#isobelevansweek20

This weekend was their 23rd birthday and the one single thing Michael wanted was his boyfriend to come visit him. After some last-minute arrangements and a little bit of influence, Isobel had convinced Alex’s boss to let him have the weekend off. But Alex was apparently scared of planes (which was downright comical for someone in the Air Force to be scared of planes, by the way) and Michael couldn’t afford to take the day off of work to go get him, so that left Isobel.

She hadn’t expected to run over something sharp enough to pop her tire though.

"Where is your spare?" Alex asked, already digging through her trunk.

"I'm already using my spare," Isobel said, gesturing towards the back wheel. He stared at her for a solid 30 seconds in disbelief.

"You're joking," he said blandly. Isobel raised her eyebrows to say she absolutely wasn't and that's why she was so irritated. She didn't want to be stuck with him in the middle of the goddamn desert. "Right."

Isobel watched in veiled amusement as Alex felt his pockets and pulled out his phone, squinting as he held it up to try to find signal. She watched him walk around in search and spent that time trying to figure out what exactly Michael saw in him.

He was handsome enough, she guessed, but he'd gone from a fashion disaster in high school to a military man with unflatteringly short hair and plain clothes that could be on any man in the entire US. The few conversations she'd had with Alex had told her nothing about him, even their car ride consisted of short answers. Imagining that with Michael didn't make sense.

Isobel was broken from her daze as he jumped onto the hood of the car and walked to stand on the roof.

"What are you doing?!" Isobel yelled. He ignored her, squinting up at the sun as he held the phone to his ear.

"Guerin? Hey, can you hear me?" Alex said into the phone, voice the same exact tone as it was when he spoke to her. She didn't like that either. She saw the way Michael melted when he thought about him. He deserved sweetness too. "Shit, look, if you can hear me, Isobel's tire is blown. We're 40 miles northwest of Roswell. I'll try to send a text."

Alex ended the call and stayed posted up on the roof of the car as he typed out a message, clearly posing as if he had a photoshoot no one else knew about before jumping off. Isobel stared dully at him.

"Am I supposed to be impressed?" she asked. 

"No," he said, shrugging off his jacket so he was left in a plain white tank top and plain baggy jeans.

Clearly, she was supposed to see something in him that she saw in herself. Michael always said how similar they were, but she knew damn well she wasn't that closed off and boring. Or, at least, she hoped.

Alex's phone dinged with a message after a few minutes of him pointlessly inspecting the tire and he looked at it with a bored expression.

"Michael said he's on his way, but it'll probably take him at least an hour to find us," Alex explained, pushing himself to an upright position again. 

"Oh, so we can call him Michael as long as he can't hear?" Isobel asked. Alex raised an eyebrow.

"What?"

"I've only heard you call him Guerin to his face.”

Alex didn’t reply as he kicked the tire and then sighed. She waited for him to respond, but it didn’t happen and he just leaned against the car. Isobel stared at him and he stared at the ground. The silence seemed to drag on as the sun just beamed down with unforgiving heat, but Alex easily seemed to be in a spotlight. She hadn’t really noticed that he was attractive before since he wasn’t her type (and she definitely wasn’t his), but he seemed to glow like a model under the sun. His skin was tanned and his biceps were sculpted. She could understand why Michael liked at least that.

Isobel was nearly sweating by the time she said, “You know, Michael wanted us to bond, but you don’t talk very much.”

“What’s there to talk about?”

“I don’t know, what’s it like being queer in the military?” Isobel asked immediately. He shot her an icy glare that made her have to hold back a smile that, after hours of being locked in a car with him, she got a reaction. “What, gonna try to deny that?”

“I didn’t deny shit.”

“Okay, then what’s it like?” she prodded. Alex huffed a dry laugh and shook his head.

“How about you tell me what it’s like to be white and thriving off Daddy’s money in the suburbs?” Alex shot back. Isobel raised an unbothered eyebrow.

“Shouldn’t you know a little about that too?”

“My dad’s got money,” Alex said, a cynical smile on his face as he held out his hand as if that was enough explanation for the other part he didn’t quite fit, “Not me.”

“Fair enough,” Isobel agreed. Alex took a deep, grounding breath and then to sit on the hood of the car. Isobel gave him a few seconds before following and sitting beside him.

“Oh my God,” he groaned softly.

