June 24th 2020

Chapter 176
Their Joy in Heartbeats

The sun was just starting to gain on the sky when Maya started to open her eyes. For a moment, she didn't know where she was, and then she remembered she was at the Zvolensky house, but why…

Oh… yes… This was the day. The day, their day…

She reached to the night stand by her side, picking up the thing she'd found in her bag the night before, as she'd dug out her PJs for the night. If she had to guess, Lucas had slipped it in there last night, as they were about to say goodnight, right before it had been taken off to the car. She hadn't even seen him do it, but then she'd pulled her shirt from the bag and something had thumped to the bottom. She'd dug her hand in and even as her fingers had touched it, she knew what it was and it made her smile.

Maya had given him this pocket watch, their second Christmas in Austin, ten years ago. It had meant so much for him to have it, but it also meant a lot to her, after they had started a tradition of sorts. Whenever she was going through something stressful, for whatever reason, and he couldn't be with her in person, he would lend her the watch to hold on to, as though he was really there with her after all. When she would give it back to him, they would be together again, and all would be well.

She held it in her palm now, lying back in that ridiculously comfortable bed in one of the guest rooms of Sophie's mother's house. Lucas wasn't here with her this morning, naturally. He'd be back home, sleeping on the couch as he'd told her he would. If he wasn't awake already, which she suspected wasn't the case, he would have to be soon. His preparations for the day may not have been nearly as extensive as her own, but they would still need doing. He wouldn't have this watch to look at, to think of her. Well, he'll have Evil Maya.

The thought made her chuckle, and it felt like this reaction was the spark to light the flame, to properly ignite the blaze. She was getting married today! She could not have predicted how much this knowledge would leave her in a giddy state. It was one day, with a lot of running around, fancy dress, a big party… At the end of the day, it would still be the two of them, they wouldn't suddenly go and grow wings from their backs, or get magical powers. They would be married, and maybe that was only the two of them telling each other what they already knew, and yet…

And yet for this day to have finally come, to know what was about to happen in a matter of hours, her heart just would not sit still. It was doing somersaults in her chest, great trampoline leaps, and all the judges were giving top scores. She wanted to laugh, loudly, wanted to jump around for real. It wasn't an unfamiliar feeling now. She had been very fortunate of late, with her music, with her job at the school, but this was just different, how could it not?

She was marrying this man who had been making her life entirely better, every day of her life since she was thirteen. She loved him and he had loved her back for near on the whole of the time they had known one another. This was no secret, to one another or to the people who would be in attendance today, nor was it a secret they planned to spend the rest of their lives together, to make a family together.

But they would declare it out loud today, with all their people there, and then they would celebrate, because as much as they would have done all those things no matter what, they had earned it. They had found one another early on in life, and they had fallen for one another, finding a love they had nurtured and been nurtured by for all these years, something they could just as easily never have had. Come November 1st, they would mark their tenth anniversary as a couple. Had they been older, this anniversary would easily have happened several years into their marriage. To finally be at this point now, to get to stand together and say the words, exchange rings… It felt like something a long time coming.

Just as she was starting to sit up, there was a knock at the door, quiet enough to suggest the knocker wanted to see if she was awake.

"I will only grand admittance to a giant cup of coffee!" she called out, and a moment later the door opened, ushering in Sophie and Chiara, the latter holding… "Alright, it's not giant, but I'll take it," Maya chuckled. As Chiara brought the cup to her, Sophie cut ahead, climbing on to the bed to happily tackle hug her bride friend. Maya laughed, welcoming the embrace. To see her now, no one would have guessed how close they'd come to lose her, nearly a year and a half ago, unless you spotted any of the scars, of which she had a handful. Those didn't matter nearly as much as getting to see her run and jump around like she once did, or happily dashing up on a bed to show giddiness for a friend.

"So, sleep alright?" Sophie asked, sitting up now. Maya did as much, the better to take her cup and make space for Chiara to join them.

"Yeah, big time. Can I take this bed back with me?" she laughed.

"If only it fit in your bag," Sophie smirked.

"Now that you are awake, we will start breakfast," Chiara told Maya. "The others will be here in a little while."

"How much is a little while? Am I going to have time to eat or is this going to be one of those times where I have to just…" she mimed shovelling her food into her mouth as fast as she could.

