₍ ᐢ.ˬ.ᐢ₎˚୨୧
ꜱᴡᴀᴘ ᴀᴜ (ᴍᴀʀɪ & ʜᴇʀᴏ, ꜱᴜɴɴʏ & ᴋᴇʟ)
ɴᴏ ᴏɴᴇ ᴅɪᴇꜱ
𝓎𝑜𝓊 𝒸𝒶𝓃'𝓉 𝓈𝒽𝑜𝓌 𝒽𝒾𝓂—𝒶𝓃𝓎𝑜𝓃𝑒—𝓉𝒽𝒶𝓉!
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ᴀᴜʙʀᴇʏ ᴡᴀꜱ ꜱɪᴄᴋ of hearing Kel say, "Do I have to wear this?" over and over again. Kel and Hero's recital was happening in a few short hours, and she was at Kel's house. She and Basil went to Sunny and Mari's house together, but since she got ready fast, she left to go to Kel and Hero's since they lived right next to Sunny and Mari—lucky. Hero was still getting ready, meaning she had to listen to Kel grumble about wearing a suit.
"It's too late to change what you're wearing now," she said when he asked that annoying question again.
"She's right," Kel's mother told Kel, nodding in Aubrey's direction, making the young girl feel happier than he was seconds ago. The older woman smoothed her son's white button-up shirt. "We can't go buy something now. You're going to be on stage in a few hours. Your violin is okay, right?"
Kel sighed. That was a question everyone was asking him, but in their defence, he could break everything very easily. "It's okay, but I can wear something—"
"You will not wear something else," his mother promptly interrupted. "You're going to be on stage, and you're going to look nice in front of everyone. I don't want to hear anyone teasing you for looking like a slob on an important night."
Kel opened his mouth to say something, but he changed it to, "Can me and Aubrey go to Sunny and Mari's house?"
"You will see them when we're all going to the recital. Aubrey's here, so why don't you play with her?"
Aubrey didn't want to play and risk getting her new, pink dress dirty. It was long with a pink bow on the side, matching Mari's purple one. They even had matching gloves with a pretty frilly pattern and cute purses shaped like hearts, and there was no way she was going to ruin it. It was a miracle that her father agreed to even buy it for her, after all. She didn't want to make him think that he couldn't buy her anything again after she ruined what he last bought her. Not a single stain could be on this dress!
"But I wanna see Basil and Sunny," pleaded Kel. "Please, Mama, me and Aubrey can go there together! They live next to us!"
"I know that, but I don't want you causing any problems for other people tonight." She turned to the stairs. "I'm going to check on Hero. Kel, don't do anything that will cause problems. Aubrey, please make sure he doesn't."
Aubrey smiled at Kel's mother as she climbed up the stairs. "Will do!"
"Why does my mom like you?" Kel asked Aubrey once his mother was out of earshot. "You're not even that good of a person she thinks you are."
"If she thinks I'm a good person, then I am a good person. So, since she told me to make sure you don't get in trouble, you can't get in trouble, and you have to listen to me!" Aubrey adored Kel and Hero's mother. She was so orderly and always knew what to do and when to do it. She loved her children too, and she liked her children's friends as well. Aubrey always tried to stay on her good side, and doing so rewarded her with Kel and Hero's mother's love and care. She wished she was her mother—but that would mean being Kel and Hero's sister, and while she wouldn't mind being Hero's, she definitely would mind being Kel's.
Kel sat down on the couch in the living room. With his back straight and his knees perfectly bent to avoid creases, he looked uncomfortably stiff. It didn't look like him, but if he stayed looking nice, then that meant his mother would like her even more.
Aubrey sat beside him, and for a minute, they sat in silence. She could hear people moving around above them, and she swore she could hear his mother scolding his father for not treating their sons' recital seriously. All the sounds were muffled, however, so for the most part, there was nothing but the two of them.
Then, Hero walked down the stairs wearing his suit—she noticed how he wore an orange tie while Kel wore a dark blue tie—and headed to the front door. Kel noticed and asked, "Where are you going?"
"I'm going to Mari and Sunny's," he answered. "Mama said I could."
"But she told me and Kel that we couldn't," said Aubrey. "Well, she told Kel that, but she told both of us to stay here."
