A time of miracles? (CC, M/L, Teen) 2/2 complete 5/4/06
Posted: Sun Apr 16, 2006 7:36 am
Title: A time of miracles?
Author: Rie482
Rating: I dunno. Teen?
Summary: This is Liz POV about how she feels after Max is called to Antar. Can’t explain more. You just need to read. Serious angst so be warned and it’s just a one parter. This takes place about 3 or 4 years after Departure.
I have been told that Easter is supposed to be a time of miracles. In a way it’s supposed to be just like Christmas, and the celebration of his birth, where Christians celebrate Jesus’ resurrection. It’s a time when a man so dearly loved and adored came back to this earth to guide his disciples and the ones he loved. He came back. In sort of the same way Max brought back those children in Phoenix. He brought them back – from the brink of death. Many see it as a miracle, so therefore I’ve heard some people call Easter a time of miracles.
If that is true… why did he have to leave at Easter? Why did he leave with just a lingering kiss? I remember that lingering kiss well. I can still smell the chocolate on his breath and the taste of it on his lips. If I think about it hard enough I can feel the last kiss we shared as if it was still carrying on – as if that moment didn’t really end. A smile forms across my lips as I melt into that kiss, melt into his body and feel my hands pressed against his shirt, able to feel each and every defined muscle that ripples under it – under my touch. I smell his warm unique smell and hear his short breaths as his mouth lingers the kiss an extra minute. This minute is one perfect moment as I take in the feel of the soft lips caressing mine.
I live in that moment. I hide in that moment. I survive in it. I am Liz Parker when I live in that moment and it helps me to hold on to a part of myself I let go a long long time ago. It’s been three years since that Easter, the Easter when Max was taken away from me by a stupid little alien, his stupid little ship and that stupid planet of his that called him back. They needed him.
He was stupid.
He is stupid.
I hate him.
I love him.
I know he wasn’t the only one to have left someone behind. I know that. I feel it every time I look into Maria’s eyes and see the pain that rests there. She hurts as much as I when we step back into the Crashdown, half hoping that they will be sat in their favourite booth, Max looking out for me intently as Michael grumbles at Isabel about how sickening it is. But it’s one of these lessons in life that we just don’t learn or take in. We know they aren’t going to be sat there. We know they aren’t even on planet earth.
We know that they probably aren’t coming back.
They aren’t coming back.
So now it’s that time of year again where I walk around in a daze wishing that my life was different. I wish it was less lonely and full of longing for a man who probably won’t be coming back to me. It’s a day I wish he didn’t save me.
I don’t mean that.
I know I don’t.
I wouldn’t change anything.
I just miss him.
My roommate Serena has tried so many times to get me out of this funk. She’s tried making me date, girly nights in, girlie nights out, dinner, cinema, dancing, swimming and cried all in the desperate bid to get me to accept it and move on. But it hasn’t worked. She knows that Max was special. She knows how special he was. How special he is. She knows that I can’t heal until I know what has happened to him or until he comes back to me.
But that isn’t going to happen.
I wish it would.
So Easter is supposed to be a time of miracles. A time of miracles for everyone other than me. I’m Liz Parker and I’ve run out of miracles. I’ve had far far too many. My first was Max saving me. My second was us falling in love. My third was when I prayed for Max to be okay, to survive the white room. See. I’ve had three already. I used them all. So now there is no hope in Max coming back to me. There is no hope that I’ll be able to taste his lips once again.
There is no hope without Max Evans, the loveable alien, in my life.
I hate him.
I miss him.
I need him.
I love him.
How can I feel all this when my heart feels so numb? How is it possible if it’s dead for my heart to feel? Perhaps it retains some feeling just in case he comes back. So if he does come back I’ll be able to have some sort of life with half a feeling heart. It would be better than nothing I suppose. I’d still be able to love him. I’d still be able to enjoy our wedding day. I’d still cry when we had our first child. I’d still be able to feel it contract as we grow old together. I’d still be able to feel.
But he isn’t coming back. So what is the point? Why can’t my heart just die and let me either die or live my life dead and bitter. Oh hang on – I’m dead and bitter already.
Damn Easter.
I hate Easter.
I hate him.
I love him.
Him. Max. Where is he? Is he still on Antar? He is he dead? He is he alive? Is he with Tess again? Was she waiting for him with open arms? Did he take her into his arms and spin her around happily, all memory of me fading into nothing? Did he find something in her for him to love?
