Short Story: Best. Wingman. Ever.

The siblings were never as close as they used to be. Life had driven wedges between them—career pursuits, personal failures, and above all, their father’s betrayal. The old man had married a woman half his age, a decision that splintered the family. When he was murdered by his new wife, who then married her lover and served no time, the fractured family dynamic seemed irreparable.

The six brothers and their two sisters stood at their father’s grave site, united in grief but divided by years of resentment and unspoken words. The funeral had been an uneasy reunion a year ago. Now a year later, the tension was palpable with each sibling grappling with their emotions and the shadows of their shared past.

“Do you remember when Daddy used to take y’all to the river?” Robert, the eldest, broke the silence, his voice thick with nostalgia.

“Yeah, and how he’d always bring that old pocket radio and play those R&B classics,” Ethan, the youngest, added with a faint smile.

The brothers chuckled, the tension easing slightly. They had begun to reminisce, slowly peeling back the layers of estrangement that had grown thick over the years.

But there was a secret, one buried deeper than their estrangement. A truth that could shake the family to its core if revealed. Two of the siblings were not their father’s children. The five youngest siblings’ mother had taken that secret into her new marriage, but whispers of it lingered like ghosts among the family.

As the conversation grew lighter, the eldest sister, Lydia, spoke up, her tone serious. “We need to talk about something. Something that could change everything.”

The siblings turned to her, their faces a mix of curiosity and apprehension.

“Mommy… Mommy left a letter when she married her lover and moved away,” Lydia continued, her hands shaking slightly as she pulled out a worn envelope. “It’s about us. About Daddy.”

Robert took the letter, his hands trembling as he unfolded it. The words on the page were stark and unforgiving. The revelation that two of them were not their father’s biological children hung in the air like a thick fog, suffocating and real.

Robert knew of this secret but wasn’t prepared for the cat to be let out of the bag just yet; especially in this way.

For a moment, there was silence. Then, Andrew, the sixth-youngest child, spoke up. “Does it really matter? We’re still family. Blood or not, we’ve shared our lives, our memories. We’ve been each other’s wingmen through thick and thin.”

A wingman, Robert thought, is someone who stands by you no matter what. They have your back in the worst of times and celebrate with you in the best. They are the person you can always count on, the one who lifts you when you fall.

His mind drifted to his relationship with Nathan, the fifth-oldest child. They had always had a special bond, one that had deepened over recent years. When Robert had gone through his estrangement, it was Nathan who had been there, offering a shoulder to lean on. When Nathan had lost his job, Robert had helped him network, lent him money, and helped him find a new opportunity.

Nathan had become Robert’s unexpected wingman, always ready to step in and support him. He was the one who had convinced Robert to reconnect with the family when their father died, insisting that it was time to heal old wounds.

But it wasn’t just the brothers who had their differences. The sisters, Lydia and Emily, had fallen out recently over a disagreement about their father’s care. Lydia had believed in keeping him at home, while Emily had insisted on a nursing home. The argument had driven a wedge between them, and they hadn’t spoken in months.

Robert, oddly enough, felt he had to intervene. He reached out to both sisters separately, sharing his experiences and the pain of estrangement. Gradually, he helped them see past their differences and remember the bond they shared. Lydia and Emily slowly began to mend their relationship, thanks to their big brother’s efforts.

However, Robert’s own relationship with the youngest sister, Emily, was also strained. They had fallen out after the sisters’ spat, and the silence between them was deafening. Robert had grown accustomed to estrangement; he had spent ten years not speaking to his father’s side of the family due to the disrespect from his father’s wife, his siblings’ mother. These siblings didn’t share the same mother—Robert’s mom was the first, the next oldest brother’s mom had been murdered years earlier, and the last six children’s mother was the one who had ultimately murdered their father with severe neglect and ever present disdain.

Emily and Robert’s rift had started over something trivial but had grown into a chasm neither knew how to bridge. Robert wasn’t particularly bothered by the silence, given his history of familial estrangement, but it was clear that it weighed on Emily.

At the grave site on the one-year anniversary of their father’s untimely demise, Emily stood apart from the rest, her eyes filled with unresolved anger. As the family began to disperse, Robert approached her, the letter from his siblings’ mother still in hand.

“We need to talk, Emily,” he said, his voice gentle but firm.

Emily looked at him, her eyes filled with tears. “What’s the point, Robert? You never cared about us anyway.”

“That’s not true,” Robert replied. “I was hurt. I’m still hurt. But we’re family, and we need each other now more than ever.”

The tension between them was palpable, but as they stood there, something shifted. Emily took a deep breath and nodded. “Maybe we can try. For Daddy.”

Robert reached out, pulling her into a hug. It was awkward at first, but gradually, the embrace grew tighter, more genuine. They had a long way to go, but it was a start.

Nathan walked up to them, placing a hand on each of their shoulders. “We’re all here for each other,” he said, his voice steady. “We’ve been through too much to let this tear us apart.”

As they left the graveyard, the siblings walked away together, side by side, ready to face whatever came next. They were rediscovering their strength in each other, their bond becoming once again unbreakable.

Nathan, who had always been there for Robert, was helping to bring their family back together.

He was, and always would be, the best. wingman. ever.