The Short-term Fix

by Yettaren

“I should just fire you,” Liz says, shaking her head at me.

I squint at her. “Like you care about my grades.”

“Okay, I may not be your best friend here, Michael, but I am dating him, and as such, I have a stake in whether you get transferred to Goddard or not.” She hops up on her tiptoes, leaning over the counter. Best friend, phhhttt. My best friend has barely spoken to me since Sunday night. Try former best friend. What page is Liz on, anyway?

“I’ll do my homework when I get home, all right?”

        “After closing?” Liz cocks her head at me, her antennae bouncing sideways. “Won’t that be late?” It’s Wednesday, things are back to normal. Nate hasn’t spoken to me since Monday, not that I blame the kid; Isabel was back in school with no explanation given for her absence yesterday; Maria and I spent our lunch break in the Jetta parked behind the gym, and had a really, really good time. Yeah, really… good. Life overall is… well, if not good, at least normal…

        I shake my head at her. “Liz, leave me the hell alone.”

She shrugs. “You got that Sigourney Weaver yet?”
       
I shove a plate at her. “Here!”

Liz skips away with the order. I shake my head at her retreating miniskirt. She’s back in a moment to bug me again, though. “So what if I make you take a break and do your history reading?”

        “I’d say you were nosy and obnoxious,” I reply.

“What’d you make on this morning’s pop quiz again?” she asks.

I glare at her. “None of your business. You’re pushing it.”

        “We’ve already established why it is my business. And I did see your grade before you tried to crumple it up.”

“Hey…”

She folds her arms as she leans over the window. She glances behind her to the counter, where Max and Isabel are sitting together, generally trying to ignore the fact that I’m here. And Isabel is progressively trying to ignore the looks that Max and Liz keep giving each other. It’s an odd, odd dynamic we have.

“What’s eating your underpants?” Liz asks.

I stare at her. “Say what?”

“You’re even more testy than usual, Michael.”

I glance out the window before lowering my voice to her. “I gotta go see the doctor tomorrow.”

Liz gasps a little. “Oh…!”

“Shhh.”

She turns to look behind me. “You haven’t reminded Max?”

I turn to flip a burger that looks a little too well-done. “I haven’t spoken to Max all week.”

When I glance around again, she’s looking concerned. “Maybe you should.”

I sigh. “We worked it all out,” I say. “I told Toby I faint at the sight of needles, he said they won’t draw anything. Just height, weight, medical history, you know.”

I’m lying. This is what I hope will happen when I get back from work today. Truth is, I’d almost forgotten about it until Veronica reminded me this morning. And now I’m trying not to freak out about it.

        “Immunizations?” Liz asks.

        I shrug. “Maybe. So?”

        “So you better follow through and faint.”

        Oh, sh…

        I slap the burger on a plate, check the ticket to see what to throw on it, and shove it at her loaded with lettuce, onions and mayo. No accounting for taste. She shoots me a look before taking the platter to the dining room. It’s the end of the evening and things are slowing down a bit. That was the last order, thank god.

        I grab for a rag and begin to wipe the counter half-heartedly. It’s at least an excuse to glower over in Max’s direction, where he’s at the counter eating dinner with Isabel. We haven’t really talked since Sunday night, though she keeps shooting me and Max warning looks whenever we go near each other. I think she’s a little on edge.

        I should tell them about the doctor appointment, but I just don’t want to have anything to do with them right now, and they seem to have forgotten about it. So more power for them. I don’t care.

        I can handle this on my own.

        I want to handle this on my own.

        I’m just afraid about what happens if I can’t.

        Liz skips by with a pot of coffee. She’s way too giddy around Max right now. Isabel looks like she’s about to puke, and I’d almost like to see that. No, I wouldn’t, I’m not quite that peeved at her. Though I wouldn’t complain if she wanted to puke on Max.

        Maria’s off for the evening, studying for her math midterm. I’m under strict orders not to call or bother her tonight. I don’t think I’d want to bother her with the doctor thing, but the math final kind of settles it. It’s my problem, I’m the one who went off and got myself lost in the desert and wound up in state custody, I’m the one who got myself dumped into a home where they actually follow up on my paperwork, I might as well work the rest of it out myself.

        There’s a jangle at the door, and I slow my wiping motion as I recognize the tall ten-gallon hat making its way into the Crashdown. The person beneath it hands his thermos to Liz, who walks back to fill it with coffee as Isabel and Max try and camouflage themselves at the counter. It’s not working.

        I slip out from around the counter and through the door, entering the dining room quietly, moving slowly. I don’t know what it is I plan on doing, but I don’t like the idea of being cut off from Max and Isabel at the moment.

        “You folks have a nice night,” he says to us with a tip of his hat, before entering with his thermos full of coffee. Who the hell drinks coffee this late at night? What exactly is he up to, anyway?

        As soon as the door closes, I whirl around on the others, leaning in close to avoid being heard by anyone else. “He knows,” I say bluntly.

        “What does he know?” Max asks dismissively.

        “He’s got the orb!” I point out.

        “Which proves nothing,” Max argues. “And if you hadn’t taken it to Buckley Point in the first place-“

        “Oh, yeah, it’s always my fault, isn’t it?” I snap at him.

        “Blaming each other is not going to change anything,” Isabel says, her voice tight. I twist the rag in my hands for a moment before storming back towards the kitchen. “Valenti now has something from our planet in his possession,” she sighs as I go.

        I burst back through the door and into the kitchen, yanking off my apron. I throw it down on the counter and storm to the fridge to start wiping it down for the evening.

        I’m not going to get any help from Max or Isabel. And I’m not going to accept any help from Liz. But they’re the ones with normal families. They’re the ones who know what it’s like to go to the doctor. And they’re the ones I’m not going to talk to.

        Except, there is still…

        I take a deep breath, and wander over to the phone in the corner of the kitchen. I pick it up, start to dial, and slam it down before I can finish dialing. I take a deep breath and reach for the phone again, dialing the number all the way this time.

        “Hello?” a woman’s voice answers.

        I take another deep breath. “Yeah, hi, is Alex there?”

        “Just a minute.” She puts the phone down. “Al!”

        Al? Who the hell calls him Al? After a moment, I hear his voice. “Alex here.”

        “Hey, it’s Michael.” I wait for a response and hear nothing. I think he’s just shocked into silence by the fact that I’m calling him. “Can we talk?”

        “Um, sure,” Alex says, sounding a bit befuddled. “Go ahead.”

        “In person.”

        “Where are you now?”

        “At the Crashdown.”

        “O-kaaaay,” Alex says, and I hear him taking a breath over the phone. So we’re both nervous about this. “Can you come over here?”

        “I don’t have a car.” I wait for the inevitable.

        “Fine. Fine, fine, fine. Uh, I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

        “Can you come in through the back? I want to talk privately.”

        “Is everything okay, Michael?” Alex asks, concerned.

        “Yeah. I just… I don’t know.”

        There’s an extended pause. “See you in a few.” He hangs up and I stare at the dial tone. I place the phone back in its cradle, and walk through to the breakroom. Max is standing there, staring through the window into the dining room like he’s seen a ghost.

        I cough behind him and he jumps, startled. He whirls around to look at me. I stare back at him and shrug.

        Max shakes his head and presses his way back into the dining room. No telling what’s going on with Max, and I could care less right now. I return to the kitchen to wait for Alex to show.

        Which he does, ten minutes later, exactly on time. The kid’s dependable. He’s got one of his hooded sweatshirts on, and is blinking like he’s just gotten out of a closet as I pull him into the breakroom.

        “What’s the big deal?” he asks as I rush him over to the couch.

        “I got my doctor appointment tomorrow,” I say in a hurry.

        He blinks at me. “O-kaaaaay… And what does Max say?”

        “Max and I aren’t speaking to each other.”

        “Isabel?” I snort dismissively. “What does Maria say?”

        “Midterm tomorrow.”

        “I’m sure she’d blow off her midterm to help you, Michael.”

        “Which is why I’m not telling her. You gotta help me out,” I say desperately.

        “O-kaaay,” he says again, exhaling and resettling himself on the couch. “What exactly are you worried about here?”

        I blink at him. “Um, maybe that they’re gonna find out I’m a fucking alien?”

        “Yeah, but specifically. My last physical, they took my height and weight and gave me a couple of shots.”

        “I haven’t had a physical ever.”

        He glances down at the ground. “Ever. Okay.” He stares at me. “Wow. How-?” I shrug. “Dude, you’re a ward of the state . How in the world did you swing that?”

        “It’s a big state. They don’t follow up too good. Now how many different ways are there for them to tell that I’m different?” I drum my fingers nervously on my knee.

        “Why are you asking me? You’re the one with the Martian physiology.”

        “If I was from Mars, this wouldn’t be half as hard. As far as we know, our cellular structure and blood are inherently different. We don’t even know why we have the powers we do. God, Alex, we don’t know anything!” I slam my palm against my leg for emphasis.

        “Okay, calm down, we know a lot,” Alex says. “Height, weight, vision, you’re normal. Enough.” He glances up and down. “They’re gonna ask you if you feel okay, if you have any health problems, and you’re gonna say-“

        “That I went into an alien-related coma a couple months ago and was brought out of it by Native American mysticism combined with unexplained alien phenomena?” I ask, blinking.

        Alex nods, cracking a small smile. I don’t smile back. “Right. So you’re healthy,” he says, sobering again. “Now, you’re probably gonna need some shots. And realistically, those aren’t for data purposes.”

        “But what if someone ran tests on the syringe?” I ask nervously. “My cellular structure is completely not normal.” I have a brief flash of being poked and prodded by whitesuits on an operating table.

        He purses his lips. “I’m stumped there. There would be cellular evidence on the syringe.” He leans in closer. “How much of a threat do you really think they are?”

        “I don’t know!” I burst out. “Toby’s tight with Valenti.”

        “I don’t think Valenti’s a danger,” Alex says slowly.

        “Well, I’m the one actually in danger, and I think he is,” I say.

        He puts his hands up to surrender. “Okay,” he says, conceding to me. “Let’s assume that Valenti is a risk. What does that make Toby?”

        “It makes him the guy who’s taking me to the doctor appointment,” I say.

        “So the suits, the guys who were trying to get Max’s stats at the hospital. Do they suspect you at all?”

        I shrug. “Valenti’s got the orb, he knows something’s up.”

        “Yeah, but do they think anyone besides Max is an alien?”

        “Three kids wandering in the desert. Three. Max and two more. If somebody puts that together, I’m toast. We still don’t know that I wasn’t on Topolsky’s list.” I’m starting to tremble again.

        “Topolsky was crazy, Michael.”

        “That doesn’t mean she was wrong.”

        “She was working for the FBI when Max was in the hospital. She’s not anymore. I bet they don’t even know you have this doctor appointment.”