That’s just ridiculous.
She killed Alex.
He’d have killed her.
I hate Easter. I hate the fact I’m walking around this town in a daze. I hate the fact I can’t hate him. I can’t. It’s impossible because I understand why he left. He left because his planet wanted him. They needed him. They needed him to save them from Khivar who was destroying every last thing on their planet. They had tried to fight him off for as long as they could but in the end they needed him. So he left. He stepped on that bloody spaceship and flew away. What’s worse is the fact he was willing to stay.
He was going to stay.
For me.
But I made him go.
I couldn’t stand the thought of him breaking down from the guilt that would weigh heavily on his conscience for the rest of his life. But I couldn’t go with him. I was human. Human’s couldn’t survive. So I made him go. Told him to forget about me and do what was right.
We weren’t supposed to be together anyway – were we?
‘Destiny.’ That’s the last word he had said to me. The final sentence was “I will come back for you because, unlike Tess, you are my destiny.” I can still hear him choke on his words and his voice crack under the strain of his tears. His lashes were dam, a dam which burst the moment he pulled away from me and backed up on to the ship.
I can still taste the salt of my own.
I’m crying right now. I thought it was just a part of the memory. Or maybe I’ve always been like this. I always thought that the taste of the salty water was just the memory – now I think maybe I’ve never stopped crying.
My feet are carrying me to towards the car and I have no idea why. I never know where my feet are trying to take me. I end up in the weirdest places. All from past memories. The other day I found myself in the UFO centre reliving the day when we all disappeared. The day the Skins came to town. I wish I had disappeared that day. Would have been so much easier.
The other day I ended up at Alex’s grave. I remember just sinking to the ground, my knees melting into the soil as the rain poured down around me. I remember crying my heart out into his grave as I laid myself out on top of it. I curled into the smallest ball, just wanting to remember what it was like to have Alex’s arms around. I cried even harder when I realised I couldn’t remember what it felt like. All I could remember was that last lingering kiss.
I hated him in that moment. For the briefest second; because of him I couldn’t remember anything after the lingering kiss. That final moment with him.
But now, as I drive in the mid afternoon sun, now I don’t hate him. I hate myself. I’m the one who is focusing on this separation and pain. Max didn’t deliberately make me forget the warmth of Alex’s embrace – I did that on my own.
The ground underneath the car turns from smooth tarmac to dry, dirty and bumpy and I instantly know where I’m going. I want to turn back, my head is yelling at me not to go there, but I feel that I have to.
To find closure.
Because that’s what I need. I need closure. I need to move on with my life. I need to stop thinking about Max Evans. I don’t want to stop. It’s a case of I need to or I think I’ll just breakdown into a bigger mess than I am already. That wouldn’t be productive.
I slow the car down to a stop and I instantly break down. What is it about this place that makes all the painful memories just surface forming brand new tears? What is it about this place that I hate?
I hate it just as much as I hate him.
I love him.
This is the place he was born.
I couldn’t hate this place if I really tried.
What I hate is what it represents – the beginning and ending of human life. Max was born here – in to human life and this is the place where the ship took off – The end of his human life. This place gives and takes life and I hate that. I hate the fact I am alone. I hate the fact this place even exists. I hate the fact I’m alive. I hate the fact I just cannot let go no matter how hard I try.
I have to breathe. I have to stop this now before I destroy the car. The green electricity can destroy a wall – a car is no match for it. So I step out of the car. I don’t even need to look down at my hands to know that green electricity runs just under my skin. It isn’t new either. It’s one more thing Max ‘gave’ me. One more thing I can ‘thank’ Max for.
I look towards the pod chamber and take another good look at my hands. I frown slightly. Why am I here? I can’t get in there – could I? I glance at the pod chamber and soon I find myself charging up to the entrance like a woman on serious mission. I have pure energy and anger rolling through my veins right now and I feel like I have to go there. I have to be there before I explode.
I nervously glide my hand over the rocky surface and almost jump back with fright as the unforgettable silver hand print appears.
Everything is turning dark now.
I have no idea how long I have been stood here just staring at this hand print, half afraid to put my palm to it. I think it’s been hours when it has just seemed like minutes. My hand is shaking as I place it on the print and I almost cry as the door opens up.
I step inside, the room still glowing from when the Granolith inhabited its walls. There are fresh tears now as I come face to face with this place once again. This was where everything went wrong. This was where Tess flew away and the group started to fall to pieces. This was the place Future Max had come, the place that had destroyed any hope of me having any sort of happy life. The moment Future Max had stepped into this room; he had destroyed the Liz Parker I used to know.
Because of him my best friend died at the hands of a monster – one who had no morals or conscience. A monster that had killed Alex just so she could go home. Because of him I didn’t stand at the Elvis chapel with Max at the age of 19. Because of him I can’t listen to I Shall Believe ever again with out painful heart wrenching memories surfacing. Because of him my Max had to leave. Because of him I can’t feel my heart. Because of him I am dead.
I hate him
But I love him.
Always.
Forever.
I turn back to the pods and nearer to which I know was Max’s. I haven’t actually been told which one was his, I can feel it in the same way I could feel Max when he was still standing on this planet. I could feel him everywhere I went when he was here, but now I just have vague fluttering of his existence. It’s becomes stronger as he trace my fingers over what remains of his pod. The steel that encases it is so cold I would have flinched if I could feel.
But I don’t.
I can’t.
It would be a miracle if I could. These holidays are supposed to be a time of miracles but here I am, in a long since abandoned pod chamber unable to feel the ice cold steel beneath my fingers. The tears pour over my lashes as I realise the true extent of my loneliness. I just want to scream and cry but I can’t. I’ve been doing it for far too long – I’ve run out of energy.
I plop onto the floor as my weak legs buckle from under me. He’s gone. I’m gone. I can’t live, I can’t eat and I can’t breathe. There is no hope in my life; there is no joy that keeps me going. It’s the third Easter since he left me and I finally feel ready to just let go and die in this pod chamber surrounded by the memories this place envelopes me in. I hiccup tears as I lie down on the floor, resting my head in my hands. I curl up into the smallest ball and just cry out.
I just want this to end.
I need this to end.
My eyes open and close as the darkness starts to take over. I close them tightly.
I hate him.
I love him.
Always and forever.
Opening my eyes wide, wanting to take one last look at this place, and all I see is amber.
I see my miracle.
My Easter miracle.
My Max.
Author: Rie482
Rating: I dunno. Teen?
Summary: This is Liz POV about how she feels after Max is called to Antar. Can’t explain more. You just need to read. Serious angst so be warned and it’s just a one parter. This takes place about 3 or 4 years after Departure.
I have been told that Easter is supposed to be a time of miracles. In a way it’s supposed to be just like Christmas, and the celebration of his birth, where Christians celebrate Jesus’ resurrection. It’s a time when a man so dearly loved and adored came back to this earth to guide his disciples and the ones he loved. He came back. In sort of the same way Max brought back those children in Phoenix. He brought them back – from the brink of death. Many see it as a miracle, so therefore I’ve heard some people call Easter a time of miracles.
If that is true… why did he have to leave at Easter? Why did he leave with just a lingering kiss? I remember that lingering kiss well. I can still smell the chocolate on his breath and the taste of it on his lips. If I think about it hard enough I can feel the last kiss we shared as if it was still carrying on – as if that moment didn’t really end. A smile forms across my lips as I melt into that kiss, melt into his body and feel my hands pressed against his shirt, able to feel each and every defined muscle that ripples under it – under my touch. I smell his warm unique smell and hear his short breaths as his mouth lingers the kiss an extra minute. This minute is one perfect moment as I take in the feel of the soft lips caressing mine.
I live in that moment. I hide in that moment. I survive in it. I am Liz Parker when I live in that moment and it helps me to hold on to a part of myself I let go a long long time ago. It’s been three years since that Easter, the Easter when Max was taken away from me by a stupid little alien, his stupid little ship and that stupid planet of his that called him back. They needed him.
He was stupid.
He is stupid.
I hate him.
I love him.
I know he wasn’t the only one to have left someone behind. I know that. I feel it every time I look into Maria’s eyes and see the pain that rests there. She hurts as much as I when we step back into the Crashdown, half hoping that they will be sat in their favourite booth, Max looking out for me intently as Michael grumbles at Isabel about how sickening it is. But it’s one of these lessons in life that we just don’t learn or take in. We know they aren’t going to be sat there. We know they aren’t even on planet earth.
We know that they probably aren’t coming back.
They aren’t coming back.
So now it’s that time of year again where I walk around in a daze wishing that my life was different. I wish it was less lonely and full of longing for a man who probably won’t be coming back to me. It’s a day I wish he didn’t save me.
I don’t mean that.
I know I don’t.
I wouldn’t change anything.
I just miss him.
My roommate Serena has tried so many times to get me out of this funk. She’s tried making me date, girly nights in, girlie nights out, dinner, cinema, dancing, swimming and cried all in the desperate bid to get me to accept it and move on. But it hasn’t worked. She knows that Max was special. She knows how special he was. How special he is. She knows that I can’t heal until I know what has happened to him or until he comes back to me.
But that isn’t going to happen.
I wish it would.
So Easter is supposed to be a time of miracles. A time of miracles for everyone other than me. I’m Liz Parker and I’ve run out of miracles. I’ve had far far too many. My first was Max saving me. My second was us falling in love. My third was when I prayed for Max to be okay, to survive the white room. See. I’ve had three already. I used them all. So now there is no hope in Max coming back to me. There is no hope that I’ll be able to taste his lips once again.
There is no hope without Max Evans, the loveable alien, in my life.
I hate him.
I miss him.
I need him.
I love him.
How can I feel all this when my heart feels so numb? How is it possible if it’s dead for my heart to feel? Perhaps it retains some feeling just in case he comes back. So if he does come back I’ll be able to have some sort of life with half a feeling heart. It would be better than nothing I suppose. I’d still be able to love him. I’d still be able to enjoy our wedding day. I’d still cry when we had our first child. I’d still be able to feel it contract as we grow old together. I’d still be able to feel.
But he isn’t coming back. So what is the point? Why can’t my heart just die and let me either die or live my life dead and bitter. Oh hang on – I’m dead and bitter already.
Damn Easter.
I hate Easter.
I hate him.
I love him.
Him. Max. Where is he? Is he still on Antar? He is he dead? He is he alive? Is he with Tess again? Was she waiting for him with open arms? Did he take her into his arms and spin her around happily, all memory of me fading into nothing? Did he find something in her for him to love?
That’s just ridiculous.
She killed Alex.
He’d have killed her.
I hate Easter. I hate the fact I’m walking around this town in a daze. I hate the fact I can’t hate him. I can’t. It’s impossible because I understand why he left. He left because his planet wanted him. They needed him. They needed him to save them from Khivar who was destroying every last thing on their planet. They had tried to fight him off for as long as they could but in the end they needed him. So he left. He stepped on that bloody spaceship and flew away. What’s worse is the fact he was willing to stay.
He was going to stay.
For me.
But I made him go.
I couldn’t stand the thought of him breaking down from the guilt that would weigh heavily on his conscience for the rest of his life. But I couldn’t go with him. I was human. Human’s couldn’t survive. So I made him go. Told him to forget about me and do what was right.
We weren’t supposed to be together anyway – were we?
‘Destiny.’ That’s the last word he had said to me. The final sentence was “I will come back for you because, unlike Tess, you are my destiny.” I can still hear him choke on his words and his voice crack under the strain of his tears. His lashes were dam, a dam which burst the moment he pulled away from me and backed up on to the ship.
I can still taste the salt of my own.
I’m crying right now. I thought it was just a part of the memory. Or maybe I’ve always been like this. I always thought that the taste of the salty water was just the memory – now I think maybe I’ve never stopped crying.
My feet are carrying me to towards the car and I have no idea why. I never know where my feet are trying to take me. I end up in the weirdest places. All from past memories. The other day I found myself in the UFO centre reliving the day when we all disappeared. The day the Skins came to town. I wish I had disappeared that day. Would have been so much easier.
The other day I ended up at Alex’s grave. I remember just sinking to the ground, my knees melting into the soil as the rain poured down around me. I remember crying my heart out into his grave as I laid myself out on top of it. I curled into the smallest ball, just wanting to remember what it was like to have Alex’s arms around. I cried even harder when I realised I couldn’t remember what it felt like. All I could remember was that last lingering kiss.
I hated him in that moment. For the briefest second; because of him I couldn’t remember anything after the lingering kiss. That final moment with him.
