Songs from my Bewilderment

Chapter Fifteen

After thinking about how sweet it was that Max asked her to prom two years ago, Olivia smiles. Secretly, she loved romantic gestures, but because Max had always been "just a friend" to her, she didn't think about that day and how sweet it was until now. Could I be jealous of Maddy's secret relationship with Max? She thinks to herself. No, I'm more mad at the fact that he hid it in the first place. We tell each other everything.

Olivia passes through the streets of Berkeley and finally pulls up to Max's driveway, walks up to his house and rings the doorbell. She knows she has to compose herself. Cole answers the door. He looked like he hadn't left the house all day. He's wearing a pair of basketball shorts and a white t-shirt.

"Liv!!" Cole says, giving Olivia a hug and opening the door for her, gesturing her to go inside.

"Hi, Cole. Is Max here?" Olivia asks as she walks in.

Around the corner, Dee rushes over to hug Olivia. "Liv!" Dee screams, she's so happy to see her. Similar to Cole, she was also wearing comfortable clothes; yellow sweatpants and a white USWNT soccer t-shirt. She squeezes Olivia so hard that Olivia squeals a little bit. Dee's expressions were always animated and fun. Having her in the room immediately brought excitement.

"Max said he was going to meet you?" Dee says, with a confused expression.

"Oh, that's weird. I told him I was coming here," Olivia says, feeling anxious. She feels that this was Maddy's doing.

"Yeah, he left about 20 minutes ago," Cole says, as the three of them sit on the couch in the living room.

"Are you okay?" Dee asks. She can tell Olivia was worried and anxious.

"Yeah, I'm fine..." Olivia says. She then continues to tell them about what happened to Chloe and Ryder, and how he was secretly hooking up with Maddy.

"She did what!?" Dee exclaims. "I can't believe this!" Her expressions are seen through her eyes. They've widened and she's lifting her hands up in the air.

"That girl is drama," Cole says, shaking his head.

In her head, Olivia is thinking about how she left out the part about Maddy and Max hooking up. But, she knew it wasn't her place to tell them. Well, she knew she shouldn't have told them about Maddy and Ryder. But... whatever, she thinks.

"I've always said that!" Dee shouts, trying to prove her point. "This is exactly why you should go to the wedding with him!"

Cole gives Dee a look, and then Dee realizes she shouldn't have said that last sentence.

"What?" Olivia says, looking confused.

"I mean... he just shouldn't go with Maddy," Dee says. Max and Olivia should just be together already, she thinks to herself.

The door to the house opens abruptly and Max rushes to his room and slams the door, bypassing the living room and ignoring Cole, Dee, and Olivia in the living room. The hood of his black hoodie is over his head and his headphones are in. Dee mouths to Olivia, "You should go talk to him."

Olivia nods her head and gets up from the couch. She knocks on his bedroom door and says, "Hey... it's Liv."

"Come in..." he says.

Olivia opens the door and the door to the balcony is open. She follows the open door and climbs up the ladder that leads to the rooftop. He's sitting down and she sits next to him. You can see the sunny, shiny San Francisco city skyline ahead. And they both stare at it. 

"Listen..." Max says, in a nervous voice. "I didn't mean to lie to you about Maddy."

"Why did you though?" Olivia asks. At this point, she's just curious. She doesn't want to pry, but she did feel like she should know.

"When I first met Maddy, I didn't think I was going to see her ever again," Max says. Crap, he thinks. Now he needs to explain how they actually met before Olivia introduced them to each other.

"What? What do you even mean?"

"So, here's the thing..." Max says, looking at Olivia with concern, "Maddy and I actually met and hooked up a week before you introduced us."

"What?" Olivia says. She's shocked. "How?"

"At a Pi Kapp party..." Max explains, "And then a week later, I had no idea that you two were friends. When we had that picnic at Dolores Park, it just got awkward. So Maddy and I just didn't say anything?"

"So you two pretended you had never met each other? Or hooked up?" Olivia asks. Deep inside, she's hurt. Why would did they do that? That's so weird. "The two of you were lying to me this whole time?"

"I wouldn't say we lied... we just... didn't say anything."

"Max... do you like Maddy?" Olivia asks. They've always told each other everything, so she's shocked that she even has to ask this question.

"No... not at all," Max says, even though he thought Maddy was beautiful, he was thinking about Olivia a lot more recently. Especially with Dee telling him all the time that the two of them belong together.

Olivia thinks that now is the time to tell him about the love triangle between Maddy, Chloe, and Ryder. Even though she's confused as to why he'd lie about something like this, she still doesn't want to see Max hurt. Though, he deserves to know the truth.

"Max... I think you should stay away from Maddy..." Olivia says, in a concerned voice.

"Why is everyone always telling me this?" Max says, with a raised voice. Just earlier, he had spoken to Dee about his relationship with Maddy. It frustrated him that Dee kept telling him to get away from her.

"Maddy has been hooking up with Ryder," Olivia explains. "Chloe's boyfriend."

Max feels himself sweating and his heart starts beating. She's what? He thinks to himself. He wasn't even sure what was going on between him and Maddy but he felt sorrier for Chloe.

"Are you serious?" Max says with a shocked voice. "Does Chloe know?"

"Yeah, she just found out today... there's just so much drama going on right now," Olivia says.

"Oh, wow..." Max says as he thinks about how he doesn't know what to do about Maddy now. This just seemed like a whole mess.

The two of them become silent as they continue to look at the San Francisco skyline ahead. Even though things were left up in the air, they both knew that they'd still have each other's back. That's how it's always been.