A/N: So exams are coming up. But before exams, all my profs are trying to squeeze in last minute assignments, tests, quizzes, projects, etc. Literally next week might be devoid of updates because it's looking like I have a lot of crap that will be due all at once and my first final begins next Saturday and will last about a week and a half... I'll do my best, but as things start to take up more of my time, I'll be pretty much gone... Sorry!
Alright. Last slow chapter and then we'll start to pick up some speed next chapter :3 Thought I'd put a little humour (and some raunch. Well... as much raunch as I can put in a low T piece without it getting vulgar ahaha) in this chapter.
Hi! Youknowwho-13! I can't respond to guest reviews through PM though :/ Do you have an account by any chance? :)
Thank you for the kind words and all the support you guys! I appreciate it very much and I am glad that I can entertain you with this story no matter how slow it is going! Thank you for reading it! :D
Disclaimer: I do not own Girl Meets World, but… eh I got nothing…
"Alright guys. Art club is just about over. Let's start to clean up some of this mess. You know the drill. Drop the brushes in the sink."
She'd chosen for this week to have a focus on small watercolour pictures so clean up would be minimal. She wanted to avoid painting with any other types of paint until the kids had a little bit better wrist control. She didn't want to end up with paint splatters all over everyone's clothes and hair and over every surface. It really was troublesome to try to clean up everything.
As the children began to put away the materials they had been using, Maya walked around, looking at the paintings they'd been working on. The kids had been instructed to draw their interpretation of the flowers in the vase that she'd placed on the table. The paintings were very nice, and she definitely enjoyed how they all had different ideas of how to do so. One of the kids had even decided to make his image out of black with only the petals of the flower coloured. And Maya was glad to see that Anna didn't seem to be having trouble keeping up with the older students, despite the fact that she probably had less experience.
"If you have your transportation sorted out and know your guardian has arrived, you may leave." Maya said, once the room was pretty much cleaned up and most of the students moved to get their bags out of the cubbyholes. "Otherwise, please stay in here until whoever is supposed to pick you up arrives."
The students said goodbye to her and made their way out of the room, heading out to leave. As she expected, Anna stayed behind, messing with a wayward curl in the middle of her forehead that kept popping out of its hiding place behind her ear. She seemed to be having a bad hair day that day. She'd hesitated to take her beanie off her head in the morning and she had kept messing with the piece of hair all day.
Maya smiled in amusement. She herself had been having a pretty bad hair day too, though she'd kept her hair in a ponytail so no one could properly tell. She had a feeling Anna would probably spend much of her teen years regularly straightening her hair. Maya's hair wasn't as coiled as Anna's but she kind of knew how much of a hassle curlier hair could be sometimes.
"Anna, come here."
She walked over to Maya curiously. "Yes?"
"Is your hair bothering you?"
Anna nodded, pouting and going cross eyed as she looked at the stray piece of hair dangling in front of her nose.
"Alright turn around."
Anna turned around and Maya leaned over her head, carefully taking the piece of hair and braiding it with some of the upper layer of hair down the right side. She did the same to the left side before she combined both plaits in the back, braiding it to the bottom and letting it hang. Anna's hair was coiled enough that it could hold the braid without a tie or pin.
"There." Maya said, "Now it'll stay out of your face."
"Thank you, Miss Hart."
"Whenever your hair gets pretty hard to handle, try using clips or braiding it back. It'll make it easier. Putting it in ponytails will also help."
"Okay." Anna nodded with a smile.
"Did your father tell you he would be late today?"
"Yeah, he said he might get off late today and to wait with you."
"Okay, well then you," Maya said, tapping Anna on the nose, "Have been selected to help me clean all these paintbrushes today."
Anna groaned, her shoulders slumping. "Not again…"
"But cleaning up is fun, Anna Banana." Maya chuckled, ushering Anna over to the sinks in the back where the paintbrushes were waiting to be cleaned.
"No it's not!"
Maya laughed and turned on the water in the sink, being careful to make sure not to open it too far widely. Maya began to clean some of the paintbrushes that had been left in the sink. Anna did the same, slightly on her tiptoes so she could see more easily over the sink.
