Chloe spun around and there she was. Rachel Amber, now a platinum blonde and was back in her plaid shirt and ripped jeans. Next to her, was another woman. Sera Gearhardt, Rachel's mom.

As my mouth fell open, Chloe ran to her and hugged her tightly. I had to take a picture of that, so I shook my head and took my camera out. After Sera moved to the side with a little smirk, I clicked my camera, then they separated.

"H-how did you know I was here?" Chloe's voice cracked.

"Baby, come on, your selfie had your old room in the back." She raised her eyebrows and laughed. "Plus, since you were here, I decided to cancel any other plans I had. I've worked enough and I think I took enough anger management classes, don't you think? And my mom was able to come!"

They hugged again and Rachel gave her a kiss on the cheek. Chloe had a long sleeve jacket now, covering her new tattoo she shared with her.

"Hey Sera." Chloe waved her hand, but was then pulled into a tight embrace. I think I even heard her back crack. It's crazy how similar she and Rachel looked. She's really cool and was so supportive. I couldn't believe the story about Rachel's dad trying to keep them apart.

"God, you gotta be so awkward! You're family, Chloe, we can hug." Sera laughed and then let go of her. "You saved her, Chloe, need I remind you?"

Rachel and Chloe were in a hug again. Chloe chuckled then said, "Yeah, sorry, I'm still hella shocked to see you." I felt weird standing there.

"Actually, uh, I wanted to talk to you." Chloe added, looking towards Sera.

"To me?" She sounded surprised. "What do you need from me?"

"Come on, let's walk and talk." Chloe let Rachel go and walked away from us. This prompted Rachel to finally hug me.

"Oh, my god, you look hella cool!" She said, touching my bangs. "And you have a tattoo, you're looking so awesome I could cry!"

"I can't believe you're actually here." My eyes looked to the side from time to time to see Chloe and Sera talking. I knew Chloe was asking for permission to marry Rachel, but instead of taking out the real ring, she took out the ring pop she still had. I could see the pink and blue packet from where I was standing.

"Me neither, but who ever said I was predictable?" She laughed. "It's so weird to be back here. I hated this town. But, here I am. I missed you so much!" She hugged me tightly again. So tightly, in fact, I heard my back crack. I hugged her back, "Missed you too."

"Oh, my god… did you fucking kill that girl?"

"It's a long story." I waved my hand, laughing awkwardly at the memory. "But, Chloe got a good punch in."

She gasped, "God, I love her."

"You're gonna love her a lot soon." That sounds ominous as hell. Why did I say it? Why did I worded it like that?

Rachel's eyebrows furrowed, but she nodded anyway.

"You look nice too, by the way." I added. "Platinum blonde's your color."

"You think so?" She grabbed a lock of it. "I had to do it for a photoshoot. I'm hella glad to be with you and Chloe again. I need to learn how to chill and have fun again." She laughed.

"I think so and no problem, Chloe has something special planned today."

"Can't wait!" She said happily.

Chloe and Sera came walking back, Chloe's arm around Sera's shoulders. In her other hand, she still had the ring pop. She shoved it into Rachel's hands, "I love you, bitch."

"Why thank you." She laughed louder through her sentence. "I ain't never gonna stop loving you, bitch. Is this your proposal?"

"No, I just love you." I could tell by the look on her face that she wanted to say yes.

Rachel snickered as she opened the package and then placed the large ring around her left ring finger, licking the candy.

All four of us laughed out. Oh Chloe. You can be awkward sometimes.

"Well, you three enjoy your time. I'm going to eat here and have a talk with Joyce, if I can." Sera said. She kissed Rachel's temple, telling us to take care of her. We all waved goodbye to her as she went into the diner.

"Fifteen days?" Rachel poked her finger at the blue post-it Chloe still had on her jacket.

"I've been sober for fifteen days, or sixteen now. Thanks to Max, who was counting."

"I'm so proud of you." They kissed again. Rachel then turned her attention to our ride, "Wow, this truck still works good, huh?"

"It has hella Chloe magic."

"Even after three years, that's hot." She said with a smirk. "Then, tell me babe, what are we doing today?"

"We're gonna cruise." She opened the truck's door. "Go see Kate's school, go see Blackwell, maybe do something you want to do, then the kicker, we're going back into that pool, I swear to God."

"Yes, please, I need to wash all this model and fame off me." She sighed in relief. She got into the truck, sitting in the middle and making me sit at the window.

"I got hella sick of driving around in these black, tinted cars. I miss being in this thing." She rested her head on Chloe's shoulder. Chloe and I gave each other a look, still in disbelief Rachel was here. Whatever the look was—love, most likely—there was a mutual feeling.


I asked Kate for her high school's address last night and it was still a lot of miles off of Arcadia Bay.

"Hella crazy how Kate was this close to us." Rachel said. We agreed with nods.

I sighed, "It's weird how different things could be right now if I knew her sooner."

"That reminds me," Rachel took her head off and looked to me, "How are you, Max? About the anxiety and being with Kate at all." Oh dog, it's all been so much. My anxiety was the least of my problems.

