A/N: I'm back. I nearly made a weed joke in here that referenced the potential pun in the title, but I didn't because I'm nice. Either that or I'm lulling you into a false sense of security - you decide. Anyway, have 2700-odd words covering the next interactions with the good folk of Arcadia Bay.

Joyce and David come by later to talk to me and Chloe, and while Joyce is as close to what I remember as she can be (given her daughter was nearly killed five days ago), it's the changes in David that keep confusing me. It takes a lot of brainpower (brainpower that I don't exactly have to spare, given how tired I am) to remember that this isn't the same David that found the bunker and saved me from Jefferson.. but he's got the same heart. Despite every argument that he and Chloe and I had in my week-that-wasn't, I owe him everything, even if he'll never know it.

Then I get a surprise, as Joyce finally mentions something that nobody had told me just yet, and I realise I owe him for saving me twice.

"I talked to your mom for a bit earlier. She says that the doctors think David's first aid gave you a chance, and if he hadn't been there, you'd have never made it to the hospital."

I look up at that, and he turns back from the window he's staring out, an uncomfortable look on his face. Chloe - who admitted to me earlier that she doesn't really remember much other than screaming for help, which isn't entirely surprising, since she went into shock - has an expression on her face that makes me want to smile, as she tries to reconcile the numerous grudges she's held against him for so long with the gratitude she's suddenly feeling for him for saving my life.

Eventually, I find my voice. "Thank you, Mr Madsen." I'm not exactly in a position to hug, so I offer the next best thing by holding out my hand. After a moment's hesitation, he takes it and shakes it gently, like he's still slightly afraid I'll break, but then a small smile brightens his face.

"You can call me David, Maxine."

Chloe groans, and I start to laugh, then cough as the pain from laughing hits me. After a moment of recovery, I wheeze, "Please, call me Max."

He nods, slowly.

"Sorry for laughing. It's kind of become a running joke by this point. I've had to tell every doctor and every nurse so far."

The smile briefly reappears, then he looks over to Joyce and after a second of non-verbal communication, he nods at her. Chloe's mom grabs her and pulls her away, over her somewhat muted protestations. Joyce whispers something in Chloe's ear and she stills instantly and follows her mother out the door. Without protest - most unlike Chloe. As the two of them step away, David takes a small step closer, and sinks down to his haunches so his head is level with mine.

"Max..." he says softly. "I just… I want you to know how grateful I am to you for saving Chloe's life. I know her and I, we don't get along that great, but she means the world to her mother, and her mother means the world to me, so I try... not very well, but I do try. Anyways... thanks."

He goes to get up, but my hand on his arm stops him.

"Thank you for saving me."

"It's nothing," he says.

"It's everything," I tell him honestly. "I can't imagine how she would have survived.. after losing her dad, then Rachel... then me..."

He looks thoughtful, then nods. "You're right, I don't know that she would have. She's been so different this week, even if it's just been waiting around here all the time, waiting for you to wake up... she's almost seemed happy, happy like she hasn't been since Rachel vanished, and now that we know what happened... I know it's not fair of me to ask it of you but I hope you can keep being a good influence. I've seen you at school - Chloe could use someone like you around."

I think back to a confrontation in Chloe's bedroom, him hitting her after she talked back to him, me rewinding and taking the blame for her weed, and once again I have to fold all the confused feelings toward him away carefully. He's not that David, not after what happened on his Monday - and I'm starting to realise that I'm not that Max either.

This is so much more complicated than just saving Chloe's life.

Also, I just realised that he'd probably not find the same humour in the realisation that the Chloe-that-wasn't was a much bigger influence on me than I could ever be on her.

"I will," I tell him, locking eyes briefly. "I will always be there for Chloe."

He looks away, clearly feeling uncomfortable, and stands, takes a step towards the door, then turns back as if something else had just occurred to him, but I can see in his eyes that it's something he's been trying to decide whether to say to me or not.

"By the way... there's no real easy way to say this, but as a vet, I know what it's like to go through something and not be real sure how to deal with it... I know I've struggled with it a lot and this week, after what I went through going into that bathroom with you and Chloe and that Prescott boy... it's made me realise that I wasn't dealing with it at all, and it was hurting my family - hurting me."

