Part 26

The next morning, Amy sat on the front porch watching the stars as they began to disappear from the sky, her breath misting on the early morning air. She pulled the denim jacket a little tighter around herself and contemplated the things she and Gabriel had talked about the night before.

She turned her head when she heard the screen door creak as it was pushed open and he stepped outside. He handed her a cup of coffee as he sat down on the top step, long legs bent at the knee and bracketing her body. His arms came around her loosely and he rested his chin on her head when she leaned back against his chest.

"I know you can't stay for breakfast but I thought you could at least have a cup of coffee before you go."

"No breakfast today," she agreed with a smile. "I told Maria we'd have breakfast together so she could tell me about dinner with Michael's family. It's strange but I think we've talked more about things we normally don't talk about since she started seeing him."

"So maybe she'd be open to you and me bein' together."

"I don't think Maria's gonna have any problems with you, Gabriel. My concern is that she's suddenly becoming open to talking about certain things because she's not talking to Liz or Alex anymore."

"Or maybe she's grown up enough that she's ready to really talk to you about those certain things."

"I think it has more to do with not having anyone to talk to."

"Since she's been opening up about the guy in her life, why haven't you told her about me? You've already said you think she'd be open to us bein' together, so what's keepin' you from tellin' her?"

Amy sighed. Gabriel wasn't wrong to want Maria to know about them, but she had a feeling that now wasn't the time. Soon, but not right now; the timing was all wrong. "Right now she's feeling abandoned by her friends and she already had abandonment issues because of her father, so I don't want to compound it by introducing you and having her think I'm gonna leave her too." She took a sip of the coffee before continuing with her thoughts. "I've made some bad decisions with the men in my life, Gabriel, and Maria's been there for the fallout every time; I just don't want her to think this is a repeat of all those other times."

"You tryin' to scare me off again?" he teased quietly. She had told him about all of her disastrous attempts at relationships, but he was confident that they were going to work. "Amy, she's practically an adult. Talk to her like one and trust her to deal with the situation in a mature way." He paused and watched the fingers of her left hand as they tapped against the rim of the cup. "Is this really about Maria or are you just not ready to make a commitment? Maybe I'm pushin' too hard for an answer to too many questions at once, but I know exactly what I want and unless you tell me differently, I'm gonna keep askin'."

She smiled at the hint of impatience underlying his words. "I'm not telling you to stop, but it's a big step and I've got some things I need to work out personally before I give you an answer." Her hand came up to curl around his neck when he dropped his forehead down to rest on her shoulder. "Just be patient, Gabriel."

"You know you're killin' me, right?" he groaned. He lifted his head a short while later and watched the first rays of sunlight creep over the horizon. "Okay, we'd better get movin'; you've gotta get home for breakfast and I've gotta finish packin' for the show this weekend."

Amy accepted his hand when he held it out to her, allowing him to pull her to her feet and lead her back inside.

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Maria stumbled along the hall, making her way to the shower with slightly uncoordinated movements. She wasn't the type of person who jumped out of bed wide awake and ready to face the day, but a hot shower always helped to ease the process along. She flipped the light switch on and was just about to reach for the faucets when a thought occurred to her and she backtracked halfway down the hall to look into her mother's room. She frowned at the neatly made bed, knowing that it meant her mother hadn't slept at home the night before.

Unbidden, an image of the aromatherapy salesman came to mind and she shuddered. Her mother could do so much better than Howard, but apparently she needed to be made aware of that little fact. And it looked like Maria was going to have to be the one to provide the wake-up call.

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Amy was humming along with the song on the radio despite her inability to carry a tune, and making breakfast when Maria entered the kitchen nearly an hour later. She frowned when her mother didn't notice her arrival and continued to hum the same song even after a new one replaced it.

Watching her mother's absent-minded behavior she was surprised the older woman hadn't set the house on fire yet. "So, you must've gotten home pretty late last night, Mom."

"Oh, Maria, honey, I didn't hear you come in."

"Yeah, I didn't hear you come in either. Get home late?"

"What? Yes. No." She blushed and fanned herself as she turned back to the stove. "It's so warm in here."

Maria frowned when she noticed that her mother was uncomfortable. The woman was never uncomfortable, which meant that she felt guilty about something. What could it be? she wondered. She was determined to get an answer. If her suspicions were correct, she had to talk to her mother and make her understand that Howard was not good for her. "So, you did get home late?"

Amy tugged at her ends of her hair, feeling uneasy. In front of her own daughter! The world was obviously coming to an end. She really felt like she was the daughter and Maria was the mother. Somehow, that thought saddened her. Had she turned her daughter into an adult too soon? Had she stolen the last years of Maria's youth with her way of life, with the way she had decided to raise her daughter? She had wanted her to be aware of the world around her, to be a part of it, to be active and reactive, but had she gone too far? Had she succeeded too well? "Uh, why don't you set the table." Amy couldn't believe the turn the conversation had taken. This was why they had a don't-ask-don't-tell policy in place – to avoid this type of awkward conversation.

Maria sighed. Her mother still wasn't ready to talk to her about the changes taking place in her personal life. "Can I just say one thing, Mom?"

"Okay."

"If you're this serious about Howard, I'll find a way to deal with it, but I just think you can do a lot better. That's all I'm gonna say."

Amy set two plates on the table and poured a couple glasses of juice before sitting down across from her daughter. They started to eat in silence, lost in their own thoughts. Amy glanced at her daughter, surprised that she had remained so quiet for so long. "How was dinner with Michael's family?"

"It was nice and his family's great…" Maria hesitated, not quite sure how to explain what she was feeling.

"But?" Amy prompted when Maria hesitated.

"But, I'm not sure what his mom really thinks of me. They adopted Michael when he was six…" She reached for the jelly and started to spread it on her toast. "Well, I assume they adopted him, he's never really said. Anyway, that's not my point. It's important to him to find out where he came from, y'know? He wants to know how his family could just leave him in the desert and I think he has every right to ask those questions and to pursue the answers."

"Which you encouraged him to do," Amy guessed.

Maria slammed her glass down on the table with more force than necessary. "He deserves to know the truth! He knows that he might not like what he finds, but if nothing else, he needs that closure, Mom." She sighed and bit into her toast, chewing thoughtfully as she slouched down. "I don't think his mom liked it when I told him we'd find the answers."

I'll just bet she didn't! Amy thought. She doesn't want you to push Michael to look for his family and find his real parents; it would disrupt her perfect family. She grimaced when she realized how her uncharitable her thoughts were. Catherine was a mother, so she could understand the woman's position. "Well, she's his mother, honey, and we've already established that she's very protective of him. She isn't going to be very happy about you encouraging him to go after something that may end up hurting him in the end."

"But he wants – "

"It doesn't matter how much he wants to find these answers." She shook her head when Maria started to protest. "Not because she doesn't care about him or the answers he wants to find, but because she doesn't want him to get hurt. No matter how unrealistic it is, a parent will always want to protect their child, even if it means keeping them from pursuing something that they want."

Maria huffed angrily. She hadn't done anything wrong! "He's been looking for answers for the past couple of years, Mom! Why does my being involved make me a threat?"

"Because you're moving into a territory that has belonged to her exclusively since he came into her life." She smiled at the look of confusion on Maria's face. "You'll understand one day when you have children of your own."

In a far off future. Maria easily heard her mother's unspoken words, knowing that she wasn't anywhere close to being ready to understand mothers or their methods of reasoning. "He's been looking for answers; it's not like he suddenly came up with the idea after we met."

"Has he found anything? Has he found any of his biological family?"

"No, but his parents haven't objected to him searching for them before."

Amy was insistent, firing off more questions. "And who's been encouraging him to keep looking? Who's been telling him that they would help him find the answers?"

"No one that I know of."

Amy took a drink of her juice and leaned back to study her daughter. "Michael's mother is being faced with the reality of losing her son and that's not an easy reality to face. He may have been conducting this search on his own, and maybe his parents haven't done anything to prevent it, but it also sounds like they weren't actively encouraging him to search for these answers that he wants. But now he's suddenly involved with a young woman who believes in him, who's encouraging him to go after these answers, who's slowly taking him away from the woman who raised him."

"God, Mom, you make it sound like I'm in competition with his mother," Maria complained.

"Well, in a way you are. From what you've told me about Michael, I'm sure that his family is important to him, but his mother only sees the possibility of another family coming between her family and her son. And you're the one responsible for this threat."

"Great." Maria crossed her arms over her chest. "I'm not backing down on this though. I believe that he needs to find these answers if he's ever going to be able to have any peace."

"You have to do what you think is right, honey, but I think you can expect to encounter more resistance from his mother. Did she say anything to you about it?"

"No." She sighed. "She wasn't mean or anything, y'know? She was really nice… I just got the feeling that she's questioning whether or not Michael should be with me."

"Don't let it worry you, honey; she'll come around."

"Michael's father was much easier to read and I think he's on our side."

"And Maggie?"

Maria laughed. "She'll be happy as long as I can keep her brother occupied so that he doesn't threaten the guy she wants to ask her to the dance that's coming up."

Amy smiled. She liked what she was hearing; Michael was a good guy, so she really didn't have anything to fear with him around to protect his girls. "He's the overprotective older brother, huh?"

"All the way. He invited me out to the Rez next weekend for a ceremony but I told him I'd have to ask you about it and let him know. Actually, I told Maggie the same thing about the big Roswell/Ruidoso game in three weeks. They're both overnight trips and I didn't know how you'd feel about that. Well, actually the ceremony starts on Friday night and I wouldn't be back until late Sunday afternoon or early that evening."

