The Dilemma.

I walked into the only quiet room at Max's parents, which happened to be Max's dad's study, on my phone pretending to listen to whatever Elissa had to say. I randomly started flipping through what ever it was that was on the desk. Bunch of papers really, nothing to interesting. Until I saw a thick and ripped, though being held together by tons of tape, envelope, it had Max's full name on it. I raised my eyebrows wondering why some Max's mail was doing in here. I picked up it and pulled out what ever was in it, it was several sheets of notebook paper filled front and back with a cursive scrawl. I unfolded them and told Lissa I'd call her back later and started reading the first page. It was dated March 13th 1992.

"Dear Max,

I know, that when you read this you're either going to be in your early 20's or you're never going to read this at all. But I just want you to know that I'm leaving. I'll always love you, my dear little hedgehog. You are going to have a wonderful life ahead of you, I'll miss you every single day that I'm not around you my son. I know that you probably have no idea who I am. Well I guess I should explain then? I'm your mum. My name is Claire Olivia Gettys-Helyer. Well, technically, Claire Gettys as your father and I never married and well, we'll get to that in time. I know that you're going to be a lot more like I am than your father, let's hope for that at least I don't think the world needs another Michael Oliver Helyer in the world. Anyways before I distract myself again I'm going to tell you a few things about me. So maybe one day you'll know at least a bit about who I am. I play guitar, helluva lot better than your father does, I don't think I can imagine a day that I won't regret leaving you here with your father, but I know that you'll do so much better for yourself here than for me to bring you with me. I hope you act a little crazy and wild. But know the way to treat a woman. So a few things about why I'm leaving. I know that you're only a year old, but I just need to tell you. You have a younger sibling. I'm not sure if it's a boy or a girl yet. I went to tell your father, as a surprise at work, and found him cheating on me, which is why I'm leaving. I don't think I can face him again. Ever. I'm moving to Wilmington North Carolina in the States. I'm leaving my address attached to the last page."

I gaped at the letter for a few minutes until a cough echoed through the room, I dropped the pages like they were on fire and looked up to see Max's dad standing there with a cold look on his face but not before noticing a few pictures fall out of the pages.

"What were you doing reading that?" He asked.

"I thought it was something of Max's." I muttered not looking him in the eye.

"How much did you read?" He asked.

"Enough to know you've been living a lie and making your son do the same for the past 21 almost 22 years." I looked him in the eye gaining my confidence. "You have another kid and a woman, who by the looks of it, was shattered by the fact that she had to leave her son because you cheated on her and," I picked up the pictures looking at them, there was one of Max's Dad and a baby with a woman who looked extremely like him, the woman again and his father, and then those two again with Max's grandmother Alice standing there in all her Auburn haired and green-eyed glory. "You've lied to Max about who his mother is? Was El the one who cheated on Claire is it with?" I looked at him, suddenly filled with rage about him lying to my best friend his whole life. Max has a mother and sibling that he doesn't know about, and here Oliver is hiding it from him.

"You can't tell Max. Any of it. Not at all." He glared at me.

"You are though." I sat the pictures back down, "before I have to."

"I can't." He sighed, sitting down in a chair after closing the door, this only angered me more.

"Any why bloody not?! He deserves to know, he deserves to find his real mom and his sister or brother."

"Because if I told him now, how the hell do I explain the fact that not only I've been lying to him for all most of his life but his real mom died yesterday of breast cancer? And his sister is 20 and heart broken." His hands rubbing up and down his face, a habit Max does when nervous. I just gaped at him.

"How do you even know this?"

"She called me yesterday, his sister. Apparently she never took me off the will, or well never took Max off the will and left 15,000 in a bank account for Max. It was transferred to Max's savings account this morning but look you can't tell Max. Not now." He looked at me begging me with his eyes not to tell him. I groaned.

"Fine. But seriously you need to tell him, he at least deserves to know that he has a sister." I stood up leaving everything on the desk and left the room.

--

The lads and I are at Kerrang looking over two pieces of work for an intern that is going on tour with us in five days. One was handwritten, and that handwriting looked familiar and I don't know from where, and the other typed out. I personally like the handwritten one more. It was an article about how music saved lives, it went in depth about how it can help a person through dark times when nothing else can. I flipped the pages over and looked at the name, which struck me as odd, her name was Lennon Rae Gettys. Then it hit me, her hand writing looked a lot like the one from the letter from Claire that I saw last month at Max's. Maybe it's? Nah I doubt it.

"So, which person, based on their writing, would you rather be stuck on a bus with for 7 months. Also tell Bobby that we can't thank him enough for letting us give you this intern. The job these two applied for is doing live reviews, spreads and other things and we want them to really understand tour life for it."

"Based on their writing I like the handwritten one. It has more power to it." Chris said. We all nodded into agreement about the girl.

"So, you choose Lennon Gettys?" We all nodded. "Well, here's a picture of her so you know what she looks like when you pick her up at the airport in four days." Catherine handed me a picture of the girl. She had dark Auburn hair and green eyes. Oh shit. It is her, she's a spitting image of Alice Helyer, I'd recognized that look of annoyance in the familiar green eyes, as Max and I usually got it from Alice herself by taking pictures of her when she didn't want one taken, she was short, shorter than Max. In the picture she had on a pair of skinnies and a Blink shirt. Good music taste at least, with headphones in sitting in a chair in what seemed to be a library with a Harry Potter book in her lap. I passed the picture along quickly as Catherine handed me a folder to give to Bobby with her personal info. I told her I'd give it to him later, after I got a quick look through it. We all left the office, while the lads went out for drinks I'd figure I'd stay in and look at this folder.

When I got back to mine, I opened the folder and lay all the papers out on my bed. It had her number in it, which I put in my phone along with her e-mail address. It had a few more pieces, which were all fucking genius by the way. I looked at her family history. There was the name Claire Olivia Gettys, listed under Mother. The fathers side of the page was empty a long with a note giving a brief explanation as to why it was, saying that her mother and father divorced before she was born and had never met him. After writing things such as, "How can you say you'll be there, when you've never been there before." "Can we not repeat this cycle after every argument?" from her piece The Cycle, which I was proper excited to ask her about. I put everything up and called Bobby saying that I had stuff for him from Kerrang and hung up quickly before showering and going to bed.