Rachel hopped onto the floor, her legs all bruised just as her arms had been. Its is not how she remembered Rachel in her dream, this Rachel had seemed so ominous and incredibly troublesome. Rachel walked with a sway to her hips, a smile plastered on her face she sat down right on Chloe's lap.
But the thing was, Chloe didn't move, didn't flinch or get taken back by any of this. She was there with her arm outstretched to Max but looked confused, worried and her mind preoccupied as well.
There was a familiar voice echoing in the back of Max's head, repeating the same phrase. "Max! Hello. Earth to Max." Chloe waved her hand mere inches from Max's face.
Max blinked her eyelids rapidly, her attention pulled back to Chloe and Rachel.. "Sorry I thought I saw something." Max craned her neck before placing her palms on the bed and Rachel slowly reaching out to her, softly brushing her fingers against Max's. Max was terrified she didn't want to turn and look at the announced dead corpse.
Rachel ever so delicately came on her knees on the side of the bed and began to whisper
"You need me here, she needs me here. There is so much that you don't know. So much that I can't just explain in dreams, I want to help you discover the truth and I don't want you guys to be scared when it comes around." Max fell back into the bed, her hands coming over to cover her face, how could she keep this from Chloe, or the better question how could she explain that she could see Rachel, could touch and feel her. How could Max prove that she wasn't the one going crazy, that she was sane enough to stay here with both of them.
Max jerked away burying her nails into her palm, grabbing Chloe's attention again. "Max you alright?" Chloe cocked her head to the side trying to figure out what had Max going off the walls.
"No.. I mean, I am. I just need air, I just really want to get out of here. "
Chloe nodded with a hand on Max's shoulder "Yeah, just give me a second. I'll get ready and we can leave." she squeezed tight before pushing off the bed and standing tall over Max.
Max nodded brushing past Rachel who just sat there, not saying anything, but either way she stood up, following in stride behind Max. The brunette grabbed her book bag and slung it over her shoulder, adjusting the strap.
Max turned around trying to look past Rachel and back at the only other living person in the room. "I'll be out back, I want to say Hi to David and Joyce if they're here. Twisting her body forward she began to walk when she stumbled on a loose board, Rachel grabbing her arm forcefully keeping Max from falling flat on her face. "You better be careful there Maxine, we wouldn't that pretty little face to get busted up as it is. We have enough problems, babe." Rachel helped Max to her feet again and hooking her arm through Max's pulling her down to the first level and out to the backyard, past the sliding glass doors.
Chloe watched Max go, there was something seriously wrong with Max, the mumbling and the spasms. She knew Max hadn't been the Max from before, her hand and all but this wasn't just physical devastation. There was something emotionally that she wasn't telling Chloe. Chloe's mind lost in thought, mindlessly she slipped a clean pair of jeans and a clean but wrinkled muscle shirt from her closet.
On the way to the bathroom she thought about what she said about Rachel, how could know all these hard hitting facts about the once flamboyant girl, the thoughts were starting to drown as she splashed her face with water and started scrubbing her face with a cleanser.
Chloe furrowed her eyebrows dabbing a dry towel to her face, her bare feet barely touching the surface of the hardwood floors as she skidded across the hallway and back to her room. Pushing back the mess of her closet she tried looking for her Jacket, throwing everything across the room, she finally set eyes on her light brown jacket and shook it out. Forgetting that was where she kept the letters that Max had written her so very long ago.
Chloe then sat down on the chair by her desk, draping the jacket over the chair and tore the next one down the line. She paused, wondering if this was still a good idea.. Max was in her house and if she knew she had the letters, these personal pieces of her old life, clearly there must have been a reason the letters were kept for only Max's eyes. No she would figure it out later, Chloe felt that this was actually the only reasonable thing she was doing.
Taking a deep breath she began to read the letter
Dear Chloe,
I don't know if you know this but Seattle is lake town, I have been trapped in this god awful house for nine days straight. This is why those damn vampires came to this state, they can't glitter here. I feel like I haven't felt the sun on my face in so long. When you see me i'll be more pale than you :0
Dad and I went to the docks the other day and I took pictures of the faerie boats, it was a mini version of the titanic, if you think birds taking a massive load on deck is romantic then yes, this is the ship of dreams, boat of dreams? idk it's not that big, I'll attach a picture so you can see. At the beach and up in the woods it feels a lot like home. Not physically more like it feels like you're around, like I can just turn around and I want/ can see you there. That's the only problem. That you're not here then I wouldn't have to write about boats and stupid shit-birds. I don't know if you're still mad or if you'll get this since I haven't gotten anything from you but here's to hoping..
