Chapter Text
Max doesn’t realize she’s dreaming at first.
She’s never had particularly vivid dreams. The most she usually recalls upon waking are vague impressions. Ideas, feelings, sometimes faces. Even those fade with time. On the rare occasion she does remember, it’s nonsense. Like she and Chloe sailing on a pirate ship made of bread to save the queen of Mars, because she’d fallen asleep hungry while watching one of Chloe’s campy sci-fi movies. Not exactly a deep dive into her psyche.
So when she finds herself standing on Arcadia Bay’s beach at sunset, the thought doesn’t cross her mind for a while. She’s ankle deep in the cool surf, little waves gently lapping at her legs, a soft breeze ruffling her hair and the warm sun on her skin. It’s quiet here, save for the sea and the wind. Peaceful. She closes her eyes and welcomes it.
Max has been too long without peace. Since the crash that killed William, who’d been like a second father. Since being forced to abandon Chloe right when she needed Max most. Since… leaving Arcadia.
She opens her eyes and looks around. Yes, this was Arcadia’s beach, no doubt about that. She’s been here more times than she can possibly count, usually with Chloe. But she can’t really be here now. She’s been living in Seattle for a little over a year, and she has no memory of getting here. A dream, then. A really, really vivid dream.
It all seems so real. She wiggles her toes, marveling at how the wet sand feels between them. Her head feels remarkably clear, too. Her dream-thoughts usually have this… hazy weight to them? As though each word and concept is filled with sludge.
Another constant of dreaming: running is difficult. Her limbs would feel heavy. Being chased by something — usually from another of Chloe’s stupid movies — would feel like trying to swim through molasses.
Max turns and takes off sprinting down the beach. Each step sprays her legs with a fine mist and kicks up clumps of wet sand. She’s never been very fast, or in that great of shape, but here it doesn’t seem to matter. She feels alive, full of energy that doesn’t fade as she picks up speed. A laugh tears from her lips, and she throws her arms out sideways, like she’s an airplane going for takeoff.
Maybe… I can do THIS!
With her next step, she pushes with all her might and leaps into the air. The wind itself seems to catch her under the arms and carry her upward. Her stomach lurches like it’s the first drop on a roller coaster, and for a terrifying moment she looks down, sees the beach hurtling away from her, and thinks about what will happen if she falls. She’s never been a fan of heights. Is it possible to get vertigo and pass out when you’re already dreaming?
But— No. This is a dream. Her dream. She will not fall. She cannot fall.
Max asserts control. Her assent stops, and she hangs there, dozens of feet up, admiring the view. She can’t make out most of town, as it becomes a hazy blur past the end of the beach. The ocean stretches out crystal clear and unbroken to the horizon. The orange sun is just beginning to dip below the waves, its glare a brilliant streak of gold across the water.
This has always been her favorite time of day. When sunset’s glow casts everything in a golden pallor as the world prepares for a well deserved rest. The Golden Hour. She’s always wondered what it would look like from a bird’s eye, with nothing to obstruct the view.
What might it look like from even higher?
No time to chicken out. She looks to the sky, snaps her arms to her sides, and rockets upward. The wind roars in her ears as she climbs higher and higher, approaching the layer of scattered clouds above. It’s getting colder, she can feel the iciness of the air on her skin, but it brings no discomfort. The rushing air stings her eyes, but it brings no pain. Does that even make sense? How can one register pain but not feel it?
She smiles at the naivete of the thought. Yes, let’s apply sense to a dream. Especially one where she’s rocketing upwards under her own power.
Max bursts through one layer of clouds, then another. The sky above her is beginning to darken, faint pinpricks of stars entering her view. She could probably keep going into space, if she wanted. But even in her dreams she’s still an artsy hipster, and she’s here for a more earthly view.
And what a view it is. She comes to a stop just above a third layer of clouds. The sun is now a half circle on the horizon, and it bathes the entire sea of white in golden hues. Rays of light shine through the gaps between fluffy towers that morph and tussle in currents of air. She’s seen something similar once, the only time she’s ever been on an airplane. It was one thing to see it out a dirty window, and another to see it with her own eyes.
Well, an approximation of her own eyes, anyway. This wasn’t real. But she wasn’t about to let that spoil the view for her.
