Title: "New York State of Despair"
Rating: T, because I'm paranoid
Genre: friendship, romance
Character(s): Maya Hart, OC
Pairing(s): Maya/OC, hints of Farkle/Maya, but it's one-sided
Summary: Okay, so she feels horrible. Terrible. Horribly terrible, more precisely, and also quite depressed. Though she takes quite a bit of a pride on being roguish from time to time, there are some days when it catches up to her and makes her feel awful. (But, apparently, the boy sitting next to her on the subway can see something beautiful in her that she can't see.) Reposted.
Notes: Written for a writing competition in Shadowplay, with the prompt: "You're a good person. You just don't know it yet." We're currently in the fanfiction round (were, now, actually).
Okay, here's a confession: I don't watch GMW a lot. But – I have seen enough episodes (mostly season one, and a bit of season two) to be familiar with the characters. When I picked up this prompt, Maya was one of the people I thought of whom this would apply to. The plot idea that popped up along with it made her the winning character. :) This story's a bit AU/AR-ish, too.
This story features an OC that, if you've read my works on another Disney fanfic archive, will seem very, very familiar. ;)
Anyways, first story in the fandom, so please be nice! I did try my best at this!
Please enjoy!
For some reason, the subway seems darker, dingier, smellier, and more irritating than normal today. Maya wants to think that it's because midweek commutes, even on afternoons like this, always bring more people and thus inevitably worsens those already none-too-pleasing features of this place—but, really, she knows better.
Okay, so she feels horrible. Terrible. Horribly terrible, more precisely, and also quite depressed. Though she takes quite a bit of a pride on being roguish from time to time, there are some days when it catches up to her and makes her feel awful. Like this past week. Her seemingly innate habit of opening her mouth on issues and topics she should probably keep it close on got her in trouble again. Mr. Linley said something in English class that made her feel uncomfortable and which she felt was bordering derogatory, so she spoke up. What else was she supposed to do?
Given, how she handled that wasn't stellar. She could've just told the principal like how the other kids in class did instead of humiliating their teacher in front of the class. However, she knows she was in the right, and it should've been what counted.
Though she was given the clear last Friday, getting away with only a light reproof, it was pointed out to her (once again) that she's a bad influence on the other children. She's the rotten apple that would eventually spoil the bunch if left uncontrolled, the 'But What Else Would You Expect? She'll Only Be Good At Being Bad' kid.
They didn't think she heard them, but she did. She knows she shouldn't believe them, because Riley has said that it's not true, that they just don't know the real her. Even Mr. and Mrs. Matthews, whose opinions she secretly highly esteemed, has advised her to only lend her ears on what's constructive and turn them away from what's destructive.
Still. It hurts. After all, who wants to be the person who others only expect failure from?
Usually, thoughts like these don't sit and stew inside her for very long, but after the very unfortunate, overtly cumbersome, and sadly best friend-less weekend (to which she truly, deeply, and very sarcastically thanks the flu going around the school district for), the negativity hasn't gone away. The weather hasn't been of much help either. The October weather is starting to set in, with its crisp and mildly cutting low temperatures triggering the gradual erosion of the once-green trees all over the city. The sun doesn't come out much anymore now, but then again that's always been a hazard of living in the East Coast.
Maya pulls her jacket tighter around her as a gust of chilly air thickly sweeps through the subway along with the newly arrived commuters. She shivers a little as she frowns at her worn-out shoes.
"Bad day, huh?"
She looks up and finds the boy sitting next to her smiling at her. He's dark-skinned and has a rather thin, unintimidating frame. He has an easy lean on him which makes him appear very approachable, but his somewhat confusing choice in wardrobe, with the sensible dark gray windbreaker but overlapping, mismatched print scarves, can make one think twice. The thick-rimmed glasses he's sporting doesn't improve his odd look, either.
She doesn't really know what to make of him. "What's it to you?" comes out of her mouth rather uncordially.
He just shrugs, the smile on his face growing. "Nothing. Just making conversation, that's all," he says then picks the book he has clipped on his hand back up to continue reading.
She eyes him suspiciously, particularly the belongings he has around him. The bulky backpack and the stack of books on his lap tell her he's a student. He looks to be about the same age as she is, but she's not sure. She checks the novel he's reading. The Things They Carried. Tim O'Brien.
