inside my mind • lucaya

Chapter Seventeen

Saturdays. My favorite day of the week. No school, no teachers, no waking up early, it's great. But today there is an added bonus that I would have never expected a few weeks ago.

Today is finally I have been waiting for, and so have my dreams. Every night since asking I dreamed of this moment. Hopefully I won't be let down. Will I actually let him? In that moment, if he grabs my hand will I let him or will I stop him?

I haven't really thought about that part yet.

Lucas: Are you ready?

Maya: What time?

Lucas: Well I know it's only 11, but maybe we can go eat or something and go to the mall before the movie?

Maya: Sure where do you wanna eat?

Lucas: Topanga's?

Maya: Sure.

Lucas: See you soon.

Maya: You too.

Walking through the door at Topanga's, I already see Lucas. He doesn't see me though because he has his hands folded on his lap and he is shaking.

"Hey," I say.

He looks up at me and immediately smiles. It feels quite reassuring to see that.

"Hey Maya," he says.

"So lunch right?"

"Yeah, come sit down, what do you want?"

"Surprise me."

He walks up to the counter and tells my mom what we want. I wonder if she knows that this isn't a date. She is probably really confused, I should explain this to her later.

He comes back and sits down next to me.

"She said it should be done soon," he says.

"Good, I am really hungry," I say.

"Me too."

"So how has your day been so far?" I ask.

"Pretty good. I have been anticipating this all morning."

"Us eating?"

"Well just today in general."

"Oh."

"Yeah, even though it isn't a date, I am still excited."

"I don't know how we are going to wait for a couple weeks."

"Me either. But you're right, it's the best thing we can do."

I think he really likes me. The fact that we are willing to wait for each other proves that.

"It will be hard, but I've waited for you this long. Two weeks should be nothing."

"How long have you waited?"

"Basically since you came. I saw you on the subway, but even though I thought you were cute I didn't know if I liked you because we had literally just met. Then you came to school and I saw how you were and yeah, I started to form a bit of a crush. Then it began to develop even more as we grew up and got closer to each other. It was horrible because every day I started liking you more and more but Riley liked you and I couldn't hurt her. After a while, as it is obvious from what happened at Texas, it became harder to hide it. Even though I could have probably hid it if we wouldn't have been in that situation, it just so happened that it is hard to pretend you don't care about someone that you really do care about. It is especially hard if you could lose them."

He looks at me for a while and grabs a napkin. He starts wiping tears off my face. I didn't even know I was crying.

"How long have you liked me?" I ask.

"I don't remember exactly when it started, but the more time I spent with you the more I liked you. It was like all of a sudden you became very important to me and I couldn't quite put my finger on it. I picked you the first time Maya. But you stopped me. I also wanted to pick you the second time, but you were starting to drop out of the triangle because of Josh, so again, you made my decision for me."

"It wasn't because of Josh, Lucas."

"What?"

"It wasn't for Josh."

"Then why did you tell me to pick her?"

"I didn't want Riley to get hurt."

"Oh."

"And I didn't think you liked me either," I say, tears begin to form at the corners of my eyes again.

"Don't cry Maya, I like you. I liked you then and I won't stop liking you."

He pulls me into a hug and tightly holds on. He doesn't let go until the food is placed on the table.

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Hugs are cute.