Author's note:
 this fic came from a song called "Where's the Girl?" from the Broadway musical "The Scarlet Pimpernel" You can read the lyrics here since i took them out of the fic itself.  its also not mine. this is probably my first fanfic, and my definite first Roswell fic, so be nice and boost my ego with lavish praises. Also, this assumes that Heatwave is the last episode shown, ok?  Character thoughts are in **.

Had it really been five whole years? Only five years?

Forever ago, when she and Liz had been best friends. Giggling and chatting about boys and clothes. All that had changed though, after Liz was shot.  Their whole lives had changed before their eyes.  No more silly talk about boys.  Afterwards, they had to concentrate on survival.

Liz.  Maria often wondered what had happened to her.  Maria had picked up the phone so many times to call, but she lost her nerve before she even finished dialing.  Maybe Max had finally gotten his act together and asked Liz out. Maria was not sure if that would be a good thing or not.  Max and Liz together, that is.  What if he had to leave, or the sheriff caught him?  Liz would be heartbroken.

The bus was almost there. She could see the small bus station approaching.  She really was not sure if she could handle this. She used to be able to deal with anything.  She was Teflon. At least, that's what she had thought.  Now, she knew better. When Maria was younger, she believed that nothing too terrible could ever happen to her little world. And then Liz was shot, and everything spun out of control.

Maria was tired.  So tired.  She had been traveling for days to get back. Had to get back.  Her mother was dying.

It had been a long time since she had spoken to her mother.  She didn't tell anyone where she was going when she had run.  She had just run.  Blindly, praying that somewhere, anywhere, she could escape the feelings, the memories that chased her.  But somehow, after five years, her mother had managed to track her down, and now she was coming home.

The mountains of North Carolina were very different from the flat desert of Roswell, New Mexico. Different was good. It had been what she was looking for.  Anything to keep the memories away.  Not an ideal existence, maybe.  She barely made enough to cover her rent and groceries, but she could live.  And be too busy worrying about money to think about anything else. Too busy to remember.

Her life had been so different then.  Before the shooting. Before him.  Before...everything.  She had grown up quickly after that.  Liz had too, but Liz didn't seem to mind so much.  Liz had been so captivated, so hypnotized by Max, that little else seemed to matter to her any more. Not even Maria.

Oddly enough, she had enjoyed it, at first.  Everything was an adventure.  Always having to be watching out.  She had been forced to put her trust, and her life, sometimes, into the hands of three people she barely knew.  It was exhilarating.

But then, Alex had stopped speaking to her.  And Liz got so involved in Max that she was always to busy for Maria any more.  Maria just got tired of it all.  Tired of always watching over her shoulder for some unnamed evil. Tired of always clashing with Isabel, of not being trusted by anyone.  She weakened.

When he had come to her that night, she was too tired to protest. And she was glad that something in her life seemed semi-normal.  She should have known better.

Maria wearily wiped her face, and rubbed her burning eyes as the bus began to slow.   She took a deep breath and got herself back under control.  This was it. She was home.

A weary young man trudged up the stairs to his drab little apartment, almost tripping over one of the loose boards on the staircase.  He swore tiredly at the stubborn lock.  Kicking the door open, he stumbled inside.  Without looking, he tossed his keys on the rickety table, and then collapsed into a beat up armchair.

He was exhausted.  It was only his second week at this job, and he already loathed it. It was not hard, but it was hot, filthy work.  Closing his eyes, he contemplated how long he could live here without a job.  The apartment was not much, but it was better than the trailer he had shared with Hank until he was eighteen.  Maybe the Parkers would let him work at the Crashdown again for a while.

The shrill ringing of the telephone roused him from a half doze.  Groaning, he pulled himself to his feet and fumbled around for the phone.  He finally located it under a pile of papers on its seventh ring.

“Yeah?”

“Michael! I’ve been trying to get in touch with you for almost three days!”

Michael winced as Max’s worried voice blared loudly into his ear. “Hi Max,” he answered casually, repressing a sigh at the paternal tone.

“Where have you been?  Why haven’t you been answering your phone?”  Max sounded as if he suspected Michael of deliberately hiding from his calls.  Admittedly, Michael had done it before, and would most likely do it again at some point, but he had a valid excuse this time.

