“So, what’s your deal?”
Tess continued to stare out the window of Kyle’s car, his voice barely penetrating the depth of her thoughts. “Hmm?”
Kyle sighed as he pulled to a stop at a red light. He chanced glancing at her and saw how far away she was. She’d been distant in the last few weeks, but nothing like this. “You heard me, Tess.”
“Yes, but I didn’t understand you.”
Scrubbing his hand over his face, Kyle had to remind himself that she was stressed and worried. And he’d had to have patience with her on her good days. “You’ve been moody and sullen for the last few days. You’ve barely said a word and you haven’t picked a fight with me all day, even when I ate the last of your cereal. So, I repeat my earlier question. What’s your deal?”
Tess did turn from the window now and she glared at Kyle. He was trying to make her feel something. She knew him well enough to recognize it. Kyle was an emotional creature, and she wasn’t. She’d blocked off emotion from the first mention of something happening to Max, and now despite her best efforts, because of Kyle, emotions were slipping through the cracks of her tightly woven shield. “Max is sick, possibly dying and there’s nothing I can do to help him.”
“Well, isn’t that why we have the healing stones this morning?” Kyle accelerated, continuing the familiar drive to the Crashdown. He’d tried everything he could think of to break through that damn shell she hid herself in. He’d seen her do it a dozen times, whenever something happened to shatter the illusion that her world was perfect. She’d arrived in town in a seemingly unbreakable shell, and they’d slowly chipped away at it. He’d seen glimpses of true emotion from her, and every time he witnessed it, it was breathtaking, almost like seeing a flower open to the sun for the first time.
“I don’t think they’re going to work and neither does Liz. Otherwise, we would have tried it yesterday.” If Kyle was determined to make her talk, she would do it. But she kept her gaze firmly out the front window. “What’s happening to Max isn’t an illness. His body is changing, the breaking down of his cells is the side effect, not the problem.” Nasedo had explained how the stones worked to her once and she wasn’t hoping for them to be the miracle cure now. The block she’d encountered in his mind the day before yesterday had been a testament to what they were up against. It had almost been like an internal shield, blocking her from entering his mind. And it had occurred to her that it might be a defense mechanism until his body had undergone whatever change it was trying to complete.
“We’ll figure something out, Tess.”
Tess straightened, nervous by how easily Kyle could read her thoughts. She said nothing, watching as his car ate up the distance between them and Max and Liz. Even now, their names flowed together seamlessly. And she wondered if there would ever come a time when it wouldn’t. She’d thought she’d known her place in the group finally, though that things would find a normal. She’d thought that maybe Kyle was the key to it all. But in one night, everything had changed again.
They’d been at home together. Jim had been working late and the two of them had been home making popcorn. Kyle had rented some incredibly cheesy alien movie he’d claimed she had to watch, and then the phone had rang. She’d watched him as his face scrunched up in confusion, and then he’d hung up the phone and had grabbed his keys. He’d smiled at her, begging for forgiveness and understanding, and said that Liz needed his help. He’d promised he’d be right back to watch the movie with her. But he never had.
A few hours later, she’d felt Max’s anguish as it ripped through the night air. And she’d followed the source. Max hadn’t had to tell her what had happened. She’d already known, seen it in the horrific flashes she’d picked up when she’d laid a tentative hand on his shoulder. And while Max sat on the bench, his heart in tatters, her own heart had bled for the first time. Over Kyle Valenti.
Suddenly, she had to know. She’d never brought it up before, hadn’t wanted an answer really. But she needed one now. “Why did you sleep with her?”
Kyle could actually feel every molecule in his body slow down and freeze. Why was she asking now? She hadn’t posed the question to him once since the night Max had found him in Liz’s bed. He’d suffered through guilt, knowing he’d hurt her and Tess had taken an immediate step back from their casual flirtations and sexual innuendoes. And he’d discovered that in helping a friend, he’d lost the potential of what could have been with Tess.
He didn’t want to lie to her, so he said nothing. Besides, it wasn’t as if it mattered in the long run. Tess had gone running to Max’s side the minute she’d found out she had another chance with him. They’d been practically glued together since that night. He’d thought he had understood pain. But the meaning of the word had been painfully clear the first time he’d had to meet Tess’s blue eyes and had seen that damn shield covering the emotions he’d worked so hard to unearth.
