A/N: The new chapter of "We Three Hearts" is now available!

February 25th 2023

Chapter 56
We Begin to Sing

"Mom… Good morning… Hey…"

Even with their eyes closed, giving the semblance of sleep, both Maya and Lucas were awake enough to hear their daughter's whispers, to catch the rising insistence in Marianne's voice as she tried to tell herself that she wasn't trying to wake her parents, not at all, but she did really want them to be awake because it was finally happening and she was just as excited as they were, maybe even more than them, as far as she could tell. It was premiere day, and the sooner they got up, the sooner it could begin. And she really wanted it to begin.

To Marianne's delight as well as her mother's, Maya was now an expert in the art of daughter snatching. The eight-year-old would barely have time to watch her arm and the blanket going up that she'd then be caught and pulled into a snuggling embrace that made her squeak with surprise.

"Not yet, not yet," Maya told her, pressing kisses at her cheek. "This, first."

"Okay, fine," Marianne sighed so dramatically that it was now her parents who laughed.

"I'm really glad we travelled all this way for this," Lucas declared as he draped his arm over the both of them. "We never do anything like this back home." Maya snorted; Marianne giggled.

There was no way that this brief moment, just the three of them, would be allowed to remain that way very long, not with that handful of little sisters not so far off. Much as they would have loved for this to be their entire day together or at least a larger piece of their morning, with the bed overrun with small blondes and one raven-haired sneak, they did have a full day ahead of them, so they had best get on with it.

The trip to New York had been very good for all of them, but it was hard for Lucas or Maya to think it had been best for anyone other than Thomas Friar. It wasn't as though everything was suddenly rosy and carefree for him, no, but they could definitely see that it had been really good for him, maybe, just to get out of Texas for a few days. Back home, there were memories everywhere he looked, memories of Melinda, of their life together… and there was The Place, the intersection where it had all gone very wrong. He didn't really talk about the actual accident, the details they were sure he remembered more than he'd like, but they all knew exactly where it had happened, and none of them were going to be able to look at it the same way again.

He would only be away from his hometown for a few days, but it had done him good to disconnect from it for that long, to be with his son, with his daughter-in-law, with his granddaughters and his great granddaughter. Now he looked forward to being with them through this day. It would be a busy one, right from breakfast through to interviews and appearances, which would eventually lead them to final preparations, rehearsals… As hectic as it all was, it went by a lot faster than they imagined.

"Now?" Sam came to grab his big sister, and Maya smiled.

"Yeah, come on," she hurried off with him so they could find a quiet corner and disappear before someone else called on them for something. Half the time, it was really something that someone else could have answered or done, so really there was nothing to worry about. And they had something very important to do.

"You guys look so fancy," Cara smirked on the screen.

"You don't look so bad yourself," Maya laughed. Cara looked down at herself with an expression that said she wasn't so sure about that, being so very pregnant as she was, but she'd humbly take her sister's praise of her look for the Austin party.

"How is it back there?" Sam asked, squeezed in at Maya's side.

"Crowded, busy," Cara reported, turning herself and her phone so they could see behind her, Sullivan Stables in all its splendor and playing host to what was indeed a very sizable group of guests.

Not all of them could fly out and be there in person, much as they would have loved to be, but that wouldn't stop them from cheering on the siblings' achievement. They couldn't well stream the actual show, but their Austin crowd would get to see the performance the cast and (two out of three of) the musical's creators put together for the press.

"Where's our guy?" Sam asked, raising his voice just enough – he hoped – not to be heard on their side but maybe on the other side to have himself be heard by a certain three-year-old.

"Yeah, give us our nephew," Maya joined this campaign.

"You out there, Fe?" Sam called, laughing with Maya at the way Cara looked borderline exasperated that of course this was what they were after. "Hey, come on, we're just messing with you," Sam told her.

"Yeah, we wish you were here with us a lot more," Maya promised before exchanging a look with Sam so they might agree that there was really no need or means for them to quantify their love for their sister over their nephew or the other way around.

"Me, too," Cara smiled. They could play around all they wanted, but she'd know when they were being genuine, and this moment, right here…

They had lost count of how many times they had mentioned, in one interview or another, that this night was years in the making. And without any deeper explanation, it would be easy for that to be taken directly this way. They had been piecing this musical together since… fall 2031… Over six years, and they had so much to show for that time as people, as parents… One of them hadn't been one yet, another had just barely become one all of a handful of months back, and the third had just the one child and was trying for a second, not yet knowing just how successful she would be. Their careers, their jobs, had been as fulfilling in places as they'd been unexpected in others. They had wonderful memories and some less so. But that wasn't all they meant when they said this had been years in the making.

This musical, it wasn't a biography, but its bones were forged of their story anyhow. They were not those same kids they'd been anymore, the children of Kermit Hart left to cope with his failings and how they had been affected by them, left to reconcile how they'd been made to feel and what they'd felt for him in the end, only to lose him. As honest as they could all be in interviews, they didn't know that any of them could express just how personal this project had been to them, not to anyone that hadn't been a part of it by being part of the family near and far.

"Love you loads, okay?" Maya told her little sister with a smile.

"Love you, Carebear," Sam added in kind, and Cara laughed, wiping tears from her face as she nodded.

"Love you, too, weirdoes."

