Chapter Text
Saturday, February 15th 2014 [ Brooke ]
On the morning of Max and Chloe’s second day in Lincoln City, Brooke and Kate picked them up at the hotel they were staying at and drove them east in Richard’s car. Coastal streets and hills receded behind them as they followed the county roads into Siuslaw National Forest, leaving civilization behind for verdant wilderness.
When they eventually pulled off the road to park in a lot marked by a sign that looked like it hadn’t changed since the fifties, they found themselves at a trail head. Hiking had been Brooke’s idea first, but one enthusiastically endorsed by Max. “I’ve been dying to get out in nature again,” she had exclaimed when Brooke brought it up the previous evening. “Cityscapes do nothing for me creatively. No matter how long I live in Seattle, I’m still such a small town girl where it counts.”
Chloe and Kate had proved open to it as long as Brooke and Max were excited, and so here they were. It was a good day for it, in the event. Although it was overcast, the temperature was in the fifties, despite which there was really nobody out here as there would be in the spring or summer. With boots laced up and water bottles handy, they were ready to enjoy a private nature walk.
“It’s gorgeous out here,” Max breathed, shading her eyes with her hands as she gazed up toward the soaring canopy above. Her Polaroid camera jostled on its strap around her neck as she walked, as if jumping for the chance at action. Just behind her, Kate had a sketchpad tucked under an arm, also smiling appreciatively at the scenery. There was a small skip in her step.
“It almost doesn’t feel like winter,” Chloe said from the lead of the pack, arms crossed behind her head. “And not just because of the weather. Everything’s still all green.”
“Shout out to conifers for evolving a waxy covering on their leaves to conserve water through the winter,” Brooke chimed in from right behind Chloe, unable to resist a chance to inject some scientific knowledge.
Chloe shot her an amused look. “Nerrrrd…”
“Oh, whatever, Starfleet captain.”
The group proceeded beneath the awesome shadows of the firs and pines for about a mile and a half before finding this particular trail’s best selling point. The trees parted to make way for a chasm where a creek ran through the forest, surrounded by towering mossy cliffs. From among the tall trees on the other side, as if appearing out of some underworld haunt, white water streamed down the dark stones in a dramatic waterfall sixty feet high. Its roar joined with the sound of a now rising breeze in a hush of natural white noise which kept the four of them rather silent for a moment as they took it all in.
“Wowsers,” Max expressed eloquently.
“You can say that again,” Brooke quietly agreed. “But, um… about that bridge?”
As beautiful as the sight was, she found herself nervously scoping out what lay between them and the other side of the gorge. It was a suspension bridge, and while Brooke always loved a good suspension bridge, marvels of human ingenuity that they were, this one must have been about a hundred feet off the ground.
“What about it?” Kate asked, blinking in concern.
“Isn’t it a bit… narrow?”
That it was. They’d be challenged to go two abreast on that thing. It also looked like it was… swaying a bit.
A bit disbelieving, Chloe turned to Brooke and asked, “Are you scared of heights?”
“What? No!”
Maybe a bit. Being up in a plane had been fine, the few times she’d done it, and little Brooke had enjoyed watching the countryside recede below her like a tableau from a playroom mat. But something about being on a narrow bridge this high up, especially a moving one – even if she knew, intellectually, that it could probably bear a few hundred thousand pounds – was setting off her anxiety a bit.
Perhaps seeing through the fib, Chloe rolled her eyes and started walking again. “Alright, I’m keeping point position anyway. Just stare at my beautiful backside to keep your morale up.”
Brooke scoffed, but did indeed keep her eyes glued to the back of Chloe’s beanie. As long as she kept her hands on the side railing and didn’t look down, she was fine. Nature had other plans, though; a harsh gust caught her halfway through the journey across the bridge. Her ponytail whipped around and thwapped her in the face, causing her to sputter in dismay and try to get it out of her mouth. “Ugh!”
“You okay?” Chloe asked, looking over her shoulder.
“Stupid wind. Stupid hair.”
“It’s grown out a bit,” she noted. “You need a haircut, girl.”
It was meant in good spirits, but having it pointed out made Brooke feel a bit embarrassed. She hadn’t had a haircut since October, and the long and untidy look of it had started to bother her. She’d just been too busy to do anything about it. “I swear I’m gonna chop it all off,” she grumbled to herself.
Perhaps sympathetic to her plight, Max and Kate only dawdled behind her long enough for Max to snap a couple of pictures from the vantage of the bridge. They’d crossed it soon enough and took a turn to follow the path down toward the creek at the bottom of the gorge.
