Girl Meets World One-Shots

The Trick is to Keep Breathing: Riley's Journey

A/N: Okay, so I was trying to ease myself back into fanfiction, because my writing sample was a little crazy, so I thought a one-shot would do, because I've been meaning to write Riley's side of Through her eyes.... this is 15,000 words.... I didn't expect it to be this long.... I honestly don't know how it happened, and it took three days to write and now I'm just tired. I'm working on getting back into the groove of writing, so that by Christmas I can have everything I'm backlogged in done, well at least Season 6 and a few other things that I was going to write for the marvel fandom, (there's a few one shots and a story for them that I've been plotting as a part of my post Infinity War series). There's also Rucas Holiday Bingo Post coming, and if you're reading this and want to know what that is go to this post ( https://yuniesan.tumblr.com/post/179672473282/rucas-holiday-bingo ) on my tumblr to find out. It's not going to be fast, I'm still doing a lot of things all at once, but I'm determined to keep writing.

For now enjoy this angst fueled one shot, that was painful to write, but very much worth it in the end.

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When it first happened, when that pain in her heart had started, she wasn't sure what to do, everyone around her was happily joking about everything. They said things about Maya and Lucas having a fire, while what Riley only had the spring rain, she was Most Likely to Smile Herself to Death, she was just Riley, and Riley could never be Maya. Everyone loved Maya, and everyone loved Maya with Lucas even though they had all seen Riley and Lucas together, working on their relationship, working on just being themselves.

"Who am I really?" she asked herself as she stood in the bathroom after not being able to deal with the whole yearbook situation.

Her reaction was the same as Farkle's, they decided to become other people, because if they were so quick to take away everything from her, to judge her based everything that made her who she was, why shouldn't she embrace the darkness just a little. So, she darkened her room, her clothes, and gave herself a whole new outlook. No one cared in the end because Maya showed up dressed as Riley, and if Maya could be Riley and still have Lucas than it didn't matter. To them all that mattered was getting the best of both, with just one of them.

Then Lucas walked in and started freaking out, because Maya had changed as well, and Lucas just wanted everyone to be themselves. Who she was mattered to him, but then there was a small moment between him and Maya, and after that Maya started talking, in the way that she thought

"Aww, Lucas, you're a very sweet guy. That's why I always liked you since I fell onto your lap on the subway. It's why we should have been favorite couple. Because we're so much alike. You know, it's like we're two sunshiney people from the same sunshiney family. That's why I like you so much. It's like you're my brother. Oh. It's like he's your," Maya heard herself say.

"What," she had heard everything Maya had said and could only feel the rushing of blood in her ears, her head screaming. Was this really how Maya saw them? Or how Maya saw Riley?

She wondered if her best friend had ever truly paid attention to her, or if all those moments where she was sure that the other girl was listening, she had only heard what she had wanted to hear. It hurt.... everything hurt. She wanted to scream and yell and say that this wasn't how she felt about Lucas. She liked the way that Lucas and her relationship was, because they were only in middle school, it shouldn't be fast and crazy like Darby and Yogi, it should be slow and careful. Even her parents hadn't taken thing very fast, they had years together, they had time, but for some reason, everyone was pushing for everything to happen or else they would move onto the next best thing.

So, she talked to Maya, she turned back into her old self, but now it felt fake and weird, but only because it felt as if she was attempting to be herself and ignore everything else that had happened. Everyone still wanted Maya and Lucas together, Farkle had changed, not too much, but enough to grow, but Riley felt stuck in her own body in her own thoughts. She was stuck being who everyone wanted her to be, with who they wanted her to be with, all without thinking about what she had wanted. They had her father's life lessons, they had an inside track into her life, but it felt like they never really understood her, they never saw who she was.