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The first time you see her, she’s just a blur of blonde hair and blue eyes. Gone just as soon as she showed up.
Her name is Maya and you repeat it a few times, feeling and hearing how it sounds pouring from your lips and you feel dizzy because holy crap you want to know her.
You hope with everything that you’ll see her again.
.
When the girl from earlier that morning on the subway - Maya - is in your class, standing on a desk and setting off fire sprinklers you’re completely enamored. She’s terrifying and different, and trouble.
Little parts of her remind you of yourself. The boy that you tried to leave behind back in Texas. All he knew was trouble and this was your fresh start to forget all of that ever happened.
.
Her best friend, Riley, is sweet and kind and everything that this New York version of you should want.
But she isn’t Maya.
You try to ignore Maya trying to push you and Riley together every chance she gets. Pretending that it doesn’t create a twinge of pain in your stomach at the thought that she doesn’t think of you the way you can’t stop thinking of her.
.
Maya never says your name and, really, it should bother you. It should, only you can’t help the goofy grin that spreads across your mouth whenever she hurls some ridiculous so-called Texas-themed name your way.
It gets under her skin when all you do is smile and tip your imaginary cowboy hat toward her.
She visibly shudders and promises that one day she’ll win and you can’t help but think that if winning the game is so important to her, you wouldn’t mind losing.
.
You tell Maya about your past, why you were kicked out of school. That sometimes you can’t stop the way your anger flows through your whole body and another student was hospitalized because of it. He was bullying your best friend and you fucking lost it. It wasn’t an excuse but it’s what happened.
Ultimately, your family relocated to New York due to a job offer your father had received but the timing was right on point with when you were expelled from school.
She tells you about her own life, how her dad left and her mom’s barely around. That it’s okay, she’s okay and please don’t worry about her because, Seriously, Huckleberry, It’s all good.
Her reassurance doesn’t stop you from worrying. It doesn’t stop you from inviting her over to your house for dinner in case she’s going to be alone that evening after school.
.
Stories of getting kicked out of school and rumors of your past start making their way around the student body when an old friend from Texas shows up in your history class, sitting in the desk behind you and letting out things about you that were meant to be long forgotten.
It’s hard to stop your hand from forming into a fist and it’s even more difficult to keep that fist in place on your desk when you wish Zay would just shut up
And Maya must sense it because her hand is atop your clenched fist, thumb rubbing small circles against it until your palm is flat on the desk and your breath is steady.
.
Riley’s only seen you as prince charming from the moment she met you and doesn’t take well to the news that you haven’t always been that guy.
She’s your friend more than anything else and, of course, you don’t like that she’s disappointed in you but you also don’t hate that the pressure to be Mr. Perfect is off now.
She regards you differently than she did before. Says she’s letting you go and she thinks that she may have feelings for Zay, and she wants to give that a chance because he never hid who he was.
.
There’s a particular night where sleep isn’t coming easy and a knock jars you from the focus you’re trying to maintain on falling asleep. Before you’ve turned around to see what the noise was and who made it, Maya’s crawled in through your window with a sheepish grin.
It’s not a surprise she made it up there because apparently climbing up fire escapes is something she seems to have perfected years ago from what you’ve heard and seen while hanging out at Riley’s. She’s been here before, multiple times, but always through the door and never in the middle of the night.
She doesn’t say much other than asking if she can stay the night and you nod before scooting over and letting her in beside you, too tired to relocate to the couch in the living room and she doesn’t ask you to as she settles her head on your chest, curling her small frame against you.
In the morning when you trail out of your bedroom behind Maya who’s clad in the jeans she was wearing the night before but one of your shirts, your mother gives you a knowing albeit disapproving look before you leave for school.
.
After that night it becomes a steady occurrence. Some nights, you help her with her homework. Other nights, she tosses it aside before completing it and says she’ll just wing it before class and you watch as she draws in her sketchbook instead.
Sometimes she doesn’t want to talk and you don’t mind because having her next to you has always been more than enough.
