A/N: This story has been done to death, I know. Hopefully I've brought some originality to this cliché.
Angela Moore
"Ms. Moore."
"Mr. Feeny." Angela nodded in the direction of her former teacher as though she just happened to be passing by in the neighborhood; as though she just happened to be standing on his porch for the last five minutes; as though there hadn't been a motive, and she was just looking to catch up with her past instructor's happenings since she had been gone. "Been a long time."
Mr. Feeny set down his gardening tools. "One might dare to say that it has been too long, Ms. Moore." His hands fidgeted in that constant Feeny-habit of his, but, always perceptive, Angela noticed that there was something wrong in Mr. Feeny's stare. He didn't look at her; his gaze was fixed off in the distance as though a slide reel of the past years' events was playing off somewhere near the horizon and he was reliving each memory. They didn't seem fun.
Angela looked, but didn't see anything. Of course not. She'd been gone for too long.
"One might."
At her words, George Feeny snapped from his trance and returned to the conversation with a fake smile. Angela knew people, and his smile and good-natured laugh were completely meant to throw her off the scent. Too late, Feeny.
"I am sure that promptly upon landing in America you rushed to visit Mr. Hunter?"
Angela coughed. Nice tactics, Feeny, throwing Shawn out like that. She approved of his underhandedness. She gave him mental-props, but then returned to her own attack. There was, after all, a reason why she had come to her old teacher's house when she'd never bothered to make the trip there before.
"Uh, no. Actually, I rushed to visit Cory and Topanga. Or, I guess I should say, first Cory and then Topanga." Her eyes honed in on Feeny's, anxious to see what he'd make of that statement.
Mr. Feeny slipped off his gardening gloves and set them on his fence. "So you know, then, the current state of the union?"
Angela continued. "They told me about Shawn." Watch his eyes.
"Then you are also privy to… ah… what's going on in his life?"
"Yes, Mr. Feeny, I am privy. I'm so privy that I can't stand it. And I'm not sure if it's me being gone for three years, or if this is where their lives would have eventually come to—but I'm back and I won't stand for this."
"Is that why you are on my porch steps, Ms. Moore?"
"You're a link, Mr. Feeny. Even if the relationships between them have broken, you're what they can all trace themselves back to. I bet they haven't stopped writing to you about their lives. Am I right?"
"You are."
"They still love you. I'm sure that they still love each other, but some gear in their minds that helps them see that has stopped turning, so I can't work with that. But they still love you, and I can work with that."
"Do you have a plan, Angela?"
The old man quirked a smile, and Angela Shanaynay Moore flashed a mischievous one of her own.
"Yes, Feeny, I do."
Shawn Hunter
"I am cordially invited to Mr. Feeny's birthday party. Hunh."
Shawn's fingers drummed against the café's table. His eyes burned holes in the invitation as though dissecting each sentence into each individual word into each individual letter as though there were some kind of code. When he was sure that Feeny wasn't trying to dispatch an SOS to him through a perfectly innocent looking party invitation, he put down the paper, leaned back in his chair and sighed.
His eyelids closed and became a screen for old memories.
Naturally any thoughts of Feeny brought thoughts of Feeny's porch and the endless encounters with reality he'd had there. Feeny's porch led to the Matthew's porch which led to Cory Matthew which led to unspeakable horrors.
Okay, so the tangent only led to pangs of regret and to his conscience Tsk, tsk, tsk-ing at his life choices yet again. For Shawn, though, that pretty much equated to unspeakable horrors.
He'd wonder why he hadn't spoken to Cory or Topanga in years, but he pretty much knew the answer. Pondering over it wasn't going to change the fact that it was all Angela's fault.
Angela's fault. If she had come back like she said she would, if she hadn't made it painfully clear how different Shawn's life was from Cory's, if she hadn't kept him holding on to some unreachable past while his two best friends sped head on into the future with plans for a kid and a house and a life together, then Shawn wouldn't have reversed himself. Shawn wouldn't have jumped off the treadmill going forward. He wouldn't have had to watch with longing as his friends jogged their way into the broad range of opportunities calling out for them. And then he wouldn't have had to start on a treadmill of his own except facing the opposite way as he ran, blinders on, into the past.
There he was stuck, digging his heels into tenth grade as Cory and Topanga eased on toward the horizon.
And it was all Angela's fault.
She left him waiting.
"A year," she promised on the phone. "I swear, I'll be back within your arms in a year."
His arms had suddenly felt cold as some imaginary breeze wafted through the spot where she should have been. And every day for three hundred and sixty five days, his arms had felt cold. But he also felt hopeful because each calendar day thrown in the waste bin was another day closer to her warmth. So he waited. That was the good year, Shawn believed thinking back on it. She called every week, and when she didn't call one week, she'd make it up to him by talking an entire day about everything and nothing and all the things in between.
And then that day that would live in infamy, whose conversation still caused his heart to prick uncomfortably.
"Shawn! Great news! I've been asked to write a weekly article for a magazine. I pitched the idea to Maggie, and she loved it. Of course she pitched it to Burmester as her own, but I got the job. A world-wide scavenger hunt, although it's not so much about getting the items as it is writing about how I did. Going to exotic places, searching for the weirdest things like a used tissue of a Scotsman… The title's not finalized yet. Any ideas?"
Any ideas? She had honestly expected him to give nonchalant suggestions about the very thing that was going to take her away from his arms for another year?
But he had.
He'd offered a witty, cleverly spun suggestion that made Angela laugh and compliment him. If she heard his voice suddenly dip, suddenly become soft and vulnerable, she gave no indication. She was happy. He heard that in her voice. That's why he didn't stop her. That's why she stayed that extra year.
Maybe that part was his fault.
But she didn't have to stay for another year after her job ended. And that was her fault.
Cory Matthews
"Feeny! Turning the big Six-Seven. If that isn't cause for celebration, what… is…?"
He had every right to stare at the ornately decorated card with confusion. Who threw a grand party for their sixty-seventh birthday? But then, wasn't Feeny always a little shifty? Probably had a hidden agenda. Probably wanted to lecture Cory on how his life had spiraled from So Much Potential. A teacher's favorite word, "potential". And he should know as he had spent most of his student-teaching trying to imprint that word in the head of every third grader he taught.
He wondered whose side Feeny would be on. His or Topanga's?
Oh. Crap. He would have to see Topanga again, wouldn't he?
What was this? This sudden—sudden tug at his stomach there? And this constriction in his chest? No. He could not be looking forward to seeing Topanga. He could not be getting anxious at the thought of seeing his ex-wife (though they hadn't legally separated, had they?) in the flesh with Feeny as a buffer.
Feeny.
Feeny would definitely be on his side. After all, they had Porch-Loyalty. Once neighbors, always neighbors. All of those heart-to-hearts had to mean something, didn't they?
But then, was their separation really about sides? Had either of them really done anything to warrant strategic armies and war tactics? No. All that had happened was Topanga's inability to produce a child. Or his inability. Or—to not put blame on any of the involved parties—the fact that it had been two years since their decision to try and become a three-person family, and still nothing.
Four of those months of infertility had been due to the fact that Cory and Topanga no longer lived in the same building. No longer spoke to each other let alone kiss let alone do anything under the sheets leading up to child bearing.
There were no sides. The blame belonged to no one. If Topanga blamed him or herself, he wished that she could tell her that. No one was to blame.
So why were they still estranged?
"Maybe…" Cory whispered to his empty apartment.
Feeny was a smart guy. Practically a genius. Alvin Einstein had nothing on him.
Maybe Feeny would know?
Mmkay. He had decided. He'd go to the party and he'd make small talk with friends of Feeny who he didn't know and then he'd ask Feeny how to make it up to Topanga.
His stomach tugged upward and his chest felt like a hot water balloon had just burst open.
So, okay, he was looking forward to seeing Topanga.
Topanga Lawrence-Matthews
"Celebrate the birthday of your favorite educator, advisor and old-guy."
Her life wasn't that bad.
Yes, she had immersed herself in work, staying hours so late at the school that she spent maybe twenty minutes at home before heading out again on some big project. Yes, she lived for her schedule because she hated heading "home", her home that wasn't her home because home was with Cory, and without Cory her apartment was just an asphyxiating box. It wasn't home.
But! Her life wasn't that bad.
…
Allrighty. Her life was crap. She admitted it. And it was her fault.
Topanga rubbed her temples and sifted absentmindedly through insignificant papers on her desk. A vanilla colored card stood out and Topanga moved the few papers on top of it so that she could read the script.
"To Mrs. Topanga Matthews, you are cordially invited to George Feeny's Sixty-Seventh Birthday."
Mrs. Topanga Matthews.
Mrs. Topanga Matthews. Legally, yes. Emotionally, physically, no. She was no longer Cory Matthew's wife. And it was her fault.
She had done this. She had created this rift between them. The countless pregnancy tests thrown away in anger and sorrow had eventually eaten away at her until she started blaming Cory. Already, hadn't he admitted several times that he felt inadequate compared to her? And the fact that she was excelling in her new job that everyone loved her at work for her diligence and her hard work had to have been grating at his esteem. So did she have to yell at him? And did she have to make him feel inferior? And did she have to tell him that it was his fault that they couldn't produce a child?
And then, that after she finally became pregnant, did she have to tell him that her miscarriage was his fault?
"Inadequate man, inadequate sperm."
What a warm and loving wife. Topanga never doubted Cory's decision to separate for a moment. She had been out of whack and she hadn't been ready for that kind of pain, but that hadn't been reason enough to lash out at her husband and dredge up some of his darkest insecurities.
Cory would be there. Of course Cory would be there. Cory got the off-white invitation with the golden script in the fancy-curlicue font. And even though not many people made such big deals out of their sixty-seventh birthday, Cory would fling himself on the nearest plane to Philly to celebrate with old Mr. Feeny.
And Topanga would fling right after him. Because after four months of this life (her crappy life, she'll finally admit), Topanga was ready to relax and take a break and to finally go home.
Topanga was finally heading home: to Cory.
If Cory would take her, that is.
A/N: Was digging through the FanFiction folder on my computer. Then, figuring that I'll probably never write anything new, I won the debate with myself over posting the good portions of what I've written. Hopefully, I'm right in believing that this is a good portion and not a mediocre portion that Boy Meets World lovers will sneer at.
Also, if some bits sound strange, they're probably an obscure reference to Boy Meets World episodes that I have watched for the umpteenth time at the expense of my health and social skills.
