A/N: Thank you so much for your kind words and generous views. I know there was a problem with the Chapter Two email alert, but I did keep my word and post as promised. As you may have noticed in the second chapter this is where the details of this story began to shift from the original work, but the important details are still the same. This is the last update I will make until Tuesday after Christmas. Hope everyone has a Merry Christmas, and is ready to return for Chapter Four Tuesday!
Isaiah Babineaux waited outside the apartment when Maya came up behind him. Her hair was mussed and her lipstick smeared. Clearly, she and Josh had been having a fun time on their date when she'd received Farkle's text. Not that he had the time or inclination to dwell on that image long. There were more pressing matters to deal with, like the person they'd stumbled on outside the bakery earlier.
The blonde bounced on the balls of her feet impatiently before charging forward. Her tiny fist pounded the door.
"I just did that," he mumbled but she wasn't listening. Her mind was already busy planning all the ways she would make Minkus pay for interrupting her evening.
"This better be good," She grumbled. "I was in the middle of pretty hot make-out session when-"
He tried to hide the flinch, but she saw it.
Silence fell between them as she gnawed on the corner of her lip.
That was the sticky part about their situation. They were friends, but they were also more. And she was so comfortable confiding in her friend Zay that sometimes she forgot to censor subjects that might hurt him as her more than friend. It was all very confusing!
"Sorry."
Zay stared straight ahead. Suddenly eager to put distance between them, he banged repeatedly on the door. The sooner Farkle arrived and let them in, the sooner they would have something less awkward to focus on.
Maya pulled her keyring from her pocket and began rummaging through the individual keys until she found what she was looking for.
Zay watched quizzically as she slipped the key into the slot and gave it a turn.
"What are you, the gatekeeper?"
The blonde shrugged with an impish grin.
"Do you want in or not," she countered as she stepped inside.
He resisted at first. Letting himself into a friend's apartment didn't exactly seem the polite way to enter. It was just a notch below climbing through the window like a burglar. However, it also seemed silly to stand there on the doorstep when his companion had already unlocked the door and made herself at home on the sofa.
Begrudgingly he stepped through the frame.
"Did they at least give it to you, or did you help yourself to a copy?"
She smiled wider, her expression saying it all.
"Oh, she has keys to everyone's place." Farkle chuckled from behind. "Even yours."
The man's mouth fell open as he processed this information.
"I didn't give you a key." His voice shot up in octave.
Farkle was tempted to let the current subject run its course, knowing the conversation was about to take a turn for the worst. He also knew it had to be done, not just as the protection squad, but as people who had once been friends with Lucas as well.
"What's so important that it couldn't wait til tomorrow Minkus?" She raised a brow in suspicion.
Or at least until after Riley's party.
The genius rocked slightly on his heels, instead turning his gaze toward Zay.
This only spurred her further.
"I knew it! She leapt from her seat with a growl. "I knew there was something going on when you didn't show up! What's going on?"
The two exchanged a glance of caution. Neither wanted to be the one to tell her.
"One of you better say something," she demanded.
Zay, "let me tell you a good story" Babineaux was, of course, the first to break.
"Lucas was here," He lifted his hands in defense for the sucker punch that would surely follow.
"Simmer down, spitfire! Its fine. I saw him, I shoved him, and Farkle sent him on his way, right man?"
They both turned toward the brunette for confirmation who cringed under their scrutiny.
"I…may…have sent him back to the bakery after the party."
He took a step back from his friends as his announcement set in.
"You did what?!" They shrieked in unison.
Farkle took another step back, which did him little good since they were advancing toward him. Maya was staring him down with that "I'm going to cause you pain and I'm going to enjoy it" look he knew so well. Zay was dumbfounded, understandably so.
"Dude! Why would you do that?"
The blonde should have been ready to pummel her favorite little know it all within an inch of his life, but something was distracting her. Her first was reared back and aimed straight for the genius's arm, but her attention drifted back to the man standing behind her.
"You really shoved him?"
She'd never tried to imagine Zay losing his temper before, but the picture sent a warm shiver through her. His bashful "Well, yeah," only intensified the heat licking her veins.
"That's kinda hot." Her tone was teasing, but sensual.
Farkle was queasy listening to what now sounded like a rather intimate conversation.
"Okay first of all, ew! Zay blanched at the comment. Maya was shameless. "Second of all, I get why you're upset but hear me out." He pleaded.
"I love Riley just as much as both of you. I'd never do anything to hurt her, and if it had happened the way we thought, I'd have sent him packing, but it didn't. Guys, he has no idea! Or at least he didn't…. he might by now."
The petite blonde punched his arm again.
"She's gonna freak! You know that, right?"
The brunette's words were like cold water to Zay. Lucas had been his best friend. He'd raised his hand to his best friend, and it wasn't what they thought.
He placed his hands on her shoulders, forcing her to stop and think.
"They're both gonna lose it."
That was the one fact all three could agree on. There was nothing left to do but man their stations and wait for updates.
Riley was paralyzed. Her mind raced. Had she somehow fallen asleep while sweeping the bakery floor? Had her body finally crippled under the strain of motherhood, work, and finals, leaving her victim to her subconscious imaginings? That was the only logical explanation for what she was seeing. Though it didn't account for kinetic energy pulsing through her. That only came from proximity with one person.
"Lucas," she breathed in disbelief.
Two hours before he'd thought the closest he would ever be to her was standing on the opposite side of a window, staring in at what might have been. Now he was there, face to face, and overwhelmed by her presence.
Anxiously, she brushed her bangs from her eyes- those dark chocolate eyes that could cut him to the core
"Hi." Her smile was stiff, forced, but not insincere. Whatever misunderstandings were between them, she appeared genuinely happy he was there.
"Hi," he echoed, unsure how to proceed.
He released her waist from his grip, apologizing for his lingering limbs.
While he was in the middle of stuttering an apology, the dream shifted into a nightmare as realization dawned. Her daughter was sleeping in the back office, mere feet away from where they were standing. She couldn't afford to fall into old habits.
"Can I get you something?" Her voice was higher, bouncier, more suitable to customer service now.
Her shields went up and she fell into her second default; waitressing. Riley dashed back toward the counter, groping for some use to make of her hands.
"How about some coffee?" She stepped toward the pot before remembering she was off duty and unprepared for company of any kind. "Or not…you know they just had a big party today. I'm sure there's some leftovers if you'll just give me a second to check," she rattled on nervously as her eyes darted frequently to the office door.
Lucas reached out, laying his hand over hers. It was a gesture that had always calmed her in the past, but as he looked into her eyes all he could see was fear.
"It's okay, Riley. I'll go if you really want me to." His thumb made circles against her skin.
"I just needed to see you…"
The longing in his eyes was more than she could take. Why did he have to be there now? And why did she have to revert into her walking spastic former self every time she got near him? She wasn't that girl anymore.
"Why?"
A small cry erupted from the backroom, sending Riley into high alert. Lucas released her hand as the pitter patter of little feet came closer until the little girl took off in a run for her mother's arms. Finally safe, she nuzzled against Riley's shoulder while she hummed a song that brought back the most bittersweet memories.
He'd always known she would be an incredible mom, but seeing her with her daughter reminded him once again that he was intruding on her life. He had no place there.
"I think I should go," he whispered, careful not to wake the sleeping child.
Riley hugged her daughter closer, avoiding his gaze.
"Maybe you should."
Her answer shouldn't have shocked him. If even he was aware how out of place he was, she had to be. Still, it hurt to hear her confirm what he already knew.
"She looks just like you." A half-hearted smile crept across his face.
He didn't have it in him to say goodbye to her. He couldn't say "I'll be seeing you" this time either. So he chose to leave it there. For the rest of his life he would remember the image of Riley with that little girl in her arms. That's how he would always see her now. As a mother.
She looked down at the toddler sleeping in her arms. If he walked out that door now, they might never see him again. Didn't she owe it to her child to at least try one last time?
"She has your eyes." The brunette called out just loud enough to be heard.
Lucas stumbled into a nearby table. His thoughts moved at light speed, yet he couldn't form a coherent response. Instead he turned toward the woman with the sleeping child in her arms, trying to reconcile the picture in front of him with the words she'd just spoken.
