Disclaimer: Anything familiar to you, I don't own. This is a work of fanfiction for personal amusement, fulfillment and a bit of self-therapy. I make nothing from any of it.
Chapter Forty-Six: Deipnon
January 25th, 2012 3:02 PM
"So," Dana declared as Rachel waited uneasily for her to continue. "The next party is Saturday, February 11th." Rachel glanced toward Max. The photographer looked conflicted. Rachel was, too. It was good to have a date and time but the eleventh seemed awfully close. Dana seemed to be trying to reassure them, but there was a certain edge to her voice. The girl was perfectly capable of remaining calm most of the time but when something genuinely upset her she either could not or did not care to obscure that fact. "The bad news," she started and then Rachel came to understand the distaste in her tone, "you'll be coming up with the theme and decorations for the gym, which is where it'll take place, since it's gonna be a big one." That's kind of a hefty task alone, Rachel thought. Immediately she decided that the only way to pull it off was not to take it too seriously. Overthinking was for the birds. She took one look around the crowded hallway they stood to one side of before leaning back against the wall. Max was not so relieved. The photographer had not yet relaxed her shoulders beneath the ragged, dark red sweatshirt that had once been Chloe's. The photographer was frowning. "Yeah, I think it's bullshit, too. You've got a week to at least come up with a theme but it'd be better have the decorations too. If you've got any questions you can talk to me or Hayden though." Glancing toward Max, who grimaced, Rachel wondered just how much leeway they would be given on the 'asking questions' portion of the test. "One more thing," Dana added as she reached up, as if to check whether the ponytail that was holding her hair back was straight or not. Her tone shifted now toward someone who was perhaps treading a little lightly around an awkward topic.
"What's up?" Max asked her. Rachel rather thought the brunette was trying to put their friend at ease and had to admit that Max had a fairly good grasp on the 'cool, calm and collected' voice at that point.
"Well, I guess I wondered why you didn't come to me about getting into the Vortex Club. No offense to Hayden, but I think I could've found a way to get it done that was a little less – messy?" Rachel laughed. Messy was a fairly light word to apply to pretty boy Nathan's meltdown and being subsequently put on his butt by Hayden Jones. The almost immediate exposure of all of the club's inner politics, too, qualified as something a little more than 'messy.' Dana gave a wry smile at her laugh, as if to say it was the best word she could come up with.
"It's my fault," Max promised. "We thought about coming to you, but we figured Hayden was the better call, because Nathan was never going to be just a little annoyed. He was always going to throw a fit." Dana shrugged as if to say she couldn't argue the point in light of recent events. "Besides, Hayden's the only one I've ever known to really handle the asshole. I didn't know they had so much history, though and I kinda feel bad now."
"Don't," Dana and Rachel said at once.
"Seriously," the cheerleader continued, "don't. It's the weirdest shit but Hayden's been losing his patience with Nathan more and more. I think it's been coming since he hit Hayden with that first chair. But, you know what, I get it. I just want you to know I've got your backs and so do Juliet and Hayden. The committee's basically asking you to make decisions that we make as a whole. You're doing the majority of the brainstorming alone. It's kind of a shitty test, actually, but Nathan was pushy as hell." At this confession, Dana paused to look at Rachel for a few seconds as if looking for something. Maybe she just wanted to know if Rachel realized how big of a pain in the ass Nathan was going to be, maybe something else was going on. She didn't know. What she did know was that there was a certain head of bright blue hair bouncing down the hall toward them.
"Hey," Max said, drawing Dana's attention. "Seriously, thanks. We won't let you down." Dana waved a hand and then followed Rachel's gaze.
"Oh, the old ball and chain is coming." The cheerleader once more checked her hair as if it was an absent minded gesture and then waved at Chloe and Steph as they approached. Dana took her leave of them before the others arrived, but it didn't stop Chloe from practically bounding up to them. For all that she looked eager, there was also a certain exhaustion in her eyes. Rachel was beginning to suspect the source of Chloe's recent irritability and frequent weariness might be depression related. Sometimes it looks so much like Max's bad days.
Just before the four were reunited, Steph tapped Chloe on the shoulder and whispered something to her, causing the bluenette to slow and look behind herself. Rachel followed both sets of eyes down the hall to David, who stood right in front of a set of double doors, arms crossed and almost definitely staring at them. She was again struck by Max's suspicion that he was keeping an eye on them all over again. The fact was that Max was probably the least aggressive of them all when it came to distrusting David. Now, whenever they spotted him looking their way she acted as she was now. Beside Rachel, Max squared her shoulders and held herself as tall as she could, eyes narrowing, face scowling, arms crossed. There weren't many people who Max disliked who did not also scare her enough to keep her from trying to stand up to them. Apparently threatening me or Chloe gets you on Max's shitlist. Who would've thunk it? Max's promise to Frank on the first day she had met either of them rang out. 'If you ever lay another hand on Chloe, or for that matter, her, then you'll get to be the one who tells all your hella scary friends how you got beat up by a little girl with a stick. You understand?' Rachel wondered if, in the here and now, Max was still capable of swinging a baseball bat when threatened with violence. Would she still willingly fight back? Rachel hoped, but understood that there was a world of difference between that person and the one staring David down.
Apparently realizing he had been made, the man made a motion that was such that Rachel could almost imagine his grunt of frustration and then turned to look away. That seemed to be good enough for Chloe, who pulled her hat down over her head and turned to approach. Steph followed with her arms still crossed, looking put out. Rachel couldn't blame her. Steph had not taken kindly to the idea that David might have been watching her and none of them were stupid enough to think that David did not know, in a town this small, precisely where Chloe was living. It wasn't that long of a drive to check the entire town and Chloe's beloved Frankentruck stuck out like a sore thumb.
"Hey you," Rachel greeted them. Max continued to glare past Chloe, but Rachel wanted things to move along. Shifting beneath her jacket which was beginning to feel a little warm inside the building, Rachel made a gesture toward the front doors. Steph relaxed a bit at the idea of getting away from David's prying eyes and returned the greeting.
"How goes, guys?" They put on a show of a friendly conversation as they passed through the front doors, but once they were shut behind the four of them the real topic du jour came out quite quickly.
"Um, so, are we being followed?" Chloe asked the group at large, refusing to turn. Rachel, on the other hand, had no such compunctions. She glanced back at the doors which showed no sign of so much as another student, much less David Madsen. Shaking her head, Chloe sighed. "I'm not sure if I'm paranoid or he is."
"There's no reason to think he's back to his stalking shit," Max chimed in.
"I just had really hoped David was not going to be a problem anymore." Steph adjusted the strap of her backpack and hefted it farther up. Whether this was an intentional gesture or not it tended to indicate that she was very done with being on campus and was ready to go home. Rachel didn't blame her and they did have plans of a sort. "Let's just hope for the best and go have dinner. Rachel and I can sit on our asses and leave it to Max and Chloe." Chloe grimaced, glancing sideways at Max as if she didn't know whether or not to be excited or concerned about cooking with her.
"Hey, don't be like that. I'm actually looking forward to it, a bit." Chloe only shrugged beneath her thin, dark jacket and looked dubious. I'm not sure if she actually thinks Max can't be trusted in the kitchen or if she's just screwing with her. Either way, Max's face reddened slightly and it was somewhat on the cute side, so Rachel did not step in as they started the trek to the parking lot. "Deal with it," Max finally shot back, earning a smile that split Chloe's face from ear to ear. "I've got some second hand experience, anyway." Max did often tell them that in the other timeline she and Chloe had tried to learn to cook better. In that Chloe's case, it had been a necessity as a result of work. Still, Rachel imagined that their Max held a few memories of cooking with Chloe. Some people enjoyed that kind of thing. Rachel was not one of those people.