It catches her by surprise when he looks up at her. Instinctively, she looks away and pretends she wasn't caught.
He, meanwhile, hides his grin behind the pages. "It's a really good book," he tells her in an effort to make things less awkward. "It's about the author's experience when he was in Vietnam during the war. It starts off with him talking about the equipment they had to carry while they were there, but as the book progresses, it shows that what they carried physically is nothing compared to what they have to carry mentally and emotionally. I guess that's the reason why I like it. It's true." He looks at her. "It's really what's inside a person that we have to pay attention to."
"Sounds…deep," she says uncertainly.
"Isn't it?" he agrees as he goes to another page.
"You're not in middle school, are you?" she asks.
"No," he says. "I know I don't look it, but I'm in high school. Freshman."
"Oh." That explains the book. "I heard high school sucks."
He puts the book down. "As much as I want to disagree with that, it hadn't been proven to me otherwise," he says. He shrugs. "I don't know. Maybe it'll get better. It's just the new school and me having to deal with the weird stares again. It really wouldn't have been so bad if my sister helps me adjust, but I don't think she wants to be seen with me. Something about her being an upperclassman now and me being an underclassman."
She smirks. "Sounds like you're the one having a bad day."
The grin comes back to his face. "Yeah. I guess so," he admits resignedly. "What about you? Got any older siblings giving you a hard time, too?"
Truthfully, she doesn't want to give him an answer because for one, she doesn't know who he is, and two, she's really not inclined to. But then again, she doesn't have anyone to share her thoughts with. Maybe Riley, later, but she does like the idea of venting to someone whose first instinct wouldn't be to reassure her and who she would probably never see again. So, she replies, "Nope. Just me. Actually, I'm the one giving people a hard time."
"Oh, are you?"
"Yeah," she says. She sighs. "People don't like me much because of it."
"What about you? Do you still like yourself?"
"Honestly, I don't know," she says. "There are things I don't regret doing because I know they're right, but it seems like even if that's the case, I still disappoint other people. I see it in their faces. I see it in my mom's face, I see it in my best friend's parents' faces. It's awful, because their opinions matter to me the most. My best friend is always supportive, but from time to time I can see she feels sorry for me. She doesn't mean to, but it happens. Other people just don't think much of me, and lately, I'm starting to think that they have a good reason to."
"And what reason would that be?"
"I'm a bad person. I'm not capable of any change," she says, and the words sting much more when she hears herself saying them out loud. "I'm not like Riley. I won't turn into this smart and innovative and good girl who will change the world one day. I'm just like the caterpillar in the bunch that dies in the cocoon. I'm just going to stay ugly forever."
He chuckles, and though she hoped he wouldn't feel bad for her, that opposite reaction still offends her. "Well, thank goodness you're not a caterpillar," he says.
What does this jerk mean by that? "What do you mean?"
A loud, mechanical noise echoes through the tunnel as a train comes in, causing him to speak a little louder. "I mean maybe you're underestimating yourself," he says, gathering his belongings as he stands up. "You're a good person. You just don't know it yet."
He turns around after that with a smile for a goodbye and leaves. She stares at him as he joins the dissipating crowd draining inwards the newly arrived train, intrigued by what he has just brought to her attention.
You're a good person. You just don't know it yet. No one has said something like that to her before. It makes her wonder what's really inside of her the more she thinks about it. It also makes her feel light and adventurous, because it gives her a new perspective on her limits and how far she could mold previous expectations.
The train rolls off the station and is gone in a matter of seconds, leaving the room breathless, cold, and dead.
She glances at the empty space beside her.
She wishes she had asked for his name.
. . .
"So we meet again."
She lifts her eyes up from her sketchbook and smirks when she recognizes him. "That's the best you've got?" she challenges.
He laughs. "You've met me before. You should've known not to expect too much," he says as he takes the empty seat beside her. "I'm not very gifted when it comes to greetings."
Two months has passed since they last spoke to each other, and the falling leaves outside had been replaced with falling snow. She still hasn't forgotten him after all that time, mostly because she has spent the first few weeks after their conversation kind of keeping a lookout for him. It wasn't because she liked him—not that there's something wrong with liking him, of course. Even with his slight nosiness and dowdy sense of style, which, as she can see, still hasn't changed, there were some things about him that made him affable. She just thinks attraction wasn't the reason.
