A/N: Hi! This is just a little story I decided to post and I just wanted to make a few things clear:

* The kids are all in their mid-twenties in this story

* I don't know how frequently this will be updated

* I apologize for any spelling errors/sentences that make no sense: it is 2 AM.

* I really appreciate feedback so feel free to comment!

* I do not own GMW or any of the characters that occur in the show. Some of the characters in this story might be original but most of them belong to the writing team for GMW.

That's it! I hope you enjoy the 1st chapter!


I.

Maya Hart was back in town. The Big Apple, the city that never sleeps... New York City had a lot of names. Maya personally preferred calling it home. At least she had preferred calling it that before she had moved away. Before she had left everything and everyone she loved.

It was weird, Maya thought, being back here. The subway smelled the same, she still knew how to get a cab to notice her and the pace of the people on the streets was still the same fast, chaotic mess that she remembered. It was as if she had never left.

Except.

Except, she had. And everything was not exactly the same.

There was a new sign outside the shop where Maya used to watch young couples and rich ladies with fancy suits buy jewellery and daydream about when she would be able to afford jewels and diamonds, herself. A trashcan was now right outside the bright yellow sushi place in Scarsdale. Riley and Maya used to take the twenty minute commute there just to eat their avocado rolls. They were amazing. But what had changed the most about New York didn't have that much to do with the city. It had a lot more to do with Maya and how she felt being back. She used to feel like she belonged here, with her model friends and performing buddies on the subway, the chef at her mothers old job always sneaking her the pancakes that had turned a little too black around the edges, at Topanga's with her family and her friends, the people she loved. She didn't have that anymore. She was 26 years old and nothing was the same as it had been when she had left 7 years ago. Her model friends and the guys singing and juggling at the subway were long gone, her mother's old diner had closed, apparently, and mr. and mrs. Matthews had changed the sign to Topanga's (Riley had sent her pictures) and left Katy in charge of the place. Riley, her best friend, was getting married to Farkle, her other best friend. No one had seen it coming. Farkle had been in an on-and-off again relationship with a girl named Wendy up until a year ago and Riley had been happily single for two years, choosing to focus on her career and herself, instead of her love life, when they had announced that they were together last summer. Apparently they had gotten drunk, slept together and then, in typical Riley and Farkle fashion, decided to talk about it and weigh the pros and cons of a relationship. In the end they had decided their friendship was not worthy of ruining for a maybe-relationship but by the end of the month they had realised they'd made a mistake and ended up getting together again. Two months later they moved in together and six months ago Riley had ruined Farkles proposal by proposing to him herself. Maya had spent five hours with Riley on the phone afterwards and had (unfortunately) gotten to hear every single detail of the Riarkle-romance. The two girl might not have been living in the same city anymore but the phone calls and facetimes made up for that. They still talked most days, still saw each others faces. They still discussed everything and nothing together. Well, almost anything, anyway.

The cab Maya was sitting in came to a halt and Maya stepped out of it to take her luggage out of the back. The driver seemed to be one of the nicer ones in the city because he came out and helped the blonde with her things. Either that or he wanted to speed up the process so that he could get out of there. She thanked him either way and payed the fair before lugging her luggage behind her and looking for the right number. She stopped when her phone started ringing and put her purse on the black luggage to answer it.

"Riley, I'm on my way, what is it?" she said into her phone and tried to pull her stuff with one hand. 32, 32, 32... Where are you 32?, she thought. She could hear people laughing in the background and her friend shushing them.

"Maya! Hurryyyyy, I need to see your beautiful face! I can't wait anymore!" Each sentence was punctuated with an exclamation mark but Maya was used to that. Could she really expect anything other than absolute excitement from her friend? She was kind of excited, too.

"Riles, you saw me like two months ago" she reminded her, rolling her eyes. Her luggage had started rolling a little bit faster, finally, and Maya was surprised at how easy it was to walk backwards, talk and look for the correct apartment building at the same time, whilst in heels.

"Yeah, for a day! Now I'm going to get to see you every day for an entire month! This is so exciting! Isn't this exciting?! I think it is" Riley rambled on. There was something in her voice, Maya noticed, and made a mental note to ask her if everything was okay once she got to her friends apartment.

"Yes, honey, it's exciting. Okay, where the hell is your building?! I've been walking for almost five minutes now!" Maya stopped for a second to rest. This was ridiculous. Maya prided herself on knowing most parts of New York by heart but now she couldn't even find an apartment in Greenwich Village. Things had definitely changed.

"Oh, I'll tell the boys to go lean out the window! You'll see them, they're the ones who will be waving like idiots, I'm sure" Riley said. Maya took a hold of her things again and looked up, trying to see if people would suddenly show up somewhere.

"HEY!" she heard Riley yell. The sound was muffled but Riley had quite the lungs.

"DOUCHEFACES, GO WAVE FROM THE WINDOW, MAYA CAN'T FIND OUR PLACE!"

Two seconds and a bunch of shuffling sounds later Riley was back.

"Okay, I fixed it. Do you see them?" she wondered. Maya looked around but alas, no boys were to be found.

"Riley, what do you mean when you said boys? That's plural" Maya wanted to see all of her friends now that she was back of course, some more than others, but there was one person she was trying to avoid and she did not want to see him like this.

