Prologue: What If “Love alone is capable of uniting living beings in such a way as to complete and fulfill them, for it alone takes them and joins them by what is deepest in themselves.” – Pierre Teilhard De Chardin ~ “Scully, I’ve got to go.” It wasn’t the first time he’d uttered the phrase. It wasn’t even the first time he’d uttered the phrase in the past five minutes. She just refused to hear him. Of course, she wouldn’t be Special Agent Dr. Dana Katherine Scully, if she didn’t. Glancing up at the sign located just above his head, Mulder confirmed that this was the place he’d been looking for. He shook his head. “What’d they do, cloak it?” he muttered out loud. “What?” Oh, right; Scully. “Nothing, just thinking out loud,” he murmured in an absent tone as he entered the building. The place had popped up out of nowhere. Mulder had spent the previous hour walking up and down the street, to no avail. He had kept careful track of the shops along this row: Pottery Barn, used bookstore, Radio Shack. This place hadn’t been here five minutes ago. Definitely too spooky to be a coincidence, he decided. “Mulder, we need to talk,” Scully informed him, her voice adopting that no nonsense quality he’d always respected, and, in truth, found a tad sexy. “We =are= talking,” he replied glibly. “You say something, I say something; hell, Scully, we’re having a regular old conversation here.” He knew something was bothering her, and it wasn’t his refusal to give her a straight answer. It was the day before Christmas Eve, and he hadn’t so much as mentioned it. Usually, he would at least wish her a Merry Christmas, especially when she was planning a few days out of town to be with her family. The prospect of a lonely Christmas had been a good part of the reason the woman’s voice at the other end of his phone had drawn him out here. Curiosity made up the other part and combined, they posed an considerable threat. Scully emitted a sigh, which told him she was definitely not pleased with that answer. He winced, picturing the coming scene in his mind. “Mulder,” she stated, and he’d never been more afraid of the sound of his own name. “Listen, Scully, I’ve got to go,” he said once more in a vain attempt to buy himself some time. “I promise, we’ll have a nice long talk, about anything you want, as soon as I’m done.” “What the hell are you doing, anyway, Mulder?” He could hear her shift the phone and settle deeper into her couch, preparing to stay with him, over their phones, for as long as she could. Containing a chuckle at the image, Mulder pulled his lower lip between his teeth, debating how much to tell her. “I’m just doing a little investigating independent of the Bureau,” he hedged, going for a half-truth. What would you do, he thought absently, if I asked you not to go, to spend Christmas with me? If there was no case of the missing car keys, would you willingly attend one of these little sojourns with me, or is this connection we share all in my head? Are we soul mates, or two people who just happen to have an above-average working relationship? “And of me?” she countered, and he could =see= the raised eyebrow. “Scully, you wound me. It’s not like that at all. If I didn’t want you to know about it, would I be talking to you right now?” “Yes,” she answered, without missing a beat. “But that’s beside the point. Care to fill me in? Or at least tell me where I can have them send the ambulance?” “Ha ha,” he mumbled, warily crossing the threshold of this mysterious building. It resembled a town house, only it was a single story. The door was, not surprisingly, unlocked. Peeking inside the first room he came upon, Mulder tried again to dissuade Scully from their current conversation.. “This is nothing you’d be interested in, Scully. Trust me. Definitely as far from normal as you can get.” Over a year later, and the bitterness cup still runneth over. That had stung, more than he’d admitted at the time. Something about the holiday season had the power to turn a man introspective. When Mulder thought about the things that really mattered in his life, he either became maudlin about his quest, or about Scully. It appeared that this year, it was Scully’s turn to be maudlin. “I thought our life was normal,” she reminded him softly, sounding almost indignant. Another smile came to Mulder, this one much easier than the last. “It is. For us,” he amended. “But this . . . Scully, this is more of a Spooky Mulder thing. Trust me, you don’t want to know.” “Let me be the judge of what I do and don’t want to know, would you?” Scully suggested none-too-gently. She was being awfully insistent. “Okay,” Mulder gave in. You asked for it. “I’m presently just outside D.C., visiting the parlor of a gypsy fortune teller, who may or may not be a descendant of the Romanoff’s. She contacted me early this morning, to tell me she had seen something extremely important about my life; something she =must= tell me about in person,” he delivered deadpan. “Oh, and I had to come today, because she’ll be disappearing again tomorrow.” Silence reigned, for a full ten seconds. “Still there, Scully?” he asked, twisted amusement coloring his words. “Mulder, what are you wearing?” she asked, and, had her voice not been so dead serious, he might’ve been able to hold the laughter in. As it was, he nearly dropped the phone, chuckling into the receiver. “I’m walking around D.C., in the dead of winter, wearing nothing but a Speedo. Yourself?” “I’m lying around my apartment in my Academy sweat shirt. Nothing but, my Academy sweat shirt.” He wasn’t sure, but he’d swear her voice was an octave lower than it had been a minute ago. Was it his imagination, or had Dana Scully been flirting with him more consistently than ever before these last few weeks? “Scully,” he began, his voice only mildly choked. “Oh, would you look at the time, Mulder? I’ve got to go. People to see, suitcases to pack.” He could practically see the wicked smile on her face. “Have fun. Be sure to tell me all about your fortune.” A dial tone echoed in his ear before he could formulate a response. It was only then that he realized he hadn’t wished her a Merry Christmas. Oh well. It would give him an excuse to see her when she got back. He =had= gotten her a gift. Smiling slightly, he shut the phone and took another look around the place. Wine colored decor, splashed with a few shades of purple and blue, gave the place a definite ‘gypsy’ feel. Nothing but antique furniture, and an odor like you might expect in a caravan. Sniffing the air, Mulder wondered at the odd smell. It was both familiar and foreign, and he couldn’t have described it if his life depended on it. “Mr. Mulder?” a thickly accented Russian voice appeared out of nowhere. Spinning, his eyes landed on a woman, nearly sixty, her straight salt-and-pepper hair pulled under a scarf. She wore long, flowing material in layers around her body like sarongs. He’d never seen colors as vibrant as the reds and purples that covered her. “Yes,” he answered slowly. “Alexandra?” “Alexandra Romanoff,” she corrected, extending an arm to him. “Please, have a seat,” she offered, indicating a table with two cups of what appeared to be tea set out. It was a fortune telling parlor, he thought, like the kind you’d find on a midway. “Relax. Drink your tea. We will talk, once you have finished.” Sitting, Mulder picked up the tea and sniffed it. The thought that it might not be entirely safe to drink briefly crossed his mind. Alexandria laughed, and Mulder got the impression she was reading his mind. Her next words only served to confirm that suspicion. “I assure you, Mr. Mulder, it’s perfectly safe. I wouldn’t poison the man I’ve come so far to meet.” “Far?” Mulder asked, an eyebrow raising, an unconscious gesture he picked up from Scully. “You’re a twenty-minute cab ride from my apartment.” “Ah, yes, but it has not always been so.” She looked at him carefully. “Haven’t you found that to be true, in your life? Things that are true now, were not true a year, a week, even a day ago. How long does my being here have to be true for it to no longer inconvenience me to see you?” Mulder blinked, following her train of thought with interest. “I suppose,” he began slowly, “that’s all in the eye of the beholder.” “And whose eye is that?” she countered, not missing a beat. “Yours? Mine?” “Considering you’re the one with something to say, I’m going with yours,” he answered slowly, tamping down on his growing irritation at her cryptic countenance. “Very good,” she murmured in a complimentary tone. Ridiculously, he felt pleased by her approval. “Now, drink your tea.” Not giving it another thought, Mulder brought the cup to his lips and drank half in one gulp. At her look, he quickly downed the rest and set the cup back on the table. She held out her hands, and he acquiesced, passing the cup to her. “Are you reading tea leaves?” he asked incredulously. “Hush,” she instructed, never lifting her eyes from the cup. “Hush?” he asked, disbelieving. “Hush?!” Shaking his head, Mulder began to rise from his seat. “Look, thanks very much for the tea, it’s been a real slice of heaven. If you don’t mind, I’m going to get out of your way--” “Sit,” she shouted, in the lowest whisper he’d ever heard. Mulder sat, his hands folded neatly on his lap. “You do not believe I have the ability?” she questioned softly. “You do not believe I know things about you?” “I’m willing to believe,” he hedged carefully. “I did not ask for your willingness, Mr. Mulder. I asked if you believed. Please answer the questions I pose to you.” Mulder’s lips tightened. “Fine. No, given the current state of affairs, I do not believe you.” She nodded once. “Thank you. Now, we will move on to making you believe me, yes?” Mulder shrugged. “It’s your dime.” “Is it,” she murmured, but it wasn’t a question. Eyes narrowing, she snapped her head up. Her gaze probed his carefully, an intensity lying somewhere in the depths of her eyes that took his breath away. “Which one are you?” she asked, her voice sounding almost accusing. “Excuse me?” Mulder asked, genuinely confused now. A trickle of apprehension rolled down his spine. “It’s a simple question. Which one are you? The Fox William Mulder who lost his sister, or the Fox William Mulder who didn’t?” The question brought him up short. His breath froze in his lungs and tightened into a viselike grip around his heart. “What?” he croaked out. She nodded slowly, giving him a sympathetic look. “I see you are the one who lost her. I am sorry,” she told him gently. “What do you mean, the one who lost her?” Mulder asked, getting downright angry now. “How is it possible I didn’t lose her?” “Another life, Agent Mulder,” she murmured, obviously having decided who he was. “Another life, another time, another set of circumstances.” “You know what, I’ve had just about enough of this bullshit.” He moved to stand again. “Haven’t you ever wondered?” she asked in the most enticing tone he’d ever heard. “Haven’t you ever wanted to know what life would have been like if you’d never lost her? I can show you. I can show you what it would have been like, had things been . . . different. I can even let you live it, for awhile. Not too long, but . . .. just the right amount of time. The right moment in time.” Mulder slowly sat back down and folded his hands on the table before him. He wasn’t sure he believed her, but that was beside the point. She’d gotten him thinking again about something that he’d long since blocked from of his mind. He’d stopped wishing for impossible dreams long ago. He’d had to, to keep himself sane. Resigned, he only chased rainbows he had hope of catching. Yes, they were still lofty goals, but they were at least attainable. He’d put away games of ‘what if’ ages ago. But now the question was posed, once more, in his mind. What if things were different? “How?” he asked, intrigued, despite the little voice inside his head that was telling him to get his ass out of there. That voice sounded like Scully. “She is still there,” Alexandria told him, as though it was something he’d want to know. “Who?” Even as the question passed his lips, he knew the answer. “The woman you call Scully,” she answered simply. “She is always there, always with you.” A smile, temptation incarnate, spread across her face. “Would you like to see now? I promise, while you’re there, you won’t know you’re out of place. In fact, you won’t even remember this life until you return to it. It’s the chance of a lifetime, Agent Mulder. The chance to see a world that could have been yours, if only one thing had been different. One little thing.” “Samantha,” Mulder murmured, wondering if he’d ever regain the ability to form more than one word at a time. A half-formed George Bailey quip flitted briefly through his consciousness, but before he could grasp it, she continued. “Samantha,” she agreed. “Your sister’s abduction changed your life, in more ways than simply the obvious. Aren’t you ever curious? Wouldn’t you like to know for certain, one way or another, what your life would have been like?” “Yes,” he answered, before he could stop himself. “Yes, I want to know,” he blurted out, feeling absurdly pleased with himself for speaking an entire sentence. “Then so it shall be,” she murmured, her voice husky. That damned smile was firmly in place. “Give my regards to . . .” a twinkle appeared behind her eyes. “ . . . your sister.” Mulder blinked, and everything went dark in his world. ~ There was a second before Mulder emerged from the darkness, into the light, where he remembered everything. From the moment he and Sam had sat down to play Stratego, right up until he felt himself sit back in that chair, the taste of herbal tea fresh in his mouth. Images from his life flashed through his mind; his sister calling his name, begging him to save her; growing up on the Vineyard; his father’s hateful words of blame; the occasional backhand. And his mother’s eventual deconstruction, the loss of her daughter too much for the woman’s soul to bear. Oxford, snippets of conversations long buried he’d had with Phoebe Greene. Those conversations had helped destroy what had remained of his psyche; had shaped the way he would forever deal with women. No one got too close. A glib demeanor would become his best defense against the opposite sex. Diana’s place in his life, and the few that came before her, were extraneous at best. He loved her; the best way he knew how at the time. But his heart and his mind had taken too great a beating for too many years prior to meeting her. By the time Dana Scully came along, it was amazing anything of Fox Mulder the man had remained. He had, in fact, believed all he had left was Special Agent Mulder. She’d proved him wrong within a matter of months. Once he’d realized she wasn’t trying to destroy him, he’d tried to let her in. He’d really, really tried. He’d tried to drop the walls and the bullshit; had even succeeded a few times. But these defenses, his hard-won resistance to matters of the heart were too firmly entrenched. Even Dana Katherine Scully couldn’t eradicate them completely; couldn’t completely heal his soul or allow him to cross the distances that separated them. Snippets of conversations floated through Mulder’s mind; whispers of spying and trusting, resisting and denying, hoping and praying, fighting and dying. Bits of these words played on a continuous loop, interspersed with tracks of laughter and tears, and the notion of someone having the strength of someone’s beliefs. As the fraction of a second it took for all this to occur to Mulder ended, he blinked, dimly aware of someone calling his name; though not the way he last remembered her calling his name . . . And then, Special Agent Fox Mulder faded away. ~ Chapter 1 –Again for the First Time "Why did I love her? Because it was her. Because it was me." –Montaigne ~ “Fox? Yoo-hoo, Earth to Foxy Loxy? Are you even listening to me, dim wit?” Sighing, Mulder switched the phone from one ear to another and glanced around the room. “I’m trying not to,” he muttered, attempting to keep his voice down. “Have you forgotten I’m actually supposed to be listening to the people speaking at this conference?” Samantha was the only person Mulder knew who could roll her eyes over the phone and make you hear it. “Yea, right. Like you care about what anyone else has to say. Don’t bullshit me Fox – I’m your sister. I actually =know= you.” “Yea, well maybe I care about =this= speaker,” Mulder clarified, his eyes automatically moving to the woman on stage. “Is she hot?” Sam asked, her interest piqued, as he’d known it would be. “Why do you assume the speaker’s a she?” he countered. “Cause you’re not gay,” she answered, as though it were the most obvious thing in the world. “And you, Fox William, don’t give a damn what anyone else thinks about your field of choice. Unless we’re discussing your career, part two, and you’re drooling over some author you’ve always worshipped.” “It just so happens she isn’t in my field, Samantha Ann,” Mulder informed his nosy little sister. He gritted his teeth when he realized he’d slipped up. “Well then,” Samantha continued smugly, “is =she= hot?” “Drop dead gorgeous,” he admitted, sighing with resignation. “But not in a conventional way,” he hastened to add. “She’s got this voice . . . she knows her shit. Her notes are together. This lecture -- what little I’ve heard of it --” he added pointedly, “is phenomenal. A =lecture=, Sam. I think a lecture is phenomenal. I’m almost . . .” he grinned at the thought that crossed his mind. “I’m almost bewitched by her.” Samantha let out a whistle. “Wow. Not bad for someone who hasn’t even met my big bro. I’m assuming you haven’t met her yet.” “You assume right. In fact, I hadn’t even seen her until about fifteen minutes ago. Then, before I could work up a case of good old-fashioned lust, my baby sister called and threw a bucket of cold water on my mood.” “I’m crying for you,” Samantha assured him, sounding not even the least bit misty. “And I ain’t your baby nothing.” “My Oxford-educated self cringes at your grammar,” Mulder murmured dryly. “Am I boring you?” It took Mulder a moment to realize he was being addressed by someone other than his sister. Glancing up, he found a pair of the most exquisite, annoyed blue eyes glaring back at him. “Uh-oh, busted,” he muttered quietly. “Is that her?” Sam asked. “Ooo, she sounds scary.” “Would you like to share what you find so fascinating on the other end of that phone with the rest of us who gathered here to learn and share ideas?” He wasn’t sure, but Mulder thought she might be pissed. It was hard to tell. A single, elegant brow was arched. Otherwise, she was totally composed. Hanging up on his sister without a pang of remorse, Mulder put his phone away with slow, deliberate motions. “Are you insinuating I haven’t been paying the attention your dissertation deserves?” he asked, quirking a playful eyebrow back at her. “Not at all,” she countered, shifting her weight in order to glare at him better. “I’m insinuating that you haven’t heard a damn word I’ve said.” Quirking his lips slightly, Mulder inclined his head. Oh yeah, she was definitely pissed. “I heard ‘thank you, ladies and gentlemen for being here this afternoon’,” he pointed out helpfully. She looked heavenward. “You’ve heard nothing of significance,” she clarified. “Would you care to fill me in on what I’ve missed?” Mulder challenged, rising from his seat to stand before the entire auditorium of doctors, from a variety of different fields. “Because I assure you,” he stated clearly, something twinkling in his eyes just for the woman behind the podium, “I am fascinated with whatever you have to say.” She sighed and removed her glasses, causing a lock of near shoulder-length red hair to fall over her eyes. She tucked it back behind her ear, sending Mulder a look that cut him deeply. It was sad and long-suffering, as though she’d done this a thousand times and, frankly, was quite sick of it. “Look,” she began slowly, “it’s clear you’ve decided you’re not interested in my discussion. I don’t really care. I’d just appreciate your not disrupting my paper.” “I apologize if I offended you,” Mulder began, edging his way out of the aisle to stand about twenty feet in front of the podium, and a considerable ways below it. “It wasn’t my intention. You’re the one that called attention to me – I was conducting a quiet conversation on my cell phone.” “You were being anything but quiet,” she countered, glancing around the room for support. A few reluctant heads bobbed. Mulder inclined his head forward, intending it as a gesture of surrender. “All right. I disrupted your lecture.” He gave her a winsome smile. “I would be eternally grateful if you’d quickly recap the pertinent points, so that I might have the ability to make an educated statement concerning said paper.” Out of nowhere, she grinned, and it nearly knocked him dead where he stood. Now =that= was what he called the kind of smile that could light up a room. “I suppose any man who could spit that out without sounding ridiculous deserves a second chance,” she murmured, once again placing her glasses on the end of her nose. “The pertinent points,” and there was definite amusement in her tone as she said that, “as you say, are simple: we spend billions upon billions of dollars to travel to Mars and study rocks. We grow ears on the backs of rats and call it a scientific breakthrough. We travel to the moon on a near weekly basis, for no other reason than, ‘because we can.’” She swallowed, and appeared to gather her thoughts. “My hypothesis is that if we took even one tenth of the funds given to NASA on a yearly basis, and put that toward finding a cure for cancer, and toward AIDS research, we could be well into eliminating the two greatest plagues of the twentieth century.” “Are you suggesting that space research is unnecessary?” Mulder asked. “Are you suggesting that it’s necessary?” she countered. “When you look at all that needs to be done right here on Earth, how can we look to the stars? Why squander our money, time, and effort, on frivolous pursuits, when we might actually do some good down here?” “I don’t believe the exploration of space is frivolous,” Mulder stated flatly. “The very core of the human condition -- the indestructible center that defines us -- is our ability to grow, to learn, to adapt to the way we and our environment changes. How can you be so sure that a cure for cancer doesn’t lie somewhere beyond the stars?” “I suppose I can’t be,” she admitted, though there was definitely a grudging undertone to the admission. “But how can you be so sure that it does? We could be wasting valuable resources on what amounts to nothing more than a lot of grown men wanting to play cowboys in space.” She shook her head. “I’m not saying we stop growing, or exploring completely. I’m merely suggesting we might want to fix some of the things here, with the means we have, rather than chase pipe dreams in the sky.” “It’s more than mere pipe dreams to a lot of people,” Mulder reminded her. “Man walking on the moon is one of the greatest achievements of this century, and yet the idea would have been unthinkable even a hundred years ago. Who knows what might come next? Currently, we can travel to planets other than our own; we can orbit our own planet. These are the kinds of things that Jules Verne wrote about over a century ago. These are the kinds of things men and women used to dream about. We live in these times; it is our responsibility to support the quest forward. We stand at the threshold of the next Millennium. The question becomes, are we prepared to enter into it with open minds, or do we merely wish to bury our heads in the sand and pretend that there is nothing out there?” As she shook her head in what he determined to be reluctant amazement, Mulder felt that this woman he didn’t even know respected him, just a little bit, despite their disagreement. The fact that she actually made him listen to a point of view so drastically different from his own made him respect her almost instantaneously. “You have illustrated my point for me,” she began slowly, speaking to Mulder as though he were a very small child. “We have already accomplished all that we’re going to accomplish with space travel. It’s time to put aside flights of fancy and concentrate on things that are real.” “I believe that what we can imagine is real,” Mulder insisted. “That what can be imagined, can be achieved. Just as you believe we could do more good with both feet planted firmly on solid Earth, I believe that without allowing ourselves to fly on occasion, there’s nothing left worth fighting for.” A tiny smile curved her lips. “Perhaps we should agree to disagree then,” she proposed softly. “I do thank you for taking this seriously.” She glanced out at all those assembled. “I believe my paper has been delivered in its entirety, though certainly not in the way I’d intended,” she added dryly, sending Mulder a pointed glance as she gathered her papers together. She quickly exited the stage. Moving faster, Mulder made his way to the side, and offered her a small, conciliatory smile. “Anytime,” he murmured. She raised a slightly confused eyebrow. “Anytime . . . what?” she asked, looking thoroughly amused with him. “I’ll take you seriously anytime,” he murmured. “Or, if you’d prefer, I’ll take you goofy. Hell, why don’t I just take you to dinner?” “Subtle,” she complimented sarcastically. “Not to mention managing to sound original and corny at the same time.” “You wound me.” Mulder began to walk alongside her as she headed toward the side exit. “If you won’t agree to dinner, will you at least give me a name?” Her lips pursed as she considers him. “Dr. Scully,” she replied, allowing a small smile to curve her lips. “Kinda formal, isn’t it?” he fished, hoping for a first name. “Yes, it is,” she answered brightly, walking at a slightly brisker pace. “I’m Dr. Mulder,” he added, as though she’d asked. “So Doc,” he began, after they’ve walked a few more feet in silence. “How about dinner?” Scully stopped finally and turned toward him, an incredulous look on her face. “You don’t give up, do you?” she asked, and he could tell the question was rhetorical. She sighed. “I can’t imagine why you’re still interested in me and I promise, were that I were a different person, I’d be flattered by your attentions--” “Were that you were a different person?” Mulder asked, making fun of her just a little bit. “Look, turn me down if you must, but at least have the decency to be flattered as =you=.” He frowned slightly. “And why wouldn’t I be interested?” “Other than the fact that I dissected and refuted your entire belief system in there, you mean?” she asked. “I wouldn’t be much of a man if your putting up an intelligent, well-thought-out argument of your own beliefs turned me off, even if they happened to conflict with mine.” He waited a beat. “And what makes you think my opinion on that particular subject is my entire belief system?” “My mistake,” she conceded, tucking her papers to her chest, hugging them to her almost protectively. “Most men wouldn’t be interested in a woman who could give as good as she got,” she rephrased, apparently not the slightest bit embarrassed to acknowledge her intelligence. The urge to flee, however, was written all over her very attractive body. Mulder decided he most definitely liked her mind; the challenge she seemed to present. She had a natural intelligence that sort of lingered behind her eyes. It gave her an edge over every other woman walking. She had fire, too. Enough of a spark to make you sit up and take notice, but not so much that it put you off. Dr. Scully had the ability to put you at ease or terrify the bejeezus out of you, depending on who you were and what you meant to her. He knew all this instinctively, almost as though some exchange of inner information passed between them when they had spoken earlier. Leaning in closer, Mulder invaded her personal space, nearly bumping noses with her. “I’m not most men,” he assured her softly. Scully swallowed and he could tell he’d affected her. But she didn’t move back; didn’t give any ground. “I can see that,” she murmured, her voice turning as soft as his. She licked her upper lip quickly, shifting mental gears before his very eyes. “Would you mind telling me what was so all important that you couldn’t let it ring until I was finished?” He could tell she was dying to know. Reaching out with a hand, Mulder tucked a lock of hair behind her ear without conscious thought on his part. “I was talking to my little sister,” he murmured. The eyebrow he was growing to love arched a little higher. She stared at his hand pointedly as it moved back to his side, but didn’t say a word. “And it couldn’t wait until Sunday dinner?” He gave her a smile, one of the full watt specials he usually reserved for Samantha, or a patient that needed a smile more than session. “We were discussing how irrefutably exquisite you are,” he told her quietly, using a tone far more intimate than he should have. She laughed nervously, bringing her papers up a little higher; an obvious defense mechanism, his psychologist’s brain calculated quickly. “That’s very sweet of you to say,” she demurred. “It’s very honest of me to say,” he countered. “Have dinner with me,” he implored again. “I can’t,” she answered, slowly backing away. “Why not?” he asked, not following her this time. He sensed, somehow, that she =really= didn’t want him to. “Because my feet are permanently and unequivocally planted right here on terra firma,” she told him, only a hint of sadness lingering in her voice. “Da firma da better,” Mulder quipped, keeping his eyes on hers as she walked backwards. She allowed him the sight of a brief grin. “Goodbye, Dr. Mulder.” “Until we meet again, Dr. Scully!” he called back, almost yelling because she’d gotten so far away. He watched her walk away. Briefly, he toyed with the idea of checking today’s program in order to learn the delectable doctor’s first name. But that’s not how he wanted to find out. He wanted to hear it from her. He watched until she had completely disappeared from view. Tamping down on the thought that he’d let something infinitely precious to him get away, he pulled out his cell phone, and hit number one on his speed dial. “Sammy’s sex talk – where our motto is, if you say something too depraved, we’re not afraid to laugh at you.” “That you answer your phone like that gives credence to all of Dad’s concerns,” Mulder muttered. “I take it this means you didn’t score with Ms. Drop Dead Gorgeous?” Mulder sighed and plopped himself down on a bench. He undid his tie and fixed his eyes to the exact spot Dr. Scully had disappeared from a few moments before. “Not exactly,” he mumbled dejectedly. “You sound really bummed out,” Sam observed. “She must’ve been =hot=.” Mulder grinned. “Let’s just say if I find out she lives anywhere near the area, I may finally give up my wandering ways and take you up on that offer to relocate permanently to Pasadena.” “You know I’d love to have you close,” Samantha began hesitantly, “but I’m afraid my offer to let you stay with me for awhile is off the table, indefinitely.” “You’re doing a take-back with your own brother?” Mulder asked, aghast. “And to think, you used to be my favorite sister.” “I’m your only sister,” she reminded him, “and it’s more complicated than that. There’s been a recent change in my life since you’ve been abroad. A friend of mine is staying with me for awhile. She’s had some bad stuff happen to her – stuff I’m not at liberty to discuss.” Mulder rolled his eyes. “I thought I was the ex-FBI agent,” he noted wryly. “Besides, I don’t need your house – I took an apartment on a month’s trial basis yesterday.” “Wow, your first stable apartment. I’m so proud. You’re still coming to dinner, right?” Sam clarified. “I want you to meet my Chuck.” “I’m still coming. I’ll see you tomorrow, all right?” “Definitely. You’ll get to meet Dana, and Chuck.” Samantha gave a little excited noise. “I can’t wait for you to meet them both. Chuck introduced me to Dana, you know. I think she used to work for the FBI, too.” “Are you trying to fix me up?” Mulder asked, his tone accusing. “Fox!” Samantha gasped, sounding outraged. “How dare you even assume such a thing!” She cleared her throat. “Be sure to bring Dana some flowers, she loves daffodils and white wine.” Samantha disconnected before Mulder could get a word in edge-wise. Sighing, he put his phone away and forced his eyes away from the spot where they’d been focused. How the hell did Sam expect him to concentrate on Dana, when all he could think about was the enigmatic Dr. Scully? ~ “I’m home,” Dana Scully called out as she tossed her briefcase onto the worn leather chair beside the door. Shrugging at the lack of response, Scully moved to the phone and dialed a familiar number. “The Goddesses Realm, Melissa speaking.” Scully smiled at the name of her sister’s new-age bookshop slash coffee bar. “Hey, Missy, it’s me.” “Dana! How’d your paper go over?” Melissa asked, the sound of a cash register ‘pinging’ in Scully’s ear. “Fine,” Scully answered, unwilling to discuss the feelings she had that did =not= relate to the paper she presented earlier, with Melissa. Her sister’s advice would be for Scully to head back and sit in the spot that she’d left him in until Dr. Mulder returned. Then, she’d advise they ‘go where the wind blows you’. “I’m actually calling because I wanted to . . .” “Check up,” Melissa finished knowingly. “Dana, everything is fine here. Stop worrying and enjoy yourself. There will be plenty of time to worry next week.” Shutting her eyes, Scully nodded her head, knowing what Melissa was saying was true. She just couldn’t help but worry, anyway. “All right.” Scully sighed. “Just tell me one more time that everything’s fine,” she almost pleaded. “Everything is fine,” Melissa assured her, chuckling. “Oh, Dana, we just got a bunch of people in – I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?” “O--” =click= “--kay.” Holding the phone away from her ear for a moment, Scully shook her head, then set the cordless back into its cradle. Peeling off her gray blazer, she walked into the back of the house, looking for signs of life. When she finally found it, she wished she hadn’t. “Jesus, guys, you have a bedroom,” she reminded Samantha and Charlie as they hastily skittered apart, Samantha grabbing the blanket, Charlie stuck with the throw pillow that was strewn about the floor around them. “Yeah, but you can’t be as spontaneous in the bedroom. Can you, Chuckie?” she asked Scully’s brother, his face as red as his sister’s own hair. “Uh . . . no?” he answered, his face hopeful. Scully tried – unsuccessfully – to contain a laugh. He glared at her. “Just cause you’re my big sister doesn’t mean I can’t kick your ass,” he warned. “Bring it on, Popeye,” she threw back, folding her arms and leaning against the wall. Even though he’d left the Navy, she couldn’t give up the nickname. “Sam, are you ever going to grow up?” she asked tiredly. “Dana, are you ever going to =loosen= up?” Samantha countered, weaving the blanket around her body like a sarong. She glanced at Charlie, then back to Scully. “C’mon, let’s go get something to eat. We were done anyway,” she added impishly. “It’ll give Chuck a chance to . . . make himself decent.” “That’ll be awhile,” Scully and Charlie muttered at the same time, causing all three to laugh, as Samantha hooked her arm in Scully’s and the two women headed for the kitchen. “So, how’d it go today?” Samantha asked as soon as they were alone. “I swear, an entire room full of scientists and researchers must’ve been so =boring=.” “Well, it wasn’t =just= scientists and researchers,” Scully reminded her. Her eyes narrowed as she took in the ‘boring’ comment. “And hey!” she added, smacking Samantha lightly on the arm. “What do you mean it wasn’t just scientists and researchers?” Sam asked, pulling out a giant bowl of chocolate pudding. “I mean,” Scully began, grabbing the whipped cream in a can, “that there were over three hundred doctors, from every profession known to medicine there,” she concluded. “That was the point of this thing – to share ideas, to learn something we didn’t already know.” Scully sighed. “I don’t want to go back tomorrow,” she whined. “Why not?” Sam asked casually, grabbing the whipped cream and spraying it over the entire surface of the pudding. She plopped two spoons in the middle and made a little ‘ta-da’ motion to Scully. Scully leaned a hip against the counter and weighed her options. She didn’t want to tell anyone about him, knowing the immediate reaction would be to get Scully to take Dr. Mulder up on his offer of dinner. However, Samantha had been rather insistent about her brother Fox being ‘perfect’ for Scully, so perhaps she wouldn’t be as encouraging. Honestly, Samantha Pierce could be the most stubborn person when she wanted to be. Given Samantha’s allegiance to the mere idea of Scully and her brother, she decided it was safe to share this with her. “There was this guy,” Scully began, taking a large amount of whipped cream on her spoon. Samantha’s eyes actually lit up. “Guy? What guy?” she asked, taking a huge bite of cream covered pudding. “The most obnoxious, opinionated . . .” Scully smiled a little as memory hit her. “Adorable, intelligent guy,” she finished, groaning as she took a bite of the whipped cream, then quickly grabbed another, more like Sam’s portion, and downed it. “Was he cute?” Samantha asked, forgoing the pudding for her intensive questioning. “What’s his name? How’d you meet him?” “His name is Dr. Mulder and I met him when he was carrying on a very loud telephone conversation during my paper,” Scully answered, ignoring the first question as more pudding ended up in her mouth. Scully didn’t like the way Samantha’s eyes started twinkling. “You didn’t answer my first question,” she pointed out. Sighing, Scully tossed her spoon into the sink, frustrated that even chocolate was not helping her state of mind. “Yes, he’s cute,” she grumbled, putting her head in her hand. “He’s incredibly charming, too, in an annoying sort of way,” she couldn’t help adding, a fond smile crossing her lips. “I just . . . I just like him, I guess,” she admitted, a little scared by that revelation. She just =met= him; she wasn’t allowed to =like= him yet. “Dana, I’m failing to see the problem,” Samantha announced, giving Scully a pointed look. Scully gave her the same look right back. “You know what the problem is, Samantha,” she reminded her, wishing she could forget; knowing she couldn’t afford to. “You can’t live like this forever. And if you intend to, you might as well become a nun,” Samantha stated, folding her arms over her chest. “You’ve got to get back out there; and this Mulder guy,” and Scully =swore= Samantha was laughing at her there, “sounds like he could be the one to lead you out.” “And what about this grand kismet plan you’ve had for Fox and I since the moment you met me?” Scully countered, staring down the young woman who’d become her closest friend over the last few months. Samantha waved a hand in the air. “Que sera, sera,” she proclaimed airily. “If you and Fox are meant to be, you’ll know it tomorrow night at dinner. And if not . . . maybe you should give the good doctor a shot,” she suggested gently. “What is it going to cost you?” “It could end up costing me more than I’m able to give.” “Why?” Samantha asked, something akin to amusement in her tone. “Could you fall in love with this guy? Are those walls you’ve built up in danger of being breached?” “I don’t know,” Scully muttered, uncomfortable with the entire discussion. Her friend was too close, saw through her too easily. “It’s a moot point, anyway. I don’t plan on falling in love anytime soon. I’m not ready for it. I doubt I’ll ever be ready.” Samantha laid a hand on Scully’s arm, waiting to speak until their gazes met. “I’ve got news for you, Doc. No one is =ever= ready to fall in love. We just do. You just have to go with it.” Samantha’s mouth quirked with humor “And hey, if you can enjoy yourself with a cute doctor for awhile, love or no, more the better.” Scully laughed, shaking her head slightly. “You make a good argument,” she conceded, sighing. “Okay, okay,” she gave in, pushing away from the counter. “I will give Mulder a shot =if= I run into him tomorrow. And then, if we haven’t eloped,” she added derisively, “I will give Fox a shot tomorrow night at dinner. Happy?” “Oh, Dana,” Samantha murmured, walking past her, “you have =no= idea” She trailed off with something akin to a maniacal giggle. “What have I gotten myself into?” Scully muttered to no one in particular. ~ Chapter 2 –Cloud Gazing for a Thousand, Alex “Love must be learned, and learned again and again. There is no end to it.” – Katherine Ann Porter ~ Ever since Scully moved from New York, to Pasadena, she’d been suffering from chronic lateness. Is that a clinical term, Dr. Scully? Smirking at the scientist that lived inside her head, Scully rounded the corner of the auditorium, grabbing a seat in the very back row. She shouldn’t be doing this. Against all her better instincts, when Scully had heard colleagues talking about Dr. Mulder’s lecture today at twelve thirty, she hadn’t been able to stop herself from high-tailing it over here. Watching him gather his notes, a pair of incredibly sexy glasses perched on the edge of his nose, Scully admitted to herself that he went a few steps beyond ‘cute’: Dr. Mulder was positively delectable. “I’d like to thank you all for choosing my lecture over a few of the other fascinating alternatives,” he began, sending the crowd a killer grin. “I for one will never quite be able to live with missing The Appendix: Useless Organ or the Body’s Garbage Disposal,” he quipped dryly, eliciting a few giggles, mostly from the female population of the auditorium. Scully sank down in her seat a little further, feeling absolutely foolish for attending. His harmless flirting yesterday probably hadn’t meant anything. He was intelligent, funny and gorgeous; he could have any woman he wanted. Why on earth would he want her? She’d been a challenge – a temporary one at that - nothing more. It was why he’d taken an interest and it was why he’d asked her to dinner. He had probably forgotten her name by now. Then why are you still here? Forcing the traitorous voice into silence, Scully focused on Mulder’s words, even as the rational part of her being advised her to get the hell out while she still could. “I’d like to share with you a horrifying statistic,” Mulder began, bringing a piece of paper up before his eyes. He read from it precisely. “Every six seconds in the United States, a child is abused, either physically or sexually. Nine times out of ten, that abuse occurs at the hand of a ‘loved one’.” The words ‘loved one’ were spoken as derisively as Scully had ever heard them and something inside her she refused to examine in a public place clenched at his words. Mulder put the paper down and braced both hands on either side of the podium. “For those of you who don’t know, I am a child psychologist. I personally dealt with six cases of domestic abuse last year alone. Three of those dealt with sexual abuse; cases of fathers abusing daughters, uncles abusing nephews.” He removed his glasses and brought his thumb and forefinger to the bridge of his nose, seemingly to ward off a headache. “I have worked in conjunction with various law enforcement professionals over the last six years. I do something most in my profession refuse to do; I acknowledge that in order to truly help a child, you have to stop the people who are hurting them. Do they need us to serve the same capacity we always have? Of course. But they don’t get to us until someone gets to them. “It is my contention that psychologists should take a more active role in their patient’s lives. Detachment sounds good in theory, but what our patients need, the children who come to us, in particular, is someone to care about them. To love them, because often, we’re the only ones who will. This would cause less of a caseload, which, to most people, means a smaller bank account. As professionals we should become involved in removing children from the situations they’re in. Unlike those old reruns of Hart to Hart we’ve all seen, the police are not as adverse to civilian help as they are portrayed. In particular, civilians with PhD’s.” Scully swiped at unwanted tears, watching the psychiatrists around her buzz with disagreement. They were mostly therapists to rich women dissatisfied with the monotony in their lives. It was a foreign concept to most of them, living in their concealed little worlds; they possessed no emotional attachment to their patients. No above and beyond the call of duty. They took two fifty and hour and called it a day. So few people really cared about their patients. It was one of the main reasons Scully herself chose to study facts and data, instead of working with live patients. She couldn’t remain detached. She knew that her first year in med. school. “My research shows,” Mulder continued, snapping Scully’s attention back to him, “children who get to know their future therapist while still in unsuitable conditions will trust that therapist once they’re removed from said conditions. The bond of trust is formed with whomever rescues them from their circumstance. Usually, that person is a police officer investigating a neighbor’s concerns, or even, in some cases, a social worker will pay