Chapter 58
Under the Cover Of

"Are you sure you're going to be okay with this?" Lucas asked, as he pulled back from getting Elliott settled into his car seat.

"Yeah, of course I am, why wouldn't I be?" Maya asked, standing behind him. He turned to look at her and found she'd started to cry… again.

"Because that," he pointed to her face.

"I'm sorry, okay, I'm not really in control of my emotions right now," she tried to sound insulted but mostly knew he meant well, and anyway who was she kidding? "I'll be fine, I can keep it together," she sniffled, wiping her face on her sleeve. "It's just…" she tried to explain, only to burst out again.

"Okay, alright," he moved up to put his arms around her.

"I just don't understand how this happened… they won't even say and…"

"It won't last," Lucas vowed. Maya looked up at him. "I don't see how it could. It's Z and Z, they've been going longer than we have." That didn't help. Possibly it made it worse. "Deep breath, there you go," Lucas rubbed at his wife's back as she started blubbering again. "Halloween, remember? This is going to be great."

It had already been something of a complicated decision for all of them, as to what would happen with the year's 'spooky day festivities.' All their friends – save for Lucas' new school friends and their parent buddies – were back in Houston, figuring out what they would do this year without the proclaimed instigators of their previous house parties. Meanwhile, Ramona, Gaby, and Ari were off to a school party, the kind that did not mesh with Lucas and Maya's first Halloween with their son, not to mention baby number two currently in progress. And none of the parent crew was looking to do much more than put the kids in cute costumes, maybe give out candy, get some sleep… For a while, the Friars on the lane were starting to contemplate doing some of that, too, maybe just stopping in to see what Maya's siblings were up to, the Hunters here and the Harts there. It would be the Harts' first Halloween in Texas…

But then a few days ago, the night when Maya had played the new lullaby lyrics to Lucas actually, Riley had called the house with a plan. The roommates, back in Houston, had been talking things over, and the consensus had been reached between them. They weren't looking to have a big, crazy party like the last couple of years. Something about not having their friends there had kind of taken the heart out of it. But now, if they weren't going to be having that party, they had gotten to think how they might have a smaller party, just the housemates and their closer friends, all those ones Maya and Lucas did their best to stay in contact with – and vice versa – since the move but still didn't get to see nearly as much as they used to or wanted to. And they could bring Elliott that way, and, per Riley's insistence, they were more than welcome to spend the night at the house, so they wouldn't have to drive back to Austin afterward.

"You can spend your anniversary out here!"

It was their sixth, dating wise at least. In all the madness of baby stuff, and Kermit stuff, they had… not forgotten, exactly, but maybe resigned themselves to the thought that they would have themselves a quiet one this time around. After the invitation they had received however, they'd been left to consider their options, and they had finally decided… Yeah, that might actually be what they needed right about now. And Lucas finished class in mid-afternoon on that day, so it would be easy for them to pack up in the car and head on the road to make good time.

And then the bombshell had dropped, the night before. Zay and Nadine had broken up, over in Boston.

The strike had come via a phone call Lucas had received, from Asher back in New York. There wasn't so much to say except that apparently it had happened a few days before but he was only finding out now, as Zay had asked if he might come over and crash with him and the others for a while. Asher had also heard how they had almost broken up, over the summer, but then they'd had something of a reprieve, which might have been brought on by the arrival of Elliot Friar. It was hard to be unhappy with that little dude around, huh? But that had only worked for so long, and now…

Lucas had hated having to tell Maya, and he'd considered waiting a few more days, at least getting them past Halloween and the anniversary, but then it wouldn't have worked, not with them going to see their friends. And it wouldn't have been right either. Maya would want to check in with Nadine and Zay both, to know how they were doing, and she would hate to know she had been kept in the dark. So, he had told her. He'd just come home, and she was so excited, telling him about how she'd done a few last minute tweaks on their costumes, which only made it harder to tell her. If he'd had any choice…

To see the way her face had fallen, when he'd told her about the breakup… That was the first time she'd cried, looking very much as though her outburst had been fueled to some degree by hormones. She would have been upset either way, but now… Lucas was caught between being sad for their friends and being just a bit amused at how silly Maya was acting over the whole situation. She had been having little crying fits every one to four hours at the most, as far as he'd been made aware.

And now they were going to Houston, to spend Halloween with their friends, who had no idea she was pregnant and were not supposed to find out, not for a few more weeks. If all went as planned, the goal was to have themselves another Christmas revelation, but that was not likely to happen if the others started to wonder why she was having so deep of a reaction to their friends' break.

