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 Fifty-Two: Aphorisms
February 12th, 2012 9:53 AM
When the banging began, Rachel had no concept of how strange of a morning it was. She did not realize that she had just awoken in another's bed. The only thing that stuck out to her was the insistent, slow, heavy banging of a fist against a door. It took the better part of thirty seconds for the bed to begin to shift beneath her, forcing her to open her eyes, when she had, until that point, been content to squeeze them shut and wish a painful punishment on whichever of her neighbors was being loud as the fieriest hell. Things fell into place a little more quickly once her eyes opened.
The bed was moving because the person who had been laying beside her, Max, was groggily attempting to make her body obey her. The jerking motions of her arms and legs as she fought to scoot across the bed and then stand made it clear how strongly sleep still held her. Rachel shut her eyes again and, processing the night before, considered that maybe she could get away with just going back to sleep. The steady, insistent banging which was not on a neighboring door but the one to the room she was in kept her from doing so as much as, if not more than Max calling out to try to ascertain who was at her door.
She did not get an answer, forcing Rachel to open her eyes as Max steadied herself on her legs once, blinked and then ran a hand through her hair to try (unsuccessfully) to tame bedhead. Rachel, who had slept far less than Max, had trouble convincing herself to rise until Max cracked the door open and announced exactly who was knocking. As soon as that happened, Rachel sat up all at once. Should I hide or pretend I've been up, already? The question was a moot point because before Rachel could kick the blanket down the bed and free herself, Max stepped aside and allowed the person standing in the hall to enter.
"Come in," Max muttered, quietly. It was not sleep that muted her voice anymore. Rachel wasn't sure she knew exactly what it was. Victoria Chase came abruptly and quietly into Max's room. All of that was strange enough as it was, but most unusually of all, she did so alone. Other than the day the two of them had presented the party's theme to the Vortex Club, Rachel could not remember the last time she had seen Victoria unaccompanied outside of classes that she and her friends did not share. The girl took one look around the room, spotted Rachel and seemed to redden slightly. She had not, as of yet, spoken. Max shut the door behind Victoria and gestured for the blonde to take a seat in the old office chair beside her desk or on the futon. "Morning," Max greeted. "But I'm not sure how good it is." All at once, this morning which had come too soon and with some Grade A strangeness seemed like it would have required coffee to have even a vague chance of not being a shitty morning, given the night before. Nothing's going to make this more awkward than sitting here, not saying anything.
"Hey, Victoria," Rachel greeted. Unable to come up with way to make the action less conspicuous and not draw attention to the fact that she had slept there, Rachel took hold of the edge of the blanket and forced it down herself until her feet were sitting on top of it and she was free of the damned thing if she wanted to get up. When she was finally sitting cross legged and Victoria had not spoken, Max again gestured toward the futon.
"Victoria, sit down, relax." It was strange to see the thin blonde not at the top of her game, not smarting off. She was still dressed in pyjamas that likely cost more than the contents of the room she was standing in. Apparently, this time the offer to sit down registered because Victoria shook her head, lifted it and settled into a seat at the far end of the black futon, promptly crossing her arms over her chest. Any other day, Rachel would interpret it as a haughty gesture. Any other day, it probably would have been. Today it just looked like someone who felt a little bit unsafe. "Are you, alright?"
"Hell no," Victoria answered, her first words since arrival. There was a bit of her old fire in them, but Rachel figured she was not the only one to catch slight shake. I'm gonna take that to mean she remembers enough to be freaked. Max did too, it seemed. The brunette chewed her bottom lip for a second. The way Max described Nathan and Jefferson's operation in the other timeline, people did not remember much about their nights. Nathan must be using something different right now. Scooting toward the edge of the bed, Rachel grabbed a pillow and rested it in her lap so her elbows had something soft to lay on.
"Yeah," Max agreed. "Yeah, I'd guess not." Max, for her part, stood close to the door, one hand rubbing the length of the other arm as if she was unsure what to do with her body or her hands. Rachel considered calling her over to the bed to sit down as it would probably put Victoria more at ease, but then maybe Max needed to stand. Slowly but surely, Victoria lifted her head again and began to look at Max expectantly. Rachel was starting to get the opinion that Victoria thought Max had answers for her. Without knowing what the questions were, though, how would the brunette know what to say? Neither of them were communicating very well, but quite suddenly it felt like this part of the conversation was most definitely a scene where Rachel had no lines. "I think I have to ask what the last thing you remember is." Victoria's defiant, expecting stare faltered as Max took a couple of steps until she was standing right in front of Victoria and then knelt down. Rachel didn't understand the gesture but she did see the effect it had on Victoria: she did not drop her gaze, she did not look away, she held Max's eyes.
"I remember feeling wrong. I was tired, sort of disconnected from everything. I was dizzy. Nothing looked right, nothing held still. I'd only had like, a beer and I'd actually eaten kind of a lot for dinner. I knew I wasn't drunk. I tried to tell Nathan I was going to be sick. I tried to get up." Victoria seemed to be piecing the night together as if recalling an old story she had heard when she was a child. When the girl tilted her head and seemed to squint, it became clear things in her memory were breaking down. "Nathan had been talking to me for like an hour, for the first time in two weeks. I was so fucking happy. We used to be so close. We'd always talk. I was always there for him and lately... well, he's been really angry with me because- well, you know." At this, Victoria lost her fight to maintain eye contact. Though Rachel couldn't see Max's face from this angle she could measure heartbreak in the way Max's shoulders sagged. This was the only part of this conversation where Rachel knew better than Max or Victoria how delicate of a situation they were in; when Max's heart broke for someone, the photographer had only two routes forward: devastation or anger. Max prompted for Victoria to go on, when she was ready. The three waited there in silence for another three seconds. Rachel tried not to consider that she was in the shorts and tank top she preferred to wear to bed around someone who had, in the past, been adversarial toward her girls.
"I kind of remember you telling him to let me go, but I didn't understand. My head hit something and then a couple of hours later, Taylor was telling me what happened and I was back in my room." Max gave a brief nod. "She told me you said he slipped me something. That he was trying to take me back to his room." When Victoria's eyes met Rachel's, Rachel was actually relieved to see her looking at least as livid as she did hurt. Victoria's still in there, then. "She told me you two and Chloe stopped him." Holy shit, did she just say Chloe's name? This, Rachel thought, was definitely a first. Before then it was usually Kari or Katie or even once, 'Karl.'
"We did. We just don't know where he went after that."
"I took you back to your room," Max told Victoria, drawing her eyes back to the brunette as surely as if she had reached out and taken the girl's face in her hands. "Then I took your keys to Taylor and Courtney and sent them after you."
"Except that's not all of it, is it?" Victoria asked. Again, Max shifted on one knee and then stood up. When she took a step or two away from Victoria, Rachel caught a glimpse of Max's blank face. Victoria's hardened in response to not being answered. "You told them something, didn't you? I know because they told me." Max finally turned on her bare heel and nodded, once. The blonde photographer's hard face cracked slightly, thin lips turning downward, hurt seeping into her features. "I didn't think he was like that. He was under so much stress. He was so fucking lonely." For a moment the blonde stuttered as, still blank faced, Max settled onto the futon beside Victoria. "I just wanted to believe he needed help and he could get it if his family ever let off of him." There was a reason this line of thought was painfully familiar. It was precisely the route that had led to Max's own assault at the hands of the piece of shit the two girls were discussing. Putting aside her embarrassment at how she was dressed, Rachel tossed aside her pillow and stretched her legs out until they were dangling off the edge of the bed.
"You're mostly right," Max said, reaching out and taking hold of Victoria's right hand. The blonde immediately seemed to recoil at the touch, but she did not precisely pull back. She simply jumped as if shocked. Confusion etched Victoria's features. Max's face had not yet let go of its own stone mask, but Rachel could see it fading. "He is sick. He really is." Her voice is calm, but her eyes... Max's eyes narrowed, first. When the flaring nostrils, the frown and the slight increase in the rise and fall of her shoulders became evident, Rachel got her answer. Max had not chosen the path of being devastated. Anger it is. "When I first came to Blackwell I tried to help him too. But I pissed him off by pushing too hard. When he feels challenged, when he feels like someone doesn't see him as the big shot, he snaps. He needs to get that power back. He did it to me and I don't know how far he would have gone if someone hadn't stopped him." Rachel swallowed as the brunette's eyes twitched almost imperceptibly toward her. Like him or not, Rachel sometimes still regretted the physical damage done, the cost. She had not voiced this thought aloud, but sometimes when she saw Nathan she felt her eyes drawn to his false one. There was strong guilt at work, there. She hoped that after last night it would shut up.
"And you still put yourself in the shit?" Victoria asked. How eloquently put by the Chase heir.
