Author: Lioness
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Missing, Max to the Max, End of the World, Meet the Dupes, Viva Las Vegas, Heart of Mine.
Legal Stuff: Roswell doesn't belong to me. it belongs to Jason Katmis Productions (fill in TV Network) and Melinda Metz.
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I flipped open the first page.
My name is Liz Parker and five days ago, I died.
Okay, been there, done that. I flipped ahead some. Read this, read this, read this...it was like going through someone's memories. And skipping over the boring parts. Wait. Stop. What was this? I flipped back a few pages.
I never write in this thing anymore. It seems like such a waste anymore. Writing my life down in a book isn't going to change what happened. It's not going to change what I did, and more importantly, it's not going to change what Max thinks I did.
Now here was something new. More of the "Liz angst shit." I had to find out what this was actually about. She seemed genuinely upset over whatever the hell she was writing about.
I went ahead some pages, until I hit two days after that.
Here I am. Little Liz Parker picking up her journal again. Five times in two days, and I haven't written about anything. It's clearly pathetic. But then again, it shows how much I still love Max. And how that will never change. I guess it's time.
For the world to not know: I did not sleep with Kyle Valenti.
I suppose that's the worse. Or maybe the best. Because all would be over if I had. If I had slept with him (which I never would, not in this lifetime not in any lifetime), it wouldn't be that way. If I slept with anyone it wouldn't be that way.
I guess that was the night for me to lose something. The first time around, when Max came over to pick me up, I lost my virginity. This time, I lost Max.
I'll be damned. I went ahead more pages, but nothing was explained. Soon the spaces between entries went from days to weeks. She wrote less, but the entries were longer. After that, she mostly wrote about Max. Lost-love shit.
Well, here, talking about a kiss. Liz's love life isn't something I'm interested in, but when she's kissing on someone besides Max, it's more interesting. I've noticed something about her. She doesn't use any names except her own and Max's.
I've been thinking about that kiss a lot lately. I can't say I didn't like it at the time. It was just not something I was used to. It was hard, and his tongue was in my mouth. Max never kisses like that. They're always soft and sweet.
Now, months later, I can still feel his tongue against my teeth, forcing its way into my mouth. Sometimes I even dream about it. God, I hope no one's snooping in on those dreams. But when I think about that kiss. I wonder, I really take time out to wonder, what would it have been like if it wasn't him who had kissed me. I mean, would it have been the same? Of course I doubt he would have kissed me if it wasn't him, since he has a girlfriend and all. I suppose I shouldn't say "a girlfriend." That sounds so...impersonal. Like I don't know her or something. It's almost like I don't know him.
And then I realize, I don't know him.
Okay, I don't know what the hell she just said, but it sounded important. but it wasn't exactly something I could ask Liz about. She would be pissed at me for A. Stealing her journal and B. Reading it. Of course, if I hadn't done A. B. Would have never happened.
And now look at me. I'm thinking like Little Liz. Illogical steps, going backwards, but you can't go backwards unless you go forwards, but of course, you can't go forwards until you've gone backwards. That's Liz Parker in a nutshell.
This entry was dated two days after we came back from Vegas.
Here I am again. Looking down the barrel of an empty page. My heart knows what to write, but my brain won't let it write the words.
When I look at the past now I see three things. That moment at the Crashdown. That hug. And that kiss. None of those things had anything to do with me. That's the part that hurts the absolute most.
Okay, moment at the Crashdown. That had to do with paranoia and suspicion. The hug. That had to do with Max. The kiss. That had to do with lust, and it wasn't even him. But it was him. I don't know how to explain it. Would he kiss that way, anyway?
And then there's the whole Max thing. Max thing. Max. God. Max has been the center of my world for going onto two years. It's funny, how when I "slept" with Kyle, all the things he felt for me changed. But the funniest (weird-funny. Not funny-funny) part is that my feelings to him changed.
I get it now. Liz has the hots for Kyle again. I continued reading.
I'd never seen him as a romantic before. But after Vegas, everything changed. I saw him in a new light. When I danced with Max, a part of me wanted to tell him everything about Kyle. But then, a part of me wanted Max to never find out. Because if Max ever found out, I could never have who I really want.