"I can do this," she took a breath, moving to climb in the passenger seat as she let the breath out. "This would be so much easier if I could get very drunk right now…"

Lucas chose to take it as a good sign that she didn't cry again through the whole two-hour drive out to their old house. Instead, she told him about being with her siblings earlier, before he'd come to pick her up to head to Houston.

She had spent much of the day with her Hunter siblings over at the house. The girls were home along with MJ, and they wanted nothing more than to spend time with their big sister and their little nephew. When Maya had shown up in mid-morning however, letting herself in with the aftermath of her latest bit of crying showing over her face, she had been greeted by a very puzzled looking Shawn. Setting down Elliott's car seat, she'd gone on to explain about Zay and Nadine, which only sent her spiralling once again and left her father to do what he could to console her and not come off as though he thought this was funny, especially when her voice would reach fever pitch heights.

"I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm…" she'd stopped, and taken a breath, her face zoning into what could hopefully be taken for determination. "Halloween," she stated along, like a mantra. "Where is everyone?" She took Elliott from his seat, lifting him up into her arms before passing him over to his grandfather, who had to blink and acknowledge him even as she took off to find the answers for herself.

They were all in the living room, as she soon learned. Her mother was laid out as comfortably as she could hope to be, on one of the couches. She was due… anywhere from the next few days to a week or two from now, as far as they knew, though by looking at her they could imagine she would have been glad to give birth right this very day. Meanwhile, the twins were sitting on the floor, on their knees in front of the coffee table, where they were busy drawing up their very own pumpkins, aided with markers. Their hands were half as covered in orange and green and brown and other colors as the papers in front of them. Standing in watch, MJ was not drawing, but the nearly two-year-old boy seemed enthralled by his sisters' work. This did not stop him from being the first to look up and see…

"Ya!" he sped over to her, and she snatched him up into a hug.

"Hey, baby brother, what's happening here?" Maya gave as good as she got. A year ago, he'd still been a babe in arms, when Maya and Lucas had been struggling to keep their secret from Katy and Shawn and now… It was hard to decide if she was stunned for how much he'd grown or for the way he was actually still so small. And then she would think about Elliott, a year from now, when his little brother or sister would be about the size he was now, while he… Halloween, Halloween, keep it together. Emotions were really going to be her minefield today, weren't they?

Her sisters had been very proud to show her their drawings, and as chaotic as the four-year-olds' interpretations could be, on the whole they were really very expressive. Now that Maya was here though, they were ready to abandon their markers and finally get their costumes on. If it had been up to them, they would have been wearing them day to night, every day, since they'd gotten them tried on for the first time. Today was the day though, which meant they were well within their rights. Shawn had taken on the task of getting them cleaned up post-drawing and Halloween ready.

"I believe this belongs to you," he passed Elliott back over to her.

"Looks familiar, yeah," Maya smiled as the boy clung to her the moment she had him. While Shawn grabbed MJ and led the girls upstairs, Maya went and sat near her mother, where Katy could get a look of her grandson. "How are you feeling?" Maya asked her.

"Like I'm this close to exploding and that might not be the worst thing?" Katy hummed, with a sweeping gesture around her belly which made her look like a witch stirring at her cauldron. "Used to be that all we wanted was for him to stay in there, but now he's good and cooked, so… whenever he's ready…" she sighed. "How about you?" she turned to her daughter now, chuckling like she was just remembering the fact that she and her daughter were both pregnant at the same time… again.

"I'm alright," Maya nodded.

"You want to tell that to your face?" Katy reached out, and Maya could only wonder what she must have looked like.

"It's nothing to do with me, but I shouldn't say it or I'll get started again. Ask Dad when he gets back, okay?"

"As long as you say it's not you or the b-a-b-y," she spelled out, in case the girls ended up in earshot. Maya promised her that, on that front, everything was about where they could be expected to be, being all of eleven weeks along.

Then again, it was impossible not to notice how much faster she was starting to show this time around. Eleven weeks with Elliott, no one could really know unless she spelled it out for them, but now she was definitely more than 'a little round' all of a sudden. To some, she might have been able to say this was from having Elliott, but others, those closest to her… All it would take would be one piece of clothing betraying her and the secret would be out. Her Hunter siblings would likely not notice a thing, but then the Harts… If this kept up, waiting until Christmas would be impossible.

Case and point, she had gone to see her Hart siblings after leaving the Hunters, where she was greeted at the door by Eliza. The eight-year-old had hugged her at once, and as she'd pulled away, Maya could just see a look on her face, like she'd felt something strange. All she could do was work quick to distract her, to stop her mind from going much further down that road. As ever, this had been facilitated with the presence of baby number one. Now that Elliott was bigger, steadier, they were getting to the point where Maya and Lucas might trust the girl to pick up her nephew and carry him around, which she'd done, taking him over to where young Uncle Wyatt was already in costume and ready to go trick or treating.