"You'll be able to get the time off from work?"

"I should be able to." Maria nodded. "Yeah."

Amy considered Maria's request for several minutes, debating the pros and cons of letting her only daughter spend the night with her boyfriend's family. She had only talked with them for a little while and she didn't know them very well, but knowing how protective the young man's mother was, she decided she was comfortable with Maria staying with them. She wouldn't have to worry about anything happening between Maria and Michael with Catherine there. From everything her daughter had said, she knew the woman would keep a close eye on the teenagers.

"All right, you can go." She pushed her plate back and rested her arms on the table. "So, do the two of you have a lot in common?"

"Michael is the photographer for his school paper." She looked down at the table and smiled. "He's been into photography for a few years now… he asked me to pose for him."

Amy stilled for a second, not quite believing what she was hearing. "Excuse me?"

Maria repeated her previous statement in a patient tone, as if talking to a small child. "He asked me to pose for him. He wants to – "

"I have a perfectly good idea of what he wants to do." Amy shook her head, certain that the boy had nefarious plans for her daughter. She retracted her last thought; she had MUCH TO WORRY ABOUT with this… this… Michael Guerin!!

"Mom, I can tell you've got some idea of what Michael's planning and you couldn't be more wrong. This is not some plan for him to get me out of my clothes; he just wants to take some photographs of me in the desert." Mothers would always be mothers! Amy had probably posed naked and done other crazy things in her youth… things Maria really didn't want to think about, especially in regards to her own mother! But the thought – even if it was a wrong one – of her daughter imitating her actions sent her into a frenzy of suspicious thoughts. Figures, Maria huffed. Do what I say, not what I do. Or in my dear mother's case, not what I've done!!

"You've already decided to do it."

"No, I told him I'd think about it, but honestly, I'm a little bit nervous about it," she admitted.

"You shouldn't be. I'll bet you'd realize how comfortable you are in front of the camera before he had taken a dozen pictures." She smiled at a memory. "Your father used to paint your portrait all the time when you were a little girl."

They never talked about the man who had walked out on them out of some unspoken agreement. They looked at each other as a lengthy silence fell over the room and Maria was the first to break it.

"Have you ever heard from him?"

Amy shook her head. "No, I never spoke to him again after he left."

Maria chewed on her lips, as another question popped up in her mind. What would she do if her mother answered it positively? Would she be ready to move to the next level, to take the next step to find answers? "Is there anyone that he would've kept in contact with?"

"Not that I know of." She watched her daughter closely, wondering if being around her boyfriend's family was the reason behind the sudden questions. "Your dad left most of his paintings here, Maria; they're in the attic with some other things he left behind if you wanna look at them."

Maria polished the table with the palms of her hands, her expression distant as she considered her mother's statement. "Maybe… someday."

"Well, let me get the dishes washed so I can get ready for work."

Maria watched her mother for a moment, finally deciding to tell her what was on her mind, about the older DeLuca woman's romantic life. "Mom?"

Amy sat back down at her daughter's serious tone. "What is it, honey?"

"I just… Are you happy? I mean, with Howard; are you happy with him?"

"Maria – "

She shook her head, fully intending to make her mother understand her point of view. "No, it's just that I'll be graduating next year and at some point, I'll be going away to college. I don't want you to be alone when that time comes, and while I think you could really do so much better than Howard…" Maria bit her bottom lip for several moments before looking directly at her mother. "Please tell me you're not planning to spend the rest of your life with Howard."

"No, Maria, I have no such plans."

"Thank God," she muttered. "I just want you to be happy, Mom. I want you to have someone who really means something to you… I don't want you to be alone." She hugged her mother and set the dishes in the sink. "Promise me that you'll think about it, okay?"

"Promise."

"And, while I realize we've violated all rules in our don't-ask-don't-tell policy, I feel that I have to ask where you were last night."

"Let's just say that I was with someone who wasn't Howard and leave it at that for now."

Not Howard? That was good news. Maria started to smile, but quickly realized what that meant. Wait… not Howard? Then who was he? "Someone you might be spending more time with in the future?"

Amy chuckled at her daughter's persistence. "Maria, you're gonna be late for school if you keep hanging around here digging for information I'm not ready to share yet."

"Fine," Maria huffed. "I'll be home late tonight; I'm closing at work."

"Are you working tomorrow?"

She rolled her eyes. "I'm working all weekend; it was the only way for Mr. Parker to rearrange my schedule so I'd be off last night."

"Will you be closing all weekend?"

"Yeah." She shrugged. "It's okay though, I didn't have any other plans. I'm gonna go get ready, Mom. Do you need the car today?"

"Um-hmm. So if you hurry I can drop you off and you won't have to walk." She smiled when Maria hurried out of the room and before long her mind began to wander back to her own situation.