Work Text:
“Maya hurry!” Riley called over her shoulder. “We’re gonna miss the train!”
She wasn’t wrong, but Maya’s attention was less on that catastrophe than it was on the threat of another.
“Riley, watch the steps!”
Riley’s hand shot out to catch the railing moments before she plunged downward. She teetered wildly at the top of the yawning pit that led to the subway platform, arms windmilling until Maya caught up and snagged the back of her dress.
“You saved me,” Riley beamed. Maya shrugged.
“Any time.” She steadied Riley and they clattered down the steps together at a tooth-rattling speed. “I think we’ve established that by now.”
“Yes, but after the last time, I’d really rather not break my other leg. Or,” Riley amended, “the same leg again, either.”
“Yeah, good call. You break your leg and we’d definitely miss the train.”
“And then,” Riley’s voice rose at the thought of this disaster, “if we miss the train we won’t make our appointment to look at the apartment, and if we miss looking at the apartment they’ll give it to somebody else, and then we’ll have to stay with my parents for the rest of our lives! Which wouldn’t be so bad I guess, I mean, they do still cook for us sometimes, but right now there’s so much we can’t do.”
“So much?” Maya followed Riley around the corner to the turnstile. “Like what?”
“Oh.” Riley ducked her head to swipe her card, but there was no missing the tinge of pink on her cheeks. “You know. Stuff.”
Then she pushed quickly through the turnstile, leaving Maya to grin and follow.
“Stuff?” she called, jogging after her. “Oh come on Riley! After two years you still can’t even say— I mean, stuff?”
“Stuff,” Riley said primly, as Maya caught up with her on the platform. The pink flush to her cheeks was almost certainly due to more than heat. Maya’s grin widened.
“All right. We’ll check out the apartment, they’ll rent to us, and then we’ll have privacy for . . . stuff.”
Now more red than pink, Riley smiled too.
“Good,” she said. The arrival of the train was heralded by a blast of hot air that stirred and lifted her hair brought a brighter smile to her face. “That’s us!”
They stepped onto the car together, and the oppressive warmth of the subway platform fell away as a solid wall of heat struck them both in the face. Maya flinched.
“Aw man the air's out. This is going to be brutal.”
“It’s not so bad,” said Riley. Her confidence wobbled, though, as they stepped aside to let a pair of perspiring paramedics carry an elderly man off on a stretcher. “Oh no. Maya, is he—”
“Just resting, Riles!” Maya said cheerfully. “Just . . . taking a nap. I hope. All right, grab a seat.”
There was no shortage of empty seats; most people had apparently stepped onto the car, thought better of staying, and vacated as quickly as they had come. Both girls sank down beside each other and set to work sweating quietly onto the plastic. The train started off with a lurch and a clatter, and Riley made it all of twenty seconds before turning to poke Maya lightly in the shoulder.
“Hey, can you tell me a story?”
“Are you trying to take my mind off the heat?” Maya wondered. “You know I don’t appreciate benevolent distraction.”
“I know. I just think if I keep thinking about the apartment I'm going to do that thing where I get so excited that I have to dance, but I’m thinking that’s a bad idea because it's so hot in here that dancing could literally kill me. So . . . tell me a story instead?”
Maya frowned. “I don’t know if a story from me is a good idea.”
Maya, as a rule, didn’t tell stories. It wasn’t that she didn’t know any; it was just that the only person she'd ever want to tell stories to was Riley, and Maya knew she could never manage the kind of story Riley wanted to hear. That much had been clear from the week they first met.
“Let’s say there’s a princess,” Riley had declared shortly after Maya’s third entrance through the bay window. “A princess in a tall tower.”
Maya had heard of such things, of course, and Riley’s enthusiasm was infectious.
“Okay. There’s a princess. Then a dragon eats her!”
Maya thought it was a great story but Riley had been horrified. A decade later Maya could still vividly remember the look of shock and anguish on her friend’s face, which was why that had been the last time Maya made a conscious effort to inflict her will on the narrative.
Riley’s suggestion that Maya buck that tradition wasn’t sitting well.
“Uh,” she said, “honey I think maybe you can tell this one, okay? I’ll listen.”
“Noo,” Riley moaned. “S’too hot. Like . . . like dragon breath. Like the dragon ate us after all and now we’re inside it. Dying. But I’m so happy we’re going to have our own place I still have to dance . . . don’t make me dance in a dragon belly, Maya! Please!”
