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

Chapter Seven

She can't stop fidgeting. Her fingers tap against the table in an endless routine, drumming along the surface as she waits for Chloe to show up. In fact, Max feels as though she hasn't stopped moving from the moment that happened in the forest. She hasn't slept a single second since, nor has she been able to study. Even though she has two finals today, she can't even find it in herself to care or worry about them, despite how panicked she'd been about them only a few days ago. The thought sends a dry chuckle up her throat.

Glancing at the clock on her phone, she admittedly hopes that she and Chloe can wrap this up before she needs to be back at Blackwell, but she still has almost an hour and a half before her first class begins so she doubts it'll be an issue. At the same time, she's prepared to stay with the girl as long as it possibly takes for them to work out the kinks that all this has inevitably caused. Her priorities are set, clearly.

Even now, after a couple of days have passed, it still feels ridiculously unreal. There's a part of Max that wonders if any of this actually happened. Then that makes her think about how if it's surreal for her, then it must seem like a bad pipe dream for Chloe. Max sighs as she takes a drink of her coffee; the caffeinated beverage is honestly the only thing she's been able to consume the past two days without feeling sick. Everything else sounds absolutely unappealing, and she had told Joyce this when she came along asking for her order; that'd resulted in a concerned look accompanied by a brief comment about hoping she felt better soon. Yeah, I hope so too.

Chloe's five minutes late now and of course Max hasn't received a text, and she's left wondering if it's just the usual amount of lateness or if the other girl decided to bail. Max discards finger tapping in favor of bouncing her leg anxiously, sighing through her teeth. After a few minutes, she combines the two nervous acts together, unable to help herself.

Almost another ten minutes pass and she's just about to send a likely futile text when the door chimes and a head of blue walks in. And Max's heart stutters for a second as a shock wave of nerves jump throughout her. The feeling of pure anticipation sits like a rock in the pit of her stomach and for a wild moment she actually decides that she doesn't want to talk to Chloe, and that fleeing the diner seems like a much more appealing idea. But it passes and she watches as Chloe approaches and slides into the booth across from her.

Max hasn't exactly planned the conversation out in her head, like the idiot she is. "Hey," she says lamely.

"Don't 'hey' me," Chloe snaps at her, but then it's immediately followed by a grunt. "Sorry."

"It's fine," Max replies, looking away. The silence that follows is so weird that the awkwardness is almost tangible. Chloe's the one who speaks after a few moments.

"Is this really—did this really fucking happen?" she asks.

Max looks up at her then, staring her in the face. "Yeah," she exhales. "It did."

"Why didn't you just tell me?"

The first thing that flashes through Max's mind is incredulously at the question. Isn't it blatantly obvious why? But then she sees the expression on Chloe's face and her heart slips again. No one else would have been able to detect it, but Max can. Right below the surface is the faint trace of hurt and betrayal, carefully hidden but still peeking through, visible to her and likely only her.

"Chloe... I couldn't," Max says softly. She doesn't even know how to articulate it; she wishes she could just telepathically convey her emotions and reasoning to the other girl.

"I'm your best friend though. I could have handled it."

"But Chloe, look how you responded. You ignored me for two days straight."

"Boo-fucking-hoo," Chloe sneers. Then her voice raises as she continues on. "Maybe I wouldn't have reacted that way if you hadn't fallen off a fucking cliff and then asked me to fuc—"

"I know, I know," Max interjects before things can get out of hand. "You have every right to be pissed. I'm sorry."

"For the record, I'm still hella freaked the fuck out," Chloe mutters under her breath. Then she snatches the coffee mug on the table and takes a long sip out of it before slapping the cup back down. That's when something catches Max's eye and she grabs Chloe's wrist, looking down at it and blinking in surprise. Where a wound should have been, there's only a perfectly healed scar: a ghost of what had happened, a permanent mark to signal a memory. She runs a thumb over it.

"That's new," Max says quietly, and she's silently thankful Chloe doesn't pull away.

"What do you mean?"

"There's no way that would have been healed already under normal conditions," she replies, still rubbing her finger over the mark.

"Oh, yeah," she huffs. "That also contributed to the breakdown I totally had the other night."

Max frowns. "I didn't want you to find out, Chloe. Much less... like this."

"So you weren't going to tell me." It's a statement, not a question.

Guilt pokes through her again at that line and the wounded look on Chloe's face. Truthfully, Max doesn't know. She had never been entirely sure what she wanted to do. "I certainly considered it," Max says, looking down at her hands. It sounds pitiful, even to her ears. "I wanted to, I swear."

"But you didn't. Because you don't trust me," Chloe replies, frowning.