        “Toby knows.”

        “Look, the amount of DNA on the syringe is compatible to, like, the DNA on your toothbrush. Hairbrush. The DNA you leave behind on your silverware.” I stare at him, horrified.

        The door bursts open and Liz comes barreling through. She stops dead in her tracks and stares at us. “Hi! Alex! Michael…”

        “Hey, Liz,” Alex says, uncomfortably.

        She narrows her eyes at us. “What’s wrong?”

        I glance to Alex for help. “We’re just… studying,” Alex says innocently.

        “I didn’t know you had any classes together.”

        “I’m tutoring Michael in-“

        “Biology,” I finish up, and Alex nods enthusiastically.

        “Okay, sure, guys,” Liz says, giving us another weird look before rooting her purse out of her locker and heading for the restroom. Girly stuff. Ick.

        “So the evidence on the syringe would be about the same as that on your toothbrush,” Alex continues, once she’s out of hearing distance.

        “Toby has access to my toothbrush all the time.” I’m getting nervous even thinking about it. “My hairbrush… my dirty laundry…” I lean forward.

        “Okay, okay, Michael, calm down,” Alex says, putting his hands up defensively. “Assuming this, and that he hasn’t done anything weird, let’s just chalk that syringe factoid up to paranoia. Let them give you the shots.”

        I remember what Liz said. “I told Toby I faint at the sight of needles. I gotta prove it, I think.”

        He shrugs. “So can you faint on command?”

        Um. “Yeah, I think so.”

        “I think you’re gonna be fine, Michael. As long as you don’t let them run any blood tests, and they usually only do that if you say you’re tired and they think you have mono or anemia or something,” he says encouragingly.

        “I don’t think I can catch mono.”

        “That’s probably good,” Alex says. “Probably really good. Listen, it’s gonna be okay.” I’m glad I can believe somebody who’s saying those words. “I don’t think you have anything to worry about. Just convince them you’re healthy.”

        Like that’s all there is to it. Like nothing hangs in the balance, not my existence, not my freedom, not my identity (secret or not), not the lives of everyone I hold dear. Like it’s just a trip to the doctor.

        Cause maybe, after all, that’s all it is.

        “Thanks again, Alex,” I say sincerely. That’s twice in one week now.

        He smiles at me. “Yeah, anytime.”

        “You’re cooler than I give you credit for.”

        He squints at me. “I think I should say ‘thanks’ for that, then?”

        I nod. “Yeah. Yeah, that was definitely a compliment.”

Chapter 42

77.

Four weeks of work, all the studying, all the Cliffs Notes, and I still have a fucking 77 average.

Some are better than others. I actually have a 91 in History, probably because I have four people on my case in that class. My English grade is a 64. Failing. Maybe because I spend too much time fantasizing to the back of Maria’s head? But I do that in History, too. 73 in Geometry. It’s better than I had. But not good enough.

Teachers give the A’s to the kids they like. It’s that simple. My teachers hate my guts. End of discussion.

I can’t work any harder. I’ve got other things to worry about now, anyway. Being exposed as an alien, for one. The man who’s been pursuing my identity now has an item from my home planet. A wee bit concerning.

I sit through first period Geometry glowering at the teacher. Seventy-fucking-three. I also periodically glower at Kyle Valenti, on the opposite side of the room. Just because his father is a creep and could very well put an end to my semi-normal existence. Viv leans over at the end of class, when he stops teaching the last two minutes to allow us to pack. I actually have a bag to pack now, it’s weird. I’m shoving textbooks in and fiddling with the zipper as she addresses me.

“I miss anything good in class on Tuesday night?”

I hadn’t even noticed she was gone. “Naw.”

She waits a beat. “What’d you guys do?”
       
I have to think about it to even remember. Two days ago, but it’s just not my priority. “Balanced checkbooks, that kind of crap.”

“Who doesn’t know how to do that by the time they’re our age?”
       
“Dunno.”

“How’s everything going with you, anyway?”
       
How’s everything going? How’s everything-? “Shitty. You?”
       
“Same,” Viv says, snapping her gum at me. She lowers her voice. “My baby sister got moved last week.”
       
“Huh,” I say, not at all interested, as the bell finally sounds.

I storm out of first period towards the bathroom, knowing I’ve got to get in there quickly or else I’ve got a good chance of running into Max. We always see each other in the bathroom between first and second period.

I glance around, no Max yet, maybe if I go quickly I can avoid him.

I wonder if Nate and I will have any classes together at Goddard. He’s in ninth grade, I’m in tenth, so I doubt it. Will I still be allowed to sit on the West Ros side at baseball games? I feel like I’m going to purgatory.

I have another month to turn it around. I just don’t know how much harder I can work. It’s out of my control. It’s hopeless. A desperate feeling washes over me as I slip into the bathroom.

        I make use of the facilities, and sure enough, as I come out, there’s Maxwell the Great, examining his sleeve in the mirror. I sniff the air, and there’s a bit of a smoky smell to him. I want to just walk away, but then I remember what Isabel said about being family even when we’re not friends.

        I take a deep breath. “What’d you do now?” I ask, running my hands under the water. I already know there’s no soap in the dispenser, no point in trying.

        He growls at me. “Don’t ask.”

        I decide now isn’t the time to tell him about burning my own shirt the other day. But how would Perfect Max screw his powers up like that? Stupid Michael is the only one who screws up.

        I slide myself up onto the sink and watch as he picks at his sleeve. He’s really burned it pretty well, but of course he’s got another one on under it.

        “Michael, I’m worried,” Max says abruptly, as he strips the ruined shirt off.

        “You should be,” I say matter-of-factly, more interested in the dirt that’s accumulated under my fingernails today. Valenti, my grades, the orb, my doctor visit that Max still doesn’t seem to remember…

        “It’s not about Valenti. It’s about Tess.” I immediately glance up to his face. Tess. I still don’t like her. “Isabel’s friend?” I know. He clears his throat. “I’m having these… kinda… daydreams. About her.”

        “Daydreams,” I repeat. And I’m supposed to care about his fantasies, why again? I remind myself that we’re back to brother mode – not friend mode. I don’t want to know about my brother’s fantasies. Not interested. And about Tess? Max really has no taste. I can’t fathom.

        “Yeah, where we’re together? You know… together .”

        I can’t help but smirk. “Guess you’re only human after all,” I point out. At least one of us can keep his daydreams focused firmly on his girlfriend. I also can’t help but feel a little superior. “Liz not doing it for you anymore?”

        Max sighs and settles himself onto the sink beside me. I guess we’re back to talking again, whether I want us to be or not. I reluctantly scoot over to allow him room without falling into the basin. “It’s me,” he says. “I’m the problem.”

        “Haven’t you ever had a fantasy before?” I ask, exasperated. All the things we could be talking about right now, and Max wants to share his daydreams about the little blond siren.

        “This is different,” Max says, shaking his head. “It’s out of my control. I can’t stop it.”

        I’ve heard all I want to hear. With a half-hearted clap to his shoulder, I hop up. “We’ll work it out,” I tell him, not really meaning it. Get the boy some porn, get Maria to tell Liz to bump up the action a little. Of all the problems we have, this one is about the most easily solved, and about the least applicable to me.

        “Thanks for the compassion,” Max grumbles sarcastically, and I stop and turn around to face him angrily.

“Valenti has the communicator, and we need to do somethin’ about it. This isn’t the time for your sex fantasies.”

        “Michael, I’m telling you,” Max says in a low tone, “there’s something weird about this. It’s like she knows something about me she shouldn’t know . I mean, who is she?”

“Can you focus?” I snap at him. “I mean, focus on what’s important here, Maxwell.”

        He stares at me in shock for a moment before rolling his eyes and turning away from me. “Forget it. Why’d I think you’d be any help.”

        I want to say something, to argue, but there’s no argument to be made. Why did he think I’d be any help? I don’t want to hear what he has to say right now. I don’t want to hear anything out of him other than groveling and apologies, and those aren’t coming anytime soon.

        I don’t think those are ever coming.

        “’Scuse me,” a voice says roughly, shoving past me, and I turn to see Kyle Valenti.

        “Watch where you’re going,” I snap at him.

        “Watch yourself,” Kyle says, before heading into the bathroom.

        Kyle. Oh, god. Watch yourself? What does he mean by that? I pause outside the bathroom, to hear in case he and Max say anything to each other, but all I hear is silence.

        This just gets worse and worse, and there’s no end in sight. How paranoid do I have to get before I actually explode? I think I’m in for some valuable research in that area.

Chapter 43

        “You want a magazine to look at, or somethin’?” Toby asks helpfully as he stands over me, holding a clipboard.

        I glance at Annie, deeply immersed in her GameBoy beside me. “No. What’s that?” I ask, pointing at the clipboard.

“Just some background information. Can you help me fill it out?”

I shrug. “I never get sick. I never get hurt.”

“What about your shots?”

“Hell if I know.”

Toby shoots a glance in Annie’s direction, sees how oblivious she is with the machine in her hands, and immediately gives up on reprimanding me. “Do you remember visiting the doctor at all?”

        “Nope.”

        Actually, I did, my first week in civilization. I didn’t have much language, so I pretty much screamed bloody murder the whole time. I was genuinely terrified. I wasn’t kidding when I said I could probably faint on command here. They didn’t even get near me with a syringe or a needle that time, it took some brute force just to get me weighed and take my temperature and blood pressure. Force. I shiver with the memory, of being held down, restrained by the fat heavy babbling nurses, flailing for freedom and not finding it, drowning and sobbing in the bright white rooms. I tried pretty hard to get back into the desert after that, needless to say I didn’t make it, and nobody’s tried to take me to the doctor ever since.

Toby doesn’t need to know that.

“Your file said you had a visit when you were little,” he says slowly.

Damn.

“Really?” I ask, trying to keep my voice level. “I don’t remember.” Yeah, I wish I didn’t.

        “There’s nothing to be afraid of, Michael. The needles will hurt a little, but that’s the end of it.”

        No, not if they run tests on the needles. Cause if so, there’s gonna be a lot more needles where those came from.

        “Do you have any history of hypertension?”

        “Huh?”

        Toby points to the form he’s filling out. “Hypertension,” he repeats.

        “What? No!”

        “Diabetes? Alcohol abuse? Hepatitis?”

        First off, that’s kinda personal. Second… “No. No, I’ve never been sick, never had surgery, never broken a bone. I’m healthy and I don’t need to be here, for god’s sake.”

        “Michael, calm down,” Toby says in a sharp tone, hissing through his teeth. He’s glancing around at the other people in the waiting area. “This is no big deal. So you don’t have a history of anything. Ever feel fatigued?”

        “No!”

        Annie glances up from her GameBoy, bored. “Am I gonna have to hold your hand for the shots, Michael?”

