Chapter 8

"Oh my God! Did you hear the news?  Max Evans and Liz Parker got back together!"

"You’re kidding me!"

"Nope…I just saw them coming out of the eraser room hand in hand.  And this is the best part, you’re going to love this! Tess Harding was walking by at that exact moment! Max bumped right into her without realizing who it was!"

"No way! That’s classic!"

"Yeah, you’re telling me!  Tess looked like she was about to cry at the sight of them."

"I’m sure! Can you believe that girl?  And have you seen her lately? She looks like her whole world fell apart or something."

"Yeah, well with Max dating Liz again it probably has.  That girl was always draping herself all over the poor guy.  You’d think she’d take a hint!"

"Well, maybe Max and Liz’s reunion will teach her a thing or two."

~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~

"Aw, shit!" Kyle groaned, as the gossipy girls wandered past him, completely oblivious to the fact that he had stopped dead in his path after overhearing their conversation.  "Damn you, King Max." He growled, mentally cursing Max over and over again as he quickly turned, taking off at a jog down the hallway towards the schoolyard in search of Liz.

Kyle started to get frantic after searching through the courtyards, the soccer field, and the bleachers, heading quickly back towards the main campus. She wasn’t in the eraser room, or the gymnasium either. Finally, running out of ideas, Kyle grabbed Missy Howard, one of the head cheerleaders, who was heading away from the gym.

"Missy, have you seen Tess Harding anywhere?" He demanded.

"Oh, hi Kyle! Yeah, I saw her a little while ago in the girl’s locker room, crying! Do you know what’s wrong with her? Does it have anything to do with Max…"

"Thanks, see ya!" Kyle interrupted her, turning and rushing towards the double doors that lead into the girl’s locker room. He paused, hesitating for a quick moment, before taking a deep breath and pushing through the doors.

Wincing in fear of seeing something he wasn’t supposed to see, Kyle looked around, relieved to find that the room was thankfully clear, probably because it was lunchtime, so Kyle headed through the rows of lockers, searching for Liz.

A soft whimper emerged from behind him as he walked past the showers, so he peeked his head over the short, tiled wall, and breathed a sigh of relief at the sight of her sitting in the corner. Her arms hugging her knees close to her body, Liz had her face buried in her knees, her body racking with painful sobs.

"Liz…" Kyle gasped sadly at the sight of her, and Liz met his eyes with her own painfully red, tear stained ones.

"You shouldn’t be in here." Liz gulped back her cries at the sight of him. "You’ll get in trouble if anyone finds you here."

"Screw that." Kyle argued stubbornly. "You need a friend right now, and I’m one of the only one’s you’ve got, so they can just deal. I heard about what happened…are you okay?"

"Of course I’m not okay." Liz cried out angrily. "Am I supposed to be okay? She’s stolen my life! She mindwarped my best friend! And now she’s got Max too…and Max couldn’t even tell the difference between her and I. How do you think that makes me feel? Max loves me so much, but when it comes down to it, he doesn’t know me well enough to know that I’m not her."

"Max is an idiot." Kyle insisted gently. "He’ll realize it in time, and if he doesn’t then he doesn’t deserve your love."

"But how long is too long?" Liz asked in agony. "How far will he go with her before he realizes it? How many times will he kiss her? How will I ever be able to be with him again knowing that he was involved with her?"

"Liz…I’d love to be able to tell you that it will be all right, but personally? I think it’s shit. Evans is making a huge mistake and I hope he’ll realize it soon. As for that other stuff...deal with it when the time comes. If you guys are meant to be together, then you’ll be together and everything will work itself out."

"Is that Buddha’s advice?" Liz smiled weakly at her own joke.

"No, just my honest opinion." Kyle explained with a laugh. "Come on…how about we cut out early and go get some coffee or something?"

Liz nodded firmly. "I really don’t want to be here right now. Anyway, it’s not like Tess’s grades will really effect me in the long run, right?"

"My point exactly, I’m the only one getting screwed here, and I’ll just be missing gym, so let’s go."

~~~~~ ~~~~~~~

"My God." Max murmured in shock. "I can’t believe this."

"I know it’s unexpected and hard to believe." Liz soothed him gently. "But I swear to you, Max. It’s all true. Tess has been working against us all of this time."

"She was mindwarping Alex?" Max asked again, still trying to get the story straight in his head.

"That’s what it seems like." Liz confirmed. "Ever since he broke out of the mindwarp the other day I haven’t seen very much of him. Maria says he’s been really tired and moody."

"God, why would she do this to us?" Max wondered aloud. "Maybe I should check him out. Hopefully the mind warp didn’t have any lasting effects on him. Maybe in the process I can figure out what she was up to."

"That’s not a bad idea." Liz agreed quickly. "So, do you want to go out tonight?" She asked him changing the subject.

Max glanced curiously at her, surprised at how unconcerned she seemed with Alex’s well being. He had expected Liz to take him to see Alex without a moment’s hesitation, yet the thought hadn’t even seemed to cross her mind.

"You don’t want to go with me to see Alex?" Max asked in disbelief, as Liz lifted their intertwined hands to her lips, kissing each of his knuckles slowly one by one.

"Alex will still be there tomorrow." Liz reminded him breathlessly. "He could probably use some rest anyway. It’s not every day that we get back together. We should celebrate."

"Celebrate." Max repeated with a half smile. "Right. We should do that."