"Come on, that's not fair, Chloe. I've never told anyone about this. You're the only person who knows now." Then her thoughts flicker to Mr. Jefferson and that awful sense of unease flashes through her. She certainly hopes that Chloe is the only one who knows, and that's something she never imagined she'd be thinking to herself.

"That doesn't change the fact that you didn't plan on telling me," the blue-haired girl says sharply, her voice beginning to rise again.

"Chloe, please."

"Okay, whatever. I've had enough of this," she huffs, moving to get up. Max grabs her wrist though, looking the other girl in the eyes.

"Wait—"

"No Max, I can't take this shit. It's too much, even for me."

With a painful likeness to the scene that'd taken place just a couple days prior, Max is forced to watch as the blue-haired girl stands up and hastily makes her way out of the diner. Except this time, instead of blind shock and confusion written on Chloe's face, there's hurt and anger there. It prickles uncomfortably in Max's stomach and her heart thumps heavily in her chest as she sits there, just wishing she could make everything okay again.

She's both horrified yet incredibly relieved when the bell rings, startling her out of her intense testing mode. With a deep breath of resignation, she flips the thick packet of paper over and tries not to think about how she was only three-quarters finished with it, and how the likelihood of her having bombed that final was very plausible. It was impossible though, attempting to focus when all her thoughts would throw at her were images of Chloe and the hurt painted on her face.

Max internally groans, gathering up her things before making her way to the door, plopping the test on the teacher's desk alongside the other students slowly filtering out of class. It's okay, Max. Mr. Jefferson's class is next. That should be... fine.

She doesn't waste anytime shuffling to his class. There's still ten minutes before the bell rings, and she wants to just sit down and try to collect herself for a few moments. She tries to avoid Mr. Jefferson's gaze when she slips into the classroom, but naturally he spots her and immediately approaches her. Something inside her—some instinct—flutters in panic for a moment until she reminds herself that everything is okay.

"Max!"

"Good afternoon, Mr. Jefferson," she says politely, awkwardly shifting her weight from foot to foot.

"No need to be so formal," he replies, smiling at her. "You're free to call me Mark."

"Oh, uh. That's... that's alright. Thanks though," she stammers, trying to figure out what he's getting at. It feels weird. The way he's looking at her; it reminds Max of that first time he started going off about odd shit, and in turn, her stomach churns with unease.

"Anyway," he continues, that eerie smile still playing on his lips. "I have some things I'd like to discuss with you, Max. Mind sticking around after class for a bit?"

Oh no, it's just like last time, she thinks, the pit of her stomach dropping a little. "S-sure," she almost chokes before darting to her desk. Calm the fuck down, Max, she mentally hisses at herself. Really, she doesn't have a reason to feel so panicked, like an animal backed up into a corner. There's just something about Mr. Jefferson that feels off. She'd hoped so much that she'd been imagining it that day the previous week, that nothing like that would ever happen again... but here it was again, that terrifying feeling clawing at her insides.

She tries not to think about it as the class drags on at an impossibly slow pace. Max mutters little reassuring lines to herself in her head. He's just going to pester you about getting your work out there. Or he wants to know what you plan on doing after the school year is over. Yeah. It's cool, Max.

When the bell rings, she wants to dart out the door, but knows she won't be able to. Victoria tries to chat with Mr. Jefferson like usual, but he dismisses her and she leaves with a little sneer on her face. It's not until everyone is out of the class that he leans against his desk and gestures for Max to come over. It's like anvils are tied to her feet as she walks up to him.

"So," he says, drawing the word out. "Max. I'd like to talk about your true nature."

She stares at him, heart thumping uncomfortably in her throat. "What... what do you mean?"

It would be impossible to convince her that time doesn't slow down at that moment. As soon as the words are out of her mouth, the nanoseconds seem borderline tangible as the following events come to pass. It's unlike anything she's experienced before and she wishes that it would stop, because the way her throat begins to constrict with an unknown tightness makes he queasy and her desire to flee only heightens.

Because his thin smile turns into a toothy grin, things stop moving in slow motion, and then her brain stops as it attempts to comprehend what she sees. There are fangs there. Two very sharp, clear-as-day, fangs just like her own. They're there for about a second before they're gone and he's talking again.

"We're a lot more alike that I'm sure you ever imagined, Max."

She wants to reply, but she doesn't know what to say. Her mental processing abilities jumped out the window and now she can't seem to find anything to respond with, so instead her mouth hangs open a little bit but words do not fall out. Then he reaches out to put a hand on her shoulder, and she flinches away. He sighs.

"Listen, I know it's a lot to take in," he starts, his expression sympathetic. Her stomach is rolling and she feels like she might throw up. "How about dinner at my place, tomorrow if that sounds good? I can tell you everything you could possibly need to know."

