A/N: So do you guys want me to make the next chapter smutty or do you just want to skip ? Let me know!
"So what.. now you think I'm a delicate thing, like this stupid fragile flower?" Max spat back, she sat up straight pushing strands of hair out of her face even the pieces of grass stuck to it.
"Uh no. You're like this flower because even though I plucked it from the ground, it still has life and is kicking all the other pretty little flowers asses. Y'know what? This flower isn't just pretty it's strong, willing and beautiful. None of the flowers can compare to it." Chloe arched her eyebrow leaning on her elbow, propping herself up. "What's even up with you today... you're not you."
"Nothing is wrong with me. I just.. You see me as this delicate thing. You try to shield me from all of it..this town. Like you make it seem as if I couldn't do the things you did with your other friends, the things you did with Rachel Amber. Tell me Chloe am I not good enough to get the whole Chloe experience because if that's the case then I should go. Obviously I am not doing you any good." Max replied digging her heels into the dirt hole in the ground.
Chloe pushed off the ground feeling the grass underneath her, slowly she approached Max wrapping her arm around her neck, she reached for Max's hand lacing Max's fingers with her own. "Listen you are experiencing the whole Price effect." Whispering into her ear letting her chin rest on Max's shoulders. " You already know who I was, who I am now. You are different, you are not like everyone else here and that means I can't be careless with you." Chloe cleared her throat before continuing speaking in hushed tones. " I was once careless and I- we paid the price for that. Literally the price. I was here one minute and the next I wasn't. I supposed that's because of you. All that you did and all that you had to see. I don't mean to coddle you, I don't mean to keep you from doing what needs to be done, but you know I promised a lot of people to keep you safe and that includes your precious parents, I promised mine and I promised myself. It may not seem like much, and I know it's not what you want and you don't have to appreciate it but it would mean a lot to me if you could accept what I'm trying to do. If I make one wrong mistake it's over for both of us." Chloe turned Max around forcing the corner of her mouth to curve, chloe's eyes scanning Max's face before placing a soft peck of the bridge of her nose.
"The only thing we're missing is time." Chloe mumbled under her breath.
Max sat up straight looking up at Chloe, her arms and hands lingered around Chloe's waist. After several unnerving seconds passed Max pushed off turning her body toward the taller girl. "Chloe.. I'm sorry. I know you're going through stuff too and I don't want to dismiss it but you have to know none of this is on you. No one is expecting you to do it all. "Max played at the loose strands of hair away from chloe's face, Max knew she was playing with fire that Chloe too was playing hot and cold with her and it wasn't fair to Chloe but she didn't know what to do bottled with up emotions. "I don't expect you to save me Chloe Price." Max's lips curved into a smirk as she inched closer, brushing her nose against the taller girl's and then her lips. Her breathing became shallow as she spoke " Not unless you mean it." She whispered pressing her soft lips against Chloe's full ones followed by a surprising soft moan escaping her lips. Forgetting where they were Chloe grabbed Max and lifted her up on her lap, grabbing the back of her head for a more hungry embrace of their lips. Chloe mesmerized by Max, her hands on her waist traveling up her back, lifting Max's shirt right when a cold breeze passed through them, Max became small again curling against Chloe. "Chloe.." Max scolded but not before burying her face in the crook of Chloe's neck "Were still outside and your dead cat is still in the yard.. maybe if it weren't so cold you could have gotten away with it." Max teased wrapping her arms around Chloe's waist tighter afraid to let go.
"You're the one that said you didn't want to be sheltered, this is what living with the Price family is like Caulfield." Chloe teased kissing the top of Max's head. "Come on then, I have something I want to show you."
Chloe pulled up to the junk yard again and she could already sense Max's uneasiness when she turned off the engine. "Okay I know you don't like it here but I promise it's nothing bad this time." Chloe raised her hand over her head in a mock surrender "See I didn't even bring dirty hands to this dump." Chloe tried to suppress a grin but failed as she reached over Max and opened her car door. Max sighed pulling her hoodie over her head as the rain poured on the hood of the truck. Chloe raced over to Max's side and tugged on the smaller girl's hand taking her to the shed in the back.
After the investigation the police had snooped through the whole lot so forgotten caution tape was scattered all over Chloe's little oasis. Chloe reached into her pocket pulling out her dad's old swiss pocket knife and started cutting through the tape rapidly not risking being stuck in the rain for much longer. "Gotcha." Chloe hissed almost ramming her shoulder through the door, ushering Max to run inside , to the corner with the chairs before pulling the doors shut.
"Well it's not like I don't appreciate your Chloe cave but what are we doing here?" Max wrapped herself in her jacket, teeth chattering and legs bouncing off the floor. Chloe tossed her jacket on the couch and started ripping through the floorboards "First we needed to get out of that rain and second I want you to explain some things for me."