"I'm guessing it's because she wants to make sure Kel doesn't get in trouble, and since you're here, you're her free babysitter." After he put his shoes on, Hero paused at the doorway. "Aubrey, Kel, please don't get into an argument for the rest of the night..."
"I won't get into one unless Kel starts it!" She expected Kel to come up with some snappy comeback, but even when Hero left, Kel was silent.
She looked over to see him looking at his fingers. His head was lowered, and his shoulders were slumped. It looked like a much more comfortable position than before, but this didn't look like Kel either.
She remembered Kel and Hero's mother telling her to make sure he didn't get in trouble. She knew what she meant by that, but she didn't say they couldn't. Plus, it would cheer him up and make him look more like the person she knew, so she stood and said, "Let's go to Sunny and Mari's house."
He didn't look up and sounded almost tired when he replied, "We're not allowed to."
"Your mom said you can't get in trouble, and she told me to keep an eye on you. She never said that we had to stay here."
"She said that before she told you—"
"I know that," she interrupted, "but when she told both of us to make sure you don't get in trouble, that basically overwrites what she said before. It's...law, or something."
"It doesn't work like that," he started, still sounding a bit tired, "and she's going to get mad."
"I'll take the blame. I'll...say I tricked you. That I left something at Sunny and Mari's house— I left my bow. I left my bow at their house."
"You're wearing it right now."
Aubrey took her pink bow off and stashed it in her purse. "Now I'm not. See, I left it at their house, so I tricked you into coming with me to find it."
"That's not tricking—"
"I told you that I left my bow there, and since I was supposed to keep an eye on you, I took you with me. That's our story." She smiled. "So, are you coming or not?"
Aubrey was expecting Kel to stand up and go with her, but while he did stand up, he shook his head. He didn't look at her. "I don't feel like it anymore. Do you wanna go to my room? Play some video games before we have to go?"
Her smile faltered. "Are... Are you sure? You wanted to go earlier..."
"I don't want to anymore. Are you coming or not?"
"Umm... I am, but..." Seeing him much less energetic intimidated her. "Never mind."
Aubrey followed Kel upstairs. She decided to pretend that what just happened never occurred. From how Kel immediately brushed it all aside once entering his bedroom, it looked like he had the same idea.
. . .
ᴋᴇʟ ᴀɴᴅ ʜᴇʀᴏ'ꜱ recital was at Hero and Mari's school. Aubrey and Basil joined their families during the open house, but both of them were still awed by how big the school was. The ceiling towered above them, and it was decorated with pumpkins and fake haystacks for Halloween just around the corner. Sunny was staying close to Mari as they went by fake spiders, and Basil was talking to Hero about the flowers with fake skulls instead of petals they saw and what real flowers they were inspired by. Aubrey jumped between conversations before noticing that Kel was standing by himself a little far from the group.
She left Basil and Hero's conversation, which had moved on from the fake flowers to real flowers symbolizing good luck, to go to Kel. "Nervous for the recital?" she asked him.
He glanced at her, quickly looking at his violin case. "I'm fine. Not nervous. But I don't want to be here."
She nodded. "Yeah, I thought so. Do you even like playing the violin?"
He sighed as he said, "No, but you know my mom wanted me to play some sort of instrument after Hero started, right? Guess I have Mari to blame for getting Hero into playing the piano—not that I can blame her for...anything."
"You know, I never asked why you chose to play the violin. I thought you'd play, like...the tuba."
Kel's eyes lit up, and she felt an odd sense of relief at seeing him happy again. "A tuba would've been so cool! Why didn't I think of that? I just chose the violin because Sunny used to play it. I should've listened when he told me the violin was a bad choice. Imagine how fun playing a tuba would've been!"
"I think you'd be extra annoying," she mumbled.
"I heard that!"
"Good!" She was about to stick her tongue out at him when she remembered that Hero told them to have no arguments. Instead, she said, "You should ask Hero when you should start preparing to be on stage. You're on stage soon, right?"
"We're in the middle, but I guess so..." Kel looked around for Hero. When he spotted him next to Mari, he turned back to her. "I'll see you on stage?"
