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"Can you two fucking—stop back there," Chloe glances over her shoulder, hands gripped tight on the wheel.
Rachel giggles into Max's neck, her finger tips threatening to slip under the fabric of her bra. Her hands are everywhere under Max's shirt, warm and full of purpose. "I'm not doing anything, for one," Max manages to say, one of her hands coming up to grab onto Rachel's sleeve.
Chloe scoffs, "uh huh. God." Max tries and fails to stifle a moan as Rachel bites, sucks, right at the base of her neck. "Fuck," Chloe glances at the rearview mirror. "We're almost there, alright. Can you please keep your hands to yourself for 5 seconds, Rach."
Rachel laughs, but draws back, and Max can finally breathe again. It's too warm. Too warm in this car. She's taking deep breaths when Rachel reaches out, runs her fingers through her hair. It must have gotten mussed up. Rachel smiles easily, looks completely unaffected herself. So unfair.
"Sorry," Rachel says pointedly, but it doesn't look like she means it one bit. She drops her voice a little, leans in to straighten out Max's hoodie, "you're just so cute when you're all worked up."
Max doesn't know what to say. She never does. It's easier, with Chloe. They've known each other so long—Chloe always fronts like she's confident but crumbles quickly. She can press her buttons easily, without even thinking about it. She hasn't worked out a way to get one over Rachel. She's not sure she ever will. She doesn't think she minds.
Rachel grins slyly when she gets no response, the same kind of look on her face she'd had when she'd piled into the back of the rental with Max after their last stop thirty miles back. Max is surprised it took her until the end of their second day of this trip to do something like this.
It was Rachel's insistence they road trip down here, mostly for the novelty of it. Max hates airports, and she doesn't mind long car rides, so she hadn't needed much persuading. Chloe really hadn't either. She was a little bitter about taking a rental car instead of that junk she calls her truck, but she admitted it was more practical. The motel they'd stayed in last night wasn't terrible, and after having left right when class got out Max was so tired she hadn't really cared either way. Not that she got to sleep right away, with Rachel drawing designs higher and higher on her thigh on the bed and Chloe pressing close to them with a lazy little smirk.
This was their last hurrah, in a way. The last spring break until Max graduates, before they move out here for real. It's been a rough and wild six or seven months. They've all been hard at work, one way or another. Rachel's stayed at Blackwell for the extended year, she's floated from part time job to part time job. Max has managed to keep her head on straight enough to keep her grades up and keep at the little gig she's got at a pottery painting place in town. Chloe was working at Sav-Mart for a couple months, before she started at the mechanic shop.
It's been stressful, but certainly not all bad. They've had each other no matter what. This does really feel like the first time they've been able to enjoy the fruits of their labor, though. California is expensive. Saving is annoying. This, though, this is their first taste of what's to come. Just the three of them. Off on their own in California.
"Alright fuckers," Chloe says, glancing at the GPS and up to their right, "here we are."
The resort's a place the Amber's have been getting timeshares at for a while, apparently. Rachel's been here more summers than she hasn't growing up. Max isn't fully in the know about how they've gotten here, on their own and in the spring, but if she knows anything it's that Rachel Amber has her ways. She'd said something about playing the right cards with her dad.
It's right next to the beach, which is its main attraction. The resort itself has its own stuff to look forward to according to Rachel, with a pool and a hot tub and a rec room with a ping pong table. Certainly looks nice, just from the outside. Max wonders if she'd really want to know how much it costs.
Max waits in the car while Chloe and Rachel head into the lobby to check them in, and before long they've found a spot in the underground parking. Chloe grabs them a luggage cart, riding it down the slope of the garage. She almost crashes it into the car.
"You brought way too many fucking clothes, Rach." Chloe says as she stacks the last of Rachel's bags onto the cart.
"No such thing," Rachel grins, grabbing the last bag, Chloe's duffle, from the trunk.
"This is like half your wardrobe."
"That's cute," Rachel pushes the bag into Chloe's chest, "you underestimate my closet."
The room's like it's own little apartment, with a kitchen and a living room and two bedrooms. Chloe flops down onto their bed for the week the second they've got all the bags in.
"C'monn," Rachel climbs up on the bed to straddle her, "we just got here. I wanna go down to the beach."
"You haven't been driving all day," Chloe groans, flopping her arms out above her head.
"I told you I'd take a turn," Max twists her mouth in a little smile, sitting down next to them. Chloe just waves her off, turning to bury her face in her shoulder.
"Well I'm taking our girlfriend to the beach, whether you come or not." Rachel leans down to plant a kiss on Chloe's cheek before climbing off her. Chloe grumbles and makes a show of dragging herself off the bed.
"You two are ridiculous," Rachel says as they head down the hill towards the beach, looking pointedly at their outfits. Neither of them had changed out of their jeans, and Max kept her hoodie on. Rachel hadn't needed to change, with her habit of looking beach-ready on the regular. They were a bit of a sight next to her little jean shorts and crop top.
Max shrugs. Chloe waves her off, "got plenty of time to go all out later this week. Not like I'm going in the water today."
Walking in sand sucks. Max remembers this the second they start making their way towards the shore—the sand on Arcadia's beaches isn't nearly this soft and plentiful. Max doesn't not like the beach, it can just be a bit much. There's nowhere to hide from sand. She's already accepted her fate of being vaguely uncomfortable this entire week.
Rachel tosses her sandals aside, and wades into the water. She turns back to them with a grin as it laps at her ankles. "God," she stretches her arms out above her head, and Max watches respectfully from her safe spot in the sand as her shirt rides up, "I've missed this."
As she takes a few steps farther into the water, Chloe seems to materialize right at Max's side. "Mmm," she hums, watching Rach, "this is gonna be a good week."
Max tries to hold back from grinning, but she can't. "Shut up," she shakes her head, looking away from Rachel to mindlessly scan the rest of the beach.
"You were thinking it," Chloe elbows her.
"I was not," she wasn't. Mostly. Not exactly.
Their first full day starts with a trip to the closest grocery store. They've got a meal plan for the week worked out, with Chloe as their chef. It's silly how exciting something as mundane as grocery shopping feels, but Max can't help feeling giddy about all the mundane tasks she'll get to do with them when they get to start anew together. They spend so much time together as it is, but they don’t get to live together. That’s all any of them have been craving.
They also stop at a surf rental and get two boards, as Chloe has agreed to let Rachel take her surfing. Max said maybe she’ll try it, sometime, if Chloe doesn't die. They put the back seats down and manage to fit them in the rental. Max sits in Rachel’s lap on the way back to the resort.
When they get back to the resort they hang out until that evening; Rachel kicks Chloe’s ass at a game of pool in the rec room just before dinner.
“Aren’t you supposed to be the math wiz,” Rachel says as she puts her stick back up on the rack.
“The fuck’s math got to do with this?” Chloe’s been leaning back on the pool table in defeat since Rachel was lining up her last shot.
“Geometry,” Rachel saunters up to her with a grin, “it’s all about the angles you’re hitting the ball.”
“Yeah well, fuck angles.” Chloe grumbles. Rachel just smirks and hums, leaning up to peck her jaw as she snatches the stick from her hand. Max watches them like she always does; with warm adornment heavy in her chest.
She used to feel detached from them, an outsider, when she watched them banter, when she was still unsure she had any place between them. She’s come to welcome the different dynamics between the three of them, see them as only something that makes them more special and important to each other.
A bit after dinner they take the surfboards down to the beach, and Rachel’s grinning the whole way down. She’s changed into her bikini—which Max avoids describing as distracting as to not let school dress codes everywhere win. Chloe’s got her board shorts and sports bra on. Max finally gave up her jeans and hoodie this time for little swim shorts and just her t-shirt. She’s got her bag and a towel, with the plan to park it in the sand while they freeze to death and get attacked by a shark or something in the water.
Max sets up shop closer to the water than most, to be more secluded. The sun’s just about to set, but Max sprays Chloe and her down with sunscreen anyway. Rachel’s much tanner than their ghostly asses, and her lotion’s got sunscreen in it anyway.
Chloe sputters when she sprays her directly in the face without warning, “you dick!” Max and Rachel think it’s very funny.
Max comes with them to the shore, takes some pictures while Rach goes over some surfing basics and Chloe makes her stupid quips. She gets some nice photos while they’re closer to shore, but when they get out farther she returns to her towel. She’s got a book in her bag, but doesn’t end up touching it as she watches them.
It’s not really what she usually pictures when she thinks of surfing; the waves here are quite small compared to the massive ones she’s got in her head. She watches Chloe fall into the water what feels like a thousand times, watches Rachel guide her through riding little waves. Sometimes she thinks she can hear their laughter from all the way over here.
A while after the sun has completely set Max is cold and Chloe looks like she might actually be getting the hang of this. The two of them are giggling when they emerge from the water.
“So,” Chloe jabs her board into the sand, “how’d I look out there Maximus?”
“Geering up to be the next surf superstar,” Max nods sagely.
“See!” Chloe proclaims, turning to Rachel.
“You were just about average,” Rachel shrugs, but she’s smiling a little. Chloe gawks like she’s offended, but Rachel moves on. “God, I missed being in the water.” Rachel grins, sticking her board in the sand.
She turns on Max then, “Maxiieee,” she sings, and she’s looking rather untrustworthy as she draws in.
“Rach—”
“You gotta let me take you out there!” and she swoops down and half-tackles Max, wrapping her wet arms around her waist as they fall back against the towel.
“Rachel!” Max squeaks, and she can already feel her clothes are damp, Rachel’s hair particularly soaking part of her shirt.
“Yeah!” Chloe cheers, and then she’s on Max’s other side, arms wrapped around the both of them.
“Oh my god I hate you guys,” Max accepts her fate and lets herself go limp. She can feel her shirt sticking to her. Gross.
“Mm you love us,”
“I guess.” Max murmurs. “I hate damp clothes.” Maybe she’s pouting a little.
“I’m sorry,” Rachel pulls back and rests a hand on her neck, and it sounds sincere in a way that makes Max warm. And then Rachel kisses her, and she forgets it entirely.
Chloe sucks at pool, but Max sucks harder. She never hits the ball with the right amount of pressure, and she scratches far more than she actually gets one of her balls in.
“Why can’t we play ping pong?” Max stares longingly at the table not even eight feet away as Rachel lines up a shot.
“You’d suck at ping pong too.” Chloe says from the chair behind her.
“Shut up.”
“Here,” Rachel says after she’s taken her shot and not quite gotten it. She walks around the table to Max, leans her stick against it. She examines the table for a moment, and then takes Max’s hand to lead her to where the white ball ended up. “That one there,” she points to a striped ball—one of Max’s, “line up a shot.”
Max sighs, her stick still feeling weird in her hands as she tries to position it properly.
“Here,” Rachel murmurs when she’s settled, and then her hands are on Max’s and she’s pressed semi-awkwardly against her. And it’s—well, Max has had a lot of Rachel pressed against her in a lot of ways by now, but it still feels the way it did the first couple months they knew each other.
Rachel’s giving explanations in her ear as she corrects her form and how she’s lined up the stick, but Max doesn’t even try to absorb it. When Rachel takes the shot for her, it goes right into the pocket. “There,” Rachel smiles.
Max just smiles back. Wants to kiss her, so she does.
“Soo, when do I get a lesson?” Chloe raises an eyebrow, eyes shifting between them.
“Never. Screw you.”
“You know what, you people can make your own meals this week.”
They’re on their way back from a walk around town, stopped at a corner waiting to cross. “Max, Max,” Chloe says, and Max turns when she tugs on her shoulder. She’s towering her over as always, that familiar devilish excitement radiating off of her. “Give me a kiss,”
Max narrows her eyes, trying to suspect what danger could be coming for her from her girlfriend in the middle of the afternoon on a street corner. She decides to play along, meeting Chloe’s smirk with her own mouth. Chloe slips her tongue in her mouth, and she realizes immediately what the bit is when the tingle sensation hits her.
“Oh my god,” Max huffs as she pulls away, letting the candy sit on her tongue, “you’re ridiculous. I forgot you bought those.”
“Pop rocks?” Rachel’s grinning at them.
“Yep.”
“She did that to me when we were sixteen.” The hand on the sign across the street turns to the little walking man, and she leads them across the street.
“Never letting you in a candy shop again.” Max bumps Chloe’s shoulder as they walk.
“Ah c’mon,”
They’re working on making a dent in their third Next Generation rewatch when Rachel’s presence has filled the room so much it’s hard to focus on anything else. She does this, sometimes; lurks before she strikes. She was coming back and forth from their room to the kitchen, first, and now she’s lingering in the entry to the living room. Max knew from the second time she went into the kitchen they weren’t making it another twenty minutes into this episode.
(Max thinks it’s her trying to be respectful, trying to let them watch their show, before caving to her boredom.)
Almost like clockwork Rachel swoops in and straddles Chloe’s lap. She tangles her fingers in the back of her hair, presses herself close. “Hi,” she says, ducking down to kiss her jaw.
Chloe tilts her head for her with a chuckle, her hands coming to rest on Rachel’s waist. “Hey.”
Max eyes them, something already rising inside of her, an anticipation that flusters her without either of them having to even look at her. Rachel’s quick to get her teeth on Chloe’s neck, Max can tell from the way Chloe groans. Chloe’s hands roam up, lift Rachel’s shirt on their way to reach bare skin. Max is pretty sure Chloe’s got a new bruise by the time Rachel pulls back.
“Max,” Rachel draws it out in that stupidly addictive way she does, and she gets off of Chloe’s lap to kneel next to her, “can you get Chloe out of her jeans?”
Max’s mouth still goes dry, she thinks that’ll never change, but she’s quicker than she used to be when she gets off the couch to kneel between Chloe’s legs. At least when she meets Chloe’s eyes she’s got the same almost diffident look in her eye that Max is probably sporting herself. That’ll never change either. They’ll both be lost to Rachel’s whims and charm for the rest of their lives.
As she gets her fingers on the button of Chloe’s jeans and Rachel strips her shirt, she wonders how many times the Star Trek cast will bear witness to their depravities.
Mornings are Max’s favorite part. Nights are a close second, turning in to bed together, but the warmth of the late morning sun and the sleepy kisses are kinda unbeatable. She’s woken up next to Chloe her whole life, and to not only be able to keep doing it, but do it with someone they love as much as each other that loves them the same in turn, it’s more than enough to live off.
Max always wakes up first, same as it was on the thousand sleepovers she ever had with Chloe growing up. Now though, it’s never all that long before Rachel rises and joins her in the wait for Chloe to get her ass up.
“Morning,” Rachel squints, eyes adjusting. She’s sandwiched between Max and Chloe, has half-extracted herself from being wrapped around Chloe to shift her body to look behind herself at Max. (Rachel’s usually middle, with Max big spoon and Chloe little spoon. Chloe likes being held in some capacity—even if she won’t say it outright, Max overheats in the middle, Rachel likes being the center of things in general.)
“Morning,” Max smiles, burrowing herself in Rachel’s side. People are made to hold each other, Max thinks. To feel someone and their warmth against you.
Rachel hums, strains her head towards Max to show some reciprocation even when she’s restricted by being half wrapped up in Chloe. “How long you think until Lanky here is up?”
“Mm could be twenty minutes. Maybe an hour.”
Rachel sighs dramatically. “We’re gonna have to start fending for ourselves for breakfast.”
“I think I could make us eggs. It’s not all that hard.”
“Didn’t you almost blow up a microwave?”
“That was one time, and I was eleven,”
It’s late enough that Max is worried they might’ve closed the pool or something, but Rachel assures her they don’t close it. And it’s not closed, their room card still lets them through the gate, but there’s no lights on so it doesn’t look open either.
There’s something uneasy about this to her, especially with the pool being the center of the resort where anyone could look down at them and see them doing something they’re maybe not supposed to. She rolls with it though, as she learned to do with Chloe by the time she was ten. And the bowl they smoked on the balcony an hour ago helps.
They both glow in the moonlight, perfect in their own ways, Rachel with her curves and Chloe with her toned stomach. It took a while to work through her anxieties, but she’s learned to stop comparing herself to them and just enjoy them for how they are and how they love her. And they're the most beautiful people Max has ever seen, will ever see, and they show her how much they love her in a million little ways every day.
Chloe dives right in, and Max thinks distantly of the no diving sign she thinks is around here somewhere. She surfaces quickly, pulling her blue-green faded hair out of her eyes. “They definitely turned off the heating.”
“Yippee,” Max says dryly, taking a seat at the edge to dangle her legs in the water. Not as cold as the ocean, but still freezing.
Rachel chuckles, bracing herself on the edge next to Max to lower herself into the water. “Not too bad,” she says, swimming backwards.
“C’monn,” Chloe swims up to take one of Max’s legs by the shin and shake, “join us, nerd.”
“I will, I will,” Max pushes back with her leg. “Just give me a minute.”
Chloe takes this as enough and swims off to bother Rachel, immediately splashing her in the face.
“Oh you bitch—” splash.
And Max decides maybe it’s best she’s not in the water yet when they’re a fury of splashes. The water feels nice, though, and she swishes her legs back and forth while they warm up to the chill and her dork girlfriends’ splash fight dies down. Their laughs almost echo off the resort walls, all wide grins and wet hair and care-free attitude.
