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Max Caulfield is either the most enigmatic student at Blackwell or the most boring, and Rachel intends to find out which.
It’s not a little convenient that when she slides into her Monday afternoon photography class a couple of minutes after the bell, the desks are rearranged to form a circle around the room. She knows Jefferson only does it so he can feel hip while he delivers his lecture, but today it’s doing her a favour: usually Max sits in the back of the room, and Rachel sits further up. This way she can observe her without looking like a total creep.
It’s not a very enlightening endeavour. Rachel can only see her about half the time, when Jefferson isn’t standing his pompous ass directly in her line of sight, and when she can see she only catches Max doodling or responding to texts, or worse, engaging fully in a lecture on Diane Arbus.
It’s in line with what Rachel’s seen firsthand. The first time they met, they had really only exchanged awkward hellos, and whether Rachel was offering booze or asking to see some photos, Max had seemed apprehensive. It wasn’t a reaction that Rachel was used to getting, and it didn’t line up with all of Chloe’s stories either. She’d heard time and time again tales of Max and Chloe, the fearsome pirates: tales of exploration and tree-carving, tales of wine spilled behind parents’ backs, tales of co-ed parties and first kisses.
For some reason, she’d just expected someone a little more … wild. And no matter how highly Chloe still thought of this girl, after an hour and a half of watching her in class, Rachel was starting to lean toward boring. Smart, good at photography, but boring.
She has no intention of sticking around after the bell rings. It’s only because she gets caught behind the herd as they shuffle out the door that the game plan changes.
Max is over at Jefferson’s desk. It’s not unusual for Blackwell students to get one-on-one time with their professors when they’re falling behind or doing particularly well. It’s the look on Max’s face that catches Rachel’s attention. She knows that look. It’s the look that follows her down the halls on the faces of underclassmen when she wears a short skirt. It’s a look she’s worn herself, on late afternoons in a hot RV when she still thought that a few free dime bags meant the start of something real. It’s the look of hero worship, of a school-girl crush.
Jefferson’s pulling out a fucking John Lennon quote, and Rachel knows the look on his face too.
Boring or not, there isn’t a girl in the world that deserves to be looked at like that.
“Maxxie!” Rachel shrieks, pouncing on Max from behind, wrapping her arms around her shoulders. She thinks it looks genuine from her end, but she can feel Max jump and tense against her. “We’re gonna be late. Girls’ night out, yeah?”
Jefferson straightens up, his eyebrows making a jump toward his hairline. “Rachel. I didn’t know you two were pals.”
When she turns from looking sidelong at Max, Rachel maintains her saccharine smile, but her eyes are hard and cold, meeting Jefferson’s gaze head-on. “There are a lot of things you don’t know about me, Mark.”
The set in his jaw tells Rachel that she’s succeeded at throwing him off, but Jefferson does his best to maintain his dignity. “Right. Well, Max, there’ll be plenty of time to talk shop later this week. Have fun.”
Rachel doesn’t wait for Max to open her mouth again before she takes her by the hand and tows her away, out of the classroom and down the hall. She ignores Zach Riggins hooting at her, offers only a polite nod to Dana waving hello, and doesn’t let go of Max’s hand until they’re safely in the girls’ bathroom.
No one else is there, and Rachel doesn’t have to piss, so she heads for the sinks and starts screwing with her lip tint. It doesn’t need a touch-up, but for the appearance of keeping busy it’s easier than reapplying mascara.
She can see Max’s mirror image, hanging back by the door. She reminds Rachel of a woodland creature, startled into stillness, but there’s an intensity in her eyes that wasn’t obvious before. She doesn’t look weak. Just ready.
Max still sounds timid, though, and the moment is lost. “Not that I don’t want to hang out with you, Rachel, but … we didn’t have plans.”
“I know.” Rachel focuses again on her own reflection, pressing her lips together, examining the colour. “I was just saving you from Jefferson. You don’t have to stick around if you don’t want.”
“Saving me? He was just helping me with my project. I’m having some trouble with inspiration, and I guess he saw that …”
Capping the little red tube and tucking it away, Rachel turns to face her, does a little shimmy so she can perch on the edge of the sink. “Max, he ‘helps’ every cute, talented girl that takes his class.”
