Disclaimer: I do not own Life is Strange or any of its characters. This story is for entertainment only.

Chapter Four

It's snowing outside when Chloe wakes up that morning.

She walks up to her desk and looks out the window, bringing a blanket to wrap around her shoulders because there's a chill in the air that clings to her skin. It's the first and likely only snow of the season, a light and delicate thing to indicate the beginning of the winter season and more cold weather to come. Chloe finds herself smiling, feeling oddly content as she watches the soft snowflakes drifting closer to the ground. She pulls her phone out and sends a text.

Chloe: have u looked outside

Her phone buzzes in response about five minutes later, right as Chloe is unlocking the window and lifting it up. She climbs up on the desk and ducks outside, inhaling sharply at the wave of icy air that hits her entire body. After crawling out and closing the window behind her, she wraps the blanket around herself even tighter before sitting down on the shingles and checking her phone.

Max: Look's like someone is up early. (^_^)

Chloe: but have u looked outside

Chloe: and DAMMIT MAX

Max: Haha. And no, I haven't. I'm not even out of bed yet. Why?

Chloe: just do it

She sits there like an idiot out in the cold, grinning as she waits to see Max's response to the beautiful day outside. It's cloudy and overcast but stunning in a melancholy sort of way that Chloe knows Max will totally dig. There's a bubbly feeling in her chest that she hasn't felt in a long time, burning within her despite the fact that she's actually shivering now. Chloe wishes the other girl was with her on the roof right then.

Her phone starts ringing and she can't wipe the dumb fucking smile off her face as she picks it up.

"It's snowing out!" she hears the girl exclaim on the other end of the line.

"Thanks for pointing that out, Captain Obvious. But isn't it fucking awesome?" Chloe hears Max laughing at her and she can feel the affection for the other girl humming in her bones. "I wish you were out here with me. You could totally take some epic shots."

There's a slight pause. Then, "Wait—are you outside?"

"Well, duh, it's snowing out! Of course I am!"

"Jesus, Chloe," Max says with what sounds like an exasperated huff. "Get back inside, you're going to catch a cold, silly." Chloe swears she can hear the smile on the other girl's lips though. Rolling her eyes, she nods even though Max can't see her.

"Aye, aye, Captain."

After they hang up, Chloe sends her another text.

Chloe: two whales, 25 mins

Chloe: wont be late this time, promise

Max: You better not be, otherwise you're paying.

She crawls back inside, bouncing to keep herself warm. The entire time she's getting ready there's a little grin on her lips that she can't seem to erase.

For the first time ever, Chloe gets to the diner before Max. She taps her fingers along the table and smirks triumphantly as she sees the shorter girl walk in.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. You can try to rub it in my face, but don't forget that I'm still five minutes early."

They sit and chat for a while, just talking about anything and everything over the table until Joyce comes around and takes their orders. Even though it's nice, after a bit Chloe begins to get the feeling that Max's mind is wandering elsewhere. It starts to get on her nerves, especially when she's trying to tell her about some shit her step-douche had pulled the other day.

"Max, hello? You there?" Chloe huffs out an annoyed sigh as she snaps her fingers in front of the other girl's face. Max blinks in response, looking startled and not unlike a deer caught in headlights. Admittedly, the expression is borderline adorable and Chloe feels some of her previous ire dying out.

"Huh?"

"You keep zoning out. What's up?" she asks, taking a sip of her coffee. She's been noticing this more and more lately, too. It had almost been three weeks since Chloe had shown up at Max's dorm room in the middle of the night—only to find her gone—but ever since, she can't help but think that something's been off about the other girl. Chloe's still extremely curious about the contents of the large case Max had been carrying when she got back to the room that night.

She wants to know the truth, yet at the same time she's trying desperately not to pry too hard. Max had obviously not been keen on sharing that information with her.

"S-sorry," Max says, looking a little sheepish. "I'm just stressed out because finals are coming up next week and I need to study more."

"You study way too much. Sure you're okay?"

Max seems to hesitate for a second and then she looks down at her plate. It seems like she's contemplating her words, or whether or not she's even going to say them. Right when Chloe is almost sure that she's not going to say anything, Max glances up at her.

"I don't know. I can't stop thinking about something Mr. Jefferson told me a couple weeks ago."

Chloe blinks, mind turning. "You mean, the famous photographer you're always talking about?"

