Dreamwalk

2

«There you are," Isabel exclaimed with relief as she found her brother in the back room. «Come on, we're up next.» She plopped a baseball cap on his head and grabbed him by the arm.

«Isabel, wait," he tried to say, but she ignored him.

«Whatever end-of-the-world situation we're in the middle of, it can wait.» She pulled him to the door. «We're doing this.»

It was now the time for Isabel to pay her respects to the one boy who had truly loved her, even though she had pushed him aside-not because she didn't want him, but because she didn't want him to be hurt. But he had been hurt-killed-and since she couldn't change the past, she was going to do her best to honor him in the present.

«Isabel-," Kyle started to say as she pushed the still swinging door back open.

«Hey, Kyle," she replied before he could say anything else. «Glad you made it in time for our skit.» Then she and Max were out of the kitchen.

«I'm not going to miss this one," Michael said as he followed.

Alone with her ex-boyfriend, Liz asked the obvious: «What's wrong?»

«Nothing," he replied unconvincingly.

«Are you sure?» she asked. «Michael was right. You don't look too well.»

«Lack of sleep," he replied curtly. «We should get out there.» Kyle didn't give Liz a chance to respond and he headed out to the cafe part of the Crashdown and took a seat with his dad.

Isabel stepped into the glow of the small spotlight that was also borrowed from the school AV closet. She had gone to the school over the weekend with Max and Michael to pick everything up. Granted, it hadn't actually been a faculty sanctioned visit to the school, nor did they technically have permission to borrow the equipment, but it was for a good cause. Besides, with classes out for the summer, they didn't know how else to get inside, and they fully intended to return the equipment before anyone would even miss it.

Wearing a baseball cap of her own, she waited while her brother helped Ms. DeLuca clean the glitter, confetti, and pork rinds that she had spilled out during her performance art piece. It had been actually a poignant tribute, although Isabel still didn't understand how the pork rinds fit in.

Using the extra time, Isabel went over the routine in her head once again. She had convinced her brother to perform the comedy skit with her by explaining that Alex had loved old-time vaudeville comedians, especially

Abbott and Costello. He had even managed to drag Isabel to the annual Roswell Weekend Classic Comedy Movie Marathon at the Palace Theatre last year. He had always been trying to get her to see classic cinema, and she was glad now that at least once, she had given in to him. At first, she had questioned her own idea to do a comedy sketch at a memorial service, but Liz had supported her by agreeing that it totally fit in with the evening's theme. In tribute, she chose Abbott and Costello's famous «Who's on First?» routine to perform for the group.

Ms. Deluca had finally managed to get all the remnants of her performance off the floor, which allowed for Isabel to step up to the microphone. She took a deep breath before speaking her memorized introduction.

«Alex loved to laugh," she said to the crowd of friends. «Even in times of crisis, he would come up with some totally out-of-place comment that would always break the tension. With that in mind, my brother and I would like to perform one of his favorite comedy routines, altered slightly to meet the abilities of the performers.»

Taking a moment to get accustomed to the audience, Isabel couldn't help but wish that there were a couple more familiar faces looking on. Naturally, she missed Alex and wanted him back more than anything, but she had also hoped that Jesse Ramirez could have been there as well.

She had only recently begun dating the handsome young lawyer from her dad's firm, but somehow she knew that they were destined to be together forever. Of course, forever was going to have to wait until such time that she could actually tell someone they were dating. Things were

just too complicated right now for her to explain that she was falling in love with someone while still mourning Alex's death. And things would be even more complicated when the time came that she would have to introduce Jesse into her crazy alien life. For now, she wanted to enjoy her time as a recent high school graduate and the life of a seemingly normal teen. As long as she and Jesse kept their secret, she would always have one very important part of her life that was blissfully normal.

«So… I recently bought a baseball team," Max said, standing beside her on the makeshift stage.

Immediately pulled from her musings into the real world, Isabel caught the end of her brother's cue. «Oh really," she said. «I love baseball players. So, tell me the names of the guys on your team.»