"Um, I—"

Chloe scoffed, "She kissed her."

"What?! And you didn't tell me?" She really was offended by that.

"Because I didn't know! It was dark, then I remembered it tasted like strawberries and she had strawberry chapstick! I'm losing my shit too, okay?!"

Rachel grabbed my shoulders, "What the hell! Are you kidding me?! What were you thinking?!"

"I don't know, Rachel, it just happened! Stop yelling!"

It took half an hour into the drive for Rachel to stop being mad and she focused more on finishing her ring pop (though she was glaring and ignoring me). In the distance, we saw an ordinary high school. In big, bold letters, it was clearly the word "Christian" written boldly on the school sign. However, there were multiple buildings, which I only assumed were the dorms the students lived in. It was also clear that it was "all girls."

"She paid tuition for this?" Chloe seemed to criticize the school.

"Hey, she went here for entire high school career. But, let's get out of here, I do get bad vibes here after who we just met." I rubbed the back of my neck.

"What was that like?"

"You explain it, Maximilian. I'm too fucking mad to talk about it."

I took a deep breath and started to explain the whole thing. Especially how she tried to explain herself about how she felt about Kate and trying to make us relate to her somehow, which was fucking horrible to think about. I ended with the phone call, which was the most nerve-wracking part of the whole thing.

"Holy shit..." was the only thing Rachel could say.

"We were only gonna be here for four days and that was the only goal we had." I avoided talking about Chloe's goal, but I wanted to tell Rachel that she was going to be engaged soon.

"I would hella beat her ass if I saw her." Rachel said after being baffled.

"I already did that and we also messed with Frank by fucking with his food." Chloe said proudly.

"Wow," she said with a laugh, "You would do that."

"I didn't. She did that."

"Because you told me!" I had to add.

"That... somehow makes more sense." Rachel chuckled at both of us and then messed with our hair. "I love you guys!"


After that, we headed home. Chloe still had to go out and get the keys from David. He should be home, since the car-drive to and from Kate's old school took way longer than we thought. We got into small talk about Rachel's time being back to her famous self and, before every sentence she had to say, she groaned about it. She was only happy to take another photo for her Instagram of her and Chloe. When we got to her house, there was a car in the front, letting us know that David was home. When we got onto the driveway, the motion-sensor light over the garage turned on.

"Okay, David might talk to you," Chloe looked to Rachel, "So, you do that and Max and I will go get that key."

"You got it." I nodded and Rachel did too.

We got out of the car, but Rachel wanted a picture with Chloe, kissing of course, under the light for her Instagram. She posted it and then showed it to me.

"Back with my love -RA" with a little heart emoji.

"Nice," I nodded as I went to the previous page and saw how her page went back to a more black and white theme. Her picture just now was the only one in color.

"Okay, let's go in."

We followed Chloe into her house and then she yelled, "David, we're home!"

"Evening," he was sitting at the couch, watching a cop show on TV, "Oh, Rachel, you're here."

"Hey David," Rachel waved her hand and approached him as he stood up, "How are you?"

"I've been alright. Tiring day today."

Chloe nudged me in my side and waved her hand to go upstairs. I followed her up, going straight to Joyce and David's room and saw right away that the keys were... not there. We split to search the room, finding nothing in the end. We then went into the other rooms, Chloe's and the bathroom: nothing. Dumb to look in Chloe's, but we were desperate.

"Damn it, are you fucking serious?" She huffed.

"It might be downstairs still."

"Damn it." She repeated that with every step we took, turning into a whisper.

As we went back down, we heard, "I truly am happy you're with Chloe. I can see now that she's happier."

"Thank you, David. That means a lot coming from you. But, I think I'll go and be with those two now, if you don't mind."

"By all means, go ahead."

We heard Rachel coming up and then pulled out the jumbo key ring full of keys.

"Yes!" Chloe said in a whisper-yell, "We're going, right now." She went down the stairs, "David, we're heading out again. We just needed something."

"Alright, don't crash the truck now, you hear?"

I wonder what the conversation was. He apologized to me and Chloe, so maybe he had another one for her too. It would be nice and it would make sense. Now's not the time, though. He's happy they're together.


We were cheering loudly as we left the driveway and went to Blackwell. The school was still the same and, because it was still the same, Chloe decided to park very badly and took up two spaces. We had to be calm and not alarm anyone in the school. Stealthy, Chloe was given the keys and then guided us through the school (with some help from me) and into the Blackwell pool. Everything, in the dark anyway, was exactly the same.

"Girls or boys locker room?" She asked, reminding me of when she asked that for the first time. We went through the boys' first, which prompted her to call me a "perv."

"Girls." We all replied and went through the room.

The pool looked like a tranquil, bright blue, lit by the lights under the water. Chloe went down to the water and dipped her hand into it, feeling the temperature of the water. "Perfect." She said.

I was gonna go into the water with them, but instead, I thought it would be better to take pictures of them.

