Chapter Text
Luis gripped his boyfriend’s hand extra tightly and took a deep breath as he led Max up the winding staircase. He’d been planning this night for a couple of weeks and everything had to be perfect. Max deserved perfect.
He was stunning in the dark purple suit he’d worn because Luis had told him to dress up, and Luis was looking forward to staring at and doting on him all evening. Reaching the top of the staircase, the two young men’s faces were bathed in cool springtime air, scented with lilacs and jasmine. Violin music rose in a haunting melody.
This date was costing Luis a pretty penny, most of which he’d made doing odd jobs and some of which had come in a loan from Red. The fanciest rooftop restaurant in Auradon on a Saturday night didn’t come cheap. But Max was worth it.
The dark honey eyes that Luis could get lost in were roaming over everything; the black tie waiters, the columns of flowers, the intimate tables covered in white linen and crystal. Luis mentally patted himself on the back for arranging a date like this for their three month anniversary.
“Do you like it?” he asked excitedly. “I wanted to do something really special, you know, cause…” he trailed off, trusting that Max knew the significance.
“It’s…wow…” Max replied as they reached their reserved table in the corner and took their seats.
“I know,” Luis agreed, beaming.
A waiter was next to them in a moment, asking if they would like the wine selection for the evening. Moral to his core, Luis divulged that they were not quite old enough to drink. Nonalcoholic wine it was then, and the waiter trotted off.
“Always have to be the goody-two-shoes, don’t you?” Max teased from across the table. His smirk was one of Luis’s favorite things in the world.
“One of us has to be,” Luis returned playfully. The novelty of joking with each other and it not turning into insults like their interactions used to was still new, and refreshing. Luis couldn’t keep the smile off his face as he watched Max peruse the menu.
“Get whatever you want,” Luis made sure to tell him. Max flicked his eyes up towards his boyfriend.
“I can cover my half,” he said carefully.
“No!” Luis was quick to argue. “I asked you out, this is my treat. Let me do this for you.”
Max gave a small sigh.
If there was anything about Max that bothered Luis, it was that he sometimes acted like he took up too much space or was in the way, when nothing could be further from the truth. He reduced his personality to hat tricks and sarcasm while his friends tried to applaud him for being witty, and smart, and building a future and a life that his father would never have given him.
But Max couldn’t hear the applause. Nothing he did was ever good enough; he used an impossible yardstick to measure himself and somehow always came up short. Max Hatter was independent, brilliant, thoughtful, and gentle.
Luis Madrigal was head over heels for him. And he was determined to prove Max’s worth to him, no matter what it took. Luis reached across the table and looped Max’s fingertips with his own.
“Please let me do this?” he asked, bringing out a hint of the puppy dog eyes that he knew Max had a hard time saying no to. Max granted him a wary smile and Luis grinned in triumph.
The meal was delicious, which was truly a good thing for how much Luis was spending on it. He had the steak, medium rare of course, and Max had swordfish. They flirted over their glasses of sparkling non-wine and admired the stars and listened to the music. If Max was a bit quieter than usual, Luis chalked it up to the fact that this wasn’t totally their scene, to be fair.
They usually hung out at Auradon’s burger joint or went on hikes in the Enchanted Forest. But that was partially why Luis had wanted to do this; to go big for their anniversary. He was already tentatively planning their six month mark.
They shared a tiramisu for dessert, though Luis had never had one before and got some on his nose. Max giggled at him and all was right with the world. He frowned again, however, when Luis made sure he paid the whole bill, and his demeanor was not as buoyant as Luis could have hoped as they descended the staircase.
“C’mon, let’s go for a walk along the shore,” Luis suggested, figuring getting out of the stuffy black tie atmosphere would do Max good, even if he was usually the one more able to be formal than Luis. Max nodded willingly enough, and took his boyfriend’s hand.
They wandered out of the town proper and past the boats tied up at the pier, the stars reflecting on the water in a million pinpricks. Luis wanted to see the stars in Max’s eyes, too, but Max kept his gaze down, and more than once Luis heard him sigh.
