I'm Liz Parker, and I grew up in a small town miles from anywhere ... a small town where rumors are an industry and innuendo a pastime.

Since high school, I've been watching my back, keeping secrets. Including the biggest secret of all -- that there is truth to Roswell, New Mexico's most cherished rumor.

It's night as I write this ... "this" being my journal, something I've kept religiously since high school, since the day in the Crashdown Cafe when Max Evans healed a bullet wound two inches below my ribs. It's night now, and it's been a long time since high school.

Max isn't home yet, so I'm waiting. He's working late at the hospital tonight. His best friend, Michael Guerin, and his sister, Isabel, still think it's funny that Max should be studying to be a doctor. Sometimes I see their point. Someone who can heal fatal injuries with a touch of his hand using stethoscopes and band-aids and plaster casts seems unlikely. But Max loves medical school. He thinks it's the perfect cover. He describes it as his way to be normal, to study a subject he finds fascinating, and to help humans all at the same time.

A love of biology -- of science in general and the reality of how things work in the world specifically -- is one of the interests Max and I share. We also share a secret, Max's secret ... the one he shares with Michael and Isabel ... the secret of who and what they really are.

Max and I also share an apartment these days. After all we've been through together, after everything that has happened, considering who we are, it made sense for us to stick together when we're both so far from home. Boston is a good place to be if you're a student, which is what we both are. As I mentioned earlier, Max is med student, interning at one of the hospitals here. I'm pursuing my lifelong dream and am working towards my doctorate in molecular biology. Max and I were the only two people each other knew when we first arrived in Boston. It just made sense for us to share an apartment in such an expensive city so far from home.

You might be wondering what I, Liz Parker, am leaving out ... whether I'm being deliberately coy, or doth-protesting too much. Let me be honest then. Max and I may have started out as logical roommates, platonic friends who knew and realized and respected the dangers of being together. But we didn't stay that way.

How could we?

Max Evans hasn't changed that much since high school. He is still quiet, still reserved, still cautious, still over-responsible. When he lifts his soulful brown eyes to mine, how he feels about me -- how he has always felt about me -- is obvious. And I haven't changed that much since high school either. When I look back at him, my eyes tell him that how I feel about him hasn't changed, won’t ever change. It was inevitable that we couldn't remain platonic roommates.

So here I am, waiting for Max Evans to come home to me. We need to talk.

Usually when Max comes home this late, it means that the attending doctors were even harder than usual on the interns and/or that some emergency required "all hands on deck." Don't get me wrong. I don't begrudge the time Max spends at the hospital; it's important to him, so it's important to me. But I can't help resenting ... worrying about him when he comes home so exhausted he can barely find the light switch in the bathroom. Sometimes I worry that Max gets more tired trying to be normal -- trying not to use his powers to help, trying to deny who he is -- than just from being your average medical student. Given how late it is right now, I know that when Max finally does get home tonight, he'll be so tired that he'll just crawl into bed beside me, kiss me quickly on the forehead, and fall into an exhausted sleep.

But we really do need to talk.

I know Max feels safer here, thousands of miles away from Roswell. I know Max well enough to know that's why -- one of the reasons -- he feels we can be together. He thinks I'm safer here too.

But something has happened that we didn't plan on, something that will change how we look at the world completely. Something that might make us feel less safe, even here.

Sometimes when I stop to reflect on everything that has happened since the day of the shooting in the Crashdown, it occurs to me that my life could be featured on the front pages of a supermarket tabloid. What Max and I need to talk about would definitely warrant a front-page headline, something like, "I'm Having my Alien Boyfriend's Baby."

November 16

I'm Liz Parker, and I'm not sure where things stand right now. I'm still trying to think through what happened last night, so I'm going to try describing everything as a narrative to help me think.

Max didn't come home until 2:00 am. He told me later that the emergency room had been overflowing with the victims of a gas leak in a high-rise building. At 2:00 am, I heard Max's key in the lock, listened to his weary footsteps in the hall, knew when he was in the bedroom because his tiredness caused him to stub his toe on the foot of the bed. He slid under the covers, wrapped his arms around me, kissed my forehead, then noticed I was awake and told me that it was late and that I should go back to sleep. Typical, over-protective Max.

I shook off my sleepiness and said, "Max. I know you're tired, but we need to talk." Max sighed and cuddled me closer. His eyes were closed. I could tell he was trying hard to find the energy to listen, to be there for me. For one seductive moment, I thought about giving in, about letting myself fall asleep in the arms of the man I love, and letting that man get some much needed sleep himself. I felt like a jerk, but I couldn't forget what we needed to talk about. It was too important. So I said, "Max, I'm so sorry. Please. This won't take long. It's really important though."

