The road was still empty, no matter how many times I looked, no matter how many days I waited. There was no distinctive red flash of scarlet pride. No golden flares in the sun that had seemed to have all but die in your absence. There was nothing to indicated that you were ever coming home, and yet I waited still, hoping, wishing, that one day, you would find us in the torment you were lost in, that you would struggle your way through the hell that held you captive, and make your way home.

But there was never any sign. I told myself, day after day, a million times, that you were coming home, but deep down, I know.

You can't find us.

What little flare of life, what small amount of strength you had left, it had all been given away, given to someone who had only ever wanted things to be the same as they had been, someone who ardently wished that they could turn back time and go against his brothers wishes to never look back.

It had been given to me.

There is a legend, one that tells of a boy who flew too close to the sun, his wings of wax melted, and he fell to his death.

You had always recited that legend as if you had been that winged boy, but in reality it had been I who had flew too close to the sun, tried to be god. It was I who had taken what little you had had left, and destroyed you in the wake of my mistakes. I knew you had already forgiven me before the deed had been done, but the guilt racked me to this day.

Are you in a dark place Brother? Or are you trapped in an empty expanse that fills your mind with an aching longing to see the sun? A place that tears at your existence and drains you of life.

I watched that road, the one you had taken, no, the one we had taken, and saw as the seasons changed it, from dust to mud to ice in what seemed like a second as I stood there and watched.

Years were nothing to one that had lost his whole world in the time it took to blink. Years were nothing but an illusion of pain and torment, a guilt that ebbed and flowed through veins in constant motion.

All is one, and one is all, do you remember? Are you part of the earth now Brother? Are you feeding ants in a never ending cycle, you that are only a miniscule speck in the universe, yet a great shining star in my memory?

It is strange that a life, so insignificant to the world around us, could change the lives of so many. You saved us Brother, you saved us all, and there are people who want to thank you, I want to thank you.

Would you come home for that?

For the people that miss you terribly?

For the people whose lives you made just that little bit better?

For the people who wait, standing on the grass with me and watching, waiting?

What would you do if I told you that we were all waiting? That there was an army of people, friends and family, behind my back, watching and waiting just as I am?

Would you come home then?

A flash, bright crimson in the green fields of our home. A flare of golden brilliance, and my question had been answered.

A soft smile lit up my once dead features, and I turned back to the yellow house, following the smell of dinner that I knew would be the first dinner I would enjoy in peace.