"You're a little too late."
When Riley had texted her that she’d finally found Farkle’s cause of death in old newspaper records, she’d seemed so excited. Like there was nothing in this world that gave her greater joy than helping Ghost Boy figure out what had happened to keep him stuck haunting their apartment for so long. Maya, on the other hand, had been crestfallen. She’d tell Farkle what was wrong, he’d fix it... and he’d leave.
Maya had ran straight home when she’d gotten the message, but she’d known Riley’s enthusiasm could never be quelched, and hearing Farkle deliver the bad news -- that Riley had already explained her findings by the time Maya had burst in shouting “Riley, don’t tell him!” -- shouldn’t have come as a surprise.
What did was the fact that she felt tears pooling in her eyes, and she swatted them away angrily, hoping that Farkle and Riley couldn’t notice them. But all Maya’s hopes were in vain, and she shudded as Riley came and wrapped an arm around her, asking, “Maya, what’s wrong? Shouldn’t you be happy? We’ve been trying to find this for a long time!”
But Maya shook her head, trying to find a way to start talking without also crying at the same time. She didn’t let people into her life easily -- not even before she’d become a wolf and realized that she’d outlive anyone she cared about anyway. For as long as she cared to remember, it had been her and Riley versus the world... until stupid Farkle came along and changed everything. Stupid Farkle making it him and Riley and Maya versus the world instead.
“I didn’t want this,” Maya whispered, swallowing the lump in her throat. She couldn’t even look at Farkle, not wanting to see how excited he probably was about getting to finally find peace in the afterlife soon, when Maya was all choked up about the thought of him resolving whatever was keeping him here in their world. “Don’t you get it, Riley? Now that he knows, he doesn’t have to stay here anymore! Now that he knows, he’s just going to leave...” Broken, she added in a voice that she herself could barely even hear. “Everyone I love always leaves.”
ASK MY MUSE (RED EDITION)