“The falls used to look completely different,” Kate remarked as they got closer to the bottom, gesturing at the toppled pillars of basalt in the pool beneath the crashing water. “But there was a collapse a couple of years ago.”
“Have you walked back here a lot?” Brooke asked, recovering from her ordeal.
“A few times. There are a lot of nice nature trails and hiking spots in the area, but admittedly I’m not the most outdoorsy girl.”
“The hiking boots and flannel are a hella cute look on you though,” Chloe opined.
Brooke felt a little twist of jealousy for… some reason. While she was doing that, Kate stopped a second to pivot on one of her boots and turn to show where the flannel, a bit too big on her, was tied in the back. “Thanks, Chloe! The flannel is Brooke’s, actually. She let me borrow it for the day.”
Kate flashed Brooke a grateful smile there, and what was Brooke annoyed about again? She’d forgotten, suddenly.
Max breathed out a small laugh as she brushed past the three of them to scurry ahead, her camera already in hand. “Catch me when the fashion review is over!” They had just reached the foot of the path, so Max bustled up to the fallen rocks by the creekside and started to take in the view, looking for a good vantage.
Kate wasn’t far behind her, grinning from ear to ear as she went to find a good spot of her own, no doubt within an arm’s reach of Max. Now that the two were reunited, it was easy for Brooke to see the closeness between them, how easily they got along. Those tea dates back at Blackwell really must have really been something.
Left in the dust by their artistically inclined companions, Brooke and Chloe settled in to watch. Brooke clambered her way onto a large rock to sit there, Chloe crossing her arms and leaning back against its side.
For a moment, Brooke just enjoyed the slightly diminished breeze, the smell of fresh water, the singing of birds deeper in the forest. The faint sounds of Max and Kate chattering excitedly with each other brought a small smile to her face. When she opened her eyes again, she noted that Chloe was being uncharacteristically quiet, and she spared her a glance. It looked like she was allowing herself a dopey, absent smile of her own, so Brooke followed her line of sight to see why.
It appeared that Max had found a spot that was to her liking. She was standing poised atop a large, flat boulder, her mousy brown hair ruffled slightly by the moving air from the waterfall, snapping picture after picture. She cut a pretty inspiring figure in full photographer mode. But something told Brooke that Chloe was enjoying the sight a good deal more.
“Okay,” Brooke said, breaking the silence. “So – no teasing. No bullshit. Just being straightforward with you… one friend to another.” She raised her eyebrows. “Have you told her?”
“Huh?” Chloe’s face scrunched in confusion as she glanced at Brooke, the lovestruck look vanishing.
“How you feel about her.”
That had Chloe’s full attention. Her eyebrows shot up, her pale complexion pinkening. “How I – I don’t–!”
“Dude.”
The other girl’s shoulders slumped in defeat, her head tilting back so she could sigh at the world at large, arms unfolding to lay flat at her sides. “Christ,” she uttered, a weary sigh on her lips. “I… I don’t know how.”
“You could always try just blurting it out?”
Chloe passed a gimlet eye her way. “You’d think, right? I’m the world champion of blurting shit out. I spill the beans with the best of ‘em. But this… this is different, man. Max is…” Her voice was softer, more vulnerable than Brooke had ever heard it. “She’s my best friend. My first mate. She’s literally everything to me. I wouldn’t ruin what we have by being selfish like that. It would kill me.”
“It’s not selfish,” Brooke disagreed. “Love isn’t selfish. It’s patient and kind, or so the Marshes have drilled into my head…”
Chloe snorted. “I got so used to having no one to look out for me but myself. I’m not sure I have an unselfish motive left in my body.” She paused to kick a rock before continuing. “It just feels like I want too much. Like… this feeling is too big to handle. For either of us. And things are still so complicated…”
These sure were a bunch of excuses that Brooke was hearing. But she could understand the central thesis well enough: Chloe was scared. It was a state which Brooke was intimately familiar with.
She perceived several perfectly logical counter arguments here, not least of which being the fact that Max was plainly, obviously, wretchedly besotted with Chloe right back. Would it violate some kind of lesbian prime directive for her just to point it out, though? Maybe she’d better take a page from Kate’s book and try to be sort of subtle about it.
“Okay… I get you. But look at it this way. What if it was Max in your position?”
Chloe gave her another searching, puzzled look, but didn’t interrupt.
“If it was Max who was totally in lesbians with you and was kicking herself about how to tell you… and let’s say in this scenario you didn’t feel the same way… would it change even a little bit the bond you already have with her?”
“Well,” Chloe’s gaze dipped, contemplative. “No. Of course not.”
