10 Months Ago

This is the day that Gray has been dreading for ages, silently pleading for it not to come. Even Zach, although he's not quite willing to admit it, has had butterflies dancing about his stomach because of it. This is the day… that 18-year-old Zach Mitchell moves into his own house.

"Hey, Gray! Come down here and help your brother load the last of his boxes into the moving truck!" Karen shouts anxiously from the bottom of the stairwell as Gray barrels down into the living room.

He stealthily peeks inside one of the cardboard boxes—once Zach disappears through the front doorway—to make sure that there's nothing breakable in it. When he confirms that there's not, he plops down on top of it and hastily wipes the tears that threaten to shed from his eyes.

"What're you doing, Gray?" Zach questions flatly, his eyebrows furrowing in confusion. "C'mon, that's the last box. I need to get it loaded so I can get to my house."

"You mean so you can leave me here?" Gray sniffs quietly as Zach's hard expression softens, and he kneels down next to his younger brother.

Zach gently places his hand on Gray's back and pulls him closer. "Lil' bro, I'm not leaving you. I never will."

Gray wriggles out of Zach's grip and stares at him, frantically rubbing his watery eyes. "Yes, you are! Don't you get that? I'm not gonna see you again until summer! Summer, Zach!"

"Gray! You'll see me before summer! I'm only moving 15 minutes away from this house!" Zach exclaims reassuringly, slowly weaving his fingers through Gray's golden curls. "I'll come and visit you every week after my classes if you want!"

Gray shakes his head as a light hiccup escapes his lips, the heavy tears falling down his face in streams. "No. You're not gonna come and visit me. College will make you too busy and then you'll still be busy over Christmas break and spring break and, and… and you'll forget about me," he breaks down miserably, a sobbing mess as the last few words of his sentence hang in the air like a dense sheet of fog.

Zach quickly wraps his arms around Gray's shoulder and tugs him up off the box, pulling him to the couch. He plops down on the cushy surface, and Gray falls back on his lap. He ruffles his younger brother's mop of hair affectionately and attempts to wipe away the stray tears.

"Gray," he begins firmly, "listen to me. I will never—and I mean never—forget you. You are my little brother who I, although I never say it, love very much, and I don't want you to ever forget that, okay? No matter how far away we are from each other—may it be 15 minutes or 400 miles—no matter how much we lose sight of each other, I will always be there for you. And, you'll always be there for me, right?"

Gray nods silently, his head resting under Zach's chin. He buries his face further into his older brother's neck as the frightful images of himself—alone—in this house fill his mind.

"Because we're brothers, right? You remember what I told you in the back of that ambulance?" Zach pauses momentarily, gazing down at the beige colored carpet. "We're brothers. And, we'll always be brothers, and we'll always come back to one another. You remember that?"

"O-of course I-I do," Gray stutters apprehensively, "I just… I just d-don't want you to l-leave b-because I know you're g-gonna… gonna-"

"I'm not," Zach replies quietly, running his fingers gently along the outline of Gray's forearm. "I'm not going to leave you, Gray. I'm not."

"You promise?" he murmurs softly as he slowly pulls away and glances up at his older brother.

Zach stares down into his glimmering baby blue eyes intently, clutching tightly onto each of his shoulders. "I promise."

Gray swipes the light stream of tears away from his rosy cheeks, and Zach envelopes him in a close embrace. He is about to lean back from the 18-year-old's chest when a gigantic flash illuminates the seemingly dark room, causing both boys to jerk out of shock.

"Whoops. I forgot to turn the flash off," Karen chuckles softly as she stands in the corner, fumbling anxiously with the camera she holds in her hands.

"Mmmooommm," Gray groans, rolling his eyes in a good-natured tone.

Karen shrugs and quickly moves to plop down on the couch next to the boys. "What can I say? It looked like a good brotherly bonding moment! I couldn't miss out on snapping a picture of you two!"