#this isn’t me saying i wouldn’t ship with an amanda or anything!!! or that vinh is a better love interest

[caulfect]

max & amanda, an overview :

to put it simply, amanda is … perfect. she is someone who isn’t held together by strings of chewing gum or elmer’s glue, but rather this whole entity who has put the pieces back together ( who has completed that messy, blurred puzzle piece box of trauma ) and hasn’t cracked once since.

there are other things -- like how amanda isn’t boring despite the healing, how she remains spunky, sassy, still brimming with a rockstar pull that max has always been so brittle against, and she’s an activist, and kind, and … she’s still everything interesting, she just happens to be more confident in herself than most. more knowing. some part of max envies that, this sense of pure unfiltered self, of understanding the vast canvas you hone inside your body, your fucked up mind, and being able to chart the crevices as you go ; unafraid and undeterred, facing flaws and unhealthy habits with empathy, with compassion, and running your fingers along those wounds like a best friend to kiss them better, to say we’ll spruce you right up, you’ll see. max doesn’t think she could ever be so comfortable inside herself, that she’s capable of such self-examination. she’s aware of her problems but only in the way that one tucks dirty laundry under the bed when guests come over, nervous and hiding, disapproving of the mess her needy, ruinous body leaves and the filth her haunted mind stews in, but unable to do anything else except stuff it into corners, baskets, hide between furniture, hoping and praying to beach gods that nobody will see even a hair of max caulfield’s stormy disarray. aware, always so aware, but never brave enough to venture -- eternally afraid of touching, prodding, because there is more piles to tend to and washing one means washing them all, and sometimes there’s too many old, ratty memories you need to avoid.

max is hesitant about amanda for an odd month or two, subconsciously aware of the girl’s attention ; breathless and awkward beneath it, those prying questions, that particular dance of queer women with crushes who are more than intimidated by one another, swept up in clueless, innane attraction. it almost seems … too good to be true? that sounds dramatic, emo levels of loathing which make her cringe ( 2013 much, max? ), but after spending years dodging intimacy that doesn’t involve sheets or alleyways or the squashed corner of dimly lit bars that smell so, so shitty, crushing and being crushed on seems childish, alien, something everyone else is allowed to do but her. feeling barred from entry amongst lovers and their sickly sighs is one thing, it’s another thing entirely to have an invitation and still abstain. it’d be easier if max didn’t want to, if that old section of her heart was broken beyond repair and ghastly, widowed to blue hair and potty mouth without any hope of whirring up again ; sworn bruised-skin on dirty, stained bathroom tile floor and never destined to get up again, devoted to the kneeling, that heartache, hands too young fisted into those dirty clothes she keeps hiding, slipping from cloth when they tremble, shake, like someone else’s hands. like his. but life is never so kind and max sees amanda in all her space bun glory, with her hands perched on one hip at an angle like a total mom, and something soft stirs somewhere. if max had to pick a partner after years of nothing, she’d like for amanda to be who leads her. she would be kind about it, max knows, or thinks she knows, but that inclination feels true so she sticks to her guns. amanda is beyond sweet -- always asks max how she’s doing, places her order before her as if it’s precious china rather than standard all-american glasses, jokes for ages with pupils that light and expand, and she’s curious but never dares prying. sees her flimsy, fragile boundaries that max can’t word because having them is weird and respects them without being told to. she’d be perfect, the right choice, the only one.

( and, uh, her hands are soft and super nice … which might be some secret of the universe, some ancient divine tell that max has stumbled upon, wobbly and uncertain. once upon a time they both reached for her glass -- max, hastily trying to help, and amanda, just doing her job … hands brushed, the tender side of them, a clumsy bump of knuckles and nails and amanda’s were cut short and so was max’s, which, yeah, she noticed! and her face did that rashy, bashful thing around women so out of her league but all she could think was a jerky chorus of : wow, that’s soft. it felt like bumping into a pillow on a lazy, dreary morning when you’re kicking restless limbs and seeking comfort. it felt like a tender pastry that’s more artsy than tasty, and while amanda bustled away there was a distinct raised brow and puckered lip look from safi which read her to filth. gay, was the unspoken joke between them. it is pure irony amanda would say the same thing later, baffled but preening, a little flustered by max’s weird comment instead of freaking )

