The Peace Offering

TWENTY-THREE

River

When Monday came, Maxine greeted me as usual by my locker with a bag of bagels. She had called me earlier in the morning to tell me that her jeep was in the workshop for some maintenance thing hence she wouldn't be able to drive me home that day. Since I had driven Rain's car to school, I insisted on sending Maxine back home at the end of the day. After some hesitation, Maxine finally agreed.

"I've got the feels for some ice cream today," I chirped as we walked into the parking lot towards my car. "Let's drop by the mall before we get you home."

"Sure," Maxine shrugged as she climbed into the passenger seat and fastened her seatbelt. She took out her phone and I saw her scroll through Facebook while I drove us to the nearest mall.

The car ride was unusually silent. Sure, I had the radio on and when good jams came on both of us would hum or sing them together. But we weren't communicating. At least not about what happened the other night. Maxine would comment on a random car on the road which she found aesthetically pleasing, or laugh at a pedestrian who charged towards safety when the red man came up.

I was desperate to break the tension between us that Maxine was so desperate to bury in her mental graveyard. I wasn't sure of the right way to do it myself, so I thought it through as I drove. We finally arrived at the mall and the first thing we got was some ice cream from Baskin-Robbins. I figured I needed something to ease my own nerves first so when I reached a calmer state of mind, I brought the topic up.

"Hoffman, you're not mad at me right?" I asked nervously. We were just taking a stroll around the mall with ice cream cones in our hands.

"I didn't say it for you to say it back," Maxine looked up at me and gave me an assuring smile. I felt relieved instantly. "I just wanted you to know."

Maxine turned back to her ice cream and took a small bite out of it. When she turned to look at me again, I exploded in laughter and she gave me a confused look. I reached out and wiped the bit of cotton candy flavoured ice cream off her nose. She laughed too when she finally understood what amused me so much.

"You're so cute," I mumbled.

"Am I?" Maxine countered teasingly.

"I don't know, are you?" I double-countered. Maxine shrugged and continued enjoying her dessert. I followed suit before I broke the comfortable silence between us. "Fun fact. Paige and I weren't exactly together. I mean, yeah we hung out a lot but neither of us really did ask the other to be our girlfriend. People just started calling us girlfriends so we went along with that 'cause we got tired of explaining our status to everybody."

Maxine appeared impressed at my story. "So it was like a 'no strings attached' kinda thing?"

"Something like that," I nodded. "What's yours?"

"Fun fact or ex fact?" Maxine grinned.

"Both?"

There was a short pause when Maxine seemed to let her thoughts stray. I noticed a slight hesitation before she finally answered my question. "I had been in a relationship with only one person throughout my whole existence so far. We were together for three years."

"What happened?" I probed, genuinely curious.

"She has issues," Maxine deadpanned. "With drugs. And I'm just so sick of trying to convince myself that she would change."

"Oh," I muttered, darting my gaze back to my ice cream. "But hey, I really wasn't expecting you to be a one-girl kinda person. You look like you could break ten hearts in one day and not even feel a thing about it."

Maxine laughed. "Yeah, I get that a lot. Goddammit, this ice cream is so good."

"Tell me about it," I said into my own ice cream. I was happy that the tension was cleared and even though I hadn't said it back yet to Maxine, I was confident she knew I felt the same way about her.