It's really what he said. There are a tremendously few people who's ever pushed her to challenge her future, and he had unknowingly included himself in that short list that day. Seeing that keeping him close as a friend is not a possibility for them, she wanted to at least thank him for the vote of confidence.
However, after not seeing him in the subway, she gave up hope and decided to just let it go.
Now, as circumstance would have it, they cross paths again.
She eyes him with hitched brows and an amused smile as he tries to settle in his seat, his big, off-white bubble coat nearly swallowing him whole. She wants to laugh so much, but she finds that she's a tad bit more interested to see whether he'll get to settle down before he vanishes in his own personal quicksand.
He unzips the top half of his coat to give himself room to breathe then turns to her. For a moment, they're just looking at each other. Then, he scoffs, a smile pulling at an edge of his lips. "Okay. Come on. Out with it," he says. "I know you're itching to make a coat joke, too."
She finally allows herself to grin. "You look like a big marshmallow," she says.
Instead of offending him, her statement seems to only fascinate him. "Huh. That one actually isn't too bad."
"Isn't too bad?"
"Yeah," he nods, pulling on his scarves (today a combination of a navy blue scarf and a gray and crimson striped one) to prevent them from strangling him. "I've heard worse from the people in my class."
"What did they say?"
"They said I look like the Michelin man. You know, the one in the tire commercial."
She laughs, but she doesn't tell him that it's because she can see what those kids mean. She just resumes the shading work she had started in her sketch.
"So, how have you been?" he asks. "It looks like things are okay now."
She lightly hitches a shoulder. "As okay as okay things can get, I guess," she says. "What about you? Is high school still a nightmare?"
"Yep. Pretty much," he says. "Winter break is coming soon, though, so it's alright."
Her brows draw together in curiosity. "Don't you have any friends at school?"
"A few kids at school hang out with me from time to time, but I don't think any of them want to be friends with me."
"Why not?"
"Well, they always want to either play ball or go to football games or talk about their very expensive ski trips to Vienna. I just want to read. And take pictures. And binge watch shows on Netflix."
She smirks. "You're a homebody, I see."
"I'm boring, really," he says. "But I kind of don't care."
She chuckles. She darkens the lines in her drawing as she says, "You said you like taking pictures?"
He nods. "It's really my mom who got me started on it. When she was just starting up her flower shop years ago, she asked me for help with taking pictures of the arrangements and the garden. She told me she'll give me a boost on my allowance that school year if I help her out, so I did. Over time, I kinda just grew into it," he says. "I think what made me really love it was when Dad took us to a National Geographic expedition a summer or two ago. I must've taken thousands of pictures from that trip."
"What'd you do with them?"
"Most of them are on flash drives, like the others." He smiles sheepishly. "I don't really go through them unless I need a picture for a project or unless Mom or Dad wants to see them. Along with being boring, I'm also a slob."
"What creative person isn't?" she says.
They lapse into silence, but only briefly. He peeks down on what she's working at and grins. "So you're a slob, too?" he asks.
She looks at him with a frown. "What do you mean?"
He nods at her drawing. "You're very artistic," he comments.
She follows his gaze and understands. "My desk and my closet are a mess, yeah," she agrees. "The rest, I have to keep neat. My mom and I live in a small place. Can't clutter it with too much…um…"
"Clutter?"
She smiles. "Yeah. That," she says. As she polishes her sketch, she says, "Your mom owns a flower shop?"
"Yep. My mom has a green thumb, and making floral arrangements is her thing," he says. "It's really the perfect business for her. Her old job really beat down on her. This one calms her down and makes her happy."
"What did she use to do?"
"She was a social worker," he replies with a nod. "She was okay with it for a while, but after some time the cases she dealt with on a day to day basis made her really sad. My dad saw that, too, so he talked her into quitting and starting her own business instead. She didn't want to because she was worried about the income and because she doesn't like the stress of being a business owner, but we asked her to try it for a little bit. The shop's doing good. The rest is history." He turns towards her. "What about your mom? What does she like to do?"
She feels awkward for a moment because she feels small after all that talk of his mother actually owning a successful business and his father being able to take them to trips that must have had a pretty hefty price tag (it must have; he called the trip an expedition). Her mother is a waitress, and her father couldn't be bothered with anything. Nothing fantastic about that.
