Drugs, sex and a… baby.
Chapter 10
Max Caulfield x Mark Jefferson
AN: I did a little research for this chapter. The characters (aside my OC) belong to Don't Nod and Square Enix. "" means talking, '' means texting, italics means thinking
When Mr. Jefferson sat down in his chair he motioned for Max to sit down as well.
"I've got some work I can do while we wait." Mr. Jefferson said. "As for you, you are welcome to read any of my books I have got here in the office." He continued.
"Thank you, Mr. Jefferson." Max said. "But do you have any small precision tools that I could use?" Max asked. "I was hoping to see if I could somehow fix my camera." Max said while looking at Mr. Jefferson.
"I'm sorry Max, I do not have any of those tools here. They are all at my house unfortunately." Mr. Jefferson said as he waited for his computer to start. "Like I said Max, help yourself to one of the books." He said as his computer finished booting up.
Max decided to browse his shelves for a few minutes before settling on a book about digital photography and how to guide you to take better photographs. Looking through the book, Max noticed how worn some pages were, as if the book itself was very old or it had been frequently used.
Looking up from his screen Mr. Jefferson saw that Max had settled with one of his older versions of his books about digital photography. Smiling he went back to looking at the photographs his class had taken during the lesson yesterday. Some of his students had taken quite good photographs (namely Victoria, Evan and surprisingly Alyssa). While some still had a lot of work ahead (namely Daniel and again surprisingly Taylor). If they wanted to succeed within the art industry, they had to step up their endgame. Too bad that Max had to sit out on this for he would have loved to see what kind of photograph she would have taken.
After a while curiosity got the better of her and Max ended up standing behind Mr. Jefferson looking at the screen and the different photographs currently displayed on it. While looking at the screen, Max did not notice that Mr. Jefferson had noticed her standing behind him.
"Seeing something you like Max?" he asked making her take a step back.
"Oh, sorry, didn't mean to be nosy." Max sad as she went back to her seat.
"Actually Max. Mind telling me what you think of these photographs?" Mr. Jefferson said as he offered his chair for Max to take a seat. "They are all from yesterday's lesson when I helped you go to the nurse's office to rest." He said as Max sat down in his chair.
"What's up with all the ugly looking comfy chairs everyone seems to have?" Max said out loud as she sat down, making Mr. Jefferson chuckle. "Oh, sorry didn't mean to say that out loud." Max said embarrassed.
"No need Max. I agree, they are ugly, but comfortable." Mr. Jefferson said as he beckoned for Max to start looking through the photographs from yesterday.
After going through almost all of them Max decided to give her opinion on them.
"Some of them are obviously better than others. Take this one for example." Max said as she focused on a photograph taken by Alyssa. "There seems to be a great depth to the photograph and yet, the viewers' attention is at the front, but we can clearly see that there is something happening in the background." Max said as she turned her head to look at Mr. Jefferson. "Who took this photo?" Max asked.
He couldn't help but smile at the description Max gave on the photograph Alyssa had taken yesterday. She had just said what he himself had been thinking. "That photograph was taken by Alyssa." Mr. Jefferson said when Max asked him who had taken the photograph.
"Really!?" Max said surprised. "I for sure thought that it had been taken by Evan or Victoria." Max continued as she stared at the photograph, not noticing that a smile had made it onto Mr. Jeffersons face.
The silence that had fallen between Max and Mr. Jefferson was broken by the ringing of her phone.
"Hello." Max said as she answered.
"Hey Max." Ariana said. "I'm parked up, where do you want me to go?" she continued.
"Head to the main entrance and I'll meet you there." Max said before being stopped by Mr. Jefferson. "Correction, Mr. Jefferson will meet you there." Max said as he left his office.
"Is he the reason why you said that it was complicated when I called you earlier?" Ariana asked with a serious tone.
"Yes." Max finally admitted to her cousin after a moment of silence.
"Alright, see you on a bit Max." Ariana said as they hang up.
While Max waited for Mr. Jefferson to come back with her cousin she went back to looking at the photographs her classmates took yesterday. "I wished I had attended this lesson. It could have been a great learning experience." Max thought. When Max heard voices approaching, she went back to her original seat and picked up where she left off in the book she had picked earlier.
"Max!" her cousin said as she rushed up and gave Max a hug once she had entered the office. "How have you been?" she continued as she put her bag down on the desk.
"I've been better." Max said.
"I bet." Ariana said as she opened the bag and took out two sets of needles and syringes as well as two small containers. "It's not everyday something as serious as this happening." She continued as she wrote a label for each container. "Since you both already have your other sample, I'll just grab those and then I'm going to take a small blood sample." Ariana said as she finished the preparations. "And then you should be all set to leave Mr. Jefferson." Ariana said as she motioned for Mr. Jefferson to take a seat and to roll up his sleeve. After taking his blood sample, Ariana turned to Max to do the same.
"Now Max, once we are done here, I'm going to have to talk to you privately, unless you want Mr. Jefferson to hear what I am about to ask you." Ariana said as she finished taking Max blood as well.
"I'll leave you two alone for a moment, I'm just going to go get something from my car." Mr. Jefferson said as he left them alone.
"Well, he's quite the charmer." Ariana laughed as Max put her head in her hands embarrassed.
"Ariana! What if he's still listening?" Max said panicked.
"Oh, just relax Max. Nothing to be ashamed of." Ariana said light-heartedly. "After all, who am I to judge. My own parents have a good 18-year age difference." She continued as she lightly nudged Max on her shoulder. Seeing her cousins face, Ariana knew when to draw the line. "Ok, ok. I'm just joking." She said as she pulled a small package from her bag and giving it to Max along with a bottle of water. "Here is a day-after pill, however, I will have to know where you are in your cycle." Ariana said as Max took the pill and when Max looked at Ariana with a confused look she sighed before continuing. "Max, you do know how the day-after pill works right? Ariana asked her cousin.
"It's to prevent pregnancies, correct?" Max said as she was eyeing the package.
"Yes, and no." Ariana said. "It's made to prevent or delay your ovulation." She continued. "So, what I need to know is where you are in your cycle. Because if you have already ovulated there is still a chance that you may still fall pregnant since this pill won't stop an already fertilised embryo." Ariana said while crouching in front of Max. "And due to one of the side effects being vomiting, I'll stay by you side for some time and then we'll go out and have lunch. Alright, does that sound good?" Ariana finished as she got up.
"Shit!" Max said as she quickly did her monthly calculation in her head making Ariana turn back to look at her worriedly. Seeing her cousins worried face Max quickly explained. "If my math is correct, I ovulated the day before yesterday or yesterday." Max said starting to feel worried. Without much further ado, Max opened the package, popped and swallowed the pill. "Better safe than sorry, right." Max said with a quiet laugh.
Right at that moment, the door opened again, and Mr. Jefferson walked in.
"That was quick." Ariana said to Mr. Jefferson as she packed up everything into her bag. "I think that the both of you need some time to digest what has happened, so I'll skip the interrogation for now." Ariana continued as she looked between Max and Mr. Jefferson. "But be prepared for one to come as soon as I have the results from these tests." She finished as she prepared to leave the room. "I'm taking Max out for lunch if you would like to join us?" Ariana asked Mr. Jefferson.
"Sorry, I don't think that would be a good idea at the moment." Mr. Jefferson said looking from Max to Ariana. "Let me follow you out. That way I can open the front door without the alarm going off." He said as they all left the office.