*17*

The three of us, we stand here in a triangle.

A menage-a-trios of pain, of self-punishment, this is all we've ever been. We were out to hurt each other, manipulate each other, hate and love each other. Now we have to work together.

I'm faced with a decision because Tess can't make decisions at the moment and I'm not ready to ask Max.

But who am I. Who am I to say what's right and wrong.

Who made me the judge?

If you shift your eyes to the left, you can see the figure laying on the ground, you can see the blurry outline. Don't turn your head, or you'll focus. You don't want to focus.

Did she do something wrong here? Does she deserve to be punished for attempted murder? Does she deserve any more punishment? If she doesn't, I have a plan.

Logic.

But still, if you shift your eyes to the left and downwards, you can see a trail of blood. You can see it hazily emerging from the figure, you can follow the path it makes in little drops between you and - whoever. If you shift your eyes to the right, you can follow the path it makes towards the knife. I wish her carpet wasn't white. I bet it's a bitch to get blood out of white carpet.

Logic always wins out in situations like this. I see blood, I think logic. Can't let my emotions rule, Tess can, I can't. But my plan, my plan would be the lie of the century.

Worse than covering up a car accident, worse than covering up an alien conspiracy, worse than washing the blood off the street that night, worse than burning those bloody clothes.

Who do I think I am. Why doesn't anyone else want to be the judge for a change.

If you raise your eyes a little, you can see Tess's knees against the carpet, you can see the tears falling on them. If you raise your eyes even more, you can see her face getting lost in her hands. Her wet, bloody hands. You know she's not a killer. You know what you have to do.

I know what I have to do.

And inside, I'm laughing. Sometimes the emotions are so strong that they have to come out somehow. I don't want to cry, so I think about how fucked up this is and I laugh inside.

I think about how I could have stopped this and I laugh inside.

It's a defense mechanism.

It's called: Reaction Formation.

Look it up.

'Without our defense mechanisms,' Says Dr. Amos, 'We wouldn't survive.'

'People need them,' says Dr. Amos, 'Don't mess with them, they are adaptive.'

I wonder if I'm becoming any less of a person.

I wonder if I'm becoming a defense mechanism.

I'm becoming a robot. I'm just a vessel for every psychological term in the book.

Max's biggest fear is telling Tess he's an alien.

My voice is mechanical, cold as steel. "Go in your room Tess, stay there."

She sobs harder. I don't want to be mean, but I'm doing this for her. " GO."

She goes.

I don't know where to start. I know what I have to do, but I don't know where to start.

I can't look at Max's face. I pull him over to the body with closed eyes.

When I open them I'm expecting some sort of shock, but it doesn't come quickly. I expected this, some greasy guy, a bloody knife wound on his chest, a gash on his forehead from where she must have knocked him out. This isn't affecting me.

Maybe I'm losing my humanity, maybe Max is too.

We kneel on either side of the body. The disgust comes slowly, but intensely, in waves. I want to throw up.

Max is disgusted too, I can tell without looking. I grab his hand in mine and pull. Our hands hover over the body. I don't know how I know this, but I know we're both thinking the same thing:

Fucker deserves to die.

And:

It's not for us to decide.

I say, "Don't heal the head wound, we need him out."

Max nods and places his hand over the chest.

Ed Harding.

I hope he rots in jail. I hope he gets beat up a lot. I hope he gets what's coming to him. I wish I could be the one to give it to him.

But I can't.

I put my hand over Max's and he nods at me. This is for support. We're in this together.

He clenches his eyes shut when he heals him. I know he's seeing things, I hope it's nothing too traumatic.

"I knew it, I fucking knew it," this is coming from the door.

I'm thinking: Shit.

Me and Max turn our heads to see Kyle. Insane looking Kyle, rage filled Kyle. He's glaring at Max, "I knew it was you," Kyle says, "I knew you were the alien."

Max has this look on his face, like he's losing hope.

"What did you do to her," says Kyle, "Did you make her like you? Are you that fucking sick?"

Kyle has a one-track mind: Tess. He's not even wondering why Max just healed Tess's dad.

"It's over," Max whispers to himself, "I'm over."

Not yet, Max.

I was touching the body too.

I get up and face Kyle like the fiesty alien hybrid I'm pretending to become, "It's me Kyle, ME. I'm the alien. What are you going to do, you gonna turn me in? You gonna tell everyone? Your girlfriend just tried to kill someone, you want her to go to jail?"

I'm yelling at him, I'm being as intimidating as I can be.

And Kyle looks confused, about to cry, he says, "You?"

I nod, "Max is human," I say, "get out of here."

He starts walking backwards towards the door, slowley. Then turns around and runs. I hope he doesn't go do something stupid. Now we don't have much time.

Max says, "Liz."

I try to ignore the way he's looking at me. We don't have time for a mushy best friend moment.

I say, "Your welcome, now make the blood go away."

He looks down and nods, waving his hand over the carpet, over Ed's clothes, over the knife. We're almost done.

I put the knife in a big wooden block on the kitchen counter. We go into Tess's room, she's crying on her bed. Then words just come pouring from my mouth. Lies. This is for Max.

I tell her she has to listen to me, I tell her to concentrate. I tell her I made it go away, that she's not going to be in trouble. The bloods gone, the stab wound is gone.

I say, "I'm not from around here."

She wipes some tears out of her eyes and looks at me in awe, she says, "I always did think it was you."

So Tess thought I was an alien all along.

Inside, I'm laughing.

I say, "Let's get the hell out of here."