"I wasn't about to let you find out how far he'd go, was I?" Max muttered, and then released the girl's hand. "I thought for a second about saying nothing and just hiding more but… people can't do that to each other. Nathan is better when he's on all of his meds, but he doesn't fucking take them right, Victoria. Half of them he's not taking at all, just selling. The other half he only gets sometimes, when his father isn't watching, isn't judging." How does Max really know all of that? The girl's knowledge of Nathan's mental health was a bit upsetting in and of itself. It wasn't that Rachel gave much of a damn for the privacy of someone who had committed such a crime against Max, but the idea that Max was carrying that around as if it were some kind of responsibility of hers to keep track of was off putting.
"How do you know all this?" Victoria queried. At this point, Rachel both wanted Victoria out of her head and noted the haughty, demanding tone in her voice. She wasn't sure if this was just Victoria's resorting to some sort of coping mechanism or not, but it was certainly more Victoria than the girl who had quietly stood at Max's door and knocked for what must have been almost a minute and a half. This was way more than Rachel had ever known about Max's connection to Nathan early on in her time in Arcadia Bay. There are some things Max doesn't like to talk about, but there are some things she really needs to. Her recommendation too few hours ago that Max see a counselor came back to her and Rachel had to consider that Victoria might think about the same thing. I do have my counselor's card, Rachel thought. I'm turning into that person, aren't I?
"Most of it," Max started, lifting one leg up to cross it over her knee, "he told me in the first couple of weeks before I started to 'annoy' him by telling him to treat people better or to start taking his meds." She really was just trying to get the guy to get help, to neutralize him as a threat. Rachel grimaced. "The rest, well, let's just say when someone does to you what he did, you stop caring about his privacy when it comes to finding out if he's going to hurt someone else or not. I knew it was only a matter of time."
"Besides," Rachel chimed in, "you were actually kind of nice to us. Nathan hates us. Max for the obvious reason, me because I stopped him from hurting her and he got hurt in the process. It was an accident, hurting him, but it still happened." She wanted Victoria to understand that there was no fault on Victoria's shoulders for what had happened. What she had not planned to do was expose the truth of Nathan's injury.
"Got hurt, how?" the blonde asked, and then her face changed. Seemingly newly determined, she pushed onward. "His eye?"
"He was trying to kill me," Rachel told her, summoning up resolve and confidence. It was important that the girl understand who Nathan was when he was backed into a corner. It was also important that Victoria not know she could make things overheat and explode. "This lamp he was trying to hit me with broke and part of it just hit him- right in the eye. I grabbed Max and ran. Well, I mean I tried to run. She wasn't, in a state to run. She was a little bit worse off than you were. I think he used a lighter dose on you and honestly, Victoria I really don't want to know why." The look on Victoria's face wasn't a glare, or if it was it did not seem to be a normal one. She looked upset more than angry.
"You know, I thought I could help him." The blonde's voice slowly faltered as she spoke, but her face barely changed. "I thought I could help him. I know he was into me, you know, but I thought I could be his friend and help him. I thought he'd forgiven me and everything was going to get back to normal. Someone needed to help him... but I don't want it anymore."
"You acted like a decent person, instead of acting hateful, like him," Rachel told her, taking over this role in the conversation as Max took a metaphorical step back. "If he couldn't forgive that, it's on him. None of this shit was your fault, none of what either of you got was your fault." Max kept her eyes either on Victoria or the wall behind her instead of looking at Rachel as she said this. "He probably decided enough was enough and he needed a new scapegoat for all of the shit in his head." This kind of talk was usually reserved for David Madsen. No wonder David was the type to protect Nathan, Rachel thought. Whatever she was going to say next died when Max stood and crossed to her computer desk. Rachel definitely saw Victoria's face darken when Max grabbed her phone from it.
"You're not going to call the cops are you?" For the first time in her life, she heard genuine panic in Victoria's voice. It was enough to make Max turn quickly and mute whatever fire had been building in the shorter photographer's head. Still holding onto her phone, Max turned back. She did not return to the futon or kneel in front of Victoria again, but Max's voice lowered.
"Not unless you want me to." This earned a quick and emphatic shake of Victoria's head. "Are you absolutely sure, Victoria? This stuff is probably still in your system. How do you feel, anyway?"
"I'm sure," Victoria insisted, not answering the last question. "I don't want that." Max again started to raise her phone as if to call someone, but she stopped at Victoria's next. "He didn't get to do anything, it doesn't matter. I just don't want to-, I don't know. " When Max spoke again, her voice was stronger, snappier, as if to make up for the very same fading out of Victoria's.
