The sunset slowly faded into the murky blackness that came with the night, the stars slowly coming to light over head, as Max and Liz lay silently in each other’s arms. Neither of them had said a word to each other since their memories returned…Max was waiting for Liz to initiate it for fear that he’d be pushing her too quickly, but Liz wasn’t saying anything, so they just sat wordlessly together for what seemed like eternity.
The night was no longer young when Liz finally moved, pushing herself away from Max, before gathering her clothes and slowly dressing. Max followed her lead, watching her regretfully as she slipped into her jeans without so much as a glance in his direction.
“Could you take me home?” Liz suddenly asked so quietly that Max almost didn’t hear her…almost.
He blinked at her words, completely and utterly confused. Her voice was distant again, unemotional and removed, causing a chill to fill his heart. After what they had just experienced, what had happened between them, he expected something, anything…either pain, or anger, or love…but there was just nothing. It was like she wasn’t even there.
Max desperately tried to meet her eye, praying that he could read something, anything in her gaze to give him a clue about what she was thinking…what she was feeling. Anything, besides this incredible emptiness.
But Liz refused to meet his eyes, looking anywhere other than him…at the sky, at the ground. Her own two feet were more interesting than he was at that moment. It left him feeling low, inhuman…like he was nothing at all to her, even after all they had just shared.
Max nodded almost mechanically as he moved around them, cleaning up their picnic, and folding the basket, until he finished and followed Liz down the embankment to where the jeep lay below.
He understood why she was avoiding him…avoiding his eyes, avoiding conversation, avoiding any physical contact. He knew what a bastard he probably was at that moment. He had slept with the enemy, gotten her pregnant, and then thought that he could just turn around and continue things with her the way they had been in the past.
But the memory loss had screwed everything up. It had made them both feel again, as easily as they had before Tess had disrupted their quasi-normal lives. And then they had given in to it…
For some reason, Max couldn’t help wondering if loving Liz at that moment had been the worst mistake of his life…even if they had both wanted it.
~~~~~~~~~~
The silence was suffocating, consuming both Max and Liz during their drive home from Albuquerque. Neither of them said a word to each other for the whole two hours, and Liz wouldn’t even look in his direction. Her eyes were locked on her window, into the murky nothingness of the blackened night, as the miles stretched past them.
Still, with all of the tension, all of the anguish coming off the couple in waves, Max couldn’t help thinking that he needed to cherish every second of this time with Liz. He couldn’t shake the fear that now that they both remembered everything, this was going to be the end of them. Now that she knew the truth again, Liz would never be able to forgive him, particularly after going through the discovery of his betrayal twice.
Pulling up to the front of the Crashdown at the end of the night felt like walking into his deathbed. For an instant he wished he had automatic locks on his car so that he could keep Liz there beside him, but he knew that wasn’t an option. Max dreaded that Liz was going to get out of the car, turning to run into the house without looking back, and Max was going to feel his heart break…again.
The strange thing was, she didn’t. Or at least, she didn’t right away.
Max pulled the Chevelle into an empty parking space beneath the dim, unlit Crashdown sign, and sat stiff and still, waiting for Liz to run from him. Surprisingly she stayed too, just sitting and staring out the window as she had the whole drive. Max felt like screaming from frustration, unsure exactly what was going on with her. She didn’t want to talk to him, but she didn’t want to run from him either.
What did she want from him now?
Her eyes finally turned and met his, and Max couldn’t help shivering at the sight of the emptiness in them. She looked sad, haunted. He couldn’t decide what was worse…her unwillingness to even look at him, or the pain that filled his heart when she finally did. For the first time Max realized just how much the resurfacing knowledge of his betrayal had hurt her. No matter what he did, he always seemed to end up hurting her…the last thing he ever wanted to do.
I think that what I'm afraid of isn't that we try this and it works out really badly. What I'm afraid of is we try it and it works out really well. I'm afraid of feeling everything that I know I would feel. Because I know it's not meant to be. And somewhere down the line, we're gonna get hurt. I can live with that. I just couldn't bear to hurt you.
“Liz…” He murmured sadly in a soft, apologetic voice, breaking the silence, as he remembered those words he spoke to her two years earlier when their relationship had still been so young and new. Max watched as a slight reaction flickered through her gaze, but it returned so quickly that he wondered if he just imagined it before she began to speak.
“Max, I need some time.” She started softly. “All of this…everything that happened. It’s just so much to take at once. It’s overwhelming, and I need to think on it all before I know what’s going to happen, where we stand.”
Max nodded quickly. “Anything you need, Liz. I’ll wait for you forever if I need to.”
Liz smiled sadly in response. “I don’t know, Max. You may have to. Or you may not be able to. You need to think too, Max. You have a lot of decisions to make for yourself, like what to do about…” Liz paused, closing her eyes in pain for a long moment before continuing. “About your son, Max.”
There was a long silence, as Max let her words sink in. He had been so focused on their relationship, that he didn't even start to think about picking up where he left off on the other side of your life.
“You may find yourself come out in a completely different place once you let this all sink in.” Liz continued softly, blinking back the tears that were threatening to fall. “And so could I.” She determined quickly. “So just give me some space for a little while to think.”
Without another word, Liz opened the door and flew from the car without looking back, just as Max had feared. However, he found himself sitting and watching her departure, replaying the scene over and over again in his mind for a long while, letting her words sink across his mind.
You have a lot of decisions to make for yourself, like what to do about…about your son, Max. You may find yourself come out in a completely different place once you let this all sink in.
Even as he sat in his car beneath her window, Max knew she was right…that he did need to think on everything that had occurred between them. He hadn’t allowed any of it to sink in yet, and he didn’t just mean his resurfaced memories.
He hadn’t fully accepted yet what he had done with Tess, what he had given up when he allowed her to freely leave the planet without him. He hadn’t accepted what that truly did to Liz, and she knew it. She had been watching him spend the weeks after Tess’s departure desperately trying to win her back, and not taking responsibility for his own mistakes.
And suddenly, without a doubt, Max knew that it was time for him to grow up. He had a child out there somewhere, and regardless of whether he would ever be able to be a part of that child’s life, he needed to at least acknowledge that his life was irrevocably changed because of it.
As for Liz…he needed to give her the space that she deserved, and this time whatever she decided, he would respect it.
He just prayed with every bone within him that whatever path she chose, it would lead her back to his side.