*~*~
Max concentrated on the soft rise and fall of his own chest, concentrating on his breathing. He’d been trying to slow it for ten minutes now, trying to match it with Liz’s. He hadn’t slept again last night, and he was beginning to wonder if his body didn’t need the rest the way humans did. Was it another part of the change in his body? He didn’t know, and at the moment he didn’t care. Nothing mattered in that moment but matching his breathing with Liz’s.
She was exquisite.
Her head was resting on his pillow, inches away from him. She was so close; he could feel the warmth of her breath on his face. One of her hands was resting on his chest above his heart, and no fabric separated their skin. His own arm was wrapped around her waist, his hand tangled in her hair against her back. She was covered almost head to toe in fuzzy flannel pajamas and in the course of the night, one of her legs had tangled together with his. All in all, she was a thousand degrees of pure heat wrapped around his already warm body. It was the sweetest torture he’d ever known, and though his own limbs were numb from lying still so long, he wouldn’t risk waking her.
He’d thought he was dying last night. The pain had been unbearable and the heat had been unlike anything he’d thought possible, though he’d seen Liz wrap herself in blankets and flannel. He knew he’d broken down and talked to her, whispering to her in the dark all the things he’d been afraid to say in the light of day. And much to his surprise, her eyes had filled with tears as if she had understood him. But then couldn’t she have? He’d understood what she had been telling him without knowing the exact words.
She had confessed to him everything he’d waited to hear for weeks now. She’d finally given him the truth about that night and he’d discovered that he didn’t need it now. In the last two days, he’d discovered that Liz could only lie to him if he let her. He knew her soul and though he’d forgotten that for a time, he remembered it now.
Last night had been the most intensely intimate experience two people could share. Even though she had been pushing him away with every word and every gesture for weeks now, she had reached out to him last night. She had looked at him with concern and love and she had held him in her arms when the pain had intensified. She had cried with him, maybe even for him. And she had clung to him, unwilling to let him go. It had shown Max that beneath all the problems that would forever sit on the surface between them, he could count on her when it mattered. It had also shown him that she still loved him.
It would have warmed his heart if he didn’t know her better. And he did know Liz Parker; enough to anticipate what would happen when her eyes fluttered open. She would push him away, push harder than she had pushed so far. Whatever was making her keep distance between them would surface. But he would be ready for it this time. Only, he’d be damned if he’d let her do it again. He had held her in his arms last night, had felt her heart beat in time to his. For a few glorious hours, he’d been happier than he ever had been.
He wouldn’t give that up. She would have to keep pushing, because he was going to keep fighting. Liz might be stubborn and persistent, but she had no idea that he could be even more so if enough was at stake.
Max heard scuffling sounds from the balcony behind him and he knew it was Kyle and Tess. He was sad that the night was ending, but it meant the dawn of a new day. He wouldn’t waste this one.
Closing his eyes, Max tried to relax his facial muscles. Liz would wake up in a minute and he didn’t want her to know he had spent another night watching her sleep. But there was something inside of him that couldn’t resist pulling her those last few inches closer, until she was trapped against his body. He thought he would pass out from the heat, but when she snuggled her head into the crook of his shoulder, he forced his body to settle down. She would be out of his arms in another ninety seconds anyway.
Just as he predicted, he heard Kyle and Tess stumble through the window a second later, whispering to themselves when they found them curled up in bed together. Max wanted to smile when the unintelligible sounds stopped mid-sentence. He knew Tess wouldn’t be upset. The two of them had actually talked a few days before all this had happened, and she had confessed to have had a fight with Kyle. Among other things, she had told him how Liz had tried to push them together, and how it had made her realize they didn’t have anything in common. Tess wasn’t a threat to his relationship with Liz anymore. She had moved on. But the irony had been that a relationship hadn’t existed anymore.
So, Max knew it was Kyle that stomped his way over to Liz’s side of the bed to wake her. Kyle whispered something into Liz’s ear and it only made Liz snuggle closer to Max’s body. It took everything inside of Max not to groan aloud when she rubbed her leg between his. And Kyle’s hissing grew louder.
