A/N: Hey guys! Starting next week, the upload day will go from Tuesdays to Wednesdays.

Chapter 59
Time Goes Forth

A year ago on this date, they had been adjusting to the revelation that they were about to become parents on the very same day where they celebrated their fifth dating anniversary. Maya had been dealt her first hand by the morning sickness fairy, but for all that neither she nor Lucas was about to miss whatever he'd had planned for the day.

"You wore the green dress…" Lucas recalled, as he looked to his wife. Maya laughed.

"The very one. I still remember the look on your face."

"It's a really good dress," he pointed out, and she giggled, not for comment so much as for how his fingers tickled, trailing about her belly button.

This year's anniversary was in some parts very similar and in others vastly different from the last. This year the date was almost redundant, but then November 1st had been part of their lives long enough that they couldn't just stop noting its passage on account of the rings on their fingers. So, after their relaxed Halloween party had come to an end, they had left their former house and made their way to the hotel where Lucas had reserved them a room for the night.

And Elliott had been left to his aunts and uncles back at the house.

Lucas had experienced one night away from their son already, on the night before the wedding, but this would be the first for Maya. Lucas didn't need to wonder if she would have difficulties with this, because of course she would. Even when they had gotten married, the last time they had been in a hotel, Elliott had been in another room one floor below and the distance was hard to handle, so now be in a whole other location…

"It's okay. He'll be fine with them," Maya had told him, possibly trying to convince herself more than him. "We have to do it sooner or later, right? This is as good of a reason as any."

So far, they were doing alright. They had changed out of their costumes, drove to the hotel after spending a good ten minutes looking at their sleeping puppet boy, and checked in. Maya was barely awake on her feet by then, so they'd just changed and gone to bed, waking to the morning of the first of November and their sixth anniversary… and to Maya's morning run to the bathroom.

"Good thing we didn't spend the night over there, right?" Lucas had frowned, as he came around to help her afterward.

He'd had breakfast sent up to the room and, after they'd managed to eat, Lucas had incited his dear wife to come and lie down again. The best thing he could give her right about now was the promise of relaxation. She sat up on the comfy hotel bed, breathing out, while he sat at her side at first, turned toward her, head propped up in one hand as the other had picked up one of hers, kissed its fingers.

"Better?" he'd asked.

"Getting there," she'd nodded, and for a while they'd stayed this way. Then, temptation had been too strong for him, as he nudged the edge of her shirt up so he might reveal her tiny belly. It made her smile, thinking of all those times she'd found him 'in conference' with their unborn son for all those months he'd been growing there. Now, it was their Bee in there, and he was just as tenderly enamored with the little thing as he'd been with their Sprout, and she was all too happy to oblige. As they had let the minutes drag on in peace, reminiscing over Halloween with their friends, Lucas had soon ended up setting his head at her shoulder, while his fingers dragged along over the bump.

"This year went by so fast, didn't it?" he hummed, smirking when she'd startle for having been tickled.

"Eventful, very eventful," she agreed. "You know there's no way we'll be able to hide this until Christmas, right? Eight weeks from now, the way I'm going… They'll look at me like 'yeah, of course you are, what did you think we'd say that was, a really bad bee sting?'" she intoned, only to catch herself at 'bee' and laugh.

"Thanksgiving then?" Lucas suggested.

"That might be doable, so long as we don't really see each other until then. For once it'll be a good thing we're not all in the same city, huh?" Maya breathed, letting her own fingers trace through his hair. "Damn it…" she mumbled after a moment, and when her hand left his head, Lucas looked up to find she was pinching the bridge of her nose, eyes squeezing shut, like she was trying to keep from crying.

"Hey, hey," he stretched up to cup the side of her face, laying his forehead to hers. "It's okay, I told you. They'll get through this. Imagine when you tell them about this baby, it'll make them so happy…"

"Happy enough to get back together?" she sniffled, face scrunching. She hated how easily she broke over this, he knew, but there was nothing to be done for it.