"Maya!" Cara's voice just barely preceded the sound of many feet hurrying down the stairs, and when she'd looked up, Maya discovered these belonged to her sister and their brother, as Sam was hot on her heels, as though trying to either get ahead of her or maybe just stopping her from doing or saying something. That proved to be correct, as they'd barely cleared the last steps before Sam tried to put his hand over her mouth but was not fast enough to do it before Cara dodged out of the way, laughing. "Sammy got a girlfriend, Sammy got a girlfriend!" she shouted it out as quick as she could, laughing harder now that she'd succeeded not only in sharing the news but in making her brother go all red in the face. As sympathetic as she could be for him, Maya couldn't help but bite back a chuckle at this.

"Does he now?" she asked, turning a smile to her brother, who appeared to be caught between wanting to get his revenge over his little sister and trying not to look so completely embarrassed in front of his older sister. There was no way out. "Samuel?" Maya inquired.

"She's not my…" he started to tell her, even as Cara was standing next to him, making kissy noises and bumping her puppet hands against one another.

"Really…" Maya's grin grew, while Sam's face deepened to a new shade.

"I saw them," Cara whispered. "Sammy and Dora, sitting in the yard, k-i-s-s-i-…"

"Dead!" Sam proclaimed, and Cara bolted off, resuming the chase and filling the house with giggles.

After Cara's neck had been 'saved' by Abigail telling her and Sam to quit running around, Maya had been able to get to work, transforming her brothers and sisters for their trick or treating round. After Wyatt's makeup had scared Elliott and made him cry, the baby had been left to his grandfather for comfort. It had very nearly started Maya crying again – for reasons other than her friends' breakup for once – when she'd heard him singing the words to the lullaby for Elliott while she was painting Eliza's face in the kitchen… especially as she could tell it was working.

The true test to her resolve had come with Sam's turn in her chair. She had waited until he was stuck there, unable to leave, before casually inquiring whether Cara had spoken truly. He'd stood nearby the whole time Maya had been doing her makeup, like he wanted to make sure she wouldn't say more than she already had, but now it was just the two of them.

"Well?" she asked, quietly. Sam looked ready to bolt, but then what would that get him.

"Yes," he finally replied, even quieter than her. Maya smiled.

"The girlfriend part or the kissing?" Her brother gulped.

"Both, I guess." Here she was, trying to have a playful moment with her brother, and all of a sudden, something about the promise of new love – or whatever it might be called when the couple in question was thirteen and fourteen years old – coupled with the inescapable awareness of a love broken up in Boston, had caused her to feel a tingling in her eyes, and then a rise of emotion she could not stuff back down, couldn't snuff out…

"I'm so happy for you, Sammy," she told him, and her trembling voice was paired with a trembling hand, forcing her to stop while she cried.

"Maya? Are you okay?" Sam blinked. A moment later, there was his hand on her shoulder, and her hand had gone to grasp on to it, contact.

"I'm fine, I'm sorry, I just… friends of mine are going through a rough patch and I'm really, I… It's so sad… I can't stop crying about it, but it'll pass, really, everything's fine." Now her little brother was hugging her, standing while she sat there, and Maya almost felt bad for prodding him over Dora now. And then he'd said…

"Is it the baby that's making you cry like that?"

"What?" she'd sniffed, not even sure that she'd heard…

"Not Elliott, I mean the one in your belly." Maya looked up at him. "I'm right, aren't I?" Sam asked, smiling.

"You're the genius here," she laughed, and took a breath. He never stopped amazing her, did he? She had no idea exactly how long he'd known, but he'd said it in this one moment, and he'd helped her stop crying because of it. "And… yeah… it probably is. You can't tell the others, okay?" He held out his pinky to her, and that was that.

Maybe for that confidence… and maybe because she wanted to see his reaction when he'd hear it from them… Maya had not yet told Lucas about his cousin and her brother's budding romance, or the part where Dora had kissed Sam and he'd kissed her back. She'd left that whole part of the story out, as she told him the rest over the drive. She finished with the rest, just as they were arriving at the house in Houston.

"You're going to have to stop doing that if you don't want them to know," Lucas pointed out with a smile.

"Stop doing what?" Maya asked. He nodded down, and she looked to discover she had her hand over her small-but-not-that-small start of a belly. She hadn't even done it consciously, it was just there, and she knew it was there, and her hand wanted to go… "Oh, right," she sighed. Lucas reached over now, placing his hand over hers. "Did I hear you talking at me this morning?"

"Well, I had to introduce myself sooner or later, get the conversation going," he pointed out, which made her laugh.

"The Bee can't hear you," she reminded him.

"Small detail… small bee," he shrugged. "Hey, hey, keep it together," he reached over to nudge some new tears away.

"You're the one who made me do it this time," she 'accused,' taking a breath.

Maya had walked toward the house with Elliott out of his seat and in her arms, which was as good of a way as any to keep people from possibly noticing what was happening under her jacket and shirt. This could only work so long, as any one of the boy's many 'aunts' and 'uncles' would come and snatch him away from her the first chance they got, but by then the initial introduction would have been made.

"Yeah, so, don't go in the kitchen," Lucas came to find Maya, as she'd taken Elliott back from Sophie and Chiara in order to go up and change the both of them into their costumes.

"Why?" Maya asked.

"I don't know how your stomach's doing, but there's some cakes back there…"

"I like cake, I love…"

"They're shaped like severed arms and legs." She paused.

"Oh…" she gave him a look like 'that bad?'

"Very realistic," Lucas nodded.

"Right… On a normal year, that would have been a highlight," she informed Elliott, who enjoyed the 'ride' up the stairs by reaching for the pictures on the walls as they went.

When the relaxed friends-only party had been proposed, they had jumped on the idea. Understandably, Halloween had always been very important to them for a long time, for a number of reasons. Aside from loving the day on its own, separately, it had been a key component in their growing friendship. And then, of course, on October 31st six years ago now, they'd had that moment, at the haunted house, an almost kiss which led to a proper kiss and the start of their relationship the following morning. Five years after that, to the day, in this very house, they had discovered that they were having a baby, and it had changed so much of their lives. Now one more year had passed, and they were back, with their baby boy along for the spooks, and their second child secretly growing inside Maya's belly. Halloween was and would continue to be so important to them, so now to start sharing in the tradition with their son…

"Need me to do anything?" Lucas asked, as they set up in what had once been their room almost by reflex.

"You just start getting changed, I've got this," Maya assured him.

It had taken them some time to figure out what they do as far as costumes. They had done couples at times, or group costumes, other times their own thing… But now they had to come up with something for him and her and the baby, and they wanted to get it Just Right. Maya had been exploring options for weeks already, and they had gone through more of those than they could count. A lot of those options had been eliminated on small technicalities. They didn't want to dress as anything that would transform them so much that Elliott wouldn't recognize them anymore, and he might start to cry. They wanted the baby's costume to fit with their costumes, but it couldn't be anything that might be harmful either.

And now, Maya's costume couldn't be anything that would somehow expose her secret bump. Up until a couple weeks ago, they'd been planning to go as Green Arrow and Black Canary. Maya had gotten a sling and started to modify it, to turn it into what would look like a quiver, which Lucas could wear on his back, with Elliott poking out the top with a sort of foam arrowhead hat. But then time had happened, and so had that speedy little start of a belly, promising to be very noticeable in that Black Canary costume. So, it was back to the drawing board, with little time for a turnaround.

"Look at you now," Maya felt that lurch in her heart that was like an alarm, signalling she was teetering on the edge of tears. It was really getting to be a bit ridiculous, how easily her brain could go from 'here's my baby boy, in his first Halloween costume' to 'I can't wait to show our friends' to 'two of those friends who have been together for seven years just broke up and they're so far away' and then poof, waterworks. Lucas had just finished getting dressed, and he'd come back to have a look.

"If it helps, I might cry, too," he told Maya, which made her laugh. "Go on, I've got him." Lucas picked Elliott up into his arms, the boy looking like he might start to fuss until he got a look at him. "I think he thinks I'm Pappy Joe like this," he turned to Maya, in the midst of getting undressed. It was a wonder no one had accidentally come in and seen, with the way their attempts to hide either pregnancy had usually ended up with loads of people finding out.

"What do you think? Covert enough?" Maya asked, letting the light blue dress fall into place. When it caught the light, it sparkled.

"I don't see it," Lucas nodded.

"What if I do this?" she raised her arms over her head, turned this way and that…

"Nothing but a fairy…" he promised, making her smile as she moved to finish getting ready. Soon, the trio, the covert quartet, would make its way down the stairs, the Blue Fairy leading the way ahead of Geppetto and his real boy Pinocchio, to join the party.

One year ago, to the day, their lives had changed, right here. They could not have foreseen just how true this would be, and continue to be, until they would end up here again, on another Halloween, newly pregnant once again. Next year… next year it would be the four of them, and oh how much more could their lives change between now and then?

TO BE CONTINUED

See you next week! - mooners