April 10th 2021

Chapter 100
Our Start For the Year

Lucas offered to follow her all the way to school, to help get the boxes from the minivan and into her class. There was no way for her to hear this and not know that this was him wanting to lend extra support, especially knowing about this new wrinkle brought on by Dylan and the offer he had received. It was just as clear then for Lucas to understand, when Maya promised him that she could handle it on her own and he should wait for his mother to pick him and Marianne up as they'd already decided, that much as she appreciated his offer she really needed to go forward on her own.

"You have a good time with your dad, okay, pumpkin?" Maya pressed many a solid kiss to her daughter's cheek before she could hand her back to Lucas. "I will see you tonight, and I will tell you all about my day. Sound good? I love you so, so much."

"So, am I sending pictures? Videos?" Lucas asked, when she finally did pass him the baby. She looked like she wasn't so ready to go just yet.

"I…" Maya considered the question for a moment. Finally, she gave a decisive nod. "I'm going to try and stick this out as long as I can without a fix, just be ready to bail me out if I finally give in."

"Stocking up, understood," Lucas nodded, which made her laugh before moving forward to touch his face.

"For the record, I'm going to miss your face, too, so just keep that in mind when you're 'stocking up,'" she air-quoted. He kissed her, and she leaned into it as well as she could, minding where they were, and the presence of Marianne almost sandwiched in between them. "One more, one more," Maya smiled, pressing new kisses to Marianne's outstretched hand. "And now I have to go, alright."

As she drove up to the school, she took a breath and let it out. After all this time, even as she came in a few times over the last few weeks, there was still something about arriving on the first day of class. When she'd been growing up, back in New York, the first day of school had held a much different power in her eyes, and that was understandable. She had struggled to stay on top of things, and not just when it came to classes, and grades. The first day of class would feel like she'd been released from captivity for two months and some, only to be snatched up again and forced back in her cage.

All that had changed after she'd come to Texas. Even that very first one… Maybe especially that one… She'd been apprehensive, beyond measure, and for good reason. She'd been new, both in the school and in the whole state of Texas. There were just so many things that could go wrong for her. But those thoughts hadn't last very long, not long at all. Because she'd met Lucas, and Zay, and Asher, Dylan, Nadine… That day had completely turned her life around, whether she knew it or not. And it hadn't exactly been the first day of class, just her first day, with the year recently begun. But it was the beginning, and every new year's start only strengthened her resolve that the first day of school was a very necessary, very welcome reset. And today, after having been away for a whole year, oh… The feeling was wonderful.

But what about Dylan? And the Munroes?

"This is the first day," she told herself as she parked the minivan. That was all she needed to remember. She looked down to her left arm, to the owl, the nightingale, the swan… They made her smile, and she was good to go.

A couple days back, when she and Lucas and Marianne had gone to dinner at the Hunter Hart house, her grandfather had equipped her with a foldable hand trolley. He was well aware of her diaries, and the back and forth transportation of those boxes. Now she had her trolley right there in the back of the minivan, and she loaded it with the four boxes before heading into the school. It was going to require some getting used to, maneuvering this thing with the weight of all those sketchbooks. Plus, she really didn't want to damage the boxes, not one single corner.

Stella… Like anything with a strong enough connection to a memory, to a person, the boxes now made her think of the girl who'd decorated them. This morning though… They made her think of the situation, how it had been and how it was likely to be in the days and weeks to come. They also reminded her of those times where her student had shown clear and understandable signs that she was noticing the hiccups. She knew something was going on, that it had to do with her teacher and her best friend, but she didn't know what it was. It had been easier to dodge the subject when she was on leave, but that was all over now. What a great time for a new wrinkle…

What was she supposed to do? Telling her would be putting her in the same position Maya was herself, and she would either end up telling Phoebe or be forced to lie to her best friend. Maya wouldn't do that to her. But the longer she left this unattended, the more she inadvertently tipped her hand, the likelier it was that she could cause exactly the thing she was trying to prevent.

She was going to have to do everything in her power to act normal, all of the time. She couldn't flinch, couldn't emote in any way that showed what she was thinking, if she thought about that whole mess. She was going to have to commit. She would jump right in. The time was just about right for her to hear those words she had missed hearing most every morning.

