broken polaroid

Max wondering where Chloe's fearlessness comes from while having so little fear about trespassing makes me feel so many things.

Max always comments on how fearless Chloe is, but when push comes to shove, Chloe isn't really any braver than she is. Chloe is just more confident in her own abilities.

We see that here with Max's reaction the "No Trespassing" sign. Someone who wasn't a bit of a rebel would be nervous that they were trespassing on someone's private property since that could very well led to jailtime.

But Max isn't scared. She says "Watch Us" with the confidence of someone who's done this 100 times before. Because she's far braver than she gives herself credit for.

We see this again with the dark room. It would perfectly reasonable in most people's minds if Max didn't want to explore a weird bunker in the middle of nowhere. But she does. Because she wants answers to what happened to Kate and Rachel even if that endangers her...and that's absolutely bravery.

She’s super anxious about asking for a new camera for her birthday but forgot to come out to her parents because it didn’t seem like a big deal to her. Scared to speak up in class but forgets that Chloe doesn’t know she got diagnosed with autism.

It WAS until Before the Storm where we get a similar choice in Chloe’s room. Except if you choose to water it then Chloe will water it with a can of soda, figuring it’s better than nothing, killing the plant. On the surface this might seem to support Chloe’s insecurity that she expresses during her and Rachel’s argument in the junkyard where Chloe expresses that she only ever hurts people she cares about and screws everything up. That’s probably how Chloe sees it. But that’s not how I see it. How I see it is that in order to properly nurture something, you need to use the right method. Like how in the junkyard and Rachel’s room Chloe learns that the best way to comfort Rachel is to give her space and just be there for her, which goes against Chloe’s instincts. Something that might seem good in the moment is actually harmful in the long run. This reminds me of Chloe’s dream/vision of William when he talks about how the intense and destructive beauty of fire (Rachel) can blind you to the calmer and consistent beauty of the stars (Max) (this is not about a ship war, I swear. That’s just the messaging that I feel like the game is trying to tell us).

Chloe and Rachel’s relationship is not the healthiest. They did need each other for a time, and we see in the comics that there is a timeline where they end up having an amazing relationship, but it was pretty clear that in our canon timeline the longer their friendship/situationship lasted the more harmful it was becoming. Something that seemed good at first but in the long run would metaphorically kill them. If Rachel wasn’t killed then their whole relationship probably would’ve went up in flames.

Now we come back to Max. She’s the stars. She waters Lisa with water. She and Chloe are what each other needs in the long run. They’re what each other needs to live and thrive

"lesbians for a free Palestine"