Max doesn’t meet her gaze, and the colour rising to her cheeks is response enough.
“You’re better than that,” Rachel continues, and realizes as she says it that she means it. There’s no denying talent when she sees it. “Your pictures are really good. And they’re only gonna get better, but not if you let some old creep distract you. I should know.”
Max’s head snaps up. For a moment, Rachel wonders if she didn’t say too much, but Max’s smile is gentle. “Thank you,” she says. “I’ve seen some of the photos you did with Evan. You always look so … real. I’m glad you didn’t—get too distracted.”
There was still some learning for her to do where keeping her foot out of her mouth was concerned, but maybe Max wasn’t a complete mess all the time.
Rachel slides down off the edge of the sink. “Well, Maxxie,” she starts, “I do have actual plans this afternoon.” She rests a hand on Max’s shoulder, feels the muscles contract beneath layers of cotton, thinks that physical contact is something Max will have to get used to if they’re going to be hanging out. “Just be careful with the one-on-one time with Jefferson, okay?”
“Only if you stop calling me Maxxie. It’s just Max.”
So Max Caulfield has some surprises in store. Rachel’s mouth twists, feral and amused. “Just Max,” she echoes, so close to Max’s ear that she can probably feel the little puff of air that comes out in lieu of a chuckle. “Deal.”
Max is still standing there when Rachel leaves.
Bartholomew Abigail Babcock’s punk-rock makeover didn’t last the weekend. Rachel’s a little surprised that the caretakers got after it so quickly. She’d expected to be able to look outside and see that dog collar around his neck for at least a full school day, but on her way to the parking lot, the statue’s as unfashionable as ever.
“You’re late for a very important date!” Chloe, slouching against the grille of her truck a few yards away, has no trouble cutting through that train of thought. “What took so long?”
Rachel rolls her eyes, but she can’t hide her grin as she approaches. “Oh, you know, lamenting the impermanence of true beauty.”
Chloe looks at her like she’s growing lobsters out of her ears.
“Bartie’s lost his groove,” Rachel explains, jerking her head toward the lawn.
“Oh. Well, we tried. You can lead your founder to fashion, but you can’t—whatever. Look, if you want true beauty, our window of opportunity is not permanent. You know Frank doesn’t wait around.”
For a split second, Rachel thinks that’s wrong, that he’d wait for her. But that isn’t true. She knows it and Chloe knows it, so she gives her head a shake, shoves Chloe’s shoulder. “Then get off the car and into the car.”
“Mamacita is pushy, I see.” Chloe’s waggling her brows. Smarmy is a look that kind of works for her, but it’s still annoying.
Rachel shoves her harder into the hood of the truck, and Chloe, laughing, relents. They climb into the cab in tandem, and as Chloe starts the engine Rachel turns the volume up on a Distillers album. “What’s the deal?”
“With what?”
“Usually you turn on your stereo and my ears start ringing.”
“Oh. Yeah, uh, Max made me turn it down at lunch. She thinks I’m gonna be deaf by thirty.”
The urge to ask what Max knows anyway, with her Polaroid and her juvenile crush, surprises Rachel. Max was actually kind of sweet today. “I see her point,” Rachel says instead, biting down on the impulse and going for sage when she nods, “but this is Sing Sing Death House we’re talking about.”
“Rachel Amber,” says Chloe, looking dead serious with her eyes on the road.
“Yeah?”
Chloe turns to her for a second as the treed road down from Blackwell opens into Arcadia Bay proper, and there’s the grin. “I am so glad I chose you as my punk wife. I knew you’d be on my side.”
A laugh bubbles out of Rachel before she can stop it, the thought of Max fleeing her mind entirely, and then Chloe’s doing her best Brody Dalle impression—really pretty great—singing about how she has everything she needs. Rachel joins in, and they’re in their own bubble, the cab of the truck and Rachel’s head both pleasantly filled with sound until they hit the Two Whales parking lot.
The engine sputters as it stops. Frank’s RV is parked in the back corner of the lot, all dust in the windows and crushed leaves in the wheel wells. Without Pompidou sitting outside wagging his tail at her, the sight of it sets something uneasy loose in Rachel’s gut.
