Samsonlove- Sonny's a very dense man, but it doesn't change the fact that deep down his heart will likely always do the thing that places the needs of the people that he loves before he puts his own needs out, or at least that's how it should be. The writers have forgotten what made Sonny so interesting and compelling. Brook allows herself to be victimized and shows just how much of her tough little rocker girl act is just a farce. Maxie's Maxie… and Damian's pain is just starting, but there will be a calm before the storm.

Story-

Georgie wasted no time attempting to salvage the good name of her older sister, despite only the day before believing that Maxie had no name to salvage. Thus was the quandary that she would always find herself in. Sometimes, Georgie could be such a pushover. "Dad, what happened wasn't that big a deal…"

"I asked your sister a question, Georgie. Not you."

"But dad…"

"Don't you have some homework that you need to do?" Mac asked, looking for an excuse, any excuse, to get his younger daughter out of the room so that he could speak with his older daughter. He didn't expect Georgie to just stand around while Maxie got grilled, but at the same time there wasn't much that she could do. Mac and Maxie needed to have a serious talk about things.

"No, I've done all my homework." It wasn't a lie. Anything she would have been doing would have just been because she wanted to have some more extra credit to further assure herself of the top spot in her school. Maybe having a valedictorian would be incentive enough for her mother to actually make an appearance at graduation. If not, at least Georgie was assured of a place in the Port Charles high record books.

"Then maybe you should go and check your answers over again and make sure that they're correct…"

"But…"

"Georgie," Maxie reached over and touched her little sister gently on the shoulder. "Everything's going to be all right. I'm going to be fine. I want to talk with him, okay? Just go and do something. Get something to eat, talk to Dillon…"

"Not that second one. I don't trust the boy much right about now."

"You never did," Georgie quickly countered.

"And when I find out that one of my daughters has gotten into a fight I can only assume that it's because of the influence that a certain someone has over her, and that same person happens to be your boyfriend's best friend. You see what I'm trying to say, Georgie?"

"I thought you said you were going to stop judging them…"

"I said that I was willing to try and not see the worst in them, but when I hear about things like this what do you expect me to do? Give them a pat on the back and say that they did something to make the male gender proud? Sorry, but that isn't going to happen. Georgie, please, I'm not going to ask nicely again, leave, and don't stand by the door so you can overhear what's going on."

Georgie sighed and gave a sympathetic look over to her sister, mouthing that she was sorry about the fact that she needed to leave Maxie alone with their father, but what else could she do? She was also upset that after everything they had been through, everything that had been said, Mac still wasn't willing to accept that there was something decent in people who wanted to get close to his daughters. Sometimes it was justified, sometimes it wasn't. Knowing Mac, he probably still held a little against Lucky for the crush that Maxie had on him all those years ago.

Maxie heard the door close and she couldn't help but think that it paralleled the closing of the iron bars of the Port Charles Jail cells. She backed up against the bed, leaning against the wall so that she could sit somewhat alert instead of just looking like she was defeated. While she may have been emotionally crushed, while her world may have been spinning uncontrollably around her, Maxie didn't want her father to know that. She didn't want him to be able to gloat. But she knew that if he did he would, at least to himself. Mac was like that, always wanting, needing, to prove that he was right to his daughters.

"I told Elizabeth that I didn't need to hear the details about the fight from her over the phone. I told her that I would be able to come and talk to you and that you would tell me what I needed to know. Don't make me a liar, Maxie. I want to know what happened. I have a right to know what happened."

"You should have asked her…"

"Come on…"

"I'm not a kid anymore, dad," Maxie replied bitterly. "I don't have to tell you everything that goes on in my life. You know, legally, I'm an adult now… I can make my own decisions."

"You've always made your own decisions, even when you weren't an adult. It's one of the things that I love about you the most… even though it's also one of the things that makes me worry about you so much. You're an independent woman, Maxie. You're more confident in yourself than I've ever seen in any other person. I respect that so much… but it scares me. It scares me because sometimes you make decisions that I don't understand, that I can't even begin to think about someone doing in their right mind."

"So you're saying I'm crazy now?"

"Of course not. I think that when you get into a mood where you feel the need to do something, anything, to get what you want, you take whatever steps are necessary and don't care about the consequences. Look, they're not going to do anything over at Kelly's. You didn't cause any damages in your fight… I just want to know what happened, and why."

"Because Brook Lynn Ashton is a little bitch…"

"Brook?" Mac cocked an eyebrow. "Maxie, she's one of your sister's best friends… she's one of my good friend's daughter… how could you do something like that?"

"Just because Georgie likes her, and she's Lois's daughter doesn't mean that I have to like her, too. I don't like her, not at all…"

"Why not? She seems like such a nice young girl."

"That's what she wants you to think, dad," Maxie replied with a scoff. Of course Brook would have people under her spell, thinking that there wasn't a single thing that was wrong with the perfect little angel girl. It made Maxie sick to her stomach to think about something like that. "Brook's not nearly as perfect as you want to believe she is. She's a mean spirited little tramp!"

"You're still not giving me any good reasons…"

Maxie sighed and scrunched her knees to her chest. "Daddy… I screwed everything up…"

"Honey, nothing bad happened," Mac reached over to comfort her. "I'm sure this is all going to blow over…"

"Not with that," Maxie replied. "I cheated on him… I found one of Kyle's friends at school and I… I did something that I can never take back, and I did it because I wanted to hurt him more than anything else…"

Mac was surprised. Sure, he had always thought that it would have been good for the two of them to actually spend some time apart, break up if that was necessary, but the way that she said it made it seem like she had done something he thought she would never do. After all, she spoke so highly of him that it was surprising. "You cheated on your boyfriend…"

"He's not my boyfriend anymore…" Maxie remarked sadly. "I wish that he was, I wish that he was still my boyfriend so much, but he isn't… he's gone now. He's never going to forgive me for what I did, and I don't blame him. I wouldn't forgive myself, either."

"Honey…"

"So go ahead, dad, gloat all you want. Tell me that you were just waiting for something like this to happen, that you wanted us to break up because you knew that he was bad for me, that everything he would do would just lead to my suffering. Go ahead! You know you want to…"

Mac grabbed her and held her tightly, "I never wanted you to feel this kind of pain, Maxie. Never."

Maxie believed him and she closed her eyes, sobbing gently against his chest. What she needed was someone who could comfort her. It may have come from one of the least likely places, but at least it came. "I'm sorry… for everything…"

"Don't apologize, sweetie, you didn't do anything wrong." In that moment, Mac found nothing to gloat about, nothing worth making a scene over. No, what he needed to do at that moment in time was be a good father to his daughter, and he was determined to do it, no matter what the cost.

Kelly's-

She may have been at a restaurant before, but she certainly didn't get anything to eat there. Sam was a burger and fries girl through and through. What she hated was the way that people just seemed to hype up expensive food. What was wrong with a little fast food, so long as it tasted good?

She sat at the counter of the restaurant, looking over the menu. The freebie that she had gotten earlier that morning told her that the place did have some good food, and she didn't feel like exploring every nook and cranny of Port Charles while she looked for another place to eat. Maybe another day, when she didn't have so much on her mind.

Elizabeth was still doing some final cleaning up of the place after the fight. There wasn't much that needed to be done, but since there was a relatively steady flow of people after she didn't have the time to do it like she would have wanted. Elizabeth even had to put a little sign that said there was some broken glass around the area, which she had just finished sweeping up. Her mind couldn't help but focus on what had happened at that particular spot. Maxie and Brook were fighting, and it looked like they were willing to do whatever it took to hurt the other person. "If you're ready I'll be with you in a few seconds, Sam."

"Sure, take your time, I don't have anything that I need to do." She had done what she had told herself she needed to do for the day. She had found Jason Morgan and she had done a little bit of research on him as a person, not as the legend that they seemed so intent on hyping up in the papers. No, the Jason Morgan that she had seen was something else, something special. A person who did not fit the mold. Someone that gentle, that soft spoken… the same person that was the cold blooded killer? The right hand man of Sonny Corinthos? Sam couldn't believe it, she didn't want to believe it.

"I probably won't serve your food, I just did a little extra time because of what happened earlier…"

"What happened earlier?"

"Two girls got into a fight right over there…"

"I always miss the action, don't I?"

Elizabeth shook her head, "Believe me, you didn't miss anything. I didn't think that I would ever see the two of them get into a fight. I know they didn't like each other very much, but they always seemed to be civil."

"Elizabeth, you're a woman, tell me that you haven't wanted to clean the clock of another girl who you were civil with when you were around them… you know that you won't be able to say that you didn't have that urge."

"I never acted on it…"

"I have," Sam replied. "I might be small, but believe me, I don't take that kind of crap from nobody…"

"I admire that… me… I'm kind of afraid of what could happen. I just don't want people to be so angry at each other."

"You really are something, you know that…"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It's just that from the moment I met you I saw that you were just this kind of person who always believed that there was good in everyone. You always saw the white instead of the black, focused on what was good, even if there was something there that you couldn't deny…"

"That's not exactly true," Elizabeth replied, thinking about how much she had seen the darkness in Ric, and Jason, and how it scared her away. "I've had my moments where I couldn't ignore what was right in front of my face. But, you know, I really do believe that everyone has some good qualities in them, even when they're not expected to."

"Does it ever surprise you?"

"Does what ever surprise me?"

"I mean, do you ever have this feeling about someone that you think is so on the money, and then you realize a few moments later that maybe, just maybe, you were wrong, that the person isn't who you've heard them to be, or who you thought they would be?"

"Plenty of times. Port Charles has a lot of people like that, Sam. Probably more than places ten times its size. You just have to get to know the people here in order to understand them… they might surprise you."

"Yeah," Sam grinned, "I guess they might."