Roswell Fic: "Ten Years Later..."(CC ALL, Mature)pt 15 8/26
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nibbles2
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midwestmax
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Re: Roswell Fic: "Ten Years Later..."(CC ALL, Mature)pt 11 1/17
Part Twelve
He was going to stay? For her? What did that mean? Didn’t they all end up staying? It was a bizarre thing for Isabel to have said, and Maria didn’t understand it one bit. Even more aggravating – she’d finally worked up her courage to confront Michael and he hadn’t even been home. It was just like him to be that inconsiderate.
Almost as if she’d said “Beetlejuice” three times, Michael Guerin loomed into view, picking out fruit at a road-side stand. Maria hit the brakes harder than she’d intended, sending a plume of dust up behind the Volvo. She jerked the car into a parking spot and simply stared at her ex-boyfriend, who was joking with Juan, the owner of the stand. She watched him laugh with abandon, something she’d rarely witnessed in his teenage years. Her insides flipped. He was still gorgeous, perhaps even more so than he’d been back then.
She gave her head a shake. Enough of that. Get out and talk to him, she told herself. She eased open the door of the car and the hot New Mexico air seemed to immediately suck all of the air conditioning out of it. She forced her feet to move until she was standing beside him, looking up at him through her dark sunglasses. She thought to remove them, but then he’d be able to read her and she didn’t want that. Not yet.
Michael had a cantaloupe in his hand and was holding it up to Margarita, Juan’s wife. “¿Cuánto es esto?” he asked.
“Cincuenta centavos,” Margarita replied.
“Fifty cents,” Michael repeated to himself, placing the melon in his basket and reaching for another one. “Es bueno.”
“Sí,” Maria answered with a smile.
Michael jerked, then his eyes narrowed. “Isn’t your car embarrassed to be seen here?”
Maria’s smile faded as her brow furrowed in confusion. “What does that mean?”
“And be careful you don’t ruin those shoes in all of this dust and dirt.” Michael rounded the makeshift counter, picked up a plum and held it to his nose.
Maria snorted. “What is that all about?”
Michael held up the fruit. “It’s a plum.”
“Not that,” Maria said, her hand going to her hip in annoyance. She hated herself for losing her composure so quickly. “The comments about my car and shoes.”
Michael shrugged. “It’s just that not many people stop to help out the farmers wearing Jimmy Choo’s and driving German luxury cars. That’s all.” He tipped his head to Margarita, who nodded in agreement.
Maria’s mouth fell open and she realized that no sunglasses would be powerful enough to hide any of her emotions if she stood there gaping like a fish. “Are you calling me a snob?”
Michael looked at Margarita again, who shrugged as if to say, “It is what it is.”
Maria huffed in response. “Look, I stopped because I saw you shopping and I thought I could talk to you for a moment.”
Michael placed a handful of plums in his basket. “I don’t really have anything to talk to you about, Maria.” He gave the basket to Margarita, who did a quick sum in her had and told him the price. He handed her a ten and told her to keep the change.
“Well, maybe I want to talk to you,” Maria countered as Margarita bagged his purchase.
“Can’t imagine why,” he said, taking the bag from the woman. “Buenos dias.”
He turned and made for his rental car, but Maria wasn’t giving up right away.
“Michael, wait,” she called.
He stopped briefly to put the bag on the seat, then turned to face her, his arms crossed over his chest. He met her eye-to-eye and she felt her knees go weak. Words were suddenly hard to come by.
“I’m waiting,” he said patiently. “You said you had something to say.”
“Isabel said you were going to stay for me,” she said quietly.
At that, Michael snorted and jerked open the car door. “No, she got that wrong.”
Maria’s eyebrows lifted in surprise, then she looked at the ground. Isabel had lied to her? It didn’t seem likely.
Michael started to get into the car, but something – perhaps a flash of his old temper – prompted him to right himself. “I wanted to stay for someone else, for some other version of Maria. I wanted to stay for someone who was quirky and fun and always unpredictable. But from what I can tell, that person is dead.”
Maria looked up, shocked.
“Your ass is so tight you squeak when you walk,” he continued, his voice starting to rise slightly. “Look at yourself. Do you go to the salon once or twice a week for those nails and that hair, which by the way is pulled back so harsh that your eyes have gone slanted. At what point in your life did you wake up in the morning and when deciding what to wear, you started reaching for shoes that cost more than my entire wardrobe? And it’s not even the way you look, it’s your attitude. It’s like you have everything planned now. Where did the spontaneity go?” His eyes narrowed. “Who are you?”
Maria felt the first sting of tears in her eyes and she looked to her offending shoes, was suddenly ashamed that she even owned them.
“It doesn’t matter,” Michael said in finality. “I don’t know you anymore.”
*~*~*~*~*
“I want to show you something,” Jim said as he rifled through a file cabinet in his office, a room that had once belonged to Kyle.
On the other side of the room, Liz sat uneasily in an ancient office chair. Nervous, she rubbed her palms on her jeans, told herself to relax.
Jim lifted a file out of the cabinet, glanced at the tab, shoved it back in place and produced another one that met his satisfaction. He brought the file to the desk, and laid it open, reaching over to flip on a lamp. Liz shifted her weight as he sifted through the papers, then handed one to her. She took it with shaking fingers.
“What is this?” she asked. “It looks like a seismograph or something.”
“That’s exactly what it is,” Jim confirmed. “Look at the date.”
Liz tilted her head sideways. “May 2001.”
“Where is it from?”
She read further. “The University of New Mexico.” She looked up to the Sheriff. “We had an earthquake in 2001?”
He sat back in his chair and gave a nod. “For all intents and purposes, yes, we did. What else could explain such a disturbance?”
Liz swallowed hard. A spaceship taking off, that’s what.
“That’s probably what collapsed those mountains in the desert, wouldn’t you think?”
She cocked her head. “We both know that’s not the truth.”
Jim shrugged. “Official report says it’s the truth. It must be true. As far as the FBI is concerned, it’s the truth.”
She looked at the paper again.
“No UFOs, Liz. No unexplained phenomenon. Just an earthquake.”
Liz looked away for a moment. “What about Tess?” It hurt to even speak her name. “She’s been missing for ten years. And no one has cared?”
“There’s no record of Tess ever existing.”
She saw hardness in the sheriff’s eyes that she’d never seen before. “How can that be? She went to high school with us. People knew her.”
“Who knew her? You and the Evans kids. Maria, Kyle, and Michael Guerin. Who else? The one good thing about Tess not letting anyone into her circle is that people easily forgot her.”
Liz frowned. Even though Tess was a murderer, it saddened her to think that someone could fall off the face of the earth – nearly literally – and no one would care. And maybe that had been Tess’s fatal flaw all along – there was no one who really cared about her.
“And as for her school records,” Jim continued. “Those have been destroyed.”
Liz’s eyebrows lifted in surprise.
A small smile lifted one corner of his mouth. “But I’ll deny it if ever asked.” He gave a small sigh. “Once you and Maria figured out who’d killed Alex, I did a little clean up work. I suppose you’re wondering why I never told you kids about it. Well, there didn’t seem a need. For all we knew, all of the hybrids had left the planet. We didn’t even know that Tess was dead – we only found that out recently when you reconnected with Max. Let sleeping dogs lie, Liz. Bring Max home so that he can help my son.”
*~*~*~*~*
Maria washed the cup she’d used at breakfast, rinsed it, washed it again. She knew it was clean, but she simply didn’t know what else to do with herself. She hadn’t been prepared for Michael’s hostility, and his harsh words had cut her to the core. Inside, she felt deflated, ashamed and guilty…of what, she wasn’t sure.
Movement to her left drew her attention and she found Jesse standing in the doorway, his jacket slung over his shoulder.
“Where have you been?” she asked, no malice in her tone.
“My mom’s,” he answered, placing his coat on the counter. “Don’t worry – I didn’t tell her we fought. I told her I’d gone out with some friends, locked myself out, didn’t want to wake you.”
She gave him a small nod in gratitude, then an uncomfortable silence ensued.
Finally, Jesse broke the silence. “I think maybe I was a little hard on you last night,” he said tentatively.
Join the club, she thought.
“I’m sorry for that. I just thought that I knew everything there was to know about you, and to find out that I don’t – well, it was a little upsetting.”
“I understand,” she said quietly.
“If you don’t want to tell me about him, that’s okay. I don’t want to keep secrets from one another, but I keep telling myself there must be a reason I don’t know about this guy. And maybe you’re not ready to tell me that reason yet. So, I’m sorry. I still love you from the bottom of my heart, Maria. Can we just put this and Michael Guerin behind us?”
Looking into his eyes, full of sincerity and genuine admiration, Maria could only nod.
tbc
The next part will reveal what happened the day the aliens were supposed to return home
He was going to stay? For her? What did that mean? Didn’t they all end up staying? It was a bizarre thing for Isabel to have said, and Maria didn’t understand it one bit. Even more aggravating – she’d finally worked up her courage to confront Michael and he hadn’t even been home. It was just like him to be that inconsiderate.
Almost as if she’d said “Beetlejuice” three times, Michael Guerin loomed into view, picking out fruit at a road-side stand. Maria hit the brakes harder than she’d intended, sending a plume of dust up behind the Volvo. She jerked the car into a parking spot and simply stared at her ex-boyfriend, who was joking with Juan, the owner of the stand. She watched him laugh with abandon, something she’d rarely witnessed in his teenage years. Her insides flipped. He was still gorgeous, perhaps even more so than he’d been back then.
She gave her head a shake. Enough of that. Get out and talk to him, she told herself. She eased open the door of the car and the hot New Mexico air seemed to immediately suck all of the air conditioning out of it. She forced her feet to move until she was standing beside him, looking up at him through her dark sunglasses. She thought to remove them, but then he’d be able to read her and she didn’t want that. Not yet.
Michael had a cantaloupe in his hand and was holding it up to Margarita, Juan’s wife. “¿Cuánto es esto?” he asked.
“Cincuenta centavos,” Margarita replied.
“Fifty cents,” Michael repeated to himself, placing the melon in his basket and reaching for another one. “Es bueno.”
