Archive of Our Own

Max’s cheeks felt unnaturally warm as she stumbled out of her uber. The driver gave her a concerned look, but she raised a hand, laughing.

“No prob, Bob, perfectly fine!” She straightened and immediately wobbled. The driver remained in her driveway until she’d successfully walked all the way up to Hellerton House and—after several attempts—stuck the key in the hole.

“Such a sweet guy,” she mused to herself as the car disappeared down the road. That, or maybe he’d been waiting to ambush her. Max shivered at that thought and quickly let herself inside. She took her thick coat off and hung it on the coat rack by the door, joined by her beanie. She set her bag down by the side of the couch and then collapsed, groaning.

Her feet ached. Her brain ached. Her stomach was a roiling mess of nerves and the few glasses of wine she’d had with Hazel didn’t do much to calm her nerves. Max realized that she could be a pretty anxious drunk. Never fun drunk with no inhibitions. Probably from all the trauma.

Realistically, how could she let loose and have fun at all when Safi was still gone? They were recovering from that freak psychic storm and for some reason, Chloe was reaching out with a text? 

Max pulled her phone out to look at it for the millionth time.

Chloe
Hey Max. I heard about the storm, are you ok? Look, there’s something I really need to talk to you about. Can we plan a meet up when our schedules align again? Let me know

Chloe didn’t know the goddamn half of it! She didn’t know if Max was alright, or what she’d been up to. Timeline hopping, grieving another dead friend, another possible… something. Safi’s absence was like a giant hole punched right into Max’s chest.

But Safi had gone off on her mission months ago. Chloe’s text was from a week ago, with no follow up and Max hadn’t replied to it yet. She decided to instead actually focus on her own life. Her classes were going great. So fantastic, actually, that Yasmin offered to hire her on as an actual full-time professor. That was like, amazing.

Except, Max’s new agent Hazel was setting her up with all these amazing contacts, and galleries wanted her photographs. They’d pay good money, too. She would get to travel the world and take pictures of the kind of desolate places that reminded her of her own soul.

Cracked. Bleeding. Stomped on over and over again, by those she loved but also, funnily enough, by reality.

“Fuck you reality,” Max grumbled under her breath.

She was drunk and nose diving down the sad route. So she went to her kitchen for another bottle of wine, poured half a glass of it, and told herself very firmly that she would drink this wine, distract her poor mind with brainrot like the kids did, and then she would pass out and deal with all these decisions on the morrow.

Max was almost done with her wine, scrolling through her tiktok, when she came across one that made her pause. No one knew she had a tiktok. She’d made certain none of her contacts would come across her profile, especially her students. She’d also built her fyp brick by brick.

After the eighth repeat of the video, Max was still enjoying the song Maneater by Nelly Furtado as a really hot woman gave a smolder to the camera while she lip synced. It should not have been as hot as it was. Still, after watching the woman run a hand through her gorgeous, long hair again, Max groaned. Deeply. 

She thought about Amanda and that kiss—so very long ago. She thought about Chloe, and all those kisses—and other stuff—and she thought about Safi, about how she would have kissed her, if the whole murder incident didn’t happen. 

Max yearned, for fuck’s sake!

She downed the last of her wine and then decided you know what? This looked fun! She’d try it, too. How damn hard could it be to make a… what did they call it, a thirst trap? Max knew she was cute. She’d scored a few hot women, duh, even if her crippling anxiety—and dangerous superpower—got in the way of any meaningful relationship.

So, determined and fueled by horny anger, Max propped her phone up and spent way too fucking long trying to record the damn video. She was not original about it, either. Used the same song and general idea of the video.

At first she felt a little silly, but then she slid her fingers into her jean waistband and she swept her other hand through her freshly washed hair, and the flush on her cheeks from the alcohol actually made her look… hot. Damn, she started feeling herself by then. After only a small handful of takes, she was satisfied enough with the result. She watched the video—only cringing slightly—and then mashed out a caption and tags. 

For a very brief second, sober and logical Max started screaming at her to absolutely not do this. But drunk Max was sad and horny, and she wanted attention, she wanted to feel hot. So with a little hiccup, she hit that post button. Then she flopped over on the couch right there and passed out.

Chloe’s ears were still ringing from the set they’d just finished, and it was yet another reminder that she wasn’t young and spry anymore. Her moshpit days were over, and if she had any say in it, she’d be in bed pronto. But she had to help her girls break down the set and fill the van, giving back talk as good as she got. Her heart wasn’t in it, though.

As Chloe shoved the last case with drum equipment into the van, blue lights flashed before her eyes. She flinched and stumbled back, her ears ringing, reality shifting around her. But a warm hand on her arm brought her back and she looked up, breaths stuttering, to see Izzie staring at her with concern.

“Hey boss man, you okay there?”

