A/N: Oh, look, a new story! Honestly I'm kinda pumped about this. I didn't mean to unveil so much of the story, I sort of wanted it to be this slow unwinding as you guys work out what's happening along the way, but I think it's probably better that you can understand this from the get-go.
Description:
Max can reverse time. She realises this one mundane photography lesson, when her camera breaks and she saves its life. Slowly, Max realises she can do what others cannot: get the best outcome in every aspect of her life, and help others along the way. But with the ability to make everything how she wants it to be, to redo and redo as many times as she wants, Max is becoming obsessed with perfection. There's only one person who can save Max from herself, only one person who is unaffected by her time travel and the only person Max wishes it affected: Victoria Chase. A seemingly perfect girl with seemingly normal problems - at least until Max comes along and unravels it all with nothing but a flick of her hand, and a growing hubris.
The Reverse of imperfections
The world around Max reverses.
She watches as it happens, physically sees the reversal of speech from Mr Jefferson's mouth, watches as her camera, once broken and in pieces, picks itself off of the floor and puts itself back onto the table, the screws magically winding back into place, the plastic bending and moulding back into the shape it once was, reverting from the shatters and dents it was on the floor. Max watches, unable to feel amazed, unable to feel calm, as the people around her visibly rewind. She watches as a ball, thrown at Kate, slowly travels back across the classroom and into the hand of the culprit who threw it. Watches as the pen on Kate's page moves backwards, undoing the needless doodles she had drawn to distract herself from the glares and sniggers of her classmates.
But Max herself does not reverse. No.
Because Max is the one that is making the actions of her classmates, her professor, come undone, with nothing but a wave of her seemingly normal hand.
It's amazing, seeing the world slowly unfold before her in a moment of absolute, undeniable clarity. She only wishes that Victoria were here, in class, so she could watch as the perfect actions of a seemingly perfect girl came undone, and Max could watch, slowly, and search for the imperfections.
When she lowers her hand, the world is in play again, and nobody is aware that something has changed. Something inhumane has occurred – something extra-terrestrial – incredible – unthinkable – mind-blowing – alien – something so totally abnormal that is seeks to change the very fabric of the word, of the world and society we live in that deems the abnormal something so mundane.
What Max has the power to do really is abnormal. Not mundane in the slightest. There is simply no other word to describe it, and yet it falls so short of being the word Max needs, that this power is something indescribably frustrating.
She has godly power. She could become absolutely perfect – do everything right, say all the right things, live a world where she is perfect, and her grades are perfect, and she can do all the things she had dreamed of doing –
Because she has a power. But she is too scared to trifle with it.
She drops her hand to the table. It makes a loud noise and hurts, but Max barely notices. She's too bewildered. Too panicked, anxious, scared – what is she to do, with such a power? How does it even exist, and why the hell was it given to her, of all people?
The bell rings, and Max stands. She clumsily shoves her pencil case and notes into her bag, puts her camera in afterwards. Leaves.
Or, tries to, at least.
"I see you, Max Caulfield. Don't even think about leaving here until we talk about your entry."
Max flinches at being noticed, but obeys and makes her way over to Mr Jefferson, who is leaning against his desk with his arms crossed, watching her expectantly. "I'd never let one of photography's future stars avoid handing in her picture."
Max sighs and fiddles with her fingers, her eyes guiltily darting from the floor to his face, but unable to look him in the eyes. "Yeah I – I'm not sure I have one." She says, quietly.
Mr Jefferson doesn't seem disappointed, which is good. Max hated disappointing him; he was a a legendary photographer and trying to help her. She wants to impressive him. He slaps an easy smile on his face. "Given your selfie output," he jokes "I imagine you must have about a thousand good pics by now."
"It'll take a long time to find a good one." Max replies. She meets his eyes.
Mr Jefferson nods his head, sighs, but seems to understand. He pushes himself off the desk and turns towards Max in his easy-going manner. "Max, don't wait too long. John Lennon once said that 'Life is what happens while you're busy making other plans.' " Max thinks that maybe he is disappointed in her after all. It isn't a good feeling. "Go on now," he says. "don't let me stop you."
It's a decision she makes without ever realising it. Before she knows what has happened, before she can register it, her hand is in the air. Time is reversing. Max doesn't know how she does it, how it's happening, but it is – it's happening as naturally as the constant pounding of her heart, which is the only thing reminding her that this is real at all.
Max is standing in front of him when time is normal again. And this time she initiates the conversation:
"Excuse me, Mr Jefferson, can I talk to you for a moment?"
And she gets the same reply: "Of course, Max! I'd never let one of photography's future stars avoid handing in her picture."
This is it, Max thinks, a moment where she can turn disappointment into approval. Where she can alter Mr Jefferson's opinion of her, give him the answer he needs to hear from her to avoid disappointment. So she gives it.
"I'm on top of it. I think John Lennon once said that 'Life is what happens while you're busy making other plans."
And Mr Jefferson looks so pleased. Max doesn't know how to describe this feeling, this satisfaction mixed with this string of guilt threaded down her throat, tugging at her heart with every waggle of her tongue, every manipulation of the world, as it changes from the way it was supposed to be -
"Max, you're on fire today." He says, waving his hands around in the classical overly-expressive arts teacher way. "All the right answers. Good. Make sure you finish working on it by today. I have faith in you."
And Max nods, smiles, tells him she will, because that's what he wants to hear. Now she can leave, now that Mr Jefferson is done with her. She opens the door, hears it click behind her and takes a deep, steady breath to calm her nerves. Max pulls her phone out of her pocket, connects the earbuds and shoves them in her ears, letting Syd Matters encapsulate her surroundings, cleanse her of the stress and worry. Max makes her way outside.
It's full of her friends, classmates. She sees Victoria with Nathan, Taylor and Courtney sat over on the grass together, sees Brooke playing with her drone, Alyssa sat reading her book, Justin and the skater dudes preforming ollies, nollies, lots of other difficult moves Max would fail at if she tried –
She watches as Zach throws the football a little too hard, and it zooms straight past his friend and instead hits Alyssa right on the back of the head. She hits the floor, her book falls beneath her.
Everyone laughs but Max and Alyssa.
And Max makes a decision.
She can do this, now, she knows, knows that her power is ultimately unlimited, not like a three-wish genie. She runs towards Alyssa and stops just short of helping her out. Reaches out her hand – feels this energy warp around, twist, manipulate, like her hand is the singularity in a black hole. The world undoes. It is silent, quiet, the actions of those in Arcadia Bay, possibly the entire continent, or planet, undoing before Max's very eyes.
"What the fuck!"
Max jolts at the voice, a voice when there shouldn't be a voice, because time is unwinding and Max is the only one who can speak or do anything but someone is yelling at her -
She turns around and, in front of her, is Victoria. Moving of her own volition, staring at Max as if she were a freak, an alien, something inhumane and wrong, or maybe she is staring out of fascination.
And the only thing Max can focus on is that Victoria is not unwinding why isn't she unwinding.
That is enough to tire her out completely.