“Sí,” Maria answered with a smile.
Michael jerked, then his eyes narrowed. “Isn’t your car embarrassed to be seen here?”
Maria’s smile faded as her brow furrowed in confusion. “What does that mean?”
“And be careful you don’t ruin those shoes in all of this dust and dirt.” Michael rounded the makeshift counter, picked up a plum and held it to his nose.
Maria snorted. “What is that all about?”
Michael held up the fruit. “It’s a plum.”
“Not that,” Maria said, her hand going to her hip in annoyance. She hated herself for losing her composure so quickly. “The comments about my car and shoes.”
Michael shrugged. “It’s just that not many people stop to help out the farmers wearing Jimmy Choo’s and driving German luxury cars. That’s all.” He tipped his head to Margarita, who nodded in agreement.
Maria’s mouth fell open and she realized that no sunglasses would be powerful enough to hide any of her emotions if she stood there gaping like a fish. “Are you calling me a snob?”
Michael looked at Margarita again, who shrugged as if to say, “It is what it is.”
Maria huffed in response. “Look, I stopped because I saw you shopping and I thought I could talk to you for a moment.”
Michael placed a handful of plums in his basket. “I don’t really have anything to talk to you about, Maria.” He gave the basket to Margarita, who did a quick sum in her had and told him the price. He handed her a ten and told her to keep the change.
“Well, maybe I want to talk to you,” Maria countered as Margarita bagged his purchase.
“Can’t imagine why,” he said, taking the bag from the woman. “Buenos dias.”
He turned and made for his rental car, but Maria wasn’t giving up right away.
“Michael, wait,” she called.
He stopped briefly to put the bag on the seat, then turned to face her, his arms crossed over his chest. He met her eye-to-eye and she felt her knees go weak. Words were suddenly hard to come by.
“I’m waiting,” he said patiently. “You said you had something to say.”
“Isabel said you were going to stay for me,” she said quietly.
At that, Michael snorted and jerked open the car door. “No, she got that wrong.”
Maria’s eyebrows lifted in surprise, then she looked at the ground. Isabel had lied to her? It didn’t seem likely.
Michael started to get into the car, but something – perhaps a flash of his old temper – prompted him to right himself. “I wanted to stay for someone else, for some other version of Maria. I wanted to stay for someone who was quirky and fun and always unpredictable. But from what I can tell, that person is dead.”
Maria looked up, shocked.
“Your ass is so tight you squeak when you walk,” he continued, his voice starting to rise slightly. “Look at yourself. Do you go to the salon once or twice a week for those nails and that hair, which by the way is pulled back so harsh that your eyes have gone slanted. At what point in your life did you wake up in the morning and when deciding what to wear, you started reaching for shoes that cost more than my entire wardrobe? And it’s not even the way you look, it’s your attitude. It’s like you have everything planned now. Where did the spontaneity go?” His eyes narrowed. “Who are you?”
Maria felt the first sting of tears in her eyes and she looked to her offending shoes, was suddenly ashamed that she even owned them.
“It doesn’t matter,” Michael said in finality. “I don’t know you anymore.”
*~*~*~*~*
“I want to show you something,” Jim said as he rifled through a file cabinet in his office, a room that had once belonged to Kyle.
On the other side of the room, Liz sat uneasily in an ancient office chair. Nervous, she rubbed her palms on her jeans, told herself to relax.
Jim lifted a file out of the cabinet, glanced at the tab, shoved it back in place and produced another one that met his satisfaction. He brought the file to the desk, and laid it open, reaching over to flip on a lamp. Liz shifted her weight as he sifted through the papers, then handed one to her. She took it with shaking fingers.
“What is this?” she asked. “It looks like a seismograph or something.”
“That’s exactly what it is,” Jim confirmed. “Look at the date.”
Liz tilted her head sideways. “May 2001.”
“Where is it from?”
She read further. “The University of New Mexico.” She looked up to the Sheriff. “We had an earthquake in 2001?”
He sat back in his chair and gave a nod. “For all intents and purposes, yes, we did. What else could explain such a disturbance?”
Liz swallowed hard. A spaceship taking off, that’s what.
“That’s probably what collapsed those mountains in the desert, wouldn’t you think?”
She cocked her head. “We both know that’s not the truth.”
Jim shrugged. “Official report says it’s the truth. It must be true. As far as the FBI is concerned, it’s the truth.”
She looked at the paper again.
“No UFOs, Liz. No unexplained phenomenon. Just an earthquake.”
Liz looked away for a moment. “What about Tess?” It hurt to even speak her name. “She’s been missing for ten years. And no one has cared?”
“There’s no record of Tess ever existing.”
She saw hardness in the sheriff’s eyes that she’d never seen before. “How can that be? She went to high school with us. People knew her.”
“Who knew her? You and the Evans kids. Maria, Kyle, and Michael Guerin. Who else? The one good thing about Tess not letting anyone into her circle is that people easily forgot her.”
Liz frowned. Even though Tess was a murderer, it saddened her to think that someone could fall off the face of the earth – nearly literally – and no one would care. And maybe that had been Tess’s fatal flaw all along – there was no one who really cared about her.
“And as for her school records,” Jim continued. “Those have been destroyed.”
Liz’s eyebrows lifted in surprise.
A small smile lifted one corner of his mouth. “But I’ll deny it if ever asked.” He gave a small sigh. “Once you and Maria figured out who’d killed Alex, I did a little clean up work. I suppose you’re wondering why I never told you kids about it. Well, there didn’t seem a need. For all we knew, all of the hybrids had left the planet. We didn’t even know that Tess was dead – we only found that out recently when you reconnected with Max. Let sleeping dogs lie, Liz. Bring Max home so that he can help my son.”
*~*~*~*~*
Maria washed the cup she’d used at breakfast, rinsed it, washed it again. She knew it was clean, but she simply didn’t know what else to do with herself. She hadn’t been prepared for Michael’s hostility, and his harsh words had cut her to the core. Inside, she felt deflated, ashamed and guilty…of what, she wasn’t sure.
Movement to her left drew her attention and she found Jesse standing in the doorway, his jacket slung over his shoulder.
“Where have you been?” she asked, no malice in her tone.
“My mom’s,” he answered, placing his coat on the counter. “Don’t worry – I didn’t tell her we fought. I told her I’d gone out with some friends, locked myself out, didn’t want to wake you.”
She gave him a small nod in gratitude, then an uncomfortable silence ensued.
Finally, Jesse broke the silence. “I think maybe I was a little hard on you last night,” he said tentatively.
Join the club, she thought.
“I’m sorry for that. I just thought that I knew everything there was to know about you, and to find out that I don’t – well, it was a little upsetting.”
“I understand,” she said quietly.
“If you don’t want to tell me about him, that’s okay. I don’t want to keep secrets from one another, but I keep telling myself there must be a reason I don’t know about this guy. And maybe you’re not ready to tell me that reason yet. So, I’m sorry. I still love you from the bottom of my heart, Maria. Can we just put this and Michael Guerin behind us?”
Looking into his eyes, full of sincerity and genuine admiration, Maria could only nod.
tbc
The next part will reveal what happened the day the aliens were supposed to return home
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tequathisy
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Re: Roswell Fic: "Ten Years Later..."(CC ALL, Mature)pt 12 2/22
I utterly love this fic. Can't wait for answers.
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Ti88
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Re: Roswell Fic: "Ten Years Later..."(CC ALL, Mature)pt 12 2/22
love this story. this is great. i hope it all works out. i'm glad that michael had to say what he said. its a point that sometimes is overlooked and its a real thing. a very real thing because people change. i'm glad max can come home. wouldn't it all have been better if things had come out in the open? can't wait for more
Roselle
Egyptian Dwelling Silly Sister Techie Connection
If we don't change we don't grow. If we don't grow we aren't really living. - Gail Sheey
My spelling is wobbly. It's good spelling but it wobbles and the letters get in the worng places - Pooh
Egyptian Dwelling Silly Sister Techie Connection
If we don't change we don't grow. If we don't grow we aren't really living. - Gail Sheey
My spelling is wobbly. It's good spelling but it wobbles and the letters get in the worng places - Pooh
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nibbles2
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midwestmax
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Re: Roswell Fic: "Ten Years Later..."(CC ALL, Mature)pt 12 2/22
Part Thirteen
Watching Michael wash the dishes from breakfast, Isabel stood silently in the doorway to the kitchen. In the years since they’d left Roswell, he’d lost some of his outward anger – she knew that the Michael of ten years ago would be slamming dishes in the sink at this point. But this Michael seemed calm and cool on the exterior, if not for the occasional flexing of his jaw muscles.
Clearing her throat, she took a step forward and put on her best cheerful smile. “Breakfast was really good, Michael. You haven’t lost your touch.”
He glanced at her, brow furrowed slightly. “Haven’t lost it since when? Last Tuesday when I last made breakfast?”
She gave a congenial shrug, not wanting to ruin this conversation so quickly. “Oh, Michael. Can’t you just take a compliment?”
“Thanks,” he mumbled, rinsing a plate and putting it in the rack.
“We have a dishwasher, you know.”
He shrugged. “Don’t have much else to do.”
The kitchen fell silent except for the sound of running water and the clink of the dishes. Isabel leaned back against the island, watched Michael scrub furiously on a pot. She glanced out the window, took in a breath and willed herself to continue.
“Maria stopped by this morning.”
There was only a momentary pause in his scrubbing, which he almost covered without being caught. One corner of Isabel’s lip lifted in satisfaction.
“I assume you sent her on her way?” Michael asked without looking up.
“If you’re asking if I was a bitch to her, no I wasn’t.” Isabel moved around so that she was standing beside him. “Michael, why don’t you tell her?”
“There’s nothing to tell.”
At that, she snorted. “Oh, please! She’s the reason for everything, Michael.”
He placed the pot in the drainer and pinned her with a glare. “Nothing, Iz. There is absolutely nothing to tell her.”
“She should know! She’s the reason we’re here, the reason we’re still alive. And she’s never going to know that unless you tell her.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said, snatching a towel from the counter and drying his hands on it.
