Author: Danilise
Email: [email protected]
Disclaimer: Roswell, its characters and situations, are owned
by the WB. No infringement intended.
Author's Note: This story is the part of an evolving future
storyline that currently includes (in order):
"Decisions," "Looking In," "Christmas
Envy," "From Another Place," "Husbands and
Fathers," "Claudia and Nicole," "Stars,"
"Going Home," "The Ethics Lesson,"
"Redefining Terms," "Beginnings," "First
Date," "A Quality Heart," "In Every
Ending," "Birth," and "Joshua and the
Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day." More stories may
be forthcoming.
Beginnings
He was going to do it. Finally. He was going to talk to her.
He told himself that everyday, but today was different. He was
really going to do it.
She was pretty quiet. Not in a stuck-up way. Just quiet. She didn’t
hang out with the popular crowd or with the chess-playing crowd.
She kind of kept to herself.
That’s why he thought he could approach her, even though he
was the new kid in school.
She smiled at him when he fell into step beside her in the
hallway between classes, and his chest felt tight all of a
sudden, the way it always did whenever he saw her slow, gorgeous
smile. It felt like his heart seized up then started beating
again really fast.
He told himself to calm down and smiled back. "So," he
began hesitantly, searching for the right words, the ones that
would keep her at his side a little longer. "So," he
started again then finished in a rush: "You’re, um,
really good at biology."
She looked at him oddly.
What a witty opening, he congratulated himself
sarcastically. Could I be more lame?
"Thanks," she said slowly, clearly trying to figure out
where he was coming from. "It’s my favorite
subject." She shot him another curious look from under her
lashes.
Okay, he thought to himself, we’re having a
conversation. She answered me. Okay, okay. Calm down. Don’t
blow it.
He took a deep breath and picked up the conversational token.
"I kind of noticed that you seemed ahead of the rest of the
class."
She shrugged and said wryly, "My parents have this thing for
biology." As she looked down at the books she was carrying
tightly in front of her, her long dark hair swung forward to
conceal her expression, and he tried not to think about how soft
her hair looked as he watched her shrug again. "I guess my
parents have a thing for education in general," she
continued. "They never let me goof off."
Suddenly she looked uncomfortable, as if she’d just realized
that she’d said more than three words in succession. She
glanced at him, and he felt bereft. It was the only word to
describe how he felt when he saw her eyes. It was as if a shutter
had dropped over them.
She cleared her throat. "Excuse me," she said politely
in a low voice. "I have to go. To, um, get to my next class.
I’ll see you around."
And he was left staring after her as she melted into the throng
of students rushing to get to their classes before the second
bell rang.
The next day, he slid into the seat beside her in the
sophomore biology laboratory, determined to start a real
conversation. He looked over at her, hoping for a natural
opening.
As always, he was struck by how self-contained she looked. So
reserved and untouchable and utterly beautiful. He watched her
tuck her hair behind her ears, and he thought again that her ears
were cute. They stuck out a little. And her little nervous habit
of re-tucking her hair behind her
ears was cute, too.
Actually, he thought everything about her was cute.
He had seen her around town, of course, even though he and his
mom had just moved to Roswell. He’d seen her mostly with a
man and a woman, who he’d assumed were her parents since she
resembled them so much. He’d also seen her with a younger
blonde girl, who he’d found out was her cousin.
Whenever he’d seen her, he’d felt that funny tightening
in his chest, that pull to talk to her. He wanted to understand
the facets that made up her. He saw glimpses of those multiple
facets all the time. The way she laughed and acted silly with her
cousin. The way she seemed to have serious conversations with her
parents. The way she was so focused in class. The loneliness he
thought he caught in her eyes sometimes. Her glorious smile.
While he was musing, the class flew by. The high point of the
hour for him was their teacher’s explaining that lab
partners for the year would be assigned by rows. The gods had
taken pity on him and made her his lab partner. He could barely
control his elation.
Finally the first bell rang, and class was over. He caught up
with her as the students filed out of the lab, and touched her
arm to get her attention. She jumped.