"I don't talk about him all the time," she mutters a little indignantly. "But yeah, him."

"What happened?" Chloe asks, pushing her finished plate to the side. Max's expression looks unsettled and for a moment Chloe just wants to change the conversation topic to distract the other girl's attention away from whatever is troubling her. Her curiosity gets the better of her, however.

"He held me after class one day and started going on about how he understood me and crap. It was kind of creepy."

"But isn't it hella cool that your teacher is taking the time to talk to you?" Chloe narrows her eyes, trying to piece together what was necessarily wrong with what Max just told her.

"Yeah," she replies, nibbling at the last bit of her eggs and bacon. "It's probably nothing. He hasn't done or said anything else since then, so I guess it's fine."

"Is that all though?"

"What do you mean?" Max asks warily, looking up at the serious expression Chloe is throwing at her.

"I feel like there's something you aren't telling me. Normally something like this wouldn't freak you out, like, at all." Chloe watches the way a few expressions flicker across Max's face then—alarm, hesitation, worry—and then she knows that the other girl is withholding information.

"I'm just being paranoid," Max says after a long pause.

"Whatever," Chloe says, but her insides squirm because she wishes that Max would confide in her. She doesn't admit it, but it hurts that after everything, there's still an abundance of things that she doesn't know and Max doesn't seem comfortable sharing them with her. She just wants her friend to trust her and the fact that there's still distance between them makes her throat constrict just a little bit.

If she's entirely honest, it scares her. It awakens that little part of her that's terrified of being left all alone again.

It hasn't snowed again since that day—in fact, it's warmed up some— but it's still cold out. Chloe lazily watches as her breath comes out in visible little puffs of air.

"I can't believe you dragged me out here in this weather," Max says to her left. The girl is bundled up in a cute sweater with multiple deer images knit into the design and she's holding her arms in her hands, rubbing them.

"Whatever, I know you love it when it's gloomy and shit," she replies, nudging her in the shoulder.

"Yeah." The little smile she gets in response makes her feel so warm that no amount of freezing weather could combat it.

They walk through the junkyard until they're close to the train tracks, where the remains of someone else's bonfire remains. Chloe bends down and gets to work on starting a new fire, and in the corner of her eyes she watches Max wander off, camera in hand. After she's got a nice little bundle of flames up and going, she spreads out the old blanket from her house out on the ground. It's an ancient and tattered thing she doesn't mind getting dirty.

"Yo, Max! Get your ass over here! We've got fire power!"

She grins as the other girls comes over. Max quirks an eyebrow. "Really? A blanket? Seems a little cliché, don't you think?"

"Whatever, I just wanna chill. Get it? Because it's col—"

"Stop it, you're ridiculous," Max giggles, sitting down on the material and sticking her hands out in front of the flames. Chloe sits down next to her, close enough that they're shoulder-to-shoulder. Being in each other's presence is peaceful, and for a long time they just sit there, warming up and staring into the fire. Chloe watches the memorizing way the flames flicker and lick towards the sky. It's utterly captivating.

She jumps a little and her heart begins to thump just a pace faster when Max leans her head on her shoulder. Chloe hears a contented sigh disappear into the air. "I love just being able to hang out with you again."

"Me too," she says, slipping an arm around the other girl.

Another great expanse of time passes in silence, the two of them simply sitting before the fire, leaning into one another. Max's hair smells of vanilla and she thinks there might be a hint of cinnamon there too. The scent is intoxicating and it there's a part of Chloe that has to resist the urge to just nuzzle into the other girl.

Then she blinks at that line of thinking, mentally shaking her head. Get yourself together, she scolds herself. And in her attempt to redirect her thoughts to other places, they wander to a less pleasant area, and she finds herself thinking about that night Max hadn't been in her room. That pang of sadness ripples through her heart again, knowing that Max doesn't want her to know the truth. She contemplates speaking, tries so damn hard to keep her mouth shut, but after a while she can't help herself.

"Max, you know you can tell me anything, right?" Chloe says softly, glancing at the other girl. That uncomfortable sensation of being left of the dark still remains in her stomach and she wishes that she could expel it entirely.

"I know, Che."

With a sigh, an internal war writhes inside her, one that Max is currently oblivious to. She should drop it; she should just be grateful that they're together again. Ultimately though, she's powerless to stop the words from leaping out of her mouth. "Then how come you won't tell me what was in that case?"