"Maybe…" he replied in all honesty. "Maybe not." Her whimper sounded like 'you're supposed to be helping here, Huckleberry?' He kissed her, lightly, and she kissed him back, taking strength from the fact that he was here, with her, that they were okay, better than okay. When he pulled back to look at her, there was a tentative smile on her face.

"What are we doing today?" she asked, and he smiled back, kissing her again.

"Not a whole lot," he informed her.

"I like the sound of that…" she hummed. "Where's my phone?"

"I already checked with the others, Elliott's fine," Lucas promised, even as he went and got it for her.

"I know he is, that's not why," Maya promised. "I just want to look at the pictures from last night." They had gotten through the whole thing without much in the way of incidents, like Maya crying way too much, or getting nauseated over one thing or another – especially the cakes – or either of them saying or doing anything that might reveal the thing they were working so hard to keep hidden. Maya had cried, once, but it had happened in such a way that Lucas had been able to cover for her and, as far as they were aware, their friends were none the wiser. As for the cakes, well, once they were sliced they were just cake, and they were delicious.

"You're sending them all to me, yeah?" Lucas asked as he sat at her side, looking at the screen while she swiped through them.

"You know I am," she nodded. "Have to grab a few for the grandparents, too. Like this one…" she stopped swiping, turning a smile to Lucas. They had taken several where it would be him and her and Elliott, but the one she'd singled out here… Lucas stood behind Maya, and she had Elliott in her arms, facing out, while he had his arms around her, seemingly creating a seat for the little Pinocchio boy if not for how his hands were actually plastered one over the other and over Maya's hidden bump. It was a signal to those in the know, that this was a picture of the four of them, not three, on this day of spooks.

"Check this out now," Lucas took his own phone and pulled up a picture from November 1st, six years before, and held it next to hers. She laughed.

"It's like we're completely different people," she declared, looking at the two of them in the old picture. She was fifteen, he was sixteen…Had they been older, those six years might not have shown so distinctly, but because they had been teenagers at the time, the difference between 15-16 and 21-22 was just staggering, especially with a baby thrown in the mix… two babies…

"I think if you'd told that me he'd be married with a kid and another on the way in a few years, he'd have passed out," Lucas smirked.

"Yeah?" Maya laughed. "Didn't take him long to come around to that, did it?" She looked over at him, catching what could only be described as his 'I'm about to lay on the cheese' look. "Go on, say it," she grinned.

Before he could reply, the phone in Maya's hand started to ring, startling them both. Then they saw who was calling, and they knew what was coming.

"Dad?" Maya answered, as Lucas rose from the bed and went to grab their change of clothes from the small suitcase they'd brought along.

"Hey, I'm really sorry to interrupt, I know you guys are having your anniversary out there…" Shawn replied.

"She started, didn't she?" Maya asked, moving to get up, too.

"Right around sunrise, yeah. Cory and Topanga are on their way, they'll take the girls and MJ and I'll leave with Katy. She doesn't want to leave yet, doesn't believe it's for real because she had false starts with all the others and she hasn't this time. I've been clocking it, if it's not real…"

"If that's what she feels she has to do," Maya smiled, recalling the stories of her mother's false start with her. "We're checking out here, picking up Elliott, and then we're on our way to meet you there."

"Again, I'm so…"

"Dad, please, who wouldn't want a baby brother as an anniversary present. Keep me posted, okay? Love you."

"Love you, too, kid."

"Oh, and hug mom for me."

They got dressed and picked up after themselves, which did not take long for what little use they had gotten of the room or their belongings.

"Wait, wait," Lucas went over to the minibar and grabbed a couple of things, for the trip back. Maya received these like a kid at Halloween, landing on the doorstep of a very generous candy giver.

"You know how to make your wife happy," she teased.

"I have many ways," he smirked, stopping to kiss her before they left the room.

"So, so many jokes," Maya whispered.

Their arrival back at the house had been taken with some surprise, as they hadn't been expected until later in the afternoon. When they revealed that Katy was in labor and they had to get back to Austin, the response was swift and unanimous. They were packing into their own car and they were coming along.

