"I am so disappointed in you, Maya. I thought...after what I went through to raise you…" Katy looks down at the floor, letting a sigh escape from her lips before looking back up at her teary daughter. "I just hoped you knew better than that.."
"Mom, I never meant for any of this to happen, I swear." Maya admits, ignoring the tears that threaten to spill from her eyes. "I wish it never happened, it was a stupid, stupid mistake and I—"
"Well it's done now, and boy if there's anyone that knows this, it's me…" Katy explains, before placing both hands on the fifteen-year-old's shoulders. "Maya, you do realise that there's no going back now, i'm talking about a lifetime of changing diapers, late nights, and nursing grazes."
She nods her head, nervously.
"Unless you wan't to consider your options…" Katy suggests, prompting Maya to shake her head vigorously.
"No, I-I couldn't. I'd never, I mean…I can't." Maya mutters, placing a hand on her flat stomach.
"Okay." Katy simply says, seriously. "That's fine."
At her mom's unexpected words, Maya lifts her head up. "Really? You're okay with it?"
"No." Replies Katy, "and i'll probably never will be, I won't be okay with watching you throw away your childhood, like I did. But there's one thing my mother wasn't when I fell pregnant with you Maya…and that was supportive, and it crushed me. I don't want that for you, and I also don't want that for my grandchild."
Maya isn't sure what she's feeling right now, fear? relief? Whatever it is, it has an affect on her, causing her to fall into her mom's arms in a broken heap, sobbing against Katy's bakery uniform. "Mom, what about Riley? She's going to hate me if she finds out i'm having Lucas's kid!" Maya chokes out, breaking her mom's heart.
"Which is why were getting away from this place." Katy tells her, forcing Maya to let go as she stares at Katy with confusion.
"What do you mean?" She asks, gingerly.
"I mean, we're leaving New York. It'll be a nice, fresh start for both of us. And I'll take out some money to add to my earnings so that we can get plane tickets...Orlando awaits."
"What? I can't just leave New York behind, just like that." Maya argues, snapping her fingers. "Greenwich Valley is where I grew up, it's where my friends are." When she finishes her sentence, she realizes that she may not have her friends if they find out.
Katy gives her daughter a sympathetic sigh. "Sometimes baby girl, life throws things at you that you can't question. You don't know what you did to deserve it, but you just need to do what is best."
Maya nods, accepting the fact that her mom has always known what's best for her. "Y-you're right"
Katy engulfs Maya in a hug, as she tries to hold back her own tears. She hates that Maya has wound up in the same situation she was in, she's hoped for the best for her little girl since the day she was born, and it's tearing her apart just thinking how much her daughter will have to face. But Katy's been in Maya's position, and she would've been much happier if her own mother had been there by her side, Katy isn't planning on leaving her own daughter's side.
"It'll be hard baby, okay? I'm not denying that, but it will get easier. I promise."
And that, it did.
Present day.
"I'm home, mom!"
Katy stops dancing around the apartment, and swiftly adjusts the little blonde baby on her hip before pausing the Beatles' song that blasts through the apartment. Maya smiles at what her mom was doing, as she swings her backpack up onto the hook next to the baby's little yellow coat.
"Ma-Ma!" The six-month-old hollers, almost twisting her little body almost right out of Katy's arms. Maya is beaming, even after a hard day at school; as she approaches her mom and daughter with outstretched arms.
"Hey Ember, were you good for Grandma?" Maya asks rhetorically, as Katy passes her granddaughter over. As soon as Maya receives Ember, she can't resist pressing a small kiss to the baby's nose.
"Maya, what have I told you about the word 'Grandma'? It's too old for me." Katy reminds her, she gives Ember's blonde locks a stroke before returning to her cooking in which she abandoned to dance with the baby. "It's Mimi, Ember can you say Mimi?"
Ember stays silent, keeping her head resting lovingly on Maya's shoulder. The corners of the young mom's mouth tug upwards when she feels her daughter emit a mini whimper after yawning. "Someone's sleepy. I'll be back in a sec mom, I've gotta put her down." Maya tells her mom, who nods in lieu of tasting a spoonful their dinner.
Maya is rubbing Ember's back soothingly, as she carries her up the staircase and into her room. It doesn't take long for her to have the baby changed into her pyjamas, and settled with her pacifier. Maya kisses the top of Ember's head before lowering the infant into her crib. The young mom watches her daughter for a moment until she's sure the baby is sleeping, and once Ember's little eyelids have fluttered closed; Maya heads to the door she came through.
Then, she stops for minute and adjusts the position of the picture frame on Ember's dresser drawers, the vintage frame contains a picture of the last time Maya saw her friends. Herself, Lucas, Farkle, Riley and Zay smiling before a blazing campfire in Austin Texas, beside the photo there's also an image of an exhausted looking Maya with a newborn bundled in a hospital blanket. Another, a photograph of Maya and Riley smiling beside each other in the bay window.
The sixteen-year-old's mind begins to wander, and she finds herself wondering what Riley's up to right now, is she hanging out with Lucas? Perhaps missing Maya? It's evident that Maya couldn't miss Riley more, but she's thankful that her bubbly best friend will hopefully never find out about her betrayal. She wonders how Farkle is doing, is he still into Smackle? Maya assumes that Zay still has those sardonic comments in him.
Maya's eyes then fall onto Lucas's face, prompting her to look back at her sleeping baby, who looks just like the father she will never meet. Maya starts to think of the time they'd shared together in Texas, where Ember was conceived. She will never forget about the butterflies in her stomach when Lucas took her face in his hands, the embers—in which their daughter was named— glistening in his eyes.
"Maya, dinner's ready!" She hears Katy yell from downstairs, not loud enough to wake Maya's daughter, for Ember sleeps like a rock; just like her mom.
Maya is knocked from her thoughts and leaves the room before peering inside one last time. "Sleep tight little cowgirl." She mutters. Maya then leaves the door ajar before descending the stairs.
Since this is just a prologue, it's quite short. But the next imminent chapters won't be. I hope you enjoyed, and remember to leave a review if you would like me to continue with this ;)