Chapter Eight

Ice cold water smacked him in the face, immediately making Max wake from the nothingness of sleep. He had discovered that, if he drank enough during the day, his nights would be peaceful once he closed his eyes, once he passed out. And that's how he made it through his life now, one day at a time. Despite once more catching glimpses of Liz, being back in school was unbearable. He had gone from, just weeks before, sitting next to her, talking to her, and being her friend to having Liz now ostracize him. Forget sharing a conversation with her, his dreamgirl wouldn't even look in his direction, and it was slowly killing Max – the distance between them.

What was more, it made him otherness seem even more pronounced. The less contact he had with Liz, the worse his reactions to the stimuli around him became. He saw more, heard more, smelled more, tasted more, and felt the touch of more. It was all he could do to numb his senses enough to even walk upright. Every second of every day had become a challenge of survival. His pain was constant. While his body had always craved and pressured him to form a connection with someone, now that he had experienced being close to Liz but no longer had the right to such a pleasure, his instincts were even more demanding, his urges nearly undeniable. It took all of Max's reserve not to beg for her forgiveness. At this point, it wasn't even his pride preventing him from making a further fool of himself; it was the fact that, even if Liz would consent to being his friend again, he knew that he would no longer be satisfied with mere friendship, and there could never be anything more between them. If his disaster of a relationship with his parents had taught him anything, it was the fact that, no matter what, he couldn't trust anyone, especially if they claimed to love him.

It was the feeling of the shock-inducing water slipping down the collar of his t-shirt to leisurely trail its way down his now shivering back which brought Max back to the present and out of his own thoughts. With that reminder, his inner despair quickly morphed into outer rage, and he yelled, "what the hell was that for?"

Calmly and in a very soft spoken tone, his father answered, "I wanted to make sure that your mother and I had your complete and total attention."

It was only then that Max realized both of his parents were in the room. While his dad was standing directly before him, a large pot clenched loosely in a lax, forgotten grip, Max's mom was in the shadows, blending into the background as if she was cowering from the upcoming confrontation. And that's exactly what was about to happen. There was no other way to interpret his father's steely, determined gaze or his alpha-male attitude in that moment.

"Well, I'm definitely awake now," he bit out acerbically. "Would you two mind getting out of my room so that I can change? I'll meet you downstairs in a few minutes."

"And give you an opportunity to find your secret stash and drink yourself into oblivion first? I don't think so."

Despite his dad's words being true, he didn't flinch. In fact, he didn't react at all. "So, you'd rather I sit here – cold – in wet clothes while you and mom lecture me? Again?" Adding a sarcastic note to his voice, Max ridiculed, "someone's not worried about winning father of the year."

"Sweet..." His mother had started to call him by one of her many favorite terms of endearment, but, when she stopped herself, blanched, and then swallowed roughly, he realized that, whatever his parents were prepared to talk to him about that evening, they were just as upset about it as he would surely be in a matter of minutes. Correcting herself, his mom instead said, "Max, you've never been sick a day in your life... well, at least, since you came to live with us." Not since the day you became our son. Already, the cracks in his parents' caring veneer were starting to show. While he had always known it was only a matter of time before they regretted adopting him, Phillip and Diane Evans were showing their true colors much sooner than he had anticipated. Lamely, she finished, "you'll be fine, and this... what your father and I have to say to you... is important."

Standing from his wet bed, Max stripped off his dripping t-shirt, dropped it onto the floor, and then located a dry one from a basket of clean, folded laundry. He paid no mind to the fact that, while he dug for the shirt, he upset most of the other clothes, unfolding them. Some even spilled onto the floor, but he didn't care. Then, ignoring his parents' presence, he changed his pajama bottoms as well, thankful that he had on boxers underneath his drawstring pants. Comfortable once more, he disinterestedly collapsed into his desk chair, laced his fingers behind his head, leaned back, and offered his parents a bored stare. "Let me guess: you're worried about my grades. If I don't turn them around soon, I'll never stand a chance of getting into a good school. Or maybe you wanted to tell me about the new shrink you're going to force me to see. If so, don't worry. I'll go willingly; I won't fight you this time. You see, I've been missing my afternoon naps. It's just not the same trying to sleep in school with my head on my desk instead of a pillow and a classroom full of idiots droning on around me. I'd rather just have to block out one moron rather than twenty."

"Are you finished yet," his father asked tensely when Max paused for breath. Tilting his head to the side and shrugging his shoulders, he made a noncommittal sound of concession. "This is not about your grades, though we are concerned about them."

"Don't be. I've decided I'm not going to college anyway."

Instantly, his mother shot across the room in his direction, only to be stopped when his dad held out an arm, preventing her from passing him and moving any closer to Max. "What do you mean? Of course you're going to go to college! If you don't... honey, what kind of future would you have then?"

"Diane, we discussed this already," his dad said in a softer tone, a tone obviously meant for his mother's ears alone, though Max could hear perfectly well everything his father was and was not saying. "Right now, we have bigger fish to fry."

