Chapter 10 Song: In the Water by Anadel
Max wiped away her tears as everything around her fell apart. Her legs burned with fatigue, and her skull pounded with the rush of blood through her ears. She felt like she'd been running for hours. It was so difficult to tell time here, everything moved in such a confusing fog. A thousand painful thoughts swirled in her mind, she struggled to keep her head above water.
Ever since she'd left that other Max, the world around her became more and more surreal. The air writhed and split like the sea. It shifted and changed, surrounding her with disturbing and familiar images. It was like walking through a malfunctioning projector, the frames flashing and warped. It was getting harder for her to focus; her mind flowed back and forth like waves. There was a flash.
Max was there again: Jefferson's class. That godforsaken lecture rang in her ears.
"Alfred Hitchcock called them little pieces of time."
Fuck you!
A thousand birds crashed against the window panes turning the room red with their blood. She thought of Prescott's vision, the fragile blue jay smacking against the pavement. Rachel Amber deep underground. Another flash.
She walked through the halls of her dorm. It was dark aside from the grim light of candles. A figure stood in a doorway of light.
"I'm more alone now than I ever was," she heard the voice of Kate Marsh say.
She saw Kate jump. Max's tried to cry out, but the words died in her throat.
She closed her eyes, and when they opened, she was walking through the hall in someone else's body. Familiar voices ghosted past her ears, dozens of conversations she'd remembered from this week. It made Max want to throw up. Another flash.
She stepped through a doorway into a backwards world. Sound, movement, everything flowing in reverse. She was moving forward through a rewind and it was nauseating. So many familiar faces and sounds, all going the wrong way through the halls of Blackwell. She stepped forward, the only thing headed in the right direction.
Or maybe it isn't the world that's backwards…
There was another flash, and she stepped into a true nightmare. It was a world full of shadows and beams of light. Bits and pieces of Arcadia Bay floated in the flood of darkness. She felt like she was being chased, her legs sluggish and slow. She tried to ignore the voices that came from the mouths of monsters with the familiar faces of men. Men who had pursued or threatened her on the other side. Flash.
It was raining in American Rust; junkyard first, then sanctuary, then tomb. The jagged mountains of trash were dark and sinister in the shadows of the clouds. They towered high above her, too large to be real, bits of detritus sliding down into an empty void that surrounded the island of trash. A large rusted billboard rested on its side, the big red letters read: HERE LIES RACHEL AMBER, NEVER MADE IT OUT OF ARCADIA BAY.
"So, we finally meet, Max," said a mocking voice. "Chloe told me so much about you."
Cold terror filled Max's veins as she looked at the hole in the soft, wet earth beneath the sign. She gasped when Rachel Amber, looking sickly but alive, stood out of the grave. Her face was twisted in a grimace. Max took a step back, but cried out when her foot met the open air.
She fell onto her back, into a grave, her limbs growing stiff and paralyzed. Rachel Amber stood over her, looking down like Max was the last thing she'd want to see.
"This is who I replaced? What a joke."
"R-Rachel? Please I-I wanted to save you…" Max stuttered, struggling to move.
Rachel laughed, the sound brittle with anger.
"Right, says the girl who can travel back in time. Got it."
"I…I can't go back again like that! It ruined everything," Max said, tripping over her words, her breath quickening.
"Or maybe you just don't want the competition. You'd never stand a chance with Chloe if I wasn't fucking dead," Rachel said, kneeling down and cocking her head in morbid curiosity, like she was looking at a dying insect. "I mean, the only reason she wanted to kiss you was because you were dressed like me."
That's a lie! She isn't real. None of this is real!
Max's eyes began to water as she tried to sit up.
Rachel shook her head in disappointment, her bright blue feather earring fluttering with the motion.
"It should've been you, not me."
She walked away, and Max was alone in the dirt, the rain pattering against her cheeks with dozens of cold, stinging pricks. She wanted to run away desperately but her paralyzed limbs refused to obey. She began to sink deeper into the earth.
"Yeah! That's right! Just run away! Run away like you always do!"
The words of Maxine echoed through her head. It was all lies. All of it. Nothing in this place was real. That wasn't her andthat wasn't Rachel. This all just had to be a bad dream. A side effect of pushing herself too hard fighting Prescott.
But the more she tried to dismiss what she had seen and heard the less convinced she was. What if there was no way out of this? She had never wanted this kind of power. She never wanted to have to make the choices that she did. But was Maxine, right? Was she just using her powers for selfish reasons? Maybe what Rachel said was true.