"Break a leg!" With that conversation over, Aubrey went to join Basil and Sunny, who were looking through the pictures Basil took of the school. She noticed Basil hiding the image of the fake spiders in his pocket, so she didn't point that out when they included her in their conversation. Tonight was a night for nothing bad!
. . .
ᴀᴜʙʀᴇʏ ᴡᴀꜱ ɢᴇᴛᴛɪɴɢ antsy. She had been sitting down for a long time as people went up to perform, and as cool as they all were, she didn't know anyone. She was waiting for Kel and Hero to show up, but she started to worry about what would happen once they performed. Since they were in the middle, that meant there was another group of people performing right after them. Could she really handle sitting down for more performances from people she didn't know?
Sunny noticed her and patted her shoulder. She was sitting next to him on her left and Basil's grandmother on her right. Aubrey smiled at Sunny and tried to stop fidgeting to show him that he had nothing to worry about, but she wished she brought something like Basil's grandmother, who preferred all of Basil's friend to call her "Grandma." She wasn't making it super obvious that she wasn't paying attention to the performers, but since Aubrey was sitting beside her, she could see her solving a crossword puzzle saved from the morning's newspaper. She always thought crossword puzzles were boring, but she would play them if it meant she could do something.
After so many performances, Sunny nudged her and whispered, "Kel and Hero are next."
Aubrey whispered back, "Do I tell Grandma to stop solving her word puzzle now?"
"Probably." He subtly pointed to Basil, whose arms must hurt from holding his camera like that for so long. "I have to stop Basil from taking too many pictures, so I'm busy with him."
Aubrey nodded, so while she dealt with dragging Basil's grandmother's attention away from her crossword puzzle, Sunny dealt with Basil. It must be some family thing that made them both so determined to continue whatever they were passionate about at the moment.
She managed to get her to focus just as Hero and Kel appeared on stage. After the initial clapping was over, Hero started to play the piano set on stage for him. Aubrey smiled at how good he sounded, and Kel kept that quality when he joined in with his violin. Kel looked so serious that she almost laughed, and then she focused back on the music. When it was over, she and everyone clapped for how wonderful it was, even if it seemed a bit short to her now that they were done playing it.
That was what she wanted to say.
Instead, Aubrey forgot about the music. It played as soft background music as she watched only Kel play the violin. She watched how he kept his eyes on his violin, his bow moving almost gracefully along the strings. Since they were sitting in the third row in a seat that was almost in front of him, she could see him better than she could if she was sitting anywhere else. That meant she could see the little concentrated frown he had, the slight boredom in his eyes, and the way the lighting made him almost shine. All attention seemed to be drawn to him only, making him look as angelic as the angels in stories did.
She wondered how he would look if the light shined more onto his face to see how his eyes would be. She imagined that they would look like a lovelier shade of brown than they already did. The boredom in his eyes would most likely be intensified, but all that made Kel look like Kel. After all, the Kel she knew didn't want to do this recital and would rather be running around in the park or in their secret hangout with his friends without a care if he got dirty. He was so quiet before the recital, and it was startling. Now that he was more like himself—his loud and slightly annoying self—it relaxed her.
This was the Kel she knew, and the one she always wanted to see, even if he annoyed her.
Aubrey flinched when she heard clapping around her, and she realized they were done. She quickly clapped along a second late, and she watched Hero and Kel bow. Hero looked at the audience as a whole, but Kel immediately looked for people he knew. Once he saw them, he had his usual bright smile. Then, the curtains closed.
. . .
ʙᴀꜱɪʟ ᴡᴀꜱ ɢɪɢɢʟɪɴɢ at one of the two photos he took during the recital. One of them was Hero and Kel's actual performance. The other was Aubrey staring at them with this stupidly calm look that she didn't even know she had on. Why was she looking like she was hypnotized by something? That was how the love interests in the romance movies she and Mari watched looked at the main character to show that they were in love. But Aubrey was not in love with Kel! She couldn't be!
"Get rid of that right now!" She tried to reach for the photo, but Basil kept it out of her reach. That was not how he was supposed to be acting!
"I'll get rid of it," he said between chuckles, "but I want to keep it for now."
"Why? I look ugly in it!"
"You don't look ugly in it," Sunny said in his usual calm way. He stood safely to the side and enjoyed watching his friends with a snack that Mari brought from their house for him.