Max reached over and clicked on the bedside lamp. I began hesitantly, "Max, do you remember when I got sick a month ago? I had trouble keeping food down." I noticed that Max was lying very still with his eyes still closed, but he seemed to be concentrating on what I was saying so I continued. "Food wasn't the only thing I couldn't keep down, Max." Max's eyes snapped open, and he stared at me. I couldn't hold his gaze while I told him the next part. "Max, I also threw up my birth control pills. But I didn't realize it at the time. To tell you the truth, I was never even sure that we really needed them. Because -- you know -- we're so different."

Max was so still that I wasn't sure he was still awake. I looked up to find him still staring at me, his eyes panicked.

When I saw his expression, I tried to reassure him: "Max. I'm really sorry to tell you this this way. I know it's not something that we ever talked about. I know it's not the best time for us. I know there are so many reasons why this is scary and weird. But I can't help feeling happy. Max. I love you. I'm pregnant. We're going to have a baby."

I felt a shudder run along Max's frame. Then he tightened his arms around me. When he finally spoke, there was a catch in his voice. "Liz. You know I love you too. But this isn't good..."

I shushed him. "Don't say that yet. Let's not think about this tonight. You're exhausted. I shouldn't have told you ... it was just that I found out today why I'd been feeling ill. We should just sleep. We can talk tomorrow."

But neither of us slept. We were dry-eyed and gritty with exhaustion by the time the sun crept over the horizon and slipped under the blind on our bedroom window.

November 17

I wish I could tell you that things got easier, that a way to make things work out for the best magically appeared to us.

Max and I talked about what we should do, about every option available to us. We talked about what scared us the most. We talked about what excited us. What we decided was probably not surprising given who we are. We decided to keep our baby.

November 25 -- Thanksgiving

I'm Liz Parker, and I'm feeling better about things these days ... apart from the misnamed morning sickness that strikes me every afternoon at 4:00 pm. It's been a while since I've written, so I should tell you what happened after Max and I decided to keep our baby.

We decided that we needed to tell the people who care about us, the people we care about most in the world.

Max told his sister Isabel first. They're twins and very close. Izzy didn't take the news well. She demanded to know whether Max was completely insane, then slammed the phone down in fury without waiting for his answer.

I told my best friend, Maria DeLuca, next. She was in one of her down moods, her on-again/off-again relationship with Michael Guerin being stuck in the "off" position of late. When she heard my news, Maria burst into tears and hung up on me. But I know she'll call back. I know her. We've been best friends forever.

That left Michael. Max's best friend is your classic brooding-loner personality type. He distrusts almost everyone. Except Max and Isabel -- for obvious reasons. Except me -- because he once read my journal in high school and decided based on its contents that I was harmless aside from my major-league crush on his best friend. And, of course, except Maria -- for those on-again/off-again reasons I mentioned earlier. If I think about it, I guess that Michael doesn't trust anyone as much as he trusts Max. In a lot of ways, even though they're the same age, I think Michael sees Max as an older brother, someone who always looks out for him, someone who is always there to bail him out of scrapes.

It became pretty clear that Michael's reaction to our news wasn't much better than Isabel's. As far as Michael was concerned, this time Max was in a scrape in dire need of being bailed out.

The next thing we knew, Michael was in Boston, berating Max for being so careless, arguing that this "situation" would destroy the normal life we were pretending to have, deriding Max and me for being foolish enough to think that our being in love was enough to get us through the uncertainty of what was going to happen next.

Then, the one thing that Michael didn't expect to happen, that I'd never dared hope would happen, did happen. Gentle, even-tempered Max Evans lost his temper. He told Michael in no uncertain terms to mind his own business.

Then, he turned to me and asked me to marry him.

I didn't even answer. I didn't need to. He knew my answer.

It occurred to me in that shimmering moment that Max Evans knows the contents of my soul better than I do. As I know the contents of his. He is my soul-mate, my heart, my desire, my husband.

We are different, but we are the same. Two halves of one whole, who miraculously found each other on this planet.

December 20

It's been a long time since I've written, and a lot has happened. It's December 20, and I'm Liz Evans. I still feel a shiver running down my back when I write my new name. Max and I were married last weekend in our hometown of Roswell, New Mexico. Our parents were there. Maria was my maid-of-honor. Michael was Max's best man.

Isabel, Michael, and Maria are in reserving-judgment mode. Our parents are unsurprised and maybe a little relieved. Max and I are deliriously happy.

It's as if there was nothing between us in any way any more. No shadows. No differences. No reservations. We share one soul. And we are excited about our future together.

We know that nothing is certain, that things can go wrong. For all our being aspiring biologists, neither of us knows how this pregnancy will affect my human body. Neither of us knows whether I'll give birth to a baby or a pod. It's confusing and scary. But we're optimistic. And very, very excited about our baby.

June 21

Claudia Isabel Evans was born this morning at 4:17 am. She has her father's velvety brown eyes. She has my straight dark hair, considering what little hair she has. She has her father's ears, which I think are adorable but which she may find hard to live with when she turns fourteen.