Chapter Text
''I love your daughter," said Shawn, looking right into Katy's eyes. "And… I'm in love… with you."
Before Katy could give him any type of response, Shawn added, "I want us to take care of each other forever."
Except for Cory, everyone else became surprised as the photographer got down onto his knees while withdrawing a small red box from his jacket.
While a smiling Maya tried her best to keep tears from falling down her face, a shocked Katy also got on her knees, not taking her eyes off of her boyfriend.
"Do you wanna get married?" asked Shawn, who was also surprised that he was finally having that come out of his mouth.
Topanga went over to Cory, the two of them both feeling proud of Shawn for finally getting his "moment" with a special someone.
As for Katy, the only answer she could give to Shawn was, "Yes."
With that, Shawn grinned, and the two of them began to kiss.
Well, guess my master plan worked, thought Riley, sharing a quick look with her father, who gave her a wink.
It actually came true, thought Maya, referring to the birthday wish she had made so long ago after seeing Shawn with her mom.
###########
For some reason, even though Shawn had offered to walk Katy back to her apartment, Topanga decided that she would be taking her home.
"Yes! More time with Shawnie," exclaimed a gleeful Cory, with Katy looking both confused and slightly amused whilst Topanga was simply trying to avoid rolling her eyes.
Before they walked out the door, Katy looked at Topanga. "Anything I don't know yet?"
"Just hope nothing happens at the wedding," replied Cory's wife and Katy quietly nodded her head as she followed Topanga out of the apartment.
Once the girls were gone (except for Maya and Riley), Cory took a deep breath and walked right over to his best friend. "Ok, Shawn, as your best man, I have to know where you want to get married at, what the date will be, what color tuxedo you want, where do you plan on going to - no, wait, actually, I know just the perfect-"
"Cory!" Shawn exclaimed, which made Cory feel a little startled since he hadn't expected to be interrupted. "Just hold it, ok? We aren't gonna rush into all of that right now. Besides, I never said YOU were gonna be my best man."
Cory gasped, staring in shock at his best friend after those words had come out of his mouth. "Shawn…"
"What?" replied the middle-aged man, now confused but also not surprised by Cory's current reaction.
The high school teacher shook his head. "I am so disappointed in you… who else could be your best man?"
With a sly smirk now appearing on his face, Shawn began using his fingers to count the other people. "Well, there's Jack, Mr. Turner…"
Cory brought a hand to his chest and looked even more disappointed with him. "The audacity… you would seriously pick them over me, Shawnie?"
A now-confused Maya looked over at Riley, and asked, "What's wrong with your dad?"
Riley simply sighed, and gave a small shrug in response. "He and Uncle Shawn have a… 'special' relationship, Maya. To this day, I have no idea how to give a good enough explanation."
As for Shawn, he shook his head as his best friend continued to try reasoning with him. "Cor, come on. Don't you remember what happened last time when I was your best man?"
"Oh, pbbbbhhhtt…" Cory said, in disbelief and making a 'brushed aside' motion with his hand. "Nothing that bad happened."
Riley suddenly clapped in gleeful excitement and she turned her head to the side, as well as making sure Maya was facing the same direction. "Yay, a flashback moment!"
[Flashback]
Shawn could not take it anymore, and decided it was best for him to just go. "You know what? I shouldn't have even come here. Have a wonderful life, jerk!"
"You too, trailer-trash!" yelled Cory, gritting his teeth in anger.
When those words left Cory's mouth, Shawn stopped in his tracks while Eric - Cory's older brother - just laughed. "Shawn's poor!"
The young man turned around, facing Cory, and the two of them began to tackle each other down to the ground.
Once they were brought back up, Shawn exclaimed, "He doesn't care that we're not gonna be friends anymore!"
"Why do you keep saying that, huh?" cried Cory. "Why do you keep bringing that up?"
"Cause you won't talk about it!" exclaimed Shawn, as the two young man quickly became emotional.
"I don't wanna talk about it, why do you think I've been sending you everywhere?!"
Both of them were now on the verge of tears at this point. "We HAVE to talk about it!"
"Now?!"
[Present]
Once Shawn finished re-telling the memory, Cory began to have a sheepish expression while Riley and Maya were both speechless about what had been going on.
"Oh… was - was that how it… I kinda forgot about all that." Cory replied, eventually giving his best friend a small nod. "But I understand your concern now."
Shawn just shook his head, laughing while Maya turned to tell Riley, "Please tell me we aren't gonna end up like that."
"I really hope we don't, Maya," agreed Riley.
Taking a glance over at the pair of paint-covered teenagers, Shawn asked, "Um, Cor, have either of us ever covered ourselves in paint at one point?"
Cory thought about it for a couple of moments, and he shook his head. "Nope, can't remember, buddy… but I could help you do it if you wanted!"
"Do that, and I'll un-curl your hair again."
Cory gasped, and touched the top of his head. "You wouldn't dare!"
Shawn just laughed again, and he began to head out of the apartment. "Just take me home, Cor."
But before he was about to leave, Maya suddenly felt the need to speak up. "Uh, Shawn?"
As Maya walked up to him, Riley went over to Cory, laying her head against his shoulder as they watched the other two interact with each other.
"Does, uh… this mean you're gonna be, like… my dad now?"
At first, Shawn was ready to be amused and give a teasing response but he hadn't been expecting that sort of question from her. "Um… I, er…"
"She is the reason you believe that you could be a dad one day," called out Riley.
"Not helping, Baby Cory," exclaimed Shawn.
A confused Cory looked over at his painted daughter, who just let out a sigh. "Long story, Dad… tell you later."
Turning back to the young and blonde teenager that was a little bit covered in purple paint, Shawn decided to give what he thought was a good enough answer. "I mean, technically that's going to be true… but it's not going to change what we have going on right now. Like I said back at my place, I do care a lot about you, and I don't expect to be called 'Dad' or anything - oof!"
Maya's eyes started to sparkle with held-in tears again and Shawn found himself being warmly embraced by her, which he returned.
"You think I'm a geeky dad, Riley?" Cory asked, looking over at his daughter with a small smile.
"Of course not," she replied, still keeping her head on his shoulder.
"Oh, so then I'm a cool dad."
Riley chuckled, and shook her head in response. "Of course not."
Cory wrapped his arm around his daughter with loving affection. "Then, what sorta dad am I?"
Looking up at him, Riley answered, "You're the best dad I could ever have."
Cory smiled, and ruffled some of Riley's paint-covered hair that made her laugh a little bit. "Even if I tell you that I think you should definitely go hit the showers to get rid of all this paint?"
"I'd be surprised if you didn't, to be honest."
A few moments later
Opening the door, Shawn walked into his home, and started putting away his jacket.
Well, this was definitely not the way I thought that this day would turn out to be, thought Shawn. Heading over to the wall of "extra special" photos, his smile grew as he looked at the one of him with Maya and her mother at Maya's 14th birthday, as well as the one of him and Katy on their first date.
Remembering what he'd said earlier about knowing what Maya had been wishing for, Shawn said, "Well, I guess we both got what we wanted..."
When he turned around, however, Shawn instantly went from being "happy" to being "shocked" as he saw that someone else was also in his house.
"Holy... Maya, what are you doing here?"
The 15-year-old teenage girl (no longer covered in purple paint) was now standing a few feet away from him, a duffel bag by her feet. "Spendin' the night."
"You're doing what now?" Shawn replied, surprised because he hadn't been expecting this to happen tonight. "Ok, Maya, it's not that I don't want you here, but shouldn't you at least -"
"Already spoke to my mom," replied Maya, knowing that he was going to mention her. "She's cool with it."
Shawn blinked his eyes for a moment and he said,"Well, that doesn't mean I am-"
"But you just said that it's not that you don't want me here." reminded Maya.
Man, she is good, thought Shawn before he tried to figure out what to say next. "I don't want... no, yes, I mean... I do like having you here, but next time, just please ask me beforehand so that I can at least prepare for your arrival."
Looking around Shawn's upstate home, Maya said, "Don't look like you have much if you exclude the trees and your little animal friend."
Shawn sighed, and he just shook his head before accepting that she wasn't going anywhere. "Alright, fair eno - wait a sec. How exactly did you get here?"
Maya simply gestured to the front door and replied, "I was able to convince the nearest bus driver to make a deviation and bring me up close enough so that I didn't have to walk much."
The photographer just chuckled quietly while she walked over to his wall of various photos. "Gonna put up one of you poppin' the question to my mom?"
"If I was able to, yeah," chuckled Shawn. "But now I think I'll probably need an actual scrapbook now or something for all the future photos that include... uh, future special moments to come that I'm not going to be able to fit onto the wall."
Maya then made her way to and pointed at the one of him and her mom on their first date. "So where did you guys go exactly?"
Shawn looked confused again. "Wait, she never told you what we did that day?"
Maya shook her head. "Nope... I didn't really think of ever asking her because I was just glad to see that she came home safe and happy... and it looks like you two went someplace nice."
Nodding his head, Shawn replied, "Yeah, we did. One of the best days of my life... even though to- oof!"
He stopped after Maya suddenly gave him another hug. "Um... alright, what is this for exactly?"
"For everything that you did for me today..." replied the young teenager. "And for making my mom really happy."
Shawn wrapped his arms around his "soon to be" step-daughter, and said, "You're welcome, Maya."
As Maya looked up at him, grinning widely, Shawn ruffled some of her hair, and said, "Well, let me just take a relaxing hot shower that I definitely need, and I'll come back in here to make us some dinner. Okay?"
"Sure thing," she replied, also letting out a small chuckle. "As long as there's no tea or sugar cookies involved."
"Trust me, there won't be," agreed Shawn, heading inside his bedroom, and closing the door.
After waiting to make sure he wasn't coming back out anytime soon, Maya went over to her duffel bag, and started searching for something that she had brought.
"Come on, where did she put it," grumbled Maya. "Honestly, Riley, you could've done better - oh, wait, found it!"
She was holding a framed photo that showed her, Riley, Cory, and Topanga smiling at Shawn and her mom, with the two of them kissing each other romantically.
"And now this can be an extra special picture, too," said Maya, speaking to herself as she hung up the photo onto Shawn's wall.
"Hey, Dad?" A free-from-paint Riley asked, entering the living room in comfortable pajamas. "Can I ask you something?"
"Yeah, Riley. Of course," nodded Cory. "What is it?"
Looking at her father, Riley asked, "How was it when you proposed to Mom? Was it like the way Shawn did it?"
Cory started to laugh. "Oh, no, no, no... your mom and I had our own special way of proposing."
"What do you mean exactly?" A curious Riley wondered, tilting her head to the side.
The high school teacher smiled as he gestured for Riley to sit beside him on the living room couch. Once she did, he continued to explain. "Well, when the three of us were about to graduate high school, she had told me that there was a reason for her not to go to Yale -"
"Mom could've gone to Yale?"
"Not the point here, ok?" replied Cory, and Riley quickly became silent again. "Anyway, she asked me if I wanted to marry her... and we almost did, but we waited."
"How come?" Riley had figured they would've already been married by that point.
"Because she wanted my mom... t-to be..." Cory paused to take a deep breath, and wipe away at nonexistent tears from his eyes while Riley just looked confused. "Sorry, just some emotional moments coming back to me…the two of us wanted to have our family and friends at our wedding."
"So, how long did you two wait?"
"Till our final year in college," replied Cory, smiling as he remembered that day as if it was yesterday.
Yay! Riley turned to face the direction that her father was now facing, knowing he was about to experience a past memory.
Flashback
As she held the bouquet, Topanga said, "I wasn't sure this day would ever come, but you were. I wasn't sure love could survive everything we put it through, but you were. You were always strong and always sure. And now I know I want you to stand beside me for the rest of my life. That's what I'm sure of."
In front of her, Cory and Shawn - their arms around each other - were smiling happily at Cory's soon-to-be-wife.
Turning over to his best friend/man, Cory said, "I have to talk to her now, ok?"
Nodding his head, Shawn gave him a pat on the back. "Go ahead."
Once Shawn took his seat, Cory looked back at Topanga, and said, "Ever since I was young I never understood anything about the world, and I never understood anything that happened in my life. The only thing that ever made sense to me was you, and how I felt about you. That's all I've ever known and that's enough, that's enough for me, for the rest of my life. Topanga, are we gonna get married?"
"Yea, we are," replied the lovely bride standing in front of him.
"Good, cause… I have these rings." As his bride let out a chuckle, Cory simply smiled as he placed the ring on her finger, and said, "I love you, Topanga."
Trying her best not to cry, Topanga said the same. "I love you too, Cory."
Present
Riley smiled, and said, "So, how do you think it'll be for Shawn?"
"Well, I'm not exactly sure, honey," answered Cory, shrugging his shoulders. "But I do know that, with me as his best man..."
A smiling Riley shook her head. "Uncle Shawn said that-"
"Only I will be Shawn Hunter's best man at his wedding, and no one else," interrupted Cory, and Riley held in a laugh. "Anyway, with your mom as Katy's maid of honor obviously, it'll be…"
Remembering the joy on Shawn's face when he had selected the ring to give to Katy, Cory added, "It's going to be whatever makes the two of them happy."
A satisfied Riley nodded and gave her a father a hug, telling him goodnight before going to her bedroom to sleep.
Once she was gone, Cory turned on the television, wondering if his favorite sports team was playing right now when a certain thought entered his mind.
"I wonder if I should tell her about... nah, that time will come. Yes, they're still playing!"