“Apparently it does.”
“In what way?”
Isabel stopped, exasperated, and decided to take a different approach. “Why did you come back here, Michael?”
He gave another shrug. “I missed the in-laws.”
She cocked her head, unappreciative of his sarcasm.
“The desert?” he tried.
“Michael.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said, tossing the towel onto the counter.
“You came back for her, just like you were going to stay for her. If you hadn’t done that, we wouldn’t be here. We’d be dead.”
The calm façade finally broke away and Michael took one step closer to her. Having spent years dealing with his outbursts, Isabel didn’t withdraw, in fact, she didn’t even flinch. He jabbed a finger in her direction.
“It doesn’t matter. She’s got someone else, someone who buys her shoes that cost more than my entire wardrobe. It’s neither here nor there what I did back then.”
“It is here or there,” Isabel countered. “I’ll say it again – the bottom like is she’s the reason we’re alive. All of your life you wanted to see what was out there, where we came from – you craved it, Michael. How much do you have to love someone to sacrifice your one chance at having that?”
He stopped, withdrew and behind his eyes Isabel saw defeat. “Obviously, more than she loved me.”
*~*~*~*~*
Maria’s head was pounding. In addition to the natural din of the Crashdown, across the table from her Liz was obsessive-compulsively sorting and stacking sugar packets, shoving them into the dispenser, dumping them and starting over again. And talking. Talking, talking, talking. Yeah, she got it – Max was coming home. That was good. The sheriff had done well in his espionage. Max could see his family and be with Liz. Yay for the home team. But jeez – couldn’t she please just shut the hell up…
“Don’t you think?”
Maria’s eyes jerked to her friend’s. Crap – she’d obviously just been asked a question and didn’t know the appropriate response. “Um, sure. Sounds good.”
Liz giggled. “I thought so too. I can’t wait until he gets here.”
“I know.”
Maria looked glumly into her coffee. Her despair was obviously lost on her best friend and that was okay – Liz deserved to be happy. At least someone was going to be happy.
“When is his flight again?” Maria asked, kicking herself for not being more supportive. On top of being a bad fiancé, she was also being a bad friend.
“I have to leave for the airport in an hour. God, I’m so stoked! My heart is pounding like 90 miles an hour!”
Maria gave her a small smile, took in her bright eyes and flushed cheeks. Secretly she wondered if Max and Liz would make it out of the airport terminal before they started mauling each other. She reached across the table and took Liz’s hand in hers, which started the woman into shutting up.
“I’m happy for you, Liz. I want you to be happy. I really do.”
Liz’s eyes softened. “Thank you, Maria.” Then she frowned slightly. “Are you okay?”
“Sure, fine,” Maria answered automatically.
Liz tipped her head, gave her friend a look that said it all – nice try, but I’m not buying it.
“I’ll be fine,” Maria assured, withdrawing her hand and sitting back in the booth. “Go, be happy. I’ll get myself straightened out.”
Before Liz could reply, a shadow fell over the table and both girls turned to find Isabel standing at the end of the booth. Her expression was serious and both Liz and Maria feared the worst.
“I need to talk to you,” Isabel said.
“Me?” Liz said.
“No, both of you. Is there somewhere we can go?”
Maria’s hand went to her necklace and she could practically feel the blood drain from her face. “Oh, God…” Someone was dead.
“There’s nothing wrong,” Isabel clarified, seeing the look on her face. “I just need to tell you something.”
“Oh, okay,” Liz said, starting to slide from the booth, the sugar packets forgotten. “Let’s go upstairs – my parents are out for the afternoon.”
Maria pushed out of the booth on shaking knees and followed her friends toward the back stairwell.
Isabel was amazed that Liz’s room hadn’t changed much since their high school days. Gone was the corkboard with all of the school activities pinned to it, and the curtains had changed, but it was essentially the same room. Even more astounding, the rooftop patio outside of her window hadn’t changed one iota.
“What is it?” Liz asked, cutting straight to the chase once they were alone.
Isabel leaned against the wall surrounding the roof and crossed her arms over her chest. Inside, she was more than a little pissed that she had to be the one to tell the story.
“Why don’t you two have a seat,” she suggested, nodding toward the lawn chairs. “And stop staring at me like you’re waiting for the other shoe to fall.”
Liz and Maria sat, though neither relaxed.
Isabel drew in a deep breath. She looked at Liz. “I know that Max isn’t going to tell you.” Then she looked at Maria. “And neither is Michael.” Then took in them both. “So I will. I think it’s only fair that you know what happened that day at the pod chamber.”
Liz and Maria exchanged a silent glance, eyes round.
Isabel folded her hands before her, looked at her fingers. “As you know, the three of us and Tess left for the pod chamber, intending to use the granilith to return home. Tess was pregnant with Max’s child, who couldn’t live here on earth.”
Liz looked away, the scar from that old and yet still knew.
“Max and I made a tape for our parents, explaining who we are and where we’d gone. We gave the tape to Sheriff Valenti, asking him to give it to them once he knew for sure that we weren’t here anymore. We thought they deserved an explanation of some kind.”
She drew in a breath and looked away for a moment, memories that she didn’t want to revisit coming back to her in a flood.
“So Max was preparing the granilith for departure. I was at peace with it, you know? I wanted to be with Max and Michael – they were my family. I was nervous, but I thought with the three of us together we’d be okay. I didn’t really care if Tess was there or not. Anyway, we were only a few minutes away from departing and Michael spoke up.”
Isabel’s dark eyes shifted to Maria, just to make sure she had her attention, a concern that was definitely unwarranted.
“He didn’t want to go,” Isabel said, offered Maria a smile tinged with regret. “He said he’d found his home. Here. I can only assume he meant with you.”
Maria swallowed hard and looked down at the floor. Supportive, Liz reached over and took her hand.
“I think Max was surprised at that, but he understood. He told him to stay if he wanted. And he told me I could stay if I wanted. I love Michael, I really do – but I wanted to be with Max so I agreed to go. But Michael staying was a problem.”
“A problem?” Liz said. “Why?”
Isabel took a couple of paces, shook her head. “Tess started panicking.”
“Panicking?” Maria said incredulously. It was hard to imagine that out of Tess.
Isabel nodded. “Just really over reacting. Saying that Michael had to go, that we all had to go together. It wasn’t right if just the three of us showed up. And the more that Max pressured her for a reason for being so upset, the more flustered she got. Until she made a comment about Michael not coming would break the deal.”
“Deal?” Maria said. “What deal?” She could tell by the look on Isabel’s face that she wasn’t going to like what she was about to hear.
“It seems that Nasedo made a deal with Khivar a long time ago, before any of us were even born. Tess was to return to Antar with the next heir to the throne – the baby – and deliver the rest of us to him.”
“Why?” Liz asked, her voice shrill.
Isabel shrugged, trying to make the news seem less awful. “I can only imagine so that we could be eliminated.”
“Eliminated?” Maria cried. “As in killed?!”
Isabel nodded. “I think so, yes.”
“Oh God,” Liz said, dropping her head to her hand.
“I’m sorry, Liz, but I think you need to hear this.”
“I do,” she agreed solemnly, without dropping her hand from her face. “Go on.”
Isabel looked at Maria before she continued – she seemed sort of stunned, but not freaking, so that was good.
“Once Tess spilled about the deal, Max grabbed her by the arm. She didn’t have time to block him and he immediately could tell that she wasn’t pregnant.”
“What?” Maria said.
Isabel shook her head. “She wasn’t.”
Liz dropped her hand. “Wouldn’t that break the deal as well?”
Isabel shrugged. “I don’t know what she was thinking. I guess you can fake that for a while – maybe she thought she could trap Max once they were on Antar, I don’t know for sure.”
“Stupid bitch,” Maria mumbled.
“The clock was ticking,” Isabel said. “Everything was set into motion and there was nothing we could do to stop it. With or without us, the granilith was set to launch. Time was running out, things were very tense and chaotic. Tess started yelling at Max, I think maybe trying to beat him into submissiveness to get him to go home. And then she threatened him.”
“How?” Liz asked warily.
A small tear glinted in the corner of Isabel’s eye. “She said she’d do to you what she’d done to Alex.”
Maria winced and Liz let out a gasp. Of course, by the time that Tess had threatened Liz’s life, Liz, Maria and Kyle had already figured out that Tess had murdered Alex. This much was not news to them, however the breadth of her treachery was a revelation.
“Then what happened?” Maria asked quietly.
“Max hit her,” Isabel said.
Maria looked sharply at Liz. “I thought you said he killed the bitch.”
Isabel held up a hand. “Let me finish. He hit her so hard that she fell into the side of the granilith.”
“And killed her,” Liz finished quietly.
Isabel nodded. “There’s no doubt – she dissolved into a pile of ash almost immediately. I don’t think he meant to do that, but we didn’t have time to really discuss it. We had problems of our own. Soon after Max killed Tess, the whole mountain started to shake. We tried to run for the exit, but rocks were falling down all around us. Michael took a blow to the head, dropped him on the spot.”
Maria’s eyes were round.
“We knew we were in some deep trouble,” Isabel said. “Max and I fell over Michael to protect him from other falling rocks and Max threw up his shield to protect all of us. It took all of his strength. It seemed like the mountain was never going to stop shaking, it lasted forever. And when it did stop, we knew we were trapped.”
Looking weary, Isabel dropped to a vacant lawn chair. “We were trapped,” she repeated softly, her gaze far off for a long moment. Eventually she continued. “I used the strength I had left to light some rocks so we could see. Max was able to let down the shield once we were sure that the rocks around us were stable. He used the last bit of his strength to heal Michael’s head wound. And then we started digging. We didn’t have any food or water and our powers were depleted. It took a long time to build up a little strength and it would be spent so fast that it took us forever to make any progress at all.”
“How long did it take?” Liz asked.
“Three days. It took us three days to dig ourselves out. And when we got out, we didn’t like what we saw.”
“Military,” Maria said as though she already knew.