"Did your mom have false labor when you were coming? Did she say?" Maya wondered, as Lucas drove the two of them and Elliott back from Houston. The question had never come up, not in their own first pregnancy, but now with what her father had mentioned, she had to wonder.

"Six times," Lucas nodded.

"Wait, for real?" Maya blinked.

"Depends who you ask," he clarified. "According to my dad, she was so nervous about the idea of labor and delivery that by the end of it, any time she felt something and she wasn't sure what it was, she wanted to go to the hospital, and if he didn't take her, well she would find another way, so he'd just take her."

"Oh, no," Maya laughed.

"One time, it really looked like the real thing, but it wasn't. By the time it was really happening, the nurse apparently looked like she was going to turn them away, but then my mom's water broke right there in front of her, so… yeah…"

"I am so happy that she's my mother-in-law now," Maya grinned, imagining the young Melinda Friar facing off against the nurse with a belly full of Huckleberry.

"What about you?"

"Just the one time," Maya replied. "Except it was so close to the real thing, sometimes it's hard to say if it counts."

"What happened?" Lucas asked, unsure he followed.

"Well, it was early in the morning, and my mom started to feel what she figured was labor. My father was all over the place, freaking out, like he thought I'd just pop right out and fall on the floor or something. My mom says he would walk with her like he was waiting to jump and catch me at any second. She was… pretty calm, all things considered. She decided to take the subway to the hospital. When they got there, they checked her out, but it hadn't really started, so they sent her home. She and my father had lunch and then they got back on the subway. She started to feel something, but at first she thought it was the hospital food that was messing with her. Then they reached their stop right when the first contraction hit, and that was a real one, she got the difference that time," Maya laughed, remembering when her mother had told her the story.

"She didn't give birth on the subway, did she?" Lucas had to ask.

"No," Maya assured him. "But they stayed on, couldn't exactly leave, so they were just getting further and further away from the hospital. Finally, someone called 911, and paramedics met them a couple stations ahead, and then they were off. Technically, I was born in the ambulance bay."

"Very… dynamic."

"She said it was dramatically fitting for someone like her," Maya proudly beamed.

"And you," Lucas added, which made her laugh.

As they got closer to the hospital in Austin, the question of their secret came up again. One key component of their ability to keep this secret was that the people who knew and those who didn't generally did not mix. There were her siblings, sure, but that was different. Maya and Lucas had told their parents that their friends didn't know about the new baby yet, and that they did not intend to tell them for a few more weeks, but accidents happened so easily…

"We do our best not to say anything, but if it comes out…" Lucas suggested, which took them both back to the previous year. They'd had a similar rule then, too.

"Alright, come on, let's go see your uncle be born," Maya told Elliott as she pulled him from his car seat. He'd slept the whole way, and he woke with enough crankiness to ensure he wouldn't be leaving her arms anytime soon. "Come on, you're not actually going to see it," she promised, kissing the top of his head. "You don't think he'd get flashbacks or anything?" she turned to Lucas as he came around with their 'Everything Elliott' bag slung over his shoulder.

"Luckily for all of us, we never have to find out. How's the emotion meter going?"

"Well, between having Elliott, and being around to see Stormy, and Simone, and Zoey, and now Unnamed Hunter Number Four, and thinking about Unnamed Friar Number Two, there is a lot of… baby feeling in the air, and that is just bound to mess with anyone that's not… with Bee. So you get the picture. I'm just going to hold on to Mister Fuss Pants here, hopefully we can work this out together, yeah?" Maya tipped her head to look at the baby's face. He turned those eyes up at her, a good fixed blue, and she stroked his cheek with her finger, letting her smile work at reassuring him until he was able to settle again. "Alright, let's go see what's up in there."

The group out of Houston had caught up with them as they were making their way into the elevator, and so they stepped out and went in search of Katy and Shawn and the others together. They were spotted by Cory Matthews, who called to them, walking over with Nellie perched to his hip, a necessity according to him, as she wouldn't stop running off in search of her parents. Meanwhile, Gracie was sitting next to Topanga in the waiting room, with little brother MJ sitting in her lap, locked in place with her arms as though he was a big stuffed bear that moved.