"What do you mean second hand experience?" Chloe asked as she hit the top step of the staircase down into the lot. Rachel leaned in close and flicked her on the end of her nose in response. "Ow, what was that for," the artist demanded, reaching out to steady herself on the rail so as not to lose her balance.
"To remind you to use your brain," Rachel shot back. "You've got a big beautiful one, take advantage of it."
"Awww, she loves you for your brain. You've got a keeper there." Chloe only glared past Max to Steph. Rachel preened under the praise.
"See?" she asked. "Steph knows I'm a keeper." Whatever Chloe mumbled in response was muffled by the hand rubbing at the end of her nose. Rachel had long ago considered that their relationship was going to lose an important aspect of it if the day ever came when they stopped giving each other shit. She was glad that, even in her occasionally less than agreeable state, Chloe still knew how to give as good as she got. "Alright, who's riding where?"
"Shotgun in Rachel's car," Max declared.
"I'll ride with Steph," Chloe replied, sounding a little grumpy. "Give you two time to plot against me." Rachel dug out her key fob and unlocked her car with a couple of swift clicks. The tail lights flashed, just in case the locks themselves couldn't be heard. Chloe looked pointedly away toward Steph's car.
"You know you're all we ever talk about," the photographer promised.
"Who could blame you?" Chloe asked them. Rachel took one last look at the artist's grin and opened the door to her vehicle.
Once Steph and Rachel had secured a coke for themselves, they had essentially been told to either sit down around the table or get out of the kitchen. The pair of them had chosen to do the first in order to be able to talk to Max and Chloe, not to mention pet Pompidou as they spoke. The dog turned his head eagerly from side to side as Max and Chloe went through what their options were and began retrieving pots and pans. The girls' words were almost drowned out by the sound of a tail thumping rapidly against the floor. Rachel laughed and shrugged off her shirt.
"We've got everything we need for a decent pasta," Max said. "I think we go for it. Quick and easy." Chloe's response was to nod and turn a dial on the oven, preheating it.
"I'm glad I pulled the chicken out of the freezer yesterday," the bluenette responded. Rachel popped open her drink as Pompidou turned his attention to Max, who was freeing said chicken from the bottom shelf of the refrigerator. Rachel did like the idea of something big, carb loaded and filling right about then. Besides, how hard could it be to do pasta right? Rachel couldn't say she had ever cooked any pasta that didn't come prepackaged in squares before.
"So," Rachel said once the conversation about what to make died down and the sound of pots and pans being retrieved finished. "The Vortex Club has spoken. Max and I have to decide the theme and decorations for the Valentine's Day party in early February." Max grimaced a bit as she turned back to the lot of them. Rachel tried to read the photographer and really only got frustration from her. She did not look to be enjoying herself in the moment. Rachel rather thought it had little to nothing to do with making dinner or even the Vortex Club. Max tended to get lost in her own thoughts a lot more often, lately.
"It'll be on February 11th and we're in the gym again," the photographer informed them as Chloe began to fill a decently sized pot with water. Max turned away to resume what she was doing in laying out chicken in the pan in front of them. "That means it'll be a lot of work putting the decorations up. But we've got to come up with something that won't look like shit with plenty of flashing lights and maybe a video screen of some type." Rachel did recall Dana floating that idea by the two of them.
"We'll need a theme first," Rachel reminded the photographer, who moved to the sink to wash up as Chloe set the pot on the stove and began to dig into Steph's spice cabinet. "I guess it better be 'love' related."
"Any ideas?" Steph asked, drawing Rachel's attention back to the table, where Steph had her sketchbook open in front of her and had just put glaring at the sketch in front of her on pause. From where Rachel was it looked to be some kind of scene involving a pair of characters she didn't recognize in front of a seaside scene. Chloe and Max briefly mumbled to one another about what to do with the chicken as Rachel pondered a response. In the end she was forced to admit she hadn't a single clue. While the other two decided to start the pasta after the chicken had cooked a bit, Steph leaned back in her seat. "Well, in that case, I have a bone to pick with all three of you." Something about the way she worded that set Rachel and Max both on edge, because when Max turned back to them, her jaw was set and Rachel felt herself sitting up a little straighter.