a visit at the school’s behest, a teacher having become concerned over a certain child always having bruises he or she can’t adequately explain. “The benefit of having several psychologists available to be there, from the moment the abuse cycle is broke, would be invaluable to the future mental health of too many children who are very much in need.” He swallowed, as though remembering something. The look on his face tugged at Scully’s heart. “Yet, in ninety-nine percent of all cases, the officer responsible for ending a child’s suffering is never allowed near that child again. In most cases, this is a mistake.” He schooled his features, a mask slipping into place, so cleanly, so effortlessly, that had she not done the same thing herself a thousand times, Scully would’ve missed it. “I’ll take questions now.” “I have a question.” A woman from the front row spoke up, rising from her seat. She was blonde, nearly six feet tall, Scully wagered. “How can you stand up there and tell us the way we’ve been doing things is the wrong way?” “I’m not saying wrong,” Mulder cautioned. “I’m just saying that in some situations, there might be a better way. A way we can be more beneficial to the children we profess to want to help.” “How? By turning us into police officers with psychology degrees?” she sneered, folding her arms over her chest. His eyes narrowed and Scully could see the internal battle waging inside him: to snap, or not to snap. Mulder smiled, keeping his temper in check. “Every member of law enforcement is now required to take a basic course in psychology. Why shouldn’t it work both ways?” he asked, obviously having decided to go with not to snap. Cute, intelligence, funny, and a gentleman too? The blonde, however, didn’t share Scully’s admiration. “Perhaps because our monthly salaries often equals more than their yearly salaries?” she countered, glaring at Mulder. “Honestly, Dr. Mulder, I am a psychologist. I did not become one so I could do police work.” Scully took more offense at that, than anything else this busty blonde had said so far. Mulder hadn’t suggested psychologists do police work. He had merely posed the idea that they might be able to do more than they presently were. Before she could decide whether or not to say something, Mulder apparently had enough. “And why did you become one?” He paused for a moment and Scully watched him lose the war. “Because the couch went with your dining room set?” =Snap= “How =dare= you--” “How dare =you=,” Mulder interrupted. “I became a child psychologist because I saw one too many bad things. I have found through both research and personal experience that the best way to help a child is by getting my hands dirty, by being there from the moment the cycle of abuse is broken, and continuing with the child through the entire healing process.” His eyes burned with a passion Scully had rarely seen. “Why, may I ask, do you have such an objection?” The blonde was silent, seething. She raised an elegant chin, generations of good breeding obvious in her countenance. “I assume, Dr. Mulder, your attitude has something to do with the death of Rachel Hayes?” she asked coolly. Judging by Mulder’s expression, her comment had made a direct hit. He paled slightly and a pain that Scully had only before seen reflected in the mirror filled his eyes. He opened his mouth to speak, then closed it again, seemingly unable to find the words. Knowing it was probably the stupidest, most self-destructive thing she’d ever done, Scully slowly rose from her place in the back row. “I don’t know who Rachel Hayes is,” Scully began, her voice barely audible to the entire room, “but I somehow doubt she has a damn thing to do with this lecture.” Mulder’s eyes moved to Scully’s. Even though there was no obvious change in his expression, Scully swore she saw something spark in the hazel depths of his eyes. Hazel depths? You can’t even =see= his eyes from here! “Oh? And who might you be?” the blonde asked, staring Scully down. “Dr. Scully,” Mulder answered for her. “Please continue with what you were saying,” he urged. “What is your field?” Scully asked the blonde as she held her hands behind her back tightly. “I’m in abnormal psychology,” she stated, looking confused by the question. “What do you do all day?” Scully probed further. “I study the effects aging has on the brain,” she blonde explained slowly, totally baffled by the change in topic. “Excuse me for saying so,” Scully said carefully, not sounding like she wanted to be excused in the least, “but if what you do all day amounts to counseling elder people about the declining state of their minds, what the hell do you know about abused children?” The room descended into total silence for a few tense seconds. The blonde took her seat, apparently put in her place. Stunned, Scully stood there in a state of disbelief. Did I just do that? she thought to herself helplessly. “Are there any other questions?” Mulder asked, once again taking control of his lecture, ignoring Scully completely as she gathered herself together. Finally sitting again, Scully licked her lips and looked down, startled to see her hands shaking slightly. She hadn’t been aware she still had that in her; that fire, the ability to stand up for someone who needed someone on his side. She looked up at Mulder, saw him fielding questions like a pro, making a persuasive argument, even to the skeptics in the crowd. It appeared there were no more out-right hecklers, at least. Scully gripped her hands together tightly, unwillingly to dig too deeply for a reason for her actions. Her sudden show of bravado had been a long time coming, she reasoned. God knew she’d been too damn weak, for too damn long. It was long past time to emerge from the trials of fire. Her eyes were drawn again to Mulder, the way he held himself, the sound of his voice, echoing off the walls of the auditorium. He had a presence it was hard to ignore; a charm that came through when he spoke. He was addressing a roomful of people, yet made you feel like the center of attention; as though you were the only one he was speaking to. Scully liked that; liked him, far more than she was willing to admit, even to herself. Could you fall in love with this guy? Are those walls you’ve built up in danger of being breached? Samantha’s questions floated through her mind. All she knew was that he possessed some very attractive qualities: delectable; charming; annoying; sexy as sin and sweet. Definitely a lethal combination. ~ "Why did I love her? Because it was her. Because it was me." --Montaigne ~ “And that’s my time,” Mulder announced, glancing around the assembled room. Dr. Alicia Summers had made her hasty retreat shortly after the delectable Dr. Scully had snapped her into place. Mulder couldn’t help but grin as his eyes sought out that bright red head. Alicia had some sort of axe to grind ever since she and Mulder had broken up three months earlier. It hadn’t been his fault that she did nothing for him, emotionally, intellectually or sexually. Searching the room, Mulder barely located Scully. She appeared to be trying to beat a hasty exit out the back door. Smirking to himself, Mulder took the exit opposite the stage and circled quickly, just in time to watch her emerge from the back exit. Leaning against the wall to her right, he waited for her to notice him. When his presence went undetected, he decided to get her attention. “Thanks,” he said softly. Scully froze her search through her briefcase, and Mulder couldn’t help but smile at how cute she looked when she’d been caught trying to escape. She glanced up, brushing a strand of what he’d begun to think of as unruly hair behind her ear. “It was nothing,” she mumbled, looking decidedly uncomfortable. Mulder didn’t like the idea that he made her uncomfortable. If he unnerved her, that’d be one thing. But uncomfortable didn’t sit well with him at all. “I disagree,” he countered, moving a little closer to her. “Though I could’ve handled it myself, of course,” he couldn’t help adding. At her look, he grinned. “However, handling it myself might’ve caused Alicia to lose blood she’d rather not have lost. I have a little bit of a temper when my ideals are belittled,” he whispered, as though speaking confidentially. “Most people do,” Scully conceded, looking reluctant to admit she was having an actual conversation with him. Mulder wasn’t sure if it ticked him off, or amused him; a little of both, if he was honest with himself. “I hated what she was doing to you,” Scully confessed, leaning against the wall to face him. “You were saying something that was a fact, as far as I’m concerned, and because she felt her way of life was threatened, she decided to heckle you.” Her brows drew together as though she’d just heard something. “Alicia?” Mulder winced. “Dr. Alicia Summers,” he explained, using a mockingly imperious voice. “We went out a few times,” he elaborated. “It wasn’t a mutual parting.” “I’m assuming from that display, you did the leaving?” she asked, shuffling a piece of paper from one side of her canvas briefcase to another. Mulder found the action mildly distracting, as he couldn’t seem to stop himself from watching her hands. Something about the efficiency of their movement was a turn-on. A mental gear broke in his head. The efficiency in the movement of her hands was a turn-on? Jesus, how long had it actually been since he’d last had sex? There was no way he could really be =that= attracted to her. He really wished he could sound more convincing in his own head. Question . . . she asked a question, he reminded himself. “You assume correctly,” Mulder affirmed, mentally shaking his head. “It was about three months ago. I’d thought she’d be over it by now. We only went out three times.” “Three dates?” Scully practically squawked. “Why did you stop seeing her?” He shrugged. “She wasn’t my type,” he explained. Her eyebrows rose. “And what, exactly, is your type?” she asked, folding her arms across her chest, the briefcase hanging from the fingertips of one hand. Giving her a gentle smile, Mulder leaned into her personal space and flicked his fingertips against her forearm lightly. “I’m beginning to think intellectual, petite redheads are,” he murmured softly. To his surprise and utter delight, she laughed at that. “You’re incorrigible,” she informed him. “I take it as a compliment, Doc,” he replied, leaning away from her slightly. “Doc?” she asked, that eyebrow climbing higher. He shrugged. “You refuse to give me a first name,” he explained lightly, hoping to goad her into revealing it. She grinned. “That’s right, I do,” she answered brightly. Unable to contain a chuckle at her enthusiasm, Mulder also folded his arms across his chest, adopting her posture. “I must be a glutton for punishment,” he began wryly, “but would you like to have lunch with me?” “That depends,” she murmured, crossing her arms defensively. “You going to take me someplace nice?” “I’m willing to take you to the finest snack cart at this entire convention,” he boasted, a serious expression on his face. “Order anything you like – hot dogs, hamburgers, fries – sky’s the limit with Doc Mulder.” He grinned at her. “And for the piece de resistance, we will dine atop the most expensive blades of grass outside these hallowed halls.” His smile now was shy. “I don’t see how you can refuse.” “Dr. Mulder, I’m beginning to wonder if I could refuse you anything,” she muttered, sounding surprised to be admitting it. Mulder gave her a winning smile. “Be careful what you let slip, Dr. Scully,” he warned her playfully. “Anything you say can and will be used to bring you the greatest amounts of pleasure and enjoyment possible, should you choose to accept it.” She shook herself slowly, laughing (actually =laughing=, Mulder thought, with a touch of dismay and more than a little attraction). “You are so . . .” “Adorable?” he offered hopefully. “Bizarre,” she answered. “Weird; odd; take your pick.” “Given the choices, I’ll take Things That Are Odd for six hundred, Alex,” he quipped, walking backwards, keeping his eyes on her. “You coming, Scully?” “I don’t really think I have a choice anymore,” he thought she muttered. Her chin was tucked down to her chest, so he couldn’t be sure. But she did follow him, shaking her head slowly as they made their way to the food cart. “You ever played Jeopardy before?” Mulder asked a few minutes later, while they waited for their chilidogs and chili cheese fries. “You mean other than playing along with the TV?” she asked. “Dr. Mulder,” she murmured, putting special emphasis on the doctor part, “are you sure chili dogs =and= chili fries is a wise choice? Isn’t that akin to a heart attack on a bun?” “No, I mean with another person, face to face,” he answered. “And they’re chili =cheese= fries.” “Forgive my ignorance,” she muttered. “How the hell do you play Jeopardy face to face?” “Similar to the way you play it with the TV,” he replied, handing her a Coke, straw already inserted. “For instance, I say ‘youthful indiscretions for two hundred: the time this man was found in the middle of a parking lot with Donna Bedford, wearing nothing but a tassel and a smile’ would be . . .” There was a pause. “What is Dr. Mulder’s high school graduation?” she offered hesitantly. “Judges, can we accept?” he asked people who weren’t there. He made a buzzing sound, followed by a contrite sympathetic face. “Sorry; the correct answer was ‘what is the =aftermath= of Dr. Mulder’s high school graduation?’ Nice try, Scully; you still have control of the board.” “All right,” Scully murmured, picking up two enormous plates of fries while Mulder balanced both hot dogs in one hand. “I’d like most embarrassing moments for four hundred.” Mulder smiled slightly and they headed away from the hustle and bustle of the conventioneers droning on and on about their fields of choice. “Four hundred is an excellent choice – right there in the middle. You don’t get a lame story, nor do you get something so embarrassing, that you’re likely to run screaming from the person you’re speaking to.” “Doctor, I assure you, if I haven’t run screaming from you by now, you’ve got nothing to worry about,” she murmured, giving him a tiny Mona Lisa smile that made his heart beat just a little bit faster than normal. “I repeat: most embarrassing moments for four hundred.” He inclined his head. “And the answer is: ‘She left him standing in the lunchroom, surrounded by the entire school, all of whom were laughing at him.’” “Who is Dr. Mulder’s first crush?” she asked, sounding unsure. “Ooo, close,” he conceded, finally locating the spot he’d been looking for. He plopped down in the grass, totally unconcerned with the stains his suit would suffer as a result. After only a second’s hesitation, Scully did the same, crossing her ankles demurely in her long, navy blue skirt. “However, the correct response was ‘Who is the first girl Mulder ever worked up his nerve to ask to the Junior High dance?’” “What happened?” Scully asked, warily picking up a chili-cheese-covered fry. She nibbled delicately, her face betraying her surprise at how good it tasted as she popped the entire thing in her mouth. “I was a gawky kid,” Mulder began, taking a huge bite of his hot dog. Scully raised a skeptical eyebrow. “I find that difficult to believe,” she murmured, running her eyes up and down his lanky body. Mulder narrowed his eyes at her, swallowing. “We all look different when we’re young, Doc,” he reminded her, uncomfortable with her gaze. He’d never liked the way people looked at him. When he was younger, it was because he was almost gangly looking. He’d hated that they pitied him. As he got older, he grew into his height and continued to draw attention – only this attention was quite different from the kind before. The new attention had usually been from the opposite sex and had almost always been distracting. He didn’t want Scully to be like the others, though. Mulder had never been the type to have a woman for every night of the week, although he’d certainly had the opportunity. He’d always valued his solitude. The quiet time he could take to reflect on life, on everything and nothing. The only problem with solitude was that it got awfully lonely. “So we do,” she murmured in acknowledgement. “Go on.” Taking another bite, Mulder chewed thoughtfully, trying to find the proper wording. Finally, “I’d spent an entire year trying to work up the courage to ask her out. Unfortunately, naïve kid that I was, I chose the cafeteria, in full view of the entire class, to ask her to go to the Junior High Prom with me.” He shook his head, sighing deeply. “I thought I’d been teased before . . .” “You weren’t popular at all?” she asked, her expression aching for him, and he decided right then that she either had a shitty poker face, or she wasn’t trying to hide behind anything in front of him. “I had friends,” he allowed slowly. “Mostly, they were the other quiet kids; we just sat around and read.” He chuckled, munching on a fry. “I got a lot more social once I hit high school – being voted MVP on the school basketball team does wonders for your popularity,” he confided ruefully. “You play basketball?” she queried, taking a healthy bite of her hot dog; something in the way she didn’t try to hide her enjoyment of it endeared her further to him. “Yeah,” he answered, unable to stop himself from wiping a dollop of chili away from her cheek with the pad of his thumb. He stuck his thumb in his mouth. “I still play on the weekends; whenever my schedule allows.” Removing his thumb, he pursed his lips. “Your turn, Scully: memorable moments for six hundred.” She smiled ruefully. “I knew this would get around to me eventually,” she muttered, wiping her fingers on a napkin. “All right; he left her tingling in August, yet somehow couldn’t differentiate her from the other fifty girls come September.” “Who is the guy Scully lost her virginity to?” he asked, looking thoroughly amused. “No!” she cried, smacking his arm lightly. “Who is the first boy Scully ever kissed!” She laughed. “You think the first guy I slept with would’ve forgotten so easily?” she challenged, raising that eyebrow at him again. He shook his head slowly. “No, Scully, I’m quite sure everything about you is very . . . memorable,” he murmured softly. “I met him over summer vacation,” she elaborated, pointedly ignoring his comment. “I was twelve and he was the first boy who ever made my heart flutter.” “And how many boys have made Dr. Scully’s heart flutter?” he asked softly, leaning toward her as she bowed her head. “There have been a few,” she admitted softly, raising her head to look him in the eye. “Although, I admit, it’s been awhile.” “I can’t even remember a time when a woman made my heart flutter,” he realized. “Not even the lunch room girl?” she asked, finishing off her fries. He pulled his lower lip between his teeth, considering the question. “She didn’t make my heart flutter,” he pronounced finally. “She was the first girl who ever really appealed to me, but I think that had more to do with how tight her sweaters always were, than anything else.” She joined him in a chuckle and he couldn’t remember the last time he’d heard a lovelier sound. As Scully began nibbling on his fries, Mulder admitted to himself that he could sit out here with her all day. He didn’t think he’d ever felt that way with a woman. He’d never wanted to stay in her company indefinitely. Usually, while he might enjoy a few hours with another person, he much preferred the company of his books, his TV, his computer, or his sister. Scully, on the other hand, he could spend a few lifetimes getting to know. He settled for the rest of the afternoon. They sat on the grass for awhile and talked about insubstantial things. He told her a little about his family, being very general. He explained that his little sister had been his best friend since he hit puberty. She was always there to listen when the rest of the world seemed so far away. It had been her who had convinced him to try his hand at writing, and he’d found he had a passion for it. He told Scully about how he and his dad still went to go see a ball game every month – ranging from baseball - to football - to basketball, depending on the season. His mother had died a few years ago, a heart attack, and that revelation prompted Scully to tell him about her father, whom she called Ahab, due to a mutual love of Moby Dick. Mulder found it charming that she had been her father’s Starbuck until the day he died. The bittersweet emotions that rolled off of her when she told him about her father nearly broke Mulder’s heart. Scully was quickly endearing herself to every facet of his being. She shared a few stories, about her brothers and how much of a tom boy she was, always trying to tag along with her father and ‘his boys’, while her sister stayed at home with their mother. She confided that she didn’t see her family now as much as she’d like; too busy, is all she’d said in explanation, quickly diverting the conversation. Obviously she didn’t wish to talk about it. She did, however, let it slip that something had changed in recent months; especially where her relationship with her siblings was concerned. What amazed Mulder the most was how much he had to consciously stop himself from touching her. Just pushing her hair back from her face so her eyes weren’t obscured, or brushing the backs of his knuckles against her cheek was hard to resist. Holding her hand, Christ, just laying a hand on her knee was tempting. The kind of stuff a high school kid sweated over at the drive-in. Scully brought all that out in him. For the second time in his life, he wanted to re-visit a childhood he’d flung away in favor of moving on to bigger and better things. He had been in such a hurry to grow up, he hadn’t taken into account that he might miss his childhood once it was gone. Rachel Hayes played an instrumental part in getting him to realize that. “That one looks like a horse.” Mulder turned his head to regard his new friend. He already considered her a friend, he noted wryly, an internal grin breaking out. When was the last time he had made a new friend? “Nah,” he disagreed, leaning close enough that the strands of their hair brushed together. “It’s a unicorn,” he insisted. “Pot-a-to, pot-ah-to,” she mumbled, sliding her arm into the air, pointing at the cloud in question. “You see that little piece of fluff there? It’s the horse’s mane, blowing in the wind.” “Nope,” he disagreed again, sliding his arm up, laying his hand on top of hers, indicating with his own finger. “That’s its horn. All real unicorns have horns,” he pronounced, sounding like an expert. “There are no such things as unicorns,” she informed him, sounding incredulous and amused at the same time. “How do you know?” he countered, turning onto his side. He propped his head up on his hand to look at her carefully. “Have you ever seen one?” “No, Mulder, and I think the fact that I =haven’t= seen one serves to prove my point.” Her eyes narrowed on his watch, then widened. “Is that the right time?” His eyes were drawn to the face of his watch. “Yeah.” His own eyes widened. “Shit,” he muttered. She didn’t hear him. She was already hastily grabbing the blazer she’d discarded hours ago. “I have to go,” she mumbled. “Me too,” he concurred, causing her to give him a look he was growing to love. “Believe it or not, even pushy would-be suitors have other commitments,” he informed her haughtily. She almost grinned at that one. He could tell she was trying damned hard to hold it in. “Thanks for lunch. It was . . .” She paused and contained a laugh. “It was something,” she mumbled. “Hey, Scully,” he murmured, catching her hand with his own. “The word you’re going for there, is fun,” he told her gently, smiling into her eyes as the sun began to set. “Is that what fun is?” she asked lightly, pulling her hand away with something that looked like regret in her eyes. “I’ll have to remember that.” “Not to sound like some guy you met in a bar, but . . . can I get your number?” He felt like he’d known her forever, yet hadn’t spent nearly enough time with her. “Why don’t you give me your number,” she suggested instead. “I’ll call,” she added, a bit too quickly. The fact that she felt the need to add the ‘I’ll call’ alerted his radar. He gave her a look that related he didn’t necessarily believe her. “I will,” she promised, and he =almost= thought she meant it as he handed over one of the cards he kept for special patients. “My cell number,” he explained as she looked at the card. “It’s the only number I’m sure to answer.” He paused. “Scully?” he asked softly. She met his gaze warily, her hair framed by the setting sun. She looks like an angel, he thought distractedly. “Please call,” he found himself practically pleading. “I’d . . . I really had fun today,” he finally finished lamely, wishing he could say more, knowing if he said what he really meant she’d run scared. Hell, she was almost running scared =now=. “I will,” she promised as she backed away, her briefcase held tightly in one hand. She gave a little wave as she turned and left. Mulder stood there and watched her walk away as he had done the day before, silently praying that he could get through dinner tonight, what with Sam foisting this Dana person off on him. ~ Chapter 3- Siblings Boggle the Mind “Will you still need me, when I’m 64?” – The Beatles ~ It was lightly raining when Scully finally arrived home. She still couldn’t quite believe that she’d allowed herself to spend today the way she had. Blowing off the convention was one thing; the way she’d behaved with the delectable Dr. Mulder was quite another. She emptied her coat of the receipts and cards she’d accumulated over the day, and hung it in the closet. Amongst those bits of paper, she found Mulder’s card. She would call him, she decided with a sigh; a promise was a promise. But it wouldn’t lead to anything, she repeated to herself. She wouldn’t allow it to. Letting him down easy would be the best thing for both of them. Isn’t that what you said about today, Dana? the snarky voice inside her head that insisted on being so damned optimistic and antagonistic piped up. Oh shut up, she thought. She didn’t need this right now. Dana Katherine Scully did =not= need a man in her life at the moment. She would call Mulder and gently tell him she wouldn’t be able to see him again. If gentle didn’t work, she would firmly assure him it was for the best; that while he was a wonderful man, she just couldn’t be in a relationship right now. It would be easy, infused with irrefutable logic; a simple cutting of ties. Now, if she could just convince herself she meant it, she’d have something. “Dana! You are so late!” Wincing, Scully turned to see Samantha’s expectant face. She was wearing a little black dress that showed off more leg than it did chest. Samantha had long believed her legs were her best feature, and the dress complemented that belief nicely. Scully stared down at her own legs for a minute and, not for the first time, felt grossly inadequate as a woman. This was why she preferred to remain professional; detached. She didn’t have to worry about things like what length skirt looked best on her figure, or if she was an ‘autumn’ so long as she stayed in her lab. She knew all the little beauty secrets, she just didn’t care. She hadn’t cared in a long, long time. “I, uh, got held up,” she mumbled lamely, shucking her suit jacket and sending it to the sofa in the living room. “Well, what are you waiting for?” Sam asked, sounding totally impatient. “Our brothers?” Scully supplied helpfully. Sam rolled her eyes, emitting a sigh of frustration. “Dana.” They stared at one another for a moment. “Aren’t you going to change?” she asked finally. Scully looked down at the suit she’d been wearing all day. “It’s just dinner with the family,” she said innocently, looking up into Samantha’s annoyed expression. “Dana,” Sam threatened. Scully held her hands up in surrender. “All right, all right,” she conceded finally. “I’ll change.” She turned on her heel and headed upstairs. “You’ll thank me one day!” Sam called after her. Once safe inside her bedroom, Scully let the mask of self-preservation she wore on a daily basis drop. She strode determinedly to her closet and threw open the doors. Rooting through it, she finally located a pair of black dinner slacks, the rayon ones she’d found on sale last year, and a lovely ivory silk blouse. Stripping off her suit, Scully fought off a wave of irritation. She didn’t want to be dressing for =any= man, =ever= again. However, since she was apparently doing it anyway, she at least wished the man in question was Mulder. That thought gave her yet another reason to mentally chastise herself. Realizing she was too tired to even berate herself properly, Scully gave up. Screw it, she thought sullenly. I’m allowed to have a little fun, aren’t I? If Fox is half the character his sister is, I’m sure to have a good time. So what if she couldn’t get a pair of challenging, beguiling, captivating hazel eyes out of her mind? Fully dressed, Scully took a moment to primp in front of the mirror. She ran a brush through her hair and let it fall loosely around her shoulders. Some rebellious part of her urged her for the thousandth time to cut it. She steadfastly refused to give that urge credence. She liked her hair long. She had =always= liked her hair long and she wasn’t going to change it because of some symbolic rebirth crap Melissa was trying to sell her on. “Dana,” Samantha’s voice hissed through her door. “You better be ready and girlfriend, I mean =ready=, because my big brother is here, and speaking as his totally biased sister, he looks good enough to eat!” She barged through the door and shut it quietly behind her, focusing on Scully. “Freud would have a field day with that statement,” Scully quipped, turning a full three-sixty to give Samantha a glimpse of her hastily thrown together outfit. “Nice,” Sam complimented. “And I’d tell you to fuck Freud with a stick, but he’d probably like that.” Her eyes lit up. “And don’t think I’m kidding – Fox is exactly what you need. My best advice to you, Dana, is to cover him in your favorite sauce or syrup and lick him clean.” Scully’s eyes widened. “Does he know you talk about him like that?” she asked, only mildly aghast, given what she knew of Samantha’s personality. Sam shrugged. “Sure,” she said, as though it were obvious. “Oh, you mean does it bother him?” She laughed. “It drives him nuts; half the reason I do it,” she assured Scully in an off-handed manner. “However, it also gets him laid, which he doesn’t seem to actively seek out on his own. It’s my job as his sister to help him relieve some tension.” She looked at Scully pointedly. “Sometimes, despite what they taught you in Catholic school, Dana, you really do need to relieve a little tension.” “I’ll get a massage,” Scully muttered, heading out the door, Samantha dogging her heels. Male laughter drifted from the living room. Samantha smiled happily. “Oh good – Fox obviously hasn’t threatened to kill Chuck yet.” Scully’s eyebrow crept up her forehead. “Kill him?” “Oh, he’s fiercely protective,” Sam told her. “But he knows when to back off. He gets a vibe off the guys. Actually, if Fox tells me he doesn’t like a guy for legitimate reasons, ten to one, I’ll stop dating him.” Sam shrugged. “He’s a good judge of character. One of the guys he told me ‘creeped him out’ turned out to be a rapist.” “You said he used to work for the FBI?” Scully asked, stalling at this point, more uncomfortable than she could begin to express. “Yep,” Sam confirmed. “He was with the Bureau for three years; got burned out by a bad case.” She grimaced. “You know what a chatterbox I am,” she reminded Scully unnecessarily. “But it really isn’t my place to tell you about it.” Scully nodded. “Of course not. I didn’t mean to pry.” Samantha rolled her eyes. “You know, we really need to get you a spine, Dana. You seem to have misplaced yours.” Shouldering her way into the kitchen, Sam grinned widely at her brother, throwing herself into his arms. Sam was so tall, she blocked Scully’s view of her “date” for the evening. She whispered something in Fox’s ear, but Scully only caught the end of it. “--and if I’ve got half your intuition, do I have a surprise for you,” she added, stepping away. Oh my God, the little voice echoed inside Scully’s head. Oh my God, she seconded it, her eyes widening like saucers. Fox Mulder stood before her, clothed head to toe in black, looking like something out of romance novel. She tried to look away and found that she couldn’t. He slowly walked towards her, a light in his eyes she couldn’t help but be captivated by. “Dana Scully, I presume,” he murmured, placing extra emphasis on the ‘Scully’, turning it into a verbal caress as he brought the hand that had been hanging limply at her side to his lips. Scully was so busy trying to process this newest development that she missed Samantha’s distinctly proud ‘Yes!’ motion in the air, as well as her outstretched hand being deposited with a twenty from Charlie’s own pocket. ~ “It’s been too long since somebody whispered – mmm, shut up and kiss me.”—Mary Chapin Carpenter ~ It was really amazing what one could project on the outside while inside, one was screaming. Stay cool, he instructed himself. Don’t let the total, all-consuming elation you feel at her being your blind date show too much. It might scare her. God, this was too perfect. Things weren’t supposed to be this perfect in real life. The last two days were starting to remind Mulder of a British Farce, something Phoebe had dragged him to one night at Oxford on the few dates they’d had. Except he wasn’t in the audience. He was living it, and at the end of the night, the curtain wasn’t going to go up. He got to go on living it up. The question remained, how did he get Dana Scully to realize she wanted to live it up with him? “Sam, give your paramour his money back,” he instructed his sister. “Why? Tell me this isn’t the hot chick up at the podium,” she ordered. “Something tells me Dr. Scully would object to being referred to as a chick,” he murmured, his eyes fastened on Scully’s. “I don’t know. It might be a fair trade off to being considered hot,” Scully said in reply, humor lurking in her tone. Her face, though, remained slightly panicked. However, the wide-eyed, deer-caught-in-the-headlights expression was fading with increasing speed from her face. He liked that she had fast recovery time. It inspired confidence and made her even more desirable, if that was possible. Mulder caught a look of maniacal glee in his sister’s eyes. He began making plans for retribution. His little sister was either going to be hurt or thanked. He hadn’t made up his mind which yet. “Dinner’s ready,” Samantha announced, insinuating herself between Mulder and Scully. “I really think we’re getting off to a smashing start,” she confided, sending her boy toy a grin. Mulder grimaced. He knew he shouldn’t refer to Chuck as a ‘boy toy’, even in his mind. Not only would it piss Samantha off, which he was pretty used to, but it would piss Scully off as well. And Mulder didn’t think their relationship has progressed enough for her to be pissed off at him. “Dr. Mulder,” Scully said smoothly, “why don’t you escort your little sister into the dining room? I’d like to have a word with my baby brother.” The lady’s tone brokered no argument. “Nice try, Dr. Dana,” Samantha cut in quickly, “but you ain’t getting Chuckie alone until the urge you have to slice and dice someone passes.” “Pointing out to someone that they want to kill you usually isn’t the best way to ensure your further safety, Smart Ass,” Mulder whispered loudly to his sister. “And you.” Scully spun around to face her brother. “What part did you play in this little charade, Charlie?” Charlie held both his hands up in a gesture of surrender. “I just placed my bets. You disappointed me, Sis. I lost twenty bucks. I was counting on you having sworn off men for good. Now I find you’ve been gallivanting around some medical conference with a guy you just met, you don’t know the first thing about--” “Hey,” Samantha interrupted. “That’s my brother you’re talking about. He’s safe.” She rolled her eyes. “Way too safe, if you ask me,” she added. “I heard that,” Mulder said. “I said it loud,” Samantha returned. “You know, I think you had unfair advantage with our bet,” Charlie announced suddenly. “Oh no,” Scully cut in. “Don’t start that again, Charlie. You grew out of it when you were fifteen; it would be a shame if you regressed.” Charlie sniffed the air delicately. “I don’t have the slightest idea what you mean.” “You do so,” she insisted, planting her hands on hips. “Every time it turned out I was right and you were wrong, you found some way to weasel your way out of it. You cited unfair advantage more times than I can count.” “Did not,” Charlie denied. “Did too.” “Not.” “Too.” “Woah.” Mulder made a cutting motion in the air and focused on Scully again. “Not to insinuate that I don’t enjoy a glimpse of this carefree, no holds barred side to you, because I do. But,” he qualified, “I don’t think any of us agreed to have dinner tonight to argue with our respective siblings.” He glanced Samantha’s way. “Although killing her isn’t totally out of the question.” “Words hurt, Fox,” Samantha enlightened him in the tone of voice she’d mastered at the age of five. “I didn’t agree. I was coerced,” Scully announced, her posture changing in an instant. She definitely had the carriage of a Fed. “All right then. =I= came here tonight, because my sister informed me there was a woman here I =had= to meet.” He quirked his lips at her. “She promised kismet.” “I don’t believe in kismet,” Scully challenged, but Mulder didn’t think she quite believed herself. And was he imagining that sparkle in her eyes? “I didn’t used to,” he admitted. “But when faced with undeniable proof, I find it hard to keep refuting certain truths to myself.” “Undeniable?” A single eyebrow arched. Mulder grinned. “Aren’t they =cute=?” Samantha gushed, threading her arm through Charlie’s. The rest of dinner went much the same way. They bickered and laughed, ate and talked. Samantha, in a feat Mulder felt proud of, managed to save both she and Charlie’s hides. Scully – Dana – had been more perturbed, he thought, than he had. After all, this sort of thing was right up Samantha’s alley. He was used to it after thirty-four years. Not that her boyfriend was a saint, by any means, and for the first time, Mulder had the thought that his sister finally found someone well suited to her. Through the course of dinner, Samantha told them she’d taken to calling him Chuckie after they viewed the Child’s Play movies together. Scully had nearly snorted white wine out her nose. A demurely murmured ‘appropriate’ had been her only comment. Through tacit agreement, all four stayed away from the topic of how Mulder and Scully met. Instead, their conversation steered toward childhood. They learned that one summer their families had vacationed in the same coastal town at the same time, and for all they knew, they might’ve even spent time at the same beach. Currently, Charlie and Samantha had only been dating for about seven months, but according to Sam, they’d known each other for years. “We met in college,” Charlie had confirmed. “We took a few of the same courses and became fast friends. I was engaged at the time, so nothing came of it.” He had grinned rakishly. “When I turned in my commission and Jenny left me, Sam was the only one who’d speak to me.” “I know what that’s like,” Scully had muttered under her breath. Mulder had sensed an undercurrent between brother and sister, but when he’d looked to Sam for confirmation, there had been a definite ‘leave it alone’ warning in her eyes. So he had, and the conversation moved on. In fact, things were just starting to become truly relaxed when the power went out. “Goddamn circuit breaker,” Samantha exclaimed. “It does this every time it rains.” Scully blinked and looked out the window. What do you know, it was raining. She’d been so busy staring at Mulder that she hadn’t even noticed. Not good, Dana, she chastised herself. Total ignorance of your surroundings is the first stop on the road to ruin. “I’ll go fix it,” Scully announced suddenly, standing up. Anything to get away from those penetrating hazel eyes . . . “Fine, but take Fox with you. I don’t want you fumbling around in the dark, falling, and breaking your neck down there.” “Sure,” Mulder answered before Scully could think up a good reason to refuse. It =was= dark down there and it wasn’t completely implausible that she’d trip over the mountains of junk Sam had stored away. And so, Scully found herself walking alongside the man who’d occupied nearly all her thoughts from the moment that she’d laid eyes on him. “So.” He didn’t look at her as they headed toward the basement. “So,” she agreed, having no clue what else to say. “Small world,” he tried, sounding as nervous as she felt. “Very,” she agreed again, looking at him as a flash of lightening illuminated his features. God, you’re beautiful, she thought. “What?” he asked, sounding as though he could =not= have heard her right. Oh God, oh God, oh God, oh God. “Found a flashlight,” she mumbled, forcing her voice not to reflect the horror she felt at having said that out loud. She pulled open a kitchen drawer and extricated the flashlight. =click= “Damn,” she swore. “Don’t suppose you’ve got extra batteries in that drawer,” he said with resignation. “I guess we’re going down blind,” she replied. “Just to be on the safe side . . .” He trailed off and enfolded her hand in his. “Wouldn’t want to lose you down there,” he whispered into her ear. Scully suppressed a shiver of pleasure and forged ahead through the basement doorway. They took the steps carefully, free hands feeling along the railing until they reached the bottom. She kept close to the wall until she felt the circuit box beneath her fingers. Pulling it open, she jumped backwards when it emitted sparks and shocks. She lost her balance slightly and felt herself begin to fall. Luckily, or unluckily, depending on your perspective, Mulder caught her around the waist before she could hit the ground. Her back was to his front and his arm was slung low along her hip, holding her securely to him. His breath puffed against her temple and all of a sudden, it was nothing but dark and hot in the basement. “I’d say electricity was a lost cause.” His mouth was right next to her ear and she refused to acknowledge how much she enjoyed the way his whisper felt in her ear. “Maybe not,” she put in feebly, silenced once more when a violent surge of electricity sizzled along the box. “Scully, there’s no way in hell I’m letting you touch that box, and if I’m not letting you do it, I’m certainly not stupid enough to do it,” he said definitively. She pulled away from him sharply, facing the eyes she couldn’t see in the dark. “Let me?” she challenged in an icy calm voice. She admitted, at least to herself, that he didn’t deserve it. He was only looking out for her welfare, and it =would= be stupid to touch that box at the moment. Past experience, however, made her extremely sensitive to being controlled. “I didn’t mean it like that,” he stated for the record. “That’s what they all say,” she muttered darkly. “No, that’s what I say,” he insisted. “I didn’t mean to infer I could tell you what to do, Scully. I just don’t want to see you get hurt.” For the first time, she was grateful for the dark. The sentiment behind his words was so sincere, tears were springing to her eyes and, try as she might, she couldn’t seem to blink them back. She should have been more cynical, less eager to believe he meant what he said. But it had been so long since she’d felt able to trust someone; so long since she’d wanted to this badly. Lightning flashed again, and a burst of thunder followed barely a second behind it. Scully’s heart clenched in fear, past becoming present as the last thunderstorm she was caught in came back in startling clarity. The window to Scully’s left shattered and she lost her balance. Again, she found herself falling into Mulder and, had she the ability to care, she would have been annoyed at how often she seemed to need him tonight. Rain symbolized pain to Scully. It had ever since that night, ten months ago, when she’d finally decided to take her life into her own hands. It shouldn’t have taken that long, she yelled at herself. She shouldn’t have waited until she was at the end of her rope. She should have been stronger, for so many reasons . . . “You’re crying.” That’s right. She was crying. Not from pain this time, but because she was here, with this man, so different from the one who had come before him, and he’d made her cry because of that very difference. He sounded amazed, frightened even, that she was crying. She didn’t want him to be frightened. Before she could stop herself, Scully tilted her head up and pressed her lips to his. And oh, God, did it feel good. He hesitated only a second before he started to kiss her back. His thumbs wiped the tears off her cheeks and his palms settled along her jaw line. She opened her mouth beneath his and he pulled on her lower lip gently with his teeth. An involuntary moan left her mouth and she felt his lips widen into a smile. Her arms were between their bodies, her hands lying against his chest, and she clutched two fistfuls of his t-shirt to pull him closer. She tentatively probed his lips with her tongue, and this time, his was the involuntary moan. Lightning flashed again and thunder sounded through the now broken window. Rain through the open window splattered against Scully’s neck and face. It served the effect of a dozen cold showers and she broke their kiss, averting her face to the side. His hands dropped from her cheeks to rest on her hips and his breathing was as labored as hers. She pulled away emotionally first. It was easier that way. “I’m sorry,” she mumbled quietly. “Don’t be,” he almost begged. She smiled sadly, even though he couldn’t see it. “I’m afraid I have to be,” was all she could get out. She pushed away from him and blindly made her way to the stairs, then up and into the kitchen. Once there, she took a series of deep breaths to calm the panicked fluttering of her heart. Composed at last, she carefully made her way back into the living room where Samantha and Charlie were waiting. ~ It just was not fair for a woman to be that beautiful, that smart, that sexy, and yet that totally unaware of what she did to a man. Whoever it was that hurt her before, Mulder would gladly pay good money to get the guy alone in a dark alley. He hadn’t been sure, before, why Scully was so gun shy. He’d suspected, of course, that it had something to do with love gone wrong. He had not, however, realized the depth to which the experience had affected her. Contrary to popular opinion, women did not change emotions at the drop of a hat the way Scully had just a few minutes before. Her reaction to the storm puzzled him, almost as much as the kiss she’d laid on him surprised him. Whatever secrets were locked inside Scully’s head, Mulder was determined to let them out. He wanted to earn her trust, gain her confidence, and hopefully convince her to give whatever it was between them a chance to flourish. And, most disturbingly of all, he wanted to take care of her, even though he got the distinct impression she’d bristle at the notion. But she needed to be taken care of. Hell, he needed someone to take care of him. It was a trade off and she was the first person he’d ever met in his entire life he wanted to try it out with. Unfortunately, she seemed to want to spend all their time together alternately flirting with abandon, and running like a rabbit. He didn’t know what it would take to convince her he might just be worth her while; but he knew he was going to spend every moment trying. She wasn’t the only one with a few demons. Maybe his demons could meet up with her demons and they could fight it out while he took her ice-skating. The thought amused him, probably more than it should have, as he headed up the stairs. “Dana, just tell him.” Samantha’s voice had always carried, but Mulder found it unnaturally loud as he approached the living room. “Sam.” God, he had it bad. She sounded cute when she whined. “Leave Dana alone,” Charlie insisted. “Thank you.” Scully sounded relieved, and mildly surprised, to have someone on her side. “It’s not her fault she’s a coward,” he added. Wiping the smirk off his face, Mulder carefully pushed the kitchen door open and found a lot more light around the room than there had been when he left. Apparently, Samantha had found the candles he sent to her from Italy. They gave the room a hazy glow, and he made mental note of how beautiful Scully looked surrounded by light. Ten years younger and not so much like the weight of the world rested squarely on her shoulders. “Well, I assume Dana,” it was harder than it should have been to use her given name, “told you electricity was a lost cause for the night.” “Yep,” Samantha confirmed. “We’re having an argument – should we play Risk, or Stratego?” “Monopoly,” Charlie interjected. “We are =not= playing Monopoly,” Samantha said with exasperation. It gave Mulder the impression that she and Charlie already had that conversation. “What about Boggle,” Scully suggested. Three sets of eyes turned her way. “Boggle?” they all exclaimed with total disbelief. “Excuse me,” she muttered, turning her eyes away. Mulder pulled his lower lip between his teeth as Sam and Charlie continued the argument amongst themselves. All his attention was focused on Scully. She tried so hard to act normal; to act as though nothing was wrong. It seemed as though whatever was bothering her had already been confided in their respective siblings. It was good to know that, at least, his own sister was rooting for him. Trying to be as unobtrusive as possible, Mulder made his way to Scully’s side and, leaving an inch or so between them, sat next to her on the floor. There was tension radiating from her. She did not want him to bring up what there was between them. And because she wouldn’t allow him to give her anything else, he gave her time. Leaning his head closer to hers, he forced a carefree tone into his voice. “Boggle?” Her lips quirked, and as she turned to answer him, he knew it would be all right, at least for now. They would talk. Really talk, about all the pounds of luggage they both dragged behind them. But it would wait. He would give her all the time she needed. ~ Chapter 4 – Tales From the Sleep Deprived “Too much honesty did never man harm.” –John Clarke ~ As it turned out, Samantha forbade anyone from leaving the house until the storm broke. The storm never did break, and so they all found themselves eating cereal the next morning, using up the last of the milk before it spoiled. Like any good slumber party, those who attended hadn’t slept a wink. They spent the night playing party games, including Boggle, as well as a marathon, cut-throat Monopoly tournament that eventually came down to Mulder and Samantha. Each owned half the board, Samantha having cleaned out Charlie a couple of hours before, and Mulder having eliminated Scully when she landed on Boardwalk with a hotel a few minutes before the end. Scully, they all learned, was not a gracious loser, and she began throwing small green houses at Mulder when he took her last dollar. Mulder, in an uncharacteristic moment, admitted he finally approved of one of Samantha’s boy toys. He told her quietly, hoping for a moment of sisterly affection, and instead got Samantha’s version of gloating. He didn’t blame her, though; the Scullys certainly did have a way about them. “Why is your last name Pierce?” The question was sudden in the comfortable silence that had descended over the kitchen table that morning. All eyes turned to Scully, who was looking pointedly at Samantha. “I got married out of high school in an act of utter stupidity that was, at the time, disguised as rebellion.” A wry smile pulled at her lips. “I kept his name so I would never be tempted to forget the dumbest thing I’ve ever done.” Mulder made a grunting sound, but otherwise stayed silent. Samantha stuck her tongue out at him and Scully heaved a sigh. “Marriage,” she muttered, “is not all it’s cracked up to be.” “Some marriages aren’t,” Mulder injected before he could stop himself. Off Scully’s look he elaborated: “It all depends on the people involved.” A non-committal grunt from the girl with the granola and yogurt was all he got in response. He was torn between relief and disappointment that she didn’t bother to engage him in a debate on the subject. “So,” Samantha dragged the word out to break the silence, “now that the storm’s over, what is everyone doing today?” Mulder sighed. “I should go home and change. This is the last day of that damned conference and it would be in poor form to miss it.” “I’m not going,” Scully announced. Turning toward her in amusement, Mulder pushed his own bowl of cereal back from the table and folded both arms over one another. “Playing hooky, Dana?” He thought he detected a quirk of annoyance at his use of her first name. “I don’t call it hooky when I decide not to attend a conference that wasn’t mandatory to begin with, Fox.” She drew his name out in the most taunting, arousing manner. She was trying to piss him off, and it was turning him on. So much was twisted in that line of thought, he opted not to waste his time analyzing it. “Well, if you’re not going, that means my number one reason for dragging my exhausted ass out there is gone.” He waggled his eyebrows at her. “Wanna take a nap?” The effort she expended trying not to smile was admirable. “Actually, I would. I haven’t stayed up all night since Med. school.” “A nap sounds great, actually,” Samantha announced. She stood, dragging Charlie up behind her. One of her arms slid around Mulder’s neck and she hugged his head to her for a moment. “No driving home until you’ve got at least four hours under your belt, my big brother.” She pecked his temple affectionately and disappeared with her charge in hand. “Poor Charlie,” Mulder chuckled. Scully raised an eyebrow, encouraging him to elaborate. He gestured with his hands. “He looks half asleep already and she’s going to keep him from sacking out completely for at least another hour.” He could tell she was trying hard not to blush; almost as hard as she’d been trying not to smile. “Your relationship with your sister is very . . . open.” “Open is a kind word,” he allowed, grinning. His heart did a strange flip-flop when she grinned back. “We were close growing up. As close as you can get when you drive each other crazy. We communicated almost entirely through letters and week long visits when I went away to college.” He heaved a sigh, his smile disappearing as he brought a hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose. “It scared the hell out of me when she called two weeks after she graduated high school. I’d flown in for it, met her new boyfriend, heard how completely in love she was, gotten what a ‘hoodlum’ he was from dad.” “I think that’s a universal term all fathers share,” Scully offered. He nodded. “Except this time, dad was right.” He could still hear the tears in his baby sister’s voice. “They were married for exactly eight days. She was too ashamed to call mom or dad, so she called me. I flew from Oxford to a small town in Minnesota in the dead of winter. Her so-called husband got drunk with his friends, picked up some women in a bar, and he left his ‘bride’ to fend for herself.” “My God,” Scully exclaimed. “How old was she?” “Turned eighteen the day before she got married.” “I can’t believe that . . . she’s so . . .” Her mouth worked silently as she searched for a word. “Full of joy,” she finally settled on. “When I look at her, I feel guilty for not feeling alive enough.” Mulder smiled. “I know. It amazes me she’s capable of that. I think sometimes I don’t quite live up to her good example, but I do my best. She helps. After that night, being brother and sister sort of took a backseat to what we’ve become now – the best of friends. She has been my best friend for years now.” “Over the last few months, she’s become mine, too,” Scully admitted quietly. “I’ve also been getting to know my little brother and sister again. I understand what you mean. Sometimes, I can almost feel the relationship shifting away from siblings, to friends. I never imagined how satisfying it would feel to turn family into friends.” “In my experience, blending friendship and family is the most satisfying relationship you can build. It’s why marriages that are rooted in friendship last longest . . .” He trailed off as he got a look at her face. “Did I say something wrong?” She shook her head, and Mulder got the distinct impression she was shaking something else entirely off. “I’m married,” she announced suddenly. Everything around Mulder seemed to slow, then stop altogether. They had been having a nice, quiet, ‘getting to know you’ conversation, and all of a sudden, she drops THAT out of the sky? “What?” he asked, sure he couldn’t have heard her right. “I’m married,” she said again, more clearly. As if realizing what she’d just said, she quickly stood and fled the kitchen. Amazingly, the only thought flitting around Mulder’s brain was that he would somehow break her of the habit she had of running away from him just when things were getting interesting. ~ Stupid, stupid, stupid, she muttered to herself the entire way up to her room. Not only had she sickened herself by running away from a confrontation again, but also she’d just given Mulder one more piece of her life. And it wasn’t even a complete piece. It was a fragmented piece, one he’d surely never be satisfied with. In effect, she had just ensured that as soon as he’d digested what she said, she would be grilled to within an inch of her life until he had all her secrets. Well, that just wasn’t going to happen. She didn’t care how sexy he was. Safely tucked in her room, she shut the door firmly and leaned back against it, her eyes closing slowly. If only his appeal were relegated to the surface. It would be so easy to stay safe and separate from him. But he was like his sister; relentless and endearing. Scully hadn’t wanted Samantha for a friend. She had wanted to say cloistered in her own little world, with the responsibilities she’d taken upon herself. No friends; no romantic entanglements; nothing but what she’d accepted would be her life. But her damned brother had to introduce her to his ‘soul mate.’ After the way his marriage had ended, Scully had scoffed at his use of the term. However, after she met Samantha, she was forced to eat her words. When, after having only known each other a few weeks, Sam offered her home to Scully for “as long as you like,” while she got her head together, the bond between the two women was cemented: Samantha was like another sister. The night she shared that observation with her, was the night Sam first started in on Fox. It was perfect, in her mind, for her brother to marry the woman she already considered to be a sister. Scully had indulged her for months. What did it matter, after all, if Sam had this fantasy? It wasn’t like she and Fox were really going to fall madly in love at first sight. Until, that is, she saw him at that conference. Without even knowing who he was, she’d still been drawn to him for some reason. And normally, if someone had so rudely interrupted her presentation the way he had, she would have handed him his balls. But no, not Mulder. When he did something like that, he somehow made it seem endearing and quirky. She’d actually gotten a charge out of arguing with him. It made her blood course hotter through her veins to engage his mind like that. But she wasn’t in love with him. Oh no. She could not be in love with =anyone=. It just wasn’t in the cards for her. And she was =fine= with that. She hadn’t even been =thinking= about it until she met him. Damn him to hell, anyway. “Dana.” Oh, fuck me, she thought acidly, then amended her thought: that was the last thing she needed. “Go away,” she whined, sure that he wouldn’t. “Dana, please, I just want to talk to you for a minute. You at least owe me a minute after that.” Damned reasonable argument. “On one condition,” she called through the door. “Name it,” he agreed easily. She opened the door a crack and looked at him. “You have to stop calling me Dana just because you think it’s what you’re supposed to do. I can see you cringe when you say it.” “I won’t call you Dana, if you won’t call me Fox,” he offered. Pouting slightly, she opened the door fully. “But I like calling you Fox,” she protested. “I got so used to hearing about ‘Fox’ from Samantha, it’s kind of novel to call you that.” “It feels like you’re talking about someone else when you call me Fox.” He shook his head, looking exasperated with himself. “What the hell is it about you that makes me feel like a new man?” He was =not= allowed to say things like that. It was part of the rules she’d arbitrarily made up in her mind. He wasn’t allowed to be as wonderful as he was. He wasn’t allowed to be as patient and funny as he was. And he sure as hell wasn’t allowed to feel about her the same way that she was feeling about him. Like she’d become a new woman the moment she met him. Except this new woman still had the history of the old one. And he needed to understand that. Once he did, he wouldn’t want anything to do with her. Was that the real reason she’d been dreading telling him? “Fox,” she began quietly, using that name to refute what he’d confessed, “there are some things you should know before you start declaring things like that.” “Scully, I can promise you, nothing you could possibly reveal to me would change the way I feel about you.” Her eyes slammed shut and she held up two hands. “Just . . . don’t. Don’t say that until you hear me out.” She wouldn’t tell him everything, but she’d tell him just enough to scare him off. Secure in the knowledge of her motivations, she refused to lend any credence to the tiny part of her that prayed for his understanding. ~ “If you have love in your life, you can make up for a great many things you lack. If you don’t have it, no matter what else is there, it’s not enough.” ~ “Sammy, baby, I’m =tired=.” Oh that just wasn’t fair. That pout she gave him sometimes that could cut him off at the knees and make him do anything she wanted. There wasn’t a facial expression in his entire arsenal that could do that to her. At least, not one she’d admit to. “You can sleep later,” she practically purred. She sat up on her knees beside him on the bed and shrugged until her partly unbuttoned blouse slipped off one shoulder. It hadn’t always been like this. He could remember a time when a small patch of her skin didn’t affect him in the least. Of course, that had been before he’d kissed her; before he’d felt what it was like to fall asleep in her arms and know that he’d always have a port of call to come home to. Charlie met Samantha in college. She was bright, bubbly, and extremely wounded. He never met her brother, but she spoke of him often and in glowing detail. Over the course of four years, they became the best of friends. She dated his best friend and he dated everything in a skirt. They shared confidences, copied off each other’s homework and took turns daring each other to pull off the stupidest pranks in history. “You kept me up all night last night, and the night before,” he reminded her as his hand rose of its own volition. His fingers sifted through her long, dark hair the same way they did graduation day when they’d said goodbye. Judging by the look on her face, she was remembering that day the same way. “But last night our siblings were present,” she whispered huskily as she bent to nibble at his ear. He couldn’t contain a chuckle. “I’m almost surprised that stopped you,” he commented wryly, slipping a hand beneath her shirt. They both knew he was going to give in. Fighting it would only delay both gratification and sleep. Just because she was horny didn’t mean she needed sleep any less than he did. Samantha was just more . . . goal oriented. “I swear, you Scullys. I’ve never met a more repressed gene pool,” she mumbled as her lips formed a Hoover-worthy suction around the side of his neck. Charlie frowned slightly. That had been something his ex had always accused him of. Being far too repressed. “You’re the least spontaneous person I’ve ever met,” was one of her favorite refrains. Toward the end of their marriage, he had often screamed back at her that she was the last person to infer anyone else possessed a lack of spontaneity. He and Jenny had never exactly caused each other’s blood to boil. But he’d loved her, as much as he’d been capable. He was so young when he joined the navy and married the pretty girl he met during leave. They’d been drunk, and neither one willing to give up on their first marriage. In retrospect, he wished they’d given up the very morning they woke up next to each other. They both would have been spared a lot of pain with a quick annulment. Instead, it took five years, an infidelity, hers, and a total unwillingness to forgive, his, to bring them to the brink of divorce. The day he’d finally made the decision was the day he’d run into Samantha again. It had been a chance meeting. Browsing books at Barnes & Noble, they’d bumped into each other in the science fiction section. She was picking up Fox’s first novel and she persuaded him to buy it too. They exchanged numbers, made a vague promise to get in touch and have lunch soon, and parted. As he drove home to Jenny, something occurred to him: he’d felt more alive during that five minute conversation with Samantha than he had in the entire five years he’d spent in his marriage. And it wasn’t Samantha herself that did it, really. It was the fact that he remembered what it was like to have a real, human connection with a woman. And he missed it. And it made him sadder than he could express that he didn’t have it with his wife. “You’re wearing your serious face,” Sam fretted above him. He focused and found her face hovering above his. She was straddling him now, a worried smile on her face. “You know I don’t like the serious face unless it’s focused on me.” “I was thinking about the day we ran into each other again.” He brought his hands up and buried them in her hair. He loved her hair. The way it smelled, the way it felt pressed up against his chest when she slept. “I will not tolerate you feeling guilty about your marriage again,” she informed him primly. Amazing how she could pull off being prim while half-naked, straddling an equally half-naked man’s chest. “I’m not. Not really,” he amended when she looked ready to argue. “I just wonder sometimes . . . what if you and I had gotten married right out of college?” “I wanted to kiss you that day,” she confessed softly. “That day you said goodbye to me. But you were off to be Navy boy and I knew whatever love you felt for me couldn’t stop you from following in your father’s footsteps. At least not then,” she whispered with a sly grin. “You aren’t going to sit there and tell me you knew we’d end up together.” “Not ‘end up together,’ as you say,” she chided, pressing her lips over his heart. “But I knew we’d meet again. You don’t become what we were to each other and then just . . . never meet again.” She chuckled. “Although I will admit, when you didn’t call me for months after we bumped into each other, I started to doubt myself.” “Never doubt what you mean to me,” he whispered as he pulled her mouth to his for a kiss. He and Jenny filed for divorce the following morning. He spent the next few months using sick leave and setting himself up in an apartment. Just as he was getting his life into something approaching normal, he found Samantha’s number crumpled up in his wallet. Before he could think about it too much, he had called her and asked her out to lunch. Somehow, lunch turned into lunch and a movie, and after the movie there was a walk, and after the walk they were hungry again and ate dinner. After dinner there were drinks back at her house, and after the drinks there was a game of strip poker like they used to play in college. And once there was nudity involved, there was no way he was leaving her house. Once they’d dropped the pretense that he =wasn’t= living with her, she helped him move out of the apartment he’d never really liked anyway. During dinner one night, when he was dreading leaving her to go back to sea, she asked him why he joined the navy. That question so perplexed him that he’d stayed up all night on the couch. He stared at the TV without really watching it, and eventually, she’d gone to bed without him. The next morning, she’d found him in the same position. He’d looked up at her and shrugged. “Because my father did. Because Bill did. Because it was expected.” She’d smiled at him then and pressed her lips to his forehead. “Silly man,” she’d whispered, her voice nothing but kind. And so she’d taught him how to play the stock market. She was very good at it, and made an obscene amount of money sitting in front of her computer a few hours a day. “Just until you find out what you really want to do,” she’d told him. And it was good. They sat in an office together, working separately, and he thought a lot about what it is he’d =really= like to do with his life. He also thought about other things; like how lucky he was to have Samantha in his life. And how he was going to sock Dana if she called him “Popeye” again. And recently, after meeting Fox, about how he was going to get his big sister to loosen up. “You were right,” he mentioned as Samantha shrugged out of her blouse. His eyes focused on her breasts and his train of thought flew out of his head. “I was? When?” She jiggled a little and he pinched her bottom. A giggle left her mouth. “What’s the matter, Chuckie? Easily distracted? You’d think they’d have taught you more discipline than that in the navy.” She started humming “In the Navy,” by the Village People under her breath and he groaned. “You know I hate that,” he growled. “And if you continue, I won’t tell you what you were right about.” Immediately, she was quiet. She appeared impish and impossibly beautiful the way she was looking at him. He ran his hands over her sides, simply because he needed to touch her. It wasn’t fair, that they’d lost all that time they could have been together. While he would never call the years they’d been friends a waste, he definitely wished they’d pushed the envelope further back then. “Fox is perfect for Dana,” he admitted grudgingly. “I hate to say ‘I told you so,’ but--” “No you don’t,” he cut her off, laughing. “You love being right and you love being able to gloat about how right you were.” He sat up and brought their upper bodies close together as he kissed her once, soundly. “And I adore that about you.” He sighed and rested his forehead against hers. “I’m afraid, however, that Dana is going to put up walls the likes of which you’ve never seen.” “Excuse me, I’m the one who knocked down her ‘no one’s ever getting close again’ walls to begin with,” she reminded him in a huffy tone. “Trust me. My big brother is not only a trained psychologist, but one hell of a student of human nature. If anyone can get through, it’ll be him. Besides,” and she was smirking now, “I think he’s already in love with her.” Charlie’s eyes widened. “It’s only been a few days!” “I have never seen him look at someone the way he looks at her when she isn’t looking,” Samantha proclaimed. “He isn’t interested in sex for sex’s sake.” She rolled her eyes and he chuckled. That sentiment was something the woman he loved would =never= be able to fathom. “Ever since he hit high school, he’s been searching for a soul mate. And when he couldn’t find her, he just sort of . . .resigned himself to waiting, even if he never found her.” “He seems to be warming to the idea of ending his wait,” Charlie commented wryly. She leaned in closer to him, if that was even possible. “Can I tell you a secret, Chuckie?” “Of course,” he answered without thinking. Oh, shit, he thought to himself immediately afterward. He’s going to have to abide by that and this is something about Dana or Fox that the other one is going to need to know. “I think she is his soul mate,” she confided in the softest voice imaginable. “You may be right,” Charlie began hesitantly, all ready to refute her in some way. Then: “Dana.” They both froze. “Is that--” “Shhh!” Samantha placed her hand over his mouth. “Go away,” they heard Dana whine. Charlie snickered and spoke behind Sam’s hand. “That’s my girl; petulance always keeps ‘em coming around for more.” “I will gag you,” Samantha threatened. He leered. “Ooo, really?” “Later, if you’re good,” she muttered, reaching her hand back to stroke the erection they’d both almost forgotten about. That shut him up. “Dana, please, I just want to talk to you for a minute. You at least owe me a minute after that.” “After what?” Samantha wondered aloud. “I don’t know and I don’t care,” Charlie muttered, reaching to his right and flipping on the CD player. “Hey,” Sam protested, obviously having forgotten about sex in favor of eavesdropping on her brother. Holding her against him tightly, Charlie flipped their positions until his full weight rested atop her. “I think I just got my second wind,” he confided as he nuzzled her neck gently. Her answer was a bit breathless. “Then why the hell are your pants still on?” ~ Chapter 5- Love Shack, Baby, Love Shack (my apologies for the title, to Mulder at least.) “Reflect upon your present blessings, of which every man has many; not on your past misfortune, of which all men have some.” – Charles Dickens ~ “Are you still listening to me?” Mulder started slightly, glancing guiltily at Scully. “Do you hear that?” He cocked his head to the side. She mimicked his movement. “Hear what?” “It sounds like . . . ‘Love Shack?’” A grimace crossed her face. “That’s Charlie, he’s . . . um . . . being intimate.” She sighed. “It’s a homemade compilation CD – ‘the best of love,’ he calls it.” “My baby sister is getting it on to the B-52’s?” He was aghast. “Could you let this go and focus?” Ooo, he detected exasperation. But . . . “I can’t. I can still hear it. It eats at my brain.” Rolling her eyes, Scully strode to his side and shut the door firmly behind him. “There. No more neural disintegration.” He could still hear it, but decided to let the matter drop. It wasn’t nearly as loud, and the fact that she’d shut them inside her bedroom was making him light headed. Besides, he got the distinct impression she was about to lay something =very= heavy on him. He didn’t need her frustrated with his intense dislike of certain pop artists, to boot. Her voice was almost brisk when she began. “About ten years ago, I met my husband. He was handsome, intelligent and kind. We had an affair while I was going through the Academy. It ended, but we remained friends. About three years later, I was given my first field assignment: I was one of the agents staking out a bank we’d gotten a tip was going to be robbed. We went in, caught the bad guys, but in the process, Jack was shot. He was dead for nearly two minutes. But he came back.” Her voice cracked slightly. There was a wealth of pain in her tone, and in her eyes. It cut him to the core to see her look so lost. It was obvious she had loved this man at one time. He felt an irrational pang of jealousy. Of course she’d loved him; they’d been married. If his brain were operating properly, he would have realized she had to have loved him the moment she said she was married. “I was . . . dissatisfied with my career in the Bureau. However, I was totally unwilling to admit it, to my family or to myself. It caused a lot of pain when I gave up a career in medicine to be an FBI agent. My father didn’t speak to me for months, my mother had a disapproving but ultimately loving look on her face whenever I saw her, and my two brothers branded me as good as a traitor – they were navy boys, the least I could do is be a doctor. Melissa, my sister, was the only one who didn’t persecute me, but at that point, she’d also distanced herself from the bosom of the family.” “By choice?” She nodded. “Melissa has always been different. She lives life by her own rules.” They were silent for a moment. Then: “You said you were married. Present tense.” Again, she nodded. “I am,” she confirmed in a voice he suspected was steady only through great leaps of strength and control on her part. “I owe you an apology, then, for what happened last night.” Her eyes widened at him. “For kissing you,” he elaborated. She almost looked amused. “Your reticence is endearing, but I kissed you.” He shrugged. “I still kissed you back. And I knew something was wrong with you. I’ve never kissed a married woman before, and whether I knew it or not, I’m sorry.” “Apology accepted and appreciated, but I still maintain the blame lies squarely at my feet.” “No, really, it’s all my fault.” She looked ready to protest again. He forestalled her. “I’m irresistible,” he confided, offering her an out. It was okay, he longed to soothe gently. You don’t have to apologize for anything with me; what you feel, what you think, who you are, what your past is. See how ridiculous it sounds when you try? Every piece of you is all right with me. He said nothing, of course. She wasn’t ready to hear it, anymore than he was ready to say it out loud. At least not until she finished her little confession. “Anyway,” she continued, “he was relentless this time around. He wanted me to marry him. He was so different from the man I knew before. As though he had a new lease on life. Which, to be honest, I could understand, under the circumstances. I confided in him that I was thinking of leaving the Bureau, and he made me an irresistible offer. We would get married. He would support me while I went back to school. I wanted to research cancer, help to find a cure. I’d seen some very ugly things at Quantico, and I wanted to make a difference early on.” “Is that what you do now?” He couldn’t stop himself from asking. He was fascinated with her and, even though he knew she wanted distance, all he wanted was to soak up as much of her as he possibly could. It frightened him a little, to tell the truth. He’d never felt this before. Not with any of the women he’d dated, slept with, lived with or come close to committing to for life. He’d only known her a few days, and already, he felt like she was imprinting her identity on his heart. And the damnedest part of it was, she didn’t even mean to. She didn’t even =want= to. Judging by the deer-caught-in-headlights look that she seemed to wear half the time, he was willing to bet she was feeling the same way and was equally – if not surpassingly – scared by it. At least, that’s what he was telling himself. And, until she proved him conclusively wrong, he was going with it. “Yes,” she answered, and he’d almost forgotten his question. “I think my work has been the only good thing I’ve had for a long time.” A cross between a smile and a grimace crossed her face. “Or, at least, it was before the Mulders came into my life.” Oh, that one cost her a lot. His admiration for her increased a few more notches. At the rate that kept happening, he’d be worshipping at her feet in a few days. “I think I can say with certainty that we’re very happy to be here,” he murmured quietly. His words prompted a teary eyed smile from her. He watched her visibly push down her reaction and regain control. “Things were fine while I went back to school. Or, at least, I thought they were. I was extremely focused on my career, but so was he. I’ll admit things weren’t ideal, but I never . . . it never occurred to me things were as bad as they were.” Her tongue darted out to lick her lower lip nervously and he refused to allow his imagination to place the movement in a different context. “Ten months ago, I came home from work and found a woman sitting in my living room. She told me she’d been having an affair with Jack since before we were married. Then she introduced me to her daughter; their daughter.” She ran a shaky hand through her hair. “I’ve never felt so stupid in my entire life. I wanted to believe in him. I wanted to be sure he’d never do anything like that to me. But somewhere along the way, I realized that I had lost faith in him.” The muscles in her throat convulsed and constricted as she swallowed. “He didn’t deny it.” Mulder got the distinct impression she wasn’t telling him something. She kept averting her gaze from his and she was fidgeting. “And so you left,” he concluded. “I left,” she confirmed in a voice that was barely there. “But not before he gave me one last going away present.” “What?” he questioned when she made no move to continue. “Scully, what?” “He killed her. The woman he’d been having an affair with. He killed her and then he came to me and said he’d done it for us. Now we could raise Kelly together.” Tears gathered in her eyes. “I can’t have children,” she whispered hoarsely. “I became sterile during my research a few years ago. I found out barely a month after Jack and I were married. In some twisted way, he thought he was doing something I wanted. I . . . managed to get away from him.” She was back to hiding her eyes from him. “I called the police and they arrested him. He’s in jail now, contesting the divorce I so desperately want, and I’m raising a six year old little girl who isn’t even mine.” “You kept her?” Damn, his voice was trembling. He was in utter awe of this woman; her courage and her compassion were indescribable. People like her were the reason he’d wanted a career in law enforcement in the first place and, ironically, the very reason he’d quit. “I found her,” she explained in the most pained whisper he’d ever heard. Her eyes finally met his. “She was there when her father killed her mother. I think . . . I think she witnessed it, although I’ve never been able to get her to talk about it.” Her mouth worked a few times as she searched for words. “I’m all she has. And in a strange way, she was all I’d had then, too. She was a very good reason to open my eyes again, to keep putting one foot in front of the other.” “I’m a little surprised the state gave you custody,” he commented. God knows that hadn’t been his experience with the system. Give a child to someone who would love him or her, and ultimately be the best place for them? Perish the thought. My sarcasm and disillusionment runneth over, he thought bitterly. “Actually . . . Jack gave me custody. And as his wife, they didn’t contest it. I think they were just glad to be rid of the whole situation.” She took a calming, steadying breath. “Right now, Kelly’s staying with Melissa. It’s been a week and I already miss her like crazy, even though I have to agree with both our sisters’ assessments – I needed the break.” “You know you don’t have to feel guilty for that,” he couldn’t help adding. “Everyone needs some time to themselves, to remember how to breathe every now and then.” “I know.” She didn’t sound like she did, though. She did, however, sound like she desperately wanted to believe. “So . . . I guess you can go now.” A thin smile spread across her face. “Try not to leave a cartoon cutout by actually running =through= the door in your haste to escape.” “I have a new goal,” he proclaimed, amazed at her capacity to underestimate him. “What?” He’d never heard someone that wary. “To seriously elevate your faith in me.” Very slowly, so she could deflect him easily if she chose, he stretched his hand out and pressed his palm to her jaw. His thumb stroked along her cheek lightly and he offered her the gentlest smile he was capable of. “Who am I to warrant God sending you into my life?” He barely heard her. White noise was filtering through his head from the look in her eyes. His throat was tight and his heart was beating far too fast to be normal. She was crying without shedding a tear and it was amazing to watch. Moisture gathered all around her eyes, but not a single drop spilled over. His thumb traced a feather-light trail across her bottom lip as he leaned even closer to her. When did they get so close? He barely remembered sitting next to her on the bed. But here they were, leaning toward each other at a rapidly increasing pace. He brushed his lips to hers and he felt her trying to hold herself back. He also felt the moment she gave in. With only a hint of trepidation, she leaned into him and the kiss. All the while, he continued to stroke her cheek gently with his thumb, her jaw cupped securely in his palm. Their lips slid slowly and sweetly over each other, teasing, learning, loving. While it was certainly the most intimate kiss that he’d ever experienced, it retained a certain level of innocence. He couldn’t even classify it as sexual, though he wanted her desperately. It was as familiar and comfortable, as it was new and exciting. Her palm brushed his cheek a few seconds before she gently pulled her mouth away from his. He chased her lips for a half second before realizing she wanted to speak. A shy smile tugged at her lips as an almost teasing glint appeared behind her eyes. “You knew I was married that time.” Her voice was husky, an alto caress he had to ignore to focus on her words. When he did, a slow smile spread across his face. “I don’t care,” he told her, surprised to find it was true. Legally, she might be someone’s wife, but she certainly wasn’t emotionally. That bastard rotting in jail didn’t deserve her. “But if you do, you should tell me now.” She seemed to consider him for a moment. With agonizing slowness, she leaned toward him until their foreheads rested against each other lightly. “Part of me cares,” she confessed softly. “The guilty Catholic part, I think. But it’s not enough to make me stop whatever this is. I can’t . . . I can’t promise you anything yet. I don’t even know if I ever will . . . I don’t even know what I’m saying, I’m sorry--” He cut off her rambling apologies with a quick, hard kiss. He took a moment to remember what it was he wanted to say. “No apologies. I won’t ask you for anything that you’re unable to give. I give you my word.” “Sleep with me.” Her voice was a plea, raw need coloring it. Her eyes widened, as though she just realized what she said. “I mean . . . I don’t mean . . .I just want to =sleep=--” He couldn’t stop laughing as he pressed a kiss to her temple. “Get under the covers, Scully,” he whispered quietly. “I feel like I could sleep for fifty years.” “I think I’ll join you, Mr. Van Winkle. But I’d like to change first. I don’t relish the idea of sleeping in my good clothes.” A grimace passed over his face. “I don’t relish the idea of sleeping in my jeans, but I don’t exactly have a plethora of opportunities.” “You could borrow something of Charlie’s,” she offered. Again, he grimaced. “Open relationship or not, there is nothing short of nuclear war that could get me to interrupt whatever’s going on in that bedroom.” Scully chewed on her bottom lip for a moment. Head bowed, hair obscuring her face from him, she looked like a child. “If you give me your t-shirt,” she mumbled, “I won’t take offense if you shuck your jeans.” Anyone but Scully, and he would be suspicious. He’d wonder if she were playing games with him, trying to use sex as a weapon. But Scully was guileless. He could tell on an instinctual level. Not to mention the fact that his sister would never attempt to set him up with a manipulator. Some distant part of him wondered if he’d ever figure out how he seemed to know her so well, so soon. Mulder peeled his shirt off over his head and handed it to Scully. He then turned his back to her while she changed. Taking the opportunity to lose his jeans, he almost groaned at the relief his spine felt when he finally slipped beneath cool sheets, clad only in a pair of gray cotton boxers. He turned toward her again, observing her with his head propped up on one arm. She was staring at him and the bed with more than a little apprehension. Briefly, he registered that her knees were cute. He pulled the covers on her side of the bed back, silently encouraging her to lie down. When she made no move forward, he began to feel doubts assail him. “Scully, if you’re not ready for this, I can go downstairs and sleep on Sam’s couch.” “No,” she answered quickly. Only the complete lack of fear in her voice convinced him she meant it. “It’s just been . . . a very long time since I’ve slept next to a man.” She took what he was now coming to think of as a trademark breath – quick, fortifying, and infused with strength and control. The next thing he knew, she had shut the curtains tightly, flipped the bedside light out, bathing them in darkness, and slipped into bed beside him. They weren’t touching, and their breathing was unnaturally loud in the small room. “Good curtains,” he commented nervously. He felt her nod. “Very helpful when I’ve been up all night working on something and need to sleep in the morning.” “I bet,” he replied lamely. Silence descended upon the room again. He could barely even hear their breathing. My God, he realized, they were both relegating their breaths so when he went in, she went in. As though they were loathe to disturb the others presence with the sound of breathing. An offense surely punishable by death, he mused, not without a hint of amusement. Something pulled at his mind, kept him from sleep. He wasn’t sure what, though he certainly didn’t think it was Scully’s rest, or lack there of. It was . . . damn, it was a song he could barely hear coming from Charlie’s love tape. He couldn’t get the words clearly, but he =knew= that song . . . “Just an old fashioned love song . . . coming down in three part harmony . . . just an old fashioned love song . . . one they wrote for you and me . . .” Scully’s voice, supplying his mind with what it couldn’t process. She had a soothing voice. Horribly off key, but comforting, to him, at least. Quietly, he began singing with her. She faltered for a moment, as though she hadn’t been aware she’d been singing out loud. But it was only a moment, and they both continued to sing softly, not even approaching the proper key, but delighting themselves, nonetheless. He must have drifted off before the song was over, because he had the strangest dream where he was a bullfrog, and Scully was helping him drink wine. And they were stranded in the middle of nowhere, her voice comforting him then, though it was no more melodic than it was now. That was the last time he stayed up for twenty-four hours straight. ~ Chapter 6 –Ruminations of a Life in Progress “We are each of us angels with only one wing, and we can only fly embracing each other.” –Luciano De Crescenzo ~ He was so beautiful when he slept. The urge to touch him was nearly overwhelming. Only the knowledge that it would wake him, thereby interrupting her silent study of his