Isabel nodded. “Them. FBI. Geologists. All around the mountain. It was just a mass of people. We had to wait for nightfall to come to sneak out of the desert. While we waited for dark, we discussed what to do. We knew that what we had done was very public and in no way had gone unnoticed. We knew that the people we loved would be in danger if we stayed. Our parents had the tape explaining that we were gone. So, it seemed best to us that we just stayed gone. We came up with new names, new appearances, and hit the road.”
“Why did you pretend to be married?” Maria asked.
For the first time, Isabel gave a genuine smile. “We figured it was less suspicious for a woman to be traveling with two guys if she was married to one of them. If someone happened to be in our home or walk in on us or something, I felt better to have to fake it with Michael than with Max.” She gave a little laugh. “I’m a good actress, but not that good. I’m not sure I could have pulled that off.”
A weary silence fell over the women, until Isabel pushed herself to her feet. “I wanted you to know,” she said. “Neither of them was going to tell you.” She looked at Liz. “Max wasn’t going to let you know that he’d killed Tess because she threatened you.” Then she looked at Maria. “And Michael wasn’t going to tell you that the reason all of this happened was because he wanted to stay here with you.”
Maria helped up a hand, palm up. “Why not? What’s the harm?”
Isabel gave another small laugh. “Isn’t that obvious? He’s afraid if he told you he loved you enough to give up his dream to stay with you, that you’d see that he still loves you.”
tbc
Watching Michael wash the dishes from breakfast, Isabel stood silently in the doorway to the kitchen. In the years since they’d left Roswell, he’d lost some of his outward anger – she knew that the Michael of ten years ago would be slamming dishes in the sink at this point. But this Michael seemed calm and cool on the exterior, if not for the occasional flexing of his jaw muscles.
Clearing her throat, she took a step forward and put on her best cheerful smile. “Breakfast was really good, Michael. You haven’t lost your touch.”
He glanced at her, brow furrowed slightly. “Haven’t lost it since when? Last Tuesday when I last made breakfast?”
She gave a congenial shrug, not wanting to ruin this conversation so quickly. “Oh, Michael. Can’t you just take a compliment?”
“Thanks,” he mumbled, rinsing a plate and putting it in the rack.
“We have a dishwasher, you know.”
He shrugged. “Don’t have much else to do.”
The kitchen fell silent except for the sound of running water and the clink of the dishes. Isabel leaned back against the island, watched Michael scrub furiously on a pot. She glanced out the window, took in a breath and willed herself to continue.
“Maria stopped by this morning.”
There was only a momentary pause in his scrubbing, which he almost covered without being caught. One corner of Isabel’s lip lifted in satisfaction.
“I assume you sent her on her way?” Michael asked without looking up.
“If you’re asking if I was a bitch to her, no I wasn’t.” Isabel moved around so that she was standing beside him. “Michael, why don’t you tell her?”
“There’s nothing to tell.”
At that, she snorted. “Oh, please! She’s the reason for everything, Michael.”
He placed the pot in the drainer and pinned her with a glare. “Nothing, Iz. There is absolutely nothing to tell her.”
“She should know! She’s the reason we’re here, the reason we’re still alive. And she’s never going to know that unless you tell her.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said, snatching a towel from the counter and drying his hands on it.
“Apparently it does.”
“In what way?”
Isabel stopped, exasperated, and decided to take a different approach. “Why did you come back here, Michael?”
He gave another shrug. “I missed the in-laws.”
She cocked her head, unappreciative of his sarcasm.
“The desert?” he tried.
“Michael.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said, tossing the towel onto the counter.
“You came back for her, just like you were going to stay for her. If you hadn’t done that, we wouldn’t be here. We’d be dead.”
The calm façade finally broke away and Michael took one step closer to her. Having spent years dealing with his outbursts, Isabel didn’t withdraw, in fact, she didn’t even flinch. He jabbed a finger in her direction.
“It doesn’t matter. She’s got someone else, someone who buys her shoes that cost more than my entire wardrobe. It’s neither here nor there what I did back then.”
“It is here or there,” Isabel countered. “I’ll say it again – the bottom like is she’s the reason we’re alive. All of your life you wanted to see what was out there, where we came from – you craved it, Michael. How much do you have to love someone to sacrifice your one chance at having that?”
He stopped, withdrew and behind his eyes Isabel saw defeat. “Obviously, more than she loved me.”
*~*~*~*~*
Maria’s head was pounding. In addition to the natural din of the Crashdown, across the table from her Liz was obsessive-compulsively sorting and stacking sugar packets, shoving them into the dispenser, dumping them and starting over again. And talking. Talking, talking, talking. Yeah, she got it – Max was coming home. That was good. The sheriff had done well in his espionage. Max could see his family and be with Liz. Yay for the home team. But jeez – couldn’t she please just shut the hell up…
“Don’t you think?”
Maria’s eyes jerked to her friend’s. Crap – she’d obviously just been asked a question and didn’t know the appropriate response. “Um, sure. Sounds good.”
Liz giggled. “I thought so too. I can’t wait until he gets here.”
“I know.”
Maria looked glumly into her coffee. Her despair was obviously lost on her best friend and that was okay – Liz deserved to be happy. At least someone was going to be happy.
“When is his flight again?” Maria asked, kicking herself for not being more supportive. On top of being a bad fiancé, she was also being a bad friend.
“I have to leave for the airport in an hour. God, I’m so stoked! My heart is pounding like 90 miles an hour!”
Maria gave her a small smile, took in her bright eyes and flushed cheeks. Secretly she wondered if Max and Liz would make it out of the airport terminal before they started mauling each other. She reached across the table and took Liz’s hand in hers, which started the woman into shutting up.
“I’m happy for you, Liz. I want you to be happy. I really do.”
Liz’s eyes softened. “Thank you, Maria.” Then she frowned slightly. “Are you okay?”
“Sure, fine,” Maria answered automatically.
Liz tipped her head, gave her friend a look that said it all – nice try, but I’m not buying it.
“I’ll be fine,” Maria assured, withdrawing her hand and sitting back in the booth. “Go, be happy. I’ll get myself straightened out.”
Before Liz could reply, a shadow fell over the table and both girls turned to find Isabel standing at the end of the booth. Her expression was serious and both Liz and Maria feared the worst.
“I need to talk to you,” Isabel said.
“Me?” Liz said.
“No, both of you. Is there somewhere we can go?”
Maria’s hand went to her necklace and she could practically feel the blood drain from her face. “Oh, God…” Someone was dead.
“There’s nothing wrong,” Isabel clarified, seeing the look on her face. “I just need to tell you something.”
“Oh, okay,” Liz said, starting to slide from the booth, the sugar packets forgotten. “Let’s go upstairs – my parents are out for the afternoon.”
Maria pushed out of the booth on shaking knees and followed her friends toward the back stairwell.
Isabel was amazed that Liz’s room hadn’t changed much since their high school days. Gone was the corkboard with all of the school activities pinned to it, and the curtains had changed, but it was essentially the same room. Even more astounding, the rooftop patio outside of her window hadn’t changed one iota.
“What is it?” Liz asked, cutting straight to the chase once they were alone.
Isabel leaned against the wall surrounding the roof and crossed her arms over her chest. Inside, she was more than a little pissed that she had to be the one to tell the story.
“Why don’t you two have a seat,” she suggested, nodding toward the lawn chairs. “And stop staring at me like you’re waiting for the other shoe to fall.”
Liz and Maria sat, though neither relaxed.
Isabel drew in a deep breath. She looked at Liz. “I know that Max isn’t going to tell you.” Then she looked at Maria. “And neither is Michael.” Then took in them both. “So I will. I think it’s only fair that you know what happened that day at the pod chamber.”
Liz and Maria exchanged a silent glance, eyes round.
Isabel folded her hands before her, looked at her fingers. “As you know, the three of us and Tess left for the pod chamber, intending to use the granilith to return home. Tess was pregnant with Max’s child, who couldn’t live here on earth.”
Liz looked away, the scar from that old and yet still knew.
“Max and I made a tape for our parents, explaining who we are and where we’d gone. We gave the tape to Sheriff Valenti, asking him to give it to them once he knew for sure that we weren’t here anymore. We thought they deserved an explanation of some kind.”
She drew in a breath and looked away for a moment, memories that she didn’t want to revisit coming back to her in a flood.
“So Max was preparing the granilith for departure. I was at peace with it, you know? I wanted to be with Max and Michael – they were my family. I was nervous, but I thought with the three of us together we’d be okay. I didn’t really care if Tess was there or not. Anyway, we were only a few minutes away from departing and Michael spoke up.”
Isabel’s dark eyes shifted to Maria, just to make sure she had her attention, a concern that was definitely unwarranted.
“He didn’t want to go,” Isabel said, offered Maria a smile tinged with regret. “He said he’d found his home. Here. I can only assume he meant with you.”
Maria swallowed hard and looked down at the floor. Supportive, Liz reached over and took her hand.
“I think Max was surprised at that, but he understood. He told him to stay if he wanted. And he told me I could stay if I wanted. I love Michael, I really do – but I wanted to be with Max so I agreed to go. But Michael staying was a problem.”
“A problem?” Liz said. “Why?”
Isabel took a couple of paces, shook her head. “Tess started panicking.”
“Panicking?” Maria said incredulously. It was hard to imagine that out of Tess.
Isabel nodded. “Just really over reacting. Saying that Michael had to go, that we all had to go together. It wasn’t right if just the three of us showed up. And the more that Max pressured her for a reason for being so upset, the more flustered she got. Until she made a comment about Michael not coming would break the deal.”
“Deal?” Maria said. “What deal?” She could tell by the look on Isabel’s face that she wasn’t going to like what she was about to hear.
“It seems that Nasedo made a deal with Khivar a long time ago, before any of us were even born. Tess was to return to Antar with the next heir to the throne – the baby – and deliver the rest of us to him.”
“Why?” Liz asked, her voice shrill.
Isabel shrugged, trying to make the news seem less awful. “I can only imagine so that we could be eliminated.”
“Eliminated?” Maria cried. “As in killed?!”
Isabel nodded. “I think so, yes.”
