Girl Meets Maya's Christmas Story

It was Christmas Eve at the Matthews, and Cory, Topanga, Riley, Auggie Amy, Alan, Eric, Morgan, Josh, Shawn, Maya, and Katy were all scattered throughout the house. Many conversations were flying through the air along with laughs and giggles. Everyone was having such a grand time until it hit about 8 o'clock.

"Alright Cory," Amy began. "Your father, brother, sister, and I are going to head back to the hotel now.

"And Josh gets to stay here and sleep in my room!" Auggie screamed as he jumped up and down excitedly.

"Yeah! Thanks, Cory," Josh smiled to him.

"Yes, thank you for letting your brother stay over. A lot more space now in the hotel room."

"Alan, be nice to him, will you? We'll see all of you again tomorrow for Christmas brunch."

Everyone had gotten up to say their goodbyes. Right when they had left Katy had spoken up.

"You ready to go home, Maya?"

"Nooooo. Can Maya please spend the night? Katy? Shawn? Mom? Dad?" Riley asked desperately.

Both set of parents had looked at each other.

"Well if Katy is alright with it, I suppose so," Topanga said looking at Katy.

"I guess it's all right. I'll be here tomorrow to join for brunch anyways." Katy wanted to spend Christmas morning together with Maya and Shawn, but she always loved to see the look on Maya's face when she was happy.

"Sweet," Maya said cheerfully. "Thanks Mrs. Matthews. I'll see ya tomorrow then. Bye mom. Bye Shawn. Love ya."

Once again, everyone was huddling around to say their goodbyes.

The night continued with only the six of them there. Topanga and Auggie were in the kitchen making Chocolate chip cookies for Santa. Cory, Maya, and Riley were sitting on the couch watching "How the Grinch Stole Christmas", and Josh was off reading in the corner with his hot chocolate working on getting his break assignment finished. As the clock rang eleven, Topanga scurried everyone off to bed.

Around one o'clock, Maya found that she could not sleep, and made her way out to the bay window in the front room. She enjoyed sitting there. It was so peaceful, listening to the silence, watching the snow fall, being surrounded by the glow of the twinkling lights around the Christmas tree. She was stuck in thought when a sudden creak in the floor disturbed her. She thought it was going to be Topanga telling her to go back to bed, or perhaps Riley coming to figure out why she left the room. It was not in fact either of them. It was Josh who had summoned.

They both had made eye contact with each other, before Josh broke the silence. "Well I see Santa hasn't come yet," starring at the plate of undisturbed cookies. "I don't think he'll would mind sharing then." He grabbed one and then headed over to sit by Maya.

"Isn't it past you big boy bed time?" Maya began to mess with him, as she seemed to do quite often.

"Not quite yet. I do think that it is past yours, though. What are you doing up anyways?"

"Couldn't sleep."

"Couldn't sleep or couldn't stop thinking?"

"Second one. What about you? Have you always enjoyed stealing Santa's cookies?"

"It's not stealing, it's sharing."

"Okay sure."

"I came out here because I thought I heard something."

"And that something turned out to be me," Maya nodded.

Minutes of silence went by as both of the gazed out the window.

"What's on your mind?" Josh wondered.

"A lot of things."

"It's okay for you to talk to me, you know?"

"I know, but some of the things I think about you just don't blurt out… Josh, my life is not great, we both know this. It gets hard to stay positive and upbeat all the time. Riley helps so much, you have no idea. She keeps me alive. I'm a mess, but I try my best to hide it. Earlier today, when Riley asked if I could stay here, I hoped so much that Mrs. Matthews and my mom would let me. I didn't want to wake up again in my place on Christmas morning, it would remind me too much of my childhood. I was never about the gifts, but I wanted so desperately to have that feeling that all children have on Christmas morning. I wanted that joy and that excitement. I didn't want to be reminded of that empty, numb feeling I used to have."

All Josh could do was stare at Maya at this point, he couldn't believe that she would open up to him about this type of thing. He knew she tried to move on from her childhood, live free, and never look back. He had no idea that these thoughts haunted her mind during sleepless nights like these.

"You know, I still even think about Toby from time to time. I don't blame myself for what happened, but I do wonder if he ever liked me from the beginning. Did he just go out with me for pity? I should've waited for you, Josh."

Josh was stunned at first. Still frozen from all of the information she was spilling.

"Maya… I I"

"It's okay, Josh, you don't have to say anything."

"No. I need to say something. We both agreed that we would live our lives and that we would both know that we would be out there. I've gone on a few dates with some girls myself… but they're nothing like you, Maya. You're the one I want. We still may date other people, that's a possibility, but we're the only ones playing the game. It could happen five, ten, maybe even fifteen years from now, but like we agreed on, we're both out there." All Josh could do now was look deep into Maya's beautiful blue eyes and let everything that they both had just said sink in. He felt like he needed to comfort Maya, so that is what he did. He embraced her with a hug. When she hugged back he never wanted to let go. He knew he had to at some point, though. Before he let go he gave Maya a gentle kiss on the forehead, and he could feel the awe radiating from Maya even though she did not speak a word at this point.

"Now go to bed Maya, I heard it's not good to catch Santa lying out the presents," he said jokingly with the slightest smirk.

Maya started to get up and leave, and right before she turned the corner into the hallway, she heard Josh speak up the slightest.

"Maya?"

She turned to face him.

"Don't let the dungeon of sadness eat away your sleep this late at night."

"Goodnight, Josh."

"Goodnight, Maya."

And there Maya went… off to bed to soon welcome the visions of sugar-plums dancing in her head.

First, I'm sorry it took so long to come out with another little chapter, I had just gotten so busy. Second, thank you guys so much for reading and reviewing my last little clip, it meant a lot to me. Now this little clip I was so excited to write, but it didn't come out as nice as I would have liked it to, but I'll try so much harder on the next one. As always, I hope you enjoyed reading this and please leave a review!