“You know, you should learn to like me,” Isobel said, “According to Michael, we’re very similar.”

“I don’t see it.”

“Neither do I.”

They sat on the car in silence again. The cynicism seemed to boil between them as they waited for Michael, so, when a truck pulled up in front of them, they both let out sighs of relief. Except, when the dust settled, it was clear that it wasn’t Michael and the figure of a man sat in the driver’s seat instead.

“Get in the car,” Alex said, eyes narrowed as he sat up straighter and stared at the truck, “Lock the doors.”

“What? It’s not that big of a deal, he’s probably just offering help,” Isobel said. Alex shook his head.

“Get in the car and lock the doors” Alex repeated, sliding off the hood.  

Isobel didn’t move as he walked with a confident air, shoulders back and a cocky swagger in his step. Michael liked to imitate that walk when he was pretending to be big and bad, but he was always comically bad at pulling it off. Alex, on the other hand, actually managed to look at least semi-intimating and entirely capable when he did it. She might’ve been impressed if she wasn’t scared that would piss off the stranger in the truck.

The guy got out of his truck with his hands shoved deep in his pockets, looking perfectly normal and not at all scary if not for that one little fact. Alex seemed to spot that right away and angled himself so his left side was closer towards the car.

“Y’all need some help?” he asked.

“Thanks, but we have someone a few minutes out,” Alex responded.

“You sure about that?” the guy asked, eyes going to Isobel, “‘Cause I bet the pretty little lady you got there might not wanna wait in this heat. You really gonna make her wait?”

“Yeah,” Alex said cooly, not moving as he provided a block between the two of them, “I am, actually.” 

Isobel had her nose scrunched up in disgust, but she appreciated Alex’s dismissive attitude. That was the first time she could see herself in him like Michael always said.

“Thank you, but you can go now,” Alex said.

“I can stay until your ride gets here,” the guy said. Isobel silently questioned if Alex was psychic or just so paranoid and it was simply a coincidence that he was right.

“No, we’re fine,” Alex said firmly.

The guy’s eyes found Isobel again and she just kept her stern face of disgust. She’d decided a long time ago not to be scared of men anymore. Sure, the drifter was scary and so were all the other creepy men she encountered on a daily basis, but she had learned how to take care of herself. She refused to give them the satisfaction.

“You want me to stay, don’t you?” he asked Isobel, tilting his head in her direction. She gave a smile and waved goodbye wordlessly. He laughed and went to take a step closer.

Alex put a hand on his chest before he could get around him, not-so-kindly pushing him back. Another check in the box of what Michael saw in him.

“Oh, c’mon,” the guy said.

“Fuck off,” Alex told him, unmoving. 

“You heard the man,” Isobel said, trying not to sound too playful despite her utter enjoyment at watching Alex shut him down, “Fuck off.”

“I’m just tryin’ to help, you don’t have to be so ungrateful,” the guy said, fiddling with his pockets a little more. Isobel watched his hands carefully and hoped this wasn’t about to turn into a shitty horror movie. She didn’t sign up for that. She barely signed up for picking up Alex in the first place.

The guy took a step forward again and Alex again pushed him away. However, the guy took his hands out of his pockets and pushed him back. Isobel sat up straight, adrenaline pumping through her as she tried to figure out how to prevent her brother’s boyfriend from getting beaten to a pulp.

By the time the first two punches were thrown, she slid off the hood of the car and ran over to them. She grabbed Alex’s arm and pulled him away and stood between them, letting Alex still glare over her shoulder as he wiped a bit of blood from beneath his nose.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?!” Isobel snapped over her shoulder at the strange man, “You just pulled over looking for a fight?!” 

He gave a cold little laugh, all too similar to what that drifter had sounded like that night almost 10 years before, and he reached out to grab her waist. And Isobel realized that it had nothing to do with looking for a fight from Alex at all.

“Get the fuck off of me!” she yelled, squirming just enough to get where she could elbow him between his legs. He groaned, letting her fall to the ground pathetically. Her heart was thudding in her ears and she was breathing heavily, but she managed to scramble to her feet quick enough to not show any ounce of weakness to the stranger.

Alex had grabbed him by the shirt collar while he was down and dragged him back to his truck, slamming the door. Isobel spat on the hood so she could at least do something.

“Man, y’all are fuckin’ crazy,” the stranger said as he quickly started up his truck. A whole slew of obscenities came to Isobel’s mind in response, but her heavy breathing only allowed her to hold up her middle finger. Alex stayed right by the truck until it peeled off.

