“Who are you?” Michael said through gritted teeth twenty minutes later as he stood in the safety of the Valenti-Deluca household as Jim watched over after Michael had called him at the station and requested to use his home for an important group meeting. Knowing his wife was home as she dealt with her nephew’s death, and Maria was planning to be there because Betty had her party to attend, and Michael was at work. Isabel having gotten the change of locals had rushed over because she had sensed the tension in Michael’s voice when he urged her to meet him at Jim’s place.
So, Isabel arrived minutes before, and now they were standing together facing a defiant blonde on a chair in the kitchen. Amy went upstairs to give privacy while Michael demanded Ava take a seat at the table.
“I told you Michael. My name is Ava… Ava Johnson”
“The hell you are,” Michael gritted with arms folded as he gave the royal soldier pose he hadn’t had to use to years. He felt protective of his family, and the knowledge they might have been betrayed by Tess’s lookalike dug at him. Max of all people had been immediately suspicious about how Ava had engrained herself and he didn’t immediately see it, but now he did. As all he was doing was arriving to meet Isabel for dinner while Maria spent time with her mother as Betty had a sleepover slumber birthday party to attend with friends from camp. Only to hear Ava on the phone with a mysterious person as he went to a booth he had requested for his dinner and once he overheard the words he did, well, his heckles went at what he had overheard.
“I am Ava…” Ava tried again.
“No, you’re not,” Michael muttered.
“Tell us the truth Ava, tell us why you’re trying to con us.” Maria asked as she looked straight at the woman. When her husband had stormed into the house, she had been surprised. He knew he was dealing with work related business and so she came back over to spend the evening with her mother while Jim did business at the station only to find her face going pale at the overview her husband had given her in a shorthanded version of what he had overheard at the Crashdown.
“It’s the truth,” Ava sighed
Well it is, just not the whole truth she muttered under her breath unheard… “My name is Ava…”
“How do we know that?” Isabel asked as she stood appalled when she heard her friend’s version of the events in question.
“Look it’s the truth, but it’s not the full story” Ava said as she forced into revealing the truth. She wished could keep them in the dark, and while it’s not the end of the world to have it out. She just wished she could have her normal life without them looking at her like she was a traitor, which they now were... and she hated it.
“Tell us,” Maria said softly as she saw the death glare in her husband’s eyes and it was something no one could withstand long…
“Ok, fine… My name is Ava. Ava
Langley Johnson!”
“Excuse me” Michael spat as the name
Langley came up as memories came from Max’s letter about their second watcher. He and Isabel had never met him, but now he wondered.
“You came with Lonnie and Rath?” Isabel asked.
“I did,” Ava admitted. “Look it’s a long story…”
“Tell us, because we have time.” Michael demanded.
“Sure…” Ava muttered. “I was split off from Lonnie and Rath like what I am told Tess was to you Isabel and Michael back when we all crashed. You guys ended up here in Roswell. We ended up in New York… Zan, Rath and Lonnie hatched and went on their way. When I hatched, Kal was there… He wasn’t planning to do anything about it but found me useful. He was able to present a different image by taking me in as he worked to come to terms with life on Earth. While I am told Nascedo wanted back on Antar and kept the way he was engrained. Kal found he liked life on Earth and worked hard to maintain that cover… So, he took me in and we ended up in Los Angeles…
“But you were like Rath and Lonnie…” Isabel wondered.