"Oh, hey, check this out." I heard Chloe say as she took her jacket off. She showed off her star tattoo on her arm. Picture taken there: click.

"You got one to match mine?" She sounded touched by Chloe's commitment, hand over her heart and all. "Aw, baby!"

Before Rachel could hug her, she took the other ring pop out of her pocket, "For you." Click.

"Another one?" Rachel was amused, but not surprised. "I'll eat it later."

They started to undress, wearing only their bra and underwear to swim in. I saw they were getting ready to jump in at the same time, so before both their feet got off the ground, I took the shot.

They did cannonballs into the water, then started to splash each other as their laughs echoed in the room. Click.

Chloe started to do to the Jaws theme song as she went towards Rachel. She started to swim away from her as her humming went fast.

"No, no, no, Chloe!"

Chloe's arms made the water around her splash as she caught Rachel and then they fell underwater. When the rose to the surface again, their hair was pushed back from being so wet and they were holding onto each other for stability. Click.

"I missed you, Chloe Price." Rachel said, then kissing her.

"I missed you too, Rachel Price. I mean, Amber, fuck." Chloe laughed.

Rachel did too, "Oh? I hella like the sound of that." Click.

I do feel kind of strange for taking pictures of them while they were swimming, but I knew there were going to be so many good opportunities. I'm not a perv for this, right? Right.

"First, you get the same tattoo as me, which is hella sweet of you, now you call me with your last name. And the ring pops!" Rachel knew what was going on. It was hard getting passed her. "What are you planning?"

Chloe was ready to lose her shit but said, "Hey, do you want to see which one could hold their breath longer?! Yes okay ready set go!" Then she sunk into the water.

Rachel followed, no questions asked. I took that time to check out the photos I just developed, seeing how dream-like they ended up being. When Chloe showed up her tattoo, when she gave Rachel the other ring pop, the moment before they jumped into the water, them holding each other in the water, when they were laughing, there was only so many touching moments I could take. I then heard the water splash and gasps for air, knowing I knew they came back up for air.

"I think I won, Rache." Chloe said proudly.

"We came at the same time!"

"Wow, that's never happened before—" Before she could finish, Rachel splashed water at her. They laughed again and then went to the ledge of the pool, resting their arms on the wet floor.

"Tell me, why my star?" Rachel asked.

"It reminds me of you. Other than being yours, we talked about how stars reminds us that there's always more out there and that there'll always be there. Then you got yours just for me about leaving Arcadia Bay together. And your nightlight thing."

"I still use that." She mentioned.

"It's you. It's us, you know?"

"Yeah, and it'll always be us." They kissed again. I felt the passion in it; I knew it was full of love for each other. Click.

"God, I forgot about your scar." She looked at Rachel's arm, with a giant line of a scar on her bicep.

"I wanted to cover it, but then I thought, hey, it looks badass on its own. Plus, Chloe fucking Price saved me."

Without hesitation, she kissed her arm. Click.

"Max, you don't want to get in?" Rachel turned to me.

"Taking photos is more fun." I answered with a smile.

All three of us chuckled and I couldn't help but take another photo.


Unlike before, we weren't caught or chased out, but instead was able to walk freely. They reeked of chlorine and they were shivering a tiny bit, but other than that, they were happy. I had to roll the window down so I didn't die from the chemical water they were in. Chloe made us go through her bedroom window, and we had to put the keys back somewhere that seemed normal. I had to do that, placing them on the bedside table of Joyce and David's room.

That meant they wanted me to be distracted so they could shower together.

I took my phone out again and called Kate. "Hello?" She answered.

"Hey Kate, just checking up. I saw your school. It's okay, according to everyone else's opinion."

She laughed, "It's just like a college there. You pay for tuition and everything. As if I wasn't drowning in debt enough."

I chuckled, "I know that feeling. How have you been? Sleeping better?"

"As well as I can. Victoria helped sometimes, but she needs her sleep too." I heard her yawn. "I better sleep now, actually. Do you mind?"

"I don't mind at all. I'll see you tomorrow then, okay?"

"Can't wait. Goodnight, Max, sweet dreams."

"You too, Kate."


May 14, 2015 12:30 AM

Oh. My. Dog. Rachel is here! She's here! She's here and she's real! She was so happy to see us and I've never seen either of them so happy. Ever. We went on a road trip to Kate's school, we went to the Blackwell pool again, and everything feels so whole again. I missed her a lot and I'm proud of her too for taking those anger management classes (she hates them, of course). And of Kate too! She's been very strong through this. Her ex (I don't want to call her that) was really annoying and, now, I really wanted to kill her. Maybe I should've let Chloe do that.

No, I don't want her to go to prison.


I put my phone back in my bag and placed it on the ground next to the bed, getting into bed and immediately knocking out into sleep. It was one of those sleeps you have when you don't remember your dream whatsoever, but the sleep was really deep. I woke up with Chloe and Rachel on both of my sides, holding me and cuddling with me in the middle like two new parents.

I forced myself out of their hug, but they automatically got closer to each other. Another picture wouldn't hurt.