"We have to leave no later than one hour from now, so if you go and shower now, we will take care of breakfast and you will be able to take your time… a little bit," Chiara promised, pinching her fingers together.

"Great, I'll just take this in there with me then," Maya got out of bed, heading to the bathroom with her coffee.

As promised, by the time Maya came down, showered and dressed for 'leg one' of the day, there was breakfast on the table, calling to her. Sitting with her friends, she learned that part of the agreement for their part in the 'kidnapping' of either bride or groom was that no one would come along and try to rush either of them out the door this morning. Maya was very thankful for this.

"How are you feeling?" Sophie asked, smiling.

"Like I have restless leg syndrome all of a sudden," Maya laughed, looking under the table to where her feet kept tip-tapping at the floor. "Like I literally have superpowers and they're just waiting to be let out." Chiara incited her to breathe, all the while smiling as knowingly as her wife did. "Right, that," Maya agreed. "How is it that we can get through being apart all day, most days, with school, and work, and right now waiting a few hours feels like forever?"

"It's like if someone tells you not to touch something for a while, suddenly it becomes irresistible," Sophie suggested.

"Well, he is that," Maya agreed, making the others laugh.

"Want to see some pictures?" Chiara asked her.

"Are you patronizing me?" Maya squinted. "Also where are these pictures?" Just as Chiara took out her phone, happy to dig up some shots she might not have seen from the rehearsal dinner, there was the sound of the doorbell.

"I'll get it!" Sophie ran off. Maya caught the smile on Chiara's face as she watched her go, and she felt its significance reflected with ease. They would playfully tease Sophie, calling her a puppy for how she missed no chance to go running around. She returned before long, with their first two arrivals behind her.

"Hi!" Riley made a beeline to go and put her arms around her best friend, even as Maya was reaching for her. It was hard not to feel especially excited now that she was here. Her maid of honor… There really could not have been anyone else, could there? Riley had been with her since long before she had ever gotten to a place in her life where she might think it'd be nice to find a guy and get married. Now here she was, and it felt like no one else could know quite how she felt like Riley would.

"Got any more of those eggs? Some of us didn't get to eat," Rosa asked Chiara before turning a look to Riley.

"You took too long," Riley told her roommate and bandmate.

"Wouldn't even let me grab anything," Rosa frowned. Maya struggled not to laugh. She could just picture Riley had been up and hurrying everyone back at the apartment, the better to get going as soon as possible and clock in on her maid of honor 'duties.'

"Scrambled with chives," Chiara patted Rosa's back before moving to make her eggs. Riley made a noise like she was about to ask for some, too. "Over easy, I remember," Chiara assured her without further prompt. Sophie went to help by putting bread in the toaster.

"Tell us about the puppies," Riley turned back to Maya after thanking their hosts.

"Missy texted not too long ago, said she heard from Kai and everyone made it through the night and he's looking forward to spending the day with them."

"Swear if it wasn't that the landlord already keeps going how he did us a favor to let us have Peanut…" Rosa sighed the sigh of someone eagerly willing to take on one of those puppies.

Maya looked to Riley at this, realizing neither she nor Dylan have gotten around to telling Rosa what they'd told Lucas and her at the rehearsal dinner, about how they were looking to buy a house. If they did this, if they moved out of the apartment, Rosa would likely have to move, too, unless she found new roommates to cover their share of the rent, the bills… Riley silently telegraphed what Maya interpreted as 'please can we not do this today?' On any other day, she might have called her on this, but, well… it was her wedding day. The last thing she needed was squabbling between her friends, though she had a feeling it would find a way to come out sooner or later.

"How's the 'Nut doing?" she asked instead. It didn't feel like it could have been almost four and a half years since the tiny foundling had come into their lives. To see him now, running around, you wouldn't know he'd nearly died, frozen and starved, until he'd been found and brought to Dr. Hillard's clinic.

"We left with a bunch of bags between us, how do you think he was doing?" Rosa asked with a sigh of sympathy breathed away to the dog who had become hers when Maya and Lucas had moved off with Trix and Lou. They could have easily brought Peanut along, too, but he'd just belonged with Rosa, and so he'd gone. "Mrs. Hill said she'd check on him while we were away," Rosa explained, speaking of the trio's neighbor from across the hall.

