Thursday, April 21, 2011

Questions

I know FINALLY! As promised I wasn't done nor am I done yet. Max and Mal are still on the road to... well I know where they're going.
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I left the hospital questioning everything. Kris was a good person, why was he laying in a bad barely able to move and unable to remember the love of his life? Why had Sarah been so afraid to say yes? Why had the Universe or God or whatever forces out these brought them to this place? It was unfair. Nothing ever seemed fair. Just once I wanted to see the good people win, not just the game but in life. The drive back to max’s was short considering most people were on their way out of the city including his family. They had flown out shortly after I headed to the hospital. I knocked on the door and Max answered offering me a tiny silver object on his open palm. I raised my eyebrow skeptically.

“Mal, it is simply so you can come in when I am in the shower or something. Consider it my consent for you to freak me the fuck out by turning up whenever you feel like it.” He said the key still laying on him palm.

“What if I want it to be more?” I asked before I could contain my words my eyes looking between him and the key. I didn’t want to be like Sarah. I didn’t want to miss my opportunity to say yes and end up at the hospital holding Max’s hand having him not remember me. It was scary as fuck but the only thing scarier was losing him and it was all I could think of as I stood there.

“Call me crazy but did you just say you wanted to move in with me?” he asked taking his turn to quirk and eyebrow though it was more to mock me as a wide grin spread across his face.

I stepped up level with him covering the key in his open palm with my own as my other hand slipping behind his neck bringing our lips together. “Answer your question?” I asked brushing my lips over his.

“No, not really.” He said back his lips curling into a smile.

“Yes, I want to live here with you.” Thankfully I was able to edit out the try in my head. When people say they’ll try it’s like giving themselves an opportunity to fail. I didn’t want to fail. Not at this. Not now when everything felt so fragile.

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“Woman where do you think all these clothes are going?” Max asked as the movers brought in the fifth and sixth box of my wardrobe.

“The spare room closet.” I said with a shrug. I didn’t like when he called me woman in front of people but in Private I thought it was funny and fun and to be honest it was weird but I liked how he acted as if I was a possession of his. It was nice to be wanted in the way that Max always made me feel wanted.

“You should go look in there.” Max said as he walked into the kitchen crunching into an apple trying to look innocent. I glaired and headed up the stairs.
Throwing the doors open my jaw dropped. “MY EYES!” I squealed. “You’ve got to be kidding me. MAX GET YOUR ASS UP HERE.”

He slinked into the bedroom standing next to me giving a shrug still munching on the apple.

“Explain yourself.” I said hands on my hips.

“I like bright colors… and plaid.” He said trying to give me big doe eyes but really they just translated into ‘however much fashion fail I have you want to fuck me on top of my pile of neon tartan clothes before we set it ablaze’ eyes.

“Just… no. We can put them at my place or burn them but I need a place to put my clothes.” I said with a sigh.

“That would be a good use of your place.” He said with a nod.

It was the one concession to my moving in. I had to keep my place at his insistence. It was January and in a month his fate with the team would be hanging in the balance. I didn’t think he had anything to worry about but his fears seemed legitimate to him so I didn’t question it. His contract was expiring at the end of the season and that apparently made it a desirable thing to move him now.

It was scary to think of anything about Max having an expiration date except the milk in his fridge. I didn’t know what to say and I still don’t. At best I managed to muster a pat on the leg as we watched tv. Now here I stood with him and I knew he was thinking about it again, I could see it in his eyes.

“Well help me then, start taking my clothes out of the boxes and putting yours in.” I say unloading chunks of clothes on hangers. What made the whole situation so laughable was I only brought my winter clothes. I still had a whole closet of summer ones still at the apartment. Sometimes Max and I were so alike it was scary.
It was worrying how silent he had gone all of a sudden. “Stop thinking about it.” I said knowing he was contemplating being traded and his contract ending. “Either stop thinking about it or worse, start talking about it.” I said with a silly kind of gasp at the horror of talking about feelings.

He sat down on the edge of the guestroom bed. Much to my shock he was going to talk about it. “If I have to leave I want to ask you to come with me but I do not want this to be a fight because I just got you back.”

He looked up at me with legit puppy eyes. The eyes that could make me say yes to anything if he chose to ask me while looking at me like that. He was breaking my heart. I lace our fingers together and lay my head on his shoulder. “I want you to know that’s something I want to do. It’s just scary as fuck. You left home as a kid to do this and aside from adventures I’ve never planned on leaving Pittsburgh.” I sighed pushing the hair that had fallen into my face away with my free hand. “I love you so much it scares me. To be without you now…” I lift my head meeting his eyes, those big blue orbs sucking me in with their intensity, love and pure emotion.

Thankfully he had the good sense to kiss me there just nodding. I don’t exactly know what he was nodding to but he was pleasant so I let it go deciding I would officially cross that bridge as we approached it.

“We should work on this more.” He said getting up though he didn’t let go of my hand till I was standing at his side. “Someday I’m going to marry you.”

That made me chuckle. “I think we both know I’m not the marrying kind of girl. A great love of your life yes, but you’ll meet a good French girl and she’ll give you beautiful French babies.” I teased though it was all based in truth.

He took his turn to chuckle at me before letting go of my hand smiling like he knew something I didn’t. Funny how he could go from looking like the sweetest most amazing creature in the world to a smug fuck I really just wanted to punch.

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“So Sarah tells me Kris is better.” I say from the kitchen as I cut of veggies for dinner. Without work and little else to do I took up cooking as a hobby. “She finally said yes to Kris.” I add a final chop for the stir fry I was making. It was odd how something that seemed like a chore a year ago was now a pleasure since I had someone to do it with and for.

I heard him sigh from the living room as he strolled into the kitchen sitting at the table to watch me. “Yes young love. He asked me to stand with him at the wedding, MAF and Sid too.”

I nod as the veggies hit the hot pan sizzling. “Yes, Sarah has suckered me into wearing matching dresses as well.” I hear him shift in his chair. “Spit it out. What’s on your mind?” I say with my back to him working on our dinner.

“I know you think I’ll marry a nice French girl and have French babies. What you should know is that I want you. I know you aren’t ready to talk about this but I just have to say it. I need to remind you, I want you… and if I have to go I don’t want it to be the end of us. I just got you here with me.”

I hear him sigh as I don’t respond quickly enough for him. “Max, that is all pretty and lovely. I love you more than air and need you just as much. I just don’t think you’re being logical.”

“Fuck logic.” He said with a shrug.

I smile. “I would if you tell me how. Quite the riddle isn’t it?”
He narrowed his eyes at me. “Smarty pants. It makes me want to go dig out that school girl outfit you have.”

He got up coming over to kiss my neck at the stovetop. “This isn’t the last of these conversations.” He said softly. “One day you’re going to give into me and we’ll have beautiful half French half yinzer babies.”

He got the plates out to set the table then. As much as I love him I hate how he actually made me think for a moment that I would want that. A baby in a stroller in a park, the summer flowers of St. Bruno and Max playing out a picnic blanket for us. I close my eyes banishing the thought rather than indulging in it. Dreams like that weren’t meant for girls like me.

3 comments:

  1. aww i like this chapter. will you be continuing this story? :)

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  2. What the hell happened to Kris?

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  3. are you going to continue this story or are you just going to leave it here? i hope you will continue, because i loved All or Nothing and loved this angle of the story.please keep going

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