The Rebel

"So you broke up with Max?" Adam asked. It had taken him all the way through one-and-a-half daytime talk shows to get up the guts to say it.

"Yeah," Liz answered. It wasn't a happy yeah, a now-I'm-free-to-spend-all-day-making-out-with-you-Adam yeah. It was just kind of tired and sad.

Adam was worried about her. Her eyes were all puffy; her lips turned down a tiny bit at the corners, and her aura hadn't cleared up any.

"Is that why you decided not to go to school? Too hard to be around him right now?" Adam hated the thought that Liz could care so much about Max, even in a twisted, negative way.

But basically, that was what drew him to Liz. She was so intense about everything. He wanted to make up for every moment he'd lost in the compound, and Liz was a person who did things full out.

"No. Well, I guess it's a side benefit," Liz answered. "I was afraid my father would show up at school, and I don't want to see him." Her aura's deep purple web darkened until it was almost black.

He wanted to do something to make her feel better. But what? Almost as soon as he asked himself the question, an idea popped into his head.

Adam turned his attention to a large section of the floor almost in the middle of the living room. There was no furniture in it. He and Michael were supposed to get some eventually.

"Do you like to trampoline?" he asked Liz.

"Huh?" She looked over at him with a distracted expression.

"Never mind. Just wait," Adam said, smiling to himself. He concentrated on the molecules of wood in the section of the floor and used his power to push them farther apart. "Okay, now watch." Adam stood up and walked over to the section of floor he'd modified. His feet sank into it up to his ankles. He shot a look at Liz, then he started to bounce, going so high, his head brushed against the ceiling. Maybe I should temporarily make us a hole up there so we can go even higher, he thought.

But when he looked at Liz again, he knew that wouldn't be necessary. She had this very polite smile on her face. All he'd done was give her the extra burden of trying not to hurt his feelings.

The mole boy again proves that he has failed to grasp the basics of normal social interaction, Adam thought.

He pushed the molecules of the floor back into place, then went over and sat down next to Liz. Not too close. He knew enough to know that touching wouldn't be welcome right now.

"I wish I knew what you were feeling," Adam said. "I never had a fight with my dad. I mean, I never had a dad, just Sheriff Valenti. So it's not like I can give you some great advice."

"That's okay," Liz answered. She started twisting her hair into a knot. He'd noticed that she did that almost every time she felt uncomfortable.

"I never told anyone this, but after I killed the Sheriff-" Adam began.

"You didn't kill him," Liz interrupted. "You can't think that way. Elsevan DuPris had control over you."

"Yeah, well, after my body killed the sheriff and I found out what I-it-had done, I totally broke down crying the first time I was alone," he admitted.

He glanced at Liz. She had her serious, intent look going. He wasn't sure if this was helping her or not, but it was the only father experience he could share with her.

"I should have hated him, right?" Adam asked. "And I did hate him, too-when I found out the truth. When I found out that there was a whole world he'd locked me away from while he had me do his little experiments. But…" Adam paused, not sure how to explain the rest, even to himself.

"But what?" Liz prompted.

"But he used to read me storybooks. And he… he was nice to me. And as far as I knew, he was my dad. I felt like I belonged to him. Even when I found out how evil he really was, I guess I didn't want him dead. It's almost like he was part of me, you know? So how could I want him dead?" Adam answered. "Maybe locked away in the compound himself, but not dead."

"I never thought about the sheriff dying as you losing a father," Liz said. "But of course it felt that way to you."

She reached over and took his hand. "Do you have these times where you totally forget he's dead? When my sister died, there would be days where I'd get halfway home from school before I'd remember, especially right after it happened. Like I'd have a story I was pla

"That's happened to me, too." Adam felt a loosening in his chest. He hadn't realized that he'd really been needing to talk to someone about this. "So when does it stop?"

Liz shrugged. "When it happens, I'll let you know," she answered. Then she turned her head and met his gaze. "It doesn't happen nearly as much anymore. And the realizations are more like, I don't know, like oh-rights than bams."

"I thought everyone would just think I was being a moron if I actually said I felt sad about Valenti," Adam confessed.

"Of course you were sad. He was your papa," Liz reassured him.

But he wondered if she'd switched over to talking more about herself and her own father. If Adam could feel so much for Valenti, how much more must Liz feel for Mr. Ortecho?

"You should talk to him. Your papa," Adam said. He wasn't sure she'd want him butting in, but he thought she needed to hear it.

"You don't get it," Liz burst out. "He pretty much proved he doesn't even know me. He probably thinks he loves me and everything, but how can you love what you don't know?"

"So you're just going to run away?" he demanded. "That's not you, Liz. You fight for things. You want him to know you-make it happen."

"Make it happen," Liz repeated. She snorted.

"Yeah, make it happen," Adam insisted. "You helped break Michael out of the Clean Slate compound. You faked out Elsevan DuPris's bounty hunters. You practically even brought Max back from the dead, the way he tells it. You make things happen all the time. Impossible things."

Liz didn't say anything. She took her hand away and pulled her hair free from its knot, then immediately started twisting her hair back up again.

"You know what's going to happen if you don't, right?" Adam asked. He knew what he was about to say would probably hurt her, but he had to do it, anyway

Liz shook her head.

"If you don't, someday you're going to be coming home from school-or the job you get after college, or whatever-and you'll be all excited about telling your father some great thing that happened to you. Or even some awful thing," Adam explained. "And then-bam!-it will hit you. You don't talk to your papa anymore."

Max's eyes went right to the group's usual table as soon as he entered the cafeteria. He felt a little of the tension flow out of his body when he spotted Michael sitting there. He hurried over.

"You're alive," he said.

Michael shot him an angry look, and Max belatedly realized this wasn't exactly the time for humor, not that it had exactly been humor.

"I stopped by your place this morning, but you weren't there," he continued. "We need to talk." He saw Isabel and Alex heading toward them. Maria would probably show up any second. "Alone, okay?"

"Whatever." Michael didn't sound too happy about it, but he shoved himself up from the table and followed Max to the bio lab. Max knew nobody would be hanging around in there at lunch. At least since Liz wasn't at school today.

He clamped down hard on the pain that shot through him when he thought about her. He couldn't deal with the Liz thing and the Michael thing at the same time. Even separately felt almost impossible.

"You wanted to talk, so talk," Michael said, leaning against one of the lab station counters.