Tears can't stop falling down my face, but I'm decided to stop them and deal with this situation.
"Ok Max. Relax. Just relax. Breathe. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale." I say to myself in the loneliness of my room.
I repeat this pattern for a couple of minutes and my sobs begin to decease slowly. Good, this is good. Now I just need to analyze the situation and decide what to do. I'm going to get one of my pens from my messenger bag and a piece of paper so I can note all the ideas.
Right, first I texted Victoria and she replied, so I ended up in her room because SHE invited me. It's like her private sanctuary, and I can see why after having the chance to be all nosy when I was looking for Dana's innocence proof. That is definitely weird… Syd Matter's album was playing on the background. Since when does Victoria like him? I raise one eyebrow as the feeling of suspiciousness grows inside my mind.
We started to talk, well, actually we didn't talked at all. I said a couple of lame things while she was staring at me. I'm sure she looked… she looked like wounded. But still, she didn't say anything at all. Anything remarkable.
Then she suggested me to sit by her side tapping her absurdly expensive couch. Who needs a couch like that in her room? What if you accidentally spill your coffee on it? I can't understand rich kids… Anyway, I accepted the offer and she moved her hand to my knee. Victoria Chase. Victoria Chase touched me. That's certainly something she wouldn't do without a reason to do it.
After that she leant even closer and wanted to...mmh… kiss me, and I obviously wanted to, though I don't know why… I like it when she's far from me, not the other way around.
Think about that later, Max. You can't waste time right now thinking about your messed up feelings if you want to rewind the time without going too far.
We, euh, kissed… But it was too rushed. Totally out of the blue. Like it was all prepared. As if it were meant to be…. And in that precise moment Courtney and Taylor stormed in the room and Victoria violently pushed me away with one of her brilliants statements about my face. She's always trying to be original, but I can't be bothered anymore with her hostility. Who cares? Just because I use a Polaroid and I listen to indie folk doesn't mean I'm a hipster… Jeez! Maxine Caulfield, stop beating around the bush. This is important.
I look at the paper full of ideas, trying to connect them somehow. I know I'm missing something, and the key is Victoria. Victoria… Her behavior in the room was absolutely unlike her. I've been here for two months and she's been a royal pain in the ass the whole time. She's Blackwell's Regina George. The perfect queen bee. The kind of girl that will do anything to destroy you if you slightly eclipse her, like she tried to do with Rachel.
I chose to comfort her and that lead me to see a brief spark of humanity in that tiny but mean as fuck body and although she seemed genuine when she thanked me, I don't think that would ever be enough to tear down Victoria's thick walls. It's almost like a joke.
Oh man, I can't think straight with this…. Joke. I raise my eyebrows in surprise. A joke…. Could it be that? What if she played me a really cruel joke? That's more her style, having something to blackmail me or simply ruining my already nonexistent reputation for fun.
I have to find out if I want to clarify my feelings, and besides I can't leave things like this… Courtney and Taylor saw us, uhm, kissing. I shake my head to make this shyness that just came to my mind and my cheeks disappear. Anyway, I need to rewind and change everything; otherwise hell will be a place on Earth for me in this high school. I mean, it will be more infernal whenever they are around after that. I know Victoria's reputation is everything for her, so she'll probably tell everyone I'm like a perv or whatever suits her version, and that's something I can't handle right now, not with all the problems I have to solve.
Moving my right hand I start to rewind the time seeing the images on fast forward, until I see myself in front of Victoria's room and there I stop rewinding. I can feel my mind spinning and I immediately feel dizzy, so I raise my arms to stop myself from falling down and hold her door, but unfortunately it's unlocked, so it flings open due to the pressure I apply and I can't regain my position, which makes me collapse on my knees.
In an attempt to recover from this awful dizziness I hold my head with my hands, closing my eyes for a moment and with my eyes closed I obviously can't see Victoria, but I feel her moving towards me.
"Shit, Max. Are you ok?" She must be by my side but keeping the distance, cause she doesn't put a hand on my back or my shoulder as anyone else would if they see another human being collapse on the floor. At least she didn't greet me with one of her sharp statements followed by one of the brilliant names she always has for me, so I guess I'm looking absolutely miserable right now.
"Yeah… I suddenly felt kind of dizzy. Just give me a second." I breathe deeply and open my eyes slowly. Nailed it. She's standing by my side with her arms crossed above her chest, looking just a little bit concerned.
Syd Matter's album is playing on the background and there's no way I'm going through this again, so I raise my head to look at her and say: "Could you please turn off the music? It's hammering in my head".
She offers me a huff as an okay to my request and goes to her laptop. With my eyes still on her, I see Victoria move in front of the computer and nervously turn her head to the side so she can look at me out of the corner of her eye while pressing the key to pause the music.
"Looks like I've ruined the mood you were trying to fake here, bitch."
Victoria's mouth opens in surprise for a second to then furrow her eyebrows in anger and say "What the fuck, Max?" She's now aggressively facing me.
Shit, shit, shit. Oh man… I thought that out loud! "This is going to hurt." I say before quickly moving my hand and rewind the time a couple of seconds, resuming it before my inconvenient word vomit. I feel a painful puncture in my temples straight away, but I clench my fists and jaw to handle the pain.
"Come sit down. You'll feel better." I'm still kneeling on the floor of her room and she gives me a nice Victoria's style roll of eyes before she goes to the couch and copies her previous pose, like she's flawless, she knows it and she doesn't give a damn about the rest of the world, and I'm probably overanalyzing every little detail trying to find out the truth behind her actions and that's making me look more awkward than I already am when she's around, so I have to chillax and act natural. Don't think it's going to work though, but I have to try.
I slowly start to stand up to buy me more time to look through the room seeking that something I'm looking for, but there's nothing so obviously suspicious that captures my attention. I face her and cover the gap between the door and the couch to finally sit down, trying to keep the distance from her for now.
"So, what do you want, Max? You think you can fool me with your caring attitude, but everybody wants something in exchange. Always. So spit it out before I change my mind".
She looks at me directly in the eyes, but this time I'm not going to blush, look away or back up. By now I realized there's something going on and I have to figure out what it is. It's almost unbelievable that not so long ago I was sitting in the same place following a line of thoughts extremely different than the one I'm following now. You're hiding something Victoria, and I'm going to find out what it is.
"I don't want anything from you. Not everyone consecrates their existence to make other people's lives miserable". Wow, that was blunt Max. Well done.
Just like it happened the first time I was here, she doesn't reply to my answer, but she stares at me completely lost 'again' in her thoughts with her lips firmly closed. This is the perfect opportunity to check the room. Keep it low, Max. There's nothing weird on the table; some letters, leaflets and what it seems to be her portfolio. I slowly bring my eyes to the wall in front of me, but there's nothing there that captures my attention either, only photos, her printer, the awesome plasma that I want to steal from her… Definitely nothing, so I move my eyes to the right.
"Thanks for comforting me this afternoon… I… I don't know. You're different. I realized that after we talked", she says as she moves her hand to place it softly on my knee, making my body shiver and my stomach clench for the second time this evening, but now she's not taking me by surprise, so I quickly put mine on top of hers, just like I did the first time, and I cautiously smile at her. I'm running out of time, cause what follows is her… euh, kissing me. I break the eye contact to place my eyes on her desk. It doesn't seem to be anything there, just a cup of coffee, some books and her laptop.
She moves her hand, capturing mine with her thumb again, so I briefly look at her with a shy smile before moving my eyes to the desk one more time. By the way she's sitting on the couch, I know the spot I'm looking for is the one she's giving her back to, and that's exactly her desk.
She starts to lean closer to me and I know what follows will make my headache even worst, but first I think I'm going to play with her, after all you don't hit the time rewinding jackpot every day… Before she can get closer, I kiss her lips abruptly without closing my eyes, and by the way she's looking at me I know she's never been this surprised in her whole life. If I'm doing this, I'm doing it right, so I bite her bottom lip with force and she shoves me with a horrible grimace on her face.
"What the fuck is wrong with you? You fucking potato with eyes!" As much as I'm enjoying this, it's time to rewind, so I move my hand and wind back to the moment when she moves her hand to my knee, sending another painful puncture to my temples.
There it is. I've been here a few hours ago and I clearly remember the position of Victoria's PC. It was facing the door, not facing us as it is now. "Your laptop…" The words accidentally come out of my mouth.
"What do you mean my laptop?" She spouts nervously. Bingo, Max. I'm not a genius, but that doesn't mean I'm 'a potato with eyes', so I immediately know I just found was I was looking for.
"The camera is on, Victoria. I can see the green pilot". Before she could even react, I jump off the couch and rush to the desk, pressing some keys for it to turn on, just to see myself on the screen. She is recording all! So that was it… She is recording everything for who knows what… Man, are you cereal?
"MAX! WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?" She grabs my arm and pulls me away from the computer with such intensity it makes me bump into her chair and fall onto my butt.
"Ouch… Why would you?" I manage to say, but she doesn't have time to answer cause Courtney and Taylor storm into the room.
"HEY VICTORIA! GUESS WHAT HAPPENED THIS after…noon… What is SHE doing here?" says Courtney, but I'm absolutely done with this. For real. I'm done with Bitchtoria, I'm done with her mean girls, and I'm done with whatever is going on here. I move my hand and start rewinding.
I see myself going backwards from the floor to the laptop, then to the couch, to the floor again and finally to the hallway, but suddenly my vision starts to feel like blurry and my head is pounding really hard. I drop my hand and time resumes.
I know I'm in the hallway cause I saw it before stopping the rewind, but everything is really confusing at the moment. I feel my face wet and I raise my arm to wipe the tears, but they aren't tears... My nose is bleeding profusely.
"Oh…" I whisper looking at my hand covered in blood. I can feel my t-shirt getting wet with the drops. Everything starts to get black and my knees start to shake.
The last thing I see is Victoria's panicky face peeking out of the door…