        Now I’m just embarrassed. I wipe the sweat from my upper lip and sit back in the seat glancing around nervously at the waiting area. I can smell the antiseptic smell now. I couldn’t smell much of anything the last time I was at the doctor, I was still fresh from the pod. Now the smell is fucking scary.

Annie’s shoving something in my hand, and I look down. It’s her GameBoy. “Here,” she says, exasperated. “Play Pokemon for a little while. It’ll calm you down.”

I relax slightly, just enough to grin a little. “Thanks, Annie, that’s okay.” Toby scribbles something on his clipboard and stands to return it to the receptionists. So the Q&A is over for the time being.

“Something’s gotta calm you down,” she mutters. “Just see if you can capture a Ditto, or at least evolve my Poliwag for me.”

I blink at her as Toby sits back down with us. “Was that English?”

Annie sighs heavily. “Maybe I should put my Poliwag away,” she says primly. “You can play my Raichu.”

“Just… just play yourself,” I tell her, shoving the GameBoy away. “I’m fine.”
       
“Pokemon can be very relaxing,” she says seriously.

I stare at her, confused. “Is that why you’re always yelling at that machine?”
       
She shrugs. “Relaxing for you, maybe.”
       
“Not when you’re yelling at a stupid GameBoy.”
       
“It’s not stupid!” she says in a huff. “I was even trying to be nice to you.”
       
Toby glances back and forth between the two of us, worried, and with a great sigh I snatch a Sports Illustrated from the coffee table and start to flip through it.

        “Michael Butler?” I realize after a moment the nurse in the doorway is referring to me, and I steal a sideways glare at Toby. Michael Butler? What the hell is that?

        “Uhhh, that’s Guerin,” Toby says, standing and motioning for me to do the same. “Michael Guerin.”

        I tuck the Sports Illustrated under my arm. “Michael, we’ll wait here for you,” Toby says, sitting back down, and I feel the muscles at the back of my neck clenching.

        Michael Butler. I wonder what kind of kid Michael Butler would be. He’d probably comb his hair down, that’s for sure. Probably have a straight B-average. Probably wouldn’t waste his time flipping burgers after school. Probably still be dating Maria DeLuca, cause who the hell wouldn’t want to do that? I flit my fingers up to my hair, gingerly testing its height today.

        “Hi, my name is Sheila,” the nurse is saying cheerfully. Fuckin’ A, she read my file and is trying to calm me down. “If you’ll just come stand right over here, we’re gonna take your weight, okay? Okay.”

        She points to the platform, and I stand up on it, balancing nervously. Why do they need my weight, anyway? I’m not fat. I watch as she starts sliding bars along, trying to balance the scale. How old-fashioned is that? I feel like I’m in a movie or something. I didn’t realize they still did this. I shove my hands back in my pockets and glance around uncomfortably.

        “Okay, nice, thank you, Michael,” Sheila says, still beaming unnaturally. “Follow me.” I obey, following her through the hall and around the corner, into a little room with an exam table covered in white paper. Do they think I’m contagious? What’s the paper for?

        “Have a seat, and I’ll be in with you in just a sec, okay? Okay.” Sheila bustles off, leaving me to decide between sitting on the exam table and sitting in the chair. The exam table makes me nervous – I have another flash to a different exam table, a bigger one, loud voices that I don’t understand yelling at me, as they hold me down to poke and prod me. I was fighting so much that their instruments all stabbed and jabbed and grabbed at me, until I felt like I was going to bust open and spill out.

        I sit down cautiously in the chair, staring at the white paper over the brown cushion of the exam table. I glance around the room – the blood pressure machine, the cabinet, the gloves and waste disposal, the tongue depressors. Oh, god. They’d put one of those in my mouth, too – I wound up vomiting the bland, soft, icky lunch I’d eaten at my new placement that day all over the floor. Leading to more raised voices that I didn’t understand.

        “Okay,” Sheila says brightly, as she bustles back into the exam room, and I’m starting to think this chick really overuses that word. “I’m just gonna take your blood pressure here, do you know how this works?” I vaguely remember from more than a decade before, but I shake my head mutely. “I’m gonna put this around your arm, and pump it tight, and hold it there for a few seconds to take your pulse. It’s a tight squeeze, but you’re gonna be okay. Okay?”

        I nod, still silent, and she motions for me to sit on the exam table. With what I suspect to be an audible gulp, I slide across the room and hop up onto the table. I close my eyes tightly as she wraps the fabric around my arm, and wince as she pumps it up. It does hurt. I feel like I’m going to be bruised or something. I hold my breath, tensing up, counting, waiting, as she presses the stethoscope to my arm. When she finally releases the sleeve, I find myself gasping for air.

        “You okay?” Sheila asks, concerned, and I nod frantically, still wincing.

        She’s scribbling on my chart and looking it over. “So, looks like you’re short a few immunizations and are going to need a few shots today. That’s not going to be much fun.” Yeah, tell me something I don’t know.

        Sheila peers at me over the chart. “You want me to get your dad and sister and bring them in here?”

        Would these people quit with the family bullshit? “They’re my foster family. And no, I’m fine .”

        “O-kaaay,” Sheila says, finally sounding just a little shaken. “Why don’t you wait here, and I’ll be back in a minute with what we need. Okay?”

        “ Okay ,” I say icily, mimicking her tone a little, and she freezes up on the spot before ducking out of the exam room. Fucking bitch. Poking me and prodding me. Investigating me. Seeing how much they can find out about my body. My alien body. Oh, the things they don’t know…

        I kick my legs back and forth, swinging them up against the exam table. Thump. Thump. My heels collide with the side of the table. Thump. An outlet for my nervous energy. Hoo, boy. I think I’m going to need a long, long time in the treehouse with Maria after this to get rid of all this tension. The thought cheers me up. Just a little.

        “Okay,” Sheila says, having regained her sense of composure, “This is the first one, gonna do it right here in your shoulder. She approaches me gingerly and hikes up the short sleeve of my t-shirt. “It’ll only hurt a little, okay?” she asks, as she begins to prepare the injection. I squint and try to look away, but can’t take my eyes from the needle.

        “Oops,” she says softly.

        Oops.

        Oops?

        What the fuck does ‘oops’ have to do with this situation?

        I feel a prick in my shoulder, and scrunch my eyes as I feel liquid seeping in to me. As she pulls the needle out, I wonder just how much alien DNA she collected on it.

“You seem awfully tense,” she says. “Have you considered therapy?”

        “Maybe I’m tense because you’re fucking ‘oops’ing over sharp objects pointed at my body!” I explode, not quite sure how much sense I’m making.

        Sheila backs off. “O-kaaay,” she says again, and I can tell it’s going to be a long afternoon.

        I was so shaken from that first experience at the doctor, that I discovered my powers that very night at dinner, when all the tension and fear in me came bubbling to the surface and I lifted the kitchen table from the floor without laying a hand on it.

        The very next day I had a new placement.

        I wonder how much of a fit I would have to throw right now to get evicted from the Butlers. Show them just how much I like having to see the doctor.

Chapter 44

        …Mi-chael…

        …Michael…

        That’s what they’re calling me. I know that much. I may not speak their language, but I’m quick. They look at me when they say that word. They’re talking about me when they say that word. I don’t think it’s my name, my name is something else, but I don’t remember what it is.

All I know is that here, I’m Michael.

        The big dark lady is the one I’ve seen the most. She takes me places, she talks to me in a high-pitched loud voice, and gets in my face, her breath smelling sharp and fresh. She rubs her hand on my shoulder as I sit in the waiting room, staring at the brightly colored plastic objects in the corner.

        I feel like I’m expected to do something with them. A little boy is sitting there playing with some of the toys with wheels on them. Pretending like they’re something else. All I can do is stare at him, and after a moment he stares back, trying to figure me out. He smiles at me, and I glare back at him, stone-faced. The woman with him snaps her fingers and calls him over, and he happily complies, glad to get out of the way of my stare. She clutches him tightly, keeping him safe from my empty gaze.

        I notice the big dark lady staring at me now. She knows something’s wrong. She knows I’m different. I know I’m different, but I don’t know what I’m supposed to do about that.

        “Okay, now breathe in, Michael,” the doctor says. Sheila’s standing in the corner staring at me, somewhat afraid. I don’t blame her. She should be afraid. I clench my hands into tight balls as I take air into my lungs, deep. I feel it rushing in, hear the whistling in my tight throat, feel the fullness of my chest holding it all in.

        “Good, now breathe out.” I release the air, careful to still keep ahold of the nervous energy in my hands. My chest shivers involuntarily, a delayed reaction to the cold stethoscope pressed against my back. The air is cool on my exposed skin.

        “Breathe in again.”

        I breathe in the smell of antiseptics and chemicals. The smell of medicine, the smell of fear.

        “And out.”



        I glance out the window, at the desert I can see beyond the parking lot. I want to be there again. I want to be alone. But it was hot, and it was dry, and I was hungry. I thought if I just got into the truck that the others would be waiting for me there, but they were long gone. I thought maybe when I got out of the truck and was taken into a building that they would be there, but they weren’t. And now as I sit stiffly in the plastic crinkly chair, it occurs to me that maybe I was wrong, maybe I won’t see them again. I’m trapped here, and they were taken by someone else. We’re all prisoners. We’re not free anymore.

        Where are we supposed to be? Were we supposed to wait where we were? No, the door opened, we had to leave. But not here. I’m not supposed to be here.

        “Michael…” The big dark lady is talking to me again, in her slow loud voice. I know a few words already. Eat. Bed. Go. Come. The rest of it is nothing but gibberish. I can’t pick out anything familiar in the noise spewing from her mouth now, but I can tell I’m supposed to understand it. Am I stupid that I don’t understand it? Does everybody else understand the noises when they come out of their pods? Is that why everyone is staring at me so weird, is it because I don’t understand and I should?

        I don’t understand any of it, and it pisses me off.



“So this is just a test for exposure to tuberculosis…”

“Shit, I don’t have TB.”

It’s all the doctor can do to keep from rolling his eyes at me. That much I can tell. “It’s possible to have the virus without showing the symptoms. We need to be sure, particularly with your history, or lack thereof. There are pockets of TB in the area, and we’re trying to eradicate it. I’m going to just inject a little of this under your skin. It’ll sting a little, and the skin’ll swell up. It’ll be kind of like a mosquito bite. Should go down by tonight. Then in a few days you can come back and we’ll just read it. If it doesn’t react, you’re fine, no TB.”

“And if it reacts?”

        “Very unlikely.” He smiles at me.

If it reacts. How do I know what will and won’t react to my body? All this stuff is calibrated for use on a human body. There’s no documentation on what alien bodies react to. Unless the government has been doing tests in secret, but this guy wouldn’t have access to it. And he doesn’t know what kind of body I have.