What else could he do? This night was supposed to be perfect. Luis had an idea, and came to a halt as a cloud revealed a glowing half moon. Max glanced at him, finally, and Luis gave him a soft smile. He was literally so beautiful it made Luis’s heart ache.
Luis’s free hand found Max’s chin, and he leaned in. Max's breath smelled of chocolate mousse. A kiss under the stars would erase this uneasy feeling between them.
“Happy anniversary, baby,” Luis whispered just before he closed the distance between their lips. He met empty air as Max’s face escaped his fingers. Disoriented, Luis opened his eyes again to see Max taking a step back, then another one, his hand pulling out of Luis’s. There was a look on his face that Luis hadn’t seen before - not anger, not sorrow; sort of an emptiness.
“Luis…” Max said softly. “Tonight has been amazing. Really. You didn’t have to do…any of that, and I thank you.”
“Of course,” Luis gushed, an uneasy prickle beginning at the base of his neck. Why was Max so far away from him all of a sudden?
“I really like you, Madrigal,” Max then said, slipping into their now-affectionate habit of using surnames. They still did it every once in a while, for fun. Max’s voice was more serious than it should have been, though. And then in an instant he made Luis’s stars go out.
“But I really need some space.”
“What?” was all Luis could choke out at first. He could hear the water lapping against the dock and the distant chatter of people enjoying their evening. In all of that noise, he must have misheard.
“I just…I need a little break,” Max continued. “I need to be able to breathe, to figure some stuff out. Away from you. From us, from this.” He paused for a millisecond.
“That’s cool, right?”
Space. Break. Away. Luis couldn’t hear the water lapping anymore. He licked his suddenly dry lips. It felt like a chasm had opened in the ground between him and Max, and if Luis lunged hard enough, he’d be able to vault it. He’d done something similar before, when there’d been an earthquake back home near Columbia and…
This was an earthquake, but there was no physical chasm. Luis lunged anyway, or started to, but Max drew back as if Luis’s touch would burn him.
“Please,” was all he said, his eyes wide, imploring. “It’s not you, I promise, it’s me.”
Luis was still speechless but at these words his heart and his silence cracked.
“Max,” and it was close to a sob. “Don’t do this.”
“I just need to get away for a bit. I’m not mad, I just need some space,” Max said again, and with it took another step back. Luis felt like everything good that had ever happened to him was slipping through his fingers and no matter how tightly he tried to hold on, it wouldn’t help.
There was nothing he could do. He wouldn’t try to grab Max and hold him by force; he would never ever do that, and it wouldn’t solve whatever was happening right now anyway.
Luis found himself nodding dumbly. Max wanted something and no matter how much it didn’t make sense and it was causing Luis’s brain to fog over, it was not in Luis’s nature to say no to him.
Max simply nodded in return, his eyes still too wide, then he was turning. And he was gone. Just like that. He could have been a phantom for all the tangible evidence he left behind, but he was the most real thing in the world to the man now standing there alone by the water’s edge.
Luis considered chasing after him. Calling his name, pleading, begging for more of an explanation. Fear partially stopped him. Which was wild because nothing usually scared him. What had Max meant with “it’s not you, it’s me”? Luis was scared that even if he could dig for answers, he wouldn’t like what he found. Namely, that he and Max were done and this was a relatively nice way of breaking up.
He’d done everything right - he’d tried to make Max feel special and important, on this anniversary night, yes, but also all the time. He may not have had much in the way of money, but he paid Max compliments regularly, and not only on his looks.
He’d taken him out for their two week anniversary, then their one month, their two month, and now this one that had certainly topped those. He couldn’t buy Max the stuff that he wished he could yet, but he’d done what he could for now - a purple bookmark that exactly matched Max's coat; he’d ordered a special kind of tea that Max had mentioned in passing; he convinced Pink to bring roses from Wonderland after her visits home and Max smiled his sweet goofy smile whenever Luis presented one to him from behind his back.
His mind turning endlessly, Luis sat on the shoreline for a long time once Max had walked away, staring out at the water and the stars and feeling as adrift as a boat cut loose from its mooring.