Maya couldn’t help it; she laughed.
“Okay, that’s . . . pretty grim, actually, which is encouraging, but I still don’t know if I can make something up for you, Riles.”
“So then don’t make it up,” Riley suggested. “Just tell me something true. Something that already happened.”
“Huh,” Maya considered. “Already happened. Yeah okay. I can do that. Actually, there was this one time when we were eleven and your parents were finally letting you go around without them. You remember?”
“Kind of.” Riley swiped at the beads of perspiration on her forehead. “I take it you do?”
“Yeah,” said Maya. “I do.”
Maya remembered the day with exceptional clarity. They had walked, unsupervised, one block up and one block over to the park, where Riley had permission to spend an hour before supper. As summer stretched out long and lovely behind them and sixth grade loomed on the other side of their last holiday weekend, the princess story that Riley had been telling for years finally changed. On that day Riley announced that a knight in shining armor overheard the princess singing and climbed up the tower wall to meet her.
“Using what?” Maya frowned.
“A magical rope the princess had made,” Riley said dreamily. She stretched out over the top of the monkey bars so her hair fell down like a curtain between the bars. Maya reached up to touch it.
“A magical rope, huh. Not her hair?”
“No silly. This isn’t Rapunzel. This isn’t any story ever told before.” Riley beamed down at her friend, cheeks scrunching as she contemplated her own plot development. “A knight climbed up on a magic rope and was overcome with love at the sight of her.”
“That happened awful fast.”
“It always happens that way in stories, Maya.”
“So what next?”
“Well,” Riley considered, “I guess they talk.”
“Mm? ‘Bout what?”
“‘Noble maiden fair,’ cried the knight, ‘I have journeyed lost and lonely these many years’ . . . what? What is it?”
Maya was staring at her in frank disbelief.
“Who talks like that?”
Riley seemed genuinely surprised that Maya didn’t know. “Knights talk like that. Knights in shining armor who climb towers to meet the princess.”
“You’ve met a lotta knights in New York?”
“I’m not allowed to talk to strangers. You know that. Not even knights.”
Maya shrugged. “I don’t think you’re missing out on much, if they talk like that.”
Riley rested her chin on her folded arms and smiled dreamily into the trees. “Oh I don’t know. I think it would be wonderful if somebody talked to me like that.”
The unabashed wistfulness on her friend’s face had, as usual, a softening effect on Maya. She waved her hand in a resigned gesture of ‘continue’.
“All right. Journeyed lost and lonely. Found a princess singing in a tower. Fell in love. Then what?”
Riley’s smile brightened.
“They ran away together!”
“Of course they did,” Maya sighed. “Why did I even have to ask? And after they run away together, what next?”
“Oh that’s the best part.” Riley grabbed the bar by her head and squirmed forward until she could swing down and drop to the dust at Maya’s feet. “They have adventures!”
Adventures actually sounded okay to Maya.
She could live with that.
”Adventures,” Maya explained to Riley, as the subway rattled along the track, its occupants steaming within, “sounded a lot more fun than somebody in a tin can suit. Sorry if maybe I was a little unimpressed with the rest of it at the time.”
Riley didn’t seem to mind; rather, she shook her head in wonder. “You remember that?”
“Of course I do.” Maya shifted in her seat, then slid around a little as she came unstuck and slipped in her own sweat. “God, this is inhuman. Shouldn’t we be there by how? How is Soho so far? I don’t remember it being this far, ever.”
“Maya . . .”
“Did they move it? Soho, I mean. They must have moved it. I’m dying here.”
“Maya.” Riley leaned in. “What else do you remember?”
Maya looked at her like she wasn’t sure the question was even necessary; like she thought Riley should already know the answer.
“Well . . . everything, Riles. I remember everything.”
Riley shook her head, disbelieving.
“You mean everything about—”
“Yeah,” Maya sat up a little straighter in her seat. “Everything. You were there for my exhibit, you know all this.”
“Sure I was, but you never told me any of it yourself. It all just sort of came out at the exhibit, when we saw your painting.” She was looking at Maya like she was seeing her for the first time, in the best way imaginable. “You really remembered all of that.”
“Well, yeah.” Maya dragged a hand across the back of her neck. “Hey is it bad if I’ve basically lost my entire body weight through persp—”
“Tell me more Maya,” Riley said softly. “The rest of it. Please?”