"I know, but..."

He watched on as his dad gently helped his mother back into the shadows, preventing her from voicing whatever protest she had been prepared to say. Though he was still feigning boredom, secretly, Max was beginning to panic. Something bigger than his grades or his going to therapy was about to go down, and the sinking feeling in his stomach told him that, whatever it was, he wasn't going to like it. Somehow, Max just knew that his life – or, more precisely, what was left of it – was about to come crashing down around him.

To cement his concerns, his father revealed, "this isn't about therapy either, son. You have made it abundantly clear that you refuse to cooperate with your mother and I. We've done everything that we could think of to help you, to get you back on track without actually having to... Well, anyway, we've exhausted our options, and you've left us with only one remaining course of action."

Sitting up straight on the edge of his chair, Max barked, "just get to the point already, dad. What are you trying to say?"

Without blinking, without remorse, and without a single sign of weakness, his father announced, "tomorrow morning, I'll be driving you to rehab."

Immediately, jumping to his feet, Max challenged, "you can't do..."

But his dad interrupted him, the older man's control snapping. "Don't tell me what I can and cannot do, Max. You are still my son; you are still my child. I have every right to get you help, and, if you refuse to help yourself, than your mother and I will do whatever we feel is necessary to get you better again."

"This isn't the answer," he protested. Already feeling trapped, he started to pace. "You don't understand. I'm not a drunk; I don't have a drinking problem."

"You could have fooled us," Phillip retorted acrimoniously.

Ignoring his dad, Max continued to try to explain. While he knew he was rambling, while he knew that he was losing the last thin thread of his control, in that moment, he didn't care. "It's just that... without it, without the alcohol, everything is too much. I can't handle it. I don't want to drink. I don't like it, or how it tastes, but I need how it makes me feel." Looking up at his parents beseechingly, he added, "I know I've made some poor choices lately, but I'll get it together again, I promise. Just give me a little more time. I can handle this. I am handling it."

When his mom stepped forward, Max could clearly see the tear tracks obscuring her face, though their presence barely registered on his desperate mind. "Honey, listen to yourself. Don't you hear what you're saying?"

"What I hear is that my parents don't want me around anymore, that they think I'm a lost cause."

"If we felt that way, Max, we wouldn't be trying to help you," his dad answered. "We wouldn't be spending a good portion of our retirement fund to send you to rehab."

Screaming, he responded, "I never asked you to!"

"No, you didn't," his father acknowledged, "and, one day hopefully, you'll understand yourself that sometimes parents have to do things for their children that their kids don't want. You need to trust that your mother and I know what's best for you, Max."

"Trust you," he spit the words back towards them, his voice drenched in contempt. "By doing this, you two are making my biggest fear a reality." Knowing exactly how to hurt them as much as they were killing him, he sent out one last parting shot. "You found me on the side of a road – naked, lost, mute, and, now, you're abandoning me, too. What great parents you turned out to be. You should have just left me out in the desert alone."

With his words, his mother's silent tears became audible sobs, but Max, in his need to leave, didn't pay her any attention. Instead, he pushed past his dad when the older man tried to prevent him from fleeing the room, and he didn't stop or look back as his parents pursued him down the hall, down the stairs, or out the front door. He felt trapped, and he needed to escape. That was the only thing Max could focus on: getting away. Hopping into the jeep, he started the old army vehicle without keys, uncaring of what his parents would think or wonder about his actions. Peeling away from the only place he had ever considered home, his devastated parents looking on in astonishment and mortification, in fear and frustration, Max briefly wondered if it was the last time he'd ever see that house and those people. And then he thought about getting a drink.

; : ;

He wasn't sure where his mind had been before, but Max had now come crashing back down to reality. No matter how hurt he was by his parents, he knew that he couldn't leave town. Roswell was his home – not because that's where he had lived his entire life, not because that's where he had been found, but because that's where Liz Parker was. While he couldn't go back to the house on Murray Lane, he also couldn't run as far away as he had initially wanted to.

Max took another swig of whatever it was he was currently drinking, laughing bitterly at the thought of what would happen to him if someone could somehow see inside of him, his thoughts. Though he could no longer taste the burning sensation of the liquor sliding down his dust coated throat, he was far from the numb state he sought. His unrealistic – for him – and unhealthy – for her – love, need, infatuation, obsession for and with Liz Parker was pressing down upon him no matter how fast he drove, how hard he fought against it, how much he drank. The weight of his surroundings as he sped by them still pressed down upon Max. His acute senses were in overdrive; nothing and no amount of alcohol were quelling them that night.

As his jeep soared down the deserted highways surrounding Roswell, he could smell the choking combination of burning asphalt and rubber as the friction of his tires against the road rubbed out anything pure and fresh about the desert air. Meanwhile, the jeep's normal bumps and jolts seemed magnified, his vibrations rocking up through the floorboards to travel through Max's body. A tuning rod for every slight movement, he was long past nauseous. And so that's what he tasted – the bile from his own stomach overriding the relief of the whiskey, vodka, scotch, gin that he drank and burning his mouth in recrimination.