I tighten my fist again. I feel the energy swelling up just inside my palm. All it’ll take is one thing to rattle me, and this whole room’s gonna be blowing out cabinets.



I’m scared I’m scared I’m scared I’m scared I’m scared

Where did the others go? If they came through here, did they make it out? Will I make it out?
       
Oh my god that hurts… ow… oh fuck… somebody help me… somebody listen to me… somebody understand me…let go of me…



        “You’re a very healthy young man, Michael.”

        “Yeah, thanks.”

        “No, really, you’re lucky to have had as little difficulty as you’ve had.”

        If he only knew…

        “Guess so.”

        “How’s your eating habits? You get a lot of variety in your diet?”

        I squint at him. “Guess so.”

        “What’d you have for dinner last night?”

        “Burgers.”

“Night before?”

“Burgers… uh…” I feel like I have to explain this. “I’ve got an after school job, I cook at a restaurant, so…”

        “A lot of junk food?” he asks, peering at me skeptically over his glasses.

        I suddenly feel a little ashamed for something other than being an extraterrestrial. “Maybe.”

        “Keep an eye on that. Balance it out. Have a little salad with your burgers.”

        “Uh… sure.” I rub my hand along my arm nervously.



        Things in my arm, things in my mouth, skin under my hand as I claw around me.

        I scream and scream, but all they do is hold me tighter. I can’t move. I’m completely subject to their will now. I scream louder, and feel a gloved hand trying to cover my mouth. They’re all hissing at me, trying to soothe me, it’s not working, I just want it to stop stop stop stop stop

        It stops

        It stops

        Time stops

        I feel like I’m floating, everything is so bright

        And then it’s dark

        And then I wake up, they’re all still staring at me, but they’ve let go of me. As I regain consciousness from my fainting spell, I see the faces still peering down at me, tensed to grab me again if I start to fight.

        I cough weakly, my heart is pounding again already. The cough brings on more coughs, a coughing fit. My tears are caught in my throat, choking me, gagging me.

        I open my mouth again and see one woman brace her ears just in time before I start to scream again.

        And the hands close down around me.



        “We’re just about done here,” he says, rolling his chair a couple of inches. I fidget on the exam table, rolling the paper around in my fingers. I evaporate a little of it with some of my nervous energy, buried deep in my fist where the doctor can’t see. “So this is always a hard question to ask, but let me just tell you that whatever’s said here doesn’t leave this room.”

        Oh, god. They found something weird. Something’s wrong. He’s suspicious. I brace myself. A little more of the paper turns into dust beneath my fingers, tickling my palm.

        “Are you sexually active?”

        I stare at him. “How… sexually active do you mean?”

        “Well,” he says, taking a deep breath. “Do you have a girlfriend?”

        “Uh, yeah, sorta.”

        “And you’re… involved?”

        I sit there silently for a moment, contemplating the ramifications. “We’re not sleeping… together,” I say finally.

        “But you’re intimate.”

        I gulp just a bit. “Kinda.”

        “I just want you to be aware that with any kind of fluid exchange, there is a risk of disease transmission. And pregnancy can occur without penetration.”

        I want to absolutely sink into the exam table and die. “Can I leave now?”

        “Just take this with you,” he says, producing a pamplet from his collection. Questions About Sex (For Boys) .

        I stare up at him. “What if I don’t want it?”

        He clicks his tongue at me, tsk tsk. “You’re taking on a lot of responsibility when you become intimate with a girl, Michael. Please take a look at that.”

        “I’ve had sex ed.”

        “It’s not always as thorough as it could be. If you’re going to be anything other than abstinent, you need to be informed.”

        I stare down at Questions about Sex (For Boys) , dumbfounded.

        Can I even get Maria pregnant if we’re different species? Max told me that he and Liz were talking about it after their genetics section in Biology class. I don’t want to even think about Max and Liz doing anything that would lead to pregnancy, but Max told me that if our DNA is different enough, and it probably is, that we’re probably not able to reproduce together. Which would be nice, because it would mean that we wouldn’t have to worry about that, but how would we figure that out other than the obvious? And who knows what we could do to them if… if…

        “Michael, are you okay? You’re looking a little pale.”



        Her soft shirt clumps up beneath my sweaty palm.

        Her hand strokes my shoulder, looking desperately for a place to settle.

        Our bodies rub against each other, seeking release, as our mouths frantically push against each other.

        It’s so incredibly hot… I’m so incredibly hot…

        Her head turns away and I eagerly meld into her neck, kissing, licking, seeking…



        “I’m fine.”

        “You’ve held up remarkably well today. I know you weren’t looking forward to this.”

        “Don’t like doctors.”

        “I know,” he says with a smile. “Good thing you’re as healthy as you are.”



        I feel myself retching uncontrollably as they try to force the thin brown object down my throat. What are they doing? I gag against it, I feel my mouth watering, and after a moment everything comes rushing up, and with a sick feeling I vomit onto the floor.

        The person pulls the brown thing out of my mouth, surprised, and someone is yelling in a loud voice. …Michael… …Michael…

        I yell again, mimicking their noises, and reach for the nearest thing I can grab – a container full of the brown things – and hurl it towards the wall. With a satisfying crash, the glass shatters everywhere, the brown things spill across the floor. …Michael… there’s a new word, ‘no’, now I know what that means. I scream one more time as they pull me away from the mess on the floor, my lunch, my insides, the glass, the wood.

        My stomach feels so much better now that the god-awful food is out of it, but I’m already hungry again. Someone gingerly hands me a paper cup filled with water, and I gratefully down it in a gulp, washing the acrid taste out of my mouth. I throw it on the floor towards the rest of the mess, and there’s that word again… no…

        No… no… no…



        “That’s all for today, Michael, thank you.”

Chapter 45

        Later that evening, fully injected with vaccines and scarred for life, but still presumably undercover as a normal human teenager, I cough quietly and scratch my eyebrow as I stare at the papers in front of me.

        It’s hopeless. Absolutely hopeless. I can’t do a proof to save my life. It’s that simple. I really do have to do a proof to save my life, and it’s not happening, therefore my life as I know it is over.

        “Michael?” I glance up from my geometry book at the dining room table to see Toby standing in the entryway.

        “What?”

        “I don’t mean to pry, but I just looked at my calendar. I know it’s been a rough day, but didn’t your report card come out today?”

        Holy shit. I knew this was coming. “Um, hold on, I’ll see if I can find it,” I grumble.

        “No, that’s fine, keep studying. Just tell me where it is.”

        I hear the Imperial March playing in my head. Bom, bom, bom, bom ba-bom, bom, ba-bom… “Here you go,” I say, shoving my bookbag at Toby without making eye contact with him. Instead, I dive back down to my geometry book on the lace tablecloth of the dining room table.

        There’s a few silent moments, my heart pounding as I hear Toby rustling through my bag impatiently, and then the dreadful sound of a paper coming out.

        “Mmm-hmm,” I hear him saying as he studies it.

        I slam my pencil down on the table. “Look,” I say, leaping from the chair. “I’ve studied all I can. I’m trying to work. I’m doing all the right stuff, I can’t help it if school just isn’t my thing! Okay, so I suck at school, I’m not gonna do any better at fucking Goddard!”

        “Michael!” Toby snaps.

        “I don’t care about my damn language! You can’t do this to me! You can’t transfer me!” It’s not like I could just make any new friends at Goddard. All the friends I have are the ones who know I’m an alien, and that’s not gonna be happening over at Goddard. I can see myself awash in a sea of strange faces, humans who don’t know who I am and don’t care, all alone.

I’ve been alone my whole life, but since I first found Isabel in the cafeteria on my first day at Sunset Elementary, I’ve never really been alone . “At least at West Roswell I’ve got help. I’ve got friends in my classes. Who’s gonna help me at Goddard, huh? You want to really screw my life up? Go ahead! Transfer me! That’ll help a whole hell of a lot!” I stop abruptly, gasping for breath after my outburst, and I finally pause to study Toby’s reaction.

        “Michael,” he says calmly, “why don’t you go to your room for now, and we’ll talk in a few minutes when you’ve calmed down?”

        I’m about to yell something else at him when I realize that’s not a half-bad idea, and I kick in the direction of the table, fortunately missing, as I storm back to the bedroom. I aim and succeed in kicking the back of the couch where Nate is casually watching Star Trek: Voyager, or at least trying to despite all my screaming and kicking. “Hey, watch it!” he yelps at me, but I stomp back to the bedroom and slam the door behind me, which rattles the house in a satisfying manner.

        I pace back and forth in the room, clenching my fists. Those first years, after I realized just how different I was from everyone else, were the worst time of my life. I was stuck in a world that I wasn’t supposed to be in, and I figured that out pretty early on. And nobody else was like me; not only that, they all hated me. They couldn’t find anybody who wanted to be my family, and at school everybody looked down on me, the angry poor kid. My eyes are stinging as I think about it. The kids who poked me in class, stole what little lunch money I ever had, laughed at my clothes and hair, beat me up when nobody was looking, until I finally would snap back and kick their asses in return, which just got me into more trouble with the teachers and I was Labeled. Troublemaker. Punk kid. That’s all anybody’s ever seen in me, anybody other than Isabel and Max. Maria. Liz and Alex. Maria. I’m labeled here. Toby and Veronica took on a Problem Child. A Troubled Teenager. That’s me.

        I can still see Isabel in her Barbie-pink sweater, with black polka dots, the top of her hair pulled back and pinned neatly with a barrette, hanging down over the rest of her bob, staring at me with big dark eyes in the cafeteria my first day at Sunset.

I can still see the bubbles she blew slowly with her bubble gum that day as we walked to her house, each of us wanting to ask the other one and each of us afraid to. I can almost remember the exact size of each one. And the taste of the gum she gave me. Cinnamon.

And the sound of my own voice as I finally, trembling, bravely, asked quietly, “We’re the same – aren’t we?” And the look on her face when she knew what I meant, and knew I’d been waiting to ask it.
       
“You are the one I remember,” she’d replied, tears in her eyes… and then all at once I wasn’t alone anymore.

It was like a huge weight was lifted from my shoulders that day as we stared into each others’ eyes, knowing; a weight that’s about to come crashing back down on me. It never really left, it’s always been hovering right above me.

And isn’t that the story of my life? What goes up must come down. Damn appropriate for a guy who started his life in the biggest UFO crash of the century. All this time I’ve been marking time, waiting out my brief time of companionship at school before I’m forced back to where it all began, alone, angry, desperate.

They can’t do this to me.

I’ll leave.

I’ll run away.

But then I’ll really be alone.

Maybe Maria will run away with me? We can still call and talk to her mom. We’ll elope. Get jobs somewhere. But then I won’t see Isabel again. I know she wouldn’t run away with me. She likes it here too much. I can’t leave Isabel. Max, I’d be glad to abandon right now, but Isabel? I can’t leave Isabel. And what if Maria wouldn’t come with me? I’d be even more alone than I’d be at Goddard.

