Part XIX Diane

I hum a little tune as I wrap a present. It's getting close to Christmas time.

In the past, when my children were children, Christmas was Isabel and Philip's domain. They decorated, they wrapped presents, they played Christmas Carols from the day after Thanksgiving until New Years Day. Sang them too, if I remember clearly. Isabel always wanted the perfect Christmas.

Max and Michael used to cower when Christmas came around. They always seemed to want to run for the hills. Michael even got us all (I feel guilty when I admit even me) to call her the Christmas Nazi. I never understood what drove it. I think on some level I didn't want to understand. Philip and I adopted them at Christmas. Do they have memories of other Christmases? Of the ones who abandoned them? Does Isabel try to purge the memories of bad Christmases with one perfect holiday season? Does that mean that I failed my daughter on some fundamental level?

I start to whistle as I tuck in one corner of the package. I press in good wishes as I wrap it. This is a tradition I began years ago. I was giving Michael a coat, and I remember wishing that the coat would keep him as warm as a mother's arms and love. He never said so, but he always seemed warm in that coat. I used to wish that Isabel would remember how much I love her every time she put on a sweater, or that she would smile every time she wore a lipstick. I would wish that a silly book would make Max smile, or that a journal would allow him to rid some of the thoughts that troubled him so deeply. And it worked. Maybe it's because I picked the present with love, and thought about what the receiver really wanted, really needed. Or maybe it was wishful thinking. But I still whisper wishes as I wrap presents and my love in bright holiday paper. It's part of Christmas magic.

What I am wrapping now is a present for Tess. She will one day be my daughter-in-law. Hopefully. That's a long story, but I have time. Do you?

Well, when Tess first came to Roswell, when the kids had children's bodies, even if their souls were older, Max's eyes sparkled. Izzy glowed a little more, and Michael unbent a little. And then she disappeared. Jim was devastated. Amy Deluca was his rock then. She made sure that he and Kyle were fed and clothed. She forced them to keep the house up to human livability standards. She never told anybody what they told her in private.

My own children and Michael were devastated. I remember wishing I could comfort them somehow. Jim was convinced that she'd been kidnapped, but Max and Izzy thought she'd gone of her own free will. Jim and Kyle got one letter. It looked like it had been through the wars and it was very short. "I am all right, but if I stayed you would not be. Ed would hurt you. I will come home when I can. I'm sorry. Tess Valenti. PS I love you." Jim railed for hours when he got that. I remember reading it that first time and weeping. I remember thinking that that little girl was exactly Isabel's age. What if I hadn't found Isabel? What a maniac like the man 'Ed' had found her first? I'm a lawyer, I have been exposed to the lower ranks of humanity but that someone could hurt a little girl like that…

Jim searched for her for years, until the people who can extrapolate what a child will look like five years down the road couldn't do any more. Just when he'd been forced to give up—she reappeared. Out of no where.

Actually, Max told me she took the bus. That thought made me shiver. A sixteen year old who looks like that should not be traveling alone on a bus, waiting in stations in the dead of night. Who knows what kind of sickos she encountered?

But when she came home, Kyle and Jim instantly brought her back to the fold, and into their hearts. Not only them, Amy welcomed her. Maria was a little more reticent, but it came. Max was in seventh heaven, and Isabel and Michael looked as though they'd found a treasure that was missing.

There were stone in the road and bumps in the path. Tess would not talk about where she'd been, except to say, "I'm glad it was me, not you." She'd been hurt, that was obvious. She was skin and bones, though she filled out quickly. Amy once told me that Tess had nightmares. Another trait she shares with Isabel.

Anyway, it seemed that Kyle had been expecting the sister/play mate he remembered. But she had grown and changed. Her eyes would go dark and haunted. She would never turn her back to a stranger, and always sat with her back to the wall at dinner, so she could watch everyone else. The heat was vicious to her. She couldn't seem to keep hydrated. She fainted twice in the first month.

Jim was expecting changes, but they slapped him with the anger of stinging nettles and thorns. He felt guilty. He thought he'd failed her. Every fearful cautious glance she scanned a room with, every shudder reminded him that he had protected the town but not his daughter. Amy won't comment on those times, but they passed. Eventually.

As for Tess herself—well, she got used to shopping malls, though she (to this day) hates having people pressed close on all sides of her. She got used to regular meals, and a roof over her head and covers when she wanted them. Her rough edges have melted away. She is wary about physical contact, though not with Max. Holding his hand has always seemed to be one of the simple pleasures of her life.

As for Tess and Max? Well, Isabel told me once that he had seen her minutes after she got off the bus. (purely by coincidence?) She laughed when she said that Liz Parker had been hanging all over him, and that he had shaken her aside the second he saw Tess. Isabel said that even though she isn't a romantic, she believed Max when he said that something in his heart recognized Tess. She said that there was an old fairy tale she once heard—that when a soul is sent to earth it is split in two. She said that most humans spend their whole lives searching for their other half, without realizing what they are searching for. She said that Tess is Max's other half. Terribly romantic and utterly unrealistic but I wonder sometimes.