“Oh God,” Liz said, dropping her head to her hand.
“I’m sorry, Liz, but I think you need to hear this.”
“I do,” she agreed solemnly, without dropping her hand from her face. “Go on.”
Isabel looked at Maria before she continued – she seemed sort of stunned, but not freaking, so that was good.
“Once Tess spilled about the deal, Max grabbed her by the arm. She didn’t have time to block him and he immediately could tell that she wasn’t pregnant.”
“What?” Maria said.
Isabel shook her head. “She wasn’t.”
Liz dropped her hand. “Wouldn’t that break the deal as well?”
Isabel shrugged. “I don’t know what she was thinking. I guess you can fake that for a while – maybe she thought she could trap Max once they were on Antar, I don’t know for sure.”
“Stupid bitch,” Maria mumbled.
“The clock was ticking,” Isabel said. “Everything was set into motion and there was nothing we could do to stop it. With or without us, the granilith was set to launch. Time was running out, things were very tense and chaotic. Tess started yelling at Max, I think maybe trying to beat him into submissiveness to get him to go home. And then she threatened him.”
“How?” Liz asked warily.
A small tear glinted in the corner of Isabel’s eye. “She said she’d do to you what she’d done to Alex.”
Maria winced and Liz let out a gasp. Of course, by the time that Tess had threatened Liz’s life, Liz, Maria and Kyle had already figured out that Tess had murdered Alex. This much was not news to them, however the breadth of her treachery was a revelation.
“Then what happened?” Maria asked quietly.
“Max hit her,” Isabel said.
Maria looked sharply at Liz. “I thought you said he killed the bitch.”
Isabel held up a hand. “Let me finish. He hit her so hard that she fell into the side of the granilith.”
“And killed her,” Liz finished quietly.
Isabel nodded. “There’s no doubt – she dissolved into a pile of ash almost immediately. I don’t think he meant to do that, but we didn’t have time to really discuss it. We had problems of our own. Soon after Max killed Tess, the whole mountain started to shake. We tried to run for the exit, but rocks were falling down all around us. Michael took a blow to the head, dropped him on the spot.”
Maria’s eyes were round.
“We knew we were in some deep trouble,” Isabel said. “Max and I fell over Michael to protect him from other falling rocks and Max threw up his shield to protect all of us. It took all of his strength. It seemed like the mountain was never going to stop shaking, it lasted forever. And when it did stop, we knew we were trapped.”
Looking weary, Isabel dropped to a vacant lawn chair. “We were trapped,” she repeated softly, her gaze far off for a long moment. Eventually she continued. “I used the strength I had left to light some rocks so we could see. Max was able to let down the shield once we were sure that the rocks around us were stable. He used the last bit of his strength to heal Michael’s head wound. And then we started digging. We didn’t have any food or water and our powers were depleted. It took a long time to build up a little strength and it would be spent so fast that it took us forever to make any progress at all.”
“How long did it take?” Liz asked.
“Three days. It took us three days to dig ourselves out. And when we got out, we didn’t like what we saw.”
“Military,” Maria said as though she already knew.
Isabel nodded. “Them. FBI. Geologists. All around the mountain. It was just a mass of people. We had to wait for nightfall to come to sneak out of the desert. While we waited for dark, we discussed what to do. We knew that what we had done was very public and in no way had gone unnoticed. We knew that the people we loved would be in danger if we stayed. Our parents had the tape explaining that we were gone. So, it seemed best to us that we just stayed gone. We came up with new names, new appearances, and hit the road.”
“Why did you pretend to be married?” Maria asked.
For the first time, Isabel gave a genuine smile. “We figured it was less suspicious for a woman to be traveling with two guys if she was married to one of them. If someone happened to be in our home or walk in on us or something, I felt better to have to fake it with Michael than with Max.” She gave a little laugh. “I’m a good actress, but not that good. I’m not sure I could have pulled that off.”
A weary silence fell over the women, until Isabel pushed herself to her feet. “I wanted you to know,” she said. “Neither of them was going to tell you.” She looked at Liz. “Max wasn’t going to let you know that he’d killed Tess because she threatened you.” Then she looked at Maria. “And Michael wasn’t going to tell you that the reason all of this happened was because he wanted to stay here with you.”
Maria helped up a hand, palm up. “Why not? What’s the harm?”
Isabel gave another small laugh. “Isn’t that obvious? He’s afraid if he told you he loved you enough to give up his dream to stay with you, that you’d see that he still loves you.”
tbc
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Re: Roswell Fic: "Ten Years Later..."(CC ALL, Mature)pt 13 3/29
Part Fourteen
A breeze devoid of any coolness brushed across Maria’s cheek, a loose hair tickling the corner of her mouth. She took the errant lock around one finger and pushed it back behind her ear.
Before her lay ruins, nothing more than a pile of reddish brown desert rock. In her mind, she envisioned what used to be there – the double peaks over the pod chamber, which had never seemed otherworldly to her until she’d found out that there was definitely something otherworldly beneath them. Even though she didn’t want them to, the memories of that day so many years ago came flooding back to her and she closed her eyes against them.
“Maria, you have to drive faster!” Liz urged from the passenger seat.
“It won’t go any faster!” Maria cried from behind the wheel. “If I push it and it blows up, then where will we be? Stranded somewhere and really unable to help!”
She could feel the anxiety washing over her friend and it was doing nothing to quell the same tension inside of her. That, and Kyle was leaning between the seats, as though he could will them to move quicker.
“Just keep it steady,” he advised, the unexpected voice of reason. “We’re going to get there in time. Just calm down.”
Maria wanted to cry. She could feel the tears welling up behind her eyes, but she forced them back. Now was so not the time to get all hysterical – especially not if Liz was already losing it.
“How could I have not seen it?” Liz moaned, throwing her hand over her face. “My God, why am I so blind!”
“Liz, that’s not helping,” Kyle barked and Maria jumped. But Liz calmed down, so Maria had to forgive him.
“There,” Liz said, pointing at the mile marker. “Turn there.”
Maria did, barely pressing the brakes, and the Jetta skidded sideways, then righted itself as they drove into the desert. Beneath them, the road was uneven and strewn with rocks. The small red car bounced and tossed them mercilessly and once again Maria had a fear of it dying before they got anywhere near the pod chamber.
But soon the twin peaks of the pod chamber loomed before them and within minutes she was slamming on the brakes and the car slid hard to the left, stopping in a cloud of dust. Surprisingly, Kyle was the first out of the car, scaling the rocks like a billy goat. Maria cursed her shoes and ran behind him and Liz, trying to keep up on the unsteady terrain.
“Where is it?” Kyle yelled over his shoulder. “Where’s the door thingie?”
Liz surveyed the rock as she ran, then suddenly came to a halt. “Here!” she shouted and Kyle and Maria joined her at an innocent-looking wall of rock.
“Are you sure?” Kyle panted beside her. “How does it open?”
“I don’t know!” Liz cried, her small hands searching for an opening.
“You need to do the silver handprint thing,” Maria offered. “That’s what Max always does.”
Liz looked at her in a mixture of defeat and incredulity. “How am I supposed to do that? I’m not an alien!” Before Maria could answer, Liz turned and started to bang on the rock with her hands, yelling for any of them inside to hear her.
They’ll never hear that, Maria thought, taking a step backward. Her eyes drifted skyward, wondering from where the ship would launch. They can’t hear us. The tears that had been threatening behind her eyes spilled silently onto her cheeks.
She could still smell him on her clothes, still feel his hands on her body. In only moments, he would be gone, maybe forever. The granilith had been entombed in the rock for over fifty years – who knew if it was still space-worthy? And even if he survived the journey, what was to say that Tess wouldn’t have them all killed in the end?
How long until time was up?
Almost in answer to her question, the ground beneath their feet began to tremble and a sound akin to thunder filled the air. She put out a hand to steady herself, saw Kyle looking down at their feet.
“We’ve gotta move!” he yelled, grabbing both Maria and Liz by the arm.
“No!” Liz protested. “We can’t let them leave with her!”
“It’s too late!” Kyle said, giving her a forceful tug. “It’s too late, Liz. If we stay here, we’re going to die!”
That seemed to unglue her feet and soon the three of them were retracing their steps, retreating down the same path they’d just ascended. The shaking of the earth became more violent and once again Maria regretted her choice of footwear. As it became nearly impossible for them to retain their balance, Kyle pulled them behind a wall of rock, threw an arm around each of them and pulled them against his body protectively.
A loud cracking noise filled the air and Maria looked toward the top of the mountain. Only a few seconds later, the ship exploded from the rock and raced towards the heavens, a plume of white smoke in its wake. She knew he was gone and the realization dragged an animal cry from her throat as her eyes blurred with tears.
Liz fell eerily silent, no tears, a look of devastated acceptance on her face. It would be days before Maria felt that numb, and once she did, she would remain there for years.
*~*~*~*~*
Max tightened his seatbelt and looked out the window of the jetliner again. Beneath him, he saw sand and rock getting more and more distinct as the plane descended lower and lower, a sight he hadn’t seen in ten years.
Even though Liz had said the coast was clear, he still felt some trepidation inside. He’d spent so long running from this place, from the law, that he couldn’t help himself.
“I used to get nervous flying, too,” the middle-aged woman beside him said with a tinge of humor in her voice.
“I’m not nervous,” he chuckled unconvincingly.
She nodded in agreement, though Max knew she wasn’t buying it. “Taking off and landing, the worse two parts,” she continued as though he hadn’t spoken. “I mean, when a plane crashes, what was it usually doing? Taking off or landing.” She laughed lightly. “So, it’s only natural to be nervous. But you stand a better chance of being killed crossing a street than you do in a plane crash.”
“I’m not nervous.”
She tipped her head. “You’ve fidgeted with that seat belt all of the way from New York.”
Okay, so he was nervous – of being tried for murder or being tortured by an alien hunter, but not because of flying. Not that he could tell her that. “You’re right, I’m nervous.”
She smiled and let him be until the plane touched down in Albuquerque. “See?” she said. “Nothing to worry about.”
