Fishing Trip//Max Joseph//Catfish: The TV Show//Catfish

*Chapter Eighteen*

Max pulled the keys out of the ignition and unbuckled his seatbelt. "How do I even... What am I doing?" he asked himself. He was in Ellie's driveway. At two in the morning. How would she react to his "surprise?" It really wasn't a good idea. She didn't even want him to come for the surgery, let alone just for a visit... a week and a half early.

"She's gonna kill me," he muttered to himself. "Do I just... knock? No, it's too late, she'll be sleeping." Max opened the car door slowly, stepping out into the warm, California air. He had brought a jacket, but California is California, and it certainly wasn't jacket weather there.

He made his way up the driveway carefully. Stopping at the door, he pulled his phone out of the side pocket of his jeans and scrolled through his and Ellie's texts. "There it is," he thought silently.

Ellie: Hey, if you're ever in town and you need a place to stay, the spare key is in the flower pot next to the door.

Max: Really? You'd just let me stay? That's sweet, babe.

Ellie: Yeah, mi casa es sú casa. Just don't eat my food.

Max was sure Ellie wasn't going to be thrilled about his little visit this time. Pissed, freaking angry... but not thrilled.

He found the key wedged between the soil and the pot, and dusted off the remaining dirt, unlocked the door, and stepped inside. Ellie's house was cold... cold and dark. Max couldn't see a single lamp on in the place. "How does she sleep like this? It has to be at least sixty degrees in here!" Max scoffed. "Damn... it might not be sweater weather outside, but it sure is inside."

It was late, but at the sound of the door unlocking, Leo woke and went out to the hall. Leo had met Max once before. "Probably knows Adam more," he thought, deriding the stranger in his mind. Leo greeted Max hesitantly, and Max reached down to pet him, reassuring the dog of his kind intentions.

Max stood and looked over to where Leo had come from. "Ellie always sleeps with the door closed," he thought. "And she always sleeps with the dog. No matter what."

So why was the door open? And why was Leo out of his crate in the first place? Max weighed his options: "Number one," he thought carefully. "I go into Ellie's room, look like a stalker, and probably get arrested. Number two. I don't go into Ellie's room, wait in the living room until she wakes up, and scare the living shit out of her when she sees me.

"Yeah... I'll take 'Not arrested for two-hundred' please." Max settled on the couch and tried to come up with a way to not scare the shit out of her when she woke up.

Three o' clock rolled around, and Max still hadn't managed to come up with a plan to not get arrested. "You know what?" he asked Leo. "I'm just gonna check into a hotel. Damn, why hadn't I thought of that before?" Leo answered by wagging his tail and giving a quick "huff" before turning over.

Max collected his phone and car keys from the kitchen counter and-

He stopped. The sound of car doors closing outside scared him out of his mind. Who was it? Ellie was home, right? Wrong. He pulled back the curtain on one of the bay windows in the living room. Ellie's Jeep, Ellie, and... a guy? "Oh, fuck," Max whispered to himself. "That's fucking Adam. Goddamnit."

Max pouted and made his way back to the couch. Ellie was gonna kill him. "It's gonna be a long night."

~~~

The sound of the door unlocking made Max's teeth grind. And Ellie's confusion when she realized the door was already unlocked made his hands ball into fists. Max could hear her laughing from outside. "Probably laughing at Adam's jokes," he thought angrily. As Ellie opened the door and her eyes met Max's, her laughter ceased and her arms fell to her side in shock.