July 11th 2020

Chapter 193
Their Circle Around Life

"Are you sure about this?" Lucas asked. Maya turned from the mirror, where she had been applying her makeup, to find her husband had finished getting ready. She smiled when she saw him. "I mean, it's still a… a funeral," he went on, looking down at himself, and even at her, in her dress. Neither of them wore a stitch of black.

"When you die…" she started, which caused a teeny tiny brain spiral until she added, "… decades and decades from now, you get to decide how the world gathers to remember you. GiGi wanted this, she had it in her will and everything. We are going to go out there today and we are going to do everything we do for her, aren't we?"

"Yeah… yeah, we are," Lucas finally nodded. It wasn't like he didn't know, or didn't want to, but there had still been that instinct in him that, at a funeral, you wore black, and that was that. They were still formal, no t-shirts and jeans or anything like that, but his jacket and pants were a light brown with a beige button-up. "She told me she liked these once," he recalled. "Said it reminded her of a suit her husband wore when he would take her dancing."

"Well then there's really no other choice for this, is there?" Maya smiled, turning back to the mirror to quickly finish up before moving to join him. She had gone for a cream colored dress, accented in light violet and deep blue flowers along the bodice, trailing off into the skirt. It covered nearly all of the new tattoo, save for the edge of the largest flower and the outstretched end of the branch and then the bit of branch on the other end disappearing into her hairline, but then her hair was down and so it was hidden. "Chose this one because it kind of reminded me of the lilac trees outside Susanne's house… GiGi always wanted us to come over and get some of those when they came in bloom."

For a moment, they stood there, looking at one another. Yes, GiGi had wanted a party for today, and that was what they would give her, but just for a moment, they needed to acknowledge to one another that they would have rather had the old woman back, any day. Lucas moved up and embraced his wife, and they stayed this way for near on a minute, until Rosa called from downstairs, asking if they were ready to go.

"So many memories," Maya sighed, thinking of their days living with their temporary roommate, back in Houston. It made Lucas chuckle as they headed down to join her and Sam.

The last couple of days leading up to this had been sort of non-stop, and it might have felt like too much all at once, but really they sort of preferred it that way right now. They preferred to be occupied with something than to be left to sink into any thoughts they couldn't bear.

When they had finally gotten to see their families again, on their second morning back from Paris, it had been hard to navigate the emotion, much as it had been when Sam had surprised them. It was happiness, after having been apart for all this time, mixed with a wave of grief as they remembered that GiGi had gone. They'd wanted to be able to be near all of them as much as possible, and so the Friars – Tom and Melinda – invited the Hunter Harts over, the better to have the returning pair put at ease.

Lucas had pictured his mother rushing up to embrace him the moment she saw him, and to some extent it was that, although it had been the less often seen quiet Melinda which came up to him, with that motherly smile. It sort of went without saying that, whatever stories he and Maya had from their trip would be kept for later, after they had put GiGi to rest, and they were more than on board for that. Tom hugged his daughter-in-law, his one sweet girl returned, and the affection could not have been appreciated more than it was, so very much.

Less subdued, and all for the better, were Maya's young siblings, who only saw their returned sister and their new brother and immediately dashed to crowd around them as they all tried to tell the two of them about what they'd been up to since they'd last seen one another. It was chaos, and it was wonderful. Haley kept trailing after Lucas as they went around, until finally he picked up the three-year-old and kept her in his arm for the better part of the time they all spent at his parents' house that day.

Katy and Shawn had come along like they knew exactly what their daughter would be like in that moment, and they'd come prepared. She was not unlike her little sister that day; she just wanted to keep close to the two of them, short of being in their arms the whole time. She thanked them for taking Sam in when he'd come back early.

They'd all seen each other every day since then, at this one's house or that one's, going to a store here or there… They had done their part, as many others did. GiGi had been in all of their lives long enough that it simply mattered to them to do something. And now, finally, this was the day where it would all come together.

In what felt like a repeat, and a very close one at that, of their last visit, here were Farkle and Isadora and little Ada. After having been in Austin for the band's anniversary and sticking around until the wedding, they had gone home, only to be made to return not three weeks later, for GiGi, and then sticking around another week, for Asher and Ray's wedding. Zay and Nadine both had been so touched, knowing that it was for them most of all that they came. They might have said that they didn't have to, not for this, but to the travelling Minkus family there had been no doubt that they were needed here today, and so they came.