She crosses her legs and settles down on a particularly fluffy cloud. The logical part of her knows that clouds are just water, and can’t hold any weight. The dreamer in her has always wanted to sit on one. So she does, and it’s every bit as comfy as she imagined it would be. She smiles at the gorgeous vista, framing it in her mind for an attempt at drawing when she wakes.
If only I could just… stay here forever. No more worrying. No homework, no social anxiety, no dead family or abandoned friends. Just me, the clouds, and the sun.
That would get boring after a while, no doubt. And it isn’t like her problems aren’t solvable. Homework is finite, however much it felt otherwise. She’s starting to make friends in Seattle. William’s death was… well, it simply was, now. She’s numb to it after all this time.
And Chloe… She’s still there. Here, in Arcadia. Max just had to grow a pair and reach out. Then…
Then she’d meet a wall. A wall she’d built to protect herself from having to bear Chloe’s grief as well as her own. A wall maintained by a year without contact. A wall likely reinforced by Chloe’s anger for leaving her behind.
And unlike in dreams, Max can’t simply fly over that wall.
Max’s smile had faded, and now she watches the sun continue to fall with a somber expression. No, she can’t stay here forever, even if she wants to. All dreams fade come morning. Or so she wants to believe. Her waking life is a… nightmare is too harsh a word. She has loving parents, she gets decent grades, she’s starting to make friends again. No, it’s more akin to being lost in the void that lies between waking and dreaming, that hazy space where time means nothing and feeling becomes impossible. A purgatory where all she can do is wait. That’s what her life has been since she left Arcadia. Waiting.
A colorless dream without end. A dull night where morning never comes.
Motion breaks her out of her brooding. She gasps as something flutters into view. A butterfly, all the way up here?
No, too fuzzy. A moth?
Transfixed, she raises a hand and holds out one finger. The moth circles it curiously, then comes to a soft landing. It flexes grayish white wings that stretch about one of Max’s handspans across. Its body is covered in soft-looking white hair. From the top of its head jut three antennae, all of which come to points. From this angle, it almost looks like a little crown. It regards her with round, golden eyes. It seems to glow in the sun’s dying light. Or… is it glowing on its own?
“Hey there, little guy,” Max whispers. “Don’t suppose you have any advice for me?”
She cocks her head at Max. Somehow, Max is certain the moth is a she. Her wings vibrate, then flap twice. Even Dream Max, gifted with flight, doesn’t understand moth sign language. But she feels better, somehow.
“Thanks.” Max smiles at the moth. What she’d give to have her camera with her. She’ll have to try a drawing later. “It’s always nice to have another friend. Even if you’re just a dream. But who says dreams can’t be real, right?”
Again, without knowing how, Max is certain that comment makes the moth happy. She stretches her wings and takes off again, flying in circles around Max. Little motes of light fall from her like flakes of snow, dusting Max’s arms and hair. She laughs and spins in place on her cloud, following the moth as it goes round and round. Just before she can get dizzy, her moth friend stops and hovers in front of the fading sun.
She needs to leave, Max thinks with strange certainty. I’ll be waking soon.
“Go on, little girl,” Max says with a little wave. “I’ll be okay. I hope I see you again some other night.”
The moth’s little crown antennae twitch, as if in farewell. Then, she turns and flutters off towards the sun. Max watches her until she vanishes, at which point the entire dream world begins to blur around her. In the distance, she hears the muffled tones of her alarm. The vague impression of her blankets upon her body. Her thoughts start to muddle.
The entire sea of clouds fades away but for a single, distant point. From it, she hears the faintest of whispers.
“Remember… Light…”
Max wakes that morning with a smile. As the most anti-morning person she knows other than Chloe, she surprises herself by jumping out of bed and finding a notebook. She starts scribbling furiously, wanting to record every detail of the dream before it fades. When she’s satisfied with the description, she does a quick sketch of her little moth friend. Her drawing was never as good as Chloe’s, but it will do. To remember.
She needn’t bother. As the minutes, hours, and days pass, that dream never fades from clarity. And neither does the next, similarly vivid dream. Or the one after that.
In fact, it will be a long, long time before Max will have anything resembling a normal dream again.