"Call them or don't," Max told her, "that's your choice. But it does fucking matter. I figured that out last night the hard way. Don't do the same thing as me and try to write it off. He did something to you that was not at all okay." Victoria shut her mouth and, looking uneasily up at Max, said nothing. Rachel considered that maybe this would be another time when she needed to stay quiet. She was, after all, out of her depth, here. Victoria did not move and though Max paused close to the futon, no one else spoke. Max seemed to take this as a sign that she could do whatever it was she was doing and began to dial again. Rachel decided that if the moment had passed, she needed to distract Victoria, who was still watching Max.
"How are you feeling?" Rachel asked her, echoing Max's last question. Slowly but surely Victoria pulled her eyes away from Max but before she could formulate a response, whoever Max was calling answered.
"Hey, Hayden." Fear remained firmly in place on Victoria's face.
"Um," the blonde said, eyes shifting between Max and Rachel. Victoria's right hand rose, as if to pull the phone out of Max's hand if she said something Victoria didn't like. The two were not close enough for this to happen, but it seemed to comfort her enough to answer Rachel. "I don't know. My head hurts and I think I could drink a river." Rachel nodded. The good news was that as Max slowly stepped away, making sure that Victoria did not react too negatively, Rachel rose and crossed to the mini fridge beside the futon. Four of six bottles of water were still inside and cold, so Rachel freed one of those and pushed it as softly as she could into the distracted blonde's hand.
"You never sent me the number for your connection in Edgeton," Max announced. Something between awe and confusion took over Victoria's face as she grasped the bottle. Rachel could understand. Was this the time for Max to be looking to secure her connection? "I mean yeah, I'm almost out of grass but it's not about that." Rachel raised an eyebrow as Victoria slowly, almost absently opened the bottle of water. Max began to pace. "Yeah, Risperidone and Valium." At this, there was a longer pause than normal. Rachel could tell by the look on Victoria's face that these meant something in particular to her. The girl stopped with the bottle halfway to her lips. "Yeah, just like Nathan, Hayden. It's for him." Hearing only one half of a conversation was always either frustarting or comedic and today it was not the latter. Rachel sat in silence.
"Yeah, well, I don't intend on letting him know that I got it for him. He needs to get medicated or shitkicked immediately. Preferably both." For a moment that looked to be the end, but apparently Hayden unknowingly crossed a line on the other end of the phone because Max picked up the speed of her pacing, which was impressive when she had about eight or nine steps to cover. And she's started speaking with her hands. "Hayden, I'm pissed off right now, I'm not in the mood for joking around. He fucked up last night and he has two options: get on his meds and calm the fuck down or the other one. The other one is very bad. Did I mention shitkicking? Yeah, okay, tell me what your guy says and I'll get you the cash. Thanks. Yeah, I'll meet up with you later, alright? Thanks."
For the length of the conversation, she and Victoria had sat mostly in silence. Victoria had returned to looking anywhere but at either of them and drinking water. Rachel, who had been a little paranoid about Chloe's theory that Victoria was harboring some sort of crush on her had a bit of an epiphany on that front. If anything, when the girl looked up, it was at Max. Admittedly, Max was pacing back and forth in the small space afforded to her in front of her door absolutely exuding rage as if from every pore. Still, if there was any particular sign that Victoria thought of Rachel as anything other than a person who was in the room talking with her, she didn't see it. What she did see was that the sun was getting high in the sky and it sounded like she was going to be making a trip to Edgeton soon.
"Rachel, Victoria," Max said as soon as she hung up her phone. "Go to your rooms and get dressed. We're getting the fuck away from campus for an hour or so."
"What?" Victoria asked, taken about by this pronouncement. "Why?"
"Because breakfast is a lot cheaper than bail and I'm both hungry and pissed off." The blonde looked around, lost. Rachel thought she understood what the girl was feeling, getting dragged up into all of this.
"I don't know what's going on anymore," Victoria said, to no one in particular. "I've lost the thread."
"It's been my experience," Rachel told her, "that when I feel that way and Max doesn't, the smartest thing I can do is listen to her. Seriously, come on." Looking confused, Victoria stood up as Rachel did, taking one look around the room.
"Actually, I really don't want to be in this building right now, after all." Max opened her mouth as if to say something and instead only nodded, which Victoria noticed. Rachel led the girl over toward the door of the room. She really did want to get changed. Food didn't sound bad, either.
"There's nowhere to eat in this town, unless you want chinese," Rachel warned her.
"I could go for chinese," Max called past Victoria's shoulder. Yeah, I fucking bet you could. Rachel turned back toward the two photographers, one of which still looked a little lost as she glanced between the two of them.
"Yeah, okay," the blonde replied.
And so Rachel had lo mein for breakfast.