But it’d be my choice. That’s the part that drives me wild. This lack of control. My life is spiraling out of my control. When Toby and Veronica gave me their ultimatum, when they said I had to get my grades up to a B, that was totally unrealistic. It was a mission I was doomed to fail. I’m not a B student, no matter how much I try. It’s not me. I’m not going to college, I’m going to outer space. As soon as I can figure out how in the world I’m going to manage that. That’s under my control. That’s my decision. Going to a school all day long where I can’t pull Maria into the eraser room on a whim? Where I can’t steal off for lunch with Isabel? Where I can’t even run into stupid thinks-with-his-dick Maxwell in the bathroom? What kind of life is that?

I snatch Nate’s nerf basketball from his bed and begin to slam it repeatedly against the wall. Over and over. It doesn’t make much of a noise, but at least it bends with a satisfying squish every time it hits the wall. And then bounces right back. I won’t bounce right back if I’m stuck at Goddard. It’ll be the end of me. I won’t be able to recover. As it was I barely survived those first two years alone.

I’m terrified of what will happen when I’m alone again.

The door creaks open. “Michael, have you calmed down yet?” Toby asks me.

“No,” I say, my voice cracking. “I’m gonna calm down when I know you’re not gonna ruin my life.”

He sighs. “We’re not trying to ruin your life, we’re trying to help you.”

        “Then help me by leaving me the fuck alone,” I snap at him, turning and throwing myself down on the bed where he can’t see my face. My eyes are way too red for me to want to face an adult human male right now.

“You have another month, Michael, and your grades have come up,” he says encouragingly.

“So what happens if they don’t come up all the way?” I ask.

“Then we’ll talk,” he says. “You’re taking this seriously, that’s all we ever wanted.”

“So you’re making empty threats to scare me?” I explode, shoving myself back into a sitting position. “What the hell is that?”

        He puts up his hands defensively. Almost like he knows I could make everything in this room fly. I’ve done a good job of keeping that in check so far, but he’s about a minute away from seeing full blown proof that aliens are among him. “Will you just come with me and look at the report card?”

        I glare at him with all my might, and tighten my fists into balls to keep my energy contained. He tenses a little and I realize what it looks like – like I’m getting ready to throw a punch. I put my fists on my hips, still tight but restrained, and follow him through the living room, where Nate turns to watch our progress anxiously. There’s a commercial on, so he’s fully focused on us and trying not to be.

We don’t even make it all the way into the dining room, Toby picks up my report card from where he’d dumped it on the foyer table, right out where everyone can see it. Gee, thanks, Toby. We’re about to start when I suddenly hear a little bit of the news flash from the TV and freeze.

“And in Bethesda, Maryland, a fire at the Bethesda Psychiatric Institute has left at least six patients dead and several more being treated for injuries. Authorities have not ruled out arson. Stay tuned for News at 11 for more details.”

I grab onto a chair to keep from falling over. It takes me a moment to place why I’m so disturbed, and then I remember. Bethesda, Maryland. Dr. Margolin was from Bethesda, Maryland. And was treating Topolsky for “psychiatric” problems. Same place?

It has to be.

Oh, god, oh god. They’re after us. They got her, and they’re coming for us next. For me. I’m the one she trusted. I’m the one who was going to meet her…

“Michael? Are you okay?” Toby asks me, concerned.

The phone ringing interrupts him, and he glances to the kitchen. Veronica strides out, already in her pajamas, to answer it. “Hello?” she asks. “Oh, hi, Jim! Yes…” I’m watching her intently, and she meets my gaze. “Yes, he’s right here,” she says.

I shake my head silently, but she forces it into my hand. I click the ‘off’ button and Veronica and Toby both stare at me as I throw the phone onto the floor, eager to get it out of my hands. The battery pops out and skitters away in the opposite direction from the phone, but no one moves to pick them up.

“I don’t wanna talk to him,” I offer as an explanation.

“Michael,” Toby says slowly. “ What is going on ?”

I shake my head more violently. “Keep the sheriff away from me!”

Now Nate is really watching closely, and Annie is even poking her head out from her room.

“You’ve got to tell us more than that,” Toby says. “This is serious.”

Damn straight it is. What’s my cover story? I told Nate about the whole Kyle thing… I just don’t see that going over well right now. “It’s my life,” I say in a low, threatening tone. “Stay out of it.”

All of them are staring at me now. Veronica. Toby. Annie. Nate Westing. Realizing how much I’ll never be a part of their family. They’re finally seeing just how different I am. I slowly step away, towards the front door, eying them all.

“Michael,” Toby says in a low tone, advancing towards me a step, “do you want to go out back with me? We’ll go for a walk, you don’t have to say anything…”

“No,” I say. I turn and bolt for the door.

“Michael!” Veronica shouts behind me, pleading, and I hear Toby’s footsteps as he falls in behind me. I struggle to unlatch the front door and he grabs my arm, pulling me around.

“That is not enough of an explanation!” Toby yells. I yank my arm away from him violently. It’s starting. He put his hands on me, here it comes.

“You don’t deserve an explanation!” I return. “What did you ever do to deserve an explanation? Don’t give me that ‘we put a roof over your head’ crap, it’s not enough. It’s not enough this time!”

“That’s not what I was going to say,” he says, and is he shaking a little? I think Annie’s about to cry, and Nate is hiding behind the couch as low as he can and still be able to see. “Calm down. Michael, please .”

“I don’t owe you an explanation,” I snap at him.

“Okay, okay,” he says, spreading his hands, “you don’t owe me an explanation. Just… come walk with me.”

With you? For all I know, you’re part of it… “I’m going for a walk alone,” I say.

“You’re not,” Toby says, moving between me and the door. I reach out and shove him aside, knowing as I do that it’s the wrong thing to do.

“Outta my way,” I say, trying to get the latch open again.

“I’m going with you,” Toby says definitively.

I glance back at Nate and Annie. Annie’s still staring at me, open-mouthed. Would he kill me, if he really is FBI? Would he turn me over? It would be the perfect chance. But they would remember. They would say something. I don’t trust Toby, but I do trust Nate and Annie.

With a glowering look at him, I open the door and allow Toby out of it. He steps out into the darkness and I follow, pulling the door closed behind me.

Silently, we walk down the sidewalk and up to the street, then down Summerwalk Circle. I keep a sideways eye on Toby, who’s not looking at me at all. He doesn’t seem like he’s out to get me, but I’m not about to let my guard down.

“When you’re ready to talk,” he finally says, “I’m ready to listen.”

“I talked already,” I say. “Told you what I had to say.”

        “What are you not saying?” he asks.

        “Nothing I’m ready to say,” I say definitively.

        “I can try to respect that,” Toby says, “but people expect me to be responsible for you, Michael. What happens do you reflects on me. And as such, if something’s as seriously wrong as I’m afraid it is, I need to know about it.”

        I’m silent for a moment as we turn off of Summerwalk Circle and head up Dogwood Lane. “It won’t reflect on you,” I say finally.

        “So you’re admitting something’s wrong?” Toby asks. I give him a weird look. “Because something clearly is, but you haven’t even said that much.”

“What do you do all day?” I blurt out. “What’s your job? Really?”

        “What do you mean?”

“I have to know, all right?”

“I work for the federal government,” he says after a long pause.

“Doing what?” I ask.

He takes a deep breath. “Are we still talking about the same thing?”
       
Damn. “No. I just wanna know.”
       
“Fine,” Toby says. “I do administrative support for the local office of the FBI.”

FBI.

I knew it.

I fucking knew it.

Chapter 46

“Michael? Is everything all right?”

        “No,” I say, trying to keep my voice from trembling. “You work for the FBI?”

        “Administrative support, Michael. I’m a glorified secretary, we just don’t like to call it that because I have to preserve my masculinity.” He smiles, like he’s making a joke. It’s really not funny at all.

“So why am I here?”
       
“Beg pardon?”

        “Why am I living with you?” I ask slowly.

“CYFD asked us to take you in,” Toby says, like it’s no big deal that the alien kid really is living under the shadow of the FBI.

I peer at him suspiciously. “Tell me what you know about me,” I demand.

        “What are you talking about?”

        “C’mon, Toby, cut it out.”

“Michael, you’ve got to give me more to go on than that.”

        What do I tell him that won’t give me away? Do I trust him? He’s an adult. He’s a human. He’s a foster parent. All three things that I don’t trust. Yet… something about him is oddly reassuring. I mean, it’s Toby, for crying out loud…

“You’ve never seen my name? On a file at work?”

        He lowers his voice. “Why would I have?”

“ Have you?” I demand, my voice rising.

“I don’t have much access, Michael,” he says, keeping his voice level and even. “I type, I file, I make phone calls.”

“You never typed anything with my name on it.”

“No.”

        It’s top-secret, that’s why. He really doesn’t have access. I believe him. Maybe.

“So,” Toby says, “you want to explain this to me or not?”

“Explain what?”

“Explain why my sixteen year old foster son thinks I should have seen his name on an FBI file?” Son. He called me his son. Foster son. Hank never called me that. Kid…Mickey… hey you…

I shake my head. “Forget it.”

        “Who are you?” Toby asks me, and I notice that he’s stopped abruptly in his tracks and fallen behind me.

I slow for a moment, blink and shake my head, then press on.

“Michael!” Toby calls after me, and after a moment I hear his footsteps as he breaks into a jog to catch up with me. “Something is seriously wrong here, and I need to know what it is.”

“No, Toby,” I say. “You don’t.”
       
“Look,” he says, falling back into step with me. “I’m sorry that I even have to say this, but Michael – what you’re saying, what you’re implying, it’s not, how do I say this, it’s not realistic? Do you realize what you sound like?” His hands are waving animatedly as he talks.

        “Oh, I realize,” I say.

        “I don’t want to offend you, I just…” He stops again, and this time I stop with him. “You’re scaring me, kid. I need to know that you’re okay.”

        ‘Okay’ in what sense? I realize immediately what he means. I sound paranoid. Maybe I am. God, that’d be so much better. If it was all just in my head. If none of it was real.

“I’m okay if you leave me alone,” I say in a low tone. “Keep the sheriff away from me, and let me mind my own business.”

“Why, Michael?” Toby pleads with me in the middle of the street. “Why do I need to keep Jim Valenti away from you?”

“Ask him,” I say bitterly. “I’m sure he’ll fill you in.”
       
“Will he?”
       
I shrug it off.

“Are you okay, Michael?” he asks desperately. “I need to know that you’re safe. That you’re not going to be hurt, that you’re not going to hurt yourself.”
       