He runs his hands over his face, then sighs heavily. "Joyce was right, as usual, and so I found someone to talk to about it… and it's totally up to you but I reckon you might need to do the same too, and if you decide you do, here's the card of the one I've talked to. You just think about it, Max. It's not a bad thing to have to get help. Even the strongest people need someone to lean on, sometimes."

Some part of me is more touched that ever, overriding the last of the lingering suspicion that David-that-wasn't caused. If I ever needed proof that David meant well but just didn't always know how to show it, this was it. "T-thanks, Mr Madsen. I know what you mean, and if I need... no, when I need her help, I'll be sure to give her a call."

He nods, and another small smile flashes over his rough face. "Reckon I'll go get Joyce and find some food. I'll send Chloe on in, shall I?"

I nod, and smile at him. "Thanks again,"

He waves it away and heads out, then Chloe is back in by my side.

"What did he want?" she asks as soon as the door closes. Well, at least she's not calling him step-dick. It's a start.

I hand her the card, and she blinks in surprise. "Therapy?"

"Yeah, he said that when I need to talk to someone, he knew someone who might be able to help."

"Help reconcile the fact that you time travelled and took a bullet to save your best friend you hadn't seen for five years?"

The sarcasm isn't entirely warranted, but I understand where she's coming from.

"Maybe not the time travelling bit, but the being shot and dying, however briefly, that I know I'll need help to deal with, as amazing as you are to talk to."

The compliment brings a smile to her face, and her hand slides into mine again.

"I still can't believe you did that for me," she says softly. "I don't know if I'll ever fully understand..."

"It's okay," I whisper. "You don't have to, you just have to know that I love you and I would do anything to save you."

A comfortable silence settles over us and I feel contentment wash over me again.

Predictably, it's with Warren that I fuck up first. I choose to blame how tired I was when he came by the Tuesday morning after I woke up in the hospital.

Somewhat ironically, fucking up is also what finally convinces Chloe to believe my crazy time-travel story.

Warren's not sure whether to smile or not when he sees me, and as a result has a kind of adorably goofy look on his face when he enters the hospital room. "Max Attack, how you doing?"

Chloe aggressively rolls her eyes, but my gentle squeeze of her hand relaxes her… slightly.

The side-effect of that - of course - is Warren's eyes catching the movement, and taking in the sight of Chloe.

I really kinda like that she has that effect on people. Whoa. Down girl.

"Hey Warren," I say, instead of satisfying the sudden urge to pull Chloe close and kiss her again. "What's new in the world?"

"Well, if you weren't officially a celebrity before, you are now," he says slyly, and shows me a newspaper that a quick glance at shows is dated the day after I was shot.

'Blackwell Academy School Shooting' it says, in the big bold headline font. Underneath that, 'One victim in Critical condition.' And when Warren unfolds it and starts to read, it actually happens to name both me as the victim and Nathan as the shooter. Chloe's name is absent, which is probably a good thing, and David gets a mention as the security guard who both arrested Nathan and performed emergency first aid.

It doesn't bother me that he's getting noted for saving me. It's not like I did anything that I can tell anyone other than Chloe about.

Then Warren reads the next paragraph.

"'Though details are sketchy at this point in time, off the record statements by members of the Arcadia Bay police have confirmed that they believe that Miss Caulfield did infact take a bullet meant for another, in a selfless act of heroism that will surely be rewarded by the town and the police. Details of the intended target of the shooting are at this stage unknown, but investigation into this is ongoing.'" He looks up at me, then looks over at Chloe and I can see the wheels turning in his head. "... and I just figured out who that unknown target of Nathan's really was. Wow. Okay."

Damn. Damn damn damn.

I look over at Chloe and we share a conversation in microseconds with nothing but our eyes. Warren sees it happening, shivers over-dramatically and mutters 'whoa, creepy', but the grin on his face doesn't waver.

I realise suddenly that it might be harder than I thought to keep the reason why I did what I did out of the news. Sooner or later someone's going to put two and two together and they'll either come up with four or they'll come up with five, and to be totally honest, neither option is particularly enjoyable.