“Yeah, but I was sane” Ava muttered as she thought of Zan, Rath and Lonnie. “Zan was too but too bad he got taken out before he was able to live the life he wanted. So, I was raised by Kal. But eventually we clashed too much and so I ran away when I was a teenager and ran back to New York where I came across Zan, Lonnie and Rath and they took me in and showed me how to live like them and I immediately bonded with them and especially with Zan but still something was off as it was evident that I wasn’t like them, as you could call me the black sheep which is why I probably bonded with Liz when we came town for that brief time. When everything went down in New York with the Alien Summit, well, I ran back to California and turned my life around and little by little I came back into Kal’s life. When I did, it was after he had spent time with Max. While he was put off by the actions Max took, he did reveal he had been keeping an eye on you guys all that time. He liked his life and wanted to try to get back to his own self and therefore he wasn’t relishing the idea of coming to Roswell as he figured out that Max hadn’t come back. So, he sent me here with the instructions to watch and report back to him. My mission was to watch Liz since he knew that Max had split off…”
“You allowed Liz to get mixed up with Sean Deluca,” Maria glared.
“She was already in his clutches by the time I came to town. I sensed something was not right with Sean, but I didn’t know what… Kal had his suspicions and told me to be a friend and make sure nothing went haywire with her...”
“Everything went haywire with her” Maria gritted.
“I am sorry about that…” Ava sighed. “I truly am.”
“So, this Kal knew that Khivar might have tried to take control of Sean Deluca?” Jim asked.
“I don’t know what Kal thinks or thought but it was suspicious the change in behavior from his prior time in Roswell, so questions were right to be explored. But if he was in jail, neither of us thought anything of it.”
“But Bella disappeared?” Isabel cried.
“Yes, that is when I figured things had escalated but there was no proof that Deluca was involved.”
“If Khivar became aware Liz gave birth Max’s heir?” Maria asked. “The heir that Tess had worked so hard to try to take back to Antar…”
“I know,” Ava muttered. “But because Liz was lying about the paternity…”
“Khivar would have known if he was assuming Sean’s body.”
Ava sadly nodded.
“But because she was a girl. Khivar could have cared less about Bella because he didn’t want females having any type of power on his planet, so he just found a way to get rid of her as he knew he could strike back at Max that way… if he ever did become aware of Liz having his baby?” Isabel asked.
“It would stand to reason,” Ava admitted. “Look I know that you must be angry, and why…”
“No, you don’t…” Maria muttered as she thought of all the pain Liz was put under if this was a master plan of Khivar to get even with Max and used her friend as a pawn even though Max was no longer in town…
*
It was hours later, and the middle of the night and Liz slept in the spare room while Max was in the other room. Knowing Max was so close was causing her to toss and turn as she faced the whirlwind of emotion. Memories of the good and the downright painful flashed through her mind as she remembered that day out in the desert when she said good-bye and hoped to see him again, but never imagining it would be over ten years before that time came to her again, and then only months later she was forced into a unimaginative role that she never thought possible or at least not until she was older or more prepared to handle it…
May 5, 2002
Auggh….” came a screaming girl within the walls of the hospital delivery room. She had been screaming for hours, wishing for anyone to take away the pain in which she was under…
“Come on Liz,” came the encouragement from the nurses in the room. The doctor wasn’t yet ready to come in… “A few more pushes and then it was all done…”
“I can’t do this,” Liz panted as some of the extreme had subsided for a moment. “I want to go home…”
“You’re almost there come on you do it. Do you want your husband to be in here with you?” the nurse added as Liz’s eyes went cloudy with pain as another contraction started.
“God no…” Liz screamed… “Keep him out” she yelled as she knew the marriage was a disaster, but she wasn’t ready to say it which is why her mother wasn’t in here with her but was out in the waiting room. She knew her parents she was keeping at a distance because of their hatred for her marriage. Therefore, Maria had been her birth coach and yet she wasn’t in the room because she had been on a pre-graduation trip with Michael as they were newly back together after some hiccups. They had wanted to go out of town for the weekend… Since Liz wasn’t expecting the baby for another few weeks, well, she said sure, go ahead to Maria. But then the labor started…
“Are you sure you don’t want him in here. He can be support for you. He’s the baby’s dad…”
“NO, he isn’t” Liz thought only to herself… “Max is” she mused. “God, I want him here with me… He should be here with me…”
“Do you want someone to come in here for you…”
“Bring in Isabel…” Liz said as a contraction subsided, and Isabel walked into the room soon after and was with her for the last twenty minutes before finally the baby pushed herself out of her mother…
“Congratulations Liz, it’s a baby girl!”
And immediately after being placed in her mother’s arms… Liz fell in love. She saw Max staring back to her, and knew any misgivings she might have of the pregnancy or the damage she might have inflicted on herself in the months that led to this moment… it was all worth it… because in those eyes she saw Max, and something precious she now had of him that allowed her a chance to make things right…
Isabel nearby cried as saw the baby, while also seeing how the baby looked so much like her brother…
And cried even more when she heard the name, Isabella Maria Parker
come out Liz’s mouth as she named the child and yet still maintained the lie that Sean Deluca was the birth father…
They all knew she was lying…
And now ten years later Liz was tossing and turning as Bella’s biological father laid in the room next to as she recalled how that tiny baby had turned into a beautiful little girl whose future held so much promise, and now to have that taken from them by the act of a madman that might have routes in the past…
Her eyes opened as tears ran as she thought of her little girl. Staring into the darkness, and the stillness of the house. A house that was a stranger to her and yet it felt friendly.
Sitting she saw Bella shadow staring at her from across the room… “I know sweetheart… I know…”
“Mommy, I love you.” Bella’s vision was telling her… “I am close by…”
Unable to shake the memories of her little girl and the heartache of being almost taunted by glimpses of the girl, she grabbed her housecoat and got out of bed and walked out of the room softly as she could to not disturb Max, and she walked out into the living room.
Walking to the large windows that showed the front yard. Needing fresh air, she opened the door and walked out.
Smelling the fresh air, she just stood there…
“Liz, what is wrong” came a tender voice she knew so well. Spinning around knowing who she was going to see…
Max…
*
Max had been tossing and turning also but unlike his ex, who was dreaming of their daughter. Intense dreams of their past flowed through his body which made it hard to sleep. Hearing the front door, he leaped up in a sitting position. Knowing he hadn’t heard things, he instantly grabbed his jeans and followed the noise and saw through the window, Liz standing out front in her robe.
Walking out, he stared at her for a few minutes before making himself known. “Liz…”
Liz did a spin around and saw him and saw that he was only in jeans. “I thought you were asleep.”
“So, did I?”
“I guess I did too much sleeping in the hospital,” Liz lied, and Max knew she was lying…
Max laughed but stopped. “Are you okay?”
“It was only dreaming but not really dreams you know what you mean?” Liz admitted.
“Oh…” Max said getting the gist. “You think Bella is trying to tell you something?”
“I want to find her…”
“We will,” Max promised. “I have this sense we’re closer than we think to finding Bella. She might be around the corner…”
“I hope so…” Liz said as she turned to look out into the dark night. “It’s so peaceful here… Not a house for a mile.”
“Which is why it’s spoke to me,” Max said as he came to realize how he had isolated himself here during these last five years. Sure, Serena came over, or he saw woman after woman much to his partner’s dismay but the time he had spent in Roswell made him feel the closeness. “But sometimes I wonder how much I miss…”
“You do?” Liz asked as she turned back to face Max.
“Sure,” Max said. “So much of my life these last five years has been hiding. After my time in Washington, I wanted peace and quiet but coming back to Los Angeles wasn’t that quiet of a town, so I found my corner of it. But being back in Roswell, I saw how much your house or even Isabel’s home spoke to you guys and there is something I miss…”
“Why Washington Max, why the FBI?” Liz asked as they looked out at the night sky to try to cure their insomnia and for Max to quench the desire he was beginning to have stirred up him again every time he was near Liz. Having her at home was a dream come true. “Afterall they put you through in high school.”
“That was the Special Unit. I worked for the real deal agency,” Max sighed. “I doubted whether I could or even should do it. But as I told Michael, and maybe even you… I needed the money to pay my hospital bills and I happened on a recruitment one day, and well I went for it. And it was mostly good…”
“Mostly?” Liz asked.
“My health was still not completely on the completely balanced and I needed something, but I wasn’t ready for what the job entailed, but I stuck until the darkness I felt swallowed me again… And I quit, and then spent the next year fighting to get back to normal. Finally, I achieved something… I don’t know what, but I did… Yet I still hadn’t completely turned my life around, and finally I did with this job and with this place.”
“I am glad…” Liz nodded.
“Are you?” Max asked as he saw Liz staring at him.
“But then I find that I might like the life that exists in Roswell… the one I left so long…”
“Sounds like you made quite the life here… from the looks of this place…”
“It wasn’t one because I was always missing you…”
“Max…”
“Look I mean what I said before, and I am not trying to push you into anything. I am just telling you how I think. I see you every time I close my eyes and sometimes even when they are open… I thought I had moved on and maybe I should just let you go, but I can’t because I love you.”
“Max…”
“I just wanted you to know… I am not expecting anything. Or pushing you into anything you don’t want. I will be there for you regardless of whatever move you make in the end. But know, that day when I saved your life… I told you,
“it was you” and I mean it. I screwed up and hurt you, and I am forever horrified about it but over these last ten years I have tried to get over you, and to move on and that is why my life is so miserable because I have never stopped loving you. I am prepared to live my life without you if that is what you want. But I am going to be there for you, and for Bella when she comes home.”
Liz felt a wave of spine-warming rush of desire. She didn’t know where this was leading them, but she couldn’t deny she didn’t feel the same thing for Max. She didn’t know if she could live her life with him, but she also knew what the last ten years have been like without him in her life, and looking at him without a shirt, and just in his jeans…starting at her like the she was only person in the world… She felt overwhelmed… and a stir of desire waving through her, moving her in a direction. “Max…”
“Let’s go in,” Max said finally after he broke the stare as he turned to head back into the house, and back into sanity when she reached for his arm and stopped him.
“Max,” Liz said softly.
He turned around, and she knew this was the wrong thing she could possibility do but she couldn’t stop herself. She reached up and
kissed him…
The kiss released a torrent of passion as he responded instantly as both dove into it, as her arms went around his head as they dug deeper into the kiss as ten years of waiting vanished
“Liz,” Max muttered as they couldn’t stop themselves as they continued their kissing as they backed up against the flatness of the house wall and continued to take their kissing deeper as Max also tried to go for the front door, as somehow, they made it despite not separating from each other.
“This is the last thing we should be doing right now…” he whispered they couldn’t unlock each other from their embrace as he slammed the front door.
“We should stop,” Liz whispered but she kept kissing as Max’s hands went down and undid her robe, and as it pooled to the floor.
“God, Liz…” Max murmured.
“Let’s not talk,” Liz said as she knew this was not the brightest move as she was only hours out of the hospital where she nearly died from stress that had built over the last decade after Max went and vanished on her in the first place, and only manifesting even stronger when her little girl disappeared and yet she couldn’t pulled herself away from this man. She was letting go any form of rational thought as they returned to the kissing…
“Right,” Max said as he also knew they shouldn’t be doing this, but he couldn’t help but himself as his hands went under the nightgown and felt the tenderness of flesh and felt the desire burn in himself as she finally found he was coming home again… “God, I love you Liz…”
Not wanting to get into any thought of feelings or public disclosures Liz eliminated his words with her kissing as she moved her own hands down and unzipped his jeans… She felt like the world was out of its axle and yet she also felt like this was what was meant to be…
As she felt him kissing her shoulders, and the bliss she was feeling for the first time in ten years she reached up and put her legs around his waist as they continued to feel like the world only existed with them in it as he walked move back as they continued walk and kiss…
Reaching the couch, unable to go any further they tumbled onto the piece of furniture as they went to lengths that had been denied to them with each other since the parting months before it all ended for them.
They finally felt at home….