“Max isn’t going to leave you,” Brooke offered gently. “Whenever you feel ready to say it to her, I’m sure it’ll go fine.”
That drew a soft sigh out of the other girl, who returned the favor with a small, grateful smile. “I hope you’re right. Thanks, Brooke.”
“Naturally,” Brooke said, pleased that she’d passed her persuasion check. But, since she couldn’t resist: “Besides, you two are buying an RV together. That’s practically married with kids.”
Chloe barked out a surprised laugh, her arms returning to their previous, habitual posture, tucked defiantly in crossed position. “Okay, smartass. If it’s time for us to grill each other, then how about you and Kate?”
Brooke leaned back with a blink, finding herself flat footed by the seeming non sequitur. “Me and Kate? What do you mean?”
“Ah, come on, you know what I mean,” Chloe pressed, before stopping and mumbling to herself. “Shit, did I violate the prime directive?”
“There is a–? Never mind. Explain.”
“Right, in for a penny, sorry. Isn’t your situation with Kate kind of exactly the same thing?”
“No!” Brooke waved her hands in protest, a bit frantic. Where on earth was Chloe getting this idea from? “Come on, we’re just friends. It’s not like we’ve been welded at the hip since childhood like you and Max, either. We barely knew each other until last year…”
“As if that was ever a requirement,” Chloe said, unimpressed with Brooke’s logic. “Look, I’m kind of experienced in the field of lesbinomics…”
‘Lesbinomics?’ Brooke mouthed in bafflement, but found no room to interrupt Chloe’s rant.
“... And you should trust my expertise. She’s the most important person in your life, right?” Chloe put up a finger, as if starting a count.
There were a number of people that Brooke cared about and whose company she prized. Quite a turnabout from where she was just a year before, on reflection. But it was without question that of all of these, the one whose company she enjoyed the most – the one she feared losing the most – was Kate.
“I guess,” Brooke admitted, her voice a plaintive mumble. Then a little more audibly, “But that’s just– we bonded through those traumatic experiences, if it weren’t for that, maybe we wouldn’t–”
Heedless, Chloe put up another finger. “And if she was ever in trouble or needed something, you’d drop just about anything to help her, right?”
Several examples of Brooke doing just that popped into her mind. Her cheeks were starting to get hot. “That’s what best friends do, isn’t it?”
A third finger. “And you have trouble imagining a future without her, right?”
Brooke had been having a lot of trouble doing so lately. Was Chloe reading her fucking mind? Perhaps more crucially, did she have some kind of point after all? She felt a little twist of anxiety in her gut. “... I mean, if we go to different colleges, I’ll kind of have to…”
“And, follow me here now, Scotty, this is the really important bit…” One last, expectant finger was raised. “Everything I just said is true for Kate, too.” Chloe flashed a knowing grin. “Right?”
Brooke’s mind stumbled over that one. Looking at it objectively, she had to acknowledge that Kate already took tons of time and emotional effort for her sake. She never seemed upset doing it, either. She was always there with an understanding smile, and a kind word, and a…
… A kiss on the cheek, on New Years’ Eve.
You’re the best thing to ever happen to me, Kate’s voice whispered.
The only counterpoint Brooke could find was a very weak one indeed. Her shoulders were slumped a little as she stared at the creek gravel below. “Kate’s not… She doesn’t like girls.”
Weak, perhaps, because she very pointedly didn’t make this assertion about herself. Chloe probably noticed, but had the courtesy to look sympathetic instead of mocking.
“I wouldn’t be so sure. She looks at you like you hung all the stars in the sky. For all you know, she’s questioning, or open, or… flexible. I dunno. But I know there’s something there. On your part, hers, whatever. My point is…” She took a breath, fixing Brooke with a serious look. “Don’t blow this off. You’re my friends. Some of… my only few friends. I don’t want either of you getting hurt.”
Looking down the creek away from Chloe, Brooke saw Kate, sitting on a rock just a few feet from Max. She was lost in her own little world, gaze lowered in that adorably focused way of hers as she concentrated on capturing the scene before her in graphite. She was smiling. Dressed in one of Brooke’s shirts and enjoying the presence of dear friends and nature, she seemed so different. So happy. So… free. Feeling welled up in Brooke’s heart as she thought that, hopelessly captivated by the sight.
Things just clicked, Julie had said to her. The world suddenly made sense to me.
Chloe patted Brooke comfortingly on the arm, then pushed off the rock, hands slung into her pockets as she swaggered her way over to the other two to give her some space.
Oh, man, Brooke finally thought once it was possible to stick words together again. A fear of heights had nothing on this. I’m in trouble.