It's not that I would exactly mind my… whatever the hell this is with Chloe right now… being made public, it would just be a hell of a lot easier for the two of us to figure out what it is without a gigantic public spotlight shining on the two of us. I kinda get the feeling the news would absolutely devour the dramatic story of a girl throwing herself in the path of a bullet meant for her lesbian lover... but there's Chloe's somewhat sketchy past, which I also know would be a goldmine for an unscrupulous tabloid reporter - and yes, I know that's redundant.

"Warren…" I start, and he figures out what I'm about to say before I figure out how to say it.

"Hey Max, it's cool. Nobody will hear anything about your secret identity from me, swear."

"Thanks." I realise that a week has gone by, the showing of Planet of the Apes at the drive through has already been and gone. I wonder if he took Brooke, and before I can think about exactly what I'm doing, I'm apologising. "Sorry that you never got the chance to show me your new car, or invite me to 'Go Ape' and see the movie with you at the drive in."

He freezes and his eyes widen and I realise how much I've stepped my foot in. Beside me, Chloe catches his reaction too, and blinks in surprise. This time, it's the wheels in her head turning.

Ohhhhh... fuck.

"Uhhh.. how did you know about the new car, Max?" Warren asks hesitantly. "You've been in a coma since Monday morning, and I haven't talked to you until now."

"Oh.. uh.. I thought I heard Chloe say something about a new car on campus.. she was there on Monday, after all."

Chloe was transported to the hospital with me in the ambulance in shock and doesn't remember anything but holding me and screaming my name, but there's a chance Warren doesn't know that. Unbidden, my eyes flick over to her, and she nods fractionally, confirming that she'll back up my lie if needs be.

"Oh, okay.." Thank god, he's buying it. "And you knew about the movie?"

That's actually easier to cover with a lie. "Dude, you had it in the Max folder on your USB…" Ooops, there goes Chloe's eyebrows up into her fringe again. "Uhh speaking of, did someone give that back to you? Last I saw it was in my room, somewhere - but I heard Planet of the Apes was on at a drive-in cinema nearby and figured you of all people would want to go see it."

He looks at me doubtfully for a second, then his face clears up.

I'm not so sure I should be thrilled at being an apparently convincing liar.

"Huh, well, nice of you to think about it. I did end up going, by the way, just… with Brooke. And don't worry about the USB, Dana came and found me on Monday and gave it back, said she'd borrowed it from your room and since she didn't think you'd be in a position to give it back.." He trails off, then rubs the back of his head nervously. "Well, I hate to splash and dash, but I should probably be getting back to school. They only really gave us a little bit of time off, tried to 'keep things as normal as possible', as Principal Wells said."

I nod, and he comes over and bends down for a careful hug. "Thanks for coming by, Warren. I'll text you, okay?"

He pulls back and smiles. "Sure thing. Nice to meet you, Chloe. Love the hair color."

Chloe blinks in surprise, but he's gone before she can come up with a response. "Huh," she eventually says, and I laugh.

"You know, when I kissed you the first time, in the week-that-wasn't, you said you were going to text him to tell him he didn't stand a chance."

After a second or two, she joins me in laughing. "That does kinda sound like me."

I contemplate telling her that I wussed out first time, then decided to rewind and do it anyway, but it would probably ruin the moment.

Speaking of...

"Hey Chloe?"

"Yeah Max?"

"Do you think this is going to get…'

"Less awkward?"

"Actually, I was going to ask if this was going to get weird.. because sooner or later with the publicity around everything that's going on with Nathan and me and Jefferson... and with everything else, and Rachel, and..."

Before I can take a breath and continue pouring out the fears that suddenly seem to have taken over and are driving me headlong into a full blown panic attack, a pair of soft lips land on mine, and a wave of blue hair fills my sight.

Wow.

Seriously… wow.

If I ever forget what the most amazing feeling in the world is like, I'll just have to ask Chloe to kiss me again.

Not that there's any chance of forgetting this feeling in the next million years.

As she pulls back, she's blushing slightly, and I'm grinning stupidly, and then we're both laughing again, and before I know it I'm crying, and then she's crying and I'm pretty sure that this is going to be a thing, at least for a while. How could it not be, with the way things happened to bring us here?

But we have each other, and that's what matters.