Seatbelt off, Chloe is already turning to leave, but she stops when Rachel reaches across the upholstery to grab her hand.
“Hey. Cool if I wait out here?” Rachel can hear how high and tight her own voice is. She hates it, but she continues, “Give you guys a heads up if Officer Berry decides to stop for doughnuts.”
Chloe stares at her, searching, but it’s only a split second before she’s back to life, opening the door. “Guardian Angel, huh? No pigs on your watch!” She winks before she leaves. “Back before you can say ‘misdemeanour.’”
Watching her go, Rachel lets out a breath when she realizes that the RV door is faced away from the truck. Around Mark, she only ever felt like she’d won, like she was rubbing it in his face just by existing. But seeing Frank now, buying from him …
Frank made things awkward. When he made remarks under his breath, it didn’t seem malicious; it was just sad. And Rachel had nipped it, whatever it was they had, in the bud so she didn’t have to feel sad. After a certain point, cash bought a much cheaper high than listening to him worry about holding her back from her future.
Maybe sitting alone, staring at his RV and thinking about it wasn’t much better.
Thankfully, Chloe’s true to her word, and minutes later she rounds the corner of the RV, moseying over and poking her head through Rachel’s open window. “All quiet on the diner front?”
Rachel snorts. “Oh, yeah. No pigs on my watch.” She chews her lip, considering, before she says, “How’d you do? Hope he didn’t overcharge.”
There’s a moment of silence, thick where it hangs but over just as quickly as it came, and then Chloe’s patting her chest pocket. “Nope, standard rate. He didn’t even ask.”
Shit. Was it that obvious? Rachel isn’t sure, but Chloe’s giving her this look, quiet and knowing, and it’s possible that it doesn’t matter how obvious she’s being.
“Get out,” Chloe says, sudden, straightening up.
“All my love to Joyce,” Rachel answers, brows knitting, “but I don’t really wanna hang around for a meal while Frank’s here.”
Chloe makes a fist, thumps twice on Rachel’s door, and heads around to the truck bed. “Get your little ass out of my truck.”
“My ass isn’t little,” Rachel says, but she acquiesces. Deliberately slow, one foot and then the other where she’d usually slide out in one fluid motion, but still. By the time the door’s shut behind her, Chloe’s already at her side again. She has a longboard under each arm.
“Still have yours here from last weekend,” Chloe says, offering the pintail in question, “and you need a cruise.”
It’s easy to forget, sometimes, how sweet Chloe can be, how much care she can take to make sure Rachel’s okay. How that’s what they do: take care of each other. But right now it feels like she’ll remember forever.
Rachel takes her board, drops it, tests the lacquered bamboo with one foot. “Leaving the truck here?”
“I figure beach, smoke, then we walk back up.”
“Lead the way, Priceless.”
Chloe rides hard and fast, like she thinks she’s at the skatepark rather than winding her way down from the Two Whales to the coast. Rachel’s always just a little behind, but she sort of likes it that way. Her mind is rarely as clear as when she’s swaying into every turn, tracing the curves of the road like a lover, and she gets to watch Chloe up ahead, carving low as she hits the apex of a hill, a blue streak sinking with the sun.
When pavement fades into sand, the horizon’s edged in orange. The little section of beach they’ve come to isn’t particularly busy, but Rachel follows Chloe behind a jagged outcropping anyway. It’s there that they sit, facing out on the water.
Rachel leaves her board wheels-up in the sand, but Chloe sets hers out over her knees, produces her grinder and pipe and sets to packing a bowl.
Even with something this rushed, it’s almost hypnotic to watch Chloe work with her hands. There’s something a little more focused in the physicality of it, a something special that isn’t as present when she’s just talking.
A memory surges from the back of Rachel’s mind of a hot night in July, lap dances and whiskey-soaked breath and fingers curling just so. How easy it was to forget everything else that night, too.
Chloe interrupts with a little bit of a cough, all of it smoke, and passes the pipe.
Giving her head a shake, Rachel sparks the lighter and inhales slow and smooth, not like Chloe, always too much and too fast the first few times. She doesn’t cough. She’s not entirely sure for herself what she means when she says, “Thanks for this.”
“Anytime, girl o’ mine.” It’s a joke, but Chloe has that look on her face again.
Rachel just laughs.