The clatter jarred the sleeping toddler awake.
Timidly he stepped closer, lost in those slumberous green spheres that resembled his own.
From his first glance of the child, he'd been heartbroken. After three long years of mourning the loss of not only Riley, but the marriage and family that never was, this innocent little girl running through the bakery had confirmed his worst fear. He'd barely been able to look at her, now he couldn't look away. Nor could he stop himself from reaching out.
Was it possible that dream hadn't slipped through his fingers, after all?
His hand dropped, a breath away from touching her.
It was too good to be true. And too awful! Had there been a child, surely, he would have known. Something inside him would have shifted or changed, alerting him to her existence. He had to believe that. Otherwise there was no bond between them.
The brunette watched his face; the flutters of anticipation in her stomach knotted into dread.
Maybe she should have let him walk out the door. It might have been best for everyone if they had never acknowledged the common thread that was their daughter, but she couldn't do that. She couldn't believe that Lucas wouldn't want to know their little girl. No matter how many letters returned unopened or calls went unanswered, she had clung to the hope that there had to be some other explanation for why he'd stayed away.
She clung tighter to the child squirming in her embrace.
"Please say something."
His gaze jerked from his daughter's face to Riley's.
The fear in her dark shining orbs mirrored her plea for words. But what could he say? Apologies and questions flooded his mind but he couldn't get them past his tongue.
He stared back at her; lost and uncertain. She'd imagined this conversation more times than she'd care to admit over the years and had thought her imaginings had run the gamut from best to worst. But standing there she realized this was the worst. Because no matter how she tried, she couldn't read him. The man standing in front of her was a stranger, and she'd just given him claim to the most important person in her world.
This time when he reached out Riley pulled back.
"You know what," she shifted the toddler in her arms from one side to the other. She was half awake and growing whiny. "on second thought, we should probably get home. It's getting late and I uh…I really can't do this right now."
Lucas felt sick.
She was scared, that much he could see. And their daughter kept looking back at him like the stranger he was. He didn't want them to go. He had so much to ask, to say, to apologize for. But Riley didn't seem to want to hear any of it.
"You're right," he rubbed the back of his neck. "We shouldn't do this tonight."
She nodded, forcing a smile.
Lucas had given her an out, and she was grateful. But she wasn't naïve. Sooner or later, they would have to talk, and if this Lucas was anything like the one she had grown up with, he wouldn't wait long.
"Look at that, aint nobody home. Guess that means we should go." Zay pointed back toward the staircase.
Maya chuckled at the suggestion as if it were a joke.
Farkle trailed behind from what he considered a safe distance. The two might be united in a common cause at the moment, but she'd made no effort to hide her outrage since the big reveal back at his place. Not that he would expect her to. The blonde had never been one for hiding her emotions.
"Maybe Zay's right, maybe this is a bad idea."
This earned him another frightening smile that promised pain in the near future.
"Well if you'd have kept your mouth shut, none of us would have to be here."
She growled, removing the ring of keys from her pocket and swinging it around her finger.
Zay examined each key as she thumbed through them, until she passed one that held a startling resemblance to his own.
"Is that-" he sputtered, pointing to the key in question. "I'm gonna want that back!"
She shrugged innocently, letting herself in.
"Whatever you say, Hank," she smirked in the dark.
Zay flipped the switch next to the door, filling the room with light.
"That's not my name!"
Farkle chuckled, following them in. It didn't take a genius to realize Maya only called him that to push his buttons. It was a specialty of hers.
"You're too easy Babineaux, she teased, lifting herself onto the kitchen bar.
Zay wiped his mouth to cover his boastful grin.
"You weren't complaining last week."
The brunette grimaced as he positioned himself as far from the blonde as possible.
"That joke was a lot less gross before you two started doing…" images he didn't want began to flood his oversized brain. "Whatever it is you do."
Maya didn't blanch under the accusation, but Zay did.
