I do not own Girl Meets World. The characters in this story are not mine. All rights belong to Disney and Disney Channel.

CHAPTER THREE

"Hurry up Heehaw! You're the one that made me skip my after school nap to get here three hours before our flight, and now we're almost going to miss it!" Maya angrily stammers, rushing around the airport gates.

"It's not my fault that the Uber decided to take the long way to the airport. They want money, alright?" Lucas replies in the same tone as Maya.

•

It was true though. Lucas showed up to Maya's apartment right when she arrived home from school. He grabbed her luggage from her room, and rushed out the door. Maya was able to grab her prepacked carry on purse (with her phone charger, earbuds, and a novel) before she was out the door. She bid her mom goodbye with a kiss, and left flying after Lucas.

There was a small, black Honda accord on the sidewalk of the main road, with a lanky boy standing next to it, looking down at his phone. Maya walked right up to him.

"Geez, Huckleberry, you could have given me a warning that you were coming this early." Maya mumbled passed him.

"I told you at school that I was coming to your place right after school." he scoffed in reply.

"I didn't think you actually meant that. When people say they're coming 'after school,' she air-quoted, "it means after an hour or two."

"Well, I mean what I say, always." he smirks at her, and places the luggages in the trunk of the car. Maya waved him off, and she got into the vehicle.

The driver of the Uber was a young man, probably in his early twenties, waiting for Lucas to close the trunk. Maya didn't want to be awkward, so she started small talk.

"Hi, I'm Maya. Thank you so much for driving us to the airport today, it means a lot." she gave him a small smile, and waited for him to respond. The man glanced at her, and then looked forward again.

"Okay…." her voice doze off due to her awkwardness. This would be an interesting ride.

•

"Our driver spoke once, and that was for the fee of the trip, which was actually outrageous! You couldn't have thought to use a referral code or something?" Maya responded with her teeth gritted against each other.

"There's no need to be mad at me right now! We have a flight to catch, and you can nap on the plane." Lucas replies, eyes scattering, looking at the gate numbers hanging from the ceilings.

They stopped to look at the directories which stood in the middle of a cul de sac. "Maya, what gate are we in?" Lucas speaks in a rushed tone.

"G."

"Okay, it says to keep going straight, and it should be on the left. Let's go!" Lucas grabs Maya's hand, interlocks his hands with hers, and pulls her forward.

Their sneakers thump against the tiled floors, and their breathing becomes more quick. They needed to board that plane now. The letter G was in sight, and the couple was able to sprint faster towards it.

No one was queued at the gate anymore, and the flight attendant was about to close the door that leads to the door of the plane.

"WAIT!" Lucas yells, dropping Maya's hand to run to the ladies. He waves his hands up in the air so that they could see him. Maya was far behind him, due to his longer legs being able to take him somewhere faster than her.

"We need to get onto that plane, please." Maya can hear Lucas's desperate voice in the distance. She walked up to the gate, and stopped once she was right beside Lucas.

"I'm sorry, the gates are closed. No one can get on or off plane." the flight attendant said in a, somewhat sad, voice.

Maya looked up at Lucas, seeing disappointment on his face. His shoulders slumped down, and Maya decided it was her turn to speak.

"So there's no way we can get on that plane?" Maya slowly states, her eyes burning intensely to the woman.

"We are contacting the pilot right now, but if his words are negative, then I apologize, we cannot let you on." the lady's voice has become stricter while talking to Maya.

Maya and Lucas wait at the desk, and the flight attendant was typing away on a computer. The plane was still outside the window, not moving an inch. Maya looks over to the lady again.

"How many minutes ago did you guys start boarding? Like, before we got here?"

"About twenty minutes ago, the last group." she replies, without looking up an inch.

"Is it possible that people are still looking for their seats? I mean, I've flown before. I know that the process takes a long time." Maya argues. She just wants to get on this damn plane already.

"Yes, ma'am, but rules are rules. No one can get on or off the plane once the doors are closed."

Lucas looks down to Maya and can tell that she was getting annoyed with the woman. He chuckled a little, and grabbed her hand. Maya looks down at her hand, and back up to Lucas. He gives her a closed smile, and she whispers,

"Why are you laughing and smiling at a time like this? This is fucking serious Lucas."

Lucas rubs his thumb against Maya's hand to calm her down. He traces a circle pattern, and waits her her to calm down. He can see Maya start to slack off a little, but she was still irritated.

"Yes, I know it's serious. But sometimes it's out of our control." Lucas whispers back. He turns to the woman, and asks, "So it's a no go from the pilot?" The woman looks up, and says her apologies. "When's the next flight to Austin, ma'am?"

She types into the computer. "Approximately two hours from now, so seven o'clock. It will arrive at this gate, so you both can stay and wait here." she gives the couple a small smile. "Free of charge."

