Author: Annie
Rating: Teen
Disclaimer: I don’t own the characters. They belong to the WB, Fox, and UPN.
Summary: M/M - two-parter. This takes place a few weeks after Balance. It’s the holiday season and Michael is trying to come up with the perfect gift for Maria.
Author's Note: The story is for Nibbles. Thank you for your wonderful donations to Support Stacie and all of the time and effort you've put into the Author Auctions. Plus, you gave me a chance to explore my Candy side.
PS... I just wanted to encourage everyone to check out the Support Stacie website and see if there is anything you might want and be able to do to help. There is another Author Auction coming up ( THREE days left to sign up if you want to offer a story!!!) in April. If nothing else, spread the word. Us Roswellians are seriously underrepresented this time.
More details can be found through the link in my siggie.
Part One:
Michael looked down at silver and turquoise jewelry spread across the table. He had no clue what he was going to pick. Would she like earrings or would the necklace be better? How in the heck was he supposed to decide?
He thought he’d been doing a good job with the idea of getting something out at the reservation. After all, since everything that had happened here a few weeks ago, he’d felt more tied to it. And to Maria, he thought. He definitely felt more tied to Maria, more than he thought ever possible.
It was almost as if the Balance ritual changed something inside of him. Nothing drastic, granted, but Michael felt more settled. With everything he’d been thought in his life, especially the past year, it should be nearly impossible to feel practically calm. In fact, he felt downright normal.
Just imagine an alien walking among the human race feeling completely normal. Wasn’t that a kick in the head?
Still, that was how he felt, and being Michael, he wanted to take this new found inner peace or whatever it was for a ride. So, when Maria decided that the entire group really needed to get into the holiday spirit by doing a gift exchange on Christmas Eve, he’d decided to give it a shot. Sure, he, Max, and Isabel had always exchanged presents, but they had always been more like little tokens. This year, he was really putting some thought behind each gift.
At first, Liz and Alex posed a bit of a challenge, but, in the end, he’d managed to settle on something he thought they would like. Isabel was a no brainer. Every time they passed the little boutique in town, she’d stopped to look at this one item in the display. The only problem he’d with Max’s gift was how time consuming it was to make.
So, now he was down to Maria. How ironic was it that the one person he really wanted to impress was the hardest one to buy for?
Reaching down, Michael picked up a necklace. The silver findings were intricate knots with tiny polished beads dangling down. When the woman on the other side of the table offered him a hopeful smile, he nearly winced. Yes, he’d already looked over everything on display twice. Yes, he’d been there nearly thirty minutes. Still, a customer was a customer, right?
Feeling a little guilty, he offered an unsure smile back. “It’s nice.”
She nodded, but her smile dimmed just a bit. “More than nice,” she told him. “And a bargain too.”
Michael looked down at the price tag. This time he really did wince. “Not that much of one,” he muttered to himself.
“Anita spends several hours on each piece,” a voice said from behind him
.
Recognizing the voice, Michael felt his shoulders stiffen on their own accord. Trying to seem casual, he glanced over his shoulder and saw Eddie standing just a couple feet away. “It’s really nice,” he offered, cursing his lameness the second the words were out of his mouth.
Moving towards the table, Eddie pointed towards a pair of earrings. “These are nice too,” he offered.
Michael looked down at the earrings. Silver wire was twisted into a spiral with a blue stone anchoring the center. Eight other smaller stones were scattered in other places on the wire. Whether they were meant to resemble a galaxy or not, the unique pieces did exactly that.
Yep, as far as girly baubles went, these were pretty neat ones.
With what he hoped was a discreet move, he flipped over the tiny tag to take a look at the price. It was a near thing, but Michael managed not to wince this time. While more reasonable than the necklace, the earrings were still a bit more than he intended to spend. Though it sucked, since he could already picture Maria wearing them, there was just no way he could come up with the difference in time.
Giving the ground a little kick with the toe of his boot, Michael put down the box containing the earrings. “I’m just going to keep looking around,” he muttered. “Thanks anyway.” Turning, he gave Eddie a short wave and made his way back to his bike.
~~~~
Eddie glanced down at the earrings as he heard Michael’s bike peal down the dirt road that lead into the reservation. A little twinge of pity rippled through his stomach when he remembered the teen’s face as he placed the box back on the table. The combination of longing and regret had been too powerfully written on his face to be mistaken.
That alone was unusual. Out of all the teens from Roswell that visited the Reservation over the last several weeks, Eddie had seen firsthand that Michael was the most reserved emotionally. He was the loner lost within a group of friends he was trying to accept.
Maybe that was why Eddie found him to be the most fascinating. After all, like recognizes like.
Though his reasons ran nowhere near as deep as Michael’s, he knew how it felt to be different, how that feeling could lead a child to withdraw into themselves. He also knew that if steps weren’t taken, it was nearly impossible for the child to escape becoming lonely and bitter when he was grown. For some reason he’d yet to explore, that was the last thing Eddie wanted to see happen to Michael Guerin.
He knew the teen was trying. He’d nearly bit his own lip through trying to hold back a laugh at the expression of sheer panic on the Michael’s face as he struggled to buy a gift for his girlfriend. It reminded him so clearly of his first attempt buy a gift for a girl he liked. There had been no one to help him out then, and it appeared to Eddie that Michael felt there was no one to help him now.
An idea began to form in his mind as he looked at the earrings again. Yes, he thought, they would suit the little blond waitress very well.
With a wicked gleam in his eyes, Eddie lifted the box and handed it to his cousin. “Anita, what kind of deal will you make me on these?”