Michael rolled his eyes.  “Yeah well, my machine’s broken,” he said as sarcastically as possible.  “Besides, I have a job, remember?”

Max sounded a little embarrassed, “Oh yeah.  How’s it going?  Are you still working at that Mexican restaurant?”

“No, I’m working at the toy factory now.”  Michael sighed, he knew what was coming.

“Again?  Michael, this is your fifth job in four months!”  Max exclaimed in disbelief.

“So?” Michael said shortly.  He was entirely too tired to deal with Max today.  He rubbed a dirty hand through his hair and suppressed a yawn.

Max sighed.  “Never mind.  Just try to stay at this one for a while, ok?”

“Yeah, whatever.”  Michael tried to keep the impatience out of his voice.  “Look, did you call just to check on my employment status, or is there actually a point to this call?”

“Believe it or not, there is a point.  Liz just called me.  She heard from her folks that Amy DeLuca is really sick.”

“And you are telling me this because...?”

Max was exasperated.  “Because you’re the only one in town, Einstein!  Will you at least go check on her?  Liz is really worried.”

“Yeah, I guess.  I’ve got Monday off, I’ll go then,” Michael gave in.  Anything to be able to get off the phone before Max started in on his “Michael, you need to be more responsible” lecture.

“Thanks a lot man, I’ll call you later. And Michael, try to keep this job, ok?”

“Sure, bye Max.”  Michael rolled his eyes as he hung up.  He contemplated the phone for a minute, lost in thought.

It had been a while since he had seen Maria’s mom.  Their last parting had not exactly been pretty.  The rest of the group tried to keep in touch with her periodically, but Michael stayed as far away as possible.

Liz had been really upset when Maria disappeared, and she had dragged all of them, even Alex and Kyle, along to see Ms. DeLuca in the hope that someone knew something.  Amy had spent hours grilling each of them about why Maria might have run away, and more importantly, where she might have gone.

////flashback////

Ms. DeLuca sat in an overstuffed armchair in the middle of the group of teenagers.  Everybody was really quiet, lost in their own worlds.  The note Maria had left was being passed around the circle, and the only sounds were stifled sniffs from Liz and Ms. DeLuca.

Suddenly Alex stood up and declared, “ This is insane! Somebody has to know something!  Who was the last person to see her?”

“I guess I was,” Liz offered quietly.  “She was acting..odd for a while now. She was being really quiet.  I didn’t think anything was wrong.”  Liz’s voice had cracked in the middle of the sentence.  “If only I had...done something, anything!”

Max hovered over Liz, not quite touching her. “Shh,  everything is going to be ok, you had no way of knowing.”

“Because I didn’t bother to ask!” Liz jumped up and began to pace.  “Did anyone? Alex, when was the last time you talked to Maria?”  Her tone was accusatory, and her eyes were blazing, both with anger and unshed tears.

“Stop it!! Just stop it!”  Ms. DeLuca yelled.  “My daughter is missing!  All I want to know is where she is now.  Where would she have gone?  One of you has to have some idea of where she went.”  Maria’s mother’s desperate eyes bored into each and every one of them.

Michael could not bring himself to meet her eyes.  He was sitting on the outside of the circle of people and he was very uncomfortable with this whole emotional scene.  He saw Kyle shift uncomfortably next to him, and realized that he was no more at ease here than Michael was.

“Ok, here’s what we are going to do,” Isabel interjected.  “We are going to go around this circle, and everybody is going to tell about the last time they saw or spoke to Maria, got it?”  Even Isabel was starting to look stressed, and she was the master of controlling her emotions.

“I’ll start.”  Liz took a deep breath and looked down at her feet.  “Well, it was at the Crashdown.  We were both on shift...”

Michael tuned out Liz’s quiet voice, and tried to think.  When was the last time he had seen Maria?  It had been at least three days.  He rarely went to the Crashdown anymore.  They both had been going out of their ways to avoid the other.  He passed her in the hall at school sometimes, when he bothered to go, but they never made eye contact and they were very careful never to come too close to each other.

“Michael?  Hello, Michael?”  Michael looked up with a start to see everyone in the group staring curiously at him.  “Its your turn, Michael.”  Max said.  “When was the last time you talked to Maria?”

An unexpected feeling of panic swept through Michael’s stomach.  “Uh, um, well,”  Michael stammered.  “Its...been a while. At least, I guess, maybe a little over a month?”

“A month?”  Alex said in astonishment, “You hang out with these people all the time and you haven’t spoken to Maria in a month?  Even I have talked to her more recently than that!”

“Yeah, well,”  Michael mumbled, “We don’t exactly get along.”

Liz looked confused.  “What are you talking about?  I thought you two were getting along fine.  I know you had a fight at the big party a while ago, but Maria said she was going to try to work it out.  Did something happen?”

“No! Nothing at all happened. Nothing.”  Michael defended himself.

“I don’t believe you.”  Maria’s mom was standing, and was walking towards him menacingly.  “What happened between you and my daughter?  We’ve already figured out that she was fine until about a month and a half ago.  What did you do to her?”

Michael stood up angrily.  “I don’t have to take this! I didn’t do anything!  It’s not my fault that your stupid daughter left.”  As soon as the words left his mouth, he knew they had been the wrong things to say.

“Get out!! Get out!!  I don’t know why my baby ever called you a friend! GET OUT!!”  Tears were streaming down her contorted face as she stalked towards Michael.

///end flashback///

After that scene, he had left.  He had not been back to see Ms. DeLuca since.

 He thought back over that day.  He still was not about to reveal to anybody the things he had said to Maria the last time he had talked to her.  Well, it would not have really been considered having a conversation.  He yelled.  She had just stared with her mouth open.

Michael still dreamed about that night sometimes.  And he was ashamed.  He could still see the look in her eyes.  The pain and the horror she could not have hidden.  The shy smile she had greeted him with that morning had been like the sun coming up, and then he had destroyed her.

Maria splashed cold water on her face is a vain attempt to wake herself up.  She had been up late with her mother last night.  Maria shivered.  Until she had arrived and actually seen her mother, the fact that Amy DeLuca was dying of cancer had not seemed real.

*Oh Mama, I’m sorry. *  Maria had been horrified to see her mother lying in bed, looking more like a skeleton than a living human being.  Her mother’s pretty brown hair had been cut into a ragged boy cut.  It looked like a mockery of Maria’s former hairstyle.

They had talked for a long while.  Maria could see that her mother desperately wanted to ask her why she had left, but she had held it in, and for that fact Maria was grateful.  She was not sure how to tell anyone what had happened.  Maria did not want to burden her mother, but she had no one else to talk to.

Maria stared into her reflection in the mirror.  She could see a little of what her mother used to look like in her pale features.  What her mother should look like.

Maria had never considered herself a beauty, but she knew she had changed drastically in the past five years.  And not for the better.  This half familiar stranger looking back at her had taken over her face, her feelings, and her life.  She doubted anyone she went to high school with would recognize this altered Maria.  Maybe not even Liz.

*Oh God.  I’m not strong enough for this.*  For one second, Maria honestly considered running again.  She would not have to explain herself, she would not have to watch her mother die.  She would not have to face the memories that lurked in this house, the memories that haunted this town.

The sound of her mother’s failing voice calling her name jerked her back into reality.  She could not leave.  She had run long enough.  It was time to face her past.

Maria walked down the hall towards her mother’s room, pausing a moment to take a deep breath and steady herself before she peeked around the corner.

“Yes, Mama?  Do you need something?”

Amy DeLuca looked up at her only child and attempted to smile.  “I just wanted to make sure that I hadn’t dreamt you being here.  I’m so glad you came home.”

Maria gave a strained smile.  “Me too, Mama.  Me too.  I just wish...” Maria paused, and looked down at her strong hands clasping her mother’s fragile one.

“I know.  But there was nothing you could’ve done had you been here.  I’m just glad you’re here now.”  With a final tired whisper, her mother sank back into sleep.

Maria sat beside her, like she had all of last night, just watching her mother struggle for each breath as she slept.

Maria stood and brushed her mother’s hair off of her face.  She wondered how much longer she would have her mother.  Amy refused to discuss the details of her illness with her daughter.

