Author: Danilise
Email: [email protected]
Disclaimer: Roswell, the characters, and the situations are
owned by the WB. No infringement is intended.
Author's Note: This story is part of an evolving storyline that
currently includes (in order): "Decisions,"
"Looking In," "Christmas Envy," "From
Another Place," "Husbands and Fathers,"
"Claudia and Nicole," and "Stars." More
stories may be forthcoming.
Decisions
November 15
I'm Liz Parker, and I grew up in a small town miles from anywhere
... a small town where rumors are an industry and innuendo a
pastime.
Since high school, I've been watching my back, keeping secrets.
Including the biggest secret of all -- that there is truth to
Roswell, New Mexico's most cherished rumor.
It's night as I write this ... "this" being my journal,
something I've kept religiously since high school, since the day
in the Crashdown Cafe when Max Evans healed a bullet wound two
inches below my ribs. It's night now, and it's been a long time
since high school.
Max isn't home yet, so I'm waiting. He's working late at the
hospital tonight. His best friend, Michael Guerin, and his
sister, Isabel, still think it's funny that Max should be
studying to be a doctor. Sometimes I see their point. Someone who
can heal fatal injuries with a touch of his hand using
stethoscopes and band-aids and plaster casts seems unlikely. But
Max loves medical school. He thinks it's the perfect cover. He
describes it as his way to be normal, to study a subject he finds
fascinating, and to help humans all at the same time.
A love of biology -- of science in general and the reality of how
things work in the world specifically -- is one of the interests
Max and I share. We also share a secret, Max's secret ... the one
he shares with Michael and Isabel ... the secret of who and what
they really are.
Max and I also share an apartment these days. After all we've
been through together, after everything that has happened,
considering who we are, it made sense for us to stick together
when we're both so far from home. Boston is a good place to be if
you're a student, which is what we both are. As I mentioned
earlier, Max is med student, interning at one of the hospitals
here. I'm pursuing my lifelong dream and am working towards my
doctorate in molecular biology. Max and I were the only two
people each other knew when we first arrived in Boston. It just
made sense for us to share an apartment in such an expensive city
so far from home.
You might be wondering what I, Liz Parker, am leaving out ...
whether I'm being deliberately coy, or doth-protesting too much.
Let me be honest then. Max and I may have started out a logical
roommates, platonic friends who knew and realized and respected
the dangers of being together. But we didn't stay that way.
How could we?
Max Evans hasn't changed that much since high school. He is still
quiet, still reserved, still cautious, still over-responsible.
When he lifts his soulful brown eyes to mine, how he feels about
me -- how he has always felt about me -- is obvious. And I
haven't changed that much since high school either. When I look
back at him, my eyes tell him that how I feel about him hasn't
changed, won't ever change. It was inevitable that we couldn't
remain platonic roommates.
So here I am, waiting for Max Evans to come home to me. We need
to talk.
Usually when Max comes home this late, it means that the
attending doctors were even harder than usual on the interns
and/or that some emergency required "all hands on
deck." Don't get me wrong. I don't begrudge the time Max
spends at the hospital; it's important to him, so it's important
to me. But I can't help resenting ... worrying about him when he
comes home so exhausted he can barely find the light switch in
the bathroom. Sometimes I worry that Max gets more tired trying
to be normal -- trying not to use his powers to help, trying to
deny who he is -- than just from being your average medical
student. Given how late it is right now, I know that when Max
finally does get home tonight, he'll be so tired that he'll just
crawl into bed beside me, kiss me quickly on the forehead, and
fall into an exhausted sleep.
But we really do need to talk.
I know Max feels safer here, thousands of miles away from
Roswell. I know Max well enough to know that's why -- one of the
reasons -- he feels we can be together. He thinks I'm safer here
too.
But something has happened that we didn't plan on, something that
will change how we look at the world completely. Something that
might make us feel less safe, even here.
Sometimes when I stop to reflect on everything that has happened
since the day of the shooting in the Crashdown, it occurs to me
that my life could be featured on the front pages of a
supermarket tabloid. What Max and I need to talk about would
definitely warrant a front-page headline, something like,
"I'm Having my Alien Boyfriend's Baby."
November 16
I'm Liz Parker, and I'm not sure where things stand right now.
I'm still trying to think through what happened last night, so
I'm going to try describing everything as a narrative to help me
think.
Max didn't come home until 2:00 am. He told me later that the
emergency room had been overflowing with the victims of a gas
leak in a high-rise building. At 2:00 am, I heard Max's key in
the lock, listened to his weary footsteps in the hall, knew when
he was in the bedroom because his tiredness caused him to stub
his toe on the foot of the bed. He slid under the covers, wrapped
his arms around me, kissed my forehead, then noticed I was awake
and told me that it was late and that I should go back to sleep.
Typical, over-protective Max.
I shook off my sleepiness and said, "Max. I know you're
tired, but we need to talk." Max sighed and cuddled me
closer. His eyes were closed. I could tell he was trying hard to
find the energy to listen, to be there for me. For one seductive
moment, I thought about giving in, about letting myself fall
asleep in the arms of the man I love, and letting that man get
some much needed sleep himself. I felt like a jerk, but I
couldn't forget what we needed to talk about. It was too
important. So I said, "Max, I'm so sorry. Please. This won't
take long. It's really important though."