Asher and Ray, they all knew, had briefly considered pushing back their wedding, feeling it might have been too strange to have the two events so near to one another, but everyone had the same answer, from Zay on down. They needed to keep it on the day as planned. It would be in keeping with GiGi's wishes, as she wanted a celebration for life, not a reminder of death.

The service had gotten to feel like the one moment where they couldn't keep from acknowledging that departure, that loss, and still it had been lighter than it might have been. The memories brought along of dear Geraldine, who had happily adopted the moniker given to her by her great grandson, Zay, when he'd been very little and decided to use his freshly learned letters as a way to call on his great grandma. He was under the impression that this was her name, and he had just been taught his own initials… Little by little, the name had come to stick, and it had continued to do so for the last twenty-odd years of her life.

On the matter of names, it became that this was the day when Maya shared her intentions for her surname with both her parents and her in-laws. It hadn't been planned that way, but then the tale of GiGi's own name shift had reminded Maya of the arrangement on the plane. She would have already started the process if not for the last few days' preparations.

The Friars were happy to hear she was to become one of them, like a new welcoming to the family where she had been welcomed time and again. As for her parents, they had expected the taking of her husband's name, but it was the other parts that touched them. They found it a proper tribute to Kermit for her to hold the Hart name as a stage name. The last part, the short one, the one she'd admittedly been most nervous about… taking on Hunter as essentially her new maiden name, completing the adoption of years prior, even though most of the world would become unaware of it once she took on her married name… On the whole, she had expected Shawn to be happy for it, even if she couldn't keep from being nervous to explain it.

The nerves had gone away as soon as she'd seen the reaction flood across his face. It didn't matter that she'd just as soon become a Friar. She would still carry his name with her wherever she went, and that meant plenty. He'd embraced her, and to Maya it was like a memory from the past, from the day he had officially become her father.

It would have been too odd to gather in Susanne's yard for this party, as they would do again, in a month's time, for their annual party, so they had rented a room. The Babineaux party had been a yearly event of the 'rain or shine' type, for decades, since Isaiah Sr.'s father had been a tiny tot. They had not missed a single year, and they were not about to miss this one now, or else GiGi was bound to come and haunt them, as her grandchildren claimed.

TXNY took to the stage before long, chiming in with GiGi's request of an opener, the song she felt would most embrace what she had in mind for this day. She wanted all of them, family, friends, and acquaintances, to come into the room and know at once that they were here to remember her and to smile for it rather than cry. To look at everyone as they looked to the quintet on stage, she had accomplished precisely that.

"I would dance around for her when she'd play that song," Zay told Lucas as the two of them looked to their wives' playing and singing up there. "It would make her laugh."

"Well, you were kind of a weird dancer back then," Lucas smiled, thinking of little Zay, who would generally go about dancing by leaping up and down, or teetering side to side like a pendulum, or his classic move of sitting on the ground and spinning around… Zay smirked back at him, in complete agreement.

"When I got the call, one of the first things I thought about was… I wish she might have lived long enough to see Nadine and I as parents, you know? Her first great great grandchild…" They hadn't heard anything so far, on the adoption front, but they remained hopeful.

"She would have loved that kid so much…" Lucas nodded along, imagining it.

"She already did, in a way. Every time we'd see her since we told her about all of it, she would ask if we'd gotten a call. Then we'd tell her we hadn't yet, and she'd look almost… affronted, that her letter hadn't gotten us a baby in two seconds flat." They shared a laugh at this, imagining the tiny old woman glaring at the adoption people until they did something for her great grandson and his wife.

When the band took a break from the stage, Maya made her way back to Lucas, so they might go and grab something to eat. All the while, she would have to restraint herself, knowing that the emotions of the day, this affirmation of life, was just on the edge of making her throw caution to the wind, to tell her husband that they should go ahead and try for a baby of their own. The day had to pass, the emotions had to settle. She knew deep down that this was not the time, but oh, today… It felt so very important.

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners