I do not own Diary of a Wimpy Kid or any of its character
Sometimes in life everything comes crashing down all at the same time. That sounds cliche and perhaps a tad dramatic, but when you're in middle school you don't have much frame of reference.
On one particular afternoon where the weather mimicked Greg's mindset, that was what it felt like.
Rowley still wouldn't talk to him, he knew he deserved that. School was rejecting him like a bad hot dog, and his parents weren't in love with him at the moment. If lonely was a boy, it was Greg.
Never in his life had he had no one to turn to, no one to just talk to and for them to act like they cared and were listening even if they weren't and didn't.
He held his head in his hand as his elbow sat on the windowsill. His hair dripped rain onto it in a slow 'drip...drip...drip', and above it painted a dark gray neighborhood. The walk home wouldn't have been so bad if he hadn't missed the bus and maybe if he'd had an umbrella. Now he thought he might've caught something by the headache forming in his sinuses. As if things could get worse.
Rodrick stood and studied. Greg was oblivious to his presence. He had come upstairs interrupting his solo jam session to look for anything edible when he saw Greg. Normal to the naked eye, but on the slow quiet afternoon Rodrick saw everything clearly. On a parentless evening with no Manny he should be playing video games and demolishing a family sized bag of cheetos.
Then with a cock of his head he looked closer finding the distant look in his sore eyes. Miserable was the word that came to mind.
And so, perhaps influenced by the easy afternoon and the pity he couldn't help but feel, he did the unthinkable.
Down next to him, Greg felt someone sit. He turned to find the last person he ever expected.
"It's not as bad as it feels.", his older brother who he suspected of being abducted and replaced by aliens said.
"Things will go back to normal, just gotta wait.", Rodrick said not sure what he himself was possessed by, but it felt like it was what he should say. What he wanted to say. He found himself surprised by the lack of regret.
Greg nodded, unable to believe how he said just what he needed to hear.
He took a long blink and a sigh feeling the exhaustion after releasing his stress.
Rodrick creased his eyebrows picking up on the little signs of sickness. "You could've called, I would've picked you up.".
Greg looked at him and back at the window. "Well hindsight's twenty twenty. Thanks though.".
"Hungry?", asked Rodrick.
Greg smiled and nodded.
"Pizza.", smiled Rodrick.
"Dad ate the last of it.", Greg replied.
"I'll just order some. I memorized Coach Malone's credit card number. I got it when I went back to the locker room early one day and he orders pizza so much he doesn't even question it.", he smirked.
"Nice.", chuckled Greg.
Half an hour and three pizzas later the brothers were permanently indented into the couch. From movie to movie and laugh to laugh, eventually the declining boy victim to the common cold fell asleep. A relief to the older boy because he saw the discomfort and he didn't know how to help. Sleep was good enough he thought.
And perhaps his brotherly meter was running out, or just his strange affliction to 'mushyness', so a swipe of his elbow accidentally letting the blanket from the top of the couch onto Greg was not his fault in the slightest.
As he got up to go to his own bed he may have accidentally carried something very heavy and put it somewhere else. And that he would deny if there were lives at stake.