Chloe pulled out a stack of letters hidden in a shoebox, getting up on her feet again Chloe slowly made her way back to Max, shuffling the thick envelopes in her hands. Max furrowed her eyebrow huffing when coming to the realization what Chloe was holding " I-I can explain. but.. why don't you start, how, who, when did you get those." Max pulled her hoodie down letting the light touch her eyes. Chloe nodded taking a seat beside Max "When your parents loved me." a small smiled played on Chloe's face "When you were in the hospital that first time, right before you woke up.. you had a reaction. I snuck up to your room to see you but when I touched you and you stopped breathing, I freaked and I couldn't calm myself down. Your mom came prepared I guess. The rents gave me these. They said they always knew, they didn't trust you to make the right decision so I guess in time with their help hoped that you would." Chloe shrugged finally looking up to face Max rather than the letters "I read a couple but I would like if we read one together. If you could read it to me. I want to know what it was like for you."
"Wait what did you know? You knew what these meant to me and you read them anyway ?" Max took the letters from Chloe, running her fingers over the stamp and carved in pen on the envelopes. Max closed her eyes trying to imagine her 13 year old self mustering up the courage to write Chloe night after night, sitting on her bed with her biology homework open and a glittering pen dabbling on paper. Now looking back, how could she be such a coward even back then. When she knew her best friend was alone and she could have done something to help her deal with William. To have Chloe reach out to her too, Seattle was so dark and lonely for the first year but fear ate at her like it always did. " You should be mad, you shouldn't be excited to read these. I forgot about you and that's all it was." She wanted to give Chloe the excuse of not pursuing these letters any longer, to never let her know that she never was here nor there.
Chloe shook her head "No way Max, those letters are addressed to me, there wasn't a moment that passed that you didn't look for me." Chloe place her hands on either side of her Max's shoulders giving her a tight squeeze." You don't have anything to be sorry for. I don't have anything to be sorry for. This happened for a reason, neither one of us gave up. You didn't give up on me... do you know how happy that makes me. Do you know how many months I couldn't sleep because I thought the opposite for the lack of contact." Chloe gave Max a sad smile not because she was sad, no it was because this is the one thing in a long time that actually felt good.
Max sighed fumbling with the first letter on top of the stack, looking at Chloe then back down at her hands she tore open the edges and braced herself. Clearing her throat she unfolded the paper and began.
Hi Chloe. It is I your Ol' pal Max. The year is 2009 and I'm still stuck in this universe. ( You were supposed to be reading that in a robot voice, something like terminator or like a really really old robot.) Guess what happened, what happened to me because I sure as hell did not choose this. So here I am wasting my days away reading those old zines we used to make, you know the one where we morphed Wonder Woman and your face it was beyond epic, so anyways my mom says I've been moping around the house, like obviously she hasn't seen all the amazing photos I've been taking in this town. I followed this crazy rain storm all the way to the pier and found this guy talking to his toaster like right in the middle of his little row boat. My guess is that he was calling in a higher power. So mom didn't buy it and signed me up to be in mini prodigies orchestra. So first of all I'm thinking aren't we supposed to be like six y'know like Mozart was and even Bach was like 8. So this whole name is giving them a bad rep, I feel like I'm living a lie. Now second of all I have no musical talent, remember when I broke your drum set in fifth grade and that was the end of our iconic duo. I'm playing a flute where I have to learn how to blow things? In a certain way. Anyways I'm in too deep to fake my death because we have a performance for the veterans or something at the space needle and it actually makes no sense because there's like a romance ora that circulates the place, like it's haunted with rich old dudes. There's possibly one upside to this there's this girl who plays the triangle/percussion and she's a total bitch in the best way possible, also she reminds me of your can do attitude (; don't make fun okay but I think she's super cool like she said her mom worked at quantico, do you imagine doing that all the secret agent stuff. What chaos you would cause Ms price! Write back soon. I want to visit and plan our next heist together.
Love your partner in crime xoxo
As soon as she put the letter down Max was flushed bright pink, trying to hide her features over her messy hair.
Chloe smirked nudging Max "I didn't think anybody could compete with my can do attitude. Amazing where do I meet this girl. let's go now."
Max groaned hiding her face in her hands "Chloe.." Curling on her side Max mopped hiding from her 14 year old self, how humiliating it was to relive her most awkward years.
"Come on it wasn't that bad, I am one step closer to finding out who your first crush was. This drummer girl, everything I wasn't. Now tell me Max did she teach you how to play drums? Did she get behind you and guide your hands?" Chloe was only now teasing, she smiled placing a hand on the small of her back, Chloe placed her cold freezing hand under Max's shirt on her lower back, making her yelp and jump swatting Chloe away.
"I did not have a crush on her, I thought she was cool. She wasn't my first crush by the way. I'll have you know I have many others besides drummer girl." Max sat up inching toward Chloe "Come on take me to the dorms I have something to show you."
