Salvation
By Diana ( [email protected]
)
Rating: R
Disclaimer: I don’t own any of the characters. No infringement intended.
Summary: Michael falls apart after years of searching for ‘home.’
Category: Michael/Maria
Author's Notes: This takes place as if destiny thing had never happened but Tess
showed up anyway. Feedback is always appreciated... Thanks to everyone who's
sent me feedback on my other stories :-D
He saved me. Not the way Max saved Liz. I wasn’t bleeding. I wasn’t dying. He
didn’t save me from two drunks who can’t shoot straight. But he saved me from a
life of wondering if there really was something better than Roswell, New Mexico
out there for me. I found the something better in him. So I stood by him. I
refused to let him go. And when I had to, I repaid my debt. He saved me, I saved
him.
They never found anything. They searched for years. They looked for something,
anything that would get them closer to home. They never found anything. And one
by one, they all gave up. First Max, then Isabel, then Tess. I think Max was the
happiest. He hardly mentions ‘home’ anymore. He married Liz five years ago. They
have two-year old twins, Maria Isabella and Michael Alexander, and a little
white house with a little white picket fence. I don’t think Max needs anything
else to be happy. Isabel was sad for a while. But Alex was always there for her.
I guess he finally wore her down. They were married three years ago. Liz, Tess,
and I were bridesmaids. Alex cried during the vows. I’ve never seen him so
happy. Tess left about a week after Isabel’s wedding. I think she just gave up.
Max was happy with someone else. Isabel had a family of her own. And Michael…
well he never really paid much attention to her anyway. Kyle found a note by
their bed the morning she left. All it said was “goodbye.”
One by one, they all gave up. The only one who tried to hold on to anything was
Michael. My beautiful Michael. My strong Michael. My angel Michael.
His heart ached. He needed to find out who he was. He needed to find out where
he came from. He found nothing. He was happy for that first year after Tess
showed up. He thought he’d finally find the answers he’d been looking for. He
found nothing.
Something broke in Michael. Max and Isabel and Tess didn’t how much he was
hurting. I don’t blame them. They’re not his keepers. They had their own lives
to worry about. Max had Liz and their children. Isabel had Alex. Tess had Kyle
until she left. And Michael had me. I stood by him. I believed in him. There was
nothing else I could do. I love him.
He was obsessed. Even after Max and Isabel and Tess had all given up. Every week
there was something new that could potentially help us find out more about where
he came from. Every week we turned up nothing.
I went along with him. I’m not saying that life with Michael has been easy.
Seems like we were always fighting about what he was fighting for. I worried
about him. I knew something was wrong. I’d tell him how I was feeling and then
we’d fight about that too. A smarter woman would have left him. But I’m not
exactly the smartest thing walking around. And I’m a sucker for a challenge.
They didn’t understand. I did. I love him. I knew that there was something wrong
with him. When they all gave up, Michael fell apart. I was there to pick up the
pieces.
I found him on his bathroom floor one night last December. The fluorescent light
was bright enough to blind me. It reflected off of the mirror and the white tile
on the floor and the water in the toilet. The reflections were almost pretty,
the way they shimmered on the wall. And the silver reflection, the one coming
from the razor he held in his hand, that was the prettiest of all. He’d been
practicing. There were a couple of red, angry scratches on his arms. His wrists
were left untouched. He held the razor in his right hand and his left arm laid
across his lap. He’d look at the razor, then at his arm, then at me.
He was wearing a white shirt and a pair of the boxer shorts I’d given him one
Christmas. He hated those things. He only wore them when he wanted to make me
happy, or shut me up.
He looked so small there between the toilet and the sink. He looked like a lost
little boy who was trying to find his way home. I imagine that’s what he looked
that night he was found out in the desert.
I realized that he wasn’t dying about fifteen seconds after I opened the door
and saw him there. I walked over to him and sat beside him. He let the razor
fall from his hand. I picked it up and moved it away. I did my best to clean up
the red, angry scratches on his arms. He bled onto those ugly shorts of his
anyway.
I helped him stand. I helped him walk. I led him back to his room to sleep. He
didn’t want to sleep.
We had sex then. We didn’t make love. It was not about love. It was not about
lust. I was so angry with him for scaring me like that and I was so worried
about him and I was so happy that he was alive because I loved him so much. He
needed me right then, just as much as I needed him.
He cried afterwards. We laid there on top on the covers and he looked over at me
and started crying. I held him, rubbed his shoulders, and patted his hair. I
waited until he fell asleep and then I cried.
We didn’t talk about it. We didn’t tell Max and Isabel or even Liz and Alex.
Sometimes I wonder if it ever really happened at all. Then I see the scars on
his arms and his untouched wrists and remember all over again.
All Michael really ever needed was something better than Roswell, New Mexico.
All Michael really ever needed was a home. I gave him a home with me.
I wouldn’t let him alone after that. I love him. I am not going to risk losing
him again. He tried to push me away. It didn’t work. I think that after a long
while he got used to me. Maybe he got used to being… normal.
He’s not the same, but he’s better now. I wore a bright orange sweater last
Monday. He asked me when my parole officer was coming to pick me up. I could
have kissed him.
I think the baby helps. I found out I was pregnant a month ago: about three
months after the night I found him in the bathroom. We think it’s a girl.
Michael wants to name her Mari: it means “wished for.”
Last night, I found him out on the roof of our apartment building. He was
watching the stars again. I almost got upset. I thought that he was going to… I
don’t know what I thought. I walked over to him and sat down next to him and he
put his arm around my shoulder. He pointed up to one of the bluest, brightest
stars and said that it was his favorite as a kid. I looked at the star, I looked
at his arm and saw the scars, I looked back at him and asked him if that star
reminded him of home. His voice was very small when he answered.
“I am home,” He said.
I didn’t know whether to smile or to cry.
The End