Chapter Text
It had been nearly two months.
Two months of sweeping waves of nausea and numb fingers and bloody noses.
Honestly, Max knew he should’ve been more concerned about it all, but it also had been two months since he had lost the ability to give a fuck about anything.
Every waking hour of his life was a blur. And the sleeping hours weren’t much better, they were wracked with strange dreams that could’ve been dragged straight out of a horror movie.
A lot of blood.
A lot of fucked up shit that Max couldn’t unsee.
But it was fine. Max was fine. It was either ‘be fine’ or…
Well, he wasn’t too sure what the alternative would entail and that was probably for the best.
Besides, Max had a lot more free-time nowadays after quitting the football team, and he was doing what he could to try and fill that time well.
He wasn’t really succeeding at that.
He had just been too tired to do anything, but too jittery and high-wired to laze around and do nothing. Max would kill to be lazy. To lie in bed on his phone, ignoring his homework while laughing at TikTok’s and sipping a lukewarm Diet Coke.
He can’t even bring himself to do that.
All Max ever did was bite his fingernails so much that the nail bed bled and ached for days after. He hated to admit it, but it was one of the few things that made him feel like a real person. People felt pain, and if Max’s fingers hurt then it meant he was real. Right?
Whatever.
It didn’t need to make sense. Nothing else did right now.
Max was shaken from his trance by the snap of a twig from under his foot.
He was getting used to the feeling, the strange twists and turns of location with no warning.
He had been lying on his bed just seconds ago, hadn’t he? And yet, here he was, standing in the Witchwood.
Time didn’t adhere to any rules anymore, not for Max.
The only reason he knew that two months had passed was the fact he ended up here every night.
He’d counted.
Sharpie tally marks on the off-white wall near the unused desk in his bedroom that he added to every time he ended up back home. When Max had Googled; ‘not feeling like time is real’, a website had said something about small daily rituals to keep you centered.
Whatever that meant.
He’d also seen pages upon pages of conditions and disorders that listed that loss of time as a side effect. Some kind of diagnosis would have been relieving, but Max knew it wasn’t as simple as that.
Mainly because it had all started with him jolting awake in bed, retching and gagging, in the middle of the night. There was a tingling, humming sensation behind his eyes and three phrases fresh in his mind, as if he had just been dreaming of them.
Unsound. Black book. Pay the price.
But he hadn’t been dreaming. And he couldn’t.
Not for the next two months. Mainly because he also couldn’t sleep.
They never mentioned any of that stuff on Mayo Clinic.
He didn’t know what the words meant, or what they referred to. But they never stopped repeating.
Later that same day, while in remedial algebra -
Unsound.
On the ride home after football practice, in Jason’s car -
Black book.
Later that night, when he went from stepping into the shower to standing in jeans, a white shirt, and his letterman in front of the Waylon Place -
Pay the price.
They never changed their order or their intonation. They just repeated, monotone, in his head with no rhyme or reason. All Max knew was they had to have something to do with the Old Waylon Place.
Why else did he keep showing up here?
His stomach twisted and turned around itself when he looked at the building. The wood rotting, the stairs leading to the door buckled in on themselves, the weeds overgrown and wild throughout the yard.
It made him feel sick.
And it called out to him.
A call to make things okay. To stop the ache behind his eyes. To stop everything, period.
An escape from the cold.
The first few nights, the strange groaning in his gut had been more than enough to get Max to turn around and head home.
No, walk home.
His car was never around. He had walked the hour there.
But by the end of the second week, he had stuck around a little longer and just stared.
Listened to the way the wind whistled through the slight gap in the door.
By the end of the first month, the whistle began to sound more like his name, being sung out over and over.
Warm, inviting.
He had been in there before, right?
At Steph’s party?
He had no memory of that night. He had no memory of anything that day beyond getting the text from Steph around 7pm.That text was the only proof he had that he had gone, because he had texted back. Twice.
siiiiick, yeah ill be there. i’ll bring a 6 pack lol
And just before 10pm;
just got here, door unlocked??