features, prevented her fingers from fluttering over his forehead, or sifting through his hair. When she looked at him, she thought of something her mother would say. “He’s a good man, Dana,” was what she’d always said when Ahab stayed away longer than he was supposed to. When her husband seemed to love his sea more than his family, and her youngest daughter wanted to know why Daddy didn’t love them enough to be home, Maggie would always answer that he was a good man. For years, Scully didn’t know what that meant. Viewing it through a child’s eyes, she of course knew her mother could tell her no lies. And her father was a hero, someone beyond reproach. To actually voice the concern she felt had taken a Herculean effort. Her mother’s only answer had comforted her then. Her daddy was a good man. Of course he was, that explained everything. It was only as she got older that she began to question the validity of that hypothesis. At her father’s funeral, an old family friend approached her, offered her a kind smile and a few words: “He was a good man, Dana.” Yes, of course he was. But what was it, exactly, that made that true? What separated her father from the absentee fathers she saw in this world every day? His heart, for one, was pure. The love of his career nearly equaled the love he felt for his family. And though it seemed he chose the sea over them every time he left, she knew, deep down in her heart, that wasn’t the case. Their understanding enabled him to have both his loves. His heart’s true purpose pursued, he lived a sailor’s life for months out of the year, and came home whenever he could to be an almost ideal husband and father. They read “Moby Dick,” she believed, in what was his effort to combine these two loves: His little girl, and his sea. She had been Starbuck to his Ahab, but in name only. Little Dana had never been welcome or allowed on his adventures. That had hurt, viewed through the eyes of a child. She hadn’t understood things like Naval protocol. All she saw was her father saying one thing, then doing another. But he had been a good man. Since his passing, she hadn’t met another like him. Her father’s loss, coming so soon before Jack re-entered her life, served to push her closer to him. She desperately needed to re-capture that relationship and, in her grief over Ahab’s death, she didn’t accept that trying to find that sort of love in a husband or life partner wasn’t remotely plausible. She would never be able to replace her father, she had realized less than a year into her marriage. Trying would only bring with it more pain. And hindsight was twenty-twenty. This was another good man, she thought again, finally giving in to the need to touch. The very tips of her fingers traced the furrows in Mulder’s forehead. His eyes were moving rapidly behind his eyelids and she worried he was having a nightmare. Leaning her head down toward his, she pressed her lips against his scratchy cheek. “It’s okay.” She breathed the words against his skin. “You’re safe. Everything’s okay.” Slowly, his breathing evened and she watched him slip into a peaceful sleep once again. This had happened earlier. Only before, he’d whimpered a word: “Rachel.” Scully suspected that meant Rachel Hayes. She didn’t know who that was, but she planned to find out. If he was going to drag all her secrets out, she would damn well be doing the same to him. She still couldn’t believe how much she’d told him earlier. Not everything, of course. She didn’t =want= to tell him everything. Everything meant he had her trust, and she wasn’t ready to give that yet. Not her complete trust, at any rate. But he did inspire trust, even from a woman who could never trust again. How she wished that didn’t describe her, that she was more than something broken, never trusting anyone enough to let them heal her. Already, his face was so dear to her. Just looking at him made her smile, she realized, her face unaccustomed to the feeling of smiling, just because she could. Earlier, they’d fallen asleep within seconds of each other. For the first eight-hour block in months, she’d slept without dreaming. What had finally woken her, was Mulder. His head had been resting a few inches above her breast and she’d been holding his body to hers in sleep. Frozen in place, she hadn’t moved until he had, a few minutes later. He rolled to his back and since then, she’d been lying like this, propped on her elbow, just staring at him. His understanding and easy acceptance of her stole her breath away. Most men, upon learning the woman they’d been harmlessly flirting with had not only a husband behind bars, but a small child to raise, that wasn’t even hers, wouldn’t have stayed around long enough to pronounce the “buh” sound in bye. But not Mulder. No, Mulder didn’t even hesitate. The thought of saying “bye” never even occurred to him, she didn’t think. He was her friend now, no matter what else they might be or become to each other. And Fox Mulder was there for his friends. Even when he obviously wanted more than friendship, he was still willing to curl up in bed with her and do nothing more than sleep . . . Tears pricking the backs of her eyes, she leaned forward and brushed her nose against his cheek. Her hand flattened over his bare chest, and she felt his life beat beneath her palm. Her eyes fluttered shut and she felt moisture gather on her lashes, even though the tears still wouldn’t come. “You are such a good man,” she whispered into his ear. “You aren’t so bad yourself.” His sleep-roughened voice, like liquid gravel, startled her. Her eyes opened quickly and she found a sleepy hazel pair staring back at her. One of his arms was stretched out above their heads, and she felt his fingers brush over the very top of her hair. “You weren’t supposed to hear that.” Was that her voice? Low and intimate, familiar, like they’d been waking up next to each other for years. “Why not?” For some reason, they were both paying their respect to the silence. Their voices were hushed, barely loud enough to be heard. Without giving her body permission to do so, she moved in closer to him. So we can hear each other better, she explained to herself rationally. It was a very practical, reasonable thing to do. So what if she slid her feet until they touched his under the covers? Hers were cold and his, by some magic, were blessedly warm. His feet met hers under the blanket, and she could have sworn he was cradling hers between both of his. Were they playing footsie under the covers? It didn’t feel like it. It felt more . . . the only word that came to mind was, once again, intimate. How was it everything they did together felt so comfortable and intimate? She wasn’t supposed to feel like this, ever, ever again. But really, marriage or not, had she ever felt like this? She didn’t think so. He was just a man, she tried to tell herself. Just a man . . . Why were her thoughts so jumbled? “Because when you hear me say things like that, it encourages you.” “And you don’t want to encourage me?” A teasing smile curved his lips and his fingers sunk further into her hair. “What if I promise not to get my hopes up? Would you consider saying more things like that out loud?” Lips quirking in reluctant amusement, Scully moved her hand an inch, so it now rested on his stomach, just above the covers. It was an innocent touch, she assured them both silently. “I don’t think your ego could handle any additional . . . stroking.” Did I just say that? She could tell Mulder was wondering the same thing. The slightly startled, but infinitely pleased look in his eyes gave him away. “I could say something right now,” he began, then slowly let the words fade away. They both smiled at each other again. “Go ahead,” she dared. “Say it.” He shook his head. “No, it’s bad. It’s a bad line, it’s . . . bad.” His smile turned sheepish. “If you won’t tell me . . .” Courage, Dana, courage. “Show me.” The words were breathed against his face. Mulder had turned on his side, causing her hand to slide from his stomach, to his lower back, her arm resting over him. One of his hands was still nestled in her hair; the other rested over her hip, unnaturally hot, even through the blanket and her borrowed t-shirt. Closer still, her stomach brushed just below his mid-section, and she felt something hard prodding her . . . An eyebrow crept up her forehead slowly, her expression purposely neutral. She really started to enjoy herself at his obvious embarrassment. Why was he embarrassed? They were sleeping in the same bed. From what Samantha had told her, he didn’t get laid on a regular basis. It was only natural he would have a significant physical reaction to their proximity . . . She thanked any and every God that existed for keeping her from vocalizing that last thought out loud. Neither of them needed her scientifically analyzing his current state of obvious arousal. “Morning erection,” he mumbled somewhere around the area of her temple. That was =definitely= embarrassment she heard in his voice; embarrassment, and more than a little trepidation. He was concerned for her, she realized. His concern touched her beyond words. He didn’t want to make her uncomfortable, didn’t want her to feel obligated in any way. Amazing what she could read from him, with nothing more than the inflection he used in his voice. “It’s not morning,” she reminded him quietly, indicating the clock behind them that clearly read 8:19 in the evening. He turned back toward her from the clock and gave her another in a series of sheepish grins. “Come on, Scully, work with me here,” he chided gently. “All right,” she agreed easily, snuggling up to him beneath the covers. Her body pressed against his, she felt his erection almost surge toward her. She looked up at his face, only to watch his eyes close as he bit his bottom lip. So very beautiful, she thought again, pressing her fingers to his mouth, removing his lower lip from between his teeth. His eyes opened at her touch and she stared into what she was now officially giving herself permission to refer to as hazel orbs. “This isn’t exactly what I had in mind,” he gritted out, searching her eyes. Asking for permission? “It’s not? I’m sorry. Is this better?” As she spoke, her hand drifted down his stomach, beneath the covers, to cup his cock through the cotton of his boxers. “Scully.” He was warning her now, she thought, amused despite the seriousness of the situation. He was right to be apprehensive; right to be worried about her, in light of all she’d revealed to him before they slept. But she didn’t want to be warned. She didn’t want to feel the way she had these last months; hopeless, depressed, unworthy of love or the happy life all children are led to believe awaits them at the end of adolescence. She didn’t want to be the person she’d been since she learned the depth of Jack’s depravity. She didn’t want to think about Kelly, or the constant attention the sweet, troubled little girl demanded from her. Mostly, she didn’t want to think about how hard it would be to trust Mulder the way she was beginning to want to. Hard-learned defense mechanisms were firmly in place, despite the desire she had to remove them. He knew that. It was why the chivalrous side in him was coming out. What he didn’t know was how badly she needed this. The words, she needed the words to tell him . . . “I need to forget,” she whispered, pressing her lips to his. She wasn’t really kissing him; their lips just happened to be touching while she spoke. “Just for a little while, I don’t want to remember who I am or why it’s impossible for us to be together.” “I don’t believe that it is impossible.” His breath made her feel alive. The way his fingertips made soothing circles on her scalp, in time with the patterns his other hand was tracing on her lower back, were distracting her from what she needed to say. “Then make me believe it, too,” she implored. Her voice stopped just this side of begging. “It will be the hardest thing you’ve ever done, if you succeed, but I promise, I’ll do my best to be worth the effort.” It was as close as she could come to optimism, at least for the time being. However, she had to admit, part of her was already beginning to believe. His eyes held a promise no words could come close to expressing. She wanted to trust that promise, wanted to hold it close and let it warm her soul when it was chilled to the bone. Before she could decide what she was reading in his gaze, she found her mouth crushed against his. So this is what it feels like to be kissed by a man with passion, she thought for a moment, before all thought simply ceased. There was only feeling as her hands slid over his bare back, her arms enfolding him as tightly as they could. His hands were not idle, slipping beneath her t-shirt to trace her spine, moving over each individual vertebra, sliding over the sensitive skin that encased her ribs. His tongue was in her mouth and she’d never tasted anything like him. When it retreated while he changed angles on the kiss, she beat him to the punch and shoved her own tongue between his lips. He groaned his approval into her mouth and pulled her closer, if it was even possible for their bodies to get closer together at this point. Mulder’s hand moved from her side, to her stomach, then slowly climbed until he cupped one of her breasts in his palm. She moaned low in her throat, shamelessly arching further into his touch. He nibbled on her lower lip as he brushed his thumb over her rapidly hardening nipple. She felt heavy and hot, the blanket that still covered them, the t-shirt she still wore constrictive, preventing the kind of total obliteration of consciousness she craved. Before she could move to rectify matters, however, someone began pounding on the door and calling her name. Whoever they were, she was afraid they were going to have to die a slow, horrible death. She heard Mulder groan next to her mouth, but this time it was not a sound of pleasure or desire. It was a sound of defeat and frustration. “Come on, Dana, you lazy bones, time to get--” Samantha stopped speaking mid-way and Scully forced an eye open just in time to watch her friend’s entire body freeze. “Whoops. Sorry. I thought Fox went home hours ago.” An amused smile tugged at the corners of her mouth and she placed both hands on her hips. “Although I’m very pleased he didn’t. I think Chuckie owes me another twenty bucks.” “Would you scram?” Mulder sounded almost as annoyed as she felt. “Sure, sure,” Samantha agreed easily, already backing out of the room. “Listen, sorry about this – please, don’t let me spoil the mood. I’ll come back in an hour – would two be better? – with some of the lasagna Chuckie’s teaching me to make. You two have fun. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do. Which ain’t much.” Her chatter finally ceased as the door shut firmly behind her. The room was dark and silent once more. Then: “Maybe we should’ve tied a sock to the doorknob.” For some reason, that comment struck Scully as hysterically funny. She began to giggle, and once she started, she couldn’t quite stop. Mulder’s body began to shake next to hers, and they were holding onto each other, laughing so hard tears began to pour down both their cheeks. “Did anyone ever tell you that your sister is one hell of a mood killer?” Scully managed to get the sentence out in-between gasping for breath. “If I remember correctly, I used to tell her that all the time back when I was in high school.” He chuckled once more, trying to regain control over his own breathing. “Listen,” she began hesitantly, only to have him interrupt. “Scully, you don’t have to say anything. I understand, believe me. It was the heat of the moment. I don’t expect anything from you.” He didn’t understand at all. “Mulder--” He placed to fingers over her lips gently. “Scully, it’s all right. We’ll take this slowly. I’d . . . I’d like to take it slowly. Call me selfish, but I’d like you to trust me a little more than you do before we take the next step.” How could she say no to that? She couldn’t, that’s how. Damn him for being so sweet, and kind, and understanding, and almost irresistibly sexy . . . That was okay. He could have it his way. She’d let him feel chivalrous, for now. And the first chance she got, she would jump him. ~ Chapter 7- Fumbling Towards Ecstasy, Birthday Girl “I have been on the verge of being an angel all my life, but it’s never happened yet.” – Mark Twain ~ As long as he lived, he would never understand how he let her talk him into these sorts of things. When they were kids, he and Samantha used to participate in all day pick-up games out on the Vineyard. Baseball had been a pure, simple childhood joy. Simple had never quite cut it for his baby sister, however, and she’d figured out a way to make the game just a little bit more interesting. Implementing what was possibly the most dangerous mandate in history, she convinced seventeen kids to apply the principals behind football to baseball. In other words, they were divided into teams, then given permission to leap on each other and wrestle the ball away from whomever was unlucky enough to catch it. Samantha, of course, did not participate in the game. She had always felt she functioned best in a purely advisory capacity. And so, she took on the thankless task of umpire, even though not even the players were ever really sure what the object of the game was, nor how you broke a rule. Their parents were naturally upset when they came home, he covered in bruises with a split lip, and she filthy with one heck of a shiner Timmy Callahan had given her when she determined the flying kamikaze tackle he let loose on Billy Taylor was a foul. Somehow, despite her willingness to accept her share of the blame, Mulder had been held responsible for not watching his baby sister that day. Samantha had been seven, he eleven. The following year, Samantha decided it would tickle her fancy to run away. She was gone for nearly an entire day, and their parents had been frantic. Even he, once the novelty of not having her tagging along behind him wore off, started to worry. It wasn’t that he honestly thought anything might happen to her. She’d told him she was going to run away the day before, just to see how long she could hide out in her favorite place, underneath the bridge that ran over a now dry creek. Once it became painfully obvious Samantha wasn’t coming home that night, Mulder confessed to his mother where he suspected his baby sister might be. Immediately, mother, father and son drove as fast as they could to locate the missing part of the equation, sister. And there sister slept, peaceful as a baby, curled up in the afghan their grandmother had given her on her third birthday. Mulder almost hadn’t been surprised when this, too, turned out to be his fault. To think, he never set out to be such a problem child. Until a few years ago, he’d truly thought that he’d drawn the short end of the stick. Maybe parents really =did= have favorites, he’d thought glumly. Shortly after his mother died, a conversation he had with his father finally shed some light on that subject. “We always knew you’d protect her, son.” His father’s gruff, but ultimately loving voice had always been a source of comfort. Teena Mulder played the traditional role of mother, housewife and hostess. But there had been nothing traditional in the way Bill Mulder raised his children, his son in particular. He tested them. Not in obvious ways, but always, lying under the surface of almost everything he did, was a lesson. As a child, he hadn’t understood what his father was trying to show him. But as an adult, after having several adult conversations with the old man, Mulder finally began to gain insight into him. He wanted both his children to be strong, for certain. But Bill had also wanted them to care for one another. To love one another was a given. To truly care though, to support, to be a friend to the other, that was the difficult part. So often, siblings grew apart as they grew older, unable to get past such trivialities as “he broke my toy,” and “she’s stupid.” Mulder and his sister, however, were given character at an early age. And, by being held accountable for each other’s actions, they learned to stick together. “Your mother and I wanted to be sure you’d always have each other.” Never once, on all the separate, numerous occasions Mulder had been blamed for something his sister had done, did Samantha stand idly by and watch him take her punishment. Even when she was barely five years old, she still fessed up and tried to convince their parents of her culpability. Parents, Mulder mused, always seemed to have a funny way of showing their love. Each family was different, with different codes, conducts and ways of doing things. And, if you were lucky, your family ended up being perfect for no one else but you. Though they’d had their moments, Mulder felt there was no other family he would have rather been born into. And, in a world where everything seemed to change on a regular basis, it was good to know some things stayed achingly the same. “I am going to kill you for this.” “Dana, don’t blame him, it was all my idea. He just helped because I asked him to and he cares about you.” “I don’t care. You =knew= I would hate this.” Mulder winced at Scully’s tone, not to mention the coloring in her cheeks. Mad enough to spit nails, his Aunt Louise had been fond of saying. “Scully,” he began hesitantly. “Don’t,” she snapped, turning those icy, rage-filled eyes in his direction once more. He suppressed the urge to shiver in a combination of fear and arousal he was not prepared to admit to. “Cake’s burning,” Charlie called helpfully from the kitchen. “So take it out of the oven!” Samantha yelled back. “You told me not to touch it,” he taunted. Mulder watched his sister ball her hands into tight little fists, take deep breaths, and mentally count to ten. Twenty. Thirty. “Just take the fucking thing out of the oven!” That counting thing never had worked for her. “Yes, Dear.” “You baked me a cake?” Mulder’s attention snapped back to Scully. My God, he thought, was that the same woman who’d been ready to castrate me a few short moments ago? Was her voice really all lost and teary, like a little girl? Sam shrugged, like it was no big deal. He contained a snort. His little sister was not, in any way, shape or form, a good cook. From the very beginning, when she managed to burn those brownie things in her Easy Bake Oven, it had been abundantly clear to all involved that cooking was not her forte. Still, that did not stop her from rousing him from bed with the trilling of his cell phone to inform him that today was Dana’s birthday and he had better get his butt over to her place to help her plan a surprise. >From the moment he arrived, he had been reluctant. A surprise party did =not= seem like Scully’s style. The woman he had shared a bed, and the best night’s – day’s – sleep he’d had in years with yesterday detested the unexpected. Samantha, though, could be utterly convincing when she put her mind to it. By the time he showed up at her house, she was already knee deep in cookbooks and batter. Her paramour stood by with an amused smirk on his face, biding time, apparently, until Scully came home and he got to distract her by taking her out to lunch. The cake was Samantha’s. That was made clear from the start. No one got to lick the spoon, no one got to taste the batter, no one was even allowed to sniff around it too much. Dedicated as she was, Samantha did not have a problem assigning everything else about the meal to Mulder. And, with the exception of a well-placed barb directed at Charlie about whether or not he could peel potatoes, he thought he’d handled himself rather well. He hadn’t complained about making broiled salmon with a lemon butter cream sauce and steamed asparagus from scratch. Nope, he just rolled up his sleeves and got to work. After all, Samantha had known Scully longer, and if his little sister thought the woman he was pretty sure he was in love with would enjoy a surprise party, then he would help give her a surprise party. In retrospect, he really should have known better. “I worked really hard on that cake.” Samantha sniffed pitifully for effect, and neither he, nor Scully, could keep from snickering at the sound. That only increased her pout and he watched the anger drain slightly from Scully’s body. “I know, Sam, I know.” Her eyes closed, and he watched as she took a few deep breaths, and it appeared the mentally counting thing worked for her, because ten beats later, her lids raised and a tentative smile hovered around the edges. “I appreciate the thought.” Samantha beamed. “I knew you would.” “Not so fast,” Scully warned. “I said I appreciate the thought. That doesn’t mean I’m enjoying the . . .” Her eyes moved around the room, taking in the streamers, banners and other various, colorful decorations. “Whatever the hell this is,” she muttered. “I will never, as long as I live, understand this =thing= you’ve got about your birthday,” Samantha proclaimed. Me either, Mulder mused, debating whether he’d attempt to bring it up with Scully. True, they were decidedly closer now than they had been a few days before. Way back then, when they first met. He rolled his eyes at himself. Half the time, he walked around in a love-fogged daze, wanting nothing more than to be with her. The rest of the time, he mentally smacked himself upside the head, trying to ram home the fact that he’d only met her =four short days= ago. Fortunately, or, depending on your perspective, unfortunately, the love-crazed part of him didn’t pay much mind to the logical side, and the love-crazed was far stronger. “Is my life still in danger, or can I go back into the kitchen and keep my salmon from burning?” Ooo, she was so =sexy= when her eyebrow did that thing. “You cooked?” “You don’t have to sound so incredulous.” He quirked a smile at her. “Legend has it that I can actually put flame to food without starting an international incident.” Damn, now she was starting to look uncomfortable. “I didn’t mean to imply anything . . .” She trailed off, and he started to get concerned. Was she about to cry? “Sam, your cake needs to cool before you can frost it. Take Charlie to the store and pick me up some Caesar salad dressing, would you?” “I have Caesar salad dressing,” she answered, looking at him strangely. He narrowed his eyes at her. “I want the =special= Caesar salad dressing. The kind you have to go to the store for.” “Ohhhhh.” No one could draw a word out like Samantha. “Riiiiiight. I’ll just go get Chuckie.” As she exited the room, Mulder glanced over at Scully, a sheepish expression on his face. “She’s very subtle, isn’t she?” “Just like her brother,” she agreed, her arms folded over one another protectively. Charlie and Samantha departed in record time, and Scully followed Mulder into the kitchen while he checked on the salmon. Perfect. He added a few squirts of lemon, covered it up, and glanced toward where Scully was stirring the sauce. He poked his head over her shoulder and rested his chin against the crook of her neck. Her body tensed and he debated moving away. Ultimately, he decided he was going to stay close until she asked him not to. “You stir like a pro,” he whispered into her ear. “I’m sorry.” Gently, he placed one of his hands on her upper arm and rubbed slowly, up and down. “What are you sorry for?” “For this irrational thing I have with my birthday.” Tired and small. That was the only way he could describe her voice. It scared him. There was nothing small about Scully. Tired, yes, but never small. She had strength; reserves hidden inside reserves, given the numerous things she’d told him about, and the things he knew she still couldn’t talk about. “Nobody likes getting older,” he offered. He was at a loss as to how to play this. Like a psychologist, or a lover? Prospective lover. Whatever. “It’s not that. It’s not . . . that.” Banging the spoon against the side of the pan, she let it fall to the counter and turned around so she was facing him. “Jack and I have the same birthday.” Jack. The scum sucking, incarcerated, almost-but-not-quite-ex-husband. He’d never hated someone he hadn’t even met before. It was a surreal feeling. The man didn’t even have a face he could concentrate on. He was just Jack, the man who’d hurt the woman he was beginning to think of as his, and he hated him. He hated him nearly as much as the monster that drove him out of the Bureau. “I can’t imagine how difficult that must be, that reminder on what should be a private, personal celebration each year.” He cupped her cheek gently, tilted her face upward so that he was looking into her eyes. Studying her face for a moment, he began to stroke his fingers soothingly over her cheek, the side of her neck. “There’s something else.” Her tongue darted out to lick the corner of her mouth. She tried to look anywhere but at him, but given their close proximity, there was nowhere to hide. “The first year we were married, I planned this big surprise party for Jack. I invited mutual friends, old Bureau acquaintances, his family, my family . . .” She sucked in a deep breath. “The entire night, he never once mentioned my birthday. No one did. It was like . . . I didn’t even exist. I didn’t even mind that, really, it was later. We were lying in bed that night, and I gave him a watch to replace another I’d given him that broke on duty. It had a special inscription on the back, and he just said . . . ‘thanks, babe,’ and went to sleep.” “I’m sorry,” he mumbled, bringing the hand at his side to gently rub the tension from the back of her neck. He had no idea what else to say, so he opted to listen. Sure enough, she had more to say. “I still don’t understand it. How do you forget a spouse’s birthday when it’s the same as your own? How do you do that?” Shaking her head, she looked down at the floor. “It’s such a minor thing, in the grand scheme, but . . . it hurt. It hurt then, and it hurts now.” A humorless laugh passed her lips. “He never did remember my birthday. He barely remembered his own.” “It’s not a minor thing,” he whispered softly. He waited until she looked up at him again before smiling gently. “It’s your birthday. You’re supposed to commemorate the day you were brought into this world. Personally, February twenty-third is my new favorite day.” “You amaze me,” was what he thought he heard her mumble. Before he could be sure, however, he felt her nose brush against the hollow of his throat. When had she gotten so close? He was assaulted by memories of the day before. Shortly after his sister had inadvertently interrupted their interlude, they got out of bed. He had put on his jeans, but as she was wearing the only shirt he had, they looked at one another in silence for several minutes before an embarrassed look crossed her face. He had smiled, to let her know there was nothing to be embarrassed about, then turned his back to give her privacy. Seconds later, he’d felt his t-shirt hit the back of his head. He’d slipped it on and turned back to her, only to find her bare back the only sight he could focus on. He couldn’t look away, as much as he tried. She was wearing nothing but a pair of white cotton panties. Hanes Her Way, if he wasn’t mistaken. Swallowing audibly, he’d mumbled something about having to get home and work on the ending to his latest novel. A deadline was pending, even though he hadn’t really remembered that at the time. The necessity to leave her bedroom before he threw her down on the ground and ravished her had been the only clear thought in his head. Now, though, he wasn’t quite as diligent. Both their siblings would be back soon. They were in a kitchen, in broad daylight, fully clothed. What could happen? “You have beautiful eyes.” “You read my mind,” he muttered, uncomfortable with the way her body was molding itself to his. Distraction, that’s what he needed. Her eyes provided it. While he was trying to pinpoint what the exact shade of blue her eyes were, she started playing with his hair. There was no other way he could describe it. Twirling, sifting, tugging, her fingers were busy and her teeth were nibbling at his neck. Fuck. No, not fuck, that was the point, there was to be no fuck whatsoever. Damn. This was not helping him keep the promise he’d made to himself. “You taste good, too,” she whispered, swiping her tongue from the hollow of his throat, to the tip of his chin. “I couldn’t believe how good you tasted yesterday. I was thinking about it all night.” “Scully,” he squawked, cursing the traitorous hands that were caressing up and down her sides. “Scully . . . the . . . the salmon’s burning.” Good. Grasp at straws and hold on for dear life. “I don’t care about the salmon,” she whispered around a mouthful of his ear. “But Scully . . .” The thought left his head as she sucked his earlobe into her mouth. “The salmon is my birthday gift to you.” That was loud. That was louder than it should have been. She did not seem to notice. Instead of commenting, she licked his lower lip. He tried hard, but was unable to contain a moan. Her hand trailed down his chest and cupped the rapidly hardening bulge beneath his pants. “Then you’ll just have to figure out something else to give me.” Oh sweet Jesus. Again, he tried to think, but all the blood that should have been in his head was rushing to his lower body. Focus, focus, focus; this is about her. This is about what she needs. Despite what she says, she isn’t ready for this, he told himself for the thousandth time. She doesn’t really want me right now; she doesn’t know what she wants. “I do want you,” she whispered, those beautiful, un-nameable blue eyes staring up into his. Had she read his mind? Or simply felt the hesitation in his body? “I want you so much, Mulder. I’ve never wanted anyone or anything this badly. It scares the hell out of me, but I won’t let fear stop me anymore. I can’t. I won’t survive the rest of my life if I do.” And the straws in his grip fluttered to the floor like dust. ~ “I keep on searching for the old me. I keep on thinking I can change. I keep on hoping for a new day. Will I ever feel the same? Now I wonder.” – Chris Isaak, “I Wonder” ~ Good God, he had such a beautiful mouth. His lower lip was huge, pulled into a perpetual pout, with the exception of when he was smiling. And that smile was her second most favorite position his lips could form. Her favorite, she was learning, was when his control snapped and he crushed his mouth to hers. The honest words she’d given him had barely been out of her mouth when his eyes darkened, the hand on her side moved to the back of her neck, and she found herself half bent backwards against the counter with the force of his kiss. Reluctantly, she removed her hand from the front of his pants, placed both hands against the back of his head and pulled him as close as she could. Doubt was definitely still prevalent in her mind. It didn’t matter that he was a great kisser. It didn’t matter that when he held her close, she almost felt safe. And it certainly didn’t matter that he made her laugh again, after she thought she’d forgotten how. She refused to pin all her hopes and dreams on this single relationship. She couldn’t afford to, and neither could Kelly. Yes, she wanted this. But that’s all she could let it be. Sex. Maybe it could even be a little bit about love. But she would =not= let herself trust him. Which was, of course, easier said than done. Mulder inspired trust. And he was so sweet, and sexy, and =nice=, damn him. He was funny, in a tragic, poignant sort of way. Was that what was attracting her? The pain she sensed beneath his glib, charming exterior? It was twisted, she decided as his hands fastened around her ass and lifted her onto the counter. Incapable of healing herself or sustaining an important, meaningful romantic relationship again, she nonetheless wanted to ease his pain. She wanted to give him what she knew she was incapable of giving anyone. Rather than tell him this, she was instead putting the emotional to the side and giving him what she could. Physically, she could give him anything he wanted. And he did want her. She could feel it in the way his hands moved over her body, the way his mouth managed to be rough and gentle at the same time. It felt so good to be wanted this way. He was almost single minded when he let go of himself. He was between her legs, their crotches thrusting against each other when Scully thanked God they hadn’t gotten to the clothing removal stage yet. Because beyond the kitchen door, she heard her sister’s voice calling her name. “Damn it, stop, stop,” she whispered, trying to extricate herself from Mulder’s embrace. It wasn’t easy, as neither of them really wanted her to leave it. But this wasn’t like Samantha walking in on them. If Melissa was here, it meant that Kelly was with her, and there was no way Scully was mentally prepared to explain to Kelly why the man was mauling Dana, nor why she liked it. “That voice calling your name wasn’t in my head, was it?” he muttered, pulling away with much reluctance. Drawn into his eyes, a tiny moan left her mouth. There was so much need there. Hunger, mixed with concern and . . . no. She would not acknowledge the other emotion, so clear and open to her. It would be a mistake of epic proportions to see what was so obviously there. It would mean discarding the plan she had and destroying any chance they had for some fun. That’s all it could be. Fun. They would have a good time, and one day, when he was settled down with a wife and children of his own, he would occasionally remember the redhead he’d shared a few great days with. The woman who, if she was lucky, would get to keep a little piece of him without sacrificing her own sanity. Scully herself hadn’t even realized how broken she was until she started wanting what she couldn’t have. What Jack did had damaged her, for sure. But she truly hadn’t realized how much until she couldn’t bring herself to tell Mulder the whole story. She had a world of responsibility ahead of her. A little girl who needed her, and absolutely no time to get a life of her own. It was all about Kelly. One week is what she had left. One week Melissa had insisted she take. That’s what she’d have with Mulder. One perfect little week. And then she would go back to her real life. The life that didn’t involve long, sweet kisses, conversations about nothing and everything, and laughing because you couldn’t see why not to. A life with no warm, sexy, perfect hazel eyes to feel safe with. “Salmon’s burning,” she whispered with some effort, straightening her clothes and hair as she pulled away from him all the way. “Yeah,” he muttered, doing the same. Before he moved away, however, he sent her a look that curled her toes. Hot damn. Self-consciously, she continually smoothed bits of hair behind her ears as she walked through the kitchen door, and into the living room. Standing in the center of the gaily decorated living room, she found her sister and the little girl she had no idea how to relate to. “Hi.” First, she spoke to Kelly. The little girl acknowledged her presence, but did little more than that. With a sigh, Scully turned toward Melissa. “Hey, big sister.” “How are you, Dana?” Melissa embraced Scully and for a few seconds, she remembered what it was like years ago, the year before Melissa went away to college. That was the closest they’d ever been and a hug from her big sister worked wonders on her disposition. “I’m fine.” Pulling away, Scully crouched down and hugged Kelly, mindful of how tense the small child was in her arms. It was important that Kelly felt loved, whether she was willing to accept that love yet, or not. The point was, eventually she =would= be ready, and when she was, Scully intended to be there. “Have you been having fun with Melissa?” Dutifully ignoring how lame she sounded, Scully brushed bits of hair out of Kelly’s face. Her touch was nervous, and she knew it was half the reason Kelly had trouble relating to her. Scully’s fear was palpable, and anyone with a pulse could feel it. “We went horseback riding.” Nobody’s voice should be that small. “You took her horseback riding?” Though she was still on Kelly’s level, the question had been focused on Melissa. She was only six! Melissa, for her part, looked amused. “You were six the first time dad took us,” she pointed out. Eyes narrowing, Scully turned back to Kelly and forced a smile. It wasn’t her fault Melissa’s uncanny ability to read her little sister’s mind drove her up the wall. “It’s such a wonderful surprise to see you,” she told Kelly, internally cracking up. It had been quite a day for surprises. “Missy said it was your birthday and I wanted to say happy birthday.” Her words ran together, betraying her nervousness. Scully tried to soothe it away with her touch, a gentle hand on her shoulder, but feared her own nerves got in the way. “Happy birthday.” “Thank you. It’s certainly happier with you here.” The front door opened and closed loudly. “Okay, Foxy Loxy, we got some “special” Caesar salad dressing and – hello.” Smiling tightly, Scully stood and winced as her knees popped a little. That would teach her to give up jogging. “Samantha, I’d like you to meet someone very special.” Standing behind Kelly, she placed both hands on the little girl’s shoulders. “This is Kelly. Kelly, this is my good friend, Samantha, and you remember my brother, Charlie.” “Hi,” she said quietly. “Hey, Kiddo,” Samantha greeted warmly, crouching down to Kelly’s level. “Did you come to surprise Dana on her birthday too?” “Yes. Did you surprise her?” “This whole party is a surprise for Dana, cause we think she’s so special.” Samantha’s eyes caught on something behind Scully. She turned to see for herself, and found Mulder peeking out of the kitchen. How long had he been watching? “Fox, come here and meet Kelly and Melissa,” Samantha called out. Scully felt guilty for not having introduced Samantha and Melissa immediately, then remembered the two women had actually met weeks ago. Chalking it up alongside the myriad of other things she’d forgotten over the past few months, Scully kept a hand on Kelly’s shoulder as they turned as one to face Mulder. Like his sister, Mulder knelt on one knee until he looked Kelly in the eye. “Hi. My name is Fox.” “Hi Fox, my name is Kelly.” She held out her hand and Mulder took it in his much larger one. Solemnly, they shook. As soon as politeness dictated, however, Kelly all but snatched her hand back and inched closer to Scully. It had been the same the first time she met Charlie, Scully remembered. Kelly was uncomfortable around men, mostly, she thought, because the only person she’d had any substantial amounts of contact with for the first six years of her life had been her mother. Jack hadn’t seen his daughter much, despite his professions of family to his wife when he’d been caught. Pushing bitter thoughts away, Scully again sifted her fingers through Kelly’s hair. Mulder stood and turned his attention to Melissa. “Fox Mulder,” he offered, holding out his hand. “Melissa Scully,” she replied, shaking his hand firmly. A heavy silence took over the room. Mulder stuffed his hands into his pockets; Samantha folded hers behind her back. Scully continued to fiddle with Kelly’s hair until it apparently annoyed the little girl enough to swat at her nervous hands. Melissa looked thoroughly amused at everyone else’s discomfort. Charlie broke the silence when he cleared his throat. Melissa finally gave in to the urge to laugh. “Well, I haven’t had this much fun since I broke up with my almost fiancé.” “Almost fiancé?” Scully couldn’t believe Mulder had the balls to ask. Melissa, apparently, liked that about him. Respect shone in her eyes before she answered him. “He asked. I declined. We were forced to spend the next hour and a half at a dinner honoring his father.” “Sounds awkward,” he said glibly, causing snickers to leap from both Samantha and Charlie’s mouths. “I’m starved,” Scully announced, willing to do anything at this point, if it would only get them all out of this room. “Well, dinner’s ready.” Mulder chewed on his bottom lip for a moment. “I don’t suppose you like salmon, do you?” He was asking Kelly. That he’d even think of it touched Scully’s heart. Kelly wrinkled her nose in response, and his next words didn’t surprise her in the least. “I suppose I’ll have to make you a burger then.” He winked at Kelly conspiratorially. “Although it would hurt my feelings if you don’t at least =try= my salmon.” “She likes to try new things,” Scully assured him. “Don’t you?” Kelly nodded, and it only hurt a tiny bit, Scully tried to tell herself with next to no success, when the little girl latched onto Melissa’s hand as they all headed for the dining room. ~ “We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.” –Anais Nin ~ “I’m trying too hard, aren’t I?” Melissa watched as her sister determinedly refused to meet her eyes. How to answer that, she wondered internally. “I think you love her very much,” she began carefully. “Too much?” “There’s no such thing as loving too much.” “Tell that to Jack,” Dana muttered bitterly. “That wasn’t love,” Melissa reminded her sister unnecessarily. Damn, she was uncomfortable with these feelings. Hate was not a productive emotion. It led to all the evils in the world. Yet she hated Jack Willis; hated everything about him, saw in him no redeeming characteristics. He had terrorized her sister, trapped her in a marriage Melissa still shuddered to think about, and, in the end, completely destroyed the confidence Dana had in herself. Hate didn’t quite describe how she felt about Jack Willis. As much as she loved Kelly, as much as she didn’t blame that beautiful little girl for the sins of her parents, she wished Dana had more time to heal before the responsibility of becoming a mother had hit her. But Kelly didn’t have time. Kelly needed someone then. And, rather than take any time for herself, Dana threw herself full force into being what Kelly needed. And a few weeks ago, the whole house of cards started to fall down on her. That was when Melissa insisted she take a break. A week or two, maybe three, to think things through; to find something she needed to find inside her own soul. Dana had lost her spiritual self over the years. It was something that had worried Melissa greatly, but she knew how powerless she was to change it. Only Dana could make that choice. Luckily, Jack hadn’t remained hidden forever. It might have taken years too long, but eventually he had revealed himself for the monster Melissa had long suspected he was. And when the time came, Dana made the right decision. If only she hadn’t been forced to, Melissa thought for the hundredth time. If only, if only, if only . . . “I feel as though I’m failing her,” Dana confessed softly. “Oh, Dana, you must never think that.” Melissa placed a hand over her sister’s where it rested on the table between them. “You’re just very new to motherhood. And you didn’t have the luxury of getting to know a baby before having to nurture her in different ways. A fully-grown child was thrust upon you. Under the circumstances, you’ve done remarkably well.” “Under the circumstances isn’t good enough for Kelly,” Dana snapped. “She deserves to have someone who can help her. All I seem to do is hold her back. My grief, my pain is preventing her from getting past her own. She watched her father murder her mother.” The horror in her voice chilled Melissa, almost as much as the act itself had. “How is anyone supposed to be okay after that?” “Dana, when you were with the Bureau, you saw things like that,” Melissa began hesitantly. “It was different,” Dana insisted. “As horrible as it may sound to say, I didn’t know those people. Yes, it was still horrific, but ultimately they were strangers. I didn’t have to hear them scream when they woke up in the middle of the night, and I didn’t hear the people who hurt them laughing at me in my dreams.” “You’re still having the nightmares.” It wasn’t a question. They both knew the answer, and they both knew Dana wasn’t about to give it. “I’m scared for her. I’m scared I’ll never learn how to be her mother, I’m scared she’ll never be able to have a normal life, and . . .” Dana fought back both the tears, and the crumpling of her face. Melissa wished, not for the first time, that her sister would allow herself to cry more. “Hell, I’m even scared she’ll be happier with you.” She was ashamed of that; ashamed to admit to a perfectly human emotion. At least they were finally getting down to the crux of the matter. When Dana had asked for this impromptu meeting after dinner, before cake, Melissa suspected there was a bit more than catching up on Kelly to discuss. “I wish you’d give yourself more credit.” Dana laughed bitterly. “More credit? Why? I’ve already screwed up my own life, and I’m well on the way to screwing up Kelly’s. She’s no closer to coming out of her shell now, than she was ten months ago. Obviously, I deserve a fucking award.” “You know that’s not true,” Melissa seethed, refusing to give Dana the satisfaction of reacting to her foul language. It had always bothered her when their brothers had used bad language, but Dana had always sworn like a sailor. “Kelly was in a near catatonic state when you first found her.” “And she’s Chatty Cathy now,” Dana cut in with a weary sigh. Beneath the sarcasm, Melissa could hear the genuine concern. “You’re doing as well as can be expected under the circumstances,” Melissa repeated again, running out of words for once. “And that will be good enough for Kelly.” “I hope you’re right,” Dana said quietly. Melissa got the impression she didn’t believe it, though. ~ Chapter 8- Lessons in the Fine Art of Breathing “Joy is love exalted, peace is love in repose; long-suffering is love enduring; gentleness is love in society; goodness is love in action; faith is love on the battlefield; meekness is love in school; and temperance is love in training.” –Dwight L. Moody ~ Maybe his brain was short-circuiting. Yes, that was as good an excuse as any for his behavior over the last few days. With a sigh, Mulder trudged up the stairs to his new apartment. He had decided sometime last night to keep it and settle down here. The fact that it only partly had to do with his sister’s location didn’t stop him from seeing all the many pros involved. Here, he would be close to his family. Samantha was all the family he really needed, and together, perhaps they could convince their father to move west. All the family he needed. Even if that was true once, it wasn’t any longer. Part of him had always known he’d fall in love one day. He was just waiting for the right woman. And, he also knew that when he finally did fall, he would fall hard and it would be forever. What he had =not= known, was that the woman he fell in love with would be a giant, open nerve with so many neurosis she must have named them individually. He also hadn’t planned on this woman being the custodian of a beautiful, but incredibly frightened six-year-old little girl he’d also fallen in love with over the course of the previous night. Kelly displayed classic signs of trauma. It was painfully obvious she’d witnessed something her psyche couldn’t deal with, so, with the wisdom of a child, she hadn’t. Locked away, the secret she carried couldn’t harm her, but she also couldn’t deal with it and move on. Obviously, not wanting to inflict further stress on the child, Scully had opted not to have Kelly see a therapist for longer than the state required. While he understood the protective instinct, as a professional, he couldn’t help but wonder if it had done Kelly more harm than good. After Scully disappeared into the other room with her sister last night, Mulder, Samantha and Charlie sat down with Kelly and played a good old-fashioned game of Candy Land. Samantha refused to answer him when he asked why she had a copy of the game handy. By the time round two began, the sisters Scully had rejoined the festivities, and they broke for cake and ice cream. Standoffish was the mildest term he could use to describe Kelly. She seemed especially wary around men, evidenced by her reaction to him, and to Charlie. Mulder made mental note to ask Scully what Kelly’s relationship with her father had been like before the man was sent to prison. That is, he reasoned, if she even wanted to see him again after the way he’d mauled her yesterday. Ruefully, he conceded she was provoking him, but still, he’d completely lost it. He’d been two minutes away from ravishing her on top of his sister’s kitchen counter. Fox Mulder did not do things like that. Of course, he’d never wanted anyone as much as he wanted Dana Scully. Maybe this was just how he reacted when he really wanted a woman. The psychology of it escaped him, and for possibly the first time in his life he didn’t feel like analyzing it. He wanted her, he was in love with her, and despite the fact that it had all happened in an amazingly short time, he wasn’t going to fight it. Rather, he was going to thank his lucky stars his search was over, and go about convincing the woman of his dreams that it was okay to love him back. Unlocking his door, he stepped inside and locked it behind him. The smell of something that smelled like chicken cooking caught his senses and he sniffed the air. Sure enough, that was chicken. And green peppers, he thought. Following the delicious smell, he found Scully, wearing an old apron in his kitchen, bent over his stove. He cleared his throat and she glanced up at him. “Hi. You’re just in time. This should be done in about five minutes.” It was surreal. It wasn’t often that the object of one’s affection suddenly appeared in one’s kitchen. “What’s all this?” he asked dumbly. “This is my way of saying thank you for cooking last night, and I’m so sorry I passed out before you left.” A smirk curved her lips. “I had so hoped to collect another birthday present from you.” “Is that why you’re here? To collect a present?” He was amused, in spite of himself. “And, as I said, to say thank you,” she murmured primly. “I have a dazzling variety of creative ways to say thank you.” I bet you do. Somehow, he managed to keep the words on the inside. Instead, he slowly walked around the counter until he was standing behind her, looking down into the pan. Chicken breasts covered in peppers and other appetizing looking spices stared back at him. He caught a whiff of Scully and chicken in the same breath; nothing had ever smelled better. Turning off the stove with a flick of her wrist, Scully covered the pan with a lid and turned to face him. He cleared his throat loudly. “I was uh, I was disappointed I didn’t get to say goodnight.” “Kelly tires me out,” she explained softly. “Especially when I’m not used to her. I admit I’ve been going soft this past week without her.” “Very soft,” he agreed, his mind in a daze. He kept staring at her collarbone, the way the very edge peeked out from beneath the side of her apron. “You’re not very good at following orders, are you?” “What do you mean?” Two hands gently pushed against his chest until he was standing a few feet away from her. Those same hands were placed on either side of her waist, and she jutted her hips out. His eyes naturally followed the motion, and when they did, he finally read the front of her apron. “Kiss the Cook,” it proclaimed, and who was he to argue with such a brilliant idea? “It’s not a suggestion,” she purred. She fucking purred. As if he didn’t have enough reason to follow his orders . . . Dipping his head, he caught her mouth in a kiss that could almost be considered chaste. That is, if her tongue hadn’t darted out to lick at his lower lip. And if her hand hadn’t zipped up faster than he thought it was humanly possible to move to clutch at the back of his head. Before he knew what was happening, she was kissing him with more abandon and more passion than he thought one person could possess. And he was kissing her back the same way. Too fast . . . it was happening way too fast. With great difficulty, he pulled away from her and brought the back of his hand to his mouth. His skin felt like it was burning wherever she had touched him. He was still wearing the heavy coat designed to do battle with the violent wind outside. “This is starting to get repetitive, I know, but I think we should just slow down and maybe eat some of the delicious smelling food you’ve made,” he managed to get out as he shrugged out of his coat. “I don’t want to slow down.” Was it his imagination, or had she actually stomped her foot once, for emphasis? “What’s the big rush, Scully?” Averting her eyes, she made a big procedure of checking the chicken and sniffing something that looked like asparagus. Satisfied that everything was as it should be, she once again turned her attention his way. Startled, he almost took a step back. The naked pain and vulnerability he saw in her eyes took his breath away. “Jack worked a lot. When he wasn’t working, he was, unbeknownst to me, fucking his mistress. When he came home at night, he was very tired and, despite my best attempts, he was not receptive to my sexual advances. After a few years of this, I stopped trying. I was absorbed in my work; we both knew I couldn’t have children, and I figured, what’s the point? Obviously, I just wasn’t desirable to him, sexually. “I always thought it was just him. At least, that’s what I told myself. Apparently I was wrong. If you didn’t want me, all you had to do was say so. I’ve known a lot of men, and continuing in this fiction that you’re concerned it’s too soon for sex is embarrassing to us both.” “Where the hell do you get off assuming you know what I feel?” He was really getting pissed now. The psychologist in him was ordering that he back off. She had been through hell and it was only natural she had a few hang-ups. But he was damned sick of paying for the mistakes of the man who came before him. A man who didn’t deserve the wife or child he was gifted by God with. A man who wasn’t fit to bow at the feet of the woman he’d so thoughtlessly used. “Oh, come on. A man’s primary objective is to get into a woman’s pants. That is, if he wants her in the first place.” “You may be good at it, but cynicism does not become you, Dana.” “You may be good at it, but don’t psycho-analyze me, Fox.” Mulder bit down on his lower lip to keep himself from snapping at her. Unlike his sister, a few deep, even breaths calmed him down considerably. “Tell me, have you looked in the mirror at any point in the last few years?” “What the hell are you talking about?” Good, she definitely looked confused now. “Either you’re blind, or that scumbag of a soon-to-be-ex-husband of yours did quite a number on you.” He stepped forward and entered her personal space, exiting the neutral corner he’d retreated to a few minutes before. Absently brushing a lock of hair back from her face, he traced the subtle marks and imperfections in her skin. They only made her more beautiful. They gave her character, something that couldn’t be bought from a doctor with a scalpel and a facial mold. Her voice only trembled the slightest bit. “He made me hate everything about myself. He made me doubt everything about myself. And just when I think I’ve gotten over it, just when I think I’m ready to move on, it all comes crashing down on me and it’s so much, it’s so heavy, that I can’t breathe.” He wasn’t sure if it was admiration or sympathy he felt at the way her eyes filled with tears she wouldn’t allow to fall. “I’m not him, Scully,” he whispered, finally giving into temptation as he pressed his lips to her forehead. “I think you’re the most desirable woman I’ve ever seen in my life and I’ve wanted you from the moment you opened your mouth and started lecturing about the pros and cons of government funded medical research.” Every few words, his mouth moved to press a feather-light kiss over the skin of her face. Cheeks, nose, eyelids and chin; no surface was left untouched as he blazed a trail to her mouth. A thought occurred to him as their lips met and lingered. Damaging though it may be in the long term, if he were to walk away from her now, to once again postpone making love to her, it would devastate her. Ego much, Doc? he thought disparagingly, even as another part of his psyche recognized the validity of the argument. I love you, he thought silently as he tasted the salt of her tears on her lips. I love your smile, and your integrity, and your strength, and the way you’re finally crying with me, even though I know you never let anyone see you cry. Hands in his hair, Scully pulled his head closer to her own, obliterating whatever paper-thin distance had existed between them. Resigned to the course of action they were working towards, his hands crept down her back until they reached the tie on her apron. Unknotting it quickly, he pulled his mouth from hers only long enough to slip the material over her head. Before he could move to kiss her again, however, he was distracted. Dana Scully was not wearing a bra. Not only was she bra-less, but the blouse she was wearing couldn’t even be called a blouse. It was thin and see-through, clinging to every exceedingly noticeable curve she had. Hell, there were less risqué garments in the Victoria’s Secret catalogue. His eyes traveled down her body and once again bugged out when they made note of the micro-mini skirt, no pantyhose and three inch fuck me black heels. How the hell had he missed those when he came in? Whatever the reason, he was acutely aware of them now. When he brought his gaze to hers, he was momentarily taken aback. The arousal he’d hoped for was present, certainly, but there was also another emotion too prevalent to miss; fear. Not for the first time, Mulder wished for five minutes alone with her so-called husband. It was unfathomable that this amazing woman didn’t know how desirable she was. Fingers twitching at his side, he felt like a kid let loose in a toy store. He didn’t know what to play with first, although he made up his mind quickly. While it wasn’t new, he wanted a few more minutes alone with her mouth. Although he’d always enjoyed it, Mulder had never seen kissing someone as an end unto itself. He’d never realized what an art form it could be. He put everything he had into this kiss. All the passion he felt for her, the love and the lust combined, he poured into every brush, nip, and pressure of his lips and tongue. He hoped it would be enough to take her fear away. If it wasn’t, he had other tools in his arsenal. As far as he was concerned, it was all-out war against her insecurities. His hands, tired of remaining idle, slowly began to climb up her sides until they finally came to rest on her breasts. Lifting one in each hand, he tested their weight, gently running his thumbs over the bare flesh available where her blouse gaped. She pushed herself into his hands at the same time she took his lower lip between her teeth. Tugging, she forced a groan from his mouth at the sensation. “Will you give me anything I want, as a belated birthday present?” It took his brain a few seconds to process her words. When it did, his mouth spoke without consulting it. “Of course.” The smile she smiled against his mouth was almost fiendish. Except that nothing she did could be considered fiendish. He’d think of it as mischievous, he decided. “Good.” Her left hand crept down his stomach until she was fully cupping his hardening cock. He raised both his eyebrows at her and chuckled weakly. “You can have it, but I’m warning you, I need to retain possession.” That got a genuine laugh from her. “Trust me, if you weren’t retaining possession, I wouldn’t want it.” Before his poor, dazed brain could process those words, he found his pants unzipped and a very speedy Dana Scully on her knees. Her face was centimeters from his crotch as her hand pulled his erection out right through the front of his boxers. Resourceful, he thought in a daze as her lips touched the very head of his penis. What was already rock hard got a little harder. Very gently, she began pressing her lips against him, covering every inch from root to tip and back again. On the second pass, her tongue joined the act. By the time she finally took the head of his cock between her lips, he was already gripping the counter behind him so tightly he was amazed the tile wasn’t coming up. The whimper he let out when her lips pursed and sucked with the most exquisitely perfect amount of pressure was decidedly unmanly. In his head, it had started out as her name, but somewhere en route it got completely garbled. He only had a second to think about it as her lips slid closer to his hips, that same exquisite pressure never varying. Soon, he was looking down at her, watching her move back and forth with the same slow, measured pace she’d set. It was maddening, but, try as he might, he couldn’t ask her to speed up any more than he could ask her to stop. He should really ask her to stop. If she didn’t, the idea he had earlier for proving to her how desirable she was would go right out the window. Through a fog of desperate arousal, he felt something else he’d never before felt when a woman was giving him a blowjob. Normally, it just felt good. Always, even when he loved the woman he was with, the need to come was first and foremost on both their minds. This was completely different. Yes, the need was still there, but it was overruled by another need. The need for this to =never= end because nothing, =nothing= had ever felt this fucking good. That thought, and that thought alone broke through the sexual haze. The fingers that were already tangled in her hair pulled gently until his dick slipped out of her mouth. Hooking his hands under her arms, he pulled her to her feet and brought his lips down on hers. If kissing her felt that good, if being inside her mouth felt that good, what would it be like to actually make love to her? To go down on her? He’d wanted to know before. Now, he had to know. “As much of an aphrodisiac as the kitchen seems to be for us, how ‘bout we take this someplace we can lie down?” “You tired, Mulder?” There was a smirk in her voice. He loved it. “Not even a little bit,” he assured her as he nibbled his way down her neck. His fingers began flicking open the buttons on her top. “We’ve already learned you’re not wearing a bra. Is there anything else you’re not wearing?” In his mind, he could picture the face she was making as he flicked his tongue against the collarbone that had been taunting him earlier. “Why don’t you check for yourself?” What a truly inspired suggestion. Foregoing the last three buttons, his hands trailed down her sides until they reached her bare thighs. Sliding beneath her skirt, he lifted until she was off her feet. She gave a startled cry, but quickly recovered, her arms supporting her weight against his shoulders as her legs spread and wrapped around his waist. His hands continued their journey until he was holding her naked-as-the-day-she-was-born ass against his palms. Stumbling only slightly with the extra weight, they made their way down the hall, mouths fused together. Once they reached his bedroom, Mulder let her slowly slide down his body, muffling his groan in her mouth when her wet curls brushed over his cock. On her feet, she took a moment and stepped away from him. Her gaze traveled the room with amusement. “I just moved in. The storage guys sent me all my stuff yesterday,” he said in his own defense. There really was no excuse. There was barely a path from the door to his bed. His king sized bed. Maybe Samantha had been right when she had teased him all those years ago. Maybe he had been waiting to fall in love his whole life. “Don’t give me that. You told me yourself, you’ve been living a vagabond life for the past few years. You’ll be living out of these boxes until you feel secure enough to unpack them. I give you six months.” He was about to make a crack about which one of them was the psychologist, when he caught sight of the outline of one of her nipples through what was quickly becoming his very favorite blouse. He wanted to see her without faint gray fabric in the way. Stepping forward, he brought both his hands to her shirt and quickly dispensed with the rest of the buttons. She must have read something in his eyes, because the teasing air around her dissipated into nothingness. Gently nudging the material off one arm, he pressed a kiss to the very tip of her shoulder before sliding it completely off. He repeated the process with her left shoulder, then tossed the blouse to the floor at their feet. Once again filling his hands with her breasts, he brought his mouth to one and pulled her nipple between his lips. A moan left her mouth and she quickly began working on his shirt. Halfway through she must have grown impatient, because her nipple left his mouth with a pop and she all but ripped his favorite shirt over his head like a t-shirt. The second it was clear, she shimmied out of her skirt. Next, her hands made short work of his belt, pants, and boxers. They got hung up on his shoes for a moment, but he toed off his sneakers and stood before her, naked except for a pair of white socks. She found this incredibly funny and sat down heavily on his bed, giggling. He advanced toward her, transfixed by the way her breasts swayed and jiggled with every sound she made. He knelt before her on the floor, taking a subservient position. He would worship her if that was what it took to give her back a feeling of self-worth. He would worship her because it was something he’d felt inclined to do the first time he’d set eyes on her. Pressing a kiss to her kneecap, his hand found her foot on the floor and pulled her shoe off. Setting her heel against his thigh, he began to massage her arch. She hadn’t expected that. It was obvious from the look in her eyes. But she also enjoyed it, evidenced by the deep groan of approval she gave him. After a few moments, he repeated the move with her other foot, then brought each foot to his mouth in turn, pressing gentle kisses to the instep. Satisfied that he’d paid her feet back for the suffering they’d sustained for the shoes, he inched his lips up her legs until his head was between her thighs. Inhaling deeply, he took her into his lungs, into his soul as he smoothed his hands up her legs. He tugged at her hips and draped her legs over his shoulders until her lower body hung off the edge of the mattress, suspended by his shoulders and her upper back on the bed. Holding her hips securely in his hands, he bent his head to her and began to gently probe at her with his tongue. At the first touch, she jerked slightly and he reminded himself that it had been a long time for her. His thumbs slid between her folds and gently spread her wide open. Flattening his tongue against her, he slowly lapped his way from where she was so wet, to her clit and back again. Scully let out a whimper similar to the one he’d emitted earlier and he set up a gentle rhythm, not giving her too much until she was ready. In truth, he was also enjoying himself. Her taste was like nothing else and he was beginning to remember why this was such an intimate act. The giving and receiving of oral sex was almost more intimate than the sex act itself. Although he’d yet to experience actual intercourse with Scully, if the rest of their experience together held true, it would put every other encounter he’d ever had to shame. As her hips settled into a steady rocking motion against his mouth, he let his tongue slide against her clit with increasing frequency. The direct stimulation seemed to be just what she was asking for, and she held herself as still as possible. Her hands clutched at the bed tightly, clenching and unclenching as every cell in her body waited, poised. He laved his tongue over her clit harder than he had before, firm, even strokes, once, twice, thr— His name escaped her lips with a cry and her body shuddered beneath his mouth. He stayed with her, lapping gently until her body stilled and her breathing began to return to normal. Before she was able to pay attention, he helped her push herself back up onto the bed so that she was lying fully on top. He sat beside her and shed his socks quickly, molding them into a ball and tossing them at the open box in the corner. Ten points! Her hand landed on his back and she ran her fingers over his skin, tickling and arousing at the same time. Even more amazing sensations to experience. He moved down next to her and brought one hand to her hip, and the other to brush the hair off her face. He kissed the very tip of her nose and rested his forehead against hers. “Do you know what that just was?” he asked quietly against her mouth. Her breath puffed against his lips, but they weren’t kissing. In her eyes, it was clear that she wanted to tell him exactly what that just was, in precise medical detail. She stopped herself, however, probably suspecting that he was going somewhere with this. “What?” she asked instead, laying her palm flat against his chest. “Beautiful.” Brushing a feather-light kiss against her lips, his fingers traced slow, languid circles against her hip. “And sexy as hell.” Flinging a leg over his hip, Scully pulled herself as close to him as she could. He felt every inch of her skin press against his and all he could think was, it’s not enough. Crawling inside her very being wouldn’t be enough. Their lips met with an urgency that hadn’t been present before. His tongue slipped and slid between her lips, only to be chased back by hers. A thought that threatened the natural high he was currently on intruded on his brain. “Scully,” he tried, only to find her tongue shoved into his mouth to silence his protests. It felt so good, he was tempted to let it be, but he didn’t want her to have any regrets. “Dana,” he said more firmly, pushing slightly at her shoulders. “What?” She sounded irritated. And with reason, he conceded. He was irritated with his logical side, always analyzing and thinking. “I don’t have anything we can use,” he blurted out. Gesturing to his crotch, he watched as amusement crept over her face. “I’d have to disagree with you there,” she murmured, taking him in her hand and stroking slowly. “You know what I mean,” he muttered, torn between bliss and caution. “I haven’t been with anyone in awhile, so I haven’t really kept a fresh stock. There’s one in my wallet that probably expired in the early nineties.” Teasing fled, and a serious expression crossed her face. “Mulder, I can’t get pregnant. And it’s been a very long time since I’ve been with anyone. My last checkup was three months ago, and I’m clean.” Something that almost looked like guilt passed over her eyes. “What?” he asked gently. “Scully, what is it?” “I’ve never been with anyone before, without using a condom.” “Not even . . .” He was hesitant to mention Jack under the circumstances. “We never had the chance to try for children. When it would have been an issue, I had already found out about my inability to conceive.” Whatever pain she felt melted from her face, as she looked him in the eye. A saucy smile spread across her lips. “I’ve never gone au natural.” He thought for a moment before he answered. “Neither have I,” he finally replied, a little surprised to realize it was true. Chewing on her lower lip for a moment, she seemed to become emboldened by his declaration. “I want to feel you,” she whispered quietly. “Just you, with nothing between us.” Leaning his forehead against hers, he smiled against her lips, then kissed them. “Nothing between us,” he whispered in agreement, concurring with her and adding another dimension to the words. It was both a confirmation and a vow. Hands learned and caressed over bare skin as mouths met again and again in a continuous rebuttal to whoever it was that said kissing was a lost art. It had been found by these two, and they were unwilling to give it up. So lost in each other, it was almost a shock to find himself between her legs, poised to enter her. A breathless moment passed as she tilted her hips up, and he tilted his down and with a shared moan, he was inside her. Another mutual thrust, and he was as deep as he could go. His fingers tracing the same path they had so much earlier, he once again marveled at the imperfections that made her so lovely. He pressed his lips to each section of skin on her face, each feature that formed the whole of the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. “You’re so beautiful,” and “this is what people mean when they talk about making love,” and “nothing has ever felt this good,” and “I can never get enough of you,” were just a few of the statements they mutually agreed on that night. Thrusting his body slowly into hers, Mulder grew used to the feel of her much faster than he’d thought possible. He didn’t know how, but she seemed to know exactly the pace he liked best and he knew exactly how she wanted his hands to move over her skin as their hips rocked against one another. Her fingers pressed into his back and his mind conjured up a mental image of how white his skin would look beneath the pressure of her hands. He was torn between the safety of burying his face against the side of her neck, and boldly staring her in the eyes, showing her all that he felt. Ultimately, she made the decision for him, her hands abandoning his back and taking hold of his face. As the speed and angle of their thrusts changed, she held his gaze, her thumbs stroking his cheeks. His hands were bracing his weight on either side of her head, and he envied her the ability to touch him as they moved. They were both surprisingly quiet the closer they each came to orgasm. It was as though they both recognized the importance of the moment, whatever that might be. There was more happening in the room than two bodies joining together. It was as though their very souls were tangling, dancing, and getting acquainted. Mating and merging until there was no differentiating between them. No longer his and hers, but theirs. When he came, it was the most powerful thing he’d ever felt. Not physically, although it was certainly up there, but on a spiritual level. He was deconstructed before her eyes, died and reborn in the comforting circle of her arms. Through it all, he watched her eyes as she held his face between her hands. As he came down from his high, he felt her clench around him, a shudder passing through her body as she joined him in this exquisite death. He watched as tears of wonder spilled out of her eyes. Somehow, he wasn’t at all surprised when her thumbs wiped tears from his own cheeks. Once more, he lowered his forehead to hers and felt her breath puff against his lips. His body rested against hers fully and finally, his hands held her face the same way she held his. And for an indeterminable amount of time, they breathed. ~ Chapter 9- Rachel “To love for the sake of being loved is human; but to love for the sake of loving is angelic.” –Alphonse De Lamartine ~ Whoever started selling those “sounds of nature” relaxation tapes should give it up. They’ll never find anything as soothing as Mulder’s heartbeat. She was lying to his left, almost on top of him. He was stretched out on his stomach, his left arm curled beneath his head like a pillow, his right holding the hand of the arm she’d draped over his back. Her ear rested against his left shoulder blade and she would be quite happy to never move from this spot again. Once they had recovered from their earlier activities, they’d stumbled into the kitchen, naked, and dished themselves up a late dinner. Taking the provisions into the living room, Mulder had produced the fluffiest, most comfortable afghans she’d ever felt in her life from a box in the corner. Rather than turning on a lamp, Scully had opted to light several candles Mulder had situated around the room. It made things perfect. Dinner had been finished nearly an hour ago, and since then, they’d just been lying on his living room floor, silent. Scully got the impression Mulder was thinking. She wanted to tell him to stop, but it would sound rather hypocritical, given the nature of her own thoughts. Loath though she was to admit it, she couldn’t deny it any longer. This beautiful man had made her fall in love with him. It posed more of a problem than he would be willing to admit. It wasn’t that she didn’t =want= to love him. It was that she hadn’t thought herself =capable= of loving him. Now that she knew she was, her entire being was in a state of confusion. The conflicting emotions were disturbing. On the one hand, she was thrilled; absolutely joyful. That thing inside her that was so broken wasn’t irreparable. She could love again. And through some miraculous twist of fate, she loved someone who might be able to love her back someday. And he was worthy. God, he was worthy of so much more than her fucked-up self. Before, she didn’t have to think about the future. This was going to be a fun week, nothing more. But now . . . Jesus, it was just sex, Dana. Funny, but that excuse she’d tried to use from the moment tears had started leaking out of her eyes wasn’t holding water any longer. Fine, it was just =great= sex. Again, she couldn’t quite believe it. It was more than that and they’d both felt it. There was something in his touch, in the way he looked at her, in the way he made her feel when he was near that made him different from anyone else she’d ever known. While the storm had certainly unsettled her the first time they had kissed, she now admitted that the turmoil she felt was more than the terror she had experienced with a few drops of rain. It was Mulder. More to the point, it was Mulder with her. But there was more to think about than simply how she felt. There was Kelly to take into consideration. Despite the fact that Mulder was a good man, it wasn’t a given that he was ready for instant fatherhood. And she couldn’t risk entering yet another person into Kelly’s life unless that person was committed to stay for the long haul. Maybe she was reading him wrong, anyway, and all this turmoil was for nothing. It was entirely plausible that he was just trying to save her. It was his nature. He was a healer, a righter of wrongs. Perhaps once he’d helped her move past the horror of her life before, he would return to his nomadic lifestyle. Samantha had told her things about Fox. Nothing specific, but she had been clear about one thing: something had happened when he quit the Bureau years ago and he hadn’t been the same since. That was yet another thing that was gnawing at her. She had told him so much. More than she had ever told anyone else. And through it all, he’d listened. While that had been exactly what she’d needed at the time, it was starting to worry her now. Did he see her as a patient he needed to help? Would he be willing to confide in her the same way, or was he as afraid as she had been to let someone inside? She wanted him to let her inside. She wanted it more than she had a right to. No one should want to claim another person’s soul this badly, after only a few days. And especially given the way she had so steadfastly refused to even consider something substantial between them. In the end, she kept coming back to the same hang-up. Though he obviously cared, she did not know to what extent. And until she was sure of how Mulder saw her, what he was willing to give her, she wouldn’t allow herself to become overly invested. It’s too late for that. It’s been too late since the moment you let down your guard and fell asleep beside him. She ignored the voice that whispered that. It didn’t matter. She would make herself remain detached if necessary. And she would make her own indifference true if she had to. Oh please, please, please don’t let me have to. “Did Samantha tell you why I haven’t lived in one place for almost four years?” Hope blossomed and spread through her. Play it cool, Scully, she ordered herself, the same way she had so long ago during her first field assignment with the Bureau. It’s not like he read your mind or anything. It’s just a coincidence. “No. She only mentioned how much she missed you.” His sigh rumbled through him and she felt it against his back. “I haven’t told anyone about this. All I told Samantha was that a case went bad and because of me, of something I wasn’t able to do, a child died. But I didn’t . . . I couldn’t explain more. I didn’t even know how. It’s taken me nearly four years to get myself to a place where I don’t heap blame and guilt upon my sorry ass every single day.” It wasn’t until now, when she could no longer see his eyes, that she realized how much they expressed. Windows to the soul, indeed. Satisfying herself with rubbing her cheek against his back, she released his hand and began tracing soothing circles over his skin. Trying to offer whatever comfort she could. “I’d been with the VCU for nearly three years,” he began. His voice was calm; too calm. It frightened her a little. Not for herself, but for him. “We were called in on a kidnapping. A girl went missing from her backyard during a party. No trace evidence, no fingerprints, no ransom note, nothing. The local PD were at their wits end and they called us in. The profilers.” He almost laughed. “I had a nickname at the Bureau--” “Spooky,” she said, amazed she hadn’t put two and two together before then. “Spooky Mulder; Jesus I can’t believe I just fucked Spooky Mulder.” This time he did laugh, and it was genuine. “I see my reputation precedes me,” he murmured dryly. “They said you were brilliant. Eerily dead-on when you profiled. You were practically a legend in the academy. That profile you wrote, that helped catch Monty Propps--” “Hell of a lot of good old Spooky did Rachel Hayes,” he interrupted. “This is about Rachel Hayes,” she said slowly. “Who was she?” “The little girl who went missing. The little girl no one knew how to find. I can’t imagine that, having someone I loved just disappear one day. I felt her parents’ anguish every day I spent pouring over the non-existent evidence. We were in town for weeks.” Wanting to give him the time he needed, Scully began running her hands through his hair gently, the way she did for Kelly sometimes when she couldn’t sleep. He moved marginally closer to her and she smiled, pressing a gentle kiss to the top of his spine. Whatever fears or obstacles they had ahead of them, she was beginning to believe the ones she had about Mulder were completely unfounded. “One day, I was looking through my interviews with the family, and I realized something. Ray Elders, the mother’s brother, was almost always absent when I got there. It was just a hunch. I didn’t have anything substantial, but we were desperate. Most of the other guys, my partner included, didn’t think there was any chance Rachel could still be alive. “I went alone. I was just going to check out Elders’ house, nothing more. But then I saw that he had a basement, which was in the limited profile I was able to write. I saw her being kept in a dark place, possibly an attic or a basement. The windows were blacked out, too. I was acting completely on instinct when I bashed one in. I slid through it and as soon as I got down there, I felt it. The air was heavy and oppressive, as though you could smell fear.” “I remember what that smell is like,” she whispered softly when he grew silent. Her hands continued their ministrations, hoping to keep him here with her, instead of surrendering to the memories. “I didn’t come face to face with it too many times during my short stint as an FBI Agent, but it’s not something you forget.” The commiseration helped, she thought, as he rolled to his side and allowed her to press her front to his back. They were wrapped in separate Afghans, with yet another one over them both, but the close contact still made her shiver. Her right arm she folded over his chest and let her hand rest over his heart. The other hand she left in his hair, circling and soothing as best it could. “Scully, she was so small, and so quiet.” Finally, the calm began to fade from his voice. She wished it back with a desperation that surprised her. Because this haunted quality his voice had taken on made tears sting at her eyes; made her long to wrap him tightly in her arms and rock him like a child. It was a minute before she realized that she didn’t have to deny that urge. Enfolding him more firmly in her embrace, she pressed her lips to the back of his neck. “You don’t have to tell me this.” And he didn’t. It was enough that he’d tried. If it was going to cause him this much pain, she didn’t need to hear it. “Yes, I do.” He didn’t sound sure of himself and he cleared his throat. This time, his voice emerged much stronger. “I’ve never told anyone everything, with the exception of what I put in the report. And . . . I need to. One last demon to exorcise,” he added. Under different circumstances, it could have sounded like a joke. Now, it sounded heartbreakingly sad. She felt him hesitate, and through some nexus or connection that had formed between them, she knew what was wrong. “I want to hear it,” she promised him quietly. “I want to hear anything you want to tell me.” All these small but profound truths she was learning tonight. It was enough to send a girl’s heart into palpitations. Scary as it was, the fear didn’t compare to at least ten other things she could name off the top of her head. Whether that had to do with the circumstances, or the man himself, she didn’t know. Maybe it was as simple as the benefits far outweighing the frightening aspects. Because there were benefits. If she could sense his fear, know him that well, chances were he could do the same with her. Was that kind of connection even possible? If someone had asked her that a week ago, she would have laughed in their face. But now? Now, she was open to any number of extreme possibilities that hadn’t so much as occurred to her before. “When I found her, Rachel was terrified. She wouldn’t even speak. He had her handcuffed to something, a radiator, I think. I remember the only thought that kept running through my mind was, “Jesus, she’s only six, what kind of monster . . .” But of course, I already knew what kind of monster. I’d spent the last three years chasing them down, getting inside their heads, putting them behind bars. “I was so focused on getting her out of there that I somehow fucking forgot to call for backup. Maybe I was thinking about it too much, maybe I was distracted so I didn’t hear him come up behind me, but I felt something conk me over the head, and when I woke up, I was handcuffed next to Rachel. And because I screwed up, the Calvary wasn’t on its way.” Fear wrapped its tentacles around her heart and squeezed. This man had captured him? And did it make her a horrible person that she hadn’t felt this kind of deep, bone crushing sorrow when it was a faceless little girl in peril? He must have felt the subtle change in the way she held her body. At least, that was what she was telling herself. “It’s always different when it’s someone you . . . care