That was always the reaction. No one doubted Farkle and Smackle's relationship, and until Lucas had gone MIA during the pregnancy, no one had questioned whether he and Riley would make it. Yet when he and Maya crossed that line together, it was somehow gross or wrong. He couldn't understand why two pairs of soulmates from the same group of friends seemed perfectly acceptable, but the idea of three was absurd. Not that he'd go so far as to call her his soulmate.
Still, she meant a great deal to him, whatever they were.
"Leave him alone." She combed her hair to the side. "Don't you think you've done enough damage already?"
Farkle groaned. He wished Isadora were there. He liked to think that she would understand, maybe even be able to get through to their passionate friend. But even if she couldn't, he'd feel better just having her close.
"I did the right thing Maya! He deserved to know and so does she!"
Riley stormed out of the bedroom where she had been hiding. She'd known it was only a matter of time before they showed up, but she'd foolishly hoped she'd have more time to process her feelings alone before having to pretend to search for birds while they bickered amongst themselves about how to handle her situation.
"I already know."
All eyes turned to face the brunette at the end of the hall. Her expression eerily calm.
"How you doin' sugar?"
Before she could reply, Maya leapt from the bar, eager to take her rightful place next to her sister.
"Farkle just blew her life apart, how do you think she is!?" She gestured toward friend in question. "Go ahead Riles, tell him how betrayed you feel, how out of line he was."
Zay came over placing his hands over the blonde's slender shoulders.
"How about we let Riley tell us how she feels instead of us telling her?"
She scowled at him, but reluctantly agreed.
"Fine. How do you feel Riles?"
Riley made her way into the living room and slumped on the couch, dropping her head into her hands.
How did she feel? Like a stranger in her own life, like she must be glutton for punishment. Like she had just messed everything up and nothing would ever be the same.
"I don't know," she sighed. "It all happened so fast. I turned around and bam! There he was. And then tried to act like it wasn't weird but of course it was weird, and then she started crying and ran out to find me-"
Zay and Maya exchanged a concern filled glance.
"You mean he saw her?" The blonde demanded.
Riley thought back to the pained look on his face when she'd come running out.
"Yeah, he did. He almost left."
Farkle sidled closer to his friend. For the first time, he questioned his judgement that night. Perhaps Maya was right and he'd made a mistake.
"So, what stopped him then," the blonde probed further.
The brunette tucked anxiously tucked her hair back. She knew her best friend wouldn't like the answer.
"I did…" she choked out, turning to the genius next to her. "He doesn't know, does he?"
It had taken a good amount of retrospection for her to put the pieces together but eventually the picture began to form. She had always secretly hoped there was another explanation for Lucas's dismissiveness. For months, she'd waited for him to come back to her and their child, to help her be brave enough to face the unknown, but eventually she'd had to move on without him. It hadn't mattered what Lucas had done or why anymore. All that mattered were the choices she'd made and the precious little life that they'd created together. She'd somehow managed to build a new life over the ruins they had left behind despite the ghosts of yesterday. Now that ghost was here in the flesh, asking to be invited in, and once again she wasn't ready.
Farkle shook his head.
"He didn't, no."
Maya plopped down next to her. She didn't appreciate what Farkle had done and liked the idea of Lucas Friar's return even less. Whatever feelings she had on the subject they could wait.
"What can we do," she asked.
The brunette forced a smile, rising from the couch.
"You guys can get out of here and get back to living your lives." She opened the door and gestured to the hall. "I appreciate the concern, but I'm okay. Go home! Go out! Just please stop worrying about me," she pleaded.
After several attempts to sway her, the group of friends finally had no choice but to relent and grant her wish. Each one trudged across the threshold, promising only to be a call or text away before being pushed through the exit.
"I don't like this," the blonde declared on the other side of the door. "When someone drops a bomb, you react! You don't stand there all calm and collected. You cry, or scream, or break something. It's weird!"
Zay's lips formed an upside-down U shape.
"Maybe it's a mom thing? You know, holding it together for the kid?"
The blonde snorted. Trouble is what it was.
He raised his arm without thinking, almost wrapping it around her, before remembering why he shouldn't. He jammed his hand into his pocket to avoid temptation.
"Back in high school, all I wanted was to be them. I was so jealous of what they had."
