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.
Going Home
Max Evans walked into his kitchen, rubbing a tired hand around
the back of his neck, longing for coffee.
He found his daughter Claudia and his niece Nicole already
sitting at the table, eating a late breakfast. Every available
surface in the kitchen was covered with open boxes of cereal and
cartons of milk and plates of fruit and half-filled mugs of
coffee and half-empty glasses of orange juice.
Shaking his head at the mess in the usually neat and orderly
kitchen, Max cleared off a chair and sat down. He looked from one
girl to the other then asked, "So, where is everyone?"
Claudia frowned at him. "Dad, you don’t look so
good."
Max sighed, rubbing his forehead wearily. "Thanks,
sweetie." He tried his question again. "So, where are
your mom and your uncle and aunt?"
"Mom said that you came home late from the hospital last
night and needed to sleep more. The twins and Molly wanted to go
to the big toy store downtown -- you know, the one where the
song, "welcome to our world, welcome to our world, welcome
to our world of toys," plays over and over again -- so Mom
said she’d take them. And Aunt Maria wanted to spend time
with Mom, but Uncle Michael didn’t know whether he should
stay with us or go with them, so Aunt Maria said that we were big
girls, and that he should go with them because the twins are a
handful all by themselves let alone with Molly, and Nicole and I
could stay by ourselves quietly until you woke up. So Uncle
Michael went with them, but he complained to the twins about
having to listen to yakking girls before they left, and they’re
all downtown now, probably at FAO Schwartz."
Smiling, Max watched Claudia push her dark hair behind her ears
and take a deep breath after her long speech. He could visualize
the scene she had just described with little difficulty. It
sounded just like everybody. He was glad his oversleeping had
allowed him to miss the early-morning chaos.
Rubbing his forehead again, he got up to pour himself a cup of
coffee. He leaned against the kitchen counter, sipping the coffee
slowly in the hope that it would filter into his bloodstream
faster, while he watched the girls flick Cheerios at each other
off the ends of their spoons. After a couple of minutes, Max
decided that he needed to interrupt their game before the kitchen
became irretrievably indistinguishable from a garbage heap.
"I guess that means that it’s just us today?"
Nicole nodded violently and jumped up from her chair, her hands
waving in excitement as she assured him: "But we’re
going to stay out of your way, Uncle Max. Like Auntie Liz and Mom
and Dad told us to. So don’t worry. Claudi and I have a plan
for how we’re going to stay out of your way. We’re
gonna--"
Suddenly, one of Nicole’s waving hands caught one of the
cartons of milk. The carton tipped over as if in slow motion, and
milk spilled everywhere.
"Oops," said Nicole in a small voice, staring in dismay
at the spreading puddle.
"Oops," Max agreed dryly.
Claudia giggled.
"Don’t worry!" Nicole cried. "I can fix it!
This happens all the time at home. Don’t worry." And
she waved a glowing hand over the mess, and it was gone.
Max spat out his coffee. "Nikki," he began, stumbling a
little over his words. "You know?"
Nicole shrugged in typical Guerin fashion, looking exactly like
her father for a second, minus the spiky hair. "I’ve
always known. Mom and Dad don’t really talk about it, but I’ve
always been able to do stuff." She looked sheepish.
"Well, mostly I break stuff, but I’m getting
better."
Max glanced at Claudia questioningly. She gave him one of her
slow, sweet smiles then got up from her chair and came over to
stand beside him. She patted his arm sympathetically. "You
know I know, Dad."
Max returned her look thoughtfully. "Yeah, I know. I just
didn’t think."
Claudia and Nicole exchanged a puzzled look while Max just stood
there, leaning against the counter and looking thoughtful, his
longed-for cup of coffee forgotten.
Liz Evans, Maria and Michael Guerin, and the rest of the
Guerin children -- the twins, Stephen and Leo, and the baby Molly
-- came home late that afternoon. They found Max sitting in the
living room with his legs stretched out in front of him and his
feet up on the coffee table. He was staring unseeingly over his
steepled fingers at an Italian league soccer game on the
television.
"Hey." Liz sat down beside him and placed a hand on his
knee. "What’s wrong? Did the girls drive you
insane?"
Max’s eyes were pensive when they met Liz’s.
"No," he said seriously. "I think they spent most
of the afternoon playing with their hair and listening to ‘Sergeant
Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.’"
Michael grimaced at the word "hair" and slumped down on
the sofa on Max’s other side. Glancing at the TV, he heaved
a sigh of relief. "Thank God you’re watching sports,
even if it is in a different language. I’ve got to get away
from women for a while, Maxwell. Today was too much. Liz and
Maria actually made me go shopping after the toy store. The
yakking, the shopping...." Michael’s voice sounded
peculiarly Kurtz-like as he described the horror of his day.
Dropping his head against the back of the sofa, he continued,
"I am not doing that again. I don’t have that much of a
feminine side."
Max laughed. "Good thing you weren’t here this
afternoon then. The girls--"
And at that moment, the subjects of their discussion waltzed into
the living room in their usual boisterous high spirits, singing a
loud, off-key medley of "Lovely Rita" and "Lucy in
the Sky with Diamonds," mixing up the words with at least
four other Beatles songs, so that it sounded like Lovely Lucy the
Meter Maid was singing "love, love me do" in the sky
because she was leaving home after so many years, and a nowhere
man was sitting in one of the newspaper taxis that were waiting
on the shore, wondering if he shouldn’t be driving his car
instead. The two girls danced around together, singing the parts
they remembered and humming the parts they forgot and making up
the bits in between, until Claudia grabbed Stephen, and Nicole
grabbed Leo, and then they waltzed around the living room in
separate coupledom with the hapless twins.
"Hey, Dad, Mama," Nicole sang, weaving her greeting
into the crazy medley as she twirled her little brother around
the room.
"Yeah. Hi, Mom," Claudia added, laughing as she dipped
Stephen backwards.
"Help!" Stephen squeaked, and Leo just looked
miserable.
And the four adults tried not to laugh at the twins’ plight.
Then Maria swung little Molly around and began to sing too. And
Liz pulled Max off the sofa and into the song-and-dance routine,
although in their case, it was mostly an excuse to be close to
each other after a day apart.
And Michael just shook his head, muttering under his breath
about yakking and singing and dancing, and wondered out loud why
every time they got to Boston, everyone got all weird.
And wrapped up in Liz’s arms, Max forgot about what had been
worrying him all afternoon.
But that night, when he and Liz were curled up together in
bed, Max remembered. He kissed the back of Liz’s ear and
tried to decide how to bring up the subject. The afternoon of
dancing and silliness had truly gotten his mind of his worry, but
alone in their bedroom, it came back with a vengeance. He said
quietly, "What would you say if I said that I thought it
might be a good idea to go home?"
Liz rolled over to face him. "Go home, Max? We are
home."
Max shook his head. "No. I mean, home home. Roswell."
"Roswell?" Her voice sounded carefully expressionless.
"You sound like you don’t like the idea."
Liz sat up. "I’m not sure I do." She wrapped her
arms around her knees and looked at him solemnly. "If we go
home, will I lose this Max? The one who is relaxed and playful?
Will this Max be replaced by the Max who is always looking behind
him, always worrying about everyone else, always carrying the
weight of the world on his shoulders?"
Max sighed and tugged her back down into his arms. "I don’t
know," he said honestly. "But I’m worried about
all the kids, Liz. I saw Nicole use her powers today. And it
really hit me that all of the kids are growing up with these
abilities ... and it’s not like Michael is into enforcing
rules or anything. Not that he needs to. I mean, I know it’s
just not who he is. But then I was thinking that on top of having
powers, maybe the kids are susceptible to different
illnesses." He paused, trying to think of the words that
would make Liz understand. "Do you remember when Claudia got
sick?"
Liz nodded, finally grasping what was bothering him. Stroking his
hair off his forehead, she asked, "So, do you need an answer
now?"
"No. Let’s think about it for a while." He laughed
softly. "We wouldn’t be us if we didn’t."
Laughing back, Liz tightened her arms around him. "Yeah, let’s
think about it. We’ve got time."
"We’ve got time," Max agreed. "Although we
probably shouldn’t wait until Nicole gets too much farther
into puberty."
Liz laughed again. "You know, Max, it’s a good thing
that I get your sense of humor. Hardly anyone else does."
"What humor? I was being serious."
"Oh, were you?" Liz tickled him partly to undermine his
pretend indignation, but mostly so she could hear him laugh
again.
And Max looked sheepish when he eventually did laugh.
"Mostly serious," he admitted. "I mean, if Nicole’s
anything like Iz, let alone Michael and Maria...." He
laughed again. Then he looked down at Liz, and his eyes darkened.
"Okay, you," he said as he rolled her under him.
"We’ve talked enough for tonight. We have better things
we could be doing right now." And the only sounds coming
from their bedroom for a long time after that were soft rustlings
and the occasional giggle.