As Bad As it Seems

Author: Jess
Email: candygurl2878956@aol.com
Spoilers: Season One, Two and Three
Summary: What if Kyle and Maria stayed in Roswell after Graduation...



Dear Michael,

It’s been almost two years since you left Roswell, riding away into the desert blackness. I don’t even know why I'm writing this letter at all. It will probably end up as countless pieces of torn paper, scattered into the garbage bin outside of my bedroom. Just like the others addressed to you that I’ve ripped up, tears burning in my eyes. But I'll write it anyways, despite its credible fate.

Remember that night when you came to my window in the middle of the night, drenched from the rain? And I let you sleep in my bed, no questions asked? I used to lay awake at night and pretend that you were still here, sleeping beside me, your dark hair sticking to your wet forehead, you arms around my waist. I'd fall asleep with a smile on my face, thinking that you were there. But in the morning, when I woke up, I saw someone else lying beside me. Someone who wasn’t you. Slowly, that smile of mine would vanish as I remembered.

I don’t do that anymore.

My life now is exactly what I'd been trying to steer myself away from all those years. I’m still here, in Roswell, working at the Crashdown, wearing that horrid green uniform and making the same pay I did when I was sixteen. I still greet the tourists passing by with a welcoming smile, but now it’s more of a forced expression, painted upon my lips. Before, I found it all a huge disappointment, because I was supposed to be more than this. I was going to be the one person in Roswell to escape. But it’s been so long now, that I’m getting used to feeling like a failure.

Kyle’s town sheriff now, a job he professes to be proud of. But, the grim expression on his face as he climbs out of our bed every morning for another day at work tells me otherwise. Sometimes I ask him if he’s truly happy, and he looks at me with these grey eyes and lies. I have no idea why he can’t tell me the truth, when we both know he’d rather be anywhere else then in his father’s shoes.

Last year, we stared dating. It was nothing like when we were together, Michael. It was more a relationship of convenience then passion. We wanted love to be simple for once, instead of the twists and turns we’d dealt with in our past relationships.

We love each other, and that’s the honest truth. He makes me laugh, and I could never imagine myself being with anyone else in Roswell. Our kisses are real and our wedding vows are true. But sometimes, he catches me dreaming about you, whispering your name over and over in my sleep. He tries to ignore it. Just like the way I’ll ignore the way he stares at the empty chair beside me, the one she sat in every meal quite awhile ago, giggling at his every word from across the table. He’ll never admit it, but he misses Tess. With every bone in his body.

I don’t really miss you anymore. You’re just a memory now, swimming through my head every now and then. I gave up on you awhile ago. Do I still love you? The answer is indeed a mystery to me, because I don’t know whose answering. I’m not the same Maria anymore... I guess I gave up on myself awhile ago too.

Sometimes I hate you, because you left me here, the last place I ever wanted to be. I hate you so much I can feel the hurt seeping through my veins. I hate you because I wanted you, I hate you because I let you go, and I hate you because I’ll die here, in Roswell, without you. But mostly I just hate myself, for reasons I can’t really explain at all. I’m in such a complicated web, I don’t even know where to start unweaving.

I often ask myself if it was really worth it. Was the love that we shared worth what I’m going through now, or what I went through before? If I had a chance to go back in time, would I have just left you alone and found somebody else, as you once requested? Or would I do it all again, never changing a thing? When I think through it all, the obvious choice for most people would be to find another man, one who could appreciate me and never push me away. But then again, I’m not like most people.
I don’t know how I feel now, but I remember how it all felt then. The tears, the passion, the love, the way you held me against your body...I wouldn’t trade those memories for a thing. It was worth it.

Maybe it was a bad idea writing this, and I’ll regret it later on. But I just wanted you to know, that I’ll never forget. Never.

Maria.