Max has been an observer her whole life, probably to cope with feeling excluded from so many things in her life. If you exclude yourself, make your role to be the one looking in and capturing things, it softens the blow. Sort of. Maybe she just wanted to convince herself it did. She can feel herself in that role even with Chloe and Rachel, even now, even when she’s not literally hiding behind her camera.
She doesn’t wanna do that so much anymore.
The waters a shock to her whole system, hitting her thighs and her torso and her arms and her everything all at once. The chill feels bone deep when she surfaces, flicking her hair out of face.
“Maximusss,” Chloe grins, swimming over to her to shake her by the shoulders and press a sloppy kiss to her cheek. Rachel giggles from a few feet behind Chloe, and Max chuckles, feeling better in this water than she has anywhere else.
It’s their last full day here, and they’re heading down to the beach to surf and Max has agreed to try it out. Max has never been deeper than waist level in the ocean in her life, so the threat of her drowning doesn’t feel like zero, but at least Rachel’s lifeguarded a couple summers. She’ll probably hate it. She’ll definitely have fun.
It’s pretty crowded, which is fair for a Saturday afternoon, so Max has to remind herself no one on this beach cares what she’s up to enough to judge her about it. At worst someone’ll see a girl out in the water struggling to get a handle on her board and move on. Well—maybe at worst they’ll see a girl drowning and try to get the lifeguard. Who knows.
“I’ll be on standby to get the lifeguard,” Chloe ruffles Max’s hair and then sits herself down in the sand. “In case the teenaged boy up there has to save your life,” she jerks her head towards the lifeguard tower, whose occupant can’t be any older than sixteen.
“Hey, I will be right there to save her life. And Inevitably give her mouth to mouth.” Rachel props her board up next to her.
“Why are you guys so set on me almost dying?” Max says, despite her own thinking.
“Rach just really wants to give you mouth to mouth.”
“Well she could just ask,”
They find an opening in the shoreline that’s not occupied by screaming children, and Rachel makes both a great and terrible teacher as always. She’s patient, always kind and reassuring, but she’s a persistent siren. Getting farther and farther out in the water with her being all soft but still letting her touches linger and her eyes gaze in that intoxicating way, it’s hard to focus on the task at hand. Max wonders how much of it is a performance. A sincere one, but a performance nonetheless. She’s still not sure, even after all this time.
The water’s not as bad as she thought it would be, she’s only a little terrified when Rach walks her though getting up on the board. She swears she can hear Chloe whooping from all the way out here when she finally gets it for a second, standing up right before crashing into the water. She’s grinning when she surfaces, and Rachel’s grinning back at her from her place sat on her board.
“Nice job Caulfield,” she says, and her eyes are dazzling and her skin is shiny with water droplets in the sun. As Max gets herself together to try again, she’s shaking off more than just adrenaline.
Max’s limbs ache and the salt water feels like it’s absorbed into her skin when they return to shore, the sun dipping low. She wonders how Chloe’s handled entertaining herself this whole time, but she seems chipper as ever when they approach.
“Let’s go Maxaroni!” She practically leaps up from the sand and jogs up to meet them halfway. She throws her arms around Max, presses a couple hard kisses to her cheek.
“Please, I’m fragile,” Max mumbes, but she’s smiling softly and dropping her board in the sand to wrap her arms around Chloe’s middle.
“So,” Rachel starts when they part, “you have fun?” She’s got one hand on her hip, one on her board, squinting at Max to see through the glare of the setting sun.
“Yeah,” Max gives a sure nod, “I get why you love it so much.”
Rachel grins, “there’s nothing like it. Just you and the waves, it’s the most centered I feel in my life.”
With the sun’s warmth seeping into her skin and her girls here with her, Max certainly understands the feeling.
The drive home on Sunday is a straight shot, all day from when they leave at eight in the morning and only a break to stop for lunch. It’s much quieter in the car than it was on the way down here, even Chloe playing her most tame stuff when she gets her turn on the aux. When Rachel gets in the back with Max after lunch she falls asleep on her shoulder.
Going right back to classes tomorrow is gonna suck, but she does her best to comfort herself with the knowledge there’s only three or so months left.
Three months until they can get the hell out of dodge for real, three months until what they’ve had together this week is the norm. She’ll make the most of it.