Chapter Text
It has been 6 months since camp has ended. A lot has changed. He turned 12 last September. He has yet to get a haircut, his curls frame his face and drape over his eyes and neck. His foster mom got him some new shoes after the soles of his old ones fell off. Oh, that's another thing. Max has been in Mr and Mrs Mooresons care for about 3 months now. Some shit happened with his real mom and dad. He didn't hate his foster parents, but he didn't like them all that much. They were too clean and proper and just obnoxiously perfect.
They have family dinner every night with him and his foster brother and their biological daughter and go to church every Sunday and always put their shoes in the shoe rack and coats on the cost hanger and they have to be in bed by 10 PM and the kids can't drink coffee.
Of course Max had his own secret coffee machine and just wore headphones after 10 and kept his shoes and hoodie in his room, but that wasn't the point. This whole family looks like it came out of a stock photo with their sad beige, cross covered house. And obviously they were all white except his Hispanic foster brother. He knew there wasn't a place him in a functioning family like this one.
But it's not like he was getting comfortable anyways because this was an emergency placement home. They take kids last minute and hold them for 3 or 4 months until CPS can find a long term home. He would leave this place and go to his new home later this week, whoever the fuck they were.
Though he did feel sorry for his foster brother, who just arrived here. They didn't really talk about feelings and stuff, but Max knew Evan felt the same way to some extent. Most of the month they had together was spent exploring the forest and getting kicked out of stores. Once they got caught breaking into an abandoned movie theater and weren't allowed to hang out together for 2 weeks.
Emily seemed to like it here just fine, though. She never objected to the rules and was close with her parents. Not so much with Max. It's not that he didn't like her, although he didn't particularly like her, it's that she's essentially a massive fucking snitch. She reports every little detail of her like back to her parents and the few times Max or Evan fought with her or broke a rule in front of her, she ran to mommy and daddy. And she was a very devoted Mormon. If she ever found out that he was trans, Max is pretty sure her little brain would implode.
Right now, he was laying in bed after another painfully awkward family dinner and listening to music while he drew. He didn't used to like drawing, but only having one friend who lives in the same house as you gets fucking boring. God, he missed Nikki and Neil. The music blaring in his headphones was interrupted by a muffled knock on the door. Irritated, he paused his music and opened the door to find his case worker behind it.
She was a tall, slender, black haired woman with her hair in a medium length braid, dark skin and round wire frame glasses named Ms. Lopez. Max actually liked Ms Lopez a bit. She was a lot like Gwen in the way that she kept it real with him and didn't baby him. She knew there was no point in sugar coating things because she knew he's seen much worse. Unlike Gwen though, she had a sweet and welcoming aura to her. Not in the sickeningly sweet way like David, she was a perfect blend of the two.
"Hey, Wendy! You find my new place?" He asked, closing the door behind her as she walked in. He knew he wasn't supposed to call her by her first name, but she wasn't one of those annoying adults that preached respecting your elders. "Hey Max, sure did!" she pat the bed next to her to indicate for him to sit before reaching into her bag and pulling out a neon green folder.
"I met this guy earlier today, he's... Quite the character! But he's nice, I like him." She opened the folder to a picture of a suspiciously familiar ginger, green eyed man. "This is David Cedar. He has 5 years of experience as a foster parent, plus 9 years as a summer camp counselor. He currently doesn't have any other kids with him, but he's one of the only available foster parents in the sleepy peak region and he can house 2 more." Max could here her talking, but he stopped listening after he saw the picture of fucking David in his case file.
Finally, he processed what she was saying and yanked the folder out of her hands. He stared intently at the picture and information on the page. "Fucking DAVID? Are you shitting me right now? Since when is he a mother fucking foster parent!?" He screeched. "Woah, do you know this guy? From where?" Wendy questioned, leaning over his shoulder to see if she missed something. "Wendy, this is the camp counselor I've told you about! The stuck with him every summer for 3 months for the last 5 years of my life David! The on the verge of snapping on me after I purposely fucked with him since I was like 6 David!" Max shouted. "Oh, shit. Do you think we need to keep looking? You may have to stay here a bit longer, and probably have to leave Sleepy Peak, but if your not gonna be happy there..." She trailed off.
Max felt a pit in his stomach for some reason at the suggestion of not going with David. It was probably just the initial shock setting in, obviously. "No! No, I mean, I'll deal with it if it means I get to leave this week. Plus, now I get to mess with him year round." Max closed the folder and handed it back to Wendy. "... If you're sure, dude. Be ready at 9 AM on Thursday, and don't give him too much hell kid." She chuckled, ruffling his hair a bit as she headed out the door.
After he heard her decend down the stairs and the front door slam shut, he pulled out his digital camera and started to look through this pictures from camp. There was Erid and Preston singing a duet of Hamilton at the top of their lungs, Nikki holding on for dear life to Nerris's cape while the elf was riding a horse, and Nurf trying to help a sweaty and exhausted Harrison on a mountain hike. Then there was the picture of the sunset. After staring at it for a moment, Max went to turn off the camera. His finger slipped on the next button and it flipped to a picture of the campers building their robot abomination. He thought the sunset was the first picture on the camera?
Confused, he clicked the arrow again and saw Neil, Nikki, Space kid and Nurf throwing their time capsules into the fire followed by a picture of Campbell covered in ashes, the edges of his clothes singed and fuming with rage. Next was a picture of Max laughing while Gwen's dads dog jumped up to lick his face, and a picture of the dachshund performing. There was also a stalker-ish picture of Max taken from a distance of his beaming with joy watching the dog do a flip. There was a picture of the campers huddled together terrified, listening to space kids haunting scary story, one of Preston's play, the woodscouts hung from the flagpole, an unexplained picture of a wolf happily chewing on a cooked rabbits leg, the bus full of campers after they won Camp Campbell back from Camp Corp, Max, Nikki and Neil laughing by the fountain in the park in the city, the Lake Lilac Summer Social (including Gwen and Jermy dancing in a puddle of vomit), the forgein exchange students before they went crazy, space kids "space ship" flying through the air, and all the campers in their questionable costumes at the order of the sparrow bonfire.
There were a ton of less notable pictures sprinkled in there like Nikki putting green beans up her nose or Neil trying to delicately squeeze one single drop of some liquid into a beaker unaware that Nikki was about to pound from behind and a suspicious amount of Gwen simply existing, and Nikki and Neil's first day at camp.
Actually, there were pictures of everyone's first day of camp that year. And there were pictures of Max his first day last year, and the year before that, and every year since he started going to camp.
Scrolling through the photos, Max started to realize there were pictures he didn't even realize where taken of every single smile or happy memory since his first summer at Camp Campbell. He knew that for a fact because he could count every time he'd smiled before Nikki and Neil showed up on two hands.
Did David leave these for him to find on purpose? Did he just forget about them? And the most important question on Max's mind, why did David become a foster parent the same year he met Max? It had to be a coincidence, right? Yeah, of course it was. What other reason is there?
The drops of water that landed on the screen of the camera must be from a leak in the ceiling. That explains the wetness on his face, too. His nose is only stuffy because his window was open and he has allergies. And he suddenly felt excited to see David because he just couldn't wait to torture him again.