about.” I love you. “Yes, it is.” “I never saw him. I heard him, I knew it was him, Rachel told me it was her Uncle Ray, but I never actually saw him. We were down there for nearly two days together, and the entire time, she kept telling me stories about Uncle Ray. About how nice he was when other people were around, and about how mean he was to her when they were alone. How she tried to never be alone with him, because he would tell her that she’d ruined her mother’s life and that if he were any kind of brother, he’d do something about it.” A shudder ran through his body, mirroring the revulsion Scully felt. This was why, she thought dully, her decision to quit the Bureau hadn’t been as hard as it should have been. Why, when Jack had asked her to quit, she’d been all too quick to agree. The only partner she’d ever had in the field had been a joke, and there was really nothing else keeping her there. She’d proved to herself, at least, that she could handle it; she didn’t need to prove anything to anyone else. “I tried not to close my eyes. Part of me was afraid that if I did, Rachel would disappear in the time it took me to open them again. He left food close enough for her to reach it. Some bread, stale crackers, bottles of water. Enough to keep us both alive indefinitely. “My partner apparently pieced together the notes I had all over my room and determined that I’d gone sniffing around Elders’ place on my own. By this time, Rachel had slipped into a detached state. If I tried very hard, I could still draw her out, but she was fading away before my eyes. Reggie came in with the cavalry, but Elders wasn’t at home. When they picked him up at his sister’s place, he maintained that he’d been staying with her the entire time, which she confirmed, and that he had no idea what Rachel was doing in his basement, or that I’d been locked down there.” “And they believed him?” Try as she might, Scully could not keep the incredulity out of her voice. “The police didn’t. The judge and jury didn’t. But there was no concrete evidence. Nothing but my hunches, and me swearing up and down that Rachel told me it was him, and that I’d heard his voice. She couldn’t testify; by that point she’d completely withdrawn inside herself. On her good days, she was semi-catatonic. On her bad days . . . well.” He cleared his throat. “Her mother, Tracy, didn’t believe her brother capable. I think maybe Jim, Rachel’s father, was suspicious, but he wouldn’t contradict his wife. Not even to save his daughter.” His contempt was palpable and Scully shared it. Again, she offered him a comforting squeeze of both her arms and legs. Practically wrapped around him as she was, every breath he took shuddered out of her lungs. “They were going to hand down a not guilty verdict. I knew it. So I taunted him before court began. I got in Ray’s face with no one around and assured him that Rachel would be coming home to take up all of Tracy’s time again. He flipped out. Shoved me into the hall and started beating the shit out of me in front of not only the prosecuting attorney, but the judge as well. He was brought up on charges of assaulting a federal officer. They sentenced him to eight years. “They wouldn’t let me see Rachel. Even when she asked for me, Tracy wouldn’t let me in. She thought I was going to poison her daughter against her uncle. The therapist assigned to her case couldn’t get her to open up. Elders’ wasn’t anywhere near her, but still, he was hurting her. Killing her slowly, from the inside out.” “That’s why you feel so strongly about the roles of law enforcement officers and psychologists merging somewhat.” “I couldn’t profile anymore,” he whispered, continuing as though she hadn’t spoken. Maybe, to him, she hadn’t. He wasn’t really in this room right now, anyway. Again, she pressed her lips to his neck and hoped it offered some comfort. “Even though I know it’s not the case, I felt as though my place in the FBI was of no help to anyone. Yes, I was saving their lives, but their souls were still being tortured. And I couldn’t get to Rachel. So I made a decision. One of those life-altering decisions that somehow never get to be weighed, but instead are made in a split second. You ever notice that, Scully? The most important decisions are so often split second choices.” Nodding against him, she tried not to think of how true that statement was. It could get painful. But then she thought, and realized, that maybe there were some good memories connected to it. Because after all, it had been a split second decision the first time she had kissed Mulder. “So I tendered my resignation, ignored the whispers and protests of my colleagues, and went back to school. Three years later, I had a Ph.D. in child psychology from the very school that had given me my psychology degree a few years before.” “You changed your entire career path so you could help one little girl?” If she hadn’t loved him before . . . Instead of acknowledging the awe-inspiring grandness of his gesture, Mulder shrugged it off. “They brought me onto the case to save her. Some might say I was just trying to finish my job to the best of my ability.” That same shift occurred in his body and she tensed, waiting for the other shoe to drop. “Except I couldn’t save her.” Her fingertips brushed over his jaw and she felt him bite his lip. Gently, she pried the bit of flesh from between his teeth and continued on her way, stroking over his chest, shoulders and arms, letting him feel her touch when he couldn’t hear her words. “A few days before I had my degree in hand, Ray Elders was released from prison. Good behavior, they told me later. Well, his first stop was to see his dear sister. And what did she do?” “No,” Scully whispered, denying to herself what she knew would certainly follow. How could anyone, any =mother= allow . . . “To this day, no one knows what he said to her. He was only in there for a couple of minutes. At the time, she showed no reaction, no sign of distress. But that night, using a toothbrush she must have sharpened somehow, a nine-year-old little girl slit her own wrists in the psych ward of a small-town Indiana hospital.” “It wasn’t your fault,” Scully said immediately, those being the first words that came to mind. Addressing the tragedy itself was beyond her capability at the moment. Caring for the man in her arms, however, was not. “I know that. Now,” he amended. “I spent a good long while blaming myself, though. Years, if I’m honest. It’s only recently, as I said, that I’ve come to terms with it. A lot of that has to do with Samantha’s persistence,” he admitted, some small bit of light starting to creep back into his voice. “You know what the worse part of it all is?” She didn’t have to ask what. That was the most rhetorical question she’d ever heard in her life. “That son of a bitch is still on the streets today. No one can prove what he did.” “Jack’s urging aside, that is an perfect example of one of the most valid reasons I had for leaving the Bureau. I was becoming so hard, so numb to the tragedies and the injustices.” They were both quiet for a time, breathing in perfect rhythm with one another. “I know that you know,” she whispered after a time, her chin now resting over his shoulder so that their cheeks touched, “you aren’t responsible for what happened to Rachel. But sometimes it helps to hear it. Knowing all the facts, having heard every detail, I can say with certainty that you did all you could; more than most. And if she were here, I promise that Rachel wouldn’t blame you, either.” The breath that hitched beneath his chest sounded like a sob. She unwrapped her arms only long enough to help turn him toward her so that she could embrace him properly; pull his head against her breast and stroke his back as his tears wet her skin. Feathering kisses over the top of his head, she soothed his back with hands that shook only a bit, from lingering emotion and anguished sadness for the grief he had carried with him so long. While his tears flowed freely and without shame, she opened her afghan and he opened his, so that they were sharing only the single one atop them. Wrapping themselves around each other, she felt him rub his nose against her breast, the sensation so similar to that of an infant craving its mother that tears she hadn’t allowed herself to shed earlier spilled down her cheeks, but only for an instant. This was about him; his pain, his grief, his release. When the only tears left on his cheeks were old, she kissed them away and promised them both a day when there would be nothing to cry over. Later, minutes or hours, she wasn’t sure, touches that were comforting and almost asexual turned arousing. His mouth latched around her nipple and her earlier observation was confirmed as he began to suckle. She was glad for whatever comfort it gave him. Anything he needed, so long as she was able to give it, would be his. Pushing him to his back, she crawled on top of his body and covered his torso with gentle, fleeting kisses. After she had bathed his entire upper body, her mouth turned playful, nipping, licking, and sucking over his flesh. The act of making love was a process of give and take. But, inevitably, one partner will end up taking control. In her experience, the man normally took the initiative. Earlier, it had been Mulder who was making love to her. Now, while he certainly was anything but passive, he was giving her control. He was allowing her to make love to him at whatever pace, whatever level she wished. This time, when she took him inside her body, the rhythm was faster than before. It comforted her to know that none of the patterns --emotional or physical -- she’d fallen into with men in the past had emerged with Mulder. Smiling into each other’s lives, each breath they took labored, she almost believed this thing between them had a real chance. Sated, they parted for a moment as they each took great gulps of air. Missing him already, Scully pulled his head back to her breast and his arm settled over her waist. Exhausted, they fell into a state of semi-conscious sleep almost immediately. Fading in and out, she was aware only of his presence. It was as though nothing had existed before, and nothing would exist after, this moment. And for now, that was exactly how she needed it to be. Morning would bring with it more than enough time for analyzing and second-guessing the things that were sureties tonight. ~ Chapter 10- Animalistic Interpretation “Come and be one in the motion. Desire they cannot comprehend. Never to question again. For I am your passion, your promise, your end – yes I am.” – Melissa Etheridge, “Yes I Am” ~ It was, perhaps, a sad commentary on his life that he could not remember the last time he’d woken up next to a woman. That the woman in question was the only person he could see himself building a life with, loving without question for the rest of his days, was truly awe-inspiring. Speaking of awe-inspiring . . . The sight that greeted him this fine morning was nothing short of astonishingly beautiful. Dana Scully possessed the kind of beauty that inspired sonnets to be composed and great works of art to be painted. That she was so guileless in her beauty, so unaware of her effect on all those who knew her, only served to make her more lovely. At the moment, the only view he had was her mouth, her amazingly perfect breasts, and the patches of skin in-between. His head was pillowed on one breast and, to his distinct surprise, he’d woken up with his hand resting over the other. He couldn’t think of a better way to open his eyes in the morning. What would she do, he wondered, if she woke up to find his hand on her breast, his lips attached to her neck, and one of the most impressive morning erections he’d ever had prodding her hip? Would she be receptive and actively encourage him? Or would she slug him for his audacity? Her reaction, of course, would have a lot to do with how she viewed what happened last night. Last night. It hadn’t gone as she’d intended, he didn’t think. She had come to his apartment with the intent to seduce, surely. But it had all been in good fun. What happened between them last night, while certainly fun, had not been easy or light. It had been deadly serious and he had felt pieces of his soul tether themselves to hers. Had she felt it too? And if she had, would she seek to sever these ties, rather than risk being hurt again? Memories assaulted him and he nearly groaned. He certainly hadn’t meant to unload on her like that. He wasn’t even sure where it had all come from, although he could take an educated guess. For years now, he’d been storing up all the pain. With the exception of a single incident outside his sister’s home, he hadn’t let any of it out. But finally, =finally= there was someone he trusted, someone he wanted to share everything with. The reason Rachel’s story had come pouring out of him the night before directly reflected on the fact that he had been truly happy, for the first time in years. He thought about Rachel last night, when he realized he hadn’t thought about her all day. Staring at the fabric of his carpet the night before, Scully’s obviously nervous body beside him, it had seemed the right time to give her a piece of his life. Return her trust, in a way. Now, though, back in his bed, he found himself wondering if it was a mistake. Last night, she’d held him while he cried like he hadn’t cried since he was a small child. He hadn’t felt embarrassment at being seen as less than manly and that, more than anything else he’d experienced with her, eased his worries about this thing between them developing too fast. He was safe with her. So long as she didn’t start second-guessing herself, they’d be safe with each other. In the midst of his thoughts as he was, it startled him when one of her hands covered his over her breast. He tilted his head up and caught her open, sleepy eyes. However long she’d been awake, it was obviously long enough to have observed his internal debate, given the consciousness he saw in her eyes. Split second decision made, he pressed a kiss to the underside of the breast his head was resting near, then another, and another, until his lips found and wrapped around her nipple. She made no move to stop him, nor a sound of protest, unless that long moan had been one of pain, which he highly doubted. Never a believer in the theories of Freud, he did not examine why suckling at her breast was such an incredible turn-on. The hand that rested over his slowly began stroking up his forearm. In his best estimation, the movement was involuntary. He smiled around her breast and slowly began feathering his mouth toward her face, occasionally darting his tongue out to lap languidly at her skin. It amazed him that he now knew what every inch of Dana Scully’s body tasted like. His hand began to gently knead and caress her breast as his mouth settled itself near her ear. Licking, nibbling, and sucking, he spent an inordinate amount of time acquainting himself with this particular part of her anatomy. Her approval was obvious, both in the husky-morning-voice moans she emitted, as well as the act of digging her nails into his forearm. “Tell me, Scully,” he whispered into her ear, his tone conversational, “are you having as pleasant a morning as I am?” She pulled her lower lip tightly between her teeth and he took the opportunity to place a few kisses against her jaw. “Yeah. But the weirdest thing happened. I was pleasantly dozing and woke to find some guy pawing me.” He barely contained a guffaw as his lips returned to her ear. Tracing the little whorls with the tip of his tongue, he pulled back, stunned, as she started to giggle. “Ticklish?” “No,” she denied vehemently. But when put to the test, she erupted in another peel of giggles. Delighted by the sound, he continued to lightly trace the tip of his tongue over her ear. “Mulder,” a gasp, “please, I’m begging you,” a breathless giggle, “you =must= stop,” she trailed off as she began laughing too hard to form coherent sentences. He was sure the fact that his hand had left her breast, and was now teasingly fluttering over her sides had =something= to do with her breathless state. Ceasing his movements for a moment, he deliberately blew a puff of air into her ear. Shuddering, both her hands immediately clamped down on his; a vain attempt to keep him from renewing his attack, he scoffed internally. Her eyes were shut, and while her skin was flushed and her breathing heavy, she looked almost peaceful. To be the cause of that . . . it took his breath away. “I don’t know, Scully,” he whispered into her ear, “this is entertaining the hell out of me. And if I’m not entertained in the morning, I usually just roll back over and go to sleep.” “Who says I wasn’t planning to entertain you?” She was beginning to regain some control over her breathing. There was still a light, teasing note to her voice, though, and again, he reveled in it. “Scully, we’ve been awake for nearly five whole minutes and still, I haven’t gotten a single good morning kiss.” He tried to sound petulant, but he was too damned happy to pull it off. He punctuated his statement with a nip to the side of her neck. “And, confidentially, taking into consideration that you would be the one to bestow the good morning kiss – it’s gonna take a hell of a lot more than one to satisfy me.” “You didn’t say anything about satisfying you,” she murmured, sliding down in the bed and turning to her side until they were eye level. “You just said I had to entertain you.” The smile that lit up her face could have nourished his soul for decades. “So which is it, Doc? Do you want entertainment, or satisfaction?” “I can’t get no,” he began, then trailed off as she pressed her lips to his. Her tongue brushed against his mouth and he opened to her immediately, moaning at the feel of her. His hand quickly made the journey up her side to tangle in her hair, finding a firm grip. Wasting no time, he pulled her head closer, devouring her mouth with his own and being devoured at the same time. After a long, long while, they pulled back, foreheads resting against one another, breathing labored. “Good morning,” she whispered in a voice that was just this side of a sex kitten. Grinning like an idiot, he rubbed his nose against hers in an Eskimo kiss. “Good morning.” “You still haven’t made a decision,” she reminded him, her leg slowly sliding up the side of his. A snicker left his mouth and he slowly rolled her to her back, placing both his hands firmly against the mattress, pressing his body into hers with the slightest pressure. “I’m sorry, I must have been being vague. Allow me to make my point more clear.” Dipping his head down, he ravished her mouth with his own. He nipped and sucked, licked and caressed until he thought the top of his head was going to come off. Even that couldn’t make him stop. He never wanted to stop kissing her . . . The most amazing thing was, she couldn’t seem to get enough of him, either. Her hands were pulling and clawing at his back until he could no longer support himself on his arms. He rested fully on top of her, his hands now free to roam the expanse of her body. Squirming and wiggling, sliding and touching, she made the most exquisite sounds into his mouth. How this woman could ever doubt what a sensual, beautiful creature she was . . . When he was sure they were both too breathless to think coherently, he released her mouth in favor of the skin along the side of her neck. “You are so beautiful,” he whispered into the ear he hadn’t been tormenting earlier. “I want you so badly . . . I ache to be inside you. I’ve never felt that before.” He continued to press his lips along her shoulder, then back to her ear again. He was frantic, unable to get enough of her. “God, Mulder,” she whispered. “Are you like this every morning?” They both laughed, a bit unstably. With a supreme force of will, he raised his head to look her in the eye. Both his hands pushed the hair back from her face and sort of cradled her head between his palms. Again, he leaned down and rested his forehead against hers. He opened his mouth once, but found the words he wanted to say were absent. Instead, he asked a question. “Are you?” he countered, having noticed how eager her own hands and mouth and legs had been. Every inch of her skin burned against his, responded to every touch, extended overtures of her own. Like him, she seemed to search for words she couldn’t find. Then, like a bolt of lightning, the answer seemed to come at them both at once. “I don’t know,” they said together slowly. “Because it’s never been you before,” he continued quietly. “And already I know it’s going to be different with you,” she added, her fingers idly tracing patterns along his sides. “Better,” he corrected. “Different and better than it’s ever been before. Better than either of us ever thought was possible.” “It’s good that you’re realistic about this. I’d hate to see you build it up some great expectation it couldn’t possibly have a prayer of living up to.” He ignored her dry, somewhat sarcastic tone. “I am being realistic. I don’t know about you, Scully, but I do not fall in love in a day and a half.” Almost without conscious thought, he began feathering little kisses down the bridge of her nose. “I don’t find my other half, the woman who makes me a whole person, every time I go to one of those mind-numbingly dull conventions.” Catching sight of her expression, he could have kicked himself. Too much, too soon, dumb shit, he seethed on the inside. If you were a little unsettled by the speed of this relationship, how the hell must she feel? As ever, she surprised him. “I had given up on finding my other half,” she whispered quietly, leaning her head up to cling their lips together briefly. “I’d begun to believe that he didn’t exist.” Another smile curved her lips, those beautiful, sexy lips he could never get enough of . . . “You’re making me believe in a lot of things I’d given up on.” Tears were threatening in her voice, and as much as he loved the things she was saying, he didn’t want tears to factor into the equation every time they made love. Whether they were tears of sadness, or joy, of grief or of awe, he wanted her laughter again. Something inside him craved her laughter. He knew she was still afraid. After all she’d been through, he’d be a little worried if she wasn’t. But, just like she’d promised, she wasn’t letting that fear rule her. And, because of what they were becoming to each other, she was trying to move on, to move past the pain. Again, he kissed her, slowly at first, gently and with great reverence. Her hands crept up his back and her fingers threaded through his hair, pulling his head to hers more firmly, parting her lips in silent invitation. He took it, slipping his tongue past her teeth, caressing, learning, and revisiting his newly appointed favorite spots. Lulling her into a false sense of security with these gentle, exploring kisses, she was caught completely unaware when his fingers began moving with great purpose along her sides. Their kiss broke as she erupted with great peels of laughter into his mouth. Her mirth brought out his own and he let her roll him until he was on his back, her weight pinning him to the bed. “That,” she exclaimed, once again panting slightly, “was a horrible thing you just did.” “Who, me?” It was his mother, he remembered, who said he never could feign innocence in a convincing manner. “Mulder, are you ticklish?” There was not a trace of preamble in her voice. “’Fraid not,” he said, with little regret. “I assure you, it was a considerable bone of contention between Sam and I growing up.” “I bet,” she muttered darkly. “If you’re not ticklish . . . I’m going to have to find some other way to torture you properly.” “You think anything you could possibly do, short of getting out of this bed and leaving my apartment, could torture me?” Dangerous. It was dangerous to scoff at a tigress. He couldn’t seem to heed his own warnings. “You don’t think I can do it?” A single, beautiful eyebrow arched toward the ceiling. “Baby, give it your best shot.” Danger, Will Robinson, danger. Pulling her lower lip between her teeth, she sat back against his thighs and seemed to give the situation some considerable thought. Bracing himself on his elbows, he sat up enough to press his lips between her breasts, the lack of contact driving him crazy. To his surprise, she placed her hands against his chest and shoved him back to the bed. Before he could form words to ask her why, two delicate fingers covered his lips. “Would you do something for me, Mulder?” As her fingers were still preventing him from speech, he raised an eyebrow to ask what. Grinning as only a woman with an idea can, she began to caress his lips, her movement nearly imperceptible. “I have a fantasy. Something I never used to allow myself to think of deliberately, because before, it was just too painful. But now . . . now I remember it was one of those things that waited inside my mind, waited until the tethers of my control were worn enough to seep into my thoughts.” Bending at the waist, she placed a soft, open-mouthed kiss over one of his nipples. Straightening, she once again sat back on his thighs. “Would you do that for me, Mulder? Would you make my fantasy come true?” He did not understand how this was supposed to be torturing him, nor was he stupid enough to actually raise that point. It might pose an intriguing argument at a later date, but right now, the very last thing he wanted to do with Dana Scully was argue with her. Swallowing around the huge lump that had formed in his throat, Mulder pressed a kiss to her fingers and she removed them. “Anything,” he croaked. He cleared his throat. “I’d do anything for you, Dana.” “Scully,” she corrected softly, a shadow passing over her eyes before she blinked it away. “No one else has ever called me Scully, and I like it that way.” “Scully,” he whispered, once again trying to lean up to kiss her. Once again, she stopped him with a gentle but firm push against his chest. “Have you ever lost control while making love?” As she spoke the words, she moved away from him until she sat at the end of the bed, her legs stretched out in front of her, feet near his shoulders. Puzzled, he sat up against the headboard, mirroring her posture. “Define control.” “Thought, sense, reason, ability to control what your body does.” “Technically, every person reaches that point at the moment of orgasm--” He hadn’t even finished pronouncing the end of the word when her hand began shaking him off. “I know that. I’m not referring to the loss of control that occurs through the narcotic of ecstasy.” A wide grin split her face, and he shared it, wondering if there were two other people on the planet capable of having this conversation in quite this way. “What then, pray tell, Dr. Scully, are you referring to?” “I want to be taken.” She spoke quietly, and with a gentle sincerity that touched his heart. At the same time, he felt his cock twitch slightly at the mental picture that formed. “I want to be wanted by someone,” she looked him straight in the eye and he thought, “Look at me, ma, I’m someone.” She was still speaking. “Wanted beyond reason, beyond sense, beyond ability to control what they think or do.” Again, he had to physically clear his throat to speak. “That’s a perfectly natural want. The problem usually posed with such a fantasy, though, is a trust issue. To whip someone into that sort of frenzy, into a mass of want and need to the point that they can no longer control what they do, you have to trust that what they’ll do won’t be damaging, to themselves or you.” He wondered if he sounded like he was fishing for reassurance. Trust was a big thing for her. Even if she was able to bestow it upon him at some point, she wouldn’t be ready to yet. “I want to trust you,” she said quietly, shocking him so that his head popped up, their eyes meeting. “And the easiest way for me to begin that process, is to trust you with my body.” Flabbergasted. Certainly, a word he’d never been particularly fond of. But it was the only word that came close to describing his current state of mind. Taking a moment to collect his thoughts, he made another split second decision. He trusted her to know what she wanted, to know what she was ready for. “Can I be honest with you for a moment?” “Always, I hope.” He smiled in confirmation. “I don’t think I’ve been clear as to exactly how badly I want you. Allow me to rectify that matter.” A raised eyebrow was the only response he got. Jesus, even that was sexy. “The first time I saw you, I nearly fell out of my chair. You were lecturing in the most monotone voice and I was listening to every word in rapt attention. I watched the way your hips moved as you walked to the podium, the way that one lock of hair wouldn’t stay out of your eyes, and the way your gaze scanned the room and took precise note of each person in attendance. Intelligence has always been the most profound turn-on to me, and you, Dr. Scully, absolutely stunned me with your brilliance. “Had my darling baby sister not called at a most inopportune moment, I assure you that by the time I stood up to engage that beautiful mind of yours in debate, I would have been sporting an erection the likes of which most medical professionals would tell you was impossible given no direct stimulation. “Putting all of that aside for the moment, you are the single most stunningly beautiful woman I have ever seen in my life. Due to a disastrous marriage I am fully aware you haven’t told me every detail of, you have a low to non-existent sense of self-worth. I promise you, Scully, all you have to do is look at me the way you’re looking at me right now and I want you more than I’ve ever wanted any other woman alive. “What I’m doing right now is telling you the truth. But I also have an ulterior motive. We both think too much. And as a result, words have the power to arouse greater, in some sense, than touch. The way you’re hands are moving restlessly over the covers, the way your pupils are dilating, the way you can’t take your eyes off me are all small signs of how turned on you are. Do you know what turns me on more than anything else?” She licked her lips, the sound of her throat clearing the first she’d made since he’d begun. Odd how the baring of his soul had never been this effortless before. He felt something, and he wanted to share it with her. “What?” she finally croaked in much the same tone he’d used earlier. “Knowing that I’m turning you on.” He made a nodding motion as she processed that little nugget. “I know what you mean,” she said, her eyes focused on his cock which was beginning to throb, he wanted her so badly. “You want me to be beyond reason or control.” He waited until her eyes met his again. “Scully, I’m halfway there the very first time you put your hands on me. I hold myself back with every ounce of willpower I have, so that I don’t scare you.” “You could never scare me.” Husky, with an alto timbre that caused his dick to twitch. Her voice danced over his senses, putting to shame any theory of direct stimulation being the most arousing sensation. It was getting more and more difficult to take normal breaths. His blood was pounding through his veins and he wasn’t even touching her. There were several feet separating their faces. They just kept looking at each other, the words they’d both confessed ringing through their ears and finally, finally he understood how this might be considered torture. If this was torture, call me a masochist, he thought with near manic glee. Feral, that was how he felt; nearly animalistic. It had always been a skill of his to easily slip into whatever state of mind he needed to be in. And right now, he was letting the veneer of civility men and women wore in their day to day lives slip away. Because it was what the woman before him needed. Starting from the inside out, he reduced everything he felt for her, all the mature, very proper impulses he had into baser urges. The desire to mate. The need to possess completely. The desperate want she had to be taken. “Come here.” The words were almost growled. He couldn’t recognize his own voice; didn’t even try. Her eyes widened slightly, but he didn’t see fear in them. Quite the contrary. Her nipples hardened before his eyes and he watched as she rose to her knees. She turned, and his instincts reacted before his mind could. He was behind her in an instant, one arm snaking around her waist, the other securing her shoulders, gripping her tightly just above her breasts. A gasp left her mouth and he felt her body shudder against his. “Going somewhere?” His mouth was at her ear again, no longer tickling. He bit gently, sucked and laved his tongue over her skin. “No,” she whispered, her hands covering the arm he had around her waist. Confident that she wasn’t trying to change her mind, his hands strayed from their neutral locations. One cupped her breast firmly, pinched her hardened nipple between thumb and forefinger, tightening only when she moaned the word “more.” His other hand did not hesitate either. It plunged between her legs and quickly found her warm and wet. If there was any part of his mind that wasn’t completely fogged over, it recognized how satisfying it was to have physical proof that she wanted him as much as he wanted her. Exploring, his mouth continued to feast on her skin. The back of her neck was particular tasty and he set to work on giving her a hickey she’d carry around for a week; branding her as his. She kept moaning his name; whimpering it, crying out softly in pleasure. His teeth got into the act as he grazed them over her skin lightly, finding the crook of her neck to be another particularly tasty spot. Both her hands braced themselves against the foot of the bed and he felt her ass push back against his erection, demanding, begging. Her voice was begging, too, he thought, lost in the clouds of her hair and the ambrosia of her skin. Somehow, his hands found their way to her hips and he pulled her into the position he needed her in. He went as deeply as he could on the first thrust. His thought process was limited to recognizing senses: hot, tight, wet, she’s moaning, tastes good, beautiful, mine, mine, mine. Blazing a sloppy trail up her back with his mouth, he finally reached her ear again. His hips began a hard, fast rhythm against hers. She tried to meet his thrusts, but her position limited movement. Finally, she just held on tightly to the foot board and let his hands move her hips as he saw fit. Mingling his name and God’s, he was amazed when he heard another word pass her lips: “Harder.” His brain was no longer able to process the fact that he was pounding into her harder than he’d thought himself capable. She issued a command and he would follow. Draping his body over hers, his breath hot and labored in her ear, he picked up the pace, eliciting the most amazing sound from her mouth. =That= was animalistic, just as he would have recognized the grunts coming from his mouth to be if he’d been in any position to recognize such things. A few thrusts more, and he was done for. The pressure in his balls built until he exploded into her. A cry was torn from his mouth and he heard an answering cry from her. “Some mates call out for each other, even from opposite ends of the globe,” he remembered some National Geographic he read once saying. As something approaching rational thought returned to him, he managed to reach a hand around her waist, two fingers moving down to gently finger her clit. He’d barely touched her before his name left her lips with a scream. That was it, that was the sound, that was the sound he needed to hear before he could die a happy, satisfied man . . . With that last thought, he pulled out of her and collapsed onto his side. She fell back with him, a tangle of arms and legs as they climbed halfway up the bed, just so that their limbs wouldn’t hang off the mattress. They both rested on their backs, breathing heavy, staring up at the ceiling. Her small, warm hand found his and she threaded their fingers together. Out of his peripheral vision, he saw a smile break out across her face. One of equally foolish joy spread across his own. Together, they laughed slightly, giddy with the situation, themselves, and the feelings coursing through their very beings. “Good morning, Scully,” he whispered, turning his head to look at her directly. Turning her head toward him, idiotic grin not slipping in the least, she squeezed his hand once. “Good morning, Mulder.” And, as though she just couldn’t help herself: “Entertaining =and= satisfying. Who’d’ve thought we could have the best of both worlds?” They slipped back into a restful slumber, chuckling softly at stupid things no other person on the planet would find remotely funny. ~ Chapter 11- Chocolate-Covered Human-Buffer “You don’t marry someone you can live with – you marry the person who you cannot live without.” ~ This was why people got married, she thought dreamily. If her eyes weren’t open, she wasn’t really awake yet. Or, at least, she didn’t have to admit to being awake, Scully rationalized to herself. Not that being awake would be such a bad thing. After all, the last time she woke up, it was to find Mulder’s hands on her body. They were there again. One of his hands was curved possessively over her breast, the other wrapped around her lower back, holding her body to his. Oh, yes, that was his skin pressed to every inch of hers, his legs tangled with hers and his breath puffing against her hair. It was his heartbeat beneath her ear and his chest her hand rested over. This was why people got married. Sleeping with someone was more intimate than making love. On the only occasion she had had a one-night stand, she hadn’t slept a wink all night. As soon as the sun came up, she had hurriedly thrown on her clothes and all but ran from the nondescript motel room. The experience had left a bad taste in her mouth, and she had vowed to never do it again. Yet Mulder was to have been a one-night stand. Well, a one-week stand. The point was, there were to be no long-term attachments, no residual emotions, and definitely no thoughts of anything deeper than friendship, sex, and fun. They’d certainly been having fun. She hadn’t laughed this much since college, if then. And sex had figured prominently into the equation. Great sex, mind blowing sex, soul-searing sex the likes of which could become addictive. Had already become addictive, she amended. He was even her friend. Amazing, really, that he’d been her friend almost from the first day. Earnest in his desire to know her, he’d ferreted into her thoughts, insinuated himself into her personal space and fought back her insecurities like a knight conquering dragons. Plus, he smelled so damned good. His scent wrapped itself around her nerve-endings. Inhaling, she took that smell as deeply into her lungs as she could. It was already something she associated with being safe, loved and happy. When she was younger, her mother’s chocolate chip cookies, the salt air, and her father’s combination of tobacco and leather had been the smells of home, wherever home was that year. Now, though, she was beginning to associate Mulder’s smell with home. This was why people got married. It was the desire to belong, with and to another person. The idea that, no matter what, there was somebody on this earth who would always accept you, always love you for whoever you were. The notion was seductive, sleeping and waking with a warm body curled next to your own. A bond composed of love, trust, and desire coalesced into a state of being that each person, if they’re honest with themselves, strives for. Celebrating the joys together, weathering the hardships and comforting during times when the rest of the world seemed a cold and unyielding place to exist in. A safe harbor was what Ahab had called it. A sailor to his core, it was how he’d viewed his Maggie. As a child, Scully had worshiped her parents’ marriage, yearned to achieve something approaching it. It was how she’d been so tempted by Jack. He’d said and done all the right things. At first. He’d promised her happily ever after, offered her everything she’d ever wanted. He’d supported her career, had been so understanding about what it was like for a woman in a man’s world. The idea of the perfect life had taunted her until she saw no other choice but to marry this seemingly perfect man. In retrospect, she had to wonder if she’d been blind. The reality of her marriage had been nothing like the fantasy he’d deluded her into believing. Soon, he convinced her to quit the Bureau. That was not as much of a hardship as the rest. And she wouldn’t give up the career she had now for anything. At least at the lab, she felt like she was helping something. The sabbatical she’d taken these last few weeks had been welcome, but soon, she would be eager to get back to work. She had been resisting the idea of returning to work, unsure how it would affect Kelly. The time the little girl required from her was considerable, and Scully felt guilty leaving her alone. Mulder’s lips moved over the top of her head, mumbling in his sleep. It sounded like her name. Despite the melancholy of her thoughts, she had to smile. This was why people got married. Her problems were not with the institution itself. She believed in marriage, even if that belief was shaken considerably by Jack’s betrayal. A week ago, a =day= ago, if someone had asked her if she’d ever consider marriage again, she would have been unable to form a response. She would have been too busy laughing in his or her face. Now, she didn’t know what to think. She only knew that she felt something with Mulder; something that was more powerful, more binding than a fling and certainly more permanent than a few nights. He was one of those people Missy was always talking about. One of those people who, no matter what role they played, would always play one in your life. As to what role he would play in =her= life, she couldn’t say. This . . . everything that had happened between them had been so good. Everything seemed so natural, so right that to question it seemed presumptuous on her part. But she didn’t know any other way to be. It was in her nature to question, to weigh, to test. And as much as she wished she could just let go, trust, love, and let tomorrow bring what it would, she couldn’t afford to. There were still doubts prevalent in her mind. And she couldn’t quiet them, couldn’t contain them. Sometimes, it felt as though they were ready to burst from her being. The life she’d lived, the life she’d dreamed of, had been an utter lie. And she’d participated in her own deception by staying with Jack for nearly six years. It had been obvious the marriage wasn’t working out. But some hard-won Catholic guilt complex, or some idea that things weren’t completely unfixable had kept her there. It had kept her with a roommate, not a husband, and in a house with no love to keep its walls standing. It shouldn’t have surprised her that it had all crumbled like a house of cards, but somehow, even now, it did. The good example of a marriage set by her parents meant more to her. She conceded that part of it was how drastically Jack had changed from when she knew him before their marriage. Every day she had woken up, she had secretly prayed to find the Jack she’d known before in bed beside her. Every day, she woke up to find him already gone, most likely, she knew now, to see his mistress. What if . . . what if she trusted Mulder? What if she put aside every reservation she had, let him fully into her heart and soul and he changed the way Jack did? That was the real fear she felt gnawing at her gut, she realized. Perhaps all this self-analyzing wasn’t all bad. It was the only way she knew to truly find what was wrong in her heart. Terror was what she felt when she thought about it. Losing this Mulder, the one that held her so safely and . . . lovingly in his arms, the one she’d trusted with more than her body early this morning, would be like losing her other half. And there it was, in a nutshell. Against her better judgment, without conscious permission on her part, she had done it again. Invested up to her eyeballs in a relationship with a man who could, however unlikely, rip her heart out. And it would hurt. It would hurt more than anything had ever hurt before, more than the disillusionment, more than the betrayal, more than . . . Mulder’s lips, feathering kisses across her brow. Soft, gentle, reverent kisses as his fingers made slow circles over her lower back, and the hand covering her breast made no move to vacate its current position. “Don’t wake up yet, Sleeping Beauty.” His breath fanned her face and she felt his raspy whisper down to the tips of her toes. “I need a few more minutes to convince myself you’re real.” Unbidden, the image of his body, shaking in her arms came to mind. He’s opened himself to you, too, she reminded herself. He’d opened himself completely, sharing something she knew he’d never told another soul. It wasn’t one-sided like before. He isn’t going to lie to you, he isn’t going to cheat on you, and he sure as hell isn’t about to stop wanting you, if the way he holds you is any indication. Suck it up, Dana, and stop freaking out. Giving them both a few minutes to breathe, she collected her thoughts. Nothing decided yet was the only decision she allowed herself to make. Just enjoy it and accept his place in your life, whatever that