Chapter Four

(Tess):

"Do you think they'll have him scheduled for anything today?" Liz asked. "You know, big important computer stuff that'll take hours..."

"C'mon, Liz," Isabel replied. "It's his second day there, or third or whatever, and it's the weekend. Worst comes to worst..." she smirked a little. "We 'kidnap' him. They'll understand."

Liz snorted. I might have too, a little bit, but I didn't chime in. It was nice of Maria to arrange for me to join in on this little expedition, but I didn't really feel comfortable enough with them to join in on the rapid-fire back and forth banter. At least not when I had to keep my eyes on the road...

"You've got the directions to his residence and the room number?" Liz asked Isabel for the third time, (and we were only twenty minutes out of Roswell.)

"Yeah," Isabel assured her. "Right here." She tapped her purse.

"But what if he isn't anywhere near there?" Liz said, rambling to herself as much as talking to Isabel. "It won't be that early by the time we make it to Las Cruces and the campus. And he's new there and doesn't know anybody... probably none of his neighbors would know or care where he might have gone... that's if he even HAS neighbors in the dorm... it's probably pretty empty. Did you that spring exams have been over for a week already at all the New Mexico universities??"

"Liz," I broke in before she could come up with something new to worry about... "Relax! We found Max in an abandoned army base... Isabel found a girl buried in the desert. I think we'll be able to find a friend of ours on a college campus."

Liz laughed. "Yeah... I guess you're right at that. Between the three of us, we do have our talents."

We drove on in silence for a little while. What vehicles were being used by whom had been a subject of a fair bit of discussion during the plans that surrounded Maria pulling out of the trip to Las Cruces and me tagging along. The original plan had been to use the DeLuca family Jetta, and she had offered to lend it out, but the old third hand car that Michael bought three weeks ago was still more than a little temperamental, and nobody was eager to trust themselves to it for a road trip to Albuquerque so soon. Isabel had asked about borrowing the Jeep from Max, but I volunteered my wheels... I wouldn't need them for anything else today, would I, after all?? And here we were. Not quite the three amigas yet.

"So," I blurted out suddenly. "Does anybody know anything about this Carver guy?? I mean, I've picked up that Michael met him last fall when he came to Roswell for some Air Force reunion thing... can't say that I was paying any attention at the time. Guess I was a little too obsessed with the big G... it was immediately after you discovered 'it', right Isabel?" Iz nodded.

"Yeah -- all I really know is that right after doing his history makeup project with Hal Carver was the first time in months upon months that Michael was nice to me," Liz put in. "Even APOLOGIZED. And he brought Maria up to the rocks right around then... showed her the Granilith."

"He told me a little about Hal's story," Isabel put in. "Afterwards... around the time that you and Max were in New York," she quickly added the last part, as if I'd get upset that Michael had shared information with her and not with me.

"Broad strokes, Hal Carver was an air force captain, stationed here in Roswell at the time of the crash. Saw some things, a couple of which he didn't like. Started working with an investigative reporter, Betty Osorio, to uncover the whole truth."

"Oh," Liz breathed, sounding as surprised as I felt. "What happened next?"

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(Michael):

"Maria, Henry Carver. Hal, my girlfriend Maria DeLuca." The two of them smiled at each other and shook hands. It was a few hours yet before the awards dinner would begin, and we had just gotten into Albuquerque. Hal had suggested that three of us meet at a coffee shop that he knew of, to talk and spend some time together first.

"Right, we met at that cafe back in Roswell," Hal said. "The one where Parker's bar used to be." That got a bit of a snicker from both of us, but he continued on without noticing. "So glad to have the pleasure formally." And with a twinkle in his eye, he brought Maria's hand up towards his head and kissed it roguishly.

"Oh brother," Maria chuckled. "I'm gonna have to keep a watchful eye on you ALL evening, aren't I??"

"Seems only fair," he winked, taking a moment to look her up and down appreciatively. Maria was wearing a nice dress for the dinner tonight, in muted purple and blue print, and she did look VERY cute and attractive. I fought down a completely inappropriate surge of jealousy... Hal was a fairly old man, a good friend, and he was only teasing the both of us, I was sure.

"So nice to really meet you too, Mister Carver," Maria told him belatedly, and we found a table, sat down, and ordered some beverages. "So... you must have a lot of memories of Albuquerque, Hal."