"Eggs, toast, now eat," Chiara told Riley and Rosa as she set plates in front of them. Maya covered her smirk as she went on with her own plate.

X

Even as Maya had awakened at the Zvolensky house, Lucas opened his eyes to find a trio of eager pups standing by the couch, as though they were all wondering what he was doing down here and, now that he was awake, they would finally get some answers.

"Morning," Lucas yawned, reaching out to pet each one in turn.

As he did this, his barely awakened brain caught up with him. Morning… It was morning, on July 2nd… He was getting married today, within hours…

"You're all getting the good treats today," he whispered to the dogs, who happily barked, whether they understood or not.

He had offered his and Maya's room to Asher and Ray last night. He didn't feel right having the both of them share Sam's single bed, but they had taken it anyway, under the excuse that it would have felt like they were doing something they weren't supposed to if they took the big bed, even though they couldn't say exactly why. Either way, they bunked in Sam's room – with his blessing – and that was that. So far, neither of them had come downstairs from what Lucas could tell. He was so used to waking up to sounds or smells from below, telling him that his brother was in the kitchen, and now the near silence felt too big, especially without his little spoon there by his side.

After quietly moving upstairs to change, Lucas took the dogs out for a quick walk up and down the lane. They'd spend the day home on their own, so it was the least he could do.

It had already been two years since he'd proposed, two years since the night of Zay and Nadine's wedding, when he'd taken Maya up here and revealed the work which had been done, right before getting down on one knee and popping his question. It didn't seem nearly possible, and it made him wonder how quickly the next two years would be gone, too. He didn't think about it too long though. The future would have its own time, and right now every last minute, every last second, was to be devoted to here, now, as he was about to embark on this day where he would marry the woman he had loved since she was 'the new girl.'

He still thought about all the what ifs. He thought about what might have been going on by now if they had been married a year ago, when they were first supposed to be getting married. They'd be celebrating their first wedding anniversary by now, they might have had a baby by now… This made him think of another what if, of their 'maybe baby' of Halloween a few years back. If it had turned out to be positive, that child would have been four years old already. That life would have been even more different than the one brought by getting married one year ago.

None of those thoughts mattered nearly as much as the reality he had been granted. Today, at long last, he and Maya would be married. He had the second of his grandmother Marianne's rings to place on her finger, and he had his vows… He had thought long and hard whether he'd go for something more 'on the spot, off the top of my head' or whether he'd instead opt to write them down, possibly learn them by heart. Even though Maya constantly told him he always knew what to say, he wasn't so confident, at least in this case. He just really didn't want to mess this up, to somehow blank or trip over his words…

He'd written some vows down last year, started to at least, if only to try and put together what was swirling through his head. And then Sophie had been hurt, and they'd pushed back the wedding, and his initial draft had been hidden away for no one to find. He'd pulled that paper out a while back, to see what he'd said then and whether it still worked now. It did, for the most part, though he'd ended up scrapping it. He had written those words a year ago. He wanted to start over, to focus on this new date, with one more year under their belt… So much had happened in that one year, and though some of what he'd write the second time around would inevitably resemble his first attempt in places, this was really the way to go. After working on it for a while, he'd come to the conclusion that maybe he should try and go at it without a script. It couldn't be so hard. All he had to do was look at Maya, and the words always came.

"Where do you think you're going, Friar? Better not be skipping town!" a shout startled him, right along with a car honk. The dogs started to bark at this, while Lucas laughed, finding it was his best man, driving up the lane with Farkle and Dylan in the car, too.

"You guys are up early," Lucas told them while working to redirect the dogs back toward the house.

"Yeah, our friends are getting married today!" Dylan 'reminded' him, after opening the backseat window next to him.

"What do you know," Lucas chuckled.

The car continued rolling slow enough to keep up with him, all the way back to the house, where the guys got out of the car even as Asher and Ray appeared on the porch, both looking like they'd been spooked into thinking they'd up and lost the groom.

"You guys act like I'm not the most eager about today," Lucas shook his head at all of them.

"Better safe than sorry, man," Ray told him.

