Thanks, y'all, this is chapter three. I've had this one done for a while now, it'd be nice to get feedback :)

Disclaimer: James Patterson owns, you betcha, baybay, but my stuff is mine own and if you steal i'll set the FF police on ya :)


Max stirred sleepily. By her guess, that was the longest she'd slept in a long time. The cafe smelled of fresh coffee and spearmint. They had moved the couches from the fire just enough to create a space where her, Amanda, and Adam could sleep in front of the warm fire. It seemed that Alex still had a lot of issues, and they couldn't sleep in the same room together. He took the only bedroom in the small apartment above the cafe.

Max was squeezed against the couch, Adam taking up most of the room. She turned over and was greeted with his hand, inches from her face. She shoved him over as hard as she could. That coffee scent hadn't come from nowhere-Amanda was already up. Max could hear her feet moving around, quick, brisk. She sounded like she was ready to get down to business.

The fire had long gone cold but that was alright. Max had four or five thick quilts piled over her. She stretched as far as she could, her fingers toward the fire and her feet pointed away. She yawned widely with the stretch, so much so that her eyes closed and when she let the stretch go she thought she was going to fall asleep again.

Max turned over onto her belly, resting her chin on her forearms. She breathed out and ashes fluttered away. She breathed in and ashes fluttered closer to her. She blinked slowly and waited for this easy picture to go away.

It seemed surreal. After so long of living in fear, she didn't have to worry any more about Itex or people attacking. She could rest easy and spread her wings now without people freaking out. Max smiled, laughing a little as she remembered the time they'd all busted in that restaurant, and pictures of them flying away graced the next day's front page.

"Come on, sunshine, you need a shower," Amanda said from above. Max looked up to see Amanda looking down at her. Her light brown and blonde hair was pulled back into a loose bun, bangs hanging loose. She had an apron tied over her shirt and jeans, and she held a mug of coffee. "I'll hove you some coffee when you're done," Amanda said.

Max followed her, sleepy, to the bathroom. Amanda fetched a pair of her own clothes for Max and Max only thanked her. She sucked up a little bit of her pride and faced the thought that she might need to learn how to depend on other people, if only a little bit.

She stood under the hot stream of water, feeling it beat away some of the stress that knotted her muscles up. Not five minutes later she stepped out, hair smelling fruity and skin scrubbed pink. She donned Amanda's clothes and put her own into the laundry basket as Amanda had insisted that she do. She passed Adam on his way to the bathroom and he nodded at her, his feet dragging and arms hanging.

Max trotted down the stairs toward the smell of caffeine and oatmeal. Amanda was moving around the small kitchen behind the counter. Four bowls of steaming oatmeal sat on the counter, topped with fresh berries. Three huge mugs of coffee complemented them, steaming as well.

Max halted on the last step, looking at the cafe. It may have been small but it was comfortable, and it made her relax a little bit. The curtains were swept away from the windows, letting in the bright sunlight, and the oak floors gleamed with the light. The couches, some ratty, some new, littered the cafe floor, love seats sprinkled among them.

It looked like it had last night, only... warmer. More inviting. Accepting.

"You gonna move out of the way any time soon?" A voice asked from behind her. Max whipped around, startled, and about to throw some punches. Adam held his hands up in the air, defensive, and Max let her breath out, forcing herself to relax a little. Max nodded slowly and vacuumed herself to the wall. Adam passed smoothly, glancing back at her as if she were some kind of deer, scared out of her wits. In a way, maybe she was.

Max moved down the stairs and over to one of the windows, looking out. "Door's open," she heard Amanda call. Max nodded and moved to it, turning the knob and leaving quietly.

The promised storm had come in the night, it had rained. The gutters were full of water and leaves, and water pooled in the cracks of the sidewalk. It gleamed with the sheen of gas, showing miniature rainbows on it's surface. When Max glanced up, the sky showed no signs of the past storm. It was calm, pale blue. The only thing that interrupted it was the yellow sun, weak this early in the morning. Max sucked in a breath and let out one big sigh, leaning against the outer wall of the cafe.

"Pretty, isn't it?" Amanda asked from behind Max. She had followed her outside. Max turned, startled. Amanda held out a bowl of oatmeal, a spoon sticking out. It smelled so good, Max would have eaten it without the spoon. She took the bowl, careful of the heat, and started wolfing down her breakfast.

"I like to come out here sometimes. Just to listen to the quiet, before the people start waking up and making a racket." Amanda said, and laughed to herself. "I didn't think I'd miss the quiet this much, but I do. I remember when I was younger I used to hate it and now I go finding it."

Max looked over at her. Amanda seemed to glow, basking in the weak sunlight. Her eyes were closed, hands in her pockets as she leaned casually against the brick wall. She had a lazy smile on, her face turned up to the sun. Max felt her eyebrows crinkle together. She wished she could be as... free with her past as Amanda was, but for some reason she couldn't make the words pass her lips.

"It's Saturday, so we'll be open from eight to six," Amanda informed Max. "You can help around as much as you want, but I'm not sure how much you know about coffee. Sunday we're closed, on that day we can go shopping around."

Max nodded, looking down. She'd finished wolfing down the oatmeal. "Do you have any more?" She asked sheepishly, glancing up at Amanda, holding out her bowl. Amanda laughed, taking it from her hands.

"Should have known you'd have a huge appetite," she said. "Alex eats anything in sight," she said, with a wistful smile. Amanda headed inside, the door closing quietly behind her.

Max stared down the road for a second. Suddenly, she turned around and opened the door. Amanda hadn't gone far, and she looked up at her. "I'm gonna go out for a, uhm, fly, okay? I won't be too long," she said. Amanda tipped her head in her direction.

"Okay, we'll be here when you're back," she said. She was busy pushing the chairs around, experimenting with the spaces. Adam and Alex were nowhere in sight. Max double-checked for permission to make holes in Amanda's shirt, and within minutes there were two slits in the back of her shirt and she was walking down the street.

The sun had warmed up in that short time, and already the puddles were growing smaller. Max buried her hands in the pockets and let herself relax. She didn't have somewhere to go, she didn't need to be anywhere. It was somewhat liberating.

To be on her own, as close as she could get. She may not have had a distinct purpose, but she felt more like she had a place, already. Yes, she did belong with her Flock, but she could also survive on her own.

Max soon found herself in an empty lot. She simultaneously wrangled her hair back into a ponytail and unfurled her wings. With a few running steps and a hard beat of her wings, she was in the air. High and soaring higher, the city below her seemed to spin. At her flight's lowest she could see people bustling around, and at it's highest she could barely see the lights of skyscrapers.

This city, New York City, THE city, was alive. Even though she was high above it, she could feel it, pulsing with life, vibrant. She could feel the hundreds, thousands, of lives beneath her, their breath, their movements. She could almost hear them, their heartbeats in her ear.

Max wondered how many of them she, and the flock, had saved.