Steph hadn’t replied either time.
Steph also ignored him now.
Most people did.
Something had changed and everyone could tell. He let Steph’s new nerdy friends do whatever they wanted. Max didn’t care.
The day after that party, as Max walked into the corridor, Steph and Micro-Peter had stared at him with fear. Grace Chasity had clutched the cross around her neck.
But the migraine and the nosebleed Max had gotten at that same moment seemed to quell them.
They, along with everyone else in the hallway, had awkwardly turned away and whispered amongst themselves.
Max was acting weird. Max wasn’t himself. Max looked pale and sickly. Max nearly passed out on the field.
Max wasn’t being an asshole for once.
Why look a gift horse in the mouth?
When he told Coach he was dropping football, there were no questions asked. No one really cared. They had Brad Callahan from Junior Varsity lined up. Max had been on autopilot for weeks. If he wasn’t going to play well, they preferred if he didn’t play at all.
The only thing Max had been useful for had been football.
Max wasn’t a nerd, or a prude, or a loser.
He was worse.
He was a total nobody.
Overnight, he went from King of Hatchetfield High to the guy who sat in the back of the library every lunch, staring at the walls and picking at the just-scabbed over scratches on his arms he kept waking up with.
The only other person in the whole school with that kind of reputation was that freaky freshman girl, Hannah. She sat across from Max in the library some days. At least she had her weird imaginary spider friend to talk to.
Sometimes he just wrote out the phrases, to try and get them out of his head. But all it ever did was lead to Max having pages upon pages of wasted paper and a sore hand from all the writing.
Kyle and Jason had tried to pretend nothing had changed for a while, giving him a ride home when he felt too sick and dizzy to drive himself.
“Man, how hungover are you, dude?,” Kyle would joke, but it rang hollow. Max knew Kyle was uncomfortable.
“Is everything cool at home?,” Jason had asked, pulled into the driveway of the Jägerman house, “If your dad is doing anything to you again…”
No. Everything was fine at home. Max’s dad didn’t bother him much anymore, not since Mom had threatened him with divorce. He barely even saw his dad besides dinner. Mom was standing up for herself, telling her husband to walk it off when he got too heated.
If anything, it was the best his homelife had been in years.
It sucked that Max wasn’t able to appreciate it.
Stacy had even cried, begging Max to stop using. She thought he was on drugs.
She knew a rehab near Sycamore, she’d make up a cover story for him and everything.
But Max hadn’t even so much as drunk a beer since that night.
Eventually, they all stopped trying. Four years of friendship reduced to awkward, closed-mouth smiles in the hallway.
Max felt no resentment. He didn’t feel anything. They’d be better off.
The Waylon Place said that.
Not with words, obviously. But in the ever-growing comfort of the creaks from the aged wood and in the rustle of vines in the wind.
It could be okay. Everyone would be happy.
He just had to come inside.
The past few nights, he had edged closer. Past the ‘For Sale’ sign, he could see the crack in the door.
Unsound.
He could see the beginning of the staircase.
Black book.
Leading the three stories up.
Pay the price.
What would happen, he wondered, if he fell from that height?
“Max?”
The voice hit him like a gunshot, and he whipped his head around with a choked-out gasp.
“It’s just me, don’t worry.”
Brenda.
It was Brenda.
She was a few steps behind, hand slightly outstretched. She was in her pajamas, her letterman wrapped around her. She even still had her bonnet on.
“C’mon, I left my car running,” she said, reaching for Max’s cold hand.
He accepted, shaking himself from the daze and gripping tight in hopes it would stop its trembling.
Brenda came every night.
He had told her what had been happening a week in over some cold fries on the bleachers just as he planned to quit the Nighthawks, and ever since then she had been a constant. She drove up to the Witchwoods and took him home.
Because something had also changed with Brenda.
If you asked Max, he’d say that she had been his best friend since middle school. But that was mainly because there was no one else from middle school that even spoke to Max.
People either feared him or hated him in the before-time and now, in the after, people either mocked him or ignored him. But Brenda had always stuck around.
Max knew that Brenda’s mom had kind of gone crazy herself when Brenda was a little kid. Just a baby.
It had been postpartum psychosis. No one's fault. Especially not Brenda’s. But she had heard her dad tell stories about how her mom used to be.
Max also knew that Brenda felt guilty.
And Max felt guilty that Brenda felt that she had to help him.
So they were even.
Once they were in the warmth of her car and back onto the road, Brenda did what she always did.
Turned on her late-night driving playlist, which mainly consisted of Tracy Chapman’s Fast Car, and took the long way home.
“Want to stop at the Drive-Thru?” she always asked as they passed the McDonald’s. She already knew the answer, but she still asked every night.
“Nah, I’m fine. But if you want something…”
“I got a McChicken on the way here, it’s all good.”
It almost felt scripted at this point.
It was a small comfort.
It also made Max wonder how many fucking McChickens Brenda had eaten in the past few weeks.
Tonight was only slightly different than every other one before it.
Brenda took one of her hands off the wheel as she turned onto her street, resting it on Max’s thigh.
She stroked her thumb against his leg, soft and feather-soft, as she mumbled the words to whatever song was playing.
Max took a deep breath, reveling in the momentary feeling of bliss that came from the heavy exhale.
It went as soon as it came.
But Brenda’s hand didn’t, it kept the gentle rub going until she had to take it away to put her car into park.
The only light on in the Briggs’ house was from the kitchen - Brenda always kept it on when she left so the two of them didn’t have to stumble around in the darkness to get the stairs - and it called out to Max in a way that felt much simpler than the Waylon Place.
Brenda’s home was his lighthouse.
He was safe here. He was safe with Brenda, she had assured it.
“Damnit,” Brenda mumbled to herself, “I keep forgetting to ask you to give me some pajamas to keep here.”
With that, she gave Max another gentle pat on his knee and then headed out of the car.
Max followed suit a few seconds later, once his thoughts had caught up with him.
It was fine. It was all good.
He was with Brenda.
The Waylon House was out of sight, out of mind.
“Max, it’s supposed to rain tonight, c’mon,” Brenda called out from the front door.
The glow from inside the house, through the slight opening, bathed the side of her body in orange.
She looked like an angel.
Max ran up to meet her at the door.
“What episode were we up to?”
Max’s head snapped around from where it had been fixed, staring hazy-eyed at the carpeted floor.
He gave Brenda a blank stare and a ‘hmm?’.
He wasn’t sure how long he’d been in her room for.
“With Degrassi,” she clarified, unphased, “the last episode we watched was the one with Ashley’s dad having that gay wedding, right?”
Oh, yeah. Degrassi.
The two had started watching the show together before that night, and Brenda had refused to drop it.
It was their thing. Even if Max struggled to keep up with it now. Brenda always caught him up to speed when he blanked out, missing entire episodes despite looking at the screen the entire time.
“Uh, yeah, I think so. Craig, like, trashed that hotel room,” he eventually answered, scooting further back onto Brenda’s bed as she set up her laptop.
Max rolled up the sleeves of the oversized sleep shirt he wore to bed while at Brenda’s. Well, it was technically a night gown, and it absolutely swallowed Brenda when she wore it, but on Max’s frame it fit more like a sleep shirt, and Max had decided to ditch the pair of pajama pants borrowed from Brenda’s dad in favor of just wearing his boxer briefs.
The room felt too warm, his skin was sticky and hot even in the little he had on, which was strange for Michigan anytime of year - but Max had also found himself sweating when it was freezing and shivering while under the hot water of the shower.
It didn’t matter what Max wore to bed when he was in his own house. He always ended up in the jeans, the white shirt and the letterman. He wished sometimes he could jolt awake like this, in Brenda’s bed, in her nightgown, bathed in the warmth of temporary safety and comfort.
He envied the concept of comfort.
Brenda tucked herself in at Max’s side, resting her head against the crook of his neck and pulling the blanket off his feet so she could wrap it around their shoulders.
“Do you think I’m, like, fucking crazy?,” he asked after a beat of silence that was only quietly filled by the opening lines of dialogue from tinny laptop speakers.
Brenda hugged Max’s upper arm.
“Yeah. A little bit.”
There wasn't any judgment in her words. It was just a matter of fact. It was actually kind of reassuring.
“I think something happened to you at the Waylon Place and you don’t remember it. And that’s okay, I’ll be here for you if you do-” She pressed a kiss, warm and soft, on top of the fabric covering his shoulder, “-And I’ll still be here if you don’t.”
Max took a deep breath, gaze drifting from where it was blanking looking at the screen and over to the window.
A spider dangled from its web outside the glass. Small, probably no bigger than the nail on Max’s thumb. Stark white.
Suddenly, Max’s head raced with the three phrases.
UnsoundBlackbookPaythepriceUnsoundBlackbookPaythepriceUnsoundBlackbookPaythepriceUnsoundBlackbookPaythepriceUnsoundBlackbookPaythepriceUnsoundBlackbookPaythepriceUnsoundBlackbookPaytheprice.
There was an echo, a ripple, of something new. It sang out from behind his eyes like a flash of light. It sounded different to the others and was only there for a moment. But Max was still about to make it out. It was crystal clear in that regard.
Hi, Max.
It was like he was being pulled backwards suddenly, a jolt all throughout his body that he couldn’t control as he slammed down against the bed. He let out a gurgled sound, like he was drowning and attempting to inhale. Brenda pulled herself away with a yelp.
“Max! Max, what’s wrong?!” she cried out as he retched and gasped, trying to catch his breath.
“I’m here, Max, I’m here, okay?,” Brenda reassured in a barely-there voice, stroking her hand through Max’s hair as he panted. He dug his nails into the bed sheets, clawing desperately.
The spider crawled up its web, disappearing from sight as it made its way up the windowsill
Max coughed once, twice and then heaved in a deep breath. “I’m okay,” he rasped, trying to push himself up onto his elbows. He looked to Brenda, her eyes wide and wet and fucking terrified.
“No, Max, you’re fucking not okay. None of that was okay!” Brenda scrubbed a hand across her face before she stood up from the bed, pacing the length of her room. “W-Was that some kind of seizure of something?”
Max blinked, still trying to even out his breathing. He didn’t have an answer to that. A seizure would have maybe made sense. He hadn’t been sleeping after all. But they both knew this wasn’t as cut-and-dry as that.
He looked toward the window again. There had been a voice in his head. Someone called out to him.
It had felt a little different, Max noted, to the monotonous droning that came with the three phrases. But not entirely unfamiliar.
He shook his head and pulled himself to sit up on the edge of the bed. “I think I’m gonna fucking die, Bren. I think I’m actually gonna die.”
Brenda let out a noise that sounded a lot like a sob, and crouched down on her knees at Max’s feet. She gripped onto the sides of his arms tight.
“Max. You need to talk to Steph. We need to talk to her. Because this is more than just some weird auditory hallucinations or depression or whatever. Whatever that ‘something’ was? It’s not something we can fix by ourselves anymore.”
Max had tried. Tried to talk to anyone who’d been there at the start. Tried to wait it out and hope it would just go away. The issue had been that anytime he even thought about that night too long, like clockwork, Max would find himself with a migraine and a nosebleed.
But he supposed that getting blood down the front of his shirt would be worth it if it led to some actual answers.
He nodded, grounded in the pressure of Brenda’s nails into his skin.
“Yeah. I know.”
Brenda’s grip tightened. “Now, Max. We have to go now,” she said, voice stern.
Max nodded, exhaustion thrumming through his body. “Yeah. I know.”