Family Matters (CC, Mature) - Chapter 88 - Completed - 01/10/2024

[Parker1947]

Minutes later…

It felt like an eternity only broken by Okay, I am taking you home Maria murmured as she dragged her husband away from it all because she was tired of this, we have to move on she thought. This does nothing to stay here and go around in circles. “Liz, we will talk,” she muttered as she glanced at her best friend who only nodded, but nothing was more said as she made sure that her husband Michael followed her. With the additional responsibility of taking JJ with them because it was getting late, and the last thing the ten-year-old needed was to deal with more fallout. Because he was already getting an earful. Maria overriding her husband on that vote too, because Michael was not in the mood to do Liz any favors, and they all knew this, but Maria won this as the boy walked off with Maria “I will return him to you in the morning,” was all Maria said as she said her goodbyes as Kyle standing guard to make sure the rogue alien hybrid followed the demands of his all too human wife. While Liz could not help but stand there and watch, as everything she had ever done to make sure she had a strong relationship with her daughter, go up in smoke. Maybe there was some way to stop this, she thought of the child she had taken with her when she left Max and went into that deal with the devil as Michael so subtly said while her son was looking like it was great entertainment.

Because he does not have a role in this drama except to be my son, and to be normal Liz said. At least someone is normal and did not have to be burdened by two decades before she thought. Claudia was not born yet, but her DNA ties her to all this.

And that DNA had always told her that she was different. And she had never known what it all meant, until she came back to this town and there was always going to be stuff she was in the dark about because she had not been back here and known what was going on, and there was only so much her mother would tell her, basically nothing she would think now as she stood and watched the very mother who had strived to raise her, and yet now seemed to be a different person than the woman she had known.

If you went by the venom in Lucy’s father’s voice. As if everything was coming to the surface. Years of history and baggage exploding all over the place and Claudia was unfortunately collateral damage. “Mom,” was all the eighteen-year-old could say as she tried to go with something easy, “What are you doing here?”

“You were not returning my calls,” was all Liz answered.

“Phone died,” Claudia muttered. “We were going to return to the motel but then we stopped because we heard Aunt Maria and Michael talking, and yelling at each other, and I could not help but stop and listen,” she muttered. Maybe I should have continued walking as common sense told her JJ was better off away from this, but maybe not in Michael Guerin’s house because she did not know what to think of her godmother’s husband.

Claudia’s mother could only sigh because this was the last thing she wanted for tonight, “Obviously you heard a lot?” Liz asked as she looked at her trusted friend in Kyle.

Someone who nodded. Even though he had already heard the news of the hour before…

Which is what Liz had suspected although she did not know the news had traveled all the way to Isabel, and therefore Kyle as she had heard the venom in Michael’s voice. It was not hard to miss. And it was something she had heard years before things started to settle down. Helped by the fact that their children were friends, and distances. That helps a lot, Liz knew. We did not have to reside in the same town anymore, she thought. With me, and the kids on the East Coast and Michael and Maria in the dead south she thought. We saw each other, but Maria and I did things and Michael stayed away.

And the girls spent time together, and whatever Michael truly felt for her could be hidden because they had not spent that much time together.

Now she heard the vibrating nature of what Michael was spewing, without knowing what happened, or the terms of that deal with the devil as he so kindly termed it. Yeah, it was a deal with the devil.

But if he had gone through what I went through. He would have taken the deal. But the deal of course would not have been offered to Michael, not likely she knew. He would have been in some cell, standing trial for crimes committed in his youth.

Or if they had not gone that route then a worse fate would have befallen him, she knew, because I only got out of it by the skin of my teeth.

None of them knew this, and she would hope their opinions of her actions would change if they really knew what she had gone through. Hell, she thought. Still, I made that deal even with what they did to me, she thought. She had sat with it a long time before she acceded to their wishes and made the deal.

But she had gotten a lot out of it, Liz thought. Max would be safe. Maria got the boy she loved, although sometimes Liz wondered why she had gotten through the battles to win Michael’s freedom when it did not matter to him.

Although Michael did not know everything.

None of them did Liz muttered as she glanced at her daughter, my baby girl and Kyle who did not know what to think. Except to suspect his former girlfriend was seriously overwhelmed and did not need this, but there is no going back.

We have to make peace with what came before she thought. Good luck Liz, she muttered. “I guess that explains why you did not return my call.”

“Sorry,” Claudia muttered as both were trying their best to ignore what was being said in the park. “JJ was hearing your fight with my father, and he needed reinforcements and so I took him out on the town, but neither of us thought it would be this long.”

No kidding Liz thought as she knew she should be chagrined to know that her son had overheard some of her fighting with Max. Hopefully not all of it, but she suspected enough, but Claudia had gotten to her brother before it has escalated through the thin walls. “Thank you,” she muttered as Kyle was clearly amused at the discovery that Liz had been fighting it out with Max, which meant who knows what he would think.

Only Max and Liz would know what had happened next.

And we are both living it down she would mutter to herself. This is not much better she thought of coming here, and knowing what Michael had insinuated to her daughter, but fortunately Maria had gotten them out of dodge before Liz had to explain to the masses.

But she knew that day was coming, too soon.

So, she would rather talk about anything other than what could be out in the world and what Michael was thinking of her deal, without knowing any of the particulars of such a deal she thought. Of course, Michael would think badly of me, and not want to know before putting his dander up and thinking the worse.

Because I broke his brother’s heart.

Michael, Max, and Isabel were like siblings, and too close to think that Michael would not take what she and Max did personally, especially since I left Max in the lurch and taken Claudia she thought.

So, the fact Michael was so against her at the moment did not surprise her or hurt her. We always did have an antagonistic relationship she thought. Of course, there was some softening of the battle lines there for a time she acknowledged. But we were never close.

Except that he loved my best friend.

And I loved his…

And therefore, it had led to a group of unique and strange bedfellows. And we were never the same.

Or I was not Liz thought, once the shooting happened. “Kyle, thank you for trying to defend me, but you don’t need too…”

“Someone has too,” Kyle muttered. “I don’t know exactly what happened back then,” he sighed. No one does. “But I know you had to do what you had too…”

Liz nodded.

“So, you made this deal that Lucy’s father was citing, getting angrier every time he was thinking of it,” the teenager observed.

“Michael has no idea what it involved,” Liz murmured as she looked at Kyle. “No one does,” she sighed. “But I have done things in my life that I am not proud of, and it was not an easy time” she sighed. “But I did what I thought was best for all involved. Michael does not have to like what I did to your father, although what Max and I did in our relationship and the choices we made is really none of Michael’s business,” she muttered. “But I know that he is looking out for his friend, but still it was not like I liked what I had to do, but it needed to be done, because it was the only thing, I could do to make sure everyone safe at the end of the day,” she sighed as she looked at Kyle who were one of the normal ones in this drama. But he had the unique knowledge of what it was like to be saved by Max. Just like me, but he is nothing like me she murmured. Because he did not change.

But I did.

“So, you took this deal, and broke Dad’s heart and took me away from Dad?” Claudia asked as she was trying to put two and two together to get four, and the truth. Even though she did not know the warts of the deal “And you did not tell anyone you were doing it?”

“I told one person,” Liz sighed. “Your grandfather.”

“Grandpa Parker,” Claudia asked but Liz shook her head. “Whoa you didn’t, Dad’s father. Grandpa Evans,” she asked. Someone who I have only seen once “You asked my grandfather to lie to him?”

“I did not ask your grandfather to do anything of the kind. What Phillip did with the information was up to him, but all I wanted was for him to know, and I should not have told him, but I needed him to protect your father, his son. And the only way I could do it was to tell him some of it, about why I had to leave your father, and take you.”

“He probably kept it to himself, because you had told him too” Claudia muttered as she could not believe it. Mom might deny it, but the implication was enough Even though sure, she did not know the history of this little fraternity she was in, but she knew enough because of her mother’s journal to know the federal government was hunting them, and now she was finding out her mother had made a deal. And that maybe Michael had a right to be upset, because of who Michael was, and who her mother was not. And I am just like them and not like my mother? “I cannot believe you,” she said. “All this time, all these secrets you have been keeping from me. All you told me was that you had to leave my father, but that was not all of it, right, because he did not want to lose us, but you are the one who chose to leave.”

“Unfortunately,” Liz murmured as she looked at Kyle. I tended to run she thought. “I did what was best for you, and I had to protect your father and you which is why I kept you with me, because the last thing your father needed was to have to raise you, and I did not know what it would mean by taking the deal I did.” Because if Claudia had stayed here and been raised by her father and become the girl, she was meant to me, and was today. The government might have become wise and rescinded the deal and come after her family.

She could have stayed away.

But Claudia was a new version of the original generation that had come to this planet.

“You cost me my father?” Claudia asked.

“Your father agreed that you needed to come with me,” Liz murmured.

“Because he did not know all of it,” Claudia asked, would he have done if he had known she wondered. “You made a deal with his enemy?” she murmured. “The one person who wanted to stop him,” she asked as she thought of the journal entries. “You never told me about it, but I read enough of it in your journal.”

“I never should have let you read my journal,” Liz muttered. “And your father had more than one enemy,” he said as he looked at Kyle who sighed because he knew well what had happened in those original three years, and how much it had changed all of them.

“Why not, so you could withhold the truth from me?” Claudia asked ignoring that there was more… “No wonder Dad is angry at you, and Michael too…” she muttered. “You played god with everyone’s lives, and you forced everyone to live by your decisions.”

“Everyone survived,” Liz murmured.

“You played with everyone’s free will,” she muttered. It is our right. “You did the same with that Future Max bit,” she muttered as she though of what she read in the journal. Stuff she did not want to believe, but now she was suspecting that it was not particularly farfetched. “You changed everyone’s worlds, and nothing was ever the same again.”

“We managed there for a minute or two,” Liz said softly as she hated reminding the downside of the Future Max time in her life, I changed everything and set everything on a new course she thought.

“And then you changed everything,” Claudia muttered as she looked around and she knew she was tired of this, all of this. “I should have gone to Colorado to be with Archie …” she muttered even though she did not know if that would be any better. But it was better than being here and getting an unfiltered look at her mother, warts, and all. “This is too much, I am out of here,” she muttered and as if she expected her mother to speak. “Don’t follow me. Leave me alone,” she said. “You have already done enough, haven’t you” she sighed in a defiance only an eighteen-year-old who was too independent for her own good could muster as she stormed off.

And it only left Liz and Kyle alone in her dust.

“She hates me,” Liz reflected.

“She does not hate you, she is just disappointed” Kyle allowed. Many of us are the same he thought even though he did not say it aloud. Liz could tell what Kyle was thinking, everyone else in this drama of us thinks the same. “As a father of a teenage boy who is not much younger than your daughter. Their moods come and go,” he reflected. “She’s gotten a terrible shock tonight, with the finding out that her mother is not a saint.”

“I never made myself out to be a saint,” Liz murmured. I am definitely not a saint. “Claudia knows how things have been for us…”

I have never been a saint, not in this life, or any of those other ones too she could not help but think as Kyle nodded. “I know want you want to say.”

“No, you don’t” Kyle muttered.

“I am not a saint,” Liz sighed. “Far from it. But all I know is I made the right decision for myself at the time, and I would do it again.”

“Would you?” Kyle asked.

“Yes,” Liz muttered. “You might not understand it, but I was not only saving Max with that deal. But I was saving Isabel and Michael although sometimes I wonder if I should have done it because I know how much Maria loved him, despite his difficult ways. We never saw each other the same way back then, and still I would want never to have wanted the government to get to them, and therefore I made that deal. And I am forever living with the results of that deal,” she thought. “My daughter did not know her father, although really, even if I had not left Max in the manner I did. My daughter still was unlikely to have her father today.”

“Why is that?” Kyle asked.

“Because they knew everything,” Liz sighed. “I would have cost everyone everything if I had not taken the deal,” she muttered. “Michael’s life has been golden all these years and it would have been much worse if I had not made that deal,” she thought.

*

Meanwhile,

“What is the hell is up with you,” Maria muttered as she and Michael walked into their house. The house was quiet. No lights were on, but they knew that Lucy was at home. Because they checked the first moment the surveillance system on the way home, and there were no disturbances, but there were plenty of disturbances between them. Because the air was thick. You could almost cut it with a knife. Therefore, Maria hoped her daughter was sleeping peacefully because it was not very peaceful between her and Michael at the moment as she had glared at him the whole way home, and it had been a long drive even though they lived nearby. “But before you tell me what got up your ass, JJ let me escort you the best spare room in this house,” she said of her godson. A boy she had not seen that often in his short life, but an arrival that had settled her friend and her daughter and given them a new purpose. “It is not that dressed up yet because we only just moved in, but it has a made bed and it can do for tonight.”

“It had to be better than what I had at the Crashdown, and it’s not a motel” JJ murmured as he had sensed the undercurrents of his godparents during the whole ride home, and now they were, and he knew his Aunt Maria wanted him out of the way. Which is why she brought me home with them even though he suspected her husband had an outburst or two to go before he started to settle down, because I have seen those kinds of outbursts and they are never good he thought as he lived in a house with a single mother and an older sister who was constantly trying to prove herself.

“Glad we are able to serve you,” Maria smile. And for once it was a smile that brought warmth to the house even though she felt nothing but ice for the love of her life. “I will show you, and Michael you take the time to cool off.”

“Whatever,” Michael muttered as his wife disappeared with the boy that Liz had brought into her home and gestured because the boy had been calling out for a real home and for once Michael remembered being grateful, but that feeling was short-lived and now was over, because of the current but also the past.

Michael did not know why it got him so upset, but the government makes it raw he thought. It is a button that gets pushed when I think of how close they came to getting us or more like Max and Isabel he thought back to that day when he had disrupted the graduation, he had not been apart of because he had not graduated because senior year got off track, and it never got back on track he would think because he had to work to keep a roof over his head. And be the guy Maria deserved even if they had spent a large part of senior year broke up.

Because it suddenly got too real once he had picked Earth and Maria, should not a girl like being the one picked, and a boy staying for her he thought. And he knew Maria did, but still it was a test to them, but still he had roared into that graduation and saved the day and known they had gotten out of town with the skin of their teeth.

And Liz makes a deal with that government agent who wanted to exterminate us he thought as he remembered what Max had been put through under Fisher’s regime, which him to take actions that still haunt him, and he only wished my own daughter does not have to go down the same path he thought.

Lucy did not know the warts of her parent’s courtship, and her father’s past. Neither of her parents felt the need to give their daughter a wakeup call. Lucy only knew that things had not been good back then, and they got lucky. And been fortunate to set up a new life in Tennessee, and she should be careful because who knows who is out there, he thought We have enemies, and enemies who we know about but whose whereabouts are unknown.

He did not want the newest generation to open up the path, and therefore any thought of the government that set us all running gets to me he thought and knew there had to be some good reason why Liz would have had to make that deal, but still it was a deal she should not have made he muttered even though he did not know everything, and how he should be very glad that she had made because he would have had a different life.

And would not have had Maria and Lucy in it, and Lucy like Claudia might have had a different future.

And not the existence she did.

Still, the concept still got to him.

So, yes, he knew it was scab that was easy to come off.

*

As, upstairs, Maria was showing JJ the spare room. “I know it’s a lot of confusion for you right now,” she murmured more so than Claudia she thought as she showed JJ where the bathroom was and gave the boy an old t-shirt of Michaels for him to wear. “One day, it will become clearer,” she said, and she prayed she was not giving the boy some falsehood given how out of control things had been and it was only a few days into this new adventure there cannot be more to this can there?

She knew not to make any bets on it.

“Thank you, Aunt Maria,” JJ asked of his godmother. Even if they were not close because of the circumstance of his life prior to these days. Someone he knew to be close to his mother, and they were like siblings even though they had not seen much of each other over the last couple of years, because of that dame pandemic he muttered but he knew his mother made this choice to come here not only because I needed a more stable life he murmured because he knew it was well known that he was the reason his mother came back here.

Although, there were other reasons for it and JJ could not know the real nitty gritty of it. “But something tells me that we should be not making any promises,” he wisely said.

Oh, JJ Maria thought of the boy who had seen too much and experienced too much in his short life, “Let us hope that we are both wrong on that score.”

“Hey, what is going on?” came a sleepy Lucy as she opened the door, as she had woken up to the noise out in the hallway. “JJ, what are you doing here?” she asked with surprise at the young boy’s arrival.”

“JJ is spending the night with us,” was all Maria would say.

“Is Claudia here too?” Lucy asked as her eyes perked because it was a surprise to think that the boy would only be here, and not either his mother or sister. “Aunt Liz?”

“Nope, just me” JJ muttered. “Mom and Claudia are having it out.”

Whoa Lucy murmured. Am I still sleeping?

Am I in some intense dream?

“Go to bed Lucy, we can talk about it in the morning” Maria murmured although she did not know what the state of things would be in the morning, but Lucy begrudgingly turned and walked back into her new bedroom and closed the door, as JJ finished getting ready for bed and turned in.

While Maria walked downstairs and had her own battle with her husband. “Are you going to tell me, what has gotten into you?”

“What do you think?” Michael muttered. “I figure it was pretty easy to know what is going on with me, after more than eighteen years of marriage?”

Space boy is too damn predictable because yes, she did know what was up with him, she mused. But it does not mean I like it.

“I don’t know, but maybe you should enlighten me” Maria murmured as across town Claudia stormed up into the apartment that had been too quiet for hours now, prepared to pack up and leave this forsaken town. It should not be this hard, she thought. Why am I doing this. If Mom is not the woman, I thought she was, why should I stay here? she muttered even though she at the end of the day knew it was all talk because the last thing she would do was abandon her little brother when he needed her.

Mom can drop dead, but JJ is why I am sticking around Claudia muttered. Even though she knew she was only hurt because this had been the routine with her mother and her since she came of age and could see that this was not the life her mother had wanted to lead but for some reason it a was life, she was leading Claudia down.

I just did not expect her to be the person she is she thought. And wondered once more if she should get on the first bus to the nearest airport and head to Colorado.

But before she could put any new plan into action, she heard “Hey, you are still a beauty as the last time we saw each other” came a voice and she stopped short of the front door of the apartment she was heading to as she walked up the stairs.

“Archie, what are you doing here?”

“If you could not come to me, well, I might as well come and visit you” Archie Holmes smiled. “Don’t I get a smile?”

“You will get the hell more than that,” Claudia rushed and jumped into his arms, and the intense passion between them started to boil once more as she and Archie soon made it behind closed doors, even though this was the last thing she knew she should be doing with how heated she was feeling about her mother.

All the while Tripp Valenti had witnessed his dream girl heading into the apartment with another guy as he had stopped by to deliver a note from his father for Claudia’s mother, this was before Kyle became of aware of where Liz was now spending her time and he had taken his time with the task and felt it was a way to see Claudia again. And plus, he had a note of his own.

He turned and left after sliding the notes under the door.

[totallizfan]

I like fan fiction Kyle...he's always loyal to Liz.
Michael is just being Michael..over reaction is his thing.
Everyone's upset...but when Liz tells them her secret..hopefully they'll understand.

[Parker1947]

Twenty-four hours later,

The music was full blast at Cow Patties as Maria parked in the parking lot. It was 80’s night. So, one could reasonably expect all kinds of different kinds of music not strictly in the country domain and ensuing mayhem could also be expected to occur. She was meeting Liz and Isabel on neutral territory as things were still chilly at home. No way could I bring Liz to the house until Michael cools down. Because Michael was in one of his moods, and Maria could not help but remember back to the conversation with her husband the previous night when things were boiling between them, “I love you Michael, but you carry a grudge with the worse of them,” she would mutter. “When we both knew that Liz had to do what she did,” she sighed. “You don’t have to like what she did, but she did it for a reason.”

“You do not know why she did it,” Michael batted right back.

“That is true, but do you yourself know why?” Maria slammed. “Look, I know why you are upset. As I said, you have a right to be pissed for the brother you never got to have biologically in Max, and you will defend him, which is your right, which is what I am doing at the same time with Liz, but he is a big boy and if he was old enough to get married. He is old enough to deal with it without you getting in the middle of it. You know he loves Liz and will to his dying days.”

“Sometimes we pick out the wrong people for us,” Michael murmured. And got a frown out of his wife, I don’t mean us he wanted to say, but did not. Maria knew what her husband meant and did not flinch. “I never felt that they should have gone there.”

“We know you did not” Maria murmured because they all knew that Michael had been cold about Liz in the beginning, and me too she smiled because they were a unique combination. And somehow, we have made it work.

But it does not mean that sometimes I do not know why he thinks the way he does she sighs as she looks at her husband. I have known him for way too long. “You have a right to hate the deal, but something tells me Liz would not have made it if she did not feel like it was necessary,” she muttered. “You need to be giving her the benefit of the doubt.”

“The hell I will,” Michael muttered, and he was ready for another rant. “Whoever goes into a partnership with the other side does not get the benefit of the doubt,” he muttered as he poured a stiff drink and Maria knew this was trouble because Michael knew not to drink.

Maria knew when to apply the brakes to any dealing with her husband. I love the guy, but sometimes he is too much. “It is obvious I cannot speak to you when you are like this,” Maria would mutter to her husband and walked past her Space boy and made sure he knew he was not welcome in their bedroom, which meant he would sulk and went to the other spare room in their palatial home.

Which was a result of their vastly different life than the small apartment he had to work hard to pay rent on once upon a time, and it was a home he would not have had if not for Liz’s deal.

And now…

Liz walked into the crowded and rowdy bar. She had not been here since she returned to town and she could tell the new owners were making a success of it, as it did not always stay a country and western bar she thought, it seemed to stray occasionally, and tonight was one of those nights.

She wanted to have fun. JJ was going to a movie with Kyle. Because there was a boy only movie that she would not have appreciated viewing, so her former boyfriend had come to her with the idea. Plus, it would give her a night off, and she could have some fun times hopefully she thought with her best friend.

She and Maria had barely had time to talk when her best friend had dropped JJ off that morning because she had to be over at the Crashdown, a place that did not have her daughter or her boyfriend, so Liz did not know Archie was visiting. It was empty when she got there and had the electrician give a quote on updating the restaurant and the restaurant, so a discussion about the explosion in the park was for another time because Maria had her own business she had to get going on.

And when she had gone back to the motel with her son because Maria had dropped him off at the apartment, they had not been able to talk and had daughter had not returned, so she did not know what to expect tonight, but she wanted to not think she thought is that too much to ask she wondered because it had been too full of everything since she came back, and it was only a few days.

She did not know what to think of Isabel joining them, because she had not seen Max’s sister since her return, because other things had been happening. So, the evening had the ability to be a little of everything, just like the music she thought as she walked into 80’s country music. And she walked into the bar and ordered herself a beer.

She needed to unwind.

“Hey, Parker, I heard you were back in town” came a woman’s voice across the bar.

“Ava,” Liz asked as she could not believe it. Ava, are you kidding me? She was even more surprised to be able to put a name against the woman who was staring at her now, because she definitely does not look like the Ava, I knew for a brief couple of days back in high school she thought. Of the short blond-haired person with highlight in her hair, which looked more like a wig than a real hair cut she mused as she focused on the woman talking to her. “Welcome to the bar.”

“You work here?” Liz asked as she was stunned to see the woman who did not have blonde hair anymore but now was a red head.

“I do more than work here, I own it” Ava murmured with a laugh as she came closer to Liz and revealed her new auburn hair. And knew how much Liz was shocked by her sighting. “I know I look different from the last time you saw me?”

“Just a tad,” Liz said feeling discombobulated about the change in Ava. “You moved back here to Roswell.”

“Well, it is a place that had my people of sorts,” Ava said with a smile. It only made sense. “Made sense to me after years away, I needed a fresh start and I married myself an earthling although it did not work out, so I came back, and found the bar, which was needing new ownership to liven it up a bit.”

Wow, Liz thought.

“I know, I look different” Ava said because she knew Liz was having a tough time grasping the changes in her.

“Yes, you do” Liz murmured.

“I figured a whole sales change was needed after the divorce,” Ava smiled. “And being around and being around you know who I figured I needed distance from looking like her,” she murmured as she thought of the girl, she had once been a dead ringer for…

Max Liz thought but most of all Tess Liz snarked. Ava’s duplicate, and vice versa. “Yeah, I guess,” she murmured. I have been gone a long time a long time she thought as she looked around and then back at Ava and really did not see Tess in Ava because the difference was stark. “You really do look different?”

Ava nodded. “I figured after what my you know…”

Duplicate Liz thought but did not say it aloud despite the music. Still, you keep certain things to yourself.

So, she nodded.

“I figured with what Tess did to Max, if I was going to last in this town I better look as far from my twin sister,” she said to make it seem to people listening that was who Tess was to her, her deceased twin sister. It made sense to anyone who knew Tess back here, assuming they could recognize her after her changes. “It works better for dealing with Max that way…”

“Yeah,” Liz said. Wait, what did Tess do to Max she thought, I thought I knew everything, and Tess died before everything went south, she thought. “What are you talking about. Are you talking about the army base because what do you mean?”

“Oh,” Ava murmured. The army base is a whole other story she thought. “I thought you knew.”

“What do I not know?” Liz asked.

“Oh, just great,” came the arrival of one of the true blondes in their lives, as they saw that Maria had now arrived on the scene and saw that her friend had found Ava. As she was arriving at the tail end of Liz’s discussion with Ava. Maria had forgotten that Ava was likely to be working when she made the plans with Liz. Ava does own this bar now.

But the last thing Maria wanted was for Liz to see Ava. The last thing we need is more drama.

“Maria,” Ava murmured. “I heard you were also back in town.”

“Seems as if it a true reunion,” Maria muttered. Although I am not sure I would have thought any reunion would include Ava “Liz?”

“Maria,” Liz said as she moved her attention back to the now red head. “What is going on Ava. Is there something I should know about Max and Tess?” she asked. “I thought I knew everything that happened.”

“You did,” Maria muttered.

“But…” Liz wondered.

“The ground shifted once you and Max split up, and he came back to town” Ava murmured as she looked at Maria who nodded. Neither wanted to be people to be telling Liz this, especially not Tess’s duplicate even though she looked far away from the blonde hair girl who had wormed herself into the group and changed everything about it…

And made things even more complicated than it was already they were all thinking. “I’ll leave Maria to tell you,” Ava murmured as she heard her name Ava being called, “Coming” she said to one of the bartenders who had a problem. “Works beckons, see you later,” she said and left the women alone. “Maybe we can have a drink before the end of the night?” she asked of the one girl who had been welcoming her back in the day. Which is why Roswell always appealed to me, but without Liz here…

The rest did not have the time of day for me… So, Ava was happy Liz was back.

But would anyone else by the end of the night?

“Are you going to tell me what is going on?” Liz murmured as she glanced at her best friend once the newly christened red head went her own way.

“Are you?” Maria asked herself, because obviously we are both keeping something from the other, she would think to herself. “Let’s go outside and talk because we probably should have it out in the relative peace of outside before Isabel joins us and has more than a few questions for you,” she murmured to her best friend. “Before you ask, I did not ask for Isabel to join us, but she invited herself.”

“Fine,” Liz muttered.

She knew this was coming. And it was probably something she deserved but she just did not want it to be tonight, but she knew it was not going to be ignored as they walked outside, as Ava watched them go, as the former blonde and now a bright redhead could only sigh because she knew it was not going to be simple from here, it cannot be she thought.

At least Liz is back, Ava murmured. Max at least will be settled on that angle of it she thought.

Or so, she thought.

*

While at this time Max did not know what was going on at Cow Patties because he was looking for his former wife. And even though he knew she was no longer there, he found himself going to the Crashdown with hopes of seeing her maybe she had dinner with her daughter he thought our daughter he corrected himself because she is our daughter even though their daughter was now an eighteen year’s old.

An adult in the many parts of the world, if not her parents

Max knew he could not have any vote on the matter because he had been an outsider in his daughter’s life because her mother wanted that to happen, he thought. If only so much could have been different than I would have been a part of my daughter’s life, he was sure.

But he also knew that Liz had a view of the situation that differed from his own, and maybe she has some merit to think how she was he thought and maybe I am trying to have in a rose colored way so make it bearable that I missed so much time, but still I wanted to know my daughter and know the girl she was now even if she was eighteen year old and therefore he did not know what he was going to get when he climbed the stairs and knocked on the door.

And see the two women in his life, if Liz is here…

“Did you forget your keys or something?” came a sound.

A sound that Max did not recognize, and it immediately got his dander up because it was a voice he did not know, no one other than my daughter should be except maybe her mother and her brother, and the voice he heard was deeper and not the young childish sounds of a boy still finding his way, as the door came with a burst.

And Max was shocked to see it was a shirtless young male, damn it.

“Oh, you are not Claudia” Archie murmured. “She stepped out to get some take out and I figured she forgot her keys and I was just going to jump into the shower.”

“And you are?” Max said as he was trying to figure out what to say about this male, about my daughter’s age but acting so much older he thought as he was suddenly getting a lesson in parenthood even if no one was figuring he needed it, “I don’t recognize you?”

“I am sure to you I am new,” Archie said. “The name is Archie Holmes. Claudia’s boyfriend. Came in from Aspen for a visit,” he said.

“Aspen?” Max asked. “I thought Claudia was from back East. Boston, I think?”

“I am working there, with school vague for the last year and I needed to pay the rent, because I have lived on my own, so I took the only job I could find,” he murmured. “I work the mountains in the winter, and other odd jobs.” he said. “And you are?” Archie asked. “If we are speaking of someone I don’t know?”

“Max Evans.”

“Evans,” Archie asked with a startle stop.

“Yes, Evans,” Max muttered. “I am Claudia’s father” he said softly as he finally was feeling like a father, and he was determined to make the fact I am Claudia’s father apparent even though we do not know each other.

“Oh,” Archie murmured as he collected himself. “I didn’t think Claudia’s father was in the picture, or even alive,” he admitted because he knew he and his girlfriend had not talked about her father much, except to say yes, he was not in the picture he thought and so he did not know that he was now in the picture, and what that were to look like.

“Well, I am” Max murmured. “So, you might as well get dressed.”

“Since when do you make the decisions, because I don’t see this as being your home” Archie muttered and Max was going to say something when they both heard, “I hope you have worked up an appetite because I have plenty of food…” came a sound of a female voice, as Claudia came up the stairs and stopped in a paralyzed stand when she saw her father talking to a shirtless Archie .

“Dad,” Claudia said in an unsure way.

“Hello Claudia,” Max murmured. “I was just having something to say with Archie here, who I can see has been staying with you in the apartment,” he sighed because he did not like this part of fatherhood. Liz cannot be happy. “Which is something I would think your mother would be having a say about, and she cannot be happy…” does she even know?

“Who cares what Mom might think?” Claudia muttered in her sarcastic way. “She moved out, so I can do what I want and be with whoever I want, and neither of you can stop me,” she sighed. “Especially you, and most of all, her.”

Welcome to parenthood Max.

Therefore, Max was indeed getting a rude awakening…

*

Meanwhile,

Liz was getting her own rude awakening. But not from her teenage daughter. But from her best friend. Someone she had known since they were kids playing on the school ground together and had been through everything imaginable and especially an alien invasion together. Falling in love with the two most unlikely suitors for a pair of small-town girls who had dreams and wished for any kind of life than the ones they were sure was coming our way because we were from Roswell they would think, and now twenty years since that invasion. They were different people and were looking at each other with different eyes because they were seeing things differently. “Are you going to say something?” Maria muttered as they walked out into the coldish New Mexican air, and they looked around at all the cars in the parking lot.

“Are you?” Liz asked as she sighed and knew her best friend because she had been in her life since she was a kid, we both knew each other too well to try to snow the other she thought. Although I managed for many years.

Although not seeing each other helped Liz would realize even though for most of those years when she was under guard of the deal she had made with yes, the devil well, that meant we could not see each other.

Because Maria would have known something was up if we had talked and so we just communicated in the odd email or quick call she thought but then Maria’s career caught fire almost immediately after she and Michael settled in Nashville, and then Lucy came sooner than expected in their lives so Maria was preoccupied until later, Liz thought when the clouds lifted and she was able to create a new life for herself without worry, but there was always the worry that things would take a turn for the worse she thought and so they saw each other, but it was never the same as it was before.

How could it be? When I did something so different that allowed Maria peace in her life at the expense of my own happiness and now, they were standing out of a country and western establishment and trying to out each other’s secrets.

Maria knew hers, but Liz did not know Maria’s.

Neither knew how to broach it. “Liz,” Maria murmured and tried to get Liz out of her headspace. “Look, I know…”

“What do you know?” Liz sighed.

“A lot obviously,” Maria sighed. “I thought we should talk because Isabel also knows, and she might not be so friendly and will be demanding why you did it?”

“That is not for her to question…” Liz muttered even though she knew Isabel had every right to question, because they all did, she thought. I changed their lives.

I allowed them to be happy, while I was miserable, she thought. As I was in misery.

Maria saw through it. “Is it not?” she asked of her best friend in the world. Someone she had met as a child and they had made it work as friends all these years, even when time would lead them apart from each other, and it was easy for them to talk to each other. Until now they would concede. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Neither do I,” Liz allowed because she really did not know what to say because how can I explain what I did she thought to her best friend, who was a sister to her. We always were able to talk to each other, she thought. About anything.

But not this… “It is a long story,” Liz sighed. “I didn’t want to get into it, because I just had it out with Max and to a less degree with my daughter who by the way hates me right now, because of my changing her life.”

“You changed all of our lives,” Maria conceded. “But what I don’t know or get is the why?”

“Because it was the only way to save everyone,” Liz said. Everyone might hate me right now, but it was the only choice I could have made, she muttered to herself as she faced her best friend. “Michael might detest me for hurting Max. Brothers and arms, and all that, you know, which is why I get that he is upset on behalf of his best friend. But there really was no other way, if I were to be going to help not just Max, but Michael and Isabel.”

“Jeez,” Maria muttered as he was trying to comprehend it all, because none of this makes sense. “What did you do?”

“You have heard about it I assume,” Liz sighed. I really don’t want to get into it again, not after dealing with it with Max and Claudia. “You were there last night, but this not something I want to be talking about once again. So, I have to ask, what don’t I know about Max and Tess?”

Nice diversion there Liz Maria wanted to say as she shook her head because she was not going to let it drop. “Tess doesn’t matter,” Maria murmured. She is after all dead and ash and the fact there had been no baby does not change anything, when to the contrary, Liz’s actions did change everything “Max does,” she murmured. “I mean Liz, I do not get it. Why would you take that deal? Which is something you obviously did, right?” she asked. “Michael and everyone cannot be that wrong, right?”

Could they be wrong?

Unfortunately, Liz thought. She wished that it could be a hoax and she had been lying to herself all these years but nope, “It’s true.”

Stunned even though she did not need to be because she had heard about it, but she did not know the details even outside a country and western music bar which was not the easiest place to be having this conversation, but the music was loud and therefore they had some semblance of privacy, weird but true they would think.

“You say it was out of protection, but why?” Maria asked.

“The government knew everything,” Liz sighed. “And when I say, everything, I mean it” she allowed, and Maria sighed.

“How could they?” Maria asked. “Didn’t Pierce or Fisher or whatever the hell his name was, I mean, didn’t he once Nascedo took over destroy every bit of evidence?”

“Up until that point” Liz murmured, and she meant it. “But even then, they were able to know what went in the early days of everything. The shooting, Max, and me, and what the guys and even Isabel ultimately did. You can wipe it all away, but you cannot wipe away everything without something coming back to haunt us, as evident with Tess’s ability,” she murmured and she did not even know half of it, and Maria had to sadly nod to the words even if she did not know how the government could know.

Liz is right about that she was forced to realize. “But…”

“But nothing,” Liz murmured. “All three of them did some things that haunt after Nascedo left this earthly plane of a planet,” she sighed and therefore they were able to figure out and even find hard evidence on other aspects of it,” she muttered as she felt the coolish New Mexico air. It might be May, but still the nights could turn, and turn in ways they would never know was possible for living off the desert heat. “Tess even went out in a blaze of glory that left trails to us, which is why we had to leave town in the first place.”

“I know,” Maria muttered. “But it would eventually calm down.”

Which it did she thought. We might not have come back until now, but that was never about the danger but because of my dreams, she thought. And now she was forced to see that they had been living the dream all these years while Liz took the bullet for them. Not literally, but it was close enough.

“Only because they eventually would find me and forced me into the deal because otherwise, they would have messed with everything, and when I said everything, I mean it Maria, everything.” she murmured, and she could tell Maria did not quite grasp what was being threatened if she had not taken the deal. “By then I had Claudia to think of, and you were newly pregnant with Lucy and trying with a lot of success to make a name for yourself in Nashville. I knew what it would mean to your career if they got a sniff of where you were.”

“So, taking this deal saved us, including Michael and me?” Maria wondered and being in the business for the last years meant she knew what would have happened if any controversary was attached to her career. Nashville is not as forgiving, she thought. I would have been done even before I began, she thought and knew how lucky was that the media had not found out her husband and daughter’s true status.

“Yes, and Isabel too,” Liz murmured as she thought of the happiness that her former sister-in-law had been able to find over the years. She and Isabel might not have gotten along all the time, but she was doing it for her as much as she was because she knew how close Max was to his sister.

“What about me?” came a voice into the conversation as it walked up the gathering. And Liz and Maria were almost relieved to know it was Isabel so that it was not someone who was uninitiated to their drama and instead she had some stakes to it.

“Isabel,” Liz asked.

“Liz,” Isabel murmured as she faced her former sister-in-law for the first-time face to face. “So, I walked in on something did I not?” Isabel Evans at one time Ramirez Anderson and now simply Isabel Evans again looked at the woman who once was her sister-in-law and looked at the woman who was married to her best friend in the world. It is definitely an interesting life we have, she thought. “Did I hear my name in being taken in vain?”

“No,” Liz murmured. “I was simply trying convince Maria what I did was right” she muttered. “I bet she would have done the same thing if she was in my position, but you were not, so believe me, when I say, it was something I needed to do.”

“Was it?” Isabel murmured as she had years of watching the real stakes that were in the destruction of her brother’s world, and it was all because of this woman who with her short statue did not look like she could cause so much heart ache, boy were we wrong as she turned her focus to Maria “I see her that she is trying to convince you that she did best?”

Maria sighed, because this was not what she wanted from this night. Because she did not need it when things were already difficult with her Space boy. A space boy who was gruff and difficult on his best days and even though she knew this little fight of theirs would blow over because we have been married for a lot of years, she muttered and we fight, and they will blow over but she did not know like knowing how fragile everything was, right down to her hold on her marriage, because anything could come out of the blue and stop it in its tracks.

Now, we are decades from where it all started so the chances of everything changing on a dime, Maria told herself as she looked at the frown on Isabel’s face and wondered if she should have agreed to Isabel demand that she come along when she realized that Maria was going to see Liz. The last thing we need is for things to explode.

“Believe me Isabel, I am not lying” Liz muttered as she was desperately in a need for a beer to cool things down.

“You lied to my brother about why you wanted out?” Isabel muttered.

“That was something different,” Liz murmured.

“Is it all that different,” Isabel muttered as the three women were in almost a face off because of the past, a past that was downright bizarre, and unique and could never be shared by anyone other than the three women and they would sometime have to come to terms with their bonds, whether they actually liked each other or not.

“Congresswoman Whittaker, or even Agent Burns” was all Liz muttered.

And it stopped Isabel in her tracks, and Maria almost whistled, whoa, she muttered.

Proving she was not finished naming crimes of the past. “Agent Fisher,” Liz muttered as she glanced at Maria and she flinched, “And Max, you know Vermont,” she muttered as she glanced at Isabel who winced. Even though Isabel was going through her own drama at the time. Still, Vermont was a code to a very confusing time for them all. And we are damn lucky that Max was still living after that fiasco, but that was a very different story she thought. Still, we deal with the effects of that time, she thought. Especially me, she thought once more. “So, you all have secrets that would have thrown you into real danger, so you do not have to like me Isabel because you and I are different people but at the end of the day, leaving Max and aligning myself with who you see as the enemy was about protecting you all. Because none of you would have been able to have the lives you have had lived all these years. So, I left your brother to protect him. And you two,” she said as she walked. “And I am tired of this, I am going inside and getting a cold drink, and I hope I don’t have to explain myself anymore,” she muttered, and she walked away and stopped cold when she saw a familiar car.

And two familiar people getting out of it, Damn it she cursed.

[totallizfan]

Liz might not want to explain the situation anymore....but piecemeal explaining won't cut it.

She needs to call a meeting...humans & aliens and tell everyone what happened.

They deserve to know.

Ava's back...interesting.

[Superman86]

Liz might not want to explain the situation anymore....but piecemeal explaining won't cut it.

She needs to call a meeting...humans & aliens and tell everyone what happened.


They deserve to know.

Ava's back...interesting.

I agree 100%, Also I'm curious to see how Max really gonna deal with Archie,lol

[Parker1947]

And those two figures were of course Max and Michael who were arriving in the same car because Max had gotten thrown out of his daughter’s apartment. Because he chose to show that he was the adult, and she was still too inexperienced to being playing house with her boyfriend, forgetting that once upon a time, he had not been that much older than his daughter currently was and had been married and playing house for real with his wife, my daughter’s mother he thought. We were old souls by that point he wanted to think, we had seen too much, and he did not want to see his daughter in a situation that was going to be harmful to her but of course Claudia had enough of it, and was not going to take it, “Forget it,” she snapped. “Because you are not my father, she would mutter back in the apartment.

“Claudia,” Max tried.

“No, because sure, you might have helped Mom create me, but you are not my father. And what you are, is only on some paper that is filed with the state. Even if it is, I am not sure I can believe that right now because this is all too much,” she muttered and she knew she was ranting, and not making any sense. “Because if Mom took whatever deal, how can I believe anything else she might say, or any documentation that might be true?”

Shit Max would think. Obviously, she knows more than she did… Even if she probably does not believe what she is ranting “Claudia”, he tried.

“No, please go. You might be my father, but you are not also, because you have not been there. That might be on Mom, but it’s also the truth, and this is my apartment, and you have no right to be here. Please Max,” she muttered, and Max winced at the use of his name, and not Dad. That hurts he thought. But to Claudia, it was too much. “I mean, you had to know Mom would not be here, because I told you where she was, so I need you to stop playing the concerned father okay because my life is mine. I am now eighteen and I control my own life, and therefore you cannot stop Archie from staying here.”

“I am sure your mother could?” Max asked and knew he should not have said that and that definitely was wrong to say he conceded and was shown the door in his face, and he turned around and needed time to figure out what was going to happen next.

Because anything could happen now, he thought as he picked up his phone and dialed Michael number, and because husband and wife had not told each other of their plans. Michael would not have known where his wife would be going, or that the person he did not want to see or have his friend see would be there.

And now, the car turned into the parking lot of Cow Patties, and now, across the lot Liz saw who was arriving in the open car. “Max kept the car,” she murmured to herself but thankfully Max did not see her, nor did Michael because they were getting out of the car and looking at Cow Patties and not across the parking lot.

So, Liz did something she was quite used to, and ran and rushed into the establishment and found herself in the bathroom and trying to get air.

Even though she would have been better off staying outside if she needed fresh air, but being outside would be about seeing Max.

While back where she had originally been only a few minutes before. Maria and Isabel could only look at each other and shake their heads, as the viewed the arriving party. “I did not tell Michael where we were going,” she admitted. “We were barely talking when I left the house.”

“Why,” Isabel asked because of course, she had not been a part of the fiasco in the park because she had been home with her daughter.

Mikyla was getting used to being home and had found herself going to a movie with Lucy while Isabel heard of Maria’s plans and demanded that she was included and now it was colliding once more into something larger than they were intending because they had only wanted a simple carefree night, away from the complications of their life.

So much for that thought they would both think.

“So, Liz told us” Maria muttered as she thought of what Liz had told her. “I guess it put things in prospective.”

“Assuming you believe her version of the situation,” Isabel muttered.

“Jesus,” Maria muttered because the last thing she wanted was one more person doubting Liz’s bravely. She might have her own thoughts about her friend’s actions, but still she knew Liz would not have done what she did easily. “You and Michael are impossible; do you know that?” she murmured. “When we both know Liz knows more than any of us when it comes to what was going on back then, because she is the one who was approached, so we should take her at her word. She wanted to save the day. Her way. Which is very much on brand for her. She wanted to protect your brother, her husband at the time. My husband, even my career, and our children, and maybe even yours even though they were not born yet so I can believe her when she suspected how bad it would have been for you, Max, and Michael if she had defied them, and chose to stay with Max.”

Isabel could only sigh as she hated Maria’s faith. “You have always been trusting of her…” Isabel muttered even though she could believe what Liz had said was likely to be true, because she had to live down all she had done in those three years of high school and her first year of college. And some of our actions were clearly illegal and we would have been given prison time if we were found out or if we did not have Jim on our side, and even then, Jim was off the job, and therefore, he could not have prevented everything she thought. Federal was a different jurisdiction than what Jim would be able to control, she told herself. We were lucky.

So, it was plausible, but she did not like that Liz had saved her and done so by hurting her brother.

As they watched as Liz did what she does best, and run Isabel thought as the brunette stood stunned to see a car she recognized. We all recognized it Isabel thought but the guys did not see the girls over there and went in their way into the bar.

“Looks like she is not going to get that carefree night,” Isabel muttered.

“I am going in there…”

“Not without me,” Isabel muttered.

“If you think you are going to keep your brother and Liz apart, dream on” Maria warned as they walked towards the country and western bar which was trying to celebrate a lost decade, one of excess and a unique sense to it, and the music was from all realms, not strictly country.

And the women got a full sense of it as they walked in.

*

Liz wanted to hide in the bathroom for fear of seeing Max. After all, they had not seen each other since the day before, and so much had happened since then, and tonight was about blowing off some steam and not about more angst. Good luck on that… She also wanted to drown her sorrows, which is what I am prevented from doing she muttered because she had not expected to add to the agenda of the night, seeing the one who got away.

The one I threw away she was thinking to herself as she was debating whether to call it a day and head back to the motel. Kyle and JJ were still at the double header of a marathon, of the recent Star Wars movies as the local economy was trying to get people into the movie theatre despite no current movies being released on the big screen, and would be awhile more, and she could be alone with her thoughts if she went back to the motel. “Go home Liz,” she was telling herself in the mirror.

“That would be pointless,” came Maria’s voice as she walked in. “You might as well want to face it.”

“Are you speaking to me now?” Liz asked.

“I was always speaking to you,” Maria smiled. “You are my Petunia,” she said with a small sigh and another smile. “We might not get each other all the time but I am here for you, and I know you would do the same for me” she said with a smirk. “And I am also hiding out because I don’t want to deal with my Space boy at the moment.”

“Is it really that bad?” Liz asked, even though she had seen the tension between the two the night before, but still she was surprised because for some reason Maria and Michael had always been able to make it work. Against the odds. Therefore, nothing gets between them, and they will be crossing eighteen years very soon, she thought. While Max and I only got to our first anniversary she muttered. So, how can I give any advice on a healthy marriage?

“No, it will blow over” Maria smiled. “It always does, but he needs to cool down” she muttered. “And I am not wanting to see him right now.”

Liz sighed. I wish I could be in a relationship where I knew it would be alright at the end of the night, she thought. “I guess we better get out there.”

“If you are ready to deal with it,” Maria smiled.

“I guess,” Liz sighed as she was looking for another diversion, “Hey, you never did tell me about what happened between Max and Tess?” she asked, as she did not even know if she wanted to know, but still, it was a diversion, right? and she was looking for anything to get in the way, so she did not have to go out and see Max.

Assuming Max even wanted to see her…

Augh Maria muttered. Of course, that would still be on her mind she thought although she knew her friend was also looking for yes, a diversion, and she was not going to play because the night was already going to be calamitous.

And neither of them needed, “That is for another time.”

“Why won’t you tell me?” Liz murmured.

“It does not change anything,” Maria sighed. “Nothing changes with you knowing, and I am not going to let you distract yourself from dealing with tonight.”

“Chicken,” Liz murmured.

“You know it,” Maria smiled. “Petunia, trust me, you will know, just maybe you should deal with tonight, and you can find out another time.”

“I guess,” Liz sighed because she knew she had not wanted to head out, and deal with seeing the man she still loved because she was hopeless, because nothing had stopped her from loving that dark hair mystery man…

A man’s whose heart she had deeply broke…

*

Max did not know what to expect. Coming to Cow Patties, all he wanted was to ignore the feelings that came with his ex being back in town, and his daughter being too much of a grown-up and knowing how much he had missed, no wonder she kicked me out he thought. It is a brand-new world he was thinking. Too much was different and so he took a beer from the table, “Thanks,” he said to the bartender but saw Ava coming out of the back room, the red hair is unnerving he thought and wished his friend was out here instead of in his own mood and extremely cranky, and therefore was looking for trouble, but seeking out a poker game that was known to be given in the backroom.

Not that Michael knew because until recently, he had been in another state all together.

But it was something Max was not known to partake in he thought. Because I spend my money on other pursuits, and of course Michael would find a game now that he was back in town, he said with a smile.

So now Ava was coming out of the backroom, and she had a habit of being noticed and fighting off those drunken lunatics which she was doing tonight and was quite capable of doing it he thought as he got a good look at the red head. At least it is not blonde he thought because then he would have deal with the memories of Tess’s final betrayal he thought. “Ava,” Max muttered as the woman came close, “Busy tonight.”

“Definitely,” Ava said and saw how Max was looking at her and knew they did not see each other much, because Max did not come here much because drinking is best kept behind closed doors he thought, but home has Dad in it and he was not ready to deal with his father. It means something that I am letting him stay, right? he told himself. Actually, being home and dealing with his father was a whole different atmosphere now that things were out in the open, and he did not need it.

It is better for our relationship if we stick to our corners he thought.

And especially tonight.

Trying to figure out how to speak to Max, because the past haunts in many ways Ava thought even though it was not me who did the harm, it’s my duplicate she thought. A girl who is hard to live down because of her reputation and her actions.

Even if most of the town would not have known it.

But still, she was trying to be her own person, without being tied down by someone’s baggage. And she was definitely not interested in someone who wanted someone, which is a lesson Tess should have learned, she thought.

Who gives a crap about other planets, and their fates?

Obviously, Max wanted Liz and unfortunately, they had not managed to figure it out, but she was not going down a rabbit hole repeating her duplicates failures, she thought. I had Zan and even though we had a good time, still, it was not something she was willing to repeat.

I just have to figure out my one.

If he’s out there…

But for tonight, she was going to concentrate on what she did best as she watched as Max felt like he had the world on his shoulders, “These theme nights let people unwind.”

“It seems to be a different world,” Max agreed as he took a sip of his beer. Because he knew he had to be careful because while his experience back in high school never repeated itself because my tolerance built to a better degree he thought, but still, you have to be careful and not drink too much. “People are having fun.”

“That they are, so are you in the mood for some fun?” Ava asked.

But Max could only stare at her as if he was suggesting something because she is Tess’s duplicate after all, he muttered. “Are you trying to say something?”

“Hell no,” Ava murmured. “Calm down Max, I know it would be a suicide mission to go there,” she with a laugh as she threw another beer bottle across the bar at the manifestation of who maybe I should be if we were in another time but nope, I am serious, I am not going to go there when it was obvious that he wants someone else. “So, I would not even go near you, and I can sense you don’t see me in the same way, but all I know is that I can see how you are winded up tonight, and therefore, I am just thinking you need to have some fun.”

“Sorry,” Max muttered. “It’s been a long couple of days,” Max murmured.

“I gather it would, with Parker back in town” Ava murmured.

“Have you seen her?” Max asked as she looked around and wondered if she was nearby because obviously, how else would Ava know about Liz’s return he thought but at the moment, he did not see his former wife because he had obviously had not seen his ex-wife out in the night air.

“I read the fraternity’s newsletters, and they are trumping the return of Liz Parker,” Ava said as a joke because she might be one of them, but they keep things too quiet for there to be a group email and Max only shook his head and it got a laugh out of the red head. “Seriously Max, I am sure, you will be seeing her” Ava murmured with a smile. “Sometime…” Neither confirming nor denying that she had seen his former wife. “It is going to be an interesting night.”

“What do you know?” Max asked.

“A lot, and nothing at the same time” Ava murmured. “Relax and enjoy the night Max because it’s 80’s night, and sometimes it is good to go back and remember when things were a lot saner,” she said with a smile. “Or at least a time when the music was easier to listen to,” she murmured as she focused on the band on stage, doing covers of all kinds of songs she thought because she wanted the bar to be lots of fun.

“Yeah, maybe,” Max asked as Michael came out of the back room. “No luck on that poker game?” Ava asked the gruff best friend of Max. And Michael only sighed. “You better not tell your wife how much you lost in there.”

“Leave me alone,” Michael muttered. “And stay away from Maria.”

“Boy, you are in a mood” Ava murmured. “I guess, the stories are right.”

“What stories?” Michael asked.

“The ghost stories,” Ava said with a smile. “But that is for another time because I was serious because here comes your wife,” as she pointed to the area where the bathroom was, I don’t see Liz yet, she must be hiding in there she thought.

“Oh geez,” Michael muttered as, yes, he saw his wife coming and stopping and staring at him. “She did not tell me she was coming here.”

“And I bet, you did not tell her that you and Max were coming here?” Ava asked. “Or that you would end up in a poker game that will cost you any recent paychecks,” she said with a smile, and even Max had to laugh. “Fine, I will stop it.”

“We decided on that late,” Michael muttered as he chose to ignore Ava’s implications with a grunt and a groan as through the crowd, he saw Isabel. And he could feel it in his bones that it was going to be one of these nights, wasn’t it not?

How can it not be?

Max also saw his sister and sighed. Because he did not want trouble.

Maria surely did spot her husband, but she did not walk towards the bar because she went and sat next to Isabel and chose to blatantly ignore her husband, which only aggravated Michael even more, I am the one who should be pissed off he thought not Maria he muttered. “Liz did to take that deal,” he said unfortunately out loud.

And saw the paleness in Max’s night, and the wideness of Ava’s eyes because she did not know the latest details that would drive their group to distraction.

So, yeah, it was going to be one of those nights.

*

“Parker is still hiding out in the bathroom?” Isabel muttered as Maria came over after coming out of the washroom. Something she had chosen in the end not to do, in following Maria in because she needed a break from it, as she spotted Michael at the bar along with Max, oh boy both would think because they did not know what having Max and Michael here would bring to the night, and it was a surprise to see them here because my two brothers usually do not do their drinking in public, she could not help but think. Me on the other hand. I have a more iron clad constitution so I can hold my liquor, and I like being out with friends and company. Michael when he is around and even Max are more solitary. As she saw them talking to Ava. Which was still a development that was surprising to her and Max when Tess’s duplicate showed up in town with a whole new look, and image and then bought the bar, and turned out to be very different from her earlier self and even her other half, Tess. Someone who she had a hard time remembering for obvious reasons. Still, despite her years in town. Ava’s return was something we had to keep an eye on, she thought. Because we do not know what it all means.

It could be meaningless because things had been fine. Ava has kept to herself, she thought. But Isabel had not known what to expect with the completely new Ava that returned to town. Distancing yourself from your duplicate who was of course dead but left of pain in her wake she thought. Who was the chief reason why we fled this town?

Isabel winced at the memories of that time.

Because it killed my marriage Isabel muttered bitterly although she was smart enough to know that her marriage had been hanging on for dear life by the end there so Tess’s actions had not been what had killed it.

We killed it all on our own. Or I did.

Because running from town to town and living out of a suitcase did not help matters, Isabel muttered to herself. So, Ava had a lot to follow but since she had returned to town, she had kept a low profile and had made this place a profitable business.

And it was more of a classy country and western bar than what it was like when were teenagers she thought. We did not come here, much or at all. Isabel thought. Only Jim did for a time. Although I believe Maria did some singing here… “Miss this place?”

“Who me?” Maria asked as she looked at the whole different attitude of the bar, as a country classic from the 80’s was playing, and it was a much nicer place than it was back in her day, when yes, I got discovered here she thought of that time she was singing with Jim’s band and that scout saw her and sent her on a little journey there.

And she discovered she wanted to make her own decisions about her career and did not want to compromise. It would help her later, because it told her what she would settle for, and what she would accept. Fortunately, she had been able to become a hit despite the trouble in New York. I started in this place, she thought. “It brings back the memories,” she said softly. “I wonder if Jim ever thinks of that time as a country and western singer?”

Isabel laughed because they both knew Jim was back to being where he belonged.

In the Sheriff’s department, and in the chair that he was meant to be in.

“I hear he has referred to it a time or two,” she said with a smile that Maria even returned. “But he’s back to where he belongs.”

Maria smiled and nodded as she looked over and spotted her husband once more, and knew she had to deal with Michael, and Isabel spotted the tension on Maria’s face and felt the need to defend her brother and best friend. “Michael is Michael. You will never change who he is, and what he thinks.”

“I know,” Maria nodded. I have been married to the man for nearly eighteen years she said with an inner smile. “He has a reason to be the way he is, and I am not saying we should not be pissed at Liz for keeping us in the dark…” she sighed, I am definitely not happy, but I love that girl, and I cannot stay mad, and I believe her when she says that she had no other choice. And I probably would do the same thing if I had been given the chance, Maria thought. But I am the one who got to have a normal existence despite falling in love with an alien.

Who was all talk and no bite she thought most of the time? But still it was aggravation she had long learned to deal with, but on this night, she was not having it. “Maybe it is because we have gone through a lot of changes in the year or so, and definitely the last few days.”

Isabel could relate, “We all have gone through changes,” she thought. “Life was going so smoothly there for a while?”

Maria nodded as she glanced at her husband once more.

And Isabel could see the turmoil, “But she took the bullet for us, so that we could be living the life we are?” Isabel asked because despite her many issues with her former sister-in-law, she knew what Liz’s actions had cost me, and it was a cost that gave me a good life and her a shitty one, she thought. “You got your career. Michael got you and Lucy. I got my girls, if not a marriage that goes to the test of time,” she thought, although I came close with Neil she sighed as she thought of all the things, she had been able to achieve these past years.

So, it means I should probably give Liz some respect, right?

Still, Isabel did not know what it all meant. And that is why it was still hard to come to terms with it and be easy on Liz for what she had done to her brother.

Which is why it is hard.

“So, you might want to give her the benefit of knowing she would not have knowingly hurt us if she could have prevented, and I can say we probably got the better side of the deal” Maria murmured. “I really don’t know everything that went down, but still, we got a life, and she has to give up a lot.”

“I know,” Isabel murmured. “Still, she hurt my brother.”

“And you want to hate her on behalf of him,” Maria murmured although I doubt Max hates her, and he was the one who lost the wife and child.

“Something like that,” Isabel muttered. “So, I might as go in and smoke her out of the bathroom, huh?” she asked as she looked over and saw her brother still with Ava. “That is troubling,” she muttered. “Should we be worried?”

“Ava,” Maria asked. “She’s harmless,” she smiled. “She’s not Tess. She does not want that drama.”

“I don’t know if she is” Isabel murmured. “She is single after all…”

“Then you might want to get on the bandwagon that involves your brother because I don’t think Max would ever look at someone else if Liz is in the arena,” Maria murmured. I am not even going to get into whether it is wise or not, because sometimes you love who you love, and common sense has not a thing to do with it, she thought.

“That might be going a little too far,” Isabel murmured. Because she did not want to go that far and endorse a reunion between her brother even though that might be the only thing that would give her brother some peace. But still the past is the past, and it is hard to reconcile it all.

“Then are you going to champion Ava?” Maria batted towards Isabel, who winced.

Not on this planet Isabel murmured out loud. “I want my brother to be happy.”

“I think we can all agree on that much,” Maria muttered as she stayed with her drink, and Isabel walked towards the bathroom.

*

While the adults were revisiting angst, that was so common back in their youth. The youth of today had it easy as the movie let out and Lucy and Mikyla were walking of the movie theatre, which had been set up to try to give people in the small town something to do despite very little being released and movie theatres at a whole have a tough climate to be open in, and they ended up seeing Kyle and JJ coming out of the one next to it. The girls were seeing an old fashion romance while Kyle and JJ had seen a Star Wars double feature, and neither knew they were next to each other. “That is interesting,” Lucy murmured as she was the first one to see Kyle and Claudia’s little brother come out of the theatre, “Wonder why Tripp is not with them?” she murmured.

“I might have said that too soon, because there he is,” Mikyla smiled as she saw the older teenager come out of a different door than his father and JJ. “I knew it, those movies are hard for him to ignore,” she said. “But then there is nothing to do around here, so you might as well see a movie you have seen many many times before, and even own the whole collection to this date of movies?”

“So says the girl who has been in Europe for the last months?” Lucy smiled of the feeling that Roswell was limited. Sure, it is, she thought as she was also one who had been able to see other horizons in a much bigger setting like Nashville.

Which is always bursting at the seams she thought, although that feeling is a little bit on hiatus for the moment.

“And you were in Nashville,” Mikyla smiled as if she had her mother’s talent to see into people’s minds, she doesn’t “I love this town, but you don’t have to be here long to know this is a very different town,” she smiled. At least life is more alive than it was when I last was here. Because then everything was so downbeat.

“I know, but I love it all the same” Lucy murmured it is a change of pace as Tripp noticed both Lucy and Mikyla and showed some surprise in seeing Mikyla. Because obviously he had not been hit with the latest that had Kyla back home. After returning the previous night. So, Tripp could not help but walk towards the girls while Kyle and JJ were oblivious to it all and had gone on their own.

Leaving the trio of teenagers alone.

“Kyla?” Tripp asked.

“Hey Tripp,” Kyla said of the boy that was secretly her half-brother even though none of the family had recognized that fact, still it was the worst known secret she muttered, as I have said, we keep our identities more under wraps she thought. Although Tripp is normal.

But I am, but we share a father.

In only blood only, she thought I had another last name. Even though her mother’s second husband did not officially adopt her, but she took his name to make it simple for her growing up, even though Mom has gone back to her maiden name, but I have the same last name as my sisters she thought it made things easier as she contemplated the man who was walking away, “Who is the kid?” she asked Lucy.

As she thought of Kyle, and her surprise to the young boy with Tripp’s father.

Who was holding onto the deal he made with my mother the brunette could not help but think which means no legal or official involvement in my life? Because she looked nothing like her mother, but so much like Kyle that you would have to be in a lot of denial not to notice the similarities and even resemblance of the pair, but still not many would know because of the name Anderson behind my name, and my stepfather did have brown hair she would mutter as she once more wondered who the kid was, Poppy and Katy were obviously adopted. “Who is the boy with your father? Kyle?”

“JJ Parker,” Lucy murmured as Tripp nodded. “Claudia’s little brother.”

“She has a little brother?” Mikyla asked, as she did not know her mysterious cousin because they were raised apart from each other, but she knew enough to know her uncle was forever haunted by the fact his wife had left him, and taken their daughter with her, it is pretty harsh to take a child away from her father she thought.

As a child who was not raised with an everyday biological father, but she knew she had a pretty good life, I cannot complain as she noticed Tripp who had something to complain about because his father could not settle down with one woman. “Did her mother marry again or something?” she knew because she had known her uncle had been married to Claudia’s mother, but things did not work out. And it has been a lot of years, so maybe she did marry again she would think.

That would certainly throw Uncle Max for a loop if she moved on, away from him.

“Nope, adoption or something like that. JJ came into the family as a baby,” Lucy murmured. “He was abandoned or something,” she murmured. “I am not too clear on the details but all I know is Claudia’s mother found him and rescued him about ten years ago, and she adopted him in the end.”

“Cool,” Kyla murmured. It is always good when a little kid gets home. But still she did not understand how that translated to Kyle being with the kid now. “Still, why are your father and Claudia’s young brother together?” she asked of Tripp.

“Things have been tense since Claudia and her mother came to town,” Tripp mentioned even though he had gone to the movie not knowing his father was going to be there he thought as he had arrived at the last minute, after deciding it on late, and since he was currently in the custody of his mother, he would not know his father’s schedule, and once in the theatre, he had taken a seat in the back row because he wanted to concentrate on something that did not have Claudia focused, that is not happening, “I came to say hello, I don’t want to talk about Claudia.”

“Since when?” Lucy said with a smile. Just yesterday, all you wanted to do was talk about Claudia. “You were just asking me to get you two together,” she asked. “So, what is up?”

“It’s nothing,” Tripp mentioned as his mind was haunted by the fact Claudia was with some other guy, and the last thing he wanted was complications, especially when my father is haunted by the one, he cannot have because she was someone else, he thought. I am not going to go down that route and repeat my dad’s patterns.

When I do know better, he thought as he thought of the two girls, he was closest too, someone I am not related too, either by blood or marriage he thought of both Kyla and Lucy. My mental life would be better off not attaching to someone who wants someone else.

“I bet it is juicy,” Lucy said with a smile.

“That is where you are wrong,” Tripp muttered as he was looking for something to concentrate on that was not about him or what I cannot have. “Kyla, you did not answer me, why are you back already. I did not think you were going to be back for a week or so, because that was Dad’s impression,” he thought with a smile. Because while he did not have her travel itinerary memorized, he knew that his father knew more than even he did.

For good reason, not that anything is happening in that regard Tripp muttered.

“I know he was, so was my mother” Kyla said with a smile of the scene she had interrupted and created when she had arrived back at her family home the night before. “But things were getting intense in Europe, so they shut things down a little early, and I came back unannounced,” she said with a laugh. “I cannot help but think that I rained in our parents’ parade with the timing of my return.”

“What?” Tripp asked. “Are you talking about?”

“I walked in on a moment between them last night,” Kyla said with a sigh as she had flashback to the night before “Your father was quick to leave, but I know something was happening,” she asked as she concentrated on the boy in their midst. “Do you know anything about it?” she asked of Tripp.

“Nope, Dad has been hopelessly single since the latest stepmother cheated on him, and divorce number three ensued” Tripp muttered. “He has said more than one, that he has learned a lesson, and this time, I am inclined to believe him,” he said with a smirk. “He can afford only so much alimony,” he said with a laugh that got the girls to smile too. “So, whatever is going on in terms of his love life, I am not that aware, but I do think he is not seeing anyone, and is single, but then I am with my mother at times, so who knows what really is going on,” he muttered. I am sure we will hear whenever things change.

Kyla nodded.

“So, your mother and Uncle Kyle?” Lucy asked of her uncle, via marriage she thought of their mutual grandparents. And how much it was really a close-knit family, too interconnected with very few new people. It would make you laugh, and it did make her sometimes laugh at the inner drama of it all, and especially not since the angst was not being left to the newest generation alone. Because the elders of our group can give us a good run at being melodramatic, she thought. But then I was raised in Tennessee, and not in Roswell.

But still she felt this was her home.

Just like it was for her father and mother, even though her father came from other worlds literally she thought. That can give you a laugh she thought.

If it was not so serious.

Tripp did not have that many worries, because I am the normal one in this bunch he thought. And therefore, I will never truly understand what it is like to be one of them “Seriously, I would not give it a lot of credence” Tripp muttered as he thought of his father, sure I know he is pining away for Kyla’s mother, but come on this is my father…

Nothing every good comes from his romantic life Tripp muttered with a laugh. “I would think that we are far away from anything good or newsworthy coming from our parents,” he said with a laugh. “They don’t rank except for some juicy subplots,” he smiled.

And Kyla nodded and even smiled.

Because knew she had walked into something, but she also knew her mother had been mourning the death of her father, and therefore her mother was not ready to move on, but then I have been away for the last four months she thought, so maybe we are wrong. And we should worry, she thought. But she did not really want to deal with it, “Yeah, maybe you are right. This is Mom and your father after all,” she muttered ignoring the added significance that Kyle Valenti was her biological father, and that meant anything that continued to bond their parents would have huge implications for their family. “I cannot see it.”

Lucy only could smile, because she knew how much Kyla and Tripp would not want it to happen because it would bring a huge change to the family, but it might be good for some fun, she thought. After all, I am the one in this whole drama that has a solid two parent household she thought.

Lucy obviously did not know what was going on with her parents’ generation at the moment. Oblivious to it all, she was happy in her oblivion “Your parents are on the outskirts of it all, because the real fun is with Claudia’s mother and father.”

[Parker1947]

Of course the drama was not limited to the teenagers which they obviously knew by now but things were completely unsettled because there were facets that no one knew, and especially not the newest generation except for Claudia who was currently trying to ignore it and run away from it, it must run in the family she thought as she was using her boyfriend arrival to ignore the feelings that were bubbling up in her, that were ones of resentment because of all she had missed out on but also the abandonment she felt because she had missed out on so much, and even if Mom took some deal. Still, Dad did not second guess her decision and therefore he let me go off with her without much of a fight.

And therefore, I am using Archie to ignore my issues with both of my parents she thought to herself. I know it probably is unreasonable to be so upset at my mother, and even my father because there is so much, I do not know she knew. After all, there are always two sides to a story she thought, even the most upsetting events in our life she thought.

I grew up with Mom, she thought. But she took me away from Dad.

And Dad let me go without a fight she thought. That much is clear she knew. He did not put a fight up for me, she thought. Did he not love me? she wondered, and she knew she had already asked that of her birth father, and he had tried to answer it of course that was before he knew pertinent facts of life she muttered, but then I even don’t know what is going with them and this whole story she thought.

She was feeding off the anger she had heard in Lucy’s father’s voice, and the venom he had for her mother. A woman who had given me everything she muttered and tried to give me a good life she thought. She did give me a little brother.

A little brother that kept her in this town even though her first instinct was to pack up and head back to Colorado with Archie and disown both of her parents.

But JJ kept her there, and the knowledge that this was so much bigger than even she could imagine because I did not live in their time she thought, I came just before it all ended for them, she muttered, so she had not seen how intense it was, and how dangerous it was, which was largely why her mother undertook the actions she had…

Still Mom did what she did Claudia thought as she was slowly coming back to reality, enough she would be able to hear the sound of her hunky boyfriend, “Hey, Claude what is going on with you?”

“What?” Claudia asked as she came back to earth, in so many ways she thought as she looked at her boyfriend sitting in bed, after they had done what they had done for the lion’s share of the time that he had been in Roswell except for a brief respite of it.

“I was asking, what is going on with you?” Archie asked as he could see his girlfriend was out of it, and he was not so oblivious to know something was up with her, even though he was taking what she was offering, hours of mind blowing sex he thought, there will never be someone like Claudia he knew because Claudia seemed so average, but little did he know that she was not your average teenager, and there were probably reasons for their connection but he was not about to quibble about it as a nineteen year old man.

Who was here to visit his hot girlfriend who suddenly had a whole apartment to herself, something they had made sure to take full advantage of it, without a few obstacles except Claudia’s father he thought?

Which surprised him because she had told him that he was not in the picture, and every discussion that we had on the subject made it sound like he was dead, he thought. “Are you here with me?”

“Of course, I am,” Claudia muttered even though she knew she was out of it and had to come back to reality because of Archie.

“It does not feel like you are,” Archie muttered.

“Well, I am here” Claudia muttered as she got out of bed and reached for her robe because the last thing, she wanted to do was having a big emotional talk with a guy was good for one thing, and they often kept talking for other times, which hardly come she thought. She had learned early that she did not have to share her life story with her boyfriend, even though I know I implied certain things she thought.

But then until I saw my father, he could have been dead for all I knew because Mom certainly did not tell me I could know him or see him.

“It does not feel like you are,” Archie muttered again.

“What does it matter,” Claudia asked. “You got what you wanted did you not?” she asked, “Which is why you came to Roswell after all.”

Whoa Archie muttered as he felt the words slap him. “Is that all I am good for?” he wondered as he too out of bed and reached for his clothes. “You did not have to sleep with me, or you could have turned me away?”

The sex is what is distracting me, so it would do me no good to turn that away she thought realistically. “I am not in the mood for this discussion Archie,” Claudia muttered. “We had something good going, so don’t ruin it.”

“By talking?” Archie asked.

“By wondering what is going on in my head. The last thing I need is more complications because my life is swimming with it, and I was not looking for anymore to be coming from you. Don’t get me wrong. I do appreciate you coming, and deep down I needed your visit, so yes, I do appreciate, do not think that I don’t, and no, I don’t only think of you for the physical part of our relationship,” she muttered. “Although that is pretty great.”

“Yes, it is” Archie agreed.

“And I miss it when we are separated, and we have been separated for much of the last year since you graduated and moved to Colorado for school…”

“Which became complicated,” Archie muttered which is why I had to find a job elsewhere to be able to make a living in jobs that were still hiring as the world shut down, he thought.

“Don’t I know it,” Claudia muttered because she was an example of a non-traditional senior year, and here I am, weeks away from graduation in another state and able to do my studies on-line, which is something I am being bad at finishing she thought of those term papers she had to forward to her teachers, I have to complete them to send them to my teachers she thought but sometimes she wondered if she could have been wondering about what to wear to prom, or even graduation she thought. Not that I miss the structure of school.

Which is why I am looking forward to the year off, she thought.

I need it.

“Claudia, come back to me” Archie muttered.

Shaking herself back to reality, “I am fine, I have not gone anywhere,” she sighed even though I have gone somewhere…

“Yes, you have” Archie muttered as he stared at his girlfriend. “You are in your head again,” she muttered as if this was something he was not used to seeing, which was of course he was, we know each other he thought but he also knew he did not, not totally “Is this about your father paying a visit?”

“I knew you would bring him up eventually,” Claudia muttered, and she thought she had distracted him from asking anything with the mind-blowing sex, and insane glow of it all she thought. “I don’t want to talk about him.”

“You told me he was dead.” Archie muttered.

“No, I didn’t” Claudia sighed. “I told you that he had never been in the picture, and that is true. He and my mother divorced when I was three months old. Mom took me, and I did not know the man, or see him until the other day, so he could have been dead for all I knew,” she thought. “I did not know he would be here when Mom came up with the insane idea of reopening this place with our return to her hometown,” she thought. “A place I have no connection too, because for all I know, he could have moved on.”

“But he’s not dead,” Archie asked. “And he did not move on?”

“No, he’s not dead” Claudia muttered although thanks to her mother’s journal. She knew now that claim was too close for comfort, he could have died very easily she thought of the notations in her mother’s journal that were vague. Because more and more of the passages that her mother had written were skimping on details so, there is a lot I do know.

Obviously, that goes with a lot of facets of my life, she thought.

“Claudia,” Archie muttered. “You zoned out there once more,” he sighed. “Can’t you stay in the present?” he asked of the fact that this was not the first time his girlfriend zoned out in the oddest of times. “So, you have a father?”

“Of course, I have a father otherwise I would never been alive in the first place,” Claudia muttered. “Can we table this for another time, because I don’t want to discuss it.”

“You never want to discuss anything about your life,” Archie muttered as it was starting to come to him that there were aspects of his girlfriend’s life he did not know and he was starting to feel some resentment, because she knows so much about my life he thought as they had been together for nearly two years now. “Why is that?”

“Sometimes, we have parts of ourselves that we don’t want to discuss, and you should honor that” Claudia muttered. “It does not affect our lives.”

“It affects about how close we can get?” Archie muttered.

“You live in Colorado, and until recent days, I lived in Boston and Arizona,” she muttered. “So, we were doing pretty good despite not seeing each other,” she muttered as she was now in her defensive posture, and he could see it, she is becoming defensive he thought, and he did not know why. “We were doing pretty good with how close we were,” she said of the creative ways they had been able to be close in, even if they were not face to face.

Online is not only for education purposes she thought, and she would almost blush because she knew her mother would not have approved. And she had been on a “celibacy” kick since living with her grandparents. You cannot be alone in a senior’s villa, she thought.

With grandparents who were keeping an eagle eye on you she thought.

She loved her grandparents, but she needed to get out of that environment and that is why she had come back…

“How come you did not tell me…” Archie asked.

“About what?” Claudia asked, as if she did not know. “Archie, let us just concentrate on the now, and not focus on the past.”

“The past is always important, as it is part of the now” Archie muttered. “I want to know you,” he muttered as he knew they should have talked about this before we jumped into bed together, he thought. “You only let me know what you want me to know,” he said. “I love you.”

“I love you too,” Claudia murmured. Even though she did not know if it was really the love that she wanted for the rest of her life, it does feel good for now, she thought. And he is good in bed she thought, as she looked at Archie who had come to spend time with her, and she had been bad at wanting to share everything about her, and there was stuff she could not tell him because she had been drilled into all her life from her mother that she had to keep certain things to herself, and not to let it out to others, and to be careful and she certainly knew going to bed with someone was a big risk, when you did not know if you were in true love or not.

It is not like what my mother and father had, right? she wondered.

Why am I measuring what Archie and I have against a pairing that did not work out she thought? Mom left my father, and he let her go without a fight she thought.

“Claudia, there you again” Archie muttered. “Why can you not stay in the present?”

“Can’t I have my own mind?” Claudia muttered. “Where I go, is none of your business.”

“Of course,” Archie muttered. “But I want to know you. I want you to let me in and you don’t tell me something major like your father, and you obviously know him,” he muttered. “Enough to speak to him when he came to the apartment.”

He was checking up on me Claudia muttered, and he knew it was crazy situation, I have a father, but I don’t on the other hand she thought as she could see why Archie wanted an in, and wanted to know, and there is only so much I will let him know or experience with me she sighed. As she always known that she was keeping a part to herself. That is a part of being me.

“I don’t know him,” Claudia muttered because she knew she had to talk about the situation. It does nothing to keep it all in. “But that is the point here, I don’t know him. Everything about me is about the fact that my parents could not stick it out together, and she left him when I was three months old and took me, and therefore I did not know him or the man he is. She did not allow it. And because of that. I don’t know myself. I am restless and I know it, Mom wants me to go to university in the fall, but I am resisting it because I need the time to myself, and yet I came back to be closer to my mother and my little brother, but then I find out she is the not the woman I thought she is, and it is rattling my mind,” she said honestly. “So, the last thing I need for you to get on my case because of the fact I am keeping things from you. Which I am…”

“You admit it?” Archie asked. “Why can’t you tell me what is going on?”

“Yes, I do” Claudia murmured. “I have always been upfront about the fact that there is so much I don’t know. Because my parents split up before I could know what it all meant. Still, I know I am different, and there is stuff I cannot say because it’s private. So, Archie, I wish I could be the conventional girlfriend who could spill everything about herself but there are parts of me that are hidden, and to some extent, I don’t even know what is rooted in all of it,” she sighed. A shrink would have a field day with me she admitted, but that cannot happen, can it?

As she quickly came back to reality and saw the concern on Archie ’s mind. “Look, maybe this is bad idea,” she said as she got out of bed and took her robe and paced the room. “The last thing we need right now is this,” she said. “I am not in a good mind space right now.”

“Why not?” Archie asked. “Is it because of you father?”

“No,” Claudia sighed.

“You said something about your mother not being the person you thought she was,” Archie asked. “Which is strange because you two have not gotten along as long as I have known you, and she did not want us to be together,” he thought of the early resistance to their relationship even though we are only a year apart in age he thought.

But something about Elizabeth Parker did not want us to be together he thought. He had thought it was only parental disapproval, but he also knew it had to be more.

“Mom and I are complicated,” Claudia murmured. “It has always been that way between us, but I always thought I knew her, but now I find out I did not, and I don’t really know anything about my life,” she sighed. “I am eighteen and I should know where I stand, and I don’t know anything,” she sighed as she glanced over at Archie. A boy who had come from another state to be with her, to have a visit. And it was something that she was now ruining with all her crap. “You don’t deserve this.”

“I want you to confide in me,” Archie admitted. “I want to be able to help you.”

I wish I could take that support and relish it, but I am not that kind of person she thought. Not yet. “I cannot tell you what you want to hear,” Claudia murmured as she walked into the bathroom, and Archie shook his head. Yeah, she’s not conventional he thought. So, why put me through this, he thought.

Because I do want to know her as he turned and looked out the window onto the balcony. She is someone special. Because it was a very different life than the one his girlfriend had known before. All I want is to know her he thought, and it not to be only about the sex.

Sure, that had been in the calculation regarding this special visit, surprising her and all that he thought but he had come in the middle of something he thought, and she won’t confide in me he thought.

All I want is to know her he thought as he was so in himself and his own thoughts, and I am giving her a hard time about being out to lunch he though when he heard a slam of the door, and it brought her back to reality.

Shit, he thought as he realized she had left him alone.

Why could she have stayed and talked to me? Archie muttered.

*

But she did not because she had to get out of the apartment. Running was something her mother would sympathize with because that was what she tended to, which is what I have been doing all these years Liz was thinking as she was coming to terms with her past. She was still at Cow Patties and being a coward about facing him he thought, Max she muttered as she looked at the mirror.

She had sticked in her while others had come and gone, and now it was Isabel’s turn to come in after being stopped earlier when she had planned to come into the bathroom by a passing friend who stopped and wanted to talk to her, and so Isabel delayed the talk she needed to have with her former sister-in-law, and now she was entering the bathroom. “Eventually you have to suck it up and talk to my brother,” came the sullen blonde who still felt a lot of resentment towards her one time.

“Since when do you want me anywhere near your brother?” Liz muttered. “Or talking to him for that matter?” he asked of her former sister-in-law. A relationship that had never been one of warmth, but they had sucked it up because of their love for the same man, Max she murmured as she thought of the man, she loved out there in the bar, listening to the music.

Assuming he was still around, she thought. Probably he was because Isabel is still here, she muttered to herself. But they did share love for the same individual in Max. And she knew Isabel had a right to be mad at her because of her brother, but still, we have to move on, right?

Except I am not moving on, because I am stuck here…

“I don’t,” Isabel murmured.

“Then why are you wanting me to talk to him?” Liz asked as she knew this was silly. I have to leave this room. The other ladies are giving me a look because of how long I am sticking in here, as if I am hiding.

But I am hiding, and I know it but still, I have to leave this place sometime. “This is some night,” she muttered as she and Isabel deviated from their conversation because neither wanted to deal with it because it was old business.

But it was business that could not be swept away.

Even if both wanted it to be they thought. I don’t want to be dealing with this Isabel herself thought to herself. “I know,” Isabel muttered as she finally spoke. “Look, I don’t begin to understand or even respect what you did to my brother. How can I? Because you made a choice that left him in a lot of pain. Sure, it might have had some benefits for me, and Michael, and even my brother and I do thank you for that, because I am not stupid,” she said I do have to say it, thank you she muttered because she knew the gravity of what Liz had done, and how it could have decidedly swung against her and prevented her from be a wife and mother all these years, Not knowing Kyla, Poppy and Katy would have not something I would have wanted for my life she thought. “But still you hurt my brother, and I cannot get behind that.”

“I was protecting him,” Liz muttered as she knew this was the last place they should have been dealing with the past. Because there are too many ears, and so much of their world was sensitive information, for our eyes only.

“You may say you were, and maybe a part of you were. I can never know what it was like to make such a decision because I did not have too, because it was not something I had to deal with…”

“No, you did not,” she thought. Not that they would have given you such a choice, she muttered to herself. I am special she thought Simply because I loved one of you, and I knew too much she thought. “But my choice allowed you and Michael to go on with your life. The same with Max. I hated making the choice that I did, and I knew would not be easy, and it would cause a lot of pain for all of us, and especially my former husband and our daughter, but it was something I had to make because I had to look out for your brother, and most of all, I had to look out for my daughter. And thinking about what was best for Claudia is something I do think Max would have wanted…” whether he wants to admit it or not.

Yes, he would Isabel knew. I am not stupid and totally insensitive, and I know Claudia had to be protected she thought After all, she was the first of the children to be born and in the glare of the government, she thought unlike the others.

Lucy and Kyla had been born in a different time with different expectations placed on them. The other kids were all too normal and had been able live different existence she thought.

“So, I had to do what I did because otherwise I could have not lived if I could have prevented pain for both Max and our daughter,” Liz muttered. “If any of it could have been different but it was not, and I had to make the choice I did, and I did make it.”

“If you think you think that you made the right decision, then why are you scared to see my brother and face him” Isabel muttered. “Don’t tell me you are not because you have stayed in here all night. You are a big girl. So, why not take ownership of what you did, and go out and deal with my brother, or not deal with him for all I care, and I probably do wish that you would leave him the hell alone. But staying only means you are hiding.”

“I am not hiding, not anymore” Liz muttered even though she knew that was what she was doing. But this is a different kind of hiding she thought. The real kind was what I have been doing for the last eighteen years, and especially those first eight years. But she was not in the mood to defend herself to her former sister-in-law any longer. “It is none of your business what I do.”

“Obviously,” Isabel sighed as she looked around and did not want to be looking at Liz anymore, so finally, she chose to leave the bathroom with a parting. “I am tired of this.”

So am I. Liz thought as she watched her former sister-in-law leave the bathroom and Liz knew she had to deal with this, head on. Wherever this leads us…

*

No one knew where this was leading anywhere and certainly not Max as he sat at the bar. Ava was off tending to other business, and Michael irritable as ever went back to the game, and therefore it was only him, and he winced when he saw Isabel come out of the washroom because all his best guesses of where his former wife was, because she has to be here, he muttered to himself because most of the other players are in this bar he thought. Well, he figured Liz to be in the washroom, hiding out because he had seen Maria head in and out of the room, but choosing not to talk to her own husband.

Max knew something was going on because Michael was as gruff as ever, and usually he and his wife were thick as thieves. Maria always was able to tame his unique ways he would think but tonight was not one of those nights.

As the someone’s presence coming from the direction of the washrooms got his presence, I knew it he thought as he saw his wife’s face for the first time tonight.

Ex or former before the words is all about semantics at this point. In my heart, she’s still my wife he thought, which is why it stings so badly

That it went so badly, he thought.

It was so good there for about a minute he thought. As he saw the beauty that was his former wife. A woman he wished was still his wife, but he had the signed divorce decree at home. And there was nothing funny about the document. It was legit, unfortunately he was thinking. Couldn’t Dad have done some funny business with it? he asked himself as Liz saw him.

But did not approach, as she turned and high tailed it to the table that held her best friend while Isabel just watched, and saw Max and sighed, and approached.

This is not what he wanted, he thought. To deal with Isabel about the woman he loved. “Sis,” he said as Isabel approached.

“Max,” Isabel sighed. “Are you okay?”

“Sure, why would I not be?” Max asked.

Isabel eyes went towards the beer, that was beside Max as he stood at the bar. Not wanting to leave or to get his own table. He saw more when he was here, and he was not about to fight with his sister about his drinking habits. I have built a lot of tolerance since I was sixteen, he thought. When a tiny sip sent him reeling, he thought. I was a lightweight in so many ways.

But it had led me to a memorable night with Liz. A truly memorable one he told himself.

Too bad, I became sober, and it all ended. But I remembered it, despite what I might have told her at the time.

But then we did manage to find our moment there for a while a little bit later he thought in the aftermath of that one perfect night.

“I hope you were not meddling,” Max said as he brought himself back to reality and hit on his situation, full on, as he saw the frown on his sister’s face. “You were, weren’t you?” he asked of his sister’s notion of protection, meddling in my love life.

And sometimes it was by going to Liz and trying to intercede he thought Isabel and my former wife were not always close, he thought. That is an understatement.

“I only meddle out of love,” Isabel muttered.

“Leave Liz and me alone please,” Max sighed. “It does nothing for our situation if my sister does the fighting for me,” he muttered. “We are adults Isabel,” he allowed. Sure, sometimes though we act like adolescents like our children he murmured. “And I am a big boy who can fight my own battles, if I am mad at Liz for not treating me as one back eighteen years ago. I should not need you to fight my battles for me, because Liz and I can handle it ourselves.”

“Can you?” Isabel murmured. I mean she’s hiding in the bathroom she muttered to herself.

“Isabel,” Max murmured.

“Fine, deal with it yourself” Isabel sighed. “I am only trying to be there for you because I know that she will screw things up and hurt you all over again and I will be left picking up the pieces just like I did last time.”

“Last time was different,” Max muttered. “I know everything now…”

“Do you?” Isabel asked.

“What are you trying to say?” Max wondered.

“Just be careful okay,” was all Isabel murmured as she turned and walked away, leaving Max listening to the music, and staring at the only woman who mattered more than his sister as she was laughing with Maria, and taking a sip out of an overly warm beer.

*

“So, did the Royal Princess get into your head?” Maria was asking with a laugh as she took a sip of her beer and watched the music and the dancing. She had not seen her husband come out of the backroom he had gone into not long before. Probably finding himself a game to put his aggression into, she murmured. Because it had been his pattern when they were in Nashville, and there were plenty of games to find in a bar or two. Because there were streams of them in that place, so many places, and so much music she thought as she remembered her days starting out in the business.

She had hit the big time relatively quickly, but still there were those nights where she had to work to get noticed. And Michael hated to watch her struggle, but he stuck it out instead of coming back here, and he could have come back she thought because Max and Isabel were back. The three musketeers separated after a life together, or ever since they came out of the pods together, she thought. Still, her Space boy had needed something to get put into his aggression into, and he could not get himself arrested because that would put them on the radar of the federal government that was before we would know that Liz had kept us out of the limelight, she thought because of a deal that expressively said they could not come after us.

But still, we did not know that at the time and Michael needed to keep below the radar and he found ways to do such and make a living eventually on a case or two over the years she thought. So, as she sang in the bars, and he played in a game or two.

And thankfully it never became anything. And I got my dreams she thought. So, she knew where she could find her Space boy if she had wanted to find him. She knew she was not angry at him anymore. He has his reasons but still it hurts to know he can’t see the good Liz did she thought even though I don’t know the warts of the deal.

Just the overall concept she thought as she had just allowed her blood pressure to come down as she listened to the music, even if it was most definitely not all country music she thought with a smile as the crowd was going crazy.

It was good to be in a place that was allowed to have fun again, even if there were warning signs all over the place that it was not completely over, she thought of the past year, but we are allowed to be ourselves mostly she thought.

“Ava runs a good place,” Maria murmured.

“Yes, she does” Liz sighed as she chose to ignore the question about what Isabel had said to her in the bathroom. She wanted to let loose and have fun.

And forget about the past, or the fact her blood was boiling because she could feel eyes on her she thought. Max, she thought. “Stop looking at me,” she whispered.

And Maria heard the whispers and shook her head. “You have to face him you know,” she asked. “Sometime.”

“We have already had it out,” Liz said softly as she wanted to ignore the feelings that confrontation had dredged up as she looked at Ava. “How long has she been back?”

“I don’t know for sure,” Maria smiled, “After all, I was a resident of another state until recent days,” she sighed. “But I do know she showed up a number of years ago” Maria admitted. Max was telling Michael, once he became aware of the development she thought. As it had taken both her and Michael by surprise because they had thought they had seen the last of Ava back in high school, and in the years to come, no one knew where she was. “She looks completely different, doesn’t she?”

“Yes, she does” Liz acknowledged. “She really does not look like…”

“You know,” Maria muttered, not wishing to say the blonde’s name that they all remembered because of what they had lost before Tess vanquished herself and dredged up a lot of hard times for them, and ultimately began the countdown to the end of Max and Liz. If the government had not been tempted by the army base, then they might have had a better time of it, she thought as she looked at the far away glaze on her friend’s face. “She’s not Tess,” she said there I said her name even though I had said it before, but I hate having to repeat it she thought because she could not forget whom they were missing because of that blonde witch.

“I know,” Liz muttered as memories haunt in so many ways she thought as she saw Michael’s face come out of the backroom. As he stopped and looked their way, and glared when he saw her, his face cracked a little when he saw his wife. “So, are you going to talk to him,” she asked. “You should not take it personally how he feels for me, because I don’t” she thought of course you do she thought to herself, but I know there is a reason for him feeling the way he does.

We have never gotten along, she thought.

Not in the beginning nor in the end, she thought. We just worked together and had to keep it low key, she thought. Although she was not used to people not liking her, because I got along with everyone she thought.

Except maybe Tess she muttered. For good reason she thought of her reason for not trusting Tess but then we were burned because she wormed her way in…

“I know how to deal with Space boy,” Maria muttered.

“Then you two should apologize and move on,” Liz suggested.

“Are you going to apologize yourself and move on,” Maria asked.

“Why should I?” Liz asked. “Because I know what I did was the right thing,” she thought because she was sure she had done right…

She did not want to acknowledge to herself that it was the wrong choice…

But seeing how Max was glaring at her like she was like some lost piece of treasure that he was awe at, against what common sense would tell him was something she had forgotten how it felt like, and she did not know how to deal with what she was feeling…

[totallizfan]

Waiting for Liz to finally have the sit down with the gang. A lot of angst.

[Parker1947]

Just perfect, Michael muttered to himself as he walked out of the back room. The game had finally finished up, and he had won a bundle thankfully, so I don’t have to have one of those conversations with my wife he thought. Because Maria usually will have something to say about it when I lose big, he thought as he put his windfall in his shoe, so for it not to intercepted by any of the money hungry customers in this place, because he had been that way once before he thought and now, I have all the money I need.

And always looking for more…

But still, yes, I have a different life than last I was in town. “Guerin, you are the hit of the game” Ava murmured as she walked out of the back room after keeping the peace as the pot had gotten bigger, and tempers were raising. “You might want to make up with you wife and get out of here because you have people looking out for you after that windfall you took off the table.” And they might be so pleasant to deal with was the message Michael was supposed to be taking from her words, and he knew it.

“I always have people looking out for me,” Michael muttered. “One way or another,” he would mutter Ever since my first go around with this town he thought with a glare from Max who had approached, and heard what Michael was saying. “I don’t need any lectures from you,” he muttered. “I can deal with my own life.”

“Then deal with it,” Max muttered. I have been lacking in my duties as a best friend, he thought. Us being in different states have made for different boundaries “Are you going to tell me what is going on with you and Maria?” he asked only because he suspected it was something he did not want to hear but given over the years Michael had tried to be there for him, whether I took that help is another story he thought. “Neither of you are going anywhere close to each other?”

“It’s better if we don’t talk right now,” Michael murmured.

“What is it about?” Max asked, even though he probably did not want to know.

He did not want to elaborate, and Michael knew that Max would not want to know because he is starting to drift under the spell once more despite his insistence that he was not going too he thought of his best friend’s attachment to his former wife, and the bond that was more than the fact they share a child.

A child my friend was not able to raise. So, he kept it at a “you don’t want to know.”

Oh, Max muttered as he knew his friend’s shorthand signals “Then, I don’t want to hear it,” he said as he walked away. Not willing to hear any snide comments about his former wife. I can be mad at her all I want, but I will not hear them coming from someone else.

Especially not Michael, who did not want me with her in the first place, he thought. As he heard, “I thought so.”

“What is going on?” Ava asked as she stood back and watched.

“I am me,” Michael muttered as if that was going to say anything about it. “I have always been me,” he would think.

“I think we have established that,” Ava said with a smile. You are definitely not like your double she thought of Rath, someone she had not seen in many many years.

A smile that made Michael weary because one never knew what to expect from Ava. While she had been nothing but friendly since coming to town. As opposed to that other version of her he thought. But he quickly put those thoughts out of his mind as he looked at the woman who was very different because she now looks totally different, he thought.

“What?” Ava asked.

“No, nothing,” Michael muttered.

Ava knew what Michael was thinking. She had built up some trust over the years she had been, although she had barely seen Michael because he lived elsewhere, she thought. It was mostly with Max and Isabel, but mostly Max. So, this was a brand-new proposition, she thought of having to deal with someone who did not seem to know what to think of her. “I see that I have to build up some trust with you?”

“As long as you are not…” Michael muttered, not finishing but Ava was capable to seeing what he was saying, or what she believed he was going to say.

“As long as I am not Tess?” Ava asked.

“You said it, I did not” Michael muttered. “You look completely different, so I give you that, but Max is going through a hard time right now, and the last thing we need is a repeat of yesteryear,” he muttered. “Especially since we all know…”

“We are encoded to want what we want?” Ava asked, as she shook her head. “Michael, I wanted Zan. I did not want or know this town’s Max,” she said reminding Michael. “We are very different people. And I am different than Tess, and yes, maybe I came up on the same streets with Lonnie and Rath, your duplicate,” she muttered as she reminded Michael who could not help but wince. “But I could not abide what they did to Zan. But it was hard to leave the world because it was all I knew, but I did eventually, and Liz is the one who helped me see the way. And I got to see how she is the one who has the bond with Max, not me” she muttered to the obvious displeasure of Michael at the mention of Liz. “Grow up,” she muttered. “Max loves Liz. I loved Zan. He was different from Max, and I am not about to try to recapture that with someone who is a copy of him. Because that does me nothing. And we all know that Nascedo sold Tess a rotten bill of goods because we all what he sold Tess was not going to be the life we would have experienced if we had gone back to our homeland,” she sighed. “And sure, given the life Lonnie, Rath and I had once up a time. That might have been worthwhile for a moment or two, but Liz made me see that there was a chance to do some good out there, and she allowed me a chance at seeing the bigger picture by not seeing that I was Tess. Nor was I, Lonnie and Rath, and therefore I felt like I needed to prove to her that I could make something of myself. And I am not about to get in the middle of whatever she and Max…”

“Maybe…” Michael muttered because he did not know what to say.

“I might not know what is going on. Or anything about this so-called deal that I am hearing references too. But what I can say is whatever you are feeling about whatever Liz did. But I knew her briefly once upon a time. She obviously did whatever she did for a reason, and I do know for a fact that she loved Max, and if I were a different person or if I were my other half than I might be going that way, hell with Liz, but I am not going go there, because it is a waste of time,” she muttered. “I am trying to make a life here in a world that is beyond crazy, and I am not about to complicate it, when I have enough responsibilities” Ava murmured. “So, you spoke of some kind of deal?”

“Yes, I did” Michael murmured. “Liz betrayed us all.”

“But it cannot be as bad as what Tess did to you guys,” Ava murmured. “She sent you fleeing from this town for a time,” she muttered because she had been following the fallout after she had been in town, and it had been a hell of a story when she realized what had been done to the army base and she had picked up intel about how it was her duplicate behind it all, and how the trail had led to the others, which made it for a hell of a time when she had made a life back here, because while the general public did not know. Certain people did, she thought. “And I am having to live it down what my twin sister might have said or done” she said for the purposes of anyone who might be overhearing. Because that is the easiest cover to explain how she might look like her double “If Liz did something, it was only to make it better for the lot of you” she said. “Because she would have done anything to help you guys, and I know for a fact that she was prepared to deal with the side effects of what Max did to her, if it meant she could save Max’s life that day in New York. And we both know she did,” she sighed. “So, deal with it, Michael…”

“I am trying,” Michael muttered. But it is hard to ignore those hard feelings.

“My advice is to be a little more understanding,” Ava murmured. “Because your friend lost the woman he loved and has been a ghost of himself all this time. Therefore, you should be wanting him to be happy.”

“But…” Michael muttered.

“But it’s Liz?” Ava asked.

“Something like that,” Michael answered. “I know it’s not logical, but I have to protect the group…”

“Something tells me Liz was thinking the same thing,” Ava murmured. Protection can run a lot of ways she muttered. “Think about that will you,” she muttered.

It is odd to know Ava is on Liz’s side Michael thought as he knew it was an odd dynamic given who Ava was, whether she looked like Tess or not in this present day or not he thought. “Whatever. I am who I am.”

“Yes, you are” Ava muttered as she shook her head as Michael watched Maria across the bar. “You are definitely unique.” I will give you that…

“Thank you,” Michael muttered.

“I am not sure that is a compliment,” Ava muttered as the music turned to a slow song, “If You Don’t Know Me By Now by Simply Red" and Michael only shook his head and Ava smiled, and Maria stopped in her tracks as she was talking to Liz.

If you don't know me by now
You will never, never, never know me, uh-uh-uh

All the things, that we've been through
You should understand me like I understand you
Now girl I know the difference between right and wrong
I ain't gonna do nothing to break up our happy home
Don't get so excited when I come home a little late at night
'Cause we only act like children when we argue, fuss and fight

Michael sighed.

“Ask her to dance,” Ava prodded, and Max said the same thing as he could not help but walk up and see that Michael was looking at his wife, pining away. “You have something special. You should be thrilled that you have a chance at the end of the day to be with someone you love because I don’t have that chance. Because that was a chance I lost, but you have it.”

Michael nodded.

And Maria thought the same thing as she stood up, and left Liz, and came to Michael.

Breaking the impasse. “Michael.”

Not saying anything, Michael groaned. “Let’s dance,” was all he would say, and he and Maria went onto the dance floor and soon was swaying to the music…

If you don't know me by now (If you don't know me)
You will never, never, never know me (No you won't), uh
If you don't know by now
You will never, never, never know me, uh-uh-uh

We've all got our own funny moods
I've got mine, woman, you've got yours too
Just trust in me like I trust in you
As long as we've been together it should be so easy to do
Just get yourself together or we might as well say goodbye
What good is a love affair when we can't see eye to eye

If you don't know me by now (If you don't know me)
You will never, never, never know me (No you won't), uh-uh-uh
If you don't know by now (Youuuu will never, never, never know me)
You will never, never, never know me, uh-uh-uh
(Uh)
If you don't know me by now (Mmmmmmm)
You will never, never, never know me

Max was thinking of the song and looking at Liz, as he his eyes would not stray from hers, and throughout the song Liz had been looking at Max too. Ava just groaned, Yeah, why would I want that mess she thought. “Max is taken,” she thought. “Zan was my one,” she thought. He might not have been completely sold on me, she muttered as she remembered what she had told Liz that day in the Crashdown, once she had heard of just what Max had done for Liz.

Saving her life, what a gentlemen Ava thought. She did not know if her own Zan would have done the same thing. Because we were a different breed she thought, we had different values she thought.

Zan did not deserve to die like he did Ava moaned of her Zan.

“Hey beautiful,” came a familiar face from near the bar. “Want to make some time for me,” he asked.

“Sure, why not” Ava muttered. Because at least it is not loaded with complication like that bunch she thought as she walked off and talked with the familiar face as Michael and Maria stayed on the dance floor.

“Michael,” Maria murmured.

“Don’t,” Michael said, knowing they would have to agree to disagree what a notion both would think. “We will deal with it later” was all he would say as he did not want to ruin the peace time between them.

Maria did not want to interrupt it either. So, they continued to dance.

*

Liz sighed as she watched the ice that had between her best friend and her husband start to break apart, and they spent their time on the dance floor. Sighing because she wished she had that ability to be with someone she loved. You had a chance Liz, and you blew it she thought as she knew the glances, she had given Max during that song that had broken through to Michael and Maria. After all Maria did know Michael by now.

And Liz knew Max by now.

Time had changed them. And taken them from each other’s arms, and Liz was ruing that decision constantly. Still, it did not make her want to deal with Max. The man she loved. Yeah, I know I am a mess she thought as she took a beer off the passing tray. “Thank you,” was all she muttered. “Talk to him,” came a familiar face.

It still rattled her to know that she was not Tess Liz thought. So, much changed after we last saw each other and therefore it was difficult to look at Ava and know who Ava was, and just how complicated it would become for her and Max. Even if she looks completely different. But it does not change that she is Tess’s duplicate Liz thought.

“You are running a fun place,” Liz said softly.

“It must be weird to be back here after so much time,” Ava asked as she could sense that Liz was seeing a troubling ghost when she looked into her eyes, and the woman was able to sympathize with that, because it was hard to look like a dead woman who did so much damage.

“Yes, it is” Liz sighed. “I wanted to come here and unwind, but I never imagined any of this” she said of the ensuing chaos.”

“Chaos is the name of our game,” Ava said. “Can I sit?”

“Sure, why not” Liz said as it was a needed diversion from thinking and glancing at her former husband and knew that he was still looking at her with desire on his face but like her, he was unwilling to do anything about it. So, they were staying within their impasse but at least Michael and Maria had broken through.

Liz was happy for her friend.

She wanted Maria to be happy, which is why I did what I did she thought because she knew it would do no one any good if the government had gone after Michael. Disrupting Maria’s dream, and so Liz was willing to take the bullet if her friend got her dreams because she knew how much Maria had to sacrifice because she had chosen to fall for Michael, and to follow Liz into a bizarre story.

As she witnessed Michael and Maria continue to dance, it is easy, they have a life together, Liz thought as Ava smiled. “I know, I am bad.”

“Max is worse” Ava said softly.

Liz was unsure of what to say.

“I am not Tess,” Ava sighed because she could think of what Liz was thinking. “I know it hard to see me and know what she did to you all.”

“I know you are not” Liz sighed. “But she did leave a long shadow, and it is still hard to deal with it, even though it was years ago” she said. “Sorry.”

“I know it is,” Ava admitted. “Which is why I did choose to get this makeover,” she said. “Coming back to this town, I knew Tess had a reputation, and also by taking this form. It’s liberating in a sense because I can be my own person and I am not as tied by what Tess might have done back in her time. Because she had quite the reputation.”

“Not just any reputation,” Liz muttered.

“I know what she did,” Ava sighed. “I would have told her that it was stupid to fall for what he was trying to sell her because it was full of holes, and ones that she should have been smart enough to have seen for herself, but she did not because she chose to believe Nascedo full stop,” she muttered. “Even if meant she would betray everything she was building in this town. I don’t know how she could have done it for a life we would have had no knowledge except some vague memories,” she sighed. I might have wanted that she thought because I came from the streets, but Tess had a life here she thought. She had a place to call home, however new it was she thought. “I understand the need to know it all, but how she went about it was not the answer and only left a trail of broken people in the end” she sighed, “So, yeah, I have had to deal with the fallout but fortunately time does let go of some of it. But it never completely eliminates it all.”

Liz nodded.

“And yet, give how it continues to haunt, you still did marry him,” Ava asked. “Why?”

“Because I loved him,” Liz murmured automatically as if it was second nature. Love was never the issue, she thought. Even in those early days, when it became overly complicated. “I always loved him, and I wanted to be his wife.”

“And you were, and you left him?” Ava murmured.

“Yes, that is what I did,” Liz admitted. “When I said yes, I never imagined the day would come when I would have to make such a decision,” she sighed. “But I did, and everything was different from that point on, I bet sometimes he wished he had stuck it out with Tess…” she muttered, and Ava’s eyes opened wide. “Kidding, I think” she said. “But I don’t know because all I know is I went back to him after you know, and suddenly everything was there for us, which should have been a clue because something will always come to cut us down, she muttered to herself. “I hurt Max deeply.”

“You were not the only one. So, don’t think Tess would not have done the same when we all know she had, and she was not done hurting Max even from beyond the grave,” Ava murmured. “Max might have lost you, but you did not give him a child and take it away from him.”

“But I did,” Liz murmured as she thought of their child who was no longer a child but was eighteen and upset with her. “Our daughter.”

“But he knew he had a child out there,” Ava murmured. “You might have taken Claudia, but she was concrete, and he knew she was safe somewhere in this world. Which is more than what Tess was doing to him.”

“What do you mean?” Liz asked. Do I even want to know this, she thought of whatever Maria knew, but I obviously do not know? and now it was coming out.

Ava knew full well she should not be the one to tell Liz this, everyone but me she thought because of the craziness of it all, only in our world she thought of what her duplicate had done to the group, and most of Max. Still, Liz did need to know.

“The baby was a hoax, or more like because there was actually a baby who was real, but in the end, it was all like a desperate lie to get Max away from you, and off this planet.”

“What?” Liz asked, squeaking.

“Max was not the father of Tess’s baby,” Ava murmured.

Whoa Liz sputtered to herself. That is crazy. Why would Tess lie about that? she thought. It makes no sense, she thought, none at all.

Right?

“What are you talking about,” Liz asked as she Max came into her eyesight as he was talking to Maria and Michael who had left the dance floor and they were talking amongst themselves. “Max told me he was the father.”

“He was wrong,” Ava murmured. “He was lied to…”

[totallizfan]

Just checking...thought there might be an update.