He laughed. "Yeah, I guess you could say that. I lived here for... huh." He paused, doing a little math in his head. "Forty-four years I guess... from forty-seven until 1991, when I retired and made the big move down to Florida." He laughed a little to himself. "Most of that time I was living up in this small apartment just a little west of downtown... third floor. Probably anyone else would have said that it was a dump, but --" He shrugged. "To me, it was home."

"You lived alone all that time??" Maria asked, with a bit of an odd expression in her voice.

I'm not sure if Hal caught the weirdness, but he laughed a little bit. "Yeah, lifelong bachelor. Never did manage to fall in love and get married, though not for want of a bit of trying." He looked from Maria to me, then back again... and I wondered if he thought of Betty Osorio when he looked at Maria, the same way I thought of Maria when Hal was telling me about Betty. "I didn't seize the day when I had the chance," he muttered softly, "and I wasn't watching out for the one I loved when she really needed me. Every day since I've regretted those two things."

There was a bit of an awkward silence, and Maria reached out to pat his hand, silently, supportively, a pensive expression on her face. Our drinks showed up right around then... coffee black for Hal, kiwi tea-wi Snapple for me, and a strawberry herbal tea for Maria. Hal looked around to see if there was likely anyone who could overhear us after the waiter left. Practically no one was in this half of the shop.

"How've things been going for you lately, Michael??" he muttered. "Did you ever find those -- those friends of yours? The other four you were so interested in when I mentioned that they might be out there?"

I scowled at the veiled reference. "Umm... yeah, we've met up, but it didn't go so well. Frankly, it might be better if you hadn't saved their butts after all."

Hal almost spit out a mouthful of coffee. "Do you really mean that, Michael?"

"Not really. I mean, I know that you didn't have any idea who or what were in those sacs. You could never have told the difference between us and them anyway."

"Leaving that aside," Hal continued softly. "These people are... like you. They'd probably have been killed in as horrible way as you can imagine if they hadn't been taken away from that room. Are you saying you could live with that??"

"They're not good people, Hal," I insisted stubbornly.

"It's easy to say that, especially when you haven't been in their shoes."

"But even so..." I groaned, trying not to be too loud about it. "Okay, maybe I wouldn't have wanted them left there. But still... two of them, they killed one of their own before we even found them. It was probably happening around the same time that you and I met last fall. Then they very nearly killed my best friend." He sighed. "The last of them, the fourth... I guess she's okay."

Hal blinked a little in surprise, and then nodded. "Your best friend... is he all right? I'm sorry, I didn't know."

"He's fine," I assured him.

"I'm glad," he said. "Any other... problems??"

"Not too recently," I assured him. "There was... well, here isn't the place," I decided, realizing that a few tables not too far away had started to fill up. "We can go for a walk in a bit, talk more about it then."

"There's... there's something interesting going on right now, actually," Maria blurted out. "May give us all a few answers."

Hal nodded with interest, but didn't press for any more details. "So, I know that school has just let out... you're both still in school, right?"

Maria nodded. "Just finished junior year."

"Got any big plans for the summer?"

"Not really." Maria sighed. "Probably both of us will be working long hours at the cafe. I have to get paid, y'know?"

Hal blinked in slight surprise. "You work there too, Michael??"

"Yeah." I nodded ruefully. "Fry cook."

"You didn't mention that... Is that how the two of you met??"

I couldn't keep down the laugh as that question brought back a rush of old memories... Maria and Liz confronting us in a dark alley as the three of us were on our way to run away from Roswell. Standing there in the hallway at the moment I realized she had lied her ass off to Valenti to cover for us... the time I stole her car. "No, that was a lot earlier. In fact, Maria and Liz really helped me get that job, right after I got emancipated."

"You're emancipated..." Hal broke off, evidently connecting the mental dots between what he already knew about me and this new factoid. "Got it."

"Of course, at some point this summer," I said, returning to Hal's question, "I think Maria's going to be standing as maid of honour at her mother's wedding."

"God, I hope not," Maria remarked, earning her an odd look from the two of us. "Not saying that I hope the engagement breaks off or anything -- just that rushing for a summer wedding feels like a mistake to me."

"Not a big fan of the guy??" Hal put in.