When Max had held Chloe after they found her body, all she could think about was taking away Chloe's pain. She had thought about traveling through another photo. She could warn Chloe somehow, or tip off the Police about Jefferson and the Prescott's earlier, before anyone had been hurt. But something had stopped her. As she was being torn apart by Chloe's grief, she couldn't help but think of William, and what it had cost to save him. She thought about what Prescott had said, and about the damage she was causing to the fabric of time. But was there another, more selfish reason for her reluctance? No. Max couldn't let her mind go down that dark path. She knew what happened when she traveled too far back. She couldn't do that again. Ever.
She lay at the bottom of the grave, the earth almost covering her face completely, and thought about Chloe. Everything seemed to revolve around Chloe, like she was some cosmic hotspot. It was like the universe had singled her out for some unexplainable punishment. There was just so much pain around her, it was beginning to crush Max. She felt like she was fighting against fate itself to protect Chloe.
I…I don't know if I can fix it, Chloe.
She sank completely beneath the dirt. She couldn't breathe. her wrists began to sting and there was another flash.
Bile rose in her throat when she sat up in the metal chair again, her wrists bound. Harsh white lights stung her eyes as the record player warbled in the background, the sound warped and uneven. She saw Chloe and Jefferson talking about her like she was worthless, laughing as Chloe posed for his photos. Each soft click of the camera as loud as a gunshot. It was grotesque.
She saw Chloe kissing Warren, kissing Victoria, their bodies twisting around each other in mocking sensuality. They were laughing at her, and the idea of Max and Chloe together. Shame and jealousy warred in Max's chest, making her face hot. Their words took her off guard and the strength of the feelings that bloomed at their words surprised her. It was sharp and painful, like pins all over her body.
It's not real. It's just a trick. A bad dream.
Warren and Victoria melted away, leaving Chloe alone with her. She turned and looked Max in the eyes for the first time. Max fought harder against the restraints. She wanted to believe that there was something in the eyes of the figure standing before her that would prove to Max that this was not the real Chloe. But she couldn't find it.
Chloe glared down at her camera in her hand. Max wanted so badly to hold her close to her, even though she knew it wasn't real. It couldn't be.
"I wish you would have never come back to Arcadia Bay…You're the real storm, Max."
Something inside Max broke.
The camera flashed. Her vision was flooded with white. She felt the chair melt away and she sunk to the ground.
She shut her eyes tight and curled into a tight ball. She wept, her breaths breaking out in soft puffs. It was all too much. Time travel, Jefferson, The Prescotts…Chloe.
"Some things shouldn't be changed, Maxine"
Max's eyes snapped open, the grey plain open wide before her.
"What do you want from me?" She screamed at the sky, which had gone back to the swirling red and orange.
"I never asked for any of this! What's the point of it all?" she cried.
There was no answer, as the tortured sky writhed around the eclipse. Max brought her knees closer to her chest.
Why do I have these powers if I wasn't meant to use them...W-Was Chloe supposed to die?
Her sobs deepened, as she clutched at the fabric of her jeans. The world seemed to pull away from her, like she was shrinking or it was growing larger, much too large for her to do anything but lay deep in the earth and forget. She just wanted it all to stop, for a just a moment. But it didn't.
"Finally made it back? Took you long enough," Maxine said.
Max's gaze shot upwards, her doppelganger standing where there was nothing just a moment before. Her arms were folded across her chest; her designer clothes were still flawless and pristine despite the excessive dust that littered the ground around them. The girl's face was pinched in a mixture of disappointment and annoyance.
Max felt her heart sink.
For reals? Back to square one? Fuck this…
Facing Maxine again was one of the last things she wanted to do right now. It was like talking to the darkest parts of her heart, woven from a thousand threads of insecurities. Her reflection knew just what to say to inflict the maximum amount of pain and doubt in her mind. How could she fight against herself?
Max's hands balled into a fist. She was done running. She rose to her feet, teeth clenched together with a twitch of her jaw. Her chest still moved like crashing waves, as she struggled to contain the storm of emotions that threatened to overwhelm her.
"Oh, so fierce. I'm shivering," Maxine jeered.
"Why are you like this?" Max said, breathless.
Maxine laughed.
"Why are you?"
"I'm sick and tired of your bullshit mind games. What do you want from me?"
Maxine growled, her jaw clenching.
"I want you to listen, damn it! I want you to stop running for once in your life and face the truth!"
"Well, I'm standing right here, aren't I!" Max said, arms flung upwards into the air. "Shower me with your truth."
Maxine shook her head, and turned away from Max. She pointed towards a door. It was white, with thin lines etched into the frame, softening the corners. Max recognized it instantly. It was her door, the one to her bedroom in Seattle.
"What am I supposed to do here?" Max asked.
"You'll know it when you see it."
Max placed her hand on the doorknob, and held it there for a moment. She wished she could open the door and be home. To lay in her own bed and hug her parents and forget about everything for a while. She sighed and stepped inside.
The room was familiar, but it wasn't exactly the home she knew when she left for Blackwell. It was younger, looking just the way it did that first year she was away from Arcadia Bay. There were only a few half-unpacked boxes in the space, covered with dirty clothes to the point where they seemed to have been absorbed into the floor. She had only just begun to decorate it with her own style; the walls were bare, still waiting to be filled with photographs and lights and posters. It was a half-formed reflection of herself. A developing photograph, with the first shapes only just beginning to show in the frame. Max ran her hand across the wall, taking a moment to remember those first few months in her new home.
There was a sharp buzz that came from the back of the room. Max turned saw a light flicker on in the corner of the desk. It was her old cellphone. Her heart began to pound in her chest.
No...
"What is this?" Max said.
Maxine stood beside the doorway, her gaze cast low to the floor.
"You know what this is," she said, with a degree of sadness that Max did not expect.
The phone buzzed again. Max grit her teeth, a wave of nausea passing over her. She turned away from the phone and back to Maxine, who stood between her and the door, her face was grim, but Max couldn't help but notice a quiver in her lip.
"I…I can't deal with this right now," Max said, putting as much distance between herself and the table as possible.
The words seemed to slap Maxine across the face. She snapped and leapt forward, gripping Max by the shoulder.
"What the hell is wrong with you! Why are you such a damn coward?"
Max pushed herself away, fuming at the insult.
"Why am I even bothering with you? You're just some nightmare like everything else here. Y-You're not even real."
Maxine's rage faltered, replaced with a look of hurt.
"Not real? Fuck you! What does that even mean? I feel everything that you do. I've watched you destroy everything you've touched, and it's killed me just as much as it has you. I have so many memories. So many things I remember from a life that never happened."
Max stood silent, stunned at the outburst. Maxine was shaking, tears streaming down her cheeks.
"You keep hurting people, but never take any of the responsibility."
"My powers are…" Max began, but Maxine interrupted.
"I'm not talking about the damn superpowers!"
The words were like a gunshot; the silence afterwards was crushing.
"W-What?"
"Pick up the damn phone," Maxine said, her voice cold again. But Max could see her hands were shaking.
Max tried to swallow, but her mouth was too dry. She searched for an excuse, something that she could say or do to avoid what she knew was contained on that little screen. But she knew there was no more running from this, not anymore.
Max walked over to the desk, every step a mile. The phone was still vibrating, the small screen flashing with light in the darkness of the room. A terrible pressure seemed to be building around Max, causing the floor beneath her feet to creak and groan. She reached out a hand, picking up the device as if a touch would annihilate it. Tiny letters on the screen spelled out [3 new messages]
[Chloe]
Sept. 3 2008
Hey, how's Seattle? I haven't heard from u since the move. Things r…not good here
Sept. 5 2008
Max? It's Chloe
Oct. 18 2008
What did I do?
Three short little texts. Three little bullets. She tried so hard to forget, but this had always been lurking in the back of her mind. Every time she thought of Chloe, she could feel this silence screaming at her. She hadn't just lost touch with Chloe, she had made the decision to ignore her, even if it was just this one time.
It almost made the distance from Chloe easier, she was ashamed to admit. How could she have ever reached out to her after this? As the years passed, and her life moved on, she just put it out of her mind, burying it deep within her. This was her greatest regret, her deepest shame. The pressure around her grew more intense and cracks began to fissure out from the floorboards and windows. They spread across the walls like vines.
"She should never have let us back in," the other Max whispered.
"She never reached out again," Max whispered, her gaze somewhere else.
"Why would she? The message was loud and clear. 'Max doesn't care'."
Max shook herself out of her stupor. She tried to glare, but her defiant look crumbled under the weight of her guilt. The bed behind her snapped its frame. A floorboard splintered. There was a deep, dangerous groan in the walls around them.
"You know that isn't true," Max said, her voice quivering, unable to look at the room falling apart around her.
"Then why didn't we say anything?" Maxine said, her voice torn between pleading and frustration. "How could we do that to her? She was our best friend, and you cut her out like she was nothing!"
Max said nothing, her hands gripping at her hair.
"Why couldn't you have just talked to her?" Maxine asked.
"Because I was scared, ok?" Max blurted, her chest heaving. Maxine twitched.
"I should have done more. But I was just so afraid…of her pain. Afraid that I was going to hurt that badly too, so I ran away from it. It was a shitty, cowardly thing to do, and it kills me that I wasn't there for her. Especially now...But I was twelve years old! How was I supposed to deal with William dying?"