place ultimately ends up being. Stretching like a cat against his body, she tilted her head towards his, blinking her eyes open for the first time since waking. Smiling softly at him, she pressed a chaste kiss to his lips. “Morning.” “Morning, gorgeous,” he murmured, bending his head to give her a longer, decidedly unchaste kiss. Her hands threaded through his hair and as her nails scratched his scalp lightly, both his hands tightened on her body. I can’t do it, she thought in a daze. I can’t have known this and exist without it. Before she had a chance to follow up on that particular train of thought, Mulder broke their kiss and his head came up. From the look on his face, it was as though he had heard something. His next words confirmed it. “Did you hear that?” She listened for a moment, but heard nothing. “What--” But he was up and out of bed, snagging a robe out of a box near the door. A few seconds later, he came back through the door, a resigned smirk on his face. He rooted around in another box, and tossed her what might possibly be the second softest thing she had ever felt. The first, of course, being his skin. “What’s this for?” she asked, holding up an old navy blue t-shirt of his. It looked like a favorite, worn in all the right places. When he turned away from the bed for a moment, she seized the opportunity and brought it to her nose. He’d worn it recently, but not for long. Just enough time to leave his scent. “Just trust me,” he muttered, slipping on a pair of boxers. A pout was already forming on her lips. She didn’t want either of them getting dressed yet . . .the look on his face, combined with the opportunity to have his smell surrounding her won her over, though, and she slipped the t-shirt on. He bounded back into bed beside her, and she was about to really start grilling him when a familiar voice boomed from the other side of the door. “Wake up my lovelies, breakfast is served.” “Have you ever heard the word privacy?” Mulder inquired politely as his sister barged through his bedroom door, a large tray filled with delicious-smelling food in hand. “Privacy? We’re lucky she knows the words ‘public decency,’” Charlie reminded them all from behind Sam, his hands filled with an almost identical tray. “Public what?” she asked sweetly, setting her tray down at the foot of the bed. “She used to do this when I would have overnight guests in college if she happened to be visiting me,” Mulder murmured near Scully’s ear. It was as though he was completely ignoring his sister’s presence. For her part, Scully was resisting the urge to pull his t-shirt over both her knees. Charlie placed his tray near his sister’s feet and Samantha looked quite pleased with herself. “Well,” she drew the word out. “I guess we’ll leave you two alone.” “Wait a minute,” Charlie interrupted, “you wake me up, order me over here with eggs, bacon, pancake mix, syrup and everything else on their trays, you make me cook it, cause we all know you can’t, and now we don’t even get to eat it?” Samantha patted his cheek as though he were a poor, lost soul. Scully barely contained a snicker at the image. “Come on, honey,” she said encouragingly, “I’ll take you to IHOP.” The pout that had appeared on his face brightened the slightest bit. “Can I get the nutty waffles with the strawberry syrup?” Wrinkling her nose distastefully, Sam looked at her brother on the bed. “The things I do for you,” she muttered to him. Turning back to Charlie, she smiled widely. “Anything you want, Chuckie.” Charlie cackled. My brother cackled, Scully thought to herself in a daze. What were these Mulders doing to the Scullys? Sam blew them both a kiss and left, Charlie following close behind. Mulder rubbed his hands together gleefully and lifted the tray at his feet onto his lap. Without preamble, he bit into a piece of bacon and moaned his appreciation. “Didn’t you find that the slightest bit weird?” Things like that didn’t happen, did they? That couldn’t have been normal. Mulder shrugged. “I got used to it in college. It’s just the way she is. Frankly, I wouldn’t want her to be anyone different than exactly who she is.” =This= was why people got married, she thought, digging into her own tray. Because they realized they’d finally found the life that, while certainly not perfect, was perfect for them. ~ “Your love is better than chocolate, better than anything else that I’ve tried.” – Sarah McLachlan, “Ice Cream” ~ Over the next few days, Scully remembered how to laugh without feeling guilty about it. After their first night together proved successful, they spent barely a moment apart. If they weren’t at his apartment, they were at Samantha and Charlie’s house, or laying in the park cloud gazing, or sitting in the back of a dark movie theater, making out like teenagers, except when the movie was entertaining. Mulder had asked her early on if she wanted some time to herself. She’d told him no. For the last few years she’d had nothing but time to herself. And she enjoyed his company so much. He was fun, smart, witty, sexy, and he made her feel like someone special. It had been a very long time since she’d felt special. Each morning, they woke up wrapped around each other. They made love without saying a word, and only later, sated and breathing heavy, did they exchange the most banal of morning greetings. When it was time for showers, they took them together. Scully marveled that she’d never known how sensual it was to wash a man’s hair, and then have him wash hers. Especially when that man was Mulder. Everything he did seemed sensual to her. Having his hands in her hair, massaging, sifting, scratching, was enough to turn her legs to Jell-O, her insides to goo, and send her hormones crashing through the ceiling. Despite popular opinion, it was a lot easier to make love against the wall of a shower than most people thought. Particularly when the man was tall and capable of lifting heavy objects, and the woman was petite and able to support most of her weight with her upper body. Another thing she was learning was that Mulder was a die-hard, unrepentant chocoholic. Which was blissful, because she couldn’t keep her hands off the stuff either. The confession had come from him first when she woke in the middle of the night to the sound of a candy bar wrapper crackling. Caught, Snickers in hand, he’d had no choice but to come clean. He’d been forgiven as soon as he gave her half, and the next day they had made a trip to the grocery store. His apartment was now filled with more chocolate than a class full of preschoolers could possibly consume and they both agreed it wouldn’t last them more than a week. That same day they started jogging through the park together in the mornings. Exercise, they’d both learned years ago, was the only way a true chocoholic could do battle with the calories. She also found that Mulder had the best way of eating chocolate. The nightstand near the bed was always well stocked, but when they weren’t munching on M&Ms and watching bad TV late one night, Mulder was hit with inspiration. He began eating M&Ms, mini Reese’s peanut butter cups, anything that would melt directly off certain parts of her anatomy. If the chocolate started to melt against the heat of her skin, it just made him happier, because he got to devote more time to that particular area. This was a fabulous idea, she thought, so they began trading off. Far too much chocolate was consumed that night, and they made a rule, the first rule that had ever existed between them: They were only allowed to cover each other in chocolate once a month. She did not allow herself to think about what it meant that they were dealing with their relationship in terms of months, rather than days. It was hard to adhere to, even though it was for the best. They’d both be huge blimps if they did it as often as she was beginning to crave a chocolate-covered Mulder . . . All in all, the five days since they’d become lovers were exactly what Scully had envisioned them to be from the beginning. Carefree, fun, hot and completely liberating. They were also things she’d never thought they could be. Emotional, loving, tender, earth shattering, and with the promise of more to come. The promise, especially, had taken her by surprise. Never did they discuss when things would end. Whether he would return to his nomadic lifestyle, whether she would find a home of her own and once again take Kelly on full-time, whether a time would come when they’d no longer be lovers. She couldn’t fathom it, let alone discuss it with him. Instead, they sat in the two huge, comfy chairs in Samantha’s living room and cracked open separate books to read. Or they opened up their laptops, he to write, she to receive and respond to emails from colleagues. Mostly, she found herself growing wary. It was like waiting for the other shoe to drop. Life was =perfect=. The only thing missing was Kelly, and there were times Scully forgot her promise not to introduce someone into the child’s life that might not stay. She wanted them to get to know each other, these two people who were the most important in the world to her. And, while she’d resisted the state’s psychiatric care for Kelly, she wondered if Mulder might be able to help her. The truly dangerous thing was, she was beginning to feel like they were husband and wife. They were acting like it, too. He rinsed the dishes and handed them off to her. She loaded them into the dishwasher. After they’d both tripped over the boxes in his apartment for the fifth time, she helped him shove them all against walls, so that there was a big open space in the middle of his living room. Then they went to Ikea and bought furniture. A couch, a table, a big screen TV, and a home computer so he didn’t have to work on his laptop all the time. And it hadn’t just been the act of buying furniture, either. They’d argued over what would look better and, in the end, had gotten something that was a compromise of what they’d both said. It was only after everything was set up, his head was in her lap on the new couch and they were watching “When Harry Met Sally” on the big screen TV that it hit her. It’s =his= couch, =his= apartment, why should it matter what her tastes were? But it had. It had mattered more to him than it ever had to Jack. He valued her opinion, he treated her as an equal, and he acted as though her place in his life was a given, a choice neither of them had to make because it had been decided a long time ago. The rational part of her personality rebelled against this, but the wistful little girl who’d dreamed of happily ever after dissolves was sold. That little girl could dig her feet in, too. More than once she’d overruled the grown up. However, the truly interesting thing was, the grown up inside her wasn’t putting up too much of a protest, either. The grown up had gotten very used to foot massages at night, being fed chocolate during sex, getting sex on a regular basis, and feeling remarkably safe and comfortable just being with a man. There was no pressure to make conversation, no fear that she might do something wrong around him. It was just . . . Good. It was all so fucking good. If only she could stop staring up at the sky, looking for falling shoes. ~ “I think it’s getting to the point where I can be myself again, I think it’s getting to the point, where we have almost made amends, I think it’s getting to the point that is the hardest part.”—Bare Naked Ladies, Call & Answer ~ On the fifth day Mulder woke up beside Dana Scully, something wonderful happened. They had spent the night with Samantha and Charlie. His baby sister had never been above childlike indulgences, even after she hit thirty, and in that spirit, they had a slumber party. The obvious affection and camaraderie Sam and Charlie held for one another warmed Mulder’s heart. It was good that she’d found someone worthy of her. Someone who would completely support and enjoy the idea of watching favorite movies, popping popcorn, eating junk food and sleeping on her living room floor in sleeping bags. Neither Mulder nor Scully had fessed up to the fact that they’d been eating chocolate nonstop for the past five days. They just stared at the pile of sugar Sam procured, and silently agreed to spend =two= hours in the park the next day. It turned out that getting enough exercise would =not= be a problem. At promptly nine-thirty AM the next morning, a ringing doorbell awakened them all from the floor. As he opened his eyes, he found Scully staring right at him. His sister was making the same waking noises she’d made since she was a baby, but he couldn’t take his eyes off of Scully’s. She was barely touching him, her hand resting over his ribcage, but her eyes . . . Lying on their sides, face to face as they were, he felt as though he were looking into her soul. There wasn’t fear, like he was becoming accustomed to when he got this kind of a glimpse into her eyes. There might have even been love. After ignoring it the first time, Samantha nudged Charlie out of their bag and rolled over to wrap Mulder’s back in a good morning hug. His silent contemplation of the look of utter acceptance and love on Scully’s face interrupted, they both wished Sam a good morning. She must have noticed the same look on Scully’s face, because Sam immediately rolled back over and attempted to make herself invisible. Charlie appeared in the living room again, trailing Melissa and Kelly. Melissa was babbling about how packed the store was today, and that they expected the crowds to get even bigger after noon. She would =not= be able to take care of Kelly today and as her explanation continued, Mulder had taken his eyes off Scully to watch Kelly. The little girl did not spare Scully a glance, but instead of choosing any one of a dozen places to sit, she headed for the piece of floor directly at Scully’s feet, snagged the remote and turned the TV on. A station that was showing “Tiny Toon Adventures,” caught her eye and she left it there. Crawling on his stomach, Mulder moved until his shoulders were even with Kelly’s legs. “Hi,” he said quietly. Her eyes didn’t so much as flicker away from the TV. “Hi,” she said back, setting the remote aside. “Hi Kelly,” Scully added timidly. Mulder contained a wince. She was trying to be careful, treading lightly around Kelly. But what she intended to be respectful of the girl’s personal space, Kelly saw as hesitancy. An unwillingness to be in the situation she was in. Kelly turned away from the TV to glance behind her at Scully. “Hi Dana.” Her eyes skittered away immediately and once again focused intently on the adventures of Buster and Babs. Internally sighing, Mulder looked to the TV for answers. Unfortunately, it held none, and he reminded himself that he’d have to tread very carefully this time. He loved all of his patients; especially the children. That was, perhaps, not a wise way to go about his work. But it was the only way he knew to help. If he didn’t truly care about their lives, how were they supposed to? The love he felt for Kelly was different. It wasn’t the love of a doctor trying to heal someone. It was almost an extension of the love he felt for Scully. If he ever had to guess what a prospective father felt like, moments after learning his wife was pregnant, this would be his frame of reference. He didn’t think Scully even realized how much she talked about her . . . daughter. There, he’d thought it. She related to him how well Kelly did in school, the way she drew better than any of the other kids, how beautiful she was. The pride that filled her eyes as she spoke of her could not have been clearer. Yet still, she refused to speak of Kelly as her daughter. Scully thought of herself as Kelly’s mother, yet labeling Kelly as a daughter presented some kind of problem. He wondered if Kelly was picking up on that. It might even be the reason she was still holding herself back. Because that was exactly what she did, with every fiber of her being. He’d never seen such self-control in a six-year-old. It was unnatural and never failed to cause him heartache at what horrors must have been inflicted for a child to exercise more self-discipline than most adults he knew. Scully’s hand began slowly stroking the back of Kelly’s hair. That touch held so much restrained love. He tried to figure out a way to tell her not to restrain what she felt. But that, he feared, would do =her= more harm. Scully needed to be restrained in her emotional responses. She needed to be sure she controlled what she felt, thought, and said. Anything less would put her at serious emotional risk. Kelly needed the one thing he wasn’t sure Scully was ready to give yet. And he couldn’t really explain it to either one of them, because frankly, it wasn’t his place to say a damn thing about the way she chose to raise Kelly. She had not asked for his help, either personally or professionally, and until she did he would have to keep his mouth shut. He would risk alienating her if he stepped out of line. And if that happened, not only would he lose the best thing that had ever happened to him, but he wouldn’t be able to help either one of them. Selfish motivations often mixed with unselfish ones when dealing with affairs of the heart, he mused. Her voice, when she finally spoke again, startled him. “Fox and I were going to go to the park today. Would you like to come with us?” Heart breaking for her, he watched Kelly’s profile as the light from the TV flickered over her face. She may have appeared absorbed in the show, but he was willing to bet she couldn’t have told you what characters were on the screen if her life depended on it. There was a mixture of quiet anticipation, reserved excitement, and frightened hope on her face. “Okay.” He only recognized the relief at having been asked because he’d heard it in the voice of a dozen other children over the years. “Are you sure you want me to come?” He wasn’t sure which one of these two females he was asking. “I mean, if the two of you would like some time alone, I could stay here with--” “No.” It had been spoken quickly, by both of them at once. Puzzled, he looked between them for a moment before it became clear: he was a buffer. Fox Mulder, Human Buffer. He’d take that job. With these two, he’d take anything he could get. ~ Chapter 12- Swing Therapy “And if you call, I will answer. And if you fall, I’ll pick you up. And if you court this disaster, I’ll point you home.” –Bare Naked Ladies, Call & Answer ~ Scully was being introspective; he could just tell. Not that it took someone with a psychology degree to see it. The deep thoughts were written all over her face and he could see her clearly, even from twenty feet away. Kelly came back toward him, and he gave her a firm push, watching as she soared away again. From what he could see and hear from her, she was enjoying herself. He remembered doing this with Sam whenever one of them had been feeling down. They’d head down to the park and swing, for hours if necessary, and let the freedom of the activity take away the bad things. Swinging in a park was one of Dr. Mulder’s biggest therapy recommendations. “I can do it myself now,” he heard Kelly squeal – actually =squeal,= he thought with something close to glee – as he let her go, her legs kicking smoothly as she continued to soar above his head. He got Scully’s attention and inclined his head in silent invitation – join us. Shaking her head, she politely declined. Sighing, he sat heavily in the swing next to Kelly. The child, so mature for her age, had refused to sit in one of the “kids seats.” Instead, she hopped onto one of the regular swings and showed herself quite capable of handling it. They’d arrived at the park nearly an hour ago. At first, Scully had stuck close to them, trying desperately to please Kelly. Nothing she did seemed to have an effect. After the sixth or seventh non-response from Kelly, she finally gave up and sat on that bench. Mulder took Kelly to the swings. She seemed to be warming up to him and Charlie both, evidenced by the eventful breakfast they’d all shared. For the millionth time in his life, he thanked God for his little sister. What had been a slightly tense situation was completely disarmed by Samantha’s personality. Kelly had been very quietly watching cartoons. Everyone else had dressed, and Charlie was making breakfast. All four of them were walking around Kelly like she was made of glass. Samantha had never liked to treat anyone as fragile, so she plopped down next to Kelly and asked her what was wrong. Kelly said nothing, and Samantha asked why she was ignoring everyone. Unable to give a good answer, Kelly had joined them all for breakfast. He saw the look of hurt on Scully’s face. She had asked Kelly if she wanted breakfast twice, and both times, the little girl had said no. Digging his toe in the dirt, Mulder ransacked every corner of his mind, trying to find something that would help Scully let go of this fear of failure she carried around with her like a badge. Kelly could feel that fear, as though it were a living, breathing entity between them. It kept them from connecting, kept Kelly from trusting Scully as her new mother, and kept Scully from letting go of the past long enough to bond with Kelly as a daughter. While he’d never seen a situation that exactly paralleled this one, he had one experience to draw on. Jennifer Lamb, a beautiful young girl who’d lost her mother. Her father had passed away a few months after she was born, and only a year before her death, her mother had married another man. They weren’t quite used to each other yet, although there was a strong like between them. The bond wasn’t yet formed and the one person they could have formed it through was gone. No one like that even existed in this equation. Kelly hadn’t known her father and her mother was dead. She carried around scars from that experience, scars that had no hope of healing unless someone found a way to break past her shell. He was reminded, not for the first time, of Rachel Hayes. Kelly was not as closed off as Rachel had been, but still, part of him felt as though Kelly was his karmic chance to make things right. He had been unable to help Rachel, unable to save her despite how hard he’d tried, but Kelly was here. Rather than wallow in guilt and self-recriminations, he could help make sure both Scully and her =daughter= were given a chance at a good life. And, once again adding his own selfish motivations, that life would hopefully be with him. Mulder was so caught up in his own thoughts, he didn’t even notice when Kelly came to a stop and began imitating his pose, toe making little circles in the dirt. “Did you know my dad?” The one thing he’d learned, above all others, about dealing with children: they never asked the easy questions. “No,” he answered slowly. He resisted the urge to ask, “Did you?” Her response almost made him chuckle. “Me neither.” Before he could formulate a question to keep the lines of communication open, she continued, “Mom had me meet him once. He wouldn’t look at me. Just kept yelling at her, wanting to know why we wouldn’t go away.” “Has Dana talked to you about your father?” he asked quietly, wanting to clear up any misconceptions she might have, but unwilling to step on Scully’s parental toes. “She said he was very sick and sorry that he couldn’t be with me. But that it was for the best.” She did a fair imitation of Scully. That was good, he thought, matching the non-swings Kelly was making. “Do you ever want to see him?” Immediately she shook her head. “He wasn’t nice,” was all she would say on that subject. “What kind of ice cream do you like?” They’d been quiet for so long he hadn’t expected her to open the conversation again so soon. “Chocolate,” he answered without thinking. “That’s boring,” she pronounced. “Classic,” he corrected automatically, giving her a little grin. “Chocolate is classic.” Returning his smile, she resembled an actual little girl, happy to talk about the nonsense of life. “I like vanilla.” “Vanilla? And you were giving me a hard time for =chocolate=?” A giggle. Oh God, there were now three women he loved to hear laugh. “I like gummie bears on it.” “I’m a purist. Nothing but chocolate.” From what little Scully had told him, Kelly had lived alone with her mother. She didn’t go to school before Scully found her and had never really had anyone but her mother in her life. The fact that she was adapting as well as she was to her current situation was a testament to her character. “I’m going to be seven next year.” He’d gotten used to the rapid-fire topic changes years ago. “I’m going to be thirty-nine,” he shared. “That’s old.” A sigh. “Yes, it is.” A beat. “Have you been having fun with Melissa?” “Her shop is cool. And she’s real nice.” He heard the unspoken but. An internal debate was waged. He was unsure whether to probe into this further, or let her be. On the one hand, he didn’t want to push her farther than she could go, but he also didn’t know when an opportunity like this might present itself again. A little girl’s tongue wasn’t loosened by the sensation of flying every day, you know. “Do you like living with Dana?” It was not just the kids who asked the easy questions. She chewed on the inside of her cheek. “I like it,” she finally said. “My room is nice. Dana asked me what I wanted it to look like, we went and found my bed and everything. I don’t really miss it, though. Mom and I moved a lot. Men were always yelling at her, saying that she hadn’t paid for months and that we’d have to leave.” This was all said as though it were one sentence, her words running together, expressing her apprehension toward the subject better than she ever could have. “It’s no fun having to move.” “Dana moved a lot when she was little,” Kelly informed him. “Her Daddy had to move and they moved with him.” “Kelly,” he began tentatively, “do you ever wish that you could be sure you’d never have to move again, unless you wanted to?” After a few seconds of silence, Kelly’s head bobbed up and down vigorously. Carefully, he placed a hand on her head and stroked the back of it gently. She turned her head up and her eyes were wide and wet. There was no blood between them, but she bore a striking resemblance to Scully at that moment. “Dana loves you very much,” he told her quietly. Her gaze averted, she once again stared at her shoes. He continued to stroke her hair softly. Damn, but she wanted so badly to believe that Scully loved her. It was written all over her face, in her very posture. “She was very hurt and she doesn’t know how to show you, but she does. All she wants is for you both to be happy.” “My dad said it was my fault he and Dana weren’t happy.” Mulder straightened in his swing. That was not information he’d been expecting. “When did he tell you that?” he asked carefully. “He didn’t tell me. I just heard.” Her head shot up guiltily. “I didn’t mean to listen--” “It’s all right,” he soothed gently. “No one is mad at you, certainly not me.” “He hurt mommy,” she spoke in a very quiet voice. “He was yelling at her when he hurt her.” “And he was yelling about Dana?” Nodding, she wiped the back of her hand over her nose, sniffling. She didn’t cry, though. Somewhere inside her, he knew, she must understand what it was she witnessed. But she was protecting herself from the knowledge. The part of him that loved her on a personal level wanted nothing more than to protect her from it forever, but as a professional, he knew that door needed to be unlocked for her own good. “Do you want to tell me about that day?” Her head started shaking before the question had completely left his mouth. He’d expected as much, but he had to try. “Dana doesn’t want me,” she surprised him by saying. “I promise you . . .” He trailed off as she refused to look at him. “Kelly.” He spoke her name gently but firmly, injecting the authority she needed to hear before she’d respond. Reluctantly, she looked up at him, waiting. “I promise you,” he repeated with feeling, “Dana wants you. She loves you and there’s nothing she wants more than for the two of you to be happy together.” She didn’t seem to believe him. That was all right. He didn’t expect her to yet. The seed had been planted, and with a little care from the people in her life who loved her, it would grow until her doubts couldn’t hurt her like this anymore. Hopping up from his swing, he stood behind her and placed his hands on her shoulders. “That’s enough of this for now,” he told her quietly. “Would you like to fly again?” Leaning her head back until she could look at him, a big grin split across her face. “Please,” she affirmed politely. He returned her grin and pecked her on the forehead affectionately. He pulled her back by her shoulders as far as he could, and let go again. It only took a few pushes from him before she was operating the swing completely on her own again. As he stepped away from her to keep from being hit, he jumped a bit when a hand touched his arm. “Sorry,” Scully apologized. “No harm,” he answered, moving a few swings down from Kelly, but close enough to keep an eye on her. This time, she accepted his silent offer to swing, and they both took a seat. “You two seemed to be deep in conversation,” she observed after a few silent moments of half-hearted swinging. “Girl talk,” he quipped, watching her carefully out of the corner of his eye. “I don’t know how to make things better for her.” Her voice was honest and the hopeless tone made him ache. “And I’m beginning to wonder if I’m the right person to help her.” “Scully, you’re the only person who can help her.” He spoke before he thought better of it. “Mulder, your theory about children bonding with the people who rescue them, while definitely intriguing, does not apply to us.” “I wasn’t referring to my theory, although I think you’re wrong. It most certainly applies to you and Kelly. She witnessed something very bad and you were the person who found her and brought her out of it.” They began to swing a little more, but never so much that they couldn’t catch themselves; their feet on the ground could always stop them dead. “But you’re so much more to her than a savior.” “I wish that were true,” she said quietly. “It is. Scully, you’re the one who’s been there with her for the last ten months. You’re the one who’s held her hand and kept the monsters in the closet at bay. That little girl who’s pretending to fly right now loves you, Scully, and she’s terrified that you don’t love her back.” He paused for a moment until he was sure he had her attention. “Have you ever told her that you love her?” She almost said yes. It was automatic, he could tell, but because they were staring so intently at one another, she really thought about it. The amazement that crossed her face, the guilt, made him want to enfold her in his arms. But they needed to talk; there would be time for comfort later. Right now, she and Kelly both needed his professional self. “I didn’t want her to feel obligated to love me; to give something she wasn’t ready to. I didn’t want her to feel smothered, or think that I was trying to take her mother’s place.” Those furrow lines he would normally kiss away appeared between her brows as she searched her memory. “I’ve always been affectionate with her, physically. I tried to give her free will, as much as a six-year-old can handle. And I told her that if she wanted to live with me, she could . . . Oh God, Mulder.” Panicked, her eyes focused on his. “What have I done to her?” “Nothing,” he said quickly. “Scully, her problems are not your fault, any more than yours are hers. Have you ever felt that way, even in the beginning? Resentful of her?” “No. Never.” The lady’s tone left no room for misconception. Satisfied, he nodded. “Then the next step is to go about fixing the damage. Tell her you love her. Make sure she knows that she’s living with you, not because she wants to, but because =you= want her to.” “Is that your professional opinion, Doctor?” Her voice was almost teasing and he looked down at his feet, feeling a bit sheepish. He glanced over at Kelly, who had slowed some and made mental note to get up and give her another push in a minute. Or, better yet, have Scully do it. “I know it was unsolicited,” he began slowly, only to have Scully place a hand on his shoulder. “Thank you,” she said quietly, and with feeling. “I don’t know – I can’t even imagine – what we would have done if we’d never met you.” “I can honestly say that it’s my pleasure.” His voice was raw with the emotion he felt at her words. Amazing how Scully could evoke the most stereotypical responses. “It’s always going to be my pleasure, Scully,” he added softly, hoping she understood what he was trying to say. If he read her eyes right, she did. Carefully, she licked her lips and stared down at her hands, which were worrying her coat between them. Finally, she looked back up at him and tried to form words. “Mulder.” Before she could say more, however, a boy of about twelve or thirteen tackled her and they both crashed down to the ground. Mulder was out of his swing in a hurry, crouching down next to them. “Are you all right?” he asked Scully as he helped her up. “Yeah,” she muttered, looking toward the boy. “Are you?” “I’m fine. That guy over there gave me twenty bucks to do it.” With a grin, he ran away. Mulder felt his heart tighten and his blood quicken. There was something very, very wrong. The unease spread as he spun around, scanning the park quickly but efficiently. “Mulder?” Her voice barely registered as his eyes finally landed on the bank of swings, one in particular, now empty, swinging back and forth in a most ominous way. Kelly was gone. ~ “Nothing before, nothing behind; the steps of faith fall on the seeming void and find the rock beneath.” –John Greenleaf Whittier ~ This is what hell must be like. The thought repeated continuously through Scully’s mind as she sat at Samantha’s kitchen table, trying to ignore the hustle and bustle of activity all around her. Besides Mulder, Samantha, Charlie and Melissa, who had refused to leave her alone for a second from the moment Mulder and Scully arrived back from the park, she had to tune out the entire Pasadena Police Department. A detective, Jonathon Lamb, Mulder told her, was a good friend of his. When they called the police, he’d spoken directly to Lamb. He outlined in a voice that directly conflicted with the panic she felt exactly what had happened. Lamb met them at the park. She and Mulder had already begun combing the park, asking anyone and everyone if they’d seen a little girl who looked as though she was being removed by force. Things like how you were supposed to react in a crisis was so ingrained during the Academy, she supposed you didn’t forget them. The only useful piece of information they gleaned was a rough description of the suspect. Once Lamb arrived, the woman who had seen Kelly with a tall man, forty to forty-five, sporting no facial hair and no distinguishing features she could see, left a number she could be contacted at and quickly left the scene. Lamb, Mulder, and Scully agreed almost simultaneously that the boy running into Scully was a deliberate part of Kelly’s abduction. Lamb called several other officers and they descended upon Sam and Charlie’s home. Samantha had been nothing but accommodating, and Charlie was completely unwilling to leave his big sister alone for a minute. Her nerves worn completely bare, Scully had sent Mulder a pleading look that clearly communicated her need: get all these well-intentioned people the fuck away from me. He, in turn, communicated the same look to his sister, and together, they managed to clear the kitchen. So here Scully sat, alone at the kitchen table, desperately trying not to completely break down. It had been two short hours since Kelly simply vanished and she felt every second of it like a scalpel slicing through her skin. She wouldn’t be surprised if, later, she found scars all over her body. The headache that had been gnawing behind her eyes all day spread in an all-encompassing blanket over her entire head. It pounded in time with the accelerated beating of her heart. “Do you need anything?” Glancing up at Mulder where he stood in the doorway, she tried to find the right words to express what she needed. Kelly back, safe and sound, was all she could come up with, and there was nothing he could do about that, at least, not at the moment. Shaking her head, feeling absurdly disappointed in herself for being unable to think of something, she began taking deep breaths to keep the sob bubbling beneath the surface at bay. Mulder was crouching by her side in less than ten seconds and his hands rested over hers on her lap. “It’s okay to cry, Scully.” “No, it’s not.” Her tongue darted out and licked at the corner of her mouth. “If I start, I may never stop.” This day had started out so much differently. It had been filled with such hopeful promise of things to come. In his eyes, still unfocused and beautiful from sleep, she had seen the love and acceptance he felt for her. And in the way she felt with him, the comfort and excitement she felt just lying next to him, she could almost foresee a time when fear would not rule her every decision. In a split second, that fear returned, with a vengeance. He took one of her hands between both of his and brought it to his mouth, cradling it with the utmost care. He pressed his lips to her knuckles, her fingertips, the inside of her wrist, before placing a final kiss to her palm and resting her hand against his cheek. “I love you.” He said it with such quiet sincerity that she had no choice but to believe him. “I know it’s not the most appropriate time to say so, but I do. And I love Kelly. Scully, we will find her and we will bring her back.” He must have been so comforting to the victims he had to visit as an FBI Agent. His very posture inspired trust and calm. Changing careers so suddenly would seem like suicide to some. Even without Rachel Hayes, she suspected he would have gotten bored with one occupation after awhile. He craved very few things. A life that challenged him; the love of someone he trusted, the chance to help others in his day to day existence. She knew this about him, loved it about him. “Don’t make promises you might not be able to keep.” She tried so hard to make her voice sound hard and cold. But instead, it emerged as little more than a plea. Don’t, Mulder, don’t let me get my hopes up. I couldn’t live with another loss like this. I already lost myself once. I can’t lose me again, just when you’ve helped me rediscover who that is. “We’ve got something.” Lamb interrupted whatever reply Mulder had been about to make. They both leapt to their feet and walked toward him. “Does the name Ray Elders mean anything to either of you?” Scully’s eyes snapped toward Mulder’s face as it completely drained of color. “Are you sure?” His voice was raspy, barely there. “We got something solid from a woman at the supermarket across from the park. She saw a little girl being locked into a van. She said the girl was struggling, she got worried and called the police. She wrote down the license plate and we traced it to Elders.” “Any sign of it now?” Scully felt herself slip into Special Agent mode. Seven years later and she could still do it almost effortlessly. Sometimes, she did still miss the job. “I’ve got an ex-partner on the Barstow PD. They found it on the side of the road about an hour out of Baker. No sign of another vehicle, but we’re working on it. We’re coordinating with the Barstow PD as we speak.” Lamb’s eyes cut to Mulder. “Fox, if another twenty-four hours go by, I suggest you contact any friends you may have left at the Bureau.” Mulder nodded his acknowledgement and Lamb disappeared back into the living room. Scully felt cold, irrational rage bubbling up inside her. She tried to push it back, but it was too much. It was all too much. “Scully, I’m so sorry,” he whispered. The genuine sorrow she heard in his voice only served to make her angrier. Goddamn his intrusion in her life. Goddamn him for making her care about him, for making her want a different life than the one she’d decided on. Goddamn him for coaxing her into letting down her guard, into letting him inside her very soul until she started to trust him. Goddamn him for the pain she was feeling now, the raw, never ending, all consuming pain. And goddamn him for bringing Ray Elders into Kelly’s life. A small, barely rational part of her tried to tell her this wasn’t his fault. He wasn’t responsible for a psychopath and he had been through enough pain at Elders’ hands. But she couldn’t be rational. There was a swelling, aching ball of rage inside her, desperately clawing to get out. “I will never forgive you if I lose her.” He flinched, as if she’d physically slapped him. Might as well have, she thought bitterly. Oh, God, why was she doing this to him? She knew it wasn’t his fault. She didn’t blame him, really. She was angry at everyone and everything, but she didn’t blame him. He wasn’t a danger to her or Kelly. And he loved them. God, he =loved= them. He’d actually said the words. He wasn’t the type of man to use words he didn’t mean. She hadn’t thought herself the type of woman who would, either. But here she was, staring at him with what her brother Bill liked to call “cold, icy blue, dick shriveling,” eyes, threatening him with words she would never mean. It occurred to her at that moment how long it had been since she’d seen Bill, and that she really missed him. He was away at sea, but maybe she’d write him a nice, long letter, detailing the status of her new life. That was, when she figured it all out. And of course, she wouldn’t write it now, because saying, “Well, my main focus at the moment is finding wherever some psychopath has taken my little girl. My second focus is trying damned hard not to take it all out on the most wonderful man I’ve ever met in my life. I’m in the process of ripping his heart out as I write this. How’s sea life, Bill?” would =not= bode well. Another thought occurred to her, right on top of the last, that perhaps she was not thinking in the most logical manner. She sunk down onto the kitchen floor and the sob she’d managed to suppress earlier shuddered through her lungs. Sucking in great, gulping gasps of air, tears began to run, unchecked, down her cheeks. Well, Dana old girl, the dam has broken, the floodgates are open and there’s no going back now, is there? But there was. There was a way to go back, a way to hang on to sanity a little while longer, at least until they found Kelly. And he was standing in the kitchen, hands balled into fists at his side to keep from reaching for her, radiating his desire to help, to heal, to make her whole again. Blindly, she flailed out her arm and grasped one of his tight hands with her own. Uncurling his fingers with her own, she gripped them tightly and tugged with as much heave as she could manage. He fell to her side on the floor and wrapped his long, solid, wonderfully safe feeling arms around her. Practically crawling into his lap, she clutched at his forearm where it rested above her breasts and regulated her breathing with great effort. The hysteria passed, along with the urge to cry, after only a few moments in his arms. She drew strength from him, allowed him to ground her, and that brought the terror she’d been experiencing at how easily he seeped past her defenses screaming back. But she did not pull away. Not because she wasn’t a coward, or because she was trying to confront her fears. No, she didn’t pull back because she couldn’t. Her bones were weak, her muscles unresponsive to the commands she gave. Her body, it seemed, wanted to stay exactly where it was. And when Mulder began whispering soft, soothing words into her hair, feathering the gentlest kisses over her brow, her mind reluctantly agreed to stay right where it was. At least for a little while longer. ~ Chapter 13- Goodnight Moon “You only see what your eyes want to see. How can life be what you want it to be? You’re frozen, when your heart’s not open.” – Madonna, “Frozen” ~ The next day and a half passed in a blur of good intentions, well-meaning assurances, nail-biting tension and soul crushing worry. All involved were walking on eggshells around Scully. All of them, that was, except Mulder. He absolutely refused to treat her with kid gloves, and that fact alone endeared him to her further. And that just pissed her off. She was supposed to be worrying about Kelly, devoting all her thoughts and energy to bringing her back. Every time her mind drifted toward thoughts of Mulder, of their relationship, whatever that was, she felt immeasurably guilty. Her heart was bleeding and she had no means to suture the wound. Only finding Kelly, safe and sound, would begin to fix the damage. Samantha cooked a lot. Every day, she was baking and sautéing and simmering. It was her distraction. Charlie bullied the cops into working harder. Scully tried to get him to stop, tried to explain that they were working as hard as they could, but to no avail. Mulder was the one who got her to stop trying, because it was what Charlie needed to do. Melissa meditated and sent out positive vibes to Kelly. She sat in a small room toward the back of the house, candles lit, a single crystal clutched in her palm. Mulder, it seemed, passed his time by watching Scully. His constant scrutiny was starting to wear thin. At the same time, she found his presence comforting. It was the only thing that kept her from screaming until she