He grinned, hoped he looked relieved, because his anxiety had just ratcheted up a couple of degrees. Who was to say he wouldn’t step off that plane and into the waiting arms of the military? Or someone like Agent Pierce or someone from the Roswell Sheriff’s Department serving a warrant for murder?
He couldn’t stay on the plane forever, so he grabbed his carry on bag and headed down the jetway with the other passengers. He inhaled several times, tried to clear his head, thought of Liz instead. Soon he would be with her, and she’d be in his arms again. That brought a smile to his face and a spring to his step. Liz would always make everything right.
But when Max saw her, standing at the back of the crowd, he knew in that instant that something had happened. She wasn’t her bubbly self, rushing into his arms like he’d expected. Instead, she looked at him with a mixture of relief and devastation and he knew that someone – probably Isabel – had told her.
Max dropped his bag on the floor and took Liz into his arms. Upon doing so, she began to cry softly and he buried his face in her silky hair.
“You should have told me,” she said softly.
“I know,” he replied. “I just couldn’t.”
And there really wasn’t much more he could say to comfort her.
*~*~*~*~*
It was nearly dark when Maria returned home to the house she and Jesse shared. He was sitting at the kitchen table, checkbook and envelopes before him, writing out bills. She hesitated for a moment, and he put down the pen but didn’t turn to look at her.
“When are you leaving?” he asked quietly.
Maria swallowed hard, not wanting to have this conversation. She toyed with her fingers, then came to the table and took the seat adjacent to him. When he looked at her, she didn’t see the anger she’d witnessed a few nights before. She didn’t see hate or resignation. She didn’t see much at all. The councilor at work.
“I’m sorry, Jesse,” she said.
He met her eyes for a long moment, then sat back in his chair, eyes fixed on the table.
“Michael Guerin was my boyfriend,” she confessed slowly. “In high school. Our relationship…” Maria looked to the darkened world outside as if it held the words she needed. “Our relationship wasn’t good. At the end of my junior year, Michael left and I hadn’t seen him since then. Until he showed up a few days ago.”
“Why did he leave?”
She’d prepared for this question and was grateful that she had. “Family obligations.”
Jesse simply sighed.
“But even though we didn’t have a good relationship, I loved Michael. He was my first love.”
“And he still is.” The words were said without malice, but they still stopped Maria in her tracks. Jesse turned dark eyes to her. “Isn’t he?”
She swallowed hard. “I don’t know.”
“But you have doubts. About us. Am I right?”
She nodded her head slowly. “I’m sorry, Jesse. I never wanted to hurt you. I do love you.”
He snorted a little laugh and looked away from her.
Maria reached over and put her hand over his. He looked at her fingers, then into her eyes.
“Thank you for everything you’ve ever done for me. But now it’s my turn to do something for you. I won’t marry you under false pretenses. I won’t marry you while I feel conflicted. You deserve better than that, Jesse. You deserve better than me.”
For the first time, she saw a flash of hurt in his eyes and it was so unexpected that she hurt as well.
“When are you leaving?” he asked again, his voice cracking slightly.
Maria gripped his hand and let a tear fall down her cheek. “As soon as I find some place to stay.”
*~*~*~*~*
Isabel found Michael in the kitchen again, though this time he wasn’t washing dishes, rather dicing an onion for a dish for dinner. She crossed her arms over her chest and watched him from a distance.
“I told them,” she announced without fear.
He stopped chopping for a moment, then continued.
“About what happened that day. Max killing Tess, the rock to your rock head, the cave-in, all of it. I told them.”
She waited patiently for the wrath of Rath, but it never came, so she turned on her heel to leave. Before she could clear the door, however, she heard something that stopped her. She turned to him again, found him looking at her peripherally.
“Thank you,” he said, his words barely audible.
tbc
A breeze devoid of any coolness brushed across Maria’s cheek, a loose hair tickling the corner of her mouth. She took the errant lock around one finger and pushed it back behind her ear.
Before her lay ruins, nothing more than a pile of reddish brown desert rock. In her mind, she envisioned what used to be there – the double peaks over the pod chamber, which had never seemed otherworldly to her until she’d found out that there was definitely something otherworldly beneath them. Even though she didn’t want them to, the memories of that day so many years ago came flooding back to her and she closed her eyes against them.
“Maria, you have to drive faster!” Liz urged from the passenger seat.
“It won’t go any faster!” Maria cried from behind the wheel. “If I push it and it blows up, then where will we be? Stranded somewhere and really unable to help!”
She could feel the anxiety washing over her friend and it was doing nothing to quell the same tension inside of her. That, and Kyle was leaning between the seats, as though he could will them to move quicker.
“Just keep it steady,” he advised, the unexpected voice of reason. “We’re going to get there in time. Just calm down.”
Maria wanted to cry. She could feel the tears welling up behind her eyes, but she forced them back. Now was so not the time to get all hysterical – especially not if Liz was already losing it.
“How could I have not seen it?” Liz moaned, throwing her hand over her face. “My God, why am I so blind!”
“Liz, that’s not helping,” Kyle barked and Maria jumped. But Liz calmed down, so Maria had to forgive him.
“There,” Liz said, pointing at the mile marker. “Turn there.”
Maria did, barely pressing the brakes, and the Jetta skidded sideways, then righted itself as they drove into the desert. Beneath them, the road was uneven and strewn with rocks. The small red car bounced and tossed them mercilessly and once again Maria had a fear of it dying before they got anywhere near the pod chamber.
But soon the twin peaks of the pod chamber loomed before them and within minutes she was slamming on the brakes and the car slid hard to the left, stopping in a cloud of dust. Surprisingly, Kyle was the first out of the car, scaling the rocks like a billy goat. Maria cursed her shoes and ran behind him and Liz, trying to keep up on the unsteady terrain.
“Where is it?” Kyle yelled over his shoulder. “Where’s the door thingie?”
Liz surveyed the rock as she ran, then suddenly came to a halt. “Here!” she shouted and Kyle and Maria joined her at an innocent-looking wall of rock.
“Are you sure?” Kyle panted beside her. “How does it open?”
“I don’t know!” Liz cried, her small hands searching for an opening.
“You need to do the silver handprint thing,” Maria offered. “That’s what Max always does.”
Liz looked at her in a mixture of defeat and incredulity. “How am I supposed to do that? I’m not an alien!” Before Maria could answer, Liz turned and started to bang on the rock with her hands, yelling for any of them inside to hear her.
They’ll never hear that, Maria thought, taking a step backward. Her eyes drifted skyward, wondering from where the ship would launch. They can’t hear us. The tears that had been threatening behind her eyes spilled silently onto her cheeks.
She could still smell him on her clothes, still feel his hands on her body. In only moments, he would be gone, maybe forever. The granilith had been entombed in the rock for over fifty years – who knew if it was still space-worthy? And even if he survived the journey, what was to say that Tess wouldn’t have them all killed in the end?
How long until time was up?
Almost in answer to her question, the ground beneath their feet began to tremble and a sound akin to thunder filled the air. She put out a hand to steady herself, saw Kyle looking down at their feet.
“We’ve gotta move!” he yelled, grabbing both Maria and Liz by the arm.
“No!” Liz protested. “We can’t let them leave with her!”
“It’s too late!” Kyle said, giving her a forceful tug. “It’s too late, Liz. If we stay here, we’re going to die!”
That seemed to unglue her feet and soon the three of them were retracing their steps, retreating down the same path they’d just ascended. The shaking of the earth became more violent and once again Maria regretted her choice of footwear. As it became nearly impossible for them to retain their balance, Kyle pulled them behind a wall of rock, threw an arm around each of them and pulled them against his body protectively.
A loud cracking noise filled the air and Maria looked toward the top of the mountain. Only a few seconds later, the ship exploded from the rock and raced towards the heavens, a plume of white smoke in its wake. She knew he was gone and the realization dragged an animal cry from her throat as her eyes blurred with tears.
Liz fell eerily silent, no tears, a look of devastated acceptance on her face. It would be days before Maria felt that numb, and once she did, she would remain there for years.
*~*~*~*~*
Max tightened his seatbelt and looked out the window of the jetliner again. Beneath him, he saw sand and rock getting more and more distinct as the plane descended lower and lower, a sight he hadn’t seen in ten years.
Even though Liz had said the coast was clear, he still felt some trepidation inside. He’d spent so long running from this place, from the law, that he couldn’t help himself.
“I used to get nervous flying, too,” the middle-aged woman beside him said with a tinge of humor in her voice.
“I’m not nervous,” he chuckled unconvincingly.
She nodded in agreement, though Max knew she wasn’t buying it. “Taking off and landing, the worse two parts,” she continued as though he hadn’t spoken. “I mean, when a plane crashes, what was it usually doing? Taking off or landing.” She laughed lightly. “So, it’s only natural to be nervous. But you stand a better chance of being killed crossing a street than you do in a plane crash.”
“I’m not nervous.”
She tipped her head. “You’ve fidgeted with that seat belt all of the way from New York.”
Okay, so he was nervous – of being tried for murder or being tortured by an alien hunter, but not because of flying. Not that he could tell her that. “You’re right, I’m nervous.”
She smiled and let him be until the plane touched down in Albuquerque. “See?” she said. “Nothing to worry about.”
He grinned, hoped he looked relieved, because his anxiety had just ratcheted up a couple of degrees. Who was to say he wouldn’t step off that plane and into the waiting arms of the military? Or someone like Agent Pierce or someone from the Roswell Sheriff’s Department serving a warrant for murder?
He couldn’t stay on the plane forever, so he grabbed his carry on bag and headed down the jetway with the other passengers. He inhaled several times, tried to clear his head, thought of Liz instead. Soon he would be with her, and she’d be in his arms again. That brought a smile to his face and a spring to his step. Liz would always make everything right.
But when Max saw her, standing at the back of the crowd, he knew in that instant that something had happened. She wasn’t her bubbly self, rushing into his arms like he’d expected. Instead, she looked at him with a mixture of relief and devastation and he knew that someone – probably Isabel – had told her.