"Hey, you just missed them," Cory told Maya as his eyes swept over the group containing Lucas, Riley, and the rest of the Houston House. "Things were taking a turn by the time we got here, and they ended up taking her for a C-section," he revealed.

The news hit like a ton of bricks, and if not for the moving weight of Elliott in her arms, Maya didn't know that she would have collected her scattered mind together as she'd willed herself to do now. The instinct was there for her to panic, to assume the worst. She couldn't do that… she couldn't… Standing at her side, Lucas hadn't been left unaffected, maybe finding for the first time just how much Maya's parents had gotten to feel like parents to him, too. This, coupled with being a father himself, who had read plenty about what this would mean for Katy and the baby, left him halfway between rattled and concerned for how Maya would take this.

"Okay…" she replied to Mr. Matthews, her voice quiet at first. "Right. Right, I… Dad's with her, yeah?" Cory nodded. "Good…"

"I want Mommy," Nellie informed her big sister now, as she attempted to extricate herself from Uncle Cory's arms.

"Hey, hey, Sunny," Maya caught her hand up in hers so she'd look at her. "Mommy's having the baby now, okay? We have to be patient and wait here until it's done. Do you remember when I had him?" she nodded down to Elliott. It was no use asking if she remembered MJ's birth, when the twins had been all of two. On the flipside, MJ wouldn't remember this day, so that was something, yeah?

"It was… long time," Nellie nodded.

"Exactly. Babies take a long time. Come on, let's go sit and you can tell me how trick or treating went last night. Did you get a lot of candy?"

It was all they could do, just sit and wait. And listening to her sisters talk about going out with Shawn and Cory, while Topanga had remained with Katy and MJ – just in case – was all she could do, not to head down some spiral where, already worried at the thought of losing Kermit, she was now forced to consider the possibility that something might go wrong and she might also lose this new brother she'd already nearly lost once… and then her mother… If that happened, she… No. No, not today. It was November 1st, and that was a good day, a great day. Miracles happened on this day.

After a little over an hour that felt like a little over an eternity, Gracie's call of 'Daddy!' had sent several heads turning up and around until they could see Shawn heading their way. Lucas held out his arms to receive Elliott before Maya could even think to hand him over. After she'd done so, she stood and approached her father, no doubt wearing every one of her concerns over her face. Before he'd even said a word, Shawn had just given his daughter a quick nod. All clear.

"Your mom's in recovery, everything looks good so far."

"And the baby?" Maya asked, giving very little care to whether or not anyone saw her cry in that moment. Shawn held out his phone to her with a tired smile.

"This is all I could bring you for now," he explained as she looked at the picture. "They're looking after him, he looks good, but with everything… I'm going to go back in a minute to be with him, that's where your mom will want me to be, so as soon as they'll let you be with her…"

"I'll be there," Maya promised. "He looks so much like MJ did," she sniffled and smiled, looking at the picture of the baby… her brother… "Did you pick a name yet?" All she'd known so far was that her parents had been considering plenty of possibilities but never landed on a definitive choice. By the end, it was very much a case of 'we'll know it when we see him.'

"Maybe," Shawn told her. "We have one in mind, but your mother wanted to make sure it would be alright with you, in case…" He stopped himself here, even though the others were not within earshot enough to have heard. Maya knew what he meant though, and she mouthed the name. Shawn nodded. She didn't even have to think about it. In her mind, it felt at once like this was the reason, right here. This was the reason it hadn't felt like the right choice for her in the end, the reason she'd kept looking and landed on Elliott. The name had belonged to someone else. She looked at the picture on the phone and… yeah… that was him alright.

"More than alright," she moved forward to hug her father. The way he held her, she could feel exactly how scared he'd been back there, as he'd gone and stood by while they cut into his wife to pull their son into the world. But he was here now, they were both going to pull through, they had to. When Shawn told her and the others in the waiting room the good news, there were many more good tears being spilled, all for the birth of Alexander George Hunter.

TO BE CONTINUED

See you next week! - mooners