Max reached over and clicked on the bedside lamp. I began
hesitantly, "Max, do you remember when I got sick a month
ago? I had trouble keeping food down." I noticed that Max
was lying very still with his eyes still closed, but he seemed to
be concentrating on what I was saying, so I continued. "Food
wasn't the only thing I couldn't keep down, Max." Max's eyes
snapped open, and he stared at me. I couldn't hold his gaze while
I told him the next part. "Max, I also threw up my birth
control pills. But I didn't realize it at the time. To tell you
the truth, I was never even sure that we really needed them.
Because -- you know -- we're so different."
Max was so still that I wasn't sure he was still awake. I looked
up to find him still staring at me, his eyes panicked.
When I saw his expression, I tried to reassure him: "Max.
I'm really sorry to tell you this this way. I know it's not
something that we ever talked about. I know it's not the best
time for us. I know there are so many reasons why this is scary
and weird. But I can't help feeling happy. Max. I love you. I'm
pregnant. We're going to have a baby."
I felt a shudder run along Max's frame. Then he tightened his
arms around me. When he finally spoke, there was a catch in his
voice. "Liz. You know I love you too. But this isn't
good..."
I shushed him. "Don't say that yet. Let's not think about
this tonight. You're exhausted. I shouldn't have told you ... it
was just that I found out today why I'd been feeling ill. We
should just sleep. We can talk tomorrow."
But neither of us slept. We were dry-eyed and gritty with
exhaustion by the time the sun crept over the horizon and slipped
under the blind on our bedroom window.
November 17
I wish I could tell you that things got easier, that a way to
make things work out for the best magically appeared to us.
Max and I talked about what we should do, about every option
available to us. We talked about what scared us the most. We
talked about what excited us. What we decided was probably not
surprising given who we are. We decided to keep our baby.
November 25 -- Thanksgiving
I'm Liz Parker, and I'm feeling better about things these days
... apart from the misnamed morning sickness that strikes me
every afternoon at 4:00 pm. It's been a while since I've written,
so I should tell you what happened after Max and I decided to
keep our baby.
We decided that we needed to tell the people who care about us,
the people we care about most in the world.
Max told his sister Isabel first. They're twins and very close.
Izzy didn't take the news well. She demanded to know whether Max
was completely insane, then slammed the phone down in fury
without waiting for his answer.
I told my best friend, Maria DeLuca, next. She was in one of her
down moods, her on-again/off-again relationship with Michael
Guerin being stuck in the "off" position of late. When
she heard my news, Maria burst into tears and hung up on me. But
I know she'll call back. I know her. We've been best friends
forever.
That left Michael. Max's best friend is your classic
brooding-loner personality type. He distrusts almost everyone.
Except Max and Isabel -- for obvious reasons. Except me --
because he once read my journal in high school and decided based
on its contents that I was harmless aside from my major-league
crush on his best friend. And, of course, except Maria -- for
those on-again/off-again reasons I mentioned earlier. If I think
about it, I guess that Michael doesn't trust anyone as much as he
trusts Max. In a lot of ways, even though they're the same age, I
think Michael sees Max as an older brother, someone who always
looks out for him, someone who is always there to bail him out of
scrapes.
It became pretty clear that Michael's reaction to our news wasn't
much better than Isabel's. As far as Michael was concerned, this
time Max was in a scrape in dire need of being bailed out.
The next thing we knew, Michael was in Boston, berating Max for
being so careless, arguing that this "situation" would
destroy the normal life we were pretending to have, deriding Max
and me for being foolish enough to think that our being in love
was enough to get us through the uncertainty of what was going to
happen next.
Then, the one thing that Michael didn't expect to happen, that
I'd never dared hope would happen, did happen. Gentle,
even-tempered Max Evans lost his temper. He told Michael in no
uncertain terms to mind his own business.
Then, he turned to me and asked me to marry him.
I didn't even answer. I didn't need to. He knew my answer.
It occurred to me in that shimmering moment that Max Evans knows
the contents of my soul better than I do. As I know the contents
of his. He is my soul-mate, my heart, my desire, my husband.
We are different, but we are the same. Two halves of one whole,
who miraculously found each other on this planet.
December 20
It's been a long time since I've written, and a lot has happened.
It's December 20, and I'm Liz Evans. I still feel a shiver
running down my back when I write my new name. Max and I were
married last weekend in our hometown of Roswell, New Mexico. Our
parents were there. Maria was my maid-of-honor. Michael was Max's
best man.
Isabel, Michael, and Maria are in reserving-judgment mode. Our
parents are unsurprised and maybe a little relieved. Max and I
are deliriously happy.
It's as if there was nothing between us in any way any more. No
shadows. No differences. No reservations. We share one soul. And
we are excited about our future together.
We know that nothing is certain, that things can go wrong. For
all our being aspiring biologists, neither of us knows how this
pregnancy will affect my human body. Neither of us knows whether
I'll give birth to a baby or a pod. It's confusing and scary. But
we're optimistic. And very, very excited about our baby.
June 21
Claudia Isabel Evans was born this morning at 4:17 am. She has
her father's velvety brown eyes. She has my straight dark hair,
considering what little hair she has. She has her father's ears,
which I think are adorable but which she may find hard to live
with when she turns fourteen.
I nearly forgot to mention ... Claudia also has her father's --
and her aunt's and her honorary uncle's -- hands, and a
precocious tendency to leave silver handprints behind.
The End