Max could actually feel the exact second Liz woke up. Her whole body seemed to sigh in satisfaction for waking in his arms. For one second, she melted against him. Then as the sleep cleared from her brain, her muscles stiffened and she slowly began sliding away from him. Max felt the cool air hit his skin and was reminded that he was wearing only his boxer shorts. At some point in the night, Liz had pulled the clothes from his body in an attempt to bring his fever down. It had worked better after she had opened the window to allow the crisp winter air into the room.
They spoke in hushed whispers, and he could only imagine how the conversation was going. It was only a second before he felt the bed dip again and Liz’s hand brushed against his forehead. He didn’t need to see the crease in her forehead to know that he was still running a high fever. It wasn’t anything near as bad as it had been last night, but it was still enough to worry over.
Deciding it was as good a time as any to open his eyes, he let them flutter open. Liz offered him a strained smile, and he saw the distance forming between them inch by inch. She had already begun to retreat from him, and he knew that no matter who was in the room with them, it was time to let her know that she was going to have to push a lot harder than she had before if she wanted him to leave. He gripped her hand and brought it to his lips to brush a kiss to her knuckles. He kept his eyes locked on hers, watching as the desire flared. A light flickered that he hadn’t seen in too long and it grew brighter before her resolve battled it back and she tugged her hand from his.
She handed him his clothes and rose from the bed to the sanctuary of the desk. Max tossed back the covers, careful to ignore Kyle and Tess. A smile wanted to tug at the corner of his lips, and he knew if he met their eyes, he wouldn’t be able to contain his mirth. It was enough to know that Liz was as affected by his presence as he was by hers. He could build off that.
Locked safely inside the bathroom, Max stripped and turned the shower to the coldest possible setting. He dove into the spray eagerly and allowed himself a few minutes to simply try to cool off. When he knew it was a futile effort, he pulled himself out and dried off quickly.
He felt horrible. His body ached in places he didn’t know it was possible to ache, he couldn’t understand a word anyone around him said, he was sure he was running a fever that would have put any normal person into the hospital, and his tongue still felt too thick in his mouth. But a smile still graced his face as he pulled his clothes on. He even considered whistling a tune until it occurred to him that he probably couldn’t do it. Deciding not to push his luck and discover something else he might never be able to do again, Max quickly dried his hair.
Escaping from the bathroom, Max came up short when he saw Jeff Parker standing in the middle of Liz’s bedroom. His eyes widened momentarily, his fear returning. Did he know that his daughter hadn’t been sleeping alone? Had he carelessly left some shred of evidence lying around? He tried to gauge the man’s mood, but found it as impossible as ever. And to his horror, Max watched Jeff open his mouth to speak to Max.
Had he asked a question? Made an observation? Told him to get the hell out of his house? What was the correct response? Should he smile and nod his head, or would that seem an odd response? His eyes slid quickly to Liz and he found her smiling and nodding her head. He took it as a sign of what to do and he mimicked her response. It seemed to pacify Jeff and he smiled in return.
Feeling as if he’d passed some sort of test, Max stood frozen in place until Jeff was satisfied enough to leave the group alone again. But he felt his previous good mood diminish in Jeff’s wake. He'd woken up feeling more normal than he had in days. And had been quickly reminded how abnormal he was. He’d grown accustomed to life in the bubble of Liz’s room where she protected him from the outside world. How was he supposed to function in the world? She couldn’t spend her life dedicated to translating for him.
Knowing she would be worried, he hung his head low. He wasn’t ready to see the concern in her eyes yet. All he wanted to do was bury himself in the alien book again. At least that was familiar. He could read it and make sense of it; even if what was in it was enough to break his heart. But when Liz appeared at his elbow and held out one of the healing stones for him to see, he realized that they weren’t going to leave him alone to sulk. He would spend another day being poked, prodded and experimented on.
So, Max allowed them to position him on the floor. Liz had locked the window and closed the blinds while Kyle locked the door. Max had lain on the floor, trying to relax his breathing while the three of them knelt beside him. Would this even work? They couldn’t really have believed it would if they’d waited this long to try the stones out. But he gave them the opportunity to try.
He kept his eyes closed the whole time, hoping for some sort of tickle in his mind. He waited for some sort of change, or to enter the dream plane as they had when Michael had been dying. But nothing happened, and he felt the charge of energy around him diminish. Was it because only Tess was an alien? Did they need more power to make the stones work? Or were they simply not built to help in this sort of situation?
