Sometime around dawn, josh woke up to the sound of his roommate singing some sort of happy tune and he knew exactly what that meant.

Josh rolled around in his bed

"Ugh, take it outside." josh groaned.

"Outside?" Eddie said loudly "joshy iv been outside ALL night!" he exclaimed.

"your girl Maya, she. Is. Good." he slurred. That caught his attention, good at what? He expected the worst but hoped for the best.

"What do you mean?" josh asked as he sat up straight and rubbed his eyes.

"What do you mean, what do you mean?" Eddie asked as if it was the most ridiculous question ever "SEX!" he sang.

Hh.

"You had sex with her?" He was annoyed by both of them, by Eddie for being a repulsive person, and Maya for falling into his trap. Does riley know about this? about her?

"No we went up to her place to play Jenga; yes we had sex!" he yelled, obviously still drunk. "you should've been there man" Eddie shook his head. "So many pussies for the taken." Eddie laughed before gagging and throwing up on the floor.

Josh sighed, "Come on let's get you some water," he said.

Josh helped his friend change his clothes and get into bed, but couldn't help himself from smelling a hint of a familiar perfume, one he had smelled once before during this same night. Josh thought that it was his turn to barf now.

The next morning josh had gotten a text from riley asking him to join him for breakfast, he was more than happy to accept her offer and introduce her to his favorite bagel place. The moment riley sat down she started to bombard him with questions about the campus, classes, professors students, clubs. Josh laughed and tried to answer as many as possible.

"So.." Josh finally started as their conversation died down. This was his chance.

"Hmm" riley raised a brow taking a sip from her cappuccino.

"You and Maya.." he smiled blandly. The moment her name left his mouth riley's face fell. "You don't have to talk about it." Josh quickly tried to assure her, his raising his hands in surrender.

Riley pursed her lips, it was obviously a touchy subject, and perhaps he shouldn't have asked her.

"t's..fine, I honestly thought Maya had told you yesterday.." she confessed.

"She said maybe it best you were the one who would spell the beans." josh assured her.

"Oh." riley said, and for a moment riley expression had softened before turning rigid again. "Well, there's not much to tell." she warned him, to that, josh nodded and took a bite from his bagel.

"I guess you can already tell, but we're not really that close anymore.." said Riley.

"No kidding." josh huffed.

"Yeah." Riley said with a small smile "we sort of had a fallout." she explained.

"I mean there was a fight of course, a big one..It's just..You know?"

He didnt

"I guess."

"I mean there we were, Riley Maya against the world, and all of a sudden it's just me trying to force a smile every day, it was excruciating." Riley explained.

He wasn't quite sure what riley meant.

"So what? one day you woke up and Maya wasn't there for you?" Maya's name seemed to prick riley, and she twitches the moment he mentions it. Maybe it was best to steer clear of it.

"Like I said, we had a fight." riley shook her head.

"About..?"

"Stuff." riley tried, josh could see she was struggling to let it all out, so he wasn't going to push her for the details.

"It's ok, riley you don't have to say anything you don't want to." he assured her.

"Its fine. It's just..really sad, ok?" Riley admitted.

"yeah, no more Riley and Maya." josh reminded her, but riley shook her head.

"Im talking about Maya" she corrected him, "half way through junior year she started acting weird."

"Weird how?"

"You know, skipping classes, smoking, going to parties.. It was insane."

That was an exaggeration, but to be fair riley was a little square.

"I see, and that made you uncomfortable?" josh nodded.

"It made everyone uncomfortable!" Riley said a little loudly before toning it down and recomposing herself.

"Every time I tried to make her do the right thing, she would ignore me, like she was pushing me away." she sighed. "She even started to hang out with the burnouts."

"The others didn't seem to care as much as I did, they though it was just a phase, but really? Then she started doing drugs and we all know how it goes from there." there was a hint of fear in Riley's eyes as if she was reliving those days.

"So one day I finally stood up to her, one final chance to do the right thing, an ultimatum. Quit all the bad stuff she was doing, or I would tell on her."

Josh knew where this was going

"Don't tell me you.."

"I did what was best for her." Riley said sternly "I mean I told her plain and straight quit or be caught." she tried to justify, "she was throwing her life away, throwing us away!"

"Then what happened?"

"One day she was smoking…Weed, um, in the bathroom so I told the principle, she got caught, suspended, almost went to jail.." Riley was obviously guilty over the matter.

"After that she wouldn't speak to me, I mean I tried to tell her I was trying to help her, that she was ruining her life with the drinking and the skipping and the partying, but she wouldn't budge. One day I went home and raided my room, turned it upside down trying to look for my old friendship ring, it got too small for my fingers so I didn't really wear it anymore, Maya was still wearing Her's so I figured she still cherished it." Riley ran her fingers through her hair. "So I force the tiny ring into my pinky, because it wouldn't fit in any other finger." she laughed, but it was a sad laugh, the kind of the laugh you make when you study all night for an exam, only to end up failing, it was the kind of laugh that would try to get you to accept rejection, and it was exactly that.

"-Next day I go to school and yell out 'RING POWER' like an idiot, and I tell her to quit doing illegal dangerous things, and she just...she looked at me as if I was the most idiotic thing she has ever seen." there were tears in riley's eyes and josh thought about stopping her.

"..& she looked at her hand, stares at her ring as if she forgot it was still there, like she forgot to take it off for the past 5 years, she just slips out ring and throws it on the ground, then she looks at me and tells Me 'Grow the eff up Riley' and she walks away." riley shakes her head. She rubbed her eyes and took a sip from her cup.

"That..that must've been hard." Josh tried to comfort her. Not sure whether or not riley just censored the f-word on her own.

"That wasn't the worst part" riley let out a shaky sigh. "I.. that year I was dating Lucas..& he just, He turned against me they all did...except for Farkle..Everyone took her side, Even my dad..MY DAD chose her over me, can you believe it?"

"Riley I wouldn't say chose.."

"They all told me what I did was wrong! I mean? What was the point differentiating right from wrong if you don't get to act on them, ever since we were kids..it's tell the truth, don't cheat, respect your elders...but suddenly everyone decide to get a new rule book, one I didn't know about, and it was just...it didn't make sense? In what world is it ok to steal and lie.. and do illegal activities?"

"Riley calm down.."

"And leave you and turn everyone against you she even slept with him uncle josh and it...she slept with him and it just..it was the biggest slap in the face?!" riley shook her head slowly, there were tears running down her cheeks.

"Its like she didn't care what I thought of her anymore, she didn't care about me at all, and it's all because doing the right thing was apparently the wrong thing to do at the time...and I just don't understand why...why she threw the ring that day." Riley wiped her tears quickly.

Josh didn't know what to say, it was obviously a complicated situation, but he said the only thing he could say.

"Im really sorry Riley."

It's been four days since that breakfast, and josh hadn't seen riley since then, as for Maya, he would see her on a daily basis, she would stride into his room to hang with Eddie. Sometimes they'd smoke weed, sometimes they'd drink, but they would always, ALWAYS end the night with a good old-fashioned hookup.

It was weird seeing Maya sticking her tongue down Eddie's throat. He couldn't convince himself to get used to it. This was Maya he was talking about, Maya fucking hart, she used to jump on his back and force hugs on him, she was the kid who would sneak out of her home and come a long way just to see him in his dorm.

Looking back, josh could see that Maya had always been a bit of a deviant. Josh mentally shook his head; she was deviant, not fucking reckless.

Not like this.

AN:

Thank you everyone for the wonderful reviews! ill try to make this a well paced story as much as i can, so please have patience in terms of updates or developments.

again, any comments + or - are welcome.