Max could have handled all that, though, for it was nothing new. What was worse was the sound of his own desperate heartbeat and the vision of his own failures flashing relentlessly before his otherwise unseeing eyes. As scene after scene of mistake after mistake haunted him, taunted him – Liz's disappointed frown, Liz's sad eyes, her tears, Liz walking away from him, Max also had to contend with the overwhelming pressure weighing down his chest. His heart was pounding so ferociously, so quickly that he could no longer discern its moments of rest. It was like one constant shot of tension, the tightness spreading outward from his chest; down through his torso, his arms, his legs; only to pool heavily in the tips of his fingers, his toes, leaving his head floating and dizzy, oxygen deprived, and in pain. His drive, his need, his biological imperative to connect with someone had never been so urgent.

In vain, he continued to drink. Sips turned into gulps as Max's despair ratcheted up his need to quell urges. It had worked before, it had been working for the past few months, and it quite simply had to work again. If it didn't... Well, Max didn't really want to contemplate what would happen if he couldn't get himself under control. Thanks to his parents' abandonment, their betrayal, he was already on the edge. Even in his nearly mindless state, Max couldn't help but fear what would happen to his sanity if one more thing went wrong. He was that close to the edge.

So, Max drank, and he drove. Dusk had long since turned into early evening which had then melted away into the murkiness of night. As the miles flew by, swirling around him in an endless loop of melancholy and distraction, Max got no closer to finding any of the answers he sought. Instead, he just continued to break his own rules. After nearly twelve years of trying to fit in, of trying to act as normal as possible, he simply existed. When his gas ran out, he created more. When his human body begged to be relieved, he used his alien abilities to fix the physical interruption. When the salty accusation of his tears touched his mouth, he altered them, lapped them, and then mourned the fact that they, just like the alcohol he consumed so consistently, so rapidly, so greedily, did nothing to dull the ache of dejection, the sting of sorrow.

Eventually, the highways gave away to residential streets; his route changed from circular to a maze of dangerous, screeching turns. It was the light of companionship which drew him away from the solitary confinements of the desert. Though the pinpoints of warmth blurred past him given the speed at which he was driving, Max still craved to be near what he himself couldn't have: intimacy. Every light represented a family sitting down for a late dinner, kids being read a bedtime story by their parents, a couple curled up together on the couch to watch their favorite television program – scenes his heart cried out for but would never be allowed to experience.

And then the lights disappeared. Dissolved. Darkened to nothingness.

With a sickening punch of bruised flesh and broken bones, he felt his jeep collide with something it shouldn't have. For a brief moment, Max considered running away – just leaving behind whatever it was he had injured and not facing the consequences of his own actions, but he knew that such an instinct was his alien side attempting to assert its dominance, and he held hysterically, fiercely onto the part of him that was human and demanding that he do the right thing.

Jarringly applying the brakes, the jeep came to a screaming stop in the middle of a road Max suddenly realized that he recognized. It was a nice street – a street full of single mothers and their children, small homes, and Maria DeLuca. Max couldn't even count the number of times he had slowly driven down the street in hope of spotting his dreamgirl walking, laughing, talking, living with and beside her best friend. And that's when the sickening feeling of dread settled low in his stomach.

Quickly and without even thinking about his actions, Max put the jeep in park and jumped out of the barely just stilled vehicle. If he could have willed himself to the spot where the prone form – a form he had just seconds before believed to be some family's treasured pet, he would have. Instead, though, he had to settle for sprinting in the body's direction, ignoring the overwhelming sight, smell, and taste of the damning blood rapidly pooling beneath the tennis shoes, legs, torso, shoulders, and thick, chestnut mane of hair he would have been able to recognize with his eyes closed and his hands tied behind his back.

Falling to his knees beside her, Max wasted no time in gently yet swiftly turning her over. With her disfigured face held tenderly between his hands, he begged, pleaded, ordered, screamed in a whisper, "open your eyes, Liz; I need you to open your eyes, damn it. Please!"

She didn't move, didn't stir.

Leaning down further so that their foreheads were touching, he tried once again. "I can't do this without you, Liz. I know I don't deserve your help or your trust, but you need to do this for me. For yourself. Open your eyes. Open your eyes, and I'll never ask another thing of you ever again."

At first her lashes just fluttered, then they trembled, and then, finally, they lifted. Mixed in with feelings of pain and bewilderment, there was recognition shining through in the depths of Liz Parker's coffee colored eyes. "Max...?," she questioned, her voice a mere exhalation against his lips.

"It's okay, Liz," he promised her. "Everything is going to be alright."

And then it happened – the thing he feared and desired most. In a whirlwind of images, feelings, confessions of the heart, and flashes of the mind, he let his barriers down, risked everything and nothing all at once, and connected with Liz Parker.