Chloe and Max reached the dorms after class was over, everyone was either out by the quad or hanging around the dorms. Chloe didn't really know what to expect being back at the school and even if it was good for Max. Still Chloe kept up pace with Max, she could tell that Max was trying to avoid speaking with anyone, even though she didn't leave in bad terms, she saved Kate for crying out loud and in everybody else's eyes she and Chloe solved the missing case of Rachel Amber. Everything was in a daze until they reached the dorms, the air felt cold even though there was welcoming faces crossing paths with both Max and Chloe, even Victoria Chase acknowledged them with not much more than a nod in their direction. Chloe stayed close behind Max until she unlocked her door and entered the sun soaked room.
"Sit." Max ordered as she closed the door behind her, everything looked just like how she left it but sadly so was Lisa, wilted away by the window. Chloe shrugged kicking off her boots and slouching down on the couch " I mean I was gonna do it anyways but give me more of sassy Max won't you." Chloe grinned tucking her arms under her head staring up at the ceiling.
"Har har just wait, I said I had something to show you. And no it's not my halloween costume." max reached into her sock drawer and pulled out the picture in the frame where the two of them were dressed up as a pirate and in the back of it was a letter, it wasn't really a letter it was an old note, folded into a hundred ways, knowing it was something that Max came back to for comfort or for some sort of guidance.
Chloe sat up as Max approached and made room for her on the couch. Timidly Max was back to her old self, she set the picture faced down on her lap and started fumbling with the paper in her hands, it wasn't big by any means but it felt heavy on her heart and her sleeve and practically every part of her body. Max smiled at Chloe and she reached for her, her fingertips barely brushed over Chloe's knuckles. "Okay this is when I knew, when my parents knew, when your parents knew, that I was so stupidly blind and I didn't tell you." Max unfolded note very delicately the edges already on the verge of ripping, taking a deep breathe before going on.
Chloe I really don't know how to put anything into words but I'm going to try to put these words into pictures and one day maybe I can tell you, one day I won't be me but I'll be great and you'll be proud. I think.. I love you. I don't know how this happened, why it happened but when I look at you I know, I know that it's not something that I can make up or something that I make manipulate. I don't know if you feel it but if you don't that's okay, Someday it will all be okay.
Max put the note down and picked up the frame from her lap.
Max turned her gaze back to Chloe and then the picture, pointing to the two of them in their pirate hats and puffy shirts "This is the day I knew. This is the day that I wrote that letter. I wrote it and I never gave it to you. It was before the accident, it was before I moved away. It was before everything." Max started crying silently afraid to look at Chloe now and Chloe was just looking at the letter, tracing her fingers over the crumpled paper just trying to memorize what it said and to think back what her 15 year old self would say. Finally she collected herself and sat closer to Max.
"Max you knew before I did and that's what killed me, you knew when you still had me at your side and I knew when you had left to seattle." Chloe wiped the tears from Max's cheeks very gently with her thumb, Chloe cupped her face and continued speaking "Listen.. it took me maybe a day since you had left to figure out my own feelings. I.. I didn't know it, I didn't know how to get to you to tell you. I didn't have a way to tell you. You didn't give me a chance. I would have gone to you if I knew how."
Chloe caressed Max's face with her knuckles "Like I said before I thought you forgot about me, that I didn't mean anything to you. but I know it's not true now. You're just too much of a chicken shit." Chloe laughed against Max lips, slowly Chloe pressed her lips against Max's gingerly savoring her lips. Chloe pulled away talking softly, brushing her lips to Max's jaw line and then to her ear "I know that I loved you then and that I love you now, that whatever I had with Rachel was nothing compared to this and I think you know it too."
The hair on the back of Max's neck stood up, leaning against Chloe's touch she didn't have any reason to object to what she was saying. Max brought her lips back to Chloe's, the kiss was messy and desperate but she didn't care, she had waited so long for it to be like this, to finally wash away any and all doubts away.
Max straddled Chloe's lap, she was taken back by how much she wanted this but also how much they both did. Max gingerly ran her thumb over Chloe's bottom lip and smiled to herself before leaning in and slowly and teasingly nibbling on it. Chloe moaning ever so softly "You're such a tease caulfield." Chloe mumbled slipping her hands under Max's shirt, pulling it over her head. Chloe hands ran up and down Max's sides, two fingers rested under Max's chin pulling her down for a kiss but not to her lips but to her Jaw. Chloe ran her tongue on the outline and feverishly kissed at her jaw, nipping roughly at the skin. Max was hot, she inched closer, her torso at Chloe's disposal but she need more, bucking her hips to align with chloe's, she rolled them creating friction. Chloe grinned guiding her lips to Max's neck, her kisses were feather like and trailed all along to her collarbone...