"Well how was Chloe supposed to do it?" Maxine said. Her voice like iron. "Because she didn't. She was alone."
Max said nothing. A crack split down the wall, a window burst.
"She needed us. And we weren't there," Maxine said, as bitter tears fell down her cheeks. "Her life went to shit, and we. weren't. there."
It was true. Every word that Maxine spoke. Max couldn't even find the strength to cry, it wouldn't be right. The room groaned, each passing second was another threat of total collapse.
"We could have made her life so much easier," Maxine said, her eyes shimmering. She was pleading with both Max and herself. "A text. A phone call. Anything to let her know we were still there. That she wasn't alone."
Max's gaze was buried in the floor, which was splintering under the pressure, but she didn't seem to care. Maxine never stopped staring at her.
"That's why you fight so hard to save her now. It's not just because you love her."
Love…Is that what this is?
"You're still trying to save that little girl you abandoned."
Five years of guilt; the massive weight threatening to flatten her. Dust spilled onto the floor from the cracks in the ceiling, as Maxine glared at her with agonized eyes. With a crack like a tree splitting in two, the ceiling collapsed, a wall of debris came crashing down from above.
But there was no fear left in Max's heart. She took a deep breath, and everything began to slow. The chunks of wood and glass and plaster came to a gentle stop in midair, the cloud of dust hanging in space was like a stain on the air.
Maxine blinked, mouth opening slightly as if only just now realizing the room was falling apart around her. She looked at Max.
"You're right," Max said. "And I might never be able to make up for what I did, but damn it I'm going to try."
The debris began to rewind, floating back up to their proper place. The dust evaporated, the shattered windows reforming, the cracks retreating into the surface.
"I l-love, Chloe," Max said, tripping over the feeling that she'd never put into words before. "And I'll never be able to take back those years that we lost together because of my own stupid cowardice, or that pain of that absence. But I'm going to be there for Chloe now, and until the end."
Max stood up straighter, the strength returning to her voice. She felt lighter, less afraid. There was a shift in the air, like a cool draft in a stuffy room. She could breathe easier than she had since she'd woken up here.
"I won't let anything hurt her ever again. Especially me."
Maxine's shoulder's slumped and she let out a breath that she'd been holding. She looked at Max with a sad smile on her face.
"Don't make promises we can't keep."
Before Max could respond, Maxine began to fade away, her skin burning away like torched film. As the tiny rings of red began to spread across her body, Max could see that nothing lay beneath but empty air.
"Why do you get to live on the other side? Why do you get to see her again?" Maxine whispered. There was no malice in her words, only a sad incredulity. "I love her too damn it."
Max walked over to the fading girl, and took her hand in her own. It felt strange, the tingling beneath her palms as Maxine's skin burned away.
"Y-You are a part of me," Max whispered. Maxine looked up at her, some of the fear in her eyes waning. "We're both going to see her again."
Maxine let out a soft laugh, and smiled. And then Max watched herself fade away.
Max slumped to the ground at the foot of her bed, exhausted. Her face fell into her hands and her palms pressed against her eyes as if she could hold back the flood of emotions swirling within her. It felt like such a relief to finally admit the things she'd bottled up for so long. But she now felt the weight of that responsibility. She was in love with her best friend, but she'd also been the cause of so much unnecessary misery in her life.
How am I even supposed to process all of this? I've got to find Chloe. I've got to make this right…all of it.
Max was shaken from her thoughts by a tapping on the bedroom window. She rose to her feet, and could see a small blue jay, its beak tapping against the window in a slow deliberate motion. Max lifted the pane, but the bird did not fly away. It stared up at her, it's eyes deep and knowing. There was a warm feeling inside Max's chest. She felt a presence, something familiar and welcoming.
"Rachel?" she whispered.
The bird took flight, traveling fast into the distance. Max climbed out of the window and back out into the plain once again. It wasn't difficult to keep up with the bird, who fluttered back to Max if she fell too far behind. As she walked, she noticed the sky begin to brighten, and the ground begin to fade. It was as if she were walking into a cloud, as if the world around her were being erased.
After several more steps, there was no sign of anything around her, just endless stretches of white. It was calming, this place, after all the chaos she'd endured. It was like finding a port in a storm. She felt like she could finally rest for a moment.
Max realized that she'd lost track of the bird, but she still felt its presence. Then, a voice, gentle and warm spoke to her from behind. She turned around and gasped.
"Max," said Rachel Amber. "I'm glad I finally get to meet you."
A/N: Sorry for the delay on this chapter. Life has been very hectic for me the past few months, but I'm still committed to finishing this story. This chapter was a lot of fun to write and it let me explore some of Max's motivations and flaws. I look forward to the next few chapters, especially with Rachel!