Chapter 8 Maya #2
The words landed flat.
"I've been meaning to reach out." She leaned closer, and I caught a wave of expensive perfume. "We should get drinks sometime. Catch up."
She still hadn't looked at me. Not once.
"I'm having dinner," Shane said. His voice was polite, but cool.
He didn't say date. He didn't call me his girlfriend, didn't make a claim or a declaration.
Friends having dinner together.
And he was keeping his word.
Brittany’s eyes finally flicked to me, dismissed me in a single glance. "I'm sure your friend won't mind if we exchange numbers. I'll be quick."
I watched Shane's face. A muscle jumped in his jaw. He didn’t look at her.
He kept his eyes on me.
"I'm exactly where I want to be," he said. "Have a good night."
Brittany's smile froze. For a moment, she stood there, hand still on his shoulder, like she couldn't quite process what had happened. Then she withdrew, wounded dignity in every line of her body.
"Nice meeting you," she said to neither of us, and walked away.
The silence stretched for a beat. Then I raised an eyebrow.
"Does that happen a lot?"
"More than I'd like."
I nodded absentmindedly.
"She wasn't who I wanted to talk to." Shane shrugged and picked up his fork.
He could have taken her number, could have been flattered, played along, kept his options open.
Instead, he'd looked at me like I was the only person in the room.
The wine loosened the careful hold I kept on myself. Or maybe it was the restaurant, the candlelight, the way Shane listened like everything I said mattered. Whatever it was, I found myself talking.
"I was seventeen when I found out I was pregnant."
The words came out steady. I’d told this story before, in pieces, to people who needed the facts.
But never like this. Never all of it.
"My parents wanted me to... they had opinions. Strong ones. About what I should do." I took a sip of wine. "There was a guidance counselor. Pamphlets. Conversations about my future and my potential and how one mistake didn't have to define my life."
Shane didn't interrupt. He didn't offer platitudes. He just watched me with those steady blue eyes.
"I kept her. Obviously." A small laugh that didn't have much humor in it.
"And my parents... they couldn't forgive me for that.
For choosing differently than they wanted.
For embarrassing them." I traced the stem of my wine glass.
"They gave me an ultimatum. Give the baby up, or figure it out on my own. I figured it out on my own."
Shane's expression didn't change, but something in his eyes did.
"David was supportive at first," I continued.
"When I left my parents' house, he promised to take care of us.
Said we'd figure it out together. Get an apartment, raise the baby, make it work.
" I smiled, but there was no warmth in it.
"He meant it, I think. At the time. He was seventeen too. He didn't know what he was promising."
I took another sip of wine and let the warmth of it settle in my chest before I kept going.
"We got a tiny apartment in Flushing. I worked at a diner until I was eight months pregnant. David picked up shifts at his uncle's auto shop. We were broke and exhausted and completely unprepared, but we were doing it. Together." I paused. "And then Zoe came, and everything changed."
Shane waited patiently.
"Babies are hard. Harder than either of us expected.
David started staying out later. Picking up extra shifts, he said.
Hanging out with friends who didn't have screaming infants at home.
" I shrugged. "I told myself it was normal.
That he needed to blow off steam. That once Zoe was older, once things got easier, he'd come back to us. "
Shane's fingers curled against the tablecloth. A small movement, barely noticeable, but I caught it.
"He tried. I'll give him that. We got married when Zoe was two.
I thought it would fix things. Make us a real family.
" Another bitter laugh. "It didn't. He resented us.
Resented that his life didn't look like his friends' lives.
That he couldn't go out on weekends or take spontaneous trips or have a wife who wasn't always exhausted.
Five years in, he told me I was too much and not enough at the same time.
Too much baggage, not enough attention for him. "
Shane's hand covered mine on the table. Warm. Solid.
"He was wrong," Shane said. Quiet but certain. "About all of it."
"You don't know that."
"I know exactly that." His fingers tightened on mine. "You know what I see when I look at you? A woman who built an entire life out of nothing. Who raised an incredible kid on her own. Who shows up every single day for children nobody else fights for. Who's so damn strong it takes my breath away."
My eyes were burning. I blinked hard.
"You're not a mistake, Maya. You're not a cautionary tale. You're proof that people can survive anything and still be good. Still be soft. Still be worth knowing." His thumb traced across my knuckles. "Anyone who can't see that isn't worth your time."
I didn’t trust my voice. I turned my hand over, laced my fingers through his, and held on.
We walked back to my building.
The city was quiet, that particular hush that falls over Queens on a Friday night, when the restaurants have closed, and the streets belong to couples walking slowly, unwilling to let the evening end.
Somewhere around the third block, Shane reached for my hand.
Simple. Natural. As if he hadn’t even thought about it. His fingers slid between mine, warm and sure, and I didn't pull away.
We didn't talk. We didn't need to. The silence was comfortable, full of everything we’d said over dinner—and everything we hadn’t.
At my building, we stopped. The hallway was dim, the buzzing fluorescent light casting everything in a pale yellow glow. Shane turned to face me.
"Thank you," I said. "For tonight. For... all of it."
"Thank you for coming."
We stood there. Close enough that I could see the flecks of gold in his blue eyes. Close enough that I could smell him, soap and something warm underneath.
He stepped closer.
My breath caught.
I thought he might kiss me. I wanted him to, I realized. I wanted it more than I'd wanted anything in a long time.
But he didn't.
Instead, he leaned in and pressed his cheek to mine. Warm. Brief. Deliberate. His jaw was rough with stubble, and I felt it against my skin, felt his breath near my ear. His hand came up to the back of my head, cradling it gently. Holding me there a second longer than necessary.
Then he pulled back. Looked at me with an expression I couldn't quite read.
"Goodnight, Maya."
He was gone before I could answer.
I stood there for a moment, then turned and walked slowly to the elevator.
Each step gave me time to replay the night.
Rosa's knowing smile. The way Shane had shut down Brittany without a second thought.
The candlelight flickered across his face as he listened to me spill thirteen years of hurt onto the red-checkered tablecloth. His thumb traced my knuckles.
His voice was steady and certain.
‘You're proof that people can survive anything and still be good.’
And then, at the door. The press of his cheek against mine. The roughness of his stubble. The weight of his hand cradling the back of my head like I was something precious. The steadiness of his breath near my ear.
He didn't kiss me. Not really.
But standing in my doorway, fingers pressed to my cheek where his skin had touched mine, I realized it didn't matter.
I was falling for Shane Briggs. And I had no idea how to stop.