This isn't saying that I never loved Max. I did, and in a way, I still do. I couldn't bear to hurt Max again. Not the way I did that night. If I had to see him like that again, I would die. I love Max. I'm just no longer in love with him.
I could never tell this to him. Or Max. Or Maria for that matter. If anyone knew, they'd hate me. They would all hate me. None of them would see me the same way again. And I like the Liz Parker image they have now. It's naive and innocent. If they only knew what I wrote in here.
I hadn't caught any sex fantasies written down yet.
I can't think about this. Not now. I have to keep telling myself that I love Max. Ironically, things made sense when I was in love with Max. I knew what I wanted, and I knew exactly who I wanted. Max has his heart on his shoulder. It's so easy to know what he wants. And to think, I met this wonderful guy who wants me. It's so implausible to think, but here I am, thinking it.
But what I can't understand is, why don't I want him? Why do I want the guy who has a girlfriend and who is happy with his girlfriend? Why in all of holy hell (holy hell?) would I want to break up that lasting relationship? It's more sturdy than the one I had with Max, and it was so different.
With Max and I it was almost instantaneous. He healed me and I knew my life - my love life in particular - would never be the same. It was just there, and I was in love. With them, it was gradual. Lust, then love. Max and I barely touched for the first however many months of our relationship.
Don't they say friends make the best lovers? Could I consider him my friend? I'm friends with people who are his friends. We're bound together by a secret. But, really, is he my friend?
As interesting as Liz's love life is, this was beginning to bore me. Listening to her babble on about mystery man (surely to be Kyle) was getting really old. But Liz was an interesting girl, I guess. Did Valenti have a girlfriend? I don't know, I'm not a chick, I don't keep up with some other guys' love life. For all I know he's been humping Tess for the past seven months. Now that would make for interesting reading.
Another lengthily three weeks later, but another really long entry later, things got really interesting.
Prom. Prom, prom, prom, prom, prom. Prom. Prom. Porn. Porn?
Okay, now the same two words over and over again: not interesting. But when Liz Parker says the word "porn" something is very, very wrong. Or maybe that's the secret image she talked about. Or maybe she just wrote something else by mistake since she was writing the same word over and over again. Like a typo.
Prom sucks. Max sucks. Tess sucks. Max sucks Tess. Sean doesn't suck. He's okay. Maria sucks. Michael sucks. Michael doesn't suck. Michael does not suck. And I guess Maria doesn't suck. It's not her fault she got only the best boyfriend in the entire world. this is where I say one again, sounding ever so intelligent, Max sucks.
Dancing lessons. God. Damn. Dancing. Lessons. I am so upset over dancing lessons. Michael doesn't dance, doesn't go to prom. Takes dancing lessons for Maria, still hopeless, goes to prom anyway. Bestest boyfriend in the entire world. Everyone wants a Michael. Jealously overrules the body of Liz Parker. I want Max to be more like Michael. If that seems even in the least plausible. Porn. Yeah. Prom sucks.
I just read over everything I just wrote. And none of it make a shred of sense. Why I am upset over dancing lessons is why none of it makes any sense.
I gave Max this whole...speech about us not holding on. So he drops everything so fast, I felt the air rush up my skirt. I shouldn't have been so shocked to see him and Tess kissing. It's not like I hadn't been fantasizing about someone else for the past five months. it was conceited of me to think that Max wouldn't let go the way I had. But to think that he went running to Tess. That little whore. Slut. Bitch. Wench. The dog shit on the bottom of my shoe.
Liz Parker: double standard. Liz Parker: Can't see her ex with someone, but can't help but fantasize about someone herself. Liz Parker: So much of a wuss, that she can't even tell her current love how she feels. Liz Parker: wants a lover. Liz Parker: Doesn't want Max. Liz Parker: Wants Michael.
I closed the journal on that page. I slid it under my arm and walked out of the building. I walked to the Crashdown. I climbed up the back balcony. I unlocked the window and slipped into the building. I put the book back where I found it. I went back to the window. And then I stopped. And for a minute I just stood there and watched Liz sleep.
She was right. If I knew how she felt about him, I wouldn't see her in the same light ever again. And I didn't see her in the same way. I don't think I could ever see her in that way again. Naive and innocent. I saw what she wrote in that book. I didn't just see her as the woman I loved.
I saw her as the woman who loved me just as much.