Once he was completely out of sight and the initial adrenaline started to fade, Isobel felt like she couldn’t breathe. Tears burned at her eyes and that stupid, stupid fear that he was going to come back for her burned in her mind. With the drifter, even after watching Max tackle him to where his head slammed against a rock and even after watching Michael dig a grave for an hour straight, she always felt like he was going to come back. She’d finally gotten over that feeling.

“Isobel?” Alex asked, voice soft for the very first time, “Hey, are you okay? I’m sorry I let him grab you like that, but he’s gone now.”

She struggled to find her breath, struggled to hear him properly, struggled to do anything but feel overwhelmed with fear. Alex held his hands out in front of her eyes, a silent way to ask if he could touch her. She gave a short little nod despite not wanting him. She wanted her brothers, but they weren’t here. Alex would have to do.

Instead of a hug though, Alex gently grabbed her arm and led to help her sit down on the sand. They both sat criss-cross across from each other, their knees touching. He still had blood under his nose, but he didn’t seem to mind as he looked her in the eye.

“You’re allowed to feel this way,” he said and he held her hand, just being there until she was able to calm herself down.

She felt so stupid. Logically, she was overreacting. It wasn’t that big of a deal. Would she still feel like this if she didn’t have that experience with that drifter? Would still she feel overwhelmed? Would she still want Michael and Max as much as she did? But no matter how stupid she felt, Alex kept saying that she was allowed to cry and overreact and be this way. He wasn’t freaked out. He didn’t ask questions. He just told her it was valid.

And she really understood what Michael meant about them being similar.

Eventually, her crying subsided and she calmed down enough to at least pretend to be normal. She would probably hug Michael once he got there until she felt all the way better, but she was okay.

“Thanks,” Isobel said, drying her eyes with her hand that wasn’t still gripping his.

“Don’t thank me,” he said. She looked at him for a moment and weighed the options of telling Alex about the drifter so he would understand a little better. It was obviously not her place to tell the actual aftermath of it, but she could tell him the first part.

“On our 13th birthday, Michael, Max, and I went out camping and I left the tent to go pee, so I was by myself. Then this guy came out of nowhere and grabbed me and started dragging me away, I’ve never been so scared in my life,” she admitted. Alex didn’t show much emotion other than his eyebrows raising slightly. “Max and Michael had to fight him off. I was so fucking helpless and I told myself I would never be helpless again. But I guess I still am. What a great 10th anniversary reminder, am I right?”

“What are you talking about, you’re not helpless. You got that guy to let go of you and, if I wasn’t here, you probably would’ve easily beat the shit out of him yourself. You were back on your feet in seconds. You’re a fighter, that’s what fighters do,” Alex said. Isobel shook her head, looking over to the side. “Hey, I’m serious. That wasn’t proof that you’re still helpless, that was proof that you’ve grown. Trauma doesn’t go away, but you’ve clearly done a damn good job at making it your bitch. You held your ground until you were safe and that’s the best you could’ve possibly done, so don’t beat yourself up about it. You did great. I’m proud of you.”

Isobel huffed a little laugh, “How many years of therapy have you had?”

Alex scrunched up his nose and held up his hand, his thumb and index finger about an inch apart. Isobel shook her head through another laugh before sniffling. They sat there for a few more minutes before Isobel eventually got up so she could go fix her makeup and not look like a crying mess.

“Can we not tell Michael about this?” she asked cautiously, “Like, we can tell him the situation, but not the part where he grabbed me? Because I know him and Max and I don’t want to deal with that.”

“Absolutely, no problem,” Alex said, “Don’t really wanna deal with telling him that either.”

Isobel sat in the driver’s seat and Alex sat in the passenger seat, each of them touching up their face in respective ways. Both of them made a few small comments here and there, keeping the conversation light and the mood high. This day would just be their little secret.

not everything pretty sparkles and shines

She walks into the weirdness that Planet 7 has always been because she wants to prove to herself that she isn’t only what she’s become these past years.

She’s much more than Noah’s wife – now his contrite widow – and she’s much more than the pretty face who smiles at the events she helps to organize. She’s much more than just another Roswell High Queen who never left her hometown.

She may not know who she is yet. But she has come to realize that she can be much more than what others want her to be.