Max dropped his bag on the floor and took Liz into his arms. Upon doing so, she began to cry softly and he buried his face in her silky hair.
“You should have told me,” she said softly.
“I know,” he replied. “I just couldn’t.”
And there really wasn’t much more he could say to comfort her.
*~*~*~*~*
It was nearly dark when Maria returned home to the house she and Jesse shared. He was sitting at the kitchen table, checkbook and envelopes before him, writing out bills. She hesitated for a moment, and he put down the pen but didn’t turn to look at her.
“When are you leaving?” he asked quietly.
Maria swallowed hard, not wanting to have this conversation. She toyed with her fingers, then came to the table and took the seat adjacent to him. When he looked at her, she didn’t see the anger she’d witnessed a few nights before. She didn’t see hate or resignation. She didn’t see much at all. The councilor at work.
“I’m sorry, Jesse,” she said.
He met her eyes for a long moment, then sat back in his chair, eyes fixed on the table.
“Michael Guerin was my boyfriend,” she confessed slowly. “In high school. Our relationship…” Maria looked to the darkened world outside as if it held the words she needed. “Our relationship wasn’t good. At the end of my junior year, Michael left and I hadn’t seen him since then. Until he showed up a few days ago.”
“Why did he leave?”
She’d prepared for this question and was grateful that she had. “Family obligations.”
Jesse simply sighed.
“But even though we didn’t have a good relationship, I loved Michael. He was my first love.”
“And he still is.” The words were said without malice, but they still stopped Maria in her tracks. Jesse turned dark eyes to her. “Isn’t he?”
She swallowed hard. “I don’t know.”
“But you have doubts. About us. Am I right?”
She nodded her head slowly. “I’m sorry, Jesse. I never wanted to hurt you. I do love you.”
He snorted a little laugh and looked away from her.
Maria reached over and put her hand over his. He looked at her fingers, then into her eyes.
“Thank you for everything you’ve ever done for me. But now it’s my turn to do something for you. I won’t marry you under false pretenses. I won’t marry you while I feel conflicted. You deserve better than that, Jesse. You deserve better than me.”
For the first time, she saw a flash of hurt in his eyes and it was so unexpected that she hurt as well.
“When are you leaving?” he asked again, his voice cracking slightly.
Maria gripped his hand and let a tear fall down her cheek. “As soon as I find some place to stay.”
*~*~*~*~*
Isabel found Michael in the kitchen again, though this time he wasn’t washing dishes, rather dicing an onion for a dish for dinner. She crossed her arms over her chest and watched him from a distance.
“I told them,” she announced without fear.
He stopped chopping for a moment, then continued.
“About what happened that day. Max killing Tess, the rock to your rock head, the cave-in, all of it. I told them.”
She waited patiently for the wrath of Rath, but it never came, so she turned on her heel to leave. Before she could clear the door, however, she heard something that stopped her. She turned to him again, found him looking at her peripherally.
“Thank you,” he said, his words barely audible.
tbc
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Re: Roswell Fic: "Ten Years Later..."(CC ALL, Mature)pt 14 4/25
This is my 100th post. And I'm using it to bump you.
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midwestmax
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Re: Roswell Fic: "Ten Years Later..."(CC ALL, Mature)pt 14 4/25
Part Fifteen
Michael’s boot slipped on a loose rock and he quickly put out a hand to stop himself. A rush of adrenalin accompanied the flub and amped up the tension in his body. He hadn’t been here in many years, and the last time he had been, things hadn’t been so good. Another slip of the boot and he figured maybe he should have come in daylight.
In truth, he wasn’t sure why he was here at all. If anyone had asked him a year ago if he’d ever planned on revisiting the site of the cave in, he probably would have decked them. Why would he go back there, with all of the horrible memories that place held?
Almost as a reminder, the crown of his head ached, just for a second. Of course it was all psychosomatic – no injury ever escaped Max’s healing powers, even in minutia. But Michael still held the memory of the pain in his skull, the sudden impact and then nothing but blackness.
The blackness was what seemed to linger the most. Even after Max had healed the head wound, the three of them had been stuck in the dark for a seeming eternity. They could only use their powers sparingly to illuminate the rocks around them – they needed as much energy as possible to dig themselves out. The darkness had come from all sides, enveloping them – they had no way to determine how far under the mountain they were, how long it might take them to break the surface. In the back of his traumatized head, Michael had truly begun to believe that they might become permanent residents of the mountain.
It had been months before he could sleep with the lights out.
As he crested the next rise, he wondered again why he was here. Maybe he’d become a masochist. But then again, maybe he needed to put some demons to rest.
He’d no sooner had the thought when he realized that he wasn’t alone, that one of his demons had beaten him there. Though most demons didn’t tool around town in Swedish luxury cars.
There was a bright moon this evening, casting silvery shadows on the barren desert. Nearby a reptile skittered, sending pebbles trickling past Michael’s boot. But he remained riveted in place, just watching her perched on the hood of that auto, something that probably cost more than his last three year’s wages combined.
For a moment, his throat went dry. She was close, so close that within ten paces he could touch her if he dared. He recalled the soft feel of her skin under his hand, the sweet smell of her perfume, the way every muscle her in body had moved. He’d dreamed of this, being alone with her, in the desert where he felt he somehow belonged, the two of them finally equals.
Of course, not all dreams are what they seem when they come true.
“What are you doing here?” he croaked. At least he thought he croaked. The question came out unintentionally like an accusation, more like, “What are you doing here?”
Even in the dark, he could make out the sudden iciness in her eyes as she slowly turned toward him. Then she snorted and hopped down from the hood of the car. Before she could jerk open the driver’s door, however, he took her around the arm – and immediately felt a tingle in his bones.
“Wait,” he said. “Stop. I didn’t mean it to sound that way. I meant – do you come here often?”
Internally he groaned. Way to make it better, Michael.
“Forget it,” she said. “I’ll leave. It’s obvious the desert isn’t big enough for the two of us.”
As should have been expected, irritation immediately flared within him. “Why is that obvious? You just surprised me, I didn’t mean to bark at you and now you’re stomping off all half-cocked?”
And, also as should be expected, she placed her hands on her slim hips and took the bait. “I am not stomping off! Nor am I half-cocked!”
“You look like it to me!”
“If I were stomping off, why would I still be standing here?”
“That’s a good question – why are you?”
At that she stopped and internally Michael chalked one up for himself. She was nabbed – if she really wanted to go, if she really hadn’t wanted to be bothered with him, she’d be in the car and halfway down the mountain by now. He wasn’t blocking her path. Nothing was stopping her…except maybe herself.
“Now,” he said, lowering his voice and tone, “can we sit down and talk like two adults?”
One corner of her full lips quirked upward.
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” he sighed. “Me and you and adults in the same sentence. It could happen, right?”
Maria let out a small laugh and something immediately glowed in the center of Michael’s chest.
“That’s what I missed the most.”
Her smile fell and her expression turned wary. “What?”
“Your laugh.” He allowed himself a smile. “Even after years and years, I could still hear it as clear as could be. I like the way you laugh.”
She cleared her throat and looked away, and Michael thought maybe if the moon were brighter, he’d be able to see her blush.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s sit.”
“Okay,” she said tentatively, then resumed her perch on the Volvo.
Michael looked down at the shiny hood and thought it a crime to put their weight on it – but, what the heck? He climbed aboard and the car was no worse for it. The Swedish knew how to build things.
“So, back to my original question,” he said, folding his hands between his knees. “What made you come up here?”
She shrugged, her gaze drifting up to where the peaks of the mountain used to soar into the sky. “I don’t know, really.”
“And without it sounding like a pick-up line – do you come here a lot?”
Maria was silent for a moment. “Not anymore.”
He turned to face her, liked the way the moon shined on her fair skin, making her beauty seem unearthly. “But before?”
She looked down at her hands, picked at her fingernails. “For a few years, I came up here a lot. Looking for clues maybe. Maybe looking for you.”
Michael swallowed hard, a stab of guilt making itself known. “I’m sorry for all of that, Maria. We didn’t know what to do. The place was surrounded and – ”
“I know,” she interrupted quietly. “Isabel told us.”
Guilt turned to anxiety. “What else did she tell you?”
Maria’s eyes lifted to his and he recalled many nights, in the backseat of her Jetta, on a blanket in the desert, facing each other on the seat of his bike – when she’d smile at him and her eyes would dance in the moonlight and she’d take his face between her hands and kiss him…
“That you were hurt,” she finally said, her eyes drifting toward the crown of his head.
“I was,” he confirmed. “But don’t worry – nothing got knocked loose permanently.” The jest was half-hearted and fell entirely flat.
“That it took a long time for you guys to dig yourselves out.”
“It did.”
“And that…” She looked at her hands again, worked her fingers together and only then did he realize that the Yankee-Stadium-sized engagement ring was gone from her finger. “And that you were going to stay here, for me. You told me at the produce stand that that wasn’t true.”
She said the last as she looked directly into his eyes, a challenge to find any deception there.
“It was true.”
There was a long silence during which they simply stared at one another, neither breaking the other’s gaze. In the distance, a coyote howled, but neither of them even flinched.
“Where is your ring?” Michael asked, issuing a challenge of his own.
Maria didn’t look at her hand, didn’t look away. “I gave it back.”
Too good to be true. Michael couldn’t get this lucky. He could never win out over someone like Jesse Ramirez, someone who had money and cars and careers and perfect, perfect teeth.
“Wrong size?” he ventured.
“Wrong person.”
Michael went light-headed, but years of covering his actions hid that fact from his companion. “And what about Jesse?”
“I’m giving him back, too.”
He may have whimpered, but he hoped not. “I’m sorry,” he said, because he felt it was necessary.
Maria laughed. “Are you really?”
“Okay, no. Not in the slightest.”
She laughed again, a little louder this time and Michael laughed – as much as he ever laughed – with her.
“You’re not going to give the car back, are you?” he said, looking down at the glossy hood. “Because this ride is sweet!”
“Sorry. Car goes back too.” She pulled her knees up to her chin, rested her heels on the edge of the hood and wrapped her arms around her legs.
