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"David your scary stories are shit." Max kicks at the ground.
"Well, how about you tell one then?" David suggests, pretending the insult's irrelevant.
Max gets a broken smile. David figures he might say no, but then he nods. "Okay. Scary stories. I think I can do that."
"Really!" David exclaims. "That's wonderful! Go ahead!" Max had been a bigger nuisance than usual lately, so seeing him participate is nice.
Max gets into the mood by sitting down and staring into the fire. He looks at it with reverence, like the fire is spelling out the words he's about to say. "The story starts with a little boy, whose name is," he thinks for a moment, "Jasper."
"Jasper was a good little boy, as all little boys are. He loved his father and he loved his mother. His mother was usually wonderful, worked at a school, loved to play games and adored horses.
"Then, after a while, she started getting mean. Her hair was usually unkempt and wild, just like her eyes. She would say mean things and the foulness of what she would say would come out like a fog with a horrible sharp smell.
"She would say things that would hurt Jasper's feelings. "I never wanted you." "Shut up, you don't matter right now." "I wish we never had you." Stuff like that.
"And it would... confuse him, and make him feel bad. Did he," Max stands rigid, frozen to the spot, "did he do something wrong?" For one moment he glances up, eyes connecting with Davids before falling back to the fire and letting it fuel him to continue.
"It went on like that for a few years, his father explaining that he shouldn't get into the car with her when she's mean, explaining that he should throw away the cans hidden in odd places. His mom and dad started yelling, fighting constantly. The only time they weren't fighting is when his mom would pass out on the couch. Jasper covered the sound with the TV. He was often taken to his grandmas so he wouldn't hear the worst of it.
"One time Jasper's mom came to pick him up from school. She could hardly stand on her own. Someone from the school called his dad and the police. Jasper's mom spent the night in the jail.
"When she came home she was already plastered, though who knows how she found time to get a drink. Jasper's dad had packed up her things and forced her out of the house that day.
"Once his mom was out of the house Jasper finally started noticing his dad wasn't the good guy he had thought. He was gone for long stretches of time, inattentive to Jasper's wants and needs, providing just enough to keep him satisfied. And controlling. Jasper felt imprisoned in his own house.
"His mom had moved to an apartment hours away. He never visited. Was never allowed to. Then one morning his dad walked into his room and told him his mother had been found hanging in her closet by her sheets. His dad told him "I'm sending you to summer camp so you don't have to deal with this."
"While Jasper tried to understand what this meant and how it changed his life his dad packed his things. He would never get to say goodbye to his mom. Would never get to say anything to her again.
"The next day his dad drove him out to summer camp and dropped him off. Through dealing with the ordeal with Jasper's mother he decided that he couldn't handle being a single parent. Jasper was already out of his life for the moment. When summer ended, he didn't bother picking up his son. He forgot about him." Max can feel the weight of everything he's let loose. It feels like he swallowed hot tar and its coating his insides with the sticky blackness. He clears his throat to make the feeling go away before throwing on an ending.
"When Jasper went missing no one bothered to look for him. No one cared." Max's eyes glaze over. Before he can start crying though, he takes a deep breath and walks off toward his cabin.
The campers are a mixture of confused and unimpressed. The story wasn't truly scary to them, nothing like what they would expect from Max. One or two are concerned, understanding the real horror behind the story. David and Gwen understand this isn't some shock value attention grab.
David stands up. "I'll follow him, you keep things in order." He says to Gwen. David makes his way to Max's cabin.
He knocks on the door before letting himself in to be polite. Max is sitting on his bunk, hugging his knees up to his chest with his hoodie pulled low on his face. David climbs up and sits down next to him on the bed, smoothing out the wrinkles in the blanket with his hand.
"Max... was that story about you?" He asks softly. Max doesn't speak, only turns so his back is facing David. "You know, your parents might be terrible, and make you feel unwanted or unloved or abandoned but... I'll always be here for you. I know you don't like me that much but... I want the best for you, Max. I love you."
Max tries not to cry, tries to hold in the torrent of bad feelings but his resolve is weakened from spilling his story in front of everyone, whether they knew or not. Hearing these words, knowing that they aren't a lie or meant only to make him feel better, is the thing that pushes him to overflow.
It starts with a few silent tears before the tidal wave comes and suddenly he's sobbing. Huge salty tears roll down his face, collecting on his chin before dropping onto his lap.
"Oh, Max, I-" David instinctually hugs him, scooping him up and cradling him. And Max... lets him. Lets David hold him against his chest and hides his sobs in his shirt. He lets out all the inky blackness and relief at someone, anyone, genuinely loving him and caring for him for the first time.
David takes it in stride, petting Max on the back and offering him a handkerchief to blow his nose into. After crying himself out, Max peels his wet face off Davids soaked shirt. He hiccups and it rocks his brain into a wicked headache. Max groans, rubbing his head with his hand.
David wipes the last of the tears of Max's face. "How about we get you a glass of water, buddy?" David smiles at him. Max shrugs but doesn't protest when led to the lunch room. He stands around while David reaches into the high cupboard and grabs him a cup, filling it with water from the sink. Max drinks the whole thing, returning the cup to David for a refill. That one he drinks slower.
"Alright, is there anything else you want before bed?" David asks. He's prepared to hand Max the moon if he asks for it.
Max looks up at him with dull, tired eyes. "Yeah, your silence. If you tell anyone about this I'll fucking kill you. You got that?" He bites.
David makes a show of zipping his lips and throwing away the imaginary key. Max nods once, an acceptance of Davids promise.
"Alright, I'm going the fuck to sleep, go back to everyone else now," Max says. He leaves the lunch room and makes his way back to the cabin without anyone seeing him. He climbs the ladder to his bunk again and flops face first on his bed. And then he falls asleep.