Category:  AU  M/L

Summary: AU story based on a song I have liked for a long time, but with a different twist.  Liz didn't grow up in Roswell and has been living in foster homes as long as she can remember.

Disclaimer:  Jason Katims owns everything Roswell…come on now if I owned it would I be writing fanfic???  Also I don't own the song either, it's "Two beds and a coffee machine" by Savage Garden.  I'm just borrowing this stuff and I'll put it back when I'm done I promise.  The characters Abby, Charlotte, and Frank were created by me though loosely based on characters in the song or people I know.

Feedback: Okay I said I wouldn't beg—but I lied…..Please please please leave feedback!

Thanks: To my oh so wonderful beta Elise –you rock!

A/N: the italics indicate thought, also song lyrics.

Hope in the Darkness

The gravel crunched as Liz slowly pulled the old beat up and falling apart car to a stop in front of the house.  Standing up and getting out of the car, she looked around as she walked towards the house next door and up the small steps, being careful not to use the third one, as it had been unstable for as long as she could remember.  She opened the door slowly and set her bag on the floor.  "Thank you," she sighed as she realized that no one was home. 

She walked across the room and picked up the phone, quickly dialing the number she knew by heart.  "Hello, Mrs. Sanchez?  It's Liz, you can send them over now, I just got back from work.  Okay thanks again," she said, hanging up the phone and walking back towards the living room.  Just then, two pairs of feet bounded up the stairs and through the door.

"Lizzie!" they yelled, running towards her and wrapping their small arms around her waist.

"We missed you while you were gone," the younger one said.

"I missed you too, but you girls know I have to work," Liz said as she hugged them in return.

"We know…" the older girl replied.

"So why don't you both go get cleaned up and then we will see what we can find for dinner ok?"

"Okay!" they yelled as they raced towards their room.

Liz sat down on the couch to wait for them and couldn't help but remember how this all started.  From what she had been told, she had been adopted when she was just a baby.  Unfortunately, her adoptive parents had been killed a few years later in a car crash.  She had been at home at the time with a babysitter.  She felt guilty sometimes that she couldn't remember them.  After that, the state of New Mexico had placed her in the first of many foster homes. 

She was bounced from home to home until she landed at Frank Matthews' a few years ago.  The only reason she stayed there was the other two kids that were placed with Frank shortly after she was.  Abby and Charlotte had been three and five, respectively, when they arrived, and Liz had been 15.  By that time, Liz had already witnessed their foster father's true nature and she knew that she could not leave the girls with him.  Frank Matthews put on a wonderful front when the social workers came around, but when they left he turned into a mean and dangerous drunk who only kept the kids around for the check which he used to buy more beer.  Liz ended up taking whatever he dished out when he was drunk because she was trying to keep him away from the girls.  She wasn't stupid, she knew that they knew he beat her, but she lied to them anyway, saying that she tripped or fell.  Now, two years later, Liz realized that she sometimes felt as if she were doing it to fool herself into believing it didn't really happen. 

About a month after she arrived, Liz had realized that Frank wasn't going to put food in the house, so she got a job at the diner in town.  She hated the job and the people who came in, but it gave her grocery money and that's all she was concerned about.  She had actually been lucky enough to strike a deal with a slightly drunken customer and get him to sell her his old car for about a hundred dollars, which was her entire savings at the time.  She usually parked it next-door so Frank still didn't know that she had it.  Not that he was ever coherent long enough to care. 

Just then, she heard an engine and a car stopped.  Oh no, it must be Frank, home early from the bars.  She hadn't realized it was that late already…and the girls hadn't gotten anything to eat.  She grabbed a bag of chips and ran towards their room.  Tossing the bag through the door she closed it saying, "Girls, lock the door and don't come out until I tell you that it's okay…alright?"  They nodded and went to sit on Abby's bed with the chips.  Liz turned hoping that he would just pass out on the couch and not be in the mood to fight.

TBC



And she takes another step
Slowly she opens the door
Check that he is sleeping
Pick up all the broken glass
And furniture on the floor
Been up half the night screaming
Now it's time to get away
Pack up the kids in the car
Another bruise to try and hide
Another alibi to write

Another ditch in the road
You keep moving
Another stop sign
You keep moving on
And the years go by so fast
Wonder how I ever made it through

And there are children to think of
Baby's asleep in the back seat
Wonder how they'll ever make it through this living nightmare
But the mind is an amazing thing
Full of candy dreams and new toys and another cheap hotel
Two beds and a coffee machine
But there are groceries to buy
And she knows she'll have to go home

Another ditch in the road
You keep moving
Another stop sign
You keep moving on
And the years go by so fast
Wonder how I ever made it through

Another bruise to try and hide
Another alibi to write
Another lonely highway in the black of the night
But there's hope in the darkness
You know you're going to make it

Another ditch in the road
You keep moving
Another stop sign
You keep moving on
And the years go by so fast
Silent fortress built to last
Wonder how I ever made it through