#trioau

  Maybe it wouldn’t work -- rewinding the whole week and then immediately going through a photo? What was I thinking? With my track record I probably just made everything worse. But can it get worse? It can’t -- there’s no way. 

Max’s head pounded. When she opened her eyes everything was out of focus and little black spots danced around the room. Her head felt feather-light, threatening to float away at any second but physically it was as though she was being restrained. As her vision cleared it was becoming more apparent that she was back in the classroom on the day it all started.

“Diane Arbus,” she heard Victoria chime through the ringing in her ears.  “There you go, Victoria! Why Arbus?” Came Mr. Jefferson’s usual response. 

With shaking, uncooperative hands Max picked up her camera and willed herself to take a selfie. The flash did nothing to help her already spotty vision and to be perfectly honest she wasn’t even sure she was in frame. 

“Sh sh sh, I believe Max has taken what you kids call a ‘selfie’ -- A dumb word for a wonderful photographic tradition. And Max... has a nosebleed. Go on and head to the school nurse.” 

Max automatically reached for her nose and felt the slick blood on her upper lip. It didn’t seem particularly worse than usual to her relief. She stood, gathered her things, and left the classroom which proved to be a lot easier than taking the selfie. There was no way she was going to the school nurse. Who knew how long that would take and she had to go save Chloe.

That was ...different. Max looked at the blood on her hand as she walked through the empty hallway on her way to the girl’s room. Once inside she used the extra time to recompose herself and splash just bit more water on her face to clean off the blood. Her reflection looked tired. She figured it made sense as she couldn’t recall the last time she’d actually slept. Time to tear the photo.

Her body seemed to be moving more fluidly again once she threw the torn halves to the bathroom floor. Either that or she’d done this enough times for it to be muscle memory. Max turned to watch the butterfly make its way into the bathroom. “Well, you’re right on time,” she greeted and made her way after the blue winged insect. After she focused the butterfly in the viewfinder Max shut her eyes and took the photo to avoid the reflection of the flash off of the bucket of water. She didn’t need any more spots. Next she preemptively moved Samuel’s cart to get the hammer. Right on cue Nathan Prescott entered the bathroom talking to himself and Chloe followed shortly after.  

“We know you been pumpin’ drugs n’ shit to kids around here.”