"I think I do, so you have to get rid of it now!"
"Get rid of what?" Kel asked when he joined them. Did he have to be done being squeezed in a hug by his emotional mother now?
Basil had an innocent smile that definitely had no innocent intentions behind it. "Hi, Kel. I took two photos during your recital. One of them is you and Hero, obviously, but the other is Aubrey. Do you want to see it?"
"You can't see it!" Aubrey was finally able to steal the picture from him, and she stuffed it into her purse so she could rip it apart when she got home.
"Why can't I see it?" Kel gestured to his face. "And why is your face red?"
"She's blushing," Sunny said. "You can't see it because—"
He was shushed by Aubrey clamping her gloved hand onto his mouth. He, thankfully, didn't struggle. "Let's go see Grandma," she said, refusing to take her hand off. "I think she's still solving her crossword puzzle in the auditorium."
"She's not—"
"Let's check on her now," she interrupted Basil. "And if she's not, let's go do something else. Something that does not talk about photos at all."
Kel shrugged. Did he always look that good in a suit? "Fine by me."
Aubrey risked taking her hand off Sunny's mouth, but all he did was continue eating. She looked at Basil to see him smile at her. She hoped he knew that if he told anyone, especially Kel, about that photo, or else...she would do something bad to him. Basil was her friend, so she couldn't do anything too bad, but she would do something to make him regret it! Once she thought of something...
- - - -
𝙼𝚢 𝚆𝚒𝚝𝚌𝚑'𝚜 𝙷𝚎𝚊𝚛𝚝 𝚙𝚑𝚊𝚜𝚎 𝚔𝚎𝚙𝚝 𝚖𝚊𝚔𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚖𝚎 𝚒𝚖𝚊𝚐𝚒𝚗𝚎 𝙰𝚞𝚋𝚛𝚎𝚢 𝚠𝚎𝚊𝚛𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚉𝚒𝚣𝚎𝚕'𝚜 𝚍𝚛𝚎𝚜𝚜.
𝙰𝚗𝚢𝚠𝚊𝚢, 𝙸 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚔 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚝𝚞𝚛𝚗𝚎𝚍 𝚘𝚞𝚝 𝚋𝚎𝚝𝚝𝚎𝚛 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚗 @ded1234heheha 𝚖𝚒𝚐𝚑𝚝'𝚟𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚘𝚞𝚐𝚑𝚝 𝚒𝚝 𝚠𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍! 𝙾𝚏 𝚌𝚘𝚞𝚛𝚜𝚎, 𝚜𝚒𝚗𝚌𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚒𝚜 𝚊 𝚛𝚎𝚚𝚞𝚎𝚜𝚝, 𝙸 𝚌𝚊𝚗'𝚝 𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚕𝚕𝚢 𝚍𝚎𝚌𝚒𝚍𝚎 𝚖𝚢𝚜𝚎𝚕𝚏. 𝙸 𝚍𝚒𝚍 𝚊𝚍𝚍 𝚜𝚝𝚞𝚏𝚏 𝚑𝚊𝚙𝚙𝚎𝚗𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚋𝚎𝚏𝚘𝚛𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚛𝚎𝚌𝚒𝚝𝚊𝚕 𝚜𝚒𝚗𝚌𝚎 𝙸 𝚏𝚎𝚕𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚠𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍𝚗'𝚝 𝚋𝚎 𝚎𝚗𝚘𝚞𝚐𝚑 𝚋𝚞𝚒𝚕𝚍 𝚞𝚙 𝚝𝚘 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚖𝚊𝚒𝚗 𝚜𝚌𝚎𝚗𝚎 𝚒𝚏 𝚒𝚝 𝚠𝚊𝚜 𝚓𝚞𝚜𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚊𝚌𝚝𝚞𝚊𝚕 𝚛𝚎𝚌𝚒𝚝𝚊𝚕, 𝚜𝚘 𝙸 𝚑𝚘𝚙𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝'𝚜 𝚘𝚔𝚊𝚢!
𝚆𝚘𝚛𝚍 𝙲𝚘𝚞𝚗𝚝 (𝚗𝚘𝚝 𝚒𝚗𝚌𝚕𝚞𝚍𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝙰/𝙽): 𝟸𝟾𝟹𝟾