On Thursday, Alex needed some rest form the roller-coaster of emotions that the day before had brought. Thus, she decided to stay at home playing video games in her room, specially a new beautiful pixel-art RPG that had released not too long ago, that she was loving so much. It was just gorgeous! After breakfast, Claire and her had agreed to make lunch together and eat it on the living room, while watching another of the teenage movies from their childhood.

They decided to make some made-up dish mixing vegetables, mushrooms and rice. They worked together boiling the rice, frying some of the vegetables and creating the sauce themselves. It actually came out better than Alex expected, given that they were actually making it up on the spot, going with what they believed would be good. They took the pots they made the food in with them (so they can refill whenever interested) towards the table in the living room, in front of the sofa, and went on to decide on the movie. They remembered a series of musical movies they had not watched in forever, but that Alex herself learned the lyrics from by heart back in the day. Given the time, they decided that they could watch the three of them in a marathon, and spend a great afternoon/evening together. They both had a great time remembering old times, and finished the third one after their parents had come back, who actually joined them on the sofa to remember old times themselves too. Afterwards, Alex played for a while at the open-world anime game with Aiden, doing coop farming missions to help each other speed up the process.

On Friday, Alex decided to visit Aiden on his family restaurant, where he was working on the lunch turn daily during this summer. When he arrived, he saw him tending to a table with a couple, bringing them a pair of beer bottles. As he saw her, his smile widened.

“Alex, my man, what a surprise!”, he said loudly while coming to find him. “You here for lunch? Wait, alone?? I honestly was starting to believe you and Sophie were actually two units of a single alien entity or smth”, he finished while laughing. Alex was starting to question if Sophie and her actually spent way too much time together…

“No, dear I’m sorry, but I needed to make sure that the waiters were actually nice before coming here with her. SO far, it doesn't seem to be the case…”, Alex said with a straight face, before breaking down in laughter. “She could not come today, and after playing yesterday together I decided to keep you company for a bit. If that’s OK?”, he finally said with a bit of puppy eyes.

“Man, this makes me very happy! But, uh, you have to pay for the food, no invites here”. With that, he showed Alex to a table next to the wall, close to one of the big ornamental plants in the restaurant. It was actually a very nice location, partially hidden to have more privacy, and the plant was giving off a subtle fragrance that Alex quite liked.

“Here is the menu, man. I recommend the daily menu, which basically would give you two dishes for only a bit more than what each of them costs individually, but you do you. What do you want to drink? A coke?”, Aiden said to Alex, trying to keep up the appearance of professionalism while also being nice.

“Hmm, a diet coke please, Mr Waiter”, Alex replied in high-pitched voice, imitating the voice of a child. Aiden laughed and just answered “Sure, bro”.

She took a look at the menu, but decided to look first into the daily menu, he would feel bad if she did not look seriously into his friends recommendation. There was actually three options for first dish and another three for second dish, so she actually had a lot of options from which to pick something out. Eventually, she settled for filled eggplants for a first dish, and salmon made in oven with some sauce for a second dish.

Aiden noted down her order after bringing her his beverage, commenting in a low voice how healthy all of her choices were. Afterwards, Alex decided to look around and get a good look at the restaurant. It was an elegant looking place, with 10 or so tables inside with decorated wood on the legs of the tables and chairs, as well as in the back of the chairs. A lighter colored wood covered the walls up to hip height, after which the walls were covered in a geometry-patterned wallpaper. There were only other three tables occupied, which was to be expected a random Friday even if It was summer.

She was brought out of his thinking with a loud voice calling her out, Aiden’s parents coming out of the kitchen to greet him. His father was wearing a cook uniform, while his mother was wearing more of a baker’s uniform.

“Alex! Long time no see!”, Aiden’s father started putting a hand forward for her to shake. “How are you doing? We heard from Aiden here that you aced your exams, your parents must be so proud of you, young man”, his mother added. “If only my kid was more like you…”, she finished, followed by a protesting “Hey!” from Aiden. “You are invited to a piece of cake for dessert, it’s not optional!”, his mother finally said before they both went back inside.

“Sorry, man, but my parents insisted and… well, you know how parents are”, Aiden apologized to Alex after his parents had already left. Alex simply replied that she knew how that was, not to worry.

Her food came out soon after, brought to her directly by Aiden’s father with a smile, and she started eating. It was clear that his father was a talented cook from the taste of the filled eggplants, and the white-ish sauce for the salmon was also delicious. Not too long after she had finished eating, Aiden’s mom appeared with a piece of cake for her. It was clearly some manner of three chocolate cake, even if she could not properly identify it. It was very delicious too, showing that Aiden’s mom was also very talented in her own tasks. She finished the whole piece even if she believed it was a bit too big for her, Aiden’s mom had brought it specially for her.

When it was time to pay the pay the bill, Aiden’s parents came along to also give her a final goodbye. She left the restaurant quite full, but content from the experience. She really should bring Sophie along some day.

On her way back, though, she started pondering something else. Eventually, she would need to tell her friends about herself too. And she had been friends with Aiden for a really long time, he deserved to be the first one to know among their friends, specially given that she did not know Kate and Lauren that well yet, even if they had been very nice to her recently. Also, even if she felt bad for thinking like that, the many times Aiden called her “bro” or “man” actually hurt her like small paper cuts. She knew he was being lovingly friendly, but it hurt her nonetheless, and it would be good if it stopped. She would need to discuss with Sophie about a possible plan to do it, but she had made up her mind about doing it by the time she reached home.