«Well," Max said as he began the comedic part of the classic skit. «Who's on first-"

«That's what I want to know," Isabel interrupted, pretending to be confused.

«And that's why I'm telling you," Max said in a mock stern voice. «If you'll just listen to me.»

«Okay," Isabel replied. «Who's on first?»

«Exactly.» Max gave a sharp nod of his head.

Isabel squinted her eyes in an effort to act confused. «What?»

«He's on second," Max replied.

«Who's on second?» Isabel asked.

«No," Max corrected her with a forced tone of annoyance. «Who's on first.» They received their first restrained chuckle from the audience. Somehow dancing came easier than laughing, but they were beginning to get into the routine.

«I don't know!» Isabel replied, pretending to get annoyed.

«He's on third base," Max said to the first real laugh from the audience.

Isabel loved hearing the laughter because it made everything all right for at least a little while. More importantly, she finally got the joke herself. When Alex had dragged her to the classic movie marathon she had laughed at the funny parts, but she'd never really understood why laughing was so important. In her life, between being chased by the FBI and fighting off an attack from the Skins, there often seemed so little to laugh about. She finally understood the power of humor and why Alex always seemed to have a joke or a lighthearted comment ready just when she needed it most.

But as she looked out to the crowd, she realized that someone wasn't laughing. At first, she had noticed Kyle because he seemed to be nodding off during the show. Not only did Kyle look like he was struggling to stay awake during their skit, but he seemed intent on it, and not just for the sake of being polite. What's going on with Kyle? she asked herself. He has a look of… terror?

Isabel made a mental note to ask him about it later, because she needed to concentrate on the last bit of wordplay involved or else she was going to blow the joke entirely.

«So, let me get this straight," she said, gearing up for the finale. «The ball is thrown to Who. But, whoever it is at first drops the ball and the runner heads to second. So, Who picks up the ball and throws it to What. What throws it to I Don't Know. I Don't Know throws it back to Tomorrow.

Triple play. Then, say another guy gets up and hits a long fly ball to Because. Why? I don't know\ He's on third and I don't give a darn!

«What?» Max asks, going in for the capper.

«I said I don't give a darn!» Isabel replied, acting exhausted by it all.

«Oh, that's our shortstop.»

Uproarious laughter filled the Crashdown, and Isabel found herself giggling right along with everyone. The evening was turning out to be just what they all needed. A night to remember Alex fondly, without alien worries interfering. They had come together to provide support for one another as they began to distance themselves from Alex's death. Although he would never be forgotten, this was the right time for his friends to start the healing and eventual moving on. Everyone seemed to be having a great time.

Everyone but Kyle.

Making their way out of the spotlight, Isabel and her brother accepted the adulation and pats on the back from their audience. Liz stepped up to hug Max, giving him the kind of warm kiss that Isabel had not seen them share in quite some time. For the briefest moment, she was jealous of the fact that she couldn't be so public with the guy she was seeing. But, the trade-off for her clandestine relationship with Jesse was well worth the few pangs of regret.

Setting her sites on Kyle, Isabel continued through the crowd as the band took the stage for another short set. Kyle was looking down at his glass of soda, transfixed by it. Beside the glass, his fingers drummed a repetitive beat.

Tap, tap, tap. Tap, tap.

Tap, tap, tap. Tap, tap.

Isabel remembered when Liz explained that the tapping fingers were some kind of side effect experienced by people that Tess had mindwarped. It had happened to Maria's mom after Tess had forced her to forget a particularly confusing evening at the UFO Center. When Ms. DeLuca had started to remember things, her fingers would drum on the counter. It had also happened when Kyle remembered the horrible things that Tess had made him forget. But Maria had been keeping tabs on her mom, and reported that Ms. DeLuca had stopped tapping her fingers weeks ago. Why hasn't Kyle?

«So what, your soda's more interesting than our skit?» Isabel asked, smiling.

