"Okay, kids, Dad and I are leaving!" Miranda Owens announced as she rolled the last suitcase to the door. "Byron, you take good care of Vanessa. Don't forget the check for her yearbook."

"I won't forget, Mom. You and Dad have a great time and don't worry about anything. I got this." Byron flashed a good boy smile to his mother.

Miranda grabbed her son's face and kissed his cheek. "I know you do." She pinched his cheek. "Vanessa!"

Vanessa came bounding down the stairs. Her hair was shoulder length and brown with highlighted beachy waves. Her eyes were blue with shades of green. Miranda always said they reminded her of when fresh water meets ocean water. Vanessa’s skin was fair with flushed cheeks. She was only fifteen years old. Byron was in his first year of college at Virginia University and came home for winter break.

Miranda grabbed Vanessa and squeezed her. "Okay, Mom, you're crushing me."

"Sorry, it's just that I'm going to miss you so much!"

"I'll miss you too!"

A car horn beeped from the driveway and Daniel Owens stepped out. Much like a retired superhero, Daniel was a dashing older man. Byron took after him with a height of 6'2, luscious dark brown hair, ice blue eyes, and a smile that could melt anyone’s heart. Aside from good looks, Daniel was one of the top five most requested lawyers in Alexandria, Virginia. He was taking his wife of 25 years, Miranda, on a cruise for a winter getaway. He walked up to the house and greeted Miranda. The family hugged one another, and Vanessa and Byron watched their parents drive down the street.

Two days before Christmas, they learned they would be burying their parents.

Byron had to drop out of college to take care of Vanessa or she would go into foster care. Byron worked two jobs. During the day he worked at the local bank as a teller, and after picking up Vanessa from school, he worked as a bus boy at the local diner. Vanessa got used to being alone. It was a long three years of frozen dinners, late night television, and just being alone. Vanessa relied on Byron a lot, and as she got older, she wondered if it had become too much.

After she graduated high school and was accepted into James Madison University, she encouraged Byron to go back to school. Vanessa hadn’t been close to anyone in high school, and she grew even more distant after losing her parents.

However, Rylie Summers was an extrovert who took the introvert under her wing when they met as roommates in the college dorms. Vanessa and Rylie grew close, and Vanessa had found a real friend who became her rock.

The smell of burgers and fries followed as Vanessa stepped out of Ballentine Burgers after a long weekend shift. The sharp winter air stung her cheeks as she walked through the parking lot to her old Nissan Altima. Her phone buzzed in her purse, and she pulled it out to see Byron calling. She got int the car, started it, then grabbed her phone and hit the answer button.

"Hey!"

"What's up, Little V?" Byron asked.

"I just got out of work. What are you up to?"

"Just finished studying for an exam I have before winter break."

"Haha! I took mine yesterday!" she taunted.

"Way to rub it in." Byron chuckled.

"What can I say? A mid-week exam is the way to go."

"I bet I had longer to study than you did. You probably bombed yours."

"If I did, remember who helped me with homework."

"Fair enough!" Byron laughed, then his tone went from teasing to normal. "Anyway, Little V, I called you to let you know that I'm going to New York City with some friends for winter break."

Vanessa frowned a little. It was the fourth anniversary of their parents’ death. She needed to see him and wanted to introduce him to Rylie. "Yeah? What's taking you guys to the Big Apple?"

Byron sensed that Vanessa was disappointed, and he knew why. "It's the anniversary of our parents’ death. I know. But I want a getaway, V. Don't you think I've earned that?"

Vanessa closed her eyes as tears fell down her cheeks. It seemed selfish to ask Byron to be with her when he did deserve a vacation with friends. But ever since their parents’ death, she struggled this time of year. "Of course, you do, By. I just…"

"I know, V, I know. It's hard for me too, but I need to get away."

"What about me? What if I want to get away?"

Byron shook his head and a few tears dripped from his eyes. "You don't want to get away. You're not ready to."

"You don't get to tell me what I’m ready for." Vanessa's voice shook. "It's fine, Byron. You deserve to get away. I'll just spend Christmas with Rylie and her aunt."

She hung up before Byron could say anything else. Why this trip to New York was so important, she didn't know, but he did take care of her and even dropped out of college to do so. The least she could do was let him go. She could be the strong one for once, right?

Winter break started and Vanessa sent Byron a text: "I'm sorry, you deserve to get away. For once, I can be the strong one for you." Byron replied with a GIF of two people hugging and she smiled.

Two days before Christmas, she was with Rylie at her aunt's house is Leesburg, Virginia. They were having a family Christmas party, and everyone was wearing ugly sweaters and eating sugar cookies. Vanessa was enjoying a cup of hot cocoa by the fire when a call came in from Byron. She should have known he would remember to call that day of all days and it warmed her heart.

"Hey! How's New York?" she asked as she answered the call.

"It's good. Listen, I just wanted to call and say I love you, Little V. I've decided to stay in New York. You won't be seeing me again. Just know I'm okay and I love you."

"Wait, Byron, what's going on?" Vanessa asked, but before she could finish the question, he'd hung up. She tried calling him back, but the only answer she got was a dreadful beeping noise and an automated voice. "This number is currently out of service." She tried again, and again, and again. Same automated response. She texted him, but an automated text came back. Byron was gone.

