A/N: Hey everyone! Glad to hear you're liking the deleted scenes idea! Let me know what you'd like to see!

A/N2: The new chapter of "We Three Hearts" is up!

March 24th 2020

Chapter 84
Their Music to Celebrate

Even if she hadn't asked him to keep an eye on her and her 'pensive' side, Lucas would have done it, and he would have known to do it, right from the next morning.

When he woke up, he found his little spoon had gone sideways, turned on her back and staring at the ceiling, arm slung over her head and fingers moving like they were either conducting or playing something. He almost didn't want to move, didn't want to bother her or interrupt her. But then she turned her head and looked at him.

"Morning," she smiled.

"Been awake long?" he asked, pulling close enough so he might kiss her good morning.

"What's long?" Maya shrugged. "I really can't wait until tonight. I need to be on a stage right now."

"You say the word, I will be your audience," Lucas told her, which made her laugh.

"So, no time travel then."

"Afraid not," he shook his head, and she gave a half-hearted sound of disappointment. "Just going to have to get through the day somehow."

"Can we 'get through the day' in Houston? With Sophie and the others?"

They would leave to pick up the rest of the band shortly after breakfast, which would get them to Houston somewhere mid-morning, closer to lunch. They were aiming to be at Josie's place by five, giving them time to set up before the party finally kicked off, guests and all. This left them several hours to just hang out with their friend, which was all they could ask for, and the same could be said for Sophie. Now that she could get around on her own, even if it meant hopping along with her walker, it wasn't so much of a thing that she needed assistance the way she did in the beginning. This meant that there would be those times where she was alone, and she did not particularly care for 'alone time recovery.'

When they all showed up, the band and Lucas together, Sophie looked as though she could have kissed every single one of them.

"You look like you were a minute away from rearranging the bookshelves," Rosa declared.

"Don't give her any ideas," Riley whispered.

"You know my ears were one of the things that didn't get damaged?" Sophie asked the both of them, never losing her smile for a second.

"Sorry," Riley mumbled, elbowing Rosa.

"Ow! I mean… sorry," she frowned at Riley before looking to Sophie.

"Well, you could apologize by taking me to this gig of yours tonight," the young officer beamed with victory.

Getting through the rest of the day – the part before the show anyway – was still going to be a challenge, even as they hung out together, all of them and Sophie. Already, Maya would still be thinking about Audra and the deal. Lucas knew she was, he could see it on her face, recognized the signs. It was only made more complicated when somewhere around three in the afternoon her phone gave off the bell that said she had a new e-mail. It wasn't like she never received any other ones from day to day, and yet when the bell chimed, both Maya and Lucas sort of paused, froze, looking to each other.

Is that it?

Maya pulled out her phone in as casual of a way as one could and took a look at her notifications. There was the tiniest flicker in her expression that told Lucas it was indeed Audra's offer.

"Maya, can I talk to you? Upstairs?" Lucas asked her, also going for casual. Even so, it was random enough that it drew the other girls' attention. Maya was looking at him and now her eyes gave off 'I'm shaking my head at you' vibes.

"Yeah, okay," she stood up, and he followed.

"Just so we're clear, you guys don't live here anymore, keep it clean!" Sophie called after them.

"Wasn't even thinking about that until you said it!" Maya called back.

They ended up – because it would have felt weird to go anywhere else and they wanted a closed door in case anyone came snooping – in the bathroom. Standing there, facing one another, the phone sat in her hand, in between them, and it felt very much like it could burst any second with the way they stared at the thing.

"Are you going to open it?" Lucas asked her.

"I… I mean I want to, I really do, but... well… Look, I'm screwed either way. If I open it, and I see what it says, I won't be able to stop thinking about it tonight at Josie's. And if I don't open it…"

"You're going to think about it anyway," he guessed.

"Bingo," Maya nodded, breathing out. "So which one's the lesser of two evils?" she asked, looking at him with an almost pleading smile for him to get her out of this mess.

"Is it easier to know or not know?" he asked. She blinked.

"Well, one means I know what's on the table, whether it gets me all jumpy happy or sends me swirling in the dumps all night…" she started to reply.

"Okay…" Lucas slowly nodded.

"And then the other… the other means the contents of Audra's e-mail is left at the mercy of my imagination all night. You know how that can go."

"So, so many places," he nodded again.

"Right, so…"

"Screwed," he agreed.

"So screwed…" she groaned, letting her head thump against his chest. She pulled it back just as fast, which stalled him mid reach to hug her. "What if you read it?"

"Uh…" he shook his head.

"You can tell me if it's good, and if it's not, well then you don't say, like ever."

"Tell me how that would work exactly," Lucas pointed out. She looked at him, reaching the same conclusion he'd done. She could read him so much better than he could read her, and something like this? Yes, he'd managed to keep his plans for his proposal and the house renovation a secret for months on end, but that was different, that was subterfuge and also starting from a place where she had no idea anything was even happening. Here she would know that he knew what the e-mail said, and there would be no hiding from her.

"No, you're right," she sighed. "Back to hugging, back to hugging," she gestured, setting her head down again. He chuckled and did as told.

"I say wait until we're home, after the party. It'll be a lot easier for you to just get your head in the game once you all start to play."

"Yeah… okay… yeah… I can do that. See, I knew you could figure it out," she smiled now. "How long before that happens?"

"Few hours still," he reported. She groaned.

Little by little, the hours finally faded away, and they were all on their way to Josie's. What started out as having Sophie tag along ended with Sophie, Chiara, Asher, and Ray tagging along. There was a moment where they wondered if Josie would have a problem with Lucas bringing extras like this, but there really wasn't.

