Chapter 98
That Sweet Melody

It was not hard to see why, but Maya would take a particular pleasure whenever she'd get approached by kids when she worked at the store. They were so ready to make something, to bring whatever little beast of creation existed in their hearts and mind out into the world. They were so eager, and when she would help them find what they needed… Oh, it was so good. It told her she was headed right where she belonged.

She was starting to have regulars by now, adults all of them, seasoned artists. And then she had… Well, she didn't know her name, but in her mind she called her the waif. It was the word that immediately came to her when she'd spot her. Maya would say she was all of nine or ten, but she could have been older, twelve at the most. Something in the way she carried herself had the ability to make her appear so very small. Her hair descended like waves that landed beyond her lower back, which might have played into obscuring the rest of her and skewing the perception of her size. Her face was a spray of freckles, her eyes, what she'd seen of them, might have been a light brown, or a green. Not blue, not gray… a forest. Her hands rarely made an appearance past her sleeves.

Maya had seen her so many times now that it became part of her experience, working at the store. She'd never actually spoken to her. She would be there on her own though, no parents, which would inspire most people to approach her, to ask if she was alone or what she was looking for. But they'd see her, and there would be this distinct feeling of trust. She knew what she was doing here. She would find what she was looking for, she would pay, and she would leave.

Finally, there came this day when she couldn't just come and go on her own. The thing she wanted was too high for her to reach. Maya had seen her stand there for a few minutes, considering her options, trying to come up with a solution, and there was none. She stared up, a quiet determination in her eyes. It might have been the most that Maya ever saw of her face up to now, and as she approached her she decided her eyes were brown, yes, bordering on gold.

"Which one do you need?" Maya asked, and the girl startled and stepped back. She pressed her lips together for a moment before pointing. Maya looked up. "The big box there?" she looked back down, pointing, too. The girl nodded. "Are you sure? It's expensive," she explained. The girl pulled down her backpack, crouched, reached inside, and from her wallet presented two fifty-dollar bills. "Birthday present?" Maya guessed, and she was treated to a shy but ardent smile covered in braces. "Do a lot of painting?" she asked, while the girl put her money away again. Another nod.

Maya looked to the big box, then to the girl again. Standing close to her for the first time, she thought she could see specks of paint on her fingers, on the ends of her sleeves, definitely on her jeans and her boots. She hadn't heard a word out of her yet, but it felt, after observing her all this time and now interacting with her, that she knew her well enough to say she felt a kinship that needed no words at all.

"Can I show you something?" Maya asked. The girl looked to the box up on the shelf. But I've been waiting for this, her eyes said. "Trust me? One artist to another?" she smirked, and that did it. The waif would follow.

For a fleeting moment, she worried that she might have led her on wild goose chase. She was sure they still had one in the store, that she'd seen it… They hadn't sold it, had they? No, no… She remembered now. Grabbing the ladder on the way, she brought the girl to a shelf near the stock room doors. Scaling up, she pulled down the box she'd been seeking and brought it back down. Sitting on one of the low steps of the ladder, she presented the set to her young customer. On closer inspection, she'd say now she could have been twelve after all… maybe freshly thirteen, going by the bills in her bag.

Her eyes genuinely flashed gold as she inspected this thing she was shown. A tentative hand reached out as she read over the description of the contents. Maya saw the way her fingers almost came to drum at the surface, shaken with the anticipation of so many possibilities.

"Sound good?" Maya smiled.

"Yes," the girl whispered as though it had not been intentional so much as reactionary.

"All done for today?" A nod. "Alright, let's go then." Maya carried the box over to the registers for her. Beverly was at the main one this morning, and she greeted the girl's approach with a great smile. She knew her very well, too, probably more than Maya did, if she'd interacted with her here on her previous visits.

"Thought I'd be seeing you today," Beverly nodded. The girl dropped her bag on the counter, opening it as wide as it would go after she'd passed over the two bills. On the inside, traced in marker, Maya discovered her name. Stella.

The purchase completed, she helped slip the box inside the bag. It was a snug fit, but it closed without strain. Maya helped slip it on to the girl's back. The long hair was pulled over her shoulders, half on each side, rather than to risk it getting pulled under the weight of the bag.

"Good to go?" Maya asked her. A smile, a nod. "Got a ride home?" Another nod. "Okay… I'll see you around then. Happy birthday."

"Thank you," Stella quietly replied, and she was gone.

The encounter had sparked something in Maya, something she couldn't quite explain. She felt… compelled. She just didn't know what to.

Her lunch break started before Lucas' and most times she would end up sitting in the food court to wait for him to join her. She would check her messages, or she'd call home to see how the boys were doing… Today, instead of moving one way on her way out of the art store, she went the other way. She wasn't even thinking like she was going somewhere in particular, and then she stopped in front of the windows to the music store.

It wasn't as though she never came here anymore; she'd been here just a few evenings back, before her shift started. But she was here now, and it felt different, it felt like she was here for a reason. Now, if she could only understand what that reason was…

Somedays, she forgot she used to be in a band. She forgot that she'd helped start this band, with her friends, that she'd written songs, that she'd done shows with them, and videos, and so many crazy things. She'd been on the radio, on television… It was in the past now. She'd left it all behind, when she and Lucas had made the choice to move back to Austin when they were going to be having Elliott. She'd never looked back, and she was fine with that… wasn't she?

There was no TXNY anymore. They'd kept it going for a while after she left, but then it quietly just sort of… stopped. For a while, it would be like they wouldn't admit it to themselves. If they didn't say anything, didn't say 'it's over,' then it still existed, and they were just taking a break. They'd finally said it now, a couple weeks back. The band was dead, wouldn't return to life. And that was okay. It was sad to them, but it was okay. They still had a quiet sort of following online, but it was little more than that. They were still friends, they would remain friends, for as long as they were in the world, and wasn't that what really mattered?

When she'd made the choice to quit the band, Maya had held on to this notion of being involved in some way, even if from a distance. She could write them songs, even if she wasn't there to perform with them, right? And she could write for other people, too. It would be great, would've been great, if she'd actually followed through on it. But then, of course, Elliott being born had shifted a lot of her priorities. It had to. That was why she'd given up the band in the first place. She'd given up one role in favor of another, and it was the right call.

She might have gone back to it in the end, might even have swept in and rallied the band back together, but then… Noah… and her father… She'd gotten further and further away from the idea of music as something she did. She had penned some words to her father's lullaby melody, and that was about it. The extent of her music revolved around singing to her boys. It was always appreciated, she didn't doubt it, but it wasn't the same as… as…

She jumped when she felt her phone vibrate in her pocket, and she blinked as she pulled it out to see… I'm here. Where are you?

Maya left the store window and hurried off toward the food court. She apologized for the delay, and she and Lucas went to get their food. They talked about their mornings, swapped stories. She told him about her encounter with Stella, a name finally added to the legend of the waif. She didn't mention the nature of her detour. The thought was still working at the back of her mind, but she preferred to leave it there, unattended, just… spinning upon itself.

Her parents were looking after the boys today, and so it was to their house that she went as she left the mall that day. Lucas would join her there when he was through with his own hours.

"Maya!" a squeal greeted her arrival, and it brought along a brown-haired blur as five-year-old Nellie jumped into her arms.

"Hi!" Maya laughed, giving all the hugs and kisses that a greeting of the sort deserved. She got giggles in return, and when she finally set one twin down, the other was right there, waiting for her turn. "Hey there, Mouse-Mouse," she gladly swept her up, planting one good kiss to the side of her head. Gracie's arms held to her with a tenderness free of frenzy, compared to her twin.

"Me now!" a squeak and the tap of a small hand at her leg got her to set the second girl down as well, there to find three-year-old MJ staring up at her.

"You now?" Maya asked her brother, and he nodded. "Okay!" she pulled him up, squeezed him good, and the boy laughed. "That's three of you now," she counted off, pointing to each of her young siblings in turn. "I'm missing someone though…" she intoned for extra effect.

"Up there!" Nellie pointed to the stairs.

"Yeah? Let's go see who's there…"

Did she take some small pleasure out of seeing the surprised look she got, saying how her eldest son had an uncle who was younger than him? Maybe a little. Sure, it was not quite half a year's difference, but that almost surprised them more, thinking how she and her mother had been pregnant at the same time. If she threw in the fact that she'd been expecting one son when her mother had started her pregnancy and she'd been expecting another by the time her little brother was born, well…

"Hello, boys…" Maya quietly drawled, walking into the nursery.

There was a second crib here, which her parents had insisted on having, for whenever they hosted their grandsons. Just now, it appeared she'd walked in on nap time. In one crib, she found her sprout and bee, sleeping side by side in a near huddle, while in the other…

"Alexander…" she smiled, moving to where she could see her little brother awake and sitting up.