I’m not safe. I’m not safe living with Toby Butler. Even if he’s telling the truth and doesn’t know a thing about my name being on any FBI alien hunter hit list, he still works for them. I’m not safe in general. None of us are any more. If the last few days have taught us anything, it’s that.

I shove my hands into my pockets and stride off quickly down the street. I hear him walking behind me, and I start to walk a little faster.

“Where are you going?” he asks me.

“Away from here,” I say.

“I’m following you!” he says in a warning tone, and he certainly is.

“Get lost!”

“No!”

I whirl around on him. “Why do you care so much?” I ask. “If I screw up, so what? It happens all the time. Nobody’s gonna come down on you.”
       
“I’m gonna come down on me, Michael. What’s going on? One minute we’re talking about you transferring schools, now you’re afraid of the sheriff? You sound like you’re afraid for your life . Help me out here.”

“No,” I say again, clearly, definitively, and I jog off down the street. I hear him still coming after me. Does this guy ever give up? I want Maria. I need Maria. I go to Maria when I have nowhere else to go, and I have nowhere else to go now.

“Come home, Michael,” he says behind me.

I stop in my tracks, not turning to look.

“It’s not my home.”

“It’s the best thing you have right now,” his voice comes from behind me.

“There’s something better out there.”

“Well, where is it?”

“I don’t know yet.” I close my eyes and swallow deeply.

“Maybe there’s not anything better.” That’s a depressing thought. “Give us a chance, okay?”

I turn around slowly. “You have ,” I say, “to leave me alone. You have to forget I ever said anything tonight. You have got to quit telling Valenti about me. You want me to see a psychiatrist or whatever, sure, I don’t care.”
       
There’s a long, long silence. We regard each other in the dim sodium light from the streetlamps, flickering, warming up and blinking down. Toby stares down at me, and I remind myself that he could take me in a fair fight. I could be within his control if he really tried.

“Then Michael,” Toby says, “You have to promise me that you’re going to take care of yourself, as long as you’re not letting me do it for you.”

I nod. “That I can promise.”

We stare at each other again. I still don’t trust him as far as I can throw him, but… I can’t shake the words he’s said to me, I can’t shake the feeling that maybe it will be okay.

Nasedo is my real father. Nasedo is out there. He’s trying to find me. He’s looking for me as much as I’m looking for him, but we can’t find each other. And yet… why do I suddenly find myself wishing I was standing here with Nasedo? I shrug it off and brush past Toby to start walking back to Summerwalk Circle.

He catches up to me and walks, silently, beside me, down the street. We don’t look at each other, we don’t say anything. I think we’ve said it all. I’ve said too much as it is. Now he’s suspicious. Now he’s going to start asking questions, start putting pieces together. Let him. If he figures it out, he figures it out. The FBI already knows, what can Toby do to hurt me?

I have a flash of white again, white walls and lights, men in suits, the world spinning around me. I blink. It’s nothing.

I let myself into the house ahead of Toby. Nate’s still crouched on the couch where I left him, staring intently at me. I walk back to the bedroom to shut the door, but not before I see Annie in the bathroom, gaping at me. Her eyes are red. She has been crying.

It’s not my home, I remind myself. It’s not my home. It never will be. These people are strangers. I’m getting too close, they’re asking too many questions. I can’t trust anyone.

And as I lean against the door, sliding down to the ground, collapsing and quaking into myself, I come to the realization that maybe I’ve been here long enough.

The rest of the evening is silent. Nobody says anything. Nobody talks to anyone else. And yet, as I lie in bed drifting off to sleep, I almost think I hear a small female voice from the doorway, whispering, “Michael, please don’t leave.” But I’m not sure if I’m dreaming or not, even when I lie awake for hours later in the middle of the night, trying to remember.

Chapter 47

        “Hey! Michael!” I’m trying to pretend like Max Evans doesn’t exist, but that’s hard when he’s the only other male member of my species that I’m currently acquainted with. With a sigh, I turn in my seat to face Max, who’s just slid into his.

        “What is it now?” I grumble.

        Max squints at me. “Are you avoiding me on purpose?”

        I shrug. “Maybe.”

        “Well, this isn’t any time to be petty-“

“Oh, I’m being petty now?”

        “We need to talk,” he says. “You, me, Isabel.”

        “Talk,” I say, offhandedly.

        “Private.”

        “No, thanks.”

        “What’s your problem?”

        I just glare at him. “Where do you want me to start?”

        Max sighs. “Michael…”

        “Maxwell.”

        “This is important.”

        “Yeah, so’s my business. Catch you some other time.”

        I try not to act too amused as I turn back in my seat. After all these years, it’s almost fun to just blow off Max Evans like that.

        At least, I’m trying to convince myself of that. The little voice deep down that reminds me that Max used to be my best friend…

        An hour later, following history class, I stride down the hall as coolly as I can. Some problems may be out of my control, but not all of them. This is a small relief as I carefully pull the door to the Administration Records closet shut. Toby and Veronica won’t be thrilled if I get caught breaking and entering at my own school. But at this point I gotta act on something.

        Aaron-Bennett… Bentley-Delacruz… There it is. Garrison-Hefler. I pull the drawer open as softly as I can and begin scanning through. Garrison… Gilpin… a click at the door makes me nearly jump out of my skin, and I look up in shock to see a tiny blond in hot pink slipping in. “What the hell are you doin’ here?” I ask Maria, after a brief moment of relief has set in.

She closes the door a little too loudly as I return to my rifling. “I saw you sneaking in, what are you doing here?” she asks, sidling up to the cabinet beside me.

“Nuthin’,” I say.

“Michael,” she says slowly, and I jump again, “if you want to be a couple, you gotta learn how to trust me, okay? That’s how a relationship works.” Again with that phrase. I’ve heard it way too often in the past few days. I’m not sure how much I mind. “No secrets,” she reiterates. “So either give it to me straight, or you’re not going to be giving it to me at all.”

Ah. An ultimatum. I glance up at her. “Fine. I’m checkin’ out the new girl.”

“Tess?” she asks, suddenly concerned. “Why?”

“It’s classified,” I whisper. Harding, Tess. I settle my fingers on it.

“Does this have anything to do with Max?” Maria asks innocently.

I start to say something, then cover up for it with a whistle of air.

“Ha,” Maria says, satisfied, “I knew it.”

“I’m just helpin’ Max out, okay, it’s not a big deal,” I point out.

“I thought we were a team,” she says petulantly.

“What do you mean?” I open the file and browse through briefly. Nothing incriminating, but her address is given. Yeah, baby.

“We always investigate as a team,” she says.

I think it’s time for a little solo investigating myself. And the last thing I want is Maria running to Liz with news of our results. “Well, take it easy, Sherlock - when I find somethin’ I’ll let you know,” I tell her as I roll the drawer shut. It closes a little too loudly for my taste. “Shhh…” I whisper to Maria, cautioning, as I turn to exit the records room.

This is no time for clandestine displays of affection. There’s work to be done.

I’m all business later that afternoon, as I stride down the street listed as the Harding family address. I keep a mental tally in my head, counting down the house numbers as I stroll down the slick street. The rain has just let up long enough for me to walk over from the Butlers’ house, we’re practically neighbors. Give or take a mile, but I’m in a mood to walk.

I locate the house pretty easily and walk casually up the front sidewalk. Sure, I’ve got a cover story – the chick just got transferred into my art class, so supposedly I’m coming over to ask her what the homework was. I skipped art class today, plotting my way into the records room. Go figure. Of course, we never have homework in art class, but Tess Harding, or whoever the hell she is, doesn’t have to know that.

No doorbell. I knock half-heartedly on the door, kind of hoping no one will answer, even as I’m hoping to find something out. After a moment, I knock again, and still nothing. Nobody home. Not a car in the driveway, either. This is probably a good thing.

I make my way around to the window to peer inside, and what I see when I do takes my breath away.

It’s nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

        I’m looking at nothing, and it’s a whole lot of something.

        I hear the sounds of tires on wet pavement, and turn to see something approaching down the street. It’s a fucking military vehicle. In the suburbs of Roswell…?

        I duck around the corner to watch as three men hop out of the vehicle and dash up to the door, now only inches away from me. Two suits, briefcases in hand, and a soldier. M-16 rifle. I’ve seen those in books, movies. Never in person. Goddamn. One sneeze and I could have that thing pointed at my head. I hold my breath, waiting, listening. Are these the people who killed Topolsky? Are these the people sent out as a result of that “list”? Are they after me?

        Maybe they ran tests already on the evidence from yesterday. Maybe they tracked me down here based on the DNA evidence they collected, and now that they know for sure I’m E.T. the Extraterrestrial, they’ve come to take me into custody and have their way with me. Custody. There’s the hot word of the week right there.

        My heart pounds as I wait. The suits are inside, the soldier’s still on the doorstep. I turn around and take a deep breath. I’ve got to get the hell out of here.

        With a brief prayer – heck, now that I’ve been to church a few times maybe somebody’ll listen – I gingerly creep down, lowering myself into the bushes beside the porch, where I duck my head and hide. It’s bristly and muddy under here from all the rain – this won’t do at all, with the rain starting up again.

        I make my way through the bushes, glance back at the M-16, and immediately take off towards the backyard, my legs and arms pumping, the mud splashing under my sneakers. I run into the next backyard, around to the next street, and then as fast as I can, I run almost half a mile before I stop to catch my breath, and walk the rest of the way back to the Butlers.

        I ignore Veronica grading papers at the kitchen table, make my way through to the bedroom where I dive for the telephone and punch in the number that my fingers know by heart. “Hello?” I hear Diane Evans’ voice answer after the second ring. Like clockwork.

        “Are Max and Isabel there?”

        “Yes, Isabel is. Hold on, Michael.” I tap my finger anxiously on the wall as I wait. “Isabel – phone for you!”

        “Hello?”

        “We gotta talk. All three of us.”

        “Hi to you, too, Michael,” Isabel says uncomfortably.

        “Where’s Max?”

        “If I tell you, this won’t lead to his untimely demise, will it?” Is that supposed to be funny?

        “No. Is he at work?”

        “He worked the early shift this morning. I think he’s at the Crashdown.” With Liz. The unnecessary tag to that remark.

        “Come pick me up.”

        “It’s a Friday night. Maybe I’m busy.”

        “You’re not. Come pick me up.”

        I hear her sighing into the phone. “I could have a life,” she mutters, “but no, instead I have Michael and Max. God. Why do I bother?”

        “That supposed to be a rhetorical question?”

        “Hmmph,” is all she says.

        “So I’ll see you in ten minutes?”

        “Fifteen,” she says emphatically. “I gotta do my hair.”

        “You do your hair in five minutes?”

        “Practice,” she says mysteriously. I bet she’s using her powers on it now. I know she’s been using her powers on beauty secrets for months, even though she says she’s not. “Stay put.”

        “Waiting for you.”

