Well, I have really no qualifying excuse for taking about three months to update, so I'm just gonna go right to a disclaimer.

I, PG do not own Maximum Ride.

"When love is blind

Sometimes the lies can get you through the night,

I'm holding onto what I need

Till you're too tired to fight."

--Bon Jovi

Max POV

"You alright?" Fang asked me, his voice floating around my head, his hand resting on my arm.

"Yeah," I said. "I'm fine."

"You don't look fine."

I gave him a look, and then turned my gaze back to the clouds. Suddenly I felt a little claustrophobic as Fang leaned in and lowered his voice.

"Seriously, what's up?" he asked, his tone strong and stern.

"Nothing, Fang," I said. "Leave me alone."

"Someone's grouchy," he stated.

"I just don't like airplanes. That's all," I replied, not turning to face him.

"That's only because your mind is in a negative place," he said calmly.

"Who are you, my yoga teacher?"" I asked. Fang almost smiled.

"I could be. Do you want me to be your yoga teacher?"

"No."

He was quiet, thankfully, for a few moments. It was always when I wanted him to talk that he was quiet, and when I wanted him to leave me alone, he just wouldn't shut up. Typical.

I could still feel his stare as I gazed out the window, my mind off in the middle of the universe. I heard Fang click on the mini TV in front of him, knowing he wasn't watching. I turned to look at him.

"I'm worried," I said quietly.

"About what?" His eyebrows pulled together and his eyes searched mine, making my stomach flip.

"Everything," I said, flopping my head back on the seat.

"It'll be alright," he whispered, placing his hand on my arm.

"How do you know?" I said, rolling my eyes to question.

"Because it always is."

I sighed. "That's not a decent answer."

"Max," Fang said. "You really have nothing to worry about."

"Fang! How can you say that?" I asked, outraged. After everything that's happening, everything that's going to happen, with meeting the flock's families and then them leaving me and Anne possibly being the Voice, and our wings disappearing, it was all too much. And I had expected Fang to understand, but apparently, he didn't.

"Can't you just forget about it?" he asked. "Just for a little while?"

"No, not really."

"You can try," Fang said, leaning even closer.

"I can't! My family is leaving me, the Voice is evil, I haven't seen any of the flock in three days, and we're on a freaking metal contraption that could fall out of the sky at any minute! And you're telling me to—" I stopped abruptly, as Fang slowly pulled a strand of my hair behind my ear.

"Uh," I started, staring at him, his eyes following the trail of his hand as it moved down the side of my face and below my chin. Fang wasn't paying attention.

"You just need to forget about it. Not for forever, just for now," he said his voice soft and smooth. "Just relax."

"You're not really helping me relax," I said carefully, my breathing uneven.

"Oh?" His hand started a new pattern, tracing its way under my hair to the back of my neck. It was safe to say I was going crazy.

"Fang," I asked him, staring into his eyes, "what are you doing?"

"Waiting for a response," he said.

"What?" I asked, confused. "A response to what?"

I didn't get an answer.

Fang pulled me closer to him slowly pressing his lips to mine as my eyes opened wide. His hand squeezed my neck slightly and his other hand was on my cheek. He pulled back quickly, not even giving me time to react. I could see his shoulders rising and falling as he looked into my eyes.

"See?" he whispered. "Nothing to worry about."

This was completely untrue, unless he meant I was allowed to worry about everything.

Fang's eyes were holding mine, his warm hand squeezing the back of my neck very slightly. His breathing was quick and short, although I couldn't figure out why he was so out of breath. I was trying to think of something to say, anything, and was just about to yell at him, when he leaned in again.

And like before, his lips meet mine. The hand that was on my neck was starting to mess with my hair and his other was trailing across my jawbone. His eyes were closed and his mouth was moving slowly and gently against mine.

And then, because apparently my life just could not get any more confusing or complicated or horrible or anything like that, I closed my eyes, leaned into him, and kissed him back.

Truthfully, I don't know who was more surprised, me, or him. But there was a definite smile on his face when I slowly moved my arms around his neck and as he pulled me closer, one hand on the small of my back.

For the longest time, we stayed there, just kissing, taking our time. I had a brief, embarrassed thought that Jeb might be watching from his seat behind me, but Fang had moved his hand down to my hip and the thought just flew out of my mind. All I could think of, from then on was, Ohmygosh, this feels sooo amazing. Why aren't we doing this all the time?

Sad, I know.

Eventually, we split apart, Fang pulling back first, a smug expression painted across his face. He was still holding me, and my arms were still wrapped around him. And for some reason that I didn't understand, I didn't feel like moving.

And, ok, maybe I understood. Maybe.

I realized that Fang was staring at me, with something in his eyes that looked like amazement.

"What?" I asked. Was he making fun of me?

He smiled. "You didn't run away."

My breath caught and my heart started sputtering. "Well," I started. "There was no where to go."

His smile grew larger, at least for Fang standards. "Still."

I rested my head against his shoulder, breathing in his scent, and just closed my eyes. After a while, I had fallen asleep.

Now, someone's hand was on my shoulder, rubbing small circles, stating my name over and over.

"Max," he said. "Max?"

I blinked furiously, trying to gain my bearings. Fang was staring at me, and I raised my head, my neck tensing at the awkward position I fell asleep in. I sat up straighter, but then realize that I wasn't sitting next to Fang, and I wasn't in a plane.

I was by myself, in the backseat of a car. Fang was sitting in front of me, and Jeb was in the driver's seat. Looking out the window, I noticed about four or five kids skateboarding down the street. The houses were average, not to big, but not crummy either. I turned back to Fang.

"Where are we?"

Jeb answered, "Nudge's house."

Silence.

"But…" I said. "We were just on the airplane."

"About a half hour ago," Jeb responded.

