Back with the second and last chapter! Again, I'm really sorry for any typos or stuff like that.
"No. I am very much not okay, Fang," I snapped. He raised his eyebrows—yes, both of them, the equivalent of saying "Go on, Max."
"I'm not okay, thanks to you." I stumbled over the last word of the sentence. This was really, really, so frickin' bad, but I couldn't stop myself. And that was like a nightmare. If I cut myself off, Fang would pester me until I told him. When I told him, hell would rise up and strangle me, chop my head off, stab me a million times, and kill me. So yeah, I was not okay.
"Remember when I was fourteen and we were here at Mom's house, and I wanted to get the chip out?" Fang nodded. "Well, I, um, said…I said some crap that I wasn't supposed to say, right?" He nodded once more. "And, you…you never said anything back to me. You never told me, you…liked me or other stuff like that. And now you've been ignoring me. I see you laughing with Ig and the Gazzer, and when I come in, you stop and don't look at me. And I have no clue why and…"
"Max," Fang interrupted, but I was on a roll.
"…it hurts. Yeah, it so freaking hurts."
"Max," Fang repeated.
"And you know what I want? I want things to either go back to when you had no clue to what I said two years ago when I was up on a stupid drug, or you to say you like me, hate me, or whatever you wanna say. Although I don't want you to hate me."
"Max," Fang snapped. I stopped.
He opened his mouth and closed it, looking awfully guilty. It was the kind of look that said, I don't like you, but I really don't want to hurt your feelings. Something inside me twisted.
By the way, see how serious this was? I wasn't even cracking a stupid joke about it.
He didn't say anything, just looked at me with his deep, drowning eyes. I really need to take some medication that stops me from saying such stupid sappy things.
I began rambling like Nudge, and that was seriously not something I wanted to do at the moment, but I couldn't stop. "It'sokayifyoudon'tlikemeIjustreallywantedtokn owandyoudon't…"
Here, I paused for breath. I'm not Nudge.
"…havetolikeme,Ipromise,butIreallylikedyou,actuallyIstilllikeyou."
Fang didn't say a word, and I felt my stomach plunge. Whee! There's a rollercoaster in my stomach! And my heart's on the ride and the machines just malfunctioned. This was fun.
Yeah. It was as fun as the dying and experimented-on kids we met in Africa.
And penguins with machine guns and bazookas blowing up the dying kids. 'Cause penguins are insane that way.
I love sarcasm, by the way. Just in case you haven't noticed.
I lowered my chin and eyes, suddenly taking an interest in the patterned white-and-mint-green tiles of the floor. There was a coffee stain next to the stove, and there was a light film of dust under the refrigerator. I told Iggy to wipe up his dust bomb!
I swallowed the lump in my throat and blinked my burning eyes. They hurt even worse than having a staring contest with Angel, and damn, that girl can stare. Except I kept on blinking my eyes for some strange reason, and some of the dust on the floor must have gotten into my eyes, because everything looked so damn blurry, and there was water in my eyes.
"Okay," I whispered, hating the way my voice cracked and dropped pathetically. Yeah. Hey, penguins with bazookas, can you shoot my stupid voice?
No? Well, fine. Keep on blowing up those poor little dying kids in Africa. Oh, I'm making you feel guilty? Good. Now, hand over the guns and head over to the jet plane over there. It's your free ride back to Antarctica. Thank you.
Oh, and kill Dr. Amazing Red-Head for me. I'll give you a bazooka to do the job.
Thanks, little Midget Penguin!
So, now, please ignore the fifty million or so guns lying around me and the jet plane in the distance, freaky fangirl. I should start calling you FF, but that would mean the same thing as Fanfiction, so I won't.
Back to pathetic Max.
"I just…I just wanted to know," I whispered softly, letting my shoulders slump and not daring to look at Fang's face. Great way to ruin a perfectly good July day, Max. I know, huh?
I literally whipped out my wings and flew out of the kitchen to save the organ in my chest from being ripped apart and me getting cardiac arrest and dying. Not good, folks, not good. Especially when you still have the job of saving the world. Yes, you owe me your lives.
So just maybe I was hoping for a clichéd ending where Fang yelled something along the lines of "Max! Wait—I love you!" or some other crap. But hey, this is my mutant freak life. It's not a clichéd fairytale. Nope.
And I know it isn't very Maxish to hang my head and run out of the kitchen because a boy pretty much rejected me, but whatever. I really have no excuse. That doesn't mean you, the creepy fangirl, can hold it over my head forever!
Yeah. I mean it.