As they washed the paint off the paintbrushes, Maya glanced at Anna, knowing that yes, she was spending more time with Anna, but contrary to what Riley had been referring to the night before, this wasn't favouritism.
Maya had taken into consideration what Riley had mentioned about the favouritism for sure, but that didn't mean she wasn't absolutely cautious to make sure she never tried to give more attention to a student in her class. She cared a lot about all her kids and generally made sure to always give each of them individual time each day where she checked up on them and made sure they were okay.
Yes, admittedly, Anna was something of a special circumstance because Maya wanted to make sure she was fine in her family life since she was the only kid in her class in a single parent household whose parent was rather absent. Maya couldn't deny that maybe she did feel some sort of pull towards her for whatever reason—she was a little drawn to the Anna for some reason; probably because their childhood circumstances had been the same—but she didn't treat her differently than the other students in the classroom. Riley's fears were completely founded, but Maya could differentiate between her personal feelings and how she had to act professionally.
"Alright." Maya said once they'd gotten all of the brushes cleaned up, "I'll put these away. Could you turn off the tap please?"
"Okay!"
In retrospect, Maya should have anticipated that Anna might not turn the faucet the right way, but before Maya could stop Anna as she watched her twist the knob, she'd already spun it sharply and rapidly.
And opened the faucet even wider.
And caused a plethora of water to fly out.
Which sprayed Maya.
Anna squealed, jumping back quickly as water bounced out of the sink and splashed Maya. Maya gasped, quickly reaching forward and scrambling to shut the valve before her sink flooded with water. She managed to get it shut, but the damage had already been done. Her shirt was soaked through and through, the water dripping and even getting her pants. There was water all over the back of the room, on the floor and even on the walls.
Anna burst out laughing as she looked at Maya, her giggles and snorting and snickering filling the silence as Maya stared down at herself in slight shock. No doubt she found Maya's drenched shirt and the water on her face and the stray hairs stuck to her cheeks hilarious.
"Anna. It's not funny." Maya scolded playfully, "You got my shirt entirely wet."
"Sorry Miss Hart!" But Anna continued to giggle, her nose scrunched up all cute as she laughed.
"And you didn't even get wet." Maya sighed, shaking her head in mirth. "Well you think you could run down the hall to the bathroom and get me some napkins to clean up this mess?"
"Yeah!"
"As fast as you can, yeah?"
Anna took off and left the room and Maya stared down at her shirt with a sigh, holding the clinging fabric away from her body. Her shirt was one hundred percent soaked through to the point that she could see her pink bra through the white.
Thankfully, she was prepared though. She kept another shirt in her room closet just in case of an unprecedented incident and it turned out that she definitely needed it now. It was a life hack for pretty much every elementary school teacher who taught grades two and down to keep extra clothes and shoes in their rooms for themselves because ruined clothing came with the territory of the job at some point or another. And this wasn't Maya's first time having a shirt ruined. Last year, someone had accidentally thrown mud at her. And a student had actually thrown up on Riley once too.
Maya sighed again, taking hold of the hem with both hands and pulling it up and over her head in a fluid motion, taking it off before draping it over the sink to wring out later so she could take it home and wash it again.
And just as she turned around to go grab her shirt from her closet, Lucas walked in the room.
Maya's eyes went wide as she stiffened and stopped moving, blinking at him in surprise. Lucas looked a little shocked, frozen in place as he stared at her, unsure of what to do. And then Maya covered her chest with a loud gasp, spinning around and stooping over slightly.
"Oh my God!"
"Sorry." Lucas cleared his throat when his voice came out a little odd. "Should I just leave your room?"
"Yes! Obviously!"
Maya heard footsteps leave the room in a hurry and shaking her head in disbelief, Maya rushed over to the small closet in her room and ripped the door open, snatching out the top she had in there and hurrying to slip it on. Then she pulled out her coat and put that on too.
It was so embarrassing and unbelievably ridiculous. Maya didn't know if there was any situation that could be more awkward than a room parent seeing a teacher without their top on.
"Daddy, why are you standing outside the classroom?"
"Uh… " He tapered off and Maya could just imagine him rubbing the back of his neck nervously. "Nothing… Just… looking for my… uh, keys?"