"Oh! Um... Don't worry, it's just Farkle and Zay! They're trying to fix some last minute changes with the seating." Zay, Maya remembered, had somehow gotten pulled into the planning of their friends's wedding and had become somewhat of the unofficial wedding planner. Maya wasn't sure why it amused her that Zay of all people ended up planning Riley and Farkles wedding but it did.

"Oh, okay. Wait, I think I see something! Wait, is your apartment building gray or red?" She could see two pair of heads that looked eerily familiar sticking out of a window on the other side of the street. They seemed to be waving but she couldn't really tell, they were too far away.

"Red... why? Oh, are you outside the grey ones? Mum and dad had the same problem when they were trying to find our place the first time. It seems to only happen when yo-"

"Yeah, okay, Riles. I see them." she interrupted her and took a hold of her luggage to start dragging it again. She soon realised that taking her luggage to the other side of the street would not work if she had her phone glued to her ear.

"Riles? I'm going now, I'll see you in a few!" she said and bent her knees to prepare for the pull.

"Oh okay, YAAAAY! BYE!" she heard before she clicked the red button on her phone and put it back in her jacket pocket. She took a deep breath and pulled as hard as she could, praying nothing would break. At times like these she wished she had been taller. If she had been taller she could've just borrowed Riley's clothes for a month instead of having to bring half of her closet with her. If she had been taller she wouldn't have a problem with pulling on this damn luggag-

"Hey, you need some help with that?" a voice from behind her asked. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She would recognise that voice anywhere. This was not how this was supposed to happen. She forced a smile on her face and slowly turned around to face a person she had not seen for 6 years.

"It's okay, I can take it, thanks" she said. There was a flash of surprise on his face when he realised that the stranger in front of him was actually Maya but he quickly masked that with a carefully neutral expression. It didn't matter though, Maya could still read him like a book.

"Maya!" he exclaimed. He seemed like he was at a loss of words and Maya herself could not think of one single thing to say. He looked the same, she guessed. His hair was still cut the same way, he was still tall and handsome and his eyes were as beautiful as they had always been. She had always loved his eyes the most. Once upon a time she associated those eyes with home. Not anymore though.

"You- you've cut your hair" he said, at last. He gestured vaguely towards her face and Maya put her hand up to her hair, out of habit. There was nothing there to twirl or toss anymore, she had cut it shoulder length two years ago when she had desperately needed a change.

"Um, yeah." she mumbled. He shifted his weight and she completely forgot about her hair. He was holding a few boxes of pizza in one hand and his phone and a wallet in the other. He looked like he belonged in New York. It was funny, she thought. Maya, who grew up in New York, a city child at heart, felt out of place here. But the cowboy, the outsider, he belonged, here in her city. He held the pizzas out to her and smiled.

"Um, here. You take the pizzas and I'll take your luggage. You're going to Riley and Farkle's right? Riley has been talking about it non-stop for the past two weeks" he said, taking the luggage out of her hands. Maya wanted to stop him but she wasn't really sure what was happening and, anyway, Lucas was already crossing the street. All she could do was follow his lead.

Riley confirmed Mayas suspicions approximately six and a half minutes after Maya and Lucas had shown up at her doorstep. Maya had been greeted with hugs (Farkle and Zay), kisses (Riley) and excited squeals of joy (once again, Riley) before she had even taken her jacket off. Lucas had been greeted with a "Finally, dude! What took you so long? I am starving" and two pairs of hands who grabbed the pizzas before he had even answered. When the girls had calmed down and they'd all sat down to eat Maya had discreetly shot Riley a look and pointed her finger towards Lucas when she was sure he wasn't looking. Riley had then, not so discreetly, announced that Maya and her would be finishing their pizzas in the bedroom because they needed to discuss 'something important'. Maya almost threw her phone at her best friend after that. She loved Riley to death but the girl couldn't lie to save her life.

"I'm sorry" Riley had said as soon as she'd closed the door to hers and Farkle's bedroom. It was a nice bedroom, filled with pictures and souvenirs from their many trips and adventures over the years. Maya could see herself in some of them, she could see Zay and Lucas, too. But in the more recent ones Riley and Farkle had their arms around each other or they were staring lovingly at each other or, Maya realised to her horror, they were kissing. She might have been their best friend but she could've done without seeing those two geeks smashing teeth.

"I know you didn't want to see him like this" Riley continued, snapping Maya out of her thoughts.

"But, Maya, you were going to see him tomorrow, anyway. And we really needed some help with the seatings and I am going insane here. Isadora is superbusy with her latest project and I know she broke up with Farkle years ago but I still feel weird asking her to help with the wedding and I can't stand all of this testosterone anymore. I really need you to be here." The girl was out of breath and close to tears by the end of the sentence and Maya's heart broke a little bit at that. It must've been hard to plan your wedding basically alone. She regretted not coming sooner to help.

"It's fine" she sighed, stepping closer to her friend to give her a hug. "It wasn't as awkward as I thought it was going to be" she said, hugging Riley close to her. Riley sniffled a little and giggled.

"Really?" she wondered hopefully. Maya scoffed.

"No, it was horrible. But it's okay, honey. I'm here now and I'm going to help you with all of this wedding stuff and we'll throw those idiots out of here and make you feel better, okay?" she said. Riley sniffled again, squeezing tighter.

"Okay" she said. "Thank you for being my best friend, peaches." Maya smiled.

"Of course"


So what did you guys think? Tell me everything!

xx,

Kat.