Prologue
She wasn't conscious of the pain at first. It was a curious sensation, dream-like, as cliché as it sounded. She was only too aware of the impact of the bullet rupturing her flesh, jolting her backwards despite the close range of the firing, the hot, blistering sensation of the blood against her skin, her vision blurring, pulse racing, pounding viciously against her temples. She could feel herself shuddering, gasping in panic for breath, but this whole sensation felt no different to the feeling of her heart racing frantically upon awaking from a nightmare; the brief moment in which it all still seemed real before common sense overcame her and she realised it had been nothing but a dream, that was what this reminded her of.
It wasn't until a good few moments later that the pain began to kick in.
She was still numb, blissfully unaware of the havoc the bullet lodged within her was to cause, right up until the moment her body gave up the fight to remain upright and she toppled backwards, falling heavily against the wooden laminate floor. The moment she connected with the hard glossy surface beneath her it was as though a switch had been flicked, and suddenly her body was burning, shaking in panicked desperation as the once-simple act of pumping oxygen in and out of her lungs became a formidable struggle. There was a terrible, stabbing pain in her stomach, so prominent that as of that moment it became all she could focus upon; burning, throbbing, pulsating.
She struggled to pull herself together, get her bearings; the initial shock of the bullet becoming impacted within her had caused the world to blur and a lack of awareness as to what was going on around her was scaring her more than anything. If only she could concentrate enough to see, perhaps it wouldn't all be quite so terrifying. It was her current blindness which was scaring her more than anything, that was what she told herself. Regain some clear vision, that was all she had to do, and then it wouldn't seem quite so hopeless.
But all Maxine's eyes could manage to focus upon was the stubborn blur of Earl Kelly as he disappeared out of the room, the pounding of his footsteps as he ran intensified so greatly that she struggled to concentrate on anything else at all.
She was vaguely aware of someone calling out her name; Janeece, her brain told her after some delay, it was Janeece's voice. Now she had identified it, Maxine could make out Janeece's figure leaning over her, could feel hands squeezing her own if she concentrated with all her might. But the pain… the pain was still overwhelming. It was no good. How could she even begin to focus on Janeece with this stabbing, excruciating pain in her abdomen?
"Max?" Now another voice was calling out her name, yet another Maxine recognised but couldn't find the energy to place, not when what little she had left was all being anxiously channelled into forcing her diaphragm to expand and contract, each breath an increasing struggle.
It wasn't until she heard the second voice again that Maxine finally mustered the strength to concentrate hard enough to identify it.
"No." It was a stammer, a soft, shaky stammer, so different to the tone this voice had adopted just a few moments earlier that it threatened to confuse Maxine even further, to send her into a panic as she struggled to ascertain to whom exactly it belonged. She should know this voice, she knew she should, but she was so exhausted with the effort of simply keeping herself awake… she couldn't think…
Steph; it was Steph's voice. God, how out of it was she, she couldn't even recognise Steph's voice?
"I'm here, sweetheart, I'm here." It took a disproportionate amount of Maxine's remaining energy to concentrate for long enough to make any sense of Steph's words. She could sense a hand sliding beneath her head, lifting her, but the sudden movement only caused her vision to blur once more and she sank with despair back into a world of murkiness and confusion.
"I'm sorry," she managed.
The words sounded horribly forced, strained, hardly like her voice at all. Two short words; they were all Maxine could manage to force out, and yet so much was there to be inferred.
She was sorry. She was so, so sorry. She was sorry for the fight she and Steph had gotten into earlier, just a few hours ago but what felt like a lifetime ago to Maxine now. She was sorry for being so, so stupid, for allowing herself to become so wrapped up in Earl Kelly's lies and empty promises when everyone around her was fighting so hard to make her see him for the psychopath he really was, words falling on deaf ears each and every time. She was sorry she had refused so stubbornly to listen, had failed to see that Steph had only ever been trying to protect her, to keep her safe.
It was too late now, of course. It was all too late.
But it wasn't just the events of today that Maxine was trying to convey an apology for through those two simple words. She was sorry for everything, all of it. She was sorry for all the times over the last few years when she knew full well she must have been an absolute nightmare to live with, to be responsible for. The incident on work experience just a week after she first moved in, the fake football raffle, the copied coursework essays, the lying about where she was going and who she was with, staying out all night without bothering to tell Steph she wouldn't be home and showing nothing in the way of remorse when she finally turned up back home… And then there were all the minor offences she had committed over the years; the attitude, the cheek, the gossiping to Janeece, to Chlo, sometimes to anyone who would listen, about aspects of her guardian's life which really were none of her business. The worst of it was that she had known it was wrong, deep down. She simply hadn't cared.
It was almost unbelievable, Maxine pondered, the power which a threat to a person's mortality had cause them to re-evaluate themselves, to make them see their actions on a whole new light.
But most of all, Maxine was sorry for the way in which this was inevitably going to end. She knew only too well that she was far from fully alert, but she was certainly conscious enough to understand the situation she was in. Exactly what was happening around her was still horribly unclear, but as far as her physical state went, she knew full well that she was dying. A close-range abdominal gunshot wound; Maxine had no need of being an expert to appreciate that her chances of survival were slim. And she was sorry, she needed Steph to know that she was sorry, that the last thing she desired was for it all to end this way.
She so wanted to fight on, more than anything. But she couldn't, she just couldn't. She was too physically drained to fight on any longer.
"Don't leave me, Max," she could hear Steph's voice telling her now, though her tone was weak, desperate, as though she too had already given up hope. "Please don't leave me!"
Maxine simply couldn't find the energy to tell her that she would hold on if only she could.
Her awareness was reducing rapidly as the pain became near-unbearable and the dark depths of sleep became increasingly appealing, though Maxine could sense a sudden flurry of activity around her. The pressure on her left hand had subsided; she was aware of voices talking frantically either side of her though making out the words they uttered was now proving impossible.
The just as the darkness began to claim her completely, Maxine was shocked back into semi-consciousness by a sudden pressure on her abdomen; sharp, jolting, horribly, excruciatingly painful. She tried to scream out in protest, complain to whoever it was that they were hurting her, but all that escaped her lips was a soft, pained moan.
She could hear voices again, but all she could make out in terms of the words being uttered was her own name, the rest was nothing but a blur. All she had to go by was the tone of these voices, and deciphering even that was a struggle. Soothing, Maxine decided after considerable delay, it was soothing, with a hint of something else… apologetic, perhaps? Yes, she decided, apologetic, but something else too, something she was too exhausted to place…?
Panic. That was what it was, panic.
How did Steph and Janeece- or whoever it was, Maxine was rather oblivious- expect her to keep calm and hold on when they were so evidently panicked by the state she was in themselves?
It took Maxine a few moments longer to establish exactly why the voices so close to her had become so distorted, even more so than before. Suddenly she was aware of a loud, electronic wailing; now she thought about it she was certain it had been there in the background for a while now, gradually becoming louder and louder… closer and closer?
Sirens, Maxine realised. That noise, that horrible wailing sound, it was sirens. Sirens… police? An ambulance? She didn't know. How was she meant to tell? If it was the police then that was no bloody good; what good could they do for her now? Earl Kelly was most likely long gone by now and she didn't need a god damn cop leaning over her and stating the obvious, she needed…
Screw it. Maxine no longer had the energy to think about what she needed, not when she was so sure it wouldn't be arriving until it was far too late.
And with that final, hopeless thought, Maxine Barlow closed her eyes and gave in at last to the darkness, pulse weak, feeble, but still clinging on by a thread.
Not my first attempt at writing anything but my first Waterloo Road fic, so I hope it was OK. I know I'm a few series behind TV but I really miss series 4 and the old characters, and I never quite got over Maxine's death. I loved hers and Steph's relationship, as well as her and Janeece's friendship. And so 4 years later I've finally decided to write this.
I'm really worried that I'm too late and no one's going to want to read this, so please, please if you get this far and you want more then leave me a review? I won't carry on uploading this if I'm not getting reviews because I'll worry that either no one remembers who Maxine, Steph and Janeece are or because it's rubbish, but if people enjoy it and want me to continue then I absolutely will, you just have to let me know :) A couple of words left anonymously will do, just let me know you like it and I'll write more, promise.
Em xx