"No," I said, confused. "We were on the airplane and Fang and I were--,"

Oh.

Of course. It was all a dream. Duh. Fang and I would never actually do that. We would never actually kiss like that. Of course it was just a dream.

So why was I so disappointed?

"Max?" Fang asked when I didn't finish my sentence. "What were we doing?"

I flushed madly. "Oh, nothing. Never mind," I stuttered. "Let's go." I opened the car door and started walking up the walkway.

"Max," Fang called. I turned to glare at him.

"Wrong house."

I blushed even more. "I knew that," I said, walking swiftly over to where he was standing. He glanced down at me, a smirk on his face.

"So," Fang said as we followed Jeb to the front door. Two kids stopped and watched us curiously. "What were we doing on the plane?"

"Nothing," I hissed.

"Doesn't seem like nothing." He sounded amused.

"Drop it."

Jeb rang the doorbell, either ignoring us, or just being completely oblivious to our bickering. I, however, was acutely aware of Fang's sideways glance.

"What?" I asked, annoyed.

"It had to be something, if you're blushing so much," he whispered. I was about to answer him, when the door flung open.

"Oh!" A short and plump dark-skinned woman answered the door, wiping her hands on her skirt. "You must be Jeb," she said, reaching out her hand. She glanced at me. "And you're… Max?" she questioned. "Well, I'm Sophie. Please, come in."

She held open the door for us, and led us into a very tidy living room, looking kind of nervous. We sat down, and she called for her husband, who came down the hall.

"Hello," he said warmly. "I'm Henry." He held out his hand to Jeb who stood up and introduced himself. Then he turned to Fang. "You must be Max," Henry said sticking out his hand again.

"Uh," Fang said, as Jeb sat back down and Sophie smiled uncomfortably.

"Actually," I said, "I'm Max."

Henry looked a little embarrassed. "Oh," he said. "I'm so sorry."

I smiled, because I had no other idea what to do. No one ever confused Fang with me before. "It's no big," I said, waving my hand.

"I'm sorry," Henry said, turning back to Fang. "I don't know…"

"It's Fang."

After our whole, awkward introduction thing, we sat in silence for a bit, while Henry spoke up again.

"I understand you're the ones bringing our little girl back home."

I looked down at my hands while I answered. "That's the plan."

More silence. Looking up, I noticed that Sophie was beginning to tear up and Henry was trying very hard to keep his cool.

"But there are some things we have to discuss," Jeb said.

Both of them looked surprised. "Like what?"

Fang glanced at me. We didn't tell them anything about the School, or the past year or so, over the phone. It just seemed simpler to do it in person. Except, now I was wishing Jeb had told them earlier.

Jeb spoke up. "There are some… strings that coming with returning your daughter."

Henry narrowed his eyes. "You mean, like a ransom?"

Jeb's eyes widened. "Oh, no. Nothing like that. No. Just a few…" he trailed off, unable to find words. It is a little complicated to tell a couple of parents that their long lost daughter as been a living science experiment with wings for the past twelve years of her life.

"You see," I said. "Nudge… that's what we call your daughter, but, well, she's a little… unordinary."

"Well I can see why," Sophie replied. "She was kidnapped."

"Yes, but that's the only thing," Jeb said, cautiously. "See, she's a little… different… from, let's say, you or your other children."

"How so?" Henry and Sophie were getting a little worried, I could tell.

"It's just that… Nudge is, well… special." I spoke slowly, as if trying not to frighten them.

"Is there something wrong with her?" Sophie asked. "Because if there is, we would want to know. We would still want her, of course we would want Monique, but we need to know if there's something wrong or abnormal."

Well, that could possibly cover the whole wing thing.

"Wrong, no. Abnormal…" Jeb started but was cut of by Sophie's gasp.

"She's just like a normal girl," I said. "She loves junk food and likes to play sports and watch TV and go shopping. But she has some… physical scarring…."

Fang raised an eyebrow at me and I glared at him. Sophie and Henry had horrified expressions on their face and I make a pact to just spit it out. Now.

"Do you remember, about six or seven months ago, there were these… rumors… that were constantly in the news? About … supernatural people… or kids?" I said quickly.

Henry pulled his eyebrows together. "Yes. There were these kids with wings who kept popping up everywhere." Looking at Sophie, he added, "But what does that have to do with our daughter?"

I took an extremely deep breath. "Well, she's… uh… kinda one of them."

Dead silence. Both of them were staring at me as if I had grown another eyeball.

"Are you saying," his gaze hooked on me, "that my daughter, my Monique, has wings?"

I nodded and that's when Sophie started to really cry.

And it was that exact moment that the door swung open.

"We're home!" a male voice called.

"God, I hate old people," a girl said.

"Brooke, don't say that," another girl said.

Then, I'm assuming, their kids walked in the room. An extremely tall teenaged boy, along with another tall teenaged girl and a short teenaged girl, all stared at the five of us. Behind them stood two twin boys, neither of them paying attention.

The short girl stepped forward, towards her parents. "Mom?" she asked carefully and went to sit next to her on the couch.

The taller girl glared at us. "Who are you?"

Henry stood up. "This is Jeb, Fang, and Max," he said pointing to us. "And these are our kids, Olivia," the short one, "Brooke," the tall one, "Ben" the teenager, "and Eddy and Jeff," the two twin boys.

He turned to them and spoke sternly. "And be nice to them because they're reuniting us with Monique."

And that was pretty much Day Three of this horrifying experience.

Just a quick note, because this was kinda bugging me when I reread it. I made the first half of the chapter really unrealistic on purpose. And Max is also really, really, really, dense about it, for a reason, also. You will soon see why. And the next update will either come tomorrow or Wednesday because I told myself I would not read my new Kieli book until I finish this story. Review please!