Imagine going shoe shopping, finding a pair that you like and then getting home and realizing that there’s a problem with the shoes. If you were a kid and your aunt bought the shoes for you, who would be responsible for the problem? You, your aunt, or you big sister?

Yeah, the big sister part doesn’t make sense does it? However, in this story, it’s the big sister who is getting blamed for this exact situation. Keep reading to find out why.

AITA for not micromanaging my aunt while she helped my brother buy shoes and then defending myself when my mom blamed me?

So recently, my (F17) aunt (F40) took me and my two younger siblings (F11 and M10) to the mall.

My mom (F35) gave me around $100 give to my aunt that would cover food for us and to buy my younger brother a new pair of shoes.

Toward the end of the trip, we stopped at a shoe store.

I was a bit tired from walking and standing all day, so I decided to sit down on the benches near the store entrance, while my aunt helped my brother pick out shoes. I assumed it would be fine, after all, she’s an adult, and it doesn’t take two people to buy shoes.

There was a problem with the shoes.

They picked a pair, paid for them, and we all went home.

Later, when my brother tried them on, we realized they had accidentally bought a pair with two left shoes.

Unfortunate, though my mom didn’t seem too upset at first, and someone (either her or my aunt I forgot) kept the receipt so it could be fixed later.

Her mom hasn’t forgotten about the situation.

Fast forward to today we’re out getting food, and the situation gets brought up again.

My mom says that if I had been more attentive and gone into the store with them, the mix-up wouldn’t have happened.

I told her I was tired and didn’t think I needed to be involved in something as simple as buying a pair of shoes, especially when my aunt was there. I didn’t expect something that rare (two left shoes) to happen and frankly I didn’t think I had any reason not to trust my aunt to handle it.

So I tell her “It doesn’t take two people to buy shoes for my brother, and I can trust my AUNT to buy him a pair without being there”

Her mom seems to think the aunt is irresponsible.

She says “You’re right, but looking back on the situation we can see…” to actually insinuate I couldn’t have trusted my aunt to pick a pair of shoes for him.

She “backs this up” by saying that while my aunt has bought shoes for her own four children before, and also me and my sisters shoes, she hasn’t bought shoes for my little brother.

Let me remind you, this wasn’t her getting his shoe size wrong, or like he has some foot disability with accommodations or whatever, the problem was the shoe pair having two lefts.

It being my brother she is buying shoes for does not make it much different from the many other times she has bought shoes for children.

Her mom didn’t seem to understand her analogy.

I pointed out that maybe if I were in the store and actively watching, I might’ve caught the issue. But then I say “If you check your tires every day, you might catch a flat before it happens.” To say sure, but people don’t do that and it doesn’t make them negligent when something slips through.

She responds, “We’re talking about shoes, and you’re talking about tires,” completely ignoring the analogy, which really ticked me off.

I wasn’t comparing types of objects, I was making a point about how unreasonable it is to expect constant hypervigilance for rare outcomes.

Anyway I guess I’m “selfish and catty” now for defending myself -_-

It’s not her fault about the shoes. It’s the aunt’s fault for not double checking.

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this story.

With her mom’s logic, her mom messed up too.

She didn’t do anything wrong.

This person has a lot of questions.

The aunt is the one who was responsible.

Another person points blame at the mom.

Finding someone to blame doesn’t fix the mistake.

If you enjoyed that story, read this one about a mom who was forced to bring her three kids with her to apply for government benefits, but ended up getting the job of her dreams.