“It’s Hearth’s Warming Eve!” squeals my eight-year-old sister Lightning Dust, bouncing on my bed. While I’m still in it. “Wake up!”

“Nopony could stay asleep with a filly jumping on her stomach, Dusty,” I groan, because she is, in fact, jumping on my stomach. “Get off.”

Lightning settles down and slides off my bed and onto the floor. “But Nimbus, It’s time to put up the Hearth’s Warming tree…”

Yes, my family sets up our Hearth’s Warming tree on the morning of Hearth’s Warming Eve. We do it this way every year. It’s tradition. I never break traditions. But it is also tradition for Dad to make a pancake breakfast on Hearth’s Warming Eve. I mention this. “What about Dad’s pancakes?”

“Well, he’s not home,” Lightning informs me, casual as can be.

“Okaaaaaaay,” I say. “Then shouldn’t we wait to put up the tree?”

“It’s eleven o’clock,” she wails.

And we need to do it in the morning. If we don’t do it in the morning, then we break tradition. I never break traditions. Never. “Ask Mom, then,” I say, trying to maintain my cool amidst the fact that Dad isn’t here on Hearth’s Warming Eve. Where could he be? I wonder. Practically nowhere is open on Hearth’s Warming Eve, except the pharmacy on Mane Street. And we never go there because the prices are outrageous. At least, that’s what Mom says.

“I haven’t seen Mom around either,” Lightning Dust stammers.

“What?!” I shriek. “Haven’t seen her around” conveys that Lightning doesn’t know where she is. What the hay, things are getting complicated fast, and I sure don’t like it. Dad won’t make a pancake breakfast if he isn’t home. What about loyalty? What about family? What about tradition?

“Where are they?” I unintentionally snap these words, and I wish my tone would’ve been softer, but I can’t take it back.

“I-I don’t kn-know,” Lightning stutters, seeming to shrink.

I roll out of bed, landing on my hooves. I use my wing to smooth down my cyan mane and tail. I try my best to take charge. “Let’s set up the tree,” I decide. “We can surprise them when they get home.”

When the tree is put up and decorated with ornaments, I stare at it. We didn’t finish it before noon. I broke tradition. I try not to let it bug me, but it does. It really does. “We’ll save the star for Mom and Dad,” I tell Dusty, trying not to let her see the tears in my eyes.

It’s stupid. It’s one o’clock. It shouldn’t bother me that it’s one o’clock. Except, maybe it should. Part of the tradition, I realize, is doing it as a family. This starts all sorts of thoughts to disturb the serenity of the room. Mom and Dad know me. They know what I love. They’d never deprive me of our family traditions. Unless they…didn’t care anymore.

It’s stupid, I know. These thoughts are stupid, but maybe they’re valid. I sure hope they aren’t. Hopefully I’ll laugh over this some day. It will seem silly when Mom and Dad come back home. If they come back home.

“We need our pancakes,” Lightning tells me. “And I can’t cook to save my life. I’d probably burn down the house.”

The pancakes must be made, because I really do value keeping traditions. But they can’t be made by me. I’m having so much trouble with all of the decisions I must make. I’m not ready for such a big decision-making test at age sixteen. Now I’m left with a choice: honor traditions or show kindness to my younger sister?

Waffles, I decide, will be perfect. Same mix, same everything, but I won’t quite be breaking even farther the tradition that is already broken.

As I find the waffle mix, I discover a slip of paper taped loosely to the box. It flutters slowly to the floor. My curiosity gets the best of me. I look down at the paper, with a messily written note scrawled across it.

Hey, Nimbus, take care of Lightning. Mom & Dad

It’s vague. It’s cryptic. It’s terrifying. For how long must I care for my little sister? My heart starts pounding hard in my chest. It won’t be forever, will it? My fears from before now seem more valid than ever and I wish I hadn’t read that note. I don’t know what it means. The biggest question of my whole life remains unanswered. Is it forever?

