xxx

After a brief carride to a Chilli's near by Maya's house, Maya lunged the car door open and hopped out of the car, slightly slamming it shut in an eager sort of way. Shawn slowly got out of the car, glancing over at Maya as she did so hastly. "Chill out, Kiddo, you're going to wreck my ride," he joked to Maya, earning a little giggle from Riley and a confused expression from August. Maya raised her eyebrows and leaned back against the door, gripping the front edges of her torn jean jacket.

While Shawn carefully pushed his door closed, in order to tease Maya, causing her to comment, "Hurry up, old man! The resturunt's going to close before you get out of the car!" As Maya began to loudly laugh at her own joke, Shawn walked up to the other side of her along with Auggie, snickering as well. He was a lot like Maya and didn't view her jokes as anything personally.

After a slight moment, Riley approached the trio and stood closely and silently next to Maya. Maya glanced over to the right side of her, noticing something that she felt guilty for not realizing earlier.

She was so caught up in her playful banter's with Hunter, it hadn't come to her senses that Riley was being uncomfortably and unusually quiet. Maya examined her face, picking up an evident worrisome expression and a familiar sense of content loneliness. Maya immediately grew concerned; she was very protective over her best friend, Riley. Riley was like family to her, as well, maybe even more of family than Shawn was. She couldn't bear to see her upset, and knew that Riley would openly explain her misfourtune to her if she asked.

"Ri, are you okay?" Maya questioned Riley, slowly catching her attention. Maya notied that Riley wasn't hesitant about ranting to her, but more tongue-tied. At first, she just stared straight at her bestfriend with a meaningless expression as they quickly walked into the front doors of Chilli's. Shawn glanced back at them again, knowing that Riley and Maya needed their alone time to talk.

"Uhm..Maya, Riley, I'm going to bring Auggie up to the front to order. You two can sit down at a table and wait if you'd like," he offered to them, not intentionally sounding aware of the girl's need to talk. Maya smiled gratefully at Shawn, then towards Riley, who's empty facial expression seemed to drag on. Riley grabbed Maya's arm and rushingly pulled her over to a table far away from the front counter and the waiters. Maya giggled at her reaction and allowed Riley to yank her into a small booth, throwing herself on the left side.

"Maya today has been bad! Bad, bad, bad!" Riley explained in her usual quirky tone of words, nervously tapping her fingers against the table. Maya leaned one arm back against the seat cushion, shaking her head at Riley's choice of speech.

She nodded understandingly and said, "I can see that, crazy," agreeing with Riley's thrown-together statement. Even though Riley was often Maya's shoulder to cry on, Maya was always open if Riley needed somebody to talk to as well. Riley has had her dilemmas, but they were usually small, simple, and easy to solve.

But this one in particular was slightly complex.

"My parents are arguing! And it's baaaaaaaad arguing! My Uncle Shawn is here and I don't know why!" Riley complained, leaning her head back in aggravation and nervousness. Maya's mouth dropped open in strong disbelief, as she shook her head swiftly and sat up straighter.

"Your parents are fighting? Cory and Topanga are fighting?!" Maya wondered with surprise, double-taking what Riley had said to her. Maya was the kind of girl that didn't hope for anything, believing that if you hope for things, you get dissapointed. She couldn't expect the best, unlike her best-friend, Riley. But even with all of Maya's negativity and doubts, she found in unbelievable that Cory and Topanga were bickering.

"Yesssssss,' Riley exclaimed, extending the sss sound in yes to exaggerate her point to Maya. Maya had never been aware of the Matthew's fighting before, it was honestly something that she thought was luckily impossible. She had always viewed Riley's family as "the perfect family" and loves to be involved with them as much as possible. Riley's family problems unsurprisingly seized to phaze Maya, though, because she was used to sheer dissapointmet and awful surprises. Still, it exceeded to be a shock to her; it was a problem that didn't usually go wrong...hard to explain.

"How long have they been arguing?" Maya wondered, raising her eyebrows as Riley went on talking.

"I don't know! I just found out this afternoon, and it's drving me...me...insane!" Riley dramatically responded. Maya nodded and leaned back, trying to ponder up ways to calm her best friend. She had good knowledge on family problems, but not extremely amazing advice on parental fighting issues. Maya never had two parents before and didn't know what it was like to experience arguing between them. She was sure that they had bickered...before she was born.

Shawn strolled over to the table the two girls were chatting at, along with Auggie. Auggie gave them a small wave, and Shawn said, "Do you guys want to sit here alone, or should we go to another table?"

Maya slightly shrugged, missing Riley's urgent expression that was alerting her to send them to a table that was farther away, and replied, "How about you just sit at the table next to ours," pointing
to a small table only inches away from them.

Shawn grinned in response and led August over to the table, sitting down. He leaned his head on his hand and glanced over at Riley, away for a minute, then back, and offered, "So...do you want to know something about your parents?"