Disclaimer: I own nothing, I'm merely an explorer. All rights go to the original creators and owners of this world.

"You like me?"

Why do you care?

He doesn't. He only cares because Riley said it. Because Riley's been acting weird ever since she decided she knew how Maya felt. Because Riley told him they were brother and sister now. That's the only reason he's still here, with her, instead of running after Riley and Farkle.

Is that the reason, Maya?

She wasn't doing this. She didn't have to sit there and explain herself to Huckleberry. They were friends, nothing more, regardless of what Riley thought.

Then why is he staring at you like that?

"Stop."

He had to leave eventually. He'd realize this wasn't going anywhere, he'd go after Riley to patch things up, and they would all laugh about this when they got back to New York. Huckleberry and Riley would be a couple; the world would be back in balance.

He's still staring. He's still here. He's not leaving.

"Can we just stop? I want everything to stop!" She felt herself cracking. The barrier she'd built up was beginning to crumble, slipping out of her control. Her head was spinning and, without thinking, she blurted, "It's been bad enough I've been keeping this secret from Riley all this time."

It hung heavy in the air around them. A weight lifted from Maya's shoulders, but a new one quickly took its place as the silence grew. She could practically hear the wheels turning in his head until they clicked into place and he asked, "What secret?"

She didn't know what to say to that. The whole truth? No, she wasn't even sure if she knew what that was, but she knew part of it. She knew how similar he was to her best friend. How they just seemed to fit, in a way that she could never fit with him. That they were the best versions of themselves when they were together, but she couldn't see them as a couple because of their similarities. His relationship with Riley always read as an innocent first love to her. It wasn't the whole truth, but it seemed to be a satisfactory answer. She saw him stand and breathed a sigh of relief that this was over. He was going to leave her alone at last to rebuild.

"So," he started, causing her to go rigid, "you don't make fun of me because you like me?"

She sighed, "I'm just going to watch this fire." Why wouldn't he drop this? There wasn't anything left to discuss. She'd said her peace; they had nothing more to say.

"Maya, why do you make fun of me?"

There was no hostility in the way he asked, which only caused her annoyance to rise. He didn't need to know why she made fun of him, she just did. That was their thing. She teases him, and he doesn't even try to pretend to hate it. Hell, sometimes he played along with her. None of this mattered in the grand scheme of things, and it was pointless to discuss.

Is it pointless?

"Because you're easy to make fun of," she retorted flippantly. Everything was too loud, her heart was racing, and this conversation needed to end before-

"Okay, then stop."

He made it sound so simple as if teasing him was something within her control. She could control it if she wanted, but her options were teasing him or-

"Because you're a Huckleberry."

She meant to walk away from him. To head back to the group and pretend this wasn't happening. But her legs didn't get the memo. She was gravitating towards Lucas instead, the words spilling out of her mouth before she could stop them.

"Because you're a Ranger Rick-"

"Would you stop?"

There it was, that leak of frustration. Maya knew she was making this worse, but she couldn't stop. She'd kept this from everyone. She tried so hard to ignore it. To bury it down so deep in hopes that maybe the ache would dull with time. Except now it was engulfing her. Everything she locked away, everything she'd been feeling for longer than she wanted to admit, wasn't going to surrender so easily this time.

"Look if I have feelings for you, don't you think I'd come right out and say it? Well, I don't, so what I do say is HA-HURR…"

All the breath left her lungs.

His eyes were full with an intensity she'd never seen from him before. She felt the roughness of his hands, his fingers in her hair, the heat of his breath. He was so close, why was he so close? She couldn't tell if her face was burning from the fire or distress at her current predicament. What was happening here?

He doesn't like you, Maya.

His hands cupped her face with a sense of urgency. The air was hot and electric around them, and she froze when his eyes fell to her lips. He leaned towards her slowly. His lips hovered, gently grazing against hers.

You can't do this, Maya.

Her eyes fluttered at the sensation. Everything else faded away, and it was just the two of them floating in the air as the world slowly continued spinning around them. If she just tilted her chin up just a little bit more

Think about Riley.

She crashed back to reality. Throughout the years, she'd forgiven herself for all the pain and heartache she'd caused people, but she would never forgive herself if she hurt Riley like this. So she pulled away. Not too far, but far enough for Lucas to understand what she couldn't verbalize. He backed off, fingers sliding delicately down. A hazy thought occurred to her.

He seemed disappointed.

"Why did you do that?" Her voice caught in her throat, and she mentally kicked herself for sounding so pathetic.

He slowly blinked at her. "I don't know," he shrugged, "I just…" His eyes flicked back down to her lips, "I wanted you to stop," he breathed, meeting her gaze again. There was a conflicted look in his eyes as though he wanted to say more. As though something was tearing him apart too, but he couldn't say what, so instead he murmured, "I'm sorry."

I'm not-

"Don't worry about it, Huckleberry." She stepped away from him and sat back down on the log. After a moment he sat down next to her, his knee nudging hers as he did.

"I do like you," she whispered, "just not in the way Riley thinks."

"Maya likes you."

Why did she do that? She told Riley her theory couldn't have been more off. Nothing was ever going to happen between her and Ranger Rick, why couldn't she have just let it go?

"You're one of my closest friends. If you'd gotten hurt, I don't know what I would have done." She looked at him then. His face was relaxed as she said, "Everyone can jump to conclusions, or make assumptions about us, or me, but that's the truth."

A moment passed with that hanging in the air before she nudged his arm with her elbow.

"You wanna get out of here? I heard talk of ice cream."

The side of his mouth quirked up, "You go ahead, I'll catch up in a minute."

She searched his face for any sign of what he was thinking, before deciding that he had a lot to process, obviously he would need a minute. So she nodded and stood.

"I will send a search party after you if you don't show up in a timely manner though."

He chuckled. "I won't be long."

"You promise?"

He drew an 'X' on his chest. "Cross my heart."

She smiled, and walked away, leaving both of them alone with the thoughts in their head.