Maria wandered down the hall, lost in thought.  She walked into the kitchen and pulled the refrigerator door open.  Staring at the array of food inside, she sighed, and snagged the bottle of juice instead.

A hesitant rapping at the door caught her attention.  Maria was curious; the nurse who checked in on her mother was not due until tomorrow.

Maria opened the door, and the bottle of juice went sliding through her suddenly numb fingers to bounce off the floor.

“Michael!”  She gasped.

Michael stood, frozen, his hand still half raised as if to knock again.  He felt as if someone had just hit him over the back of the head with a board.  The sound of the juice container bouncing off the floor to land, unbroken, at his feet roused him from the staring contest he was having with Maria.

“Uh, you dropped this.”  He stammered, handing her the bottle.  *Good one Guerin.  Real intelligent.  His mind was spinning.  When had she gotten to Roswell? He would have heard if she had been in town a while.  Why didn’t Max tell him she was here? Why, oh why did she come back?

“Um, yeah, thanks.”  Maria took the juice bottle from him with a similarly flustered look on her face.  He knew she had not expected to see him here.  She had not expected to see him anywhere.  She fiddled with the cap on the bottle while they both stood in the doorway uncertainly.  “So,” She said, studying his left shoulder intently, “Why are you here?”

In his shock at seeing Maria, Michael had all but forgotten why he had come to the DeLuca’s.  He searched frantically through his scattered thoughts for a reason that would not include “I’m an idiot,” “You’re beautiful,” or “Where have you been?”  Finally he stammered out,  “Max said your mom was sick.  He asked me to come check on her.”

“Oh.”  Maria stared at him for a moment.  She would have preferred to run screaming away from the house, away from him, than to have to deal with both her mother and Michael at the same time.  She swallowed hard, but managed to say, “Well, come in then.  Let me go check and see if she’s awake.”

Maria led Michael into the small living room, and excused herself.  As soon as she was around the corner, she abruptly sank to the floor of the hallway and tried to collect her scattered wits.  She covered her face with shaking hands, and just tried to breath.  Michael, here?  She was not sure if she could do this.  No, she knew she could not do this.

Why was he still in Roswell?  Why could her still get to her?  Five years ago, she left Roswell to get away from him.  Figures he would show up on her doorstep as soon as she got back.  That was Michael, always able to knock her off balance.  Damn him.

She pulled herself to her feet and continued unsteadily towards her mother’s room.

“Mama?”  She asked, as softly as she could.  Maybe her mother would be asleep and Michael would have to leave.

That vain hope was destroyed when Amy turned her head towards her daughter.  “Yes?”

Maria shifted uneasily and swallowed hard.  “There’s...somebody here to see you.  How are you feeling?”

“A visitor?”  Amy’s eyes lit up a little.  “It’s been a while since I’ve had any visitors.  Bring them in.  Is it Jim?”

Maria was puzzled for a second.  “Oh, Sheriff Valenti.”  Yet another person she could defiantly go without seeing.  “No, it’s not him.  I’ll go get him.”

Michael was perched uncomfortably on the couch, managing to look supremely out of place.  Maria fought the almost hysterical urge to laugh at his expression.  There was no way he could be more uneasy with this situation than Maria was.  “Come on.”  She said, and led him down the hall to her mother’s dim bedroom.

Michael edged into the room behind Maria, and his eyes met Amy DeLuca’s for the first time since he had walked out of this house five years ago.

“Mom, you remember Michael, don’t you?”  This had definatly been a bad idea.  Michael had the look of a trapped animal, while Amy looked livid.

“Oh yes, I remember Michael quite well.”  Her tone was cold enough to freeze Michael’s feet to the floor.  “What do you want?”

“Uh, I, uh..” Michael faltered.  She was still glaring at him from her position on the bed.  She was supposed to be the weak one here, so why did he feel like he was about to be eaten alive? Finally, he spit out, “Max said you were sick. I was the only one in town, so he wanted me to come over and check on you.”

There, he said it.  Maybe he could leave with his head still attached to his body.

Amy hissed, “Well, you saw me, now get out! I told you that you are NOT welcome here, and I meant it!”  She had pushed herself to a sitting position while she said this, and he could see the physical effort it was taking her to hold her ground.

Suddenly, Amy’s arms gave out and she dropped back onto the bed, panting with exhaustion. “Get out.” She rasped one more time, still glaring despite her weakness.

Maria rushed to her mother’s side in concern.  While her back was turned, Michael backed out the door to her bedroom and hurriedly made his escape from the house, the front door gaping open behind him.

Maria hovered worriedly over her gasping mother.  Only once, a lifetime ago, had she felt this helpless.

Maria could not believe the hostility that her mother had expressed towards Michael.  What had she found out about him? Did she know?  Maria blanched, she did not even want to contemplate that idea.  It was terrifying.

Amy was still panting a little, but she had mostly recovered.  Even after witnessing the way she treated Michael, Maria was unprepared for the firmness in her mother’s tone when she next spoke.

“What happened Maria? It’s time to tell me why you left.”

Maria whirled. This had to be a nightmare.  Liz Parker stood in the doorway, an unreadable expression on her face.

“I...I...” Maria began to back towards the corner of the room as Liz advanced one slow step at a time. Maria was about to go into full-blown panic mode when Liz spoke again.

“It’s ok, Maria.” Liz had stopped and was watching Maria, this time with an oddly gentle look in her eyes.  “I know it’s been a long time. We are not mad at you.  But we were so worried.  We just want to know what happened.”

“Maria, please listen to Liz.”

Maria turned to look at her mother, her eyes wide in panic.  Amy had managed to push herself up a bit so she could meet her daughter’s eyes.

“I know you don’t want to talk about it, sweetie, but you have to.  I called Liz just as soon as I heard from the private eye that you were coming home.  Please, baby, I have to know why you left.”  Amy was almost crying as she pleaded with her distraught daughter.

Maria swallowed against the block of ice in her stomach and forced herself to nod.  She knew it was coming, but she had not been expecting to be doubled teamed by Liz and Amy.

Liz had taken a seat in the chair next to Amy’s bed, and they both watched as Maria labored to begin speaking.

“It was...it was the night of that party, I guess, when it happened.  You remember, Liz?”  Liz slowly nodded as a jumble of emotions flitted over Maria’s face.  “Well, I had been..Michael and I had sort of been seeing each other.”  Maria hastened to respond to the look of shock that Amy wore.  “Oh, you wouldn’t call it dating, but we were together sometimes.”

Amy had started at Michael’s name.  She had a murderous look on her face, as if to say “ I knew it all along.”

Liz put her hand on Amy’s arm to keep her silent.  Maria might not go on if she was interrupted.  Maria shot her a grateful look.

“A lot of things happened that night.  It was really complicated.  I guess the short version of it is that Michael and I had a fight.”  Maria hesitated, she was not sure how much to tell them.  She did not want her mother to get upset.

Liz spoke up cautiously.  “I remember that.  You told me you were leaving right before Alex and I got arrested.  I thought you said you were going to talk to him later.”

“Well, I tried.  It was a couple weeks after that when I finally cornered him”  Maria laughed bitterly.  “But he wouldn’t listen.  He...we..he said a bunch of really nasty things about me.  I just couldn’t handle it.  He said...he..”

“Take your time, Maria. It’s ok.”  Amy tried to reassure her daughter.

Maria took a deep breath.  “He said that he didn’t blame Daddy for leaving.  That nobody would want...could ever want...”  Maria stopped.  She couldn’t speak past the tears and memories.

Amy looked shocked.  She reached out her arms, and Maria threw herself into them and allowed herself to cry.  “I’m so sorry.  I never knew you even remembered your father.  You never talked about it.  It wasn’t your fault, baby. Shh.”  She continued to rock Maria as much as she could.

Liz was holding one of Maria’s hands and watching with concern as Maria attempted to get herself under control. “But..”  She hesitated, not sure if she should bring it up.  “Why didn’t you tell me?  You know I’ve always been here for you.  Or Alex.  He would’ve listened.  And then he would’ve beat Michael up for you.”  Liz was pleased to see a watery smile and a half choked laugh from Maria at that thought.

“No Liz.”  Maria straightened and wiped her eyes.  “You’re forgetting.  I know it was a long time ago.  But Alex still wasn’t speaking to me, and I didn’t know how to tell you.”  Maria studied her hand holding on to Liz’s smaller one.

“And you wouldn’t have told me, would you?”  Amy smoothed Maria’s hair back and looked at her with sympathy.

Maria just shook her head, not raising her eyes from her mother’s bedspread.

“Ok.”  Liz finally said.  “Come on, Maria, your mom is looking really tired.  We can go cry in the other room.”

Maria gave a sniffled laugh.  She pulled herself out of her mother’s embrace and stood, looking at her mother with concern.  Amy did look really tired.  She hugged her mother one more time, then followed Liz into the hall, pulling the door shut behind her.

Liz and Maria were both silent as they wandered into Maria’s room.  Maria flopped down on her bed and watched as Liz drifted around her room, looking at all her things from high school.

Amy had never changed anything in Maria’s room.  She had always been convinced that Maria would come back some day.  Her mother had not even taken down her Backstreet Boys poster.

Liz studied the aromatherapy bottles that lay scattered across the desk  She examined the small dusty bottle of Cyprus oil for a moment.  She suddenly turned to look at Maria.  She examined Maria the same way she had looked at the Cyprus oil.  Curiously, as if she was sure there was some part of the puzzle she was missing.  “There was more to it then that, wasn’t there Maria?”

Maria stiffened.  Hedging around the topic, she said, “What do you mean?”

Liz sat down next to her on the bed.  “You didn’t tell us the whole story, did you?”

Maria sighed, “No.  No, I didn’t.  I didn’t want to upset Mama.  I should have known you’d figure it out.”  She nervously began picking at fringe on her bedspread.

“So what else happened?  It had to be something else.”  Liz was in full scientific mode and was analyzing every move Maria had made.  “You didn’t leave until about a month after the party.  And I know you, you couldn’t have kept a secret for that long.”

“Well.”  Maria did not look up to meet Liz’s eyes.  “It did start at the party, and Michael and I did have a fight.  But that was only the beginning.”

When Maria halted, Liz took her hand again.  “Well?”  She prompted.

“Ok, I can do this.”  Maria said to herself.  “What I didn’t tell you was that we made up.  Sort of anyway.  He was avoiding me, so after a few weeks I tracked him down to his trailer.  He was mad, but he actually talked to me a little.  He was scared.”  Maria shook her head in disbelief.  “He was scared of me. Me.”

Liz tightened her fingers around Maria’s in comfort.  She was watching Maria in concern.

Maria went on with difficulty.  “He...we fought again.  And then....I don’t know what happened.  He kissed me.  And then we..I..well, I ran.”  Maria gave an embarrassed smile and shrugged.

Liz was growing more and more interested in the story.  How had Maria kept these kinds of secrets?

“He followed me, I guess. I was in my room, and I guess I fell asleep.  When I woke  up, he was there, watching me.  I didn’t know if we were going to fight again or not, so I got up and got right in his face.  He just stared at me for a second with the weirdest look on his face.  Then, he kissed me again.  It threw me, I wasn’t expecting it.”  Maria looked at the wide-eyed look on Liz’s face and half smiled.

“Well, things...happened.  And he..we..I...”  Maria started to blush, and shrugged. She  would not look at Liz.

“You..”  Liz was stunned at this turn of events.  “You slept with him!  You had sex with Michael Guerin?  You had sex with an alien?”

“Liz! Not so loud!  My mom is right down the hall.  Believe me, she doesn’t need to know.”  Maria urgently shushed Liz.  “But yes, I slept with him. And..”

“And?” Liz demanded.  “Details! I want details, girl!”

“And...it was wonderful.  He completely let his guard down.  He fell asleep, and I just sat and watched him for a little while.”  Maria smiled wistfully at the memory.  He had held her so carefully that night, as if he was afraid she would break.

“Well, what happened after that?”  Liz said eagerly.

“He was getting dressed when I woke up.  He seemed...panicked, I guess.  I had barely looked at him before he just, just started saying all these horrible things.”  Maria choked back a sob as she continued.  “He said that about Daddy, and that I was a slut, and that nobody in their right mind could ever want me.”

“Oh sweetie.”  At this point, both Maria and Liz had tears pouring down their faces.  Liz pulled Maria into a tight hug and they cried together.

“I didn’t know what to do Lizzie.  I couldn’t even get near him anymore.  And it hurt, because I think I loved him then.  And you were always with Max..and Alex wouldn’t even look at me.  So I left.  I couldn’t do it.  There was too much here I didn’t want to deal with.”  Maria’s eyes pleaded with Liz to understand.  “No more aliens, no more being chased.  No more hurting.  And no more him.”

Liz hugged Maria fiercely.  “I’m so sorry I was not there when you needed me.  But I’m here now.  Don’t you feel better now that you’ve told someone?”

“I’m not done yet.”  There was a grim cast to Maria’s face.

“You mean there’s more?”  Liz was starting to feel overwhelmed.  What else could have happened?

“Yes. A little while after I left, I started feeling....funny.  I can’t really describe it.”  Maria hesitated.  “I was working in a restaurant in Texas when I realized what had happened.”  She gave a rueful grin.  “I dropped an entire tray of dishes when I figured it out.  Then I got fired.”

“Well, what was it?”  Liz asked.

“I was pregnant.”

“You were WHAT?!”  Liz yelped, her mouth falling open in shock.

Maria watched Liz somberly.  She quietly repeated, “I was pregnant.”    Maria shifted position uncomfortably under Liz’s astonished stare.

Liz finally regained control of her vocal cords and managed to stammer out, “What did you do?”  She felt a rush of sympathy for her friend.  Poor Maria, that was so much for one 16-year-old girl to deal with.

Maria bit her lip and looked up.  Her eyes were welling up again.  “I went back to the place I was staying and I cried for about a week.”  Maria smiled tightly and wiped at her eyes.  “I didn’t have a job.  I didn’t have any money.”  Maria finished in a strained whisper,  “I was so scared, Liz.  I didn’t know what to do.  I thought about calling you or Mom...but I couldn’t, I didn’t know what to say... ‘Hi, Mom, sorry I ran away, and by the way, I’m pregnant with an alien’s baby.’”  Maria smiled wryly.  “That would’ve gone over well.”

She looked over at Liz, who was still shaking her head in disbelief, “You ok, babe?  You looked majorly shell-shocked, and I’m still not done.”

Liz looked back up at her friend and grinned a little nervously.  “Go on, I think I’m ready for the next earthshaking bit of news.”

Maria made a face and got off the bed to pace around the room.  “Actually,”  she whispered,  “I think this might be the hardest part.”  She stared off into space for a moment, trying to figure out how to tell her best friend about everything else.

Wandering back to her dresser, she picked up the dusty bottle of Cyprus oil Liz had abandoned and rolled it between the palms of her hands as she spoke.  “At first,  I was terrified.  I couldn’t even take care of myself, much less a baby.  I seriously considered an abortion, but I couldn’t do it.  That little baby was all I had left.”
 

//////Flashback//////

A girl with tired eyes struggled to get out of the taxi in the early Carolina morning.  She was hampered by a large battered suitcase and a swollen belly.  She looked around at her surroundings and began to make her way towards the nearest restaurant.  It was run down and a little dingy, but she could not afford to be picky.

Maria had decided to move on after she discovered her pregnancy, and she was hoping that this place would work out better than the last three she had tried.  One place said they were not hiring, the second fired her after her morning sickness had gotten out of hand, and the third’s manager kept trying to cop a feel.

Maria was starting to feel panicked.  She guessed she only had about two more months before the baby was due, and she had no place to stay and barely enough money to buy a cup of coffee.

The restaurant was called The Golden Girl, and it had defiantly seen better days, but Maria straightened her shoulders and took a deep breath before she opened the doors.  This was her last chance.

///end flashback///

“Did you get the job?”  Liz asked, leaning forward in concern.

“Yeah, I think the manager felt sorry for me.  She was real nice.  She let me live in her basement for a while until I found my own place.”  Maria explained.

Liz stood up and stretched.  “Come on,”  she invited,  “Let’s get some tea or something.  I need a commercial break before the next part of your soap opera, and I know your throat has to be getting dry.”