Maria cocked her head for a second. "No, it's not that. Mister Valenti's cool and all. It's just..."

"Valenti??" Hal repeated in surprise.

"Yeah," I mentioned. "Son of the deputy Valenti you told me about." I remembered Jim Valenti senior's part in the tale, including the parts about Hal's sometime lady friend Rosemary that had gotten him so upset at the time. "Who isn't doing so well lately, as you might have heard."

"Yeah," Hal mentioned. Seeing that all of us had finished our beverages, he muttered, "Let's walk," and quickly the table was cleared. "Killed an innocent man, ended up in an institution... I caught the basic details. Hell, our paper covered the story."

"What you might not know," Maria whispered, "was that Sheriff Valenti senior was framed. He didn't fire that shot, but was railroaded away because he knew too much, including who did."

"Oh," Hal said, weighing that over and not coming to any conclusion about it. "So... what's this new development you were telling me about??"

And we walked carefully off into the Albuquerque streets, lost amidst the bustling city.

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(Kyle):

It was nearly eight in the evening by the time I got home. I have to admit, I was in a pretty nasty mood. Tossed my jacket into the vicinity of a hook on the front hall wall, (by some almost-miracle, it managed to catch the hook and hang very precariously,) and undid the top two buttons of my shirt. I was starting to hate cars... hate everything about them. But I knew that I couldn't quit that job.

The house seemed very quiet, much more quiet than usual. Of course, Tess had been talking about going up to Las Cruces with Isabel, so maybe she hadn't gotten back yet. And Dad... was he over at the DeLuca's house? Somehow I didn't think so, though I couldn't say why.

I searched through the entire house before I tried the garage... and before I'd done any more than step out the back door, I knew that had to be it. For one thing, there was the unmistakable sound, kind of a soft buzzing that got anything but soft when I opened the garage door. A circular saw going at full tilt.

"Dad!!" I shouted at him. "DAD!"

He heard me the second time and shut down the motor, turning and grinning at me lopsidedly, holding the piece of Gambel Oak that he'd been working on and showing it to me.

"I gotta ask... are you back in the dark place again??"

He laughed. "No, no, definitely not. In fact, I think you're going to be very happy when I tell you what I'm doing in here - what I'm starting. But I can't tell you yet."

I blinked in surprise. "Why the heck not??"

"Promised Amy that we'd tell all of you kids together. This was a decision that's going to affect... well, I guess I might as well get used to saying it now. Going to affect the whole family."

"Wow, sounds big." I hoped that he was right that I'd be happy to hear the news. "Well, I'm going to go and crash in the living room."

"You're that tired? It's still early." Dad looked around. "I could knock off for the night, we could play some Horse or something."

"Nah, that's all right." I sighed. "Long, hard day at work."

"Just a sec," Dad called before I left the garage. He dusted his hands off against each other and walked up to me.

"Kyle, all of this effort you've put in for the sake of our family since I was dismissed... I'm proud of you. It was a situation you never should have been in... and I'm sorry for that. And while there's less that I can do about it than I'd like to, I don't mean for you to have to carry this weight much longer." He sighed softly to himself and brushed a bit of hair away from my forehead.

"Sounds good to me, dad," I agreed. "See you in the morning?"

"I'll be there," he agreed with a smile, and when I turned to go he started to head back to his tools.

-------

(Maria):

"Thank you, thank you." The polite applause died down. "Ladies and gentlemen, our award honourees: Philip Rendon." This was an old guy, stooped with hardly any hair left, but he still moved energetically enough to the stage and up the stairs. "Hal Carver." I cheered loudly, much more vehemently than anyone else had all evening. Michael shot me a look but he shook his head and grinned. Mister Carver deserved it. "And Laurel Keener." This was a light-haired woman who looked a few years younger than Hal... pretty forgettable in appearance.

The ceremony was almost over when they called Hal and the others up on stage. Each of the three honourees gave a little speech, but I have to admit I don't remember a word of any of them. Plenty of people were already clearing out of the banquet hall by the time Hal got back to the table.

"Hey, it's my biggest fans," he said with a smile, and sat down in his seat. Checked his watch. "Getting pretty late - shouldn't the two of you be heading back for Roswell now?"

"Umm..." I shot a glance over at Michael. "Not... not really. Because we knew the dinner was going to go late, and it's such a long drive back, we -- we got a reservation at a hotel just out of town to spend the night."

Hal looked at the two of us for a second and then gasped. "What... what is it??" I asked.

"Oh..." he sighed, and continued in a low voice. "Just for a second, the two of you... you reminded me so much of myself and Betty that it took my breath away." He shook his head. "Take a word of advice from an old geezer who missed his chance - don't be content with seizing the day. Live every minute of every hour to the fullest, because you never know what it is that you'll look back on and regret. If you take your chances and play the cards you're dealt..." he coughed, "well, it helps a little."

Oh, my god. Did he know what I'd been thinking about all night, about that hotel room, and Michael... and whether it was the right time to... well, to consummate everything with Spaceboy. Everything I'd said to Liz about it still made sense, but I wasn't sure if it was enough to convince me... especially considering my mom's overprotective warnings. To have the argument taken up by this guy I'd really only just met... but I doubted he was talking about that, just about taking chances in general.

"Well, how about this," he said in a moment, shaking off the extremely sentimental moment. "You kids will still want to get to your hotel before it's too late, or they might give your room away. Why don't we walk over to my hotel, and talk along the way, and then you can walk back to where you parked from there??"

I looked over at Michael, who hadn't said a word since Hal had come back. He just nodded. "Okay, sounds good to me!!" I answered.

It seemed to take just a split second before we were sitting in the lobby of Hal's hotel, and then he stood up and said, "Well, it's been a great day, but I think I'd like to make my getaway at this point. Michael?" He nodded at Michael, who was standing up too, and suddenly Hal was giving him a manly bear-hug goodbye. I extended my hand for a handshake and he kissed it.

"I'll give you a call sometime, Mister Carver," I told him.

"Sounds great. Just so long as you don't expect me to pick up the phone in the middle of a pro game," he quipped, and then he was gone.

As we walked back out into the night, I took the opportunity to express my thanks out loud to Michael for inviting me up.

"You're welcome," he said after a moment. "During the ceremonies there, I was a little worried that you were wishing you were down in Las Cruces with the others."

"Not sure if they'd have still been in Las Cruces," I pointed out absently. "Depends on what point in the ceremony - it did kind of stretch out." I sighed and shook my head. "But the point is no, I stand by my decision. The awards were kinda dull, mostly, but I would have sat through much worse in exchange for meeting Mister Carver."

"Yeah, I think I know what you mean," he agreed, and we walked along in silence for a few minutes. "He told you like five times to call him Hal!"

"So what, I gotta stick by that even when he isn't here??" I asked.

"Seems like the thing to do."

I ignored that. "I do wonder how Alex is doing. Guess I'll hear all the latest tomorrow, when we get back to good ol' Roswell." Michael nodded.

We arrived at the parking lot then, the one that we'd parked at near the coffee shop... got in, paid the attendant, and headed off. The hotel was a pretty nice one, about five minutes past the city limits on I forty. I started to suspect that Michael had something up his sleeve when he insisted that I stay down in the lobby 'for a few minutes' after we'd checked in, while he went up to the room. On the other hand, I was intrigued, so I let him play out his gambit.

Once he came down for me and led me into the room, I was blown away. The light fixtures were dimmed and to that soft light were added candles, not a huge number of them, but set up all around the room. Arranged on the dresser, well clear of the candle flames but lit by them, was a huge arrangement of pink tulips -- my favorite. Some not-immediately-identifiable romantic rock music was playing softly on the stereo. The room itself was beautiful... the bed wasn't actually a four-poster canopy but seemed somehow reminiscent of that style, and the sheets somehow seemed to scream their luxurious-ness. Beds, actually, I should say - there were two of them, identical and each queen-sized. And at the wide window, all the drapes were pinned up to each side except for the sheerest possible curtain, through which the bright lights of the city winked.

I turned and stared at Michael. "No pressure," he said as he closed the door.

"Oh, yeah right," I scoffed. "Do you even believe that??"

"Maybe forty-five percent," he admitted with that grin of his.

I went over and sat on the dark blue couch, idly playing my fingers around the flame of the candle on the end table. Not getting too close to the fire, of course, I'm not stupid, but letting the warmth slide around the surface of my hands. I didn't trust myself enough to sit on the bed, not yet. "I -- I want to. To, you know... make love to you." I couldn't believe I had just gotten that phrase out without exploding on the spot. "I'm just not quite convinced yet that I *should* want to."

"I'm not trying to pressure you, really I'm not," Michael said softly, sitting beside me and taking my left hand in both of his. "I knew that you'd enjoy all of this for the sake of it, regardless of what we did or how far you wanted to go. But..." He turned to look at me, and the shadows played off his hair and the curves of his face, glinting on his dark eyes. "I love you, Maria. I love you more than I can come up with words for it. I've never... brought up this subject before, and not just because I could tell that you didn't think you were ready. *I* wasn't ready, not to let someone in to the core of myself, and I didn't want to be..." He shook his head, trying to get the thoughts to come out in some kind of sensible form.

"I tend to put up walls and keep people out, but for a long time I've known I wouldn't be able to have sex and still keep that wall up. Maybe no... no Czechoslovakian can, because we connect to people in ways that humans don't. Maybe the ability to have sex with someone and have it be just a casual thing is a human specialty." He was musing at this point, philosophical, distracted from the question of him and me, I knew. He wasn't trying to say that he thought I was the casual sex type.

"I... I don't even know what it will be like to, to share THIS with you," he finished after a moment. "Maybe there's no way that either of us can know. But I'm sure that I want to find out -- if you are."

I smiled at that, and suddenly realized that tears were flowing down my cheeks. "Let's take it one step at a time and see where things go from there," I whispered to him. I knew that I had made my decision and exactly what it was, and I knew that Michael knew it too.

He leaned over and kissed me, and some kind of fire started to immediately spread through my body. Now, needless to say, I've kissed Michael before MANY, *MANY* times. But there was never anything like this! Every part of my body was starting to rev up, to run faster and better. As that kiss started to get longer and more passionate, it was like I could feel things happening inside me step by step. The nerves were first... a jolt of energy running along the major conductors and flowing down every little fiber and synapse, without pain, without disturbing anything, and yet heightening every sensation. Then the blood began to flow more quickly and surely through every artery and vein, sending vitality and energy through my whole system. Muscles hummed with readiness, and every sense, every single hair on my skin seemed more fully alert than I'd ever been before.

Our lips separated, both of us out of breath and panting. "Did... did you feel that?" I muttered, running my hands against Michael's arms through his clothes. It sure seemed like he felt SOMETHING.

"Like my entire body went into hyper-drive without leaving the room??" I nodded. "Yeah, right there with ya."

"Good," I panted, somehow getting MORE out of breath from the *not* kissing. "Just wanted to check." And then my hands were at his collar, undoing the buttons of his shirt faster than I had known that I could. Rubbing my hands across his chest seemed to, I don't know, stabilize me? Helped me to breathe easier.

Michael gasped, and I tried to look at what he was surprised about without interrupting what I was doing. At the moment, he seemed to be moving one hand up and down the vicinity of my forearm without touching it, about two or three inches away from my skin. And in between, I could make out a soft pink glow.

"Oh my god," I breathed. I recognized the phenomenon instantly from something that had been described to me, It wasn't exactly the same, but it certainly seemed closer to something that Liz had described to me than, well, than anything else I had ever heard of, by a long shot. The night that she and Max had ended up finding the orb, after some kind of strange sensual connection had briefly entwined them.

Thoughts started racing through my mind, which despite the lust I was feeling seemed stronger and clearer than ever before. Was this an alien thing... the results of their mating cycle or some such thing? But Max and Liz hadn't actually... mated that night, hadn't gone all the way. Then again, no-one had ever explained how their passion had led them to the orb - maybe Nasedo had known some way of tapping into Max's mating urge to deliver that piece of information, and had been able t terminate the cycle once its purpose was done. Hey, this was starting to actually make sense.

On the other hand, I didn't really want to think about it any more. As clear as my thoughts were, my priorities and values were distorted, and I could tell that they were, but I didn't really care. I bent down and licked at Michael's nipple, feeling the ecstasy inside myself ramp up further with that simple contact, and I knew somehow that it was having an even greater effect on him. I could feel what he was feeling, and he could feel what I was experiencing, and it was starting to form a cycle that was feeding into itself. As the craving grew, I guessed, so would the rapport between us, until we'd surely be lost.

I couldn't wait.

Michael pushed back and took the lead, kissing down my neck to my collarbone, and rubbing his hands against my upper arms. Suddenly he gasped, in surprise and wonder. "What is it?" I asked.

"Umm... flash." He nibbled teasingly at the underside of my chin, a pleasant enough physical sensation, but I was a little bit disappointed inside. I'd still never gotten a flash directly myself, and though Michael had always said that was because of him, because he was still too guarded to let me in -- well, what if it was a lack in me? Because I was just an ordinary human girl, no matter how much I loved Michael and he loved me? Liz had been healed by Max, been *changed* by him, supposedly, so that explained why she got flashes, perhaps.

"What did you see?" I couldn't help but ask.

"I... I saw..." Michael extricated himself and moved his face up to parallel mine, looking deep into my eyes. "I saw... you, Maria. In some light pink dress, your hair as bright and beautiful as the summer morning sun." He brushed a lock of hair behind my ear. "I... I'm not sure where you were, but somehow I don't think it was anywhere on earth. And I was there with you. I can tell."

"Aww." I wasn't quite sure what that meant, but it sounded sweet. We French-kissed again for several minutes, and then Michael was unzipping my dress at the back, pushing it off my sleeves. The material thus kinda gathered up around my midsection as I lay on the couch. He rubbed his hands over the exposed parts of my torso, and I groaned with the delight of it.

I'd always expected my first time to hurt. Everyone said it did, unless your hymen had already been broken from some non-sex activity, and I didn't think mine had. But there was no discomfort I can remember, maybe because we were so connected, lost in the rhythms of an otherworldly mating urge, or whatever. It was right, and my body had been preparing for this for many long minutes, answering to a power that was beyond anything humanity knew.

It was... transcendent. I'm not sure how long we coupled, moving with the intensity of that primal beat. Probably only around ten minutes, though it seemed like much more, and also like barely seconds. I could feel both of our systems building towards the culminating moment... his dick preparing to erupt, my insides making ready to boil and spasm. But I didn't expect that orgasm, when it hit, would be an out of body experience. And it was - literally.

My soul shot out of its flesh and blood shell and enveloped itself in Michael's, then surrounding it, our two essences reaching heights of bliss and ecstasy that a physical body could never hope to attain. We began to... well, if you ask Michael he might describe it differently, but throughout the entire experience I felt that he was a part of me, and I of him, so I'll keep using the plural pronouns for what I remember of it. We experienced the pleasure of the entire city, of possibly several of the southwest states. I sang to him in the stratosphere and we played tag among the northern lights, then raced each other to Mars and back. Finally, his essence embraced me again and we... we sank into this peaceful harmony that connected every world in the galaxy, every sun in the universe, every speck of dust and asteroid and quasar. (For some reason, even universal harmony seemed to steer clear of the black holes, though, but that part might have been just my imagination.)

When I returned to my senses, I was snugly wrapped up in some of the most comfy blankets I'd ever felt... still completely naked underneath, of course. My eyes weren't blurry -- I looked around the room, seeing perfectly clearly in the darkness. The lights had been turned off all the way, the candles put out, and the curtains pulled shut. I saw Michael standing near the miniature fridge, wearing a black terry-cloth bathrobe, power-chugging a bottle of something that looked suspiciously like Snapple.

And damned if the first words out of my mouth weren't "Wanna do it again??"

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(Kyle):

"I'm really sorry," Mrs DeLuca said, pacing through the room. "I really thought she'd be back here by now."

"It's okay, Mrs. DeLuca," Tess said, pondering the game board. "That's... five, and -- two." She moved two red counters among the different triangles of the backgammon board. "Your roll."

"Come on, you can call me Amy now," she said. "Or... maybe m--"

"Not mom," Tess said quickly. Amy's face fell. "Don't take it personal, it's just..." she screwed up her face in frustration, trying to get the right words out. "I don't even call Mister Valenti dad, you know? I'm so grateful that... that you guys have let me into your family, but I'm not there yet, you know??"

Amy looked at her for a long moment. "Yeah, I guess I understand."

We continued to play for a while, with Tess beating me both times, (oh well,) and Amy serving out snacks while my dad sat and waited, reading from some book that he didn't seem to want to let me see. As you might have picked up by now, we had come over for a big combined-family meeting, only to find out that the DeLuca side wasn't complete and fully accounted for yet. Maria hadn't come back from an overnight visit to the University of New Mexico, which was really something involving Michael, and doubtfully having anything to do with a university, from what little Tess had told me about it. Something about some military type who'd lived in Roswell in 1947 when the crash happened - I didn't really follow that part.

Maria's black-sheep cousin Sean was sitting on the other side of the living room, fiddling with one of those odd looking puzzles made out of heavy, rigid metal wire contorted into odd shapes and joints, free to move, slide, or shift at a few points... where the point is to remove a tiny steel ring that looks like it's physically inseparable from the rest.

Sean looked the most uncomfortable out of all of us, which made sense in that his connection with the core 'family' was in some ways more tenuous that even Tess's. She was officially my dad's dependent now, while Sean was really just an indefinite guest. Maria had mentioned that Sean had enrolled in the local junior college, but various events had interrupted his plans to get his own apartment. Big surprise, says I

Myself, I hadn't seen Sean around much since... well, since Liz and Max had gotten back together, which pretty much put two and two together all by itself. Parker had gone back to her old soul mate, and the rebound guy had seen fit to make himself scarce around them and all of their friends. I'd probably have done the same thing, in his place.

All of a sudden, I heard a car door slam in the driveway, and Maria came in through the front door only seconds later. "Uh, hey everybody. What's going on?"

"Little impromptu family meeting," Amy told her. "I kinda thought you'd be back already, though it's 'no big.'" I shook my head slightly at the use of dated slang on her part.

"I hope this isn't too big of a shock," Dad said as Maria sat down, and Tess pushed the game board aside. "We're probably going to be getting together more, all five of us, as time goes on. Of course, the wedding plans are still mostly up in the air, but at some point we're going to become just one family, more or less," that was with a nod to Sean, "and I think Amy and I would like it if that happens sooner, rather than later."

There was a bit of a silence. "Umm, okay by me, I guess," I muttered, having at least had a little warning that something like this was coming. Maria seemed totally shocked by the whole thing, which I can understand; this probably wasn't what she thought she'd be coming home to. "Meaning what, exactly?"

"We're not sure," Amy admitted.

"One thing I've been concerned about is my own role," Dad admitted. "I don't think it's a surprise to anyone here that I've been, well, seriously at loose ends ever since getting dismissed from my post. I've had a lot of stuff to work through, but I know that I need to find something else. This may sound old-fashioned, but I do strongly believe that a man with a family should be a provider, a bread-winner, and that's become especially important to me now that I have a fiancée and a soon-to-be stepdaughter."

"Now, I've looked into a few dependable, regular jobs..." he continued, but Amy interrupted.

"That he would have DESPISED going to, day after day," she said. "So I talked him out of taking any of them. This is an important decision, and I didn't want him to jump into anything just because it seemed like the responsible move."

"Umm... okay, so, what then??" Tess asked.

"Oh, boy... how do I say it?" Dad muttered, looking over at Amy, who nodded at him encouragingly.

"Just blurt it out!" Maria called out encouragingly.

"Okay, um... I'm going to be going into business for myself as a carpenter," he said.

There was a moment of silence. "For real??" Tess asked.

"Yes, for real!" Amy insisted. "Come on, I know a little about this sort of thing, and he's *really* good. It might be a little hard getting started, but I think he'll do REALLY well once people get a look at his work." She looked around the room as if daring us to disagree.

I cleared my throat. "Well... I'm happy to hear it, Dad, and wish you the best of luck. Not just because I stand to benefit from your good fortune, either."

He laughed. "Thanks so much."

"Yeah," Maria chimed in. "Kick some wood!" That got a small laugh from the room.

"Congratulations, sir, and good luck," Sean chimed in.

"And I'm going to be setting aside some time to work as his business manager," Amy continued, "because frankly he doesn't understand that sort of thing." Dad turned to look at her. "Well, honey, you don't! Should I not have told them that part?"

"Are you sure about that part?" I asked. "I mean, you specifically being his business manager? What with mixing the business and the pleasure, as it were... or should that be mixing business and family?"

"We're a team," Dad said, standing up and putting his arm around Amy's shoulders. "A team in life, why not a team in business??"

