Aaron Welles
| Aaron Welles | |||||||
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| Home and Away character | |||||||
| Portrayed by | Ritchie Gudgeon | ||||||
| First appearance | May 12, 1997 Episode 2151 | ||||||
| Last appearance | January 1999 | ||||||
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Aaron Welles was a fictional character in the Australian soap opera Home and Away.Portrayed by Ritchie Gudgeon, he was a regular on the show from 1997 to 1998 and made a short return appearance during 1999.
Character's background
Lumbered with an absent father and useless drunk of a mother, Aaron, like many teenagers before him, first ended up on the streets and then ended up in Summer Bay.When he learned that Pippa Ross often took in foster children, he was hopeful that he could stay with her and disappointed when Sam Marshall revealed that Tiegan Brook was rejoining them so there would be no room for him.However, Alf and Ailsa Stewart took pity on him and offered to let him stay with them.He quickly became best friends with new classmate Joey Rainbow.
Aaron also befriended rich kid Vinnie Patterson, who let him have a go on his water ski.No sooner had he dismounted though then he was confronted by an inexplicably hostile Travis Nash. What Aaron didn't know was that Vinnie had earlier buzzed Travis' boat on the water ski and Travis assumed he was responsible.Neither Alf nor Travis seemed particularly interested in hearing Aaron's side of things but his name was cleared when Travis caught Vinnie in the act.
Aaron was slightly worried when his half-sister Justine got back in touch, since he knew she had had a drugs problem in the past.When Alf found out she was still using, he banned her from the house.Aaron had a keen sense of justice which surfaced when he saw bad boy Scott Irwin planting a painting he had stolen from Don Fisher's office in Sally Fletcher's locker in order to frame her. Aaron swiftly transferred the painting to Scott's locker so he was caught instead.
Aaron started dating Casey Mitchell but not long after the pair were mugged.Angry that he couldn't protect her, Aaron bought a knife and then started hanging around the scene of the mugging, hoping to see his attacker again.It took a quiet word from Travis, who had become something of a mentor figure to Aaron, to convince him to let it go.
Like most of his class, Aaron became involved in a bitter feud with student teacher Brett Egan, which escalated to the point where the class left Brett stuck to his chair in the classroom.The incident earned them one of Don Fisher's most severe lectures and a long time in detention.Not long afterwards, Casey left town, depriving Aaron of his only permanent love interest.
Aaron was more than a little annoyed when, despite the fact he was himself of mixed race, both Vinnie and Justine(who by now was being fostered by Pippa and had sorted herself out)chose to support a right wing politician who favoured the deportation of all "foreigners".This was probably the main reason why he favoured Tom Nash when he and Vinnie were competing for Justine's affection.
Aaron started dating a classmate, Lillian, but soon tired of her snobbish attitude and ended it.Soon after, it was revealed that Lillian had been selling drugs at school.When Don Fisher was unable to expel her without revealing her identity, Aaron, Tiegan and Justine went along with Joey's plan to kill her with kindness, following her around and being excessively nice to her until she eventually asked to leave the school.
When a new girl, Leila, arrived at the school, both Aaron and Tom started competing for her attention.When Tiegan explained to her what they were doing, Leila decided to make the competition official and asked Joey to set them various tasks, including an obstacle course(which was actually a children's playground)and a sandcastle competition.In fact, Leila wasn't interested in either of the boys but enjoyed seeing them jump through hoops.
Along with Joey and Tom, Aaron formed a band managed by Vinnie, who dubbed them the Chick Magnets when they were unable to think of a name themselves.Although Aaron enjoyed the attention of the band's only groupies, twins Sugar and Candy, with Vinnie running things they weren't going to get very far.However, both Aaron and Tiegan were then asked to join another band, Monkey Jam.Aaron wasn't entirely comfortable with the group, especially when their leader Colt offered him drugs, but ultimately, despite disapproval from Alf and Ailsa, he accepted an offer to join them on tour and left the Bay after a quick farewell.
At the start of 1999, Aaron was seemingly in the middle of a brief return visit to the Bay.While camping with Joey, he was shocked to find his friend smoking a joint, in what was the first indication he was developing schizophrenia.Suspecting something was wrong, Aaron asked Tiegan and Irene to keep an eye on him before leaving the Bay again.