To look at him, it could be assumed he was just like any other sixteen-month-old boy. He was like any other boy his age, he was curious, he absorbed the world around him from newness into familiarity. He was a funny little kid, he loved to laugh… The one difference was that he couldn't see. If there was anything at all, it couldn't have been more than shadows, she couldn't say for sure, not with him being so small still.

But then when she'd walked into the nursery just now, when she'd spoken and seen him… He'd heard her, and he knew she was here. He lifted his chin, he reached his hand… You're here. She went and picked him up, even as the rest of her siblings caught up to her.

"Found him!" MJ called out, only to get shushed by the twins before the girls went to see if he'd woken up their nephews. They had. Elliott blinked and looked around, while Noah looked ready to cry until Gracie reached her hand through the bars and found his.

"It's okay, Noah," she told him, while Nellie pressed her face at the bars and smiled at the baby.

Katy arrived just in time now, as she was able to slip in among her little children and pull her grandsons from their crib. She lifted Elliott first and set him on the ground, where he climbed to his feet and moved over to his mother.

"Good thing they were just about done here, huh?" Katy picked up Noah and brushed at his blond curls with a smile. She said this, Maya suspected, for the kids' benefit, so they wouldn't feel bad for waking their nephews, and she saw as much on the trio's faces.

"Yeah," she smiled.

"Alright, come on, guys, here we go. Gracie, take Elliott's hand so he doesn't run off, okay?"

"Okay, Mommy," Gracie nodded before reaching for the boy's hand. She didn't just take it but instead offered hers with a tip of the head. Elliott knew this by now, and he responded accordingly by holding out his hand.

They left the nursery and went down the hall. Elliott could go up and down the stairs by now, that wasn't the issue so much as the fact that he loved going down the stairs… maybe a little too much. He'd very nearly given Pappy Joe a heart attack – according to him – one day while he was watching the boys, when he'd gone too fast and missed a step. It was the last step, sure, and he mostly thumped down on his diapered butt and laughed about it. His great grandfather on the other hand hadn't been concentrated so much on 'it was just one step' and more on the little squeak of surprise and what could have happened if he'd been even a couple steps higher.

Maya kept her littlest brother in her arms as they got down to the living room with her mother and all the kids. She and Katy could almost have been two friends who got together with their respective children, but while they loved messing with people's heads in laying out their family timeline, they were not bothered in the slightest. It was what it was, and they were just happy to get to experience all of it together.

"Lucas told me he picked up that new book Dad wanted," Maya told Katy. In her arms, Alex Hunter had come to stand his small feet on her legs and, upon being turned around to face her, had set his hands at his sister's shoulders before finally deciding to lay himself down against her, his head in the crook of her neck while his little fingers kept drumming at her shoulder. She could hold him like this for hours, and she often did. He seemed to her especially at peace when she would speak or sing, and so she would.

"Right," Katy nodded, with her own baby boy to entertain. Noah was more than content to just tap his hands in his grandmother's palms as they were offered to him. Maya shared a sympathetic smile with her mother over the undertone in her one word. 'Another book,' it said, though not with so much exasperation as could be perceived. Shawn had been picking up a lot of information in the time since Alex had been born, specifically from when it became known to them that the boy would be blind. He wanted to be prepared for him, and there was no blame to that at all.

When Shawn returned from his brief errand and found them all there, it wasn't long that Alex ended up back in his arms, and to see them together… It was the kind of unspoken 'all my children are special and loved to me, but you, you are something else.' For Katy, it would always be Maya, but Shawn, maybe for all the ups and downs they'd gone through to even get him… His relationship with Alex was the most unique. He never wanted any of the others to feel below their little brother, or for them to think it was because of his circumstances, and he didn't even have to go out of his way to prove that to them.

Then he'd be holding Alex, and they could see it. Their bond was a thing separate from the rest. For his birthday last year, Maya had given her father a photo she'd taken of him and the littlest Hunter. It was the kind of shot that happened unexpectedly, just in the right moment, and Shawn had been too caught up with the boy to even realize he'd been photographed. Maya had developed it though, and she'd framed it, and when her father saw it… His gratitude was radiant.

Spending an afternoon with her parents, her siblings, and her sons was just a very distracting sort of chaos, and Maya loved it. For that reason, it wasn't until after dinner, when the kids had all been put to bed and it was just her and her parents, that Maya was made to recall her morning back at the mall. She told them about her encounter with Stella, and it was sort of amusing to remember how even they were aware of the legend of the waif by now. They were happy to hear there had been 'a development.'