The girls had been talked into napping that afternoon, the better to give them a shot at making it through the night. That tactic didn't always work, even when it was for something like New Year's Eve, but this time they had managed it with some assistance from Pappy Tom. There was no guarantee that they would make it through the musical, but they had been given every chance they could be given, so they would have to wait and see.

Maya and Sam stuck together even after they returned to their families. In no time, they all had to go and find their seats, but the two of them were bound for backstage, for final words with the cast and crew ahead of curtain. They had said about all that they could say over time, from back in casting up to now, but they still wanted to thank everyone, for themselves and on Cara's behalf, for the work they had all done and for the work they would soon do, bringing their musical to life for people to hear and see. It was in their hands now, and the two of them would be so happy to join the audience in taking it in.

They joined their families, their seats side by side and sandwiched in by cousins Lucas and Dora. As they saw, the kids were all wide awake and anxious for the show to start, just as they were fascinated by the little books they had been given because there was a picture in it of Maya, and Sam, and Cara, two of them in fact. One was current, taken weeks ago, while the other… Oh, the other showed them at about the earliest it could with all three of them in one place. It was the summer where she'd been more or less shipped up to Philadelphia but had managed to be granted a brief 'escape' to New York. They remembered that summer so well, the three of them especially. Eliza had some vague memories, small as she'd still been, while Wyatt understandably remembered no part of it even if he persisted that he had some fuzzy notions somewhere in the back of his mind. To their children today, that picture was not new, but it was still so, so puzzling. Their aunt Cara, in that picture, was no older than Marianne!

Maya and Sam held hands… probably from curtain to curtain. It was for their emotions as much as for some acknowledgment that there should have been a third of them there that day and she had the best reason to be absent, but they would keep her in mind all along anyway. They had heard and seen the musical in bits and pieces over time, in one shape or another, but this was so different. This was the finished production, in a theater, with hundreds more people there to watch. The lights, the sounds, the cast, all of it… Proof of reality, maybe that was part of why they held hands the whole time. If they could feel the other's palm in their own, then it had no choice but to be real.

Timothy Calahart was the only one to have dozed off, and frankly they'd expected as much for him. He was awakened and not so pleased for the manner of it when the audience cheered through the cast's coming up again for applause after the finale. Dora reassured him with a sympathetic smile. The burst of sound didn't sit well with her either, if for different reasons. The other kids had all stayed wide awake though. They were all so awed by what they saw, this none more than Marianne, as her parents had figured would be the case. There was no album out there for her to have access to, but she had something better, or so she'd claim, in that if she went into the Hex, back in Austin, she could listen to all the songs… and had she ever, many times. It was so much so that her parents had seen her all through the show singing along to every last song like she was a seasoned fan of this brand new musical.

The rest of the night, honestly, was a blur. There was a party, which Maya, Lucas, Sam, Dora, Ella, Taylor, Marianne, Tori, and Francesca attended, while Thomas gladly volunteered to take Kacey, Remy, Lucy, Mackenzie, Aubrey, and Tim back to the hotel along with Shawn, Katy, Abigail, and James, who would have plenty to report to those who had been unable to make the trip for any number of reasons. It was all a great blast, for the trio of young girls especially, but the rest of them were nearly happier to have the next day or two in New York to look forward to. Part of their group returned to Texas or Indiana the next day, while the rest of them had an extra night before flying off. The Friars and Calaharts spent theirs on a repeat viewing of the musical. The siblings still held hands, and they'd swear up and down that they'd never be able to hear any of the cast recordings without feeling the ghost impression of the other's digits.

And then it was done, as all good things, so much faster than they would have wanted it. They were so happy to be headed home at the same time, the better to go and unload every bit of pictures, and videos, and stories, and souvenirs on to Cara. They went home to drop off their belongings at least, but right afterward it was off to the Arroyos'.

"There's Felix, look!" Kacey pointed as they got out of the minivan. They looked up to find the three-year-old indeed spying them from the window and looking as excited to see them as they were to see him. They saw him turn his head and point – they guessed – to let his parents know that everyone was coming before disappearing off at a run.

For all that, they would have expected to find him at the door, but instead they were welcomed by a grinning Mateo. Much as he tried to hold it in, the guy just did not have the best poker face, especially at times like these, so they knew something was up, but they'd figured it had to do with the musical, and Cara having some plan in mind to 'get them back' for not having been able to attend. Instead, they had the greatest surprise they could have asked for when they found Cara awaiting them, now joined by Felix, with a baby wrapped cozily in a blanket in her arms. Several of them had to cover their mouths quickly, to keep from letting out a noise that might startle the newborn. Some of the children were less fortunate there, but thankfully the baby remained undisturbed.

"Would have been really awkward if I'd been out there with you guys," Cara smiled. "I swear, with the time difference, he was born about five minutes after the musical would have started."

Maya and Sam both had a laugh at this, even as their hearts felt ready to burst as they came upon this tiny boy, their brand new nephew. He looked so much like big brother Felix.

"What's his name?" Lucy was the one to ask the big question, as she and the other kids came to gather in awe of the new baby. They would all be happy to be introduced to their new cousin, Manuel Arroyo, though he would only ever be Cousin Manny to them, born just as Aunt Maya and Uncle Sam thought of him and his mother, miles and miles away and holding hands.

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners