A/N Wowowowwow it's been like 8 years since I last updated and I'm so so so sooo sorry! I had crazy amounts of homework plus I had family thanksgiving things going on (I live in Canada, we have Thanksgiving in October) and then I got the flu and I missed a bunch of school and had MORE work to catch up on plus I have volunteering and tutoring and blah. I've just been busy. I can't promise that I'll update frequently, but I can promise that I won't go months without updating, because that'd be cruel, and lame, it'd be crame. PLUS I usually carve 10 pumpkins all by myself every Halloween because I take pumpkin carving very seriously and with Halloween only a week away (yaaaass) I probably won't update much because I'll be covered in pumpking guts. Sorry for not updating! But I'm back now! Hope you guys enjoy :) And yes I know it's poorly edited but I'm still have the flu (well sort of) and I'm sick and tired so let's pretend that's a good excuse :p
Max's POV
It's November. And Fang and I haven't spoken since he punched Dylan in the face.
Hah. I never thought Fang and I would stop talking, especially over something he did to Dylan of all people.
Surprisingly, I've been spending a lot of time with Dylan and it's probably because Fang is always with Nudge, Ella and Iggy. I'm not saying that they're choosing Fang over me, or that I'm choosing Dylan over them. That's just how it's been the past couple weeks.
Fang and I have never really fought for more than a couple hours, and then we both cave in and apologize and everything's fine again. But something was different this time, I just couldn't tell what.
Fang and I always spent Halloween together, because it's my favourite holiday (Fang's is Christmas) and he was my best friend, so it made sense.
We'd hand out candy to little kids and then stay up all night watching scary movies, and if Halloween happened to be in the middle of the week that year, we'd skip school the next day.
But this year I spent Halloween with Dylan.
I know what some of you are going to say, 'you're replacing Fang with Dylan', or 'you're in love with Dylan', but the funny thing is, were still both in love with Fang and Lissa.
Me being the one in love with Fang and Dylan being the one in love with Lissa, of course.
I'm not trying to replace Fang, but he's always been the one I run to when I'm hurt and I can't talk to him about this. It's nice talking to someone who understands.
Dylan and I don't just spend all our time talking about how in love we are, we don't cry and throw ourselves a pity party every time we see each other.
Obviously the subject of Fang and Lissa comes up once and a while, but were actually friends and to be honest it's kind of nice.
Nudge and Ella have been bugging me since the whole thing happened, but I can't bring myself to tell them why I won't talk to Fang.
Every time I see him with Lissa it hurts... It was easier when I was in denial. At least that way I could convince myself I wasn't hurting.
The funny thing is, even if Fang wasn't with Lissa I don't think I'd be able to tell him how I feel. I'd be too afraid of screwing things up, too afraid of being rejected or losing him.
"Max? Max? Anybody home" Dylan asks from his spot across from me in the library.
Were sitting at one of the tables near the back of our school library, studying for some big science test coming up next week. The back of our school's library is meant for study groups, so were allowed to talk back here.
That musty smell books get when they haven't been read in a long time is in the air. I can see layers of dust on top of some of the shelves. People don't tend to check out books from our library, on account of the fact that most of them are falling apart and the information in them is 1000 years old.
I remember Fang telling me one time that he thought libraries and book stores were beautiful. He said there was something calming, something kind of fascinating about them.
Flashback - Sophomore year
"Breathe it in Max" Fang said.
"Breathe in what?", I scoff "The smell of books?"
Fang had taken me to some really old used book store in the older part of town.
Fang, throughout all my time knowing him, had always loved books, art and music.
I was always telling him he had a really old soul and this further proved my point.
"Tsk, tsk, tsk Max, can't you see the beauty in this place?" Fang asked me, his eyes glinting from the sunlight shining through the skylight in the ceiling.
"Um, what's the beauty in mouldy old books from the 17th century?" I asked him.
"You don't get it Max, all these books, they all had to have been written by someone right?"
"Right..." I trailed off, still not seeing his point.
"The people that wrote these books had ideas flowing through their heads, they had feelings, they all had lives and they all had something that influenced them to write a particular book. I think it's comforting, knowing that so many people could take things they'd gone through in their lives and turn them into beautiful stories"
Fang started wandering around the store, picking up books that seemed interesting.
"All these people had lives Max, but they all left something behind. Even if that something was a simple as a book. Don't you find that interesting?" he asked me.
"Um, sure?"
End of Flashback
I kind of understood what Fang was saying now. It's a hard feeling to describe, but I get it. I wish I'd understood when he'd explained it to me.
"What? Oh yeah sorry, I zoned out" I said to Dylan.
He rolled his eyes and continued highlighting what seemed to be pretty much all of his notes in different colours.
His study notes basically looked like a gay pride parade, if that makes any sense.
"You better chill out with the highlighting before it runs out of highlighty magic" I laughed.
"Highlighty magic?"
"Yeah, yanno like when you have a pen but it stops working because it ran out of colour?" I tell him.
"Do you mean ink Max?" Dylan laughs at me.
"I like the word highlighty magic better..." I grumble and look back down at my page.
I didn't understand any of this. Science is stupid, who needs it anyways? How am I even passing this class...
I got lost in my thoughts and before I knew what was going on Dylan was waving his hand in front of my face.
"Whattt?" I groaned as I looked up from the page I'd been staring at in my ridiculously large science textbook.
"You've been staring at that page for at least 5 minutes" Dylan chuckled.
I just rolled my eyes and went back to my staring contest with my textbook.
Eventually the bell rang signalling the end of our lunch break and I gave up trying to understand the complex world of grade 11 science.
Dylan and I made plans to continue studying after school, since I was clearly in need of some serious help.
I made my way towards my english class, pushing my way through the sea of bodies all rushing to different rooms.
A group of girls stop walking directly in front of me and being having a conversation and giggling as if they aren't standing in the middle of the hallway. So I stand and glare at them hoping they'll get the hint, but of course they don't.
"AHEM" I say very loudly, which attracts their attention, they all turn and glare at me a if I'm the one being rude.
I roll my eyes and practically push my way straight through them. God, I can't stand people who walk slowly in the hallway.
After reaching my classroom I take my seat right next to Fang. We'd picked our seats at the beginning of the semester and weren't aloud to change them, so all we could do is ignore each other and hope we didn't get partnered up for anything.
Our teacher walked in and began ranting about some assignment that I didn't have the patience to care about.
I started drawing in the margins on one of the pages in my binder when I heard Fang's voice next to me.
"Alright let's get this over with" Fang sighed, looking down at a sheet the teacher has apparently just handed out.
"Excuse me?" I ask, I guess I should have been paying attention when the teacher was talking...
I notice that Fang's cut his hair since we last spoke, his fringe is shorter but it still hangs over his eyes so that he has to keep brushing it out of his sight.
I missed his smell, laundry detergent which is a pretty common smell but I associate it with him.
Fang starts to laugh but then remembers were not on good terms and suppresses it with a cough.
"We just got partnered up for this project, weren't you paying attention?" he asked me, raising an eyebrow.
"Um, what project" I asked, sheepishly.
"Were supposed to write an essay on one another" Fang said pointing out the assignment sheet on my desk.
"Oh, great" I said, exasperated.
Normally I'd be excited about this, I know Fang inside out, or at least I thought I did. But right now I'm not exactly jumping up and down with joy at the thought of having to spend time with him.
As much as I miss him, I'm not ready to be around him all the time.
I miss touching him, and not like in a creepy sexual way, just the regular things. Like hugging him and sitting next to him on my bedroom floor doing homework.
I miss him taking care of me whenever I burn myself trying to cook something. I miss the way he always asks me if I'm alright, not so often that it's annoying, but just enough so that I have the chance to get things off of my chest once in a while when I'm to stubborn to speak up.
I miss the little things he'd do, like when he heard a song on the radio he knew I'd like and he'd write it down for me so he wouldn't forget.
Just small gestures I guess. I'd never really thought much of them until now, when he wasn't around.
"Listen Max, I know you're pissed with me okay? But we need to work on this project and I really don't want to fight with you. I've felt sick not talking to you these past couple weeks..." Fang trailed off, taking a second to breathe.
"And I'm sorry okay? I was way out of line. I guess I just didn't want you getting hurt but I was too stupid to realize that no matter how hard I try I won't be able to protect you from everything. All I can do is be there to pick up the pieces, I still don't like Dylan but I'm not going to be a dick about you hanging out with him either. I'm sorry"
I just kind of sat there staring at Fang for a couple seconds, surprised that he chose the middle of english class to apologize.
"I guess I could've been a little less thick headed too..." I said, a smirk pulling at the side of my mouth.
Fang just rolled his eyes, "Are we good?" he asked me.
"I refuse to accept your apology until you buy me chocolate" I said turning my head away from him and crossing my arms.
"I can't buy you chocolate in the middle of class, but I'll bring you some after school, okay?"
"Well, I guess that's acceptable."
Fang flashed me a smile and began explaining our assignment in further detail since I'd neglected my duty as a student to pay any attention whatsoever.
Eventually the bell rang and we made our way to music class, I still wasn't ready to be around him all the time. But I'm sick of pretending he doesn't matter to me, because he matters more than he'll ever know.
We make our way to music, catching each other up on everything we've missed out on in each others lives in the past couple weeks, which isn't very much.
I'm grateful to whoever made my schedule, because ending the day with music class if probably one of the best things in the world.
Everyone takes their seats in front of the small stage in the centre of the classroom and of course, I drag Fang back up to the front row with me.
Another great thing about this class, there are no assigned seats because people are always moving around or seated with their specific instrument. It's even better for me because I usually get to use one of the small practice rooms, which are soundproof so that you can't throw off anyone's vibe outside the room.
I mostly hate small spaces, but the practice rooms are pretty cozy.
"Okay class settle down!" our teacher says as he walks up onto the stage and claps his hands together.
"After hearing all of you wonderfully talented musicians over these past couple months I've decided that you're all ready. Ready for what you ask? To write your own music!" our teacher looks at us like he just handed over a million dollars.
I can hear some people groaning and some people celebrating, I'm one of the people in the later group.
"It can be instrumental, or it can include lyrics. But your ultimate goal is to make everyone in the room feel something. And as long as that feeling isn't boredom, you'll succeed. You can partner up with one other person if you want and your song with be performed before christmas break, now get to work!"
Fang just turned to me and smiled, trying to hold in his laughter. I guess our teacher did get a little more excited than most teachers would've.
We decided to work separately, writing our own songs but to help each other when we got stuck. We went into one of the practice rooms and began working.
You'd think that writing a song is easy, and I guess in some ways it is. For example, if a song where the words 'my anaconda don't' repeated over and over again for five minutes can be popular, then 'song' writing can't be that hard, right?
The real trouble is writing something emotional, something raw and real that reaches people.
Fang is great at these sorts of things, and while I'm excited to work on this I'm also equally as frustrated because of my lack of creativity.
By the end of class Fang had written down a thousand different ideas and all I had was a scribble.
I just walked out of class groaning, "You'll get there Max, you always do" Fang said nudging my shoulder.
"I knowwww, it's just the whole 'getting there' part that frustrates me" I groaned, running a hand through my messy hair.
Fang offered to come over after school and help me, but I told him that I already had plans, and he didn't ask.
I was grateful that he'd finally stopped making a big fuss about Dylan.
Things weren't totally back to normal for us, but we'd get there soon.
Fang's POV
I watched Max as she scribbled things down on her page and then erased them, over and over from my spot next to her in the practice room.
Max had written songs before, and although I rarely heard her sing them I knew they were good.
She'd always had a hard time expressing her emotions, she'd been like that since we were little and although I liked to put up the emotionless rock facade around everyone, I never had a problem when I was around Max.
Personally I think Max had always just been too stubborn to admit her feelings.
I smiled as she glared at her paper and crossed off yet another idea, her eyebrows furrowed in frustration.
Once the bell that let us go home rang, Max groaned the whole way out of class.
"You'll get there Max, you always do" I said, giving her a nudge of encouragement with my shoulder.
"I knowwww, it's just the whole 'getting there' part that frustrates me" Max groaned as she ran a hand through her hair.
Max has always been kind of a honey blonde, but in the colder months some of the blonde would fade away because she wouldn't spend as much time in the sun, her hair was getting darker already.
I was glad that were back to talking. I missed her.
As much as I like spending time with Lissa, she's not the same as Max and I know I shouldn't be comparing my best friend to my girlfriend but I can't help it.
Max doesn't really have an outgoing personally exactly, but she's not afraid to speak her mind or be herself, it just kind of comes naturally to her.
Lissa's sweet, always polite to everyone but I can tell when she doesn't like someone, even if she's being completely nice. It's not as if Lissa is shy, but she's definitely more reserved then Max.
Max is really passionate about music and things she believes in and doesn't ever back down whereas Lissa will stick up for her beliefs but won't cause an argument over something.
And Max is just... I love everything about her.
But I'm dating Lissa and...
Shit.
A/N I was going to make this chapter longer but I ran out of enegery and I wanted to post before you guys starting thinking I'd died. Anyways, review! 3