Apparently unaware of the fact that she was speaking to him, Kyle took a moment before he looked up at her. «Oh, no… no. I was just… thinking.» «Is something wrong?» she asked, about to take a seat. «Yes," he replied, standing. «Can we go somewhere and talk?»

Without waiting for an answer, Kyle started heading for the back of the cafe as the band struck up yet another cheerful tune. They had exhausted their entire repertoire of original songs in the first set and had moved on to top-forty hits. Oddly, however, Maria had not joined them again.

Dutifully, Isabel followed Kyle, concerned for her friend. Unfortunately, when the pair walked into the back room of the Crashdown, they came right in on the middle of another one of Michael and Maria's love spats, which explained the singer's momentary absence from the stage.

«And look at your jeans!» Maria said in a tone of voice that was just short of yelling, not wanting to disturb the party in the other room.

«Oh, now you're going to insult my clothing?» Michael shot back in his usual sarcastic, defeatist tone.

«Black!» she slammed her locker door for effect. «It was the one color Liz specifically asked us not to wear. And look at you. Black jeans. Was it that difficult of a rule to understand? Should I have brought a color wheel by to explain what would have been an appropriate hue?»

«Sorry I don't own an extensive wardrobe," he said by way of an explanation. «I wore what was clean. Besides, I think you're wearing enough colors in that outfit for the both of us.»

«I'm sorry," Kyle mumbled as he started to back out the door.

Isabel, however, was having none of that tonight. «Can't you two just put your petty little arguments on hold for one evening? It's really gotten way past the point of cute lovers' quarrels. Maria, why don't you go out there and sing some more with the band. Michael, you go watch her.»

Without another word, Michael and Maria left the room in a huff. As soon as they were out the door, Isabel laughed to herself. «Some people express their love for each other in the strangest ways.»

«Yeah," was the only response Kyle could muster.

«Okay, Kyle, spill it.»

He took a deep breath, as if stalling for time to either convince himself to speak or to brace himself for Isabel's reaction for what he was about to say. «You remember the

time you took me on a dreamwalk into the mind of the Playboy Playmate of the Year?» Kyle asked.

Isabel was afraid to think about where this one was going. «Yes. Afterward, I couldn't bathe long enough to make me feel clean after I realized the things you had in mind.»

«I've been thinking a lot about that lately," he said, with no trace of lecherous teenage humor in his voice. His fingers were tapping against Liz's metal locker.

Tap, tap, tap. Tap, tap.

«I'm sure you have," Isabel said, taking his hand so that the metal-amplified drumming would stop. «But we won't be doing that again. I don't usually bring guests with me when I dreamwalk.»

«That's not what I want.»

«Then what, Kyle?» Isabel checked through the door's window to make sure none of the «out of the loop» guests was going to stumble across their conversation. It was more out of habit than concern. «What's with the mood you're in? I mean, obviously we're all upset, but you seem to be really agitated at the moment. I didn't think you and Alex were all that close.»

«Right now, I feel closer to him than I think anyone else could," Kyle replied in a monotone. «I did kill him, after all.»

A flood of denials came rushing to Isabel's mind. It was just a matter of which one would come out of her mouth first. «That's ridiculous. Tess killed him. You had nothing to do with it.»

«But if I hadn't come into the room," he explained, «if I hadn't opened the door when I did, maybe Tess wouldn't have been pushing so hard on Alex's mind. She was trying

to get him to shut up in front of me. She killed him because of me.»

Isabel took a moment to gather her thoughts. She wasn't prepared to handle such a conversation, but knew that what she was about to say would carry a lot of weight with him. «And if 1 hadn't introduced Alex to Tess, it wouldn't have happened. And if Liz hadn't told him our secret, it wouldn't have happened. And if our spaceship had crashed in Tupelo, Mississippi, it wouldn't have happened. Kyle, there are millions of things that could have been done to avoid it, but none of us has the power to see the future. We can't stop things before they happen.»

«But you can change things after the fact," Kyle replied. «You can make people change.»

Isabel knew what he was talking about. «Kyle, Tess mindwarped you into helping her set up Alex's death. You didn't know what you were doing.»

