I have a little sister now. Unlike the other newborns I’ve seen–wrinkled, red–faced, and frankly a bit ugly–she’s actually cute. The prettiest baby I’ve everid eyes on.

    That’s what Max wrote in his journal on the day Alessia was born.

    “What’s her name?” he asked, leaning over the crib, wiggling his finger in front of the swaddled infant.

    “Your dad said she was born at night, so he picked Alessia,” someone replied.

    Max snorted. “That’s a pretty half–hearted name,” he muttered under his breath.

    Yvonne Sullivan was discharged from the hospital in less than three days, and during that time, Scott only dropped by out of obligation—a quick visit, a nce, and that was it. He didn’t spare Alessia a second look. After checking in on Yvonne’s condition, he made his excuses about work and left in a hurry..

    Once back home, Yvonne didn’t linger on motherly duties. Not even a week into her recovery, she was already trailing after Scott from meeting to meeting, hustling for business.

    So in that cramped, rundown apartment, there was just a little boy, not yet old enough for grade school, and a newborn who could do nothing but gurgle and wail.

    It wasn’t as if Scott and Yvonne had entirely forgotten about their children. At least they left some cash with the neighbor–a woman who’d just had a baby herself–to look in on the kids from time to time.

    07:45

    bBut /bmost of the timeb, /bbIt /bwas just the two of them alone in that btiny /bbce/bb. /b

    “Max, dinner’s ready.” Marian knocked on the door, holding ba /blunchbox.

    She was the neighbor’s daughter, a high school student.

    Before Alessia was born, it was always Marian who brought Max his meals. After the baby arrived, her mother, needing to nurse Alessia,

    would send Marian over with food for both kids.

    “Hey, sis,” Max greeted her.

    Without his parents around, Max sometimes became the target of the neighborhood kids‘ mischief. He was tough, though–he fought back every time, and even when their parents came toin, he never backed down.

    After a while, the other kids learned not to mess with him. Still, the neighbors looked at Max with a mix of annoyance and disapproval.

    But Marian was always kind. She spoke softly, tended his bruises when he came home scraped up, and on weekends, she’d help him with his reading and homework.

    Max remembered every kindness. He was always polite to Marian, never taking her for granted.

    “Ever since your sister was born, I see you a lot more,” Marian teased, handing him the food.

    When his parents were gone, Max was rarely home–he’d vanish for hours, onlying back to grab a bite before disappearing again. No one really knew where he went.

    The truth was, he wasn’t going anywhere special. Except for the asional scuffle with the other kids, he spent most of his time tucked away in a little used bookstore on the next street. It was a shabby spot, filled with old paperbacks and rarely any customers. The owner, an old man, never chased Max off, letting him curl up quietly in a corner with a book, even though he never bought anything.

    But ever since Alessia was born, he’d barely visited the store. He found

    07:45

    himself thinking about the baby at homeb, /bunable to focus bon /bbreading/b. bSo /bhe stayed, hovering around her crib like a little guardian.

    Changing diapers, feeding bottles–he was more adept at these chores than Yvonne ever was.

    But he was still just a kid, and sometimes things slipped through the

    cracks.

    Fall wasing on, and the temperature had dropped sharply at night. The sudden chill hit Alessia hard. She spiked a high fever, her tiny face flushed and scrunched with cries that wouldn’t stop, no matter how Max tried to soothe her.

    “Max, what’s wrong with your sister?”

    It wasn’t time for the next feeding, so the neighbor usually wouldn’t havee by. But Alessia’s cries that morning were so piercing–the kind of desperate wailing that was rare for her–that the neighbor grew worried. She told her own child to keep eating breakfast and hurried over to check.