Maria followed Liz down the hall into the kitchen, grateful for the break.  Sitting at the table, she watched as Liz put the kettle on the stove.  “So, tell me about what all you’ve been doing since I left.  Are you dating anyone?”

Liz smiled a little sheepishly as she sat down across the table from Maria.  “Yes, as a matter of fact.  Max and I have been dating on and off for about the last three years.”

Maria clapped her hands excitedly, “He finally asked you out!”

“Well, not exactly.”  Liz confided, “I finally had to ask him.  He would act interested for a little while, then back off.  It was driving me crazy!  So I asked him to Prom our senior year.”

“That’s terrific!”  Maria faltered,  “But what about the whole Czechoslovakian thing?  I mean, what happened with the Sheriff and everything?”

Liz rolled her eyes at the mention of Valenti.  “Well,  I think he gave up.  He spent a lot of time with your mother after you left.  He seemed really worried about her.  He still comes by to see her sometimes.”

“Oh gee, that makes me feel better.”  Maria got up to take the screaming kettle off the stove and poured water into a pair of mismatched mugs.  She fished two tea bags out of a container and plopped them into the mugs.  She handed Liz a mug as she resettled herself at the table.  “Why did he give up?”

“I don’t really know.”  Liz shrugged and toyed with her spoon.  “We all kind of ... drifted apart though, after you disappeared.  Isabel was convinced you had been kidnapped by the FBI, and they were coming for her next, so she was pressuring Max to stay away from me.  Alex blamed those three for your running away, and refused to talk to them at all, and you know what kind of crush he had on Isabel.”  Liz paused to take a sip of her tea.

“So..uh,”  Maria said to the sugar canister in her hand, “What about Michael?  Not that I care or anything.”  She hastily added.

Liz arched an eyebrow at Maria’s question, but answered her in between sips of tea.  “Well, you know,”  she shrugged,  “Michael’s Michael.  He was defiantly more agitated after you left.  I wasn’t sure why.  He refused to talk about you at all.  And he tried to keep Max away from me at all costs.  But then, he and Max had a fight about me, I think, and I didn’t see Michael for a long time.  Max was really worried about him.”

“So,” Maria hesitated, “he’s...everybody’s ok, aren’t they?  I mean, no evil government ET hunters or anything?”

Liz hastened to reassure her friend, “No, nothing like that.  Michael just...couldn’t deal with the fact that nobody from home came to get them.  And he left for a while.”  Liz grimaced at the memory.  “Isabel had a fit when she found out he was gone.  He went looking for his answers.  I don’t think he ever found them.”

Maria examined her half empty mug and sighed.  “Poor Michael.  He might be an ass, but he should’ve found what he was looking for.”

“I can’t believe you are taking it this calmly.”  Liz was gazing at Maria questioningly.  “We are talking about Michael, you know.  The guy who broke your heart?”  She suddenly glowered at Maria, “I still can’t believe you had sex with him and didn’t tell me.  How unfair is that?”

Maria had to laugh at Liz’s disgruntled expression.  “Tell you what, next time I have sex with an alien, you’ll be the first to know.”

“So you’re planning on doing it again?”  Liz batted her eyes innocently at Maria’s gasp of outrage.

Maria conceded defeat and smiled warmly at her companion.  “Oh Lizzie, I missed you.”

Liz returned the smile.  “I missed you too.  Who else could I talk to about kissing Max?  Alex would stick his fingers in his ears and start singing “Home on the Range” as loud as he could whenever I even mentioned it in passing.  He got some really strange looks.”  Liz grinned.  “Isabel caught him doing it once. I don’t think I have ever seen anybody turn that many different shades of red.”

“So you and Alex are still friends?”  Maria said hopefully.

“Oh definitely.  He wouldn’t talk to any of the alien conspiracy for a long time.  He doesn’t go out of his way to talk to them now, but he doesn’t totally ignore them either.  And Isabel can still make him blush just by talking to him.”  She thought for a minute.  “That might be why she talks to him actually.  The amusement factor.”

Maria shot Liz an amused look and drained the rest of her tea.  She thumped her mug onto the table and studied Liz with a serious expression.  “Are you ready for the rest?”

Liz gave Maria a wry smile and said, “I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.”