Chloe gently pulled away from her touch. “Yeah, fine. Just… tired.”

Izzie’s brow lifted. “Tired doesn’t nearly put you on your ass for no reason though.”

It was well meaning, Chloe knew it, but still, the irritation flared. She didn’t want to take it out on anyone, so she gave another half-assed excuse and then retreated to her truck. Once inside, she let her head fall back and just focused on taking big, even breaths.

That fucking place again. The lighthouse. An overlook. And… and that woman. Luckily she hadn’t been sucked back into it thanks to Izzie. Chloe felt sick. Her text to Max had been read but not replied to, and that really fucking stung.

Not that she didn’t deserve it. Max was the last person on earth who deserved to be broken up with the way Chloe had done it. She’d been scared and traumatized and stupid. She wouldn’t be surprised if Max never reached out to her again, despite everything they’d gone through. 

Her mind felt so muddy. Her instincts kept screaming at her that something happened and that she needed to go to Max, because if time and reality was being fucked with, it was quite likely Max’s doing. 

Chloe pulled her phone out to go into her chat with Max again, but paused when she noticed a tiktok notification. She generally ignored those, would swear up and down she didn’t use the damn app—she did. What made her freeze was the ‘New Video from Maxcaulfield!’ notification.

Max didn’t post tiktoks, did she? She loved taking the pictures, never being in front of the camera. Curiosity won out and Chloe clicked on it, then she choked on her spit as she watched Max perform a fucking thirst trap. Max Caulfield. To Maneater. 

God fucking damnit. “Holy shit,” Chloe said out loud. 

Max looked… wow, she looked way fucking hotter than Chloe remembered. Had that many years really gone by? Had hitting 30 just changed them overnight? Max wore a tight, black turtleneck that just… really accentuated her tits. Chloe knew very intimately how wonderful Max’s boobs were, and god she suddenly missed them so terribly. Not just the boobs though!

There was a confidence to Max that Chloe didn’t recognize. She could clearly see Max was wasted, though, and she started laughing to herself. 

“Oh girl, you’re going to regret this come morning,” she said, shaking her head and typing out a reply. Luckily she’d discovered Max’s account just before they’d broken up, and Max never realized she followed her. 

Chloe sat in her car for a good hour—on God—and watched that video over and over. The tilt of her head, the smooth glide of Max’s fingers through her hair, the fingers in her waistband, the way she clumsily sang along to the song. Her eyes were smouldering and Chloe yearned to feel that look on her again.

“Fuck it,” she decided, reversing hard and hitting the road for their motel. She’d send the group chat a quick notice, but she had a trip to make.

Max Caulfield was waiting.

Amanda yawned so loudly that her jaw actually cracked and it hurt, and Lucas made a noise of disgust at her expense. She sent him a glare.

“Are you done yet, dude?” she asked.

Lucas looked up at the clock then at his half finished beer and shrugged. “Is anyone truly done?”

Amanda rolled her eyes. “Yeah, whatever.”

She hated the guy. Not only because of all the shit he’d caused with Maya, but Amanda particularly didn’t like how this guy treated Max. He was a piece of shit, and he loved to sit by her bar until way past closing probably on purpose because he liked to be a jackass.

She fantasized about shoving her entire foot up his ass, but angrily wiped out some wet glasses instead. When she was done slamming them down loud enough to disturb Lucas’ little self pity fest, she went over to her corner and settled on the stool. Besides Lucas, Reggie was on the other side of the bar, but he was asleep on top of piles of school work. Amanda would need to gently kick his ass out, too. 

Bored, she pulled her phone out and went to the best thing since crack coccaine—tiktok. She didn’t care about keeping the volume all the way down, but she did have it soft enough for just her to hear. She’d had one incident where she opened tiktok in public and the very first video loudly proclaimed “SO MY PUSSY” to the entire line of people in front of her. She’d been mortified.

One incident was more than enough, thank you very much. Her fyp was much of the same, videos of her family and friends, lots of messages from her siblings—dumb stuff she’d watch just for them. Then there were the local music accounts, the local queers. Amanda loved seeing fellow lesbians out in the wild.

She was halfway through enjoying a delicious thirst trap when she nearly dropped her fucking phone. The video replayed and Amandra blinked. 

“Holy fuck,” she said very loudly.

“What?” Lucas asked, leaning forward like he could see over the counter and all the way to Amanda’s phone.

“Fuck off, Lucas, seriously,” she snapped at him.

The video replayed. It was Max. Max Caulfield. Wearing an outfit that made her look so very sinful, wearing an expression that was actual pure sin. Amanda bit down hard on her bottom lip. She liked and favourited the video, of course. Downloaded it too. Squeezed her thighs together.

“Goddamnit, Max,” she sighed. 

She went into the comments—they were starting to accumulate already, because of course they would—and she let the video keep replaying as she typed out her own response, replied to some others. 