"Alright, come on, Grandpa," she huffed, turning the trolley on to the path that would bring her to the front of the school instead of the side door, where she'd been headed. She'd been referring to the trolley that way, as long as she'd had it. Her grandfather's mustache had twitched a smile into sight when he'd heard her say that, and if she needed any reason to hold on to the name…

"Hey, Mrs. Friar!"

There they were… Stella, and Phoebe, and this morning… Taylor Munroe. He might be the hardest test to her resolve if the goal was for her to act normally. At fifteen, the boy still looked so much like his older half-brother, to the point where it felt impossible to Maya that he and Dylan should be seen side by side and the fact that they were born of the same mother would not be painfully obvious to anyone. He even had the hair, framing his face near exactly the way Dylan's had done back when they were the ones starting high school. And he had started wearing it shorter in college, but in recent years he'd started letting it grow out again. He may have had a bit of facial hair on him, which the Munroe boy did not, but other than that… It was properly… uncanny.

She must have resolved these thoughts a lot better than she expected herself to have done. When she and the trio reached other, there was nothing to suggest to her that anyone – Stella, for instance – was wondering what was wrong with her. They just looked happy to see her, the girls at least. As for Taylor, it wasn't so much that he was unhappy to see her, more like he didn't know her all too well, and she was his teacher, and it was the first day of school, his first in high school. It was a lot, and here he was, dragged along by his big sister to talk to a teacher. If that wasn't bad enough for his 'status' among the student body, this was followed by his sister and her best friend taking the liberty to hug this teacher, in plain view.

"You're allowed the one," Maya laughed, even as she allowed herself the same. "Day hasn't even started and you two are going to make me cry," she breathed and tried to control her tears. "How are you seniors already?" she asked them both. It was never going to stop making her emotional, was it? Seeing her littlest ones become her biggest, remembering how they had been at the very beginning and now… "And Taylor, hello," she turned to the boy, showing his difference from his brother in that Dylan would never have been so shy around a stranger, even if they were a teacher. He'd be like a curious puppy, almost sniffing around to find out if the other person would be nice, what they would be about…

"Hello," he looked at her. Phoebe reached over at this, poked behind his ear until he moved in reaction. "Stop it!" he swatted at her hand. She just did it again until, after about three pokes, Taylor's proper personality was summoned out of hiding by a clever dodge. It brought out a victorious little smile, in no way harsh, more so competitive, and amused. It opened up this notion that he'd be great on the basketball team, and from there it was nearly impossible not to think about Dylan, except if Taylor – and Phoebe for that matter – got his skills from anyone, it wouldn't be by his mother but his father… who had once been Mr. Orlando's teammate. Don't start going down that road.

"Alright, I need to get in there and start setting up for first period," Maya tapped Grandpa's handle.

"I can help," Stella offered at once.

"Sold," Maya beamed.

"I'm going to show him to his locker and his first class, but I can come and do that, too," Phoebe jumped in.

"I can figure it out on my own," Taylor protested at this suggestion of an escort.

"Come on, I've been waiting to do this all summer," Phoebe laughed. She pulled her brother by the arm, and to his credit he went ahead and matched his sister's pace. It was really the first time that Maya saw the two Munroe kids interact in this way, and to see how they clearly had a strong bond between the two of them… It made her smile, made her think of her own siblings, of Sam especially, who'd been the closest thing she had to a brother that she got to grow up with.

"Okay, let's go," Maya told Stella as she tipped the trolley and turned it to start toward the ramp. There was no way she was going to attempt the stairs with this.

"Looks heavy," Stella commented as she skittered ahead, the better to open the door when they'd get to it.

"You're not wrong," Maya informed her, exaggerating a grunt just a bit. "But see how nice it looks," she went on with a smirk as she indicated the stack. She hadn't even noticed, not until she put them all one on top of the other, how Stella had done the designs to run into one another, to connect. The Freshmen would rise into the Sophomores, who'd get into the Juniors, and them into the Seniors, until the top-most box appeared to extend into an unseen next step… College, life, whatever it would bring.

"I was worried I might have gotten the alignment wrong," Stella told her, her smile coming almost at a shake. Maya would expect no less, still seeing so much of that Shy Bird in her, but at the same time some of that shake felt like the tremor of the very first nostalgia rattle in the senior girl. She was just now realizing it was all coming to an end.

"Hey, hey," Maya's voice had the potency of a back rub. "Year's just starting, remember?"

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners