Work Text:
“Is that the right answer?”
Max’s face was practically expressionless. He took a deep breath before speaking, “No, but it gave me mine.”
Zoey stared at the empty desk in front of her as she thought back to Friday’s conversation. Obviously, it wasn’t what he wanted to hear, but she didn’t understand why it upset him. She didn’t want to hold him back, but clearly, he wanted her to say something different. I can’t give him what he wants. I just can’t. So, Max had left, he had left her and her team to go upstairs, to join their rivals. How dare he?
Zoey overheard Tobin whispering to some of the brogrammers in the corner.
“It’s not here.”
“What do you mean, it’s not here?”
“The code. It’s gone.”
“What is going on over there? Why aren’t you working on merging the sections?” Zoey sighed.
Tobin looked over at her, confusion evident on his face, “Max’s section of code. It’s gone. It’s not on our server.”
“Well, then go and get it from him.”
Zoey sat back in her chair with a sigh. Joan and Ava were fighting over Max? And Max had made his choice, he chose Ava. How? Why? Zoey tried to catch Max’s attention but he turned away from her after barely meeting her eyes. Not a word was exchanged. Her world continued to spin and she didn’t know where to go, or what to do, she felt her heart twinge. Suddenly, right in front of her, another Max appeared, looking directly at her. She looked between the two Max’s and groaned, watching the real Max walk away to the elevator with his new team.
“Why so glum, Zo?”
You aren’t real. I saw you appear out of thin air.
“That doesn’t matter. You can still see me, you can still hear me. I’m right here.”
Zoey leaned forward and knocked her head gently on her desk, sighing loudly.
“You okay, Zoey?” Tobin asked, looking at her with concern.
She nodded and turned back to her computer.
“I’m not going anywhere…” a singsong voice sounded in her ear and she looked up, Max was sitting on top of his empty desk.
UGH. DAMMIT.
She ignored the figure sitting on the desk. It wasn’t hard, he hadn’t even said a word since taunting her with his presence. She sat, typing away at her keyboard while he watched her.
“You know, I didn’t want to go. I wanted to stay here...with you.”
I know. But I couldn't hold you back.
“Hold me back? Zoey, you don’t know what the hell you are talking about.”
Zoey looked up at the man indignantly, about to let loose a torrent of foul thoughts, when out of the corner of her eye, the real Max appeared. He walked past her without a word, bending down to retrieve something from his chair. He stood with his lumbar support in his hand, turning he stoically met her eyes and then walked past her still silent.
“That’s fourth-floor property, you know.”
He continued walking, ignoring her.
“Max. Max?” his steps hesitated, but then he reached the elevator and the doors closed behind him.
A tear fell down her cheek. He said it wasn’t personal. It definitely feels personal. I think you’re mad at me. You’re mad at me for not saying what you wanted to hear and now, you’re trying to teach me some kind of lesson.
“Oh, is that what you think?”
Yes, it's what I think. Why else would you have taken their side? You’ve been there for a whopping 2 days?!
“I don’t know, maybe because people actually like me on the sixth floor. Do you know that Ava has said more to me in those two days than Joan has in the last FIVE YEARS? Oh, and it’s also a huge opportunity for me and my career. Have you ever thought about that?”
So, you’re just going to leave behind everybody that helped you get there, is that the idea?
“See it how you want to see it.”
Nobody down here understands why Ava even wanted you in the first place. Just FYI.
Max looked like he had been hit in the face with a two-by-four. He took a deep breath, “Maybe it’s because I’m a good person.”
Or a very selfish one.
Imaginary Max jumped off his old desk and strode towards her with a finger pointing at her. “ YOU are calling ME SELFISH ?”
He stopped in front of her desk and she looked up at him sheepishly. “Look, I have spent far too much time worrying about other people’s happiness more than my own, ESPECIALLY YOURS. And, I think it’s finally time I focus on my own happiness for a change. Do you even know all the things I have done for you? Do you? Or did you just ignore them? You seem to ignore my feelings about everything. Have you ever known me to have a bad day? NO. Because I don’t tell you if I do. I keep it buried. I don’t tell you because I focus on YOU . It’s about time I change that. YOU DON’T EVEN KNOW!”
“SHUT UP! JUST...SHUT UP!!” Zoey’s voice rang out and echoed across the entire fourth floor. It was followed by an eerie quiet as every person turned to look at her. “You’re all just so loud,” she shrugged, trying to blow off her outburst.
Max smirked at her, “I’m still here, Zoey. And I think I’ll be here for a while.”
Zoey squirmed as a weight pressed down on her. The hot summer air touched her face and she breathed hard. It had nothing to do with their breathing. Nothing, at least that’s what she told herself.
She ground her hips into the bed and then up against the weight on top of her as a whine escaped her throat. She reached up and tried to touch them but they trapped her hands.
The figure leaned down and whispered in her ear, breath hot against her neck, “I’m not going to touch you until you beg me to.”
“Please, Max…” she breathed, eyes flying open to an empty bedroom. She groaned and turned to her side, pulling her pillow over her head. She felt the world continue to spin around her. Max…
As soon as she walked through the doors and stepped onto the elevator, she knew that today would not be peaceful for her mind. Max stood there with Leif, and next to Leif was another Max. One Max ignored her completely while the other smirked at her.
“I’m so excited to keep you company again!”
Zoey groaned as the elevator doors opened and she stepped out. The other Max followed, his hands clasped behind him, whistling as he followed her into the bullpen.
Zoey set down her bag and tried to focus on work.
An hour later, she looked at a screen of garbled code, nothing made any sense. She heard a chuckle and looked up at the man sitting on the desk across from her. She glared at him as she stood and walked towards the stairwell.
“Okay, Max. What do I do to make this stop?”
“You know I am here because you miss me, right? You can send me away anytime, but do you really want to?”
Zoey looked up at him with surprise on her face, “Really? I can do that?”
He nodded sadly.
“The real Max, the Max who is my friend, would never have said those things to me yesterday.”
“The Max in the elevator, the one that looked like he was about to cry, that is your Max. I am just your consciousness saying what your best friend should have said to you before. You know what you really want….”
“I…” she couldn’t speak. She didn’t know what to say, she hadn’t noticed that Max’s face. She had been trying to ignore him, too. Did he really look like he was about to cry?
“You said you would never stop him from going after what he wanted, right? Well, you did. You found out that he wanted you, and you shoved him at another woman. You stopped him from going after what he wanted. You stopped him from giving you what you really want. Look at you, you don’t even know what you are doing lately. But, he always comes back to save you, and now that he isn’t here, you’re lost. You’ve lost your direction, and you’ve noticed it. Does it still feel like the world is spinning? You asked him if it was the right answer, but you knew the truth before you asked it. You wouldn’t have had to ask him if it really was the right answer.”
“What do I do? I’m not sure where we can go from here.”
“You know where you are supposed to go. You know what direction to go, what path to take. So take it, ” with those words, he vanished.
“But what if he doesn’t want it anymore?” she asked softly. The answer was silence.
Zoey rapped her knuckles against the hardwood of the door in front of her. After a moment, the door opened and she rushed inside before she could be stopped.
She heard a heavy sigh, “What are you doing here, Zoey?”
“I came to talk to you. You keep avoiding me and when you can’t avoid me, you flat out ignore me. Do you know how that feels?” she asked softly.
He looked down, “Yeah, I do. What did you want to talk about, Zoey?”
She moved to stand in front of the living room couch, “You may want to close the door. It’s going to take a little while.”
He closed the door and moved to stand in front of the tall windows, folding his arms across his chest.
“I’m sorry, Max.”
“For what?”
“Where should I start?” she sighed. “I’m sorry for being selfish. You have put your own feelings and happiness last for so long. I’ve never known you to have a bad day, and I realized that you hide them from me. You don’t want me to see that you have bad days, not when you are trying to help me. That isn’t right. Friends should be there for each other no matter what and I should have been there for you. This has been hard for you too, hasn’t it?”
Max nodded and looked at her sadly, “Zoey, you…”
“Please, Max. Let me finish or I may not have the strength to get this out,” She begged. “I’m sorry for not telling you the truth. I knew it wasn’t the right answer when I gave it but I asked you anyway. I have stopped you from going after something you wanted. I realized you wanted me, and I shoved you at another woman because I didn't want to confront the truth.”
He looked down at her questioningly, “The truth?”
“That I can’t live without you. You are there for me and without you, I can’t stay afloat. No, not just that.” His eyes widened as she moved closer to him, resting her hand on his chest. “The truth is, without you, I don’t know what I want, because when I stopped you from going after what you wanted, I stopped you from giving me what I wanted.”
He smiled down at her, “Zoey, do you mean what I think you do?”
She smiled up at him, “Max, all I want...is you.” She raised herself onto her toes and captured his lips with hers. His folded arms opened and pulled her close as he returned her kiss. For a moment, all she knew was the feeling of his arms enveloping her, and the spinning world began to slow around her.
He pulled back to catch his breath, resting his forehead against hers. “I guess it’s a good thing that I moved to the sixth floor, huh?”
She laughed and looked up at him. “I don’t care where you work, Max. As long as I have you, I don’t care where I am, because I know where I’m headed. And that, at the end of the day, is wherever you are.”
He grinned down at her, pulling her close to kiss her once again. The world had finally stopped spinning. The compass’ arrow pointed to him, her true north.