Love always Max xoxo
Back at the swings, Rachel was pushing Max, her sneakers being caked in dirt as they dug into the dirt tunnel between swings. Max looked at her palm, reciting the lines in her hand, facing her knuckles out she revisited the lines on her palm. Max's powers had felt so foreign, the sensation still there, like starting a car. The engine of the car was broken but it was still fighting to turn on and not be replaced by a new and better working engine, that's how it felt, that getting replaced now was the only option.
Rachel stopped the swing and came to sit right in front of Max, the blond girl got a hold of Max's hand and pulled her onto the grimy dirt. "Come I'm pretty good at this astrology stuff." Rachel said with a huge smile on her face. Before Rachel did anything she wanted to look the part, flipping her long luscious hair over her shoulder and taking her feather earring from her lobe and softly brushed it over Max's palm.
"I don't really believe in this Rachel, you'll just be wasting your time." Max scrunched up her nose, it's not that she didn't believe in it, it was more so that she didn't want to know that the bad things were going to come. Or how limited her time was with all the good things in her life that were yet to come.
Rachel tilted her head trying to read her, she nibbled on her bottom lip trying to think of a plan, something to ease Max. "Wait. Close your eyes," She whispered to Max removing her scarf from her neck. "No peeking you sneak." She teased Max, wrapping her scarf around her eyes. "Okay, just follow my voice. I'm going to use my feather to draw energy from you and I will just talk about what I know. Deal?"
Max nodded once, she probably looked stupid in the middle of the yard holding out her hand with no one else in sight, but she was used to this crazy-eyed gaze that Chloe always gave her and this might actually be worth that.
"Okay. First I know you're a Virgo." Rachel brushed the feather over her veins just against her pulse point on Max's wrist. " I know that you are intelligent, reliable and modest." Rachel grinned "That sounds like the Max i've come to know." Rachel pricked at Max's fingers with the feather "But you are also very very much reserved. I know that too. You are doing just that right now. You won't tell Chloe that you can see me, you don't let her know that what we're doing is impossible and you don't want to share what you've found."
Max's entire body went cold, she swallowed hard trying to jerk her hand free but Rachel didn't allow it. She jerked away, she was scrambling trying to get the blindfold off but when she finally opened her eyes she didn't find Rachel, she found chloe sitting there with a feather between her fingers.
"Max? What are you doing?." Chloe looked confused, nothing could explain her little episode as she came back into the light. "Another question. Why do you have this blue feather? What were you doing to yourself.." Chloe hugged her knees examining the familiar object in her hand.
Chloe placed the feather in her palm and let the wind carry it away.
"Come on slowpoke, we gotta go, a whole day ahead of us and stuff. I was thinking that we start at the junkyard, there's a mess of a crime scene there and I actually want to show you something." She tilted her head, running her fingers through her hair before placing the beanie back on her mess of a hair. "It's nothing bad, I promise. But.." She nibbled on her bottom lip before returning her gaze back on Max " I dunno, maybe you'll get mad. At me, your parents, at yourself."
"Gee Chloe you're so dramatic, i'm actually super chill if you forgot."
"I didn't forget, but I also know that you didn't talk to me for years... I still don't actually know why.." Chloe lightly shoved max back with her finger against her the shorter girl's shoulder.
"Yeah I.. Can we talk about it another time." Max face flushed, the hairs on the back of her neck stood up
Rachel's hand faced palm up touching Max's forehead "Yikes you should really that checked Maxine, we can't afford to have you ill now, we have so many people to see. First impressions are key!" Rachel pulled Max down on the ground, the girl's head resting on Rachel's lap and Max looked up at her, the sun glaring at her face. Max raised a hand trying to block the sheer brightness.
Chloe flickered her eyes around, the perimeter around Max, it looked as if she wanted to reach up and touch something, her body was leaning against air and it was so strange to be around that. Chloe laid down right beside her, turning on her side with a hand tucked just under her head. Plucking wild flowers from her yard, making a pile next to Max's head before placing one behind her ear. " Okay now this one reminds me of you. It's the most wilted but it's the one that stands out the most. It is the one that is fighting day in and day out to be here with the others, to stay alive. To be happy. I want you to be happy little flower."