Ghost

ch 3

It’s 4th of July at the Matthews family home in Philly again.

This year, Josh doesn’t have Maya to occupy him, and he considers it a good/bad thing. He misses her, but it also gives him a chance to discuss something with Shawn without leaving any kind of electronic trail. During the warmer spring and summer months, the women’s shelter doesn’t need as many volunteers, so Maya is now regularly volunteering at an animal shelter. They need extra staff on the 4th of July, because the animals tend to panic with all the fireworks. As such, they need people to basically cuddle the animals to help keep everything as calm as possible.

Josh manages to catch Shawn alone as Shawn is coming out of the bathroom, and Josh has been sent in to retrieve another case of pop to go in the coolers outside.

“Hey, man, do you still have that little cabin upstate?” Josh asks Shawn.

“Yeah?” Shawn says, obviously anticipating the ask to use it.

“Cool…. Cuz I was hoping to take Maya on a trip in August, after she gets out of summer classes and before the regular year starts up again…. But I am on a college student budget. She has been working crazy hard for a lot of months in a row, and I want to make sure she can relax and decompress before the pressure really goes into high gear while she finishes up her senior work and project to try and have her diploma by Christmas. You mind if I take her up there to chill and hike for like a week?” Josh is very aware that Shawn thinks he and Maya are in a relationship already, but he doesn’t want to deny it, because it may be true soon. But he also doesn’t want Shawn to assume that he is taking Maya up there for some extended booty call or something. Josh just doesn’t know how to broach the subject, even knowing that Shawn will be the coolest out of anyone else in the family about it.

Except, Josh doesn’t have to bring it up at all. Shawn takes care of that. “Chill and hike? Is that supposed to be code?”

“Shawn, Maya and I aren’t together.” Shawn’s expression is incredulous. “No, really. I was an idiot and denying how I feel until the day she took me out for my birthday, and, by then, she had so many major tests coming up, and after she was done, I had finals, then we would be apart for the summer, so….. Seriously, we aren’t there yet. I’m not gonna deny that it’ll probably be a different story soon, but I really do just want to hang out with her for a few days, and make sure she relaxes without work, or volunteering, or having her nose in a book for a bit. She needs to decompress.”

Shawn’s expression was unreadable as he processed that information. Then he looked kinda proud. “Thank you for being honest with me. If I have to deal with the reality of my daughter growing up in that way just a couple years since I’ve had her, I am glad it’s at least someone I can trust to be a good guy, who treats her right.” Josh is happy that his big brother trusts him that much. And tries to focus on the fact that, while Shawn is his brother, they aren’t ACTUALLY related, and neither is Shawm actually related to Maya, because he CANNOT be in love with Maya in the sense of her being his brother’s daughter. Thankfully, he’s pulled from that train of thought as Shawn continues. “You know what days you are wanting to go? Are you going to tell her so she can get the time off work?”

“No, if I tell her, she’ll refuse to go. I was also hoping you and Katy could help with organizing her having that week off work with her boss. I was thinking the week before Labor Day? Sunday through Sunday, so she has Monday to prep whatever she needs to before school starts on Tuesday. I’ll also need Katy to pack a bag for Maya without Maya knowing, so I can basically just show up and kidnap her and she doesn’t have time to protest.”

Shawn chuckles, acknowledging Josh’s points. “Sounds good, kid. I will let Katy know and get it worked out.” Shawn pounded Josh’s shoulder as he made his way past and back out to the party, Josh following a few minutes later with the pop and another case of bottled water for good measure.