Fredricka Gray isn’t used to being away from her brother for this long.

Ten years ago, her twin, Freddie Gray, was arrested and loaded into a police van shackled but unbuckled. The medical examiner found the trip inside the van was so jarring that it left Gray with a severe spinal cord injury leading to his death, which was later ruled a homicide.

His death from police custody sparked days of protests and unrest in Baltimore that helped to define a generation.

Although her brother’s name is attached to a national movement that still calls for justice for Black lives lost at the hands of police, Fredricka and her family always “just wanted Freddie.”

“When you’re a twin, you miss having that person who grew up with you,” Fredricka said in an exclusive interview this week with the Baltimore Banner.

Then she took a long pause.

“It’s like half of you is gone.”

The Gray family has had limited interactions with the media after their private tragedy unexpectedly transformed them into public figures. It’s still difficult to talk about Freddie, they say, who they remember as a man, not a martyr.

Fredricka Gray’s big brother by less than 15 minutes was joyful and funny, she recalled. In true twin fashion, she said, it was rare to find one of them without the other, especially at a party or community event.

When the pair linked up with their older sister, Carolina, they were like the “Three Amigos,” Fredricka said as she sat at a conference room table, sporting a black jacket.

Freddie was “just a regular Black kid outside,” who played football and other sports in West Baltimore, she said.

They bounced around to different recreation centers, a pastime she doesn’t see as accessible today. He was also a people person who went to church and wasn’t confrontational.

Freddie called himself “Pepper,” Fredricka remembered with a chuckle. That’s because he was a “lady’s man” and the nickname just stuck, she added.

“Freddie Gray,” though, would be the name chanted in the streets far beyond his own Sandtown neighborhood.

On April 12, 2015, Baltimore Police chased Gray after he saw officers and ran. He was arrested after they discovered a small pocket knife on him. Neighbors and friends pooled around him, some recording the arrest on their phones, as he was put into the police van.

Fredricka remembers getting the call from her brother’s girlfriend about the arrest that eventually led to Freddie’s death. Then, more calls. Before she knew it, she and her family were at the hospital.

“You never think it would happen to you in your hometown,” she said.

Protests began to pop up across the city after word of his injuries spread. People went to the Western District Police Station near the arrest site. They gathered in front of City Hall.

Gray was in a coma for a week before he died. His death and funeral sparked an unrest that commanded international attention as some outpourings turned violent and destructive. Cellphones and television screens spread images across the world of the standoff by police in riot gear near Mondawmin Mall and the fire that engulfed the CVS pharmacy at Pennsylvania Avenue and North Avenue.

Soon, Fredricka Gray found herself having to address the city, urging people to “please, please stop the violence.” Today, she remembers how nervous she was, but she said she was glad she could do that for her brother, whom she knew wouldn’t have wanted that kind of chaos.

Fredricka later would sit alongside her stepfather, Richard Shipley, and her mother, Gloria Darden, as they told NBC’s Lester Holt the same in a 2015 televised interview.

“Even though it was a tragic situation, we must protest and raise our voices in a peaceful manner,” said Shipley, who served as the family’s spokesperson.

Her stepfather was the “backbone” of the close, private family, Fredricka said. Shipley died in 2018 and her mom still lives in Baltimore.

Seeking justice for Freddie Gray’s death, then-State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby charged the six police officers involved, but all were eventually acquitted or had their charges dropped.

“It was justice,” Fredricka Gray said between cracks in her voice. ”But not the justice we thought we would get.” The family’s attorney, Billy Murphy Jr., eventually negotiated a $6.4 million civil settlement for the Grays from the city.

Despite the time in between, Fredricka today remains haunted by the video of her brother’s arrest. Its replay around the anniversary of his death, she said, only exacerbates the trauma of losing her brother.

“That day changed our life — my mother’s and ours. They didn’t break a family, but it changed us,” she said.

For Fredricka, her brother’s death altered her demeanor. Before, she liked to be “outside, outside,” but now the 35-year-old is focused on college, working in the nursing field, and being at home. She said she tries to stay busy because sitting idly ties her to the reality that Freddie is still gone.

When Fredricka Gray hears her brother’s name brought up in conversations, she often acts like she doesn’t know what’s going on or tries to redirect the conversation. Today, though, will be a change because she’s slated to give opening remarks at a two-day symposium at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum to talk about the impact of her brother’s killing.

Fredricka welcomes that her brother’s likeness is sprinkled around Baltimore, even if it brings back the hurt and pain. She recently visited one of Freddie’s murals on the side of a building in Sandtown with the words “The Power of the People” across it.

It’s not often that Fredricka Gray makes her way back into the neighborhood. It’s where Freddie is and isn’t. A place that reminds her she’s been away from her brother for too long.

“Hi,” she said to a man crossing the street before walking past the mouth of an alley partially filled with a few discarded mattresses and mismatched couch pieces.

Another person in a car stopped at the light and partially opened the door to wave at her.

Despite the anguish, it’s also easy for Fredricka and the rest of her family to separate the Freddie they knew and loved from the media’s portrayal of his life. Those accounts mention his past run-ins with the law and exposure to lead paint, as well as his tragic end, which turned Freddie Gray into a household name.

“We know the truth,” she said.