Thank you for your patience. Thank you for reading, reviewing, favoriting, and subscribing. I love and appreciate everyone of you.

Also thank you to sand1128 for helping me workshop several pieces of this chapter.

"Must be nice."

The comment is the first one Maya makes other than meaningless small talk about the available lunch after they meet in the cafeteria, and it takes everything Riley has left in her not to stiffen at her cold tone. Where was the friend from the art room who had seemed so understanding? Or at least...open to talking?

When they had been sitting in the hallway, Lucas had cautioned her that she didn't have to deal with the Maya issue today; Maya was willing to put it off to focus on her art, which meant she should be allowed to put it off to focus on her family's health problems. The looming conversation was important, he asserted, and neither girl should go into it if they aren't feeling one hundred percent. But Riley had insisted.

She wants one less thing looming over her head and of the things she might actually be able to do something about it's either this or her grades. The way Riley sees it, she'll be able to focus on everything else much better if she can eliminate the rift with Maya, so even though she has a good out and some of Maya's comments worry her now that they've actually sunk in, Riley can't take it. The last thing she needs is for Maya to think that she doesn't care about fixing things. Not when it's already taken this long for Maya to be ready to talk.

So Riley's there. Sitting with Maya at an isolated corner table and wondering what's happened to change her friend's attitude.

"What does?"

Maya taps her fork against the edge of her tray. "Having a guy like Lucas to hold you when you have a bad day."

Oh. So Maya had been among the students that had seen her and Lucas in the hall, still leaning on each other and too slow to untangle when the bell had rung. Riley hadn't noticed her in the crowd, but supposes it makes sense that she was there, given her luck. Sure, they weren't technically doing anything wrong, it was just one friend helping another during a rough time, but she knows how it looks to everyone else. To Maya.

Riley hadn't been avoiding friendly gestures just to deny herself the comfort. She knows how intimate they can look between certain people. Farkle placing a hand on Smackle's shoulder looks different from Farkle placing a hand on her shoulder looks different from her dad placing a hand on her mom's shoulder. She can begin to guess where she and Lucas fall on that spectrum thanks to the chatter of her classmates, and she's had no interest to make things look more serious than they are.

Naturally, the first time she gives in and decides she needs the contact, it's at the worse time possible. Riley has to mentally scramble to decide the best way to politely squash Maya's assumptions and keep things on track.

"Yeah, having a friend there when you need one is great." She mentally winces as the words come out. She wants the word friend to emphasize that's all she and Lucas are but it comes out so passive-aggressive. Like she's blaming Maya for not being there. Riley knows she can't do that. "I mean...my mom had just called to give me an update. And he was there while I processed it. It would have been just as nice with Farkle, or Zay, or Jenkins…" Or you.

The unspoken words echo loudly in Riley's head and seem to hang between them. How is she fumbling this so badly? She wants to fix this. She's been waiting for Maya to be ready to fix this, so that she can apologize and they can go back to normal. So why is she struggling now that she has the opportunity?

Maybe despite Lucas' assurances she really is broken. Before all of this Riley was a fixer. She was the fixer. She fixed everyone else's problems and her own. But maybe now that she's so tired and not feeling things the same way, now that for whatever reason she can't seem to express herself she can't do what needs to be done to make the repairs.

Maybe broken people can't be fixers.

"How are the elder Matthews'?" Maya asks after several beats pass. She's still picking at her food, still seems vaguely distant and cold. Riley's not sure if she's mad about the implication that she hasn't been there for Riley or if she just doesn't believe that Riley and Lucas are only friends.

"It's still serious, but I guess the doctors are positive." Riley looks at her own lunch tray as she answers. The spaghetti and meat sauce looks entirely unappetizing and she's not sure how she'll manage even a few bites with the rock that's settled in her stomach. She settles on stabbing at her salad instead. "We'll know more tonight probably."

"Oh. Good."

More awkward silence. Suddenly there's a part of Riley that wants to shake Maya. She's the one that wanted to meet, why can't she be the one to start the conversation? Why is this, on top of everything else, falling on her shoulders? It's not like this estrangement is solely her fault so why should she be the one to-oh.

Maybe that's why her words aren't coming out right. Because she is mad.

Riley hasn't wanted to admit it. She doesn't like being angry or what anger does to people. But somewhere in the back of her mind she's known that what Zay had told her yesterday is right: Maya hasn't been doing anything to make things better or to find a way to fix anything. Riley has been giving her space and making sure that she still has the support of her friends and pushing away Lucas and dealing with most everything entirely on her own to make sure that Maya didn't think anyone was choosing Riley over her and Maya….hasn't been doing anything like that.

How is that fair?

Riley knows how much she's been giving to make things work again and that most people in her position would be just as mad if not more so with Maya. But she hates herself for it. She can't be angry like this. She doesn't know how to be mad with someone and fix things with them at the same time, and fixing things with Maya has been her priority from the beginning. She can't be mad or ask herself why Maya wouldn't put any effort whatsoever into making things better or why she would spread the rumors she had (and Riley's not stupid enough to think that it wasn't Maya who told the school about the sweatshirt and everything else that happened in Texas even if she hasn't wanted to admit it) when she can guess what the answer would be.

Riley can't let herself think for even a second that maybe their friendship doesn't mean as much to Maya as it does to her or else the hurt would crush her. She'd never be able to move forward.

She just has to swallow it all back. She has to remember that it was her mistake that made all of this happen in the first place and hope that once she apologizes it will lead to Maya realizing that she hasn't been without blame.

If Riley ever wants things to go back to normal, she has to be the bigger person.

