Chapter Text
As they approached the house he pointed to as his, identical to the other stained, weathered houses, Ariana’s steps slowed. He looked to see her furrowed brows and chewing lightly on her lip. He wondered quietly what she was thinking, and never would have found out if she hadn’t grabbed him by the shoulders right as they got to the wooden gate, which was peeling white paint.
“Listen to me Braden,” she intoned. She was way closer than he was ready for, bent slightly to lock big hazel eyes with his plain brown ones. And she switched from calling him Nunez? “Don’t let anyone tell you what you can’t do.” The entire world was made of her hands resting on the lean muscles of his shoulders, her soft breath fanning across his nose, and her fierce gift of words. “You can do it without a protector, and you can do it better than most of the numbskulls you know.”
She pulled back from him and shoved her hands in her high-waisted skirt’s pockets, hiding half her forearms with the depth. It looked for a moment like she was going to say something else. No, apparently not, because she sighed and started down the road again.
Braden watched her for a moment with his questions brimming just under the line of being asked. They locked in his throat. He twisted his mouth dejectedly and walked up the sun bleached lawn, onto the porch. The front door popped open before he could reach for the knob. Standing in the doorway was Tío, in lounge pants, house slippers, and a newspaper slightly crumpled in his fist. He was mostly calm, but it was clear to anyone who knew what to look for how excited he was from the abused paper, which was always kept flat until Tía could do the crossword in the evenings.
“Who was that?” The middle aged man managed to keep a lid on the enormous grin that was threatening to show on the edges, peering unashamedly up the street for Ariana’s shrinking form. He apparently hadn’t seen enough from the surreptitiously parted curtain, spying so well as the teens had talked that even his nephew, well used to his snooping, hadn’t noticed then but noticed now, from the slash of light streaming into the otherwise dim room.
“Tío!” Braden hissed, trying to shove past him into the cool house. Away from the embarrassment he could feel about to happen. He didn’t get the choice.
“Hey, miss gal!!” Tío’s Georgia-flavoured English, rarely heard in the household of his Mexican born wife, now boomed into the street after Ariana. She turned on her heel, looking quizzically back the way she came. Braden was stock still in horror as his uncle enthusiastically waved her back and she shrugged, now walking back to the house. Oh no. Oh no no no no. Tío was going to invite her in for iced tea, and maybe sliced apples or something, and enough talk to completely expose his silly crush and thoughtless lies.
“I cain’t wait to meet her, sonny.” A gentle clap to the shoulder and a gleeful order to wait there and welcome her in kicked Braden’s brain back into planning gear instead of panicking. Tío had already disappeared to make tea or snacks, after making a lucky guess at how Braden felt, decided how suitable Ariana was for him, and that it was now the mission to see how far that could be helped along. But it couldn’t be all bad. Tío wasn’t dumb, he was just blunt. A bad quality for a gentleman but a boon for the uncle of a boy who hadn’t hardly ever spoken his mind at all before today. And once was enough. All he had done after asking her to walk him home was listen passively to her poignant, punchy words. If he could survive this, it might even turn into a good thing in the long run. Maybe. Hopefully.