"Okay, great," Tess said, standing up. "C'mon, this calls for a celebration, doesn't it??"

--------------

(Tess):

The doorbell rang, and after a few seconds I could hear Mister Valenti moving to answer it. "If that's anyone, I'm not here," I called out for his benefit. Not quite sure why I didn't want to talk to anyone, but I sure as heck didn't.

The door opened, and a short soft conversation ensued, that I couldn't really make much out of. Then the sound of shutting came, and footsteps lightly tromping back down the porch stairs of the house. Jim walked over until he could see me through the open exit into the living room.

"When you get back," he said with just a slight trace of friendly humour, "I'm supposed to mention that a Martin Bryce dropped by looking for you. Didn't say why..." he drew that last word out pensively, looking at me as I sat there, still scowling a little at my printouts of bad jobs. "Though I suspect that I can guess."

I tried to connect a face with the name. Bryce... Martin Bryce?? For a long moment it was just a blank. And then I had the impression of a melancholy artist-type walking the hallways of West Roswell high with his shoulders hunched and a sad look in his sea-green eyes. A loner, a 'reject' as some of the other kids might say, but handsome in a darkish-brown hair and pale skin kind of way.

Was that really Martin? I couldn't be sure, and the cliche immediately went through my head about teenage girls checking such things out through a yearbook. I didn't actually have a high school yearbook, and the only person I knew who did was Isabel, who used hers for considerably... DIFFERENT things.

And then... Jim was still standing there and watching me, and I suddenly realized the only thing he could possibly mean. Did this Martin person, whoever he was, like me? Like me enough to go walking up to the house I lived in, (the house that the ex-sheriff owned to boot,) out of the blue?? Someone who hardly even knew me, knew nothing about what my life was really like? Knew nothing about who and what I really was?? It hardly seemed possible.

And then... something else hit me. How much had I known about what Max was like, what his life was like here in Roswell, when I decided I still loved him on earth? I'd known what he was, and I'd remembered a little of who he used to be. But by then I had known how much I myself had changed since the other lifetime. I should have realized...

I couldn't finish that thought. I burst up out of the chair, leaving my printed sheets where they lay, and brushed past Mister Valenti. The only thing on my mind was driving over to Isabel's place and asking if I could use her yearbook, even though I knew she was in the middle of packing to leave.

But that was before I stopped still in the living room, looking at all of Kyle's stuff scattered around the couch and on the coffee table. Including... his WRH yearbook, stacked on top of a couple of schoolbooks and underneath a few Buddha books. Of course!! How had I not thought to see if Kyle had one?

Jim was still watching me, and so I tipped the Buddhism books up on one side and extracted the yearbook out from underneath them, hurrying back as quickly as I could with it to my room and closing the door once inside.

B... Bryce... Martin. Yes, that was the face I had seen, vaguely, in my memories. Martin seemed a little -- cooler, in the photo, but that had probably been the point at the time. Organizations: literary magazine and model UN. Memories, hmm. Not much here that made any sense to me, not surprisingly. 'Long night, getting the words just right. Third city of comedy - *you* know what it is! Slovakia forever!! Will our heroes ever disarm the total conversion bomb and foil Doc Dastard's plan?' Hmm.

And his quote: "Whatever there is inside you that's unique or worthwhile, hold it up. Let it show for the world to see." Was that taken from a book or something, or was it original? It didn't seem familiar.

Well. I couldn't say why, but after all of this I did want to get to know young Mister Martin Bryce a little better... though probably not caught in a teenage dating ritual.

Just as I was closing the yearbook, my eye was caught again by a phrase in the middle of Martin's 'memories.' Slovakia forever?? What... what was that key term that Maria and Liz had been using for the other hybrids, long before I got to town? Czechoslovakians or something - it had popped up a few times since I came to Roswell, and I'd looked it up. Used to be a country in Eastern Europe, until the Soviet bloc fell and they started redrawing all the boundaries. That country had split into two, the Czech republic and... Slovakia.

Of course, it had to be a coincidence. Martin had been in the model UN, and they pretended to be ambassadors from far-off countries, maybe he had been representing Slovakia. Or for all I knew, he had family over there.

But what if it had something to do with me? a little voice inside me asked. Was it possible that this shy and unassuming young man knew something about our secret??

TO BE CONTINUED...