What? Dinner? For a terrible moment she can't even understand what those simple words mean. Slowly, her thoughts begin to catch up, and they're nothing but panicked and freaked out. Yet there's a very small piece of sanity still clinging on, and it's an odd flurry of terror but also curiosity. She's spent years thinking about what she is, trying to figure out why and how everything happened the way it did... and now there's someone who might be able to supply some of the answers she's always wanted. It would either be very wise, or very foolish to refuse. She isn't entirely sure which is accurate.

"O-okay," she blurts, backing up, fully prepared to dart out the door. Before she can though, his arm shoots out and grabs her arm and then he looks her in the eyes. His voice seems to resonate all around her when he speaks.

"I'll pick you up in parking lot after school tomorrow. You can't run from me, Max Caulfield. And I promise, by the time this is all over... you won't want to."

She rips herself from his grip then and stumbles out the classroom door, where she then makes a prompt beeline for the bathrooms. Max doesn't—or rather, can't—bring her attention to anything else. The students still loitering around, the fact that people are throwing her nasty looks because of the way she's shoving past them, or the way David scoffs in a less-than-polite way when she passes him... none of that even registers in her mind.

When she's in the bathroom, there's no one at the sinks but she doesn't bother checking the stalls to see if the entire room is empty or not. She just goes for the stall on the far end, slipping inside and slamming the door shut before turning around to lean against it. A cold sheen of sweat covers her forehead as she tries to slow the flow of adrenaline in her veins and quench the terrible feeling in her stomach.

Then something overcomes her, and she's on her knees at the porcelain, throwing up over the edge. All that comes out is the little bit of coffee from the morning and from there on out it's just dry heaves into the toilet. It's one of the worst things she's felt in a long time. In fact, the last time she had felt this sick, to the point of actually hurling, was... before she was a vampire.

That thought doesn't makes things better. Instead, she finds herself gripping the edge of the toilet even harder as her body retches, trying to expel a non-existent spirit from her gut.

When it finally stops, she shakily rises to her feet, her lips trembling like leaves in the autumn wind. A few long minutes pass until she's pretty sure it's done for good, and she steps outside the stall and looks around. There's certainly no one out here now, and she sighs a quiet huff of relief. It's odd, but somehow the vomiting actually succeeded in making her feel a little better. At least, thoughts about Jefferson and the events of the past day didn't seem quite as bad compared to the physical spell she'd just experienced.

She waits a few more minutes, splashes cold water on her face, and then waits some more until she's positive she's feeling better. Granted, "better" just means she no longer feels like she's on the verge of attempting to throw up all of her insides; she's still thoroughly freaked out. Finally, when she exits the girls' bathroom, she doesn't bother going to class, entirely unable to give a shit about the remaining final she has for the day.

I can... take it later... she quietly murmurs to herself in her head. Max steps outside and squints as the overwhelmingly bright sunlight hits her, and she awkwardly pulls her shades out of her bag and slips them on before continuing to the Prescott Dormitories. It's still ridiculously bright and unpleasant, but it's honestly on the bottom on her list of concerns at the moment.

It's funny how, despite her ever-growing list of problems and things to address, Chloe is still up there at the top. Jefferson is a very, very close second, but a little voice in the back of her head chuckles at how Chloe will always sit up there, the utmost of her priorities.

It feels like ages before she's finally made it back inside the dormitories and to her room, but once she's safely inside the comfort of her "home," she locks the door and collapses on her bed. She's not tired. Of course she's not. But nonetheless, she's mentally exhausted in a way hasn't been familiar with in a long time, and she finds herself wishing she could fall asleep like a normal human could.

After staring at the ceiling for a good twenty minutes or so, in a broken daze, she pulls out her phone.

Max: Chloe. Please give me the chance to explain fully? Shit's happening and fuck, I really need you right now.

She hesitates before sending it, biting her bottom lip as she contemplates her wording, before eventually sending it anyway. She's not entirely surprised by the complete lack of response an hour later though; the other girl had been pretty pissed off at the diner that morning. Nonetheless, an odd pang of both annoyance and sadness shoot through her at the fact that Chloe doesn't respond.

Max spends the rest of the day with her head in her hands, trying to figure out what to do and how her life had boiled down to the current mess that it was over the past few days. She finds that a conclusion to both questions is not easy to find.

Author's Note: Ahhhhhh... I haven't been writing. I suppose that's why I wrote several chapters ahead, so I'd have something to post if I were desperate. I'm so sorry to those of you who were expecting things to be good between Max and Chloe in this chapter. Things get a bit dark after this... but they're on good terms again by chapter nine, so there's that!

And thank you everyone for the kind words and reviews. It means the absolute world to me.