"Why is it that you've never tried to figure out why you're all metahuman and no one else is?"
"I'm not calling myself a metahuman," Chloe insisted immediately, turning away from the oven to join the conversation, her arms crossed over her chest to show she was not kidding, here. "I'm a perfectly normal human, just not typical."
"Then what about 'atypical'?"
"Nah," the punk shot back. "Sounds like some kind of psychological term and I feel like applying psychology to this wouldn't be very bright." The sound of the coil heating beneath the pot of water interrupted the brief silence as Steph sighed and itched her chin.
"You're being difficult, you know?" she asked.
"That's alright, I'm having fun being difficult."
"It's a valid question, though," Max said, cutting across them. "I mean, there are some things we've got in common. All three of us have lived in Arcadia Bay."
"If that's what it is," Chloe chimed in as she crossed toward the refrigerator and dug a drink out for herself, "then we could narrow things down a bit." Max motioned for one for herself.
"And how is that?" Steph queried.
"Well," Chloe said, pulling up first one and then another drink. As she passed one to Max, the tattoo'd artist continued, rolling her sleeves up as if getting down to business. "Max has been in town since she was three, me since I was born and that tells us if something happened in Arcadia Bay the earliest it could happen was in 1998."
"Actually," Rachel said, leaning forward, "Think about me. I came to town eight years ago. I was ten."
"And there's nothing saying it happened all at once," Max argued again. "We actually don't know anything for sure."
"Okay, but here's the thing," Steph cut across them all, twirling a pencil between her fingers. "What was 'it'? And why only you three?"
"Maybe not only us three," Rachel told her, nodding slowly. "I mean, Arcadia Bay is weird right?"
"What do you think?" Chloe asked as she turned back check the pot to see if it had come to a rolling boil yet. "Does David have a super power? 'Super-Doucheholery'?"
"No, seriously," Rachel said, suddenly rather intent on the idea that maybe they should give serious thought as to whether or not they were the only people with strange abilities running around Arcadia Bay. "Think about it. There's all kinds of weird shit in this town."
"How much of it can't be tracked back to one of us, though?" Max asked her specifically. It was not an unfair question. Max and Rachel themselves had created a fair few weird conditions around them. Max, mostly in the way people reacted to her, but Rachel was capable of creating wind and rain and fire.
"Well, if you had to guess," Steph tried, redirecting the conversation, "who else would you guess had some sort of power."
"Samuel," Rachel told her immediately. This earned a nod of agreement from Max. Chloe, on the other hand, snorted.
"Samuel's a smart dude, he's not superpowered."
"He's smart," Max agreed as she leaned back against the counter and turned to catch Chloe's gaze. "Have you ever seen the library he keeps on campus just for when he gets bored at lunch? But he also knows shit, like... have you ever talked to him and just gotten the idea he knew stuff he shouldn't be able to?"
"I guess," Chloe admitted. Rachel agreed.
"In the other timeline, he knew way too much."
"I honestly just thought he was observant, I mean sure some of his work is intense but a lot of it has to be tedious as hell. Maybe watching people is how he keeps himself from going nuts when he's just sweeping the school or something? Someone who reads stuff on chaos theory and the like has to get bored pushing a broom around." Steph's characterization of his work was not unreasonable. Sometimes, even Rachel wondered how someone like Samuel didn't lose lose his mind.
"Maybe we should talk to him," Chloe admitted. Rachel was amused about the swing in Chloe's belief. Steph and Max were usually awfully convincing when they teamed up on someone.