        I hang up the phone, and it’s then that I glance up to see Nate standing in the doorway. No clue how long he’s been there.

        “What are you lookin’ at?” I ask him.

        “Where are you going?” he asks.

        “Crashdown,” I say honestly. “Friday night. I’m goin’ out.”

        He folds his arms and stares at me. “You work there.”

        “Just meeting up.”

        “Maria’s not picking you up?”

        “No, Maria’s-“ To be honest, I have no idea what Maria’s doing tonight. “Uh, working,” I finish lamely.

“Who are you goin’ out with, then?”

I peer at him strangely. “What’s it to you?”

“You’re weird.”

        “Yeah, well, I’m not the only one,” I say, before I hop up to go outside and start waiting for Isabel.

        Before too long, she pulls up in the Jeep and we head off towards town. “What’s the big deal, anyway?” Isabel asked.

        “Tell you when we get there.”

        “Are your clothes all wet or are you just happy – never mind,” she says, realizing after a moment that I’m the last person she wants to make that joke with. “What have you been doing all afternoon?”

        “Research. Drive.”

        Isabel’s pretty annoyed with me by the time we get to the Crashdown. I burst through the doors just in time to overhear Max saying at the front table, in a rush, “Can we just stop talking about Tess?”

        Nice segue, thank you, Maxwell. “Yeah, that’s probably a good idea,” I say as Isabel settles in at the counter, very pointedly not with Liz and Max. “Can we talk?”

        I hop on a stool next to Isabel and wait anxiously while Max makes his way over to us. “She’s a liar,” I say as soon as he arrives.

        “Who?” Max asks, confused.

        “Tess, I went to her house,” I say.

        “You went to her house ?” Isabel asks, as a look of alarm crosses Max’s face. “Why?”

        I sigh. Always the details with these two. “I was passin’ by, the point is, it was empty. Not a single box, they don’t live there. It’s a cover.” I wait for this to register.

        “She did just move in, Michael,” Isabel argues. I stare at her, amazed. “I can’t believe I finally have a friend and you just assume she’s out to get us.” Okay, so she’s pissed at me.

        “There were military people there, Isabel,” I say quietly.

        “Military people? Come on, Michael,” she says.

        “Two men with briefcases, and one with an M-16. They don’t work at the cheese factory.”

        This finally hits a note with Isabel. “I’m sure there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation,” she says. I’m about to invite her to provide one, but Max is looking like he’s been hit over the head with a two-by-four.

        “What?” I prod.

        “Nothing,” he says.

        “Maxwell…”

        “Valenti came to me this morning. Topolsky was killed in a fire.”

        “Bethesda,” I say tightly, and quietly. “I knew it.”

        “He thinks everything Topolsky told us could be true. The alien hunter? Everything.”

        “Why the hell didn’t you tell us?” Before I put my neck on the line going to check out your fantasy lover…

        “I didn’t know if it was true!” Max protests. “I didn’t want anyone to panic and do anything stupid.” Anyone. Namely, me. Gee, thanks, Maxwell.

        “Hey, I’m tryin’ to figure out which problem to panic over,” I say, irritated. “You having secret meetings with Valenti, or your new girlfriend Tess bringing the Army to town!”

        I follow Max’s gaze over to Liz, who happened to be right behind me as I said that, of course, and is now dashing off with a look of alarm on her face.

        “You asked for my help,” I remind him helplessly.

        “Not exactly the kind of help I was looking for,” he returns, and then stops, staring at something behind me. I turn around to see Sheriff Valenti striding slowly towards us. Right towards us. Not even casual about it. We’re done for. Where’s his backup? I lean protectively towards Isabel.

        He reaches into his coat. For a gun? For the orb. He sets it gingerly on the counter and we all stare at it. I fight back the urge to snatch it from him and run out of the café.

        Max and I stare at each other over the orb, and after a moment Max reaches for it, his fingers clutching it carefully, almost as if he’s still afraid it’s a trap.

        “Before you can expect someone to trust you,” Valenti says to Max, “You’ve got to trust them first.” We all stare at him, dumbfounded. “Whenever you’re ready, Max,” he says before turning and making his way out of the Crashdown.

        “You’re just makin’ new friends all over the place, aren’t you, Max?” I ask him. A small look of guilt creeps across his face as he stashes the orb in his pocket. The orb. The orb is ours again. And as we plot how Isabel is going to further investigate this Tess situation, my mind keeps drifting back to Valenti, drawing circles and x’s between him, and Toby Butler, and Kathleen Topolsky, and the suits and the M-16 at Tess Harding’s house. I just wish I could get it all into a coherent bundle, because as it is, it’s too much. There’s a greater something going on here, but I don’t know what it is. And I don’t know if I’ll be able to work it out.

Chapter 48

        “So you wanna tell me what’s up?”

        I glance over at the passenger seat of the van. I’ve been entrusted with the keys to the Butler family van for the first time, which I guess is some sort of rite of passage somewhere. Given that I drive the Jetta and occasionally the Jeep on a regular basis, it’s not tremendously exciting. And given that the only reason I’m driving is because Veronica has to clean the house for some stupid dinner party, and Toby has to take Annie to some stupid social skills class, so I have to take Nate to his stupid baseball game – well, this is why having a family isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.

        “With what?” I ask, bored.

        Nate stares at me, kinda dumbfounded. “C’mon, Michael. I told you my goods. You know about my mom, hell, you met her for crying out loud. So are you gonna reciprocate, or not?”

        “That’s a big word comin’ outta your mouth,” is all that I say.

        “I’ve never seen anyone as scared of the doctor as you,” he says quietly.

        “Yeah, whatever, shut up,” I say. Wish the kid was old enough to have more than a learner’s permit. Damn.

        He kicks at his duffel bag on the floor of the van. “Were you really screaming?”

        “What?”

        “Annie told me you were.”

        I sigh heavily. “Annie’s mentally retarded, Nate.”

        He scowls at me. “Jeez, some nice guy you are.”

        “It’s the truth!” I can’t help it. She has Down Syndrome. Since when are we relying on her for gossip? The fact that it’s true has no merit for the time being.

        “Yeah, but it sure isn’t PC of you.”

        “Sor-ry,” I say, with an edge to my voice.

        We lapse into silence, as I lean over the steering wheel and Nate folds his arms, staring out the window in a huff.

        “Hey,” he says after awhile, breaking the silence. “If you get a chance to talk to any of the guys on the team-“

“The ones who couldn’t be bothered to come pick you up themselves?” I gotta admit, I feel like I could be doing better things with my time. Like waiting by the phone for Isabel to call with the results of her little visit over to the Harding house.

        “Jesus Christ, if there was ever a time you needed some weed yourself it was right now. Chill. Look, as I was trying to say, if you get a chance to talk to any of the guys on the team, they don’t, um, they all, well…” He sighs. “I tell everybody I’m an orphan. Okay?”

        “Okay,” I say suspiciously. I pause. “You mean you lie to them.”

        “Well, yeah,” he says. “Lied to you, too. You didn’t seem to care too much.”

        “Nope. Couldn’t care less.” I tap my fingers on the steering wheel.

        “Then why does it bother me so much that you’re lying to me?” he asks, and it’s all I can do to keep from slamming on the breaks and pitching us both through the windshield right then and there. No, I play it cool.

        “’Bout what?” I ask innocently. A little too innocently. I’m sure he can see right through me.

        “I don’t know,” Nate says, and I breathe a sigh of relief. “If I knew, then you wouldn’t have to lie to me. Am I right?”

        “What are you talking about? You’re high, aren’t you? I knew it.”

        “I’m perfectly sober,” Nate assures me. “And I think it’s really damn weird that you freaked out on Toby the other night, that you’re always sneaking around with those friends of yours, that the sheriff is on your case, and basically everything about you.”

        I can’t help but feel a chill down my spine. Doctors, foster parents, officials, teachers, and the first one to actually put it all together and ask me directly, to my face, is Nate Fucking Westing.

        “I don’t know what you mean. Man, you’re crazy. I told you the truth already.” I sure hope I sound convincing.

        “Look,” Nate says in a low voice, “if you put my family in danger, I swear to God I will hurt you badly.”

        I look at him abruptly. In a new light.

        “Your family?” I ask. “They’re your family, then?”

        “Why, what? Don’t try and tell me that you consider them your family.”

        “I don’t,” I say immediately. “I live with you people, that’s all. And you’re insane, by the way.”

        “Am I?”

        I shake my head at him. “Yes.”

        Nate sighs. “You know I won’t tell anybody anything. Why can’t you just be honest with me?”

        “I barely know you. How do I know what you will and won’t say? And I’m not hiding anything. Jesus!”

        “You’re awfully uptight about this all of a sudden.”

        “You’re reading way too much into this.”

        But still, I’m trembling just a little, in my hands, as I settle into the bleachers with a coke and nachos at Goddard High a while later. As I crunch on the first chip, I gaze out over the ballfield. Nate and his teammates are running sprints in left field.

        I glance around the bleachers at the Goddard fans. Not a single familiar face. It’s a sea of strangers. My heart skips a beat at the thought of being thrown into that school, but I remind myself after a moment that Toby seems to think I’m okay and the threat is lifted. For now. I can’t help but glare at a guy who’s peering back at me curiously.

I check my watch. The game doesn’t start for another half an hour, and it’s going to be a long day…

        “Howdy, stranger.”

        I turn around, extremely grateful to hear the voice. “I thought you had to work.”

        Maria hefts herself up onto the bleachers from the side. It’s a good three feet off the ground. I immediately drop my nachos on the seat next to my coke and reach down to help her. Her arm braces against my elbow, and I feel a rush of giddiness at the contact.

        “I got out of it. The boss likes me, what can I say?” Maria grins at me, even as I grumble a little. “Liz and I switched shifts, my shift this afternoon for hers tomorrow.”

        She slides onto the seat next to me, and I instinctively put my arm around her, pulling her closer.

        “Uhhh,” Maria stammers, tensing a little. “Okay.”

        “What?”

        “So we’re hot now?”

        “ What? ” I mean, there are far hotter things I can do than put my arm around her… okay, now my thought process is going down that path, not good…

        “Just checking. Hot. Cold. I… can’t keep track of where we are.”

        “What do you mean? Aren’t we dating?”

        “Yeah, but you just totally blew me off yesterday at school.”

        “I was busy.”

        “How do you know I’m not busy now?”

        “Because you’re sitting with me at a boring game that our school isn’t even playing at. Let’s go find somewhere private,” I say, encouraged. “I got the keys to the van, it’s out in the lot.”

        Maria looks like she’s about to protest, but I inch closer to her and run my hand down the outside of her leg tantalizingly, and that does the trick. “Okay,” she says faintly, melting a little. She hops back down to the ground and I join her after a moment, abandoning the coke and nachos. “You’re just gonna let that go to waste?” she asks, disappointed, staring at my junk food.

        “Yeah, why?”

        In response, she stretches back up to snatch the snacks from the bleachers, without explanation, and pops a chip loaded with jalapenos into her mouth. This is the girl for me. I happily lead her out to the parking lot and key us into the van, where we both hop into the back seat together and I slide the door closed.

        I lean up next to her and pick up another chip, which I slide into her mouth with my fingers. Her lips close around my index finger, and I’m in heaven. I don’t deserve it. “Mmm,” she says, licking a little cheese off of her upper lip as I slide my finger out. “Delicious.”

        I’m still staring at her lips. “You missed a spot,” I murmur, leaning in, and find myself tasting the jalapenos and salt still in her breath as our mouths mingle.

        I push the chips aside, careful to deposit them on the carpeted floor of the van so I won’t get yelled at for making a mess. Once that’s completed, I lean my weight against her, tipping her backwards, until I’m lying mostly on top of her on the seat of the van. Our mouths crush against each other, I run my hands down her sides and over her chest, and feel her hands assuredly snaking around me, up and down my back, over my shoulders, as we press into each other. She used to be so unsure of her hands, well, once. Now we’re old hats at this. Makes it even more fun. Gotta be more creative.

        “Wow,” she says, as she manages to sneak her mouth away from mine. Not allowed. I chase it down again. “You’re eager today,” she manages to say before I’m kissing her again. She squirms a little under my weight, and I press up on my elbows to allow her a little breathing room. No need to press her to death just yet.

        “Shh,” I hiss at her, my hands settling back on her chest. That’s always a fun place to hang out, I think to myself, as I lightly massage her breasts and she begins to moan in response. I pull my mouth away from hers – I want to hear the noises – and move in to the side of her neck. Our lower bodies are rubbing together desperately now, and her moans and grunts are a little louder. God, it’s good…

        “Are you okay?” she manages to gasp.

        “Fine, more than fine,” I say quickly, moving back in to nuzzle her neck. She’s wearing my lotion.

        “No, really,” Maria says, and pushes me up. A scowl settles over my features as I straighten up, letting her really breathe now at last.

        “I’m fine, this is great, can we please continue?” I beg.

        “Of course,” Maria says, “I mean, I like it too, Michael,” she says, glancing down at my left hand which is still settled firmly on her breast. She sighs and puts her hand over mine, holding it there. Nice. “But you just seem… awfully hungry.”

        “So?”

        “Everytime you get like this, something’s bothering you,” she says matter-of-factly.

        “Dammit, would everybody quit asking about my ulterior motives and just get on with life already? I’m horny, let’s make out. End of story.”

        She grins at me, amused, leaning into my hand. Mmmm. “I’m not the only one prying?”

        “No,” I snap.

        “Is that what’s bothering you?”

        “I had a really bad week,” I say. “Okay? Sunday night freaked me out, and now Max and I are barely speaking, and I had my doctor visit, and I fought with my foster dad, and Nate thinks I’m hiding something, Annie’s terrified of me, and Max is having fantasies about some girl who could very possibly be here to kill us and who’s probably under cover. Now can we just please shut up and make out?”

        Maria stares at me, her jaw dropping slowly. “You had your doctor visit?”

        “Yeah, it was Thursday.”

        “Oh, my god,” she says, clapping a hand to her mouth. “I totally forgot-”

        “Forget it,” I say. “Doesn’t matter. Just…” I tighten my hand around her breast a little, and she pushes me away. Dammit. I flex my hand, now empty and alone.

        “What happened at the doctor?” she asks. “Michael, I’m so sorry I forgot…”

        I shrug. “It was okay.”

        She leans back in to me, wrapping her arms around my shoulders and pulling me closer. “I should have been there,” she says gently.

        “No, you shouldn’t,” I say, glancing away, glancing over her shoulder at the top of her ass. The last thing I want is for Maria to see me like that .

        “So what happened with Toby?” She lifts a finger to nudge my face around so that my eyes meet hers.

        “He does work for the FBI. And he thinks something’s going on with me, but he doesn’t know what.”

        “Michael!” Now she’s pushing me away again. “You didn’t tell me?”

        “What? I’m supposed to tell you every little thing that happens to me?”

        “No. But every big thing, yes. I mean, if we’re really in a relationship. That’s how it works.”

        “Would you quit saying that?” I run my fingers along the seatbelt nervously. If I had a dollar for every time she’s said that… well, ten dollars… then I’d be able to take a couple of days off. Or something.

        “Not until you get it right. Look, he’s really working for the FBI?”

        “Yeah, but I dunno. I don’t think he’s a danger. I think Valenti’s a danger, I think the FBI is a danger. But Toby’s a grunt.”

        “What about breaking into social services? We should know for sure, Michael. If you’re at any kind of risk-”

        I shake my head. “If he was gonna do something, why hasn’t he done it already? I’ve lived with him for a whole month now. All that time he could have accused me, interrogated me, spied on me. And nada.”

        Maria considers this. “You didn’t trust him.”

        “I still don’t.”

        “You guys had a fight?”

        “He thinks I’m hiding something.”

        “And you are!” Now she’s concerned. She runs her hand along my arm, rubbing back and forth. That feels just fine. “What if he figures it out?”

        “What’s he gonna figure out?”

        “You tell me, Mr. Paranoid Alien. What about Nate?”

        I heave a sigh. “Asked me on the way here what I’m hiding.”

“And you said?”
       
“Told him he was nuts.”

“And-“ Maria claps her hand to her mouth. “Report cards came out this week! Michael?”

        “What? It’s not like you didn’t get one, too.”

“I was preoccupied with my midterm, and I just wasn’t thinking… oh, you poor thing.”

        I shift in the seat uncomfortably. “Don’t call me that.”

        “So, spill?”

        “I did okay,” I say. “Not as well as I should’ve, but Toby said it’s okay, cause he knows I’m trying.”

Maria exhales a breath. “How could you not tell me all this? Didya tell Max and Isabel?”

        I shrug. “Not exactly.”

        “No wonder you’re horny, doofus!”

        “No, Maria, I really think there’s another explanation for that part.”

        She shakes her head at me, scolding. “You’re bottling up too much inside.”

        “Since when are you my therapist?”

        “Since right now. Okay, turn around.”

        “What? Why?”

        “For a massage,” she says, exasperated.

        “Okay,” I agree whole-heartedly, and obey immediately, twisting in the seat so that she can reach my back. I settle my hands into my lap and let out a great breath of air as her hands meet my skin, riding up under my shirt.

        “Oh… god, you’re tense,” Maria says as she works the muscles of my back with her hands.

        “I’m still horny,” I grumble.

        “First things first, spaceboy.”

        “And second things second?” I inquire hopefully.

        “Sure.”

        “Sweet.”

        “You’re not alone,” she says quietly, as the heels of her hands knead at my neck muscles.

        I know that.

But I forget.

All the time.

Chapter 49

        “Where’d you come from?” Nate asks Maria as he trots toward us, his duffel bag slung across his shoulders.

        “Outer space,” she says flippantly, and it’s all I can do not to turn on her right then and there. “C’mon, you’ve seen the uniform.” But she’s right, I realize after a moment – the more you joke about it, the less he’s gonna catch on.

I hope.

        “Maria’s comin’ with us,” I explain, as the three of us turn to head towards the parking lot. Maria and I spent the better part of the game enjoying each others’ company in the van. I had a couple of new experiences there, oh yes I did. I think she did, too. I still feel slightly drunk from it all. I hope Nate can’t tell.

        “Where’s your car?” Nate asks.

        “My mom has it,” Maria explains, working her hand around my waist.

        “So we’re taking you home?”

        “Nope,” I say smugly. “She’s coming to the dinner party tonight.”

        “Did you ask Veronica?”

        “Veronica won’t care,” I say, as Maria glances at me nervously. “I mean, what the hell else am I going to do all night?”

        “Talk to me?” Nate grumbles.

        I smirk at him. “Not anymore, Babe Ruth.”

        “Are you sure? All of Toby and Veronica’s adult friends are gonna be there and stuff. They might not like Maria being there.”

        “Then they can deal. If we have to leave, we’ll leave.” Maria exchanges a slight smile with me as I finish the thought.

        “So who won?” Maria asks as we all climb into the car.

        “Don’t ask,” Nate says, hopping into the back seat. “You didn’t see the game?”

        “Uhhh-“ Maria says, glancing at me from the front passenger seat as she reaches for her seatbelt.

        “And why are there nachos on the floor back here?”

        It doesn’t take a whole lot of convincing to persuade Veronica to let Maria stay for the party. After all, I’m on her good side for taking Nate to the game to begin with, so it’s kind of the least she can do. Score one for DeLuca, though – it’s amazing how she ingratiates herself with these people.

        “Mrs. Butler, are you sure you don’t need any help setting up the snacks?” Maria asks for, like, the fifth time as the two of us sit in close proximity watching Cartoon Network in the living room. Annie’s sitting across from us in a recliner.

        “No, dear, just enjoy the TV for now, but thank you,” Veronica says, clearly flattered. Yeah, too bad she can’t have Maria instead of me, Annie and Nate here all the time. It’s obvious who’s the favorite out of the four of us.

        “Maria, will you help me put my hair up for the dinner?” Annie asks her, rocking eagerly in the recliner.

        “Sure, honey,” Maria says. “What do you have in mind? Ponytail, bun, French twist?”

        Annie’s face brightens. I haven’t seen her look like that in a couple of weeks. “French twist,” she says excitedly.

        “You want to do it now?”

        Annie shakes her head. “When Dragonball is over.”

        “’Kay,” Maria says. She leans over to me conspiratorially. “Michael, I don’t understand anything about this show.”

        I start to fill her in, then stop. “Don’t bother,” I say. “It would take awhile.”

        She grins at me and leans up against me just a little, our shoulders pressing against each other. With a quick glance around the great room – Veronica is busily arranging crackers on a plate, Annie is fixated on the television, Toby is mowing the yard outside and Nate is sequestered in our room – I put my arm around her shoulders and pull her in towards me comfortably.

        “Michael, can I see you in the kitchen for a sec?” Veronica calls.

        With a sigh, I glance over at Maria, who’s shooting me a wry grin, and heave myself from the couch and her comfortable body to pad into the kitchen.

        “What?” I ask, annoyed.

        Veronica motions me over to where she’s standing by the stove. “I got a call while you were out,” she says quietly, so that her voice won’t carry around the wall into the living room. “An RSVP from Jim Valenti, he’s coming tonight and I thought you should know.”

        “Oh,” I say, and I feel a sickening feeling in my stomach.

        “Are you okay with that?” she asks seriously, peering at me over her glasses.

        Um, no. “Sure,” I say. “I might… go outside with Maria for awhile. You know.” I motion to the backyard with my thumb.