"So, I was wondering," he said quickly, not wanting to
lose the momentum his elation had given him. "I was
wondering if you wouldn’t mind helping me out with my
biology stuff sometime. I mean, since we’re now lab
partners. And since you’re so far ahead of the rest of the
class."
He could tell he’d surprised her again. For a second, the
way she looked at him reminded him of nothing so much as the old
cliché of a deer snared in oncoming headlights.
Then she nodded. "Sure. Why don’t we meet after school
at my grandparents’ restaurant? You know, the Crashdown Café?"
He thought he knew so much about her, but he hadn’t made the
connection. He admitted as much: "I didn’t realize you
were related to the Parkers."
She gave him a serious look. "Yeah. They’re my
grandparents." She glanced around at the faces of passing
students. "My parents grew up in Roswell. In fact, they went
to West Roswell High." She paused. "All of our family’s
here. Um. I guess I’ll see you later. I should get to
class." And
then she was gone again.
When he arrived at the Crashdown after school, he saw that she
was already there, standing at the counter, talking with Mr.
Parker. Watching them together, he could tell that her
grandfather doted on her. He realized that her grandfather must
have seen him come in, because after he said
something to her, she turned towards the door and waved.
His feet seemed glued to the floor. All he could think about was
how lovely she was. Her dark eyes were so beautiful they seemed
unearthly. Walk, he told himself. Just walk.
She introduced him to her grandfather. "Grandpa, this is the
boy I’m going to be studying with today. Thomas
Lindsey." She flashed him one of her gorgeous smiles, and he
felt his knees go weak. "Tom, this is my grandfather, Jeff
Parker."
"Nice to meet you, Tom," her grandfather said. Tom
ducked his head to hide the besotted expression he knew was on
his face. He wasn’t fast enough because her grandfather
grinned at him knowingly right before he said, "Why don’t
you two take the last booth? It’s out of the way and a
little quieter if you’re going to study."
She nodded and led the way to the booth her grandfather had
suggested. He followed tamely, wondering when he’d
completely lost his backbone.
Once they were seated in the booth, she flipped open her biology
textbook to the most recent chapter covered in class. "So.
Where were you having problems?"
He cleared his throat and tried to focus. "Uh, the last
chapter."
They studied for a while, until he noticed that she was rubbing
the back of her neck tiredly. When he saw her tiny movement, he
suggested they take a break. Okay, this is it, Lindsey,
he coached himself. Start a real conversation.
"So you said your parents are into biology." Good,
good, he applauded himself. Parents were probably a good
topic with her. She seemed to like her parents. Which was pretty
unusual for a fifteen-year old, but he had seen them together,
so....
She nodded with shy pride. "Yeah. My dad’s a
pediatrician, and my mom’s a molecular biologist. My dad
started a practice here in town when we moved to Roswell two
years ago. And my mom’s writing a book." She looked
down at her textbook. "My mom’s book is sort of why we
moved here, actually."
"What’s it about?" he asked. Hey, he
thought in amazement, this isn’t so bad. We’re
actually talking. Going back and forth and everything.
She nodded again with that same shy pride as she warmed to her
subject. "It’s really cool. Mom has this hypothesis
that the biological proof for the existence of life on other
planets is encoded in the molecular makeup of our cells."
Suddenly her cheeks flushed, and she looked embarrassed and some
other emotion that crossed her face too fleetingly for him to
identify. He guessed that she was thinking that he was probably
just being polite and wasn’t really interested in her mother’s
book. He tried to look encouraging and fascinated at the same
time. "Mom and Dad talk about
it at dinner sometimes," she mumbled, again looking down at
her textbook.
He tried to get her talking again. "So you and your parents
moved back to Roswell two years ago for your mom’s
book?"
She glanced back up. "And because we’re from here
originally," she reminded him. "All our family’s
here."
"Right, right. Sorry. I forgot you told me that." He
felt stupid that he’d forgotten so he covered quickly,
"I think I knew that about your family, too. I think I’ve
seen you around town with your cousin. A tall blonde girl,
younger than us."
"Nicole. We’ve been best friends forever, more than
cousins."
He shifted awkwardly in the ensuing silence. "So. Where did
you move here from?"
"Boston."
"Boston," he repeated, searching his mind for something
intelligent to say about Boston. "So, if you’re family’s
from Roswell originally, what were you doing in Boston?"