"Maybe one day I'll catch him having lunch outside on a Saturday or something," Rachel told her. "Either way, there's only been a couple of times he's said something that it's hard to believe he could see just by looking. But... there have been times." Steph rubbed her chin.
"So what are we saying here?" Chloe asked as Max turned at the sound of the water beginning to finally boil. While a couple of boxes of angel hair found their way into the pot, Chloe continued. "Are we saying, Samuel has powers? Are we saying he's a mindreader?"
"At this point I'm not gonna say it's impossible," Rachel shot back. "Steph's right: why would it just be us three? There's all kinds of weird in this town. All those stories about boat engines just malfunctioning in the North part of the bay for instance. Also the fact that there's this little town here and no one is questioning why someone like Sean Prescott is fucking with it, buying all of it? Building shit outside of it? What's that about?"
"Sean Prescott is rich for this town, but he's a small frog in a big pond in places like Portland or Seattle. Oh sure he's getting richer and all, but it's going to take a while before he's ready to fuck around elsewhere. It's probably just that." When Rachel shrugged as if to say Chloe had a point, Steph raised an eyebrow.
"How do you guys know that?" Steph asked.
"That's the kind of thing that was on that flashdrive you hid for us," Max informed her. Rachel felt rather bad that they had not yet filled her in on what it was she was keeping for them. "We've been keeping an eye on the Prescotts."
"Like, that's all true," Rachel tried to bring the conversation back to Sean Prescott. "But why is he trying to buy up the fishing rights and buy out factories and shit? It doesn't make sense that he's going to build all this stuff if he's also going to shut down the things that keep people living here in order?" Chloe was right. The Prescotts having all of that control over the town was not unreasonable and why they would stay in Arcadia Bay makes some sense, but what the hell was his endgame when it came to putting so many people out of work?
"So," Steph said as Max pulled the pot from the burner and gestured toward Chloe, "there is plenty of weird stuff going on in Arcadia Bay. Do you guys think we should look into Samuel?"
"Samuel's harmless," Rachel insisted, watching as the two girls in front of her struggled with balancing a strainer and draining the pasta all at once.
"Five minutes on the chicken," Max declared, glancing over the steaming bowl of pasta to the oven timer.
"Harmless, sure," Steph agreed. "But he's also pretty smart. What if he knows something? What if he doesn't have powers but maybe he knows about them? If he's been around a while and there are others he might know who."
"Okay," Chloe surrendered, throwing up her hands. "We should talk to Samuel. If he has answers that'd be neat as hell. But, I challenge all three of you to come up with a way to do it that doesn't get us all committed." There was no humor in this last comment. Instead, if anything, she sounded a bit genuinely frustrated. It made Rachel rethink most of the day and wonder how many times she had interpreted something Chloe said as a joke when it was a genuine gripe. The air in the kitchen shifted and it was enough, Rachel thought, that Pompidou noticed even over the pleasant smell of baking chicken. The dog placed his head down on his front paws and stared up at Chloe.
"Chloe," Rachel started, "are you okay?" For a moment the girl merely turned to look at her through light blue eyes as if trying to get a measure of her and then Chloe sighed, removed her beanie and set it on the counter.
"I guess I've been on edge lately."
"We've noticed, what's going wrong?"
"I haven't had a dream in about two weeks and it's really unnerving. It's starting to feel like I don't sleep well enough anymore." That would piss anyone off. Let it never be forgotten how annoyed Max gets with everything and everyone when she isn't sleeping. The photographer looked Chloe over once, worriedly, as if she could detect some outward sign of whatever was causing the girl not to dream. I don't think that's how it works, Max.
"How long are you sleeping at night?" Max asked.
"Six or seven hours," Chloe told them. "You know what I need?"
"A smoke?" Max guessed as Chloe turned and began to pull the chicken from the oven a few seconds early. Max took this as a sign to go hunt down a knife and a fork. With a slight clatter, Chloe slid her oven-mitted hands away from the pan and let it rest on top of the stove.