Unknown to her, he has seen through the brave face she's trying to display for him and sees how his question has affected her. So, to mend the unintentional mistake, he just says with a smile, "She must like the arts. You got it from her, didn't you?"
That eases the heavy feelings building up inside of her, and it actually produces a small smile on her face. "She wants to be an actress," she says.
"Cool! Hollywood or Broadway?"
"Broadway."
"Hey, that's the place to be," he comments. He checks his watch then accordingly fixes his scarves, zips up his coat, and then adjusts his snow boots. "My sister's really good at designing clothes and making them. When she was in seventh grade, she was asked to help out with the school production of The Sound of Music, with the costumes. Had a ball. She's mentioned to me once that she wouldn't mind designing costumes for Broadway plays one day." He looks up at her. "You never know. Maybe one of these days my sister and your mom could end up working together."
She reciprocates the warm expression on his face, and in that moment she finds that she's drawn to his kindness and positivity. She could really use another friend like him. "Yeah. Maybe," she says.
"Mm."
She twirls the mechanical pencil in her fingers as she hesitates on saying what she wants to say. She's been wanting to thank him for so long, but she doesn't want to make it awkward between the two of them. A 'thank you,' in her opinion, nicely concludes a conversation, and she doesn't think the time is quite right for an end yet.
But something stronger kicks in her that moves her to say it anyway. She guesses it's the feeling that he might leave again and she may not get another chance to say how grateful she was for his kindness. "You know, I've never gotten a chance to say thank you for being nice to me the last time," she braves it.
He sits up, and his coat finally buries him within itself to the point that all she can see is his hat. In an almost comical fashion, he grabs onto the collar to pull it down so he could see her.
She chuckles the same time he opens his mouth to respond. "Why do you keep wearing clothes like that?" she asks.
"Clothes like what?"
"That," she says with a gesture to his garments. "Your clothes hide you."
His shoulder hitches (she guesses they did, because his coat rose and fell). "They keep me warm," he says factually.
"Aren't you afraid you'll blend in with the rest?"
"No."
"You're not afraid of not standing out?"
"No," he says again. "I'm being myself. To people who I'll want and need in my life, I'll stand out."
Horrible dresser and socially inept, but kind and confident. He's getting more and more interesting every time, she says inwardly. "I wish I had the guts to think like that," she tells him. She extends a hand. "I'm Maya, by the way."
The sound of the train echoes through the station again, but before he stands up he shakes her hand. "I'm Cade," he says.
"Cade?"
"Yeah. Like arcade, but without the 'ar,'" he says, slowly backing towards the train while still maintaining a conversation with her. "Yeah, they gave my sister a name that means brave in battle. Meanwhile, they gave me a name that means barrel."
The hearty laugh that burst out of her catches her off-guard. It feels so good, though. "That explains a lot," she says.
He grins. Almost at the threshold of the door, he waves at her. "Bye, Maya," he says.
She waves back, but only after the doors close. "Bye, Cade," she says, even if she's the only one who hears it.
The train moves down the tracks but unlike the last time, it leaves the room warm and bright and full of life.
With a smile on her face, Maya turns her eyes back to her sketchbook. However, before she can start another drawing, her periphery calls something to her attention.
She glances at the vacated seat beside her. Instead of seeing the emptiness she saw the first time, she sees a paperback with a predominantly red cover. To Kill A Mockingbird. Harper Lee. Her brows wrinkle as she picks it up. Instinctively, she flips to the back of the book cover. Cade Cassidy, the inscription in faded black marker says.
Thoughts bound around her head. She doesn't know what the likelihood is of her seeing him again, so the most logical thing to do is to give the book to lost and found. However, doing that will mean a few things: (a) she's a logical thinker, which she doesn't really want to be because that seems boring; (b) she'll be the one to bring the closure to their accidental meeting, which she doesn't really want to do because, contrary to what he believes, he's not boring; and (c) she doesn't care if she doesn't see him again, which is not true and, come on – boring.
She ponders over these things for a while. When she reaches a decision, a smirk pulls on her face.
She's irrational, adventurous, and curious. Almost everything she does is ruled by that fact.
She slips the book inside her backpack.
She's gonna make a reason to see him again.