“What will you drive? Still have that Jetta?”
“Oh, good God no! Mom was talking on her cell phone and trying to negotiate a curve on a wet road and totaled that thing years ago. Don’t worry – she wasn’t hurt. I’m not sure she even hit anything. I think the car just gave up.”
Michael laughed again, then fell serious. “I’m sorry, Maria. For all of those things I said to you that day when you stopped at the fruit stand.”
She looked down, obviously still a little stung.
“I was angry, I lashed out. I guess I’m still not an adult yet, eh?”
She gave a little smile and bumped him with her shoulder. “Not entirely, but you’re on your way. Don’t worry, I’ll give the Jimmy Choo’s back, too. In truth, they hurt my feet.”
He smiled, then turned his gaze toward the rubble, tried to block out the memory of all of those military vehicles, the helicopters, the shouted voices. Instead, he thought about who was sitting beside him, about how he’d dreamed of sitting by her for so many years, how being here now was one of the most surreal moments of his life. He’d wasted enough time – he reached over and picked up her hand in his.
“Oh, Michael,” she sighed. “What are we going to do?”
And for once he knew the right answer. “Whatever we want.”
tbc
Michael’s boot slipped on a loose rock and he quickly put out a hand to stop himself. A rush of adrenalin accompanied the flub and amped up the tension in his body. He hadn’t been here in many years, and the last time he had been, things hadn’t been so good. Another slip of the boot and he figured maybe he should have come in daylight.
In truth, he wasn’t sure why he was here at all. If anyone had asked him a year ago if he’d ever planned on revisiting the site of the cave in, he probably would have decked them. Why would he go back there, with all of the horrible memories that place held?
Almost as a reminder, the crown of his head ached, just for a second. Of course it was all psychosomatic – no injury ever escaped Max’s healing powers, even in minutia. But Michael still held the memory of the pain in his skull, the sudden impact and then nothing but blackness.
The blackness was what seemed to linger the most. Even after Max had healed the head wound, the three of them had been stuck in the dark for a seeming eternity. They could only use their powers sparingly to illuminate the rocks around them – they needed as much energy as possible to dig themselves out. The darkness had come from all sides, enveloping them – they had no way to determine how far under the mountain they were, how long it might take them to break the surface. In the back of his traumatized head, Michael had truly begun to believe that they might become permanent residents of the mountain.
It had been months before he could sleep with the lights out.
As he crested the next rise, he wondered again why he was here. Maybe he’d become a masochist. But then again, maybe he needed to put some demons to rest.
He’d no sooner had the thought when he realized that he wasn’t alone, that one of his demons had beaten him there. Though most demons didn’t tool around town in Swedish luxury cars.
There was a bright moon this evening, casting silvery shadows on the barren desert. Nearby a reptile skittered, sending pebbles trickling past Michael’s boot. But he remained riveted in place, just watching her perched on the hood of that auto, something that probably cost more than his last three year’s wages combined.
For a moment, his throat went dry. She was close, so close that within ten paces he could touch her if he dared. He recalled the soft feel of her skin under his hand, the sweet smell of her perfume, the way every muscle her in body had moved. He’d dreamed of this, being alone with her, in the desert where he felt he somehow belonged, the two of them finally equals.
Of course, not all dreams are what they seem when they come true.
“What are you doing here?” he croaked. At least he thought he croaked. The question came out unintentionally like an accusation, more like, “What are you doing here?”
Even in the dark, he could make out the sudden iciness in her eyes as she slowly turned toward him. Then she snorted and hopped down from the hood of the car. Before she could jerk open the driver’s door, however, he took her around the arm – and immediately felt a tingle in his bones.
“Wait,” he said. “Stop. I didn’t mean it to sound that way. I meant – do you come here often?”
Internally he groaned. Way to make it better, Michael.
“Forget it,” she said. “I’ll leave. It’s obvious the desert isn’t big enough for the two of us.”
As should have been expected, irritation immediately flared within him. “Why is that obvious? You just surprised me, I didn’t mean to bark at you and now you’re stomping off all half-cocked?”
And, also as should be expected, she placed her hands on her slim hips and took the bait. “I am not stomping off! Nor am I half-cocked!”
“You look like it to me!”
“If I were stomping off, why would I still be standing here?”
“That’s a good question – why are you?”
At that she stopped and internally Michael chalked one up for himself. She was nabbed – if she really wanted to go, if she really hadn’t wanted to be bothered with him, she’d be in the car and halfway down the mountain by now. He wasn’t blocking her path. Nothing was stopping her…except maybe herself.
“Now,” he said, lowering his voice and tone, “can we sit down and talk like two adults?”
One corner of her full lips quirked upward.
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” he sighed. “Me and you and adults in the same sentence. It could happen, right?”
Maria let out a small laugh and something immediately glowed in the center of Michael’s chest.
“That’s what I missed the most.”
Her smile fell and her expression turned wary. “What?”
“Your laugh.” He allowed himself a smile. “Even after years and years, I could still hear it as clear as could be. I like the way you laugh.”
She cleared her throat and looked away, and Michael thought maybe if the moon were brighter, he’d be able to see her blush.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s sit.”
“Okay,” she said tentatively, then resumed her perch on the Volvo.
Michael looked down at the shiny hood and thought it a crime to put their weight on it – but, what the heck? He climbed aboard and the car was no worse for it. The Swedish knew how to build things.
“So, back to my original question,” he said, folding his hands between his knees. “What made you come up here?”
She shrugged, her gaze drifting up to where the peaks of the mountain used to soar into the sky. “I don’t know, really.”
“And without it sounding like a pick-up line – do you come here a lot?”
Maria was silent for a moment. “Not anymore.”
He turned to face her, liked the way the moon shined on her fair skin, making her beauty seem unearthly. “But before?”
She looked down at her hands, picked at her fingernails. “For a few years, I came up here a lot. Looking for clues maybe. Maybe looking for you.”
Michael swallowed hard, a stab of guilt making itself known. “I’m sorry for all of that, Maria. We didn’t know what to do. The place was surrounded and – ”
“I know,” she interrupted quietly. “Isabel told us.”
Guilt turned to anxiety. “What else did she tell you?”
Maria’s eyes lifted to his and he recalled many nights, in the backseat of her Jetta, on a blanket in the desert, facing each other on the seat of his bike – when she’d smile at him and her eyes would dance in the moonlight and she’d take his face between her hands and kiss him…
“That you were hurt,” she finally said, her eyes drifting toward the crown of his head.
“I was,” he confirmed. “But don’t worry – nothing got knocked loose permanently.” The jest was half-hearted and fell entirely flat.
“That it took a long time for you guys to dig yourselves out.”
“It did.”
“And that…” She looked at her hands again, worked her fingers together and only then did he realize that the Yankee-Stadium-sized engagement ring was gone from her finger. “And that you were going to stay here, for me. You told me at the produce stand that that wasn’t true.”
She said the last as she looked directly into his eyes, a challenge to find any deception there.
“It was true.”
There was a long silence during which they simply stared at one another, neither breaking the other’s gaze. In the distance, a coyote howled, but neither of them even flinched.
“Where is your ring?” Michael asked, issuing a challenge of his own.
Maria didn’t look at her hand, didn’t look away. “I gave it back.”
Too good to be true. Michael couldn’t get this lucky. He could never win out over someone like Jesse Ramirez, someone who had money and cars and careers and perfect, perfect teeth.
“Wrong size?” he ventured.
“Wrong person.”
Michael went light-headed, but years of covering his actions hid that fact from his companion. “And what about Jesse?”
“I’m giving him back, too.”
He may have whimpered, but he hoped not. “I’m sorry,” he said, because he felt it was necessary.
Maria laughed. “Are you really?”
“Okay, no. Not in the slightest.”
She laughed again, a little louder this time and Michael laughed – as much as he ever laughed – with her.
“You’re not going to give the car back, are you?” he said, looking down at the glossy hood. “Because this ride is sweet!”
“Sorry. Car goes back too.” She pulled her knees up to her chin, rested her heels on the edge of the hood and wrapped her arms around her legs.
“What will you drive? Still have that Jetta?”
“Oh, good God no! Mom was talking on her cell phone and trying to negotiate a curve on a wet road and totaled that thing years ago. Don’t worry – she wasn’t hurt. I’m not sure she even hit anything. I think the car just gave up.”
Michael laughed again, then fell serious. “I’m sorry, Maria. For all of those things I said to you that day when you stopped at the fruit stand.”
She looked down, obviously still a little stung.
“I was angry, I lashed out. I guess I’m still not an adult yet, eh?”
She gave a little smile and bumped him with her shoulder. “Not entirely, but you’re on your way. Don’t worry, I’ll give the Jimmy Choo’s back, too. In truth, they hurt my feet.”
He smiled, then turned his gaze toward the rubble, tried to block out the memory of all of those military vehicles, the helicopters, the shouted voices. Instead, he thought about who was sitting beside him, about how he’d dreamed of sitting by her for so many years, how being here now was one of the most surreal moments of his life. He’d wasted enough time – he reached over and picked up her hand in his.
“Oh, Michael,” she sighed. “What are we going to do?”
And for once he knew the right answer. “Whatever we want.”
tbc
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nibbles2
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Re: Roswell Fic: "Ten Years Later..."(CC ALL, Mature)pt 15 8/26
aw, that was perfect. Can't wait to see what they decide to do next.
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Ti88
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Re: Roswell Fic: "Ten Years Later..."(CC ALL, Mature)pt 15 8/26
i loved it. that was perfect. they found they way back to eack other. yep those two can do it. if they can anyone can.
Roselle
Egyptian Dwelling Silly Sister Techie Connection
If we don't change we don't grow. If we don't grow we aren't really living. - Gail Sheey
My spelling is wobbly. It's good spelling but it wobbles and the letters get in the worng places - Pooh
Egyptian Dwelling Silly Sister Techie Connection
If we don't change we don't grow. If we don't grow we aren't really living. - Gail Sheey
My spelling is wobbly. It's good spelling but it wobbles and the letters get in the worng places - Pooh
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nibbles2
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