"They're in your hand, Daddy!" Anna giggled. "You're silly!"
"Right."
Anna skipped into the classroom, heading straight to Maya to show her the bundle of paper towels she'd gotten.
"Look! I got the paper!"
"Thank you, Anna. You think you could put some of those on the puddle on the floor?"
"Aye aye captain!"
As Anna ran to the back to clean up the mess, Maya turned towards the door. "It's safe to come in."
Lucas rounded the corner and walked back in carefully, keeping his gaze slightly away from her. And Maya was glad for it. She felt so unbelievably awkward right now. She'd basically flashed him unintentionally, and there was nothing she could do to make him unsee the image.
"Also, I still have your gloves, Lucas." Maya said, reaching into her bag hanging from the hook and pulling out the gloves she'd borrowed the day before.
"Thanks." He winced a bit. "Look, I'm sorry about the… you know."
"It's fine. I should have been more careful not to change… in the middle of my classroom…" Maya tried to smile, but her lips felt stiff, and she knew she was grimacing. She glanced up at him but as soon as they made eye contact, Maya felt her face heat up and she quickly averted her gaze. "Umm… yeah. I-it's okay."
"You sure? Because I'm really sorry. I swear I wasn't peeping or anything."
"I mean, you honestly didn't know." Maya wrung her hands together a bit. "There was nothing you could have done to avoid that situation."
"Alright."
He was staring at the top of her head, completely avoiding her gaze and her face and looking so unbelievably nervous. It kind of made Maya's lips curve into an amused smile.
Was he really that nervous about the whole thing?
"Hey." Maya said, walking up to him and holding out his gloves to him with a raised eyebrow, "Seriously. I promise you it's okay. If it wasn't, I would just yell at you, wouldn't I?"
"That's true." Lucas smiled, looking more than relieved. He took the gloves. "That's good to know. Uh… and for the record, I didn't see that much. Well, I did, but it wasn't bad… I mean, wait. That's not what I meant. I meant it wasn't terrible… for me."
And then he stopped talking abruptly, cringing the slightest bit as Maya's brows rose in surprise at his admittance.
"Crap. Did that really come out of my mouth just now?"
"Yes. And you made it worse." She deadpanned, fixing him with a dry look, though she knew her cheeks were a little red. "I think you should just… go home."
"Right… I should probably shut up too." Lucas sighed. "I'm sorry. I wasn't trying to be a—"
"Honestly, it doesn't even matter anymore. Let's just put this behind us and pretend it didn't happen."
"You're right."
Lucas let out a long sigh, still looking a wholly apologetic and a little uneasy. Maya snorted, chuckling to herself and rolling her eyes. He was kind of a dork.
"Really? It wasn't terrible for me? I can't believe you actually said that."
Lucas' lips quirked up in an amused smile. "Would you believe me if I said that isn't even close to being one of the most awkward things I've said to someone before?"
"Yes. I'd definitely believe it."
Lucas chuckled, then turned to Anna. "Ready to go, Anna?"
"But I have to help Miss Hart clean."
"Don't worry about it, Anna." Maya said, walking over to her and crouching down, "Thank you for your help so far, but I'll take care of it from here, okay? You should go home with your daddy. Go get your stuff."
Anna nodded and went to her cubbyhole to gather her belongings.
"Who did Anna's hair?" Lucas asked curiously as she scurried over to him.
"I did." Maya said, "Her curls were a little untameable today. Just a word of advice. If you can't control her hair, tying it up in a ponytail should do the trick."
"Thanks. I'll keep that in mind."
Maya nodded. "Good. Now go home, Lucas."
"Yeah. I'm going." He smiled, "And sorry about just… that entire exchange. It was horrible."
She couldn't disagree with that sentiment.
Lucas took Anna's hand and they walked out of the classroom, Anna skipping and hopping up and down beside him as he asked her how her day was.
Maya rolled her eyes in amusement and headed to the back to finish cleaning up the mess of water. Both Friars that day had managed to exasperate her within the same day. It made her laugh thinking about the whole ridiculousness of the situation. Anna had wet her shirt, and then Lucas had walked in right when she was fixing to change.
What a disaster.
Maya laughed as she slid the paper towels on the ground to clean the mess.