I Write Sins, Not Tragedies
Girl Meets World Fan Fiction Series
Chapter 12: Hopeful Thinking
A/N: I really enjoyed writing Farkle, Zay and Eric for this chapter. I hope that you guys find them as hilarious as I found them as I wrote them.
"Maya, are you crazy?" Riley asked, her eyes wide and incredulous, clearly full of disbelief, but she was pulling on the light denim shorts all the same. "We don't even know where Rachel lives. And neither one of us can drive. How do you think we're going to find her, yet alone get there?" She asked, pulling on the green, Victoria's Secret, distressed hem sweatshirt.
She knew she was going to have to follow Maya. She knew that there was no stopping her best friend when she gave herself a mission, so her choices were limited. She could follow the blonde and make sure that she remained safe and protected, or she could let her go on her own and ignore whatever problems arose as a result. No matter what she chose, if Maya crawled out of the bay window-with or without Riley-the brunette was going to be punished for the decisions of her friend.
"It's really easy, actually," Maya shrugged, walking towards Riley's bedroom door, a pair of flip-flops flapping with every step.
"Are you crazy? The one time that we'd get into the most trouble if we got caught is when you're going to use my front door?" Riley shrieked, jumping off the bed while she attempted to slide into her slip-on Vans.
"Will you calm down?" Maya rolled her eyes, opening the door and heading out into the apartment.
Riley ran after her friend, convinced that the blonde had finally gone crazy. She was prepared to do whatever it took to stop Maya from leaving the door, even if it meant tackling her to the ground to keep her from getting them caught.
But, it didn't matter if she stopped them or not. It was clear that the girls were planning on bracing the outside world. If it hadn't been clear from their wardrobe, it was clear by the fact that Maya was pulling her hair up into a sloppy, messy bun on the top of her head.
And Riley's parents were sitting on the couch, watching a movie while they cuddled close to one another. It was sort of disturbing to see her parents acting so in love, but it was also bitter sweet and Riley feel the resentfulness filling every fiber of her being.
After all, less than a week ago she had been convinced that she was going to have that with Lucas.
It was strange how quickly things could change so drastically. With the way things were looking at the current moment in time, it didn't look like any of them were going to be getting their happily ever after, let alone their Cory-and-Topanga relationship.
"Topanga?" Maya asked sweetly, clasping her hands behind her back as she rocked back and forth on the balls of her feet, an innocent smile on her face with sparkling eyes.
Cory groaned as Topanga turned around, clicking pause on the movie they had been in the middle of enjoying.
"Yes, my fierce amazon warrior?" Topanga smiled.
"So, I know that you grounded us and everything but I was just wondering if maybe it would be okay if we went out with your supervision?" Maya asked sweetly.
"Where do you need to go?" she frowned, raising her eyebrows at the girls.
"Can I come?" Cory asked, growing excited by the prospect of being included in one of his daughter's adventures with her blonde haired best friend.
Ever since Shawn had married Katy, the friendship between he and Cory had become somewhat mundane. They got together to discuss parenting styles and their daughters. There were no more schemes or plans. Nothing elaborate and exciting happened to them.
Instead, Maya and Riley got all of the surprises in life. They got into all of the trouble. They made the mistakes and had to work their way through then.
That was fine with Shawn. He had finally been able to settle down and start a family. It was all he had ever wanted. He was content with being Maya Hart's father and the doting husband of Katy Hart.
Cory, meanwhile, was bored out of his mind. He needed some more excitement. Back when he had been the girls's teacher, he had been able to live vicariously through them. Now, while a teacher in the high school, the girls worked their hardest to avoid taking his classes, tired of having the entire school know about their lives. As a result, his life had been pretty boring ever since the girls had started their sophomore year.
"Bay window," Maya smirked. "Bay window right now," she grinned.
Topanga was off the couch in a second, racing into the room and grabbing the brunette on her way in.
"Not you," Maya held a hand up, warning Cory off as he jumped to his feet as well, hurrying towards Riley's bedroom with a bright smile on his face.
"Awe man," He groaned, slouching his shoulders as he shuffled back to the couch with a defeated look taking over his entire face.
Maya giggled as she turned around and walked back into Riley's room, slamming the door behind her to ensure that Cory wasn't listening in on their conversation or able to put in his two sense without giving them some sort of warning or seeming pathetic for listening through the bedroom door.
"What's going on?" Topanga asked, sitting up straight with her hands folded in her lap, a bright smile on her face.
She was always excited when the girls went to her for help, rather than the two of them deciding that they could handle things on their own. Which was why it worked so well that Maya knew for a fact that Rachel and Topanga were still in contact. All she had to do was ask Topanga to bring them there and she would do it without a second thought.
"We want to go see Rachel," Maya stated as soon as she had her usual seat at the bay window.
"Rachel? Like my old friend from college Rachel? Why?"
"She had to pick between Jack and Eric."
"You think she can give you advice about Josh and Lucas?"
"I need to hear from somebody who's had to pick."
"Mom…this is really important to her. She's even trying to do it in the right way instead of just blindly heading out. I really think you should bring her," Riley spoke up.
"I'm going to go change," Topanga stood up.
She was dressed casually, in a pair of leggings with an old sweatshirt of Cory's and fuzzy socks. Her hair was frizzy and loose around her face, which was scrubbed clean of any and all make-up.
"And while I change I'm going to call Rachel and let her known we'll be there in a few hours. You two are going to pack a bag for a few days and make sure you have your school things with you, because you'll most likely be missing Monday. This may take a while," Topanga instructed the girls.
Josh followed Eric from the car at almost a run to keep up with his older brother's slightly longer and excited strides. With Cory, Josh was just as tall as his older brother and was always able to keep the pace. Eric, however, always walked at almost a power-walk speed and he was actually just the smallest bit taller than Josh himself.
"Does Jack even know that we're coming? It's really late and I don't think we should just barge in uninvited and-"
"Josh, he's my best friend. He loves when I just pop in to surprise him!" Eric beamed as he hit the intercom buzzer outside of Jack's elaborate apartment building.
It was even nicer than the building that Maya lived in and it was located in the heart of the city, full of hustle and bustle all around. For Josh, it hadn't taken any time to get there since his school was located close by. Which was good, because when Eric drove his Ferrari he was like a mad man and Josh's stomach could only take so much.
"Jack? It's Eric! Can we come up?"
It took a few seconds before the intercom made a noise that there was going to be a response, which made Josh wonder if Eric was right about Jack's joy at having him around whenever he felt like it.
"Eric? It's almost eleven o'clock at night. I'm swarmed in paperwork. What do you-"
"Great! I'll be right up!"
There was a groan, which reassured Josh that he had been right. Jack couldn't be bothered with Eric's whims. But, then he heard the click that gave them permission to enter the building and he wondered if Jack was Eric's Shawn.
He had never had a friend like Shawn or Maya. There had never been a friendship in his life that he couldn't imagine losing. Maya was the closest that he had ever come to having something like that. He could talk to her about anything. He worshipped the ground that she stood on and he wanted to know everything about her.
Somewhere along the lines, their friendship had developed into romantic interest and it had escalated from there.
But, there had never been a guy in his life who was as important to him as Shawn was to Cory. And apparently Jack was exactly the same for Eric. He seemed to be the only Matthews boy who didn't have a best friend who became like a part of the family.
"How do you even know where he lives?" Farkle asked, poking his head forward in between the passenger's seat and the driver's seat.
"I took Maya there one time because she needed to pick up the adoption paperwork from when Shawn adopted her," Lucas explained, eyes focused on the road in front of him.
"But Jack has an engineering degree…"Farkle trailed off, clearly waiting for Lucas to explain the rest of the story.
"Yeah? Well he had a minor in politics or something because he went to law school. Why would an engineer be working for some big corporate company? He's a corporate lawyer, so he was reading the paperwork over before his brother signed anything. He does it for all of their legal documents," Lucas went on.
"Not understanding the atmosphere in the vehicle, Zay decides to put on some music to distract from Lucas's tense nature and Farkle's inability to sit in silence," Zay spoke up, reading towards the power button on Lucas's radio.
"Oh, I can't fight this feeling any longer. And yet I'm still afraid to let it flow. What started out as friendship has grown stronger. I only wish I had the strength to let it show."
