chapter 9

"All that is gold does not glitter;

not all those who wander are lost;

the old that is strong does not wither;

deep roots are not reached by frost."

- J. R. R. Tolkien

Max rang the doorbell and waited for it to open, thinking about the beautiful dead bee he had seen that morning. Death seemed like a very normal concept to him now that he had lost quite a bit of people for his age.

But then again, it's not like he had actually felt sad attending those funerals. In fact, he could only recall one death that had actually hurt him enough to make him cry. He wondered if Ven and Ter's death would make him cry.

He wondered if he'll ever find another whose death could possibly hurt.

The door-lock clicked and he quickly pasted on a smile soo real he himself almost believed it; half-truths really were the best lies. He watched patiently as Carter opened the door wide and stood aside, smiling.

Carter was one of those few people Max really cared about; his selfless and go-with-the-tide nature had really appealed to him.

Max hugged Carter and stepped inside to see Venessa sitting on the couch, hugging her knees to her chest and sipping what looked like lemon tea, lost in thought, her eyes staring into nothing in particular. Max had an inner suspicion that Ven couldn't really see faces; her eyes always seemed to focus on specific features of the face, most commonly the eyes, followed by lips. Or they stayed unfocused.

Of course, he could be wrong…but that was unlikely. He wasn't very good at analyzing people emotionally but he could analyze patterns and habits pretty well which mislead people into thinking he was good with emotions.

He shook his head, breaking his chain of thoughts, and realized he was subconsciously staring at Venessa, who was still too dazed to notice. Smiling slightly, he went a gently tapped her shoulder, snorting when she jumped and gave a startled cry, "Hi? What were you thinking about?"

Her eyes fluttered all over his face like butterfly wings, "Max…?"

She sounded a little confused, as if trying to make sure it really was him. "Yeah? Who else would it be," Max laughed and shook his head, making sure the confirmation did not show on his face; it was her secret to tell and definitely not his to notice. He would rather wait for her to open up.

She smiled shakily and said, "When did you get here?"

"He just got here," Carter, appearing at his shoulder, replied for him.

Venessa blinked as if processing the information and nodded, "You guys want to watch any specific movie? I want to watch 'A silent voice.'"

Carter perked up at the idea, "So we can choose anime movies too?! Then can we watch 'Your name'?!! It's been on my watch list for a while now." Max stared at Carter's puppy eyes; they were really hard to resist but he wasn't going to give up soo fast.

He sighed, realizing he was the only one who didn't watch anime in that room, "I think I'd like to watch a horror movie instead…how about 'The curse of la Llorona'?"

For a second there was an awkward silence in the room, each of them wondering who was going to lead tonight, until all of them shouted out at the same time, "Stone, paper, scissors, GO!"

There was another gap of silence as each of them compared their hands. Max watched as Venessa gasped, surprised at her unexpected loss, though he didn't understand how it could have been surprising. This was a game of chance with a probability of fifty-fifty, win or lose.

Max stared at his own open hand, now dangling like an awkwardly ignored handshake, and realized he'll have to watch anime again. He avoided watching anime; it reminded him of the one who had made him watch it for the very first-time years ago, the one and only one he'd cried for.

It was time he moved on from her death and buried it down too but he couldn't bring himself to.

Her death was like a reassurance that he could cry out of loss after all and that he was a human with feelings too; a horrible reason to keep mourning a death, really, and yet he couldn't bring himself to be ashamed of it. He just felt slightly bitter over it. Besides, he missed her. A lot.

He watched as Carter jumped up and down, like an over-excited child, cheering over his good luck. The gray-eyed boy half-walked half-jumped to the tv, switching it on and hugging his teddy bear, ready to watch the movie.

Venessa let out an exasperated sigh, knowing Carter expected her to search for the movie and play it. Max loved watching them interact, they were a match made in heaven except that this was earth and she didn't play by heaven's rules.

He loved the bond the two of them shared; it was a bond of kind love, of agape and of philia, of pragma and of storge. He admired it. He admired their love, greater than blood ties itself and soo much purer than he had thought it possible.

He smiled as Venessa played the movie and settled on the couch, patting the place beside her for him to sit. Max nodded at her and down beside her, hugging his knees to his chest like Venessa.

Halfway through the movie, his mind started to drift off again, going back to how he had first met Mei or May as she had preferred.

•-------------×-------------×---------------•

Max stood at the foot of the hospital stairs that lead to the fifth floor; he had come to visit his adopted mother again. They knew she was dying, he knew she was dying, even she knew she was dying and yet, they pretended it would all be okay because she wasn't dead…yet, so Max pretended this was going to last.

He found comfort in knowing that each event, by the laws of time, repeated infinitely. So somewhere he would think this again and then again and then again and so on. Somewhere he would be reliving the day he got adopted and found a family of his own.

He took the first step and stopped as a strawberry pink haired girl came rushing down the stairs and caught him by his elbow, dragging him with her, "RUUUNNN! COME ON RUN WITH ME BEFORE THEY CATCH MEE!!!"

Behind them he heard shouts and screams; he caught one of them clearly, it was a woman crying, "Please come back Kasumi, it's not good for your heart! Or at least run slowly! Last time you ran that fast you coughed up blood!" The woman was almost sobbing now.

The girl came to a startling stop once they were out of sight and Max, slightly annoyed, looked at her, trying to understand what the woman meant by saying she had coughed up blood. Judging from her hospital gown, it was obvious she was a patient here.

"If you were running away from them, why drag me too?" Max looked at her, puzzled and intrigued.

"I didn't mean to drag you along," she smiled at him sheepishly, "I was just running away and saw u in the way so I just grabbed you...ever seen the view from the terrace?"

"No." Max replied and turned to go back up the stairs.

"Come with me," the girl grabbed him once again and Max let her lead him on. It wasn't that he didn't want to meet his mom but he didn't want to see her dying. It was painful. He could avoid the thoughts but not what was in front of him.

"How did you even get the key?" Max asked her in amusement as she unlocked the terrace door and stepped out. "I sneaked into the office, if that's what you call it, and stole it." She stuck her tongue out in embarrassment, "But at least now we can enjoy the sunset!" She smiled and pulled him to the edge by his hand, pointing out to the horizon.

Max followed her index finger and looked out at the brilliant scene; The golden sun hidden behind golden clouds. Max hadn't seen something this pretty in a while.

"Hi. I'm Kasumi Mei but I prefer being called May," the girl extended her hand for a handshake and grabbed his hand before he could even react to her. "It's just, May sounds soo much better, like a green meadow with dew drops that shine like diamonds under the brilliant white sky and the pale sunlight. Your name is…?"

That was the first day he had met his mother late.

•-------------×-------------×---------------•

"Kimi no namae wa…?" He looked up to realize that the movie was already over; Carter was sobbing and Venessa was trying to comfort him.

Max stood up and stretched, clapping his hands for their attention, "I'm hungry guys. Let's order Chinese." He hoped they would agree. Another round of stone-paper-scissors was not something he looked forward to, especially not when he was hungry.

Carter wiped his eyes and smiled, looking up at Max, "I'm craving Chinese too. Let's order."