They fell easily into a romance. But even if their souls recognized each other, there were pitfalls. This is not a movie, or a fairy tale, it's real life and no relationship or person is perfect. Tess is haunted by demons in her past, as is Max. Sometimes these demons lead to irrational fears, sharpened tempers and tongues… But they always made it up.

Michael and Isabel were married in June. It is now December. I will confess, I always assumed Max and Tess would get married first. Actually, they took off on a road trip to Vegas one summer. Scared the b'jesus out of all us parents and old fogies. I was convinced they were getting married without me there. And Jim and Philip were definitely concerned about their respective little girl's innocence. Amy was absolutely convinced Michael didn't mean Maria's virtue well. I defended him as hotly as I defended Max to Jim. They defended Kyle's intentions with near religious fervor.

The kids came back three thousand dollars richer. Apparently someone had figured out how to beat the casino's blackjack table. They'd been kicked out, but they looked at it as a fabulous adventure.

We grounded them all for the rest of that summer, and they did community service until every nail on Isabel's hands was broken.

They left for college, and suddenly the town was a lot quieter. The houses were silent and things seemed…boring.

Max is in med school now, up to his ears in debt. We paid for college, but med school he's doing on his own. It nearly broke Jim and Amy—three kids in college on the proceeds from a tourist trap and a sheriff's salary. I know it was tough on me and Philip—and we have two lawyer's paychecks. We paid for Michael to go to school, though he keeps trying to pay us back. I've said, "Don't you get it by now? You are one of my children, Michael." I think that finally hushed him…but the stubborn child has become a mulish man.

As for why Max and Tess aren't married yet—I wish I knew. I'm not on the inside of that relationship, so I can't explain it but I think it boils down to three points.

1) 1) Max has gotten too complacent. He's too sure of himself. Tess needs to shake him up a bit.
2) 2) They are both drowning in debt. Med school for two does NOT come cheap. Neither does a wedding. (She wants to be a psychiatrist, to help children from troubled backgrounds.)
3) 3) Tess is scared. She is frightened of anything that feels even remotely like it will bind her or restrict her. I think it has to do with those demons in her past. Though I can tell that she loves my son with her whole heart, commitment is not really her strong suit. No, that's not true, they've been living together in sin for a few years now, and they've been dating since high school. Max is probably scared too. He's never been one to go whole hog. He waits patiently, weighs his options, plans ahead. But for Tess—well, for her he would go whole hog.

She has him hook line and sinker, she just needs to reel him in, when she decides she wants to. Those two are forever, so it doesn't really matter (to them) when they inform the rest of the world. They know it in their hearts.

Michael and Isabel were a surprise to everyone but Tess and Max. Actually, I believe that those two had a hand in pushing Izzy and Michael to their senses. And Kyle, and Maria. Tess can always get Kyle to lend a hand, and Maria was willing to jump in on a good cause. Anyway, it was devastatingly simple. Make Michael jealous. Turn Isabel green with envy.

Kyle took Isabel out for dinner. Maria took Michael to the same restaurant. Each tried to outdo the other with outrageous flirting. By the end of the night sparks were FLYING through the restaurant. By the next day they had realized what was going on, kissed, made up, and threatened Max with bodily harm if he interfered with them again. I don't think they ever got mad at Tess or Kyle or Maria. Maybe a little with Kyle… And if they were mad at Tess they didn't show it. I think they saw that she just wanted them to be happy. And letting her have a hand in it made her month probably.

So Isabel is a lawyer, Michael is an artist, Tess and Max and still students, broke silly. And they're all going to be home for Christmas. Under the roof of the house Max and Isabel grew up in. I couldn't be happier.

By now, I'm wrapping Michael's presents. I began with a sketch pad and crayons. I continued the tradition every year, with markers and paints and canvases and clay and art books and lessons. Every year he gives me something of my family in the medium of the previous year. We have clay sculptures, oil crayons, regular crayons, intricate ink and line drawings, a painting, a charcoal, and even (I still think this is cool) a canister with the faces wood burned on it. Every year it gets a little more elaborate. The year Michael proposed (Of course he proposed at Christmas. I think he thought that would be Isabel's perfect Christmas and that it would quell the quest.) he gave us this painting so lifelike it felt like a living photograph. It even had a tiny ring on Isabel's finger. When she noticed it, he drew her under the mistletoe, kissed her, and offered her a ring. Just a simple gold band but it meant more to her than any other piece of jewelry ever has.

That was last year, actually. This year I'm giving him a kiln. Yes, a kiln. To bake pottery in. Tess is getting a red sweater and a recipe book. My mother-in-law, Philip's mother, an impressive and imposing woman gave it to me the first year Philip and I were married. I'd been feeling on the outskirts of the family since I couldn't have children, but that gesture brought me right to the heart of it. I hope that it does the same for Tess.