And Maya couldn’t say no.
Lucas knew before Riley.
He was actually the second to know, right after Maya herself. Maya worked it out somewhere between pouring a smoothie on his head and having Riley’s hands cradle her jaw while Maya’s mouth was still full of macaroni and cheese.
Lucas . . . well, he apparently worked it out not so long after that. And because Lucas was overwrought with some kind of devastating nobility that people said was old fashioned, but Maya knew didn’t actually belong to any particular time period so much as it belonged to the best sort of person from every time period, he also didn’t have any problem arranging to meet her and confirm how she felt.
Not about him; about Riley.
He didn't actually make her admit it, but he told her what he suspected, and he was so calm and steady about it, so unalarmed, so accepting that Maya found she wanted to tell him anyway.
She loved Riley, in a way that she would never love Lucas and in a way that she was pretty sure Riley would never love her. And Lucas knew it, but he let her tell him like he didn’t know it, which made her both like and hate him more than she already did.
“It’s her. I mean, it’s never going to be her. But it’s always been her. Since pretty much forever.”
Lucas nodded, placidly understanding. Maya’s skin prickled in irritation at his solemn lack of judgement. She squirmed back in her seat to get away from it.
“So, yeah. We’re not going to work out, you and me.”
“I guess not,” he agreed, and even the smile that appeared then was a study in pure sympathy. “But you know, if you need a little more time to figure things out we could keep this up. For a little while. If it helps.”
“Are you serious?” Maya leaned forward in her seat. “You’d do that just so I could . . . um, what’s the word I’m looking for?”
“Think about it?”
“I’m trying!”
“No,” he laughed, “I mean, we could keep this up for a little while, so you can think about it. This. Whatever you want to be. Although when you do get it sorted, that still leaves the question of how you’d feel about . . .”
“You and her?” Maya kept her tone light and clear. Her smile was strained, but she knew he’d be too respectful to remark on it. “Well, I mean, you should go for it. Obviously. Since she feels like that about you. And I don’t. I feel more like you do about her.”
Lucas didn’t let that pass. He leaned in, damn his nobility, and said “I would never compare the way you feel about her to the way I do. I know there’s nothing in the world like that. But I do like her. A lot. And if you’re not going to ask her any time soon . . .”
“Maybe I will,” said Maya. “Someday.”
“What if she doesn’t feel the same way?”
“Then I live with it,” Maya said firmly. “Which is why it will be someday. As in, a day that isn’t today. Because today I’m just not brave enough for that. But you are.” She smiled at him with the closest thing to genuine admiration he’d ever seen from her. “So for now, for today, if you're not afraid of what she might say to me when someday comes, then . . . well, you ask her today.”
And he did.
“He told me about that,” Riley said quietly. “He said he was pretty sure he’d never thought better of you than he did that day.”
“He said that?”
“Yes.”
“Really?”
Riley shrugged, like it wasn’t a big deal.
“Lucas admires loyalty. He always has. I think it’s what he likes best about you.”
She had moved closer to Maya despite the heat. Her head, hair damp and curling, was settled on Maya’s shoulder. Maya blew lightly on the back of her girlfriend’s neck and Riley sighed in relief.
“Mmm. That feels good.”
Maya blew again, more gently, then asked, “when did he tell you?”
“After the exhibit.”
“Huh.”
“What?”
“Nothing. Just, he said he wouldn’t tell you anything ‘til I did. And I guess he meant it.”
“Of course he did.” Riley spoke with all the unshakable faith of a woman who’s spent her life surrounded by people she could count on. “If Lucas says something he means it. You know that.”
“I didn’t really tell you how I felt though,” Maya reasoned. She blew another line of air gently down Riley’s neck, then lifted the collar of her blouse to fan her back. “Not in words.”
“You could tell me now,” Riley pointed out. “If you remember everything. Might as well tell me what you remember, right?”
“You,” laughed Maya, “are manipulative. And scheming and . . . devious. And that’s all the SAT words I remember right now but I’m sure you’re more of them. You come off so innocent! But it’s all an act, isn’t it? You just want me to tell you stories.”
“It’s this or I start dancing because of our apartment,” Riley reminded her cheerfully. “Apartment, and independence and privacy and—”
“And this is our stop,” said Maya, as the train slowed to a halt.
