Deeper • Rilaya

9: It's Time

Maya

I never thought I deserved anything in life. From the moment my dad died, I've always thought I was destined for failure. Destined to be nothing. Destined to be hurt, constantly. Destined to be nothing more than a name and a face. Actually even less than that.

If my life was a book I could already think of the perfect title; Maya Hart: The Broken and the Damaged. It would start with how I thought at a young age that everything was all peaches and cream and how I had a heart full of love and hope. But then that would soon be burned to ashes by the fact that my dad left me and that one event would bring utter trust issues and depression into my life. It would tell how I would cry every night begging for my dad to come back to me. It would tell how my heart broke a little more every time I heard my mom crying from the top of the stairs when she thought I was asleep. It would tell how the lights would turn off as I sat in the kitchen eating oatmeal, due to there not being enough food, because my mom would miss a payment, which forced us to go without electricity. It would tell how I started to blame my mother for my father's departure.

It would then go on to tell the story of how me and Riley became friends. How she showed me friendship and the friendships I created along the way. How she and her family loved me and treated me as there own. How she was always the shoulder I could cry on. How she brung hope back into my life and how I would forever be faithful to her.

But then it would tell of how my feelings started to build up and how I had to watch in sadness as she loved someone else and she and everyone else was completely oblivious of my feelings. How every touch made my heart stop. How every look made me stare at her in awe. How every word made me feel so loved. It was always her.

And then it would stop right where I am right now. Distraught and struggling to live. Spending day by day washing cars, smoking weed, and thinking of how life would be if I would've just came clean. However, my demons were stronger than my 'what ifs'.

Over the course of my life I began to have questions. Some were answered and some were not. For example, why did my dad start another family? Was he ashamed of leaving me and thought that he wouldn't be welcomed and needed to move on? Or did he just forget about me and mom? I never got that question answered when we met after I sent him that letter and I don't think it ever will be.

Another question that swam around a lot in my head a majority of the time was why did I have these feelings for Riley? Why did it have to be her? Why couldn't it be anybody else? I wouldn't care if it was Farkle even. I just rather have feelings for anybody else other than Riley. She was too pure. Too good. See I wasn't just afraid of Riley not accepting me. I was also afraid of me changing her. I didn't want her to change for me. I didn't want her to have to start developing feelings for me or do dangerous shit just to make me happy and we all know how far Riley will go for the people she cares about.

I'm disobedient. I'm lazy. I'm dangerous. I'm destruction. I'm a let down. I don't deserve nothing but to rot in hell.

"Maya! Snap out of it!"

I'm brought back to where I'm at. I'm in the middle of the street. Mikey is next to me. He has a panic look on his face and then I remember.

I was having a panic attack in the club.

Mikey brung me outside.

I heard her voice.

Riley's voice.

I saw her.

I saw a car coming and I bolted.

I tackled her out the way and now I'm sitting in the middle of the street, shaking in fear as Riley is unconscious. She fainted. Yup you read that right. She fainted.