Three long years had gone by. After the first year, Vanessa eventually stopped trying to reach him and accepted that he was dead. Rylie's aunt passed away from breast cancer, and all they had in their little world was each other. Vanessa pushed people away while Rylie coped by sleeping with every frat boy that looked at her twice. While Rylie was…to put it delicately, an open house, Vanessa put up walls.

One night while Rylie was out partying, Vanessa's phone rang. It was a blocked number, and usually Vanessa ignored them. It was most likely about an extended car warranty. But something inside the pit of her stomach urged her to answer the call. Her heart pounded as she debated with herself, but at the last moment, she answered.

"Hello?" she asked in a cold tone.

"Hey, Little V…"

Her heart nearly levitated into her throat. She dropped her phone on the hard wood floor and stood by the counter, white as a ghost. Rylie walked into the dorm.

"V? You okay?"

Byron's voice projected from the little speaker. "Vanessa? Vanessa, are you there?"

Though Rylie had never met Byron, she knew enough about him and what he had put Vanessa through in the past three years, so she picked up the phone. "Who is this?" she sneered. Rylie was a redhead and her baby blue eyes projected nothing short of innocence. Her temper was just as sensitive as her freckled skin in the sun.

"Vanessa?"

"This is Rylie, her best friend and sole protector of the little introvert. If this is who I think it is, she is currently in shock, hence why she isn’t responding at the moment."

Byron paused, deserving every chastising word that came from the other end of the line. He was ready for something like this. On their parent's death anniversary, he called his little sister and let her know she'd never see her last living relative ever again. After all this time, he should be ripped apart. It also pleased him to know that Rylie deemed herself sole protector of Vanessa. God knows she needed someone she could lean on, and it eased his conscience that Rylie had become that person.

"Hello Rylie, may I please speak to my sister?"

Rylie looked at Vanessa, who heard what Byron was saying. She quietly nodded and Rylie passed the phone to her.

"I'm here." Vanessa could barely get the words out.

"How you been?"

"How am I supposed to believe it's really you?"

A facetime call started ringing from the same private number. With a shaky hand, Vanessa accepted the call. There he was. After all this time, after all the nights she cried herself to sleep, there was Byron, staring at her. He looked every bit of a mess as she did. Tears began pouring out of her eyes, and she and Byron sat there on facetime, silently crying.

"I can finally see you, Little V. I want you to come to New York."

Vanessa took a moment to process his invitation. "What about you coming here?"

Byron shook his head. "I can't…But you can come here and I'm asking you to please consider spending your summer break here."

The conversation was more difficult to get through than the one they had with the police when they found out their parents had gotten into a fatal accident. Byron was there to hold her while she cried and processed. That Byron wasn't around anymore. She only had the Byron that told her he was never coming back and dropped off the face of the earth. Despite Rylie's fierce support, she'd never felt more alone.

"Check your email. I've sent you and Rylie tickets."

Vanessa pulled up her email, and sure enough, there was an email with an itinerary. This was all so sudden. But what could she say? Byron had mysteriously showed back up just as mysteriously as he had left.

"You'll really be there?"

Byron looked her in the eye through the screen. "I swear on our parents’ graves I will be there to get you. We can catch up and start over if you want."

She wanted to say no, but the girl who cried herself to sleep every night for an entire year demanded she accept and go. And the next day, they were packing up.

"You okay?" Rylie asked as she pulled some blouses from her closet.

"I don't know. I've spent so much time grieving over the years. Byron's disappearance was worse than my parents’ death. And now he comes out of nowhere and wants me to come see him." Vanessa sighed as she rolled up a pair of magenta athletic pants.

"You don't have to go through with this, you know."

"Yes, I do. That girl who lost him…I owe this to her."

Rylie sat down next to Vanessa and rubbed her arm soothingly. "You speak of that girl as if she's dead."

"She is dead. I buried her behind too many walls. At some point, I stopped crying. If it wasn't for you, I think I would be dead too."

"I'll always be here for you. Hell, if it wasn't for you when my Aunt Jenny lost her battle to breast cancer, I probably would've run away with some sugar daddy and drank myself to death."

Both the girls laughed. "You know his name would've been Ricardo and he would’ve owned some mansion in Southern California," Vanessa mused.

"I'd have sixteen kids." Rylie groaned at the mere thought.

"Your cute little freckles would still make you too adorable to handle."

They joked and laughed as they finished packing their bags. The flight left late that night. For such a short flight, Vanessa wasn't sure why it had to be so late at night. But this was Byron’s plan, so she went along with it.

Above all else, it was shocking to hear from him. What he did was cold and cruel, but when she remembered the sweet boy who dropped out of college to take care of her, she knew that was who had reached out. That was the brother she was going to see.

Vanessa and Rylie stepped off the plane around midnight. Rylie slept the entire hour on the flight, but Vanessa was extremely restless and anxious. Something about seeing Byron again felt odd, and it wasn't because of the three-year span of not seeing or hearing from him. They went to baggage claim where Byron stood in a black leather jacket, an electric blue shirt, and jeans. He was the Byron she remembered. The shirt and black leather jacket hottie that all the girls in Alexandria would've died for. Her brother hadn't changed a bit. And something about that felt off. She couldn't even hear Rylie expressing that her lady parts were fluttering at the sight of him.

It wasn't until Byron wrapped his arms around her that it hit her. Byron had changed. What once was warm and comforting now felt cold and deadly.