"I need to be a shitty friend and have an after dinner nap with my girls," Chloe declared, before glancing apologetically back at Steph. The brunette waved a hand dismissively.
About half of an hour later, Rachel found herself sitting up on Chloe's bed. Her back was straight, pressed against the headboard. Chloe, on the other hand, was stretched out, head in Rachel's lap. The bed wasn't tiny, really, Rachel reflected as Chloe shifted her position and closed her eyes. It was just made for two people. As for the third, Max paused and instead of getting into bed beside them began to dig into her bag, no doubt for her camera. Considering that Max and Chloe were generally on the small side, the three of them could probably fit properly onto the bed as long as they didn't mind sleeping very close to one another. Like last year, in Portland, Rachel reminded herself. Perhaps this memory was why she grinned so largely when Max lined up a shot and snapped a quick photo of the two of them. Chloe opened her eyes a moment too late to catch it happening, but quickly returned to a resting state.
While Max dislodged her shoes and climbed up into the bed, Rachel stroked Chloe's hair. For the most part, Rachel didn't think anyone was likely to get any kind of sleep, there just wasn't a ton of room. That was alright, though. Rachel glanced to her left and caught Max smiling up at her. The photographer looked away when she was caught and instead paid attention to Chloe. There was value to this kind of closeness. It was the kind that Rachel was sad to admit they had been missing out on since late December. Oh, there were hugs, caresses, even a kiss here and there but the last time any of them had taken the time to simply sit and cuddle had been far too long ago. Max scooted a bit closer to the two of them, her head resting against Rachel's hip. She had missed this. When Rachel laughed a moment later, it came out like a giggle and she was not sure where it came from. Chloe opened one eye, groggily.
"Don't worry about it, close your eyes," Rachel told the girl in her lap. Slowly but surely as Rachel stroked her hair, Chloe began to fade away. That was fine, too. Rachel found, despite the strange, giddy, heady feeling, she could think fairly freely. However Max spent that time, she spent much of it considering themes for the party in a couple of weeks and the rest regretting that they could not just stay there, in that bed, until morning. Someday, Max and I won't have to run off to school and leave Chloe behind. But for now, I'm just gonna have to steal that picture Max took and look at it tonight. At this thought, Rachel decided that Blackwell rules could go and screw themselves: she was going to curl up in Max's bed with her tonight. Someday, it won't matter. Someday, they would be able to sleep side by side at night, have meals together, live together. It was going to be strange when it happened, but looking down at Chloe and Max relaxing in relative peace and quiet, Rachel found that she wanted it.
There was going to need to be planning to be sure that that would happen. If the girls are going through too much to start planning right now, I'm not. I mean, I can't plan everyone's future, but maybe it's time I start thinking about my own? How weird is it that you're thinking about some point way off in the future when you can live with Chloe and Max? Shouldn't you go do some wild shit, like- like I dunno, start fires or something? Har har, I'm fucking hilarious. Consumed by the possibilities of some far-flung potential future, Rachel continued to stroke Chloe's hair until the girl's breathing evened out and she fell asleep, by which time Max, too, was long gone.
It did not bother her to stay up while they dozed, but if she did sleep, Rachel was fine with that. She rather hoped that maybe she would have a dream and Chloe would join her in it.
Author's Notes:
I know this might sound like a cruel tease since you lot have some way to go... but I just wanted to say that as of yesterday I have started work on the epilogue to Kaukasos. In essence, the story itself is written and I have been highly emotional about this fact. The story's climax chapter and falling action chapter were genuinely pretty moving to write and not necessarily entirely pleasant.
As for where you all are, now, I'm happy to say that the last couple of plotlines I've been setting up since mid part two are about to unfold. I recognize that at least one of them is going to be a little unpopular with some folks, but I hope at least, upon reflection, you'll see where I laid the foundation. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed Chapter Forty-Six.