I still can’t really believe it. My daughter ran off with a group of aliens. That sounds way too far-fetched. Even for the woman who runs Roswell’s alien gift shop.

I’ve had a long talk to Jim about it, and all six of us parents have had discussions about it too. We’re all still in shock really, except Jim of course. I can’t believe how much he did and gave up for them. None of us can. The Evan’s have the slight advantage that they found out before their children left, but even they are still in shock over the whole thing.

I can’t believe an alien saved my daughter’s best friend’s life only for another to kill her other best friend.

I’ve visited the boulder that used to contain the pod chamber, the place where the love of my daughter’s life was born. I now know why she used to disappear at times without reason and it is a relief to find out that she wasn’t just off having sex.

I can’t believe how responsible and mature they’ve been about the whole thing. Six teenagers bound together by a secret and up against many unknown enemies, and they survived every time. Well… most of them.

I now understand why Maria pulled away from Alex for a while. Why I found Michael sleeping in her bed that morning. Why their relationship was always so much more complicated than most teenage relationships are.

There are two entries in Liz’s journal that I can’t get out of my head. One was from the day that the aliens almost left to go to their home planet. It’s there that Liz records her jealousy… Jealousy because Michael stayed for Maria while Max almost left. I have to say that I almost couldn’t believe it when I first read it. Michael stayed on earth because he loved my daughter so much he couldn’t leave her, not even for the home he’d been searching his whole life to find.

The second was not too much later, when Liz wrote that Maria and Michael had been sleeping together since the night the aliens were supposed to leave. Of course there were other comments in the entry, but the major thing I picked up on was that Michael gave Maria flashes to let her see the true him.

I wasn’t surprised to find out they had been sleeping together since the end of their junior year of high school. And honestly, I wasn’t even mad about it either. Strange, I know.

But I’d seen the way Michael had looked after Maria after Alex died. I’d seen the love in his eyes, the pain at seeing Maria so upset. Even I could see how deeply they loved one another. I think I even knew back then, subconsciously, that they would do anything for each other.

I can’t believe that at seventeen years of age my daughter had already found the kind of love I’ve been searching my whole life for and have never found. She’s already found the love of her life, the only person that she wants to be with, and its not surprisingly that she left for him.

Yes, for him. I know that her best friend was leaving too, as well as her only other good friends in the world, and that she and Michael had been broken up due to reasons I never knew. But I know my daughter well enough to know that the primary reason she left was for Michael. That despite their break up that she was still desperately in love with him.

I should be worried about how physical their relationship is. I know that now, after she left for him, that they will surely be back to the place in their relationship that they were before they broke up. My daughter is sleeping with an alien – I should be freaking out. But I know that Michael and my daughter will be careful. I know it’s not just lust and hormones, it’s love.

I have to wonder just how and when it happened though. How did a girl who was scared of abandonment fall for a boy, an alien, who was on a quest to find his home planet?

I know one thing though. No one expected it to end up the way it did. Not me, not even their friends. I know how Liz felt. She thought it was just hormones, that Michael was just using her. I have to admit I was scared of the same thing, especially after a comment Maria once said to me. I know that Liz never really supported their relationship, that she thought that what she and Max had was special and that what Maria had with Michael wasn’t.

But from my older and slightly wiser perspective I can see now what I don’t think Liz has realized yet. My daughter has found something that both Liz and I dream of. She’s found someone who’ll stay for her. Neither I nor Liz have truly found that. The man I thought I loved left me, just like Max almost left Liz the day Michael proved his love for my daughter.

Liz may be married and happy, but despite the loss of my daughter I am content and secure in the knowledge that despite Max’s polite ways, clean-cut look and high school diploma my Maria is loved by the better alien. The alien who will love her, protect her, and who I know I can trust with her life.

He stayed on earth for Maria, and I know my daughter could never find anyone who loves her more, who is more devoted to her, than Michael Guerin. An alien.

The End