SS 116
The bell that hung above the cafe door rang out as Maya pushed the heavy wood and glass structure open. The space was hustling with its usual customers and clatter. Maya fixed her gaze forward, towards the cafe's front counter. A woman was standing there. A familiar blond head was facing away from her fusing with the espresso machine.
It couldn't be…. Maya took a step forward as the cafe began to fade away around her. Suddenly she was standing in her old apartment. The rent controlled hole in the wall that maya and her mother had lived in for years before they had moved into a bigger place when her mother had married Shawn. Maya found herself sitting on her old sofa. She could hear someone bustling around the tiny kitchen. She rose to her feet and headed in that direction.
The woman was there again. Her back to Maya as she rummaged through a cupboard, humming quietly to herself.
Maya reached out. Wanting to take the women by the shoulder and spin her around. She wanted to see her face. Befor Maya could extend her arm the scene changed again.
Her old apartment was gone and suddenly Maya found herself standing at the front of a church wearing a long white dress. She suddenly knew with certainty that she was at her wedding. She looked out over the people crowded in the pews and saw the faces of all her friends and family and standing at the back, away from all the other guests was the women from the cafe, the women from her old apartment. Her mother.
Maya's eyes flew open, the edges of her dream still clinging to her mind's eye. Her heart was pounding and she had to remind herself to slow her breathing to a normal rate. If it wasn't for Josh sleeping soundly beside her, Maya wasn't sure if she would even beagle to tell where she was. Her mind was still hurtling through space and time. She had slipped into the past before being thrown forward into what could be her future. Maya's head was spinning. The vividness of her dream had set her off kilter. The final moments of her dream had been the clearest she had ever been able to remember her mothers face in a long time.
Maya rarely remembered her dreams but there was something about this particular intense that she knew would stick with her. It confirmed to her what she had on some level always known. Her mother wasn't encaptured in the places they used to be together. It wasn't her old apartment or the cafe that kept her anchored to her mother. Katy would always be with her when it mattered, and not just in the old haunts of her life. It wouldn't be easy to see the cafe become some else's place. It would be difficult to see it become someone else's dream but it was time to let that piece of the past go.
Maya made up her mind in that moment to text Topanaga in the morning and tell her she had Maya's support to sell the cafe if that's what Topanaga wanted to do.
With her mother on her mind and Josh asleep beside her, Maya couldn't help but let her mind drift to a topic that still hurt her heart, that her mother would never know Josh, at least not the way that she should. Katy had known Josh as an extended member of the Matthews family. They had met on a few occasions but they had never had any kind of relationship past that. It hurt Maya that the two would never have a real conversation. That her mother would never know the boy she knew, the one who no matter what always managed to make a bad day better. She felt like her mother was still with her, and she hoped that meant that her mother could see the way she was with Josh, and that she could see how well they fit together.
Maya reached out in the dark, letting the tips of her fingers graze Josh's cheek. Even if she had nothing else, she hoped she would always have this.
…..
"The wind has died down," Josh commented as they made the bed the next morning.
"And the snow has stopped" Maya confirmed as she fluffed up the pillow Josh had tossed at her.
"I should probably make a run for it" Maya concluded with a sigh.
"Now that it's calmed down out there I'm sure campus will be opening up again tomorrow"
Josh shot her a wounded look.
"Don't pout!"
"Why don't you just stay tonight and then go back to campus tomorrow?" Josh offered as a solution.
"Because I am out of clean underwear and I don't want to get up at 6 am tomorrow in order to make it to my 8:30 class"
"Hey I have always told you this is an underwear optional apartment" Josh teased.
" ha ha. I'll be back this weekend, which is only like three days away"
" All i'm saying is that this is just another great example of the benefits of cohabitation"
" I'll make note of that in your file" Josh walked around the bed and wrapped his arms around her.
"Do you want me to walk you back to your dorm?" Josh asked.
"Thank you, but I won't make you brave the subway when it's still this cold out"
"You're worth it"
" agh that was nauseating. When did we become like this?" Maya asked, faking a shutter.
" it just comes so naturally" Josh teased, leaning down to kiss her one last time before she headed out the door.
…...
The snow storm swept out of the city as swiftly as it had swept in. The slush on the streets had melted into tiny running rivers on the sidewalk by the time Maya spent her first night back at the dorms. She had been sad to leave the tiny bubble of being snowed in with Josh. Leaving the world behind for 48 hours had been the exact reset she had needed. Her mind felt much lighter after she had made her final decision about her say about the sale of the cafe. She felt much better about leaving it in Topanga and Cory's hands. She hadn't heard anything more about it since she had called Topanaga with her answer a few days before but she hadn't lingered on it. If the cafe did sell she would see it as a positive thing, and if it stayed in the family she'd view it the same way. It didn't feel like the type of decision that should rest squarely on the shoulders of an 18 year old girl, and she was grateful to be just one piece of the puzzle.
"Do you want to come to a grown up party tonight?" Maya asked Sasha as she rummaged through her closet in search of her favourite top.
"A grown up party? What does that even mean? If this is you trying to rope me into going to dinner with your grandma the answer is a firm no"
"It's not my grandma it's a bunch of grad students"
"We classify grad students as grown ups? Because I guarantee every single TA at this school can drink me under the table, and that's saying something" Sasha commented as she flipped through a magazine on her bed.
"Let's just say that the host is…..fancy" Maya concluded. Maya had decided to invite Sasha along to Kate's latest party as an act of self preservation. Ever since Kate had got into law school she'd started taking herself very seriously, and while her parties had once been casual, they now tended towards the pretentious. While the guests were the same and level of drinking was nothing if not increased, everyone was now expected to dress accordingly and snack on horderves ordered in by a caterer rather than a few different flavours of chips.
Maya thought that inviting Sasha along would provide her with some entertainment, help to mend their relationship, and put a little buffer between herself and Kate.
"You're not really selling it" Sasha muttered, most of her attention taken up by the magazine on her lap.
" There are going to be a lot of single guys there," Maya offered, playing on Sashas weakness.
"Alright i'm sold. What are we wearing?" Sasha asked, bouncing off the bed and towards where Maya stood in front of the closet.
Maya and Sasha debated what outfits would be best as Maya tried to distract herself from the feeling in her stomach that something negative was coming her way.