The old Reo Speedwagon song filled the truck and a small, amused smile took over Lucas's face. It wasn't his usual style of music. They all knew that Lucas stuck to country music, which was just another thing that Maya liked to tease him about when it came to his southern roots. She especially loved to tease him that his favorites were Jana Kramer and Cassadee Pope. (Although, he just let her think those were his favorites. He much preferred Sam Hunt or Chris Young to he female artists, despite the fact that he did enjoy their music).
Zay slammed his fist against the power button, slamming off the music.
"What the hell was that?" He asked.
"Reo Speedwagon!" Farkle chirped helpfully.
"I know who the-who gave you that stupid CD?" Zay asked.
Zay was a strict lover of pop music. He liked what was currently on the radio and the Top 40 determined his playlist. Anything older than than 1990's was not approved of by him unless the artist was currently still producing music. But he hated the 1970's and the 1980's more than anything else which had sparked plenty of debates with Maya, who loved classic rock, especially music produced in the eighties.
"You know damn well who's music that is," Lucas rolled his eyes.
"I'm gonna have to have a talk with our little Maya about her musical tastes," Zay crossed his arms over his chest as he slouched in his seat.
"She's gonna school you again," Lucas told him with a chuckle.
"She did not "school" me the last time," Zay glared at him, putting air-quotes up as he rolled his eyes.
"Are we there yet?" Farkle whined.
Lucas was in for a long car ride. He was grateful for the fact that there was only about another five minutes of their drive because he didn't think he could deal with Farkle and Zay's whining anymore.
Josh was sitting in Jack's living room and just finished telling him all of the details, when they heard the buzz of the intercom.
"I swear to god if this is the girl that I met at the bar with you the other day who you just had to tell where I lived, I am going to murder you, bring you back to life and then murder your revived corpse," Jack threatened, shooting Eric a glare.
"She was hot!"
"She had a gold tooth!" Jack yelled as he stormed towards the intercom.
"It defines character!"
"A gold tooth?" Josh whispered, staring at his brother in shock.
"Shut up," Eric sulked, crossing his arms aggressively over his chest and tucking his chin into his neck with a severe pout.
"Uh, hi? Jack Hunter? I don't know if you remember me, but I'm Lucas Friar-Maya's friend? I drove her to see you one time when Shawn was adopting her? Anyways…I was just wondering if I could talk to you about Rachel?"
Josh tensed up, his hands curling up into tight fists with white knuckles.
Of course Lucas would show up.
Of course he would figure out a way to involve himself in Josh's one hope of figuring out a way to ensure that Maya picked him.
Lucas would be fine without Maya. He'd have her friendship. He didn't need her as a girlfriend. He had lasted years with Maya as his best friend and now he suddenly needed her to be his girlfriend?
That wasn't fair.
He shouldn't just get to step in and decide that he wanted Maya to date him. She was already in a relationship and she was happy.
Why should he get to step in and mess with her head?
Besides, Josh actually did need Maya. He was a better person when he had Maya in his life and he wasn't sure that Maya would stick around if they weren't dating.
Maya made him more confident. She made him want to strive for excellence because she made him believe that he could achieve great things. She made him happier than he had ever been in his life.
He had wanted Cory to be proud of him. That was the excuse he had given his parents for why he needed to drive to New York to open his acceptance letter from NYU and it was partly true, but it wasn't the complete truth. Most of the reason he wanted to open it in New York was because he knew there was a good chance Maya would be there. And she was his good luck charm.
He knew just by holding the envelope that he had gotten in as soon as he had seen her in the room. Because she gave him faith that he could be anything that he wanted to be and that he could do anything he wanted to do. Anything was possible for him as long as Maya was standing by his side.
He couldn't lose that.
"Seriously?" Jack groaned, glaring at Eric. "This is your fault," he accused.
"How? I only brought Josh here," Eric pointed out.
"Somehow, this is your fault. I'm going to have an apartment full of teenagers all trying to date my niece!" Jack glared at him as he turned around and hit the intercom button. "Yeah, okay, come on up," He sighed.
Maya and Riley raced into Maya's apartment and straight towards her closet.
She grabbed the first duffel bag she found and swung it onto the floor. She started throwing clothes at Riley, not even paying attention to what they were.