«I loaded him into the car like he was a duffel bag," Kyle reminded her.

«Because you thought he was," she shot back. «You had no control over your actions. She was using you.»

«That's not much consolation," he replied. «Buddha says, 'Kill not, but have regard for life.'"

Isabel didn't have a good response to that one, so she went with the obvious. «I really don't care what Buddha says. I truly doubt that Buddha ever considered alien mind tricks when coming up with life philosophies.»

She managed to elicit a slight smile from Kyle on that one. But it was quickly wiped away. In the momentary pause that followed, they both listened to the music coming from the restaurant. Apparently, Maria had taken Isabel's

suggestion and once again had joined in with the band. She was wrapping up a tune by the group Save Ferris. It was a band Isabel knew Alex had loved.

«Kyle, why are you telling all this to me?» Isabel asked.

«I've been having trouble sleeping," he said. «I keep replaying the memory of Alex's death. Every time I close my eyes, I see myself walking in on them. Sometimes, I see myself in Alex's place. Other times, I see things that have nothing to do with it. Strange things that I don't understand.»

«What kinds of things?»

«Everything," he replied. «And nothing, too. I can't explain it.»

«So that's why you look so tired.»

«It's not just when I'm sleeping," he continued. «This afternoon, I was working on a car when I got flashes of Alex's car hitting the truck. Isabel, I wasn't even there when the collision happened.»

But Isabel knew what he was talking about, because she had seen it too. She thought it had been normal for the imagination to make them see these things. «I think that's just our minds trying to explain things. Since we weren't witnesses, our minds are making up the scenario so we can find some kind of closure.»

«It's not closure," he said, sure of himself. «It's getting worse. Much worse.»

«How?»

«It started out as just some nightmares and daydreams," he explained. «Normal grieving stuff. But now I can't get my mind off it. No matter what I do, I just keep seeing things that I have no control over.»

«So, what can I do?» she asked, cautiously.

«Well, since the problem is dream related," Kyle began his pitch, «I was thinking maybe you could go in there and fix things.»

«Fix your dreams?» she asked for clarification, because she wasn't exactly sure what he was proposing.

Kyle sensed her reluctance. «You've manipulated dreams before. I'd just go to sleep, and you would pop into my head and remove all the images of Alex's death.»

«That's not manipulating dreams," Isabel said. «That's displacing memories. When I go into someone's dreams, it's purely harmless recreation. I'm only playing around with the dream. This is… different.»

«But, Tess-"

«Has entirely different powers than I do," she reminded him. «I can't just go in and change your thoughts.»

«Have you ever tried?» he asked, suspecting that he knew the answer.

«No.»

«Then how do you-"

«It's too dangerous," she stopped him before he continued down this track. «We have no idea what that could do to you. It's just too dangerous.»

«I'm willing to take that risk," he said. «I have nothing left to lose.»

«Alex died," she said flatly. «He died because Tess went too far with her powers. I'm not going to do the same thing.»

«But it's the only way," Kyle said.

«Have you even considered some kind of therapy?» Isabel said. «Maybe something more interactive than speaking to Buddha?»

«I would love to talk to someone about this," his agitation level was rising. «Tell me who. Tell me what therapist on Earth I can talk to and explain that I'm plagued by images in a murder I took part in because an alien messed with my mind. I would love to get normal help, but normal and Roswell don't mix.»

Isabel couldn't argue that fact. She, Max, and Michael had lived with the secret all their lives. They'd known pretty much from the start that they were different. But their friends were pulled into their crazy lives, and now everyone's concept of normal had been thrown completely upside down. Isabel couldn't help but feel that she owed Kyle, but she also knew that she couldn't risk his life. «I'm sorry," she whispered. «I can't.»

The statement hung in the air for the longest time as music continued to waft in from the other room. Kyle and Isabel just stared at each other, until finally the moment was broken by something entirely unexpected. Apparently, Maria had taken a break from performing with the band.

«Is that my dad?» Kyle asked as they listened to the impossible. «Is he… singing?»