Kyle rose from the floor in frustration and paced the room silently. Tess and Liz stayed where they were on opposite sides of his body, both watching him. It struck him as funny that they had all become accustomed to communicating verbally only when necessary around him. He’d grown used to the silence, but it was still stifling at times. Especially when all he wanted to do was curl under the covers of Liz’s bed and drag her with him. They could just lie together and shut out the rest of the world and pretend that nothing was wrong.
Tess caught his eye, and he watched her for a minute. She was supposed to be his wife, yet he felt nothing for her outside of friendship. She finally understood it, after months of trying to wedge between his relationship with Liz. She watched him struggle internally before she offered him a smile. It wasn’t warm, and he wasn’t really even sure if she was capable of it. He’d only seen the surface with Tess, and it was all smoke and mirrors. Perhaps it was why he couldn’t feel anything for her.
But when his gaze shifted to Liz, Max knew that the reason he couldn’t feel anything for Tess didn’t have anything to do with Tess. Liz Parker had simply captivated him from the first shy smile she had given to a strange boy in her class. The boy had grown into a man, but had loved her no less.
Tess rose from the floor and left them alone, but Max barely saw her move. He could see the flicker of emotions in Liz’s eyes. She was torn between comforting him and keeping her distance. Max sat up, closing some of the distance between them, and caught her hand again. It was enough to keep her from fleeing for the moment, and he took it. He could see her chest rise and fall as her breathing intensified. He traced circles on the back of her hand with his thumb, but it wasn’t enough contact. He needed to touch her, to feel something. He needed a reason to continue fighting. If he were feeling better, he could afford to be patient and fight for her. But he couldn’t divide his energy like this for long.
His throat constricted and his chest ached with the thought of closing the distance between them with a kiss. Would she still back away? Or would she see that he needed her? That without her, he may as well stay in his current state because he didn’t have anything to offer this world? How was it that she could see him so clearly, and yet not understand him at all?
His free hand moved softly up the side of her arm, caressing her skin. When he reached her neck, he cupped it firmly and let her silky hair slide through his fingers. He had tried to put down what he felt for her in words the night before, but had been unsuccessful. Now he knew that if he wanted her to know, he would have to show her. Maybe the fates wouldn’t be cruel enough to take their connection away too, and he could have some way to communicate with her before it was too late.
Her eyelashes fluttered against her cheeks as she closed her eyes on a whispered moan. She had meant it only for his ears, and he took it as an invitation. But as he moved closer to her, he began to realize that something was wrong. Had he thought his chest ached from the need of the moment? Because it was burning now, threatening to seize as a ghostly hand tightened its grip.
He let out a strangled cry, and pulled back from Liz. His throat was constricted again, not permitting him to make any sounds. Gasping for air, he fell back to the floor and clutched at his throat. Liz was leaning over him, yelling over her shoulder. Her cool hand rested on his forehead and Kyle showed up a second later with a cold towel. Liz began dabbing at his face, and he felt the panic attack subsiding. Max tried to relax his breathing, anything to ease the unbearable tightness.
He was running a fever again. He could feel it. And then Tess was taking over where Liz had been. Liz had given up the job and was in the process of unbuttoning his shirt again, laying cold towels on his skin. It was enough to shock his system and almost immediately, he found that he could breathe again if he concentrated hard enough.
Letting his head fall back to the floor, he gasped for air and opened his eyes to find Liz by his side. Her face was contorted in fear as she continued to lay the towels against his skin. Kyle was constantly refreshing the towels and handing them to the two girls, and Max made a mental note to thank him if he ever could again.
Feeling blackness creeping along the edges of his vision, Max didn’t have time to worry about what it meant. He was sinking into the quicksand fast. Liz called out to him, but he could only dimly hear her voice through the long tunnel. He wanted to tell her that he loved her, that she shouldn’t worry because he could feel that it wasn’t his time yet. His eyes were closing fast and the more he fought, the harder it was to keep them focused on her face.
So, Max gave in and allowed his eyes to close. But he carried with him the image of Liz’s worried face. And hoped that he would have the chance to see it again.