Chloe watches as Max sits up some at that question, pulling away a bit and blinking at her. "You're still worried about that?"

"Well, come on. My best friend is off in the middle of the night and she comes back with that shit and won't tell me about it? Of course I still want to know what that was. I hope there wasn't a dead body in it."

"A body wouldn't have fit in there."

"Whatever, maybe it was just a head," Chloe scoffs, rolling her eyes. "I just want to know what you're hiding from me."

Max looks away, the expression on her face... almost wistful in nature. Like she wants to tell her but doesn't have the courage to do so. Or she doesn't trust you, the unhelpful voice in Chloe's head supplies. It's a long time before Max says anything, and when she does, the other girl refuses to meet Chloe's hard gaze.

"I can't tell you."

"Why?" Chloe asks, feeling her gut start to sink.

"I... I just can't. And I wish that you'd drop it because it's nothing."

"It's not nothing if you insist on hiding it so damn much," Chloe says, feeling her voice raise, letting the volume cover up the way it wants to crack.

She feels like her walls are being torn down, brick by brick.

"You don't have to get mad, Chloe," Max says, staring at her lap.

But she feels all her insecurities crawling up in her throat and climbing out her mouth. Suddenly, without even thinking, words start tumbling out into the air.

"It's just—I don't know! You've been all shady and shit lately and I don't know why you can't just tell me what's wrong! I'm your best friend, aren't I? Or is that a big fucking lie? How long till you up and abandon me again?" When she's done, Chloe feels like her heart is about to shatter into a million little pieces and the only person who could possibly stop that from happening is the girl in front of her. In that moment, she's torn away her defenses and now her soul is out there in the open, there for Max to see.

Max looks so conflicted in response, her face contorted in a painful mixture of confusion and sadness. "God, Chloe, I want to tell you. You have no idea," she whispers.

"Then tell me, Max!" Chloe can't tell if she feels like crying, or screaming, or possibly both at the same time.

"Listen, Chloe," the shorter girl says, looking away for a second before she grabs both of Chloe's hands in her own. In the back of her head, Chloe can't help but notice how Max rubs little circles on the tops of her hands. "I'm so sorry I left back then. But I'm not going to leave you again, I promise. I'm not going to run away again. I need you to know that, Chloe."

She feels her will to fight beginning to die, instead being replaced with the feeling of cold dejection settling over her. "But what were you running away from?"

"Everything," she says so quietly Chloe almost can't hear the words. "Life kicked me in the ass and I ran away, and I'm going to be forever sorry to you for that."

There are a thousand retorts she could have said then, but instead she just starts feeling bad. "I... I trust that you did what needed to be done... whatever the fuck that was. Listen, I'm sorry for being an ass."

"It's okay, Chloe. Honestly, you have every right to be upset with me... I'm the worst friend ever for leaving."

"First of all, that's not fucking true, because you came back. Second, at least you don't get pissy over crap and then blow your top like I do. I could go on, but I don't want this to turn into fight about who's the shittier friend, so let's just leave it at I'm sorry."

"I'm sorry too," Max says, sighing but leaning into her again. "Honestly, I've been a little on-edge lately myself. Finals are next week and I don't feel prepared at all even though I've been studying every night."

A thought flashes across Chloe's mind. "Okay, hey, if it's finals that's got you so freaked out, then let's do something fun this weekend."

"Fun?" Max asks, looking up at her. She looks a little skeptical but her curiosity is definitely piqued.

Chloe throws a grin at her. "Yeah. Saturday. You can do all the studying you want before and after then, but on Saturday we're gonna go fuck shit up! Just you and me, no textbooks." Max laughs at her enthusiasm, looks away for a moment, and then nods.

"It's a date, then."

Author's Note: Heh, something really fun happens next chapter. I mean, it's not very fun for Max or Chloe and things get worse before they get better, but it's pretty fun for us writers and readers, I think. I hope. Drop a review if you think you know what's going to happen~

Also! I have a tumblr now, courtesy of my friend Zio. My domain is: just-a-pirate-i-used-to-know - so follow me! I'll be dropping updates and additional story notes over the story there, and if you have any questions about the story, that's the place to ask them.

And lastly, I'd like to say thank you for all the reviews and follows and favorites so far! It means the world to me.