"Alright. That's it."
"What's—" Max barely had time to question her best friend before a pair of black boots stomped past her into the dimly-lit bedroom. The brunette heard a loud sliding noise as Chloe yanked up the blinds, letting bright sunlight spill across the bed. "Hey!" She pouted, pulling the hood of her sweatshirt down over her eyes. "Ugggh. Talk about light pollution."
"I am officially sick of watching you emo out in this dark-ass cave," the blue-haired girl announced, folding her arms over her chest. "Get up. We're going for a walk."
"Sorry, Chloe," Max replied, looking back down at the colored blocks she was matching absently on her phone screen. "I'm just not really in the mood."
"Nope." A hand reached down in front of Max's face and snatched the phone out of her hands, eliciting a noise of protest from the smaller girl. "That wasn't a request. Come on. You need some fresh air."
"Do we have to?"
"Doctor's orders."
"Frequent self-medicating does not make you a doctor," Max challenged, dragging herself off of the bed and slipping into a nearby pair of flats. "I'm pretty sure that's not how it works."
"Hurry up. Don't make me write you a prescription for an ass-kicking."
"That is also not how it works."
Max and Chloe made their way out the front door and down to the sidewalk that wound alongside the quiet streets of the Seattle neighborhood. Red and orange leaves danced and swirled through the crisp Autumn air, and Max, feeling the chill, immediately dug her hands into the front pocket of her hoodie. Both girls were silent for a minute or two, looking back and forth at all of the Halloween decorations lining the neighbors' yards.
"Shit," Chloe realized. "Halloween's in, like, two days."
"Oh, yeah. I forgot all about it," Max admitted, having flashbacks to conversations with Dana earlier in the month. "Blackwell was supposed to have a party. I guess there's not much to celebrate now."
"We should do something for it."
"How are you seriously thinking about Halloween right now?" The brunette demanded.
"I'm thinking about the fact that we need to have some fun before we both go ballisto. You need something to distract you."
Max shook her head vehemently. "No way, Chloe. I can't. All those people—they deserve to be remembered."
"I'm not saying you should forget them! But you can't just hide out in your room for the rest of your life, either. I won't let you." Max looked down at her shoes, but didn't respond. "I'm taking you out on Halloween, Max. We're gonna go find some cute-ass outfits and binge on weed and candy and booze, and we're gonna have a good time, and we're not gonna think about that fucking storm, just for a little while."
"I bet Warren wanted to have a good Halloween, too." Max snapped. "And Alyssa, and Brooke, and Justin—"
"Maybe they did!" Chloe shot back, stopping in her tracks and turning to face Max. "Or, maybe they didn't! There's no way to know now. But, they sure as fuck wouldn't have wanted you to waste the life you get to live by acting like you're dead, too."
At this, Max's eyes welled up with tears, and she immediately sat down on the curb, the hood of her sweatshirt obscuring her face as she buried it in her sleeves. Chloe sighed, taking a seat beside her, prompting Max to fall miserably into her best friend's lap. The taller girl pulled Max's hood back, revealing a messy brown mop which had grown tangled and unkempt beneath the dense fabric. With her fingernails, Chloe lightly combed the strands away from Max's water-streaked face.
"I'm sorry," the brunette wavered. "I'm just so fucked up right now. Still."
"God, I wonder why," Chloe replied. "It's not like you just went through a huge, traumatizing event or anything." She looked down with understanding at the girl in her lap. "Give yourself a break, Super-Max."
"I just—I feel so guilty. Not just about the storm, but—about just being able to sit here talking to you you, feeling the wind on my face and breathing air in my lungs. They'll never get to do those things again. It just isn't fair."
"Nobody deserves to die, Max," Chloe said pointedly. "Nobody except for piece of shit motherfuckers like Jefferson and the Prescotts." The blue-haired girl reached into her pocket and returned with a carton of cigarettes and a lighter. She plucked one from the box, lit it, and stuffed the rest back where they had come from. She took a drag, holding it in for a second before sighing out the smoke into the air around them. "You know, after my dad died, I stayed up every night for months, just screaming and crying and begging whatever divine asshole being was out there to bring him back and take me instead."
"Oh, Chloe," Max breathed.
"His death was such bullshit. He was just trying to do something nice by picking my mom up from the store. He didn't deserve—what happened."
"Of course he didn't. William was amazing."
"Yeah. He was." She took another drag of her cigarette, watching the smoke waft up to meet the trees. "Max, we might not deserve to live instead of them, but guess what? We're the ones who are still here. We got another chance. The least we can fucking do is make the most of it. It's our responsibility to every single one of those people buried under the ground of that shithole town."
"Wow," Max was sitting up now, staring at the blue-haired girl with surprise. Her friend's words felt strange on her ears, like hearing a different version of an old favorite song for the first time. "Where is this coming from?"
Chloe looked down, fiddling with one of the brassy bullets on her necklace. "From you, Max," she said after a moment.
"Me?"
Another silence fell between them before Chloe began to explain. "Before you came back, I was angry. Really angry." Max nodded. That part she knew. "I was mad at my dad for leaving me. Mad at you for leaving me. I thought I had finally found someone I could depend on, but then Rachel left me too. And don't say she didn't mean to—even before she died, she was never really the angel I thought she was. I'm still so pissed that she lied about Frank. Not that it matters now, I guess." Her eyes were distant, replaying memories behind them like ghosts lurking around corners, distinctly present, but impossible to touch. "I felt so alone and so—lost. The truth is, if Nathan Prescott never pulled the trigger in that shitty bathroom, I probably would have done the deed myself eventually. Or—tried to, at least."
"God, Chloe." Max's eyes had filled with tears all over again. "I never wanted you to go through that. I'm so, so sorry."
"Don't be," Chloe said seriously. "Everything changed when you saved me that day, Max. The more I thought about it, the more I started looking at things differently. Then, when you ripped up that picture at the lighthouse—that's when it really hit me. Ever since then, it's like, I'm seeing everything through new eyes. I got a renewed lease on life, all thanks to you."
"I'm so glad you feel that way," Max said earnestly. "I don't even know what to say."
"Just stop acting like your life isn't worth anything," Chloe told her, meeting the girl's eyes. "You're worth everything. Especially to me."
The wind howled through the thick pines as Max stared into her best friend's eyes, her breath caught in her throat. In that moment, she couldn't help but wonder if this intense bond she felt with Chloe was altogether normal. The deep attachment that she felt to the other girl was so strong that it made the air around them feel heavier somehow. They had been through so much together—they had altered time and defied fate just to be able to sit there beside one another, breathing the same air and touching the same ground. Their lives were starcrossed, but they had done the impossible: somehow, Max and Chloe had managed to uncross their stars.
Max was first to break the eye contact, shying away from the overwhelming intensity. A strange heat had washed over her face and chest, and her heart was beating so rapidly that she felt the need to hold her breath for a few seconds to calm it. She then exhaled as quietly as she could, lest the other girl pick up on her body's apparent sudden state of panic.
Woah, she though, glancing back at Chloe, who was now staring off in thought as she smoked the last of her cigarette. I guess this "partnership in time" is getting pretty serious.
The truth was, everything felt a lot more real once she'd stopped using her powers. Though she'd only had her rewind for a week, the force of it had been so strong that her life had quickly morphed into a calculated game of trial, errors, and do-overs. Anything she did or said, she could simply take back—and as a result, she'd played around with emotions, reactions, and friendship until they were nothing more than cards in her hand. Of course, manipulating time soon caused time itself to deteriorate into a nightmare, and as her world collapsed around her, Max had been swiftly forced to relearn entirely the true meaning of consequence. Now, a mere few weeks since the time when she had feared nothing, the brunette had begun to second-guess everything.
Kissing Chloe in her bedroom had felt so simple at the time. It had been a dare, and one that Max knew Chloe would never have expected her to actually follow through with in a million years. Maybe she had wanted to see Chloe's reaction when she actually took her up on the ridiculous challenge. Maybe she had just felt like kissing her best friend. So what? To Max, it had been no more than a harmless choice that she could undo if and whenever she so desired. Now, though, she thought back on this choice with burning embarrassment as she became ever more acutely aware that she had no idea what she was doing.
"We should get back," Max said, feeling an urge to go splash water on her face in the privacy of her own bathroom. "Mom probably has lunch ready."
"Wait," Chloe said, digging in her bag and pulling out Max's camera. Max's eyes wandered to it, and Chloe watched the girl's face flicker with surprise, then confusion, then trepidation. "I uh—I thought you might want to take a quick selfie first. Or just a picture of the leaves! I mean—before you know it, these trees will be hella bare. We should preserve the awesome scenery, right?" She looked hopeful, even as Max took a step back.
"Um—I don't know if that's a good idea." With everything that had been going through her head, Max had not been expecting this surprise intervention.
"Why not? I'm not asking you to use your powers. It's just a picture. Photography is your thing, remember?" Chloe extended the camera out to her, but Max shook her head, taking another step away from her.
"Chloe, let's just go back. Please?"
"Fine," the blue-haired girl conceded, after searching her friend's face. "But this background is amazeballs, so I'm taking one." She dug into her pocket and pulled out her phone. "You're gonna thank me for this one day."
The sound of the fake clicking shutter played into the breeze, filling Max with a sudden, sharp unease. She sucked in her breath and held it, only letting it out again when the feeling had calmed completely.
"That was actually a good shot!" Max exclaimed, pointing to the photo of the two of them against a background of vivid Autumn colors.
"Don't sound so surprised," Chloe retorted.
"Sorry," Max giggled. "I didn't mean it like that! I just didn't think you cared about framing your shots and stuff."
"Uh, newsflash: I may not be gifted like you, but I do still have eyes."
"Don't say that. You're totally gifted," Max insisted.
"The bedroom doesn't count, Max." Chloe gave her partner a mischievous grin, and Max rolled her eyes.
"Not what I was talking about."
"You're saying it's not true?"
"I'm saying that you are gifted in many ways, including, but not limited to, the bedroom."
"So, what, like, that time we did it on the trampoline, or—?"
"Chloe Price, you are merciless."