My Best Friend's Brother

Aria spend the day with Wendy

Aria sat on the front porch waiting for Wendy to pick her up. The girl was going to spend the day with the woman and meet Wendy’s other family at lunch. She was nervous to say the least, Wendy made it clear that she could leave at any time and wasn’t required to meet them if she wasn’t ready.

She had to meet them for her sake, she had to see the family that she could’ve had. She didn’t hold a grudge against the woman, she had Lois as a mother figure growing up, but she always wondered what it would’ve been like if she stuck around.

“Hey, Honey.” Wendy waved as she pulled up.

Aria yelled bye to her dad and ran to the passenger seat of her car, Wendy greeted the girl cheerfully. They quickly set out to go shopping and Aria admittedly was having fun.

The two had gone shopping for some clothes and they even got their nails done, Aria had gotten dark red and Wendy had gotten a light blue. They talked about school and Wendy’s work, the woman briefly mentioned her husband’s job, he’s a lawyer, and that Henry had recently turned seven years old.

The two eventually made their way to Luigi’s, a pizza place that she and her dad love, and moved to where a man and little boy sat. Aria stood next to the woman as the man stood and kissed his wife in greeting.

“Hi, sweetheart.” He smiled before turning to Aria. “Hi, I’m Brice. It’s nice to meet you.”

“It’s nice to meet you too.” Aria shook his hand before they sat down.

“Hi, I’m Henry.” The little boy grinned. “Are you really my sister?”

“Uh, yeah. I guess.” Aria smiled politely.

“Awesome!” He exclaimed, “I’ve always wanted a sister but Mom and Dad said that I can’t decide if they have a boy or girl. Do you have any pets? I want a dog but I want a parrot too, Mom and Dad said I can’t have both.”

“No, I don’t have any pets. My dad wants to get a dog but we are both a little too busy to take care of an animal.”

“What are you doing that keeps you busy?” Brice asked as the pizza was brought over.

“I have a band with some friends of mine and I’m usually trying to keep my best friend and his brothers out of major trouble.” Aria took a slice and bit into it.

“Oh, that’s right your mom mentioned that you have a band.”

“Cool.” Henry said in awe.

“Uh, yeah I remember mentioning something about it to Wendy.” Aria shifted a little in her seat. Aria didn’t really consider Wendy to be her mom, sure the woman gave birth to her but she wasn’t a part of her life for 12 years.

The table was awkward for a moment before Wendy cleared her throat and changed the subject. “So, tell us about your best friend. What’s she like?”

“His name is Malcolm.” She emphasized that her best friend was a boy. “He’s really smart, he's in the gifted class and everything. He causes trouble without meaning to sometimes but it always keeps things interesting.”

“What kind of trouble?” Brice asked.

“Well, there was this one time that we went to the water park and he and his brother Reese spent the entire time getting even with each other over nose plugs or something. We eventually got kicked out and there was this other time when they had the Krelboyne picnic, that’s what they call the gifted class, and don’t get me started with when he and his brother tried to impress their babysitter.” 

Aria giggled remembering Reese and Malcolm showing up in the middle of the night because they failed to threaten Dewey into coming outside and instead ended up falling for one of their own traps. She missed the look shared between Brice and Wendy, Henry asked more questions about the crazy situations that the boys had gotten her into and Aria actually had fun.

Wendy drove Aria back to home and when they arrived the Wilkerson boys stood on the front lawn talking to her dad. Aria jumped out of the car wearing a big smile and quickly ran to tell them about her day, it had gone better than she expected. Wendy got out after her and walked towards them with a strained smile.

“Aria, can I talk to you and your dad for a second?” She asked.

“Sure.” Aria shared a confused look with the others but waved them inside with her stuff, they grumbled about not being her servants as they went in.

Wendy waited until the boys had closed the door behind them before she spoke. “I don’t think it’s the best idea that Aria hangs out with those boys anymore.”

Aria’s smile disappeared and was quickly replaced with a glare. Noah was still confused but he too was angry.

“Excuse me?” He crossed his arms.

“Aria told me some of the trouble that she has gotten into with those boys and I don’t think she should be around those types of people.” 

“You don’t get to decide who I can and can’t hangout with. Those guys have been my friends since I was 5.” Aria snapped.

“I am your mother.” Wendy reminded her, “Those boys can ruin your future if you continue to hangout with those delinquents.”

“First of all, you are not my mother, you’re just the woman who ran out. Second of all, those ‘delinquents’ have been there for me while you were off playing house with Henry and Brice.” Aria sneered, getting angrier with the woman. “You know, I thought it’d be nice to finally get to know the woman who decided she didn’t want to be a mom anymore but then I found out that it wasn’t that you didn’t want to be a mom anymore, you just didn’t want to be mine.”

“That’s not –” Aria cut off Wendy.

“I don’t care why you ran out. Until you apologize I don’t want to see you anymore, you lost any privilege of getting to know me.” 

Aria turned and swiftly walked into the house without waiting for her to say another word. If she stayed Aria was sure that she would say hurtful things and she just wanted to go hang out with her friends, her good mood now sour.

She spent the rest of the night with the boys and pushed Wendy out of her mind, she just wanted to spend time with her best friends. They were her rock and it didn’t matter what Wendy said.

A/N: This chapter was pretty short and the end felt a little dramatic but oh well. Anyway, let me know what you think <3 Wendy might show up again later in the book but idk yet

Also, you should check out oh, my, my, my by cl210107 it's Reese Wilkerson fanfic!!!