“Then come on,” Riley leaped to her feet, “and tell me the rest on the way there.”
Her face was flushed from equal parts heat and excitement, and Maya, smiling up at her, found she didn’t have the heart to say no.
When it came to Riley, she never did.
The exhibit took place their junior year. Maya, at encouragement from Riley, had decided not to play it off like it wasn’t a big deal. It was actually a huge deal. It was a senior year exhibit with only one spot made available to a student from the junior year Visual Arts program considered to show exceptional promise.
And this year, that was Maya.
She sent out actual invitations and let her mother plan a meal and before she knew it, the whole thing was turning into exactly the kind of Really Big Deal it actually was, but she managed to be okay with that, because somehow it felt right. Like she had spent a necessary amount of time working and doubting, but now she was really ready for this.
It felt good.
Farkle came down from Massachusetts just for the occasion. Lucas came up from UT Austin and Riley took an actual taxi from the Matthews home because, she explained, a night as big as this one called for extravagance.
Cory and Topanga were there too, along with Shawn and Katy. Everybody crowded around Maya’s work, an impressionistic portrayal of a stylized fairy tale scene, and told her what an amazing job she’d done.
“It isn’t what I’d have expected from you,” Shawn admitted, standing beside her to take it in. “But it’s really something. Where’d you get the idea?”
Maya had painted a fortress, one square tower higher than the rest. From the topmost window shone pale, clear light. A hazy silhouette suggested somebody waiting within. Far below the window, struggling out of shadows that choked the base of the fortress, a knight in armor had begun to climb.
“Riley,” Maya smiled. “It was something she used to talk about a lot. I guess it made an impression on me.”
“It seems to have made quite an impression on everybody,” Shawn smiled. “You did good, kid. We’re proud of you. I hope you know that.”
Maya did. They were all making it pretty clear, in their own way. Lucas and Riley were interacting like the two good hearted people they were, and not like you’d expect fairly recent exes to behave. Katy was stopping strangers to make them admire the painting, while Cory and Topanga were pretending to discourage her behavior, only to turn around and corner passersby of their own to brag at. They were acting like family, and it felt right.
Farkle, for his part, was staring at the figure near the bottom of the painting like he saw something but wasn’t sure what it meant.
“Interesting,” he said, which should have been a warning sign. But Maya was too elated to notice.
The night wore on. Maya’s glow of accomplishment didn’t fade; she was almost getting used to it by the time Cory and Topanga took their leave, with another round of congratulations, and Shawn and Katy went shortly after. But Lucas, Farkle and Riley lingered, a comfortable cohort of friends ringed around her, and Maya leaned back into them with real gratitude.
“Thank you for coming,” she said. “I really appreciate having all of you here.”
“Well of course,” said Lucas. “We wouldn’t have missed it.”
“You made something wonderful,” Riley declared. “We had to be part of it. I know we’re not art people, but we’re your people.”
“Yeah.” Maya liked the sound of that. “You are.”
“It’s an interesting choice of proportion though,” Farkle said thoughtfully. “I’ve been wondering about it all night.” He leaned in to squint at the canvas. “What’s the symbolism here, exactly? Usually you’d expect the knight in shining armor to cut a real heroic figure, wouldn’t you? I can’t help but think this one looks small.”
“Well of course she’s small,” Riley said offhandedly. “That’s Maya.”
A flat silence fell around them, a sudden absence of sound in an ocean of polite chatter. Maya stared at Riley, disbelieving. Riley, still smiling fondly at the tiny figure of the knight scaling the tower wall, didn’t notice until Lucas cleared his throat. Then she looked up, around, and finally stared at Maya.
“What? What’s wrong?”
“Riles . . . what do you mean it’s me?”
“Isn’t it?” Riley said, genuinely surprised. Maya’s mouth worked a moment before she found actual words to speak.
“Well, in my head. But I didn’t know that you thought . . .”
“Maya,” said Riley, “it’s always been you. Since the first time I told the story. Where do you think I got the idea to begin with? You climbed up . . .” she shook her head in almost pained confusion. “I was the princess and you came in the window and we were going to have adventures. I . . . thought you knew that.”
Maya’s throat worked painfully around all the words she’d made herself forget she planned one day to say.
“I thought I was the only one who knew it,” she said at last. Then, abruptly, “Excuse me. I need some . . . I need to not be here.”
