"Uhhh, well, it could," he answered. "But some guys are just not word guys. They could feel the I-love-you thing on the inside but not be able to actually spit it out."
"I just have to say that you've been no help to me," Maria informed him.
"Look, words are overrated," Alex said. "You know how someone feels about you by how they treat you. That's what it comes down to. Now I'm going to go find Isabel, the Vanishing Woman." He stood up and left Maria sitting on the steps alone.
How he treats me, she thought. How he treats me is that he's not getting close enough to treat me in any way at all.
Liz quietly opened her front door. She didn't know why she bothered to be quiet. Her parents always wanted her to tell them when she got home, whether they were sleeping or not.
She headed straight to their bedroom door and gave a quick double knock, followed by three slow ones. She called it the made-it-back-alive-and-drug-free knock. But only to herself, of course.
"Good night, mi hija," her papa called.
"Night," she answered. She wondered if she should phone over to Corrine's and tell Maria or somebody that she wasn't coming. No, they'd figure it out.
She wandered down the hall to the kitchen. She thought she'd get some milk, maybe even some turkey if there was any left. She knew it was going to be one of those nights when she needed a little help going to sleep.
Liz reached for the fridge handle and noticed that a new picture of her had appeared on the door. It was truly embarrassing to see her own face wallpapering the fridge.
At least when Rosa was alive, pictures of her had taken up half the space. Liz reminded herself that she had to go through the basement and see if she could find those pictures. Every single photo of Rosa had disappeared the day after she died.
Not that Liz needed them to remember her sister. She thought about her every day. The same way she'd think of Max.
If…
"I wish I could go out with you guys again tonight," Maria said from her perch on the edge of Alex's chair. "But my dad bought these concert tickets a long time ago. He's really psyched for father-daughter bonding-just me and him, no Kevin."
"Go and bond. It's fine," Max told her. "If anyone else has something to do, go ahead and do it. You've spent the whole day crawling across the desert floor around the chicken rock."
He almost wished they would all go away. At least for a while. It felt so strange being at the center of all this attention-all this anxious, watchful, careful attention.
Michael spread his map out on the Evanses' coffee table. They were using Max and Isabel's place as their home base because their parents were spending the weekend in Clovis, where they had their second office. They had so much work to get done for Monday that they figured it was a waste to drive all the way back to Roswell just to sleep.
"We'll just keep extending our search out in a widening circle around the rock," Michael explained. "Plus Ray's going to keep the area on round-the-clock surveillance. He might be able to spot someone on their way into the compound and follow them."
Maria stood up and grabbed her backpack. Then she rushed over, practically flung herself at Max, and kissed him on the cheek, her aura swooshing through his. "Okay, I'm going. Bye." She turned around and rushed out of the room before he could react.
Max hoped he was wrong, but he thought he'd heard the sound of tears in her voice. If Maria was going to cry every time she looked at him, he really wouldn't be able to take it.
"Alex and Isabel, you take this section," Michael continued. "And Liz and Max-"
He was interrupted by Maria dashing back into the room. "I have an idea. It's kind of wacky, but it might work," she burst out. "You guys know how to use your power to change people's appearance, right?"
Max nodded. He'd only done it once, besides practicing with Ray. And that was to spy on Liz when she was out with another guy. Max glanced over at her, and she smiled at him. He knew she was thinking about the same thing.
"Anyway, I thought all of you could go out to different bars and stuff looking like the guard I saw at the compound where the ship is kept. His face is burned into my memory," Maria explained. "Then maybe somebody who knows the guard, the real guard, will come up and start a conversation. If it's somebody he knows from work-"
"We could get some key information," Michael interrupted. "I think it's definitely worth a shot." He turned to Max. "Want to try it?"
"Why not?" Max asked. Then he remembered. The akino had destroyed his power. How could he have forgotten that? "You and Isabel will have to do it for Liz and Alex and me," he admitted. "I can't do… anything like that anymore."
"Just tell us how," Isabel said quickly.
He hated feeling so helpless. What was next? Would someone have to spoon-feed him? Wipe his butt for him? What?
"It's not that much different from healing," he told Isabel and Michael. "Except instead of squeezing the molecules to close a cut or something, you squeeze them and push them to form the skin and bone into different shapes."
"I'll try it on Liz," Michael said.
Max got up and traded places with Michael so he could be next to Liz. He wasn't too happy with the idea of Michael connecting to Liz, touching her. But he knew he was being a big baby, and he told himself to just get over it.
Maria described the guard with enthusiastic hand movements. "All right, so he had roundish, middle-aged cheeks… and deep laugh lines… and a flat, wide nose."
Michaels eyes widened as he touched his fingertips to Liz's face. His hands began to massage her cheeks, kneading them like dough. He listened to Maria's suggestions and sculpted Liz's face accordingly. In no time Liz's face looked like a middle-aged man's. Michael pulled back his hands and showed Maria the results.
"No, no, no. I'm sorry. It just doesn't look like the image in my head. What if I connect to you, Michael, and transmit my mental picture to you?" Maria asked.
"Let's try it," Michael said.
Maria connected to Michael. He placed his hands on Liz's face again, and it slowly began to morph-the eyes from blue to brown, bushier eyebrows, and a slight double chin. "That's it, that's it," Maria urged him on.
Michael's hands glided up into Liz's hair. It turned mottled orange, then lightened to dishwater blond, and finally changed to white, shrinking in length as it made the color switch. The final result was bristly, just longer than a crew cut.
"Perfect. It's like that doll," Maria mumbled. "You know the one where you could sort of reel its hair back into its head to make it short?"
Liz glanced over her shoulder at Max. "How do I look as a blond? A practically bald blond, I mean," she asked, running her fingers over her buzz cut.
"I wouldn't kick you out of bed," Michael answered before Max could.
"Come on. Let's get on with this," Isabel demanded. "I want to get out of here."
After a couple minutes' work Liz was ready. The Maria-Michael connection moved on to Alex. Isabel decided to morph herself.
"I'm going to get something to drink," Max said. He felt so useless here. Maria giving instructions. Isabel and Michael working on Alex and Liz. And him sitting there twiddling his thumbs. The word loser came to mind.
He slowly made his way into the kitchen, his feet feeling as heavy as cement blocks. He dropped down into the closest chair and rested his head on the table. In here, alone, he didn't have to pretend that he wasn't absolutely exhausted, to the point where just sitting up and breathing felt like a workout.