A/N: Hey guys! I haven't done deleted scenes in a little while, I've been having some weird days, but I'm going to do my best and get more done in the next few days!

April 17th 2020

Chapter 108
Their Road to Detours

With the plan for the party's costume theme officially accepted between its hosts, the invitations had gone out late on Monday night. To no surprise, Tuesday thus began with response upon response, in e-mails, in tweets, in texts and other messages. He'd discovered this by waking up to feel a weight over him which turned out to be Maya. She had leaned over him to grab his phone from the night stand and had since remained there, browsing through the responses.

"Hey?" he yawned, casually rubbing her back.

"Your phone was having a seizure over there," she revealed, in absolutely no rush to move away.

"So you rescued it."

"I did."

"Great… Is it okay if I breathe now?"

"If you have to, I guess," she pulled away and plopped down back on her side with a grin.

"Do you mind?" he held out his hand and received his phone.

"I can't help it, I've been on this side of the… planning divide… for years now," she reminded him, with something like innocence in her eyes.

"A tragedy," Lucas smirked.

"Like you wouldn't believe…" she 'sighed.'

They had only gotten to look through some of the responses before Sam called out that breakfast was ready and they had to go. Tuesday was an early start, for Lucas especially, and soon he had to take off on his way to university. The curiosity brought on by the responses, some of them featuring some childhood photos their guests had already dug up for costume inspiration, would have to wait to be fed somewhere between classes, or around lunch.

He had the radio on, he'd willingly admit, mostly in order to catch any of Maya's songs, if they should happen to get airtime. He'd say he caught Ree's at least once a week by now, and the Violets' at least two or three times, if not more. The group was really starting to take off, and a lot of that went to this song penned by his future wife. His pride knew no bounds. Every once in a while he'd also hear some of TXNY's music. Their local station had been good for it for many years now, like they had adopted the local talent as part of their team. Lucas loved when this happened maybe most of all. That was his girl, those were his friends…

He was having one of those special occasions today, halfway up to school, when one of his tires got a flat.

It had all happened very fast, though he still managed to pull to the side of the road before he got stuck in the middle of oncoming traffic, and for a few seconds he sat there, breathing, as Maya's voice sang along from the speakers. He had to silence it, as he turned the key and the car stilled.

This was not good. Alright, that kind of went without saying, but in this case it was made particularly problematic by the fact that he didn't have a spare. He'd taken it out when they had moved Ramona back to her place and now, when he needed it, he remembered that it still sat where he'd left it, back at the house. After getting out of the car now to get a look at the damage, he had to consider his options. It was really only a matter of swapping out the old for a new. He could do that, no problem, no need to call anyone in, he just needed that tire…

Maya was going to be in this important meeting at the theater today, he wasn't going to call her out here with the tire from back home, even if that would have been the easiest solution. All he could do was at least reach out to her, let her know what was happening.

"Are you okay?" she asked, as he finished telling her about the situation.

"Yeah, yeah," he confirmed at once. "Just kind of stranded, not sure who to call, I don't want to have to make anyone go out of their way and…" The idea came to him like a flash, a face popping up in his mind's eye.

"You call him then call me back so I can keep you company until he gets to you," Maya instructed.

"How do you know…" he started to ask, getting a chuckle in return that sounded like 'oh, please.' It made him smile. How could anyone doubt the power of the HalloQueen?

As promised, they hung up and he called her back once he'd called in his assistance.

"Well?" Maya asked.

"He should be here in a half hour or so," Lucas replied, leaning on the side of his stalled car. "Are you at the theater?"

"In my office, yeah," Maya confirmed.

"If your meeting starts, I don't want to hold you back."

"I've got about twenty minutes, and I can spend every last one of them coming up with puns about you 'holding me back,'" she informed him, the air quotes present in her tone.

"I'm sure you could," Lucas replied, feeling just a bit ridiculous in his instinct to keep his voice down, as though any of the other drivers whizzing by in their cars could have caught any of his words. "Or you could hold on to those until tonight, when you and I get to be in the same room…" he went on, taking another look around.

"Now that you mention it, yeah… I like that idea even more," Maya agreed, sounding as though she was trying to keep quiet just as he would. It created this small bubble of existence where the two of them were essentially in a shared space, even though they were miles away from one another.

They had to leave it before long. A little over fifteen minutes of Halloween talk later, Maya had to head off to her meeting, which brought the call to an end. Lucas was left to keep on waiting by his car. Luckily, he didn't have to wait much longer before he spotted a car coming up and pulling on to the side of the road just behind him.

"Now, I know you were eager to hear my lecture today, but that's taking it a bit far, isn't it?" Hank Hillard laughed as he approached his nephew and greeted him with a quick hug and a clap on the back.

"Maybe my car had a mind of its own," Lucas nodded.

The faculty may have been very impressed for his connection to Professor Robinson, but as far as he was concerned, Lucas felt that they should have shown the same attention to his uncle. His class certainly did. Hank would come and guest lecture for them, once or twice every semester, and today was to be one of those. He'd forgotten for a moment, until he'd remembered, while talking to Maya earlier. He'd remembered about the lecture, but more importantly he'd realized it would mean there was a chance Hank was already at the university, which was not too far away from where been brought to stop.

So, Lucas had called him, and he'd explained the situation. He'd asked his uncle if he might have access to a spare tire that would fit to his car, and by chance he did.

"Good thing you didn't have too much trouble out here," Hank declared, as he went and got a look at the flat tire.

"No, I know," Lucas agreed. It could never be a good thing, but out here on this often very busy long road, the incident could have been so much worse.

The two of them went about getting everything set and started with the tire changing. Later, as he'd be driving back home at the end of the day and he would pass the point where he'd been stalled, Lucas would just smile to himself, thinking about how they'd talked about his idea for the Halloween party and his plan to finally follow through on a twenty-one-year delayed goal to dress as his grandfather. Hank had found the entire thing very amusing, especially as Lucas revealed his intention to go all in with the facial hair. He would keep looking back at him like he was trying to imagine what his nephew would look like. What he was left to know, of course, was that he'd look… well, a lot like him, and like his father, and his grandfather… He called it the Friar gift, and requested to be sent a photo once the whole look had been put together. Lucas happily agreed.

After they'd finished with the switch, they'd picked up everything and started off to the university, one behind the other. Everyone was intrigued to know what had held him back and he'd explained it all. With no real harm done, the conversation had quickly turned back to Halloween, all of them wanting to know if he'd seen this photo or read that reply…

To Lucas, it felt as though this Halloween was taking on a life of its own, becoming about something more than costumes, and food, and music… It had started taking that turn in steps, barely noticeable in the beginning, and now it was all just there for him to find. Most of his life, there'd been his father and his grandfather, and then a few years ago he had been reunited with his uncle, who had just not been part of his life, not by choice but circumstance, and the three of them together… Already the family resemblance was enough to make it clear they belonged as a unit, but now Lucas was made to realize – possibly a couple of years after the fact – that he had grown to become part of that unit, on the other side of some divide that, someday, his own kids would occupy.

To find himself here, he was finding it difficult to put into words how much it meant to him, but it did… it meant so much…

When he pulled up to the house, he found he had a welcoming committee. Maya sat on the porch steps, sketchbook open in her lap and drawing, with the forgotten spare tire used as a foot rest. As he came up to her, she lifted up her feet, so he might take up the tire.

"Thanks," he smiled.

"Uh huh," she replied without looking up, though he could feel her eyes on him as he carried the thing back to his car and put it away. Said eyes were back on the page before her as he turned back and walked to rejoin and sit at her side. He leaned over and kissed her temple, which made her smile and turn her attention to him at last, the better to give and receive a proper kiss hello. "Weird day?"

"I've had weirder," he shrugged.

"You're welcome," she tossed back, making him laugh.

"What are you working on?" he asked, nodding to her sketchbook. There was a picture tacked to the corner with a paperclip. She pulled it free now and held it up for him to see. It showed what he'd estimate to be a nine or ten-year-old Maya, Riley, and Farkle, posed together and sitting at a bay window he recognized as being Riley's old bedroom in New York. "Oh, is this the one?" He couldn't help but smile, seeing all three of them that small, smaller than he'd known any of them, Maya especially.

"I think so, yeah," Maya confirmed, holding up her sketch of herself in the updated version. "The girls at the theater already said they'd help me put something together."

"Would this be the same girls who helped you with that dress I still haven't seen?" he pondered.

"The very ones," she confirmed in the same intonation.

"Can't wait to see what you all come up with."

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners