~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Gathering
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The day game was in its ninth inning with two outs, two strikes, and a runner on second. It was almost over for the night. There was no way they'd loose.
Valenti sat in the dugout waiting impatiently for the poor sap who was up to bat to be struck out. Another half hour or so and he could hit the road. The coach had been incredulous at first, not wanting to let him take a leave of any kind. But it was still the pre-season and he had refused to give up; he needed to go back, at least for a little while.
A day later he was flying down the highway toward Roswell. His hands tapped out a rhythm on the steering wheel in time with the CD that blared from the speakers. A teammate had given him a copy of the music a few years earlier. He should have tried to contact Liz and Alex but things had gotten hectic just about then and he'd forgotten all about it until he was packing up to move to Chicago.
His friend had returned from a trip to Quebec regaling them all with stories of a torchlight singer he'd heard there; an angel from heaven he had called her. He'd even invited them to his home to hear the CD he'd brought back of her work.
Kyle's jaw had almost hit the floor when he'd heard the first few strains of the song and the silken voice that lifted up from the speakers. It had been a while since he had heard Maria sing, but there was no mistaking her voice.
He had tried to find her in Quebec but by the time he had made inquiries she had already moved and no one knew where she might have gone. His every query was fruitless but he never stopped trying to locate her.
Glancing at his watch, he turned his attention back to the road sign. "Welcome to New Mexico", it exclaimed in giant letters. Well, he was getting closer at least, and it was still early. If he neglected to pay attention to the speed limit he could be there in record time.
~~~
"Where are you and Mickey staying?" Liz watched Maria as she continued to draw integrated patterns of swirls in the loose gravel with her sneakered toes. It reminded her of the old home video of Max and Isabel when they were children, drawing the same design in the sand at the beach.
"To be honest, I hadn't thought that far ahead. We'll probably end up at that motel over on the highway."
"Oh no, you don't mean that sleazy flea bag motel with all the paintings of little green aliens on the walls, do you? You can't stay there. That place is a firetrap just waiting to happen."
"Not to mention that it's probably contagious," Alex added.
"Well, where would you suggest we stay then, our options are a bit limited with the festival opening this weekend, the decent hotels are sure to be booked up. I had forgotten all about the festival until we pulled into town and saw the banner for it hanging over the street."
"Why don't you stay with us? Mom and Dad won't care, they'll insist on it anyway, especially seeing as how you have no other place to go," Liz suggested, she hated the thought of Maria and Mickey having to stay at some run down old motor hotel that was best known for renting out rooms by the hour. And if Maria stayed with them, it would give her even more time to spend with her before she took off again to parts unknown.
Maria stared at the crystalline pool formed by the quarry pit. A handful of years ago she would have had a place to stay without putting out the families of her old friends. That was before the drunk driver had plowed into her mother's car while she sat at a railroad crossing, propelling her into the train and thus ripping away any family Maria might have once claimed as her own.
She had read about the accident in the Roswell newspaper four days after it happened; the newspaper was her only tie to her hometown and the international subscription rate cost her an arm and a leg but she couldn't bring herself to cancel it. She hadn't been able to make it back in time for the funeral and had spent the day in a bar, drowning her sorrows with the rest of the drunks in Drumheller, Alberta, while Mickey stayed with the babysitter, something that would take another large chunk of her money.
Neither Liz nor Alex had mentioned her mother's death to her. Bemused, Maria wondered if they were just hoping she wouldn't decide to drop in and pay her parental unit a visit. Secrets and half-truths were the norm for Roswell so she decided to remain silent and play at ignorance.
"We should mark this day on the calendar," Alex said, smiling at the two women.
"And why would we do that?" Maria felt that her homecoming would be better forgotten in the annals of time, not remembered.
"As the first time Maria DeLuca didn't run her mouth a mile a minute." Alex smiled to soften the remark. "Come on, Ri, it's us, Liz and Alex, your old buddies. You aren't going to run us off if you talked to us a little."
"I'm sorry, guys. I don't know what to say. I just keep trying to figure out why we're all here together. It doesn't make any sense."
"It's like old times," Liz suggested, "almost."
Maria smiled. "Yeah. Remember when we were kids and we'd all sleep over and watch scary movies until midnight and try to get Alex to let us play with his hair? We could always do that again for old times' sake." She winked at Alex and had to suppress a laugh at the blush that crept into his cheeks. "The time before we knew anything about aliens or the FBI or heartbreak. Sometimes I wish we could go back and do it all over again, go back to the time when we were blissfully unaware of conspiracies and secrets, when Isabel was still just another stuck up snob, Max was just an intense quiet nobody, and Michael was just a guy I passed in the halls at school on the days he chose to show up, before Max saved your life, and before I fell in love with arguing with Michael." She sighed and shook her head sadly. "But if we did, I wouldn't have known what it was like to love Michael and I wouldn't have Little Miss Mary Sunshine kissing my eyelids to wake me up every morning. And those two things I wouldn't give up for all the normalcy Roswell ever had to offer."
"She speaks!" Alex exclaimed, placing his hand on his chest in mock surprise. "Not only that but she's philosophical as well."
Liz broke into a fit of giggles as Maria reached out to lightly smack her friend up side his head. "That was uncalled for," she scolded. "You'd do well to remember that payback is hell, boy."
~~~
Kyle pushed open the door to the diner and strode into the tail end of a hectic lunch rush. He scanned the room and located a stool at the counter between an elderly woman and a young child. Walking up to it he sat down and grabbed a menu. It had been a long time since he'd been faced with alien themed foods.
"Hi!"
He turned slightly to face the child who smiled up at him, temporarily halting her quest to color all the pages in the coloring book Mrs. Parker had presented her with before her mother came back.
He smiled back at her, struck with a vague sense of familiarity. "Hi."
Her smile brightened at his returned greeting. "Do you live here?"
Kyle looked questioningly at the little girl before he answered, "I used to."
"So did Mommy. Did you come back to visit? We did. I've never been here before. I like it here though and I wish we could stay. There's lots more to do here than at home and everybody's nice to me. Mrs. Parker says it's because I look so much like Mommy but I don't really."
"No?" Kyle asked. Before the little one could explain the waitress approached from the other end of the counter and took his order. He looked again at the child. "You want some ice cream, kiddo?"
The child nodded vigorously, sending her golden curls into a whirlwind of movement.
He turned toward her to continue their conversation. "So why don't you think you look like you mother? She must be very pretty if folks think you look like her."
She giggled at the compliment. "I'm too little to look like Mommy, she's a grown up."
"Well, that would explain it, I guess. But if your mommy grew up here maybe people think you look like she did when she was little too, before she became a grown up."
She shrugged. "Maybe. But it's been a long time since she was little."
Kyle laughed at the child's comment. The longer he spoke with her, the stronger the sense of familiarity became. He held his hand out to her. "I'm Kyle. What's your name?"
"Michal Guerin. But everybody calls me Mickey." She solemnly shook his hand and drew her eyebrows together to study the man who sat next to her, he looked funny all of a sudden. "You okay?"
"You don't just look like your mommy, Mickey, you sound like her too." Kyle's face had drained of all color. For all the time he'd put into searching for Maria after he had heard she'd been in Quebec, all he had to do was come back to Roswell to find her. "Where is your mommy, Mickey?"
She shrugged again and smiled when the waitress set a dish of ice cream in front of her. Kyle watched as she snatched up the bottle of Tabasco. If Mickey's parentage had been in question before, it wasn't any longer, and Maria's mysterious absence made a little more sense.
"She went away to talk with some people and I stayed here. Mrs. Parker said she wanted to practice for when she has grandkids but I don't know what she means. I don't have any grandparents. Mommy says I used to have a grandma but she died. My best friend Anna has six grandparents though so I guess some kids do and some don't."
"Don't what?" Kyle was quickly becoming confused as the child babbled on.
"Have grandparents, silly."
"Oh, you're right, good point. Some do and some don't." Neglecting his food, Kyle sat and watched Michal Guerin eat her Tabasco sundae.
~~~
Maria stepped out of Alex's car again and into the bright sunlight in front of the Crashdown. She and Liz had coerced Alex into meeting them at Liz's later that evening to further discuss the reason behind the sudden draw Roswell seemed to have for them all. Waving goodbye, she entered the café with Liz following closely behind her.
"What was it I said about us not being a 'called' back to Roswell because Kyle would be here if we were?"
"What?" Liz bumped into Maria when she stopped suddenly just inside the restaurant.
"Maybe you were right after all."
"Maria, what are you talking about?" Liz looked to where Maria's eyes were riveted.
Kyle Valenti sat at the counter carrying on what appeared to be a very animated conversation with Mickey as the child stuffed the last spoonful of Tabasco and ice cream into her mouth.
Maria turned around to look into Liz's eyes, astonishment and hope reflecting in her eyes. "Maybe they did call us back. Maybe they're coming home."
The Gathering
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The day game was in its ninth inning with two outs, two strikes, and a runner on second. It was almost over for the night. There was no way they'd loose.
Valenti sat in the dugout waiting impatiently for the poor sap who was up to bat to be struck out. Another half hour or so and he could hit the road. The coach had been incredulous at first, not wanting to let him take a leave of any kind. But it was still the pre-season and he had refused to give up; he needed to go back, at least for a little while.
A day later he was flying down the highway toward Roswell. His hands tapped out a rhythm on the steering wheel in time with the CD that blared from the speakers. A teammate had given him a copy of the music a few years earlier. He should have tried to contact Liz and Alex but things had gotten hectic just about then and he'd forgotten all about it until he was packing up to move to Chicago.
His friend had returned from a trip to Quebec regaling them all with stories of a torchlight singer he'd heard there; an angel from heaven he had called her. He'd even invited them to his home to hear the CD he'd brought back of her work.
Kyle's jaw had almost hit the floor when he'd heard the first few strains of the song and the silken voice that lifted up from the speakers. It had been a while since he had heard Maria sing, but there was no mistaking her voice.
He had tried to find her in Quebec but by the time he had made inquiries she had already moved and no one knew where she might have gone. His every query was fruitless but he never stopped trying to locate her.
Glancing at his watch, he turned his attention back to the road sign. "Welcome to New Mexico", it exclaimed in giant letters. Well, he was getting closer at least, and it was still early. If he neglected to pay attention to the speed limit he could be there in record time.
~~~
"Where are you and Mickey staying?" Liz watched Maria as she continued to draw integrated patterns of swirls in the loose gravel with her sneakered toes. It reminded her of the old home video of Max and Isabel when they were children, drawing the same design in the sand at the beach.
"To be honest, I hadn't thought that far ahead. We'll probably end up at that motel over on the highway."
"Oh no, you don't mean that sleazy flea bag motel with all the paintings of little green aliens on the walls, do you? You can't stay there. That place is a firetrap just waiting to happen."
"Not to mention that it's probably contagious," Alex added.
"Well, where would you suggest we stay then, our options are a bit limited with the festival opening this weekend, the decent hotels are sure to be booked up. I had forgotten all about the festival until we pulled into town and saw the banner for it hanging over the street."
"Why don't you stay with us? Mom and Dad won't care, they'll insist on it anyway, especially seeing as how you have no other place to go," Liz suggested, she hated the thought of Maria and Mickey having to stay at some run down old motor hotel that was best known for renting out rooms by the hour. And if Maria stayed with them, it would give her even more time to spend with her before she took off again to parts unknown.
Maria stared at the crystalline pool formed by the quarry pit. A handful of years ago she would have had a place to stay without putting out the families of her old friends. That was before the drunk driver had plowed into her mother's car while she sat at a railroad crossing, propelling her into the train and thus ripping away any family Maria might have once claimed as her own.
She had read about the accident in the Roswell newspaper four days after it happened; the newspaper was her only tie to her hometown and the international subscription rate cost her an arm and a leg but she couldn't bring herself to cancel it. She hadn't been able to make it back in time for the funeral and had spent the day in a bar, drowning her sorrows with the rest of the drunks in Drumheller, Alberta, while Mickey stayed with the babysitter, something that would take another large chunk of her money.
Neither Liz nor Alex had mentioned her mother's death to her. Bemused, Maria wondered if they were just hoping she wouldn't decide to drop in and pay her parental unit a visit. Secrets and half-truths were the norm for Roswell so she decided to remain silent and play at ignorance.
"We should mark this day on the calendar," Alex said, smiling at the two women.
"And why would we do that?" Maria felt that her homecoming would be better forgotten in the annals of time, not remembered.
"As the first time Maria DeLuca didn't run her mouth a mile a minute." Alex smiled to soften the remark. "Come on, Ri, it's us, Liz and Alex, your old buddies. You aren't going to run us off if you talked to us a little."
"I'm sorry, guys. I don't know what to say. I just keep trying to figure out why we're all here together. It doesn't make any sense."
"It's like old times," Liz suggested, "almost."