Every time when it gets too late for her to walk home alone and with no parent back at her apartment questioning her whereabouts, she snuggles into your bed and always insists that you don’t go sleep on the couch.
Stay, Sundance.
.
You’re not sure when it happened but Maya becomes your best friend. As much time as she spends at Riley’s, she spends the other half of it with you.
Zay teases you constantly. He laughs and swears there’s no way a sixteen year old boy is just friends with the girl that sneaks in through his window night after night, sleeps in his bed, and wears his clothes. It’s just not possible.
And maybe he’s right. Maybe you like her a bit. It’s possible that you love her a lot, but who’s keeping track?
Riley elbows Zay in his ribs at the teasing and mentions that everything with Maya takes some time and a lot of trust. She says there’s nothing wrong with that because Maya has the biggest of heart of anyone Riley knows but she has to protect it.
You swear you’d never break it.
.
For your seventeenth birthday you go back to Texas along with Maya, Zay, and Riley.
There’s a night that it’s just the two of you. Zay and Riley have run off God knows where to do who knows what and you’re fine with it. Grateful and content to have this moment with just Maya.
You set up a campfire on the land your Pappy Joe owns. The night sky is free of clouds and full of stars and by the fire, Maya’s blue eyes glimmer with something you can’t quite place and she’s more quiet than usual. You can tell she’s in a faraway place, thoughts heavy on her mind, and you’ve gotten pretty good at reading her.
Something about her is so ethereal and you can’t look away as blonde hair falls over her shoulders with firelight igniting her frame and you wonder how it is that someone like her even exists. Perfect and fragile and Maya and fuck, you really do love her.
There’s no doubting it right then and there when she breaks the silence and wishes you a quiet Happy Birthday, Lucas before her lips meet yours and it’s soft and sweet and nothing like you’ve definitely dreamed of.
It’s better and it’s everything.
And she said your name.
Your lips are tingling, your mind swimming in a haze of euphoria that you’ve only ever associated with Maya who is still soso close to you, her breath mingling with your own.
Then it’s over and nothing’s changed except for the part of your heart she’s carved out and settled into, claiming it as her own and, really, you’d let her take all of you if she wanted.
.
A month after avoiding the kiss at all costs, Maya says she has a date. No big deal, it’s just a date.
You’re sure most relationships begin with ‘just a date’ and your heart fucking breaks and it may not be possible but you think that you can actually hear it shatter to pieces in your chest and that she can, too, because her eyes won’t meets yours.
.
You’re angry with her.
Except, if anything, it’s yourself that you’re angry with because you fellfellfell for her the day you first saw her and the entire world was thrown off it’s axis and hasn’t been the same since.
.
Maya Hart is both a mess and the most beautiful girl you’ve ever seen in your life and when she knocks on your window instead of just coming in as she’s been wont to do, you resist asking her if you’ve done something wrong because she hasn’t been over since before the Texas trip and makes a huge effort to appear busy when she sees you at school.
She’s a mess of red-rimmed eyes and smeared makeup. She’s gorgeous and sad and you want to hold her.
This is all your fault, Huckleberry.
You ignore the accusation, instead thinking to yourself what it is you could have possibly done.
It’s on the tip of your tongue at her words, to ask why she never calls you Lucas.
It’s been years and you can count on one hand the amount of times she’s used your real name. You don’t get how someone who’s let you in as much as Maya has still manages to keep you so distanced from her.
She murmurs something about how saying your name makes you too real.
That she’s been trying to avoid this all along and in Texas it got too real and she had to kiss you and it fucked with her head because you love her and she knows you do, don’t you dare deny it.
You don’t understand what’s wrong with real.
When she says things that are real are the things that disappear, you suddenly get it. A fantasy, a daydream, just a simple thought - none of those are things that will run out on you because they don’t actually exist and god, she wishes those were enough for her and it’s terrifying that she’s somehow found herself needing you. loving you.
All you have right now are your promises that you pray are enough and your love that consumes you because Maya’s gotten under your skin like she’s always wanted to and if this is losing the game it’s more than alright.