When Maria is talking to Liz (after Alex has called Liz out for being a bad friend for not knowing what was going on in Maria’s life), she talks about how she wanted to be the fun friend. She doesn’t want to put her problems on other people. She’s been brought up as a self-reliant, independent woman, raised by a single mother who was also self-reliant and independent (which we learn is a family trait).

 

While she had a loving and happy home life, she still had a sense of not belonging. She grew up feeling like her and her mum were the only black people in the world. Which probably reinforced her sense of both independence and isolation. While Maria is more integrated into the community as the owner of the locals bar, you get the feeling that she still feels somewhat isolated from the rest of the community, apart in some way. Which is why she’s so happy when her people - Liz and Alex - return to Roswell.

 

Michael is also very reluctant to let others know he is struggling or needs help (understatement of the YEAR). Michael has had to become self-reliant in order to survive. He puts up a front of self-reliance and toughness, that he uses to protect himself both physically and emotionally. If he doesn’t let anyone in, they can’t hurt him.

 

But also for Michael, his self-reliance and independence is framed in terms of an overwhelming need to not be a burden to those around him. I can hear more than one of his foster parents calling him a burden, not worth the money that looking after him brings in. And this has carried over into his adult life. He parses all his relationships by what he can bring to them in terms of usefulness. Because that’s the only experience he has - that people only want him around for what he can do for them. His experience of love and affection has always been conditional. This sort of plays into what I think is Michael natural helping/service orientation. And it just doesn’t occur to him (and why should it, given the majority of his experiences?) that people might want him around because they like him.

 

So Michael makes decisions based on not being a burden to people, afraid that if he becomes too much trouble, they will cut him out of their lives - often by leaving him - either physically or emotionally.

 

And this whole mind-set is then reinforced by the need to keep a low profile, to not stand out, to be as ordinary as possible. All of which means not asking for help, dealing with things by himself.

 

So for both of them, the other person is someone uninvolved in their issues. Michael really doesn’t know much about what is going on with Maria (apart from knowing that Mimi “wanders”) and Maria obviously has no idea about the alien thing (and is only now just beginning to get an idea of where Alex fits in Michael’s life). So compared to everyone else, to each other they are basically baggage/burden free. Michael can be just the rough and tumble local mechanic who drinks a little bit too much and Maria can be the fun and sexy local bar owner. They know each other enough to be interested but not enough to bogged down by the past.

 

But it is a relationship essentially built on lies of omission. And when those unvoiced truths become known, then the easiness of their relationship will become just another complication.

(Comments always encouraged and welcome)