Maria smiled. "Yeah. Remember when we were kids and we'd all sleep over and watch scary movies until midnight and try to get Alex to let us play with his hair? We could always do that again for old times' sake." She winked at Alex and had to suppress a laugh at the blush that crept into his cheeks. "The time before we knew anything about aliens or the FBI or heartbreak. Sometimes I wish we could go back and do it all over again, go back to the time when we were blissfully unaware of conspiracies and secrets, when Isabel was still just another stuck up snob, Max was just an intense quiet nobody, and Michael was just a guy I passed in the halls at school on the days he chose to show up, before Max saved your life, and before I fell in love with arguing with Michael." She sighed and shook her head sadly. "But if we did, I wouldn't have known what it was like to love Michael and I wouldn't have Little Miss Mary Sunshine kissing my eyelids to wake me up every morning. And those two things I wouldn't give up for all the normalcy Roswell ever had to offer."
"She speaks!" Alex exclaimed, placing his hand on his chest in mock surprise. "Not only that but she's philosophical as well."
Liz broke into a fit of giggles as Maria reached out to lightly smack her friend up side his head. "That was uncalled for," she scolded. "You'd do well to remember that payback is hell, boy."
~~~
Kyle pushed open the door to the diner and strode into the tail end of a hectic lunch rush. He scanned the room and located a stool at the counter between an elderly woman and a young child. Walking up to it he sat down and grabbed a menu. It had been a long time since he'd been faced with alien themed foods.
"Hi!"
He turned slightly to face the child who smiled up at him, temporarily halting her quest to color all the pages in the coloring book Mrs. Parker had presented her with before her mother came back.
He smiled back at her, struck with a vague sense of familiarity. "Hi."
Her smile brightened at his returned greeting. "Do you live here?"
Kyle looked questioningly at the little girl before he answered, "I used to."
"So did Mommy. Did you come back to visit? We did. I've never been here before. I like it here though and I wish we could stay. There's lots more to do here than at home and everybody's nice to me. Mrs. Parker says it's because I look so much like Mommy but I don't really."
"No?" Kyle asked. Before the little one could explain the waitress approached from the other end of the counter and took his order. He looked again at the child. "You want some ice cream, kiddo?"
The child nodded vigorously, sending her golden curls into a whirlwind of movement.
He turned toward her to continue their conversation. "So why don't you think you look like you mother? She must be very pretty if folks think you look like her."
She giggled at the compliment. "I'm too little to look like Mommy, she's a grown up."
"Well, that would explain it, I guess. But if your mommy grew up here maybe people think you look like she did when she was little too, before she became a grown up."
She shrugged. "Maybe. But it's been a long time since she was little."
Kyle laughed at the child's comment. The longer he spoke with her, the stronger the sense of familiarity became. He held his hand out to her. "I'm Kyle. What's your name?"
"Michal Guerin. But everybody calls me Mickey." She solemnly shook his hand and drew her eyebrows together to study the man who sat next to her, he looked funny all of a sudden. "You okay?"
"You don't just look like your mommy, Mickey, you sound like her too." Kyle's face had drained of all color. For all the time he'd put into searching for Maria after he had heard she'd been in Quebec, all he had to do was come back to Roswell to find her. "Where is your mommy, Mickey?"
She shrugged again and smiled when the waitress set a dish of ice cream in front of her. Kyle watched as she snatched up the bottle of Tabasco. If Mickey's parentage had been in question before, it wasn't any longer, and Maria's mysterious absence made a little more sense.
"She went away to talk with some people and I stayed here. Mrs. Parker said she wanted to practice for when she has grandkids but I don't know what she means. I don't have any grandparents. Mommy says I used to have a grandma but she died. My best friend Anna has six grandparents though so I guess some kids do and some don't."
"Don't what?" Kyle was quickly becoming confused as the child babbled on.
"Have grandparents, silly."
"Oh, you're right, good point. Some do and some don't." Neglecting his food, Kyle sat and watched Michal Guerin eat her Tabasco sundae.
~~~
Maria stepped out of Alex's car again and into the bright sunlight in front of the Crashdown. She and Liz had coerced Alex into meeting them at Liz's later that evening to further discuss the reason behind the sudden draw Roswell seemed to have for them all. Waving goodbye, she entered the café with Liz following closely behind her.
"What was it I said about us not being a 'called' back to Roswell because Kyle would be here if we were?"
"What?" Liz bumped into Maria when she stopped suddenly just inside the restaurant.
"Maybe you were right after all."
"Maria, what are you talking about?" Liz looked to where Maria's eyes were riveted.
Kyle Valenti sat at the counter carrying on what appeared to be a very animated conversation with Mickey as the child stuffed the last spoonful of Tabasco and ice cream into her mouth.
Maria turned around to look into Liz's eyes, astonishment and hope reflecting in her eyes. "Maybe they did call us back. Maybe they're coming home."