And she brushed past them all, heading for the door, needing very much to be somewhere that wasn’t with somebody she had loved long enough, wholly enough, to have finally contented herself with the belief that they would never be more than they already were.
“Maya!” Riley said, upset. “Maya, wait!” and she started after her at a half-run.
“What did I say?” Farkle wondered. He looked up at Lucas in momentary bewilderment before something in Lucas’s face brought the truth home.
“Oh,” he said. “Oh. Well, that’s . . .” he stared into the champagne flute he held, and then a thought struck. He raised the flute in an eager toast. “At least this time I didn’t do it on purpose!”
The air after the subway was blissfully cool and clear. Even the nearly-midday sun was nothing next to the close, stifling heat of the train. Outside, Riley’s arm linked through hers, Maya felt herself growing lighter with each step they took.
“I hope the application goes through,” she murmured, as they turned down the street and slowed to check the numbers. “We're not exactly established yet; they might not like that.”
“Oh, established,” Riley scoffed. “You’re an artist now! The people at the gallery said there’s buzz about your work. Buzz, Maya! That’s the most wonderful way to say excitement! With so much buzz, you’ll be established in no time.”
“Yeah, I don't think there's a section on the credit check for buzz, honey. Let's just not get too excited, okay?”
As usual with Riley that was easier said than done. The street was quiet and green. The apartment itself was a studio in the technical sense of the word, but everything was clean and new, and the living space was generous. There was an alcove at the end of the living room that created something like a bedroom area, if you turned your head to the side and squinted just right.
Riley squinted, and she loved it.
“Maya it's perfect, it's the most perfect ever, and it can be ours!” she burbled. “Oh let's get it, let's say we'll get it?”
“Uh, Riles, I think that might be up to . . .” Maya nodded at the stout landlady waiting to recapture Riley's attention. “Mrs. Janowski, there.”
“Miss Matthews?” Mrs. Janowski said.
“That’s me,” Riley gasped. “I sound so grown up right now. I mean, yes?”
“On your application you said you’re a children’s program coordinator. But you didn’t mention Miss Hart.”
“Miss Hart!” Riley clutched at Maya’s arm, delirious with joy. “That’s you! You’re grown up too.”
“Well that’s a matter of opinion,” Maya cautioned, “but, yes.”
“What about you then, Miss Hart?” Mrs. Janowski wondered. “What is it you do?”
“She’s an artist,” Riley said proudly, and caught Maya’s hand in both of hers.
Mrs. Janowski did not appear to share Riley’s joy at this news. She raised an eyebrow and looked sideways at Maya.
“Artist?” she repeated. “A real one? Or am I looking at the first chapter in some big, tragic, gonna-make-it-in-the-city reality check?”
Riley sucked in her breath in indignation, but Maya, not nearly as bothered to hear all her inner doubts voiced aloud, beat Riley to an answer.
“I’m contracted as a curatorial assistant with the Museum of Modern Art. I have a gallery opening next month, and I’m going to take up a position as artist in residence.”
“There’s buzz,” Riley added firmly.
“So,” Maya resumed, “I guess we’re both trying to make it here, sure. But this isn’t our first chapter; far from it.” She fit her arm snugly around Riley’s waist, and gave a squeeze to unclench her girlfriend’s every muscle knotted up in preparation to defend her. “We’ve been part of the story for years.”
Mrs. Janowski’s lips thinned as she considered the pair of them.
“All right,” she said at last, “I’ll have to check your references and get back to you.”
Riley’s arm slipped around Maya’s waist, and it was Maya’s turn to be squeezed.
“You like this huh?” Maya laughed.
“So grown up,” Riley sighed. “We both are.”
“Again,” said Maya, “that's really a matter of opinion.”
“We’re grownups,” Riley said firmly, “who do stuff. Together. To each other. In their very own apartment, like grownups do.”
Maya grinned.
“Grownups it is.”
After they left the exhibit Riley had chased Maya all the way down to the street before she caught up with her. Maya had tried to beg off talking about it, but Riley refused to make it a non-issue. They had to talk about it. It was, she’d said, the responsible thing to do.
“Isn’t it?” she added, doubtful.
Maya, hands shaking, voice steady, said “maybe. But I don’t care.”
“Maya—”
“Riley! Look, I’ve thought about everything I would say right now for as long as . . . well, ever since I figured out I wanted to say it. Only, I think now that you already know. And maybe you were the one telling the story, but you also knew it was me climbing up to you all along. So does that mean you feel the same?”
