The Magnificent Maxwell Chapter 8: The Hotel Room, a Don't Starve + Great Gatsby Crossover fanfic

Good news, folks! Updates on this should be quicker now. And for the bad news: since this follows The Great Gatsby's storyline, it's going to get heavier from here on out. "But we're sorry, and promise that the next story will be full of funny bits!"—paraphrasing Dot Warner.

Oh, Dara—I finally found out what was growing in Wilson's tub: apparently, according to the game files, red mushtrees. The kicker is, I didn't know that at the time of writing it. *~*

Wilson felt an awful feeling for the next few days—nerves, he felt.

But Charlie was true to her word, and suddenly Wilson was finding himself on all sorts of excursions, every time paired up with Willow.

He was actually beginning to warm to the idea.

But no matter what, his mind kept drifting to Charlie and Maxwell—and Tom.

"You're doing it again."

Wilson glanced over at Willow, who had paused in her rowing. "What am I doing?"

"You're sighing and drifting off and thinking. We've been going in circles for the past five minutes because you stopped rowing."

Wilson glanced around, realized she was right. "It's…I…I can't shake this feeling that something horrible is going to happen—"

Willow leaned forward and kissed him.

"Now what are you thinking?"

Wilson blinked, floored. "I—I didn't think about anything just then."

She smiled. "See? Problem solved." She paddled a bit, then looked back at him when he didn't assist.

"It's not that easy, Miss Willow."

"It will be."

"Your faith in humanity is a boon to us all."

"I don't have faith in humanity—I have faith in happy endings."

"Really."

"Maxwell's got everything sorted," she said primly, paddling again. "He's got the papers all sorted out—Charlie's got to sign them, and I think Tom does too—"

"Ah, there's the problem—Tom would never let her go."

"If he cared about her so much, then he should act like it."

"Instead of renting apartment flats," Wilson added without thinking.

Willow stopped rowing. "Huh?"

Uh-oh. "Did I say something?"

"About an apartment flat." She turned to face him better. "He is cheating on her! You need to tell her!"

"I—I tried once—it—it wasn't the appropriate—"

"She's waffling because she thinks he loves her! You need to tell her!"

"And when, pray tell, is the appropriate time?"

Willow pursed her lips, irritated at him. Wilson hoped she didn't hit him with the oar.

Her next statement made him wish she had.

"Charlie invited us to tea tomorrow at her place."

Wilson heaved a sigh as he walked up the extravagant drive of Tom's place. Not Charlie's—nothing there really made him think of Charlie. It was all Tom's overbearingness.

It was a different extravagance than Maxwell's—it was old-world, old-money, old-fashioned. Wilson personally detested the place, but put up with it for Charlie's sake.

And of course, she had invited Willow, who would pester him until he told her—

He walked into the parlor—

And felt that his day had become a million times worse.

There was Maxwell.

In Tom's house!

"Say, pal, you don't look so good," Maxwell observed, tilting his teacup in Wilson' direction. It was the tea set he had bought for Charlie a few Christmases ago, he noted inanely.

"It's this dreadful heat," Charlie observed, pouring Willow another cup. "No one can do anything productive in weather like this."

"I like it hot," Willow said. "I like to think things'll spontaneously combust in this sort of heat."

Wilson heard the back door slam and pictured someone who would spontaneously combust upon arrival in the parlor.

Sure enough, Tom was dumbfounded upon spotting Maxwell standing in the parlor, drinking tea. Maxwell made the same observation about him that he did about Wilson, but suddenly the air was tense.

Wilson was forcibly reminded of the tea party he had hosted with Charlie and Maxwell—but there was no ducking out of the house this time. This awkwardness was more profound than before…it was like having barbed wire scraped across his nerves.

He was concerned by the fact that Charlie looked like a bundle of nerves as well. She kept fidgeting and dropping things. If it didn't kill Wilson, it would certainly kill Charlie.

"Maybe you and I should leave," he suggested to her, feeling she needed to be away from the source of her agitation for at least a few minutes.

"Yes!" Charlie exclaimed, leaping at the chance. "Yes, let's go—we could go to town! We should all go!"

That was not what Wilson had in mind, but something told him that Charlie was approaching hysteria. Best to let it go.

Tom argued the point—obviously not wanting to lose his home-field advantage, but now everyone had warmed to the idea; he had no choice but to go along.

Through some trick of Maxwell's—the man had a certain way of walking and talking that disarmed the unwary—Maxwell and Charlie ended up driving together into town in Tom's convertible, whilst Wilson and Willow were stuck with Tom as he was being a pal and filling up the tank on Maxwell's car.

Wilson found himself in the back seat, making it easier to tune Tom's inane uttering out. He had bigger problems—how to get his cousin out of this unscathed. This wasn't going to end well, he just knew it.

He was aware of the fact that they were at the gas station, that the gas man wasn't completely with them, that Maxwell and Charlie were speeding by happily—

That the gas man was talking about moving and taking his wife with him—

This alerted Wilson quickly. He glanced up, saw the gas man's wife looking down in horror at Tom with Willow in the front seat; glanced over, saw Tom's thunderstruck look.

Wilson was laughing as they pulled out. "What's so funny?" Tom snapped.

"The best laid plans of mice and polo players," Wilson replied, unable to resist the barb.

