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“I honestly cannot believe I am here,” Maria said flatly to her reflection, hands curled on the sink in front of her. “This is a terrible idea,” she told herself vehemently. “Liz is a terrible person and Roswell is a terrible place that wants to drink your soul dry until all that is left of you is someone who sells tacky alien souvenirs.” She leaned further into the mirror and half-whispered, “Leave! Leave and never come back.”
“Gee, tell me how you really feel,” a voice behind her said. Maria jumped in surprise as, of all people, Isabel Evans suddenly appeared in the mirror over Maria’s shoulder and checked her lipstick.
“Uh,” Maria managed, clutching her chest in shock as Isabel carefully smoothed back an errant strand of hair into place in her sleek bun. “I don’t really…” Maria stumbled over her words. “It’s just that it’s…why are you even here?” She gestured wildly to show that here meant everything from Roswell, then the crappy bathroom they were standing in, all the way to sharing Maria’s mirror.
Isabel raised an eyebrow, but actually turned from the mirror to look Maria as Maria scowled and crossed her arms accusingly.
Rumors abounded as to what had happened to Evans family, who had all picked up stakes and moved away literally the day after graduation. With zero explanation.
Maria shook her head slowly, clicking her tongue. “You have to remember that this,” her hands swept open and around the dingy bathroom, “is Roswell. Land of endless ridiculous gossip.” Maria folded her hands under her chin sweetly and smiled as Isabel made a face. “Now,” she continued, making herself comfortable against the sink, “while I am pretty sure that Max didn’t snap and murder your parents, as Jenny Lowe once told me, and I know that you probably didn’t actually witness a mob murder, like Creepy Paul thinks, I do know that you’ve never once been back to Roswell since leaving.” Maria pointed at Isabel, “And believe me, I don’t blame you in the slightest. This place is a pit.” Maria glared accusingly at the bathroom door, where the dull thud of techno music insisted on leaking through.
Maria didn’t want to be here at all. She had moved away a few months after graduation herself. Liz had gone off to be an adorably nerdy scientist, and left her alone to slog her way through junior college. She had come back to see her mom, of course, and to work in the shop during summers to save up some rent money for the tiny dump she lived in with three other people during the school year. But she was very happy to see the end of the town every time she left again. And she sure as hell hadn’t been expecting to walk into her freaking high school reunion to see the ever impeccable, not-seen-in-ten-years Isabel Evans looking down at her in confusion when she asked a completely expected question.
Isabel tilted her head questioningly as she visibly worked her way through Maria’s very logical explanations. She opened her mouth a few times as if she was trying to figure out how to answer the rumors of her death at her brother’s hand, but then shook her head in bemusement.
Maria waited patiently with raised eyebrows. Many people were not equipped to keep up with Maria’s train of thought. They needed extra time to process. She was used to it.
“It’s our high school reunion,” Isabel finally said. “Of course I’m going to be here.“ She turned back to the mirror dismissively.
Maria blinked in confusion as Isabel suddenly frowned and looked closer at her reflection.
“Damn,” the taller girl muttered, frowning at the shoulder of her dress. “I didn’t even notice the spit up.” She made a face and dug some baby wipes out of her tiny handbag and offered them to Maria. “Do you mind? I can’t reach, and I refuse to walk around in front of the self-appointed Roswell judgment committee with baby puke on my shoulder.”
“You have a baby?” Maria took the wipes and dabbed at the spot Isabel indicated. Never let it be said that Maria would let the weirdness that was Roswell keep her from helping out a fellow woman. At least the wipes weren’t alien themed.
“Two, actually,” Isabel said absently as she examined Maria’s work. “JJ is three, and Livy is six months tomorrow.”
“You have a six month old, and you willingly dragged yourself from your glamorous castle in Venice - or wherever you live - all the way back to Roswell to attend a high school reunion in a gym decorated with giant, inflatable, glow in the dark alien heads?” Maria shook her head. “I am only here under protest, and only because Liz is deceptive and evil.”
Isabel laughed. “You and Liz are still friends? That’s great - I can’t think of anyone I talk to from high school anymore. Except Max and Michael, of course.” She waved towards the door. “They’re out there somewhere. It took forever to convince them to come. Bribery and coercion was involved. Michael begged to stay home with the kids.”
Maria’s eyebrows flew up as she half-shrieked, “MICHAEL GUERIN is your…?”
Isabel wrinkled her nose in disgust. “Ew, no! He’s basically my brother. Ew!” She shuddered.
Maria took her hand from her chest and took a deep breath. “Good,” she said without thinking. “I mean.” She cleared her throat and looked into the mirror to fuss with her hair. “Um…Zoe always said she thought he’d end up in jail. Did he?”
Isabel didn’t answer, but studied Maria’s face for a beat. She took a step back from the mirror and said breezily, “It’s good to see you, you know. I know we didn’t exactly talk in school, but we always liked how you did things your own way and didn’t seem too worried about other people.” Her smile tilted up a little more, “I mean, I assume so - otherwise I listened to entirely too many monologues like did you see that Maria girl yell at a teacher today?"
Maria blinked after her as Isabel swept by and stepped through the grimy bathroom door without even seeming to touch it.
What.
Just. What?
She sagged against the wall of the bathroom, making a face as she put her hand into something mysteriously sticky. Did Isabel mean that Michael Guerin - the sullen, irritable bad boy who had skipped almost every class they had together except for English and Shop - the guy who had stood up for her unexpectedly when a senior had knocked her lunch out of her hands - had “noticed” her in high school? Like, enough to talk about? In good ways?
Her phone buzzed in her hand and she glanced down to see a line of question marks from Liz.
Whoops.
Maria texted back a string of exclamation points before washing her hands and bracing herself to head back out into hell. Um. The reunion. Whatever.
——————
Isabel banged her handbag down on the table where Michael slumped into a table decorated with blinking spaceships and grinned at him - that too smart, too gleeful smile that generally meant that Michael had been volunteered to do something horrifyingly helpful for people he didn’t know, like, or want to even acknowledge.
He cringed automatically, then cleared his throat when she glared sharply. He turned the cringe into a squint and said, “Wow, these candles are bright.”
She rolled her eyes and said, “Uh huh,” before sitting down daintily and turning a sunny grin on him again. She patted the hand he wasn’t leaning his chin on and said, with the full terrifying force of her personality, “You’re welcome.”
That was a not a good thing to hear from Isabel. Ever.
“Why am I welcome,” he said cautiously, leaning away from her. Maybe she wouldn’t notice his escape attempt if he moved slowly enough. He glanced towards the buffet table, where Max had been hovering for the past twenty minutes, probably trying desperately to find the courage to talk to that Liz girl that Max had a hopeless crush on his entire school life. Now would be a good time for him to give up and come back over here to rescue him.
“I just ran into Maria DeLuca in the bathroom.”
Michael had just picked up his drink when she said that, and he froze for a moment. Then, very carefully, he raised the glass to his mouth and took a drink, not looking at Isabel, who was leaning forward onto her own hands and smiling smugly at him. “Why would I thank you for that?” He managed, once he successfully put his drink back down without spilling it.
She raised her eyebrows and fluttered her eyelashes. “Why, because you talked about her endlessly in high school. I just know you must be dying to catch up with her.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Michael said. “I talked about no one. I barely even talked to most of these people - much less her. So why would I care?”
Isabel waved that off. “She seemed somehow relieved to know that you were not the one who had impregnated me, so I wonder what she thinks of your insistence that you don’t care about this fascinating information?” With that surprising announcement, Isabel sighed at what she saw at the buffet table. “I’m going to go torment Max into finally talking to Liz Parker. Maybe he’ll manage to say more than ”hi,“ or an order for another terrible alien-themed milkshake.” She pushed away from the table before pausing. “Huh. What do you know? Liz and Maria are standing together. I do hope Max doesn’t accidentally let anything slip about why his best friend was always willing to go to the Crashdown with him in high school after I haul him over there and pinch him repeatedly.”
Michael jerked upright in his seat at that, but Isabel was already halfway across the room. Lesser mortals moved out of her way in either admiration or fear. It was hard to tell with Isabel.
Max was looking in her direction and looking alarmed, so at least he knew enough to be afraid.
And sure enough, Maria DeLuca and Liz Parker stood arm in arm in another area of the gym. Liz was laughing with someone - that Whitman kid, maybe - and Maria was examining the life size, tuxedo clad alien figure by the picture area with a suspicious look.
Her hair was different - longer and darker and pulled back off her neck, but her face was expressive as ever as she slung her free arm around the alien’s neck and kissed it on the cheek. Maria DeLuca had always had an energy about her. She had stuck out in school - her laugh would ring across the cafeteria and people would turn to look and she wouldn’t care. She fought passionately for things no one else cared about - like the tree outside the front office that the principal wanted to cut down, or the class goldfish in sixth grade that she had insisted get a proper burial.
She stuck out now, too. She still seemed to be somehow brighter than everything around her.
And Isabel was headed right for her, with a panicked looking Max in her clutches.
Shit.
—————
Maria whispered frantically into Liz’s ear, “She’s coming. Isabel Evans is coming over here and she’s bringing her brother and Michael Guerin has been looking at me for the past two minutes. HELP ME.”
Liz’s mouth opened while she worked through the sudden influx of information. She had years of experience with dealing with Maria-speak, so it didn’t take her nearly as long as it had Isabel. She wrinkled her nose at Maria and shrugged. “You always did find him strangely interesting. Maybe go talk to him?”
Maria gaped at her in disbelief. “I did not find him the slightest bit interesting. You are delusional.”
“Oh, if I’m delusional, then you won’t care when I tell you he’s now headed this way too.” Liz smiled serenely as she let her eyes drift over the room.
“He’s what?” Maria whisper-shrieked. She did not look away from Liz as her best friend’s face broke into a welcoming smile.
“Hi, Isabel,” Liz said. “Hi, Max. Maria told me you were here.”
“Hi, Liz,” a strangled sounding Max said.
Maria glared at Liz again, but Liz didn’t seem to notice. Liz was tucking her hair behind her ears while Max fumbled through a sentence about how good it was to see her, and Maria narrowed her eyes at the betrayal of Liz flirting with Max Evans while Maria was clearly dealing with a minor crisis over here.
“Hey.”
Maria didn’t jump at the sound. Even without Liz telling her that Michael was on his way over, Maria would have known. Her mom had met him once when he came into the store while Maria was helping put out new stock of alien key chains/bottle openers, and Amy DeLuca had looked at her daughter after he left and said, “He vibrates the air around him, doesn’t he?” Maria could have stood blindfolded in a dark room with him and point him out unerringly nine times out of ten because of it.
And now here he was in front of her. His hair was cut short and he was wearing a button down shirt, but she knew the smirk that curled up his lips from years of staring at him after he first shocked Mr. Baker by reciting parts of The Iliad by heart.
She pursed her lips and tried not to smile back. She reached up to curl a piece of her hair around her finger. “Why, Michael Guerin. The rumor mill says that you’re an international jewel thief. How do you plead?”
END