Part Six

Liz was woken that evening by a loud knocking at her window. As Max had so easily noticed earlier, she had been extremely tired and the second she entered her room after Max had dropped her home, she made a beeline for the bed.

Now, several hours later, and not completely aware of her surroundings, she merely shifted under the covers, squeezed her eyes shut tighter and ignored the incessant knocking in the hopes that it would eventually go away. She needed all the rest she could get before Max came over and they continued with their research.

Wait a minute! Max! An awful feeling swept over her. Shit, what was the time?

She cautiously opened one eye to look at the clock. Unfortunately, instead of glowing, red numbers being in front of her, she was directly facing the window, and the source of the noise that had roused her from her slumber.

Max. Kneeling by the window, gazing into her bedroom, a mischievous smirk playing on his lips.

Oh God! She groaned quietly and buried her face in the pillow. I can't believe I slept that long! I'm not ready for him to be here yet!

It was then that she realised the knocking had ceased and she knew that if she didn't get up and let Max in now, he would most likely take it upon himself to use his powers to undo the latch and come in anyway. And once he was inside he would just sit there and wait for her to wake up. She really didn't want to face that awkwardness.

Liz slowly sat up in the bed, this time taking note of the time: 7.45. Wait, 7.45? Max said he would arrive around 7.30. Had he been here that long? Trying to get her attention for fifteen whole minutes? God, this was so embarrassing!

Slowly, unwillingly she turned her head back towards Max and their eyes met. The look on his face managed to be both apologetic and sympathetic at the same time. Liz reached up to run her fingers through her hair, which she was certain was no longer neat and tidy, and got out of the bed. She reached the window and slid it up to greet him.

"Hi," she said sheepishly.

He grinned at her, "I guess you really were tired then."

"Yeah, I guess I was!" she replied, a slight laugh in her voice. "I'm so sorry, I didn't think to set my alarm. I didn't expect to sleep that long," she explained, before asking, "Have you been here long?"

"Only a couple of minutes," he lied. "I had to stay at work later than I expected."

Liz let out a small sigh of relief. "Look, why don't you come in and I'll just go freshen up in the bathroom?"

Max nodded and climbed through the window while Liz gathered some non-wrinkled clothes to change into and headed for the bathroom. She invited him to take a seat and make himself comfortable and told him she would be with him in few minutes.

Since the bed was unmade, Max took a seat at Liz's desk and awaited her return. He felt slightly guilty for lying to her just now, but she probably would have killed him if he told her the truth.

And the truth was, he'd actually arrived on Liz's balcony a few minutes earlier than their arranged meeting time. He'd hoped that she wouldn't mind him being a little early, but when he approached her window, he saw that she was still asleep. His first thought was that he should leave and come back in a few minutes when she was awake, but for some reason he could not tears his eyes away from the vision in front of him. So he contented himself with sitting outside her window and watching herself sleep.

Lying there in sleep, she looked so peaceful and unaffected by the tragic events of the last week and Max wished so much that he could simply wave his hand and make all of her hurt and sadness and grief disappear. But he couldn't and it made him feel helpless, that this time he did not have the power to heal the girl he loved.

Before he knew it, the beeping alarm on Max's watch alerted him to the fact that the time was now 7.30pm and as he looked back at Liz in the bed, he realised that she had not yet arisen. He decided that he should wait a few more minutes to see if she would wake up naturally, and if not then he would try to get her attention by knocking on the window. He didn't really mind waiting; after all, what was better than watching the person you were in love with sleep. Sitting here, with no one else around, Max allowed himself to imagine what it might be like to actually sleep beside her every night and wake up with her each morning. The idea seemed so… normal that it almost brought tears to his eyes. If only their lives could be normal.

The minutes passed and at 7.43, with no movement yet from Liz, Max decided that he'd better knock on the window. He tried several times, but still nothing and so decided to do it continuously in the hope that she would stir. As he raised his hand back up to the window, he mentally rolled his eyes at his dilemma. Was she always such a deep sleeper? And if so, how difficult was it going to be to get her up in the mornings?

Whoa, hold on there a second, Max! He thought. You're getting a little ahead of yourself there!

He didn't have too much time to dwell on her thoughts, because a couple of minutes later he saw Liz stir. He stopped knocking and found he couldn't keep the smirk off his face when he saw her cautiously pry open one eye. He realised that she must have seen him at the window, because barely a second later she turned pale, as if she'd seen a ghost, and buried her face in her pillow.

He only had to wait a few moments before she sat up and ran her fingers through her hair, no doubt trying to look more presentable. However, Max could not have cared less about her appearance. To him, she always looked beautiful.

When she'd approached the window and opened it to speak to him, he'd found himself wondering how on Earth (or any other planet, for that matter) he was going to get through the rest of the evening alone with her in her room.

Now, sitting in her room, facing the bed, with its covers strewn about the bed in the most alluring way and the thought of Liz half naked in the bathroom, Max knew he was in trouble.

Across town, in a small two-bedroom bungalow, someone else was having trouble sorting through their emotions. However, these were not feelings of love or even of lust, but feelings of dread and fear.

Everything was so jumbled and confused in the person's mind that no sense could be made of anything.

Something had happened. Actually, something was still happening. Changing. Something in the air was different.

But what? And why?

The questions just kept coming and the confusion continued. It was like something was missing, like a memory that was just out of reach, but if recovered, could uncover the truth.

This couldn't be happening.

How had everything changed so much in the space of only a few months?

In the small room across town, the individual was trying to cope with the constant feeling that someone was trying to get into their mind, to push them out of the way. Like something was trying to take control of both their mind and body.

But what? Or who?

Something was seriously wrong and they had no clue what that was or how to fix it

These thoughts and questions continued to plague the mind of the person lying on the single bed in the bungalow. Questions that had prevented them from sleeping the past few nights and which had now put a stop the possibility of relaxation during the waking hours.

Would anyone even listen if they tried to explain that something was not right about the happenings of the last few weeks and months?

Would anyone even care?

By the time Liz emerged from the bathroom, Max had managed to push his personal feelings to the back of his mind and was ready to discuss the morning's events; namely, the file that they had discovered on Alex's computer.

As she came out of the bathroom, Liz wondered for a moment why Max had chosen to sit on the uncomfortable chair by her desk and not on her bed. But as her gaze slid to the bed she realised why. It was a mess! The covers were hanging over the side, threatening to fall any second. The sheets were rumpled and there was a huge dip in the pillow where her head had been resting. No wonder he didn't want to sit there.

She sent him an apologetic glance and quickly grabbed hold of the duvet, hurriedly making the bed look more presentable. When she was done she took a seat on the end and faced Max.

"So…" she trailed off uncertainly.

"So," Max started, but then found he didn't really know what to say. Luckily Liz chose the next moment to shift into research mode and began firing questions into the air.

"What's going on here, Max? Why did Alex have all that stuff about me on his computer? I mean, what possible reason could he have for trying to investigate me? Was he lying last year when he told me that he was okay with all this alien stuff? Did he not trust me? Was that it?" She finally managed to pause long enough to take a breath, but then continued in a forlorn tone. "Oh, God. Did he think that I'd done something to put you guys in danger? Cos Max I could never do that to you, I swear." Her eyes were pleading with him.

"I know that, Liz," he replied, in comfort.

He felt an overwhelming sense of dismay that obviously Alex hadn't merely been carrying out a school project. But really he'd known that all along. He just hadn't wanted to admit to himself that there actually was something strange going on here.

"Look, I don't know, Liz. Do you have those sheets we printed out earlier? We should go through them properly and see if we can find any clues."

Liz took a deep breath to calm herself down. "Okay."

She reached for her backpack and pulled out the printed file and a pencil to make notes with. While she was doing that, Max pulled the papers from his back pocket and skimmed over them. He looked up at Liz and saw that she was ready to begin.

"Right, okay, well the first page just has your personal information on it. Nothing out of the ordinary," he stated.

Liz watched him with baited breath. She hadn't dared look at the file since that morning, a little afraid of what she might find. "What about the next one?" she asked.

Max looked up in surprise. "You haven't read it yet?"

"Uh, no," she looked up at him sheepishly. "I couldn't bring myself to look at it, you know?" she explained.

Max nodded in understanding, holding her gaze for a second before looked back down at the pages and continued.

"Well, the second page is pretty confusing. He's written all these questions about you, but he doesn't seem to have answered them."

"What kind of questions?"

"Like where you were on certain dates and at certain dates. But, Liz, all of these times were when you would have been at work or at school… or out socialising." He had to mask a grimace at the thought of Liz going out and having fun with people that weren't him, guys that weren't him. After what she'd obviously done with Kyle, who knew how many other guys she'd gone out with since? He knew he was just being jealous and irrational, but he couldn't help it.

"But, why would he be suspicious of you, Liz? It just doesn't make sense!"

Liz could only nod mutely, her eyes fixed on Max's hands holding the pages.

She had no idea why.

A shiver ran down her spine at the thought of Alex probing into her life like that.

She wasn't sure she really wanted to find out.

TBC…