"She actually said 'the more the merrier.' She said it and she meant it!" Maya whispered to Lucas as they headed into the house with their load of the instruments. "No clue what's going on with her?"

"Who says anything has to be going on?" Lucas shrugged.

"Me. I say," Maya pointed to herself. "No one changes like that on a whim, no way. Good or bad, something happened, I'm telling you."

"Well, she hasn't said anything."

"Why are we whispering?" They jumped, turning to find Asher trailing behind them with Riley's keyboard.

"Nothing… No, we're just talking, it's fine," Maya told him.

"About her?" Asher asked, nodding back to where Josie stood talking with Zelda.

"Hey, hey, stop that before she looks over here," Maya stalled, which nearly sent the three of them crashing.

"Wait, is she the one you were telling us about?" Asher looked again. "The Dark Lord?"

"Eyes front, Garcia," Maya very nearly stomped his foot. Asher looked back at the two of them. He chuckled, moving along with the instrument.

The set up may not have been part of the show, but sometimes it did feel like it was. They arrived to an empty stage, which was really just an empty floor, and little by little they made it into their space, where they would come and make their music. It was an essential step, and it started them on the road to getting hyped up.

"At the risk of making trouble where there's none, are you good to go?" Lucas asked, as the first of the guests, the first of his classmates, started to arrive, which meant that Maya and the rest of the band needed to clear out until the start of their show. In response, she gave him her phone, with the notification still on the lock screen.

"Hold on to this for me please?" she smiled. He nodded, kissing her for good luck, and then they went their separate ways.

The next few hours were something of a whirlwind, the way any show would be. That feeling Maya had been eager to get to that morning as she woke, she found it without difficulty, from the moment she stepped up to that microphone. She loved to perform. She may not have wanted to make it her life, but she still loved it like almost nothing else in the world. By the time they were all sitting in the minivan again, with Lucas driving the band back to Austin, she had that wide awake exhilaration look on her face. The day had felt endless, but the two-hour drive, and the drop off of the bandmates, looked like it had lasted two seconds in her brain.

They arrived at the house and Maya made a direct line for the basement. She had a new song working its way through her, Lucas had seen it in her eyes since the day before, and now, after tonight, it was coming right out, from her mind and into her fingers, into her voice. He could hear her as he went up to check that Sam was there and he was sleeping. He was there, and he was sitting on his bed, but he was also reading by flashlight.

"Hey," he looked up. "I was just…"

"It's fine, just finish the chapter and get some sleep after?" Lucas told him.

"I will," Sam promised, and Lucas knew he would.

He went down to the basement after this, finding Maya sitting in the room that looked very empty without the instruments still sitting in the back of the minivan. By now she had two guitars, one she took out on shows and one that stayed home. That one had once belonged to Kermit Hart, and it had been left to her. She still held it, but she'd stopped playing. She was looking at her phone, which rested on the floor in front of her.

"Waiting for me?" Lucas asked.

"Little bit," Maya smiled up at him.

"I'm here," he sat down next to her as she set the guitar aside in its case. She picked up the phone and opened the e-mail without hesitation. There was a quick note, and then a few attached documents. The note had told her which one to open first, the one she needed to look through with Topanga.

"I might be a little too tired to make sense of this right now, you can read it, too, yeah?"

"Yeah, I'm good," he promised.

X

TWO DAYS LATER

"Do it."

Those were the first words out of Topanga Matthews when Maya opened the door and found her standing there, looking entirely in Lawyer Mode.

"Are you sure?" Maya blinked. She'd passed along the e-mail, attachments and all, that night after the show, after she and Lucas had read through everything. They'd been left feeling optimistic, but then it was the middle of the night and they were both really tired, so maybe it was just wishful thinking.

"After I finished going through the documents yesterday I got in touch with Ms. Watts," Topanga nodded, as Maya let her into the house and they went to sit in the living room.

"You did?"

"We spoke about the offer, and about you. You might have a better deal now than you did going into this. I spoke to her, and a few other people. You wanted my counsel, well this is it. Call her back, say yes, if you want to say yes. This is and always will be your choice, and I will be with you every step of the way when you need me. My fee is very reasonable. You and Lucas need to come over for dinner more often," Topanga smiled, and Maya was all smiles, too, as she agreed to 'the fee.'

X

ONE WEEK LATER

"Wait, this is for real?" Nadine gasped.

"Maya, this is amazing!" Kayla signed.

"I knew something was up!" Rosa pointed at her.

"Can I get in on that 'more dinners' deal, too?" Riley beamed.

As much as she'd hated keeping them in the dark up to now, telling her friends and bandmates about the contract was possibly the best thing she could have asked for in compensation. There had been this very brief moment of fear, thinking that any of them might be in any way upset about it, that they might resent her in some way or not want to be in the band anymore. Instead, and really as she should have expected it, the four of them had been nothing but thrilled for her.

"Okay, but wait, what does it mean for us?" Rosa asked, after the hugs and the giddiness had been pulled back in halfway. The others looked to Rosa, and then to Maya. "Like… all the songs you did before, for us, for Weaver Kings, and the ones you'd do for us from now on?"

"The before stuff is before," Maya promised them. "And whatever I write for us now, that'll be ours, too," she went on. "Your mom made sure of that," she looked to Riley. "It was our make or break rule, and they agreed. Audra was all for it, too. She's a big fan of the band, remember?" Now that the brief concern was put aside, the celebration could resume.

As a way to kick off summer, Maya really couldn't think of anything better. Of course, there would be a lot of good things, great things. There was the camp, and Abigail and James and the kids coming over, and there was Lucas and Sam being out of school, which meant more time at home… And now there was the anticipation for what this new chapter would bring.

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners