You look at her, dumbfounded, your heart caged in your stomach doing back flips. What? You must have gone deaf, there's no way on earth she would say something like that. Nevermind the fact that you're in an alternate universe and at this point, almost anything is possible. You blink, hoping and not for the first time, that this is just a nightmare, your psyche's form of protest against sleepless nights, against what had transpired a few hours back with Charlie and a part of you does not even know what to think anymore.

Except that this is pretty much real. You can tell from her reddening cheeks, the soft curve of her lips as she purses them, the long locks of hair that fell from her ponytail, the too blue eyes that avoid yours neurotically. It's blatantly obvious yet you can't process it. From the corner of your eye, you try to find an escape route despite knowing there aren't any, stood where you are in the conveniently empty parking lot of Blackwell Academy. Not one soul in sight, other than you and Nathalie Fucking Prescott who just confessed her undying feelings for you.

How much crazier could the world get?

This was not what you expected when you received a text from her a few hours ago. It said that it was an emergency and feeling drained and hopeless after that god awful exchange with Charlie (his empty eyes staring right through you when you refused to give him the needle, you ran away, overwhelmed and scared to death) you were too physically drained, done with everything and you made the grave mistake of agreeing to meet up with her, half hoping she would somehow have all the answers you needed or a way out of this version of hell. You were wrong.

"Alright, I have to say that I wasn't planning on doing this" she started, talking to her sneakers "Liiiike ever but um, I thought since you and I have been friends for a while maybe you'd understand. What could possibly go wrong between friends right?"

She laughed awkwardly; you didn't know what to say. You chose silence "Thing is Max, I don't want to ruin our friendship, I really like what we have and…" Nathalie paused, frozen in mid speech "Fuck!" the girl yelled suddenly, face turning cherry red" I'm not good at fucking feelings, Max. Look I fucking like you, got it? From the moment I first saw your ridiculously cute as fuck face I have liked you! Please go out me or whatever!

Your jaw unhinged and you literally felt it hit the ground.

And now here you are. And there she is, blood rushing to her face so fast you fear she'll faint or something, looking very much like temptation and everything you should NOT want. In your head, a vicious voice screams a reminder of the things she has done back in your real timeline. The sneers, the insults, the threats, she shot Charlie, whatever she did to Kyle and most importantly, Richard. You try to remember you're supposed to be scared of her or hate her for all the wrongs she has committed. But then again, you have always had a weird gut wrenching understanding whenever you look at her, like at the Two Whales. You observed for a while, hunched over in her seat, her nimble fingers fiddling with the camera as she worried her bottom lip between her teeth and you thought that even though she still looked crazed, right there she seemed almost at peace with whatever demon was consuming her from the inside. The light gave her auburn hair a golden quality to it and without meaning to, you also noticed the heavy shadows under her eyes, a slightly red fading mark on her right cheek….

It was so easy to forget the enemy within Nathalie when she looked so human. So vulnerable and helpless. You couldn't help but think then what could have possibly made her become the irate creature she was and what if she had been spared of those circumstances that made her, well, her, and what would she be like? Looking at her now, you see the potential of what she could be, what she might have been. It hurts, you think vaguely.

This Nathalie is an innocent.

Still broken in a way, still rough around the edges but never like the Nathalie Prescott you know.

You realize, this world destroyed Charlie's life, made his life a purgatory. This world, too, saved her, gave her redemption and a chance to start anew. You wonder what it will give to you, asides from suffering twice a broken heart. Once, by the rebel blue haired boy whose smile melts your insides; twice, by the girl you know you can't ever have, no matter how much you want to.

It's a stale mate.

You know what you must do.

Blue eyes peek shyly at you behind long bangs and you could have this goddammit. This could be yours. But the thing is, it would be unfair to the both of you. You don't belong to her. She doesn't belong to you. You're not her Max, the Max she knows, the one she's confessing to. She is not your girl either, the leering, menacing Nathalie who sank her nails into your hand and left a permanent mark on your skin, made you bleed.

It's not fair. Not when you fight back the moisture starting to cloud your sight, not as you say "I'm sorry" The girl takes a deep breath and the red of her cheeks slowly turns to a sickly pale. You already miss it "I don't feel the same way, you are a ve-very precious friend to me, Nat but I… I like someone else so-"

Whatever your excuse is, you never get to say it. Your words die in your throat because fat teardrops start spilling uncontrollably from Nathalie's haunted orbs and immediately want to do anything to make it stop, knowing well that you can't. Alternatively, you consider screaming at God or whoever's out there that thinks it's funny to keep messing you up. You're not sure you can continue doing this, survive the heartache if this goes on any longer.

So you decide to stop it.

Choking on a sob of your own, lift your shaking hand, up, up, up until you can feel time unfolding, rippling at your disposal and it's more a curse than a blessing, this gift of yours, getting to watch Nathalie's expression contorted in profound grief (the first time her heart's been ripped out and spat back at her) and then, nothing; moving backwards to the point where you only had to deal with the fact that your best friend was paralyzed from the neck down, tied to a chair for the rest of eternity.

Again, you are in his room. His eyes are closed, lips turned downwards in displeasure. You're sat next to him, full of emotion and on the verge of tears yourself. If you remember correctly, this is the part where he tells you to fucking go before you storm out of there near suicidal. Seeing him, with the image of the Prescott's fresh in your mind is a new kind of torture. You don't know who you're cheating anymore, who you're betraying in thinking about the other.

On wobbly knees, you stand, gather the small amounts of willpower you have left and walk towards the cabinet you know it'll contain what you're looking for. What you need. Really, what a stupid boy you had been, for not doing this sooner. It would have saved you a lot of pain. Maybe you're a masochist.

You reach inside and pull out the photo album, a pang of nostalgia hits you square in the chest looking at all those happy moments with Charlie captured in time. Like you did with Nathalie before him, you know what to do.

Grab the photo, Max.

You do. The tips of your fingers skim lightly over the joyous smiles on younger versions of yourselves, when you used to be naïve and stared at the outside world in barely repressed awe. You try to mirror the grin on the picture but find yourself unable to. That's okay. Focusing, zooming in on the picture, putting your heart and your almost everything on it, you apologize to Willa and Charlie and John. It was never your intention to bring back their family together to just destroy it again.

It was never your intention to break Nathalie's heart.