A war was brewing, and suddenly Amanda didn’t give a shit if Lucas wanted to spend his entire early morning at the Turtle. She had gay shit to do.

Safi was sitting in the dark in their motel room, one leg swung over the other, not wearing the face of herself. She had a glass of whiskey in her hand and it was burning brightly through her chest. Her eyes burned next, but she was done crying. 

The nightmares were getting worse. That place. The lighthouse. The whatever-the-fuck Max had created to bring Safi back to life, it was haunting her. Safi felt like her essence was slowly being sucked back to that place, to that other woman that she kept seeing, too. 

She missed Max so badly, and hated not really replying to her texts or answering her calls. It would just be too easy for Safi to turn tail and run right back to Max. She wasn’t wanted like that, not really. Max had made it clear, when she merged the timelines. Hadn’t she? 

Max had shifted reality for Safi, and yet she was running away like a coward.

Sighing, she let the ice in her drink clink and took another sip.

“Can you stop being all depressed in the dark, like a weirdo?” Diamond asked her, exasperated. 

Safi paused. “How’d you know it’s me?”

Diamond gave her a look. “Girl, don’t play with me. Even pretending to be someone else, I can still see it’s you. We’ve been on the road long enough now.”

Safi let herself shimmer back into herself and took another long, hard sip. It burned again. “Sorry to be such a downer for you.”

Diamond flicked the light on. “You should just go back, if you’re not serious about this.”

Safi opened her mouth to argue, but she stopped, because Diamond was right. She’d been serious in the beginning, but she thought Max would come with her. She didn’t even really know what she thought anymore, what the point was. 

What, would they create some fucking X-Men academy or something? The few leads they’d followed led them nowhere. They were wasting their time, and even Diamond seemed like she was sick of it and just wanted to return to Caledon. 

Safi’s phone pinged. It was the sound for tiktok, and it’d been so long since she’d heard it that she opened it out of curiosity. Someone had tagged her in a comment on a video. 

Safi’s breath caught in her chest when she saw the video. “Oh my god,” she choked out.

“What?” Diamond came over, expression suspicious and also very exasperated. When she saw the video that was currently looping on Safi’s phone, her mouth popped open and her brow lifted. “Oh. Yeah,” she said. “Oh my god.”

Safi felt her entire face fill with heat. She knew Max was attractive. Cute, a little weird (a lot weird, actually), mysterious to the point that it was suspicious, and most definitely beautiful. Hot though? Fuck, Safi didn’t know Max could be hot like this.

“What is she doing?” Safi yelled at her phone.

Diamond started laughing. “Maybe she figured the way to get your ass back to Caledon is to show you what you’re missing.”

Safi set her glass down, alcohol fully forgotten. She sent Diamond the most lethal glare that she could. “I don’t have feelings for her like that.”

Diamond mimed throwing out a fishing line and hooking it directly over Safi’s chest. “And a bitch can lie, apparently.”

Safi’s eyes just dropped down to that video. She couldn’t stop watching it. Max was quite obviously drunk, though. Poor Caulfield would be mortified in the morning. Was she sad about Safi leaving too? Was this why she’d gotten so smashed she made the unfortunate decision to post a video on tiktok? 

Pressing her lips against her palm, Safi settled back into the uncomfortable couch and checked out the comments. For the video just going live not too long ago, the comments had exploded. Of course everyone at Caledon saw it first and decided they simply had to say something. Most of the comments were thirsting after Max which, fair, you know? But that didn’t sit right with Safi.

With a flame in her heart, she started sending out replies. Then she nearly choked on air when she saw her own fucking mother comment. 

“Max Caulfield,” Safi said out loud, mouth open in pure shock, “the woman you are.”

There was an annoying, insistent buzzing against Max’s cheek. Pain lanced through her skull when she moved, so she opted not to do too much of that, but she did feel for the thing against her face and realized it was her phone. Groaning, she pulled it away and just cradled it to her chest. 

It kept vibrating with notifications. Then calls. Then texts. Max had a blissful, hungover moment where she didn’t remember anything at all—not even herself, or why she hurt so bad. Then reality crashed back in and she shot up, gasping. Her first instinct was to think something was going terribly wrong—like Chloe had died again, or her father had a heart attack, or Caledon was under threat from another storm, or Safi came back without telling her.

No, actually it was just her tiktok notifications going absolutely fucking crazy. Heart pounding in her throat, Max opened the app. She had never seen such a large number on anything she had ever posted. The sparse tiktoks she ever did post were some personal, esoteric shoots. No one knew about this account.

No one was supposed to know. And now, well—Fuck, the entirety of fucking Vermont had seen her latest video.