She peered up at him with a knowing look. One that said she understood more than anyone else could. Though she'd rather die than admit it, she had been too. Everyone had. Judging by the blank expression on Riley's face, he had no reason to envy Lucas anymore.
Lucas lay awake in bed, the voice of a much younger and happier Riley echoing in his head. If he closed his eyes he could almost feel her there next to him, her left leg tangled up between his and the ends of her hair tickling his chest. He remembered the bashful smile on her face when she'd asked him to paint her a picture of their life together. His first thought had been to paint their wedding, but she'd been so hesitant to accept his proposal, he feared any reference to the actual ceremony might spook her.
"Okay, close your eyes." He kissed each eyelid gently as she did so.
The brunette sighed, dropping her head to his shoulder.
"Now imagine you're in our house."
Her eyes shot open, gleaming with excitement.
"We have a house?!"
He chuckled at her enthusiasm.
"Yes, we have a house. It's not huge or anything. Just a small family house."
She propped her head up on her hand with a smile.
"With a wraparound porch and a swing for us to spend summer nights on?"
He imagined them sitting on the porch someday with their grandchildren, just as he had done with his grandparents, and couldn't help but grin.
"Anything you want, Riles." Lucas ran a hand through her curly waves.
"So you're in our house making dinner and there's a little girl coloring at the table. She's got your deep brown eyes, and pretty, dark hair. She even smiles just like you."
Riley's eyes shot open again.
"Well she has to have something of yours too."
The blonde arched a brow.
"My equilibrium," he teased.
She leaned her head into her hand, contemplating.
"I'd want our child to have your eyes."
Her tone was so cheerful it made his heart skip a beat. If he could somehow secure that dream for her, he would.
"Fine. She can have my eyes and my balance, but the rest should be all you."
He could remember everything about that day; the smell of Riley's shampoo, the color of the sheets, the number of times they made love. Curiosity pricked his senses. Could that have been the day their little girl was conceived?
She was everything they had dreamt her to be. His eyes. Riley's smile, and she hadn't tripped once when they were playing tag in the bakery that afternoon. He'd come so close to walking out that door without ever knowing. Had Riley not called out to him, he'd probably have been on a plane back to Texas that night. And she'd have thought he knew and chose to leave them behind.
His talk with Farkle had been eye-opening to say the least, but he'd omitted the most important detail. The part where Lucas abandoned the love of his life with their child. How could he not have known? It had to have happened when they were living together in Texas. Had she been queasy the last few weeks before the move? Tired? He had spent those last days working to commit every detail of her to memory, but looking back, if there had been a sign, he couldn't recall.
She had been carrying his child the day she climbed into that moving truck and drove away.
Had she known? No! Riley would never keep him from his child like that. Even now, with every reason to assume the worst, she had done what she could to encourage a connection between father and daughter. She had to have learned once she was back home. But why hadn't he known? How could she not have told him?
Unless…
The break.
The first few weeks after their breakup had been brutal. Each day he'd come home to an empty apartment where she'd once been waiting for him, slept on the couch because the bed was too lonely without her. He couldn't take it alone and so he had leaned on the one person who had always been able to make everything bearable. Her.
She had been struggling too. It had been her decision to walk away but that hadn't lessened her pain. So together they leaned on one another, until the lines began to blur. As much as they wanted to stay friends, it was too much. And so, they had agreed a clean break was necessary. It was like ripping his own heart out, but he did it. He'd changed his number, blocked all her social media accounts, and left every trace of her behind. Everything except his heart and their baby, both of which she still had.
He shifted in bed, kicking at the covers. How could he possibly hope to sleep after the discovery he'd just made? He was a dad. He had a daughter. Whose name he didn't even know. How could he sleep knowing that? He couldn't.
Lucas bolted up in bed, reaching for his phone on the nightstand. His hands felt sweaty as he searched for shred of paper Riley had scribbled her number onto earlier that night. He wouldn't have been able to let her walk away without some assurance they'd see one another again. Carefully, he punched her number into his phone. He knew she was in no hurry for their conversation, but he'd already missed the last three years. He couldn't wait anymore.