"Pair of dark wash, ultra skinny, ultra distressed jeans," Riley called out to her. "Grey ribbed tank top with lace back, grey and navy letterman styled sweat shirt," She recited as she informed Maya of the first outfit she had managed to assemble in her madness.
"Perfect for tomorrow," Maya grinned, "but throw in a pair of dark denim, cuffed shorts just in case it's too warm," She went back to tossing clothes.
"Checker print, grey and white shorts with a black lacey sweater and a white crop top?" Riley called.
"Perfect," Maya said, moving away from the racks of clothes and yanking out a pair of pajamas that she tossed to Riley.
Then she moved over to her make up table while Riley grabbed her some shoes. Within five minutes they were done with all of Maya's packing and were racing back to Topanga's waiting car.
They shoved the bag in the trunk and Maya dove into the backseat, sprawling herself out as Riley crawled into the front seat, leaning her seat back.
"You two are going to nap the whole way there, aren't you?" Topanga asked, raising an eyebrow at the girls.
"Of course," Maya yawned, removing her sweatshirt and balling it up to use as a pillow.
"What are you doing here, Lucas?" Josh asked, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning back on Jack's uncomfortable leather couch.
"I need some advice," Lucas shrugged, shoving his hands in his pockets and rocking on the balls of his feet. "I figured you'd be talking to Eric about it, since he's your brother and all," he added on.
"Yeah, well Eric thought I should talk to them both," Josh answered bitterly.
"Sit down," Jack ordered Lucas.
"Okay," he yelped, dropping down on the rounded, extremely uncomfortably looking leather chair that was closest to him.
Josh was reminded of when Riley and Maya had crashed his party at NYU back when he was just a junior, and the girls he was with had lectured him about the way he had treated Maya. He, too, had immediately jumped into a seat the moment he was told.
"Neither one of you has any control of this, I hope you understand that," Jack said, standing in front of them both with his arms crossed firmly across his chest. "Maya is going to pick whoever she picks," He informed them.
"Rachel loved the both of you," Lucas pointed out. "How'd she pick?"
"She loved me like a boyfriend," Jack stated.
"And she loved me like a brother," Eric chimed in.
"You're the brother," Josh smirked at Lucas.
"I'm the love of her life," Lucas snapped.
"Sure," Josh rolled his eyes. "I'm sure that message got to her loud and clear while you were making out with Riley for the past year," he said sarcastically.
"Because she told me to!"
"Because you're her brother!"
"The love of her life!"
"Do you even realize what you're doing to her?" Josh asked, jumping to his feet. "She's a mess and it's all your fault! You went to her and told her you loved her and now she feels like she has some choice to make even though she doesn't really love you," Josh snapped.
"Yes she does!"
"Says who? Says some incidents in middle school when she had a little crush on you? God, Lucas, come on," Josh rolled his eyes. "If she loved you, she never would have pushed for you to date Riley. She wouldn't be dating me. You put this idea into her head with a few moments you thought meant something more and now she's miserable," Josh snapped.
"Are you insinuating that I'm taking advantage of her compassion?" Lucas asked, jumping to his own feet.
"I'm insinuating that you knew how she would react to that! You didn't want her before, Lucas. Why now? Why are you doing this now that I have her? Do you not realize that I love her and I need her? I'm not going to let you take her from me," Josh said.
"She's not property, Josh," Lucas said darkly, eyes narrowing. "She's not something that can be taken or possessed. I love her, Josh and if she wants to be with me than I'm going to be with her. If she wants to be with you? Well, I'm not gonna just let that happen," Lucas threatened.
"That's fine," Josh shrugged. "But I'm not going to just let her pick you. Even if she does pick you and you think you're with her…I'm going to be there waiting for the second that you mess up," Josh told him.
"So we're agreed?" Lucas asked.
"Oh, we're agreed," Josh nodded.
"I'm confused," Eric whispered, leaning in towards Jack. "What did they agree on?"
"Eric, you made a mistake bringing them here," Jack said, watching the two boys and ignoring his friend's question. "They're not like you and me…not at all and they're not just gonna Maya decide the way we let Rachel decide. They're going into an all out war," Jack explained.
"Jackie? Hold me? I'm scared," Eric threw his arms around his best friend and ducked his head behind the other boy.
"How long do you think Lucas is gonna be at Jack's?" Farkle asked, staring around Times Square with an excited look on his face.
Lucas had dropped them off to let them enjoy themselves so that he could talk to Jack alone. He had told them to knock themselves out and do whatever they wanted while he was gone, but he hadn't given them any indication of how long he would be.
He'd insisted that he would send them a text when he was leaving Jack's so that they could meet back up where he had dropped them off.
There was plenty to do in Times Square, even at the late hour, but there was too much to do when they had no idea how long they had. And Farkle wanted to get to as much as possible.
"Long enough for us to hit um M&M world," Zay grinned.
"I like the way you think," Farkle grinned back and the boys were off.
Maya woke up at the sound of a car door slamming shut.
She slowly forced herself into a sitting position and saw a cute, white, colonial house with a large wrap around front porch and a small, neat front yard that housed a beautiful garden. It was the type of house that Maya could imagine Lucas having growing up in, if he had never left Texas. Beautiful, large, and nothing like one would find in New York City.
Maybe it was some sort of sign?
Josh was, after all, a city boy. Regardless of the fact that he didn't grow up in New York City, he was still from a bigger, highly populated area. He loved New York City with all his heart and when he excitedly talked to Maya about plans for the future they involved always residing in heavily populated, lively cities. Namely, New York City and Los Angeles.
Lucas, however, wanted the small town life. Even if he never went back to Texas, he couldn't see himself settling down in New York City because he didn't want to raise a family there. He constantly stated how bad he felt that his friends grew up with a concrete jungle as their surroundings, rather than wide open spaces.
Maya couldn't fault him for that.
Sometimes, she felt lost in the shuffle of the world around her. Everything was happening but she wasn't changing. Not enough to realize it as it was happening, at least. Not compared to everything that was happening around her all of the time.
And then she saw Topanga knock on the door, only to greeted by a gorgeous, tall, leggy red head with a short, messy pixie cut. That was when Maya realized that they had arrived.
She had never seen a picture of Rachel before. She had no idea what the girl looked like, but something about this confident, earthy female with a sweet smile was her. She didn't seem like the type of girl that would have two guys fighting over her, but Maya knew that she didn't seem like the type of girl guys fought over either.
So, something about it seemed right.
"Riles," She shot forward, shaking her best friend's shoulders to wake her up. "Riles! We're here!" she said excitedly.
"What? Where?" Riley shot forward, slamming her head against the visor she had lowered, despite the darkness of the sky around her.
"Come on," Maya insisted, throwing open the car door and leaping out of the vehicle.
Riley was right behind, chasing after her best friend. When the two girls reached Topanga, they were out of breathe but they still had bright, hopeful smiles stretched across their faces. Their eyes still sparkled with that same ignorant innocence.
Maybe, years ago, Maya had sat in the bay window and told Riley that hope was for suckers. Maybe, in a different life, with a few other thinks happening just a little differently, she would still believe that hope was futile. At least, it was for people like her.
When Maya was younger, she was sure that people like her didn't deserve a happy ending. While she never saw life as being fair, she figured that people with bad circumstances and terrible home lives didn't deserve to have nice things happen to them. They just wouldn't know how to handle it.
The people like Riley, however, were used to getting good things so good things would happen to them all of the time. They wouldn't know how to cope with the fact that things didn't go their way.
It was why Maya had never been able to get mad at Riley when they were younger. Whenever something bad happened to Riley and the brunette was unable to comprehend the terrible occurrence, Maya couldn't hold it against her. After all, she was raised to believe that everything happened for a reason and that good things happened to good people.
Maya believed the same, in a sense. In all actuality, she believed that people who had good things happen to them became good people. They were the ones with the best educations which allowed them to get the best jobs. They were the ones who got married to the more successful people and actually found love.
A long, long time ago, Maya had believed that.
She had believed that people had no control in their own lives. They would, instead, be stuck in an endless cycle where they were unable to improve their situation from what it had been when they were born.
Now?
Well, now it was hard for Maya to ever believe that she had said hope was for suckers.
Because now?
Hope was the only thing keeping her going.