She shot him another of those odd looks that he interpreted as a
warning not to invade her privacy too much. "Both my mom and
my dad went to Harvard, my mom for graduate school and my dad for
medical school. I was born while they were still students, and
they stayed in Boston when I was little. Until we moved to
Roswell, my mom taught at Wellesley College, and my dad was a
staff doctor at Children’s Hospital."
Impressed, he leaned forward. "So your parents went to
Harvard."
She smiled. It was clear to him that she was really proud of her
parents. "Actually, they did their undergraduate work at
Stanford. Then they went to Harvard."
"That’s really something," he said in awe. He was
eager to keep her talking, so he asked, "So, do you miss
anything about Boston?"
She laughed then, and he was startled by how sweetly musical her
laugh was. He wished he could hear her laugh all the time.
"Well, I don’t miss the cold," she said.
"Though I do miss making snow angels. But what I miss most
is the Atlantic Ocean. My dad and mom and I used to go to a beach
on the North Shore and stand on the rocks at low tide, watching
the waves roll in, just listening to the ocean. It was our
weekend ritual during the spring and summer."
He was about to ask her more about Boston, hoping to hit on
something that would make her laugh again, when he realized that
he’d lost her. She was looking past him to the door of the
Crashdown.
He followed her gaze and recognized the two people who had just
walked in as her parents. He had never seen them up-close before.
She looked like a combination of both of them, with her mother’s
frame, features, and hair, and her father’s eyes and ears.
He watched her mother wave and point to the back door of the
restaurant, indicating where they were going.
She nodded to her mother in understanding then returned her
attention to him. "Sorry about that. Those were my parents.
They said they were going to be in town later this afternoon to
see my grandparents." She shrugged apologetically. "I
should probably go home with them."
"Yeah, right," he agreed quickly. He stared down at the
textbooks and notes spread out on the table between them, trying
to think of something to say, something that would create a
connection between them beyond this afternoon of studying.
"So. You know, seeing your parents reminded me of something
I was thinking about. That we actually have something in
common," he said finally.
She favored him again with the little look that told him she
thought he was pretty odd. "Yeah, Tom. We’re in the
same grade in high school, and we take biology together."
"No. I mean, I just moved to Roswell."
She nodded, obviously not seeing the connection between his
statement of the obvious and her own situation.
He tried to explain. "My parents lived up north, in Canada,
when I was born. That’s why I have a bit of an accent,
though Americans tend not to hear it. Anyway, my dad’s a
pilot there still. When my parents split up, I moved here with my
mom. She has a weird sense of humor, and she likes tourist-trap
museums."
"My parents aren’t split up," she said, sounding
confused. "In fact, they’re so together, it’s not
even funny sometimes."
He shook his head. "No. I mean that my mother grew up here
originally herself. Like you said your parents did. What we have
in common is that we’re both transplants, born in another
place and brought back to Roswell to be where our parents are
from."
She laughed as she began to pile her books into her book bag.
"Actually, my dad’s family’s not from around here
originally, even though he grew up here. Where he’s from is
pretty different from Roswell, New Mexico. But I do understand
what you’re saying, I think. We do have something in common
beyond biology. We’re both caught between two, um,
cultures." She tilted her head at him and laughed again.
"Up north, huh?"
He wasn’t sure he understood what she was getting at, but he
nodded anyway. "Well, that’s a beginning, isn’t
it?"
She smiled at him again. "Yeah, that’s a
beginning." She slid out of the booth. "I’ve got
to get going. My parents are probably waiting." She slung
her book bag over her shoulder and made her way to the back of
the restaurant. Just before she disappeared through the swinging
door, she turned back and said, "It was nice studying with
you, Tom. Maybe we could do it again sometime. I mean, if you
would find it helpful."
Then she smiled a last time and left. He sat there, staring after
her, his jaw hanging open.
A couple of minutes later, her grandfather wandered over to pick
up the leftovers of the snack they had eaten while studying. He
smiled at Tom. "Claudia is something, isn’t she?"
Tom snapped his mouth shut and nodded dumbly. Claudia Evans was
definitely something.