"About what happened in Texas…" Riley starts. "I was only trying to do what I thought would make you happy. I really thought that things would work out. But I should have talked to you before I-," It's as far as she gets. One minute she's talking, trying to ignore Maya's stoney-faced gaze, the next she's jumping to her feet as a mess of lukewarm spaghetti and meat sauce and chocolate milk spill over her head, drenching her.

The cafeteria erupts into laughs and sarcastic applause. To his credit, the clumsy seventh grader who had tripped over the hem of her pants and spilled her lunch on her seems suitably apologetic and embarrassed by the whole affair, but Riley can't bring herself to do anything to calm her.

Of course this is how her day goes. It's all she can do to bring herself to wipe the slop out of her eyes instead of trying to find a way to tunnel into the ground. Riley manages just in time to see Maya approaching, rolling her eyes.

"Come on." Maya grabs onto her elbow, carefully gripping around the mess and starts dragging her out of the cafeteria. "Do you have gym clothes in your locker?"

"In my bag, yeah. If you don't mind getting them out since my hands are a disaster."

"Yeah. Sure."

Maya drops her arm once they're out in the hall and heading towards their lockers. Riley tries to ignore how uncaring she's being (the Maya she knows would be concerned about if she was OK or if she was embarrassed or something) and goes back to trying to deliver her apology. At least if she fills the silence she doesn't have to keep thinking about everything that's going wrong.

"I should have talked to you before I did anything in Texas. I wouldn't have told Lucas about your feelings if I had known you didn't want me to, and it's my fault for not finding that out first. I'm really sorry that I didn't and that it made things so hard on you."

"But that's what you do, isn't it? You decide on something that needs to be fixed and you go for it, regardless of what anyone else wants. And...you wanted to fix me and Huckleberry." Maya starts to open Riley's locker.

Riley bristles. Is she supposed to be happy that Maya's ignoring her apology in favor of...acting like she should have just expected it? Because it doesn't feel good. It feels like there's a big part of her that Maya just tolerates because she has to and doesn't appreciate at all. And yes, it's a part of her that has caused problems, this time in particular, but she's working on finding a way to embrace that part of her in the right way. She had done it the right way when they threatened to take away the arts programs and she could do it the right way again.

She has to remind herself to breathe and stay calm before she speaks again. Losing her temper will fix nothing. "I did. But like I said, the way I did it was wrong. I shouldn't have done anything before I knew what you wanted. And you have every right to be upset with me for-,"

"Oh, you have got to be kidding me." Maya's disgusted groan cuts Riley off. She turns around, holding some bundled material in her hand. Riley can't even tell what it is until Maya is tossing it at her. "Seriously?!"

Lucas' sweatshirt hits her on the chest and Riley scrambles to catch it, even as her heart freezes. What was that even doing in her bag? She runs over everything in her mind, knowing that Maya is saying something else, but unable to process both at the same time. So much of the past few days has been a blur and Riley has to know how something she's been so careful about hiding and keeping private had gotten into her school bag.

She remembers putting it in her overnight bag when packing for the Minkus' and wearing it to bed the night before. And after she got dressed and dealt with Auggie she remembers getting her backpack ready for the day, and moving the sweatshirt out of the way while thinking about how comforting it is, and…Oh. How could she have been so stupid?

"Maya, Lucas and I are just friends. I swear. This isn't what it looks like."

"I don't even know what it looks like anymore." Maya shakes her head. "But I'm done talking about any of it. I'm done."

Riley can feel everything that's been building up, teetering above her head and threatening to crash down and crush her, start to waver as Maya speaks.

The bucket of ice water overturns and pours down her spine, seizing her lungs when Maya starts to walk away.

And the whole world seems to tunnel away and vanish when Riley notices Maya.

Taking off her ring.

By the time the world comes back into focus, Riley is on the floor. She doesn't even know how she got there, on her knees with the sweatshirt clutched in her hands, but she's there. It takes her another moment for her to realize that she's sobbing, gasping for air and coming up empty. She can't figure any of it out. What had just happened? Why can't she breathe? How is she suddenly crying? It doesn't make any sense.

Then Harper is crouching next to her, asking what happened, and Riley wants to answer but she can't make her voice work. She can't find the moments in between breaths—it barely feels like there is anything in her lungs—and she can't control her tears long enough to try and get anything more. She's not sure how long it goes on for. Harper tries to get her to calm down, tries to be soothing and get her to be breathe, and Riley only just manages to choke out her response.

"I—I," gasp, "I can't," gasp, "I-I can't stop," gasp.

She starts to hiccup as Harper tells someone to get the nurse. Her stomach churns and she can't stop crying, but she can't breathe and all she can see beyond the masses of Harper and who knows who else blurred by the tears is an endless cycle of horrible moments.

Finding out Mrs. Svorski was dead. Finding out Lucas didn't trust her with his past. The whole class thinking Maya and Lucas belonged together. The mess at the semi-formal. The texts. The texts. Those god-awful texts. Stop being who you are or I'm gonna put my foot in your weird, stupid face. The bell ringing so many times to get her to quit and standing alone in the face of everyone saying she couldn't do it. Realizing that Maya actually liked Lucas. The hurt on Lucas' face when she called him her brother. Maya pushing her down to the bed and blaming her for everything. Agreeing to be friends and nothing more. The whispers and rumors at school, making her the villain of the whole mess. The never ending silence and the cold emptiness when all she wanted was a hand to hold or someone to hold her. Screwing her smile on in front of the mirror every morning. The news coming in and the look on her mother's face as she gave it. There's been an accident. Your grandparents are in the hospital. Auggie screaming and crying and her being unable to do anything to fix it. Maya taking off her ring.

It doesn't stop.

She can't stop.

We'll get to reactions from everyone else next time around. Thanks again for reading.