I really mean it. You cannot hold it over my head! Ever! Ha!
Okay, I'm officially crazy. I know that.
I dashed up to my room, cursing the remnants of Iggy's dust bomb for making my eyes so blurry and watery, and slammed the door. I'm pretty sure Fang heard the slam and maybe everyone all the way to the dying kids in Africa.
And then my door fell off its hinges. Perfect. So what did I do? I whipped open my window, snapped out my wings, and jumped. The ground rose up at me, but because I'm not suicidal (as much as you wish I was) I caught a warm updraft and soared upwards past my open window and broken door. Now, think of the thing that makes you high. You know, you get dizzy and addicted to it, and you can't stop. Multiply that by infinity and beyond. (What? Gazzy likes Buzz Lightyear, and who am I, the queen of sarcastic awesomesauce, to stop him?) That, my dear stalkers, is flying. And hot damn, does it feel good!
Aren't ya jelly now? And no, if you say you're Nutella, I will murder you. I've had enough of Iggy snickering that in my face. Good. I only have to murder…you, you, and you.
In your sleep. With a chainsaw and a bazooka. With a mini penguin helping me.
Watcheth yourest backeth! (Is that old English? You just add an 'est' or 'eth' at the end of everything, right? That's what Nudge says.)
Okay, I probably shouldn't listen to Nudge when she talks about old English, seeing as the computer doesn't recognize these words.
And, as cliché and stupid as this sounded, my worries melted away and I lost sense of everything, turning on my super-speed and cutting through the bright blue sky. Oh my God, I wanted to do this forever. And it's rare that I want to repeat something over and over. Usually I would slow down for the Flock, but this time, nobody was with me, so I could turn it on.
Okay, that was sooooo wrong. I mean my super-speed, not anyone's 'ahem'—sorry, I coughed there. 'Cause we still don't know how far Angel can read peoples' minds.
I sounded like a sappy poet—worries melting away and losing sense of everything. Ugh. I should delete that, but I'm too lazy. And maybe I did have a few worries. What if Iggy found a stash of Francium or pure sodium, and then decided to add some water, causing the whole freakin' town to blow up? What if Angel decided it'd be nice to start mind-controlling the Flock into playing My Little Pony and dress up?
At least I wouldn't have to suffer the dresses and pink.
But yes, I did lose track of time, pushing away my misery. Maybe if I flew long enough I could out-fly my troubles and time, and stupid Fang would forget I ever said that. A girl can hope.
But you're not 'every' girl, Maximum.
Oh, jeez. The Voice was back.
No? I never noticed, dearest Voice, I shot back.
No need for sarcasm, Maximum. I'm only trying to help. And the truth is that when you stop flying, the situation will crash down worse. Your best bet is to go home and confront Fang. He won't magically forget that you said you liked him. What if he does like you?
He doesn't.
How do you know?
None of your beeswax, I grumbled, forgetting that the Voice was part of my stupid brain and could read my thoughts.
Ah, so you misunderstood his expression, Maximum.
Shut up. Just shut up.
The Voice started talking but I began to mentally sing the song that gets on everybody's nerves, 'cause I'm just so badass that I have to sound like a dying chicken to drown out the little know-it-all voice in my head.
The Voice shut up. Well, it's feeling cooperative today. Now, what time was it? I looked at the darkening sky, missing a beat with my wings and dropping about five feet.
Fail. Yeah, like your crush on Fang, Miss Fangirl.
What? Me jealous? Pfft. As if.
I ignored the Voice and kept on flying in my epically-failing quest of forgetfulness. But after I decided it was probably dinnertime, I kicked up my speed and turned around. As the house began to come into my raptor-vision, I slowed down, the oh-cuss-word-I'm-in-deep-cuss-word feeling overwhelming my brain.
I landed on my open windowsill and glanced around. I could smell tonight's lasagna, basil soup, rosemary-olive bread, and brownies with peppermint cream downstairs, but I realized with a shock that I wasn't hungry. I know, call the police. Maximum Ride not hungry?
THE WORLD IS ENDING! MAX ISN'T HUNGRY! AHHHH!
Yeah. Crazy alert, for you people.
And this was one of my favorite meals. I mean, I'd even asked (because Iggy begs, not me) Iggy to add an extra layer of noodles, cream sauce, and cheese to the lasagna, and add extra chocolate to the brownies with peppermint cream. And Nudge had to have green sugar with the peppermint cream.
Aren't you hungry? *Cue my smug smile*
The only thing better is chocolate-chip cookies made by Mom. They're foodgasmic. Yup. That's a word, so don't look at me. Y'know, a combination of food and orgasmic?
Oops. Don't say that in front of Ange.
Anyways, I kicked off my shoes and socks, pulled off my T-shirt and jeans, and put on a pair of cotton short-shorts (they were Ella's! I didn't buy them of my own account! And wearing that in public? Ugh, gross!) I washed my face with cold water, not wanting to wait for the water to heat up, and then slipped under the covers, dread coiling in my stomach at the thought of facing Fang tomorrow.
Maybe I'd get sick and wouldn't have to see him.
Yeah, except the only one of us who had ever gotten sick was Nudge. She was ice-skating and fell through a thin patch of the ice. It took us four hours to haul her through the hole, and she had only gotten a slight cold that was gone in about twelve hours.
So I highly doubted I'd get sick. Yippee.
I closed my eyes and ignored the sickeningly rich smells of food downstairs, trying to go to sleep. And I fell into my own light slumber.
…
Yeah, right. First of all, who says 'slumber'? That's so old-fashioned! And when we bird-kids sleep, we sleep heavy, only waking up when we need to.
So I was sound asleep for seven hours (until one in the morning) before I was woken by someone stroking my hair. Oh, kcuf spelled backwards. It's pathetic that I know how to spell curse words but don't know how to spell much else, eh? Thank God for spell-check.
But, yeah, the footsteps were too late for Nudge, Angel, or Gazzy to be up. Iggy wouldn't be touching my hair. When he did at age ten, he screamed like a little girl. "OMG get it off me! AHHH! Get it off!"
Ella? Nope, at a sleepover. Mom? Probably. I slowed my breathing; glad the covers hid the rise and fall of my chest.
"Mom?" I croaked out after a few minutes.
I heard a soft chuckle. "Sorry Max. Try again." Oh, God. It was him.
I sprung up out of my bed, suddenly realizing I was only in a bra and shorts. Shite. That's the British way of cussing a special word. Who said you never learned anything hangin' around with me?
I grabbed the covers and pulled them up to cover my chest. "What the hell are you doing here?" I hissed.
Fang shrugged. "Talk to you," he said simply, as if he woke me up every day at one in the morning—or is that night?—to talk to me.
"Talk to me tomorrow," I snapped. "I'm trying to sleep." He looked at me, raising his eyebrow again. I so needed to beat him in that competition.
Damn. I'd forgotten that when I woke up, I couldn't go back to sleep. That's why I usually had last watch. The only way for me to go back to sleep was to let Fang's boring monotone voice (cough, cough, deep, sexy, hot voice, cough, cough) dull my senses and bore me to death.
I huffed. "Fine. Talk to me. And don't use up your word quota for tomorrow," I warned him. "I don't want you to be all emo and silent like you typically are."
Fang snorted. "Did you mean it?" he suddenly asked. I frowned, faking it.
"What? That I wanted Gazzy to have a bath last Wednesday? That I didn't want Angel to mind-control the girl at the toy store who was pushing her cleavage in your face because that was rude?"
"As I recall, you didn't really care if Angel mind-controlled that degrading-word-for-that-girl to jump off a cliff."
I mimicked his shrug. "I'd like you to jump off a cliff with your wings shut now." I pointed out sarcastically. "I really want to sleep."
Fang frowned. "Stop sidetracking me, Max." He stared into my brown eyes. Invading personal eye space…Must destroy…invading personal eye space…must destroy…invading personal eye space…must destroy…invading—yeah, you get the point. Destroy Fang.
"Did you mean what you said about liking me?" I stiffened.
"No clue what you're talking about. Did you eat a bad mushroom or something like that? Or are you just hallucinating and freaking me out?" I fibbed through my teeth.
He stared at me and I cringed. Insert-yet-another-cuss-word
And he stared.
And he stared.
And he stared.
And then a pink dinosaur with a wand burst through my screwed-up doorframe.
...
...
...
No, really. It did happen. I mean all you gullible fangirls just have to believe whatever I write, right?
No? Good. You're not that stupid. Thank God.
And then an awkward silence reigned. I twitched.
"Look, Fang. Just forget what I just said, 'kay? I was being stupid. You don't like me. I know that, so just forget it, okay? I still dunno why you were ignoring me, but whatever, right?"
Fang snorted. "You're dense."
I scowled. "Oh, I'm dense? This's coming from Mr. Stupidly-Silent, right?"
Fang groaned. "You know what Max? I do like you. Okay?"
And I gaped. Like another goldfish. Bad. Very, very bad. 'Cause this is Fang. He's the guy who is silent and emoish. Yeah, that's not a word. Bite me. He wears black, barely says anything, and showing emotion is a big crime.
Yeah, I described him pretty well.
So Fang liking Max? Uh, no. No, no, no, no, no. No. And no, again. That was bad. Bad, bad, bad, bad, bad.
Did I make my point clear?
Oh well. Just reread it again. I'm sure you'll figure it out.
Fang muttered something under his breath and stood up. "G'night, Max," his mumbled voice sounded from his fingers. And I'm sorry, but that's just—no. You don't tell Max you like her and then walk away. That's even worse than Fang showing emotion. 'Cause that makes Max mad. And when Max is mad, bad things happen.
God, I need sleep. Talking in third person…hmm, the first sign of insanity. Well, that describes me. Okay.
Pause my rant.
Words I've used too many times: 'really,' 'okay,' and insert-cuss-words-off-choice. And maybe 'yup.'
Un-pause.
So I jumped across the room, letting the covers fall. Oops. I blushed and crossed my arms across my black bra, my cheeks resembling the Red-Head-Wonder's hair. Fang smirked.
"Okay, you do not just tell me you like me and act as if nothing happened and walk away!" I snapped. He stared at me, and I made a mental note to thank the big guy upstairs that Fang wasn't as perverted Iggy and wasn't gawking at my chest. Although Iggy's blind.
"You did."
"You freakin' rejected me!"
He looked at me. "I'd never reject you."
Aww! Cue the sweet sappy music and swoons!
CUPID. WHAT. DID. I. TELL. YOU?
YEAH! LEAVE ME THE FREAK ALONE! GO SHOOT MORE ARROWS AT IGS AND NUDGE! SHOOT ARROWS AT THE SHAW-GUY AND ELLS! NOT ME! NO!
Skipping over my pissed rant at the fat baby with stupid wings… (How do they hold up his weight? Something I'll always wonder…)
I glared. "Oh yeah? Then why the hell were you ignoring me?"
He flinched. "Ummm…I can't tell you that."
My killer glare turned up to maximum—no, not my name, igiots—level. "Why?" I snarled, taking a step away from him.
"It's for Ella…she wanted to plan out Angel's birthday—"
Oh, and just in case you haven't noticed, we've decided on birthdays. Yippee for me. Angel's July 18. She says to drop a happy birthday comment in the box below. Whatever that means.
"—and Iggy kinda wanted to prank you to make everyone laugh…Oh, crap. Not supposed to say that."
I suddenly turned on my I Will Kill Iggy Look, and Fang cocked an eyebrow, reading my expression perfectly.
"He's dead. Tomorrow Iggy will find himself buried under the front porch, the kitchen, and the bathroom sink. All in different locations. Like his body parts. And I'll start with castration," I stated, calmly and sweetly, my smile so large Fang knew that the pyro was dead.
And then I grinned. "So…Now what?"
Fang shrugged. "Hey Max, what'd you do if I said I…uh…loved you?"
I smirked. "I'd freak out, kiss you senseless, and all that crap. So, now what, again?"
Fang grinned. "I love you, Max."
And then I turned into Goldfish-Max.
Oh my God, he…loves me? Okay. He does love me. Do I love him? Duh. So am I supposed to say it back? Nope. I'm Max Ride, remember. I'll just give him his promise.
And I turned into Leader-Max. "Okay. Freak-out time is over."
Then I smashed my mouth against his, just as he leaned over to start making out. And, God must have been really happy when he made that boy's mouth, 'cause I'd give up my chocolate-chip cookies for a year just to kiss him once. He probably went on a vacation after making Fang's lips.
Hell, Lissa could dye her hair blond and I wouldn't care!
Okay, that's pushing it.
And as Fang—somehow, the sneaky little bastard manages to survive without air—kept attacking my mouth with his, I smirked. He rolled his eyes, feeling my smirk against his lips.
"Somehow," I gasped, gulping in as much oxygen as I could while Fang lifted his mouth from mine, "I think you're enjoying this way too much."
"And if I am?" he grinned.
"Better not let Angel read your mind tonight. And lock the door."
Fang rolled his eyes once more. "Yes, Captain Max," he snorted, but he was laughing as he said this, so I'm just that badass awesome.
And we returned to kissing.
Best ending to a horrible day. Ever.
Hell yeah.
The end of my first two-shot! Thank you so much for reviewing and putting Just Say It Back on your story alert! It means the world to me and I can't thank you enough! So thankyouthankyouthankyouthan kyouthankyou!
~Fly On (copied from Fang who can't say anything about it)
Penguin