Max had no recollection of making it at all. She cringed so hard when she watched it that she just closed out of the app and put it on silent. She still stared at her homescreen, though, her eyes very wide and her heart thundering. She had missed calls from a lot of people. Hazel’s name popped up with an incoming call, and Max answered it with a terrible feeling of nausea and impending doom.

“Hi.”

“Max!” Hazel said, sounding relieved. “I was starting to worry when you didn’t answer my first call. You okay? I told you that third glass of wine was too much.”

Oh, thank god, this isn’t about the video. “I’m a little hungover,” Max conceded. “I’ll be fine.”

“Right, right. Please go over the proposal we discussed last night, Max. This is life changing for you.”

“I know, I just have to think about things. I have a life here at Caledon. I, um, I didn’t tell you last night but they offered a full teaching position here.”

Hazel went quiet for a second, then she squealed. “That’s amazing Max! You deserve all of the success and happiness, genuinely. I know this is putting you in a spot and I won’t make you choose between two loves, but you may have to.”

Max felt her eyes fill with tears. She was so overwhelmed. She greedily and violently wished that Chloe or Safi were here, or even Amanda. Anyone who could just hold her and let her talk, help her figure out what she wanted to do but…

Chloe had broken up with her and moved on.

Safi left on some grand plan of world conquering.

Amanda was… unable to handle Max’s shit, and that was fine.

Maybe she’d be alone forever.

“Thanks, Hazel,” Max told her before they lapsed into silence for too long. “Can I just have a couple days to think? I have, uh, stuff going on.”

“Of course, honey. You deal with that video situation, okay? I’m a call or email away!”

Before Max could sputter her reply, the call ended. Right after that another call came through, this one from her mother. She ended it. Then her father called. She hit end call on that one too. 

And still, her notifications kept climbing, that little red dot above the tiktok icon increasing. What on earth had she done? 

Hands shaking, Max curiously went into it again. She paused the video as fast as humanly possible, then she went into the comments. 

By the end of it she was a sobbing mess. She cried from sadness and laughter, but from longing and relief. She got quite a few questions answers, but she also felt more confused than ever. 

Max just never realized how much people actually loved her, so maybe this wasn’t a disaster after all?

Simultaneously, she received texts from Chloe, Safi and Amanda. Her heart went right into her throat and her hands began to shake. Maybe she was a little… greedy. She could never have it all, surely?

But what if she tried? 

To torture herself one last time, she watched the video again, and then instead of replying to all the people sending her messages, she went into the comments instead.

Chloe
Well this may be awkward in the morning. You’re incredibly beautiful, Max. You know this. Please answer my text
First Comment
9h       Reply

Amanda
MAX OH MY GOD. Really making me reminisce on that kiss we shared at the turtle. You’re hot as hell, girl. Maybe I shouldn’t have told you to slow things down… call me? xx
9h       Reply

Loretta
Hi Max! Professor! Um this video is phenomenal work, when you’re up and if the hangover isn’t too bad, could I have a little interview with you about what inspired you to make this? Ok thanks! (also did you really kiss Amanda? What is your current relationship status?)
@Safi any comments to add?
9h       Reply

Reggie
Hi Professor Max! Sick video, love the composition. Is this like some sort of secret test? Please let me know I’m sweating
8h       Reply

Gwen
Holy hell Max, always thought you were hot as hell despite the whole Nancy Drew bit that pissed me off. Great work feeding the queers
6h       Reply

Vinh
DAMN MAX. This is wild shit, I’m here for it (you are very beautiful and I am in awe)
45m       Reply

Moses
Max! Why are half my students sending me the link to this video? They forced me to show it on the projector and everything. We had a debate on the ethics of the inherent power dynamic between student and professor, and whether it is fair for said professor to be so conventionally attractive to the entire study body (apparently). I’m traumatized. Are you okay?
1h       Reply

Safi
MAX CAULFIELD DELETE THIS
9h       reply

Yasmin Fayyad
Hi Maxine! What a lovely video, I think. Is this for some kind of project of yours? If not then I am a little concerned with the sultry tone of this. Perhaps we should have a call to discuss?
4h       Reply

Diamond
Max thank you for this, Safi has been driving me nuts these last couple of weeks and I think you finally made her stop her shit! Also hilarious to see her crash out like this. SAFI TELL MAX YOU ARE IN LOVE WITH HER
7h       Reply

Lucas
Disappointing. Pandering to the smooth-brained masses. Can’t say I’m entirely surprised
2h       Reply

Victoria
Max Caulfield thirst trap that actually gagged me was not on my bingo card for this year
5h       Reply

Steph
Whoa I am definitely GAY gay holy shit. And Chloe fumbled THIS?? I swear if I wasn’t already madly in love with Alex… just sayin
1h       Reply

Dani
HOT LADY I’M CHEWING MY HANDS OFF BARK BARK BARK AWOOOO
Just now       Reply

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