still. she is cautious in the face of peer pressure … fumbles through an uncertain rejection when safi pushes ( “not my type,” a lie, kind of, though massive crush is too strong for her taste, embarrassing, sends her skittering back into deep woods ) but knows it wouldn’t hurt to befriend amanda more seriously. gives it a go and when faced with a question so bold she freezes all doe-eyed in headlights, there is little else max can do but go all in. yes, she says, she wants this to be a date thing. yes, she quietly admits without moving twisting lips, caledon’s resident hermit and big time mystery would like giving this a go. they make idle plans for concerts, they flirt, it’s so terrifyingly mundane and natural -- the certified human experience. things play out as they do in-game after that … max is a bundle of excited nerves that are raw things, exposed writhering innards she’s stuffing back inside herself, fascinated by how fast she’ll check her phone and how the disappointment is a swift blow when it isn’t amanda’s name or her absolutely adorable comedy account. all so new and old, like she’s reaching deep inside herself to find a light switch, to see those old parts of her that ogled at boys with hoodies or flushed beneath girls who were too pretty for her. but then … safi … she’s gone, and max naively thinks she can still keep amanda, that she’s allowed that right, but instead the holy gates of the friendzone greet her and it suddenly feels cold and uncomfortable. her protests mean nothing to amanda and they’re put on ice and -- what an apt term for it, she guesses. it sure feels that way. there is a tiring mantra of she’s right and but i need her … some part of max was expectant, hopeful, that there would be somewhere she could cling. that there would be a person she’d love above all at the end of this endless grieving cycle. some sort of love, the kind one can drown in, abuse, until every other matter seems trivial against such profound connection. she was still excited about harmless dates and silly wooing in her foreseeable future, and amanda didn’t take that from her completely to be fair, the door remained ajar and welcoming, a ‘next time!’ printed on the matt, but it still felt final. maybe she’s being dramatic … yet there’s a pinprick of something weird against her clammy skin when they decide to take a break. it’s an omen, a prophecy, another doe blessed vision of storms and tumbling towers : amanda is perfect and healthy, has a nine to five and extends an ear to wayward travelers and goes to therapy each month, visits family, and ( most importantly ) she’s too good for max caulfield. too perched up high to make a descent down, unless she’s looking to tumble thirty something steps. it hurts more than it should, flares like chronic pain down her right wrist, that dejection, that unwantedness, but max is busy with timelines and safi and amanda begins paling in comparison, thankfully.

they don’t talk and they don’t see each other. max flutters between a never ending rotation of lucas, gwen, vinh, and finds herself a bit enamored by the latter. she’ll kiss him later before a fake date with amanda and when she closes painted eyes and exposes her mouth, max ( who wanted this more than anything previously, who missed it, mourned it ) will falter before declining -- a babbling mess of excuses, of half-truths, lips still oddly warm from vinh and she feels his mouth with every word she utters. she can be healthy too, can decide that kissing amanda after she poured her heart out about anxious attachments isn’t right or fair when she was locking lips with someone else earlier, in front of her, or some version of her. they part ways and max shows her remorse in soft looks and pitying ‘sorry’s … it’s only a ‘maybe later’ and the door is still cracked when max checks, so she tries not feeling too bad about it. by the time safi’s gone in a flurry of snow and owl wings, after max withdraws to let the ruination of the storm settle … things are still confused and clouded, though her heart is a bit clear despite the growing pains of ache. they do not work out in the end. max falters beneath the very stability she was attracted to like a ship towards light. it goes from safety to lesser, she is lesser than, not good enough, too broken and scary for someone like amanda. and max always feels that way to some degree, inferior to her lovers, her crushes, someone too tacky and untalented for the likes of people so endearing … but it’s different here, feels more true and less like an insecurity, feels believed. max, burned by the experience, by amanda’s relief that things didn’t work out, doesn’t attempt something between them again. she is hurt. almost weakly offended. knows amanda’s right but is still too sensitive, too weathered and full of loss, to do anything except bruise under such harsh verdict. her crush fades into something small and insignificant, some shameful thing she kicks under the bed and gets over with time. she still seeks friendship with amanda after, in the midst of their awkward but not quite ‘didn’t work out’ flame, although things are rather conflicted on both their ends for a while. amanda thinks they’re better off that way, and after some time ( when she’s shallowed her weight in regretful bile, has put together her own pieces a bit ) max agrees.

tldr : max has attachment issues and, while genuinely being into amanda, she almost definitely was also attempting to use her as a means of feeling stable and normal. similarly, amanda has her own unresolved issues and has a tendency to prioritize herself to an extreme that inherently blames max for things she cannot help nor control … they are extremely incompatible at this point in time despite an attempt being made, and i have many, many thoughts on the matter but this will do for now.

* this meta follows the choices of : telling safi that amanda isn’t your type, clarifying to amanda that you’d like for your hangout to be a date thing, and kissing vinh only to then reject amanda’s kiss in spin.