Thinking back to those minutes she spent with Stella, it was like reaching back into that little well of light that the girl had lit inside her, just by being there. It brought Maya back there, just as it set her up to remember her quick detour to the window of the music store.

"Something on your mind there, baby girl?" Katy asked. Maya blinked. She hadn't realized her mother was looking at her, or that she'd let the thoughts appear on her face in any way. There was that bond again.

"No, it's nothing," she shrugged. She wasn't sidestepping the subject. She didn't feel as though she had to, and she explained as much. "On my way to lunch, I just went to the music store. Didn't actually go in, but after seeing Stella I sort of had music on the brain, you know? The band, all of that. So, I ended up at the store."

"Hey…" They'd been so caught up in their conversation that none of them heard the door, or Lucas letting himself in, until he was just there, keys still in hand. Maya responded not unlike how the boys would react to seeing him or her. She was all smiles and she motioned for him to come forward. When he did, she pulled at his arm so he would lean closer.

"Hi," she smiled on, stretching up to kiss him. "How was work?" she asked. She had his hand in both of hers, a simple gesture that said 'I have missed you, please stay near me.'

"We had a lot of people showing up because of that big release earlier this week, so long lines at cash," Lucas reported. His nod suggested endless rows snaking all through the store. "But I did get…" he looked to the book in his hand before passing it to Shawn.

"Thanks," Shawn took it and got to looking it over at once. It made Katy smile to watch him, which in turn made Maya smile to see it.

After gathering the boys, they managed to get them both into the car without waking either one, and then they drove on home. Pappy Joe was asleep on the couch with the television when they arrived. Lucas woke him up with a tap to the shoulder and they both went upstairs, Lucas with the sleeping Elliott in his arms. Maya had already gone ahead with Noah, and she had gotten him changed for the night but hadn't set him down yet by the time Lucas joined her. He'd seen to Elliott already, and now their elder boy was settled in.

"I'm having a moment here," Maya whispered. "A 'how is he almost a year old' moment." They still had a little under two months to go before that happened, but they knew they weren't getting out from under that. The big day would be here before they knew it. "And then it turns into a 'that means Elliott will be two after that' moment, and…" she shook her head.

"I had one of those today, too," Lucas nodded as he moved to get ready for bed. Maya pressed a kiss to their baby boy's head before finally putting him down in his crib and starting to change as well.

"Don't think I'm forgetting you in there, twenty-four," she turned a smile to him that made him chuckle.

"Busy month, huh?"

"So many cakes," she agreed. "Next kid, can we aim for… October? November?"

"I… I will do my best," Lucas nodded.

After they climbed into bed, Maya turned to face him. On a night like this, where he came home later because of work and they didn't get to spend so much time together, they would stay awake a little longer, just talking about this and that, catching up on their days. Maya told Lucas about her afternoon with her siblings, dinner with everyone, and he told her about his most memorable encounters with 'motivated buyers,' which was his more polite way of referring to those less than patient types.

"So, I have a question," Lucas spoke, all the while trailing his fingers along her arm.

"Yeah? What is it?" Maya asked. He looked back at her.

"Earlier, at your parents' house, you were telling them about the music store. You didn't mention any of that at lunch, so I'm wondering if what you said, about it being nothing…"

"You were there that long, huh?" she breathed, shifting from having her head propped up in her hand to resting it at his shoulder. He responded in kind and held her.

"Didn't mean to eavesdrop, or just…"

"No, I know," Maya told him. They stayed quiet for a little while. He wouldn't rush anything, and she… she might have had some thoughts to inspect and reconsider. "I guess… I don't know… I do miss it, sometimes, but… It's been so long now that it's not the same. I don't see us getting the band back together, that's not going to happen, and I'm fine with that."

"You don't have to want the band back together to miss music though, right? Just you, singing… You had that before the band. I remember when you'd do open mic at Chubbie's. It'd just be you up there, with your guitar, singing, and I would watch you, and listen to you…"

"And fall madly in love with me…" she chimed in with a grin.

"Oh, that was already a done deal," he reminded her, nudging for her to tip her head back so he might kiss her, which he did, tenderly, slowly. "What's there to stop you from doing that? It doesn't have to be anything more than that. Back to the basics."

"I could see that…" she hummed. I like the sound of that…

"And in a couple years, just imagine, getting to be on that stage, with our boys looking at their mom, listening to you sing…"

"They do love the singing," Maya smiled. Maybe it could work. And all this, she thought, because of one encounter with that shy little bird.

TO BE CONTINUED

See you next week! - mooners