"Yeah, don't think we wouldn't have had a few choice words if you walked out on our Maya," Asher wagged his finger at him in his most 'parental' tone.

"Just words, huh?" Lucas tapped him on the shoulder.

His walk with the dogs had gotten him even more ready for breakfast, and he was happy to share it with some of his friends, especially as it would allow him this companionship as a means to distract him from the anticipation in his heart… to some minimal degree at least. No matter what they'd do, there would still be that bit of restless activity in his chest, taking him through this morning and to the point where he'd see her walking down the aisle… and even then.

It was not the first time he had envied her ability to capture moments the way she did, drawing, painting… He had watched her many times over the years, when the emotions in her became so strong that they seemed to flow into her hands, on to a page, on to canvas. And when it would all have come from her, there it would be, for them to see, to practically feel what she had been feeling.

If he could draw right now, if he could put to paper the emotions he felt, as he was hours from marrying his one and only… He had never known any other love than hers, and to some this might have felt strange, but to him it felt… lucky, perfect. They had found each other before they could even really know what that kind of love felt like. They had felt it from the start, they could tell as much, in hindsight, even though they couldn't see it at the time. It had nothing to do with infatuation, or silly teenage crushes, no. From the day she had come into his life, she had been essential to it, she had been the part of him he had been missing. She had opened up this part of his heart like it had been hers all along, just waiting for her arrival. And today… Today was their moment to celebrate it all.

"So, no pressure here, but I have to ask," Asher started, as the six of them sat on the porch with their plates, having breakfast. "Married, married," he pointed his fork to Farkle and Zay in turn, "Getting married today, and very soon," he continued, pointing to Lucas and then to Ray and himself, before his fork turned in the direction of his best friend. "And then you… What's going on there?" Dylan looked halfway cornered, but also unconcerned.

"Like you said, there's two weddings this summer," he replied. "Riley should get her own moment," he nodded. "When the time is right, that's when it'll happen, not before."

"Sounds good," Lucas smiled, offering his support of this idea, as did the rest of gathered group.

Asher's question did serve to highlight the fact that so many of them were now either married or soon to be married. It really felt as though it had all happened so fast sometimes, even though it really hadn't. Farkle and Isadora had been the first of all of them, much to their surprise, but that was already five and a half years ago, closer to six. Now they had Ada, and another baby on the way… Sophie and Chiara had taken them all by surprise with their New Year's Eve wedding, and they would be celebrating their fourth anniversary at the turn of this year. And then Zay and Nadine, that was just two years ago, and now it was his and Maya's turn, as it would be Ray and Asher's in a month…

This was the best scenario they could have hoped for. It was almost to be expected for friends to drift apart as they got through school and went and paired off, got married, but they had held on. The next challenge would be to see what happened as more of them went and had kids. If they could stick together through that, to see their families grow together… Oh, there went his heart again. The future felt just so within his grasp now, with the wedding just hours away.

He hoped Maya had found the watch by now. That had been a last minute idea, really. He'd had his hand in his pocket as he waited for her to finish packing, and it was right there, the idea not far behind. All he'd needed was a moment, without her noticing, and they were golden.

After breakfast, he had gone up to shower and get ready to head out for the day. Before he could head back to his room to do that, there was one more thing he needed to do.

"Look at you, baby face, I almost forgot what you looked like under there," Zay was the first to see him come down the stairs a short time later. Lucas laughed as the guys gave their own varied exaggerated reactions to his newly clean shaven face.

"Alright, alright, calm down," he told them. What he wouldn't have given for Maya's reaction right about now. She would be feeling at his face, expressing deep approval of this turn, proclaiming that it was well within her right to examine his newly bared face to her heart's content. He could just see the smirk she'd have on her face. He didn't know if it would be breaking the 'rule' of not seeing each other if he sent her a picture, but then maybe it was better that she didn't see yet. This way, when she'd come walking up, he'd get the surprise of her dress, and she'd get to have one of her own, with the return of his beardless face.

"We should get going," Farkle pointed out, though he mostly said this in a whisper, near Zay, so The Best Man would get to be the one to say to the others.

"Okay, alright, time to go," he clapped his hands together, motioning toward the door. "Things to do, people to see, let's not keep the bride waiting!"

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners