Two Out Of Three (UC, Mi/L, Adult, 1/1) [COMPLETE]
Posted: Fri Apr 29, 2005 11:21 am
Two Out Of Three
Written by Ann
Summary: Michael’s POV on his relationship with Liz.
Spoilers: None
Warnings: This is not one of the happy-go-lucky types of fics. I don't normally write song fics but felt the need to write this one.
Rating: Adult
The song used is Two Out Of Three Aint Bad by Meat Loaf
Two Out Of Three
Baby we can talk all night
But that ain't getting us nowhere
I told you everything I possibly can
There's nothing left inside of here
Things weren’t supposed to turn out this way. I thought after all the years we’ve been together that we would be truly happy. And for a while we were. For a long while. I remember the day we got together. I had been watching you for years. Well, since we were about twelve. I always had a thing for you. Of course, it wasn’t until we were sixteen that I realized what exactly what that thing was. You see, my whole life I had spent wishing there was someone out there who loved me. Just one person who actually gave a shit about me. You were the one I wanted to be that person. I wanted you to love me because I loved you. But you fell for my best friend Max. On a pain scale of 1 to 10, that was a 25. It hurt like hell. But you didn’t know. You didn’t know I had feelings for you. I wonder now if it would have changed anything if you had. Probably not.
It was during the summer. June 17th to be exact. You and Max had just broken up again. You did that a lot. You’d be together one day, apart the next, and back together the day after. I could never keep up with your relationship and to be quite honest, I didn’t want to. Every day that I saw the two of you together was just a painful reminder of how I couldn’t have you. I didn’t want much out of life but what I did want, I wanted wholeheartedly.
Everything was so screwed up then. Max had gone and gotten Tess pregnant, Alex died, or should I say was killed by that bitch. Shortly thereafter, she left the planet. Max couldn’t get over his son being out there somewhere and the need to find him. Who could blame him really? If I had a son out there, I’d want to find him too. But instead of letting you go, he expected you to just follow him like a little lap dog and never complain about it. Max had always been controlling, but he got ten times worse during that time. It was more than any person should have to endure. And you didn’t. Not for long. You had the strength to walk away, cut your losses, and start over. We never saw Max again. I didn’t have the heart to tell you he got killed in San Francisco, yet you still found out somehow. You weren’t mad that I kept it from you. If anything, you were relieved. You told me you needed to find out from someone who wasn’t so close to him. Finding out from Isabel or me would have just made it harder.
Two weeks later we were closing the Crashdown together. You were washing the tables and I was in the kitchen cleaning the grill. I heard you come in behind me but I couldn’t make myself turn around. I had been fighting my emotions for years and with Max gone, it was more difficult than ever. You leaned against the counter behind me and began to talk. I remember that conversation word for word.
“Can I talk to you a minute?” You acted so nervous, but that wasn’t anything unusual for you.
“What?” I spat out. Did I mention that it was really difficult to be around you then?
“Do you know why I broke up with Max this last time?” I should have known it would be about Max. I wasn’t a completely insensitive bastard but talking to you about Max sucked.
“None of my business.”
“Maybe, maybe not but I want…no, I need to tell you Michael. Please, just let me tell you.”
“Whatever.”
“I left Max because…because I fell in love with someone else.” I closed my eyes as tight as they would close and fought back the urge to run. Just go out that door and run into the night. No where in particular, just anywhere away from you.
You walked up behind me and put your hand on my shoulder, turning me around. I couldn’t make eye contact with you so I tried to act like I was real interested in the refrigerator. And what a damn fine refrigerator it was!
“Did you hear me Michael? I said I fell in love with someone else.”
“I heard you Parker. Still not sure why you feel the need to tell me this.”
“Because Michael, I…I fell in…I fell in love with you.” My head snapped forward and I was staring down into your face.
“That’s not funny Parker.”
“I wasn’t laughing Michael.” Yeah, like I’m really going to believe this. I mean, I’ve never known you to be a liar before, but there was no way you were in love with me. I wasn’t that lucky. Before I had a chance to finish that thought though, you were on your toes, eye level with me.
“I wasn’t laughing.” You said once more right before you kissed me. At first I resisted. Things this good just don’t happen to me. But I couldn’t fight it long and before I knew it, we were in a full out make out session between the grill and the deep fryers. You broke away and looked right into my eyes. That look, it was enough to bring a grown man to his knees and damn near did. If it weren’t for the grill, I would have been down for the count.
“I love you Michael.” I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I’d held it in for five years and couldn’t do it any longer.
“I love you too Liz.”
That was ten years and a wedding ceremony later. The first five years were great. We had moved to Iowa to get as far away from all the alien crap as possible. Kinda hard to do when you’re an alien but we had to try anyway. I couldn’t have asked for a better marriage. I was happy, I was confident and for once, I felt loved. We had several little arguments along the way but it wasn’t until our sixth anniversary that we had our first big fight. It was over something stupid. A shoe rack I think but it got ugly. Real ugly and you asked me to leave.
And maybe you can cry all night
But that'll never change the way that I feel
The snow is really piling up outside
I wish you wouldn't make me leave here
I walked around for hours, not knowing where to go or what to do to make it right. With it being our first real fight, I didn’t know what I needed to do to get you to forgive me. I ended up going to a hotel for the night to think. That was when I realized things had been going downhill for a while. Where you at one time were so emotional and lovey dovey, you were now becoming closed off and standoffish. You didn’t want to be close anymore. Anytime I would try to hug you or give you a kiss you would shy away from me. I had just associated it to stress, PMS, whatever shit chicks go through. But not being one to give up, especially on you, I had to keep trying. So, the next morning, I showed back up at home with flowers, hoping you would at least talk to me. That didn’t go so well either. More words were exchanged, more feelings hurt. I was at a loss, not knowing what to do.
I poured it on and I poured it out
I tried to show you just how much I care
I'm tired of words and I’m too hoarse to shout
But you've been cold to me so long
I'm crying icicles instead of tears
When did it all go to hell? When did things get so screwed up that we couldn’t even talk anymore without yelling at each other? Oh yeah, when you started blaming me for Max’s death and the way your life turned out. Granted, things haven’t been perfect. I never expected them to be. I’m an alien, therefore things are going to be crazy. For a long time, crazy didn’t bother you. Hell if anything, you welcomed it. I can’t put my finger on when it all began to go down the proverbial hellhole. I’m supposed to be a general. A warrior that always knows what to do in time of crisis yet, again, I didn’t know what to do. So instead of fighting, I just said you were right, and stuck it out in the hopes that eventually, things would go back to the way they were for so long. That you once again, would love me.
And all I can do is keep on telling you
I want you
I need you
But -- there ain't no way I’m ever gonna love you
Now don't be sad
'cause two out of three ain't bad
Now don't be sad
'cause two out of three ain't bad
I went on telling myself that for the better part of four years. That eventually, things would get better and you would love me again. It took me that long to realize that what I wanted, what I was searching for, was never going to happen. I was just setting myself up for yet another heartbreak but I just couldn’t make myself give up on you. Not yet.
You'll never find your gold on a sandy beach
You'll never drill for oil on a city street
I know you're looking for a ruby in a mountain of rocks
But there ain't no coupe de ville hiding at the bottom of a cracker jack box
It got to the point where I thought that I had screwed things up. That I had somehow changed and made things the way they were and that maybe if I changed again, maybe if I became more like Max, things would improve. So that’s what I did. Or tried to do anyway. I tried to become Max. The romantic cheeseball that he always was. But it didn’t help. If anything, it just made things worse. It made it worse because not only was I lying to you, I was lying to myself. I could never be like him. Or anyone else for that matter. I was just me. Plain old Michael. That’s all I could ever be. And yet, it wasn’t enough.
I can’t lie
I can't tell you that I’m something I’m not
No matter how I try
I'll never be able
To give you something
Something that I just haven't got
I realized then that it wasn’t me that had changed in this relationship. It was you. You had become someone I didn’t even know anymore. Someone I didn’t understand. Someone I didn’t like. It took yet another two months for me to realize that I had fallen out of love with you, or should I say, who you’d become. I will always love the Liz Parker that I fell in love with but she’s long gone. To this day, I don’t know what happened, what caused you to give up on us the way you did, what caused you to hate me. But whatever it was, it happened and we can’t go back. You don’t know how hard it is to say you don’t love someone that you’ve spent the past fifteen years of your life loving. It’s torture, it’s hell. That’s the way things became with us. Hell. I wish we could go back five years and try to fix whatever it was that went wrong but at this point, I doubt it would make any difference. We were just never meant to be, as much as I hate to admit it. Now it’s time for me to do the right thing. It’s time for me to be honest, tell you I don’t love you and walk away. Freedom from me. It’s the only thing I have left to give.
There's only one girl that I will ever love
And that was so many years ago
And though I know I’ll never get her out of my heart
She never loved me back
Ooh I know
I remember how she left me on a stormy night
She kissed me and got out of our bed
And though I pleaded and I begged her not to walk out that door
She packed her bags and turned right away
I figure I will spend the rest of my days wondering what happened to you. What happened to the Liz Parker I had fallen in love with. And yet I anticipate I’ll never figure it out. I sometimes have nightmares of that night. That first night when things got bad. I replay it in my sleep and somewhere in the background, beyond the yelling and the anger, I can hear you talking. Your voice just above a whisper, but there nonetheless. You’re telling me you don’t love me. Maybe if I had heard that voice then, I could have saved us both a whole lot of trouble. I could have just walked away and saved four years worth of pain. But I doubt I would have. I was so head over heels in love with you that I would have laid my life down for you. I should have listened to that voice..
And she kept on telling me
She kept on telling me
She kept on telling me
I want you
I need you
But there ain't no way I’m ever gonna love you
Now don't be sad
'cause two out of three ain't bad
So this is what it comes down to. The end. The final chapter. There was a time when I never thought I would see this day. But things don’t always go the way you think they will. Especially if your name is Michael Guerin. As I walk out, bags in hand, I am taken back to that day we first got together. That day was so unexpected yet it was the best day of my life. And that is the day I will go on remembering. I don’t want to remember our bad times. I don’t want to remember the hurtful words and angry looks. I want to remember you. Liz Parker. Center of my universe. And that’s what I’ll do. As much as I feel like I want to sometimes, I can’t hate you. I don’t love you anymore, not like that. But I can’t hate you. In the five years that were good, you showed me what it was like to love and be loved and that is something I will never forget. And so I will go on, remembering you as Liz Parker, the woman I fell in love with. Until the day that I die.
I want you
I need you
But there ain't no way I’m ever gonna love you
Now don't be sad
'cause two out of three ain't bad
Don't be sad
'cause two out of three ain't bad
Baby we can talk all night
But that ain't getting us nowhere
Written by Ann
Summary: Michael’s POV on his relationship with Liz.
Spoilers: None
Warnings: This is not one of the happy-go-lucky types of fics. I don't normally write song fics but felt the need to write this one.
Rating: Adult
The song used is Two Out Of Three Aint Bad by Meat Loaf
Two Out Of Three
Baby we can talk all night
But that ain't getting us nowhere
I told you everything I possibly can
There's nothing left inside of here
Things weren’t supposed to turn out this way. I thought after all the years we’ve been together that we would be truly happy. And for a while we were. For a long while. I remember the day we got together. I had been watching you for years. Well, since we were about twelve. I always had a thing for you. Of course, it wasn’t until we were sixteen that I realized what exactly what that thing was. You see, my whole life I had spent wishing there was someone out there who loved me. Just one person who actually gave a shit about me. You were the one I wanted to be that person. I wanted you to love me because I loved you. But you fell for my best friend Max. On a pain scale of 1 to 10, that was a 25. It hurt like hell. But you didn’t know. You didn’t know I had feelings for you. I wonder now if it would have changed anything if you had. Probably not.
It was during the summer. June 17th to be exact. You and Max had just broken up again. You did that a lot. You’d be together one day, apart the next, and back together the day after. I could never keep up with your relationship and to be quite honest, I didn’t want to. Every day that I saw the two of you together was just a painful reminder of how I couldn’t have you. I didn’t want much out of life but what I did want, I wanted wholeheartedly.
Everything was so screwed up then. Max had gone and gotten Tess pregnant, Alex died, or should I say was killed by that bitch. Shortly thereafter, she left the planet. Max couldn’t get over his son being out there somewhere and the need to find him. Who could blame him really? If I had a son out there, I’d want to find him too. But instead of letting you go, he expected you to just follow him like a little lap dog and never complain about it. Max had always been controlling, but he got ten times worse during that time. It was more than any person should have to endure. And you didn’t. Not for long. You had the strength to walk away, cut your losses, and start over. We never saw Max again. I didn’t have the heart to tell you he got killed in San Francisco, yet you still found out somehow. You weren’t mad that I kept it from you. If anything, you were relieved. You told me you needed to find out from someone who wasn’t so close to him. Finding out from Isabel or me would have just made it harder.
Two weeks later we were closing the Crashdown together. You were washing the tables and I was in the kitchen cleaning the grill. I heard you come in behind me but I couldn’t make myself turn around. I had been fighting my emotions for years and with Max gone, it was more difficult than ever. You leaned against the counter behind me and began to talk. I remember that conversation word for word.
“Can I talk to you a minute?” You acted so nervous, but that wasn’t anything unusual for you.
“What?” I spat out. Did I mention that it was really difficult to be around you then?
“Do you know why I broke up with Max this last time?” I should have known it would be about Max. I wasn’t a completely insensitive bastard but talking to you about Max sucked.
“None of my business.”
“Maybe, maybe not but I want…no, I need to tell you Michael. Please, just let me tell you.”
“Whatever.”
“I left Max because…because I fell in love with someone else.” I closed my eyes as tight as they would close and fought back the urge to run. Just go out that door and run into the night. No where in particular, just anywhere away from you.
You walked up behind me and put your hand on my shoulder, turning me around. I couldn’t make eye contact with you so I tried to act like I was real interested in the refrigerator. And what a damn fine refrigerator it was!
“Did you hear me Michael? I said I fell in love with someone else.”
“I heard you Parker. Still not sure why you feel the need to tell me this.”
“Because Michael, I…I fell in…I fell in love with you.” My head snapped forward and I was staring down into your face.
“That’s not funny Parker.”
“I wasn’t laughing Michael.” Yeah, like I’m really going to believe this. I mean, I’ve never known you to be a liar before, but there was no way you were in love with me. I wasn’t that lucky. Before I had a chance to finish that thought though, you were on your toes, eye level with me.
“I wasn’t laughing.” You said once more right before you kissed me. At first I resisted. Things this good just don’t happen to me. But I couldn’t fight it long and before I knew it, we were in a full out make out session between the grill and the deep fryers. You broke away and looked right into my eyes. That look, it was enough to bring a grown man to his knees and damn near did. If it weren’t for the grill, I would have been down for the count.
“I love you Michael.” I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I’d held it in for five years and couldn’t do it any longer.
“I love you too Liz.”
That was ten years and a wedding ceremony later. The first five years were great. We had moved to Iowa to get as far away from all the alien crap as possible. Kinda hard to do when you’re an alien but we had to try anyway. I couldn’t have asked for a better marriage. I was happy, I was confident and for once, I felt loved. We had several little arguments along the way but it wasn’t until our sixth anniversary that we had our first big fight. It was over something stupid. A shoe rack I think but it got ugly. Real ugly and you asked me to leave.
And maybe you can cry all night
But that'll never change the way that I feel
The snow is really piling up outside
I wish you wouldn't make me leave here
I walked around for hours, not knowing where to go or what to do to make it right. With it being our first real fight, I didn’t know what I needed to do to get you to forgive me. I ended up going to a hotel for the night to think. That was when I realized things had been going downhill for a while. Where you at one time were so emotional and lovey dovey, you were now becoming closed off and standoffish. You didn’t want to be close anymore. Anytime I would try to hug you or give you a kiss you would shy away from me. I had just associated it to stress, PMS, whatever shit chicks go through. But not being one to give up, especially on you, I had to keep trying. So, the next morning, I showed back up at home with flowers, hoping you would at least talk to me. That didn’t go so well either. More words were exchanged, more feelings hurt. I was at a loss, not knowing what to do.
I poured it on and I poured it out
I tried to show you just how much I care
I'm tired of words and I’m too hoarse to shout
But you've been cold to me so long
I'm crying icicles instead of tears
When did it all go to hell? When did things get so screwed up that we couldn’t even talk anymore without yelling at each other? Oh yeah, when you started blaming me for Max’s death and the way your life turned out. Granted, things haven’t been perfect. I never expected them to be. I’m an alien, therefore things are going to be crazy. For a long time, crazy didn’t bother you. Hell if anything, you welcomed it. I can’t put my finger on when it all began to go down the proverbial hellhole. I’m supposed to be a general. A warrior that always knows what to do in time of crisis yet, again, I didn’t know what to do. So instead of fighting, I just said you were right, and stuck it out in the hopes that eventually, things would go back to the way they were for so long. That you once again, would love me.
And all I can do is keep on telling you
I want you
I need you
But -- there ain't no way I’m ever gonna love you
Now don't be sad
'cause two out of three ain't bad
Now don't be sad
'cause two out of three ain't bad
I went on telling myself that for the better part of four years. That eventually, things would get better and you would love me again. It took me that long to realize that what I wanted, what I was searching for, was never going to happen. I was just setting myself up for yet another heartbreak but I just couldn’t make myself give up on you. Not yet.
You'll never find your gold on a sandy beach
You'll never drill for oil on a city street
I know you're looking for a ruby in a mountain of rocks
But there ain't no coupe de ville hiding at the bottom of a cracker jack box
It got to the point where I thought that I had screwed things up. That I had somehow changed and made things the way they were and that maybe if I changed again, maybe if I became more like Max, things would improve. So that’s what I did. Or tried to do anyway. I tried to become Max. The romantic cheeseball that he always was. But it didn’t help. If anything, it just made things worse. It made it worse because not only was I lying to you, I was lying to myself. I could never be like him. Or anyone else for that matter. I was just me. Plain old Michael. That’s all I could ever be. And yet, it wasn’t enough.
I can’t lie
I can't tell you that I’m something I’m not
No matter how I try
I'll never be able
To give you something
Something that I just haven't got
I realized then that it wasn’t me that had changed in this relationship. It was you. You had become someone I didn’t even know anymore. Someone I didn’t understand. Someone I didn’t like. It took yet another two months for me to realize that I had fallen out of love with you, or should I say, who you’d become. I will always love the Liz Parker that I fell in love with but she’s long gone. To this day, I don’t know what happened, what caused you to give up on us the way you did, what caused you to hate me. But whatever it was, it happened and we can’t go back. You don’t know how hard it is to say you don’t love someone that you’ve spent the past fifteen years of your life loving. It’s torture, it’s hell. That’s the way things became with us. Hell. I wish we could go back five years and try to fix whatever it was that went wrong but at this point, I doubt it would make any difference. We were just never meant to be, as much as I hate to admit it. Now it’s time for me to do the right thing. It’s time for me to be honest, tell you I don’t love you and walk away. Freedom from me. It’s the only thing I have left to give.
There's only one girl that I will ever love
And that was so many years ago
And though I know I’ll never get her out of my heart
She never loved me back
Ooh I know
I remember how she left me on a stormy night
She kissed me and got out of our bed
And though I pleaded and I begged her not to walk out that door
She packed her bags and turned right away
I figure I will spend the rest of my days wondering what happened to you. What happened to the Liz Parker I had fallen in love with. And yet I anticipate I’ll never figure it out. I sometimes have nightmares of that night. That first night when things got bad. I replay it in my sleep and somewhere in the background, beyond the yelling and the anger, I can hear you talking. Your voice just above a whisper, but there nonetheless. You’re telling me you don’t love me. Maybe if I had heard that voice then, I could have saved us both a whole lot of trouble. I could have just walked away and saved four years worth of pain. But I doubt I would have. I was so head over heels in love with you that I would have laid my life down for you. I should have listened to that voice..
And she kept on telling me
She kept on telling me
She kept on telling me
I want you
I need you
But there ain't no way I’m ever gonna love you
Now don't be sad
'cause two out of three ain't bad
So this is what it comes down to. The end. The final chapter. There was a time when I never thought I would see this day. But things don’t always go the way you think they will. Especially if your name is Michael Guerin. As I walk out, bags in hand, I am taken back to that day we first got together. That day was so unexpected yet it was the best day of my life. And that is the day I will go on remembering. I don’t want to remember our bad times. I don’t want to remember the hurtful words and angry looks. I want to remember you. Liz Parker. Center of my universe. And that’s what I’ll do. As much as I feel like I want to sometimes, I can’t hate you. I don’t love you anymore, not like that. But I can’t hate you. In the five years that were good, you showed me what it was like to love and be loved and that is something I will never forget. And so I will go on, remembering you as Liz Parker, the woman I fell in love with. Until the day that I die.
I want you
I need you
But there ain't no way I’m ever gonna love you
Now don't be sad
'cause two out of three ain't bad
Don't be sad
'cause two out of three ain't bad
Baby we can talk all night
But that ain't getting us nowhere