Riley nodded, tiny, nervous.
“I did. I do. But when we were kids it was a lot easier to feel like I did and not think anything of it, you know? Now it’s like we’re all . . . whoa, you know? So it’s harder for it to be easy, now. It feels grown up and complicated and kind of crazy.”
“Right,” said Maya. “Right. Of course you’re right. Which makes everything I was going to say just a little too extra, so I don’t know that there’s much left for us to really talk about here, Riles.”
“Okay,” Riley said, equal parts eager and unsure, “okay, so then what should we do? If we’re not going to talk, what should we—”
Before her nerves could get the better of her, Maya leaned in and pressed a kiss, light and soft, to Riley’s lips.
“—do next,” Riley finished. She blinked rapidly a moment, then her mouth curved up at both corners. Maya smiled back.
“We’ll figure something out.”
They moved into their apartment the day after the call came from Mrs. Janowski that their references had checked out and the apartment was theirs.
“Thank you for not telling her about that time with the nail polish and the living room rug, Dad,” Riley enthused, trading celebratory hugs with her father.
“Didn’t have the heart to rat you out,” Cory said cheerfully. “Plus, your mother and I could use the privacy.”
The transfer of address didn’t go exactly according to plan; there was supposed to be a pizza party afterward but Cory threw his back out while helping carry their couch up the stairs, so Topanga took him to the hospital, leaving Riley and Maya with two pizzas, a melting ice pack and a whole studio apartment all to themselves.
Somehow the newness of the last fact rapidly cancelled out the pizzas. The boxes were strategically located in a mostly-empty fridge and the girls wound up on the bed together as five o’clock sunlight spilled in the room, washing over them both.
“It’s ours,” Riley murmured. “That’s good, right?”
“Oh yeah,” Maya promised. “It’s better than good. It’s the best.”
She drank in the warm, early evening light playing over Riley’s features. Sweat-teased tendrils of hair curled around her temples and glimmered gold in the glow, forming a radiant halo around her face.
Maya didn’t realize how long she’d been staring until even Riley, who was used to Maya staring at her, gave a self-conscious little half smile and squirmed slightly.
“What is it?”
“Nothing,” Maya said. “I mean, nothing wrong. I was just thinking I’d definitely climb a tower for you.”
The new light in Riley’s face came entirely from within.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. So, what was the next bit?” She leaned over Riley, one hand on either side of her head. “Noble maiden fair,” she whispered, smiling at the blush that crept into Riley’s cheeks. “I have journeyed . . . what was the rest?”
Riley whispered something too soft to hear.
“What?” Maya prodded. Riley pressed both fists to her face.
“Lost and lonely,” she mumbled between her wrists.
Maya sat back, frowning. Riley inched her fists apart and peeked up.
“Maya?” she said. Then, concerned, “Maya, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Just, I haven’t been like that for years now.”
“Like what?”
“Lost and lonely.” Maya leaned forward again and looked fondly down at Riley’s face. “You never let me be either of those things, not from the moment I climbed into your room. Tower. Whichever you prefer.”
The blush intensified a thousandfold. Riley pressed her palms to her cheeks.
“I guess maybe the knight had a happier story than I imagined,” she said. “Anyway, Maya, it’s you. It’s always been you.” She braced her elbows on the bed behind her and levered up into a halfway-sitting position. Her eyes searched Maya’s face, curious.
“So tell me: if you haven’t journeyed lost and lonely, when you get to the room, what do you say to me?”
Maya traced a finger lightly over Riley’s hairline, blurring the gold and brown of sun-washed curls.
“Noble maiden fair,” she repeated. Riley squirmed happily on the bed. “I have journeyed with you many years. We’ve had adventures and fights and magic and each other. We’ve always had each other. And it’s been everything I ever could have wanted.”
Riley’s eyes were wide, her mouth small.
“Now,” Maya said, “we start a new chapter. Together.”
“New chapter, huh? Not happily ever after?” Riley asked wistfully. Her mouth pulled down at the corner, and Maya couldn’t resist leaning in to kiss the pout.
“Nope,” she said firmly. “Better.”
“Better how?” Riley wondered. It was Maya’s turn to smile, bright and full of promise.
“We’ve had happily ever after already, Riles. This is everything that comes next.”