The friendship between Saad Al'Maliki and Maya Matlin developed in the third season of Degrassi: Next Class.
Friendship History[]
Overview[]
Maya and Saad first met in Mrs. Grell's classroom at Degrassi. After going through his camera, Maya realized that they share the same obsession with death and they began taking a series of photos depicting Maya as a corpse. Though the two were very close, Maya eventually distanced herself from Saad as her mom attributed her downward spiral to Saad’s influence. After Maya’s suicide attempt, Saad had felt partly responsible due to fueling Maya’s obsession with death and helping her onto the roof of the school where her overdose took place. The two haven’t interacted since then.
Season 3[]
In #IWokeUpLikeThis, Saad tells Maya that it's his camera while she is looking through his camera that he left behind in Ms. Grell's classroom.
Maya takes Saad's camera and sees pictures he took from back home
In #PicsOrItDidntHappen, Maya is shown to be bothered by that fact Saad is taking pictures of her and Grace. She confronts Saad and takes away his camera. Maya becomes interested in the pictures that Saad took in Syria. They both bond over the fact that people keep dying around them. They are walking out of school when Maya tells Saad that about Cam's suicide and Adam's texting and driving car accident. When they arrived at the bus Maya poses on how she saw Tristan in the bus crash and Saad takes her picture. They arrived at the hospital to see Tristan and Maya ask him to take pictures of her in a hospital bed.
In #Unsubscribe, Saad and Maya are seen of having a photoshoot but are interrupted by Grace and Jonah who think that Maya was seriously hurt. Saad yells at Grace for yelling at Maya.
In #IRegretNothing, Saad is shown to be worried about Maya and wants to know why she hasn't been answering his text since they have been hanging out a lot. Maya tells him that her mother thinks that they shouldn't hang out anymore. Saad tells her he thought the pictures made her feel good, to which Maya replies that it made her feel something and it probably wasn't the right thing.
Maya hugging Saad
In #ImSleep, Saad sees Maya struggling with opening the door and helps her get in the school. Maya hugs him and calls him the best before telling him that he is a good friend and hugging him again, Saad is confused as Maya said they weren't friends anymore but Maya tells him to forget about what she said the other day about them not being friends anymore as it wasn't her talking, "I always liked you", Maya opens the door and leaves. This is the last time they talk to each other in the series.
Season 4[]
Saad feels as though he could have done something to prevent Maya's suicide attempt
In #BackToReality, Saad and Maya are seen to be in the same art class. For their art projects, Saad partners with Esme and Maya with Zig. While working with Esme, Saad learns that Maya tried to kill herself on the night that he opened the door to the roof for her. Saad appears guilty as he thinks that he could have stopped her. He continues to say that he should have noticed that something was wrong, but he had just thought that she wanted to take pictures. After both duos show their art projects they are given detention for including nudity. Maya does not show up to detention because she has counseling. Zig later confronts Saad, thinking that the latter was responsible for Maya's suicide attempt.
In #Obsessed, prom is put on hold because of a bomb threat and Maya and her friends are waiting it out at her house. They discuss who possibly made the threat, and everyone but Maya thinks it was Saad. However, Maya defends him saying he's not a terrorist.
Trivia[]
- They are both shown to be obsessed with death.
- People have died around both of them.
- Saad said his first line to Maya.
- Saad was the last one to see Maya before her suicide attempt.
- Saad had a conflict with and punched Maya's ex boyfriend, Zig.
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