But as Tom sped into town, leaning into the wheel, focusing madly on Maxwell ahead of him, it occurred to Wilson that with everything falling apart around him, Tom would be willing to go to painful lengths to keep his greedy acquisitions together.

And that wouldn't end well for Charlie at all.

They found a fancy hotel with a vacant room. Wilson wondered why they had left the mansion at all.

It was actually worse in the room—it was smaller, cramped, hotter, with no cross-breezes. It was a pressure cooker ready to blow. Wilson's nerves were frayed to the max.

"I heard that the world's getting hotter," Tom declared loudly as Maxwell was calling for ice. The latter shot him a glare and went back to his phone conversation. "The whole place is going to burst into flame someday."

Wilson shot a quick glance at Willow. She seemed unperturbed by the declaration.

"Like a giant…what's it called…." Tom waved a hand, heat making him more dull-witted than usual. "Pressure cooker."

"I had a pressure cooker once," Wilson declared. He belatedly realized the heat was making him say inane things, but now that they were looking at him, he had to go on. "I was cooking a ham in it once—I got distracted with a new experiment, though, forgot all about it. The whole thing exploded—I never did find that ham."

Charlie started laughing at Wilson's story, Willow joined her, and Maxwell cracked a grin—but all fell silent at Tom's look.

"And what use was that story?"

"Well, it demonstrates that pressure increases under heat until disaster is inevitable—"

"No one wants to hear your science," Tom declared, waving him off.

"And yet they're perfectly willing to hear yours," Maxwell observed, reaching into his pocket—where Wilson knew he kept his cigars—and then pausing there, as though debating the wisdom of smoking in there. He settled for smoothing his suit lapels instead.

"I'm just saying what I heard."

"Maybe you should listen more."

That feeling of dread was growing, but now there was a good reason: Tom and Maxwell were now nose to nose.

"You know what else I've heard?" Tom asked, focused on Maxwell but addressing the room. "I've heard an awful lot about you—you and your little side-ventures with the pharmacies—"

"Tom, stop," Charlie said, trying for firm but sounding too wavery at the moment to truly be effective.

Tom went on like he hadn't heard her. "Oh yes—had to go make your money illegally because you couldn't hack it—"

"Charlie asked you to stop," Maxwell told him evenly.

"And she wouldn't marry you because you were a lousy huckster street performer who didn't have two cents to rub together!"

Wilson often wondered about the term they exploded. To him, emotions—while volatile—were not the excessively combustible explosives that demanded the term.

His opinion changed within the space of a blink.

On Tom's last accusation, Maxwell did explode into a ball of fury, grabbing Tom's lapels and running him straight back into the wall. With the expression Maxwell had just then, Wilson could fully believe the rumor that he had indeed killed a man.

"Maxwell, stop!" Charlie cried.

To Wilson's surprise, Maxwell did so, thus averting Wilson's fear of being witness to murder. Although, seeing Tom's expression, Wilson couldn't shake the feeling that the world wouldn't miss him terribly.

"See?" Tom asked, indicating Maxwell. "That's what happens when you let riffraff get above their status. Charlie, you don't love this man."

Charlie looked heartbroken and terrified. Wilson stood next to her protectively, appreciative of Willow coming up to her other side.

Maxwell took a step so he was between her and Tom. "Is that so? Well, she certainly doesn't love you—you uncultured swine."

"Charlie, you ought to sit down," Wilson said to her in an undertone. She looked like she was going to faint.

"NO!" Charlie yelled, again making Wilson think of the description explosive. "I'm tired of people telling me what to do and how to feel—I need air."

"See what you've done to her?" Tom asked, taking a step forward.

"Five years of you would do that to anybody," Maxwell retorted, taking another step to block his path. "Now you listen here—"

"No! You listen—"

"Here, Charlie," Wilson murmured to her, seating her down in a chair. "Put your head down—that's it. Where is that ice?" he groused, looking around. Willow, meanwhile, seemed focused on the train wreck destined to happen.

"She doesn't love you," Maxwell snapped. "She never did. She's leaving you, pal—we've already got the divorce papers drawn up."

Wilson was expecting Tom to look thunderstruck—he wasn't expecting him to sneer like he did.

"She never loved me, eh?" he asked. And then, as though he recalled that the person of interest was in the room, turned to Charlie.

"You never loved me?" he asked, seeking clarification.

"No," Charlie said flatly, although to Wilson it sounded like it could go either direction.

"Not even that time in Detroit, when I carried you so you wouldn't get your shoes wet?"

Charlie was crumbling. Wilson could see it. "Charlie," Wilson said.

"Well?" Tom asked, with none of the softness he had affected before. It was an act, a calculated act to get her to answer the way he wanted—

"Charlie, Tom's renting an apartment flat," Wilson blurted out.

Silence. Dead silence, Wilson thought.

Charlie blinked at him once, twice. It looked like maybe she was waking up from something….

And then he saw something small, thin, and fragile break in Charlie's eyes.

"Max, take me home," she said in a frail voice, looking away from them all. "Max, please."

Maxwell herded her out gently. Tom moved to intercept, but Wilson planted himself in the way.

"You just made a big mistake," Tom growled.

Wilson smiled thinly. "I'm certain. And what are you going to do about it?"

Wilson's next impression was that of a fist in his face, and the floor rushing up to meet his head.

Then blackness.