But now, as I drive in the mid afternoon sun, now I don’t hate him. I hate myself. I’m the one who is focusing on this separation and pain. Max didn’t deliberately make me forget the warmth of Alex’s embrace – I did that on my own.
The ground underneath the car turns from smooth tarmac to dry, dirty and bumpy and I instantly know where I’m going. I want to turn back, my head is yelling at me not to go there, but I feel that I have to.
To find closure.
Because that’s what I need. I need closure. I need to move on with my life. I need to stop thinking about Max Evans. I don’t want to stop. It’s a case of I need to or I think I’ll just breakdown into a bigger mess than I am already. That wouldn’t be productive.
I slow the car down to a stop and I instantly break down. What is it about this place that makes all the painful memories just surface forming brand new tears? What is it about this place that I hate?
I hate it just as much as I hate him.
I love him.
This is the place he was born.
I couldn’t hate this place if I really tried.
What I hate is what it represents – the beginning and ending of human life. Max was born here – in to human life and this is the place where the ship took off – The end of his human life. This place gives and takes life and I hate that. I hate the fact I am alone. I hate the fact this place even exists. I hate the fact I’m alive. I hate the fact I just cannot let go no matter how hard I try.
I have to breathe. I have to stop this now before I destroy the car. The green electricity can destroy a wall – a car is no match for it. So I step out of the car. I don’t even need to look down at my hands to know that green electricity runs just under my skin. It isn’t new either. It’s one more thing Max ‘gave’ me. One more thing I can ‘thank’ Max for.
I look towards the pod chamber and take another good look at my hands. I frown slightly. Why am I here? I can’t get in there – could I? I glance at the pod chamber and soon I find myself charging up to the entrance like a woman on serious mission. I have pure energy and anger rolling through my veins right now and I feel like I have to go there. I have to be there before I explode.
I nervously glide my hand over the rocky surface and almost jump back with fright as the unforgettable silver hand print appears.
Everything is turning dark now.
I have no idea how long I have been stood here just staring at this hand print, half afraid to put my palm to it. I think it’s been hours when it has just seemed like minutes. My hand is shaking as I place it on the print and I almost cry as the door opens up.
I step inside, the room still glowing from when the Granolith inhabited its walls. There are fresh tears now as I come face to face with this place once again. This was where everything went wrong. This was where Tess flew away and the group started to fall to pieces. This was the place Future Max had come, the place that had destroyed any hope of me having any sort of happy life. The moment Future Max had stepped into this room; he had destroyed the Liz Parker I used to know.
Because of him my best friend died at the hands of a monster – one who had no morals or conscience. A monster that had killed Alex just so she could go home. Because of him I didn’t stand at the Elvis chapel with Max at the age of 19. Because of him I can’t listen to I Shall Believe ever again with out painful heart wrenching memories surfacing. Because of him my Max had to leave. Because of him I can’t feel my heart. Because of him I am dead.
I hate him
But I love him.
Always.
Forever.
I turn back to the pods and nearer to which I know was Max’s. I haven’t actually been told which one was his, I can feel it in the same way I could feel Max when he was still standing on this planet. I could feel him everywhere I went when he was here, but now I just have vague fluttering of his existence. It’s becomes stronger as he trace my fingers over what remains of his pod. The steel that encases it is so cold I would have flinched if I could feel.
But I don’t.
I can’t.
It would be a miracle if I could. These holidays are supposed to be a time of miracles but here I am, in a long since abandoned pod chamber unable to feel the ice cold steel beneath my fingers. The tears pour over my lashes as I realise the true extent of my loneliness. I just want to scream and cry but I can’t. I’ve been doing it for far too long – I’ve run out of energy.
I plop onto the floor as my weak legs buckle from under me. He’s gone. I’m gone. I can’t live, I can’t eat and I can’t breathe. There is no hope in my life; there is no joy that keeps me going. It’s the third Easter since he left me and I finally feel ready to just let go and die in this pod chamber surrounded by the memories this place envelopes me in. I hiccup tears as I lie down on the floor, resting my head in my hands. I curl up into the smallest ball and just cry out.
I just want this to end.
I need this to end.
My eyes open and close as the darkness starts to take over. I close them tightly.
I hate him.
I love him.
Always and forever.
Opening my eyes wide, wanting to take one last look at this place, and all I see is amber.
I see my miracle.
My Easter miracle.
My Max.