I tell Max to take Tess in his car. I take Tess's keys and get into hers. I think this is over, I'm not sure, but I think it is.

But there is something, something I'm forgetting.

What is it?

.....

Fuck.

Good thing my mom makes me carry around a cell phone. I reach into my bag and grab my cell phone, dial a few numbers. Tess carries hers in her pocket, always.

She answers, "Hello?"

"The gun Tess, where is the gun."

"Oh god," she says, "It's in the kitchen."

I slam on the breaks and swing the car around, "Why the kitchen."

She says, "He goes in my room, he doesn't go in the kitchen."

I say, "Where in the kitchen."

She says, "The drawer to the left of the fridge, in the back."

I hang up.

Almost over, this is almost over.

I think about going home, taking a shower, a hot shower. I think about laying down in the shower, and crying. I'm thinking, when am I going to be able to just start crying.

Crying is the hardest thing to put off for later.

I'm so tired.

So I go back to the house, we left the door unlocked. I creep past the body. I resist kicking it.

It would be so easy, to just kick it, really hard, in the face.

No kicking people in the face Liz.

I'm thinking about when I get back to my house and I can call the police.

I walk silently into the kitchen, open the drawer on the side of the fridge.

The gun is wrapped in a towel, several of them. Looks like your average towel drawer. I unwrap it. It's so weird, holding a gun like this.

I don't want to be holding it. I want to throw up again, I want to go home and cry, when will this be over.

When can I stop being a walking defense mechanism.

I hear a stirring in the living room, so I turn around. Ed Harding has decided to get up and start walking around.

What is this.

Why won't this end.

He's looking at me, he's touching the little bit of blood trickling from his head. This is the kind of person you don't want to see walking around.

I close my eyes, fear makes you close your eyes.

He says, "Little bitch tried to stab me."

He says, "Where is she."

I couldn't talk if I tried.

I grip tighter onto the gun, I'm shaking, so I don't want to drop it.

I close my mouth and try to humm but I can't. My throat is closing up.

He says, "Who the fuck are you." His voice is sick, slimy. He slithers closer, like a snake. My hand twitches.

He says, "Where is she."

He sees the gun.

I have the gun, so I try to convince myself that I have the power here.

He steps closer and I raise the gun.

I have the power. I have the power.

That's bullshit, I've never even seen a real gun up close.

But guns mean power.

Even if I don't know how to use it.

He steps closer.

I use both hands to hold the gun because one hand makes it too shaky. I try to think, this shouldn't be that hard, it's just a trigger right. But no, you have to cock it, I think, with your thumb, I don't know.

He steps closer.

It depends on what kind of gun it is, some guns go off when you cock them, Alex told me this. I think there is some guns that you don't have to cock. I don't know. Where is my power? Why isn't he scared?

He steps closer.

And what if I did know how to use it. I couldn't just shoot him, Could I. Could I shoot somebody, maybe I could aim for the knee. Could I do that.

He steps closer, he raises his hand.

I could just try a combination of things, I could cock it, pull the trigger, see what happens. But I don't want to see what happens, I want to know what I'm doing. I don't want to shoot somebody and have it surprise me.

He raises his hand and touches the tip of the gun, then slowly grabs it, then slowly pushes it so that it's not aiming at his face.

Or I could just give up.

I close my eyes when he rips the gun from my hands.

I failed myself.

I stand up straight. I prepare for what's going to happen.

How do you prepare for something like this, for something unknown. What is he going to do.

I feel a hand, grabbing my hair. Gripping it so hard that it feels like he's ripping it out. I feel my face slam against something, something cold.

I feel the round opening of the gun against my temple.

My cheekbone is throbbing.

I open my eyes and see the smooth surface of the refrigerator.

Do you want to know what it's like before you die?

Your life doesn't flash before your eyes, you think of stupid things.

I think about how I should have apologized to Maria.

I think about the crime scene photos. Brains mixed with day old sliced turkey. Blood and snot and tears mixed with ketchup and mustard. I know that death isn't romantic but this is about as unromantic as it gets.

Some slimy frizzy haired guy with a gun that beats little girls for a living shoots me and I get to die in a refrigerator.

I think about how I could have just let him bleed to death, dammit. I think about how this is the ultimate martyrdom. I know this is egotistical of me, but give me a break, I'm about to die.

I gave up my life because I'm too good to let someone die.

I think about Kyle running around town telling everyone that Liz Parker is an alien.

I think about Max without a best buddy, and I'm sad 'cause I know he'll be sad. Maria and Alex, they'll miss me, I hope they turn out okay. I'll miss them too. My parents, enough said, I don't want to do this, this is depressing.

At some point, you accept your fate. Maybe it's around the time when you hear the cock of the gun. You just know it's over. You let go.

And you know, I'm not really sad, just regretful. There's so many things I wanted to do. I wanted to get out of town, see the poppy fields with Max, see Seattle with Alex and Maria. I wanted to go to college and learn things.

I wanted to have sex. Pathetic, I know. But can you blame me. I wanted to be touched and kissed and loved.

I wanted someone to worship me like Max worships Tess.

You accept your fate, but you always have a glimmer of hope. Just a glimmer, because your not dead yet. You tell yourself, If I get out of this, I'm gonna change things, I'm gonna do things right, I'm gonna start thinking things through. I'm gonna do everything I've ever wanted to.

And then everything goes quiet, and you just listen. You listen to the quiet, you stare into the blackness beneath your eyelids.

Now you're ready.

If it's your time, you're ready.