The duo sighed in relief. One, Maya didn't pay for it. Two, Lucas didn't have that amount of cash on him. They thanked the woman, and Maya took a seat in the black metal chairs in front of the huge windows that faced the runways. Lucas pulls out his phone, and walks in the other direction.

She looked out the window to look at the setting sun beyond the horizon. The windows had no curtains; the yellow orange glow of the sun shone into the gate, and light reflected off of Maya's face. God, was she tired.

She stares out the window towards the sun, and from her peripheral she can see Lucas set himself down to the seat next to her, elbows resting on his knees. He let out a deep sigh, which caused Maya to look at him.

She turned her body towards him, back leaning against the armrest of the chair. Maya stares at him so he would start speaking, but he didn't. Lucas was flipping his phone in his hands, looking down at the floor. Maya sighed.

"What happened?"

He looks up from off the ground, and turns his head. "So, I called my mom."

"And?"

"She laughed in my face."

"What did you tell her?"

Lucas rearranges himself so his back was against the backrest. "We missed our flight by twenty minutes, and that we won't be there until, like, six hours from now." Lucas deadpans.

"Why was she laughing though?" Maya questions.

"She made bets with everyone back home that I would be late somehow."

Maya started giggling. "They like to mess with you too, huh Huckleberry? I think we'll all get along fine." she says, patting his shoulder. She rests her hands there, and began to lay her forehead down there too. They stay like this for a while—watching people rush to their gates, hearing babies cry, smelling the scent of Starbucks coffee in the air.

Maya removes her hands from his shoulder, but keeps her head in the same place. She begins to play with her own hands, and closes her eyes.

"We're so close to Texas." Maya thinks. "Am I excited? Meeting Lucas's family seems like fun; I've known him forever. Why do they even want to meet me anyways? I'm just plain old Maya Penelope Hart." This rose the question to Maya's brain. Why did Lucas ask Maya to come with him as his date for the wedding? Why did he need a date to the wedding?

"Lucas?" He hummed in reply. "Why did you ask me to be your date to the wedding?"

He gave a low chuckle. "I told you, everyone thinks we're a couple back home."

"Yeah, but," she paused, lifting her forehead off his shoulder, "why do they think that?" He was silent for a bit, and clears his throat.

"My aunt always checks in with us. Every since we moved to New York, she wanted to make sure my mom was settled and was doing okay. After my parents' divorce, she wasn't—well, in a good place, and you knew that." Maya nodded. "My mom would always mention your name to her because I was always out with you and the gang when she would call. So I'm guessing that they put two and two together, and bam, they labeled you as my girlfriend." Lucas monologues nervously.

Maya sat there speechless for a bit. She didn't know what to say. It made sense to her that if she was the only girl his mom would talk about, that she was his girlfriend. She can feel herself starting to blush. Everyone in Texas thinks I'm his girlfriend.

"You good, Maya?" Lucas asks quietly.

She turns her head to face him again, and she smiled. "Yeah, I'm okay."

•

Two hours were able to pass with a breeze, even if the airport chairs were uncomfortable. Lucas eventually got up to get cookies and coffee from the Starbucks booth, sharing with Maya. Maya read her book silently, facing the window with the (now) dark sky apparent to them. They shared their earbuds with each other, listening to music and waiting for the airplane to arrive. They never really talked to each other after their conversation two hours earlier, but they were left in a comfortable silence. Lucas respected Maya's reading time, and Maya—well, she could care less about what Lucas was doing.

The boarding process is always annoying and hard. Luckily, the duo was allowed to board first along with the first class, because of how long they stayed at the airport for; they were still seated in economy class, though.

Maya claimed the window seat, and Lucas sat in the aisle. The plane began to fill up, becoming stuffier and stuffier by the second. Maya hated waiting; it was bad enough they had to wait two hours to fly, but it was worse to wait even more on people.

"Can this plane just go already?" Maya whines. She was tired. She wanted to sleep. Lucas took away her nap time.

"Maya, the plane's gonna leave in a bit, relax." She rolled her eyes at him.

Before they knew it, the plane was going down the runway, and the lights in the cabins were turned off. The airplane safety video appeared on the screens, and the flight attendants were demonstrating the oxygen masks.

"Thank God." Maya groans, and Lucas gives a small laugh.

The video finished, the flight attendants sat down, and the plane was charging up to take flight. Texas, here they come!

AUTHORS NOTE

Hi everyone! Thank you for waiting so patiently for this chapter, I know I've been gone for a couple of days. Thank you for all of the wonderful comments too! This chapter was just another filler, but I promise in the next one, they are in Texas haha.

bhgodlygovt1 pointed out to me that my progress bar in my bio says I am writing chapter eight of this story, but I only have two, now three, chapters up. I just wanted to address publicly that I don't want to post all the chapters all at once and have you guys wait for an update which will probably take a LONG time. Also, I love feedback! Thank you for your comment :)

Please leave a comment full of suggestions, criticism, and what you liked/didn't like. That's all for now! See you all in the next one. xoxo, M.