I don’t like this thought even a bit, and I like it even less–if that were possible–when I see Lightning Dust gazing out the window, her eyes wide and filling with tears. She is waiting. Waiting for our parents just like I am. Then she asks me a question that will echo in my ears for my entire life.

“When are they coming home?”

I wonder what I should answer to this question I’d been subconsciously dreading. I long to reassure her that they will be home in time for Hearth’s Warming, but parts of me tell me that it isn’t true. I don’t lie. I never lie. I may hide my feelings like now, but I never downright lie. Honesty is important. Lying is unnecessary and never helpful.

“I don’t know,” I answer honestly.

I expect some sort of big reaction. Some sort of outburst from her, made from fear of the future. What I get from her, though, is something I never would’ve expected. Silence.

I shove the note under the table and try to ignore it. That makes it even harder to ignore.

I push through it and make the waffles, barely thinking. I don’t think anything at all but ask myself a question. The question. The question Lightning asked me. When are they coming home? When are they coming home? Then that thought disturbs me again. What if they never come home again?

When Lightning and I sit at the table, it’s silent. For a little. Then Lightning sighs. “They taste better when Dad makes them.”

This does not hurt my feelings. It’s a fact. And lying is unnecessary and never helpful.

“And Hearth’s Warming Eve is always better when Mom helps decorate,” she adds.

This doesn’t hurt my feelings either, because she’s right. This has been the worst Hearth’s Warming Eve anypony has ever had, probably even worse than Commander Hurricane, Princess Platinum, and Chancellor Puddinghead’s on the very first one. This is a fact. This is honesty. This is the simple truth.

And I dislike every part of it.

Then Lightning continues her lament, and this part I agree with more than I’ve ever agreed with anything. “I miss Mom and Dad.”

This starts the waterworks. Or it would’ve, if I hadn’t chosen to blink back my tears and stay strong. For Lightning Dust.

By now it’s a little after two o’clock.

As Dusty stares into space, I glance at the note under the table and notice something I didn’t notice before. There are dozens of erase marks. One line of writing shouldn’t have taken so much work. Unless it was an important note. I can’t read any of the erased words but one. This word is a word I wish I hadn’t seen, because it is not a good word. It is not a “BRB” word. It is a “good-bye” word.

This word–simply “good-bye” –finalizes my theories. My fears. Everything that has worried me since morning. They’re gone. But I realize something, all of a sudden. The word was erased. But that doesn’t take away the cruel meaning. It layers on more and more cruel meaning that shatters my heart into pieces so small that they’re no longer tangible.

They thought of saying good-bye. But they chose not to. They’re gone and they chose to not say good-bye to me. To us.

The room stays silent for a long time. But then Lightning Dust breaks the silence. “When are they coming home, Cloudy?”

I don’t lie. I never lie. So I don’t lie now.

“They’re not,” I say, making eye contact.

Lightning’s eyes fill with tears incredibly quickly, and she dashes to me and embraces me. I let my eyes fill as well. Soon, we’re sobbing together. Lightning looks up at me and asks me a question. “If they’re not coming back,” she says, forcing her words out like they hurt–and, to be honest, they probably do, “should we put up the star?”

“I-I-I…” I stammer, “I like it this way.”

Because it’s different. I am choosing to break tradition, and with my whole heart I don’t care.

“What about tradition?” queries Lightning.

“Mom and Dad broke us; I can break tradition,” I say confidently. Except I’m anything but confident. There’s nothing about which to be confident. Lightning’s and my lives have been changed forever, and everything is uncertain.

Maybe I said the part about everything being uncertain aloud, because Lightning answers me. “I’m certain,” she tells me, “that I love you.”

And I love her too. I love her, and I will do anything to protect her. To love her. And to show her that I love her. “And I love you, too, Lightning.”

Author's Note

Please be kind and stay on topic. Thank you!