was hoarse. Mostly, she couldn’t stand how badly she needed him. And she certainly couldn’t =tell= him that. He was already committed to never leaving. If he knew how badly she wanted him, needed him in her life, he never would. She had made a decision during this excruciating waiting period. Love was not enough to sustain a lasting relationship. There had to be more. Mulder, the beautiful, frustrating, unrelenting man who was still staring at her from across the kitchen table, deserved more. And she would never be able to give it to him. If the way she’d reacted to this crisis proved anything to her, it was that she was totally incapable of sustaining the kind of loving, giving relationship he needed. In times of darkest nights, your lover was the one person you were supposed to be able to turn to. They were the shelter you could spend a fortnight inside to regroup and strengthen your soul for the trials by fire ahead. You were supposed to hit a wall, and, rather than let it take you down, climb over it and bask in the beauty and contentment that is the other side. Her ability to do that had been greatly impaired. She was ready to admit defeat. She was ready to let go of every shred of hope she had for a future that contained anything but career and Kelly. Once before she’d made that promise to herself, but she hadn’t been truthful. Obviously, there had been a small trace of idealism inside her, because Mulder found it and nurtured it until it grew. Until she had actually begun to see a light at the end of the tunnel. And now, when she was so sure of the exact path she had to take, he wouldn’t go away. He wouldn’t even put ten feet between them. He also wouldn’t touch her. At first, she’d thought it was because he had been hurt by her words the day before. But now she was beginning to understand the real reason. He wouldn’t touch her until she asked him to. Never date a psychologist. That had been one of Melissa’s rules after being psychoanalyzed over coffee and scones. Scully felt as though she was under a microscope sometimes when he looked at her like this. When his eyes seemed to bore through her skin to see all the dark and ugly places inside. She felt dark and ugly, unworthy of such a beautiful man. Broken, she was far too broken to be what he needed. For his own good, she would end things between them as soon as they found Kelly. This action was in his best interest, but she also wasn’t so far in denial that she didn’t recognize how much she needed him. She did not believe she would be able to get through this without him. Afterward, she’d somehow find a way to exist in the capacity she had before, as had been her plan from the beginning. And always, she would remember the man who made her believe in love again. ~ “Nothing before, nothing behind; the steps of faith fall on the seeming void and find the rock beneath.” –John Greenleaf Whittier ~ He didn’t like that look on her face. Stop staring at her then, jackass, he ordered himself. With a sigh, he wiped a hand over his face and tried not to feel completely useless. Kelly had been gone for just under thirty-six hours now. Every hour, like clockwork, he and Scully would head into the living room, review each piece of evidence and offer suggestions until they were once again ejected by the police. Ex-FBI agents were not welcome in the investigation process, especially when they were too close to the situation. Neither of them had slept, despite the urgings of both their siblings. While he’d been on Scully’s side before, he was beginning to see the wisdom in at least shutting their eyes in a horizontal position for a couple of hours. But he was unwilling to go unless Scully did, and she showed no sign of leaving her silent vigil. Their gazes met over the table and he read the thoughts in her eyes as easily as he would a book. Her misguided altruism, the hatred she felt toward herself that matched, if not surpassed, that of the fourteen-year -old girls he’d counseled after coming out of abused homes. Whatever plan she’d concocted for “saving” him from her horrible self was clearly visible, and he hoped she read the determination in his own eyes. That will not happen, Scully, he promised them both silently. I won’t leave unless =you= don’t want me here. “I think we should both lie down for awhile,” he suggested quietly. “I don’t want to.” “I didn’t ask what you wanted,” he snapped, internally cursing for losing his temper. She had been like this for the past few hours. Disagreeing with everything he said, unwilling to even listen. It was frustrating as hell, but he understood why she was doing it. He should not be allowing it to get to him like it was. “Thank you for your consideration, but I’m fine where I am. If you can sleep, go right ahead.” Her tone of voice made it quite clear that his ability to sleep in this situation would be counted as a betrayal. She was in so much pain. Lashing out was her only refuge, he knew. He’d seen it a dozen times, though usually in the same fourteen-year-old kids she reminded him of at this moment. He wished to God that he knew a way to ease her pain. “When Kelly gets back, she’s going to need you. What good are you going to be to her if you’re dead on your feet?” “I’ll be fine. I went for seventy-two hour stretches without so much as a catnap in Med. school and I was still able to pass my finals.” “But you weren’t required to tend to the needs of a very young, very frightened girl.” They were at opposite ends of the table, staring each other down. Neither willing to give an inch, but also totally unwilling to walk away. She couldn’t walk away yet, and when she could, he’d make sure she didn’t want to. “I won’t sleep until you do.” That did it. It also gave him another interesting piece to the enigma before him. When it came to her own well being, the lack of care she showed was astounding. Yet, when it came to him, to Kelly, her diligence to doing what was right was admirable. If she wouldn’t take care of herself, he would do it for her. At least until he could help her give a damn about what happened in her own life again. All that could wait. It would take a lot of hard work and concentration to build up her self-esteem, to eradicate the fear and doubt he saw lurking behind her eyes. He knew she wouldn’t be ready to work on it until Kelly was safe. She wouldn’t be =able= to do much of anything but worry until Kelly was safe. That was fine. As he’d promised her and himself before, he would take care of her for as long as she needed. And later, when she could do it for herself, he’d do it on occasion simply because he wanted to. “You aren’t going to leave me alone, are you?” Her voice sounded defeated. He didn’t want that, didn’t want her to feel as though she had no choice but to capitulate to his desires. But if it was the only way he could get her to rest for awhile . . . “No. I’m not.” Without another word, she pushed back her chair, rose, and strode into the living room. He followed close behind as she got a progress report from the police, then headed upstairs. Despite her protests, once the thought of actually slipping between the covers sunk in, he watched her visibly deflate before his eyes. Her lids drooped and her movements became sluggish by the time she reached her bedside. When Scully had been still for too long, he moved to her side. Her eyes were focused upon the small table next to the bed. He tracked her line of sight and contained a deep sigh. The small necklace Scully had purchased for Kelly just three days ago sat in its blue velvet box, ready to be given just as soon as its future owner was present. “She’ll love it, Scully.” He spoke quietly, standing by her side as unobtrusively as possible. “When Melissa showed up so unexpectedly with Kelly, I thought it was a good sign. We’d just gotten it for her. That woman we bought it from said it was hand made. Do you think it was really hand made?” Keep talking, or break down. It was an easy choice. “I do,” he replied. Had his life depended on it, he would not have answered any other way. “It’s a dream catcher, whatever that is,” she muttered. “It looks like something Melissa would sell in her shop, and Kelly really seems to like it at Missy’s shop . . . I suppose I thought that maybe . . . maybe if I gave her something like that she might like me, too.” “Scully, she does like you,” he murmured, testing a theory as he moved his hands to her blouse. Just as he thought, she didn’t seem to notice the touch and he quickly began to strip her of her clothes. “No she doesn’t, not really,” she argued, seemingly unaware, or uninterested in the fact that he was undressing her. It didn’t really matter. He was intent on getting her out of the clothes she’d been in for a day and a half, and into bed. Her cooperation was optional. Turning, he moved to the bureau and rooted around until he found a large, purple silk pajama top. He grabbed the matching bottoms and returned to her side. Sitting her down on the bed, he dressed her as he would a small child, one step at a time. “I’m not going to argue with you right now, Scully. One of us is at a distinct disadvantage; though I don’t think I could tell you which one if someone paid me to,” he added under his breath. Drawing back the covers, he helped her into a horizontal position and tucked the blanket beneath her arms. “Stay with me.” He hadn’t planned on going anywhere, but her plaintive whisper banished all thoughts of sleeping on the floor. Quickly shedding his own clothes until he wore only a t-shirt and boxers, he climbed into bed beside her. Facing her profile, he once again physically reined in the urge to touch her. Her signals were confusing, but crystal clear: stay close, but not too close. Close enough to touch, but only if I want you to. There was nothing he could do to bring Kelly back. At least, not yet. That was in the hands of the police, and whatever deity might exist out there. What he was capable of doing was keeping Scully alive, healthy, and relatively stable so she would be able to give Kelly the care and devotion she would need when she =was= found. To even imagine a scenario where Kelly was not found was currently beyond his ability to fathom. “It’s like a really bad nightmare.” He blinked and her face came into better focus. Her words were pointed, he knew, and he searched his memory, his interpretation of subtlety for the answer. It came, like most realizations, as a slap in the face. Ever so slowly, he brought his hand to her forehead and began tracing her skin with the very tips of his fingers. Her eyes fluttered shut almost immediately, and he followed their descent, stroking over the flesh surrounding her ocular cavity. Soon, he moved to her cheeks, chin, temples, and every other place he could find to soothe. It was a routine they established after they discovered their mutual penchant for nightmares. Minds capable of vivid imagination, vivid recall, were often cursed with vivid, horrific dreams. Theirs were no exception, and in the short time they’d been sleeping together, they had stumbled into a pattern: He would rub her face, or her back, or her feet, and she would do the same for him. And if the nightmares were especially bad, they would tell each other stories. Her tone implied that she most certainly believed she deserved a story. He told the first one that came to mind. “Dream catchers,” he began in a low, soothing tone, “are believed to be guardians, of sorts, over our subconscious while we sleep. Native Americans believe that, if hung by a window near the bed while you slumber, the object will “catch” all the bad dreams in its net, leaving only the good to travel to the mind of the dreamer.” Watching her breathing deepen, he allowed himself a small smile of relief. At least she was resting. And if the dream catcher didn’t work, he would keep the bad dreams at bay as best that he could. “Once, a young boy in the Anasazi tribe would not sleep, his dreams were so terrifying. His mother, concerned for her child, sat up nights with him, desperately trying to think of a way to protect him from the monsters of his own making . . .” ~ In the great green room there was a telephone and a red balloon and a picture of the cow jumping over the moon. And there were three little bears sitting on chairs and two little kittens and a pair of mittens. And a little toy house and a young mouse and a comb and a brush and a bowl full of mush, and a quiet old lady who was whispering, “hush.” Hush. The words kept circling through his mind, stealing his ability to rest. Scully slept soundly beside him. Her even breathing had almost lulled him to sleep an hour ago, but his conscious mind, his own psyche would not allow it. The third time his inability to stay still seemed to disturb Scully, he rolled out of bed and went to sit by the window. He was loath to leave her, but his mind would not let him be. His memories were cascading over each other, gnawing at him until he allowed them passage to the surface. On the table by the window he found a pen and paper. Using the light from the moon he scribbled a note for Scully and placed it on top of his pillow beside her on the bed. Under normal circumstances he wouldn’t have bothered. Obviously, if he wasn’t in bed he was somewhere else in the house. But these weren’t normal circumstances; her tolerance was worn to the bone and he didn’t want to upset her more than she already was. With much reluctance, he pulled on a pair of sweat pants and, after a final fleeting glance at Scully, he left the room. Padding down the hall, he listened for one of Charlie’s tapes outside his sister’s room. So far, they had been treated to clandestine recordings of Charlie’s “Tape of Love,” the “Essential Blues,” and “Uplifting Melodies.” His brows furrowed together as he listened through the door. Add “Seventies Crap” to that play list, he thought dryly as he bypassed the door and headed down the stairs. Two officers were catching catnaps in easy chairs. Maps, files, and doughnuts decorated the coffee tables and several other officers were still diligently at work. Mulder considered joining them, but immediately rejected the idea. His mind was too occupied to be any good to their search. He continued into the kitchen. He almost changed his mind when the only person he found at the table was Melissa. “Join me?” “Sure,” he answered, finding no polite way to decline. His apprehension was based on an unknown fear, his professional self supplied helpfully. If Scully found a way to blame him for what happened to Kelly, what would Melissa, someone who didn’t know him from Adam, think? As he sat beside her at the table, she poured him a cup of tea. “Inhale before you drink,” she told him. “Trust me, it helps.” He took her advice and made an appreciative noise as he took a sip. “This is good.” “You sound surprised.” “I guess I am,” he admitted, taking another sip of the tea. Goodnight room, goodnight moon, goodnight cow jumping over the moon. Goodnight light and the red balloon, goodnight bears, goodnight chairs. Goodnight kittens and goodnight mittens, goodnight clocks and goodnight socks. Goodnight little house and goodnight little mouse. Goodnight comb and goodnight brush, goodnight nobody, goodnight mush, and goodnight to the old lady whispering, “Hush.” Hush. His eyes slammed shut and he tried like hell not to let his reaction show outwardly. That was all he needed, to have Scully’s sister witness him breaking down. “You’re not to blame, you know,” she said quietly. His head snapped up so sharply that he heard something crack. Melissa’s eyes were like Scully’s, but they were calmer, more at peace. He felt like she saw straight inside him and the feeling was more than uncomfortable. It disconcerted him in more ways than he could say. “Why do you think I’m blaming myself?” He asked the question carefully, just as he’d been trained to do, not giving away how he felt about the subject. At least, he hoped his own uneasiness was concealed. Given how he felt, he wouldn’t bet money on his ability to be enigmatic. “I don’t think; I know. Anyone willing to listen to his or her own intuition could see it,” she informed him. “What I can’t figure out is why on earth you’d think that you’re in any way responsible for this horrible situation.” “I brought the monster into Dana’s life; into Kelly’s life.” Internally, he raged at that half-truth. It wasn’t a lie, but it wasn’t the entire reason he blamed himself. She stared at him for longer than politeness dictated. Finally, she stood and placed both their cups in the sink. “I’d like to show you something.” Without waiting for a response from him, she walked out of the room. He listened to her footfalls, although he needn’t have bothered. She was going to that little room his sister had willingly given up to her. Sighing, Mulder rose and followed her. He was too curious not to, and the fact that she was Scully’s sister made him want to trust her, no matter how bizarre she seemed. Not bothering to knock, he entered her room and shut the door behind him. It took his eyes only a moment to adjust to the dim lighting. Candles were the only source of light and the flames bounced off the dozen or so crystals hanging from everywhere. A dream catcher hung from the window, and Mulder couldn’t contain a smile, remembering Scully’s reasons for buying the necklace for Kelly. Melissa sat amongst a few pillows on the floor. There was a circle of candles around her, big enough to fit three or four adults inside. Her eyes met his and she motioned for him to join her. Debating only a moment, Mulder sat Indian style across from her inside the circle. It only surprised him a little bit when she immediately grasped his hands. “What did you want to show me?” “What I do in here all day; why I’m not giving Dana my full attention. And hopefully, a way to help you let go of your guilt.” One of her hands dropped his and she lit a stick of incense. “Clarity,” she said in explanation. “Whether or not I feel guilty is unimportant. All that matters right now is getting Kelly back.” “And do you honestly think the negative energy you’re sending out will help us do that any faster?” “Negative energy? I’ve been nothing but positive from the beginning.” “On the outside, yes. But on the inside . . . Fox, can’t you see that you’re dying a little bit every minute that goes by?” “Sorry to disappoint you, oh great Swami, but I just had a checkup and I’m healthy as Mr. Ed.” “Mr. Ed is a bottle of Elmer’s glue by now and there are other deaths just as significant as death of the body.” She spoke harshly and he felt her concern. It shouldn’t have surprised him, he thought. True, she barely knew him. But he felt the same way about his patients. He had felt that way about Kelly the moment he met her. “So you’re saying . . . what? That my soul is dying?” He tried to make his voice mocking. He didn’t quite succeed. There was too much truth to her accusation. His eyes must have transmitted that because she visibly softened. “Not to sound overly dramatic, but . . . yes. It’s undernourished. I tried to tell Dana the same thing, but she shut me down within seconds. I’m a little surprised you’ve lasted this long.” He shrugged, wishing he could shrug off her concerns as easily. “A young girl named Rachel Hayes was Elders’ first victim. I should have saved her. I couldn’t. I guess part of what I’m feeling over Kelly has to do with that.” “You weren’t responsible for Rachel’s death any more than you’re responsible for Kelly’s disappearance.” An almost whimsical smile crossed her face. “Although, I don’t suppose you’ll believe me when I say to you exactly what you say to your patients.” “I’ve said it to myself a thousand times,” he confessed, finding it easy to talk to this woman. There was something about unburdening your soul to someone who seemed to already know what you were going to say that was liberating. “I just can’t seem to make myself believe.” “Have you talked to Dana?” He glanced up at her briefly, then back down to the flickering flames of the nearest candle. “A little. I don’t . . . I don’t want to burden her with this. There’s so much pain she already has to deal with . . . and now Kelly . . .” “Maybe she’d welcome the distraction.” Mulder chuckled. “You would have made a great shrink.” “Nah. I’m too weird.” “That’s what they said about me,” he quipped lightly. He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck wearily. “Have you ever read Goodnight Moon?” “I don’t think any red-blooded American hasn’t.” “My father used to read to us at night, and after awhile, when his work took him away, I would read to Samantha. It was our favorite.” It wasn’t until he paused to collect his thoughts that he realized one of Melissa’s hands still held his firmly. It was nice change of pace. He loved his sister, and he felt he could tell her anything. But she had a kind of manic energy that made stillness a very hard goal to reach. “What is it about Goodnight Moon that’s bringing you so much pain?” “Rachel and I were locked together for a long time. After awhile, I would do anything, say anything just to get her to stay with me. I don’t know where she went, but . . .” He cleared his throat. “It was obviously preferable to where we were.” “You told her a story,” Melissa realized, her voice soft. “Goodnight Moon,” he confirmed. “Over and over because after awhile, I needed something to concentrate on, too.” His eyes filled with tears and he covered his mouth with his free hand, trying to compose himself. “I hear her telling me the story in my mind,” he whispered. “I can’t sleep, I can barely concentrate on anything else. It just keeps getting worse and I know I’m being of no help to Scully, I don’t even know how to help her, and that’s never happened to me before. I always know how to help . . .” “Everyone but yourself,” Melissa observed. “When was the last time you helped yourself, Fox?” “A year ago,” he whispered, offering no other answers. Whatever else he could say was too personal. He didn’t feel comfortable sharing it, not even with the scary yet comforting psychic sister of the woman he was in love with. “Dana doesn’t really blame you.” That, more than anything, made the tears harder to fight. “Maybe she should.” “You feel responsible for Dana.” “No,” he denied automatically. “You do. There’s nothing wrong with it. It’s only natural that we feel responsible for the ones we love.” He didn’t try to deny her claim. It would have been useless to deny how he felt about Scully, even to someone who =wasn’t= psychic. “She doesn’t want me to feel responsible for her.” He didn’t even realize it was true until the words left his mouth. “Oh, if you only knew,” Melissa murmured. “I know my sister. And whether she can admit it or not, she loves you very much.” She squeezed his hand. “No matter what she may say or do, I beg you, Fox, please remember that. Believe it. She needs someone to believe in her so badly.” “I do,” he replied, his voice barely a whisper. They were both silent for a moment. As he inhaled the air, Mulder felt what she was talking about. Clarity; clarity of the mind and of the spirit was like a physical presence in the room. Melissa had created for herself a temple where she could pray and concentrate on Kelly’s safe return. He turned amazed eyes toward her. “I do not pray to God, but I do pray,” she told him quietly. “Would you pray with me, Fox? For a little while?” Once again, he placed his hands in hers. Their eyes drifted shut and he concentrated on something indefinable from inside his soul. “Thank you,” he whispered after a time, realizing she had given him the greatest of gifts as they prayed together silently. She allowed him to feel as though he had been of some help. “You’re welcome, Fox,” she assured him, her voice wrapping around his senses, taking him inside his own self in a way he’d never been before. In that place he felt a calm settle over him, and he heard Rachel softly speaking. Her voice was content, childlike with an innocence he had never heard in her before. Goodnight stars, goodnight air, goodnight noises everywhere. He couldn’t wait to tell Scully that her sister was magical. ~ Chapter 14- Erratic Dispositions ‘R Us “Is it sleeping in the hallway, does it cry all night alone? Is it selling itself for money, does it want, does it want to come home? Then I saw the world, wounded deep and curled up on my sidewalk . . . And I found my place in line and I shouted no talk. But then men all painted and proud, their words empty and loud, are trying hard to sell my dream. They tell me it’s gone.” –Melissa Etheridge, “My Back Door” ~ When she awoke, it was from a dream as insubstantial as the grasp she had on sanity. Mostly, it was impressions and emotions. But on the outskirts clung the half-realized imaginings of utter terror. Kelly was still gone and waking from a nightmare about it wasn’t going to change things. The current state of affairs between herself and Mulder was still tense -- most if not all of that tension being her fault. She didn’t even have the strength to be sorry for it. Maybe later she would be able to experience remorse again. Numbness crept through her veins like ice water, cooling her skin to the touch, chilling from the inside out. Her heart, if she even had one anymore, was dangerously close to shattering. Only the knowledge that Kelly might have some use for her in the future kept her tethered to this world. That, and the almost tangible cords she felt tying her to Fox Mulder. Damn him. Why did it all come back to Mulder? Every thought she had, every feeling she tried to interpret toward something else, ultimately returned to the man that she most wanted to eradicate from her conscious mind. His imprint may have been burned into her memory, but memories could be shut off, at least for a little while. No, Mulder must have grafted himself somewhere more permanent. Maybe a mold of his being had been seared onto her soul. Eyes blinking open finally, she focused on the neon green light that told her the time was 3:39 AM. The nightmares =had= been subdued. They retained the same level of terror, but it was a mystical terror, a fog that surrounded her but didn’t thrust her into wakefulness. For that, she was minimally grateful. Much as she hated to admit it, she had needed the rest. Six hours sleep would buy her another thirty-six on her feet. She made a mental note to thank Mulder for his bullying. Mulder. You’re slipping, Dana, she chastised herself. She should have noticed he wasn’t there before she completely gained consciousness. Her heart tripped a little and she gave herself an internal smack upside the head. Goddamn it, it wasn’t like someone kidnapped him from their bed . . . Two intensely troubling thoughts hit her at once. One, Kelly had been taken from barely six feet away; and two, she had just referred to the bed she slept in as =their= bed, rather than her bed. In her own mind, she’d begun to think of the bed at Mulder’s apartment as their bed, too. Hell, she’d begun to think of his apartment as home. You’re already scaring yourself, Dana. Might as well be =completely= honest, here in the quiet solitude of this room. He felt like home. Everywhere she could smell him felt like home. Anywhere she could look into his eyes felt warm and comfortable. There wasn’t a place on earth that wouldn’t feel safe from inside the cocoon of his embrace. The pure hell she’d been experiencing from the moment she realized Kelly was gone became almost bearable from the shelter of his arms. His voice, telling her stories to put her to sleep had =worked,= and she had been sure that there would be no rest for her until Kelly was found. Tears welled in her eyes. Confusion, despair and fear fought to be King of her emotional upheaval. She wasn’t proud of her only action to battle these emotions, but it was all she had. Turning her head to the side, she buried it in Mulder’s vacated pillow and inhaled deeply, filling her lungs with his scent, letting it envelope her senses until each negative emotion was made less somehow. Another negative emotion came to the surface, however, when she got a tiny little paper cut on the tip of her nose. Making a disgruntled sound, she flipped on the small bedside lamp and looked down at the note on Mulder’s pillow. He left me a note. It wasn’t a flashy note, wasn’t anything special. It didn’t contain a poem or even any reassurance beyond the obvious – ‘I’m bothering the cops. If you can’t sleep any longer, come join me.’ It told her he was okay, unharmed and waiting for her, should she choose to come to him. Clutching her fist, the note crumpled and she tried to convince herself again that it didn’t matter. But he had left it because he knew her emotional state was not up to par. A psychologist to his core, a healer in every sense of the word, she could not manage to shut off her own reactions to him. How did you stop loving someone like that? How were you supposed to get over and move past such a beautiful spirit? Funny, but ‘it’s for his own good’ wasn’t holding as much water as it used to. “You’re awake.” Glancing up, she was only mildly surprised that she hadn’t heard the door open. Mulder stood there, holding a tray with what looked like tea loaded on it. He offered her a hesitant smile and she returned it as best she could. “Got your note.” He acknowledged her statement by turning his smile almost sheepish as he entered the room fully and shut the door behind him. “Your sister made some tea.” “It’s her own recipe. She won’t tell anyone what’s in it. Claims there’s some magic at work.” “Wouldn’t surprise me in the least,” he answered, taking a seat at the foot of the bed and setting the tray between them. Close, but not too close. Respecting her personal boundaries while invading them at the same time. Did they teach you that in school, Mulder, or were you a natural born head shrinker? Taking the cup he offered, she sipped at the tea then set it aside. Something was up with Mulder. He was watching her carefully, betraying a slight nervousness to his posture. “What?” “They think someone spotted Elders’ car.” “What?! When? Why didn’t you tell me?” “A few minutes ago, and I’m in here telling you now,” he responded calmly. “They aren’t even sure and if you weren’t already awake I wouldn’t have told you until they were.” Logically, he was right. She knew that. But she was desperate for any information about Kelly. Even a false lead would at least give her something to focus on, to hope for. Save for never getting Kelly back, alive and well, the death of hope was the most frightening prospect she faced. “I don’t like not knowing,” she admitted quietly, reining in her temper. It would be so easy to snap right now. And Mulder wouldn’t hold it against her. He’d let her yell and scream and hit him until she was drained. How fair was that to him? He deserved better. He deserves better than you, Dana, she repeated, trying to drive the point home. Stop reconsidering the only rational decision you’ve made. He deserves better and you have to let him go. “A woman at the California Nevada border said she saw a man fitting Elders’ description stop at a McDonald’s. He was driving a van, and she said she saw a child inside. When the door opened, the girl tried to get out and it seemed to her that the man forcibly kept her in the van, despite her cries. It was suspicious, she called it in, and those guys are watching every report on this coast so closely that they spotted it in fifteen minutes.” “I’m so grateful to them. I’ve never seen a group of officers work that hard.” “Lamb’s a good man. He’s got good men all around him.” Lamb. The last name finally clicked in her head. “Didn’t you tell me about a patient--” “Jennifer Lamb,” he cut in, smiling slightly. “Nice to know you aren’t tuning me out when I talk like it sometimes seems.” His voice was teasing and she felt herself respond to it. “Oh, I am. I just happened to remember catching the name.” “Ah.” He let it go then, seriousness creeping over his features. “Jonathon is Jennifer’s step-father and I’m proud to say they’re as close as can be now. He always said if I ever needed a favor, something that needed the full attention of the entire police force, if need be . . .” “So you called in a marker for Kelly.” “I’d call in every marker I have for Kelly,” he assured her in a quiet, sincere tone. Maybe I could let my heart win the war, she thought giddily. She shut down that voice in due haste. It wouldn’t do either of them any good. He was talking again. And she could tell what he was going say. And she was totally unprepared to have this conversation with him. “Scully, I know we haven’t talked much about what will happen after we find Kelly, but I want you to know – I need you to know, that--” “Look, Mulder, whatever it is, I can’t deal with it right now.” If ever. “My main focus right now is Kelly.” That is, when I can get you out of my head for thirty seconds. “After we find her . . . I promise, we’ll talk.” I’ll let you down easy as soon as I don’t need to cling to you every second. I’ll make you see it’s the best thing for both of us. And I’ll try my damnedest to make sure both our hearts emerge relatively unbroken. He was about to push the issue. After a few seconds of heated debate, he was going to overrule her protests and leap in with both feet. Declaring undying loyalty and devotion, or something equally gallant and completely in character. A knock at the door prevented him from speaking. Thank God for other people in the world, she thought with genuine gratitude. “Yeah, what?” Lamb poked his head in the door. “It wasn’t a dead end. I think we’ve got him.” ~ There were no flights leaving immediately. Chartering a plane would have taken too long. It was faster to drive. Lamb was accomplished. He gunned the engine, used his police siren, and with Mulder and Scully firmly implanted in the back seat of the car, they hit the California/Nevada border in a little under three hours. The ride was spent mostly in silence. Lamb’s partner, Jessica Gomez, sat at his side. She kept him steadily supplied with coffee and navigated like a pro. Scully kept rhythm with her fingers against the top of her thigh. After the first hour, Mulder grew irritated by the nearly imperceptible sound, snatched her hand up and held it firmly in his. He softened the movement with his eyes and Scully moved closer to him. They arrived at a casino colorfully dubbed Whiskey Pete’s. As promised, it sat just beyond the California border across from an equally colorful Prima Donna. There was a large yellow roller coaster and a quaint Ferris wheel, yet it filled all four occupants of the dusty sedan with trepidation. Several black and whites sat in the parking lot, waiting, with looks of sympathy on their faces. Mulder placed his hand to Scully’s lower back as they walked. He didn’t know why he did it and she didn’t know why she found it so comforting; grounding. It was a simple thing. As they walked, his hand didn’t even touch her body, merely hovering centimeters away. But she knew it was there, he knew it was there and that, it seemed, was enough. An officer Chen greeted them. She explained the current situation. The tourist from Florida who had been up all night at the slot machines, watching the news between pulls of the lever and pushes of the button. How he had recognized Elders from the reports and noticed Kelly’s diminutive frame next to the much larger man. Suspicious, he had phoned the police. Squad cars had arrived within minutes. Elders saw them and ran. They pursued, though not too closely, fearful of taking a shot with Kelly so close and vulnerable. Finally, he dodged the right way and ended up in a section of Whiskey Pete’s called the Midway. Usually empty, it was designed for the entertainment of children. Games were played with stuffed animals as the prize and that’s where Elders had Kelly, holed up, with a gun he stole from a security guard. “Is one of you Fox Mulder?” Chen asked as she finished the tale. “I am.” “Good news then.” “Why is that?” Scully asked. Chen looked from Mulder, to Scully, then back again. “Cause you’re the only one he wants to talk to.” ~ “I’m not letting you go in there alone.” “John, we’ve got no other choice,” Mulder argued. “He won’t talk to the police. This is about me. About what went down between us.” “Look, ex-FBI or no, I can’t let an unarmed civilian walk into a hostage situation. It’s suicide! I could lose my badge!” Lamb was in charge until the FBI arrived. Mulder tried to tell himself his friend was just doing his job. It didn’t work. “I know this guy!” Mulder glanced at Scully who was sitting quietly to the side, talking to Officer Chen. He realized how loud he’d been and made a conscious effort to turn down the volume. “He will kill her. I believe it with every fiber of my being. I’ve been inside his head and I’m telling you, it’s not a pretty place. I won’t let her die, not because you were too obsessed with rules and regulations to let me save her!” “Goddamn it, Fox, you know it’s not about rules and regulations!” Lamb, too, lowered the pitch of his voice. “It’s an unstable situation and I’d be crazy to let you go in there alone. That gives him one more hostage to negotiate with.” “But I want to. You can assure your chief, the FBI, and anyone else that cares that I’m not going to turn around and sue the fucking department. I just want to go in there and bring Kelly out. Come on, John,” he cajoled. “You =owe= me.” “Low blow,” Lamb accused. “And I don’t care what I owe you. I =owe= you too much to let you get yourself killed.” “Is that your final decision?” Both men looked over to Scully, who had finally spoken. She was holding Chen’s hand, seemingly letting the other woman comfort her. Mulder’s eyes narrowed. That wasn’t like Scully. She barely let =him= touch her and they were lovers. He shifted mental gears and steered his thought away from the true meaning and ramification of the term lovers. Lamb’s voice gentled considerably when he spoke to Scully. Mulder smirked a little. People looked at her and forgot she used to be FBI, too. They thought she was so frail. “It is. You and Fox both will do more good if you keep out of the line of fire.” Scully nodded, and if it had been anyone else, Mulder would have been sure she was accepting Lamb’s decision. Oh shit, he thought, and gravitated toward her. He was too late, though. He had never seen anyone move that fast. The hand Scully held Chen’s in tightened suddenly and pulled backwards. Her right hand snatched the gun from Chen’s side before the other woman knew what was happening. Scully sprang up and turned toward Lamb and Mulder, gun held like an expert. Some things never go away, Mulder thought absently as he moved closer to her. “No one,” she said in a deadly calm tone that enveloped the whole room, “is going to put Kelly’s life at more risk than it already is. Not for rules, and not for badges.” She looked Mulder straight in the eye, piercing his heart with the wild determination he saw. “Are you sure?” He knew what she was asking. Last chance, Mulder. You sure you want to risk your life for this? You sure you’re ready to come face to face with this man with such ability to hurt you? You sure you wouldn’t rather get the hell out while you still can? You sure you wouldn’t rather leave this neurotic woman and the little girl in her care to their own devices? For a thousand reasons, he kept walking toward her. He loved her, he owed her, this was his fault, he never intended to leave her, an innocent child’s life hung in the balance and he was the only one who could do anything about it. Reaching her side, he turned to face Lamb and Chen who both wore identical stunned expressions. “I’m sure,” he answered and, as one, they backed toward the door Elders and Kelly stood behind. “Fox,” Lamb sputtered. “Everything will be okay, John,” Mulder assured him in the same tone he would use to talk a jumper off a high building. “I vaguely remember how to negotiate myself out of a hostage situation.” “Be careful,” Lamb hissed, his partner entering the room. “What’s going on?” Gomez asked. “They’re going in,” Lamb answered, resigned. “What?!” That was the last Mulder heard. He and Scully were inside the room. His eyes were drawn to the games on the far wall. A place for children. Somewhere they could play safely while their parents gambled away their futures. Forcing bitter thoughts away, they began to move. Scully placed the gun in the back of her jeans, well out of the line of sight. “You realize there’s no going back now, right, Scully?” She glanced up at him briefly, then scanned the room again. “This isn’t the time or the place, Mulder,” she informed him, avoiding both connotations his question posed. “I can’t think of a better time, actually,” he said lightly. Too lightly. He was trying too hard to pacify her. Treating her like a glass egg wasn’t going to help her. It allowed her to remain reserved and out of the line of fire. So long as she kept her emotions in check, she could continue to hide from him. “I can,” she snapped, interrupting his internal musings. “This doesn’t mean anything beyond the fact that we’re getting Kelly out of here. You’re helping me because you’re the only one who can.” “It means more than that and you know it,” he shot back as he continued to look for Elders. Fuck, he thought, glancing around. There were too many twists and turns to this place. It wasn’t a small room they could contain. Hell, he might not even be in here anymore. “I don’t know anything of the kind,” she argued. “We’re tied to each other, Scully, whether you can face it yet or not,” he reminded her. He needed to get her to acknowledge that simple fact. “And even if we hadn’t been before, this thing we’re doing now, this territory we’re entering into cements it.” “It’s completely different,” she insisted. “This is about Kelly. Everything else is about . . .” “About what?” he pushed, one eye on her, everything else focused on their surroundings. He’d forgotten what this was like. The rush of adrenaline, the ability to carry on with life in the most perilous of situations. It was all so fucking familiar, yet light years from the person he was now. “Shh.” She held a hand up and he cocked his head. He was just about to say he didn’t hear anything when, suddenly, he did. Softly, from the corner next to a booth that looked like balloon darts. It was whimpering. A child whimpering. “Kelly,” he whispered. They crossed the room at a jog. He reached Kelly a moment before Scully did and his stomach clenched at the same time his heart leapt into his throat. Elders had handcuffed her, same as he did Rachel, to some kind of piping coming out the side of the wall. Cursing internally for not having thought to bring handcuff keys, Mulder crouched beside Kelly’s left side where she was tied. Scully landed to her right and he forced himself not to start bawling at the look on her face. “Sweetie,” she whispered, bringing a hand to Kelly’s forehead. Kelly flinched, but didn’t say a word. “Kelly, it’s Dana. Can you hear me?” A whimper was her only answer. “She’s in shock,” Mulder muttered. “I can see that,” Scully snapped. He tried to physically rip the pipe from the wall. It wouldn’t budge. He nearly slapped his own forehead in frustration. Of course. Scully’s gun. They could shoot the chain with it. “Quit pullin’ at that pipe, FBI. It won’t give. I checked it out ‘fore I strapped the little monster to it.” Mulder froze and his blood ran cold. Elders. That voice haunted his nightmares even more than Rachel’s did. It was just a different breed of haunting. His voice was coming from the left and Mulder subtly moved his body so that if Elders went nuts and started firing, he would most likely be hit. Hopefully, Scully would be able to retrieve her weapon fast enough to take Elders out and escape with Kelly. “Oh wait, that’s right. You ain’t FBI no more, is ya? Huhn. Heard you went back to school, tryin’ to get in and take care of my sister’s brat. Well. Looks like you owe me some thanks. One less ingrate for ya to worry about.” “As I understand it, you weren’t held responsible for Rachel’s death, Ray.” Mulder didn’t know how he managed to speak. Bile rose in his mouth and he felt like gagging. Talk him down, he repeated silently. He’s in charge. Identify with him. Keep him calm. “Nope. Betcha blame yourself, huh? You ever think you coulda done something different?” “Sure, Ray,” Mulder replied easily, turning his back to Kelly in order to look Elders in the eye. Maintain eye contact. Always assume the suspect is close to cracking. Handle with kid gloves. Never use the word no. “Everyone wishes they’d done something different.” “Y’know why I went back and saw her?” Something glinted in his eyes. Evil, Mulder realized, having recognized it so many times before. “Why, Ray?” The use of the suspect’s first name creates an illusion of familiarity. He caught Scully out of the corner of his eye. She, too, had seen the gun in Elders’ hand. He tried to communicate to her not to go for her gun yet. It wasn’t time. He prayed she understood. “Cause you sent me to prison. You forced my poor sister to go through more pain by havin’ to keep that brat alive, even though she wasn’t even there. Goddamn vegetable,” he muttered. “Why this, Ray? What are we doing here?” Don’t let the suspect’s words hit close to home. Remove yourself from the situation on a personal level. You’re just a conduit. The middle man, responsible for bringing the conflict to its inevitable end. “I been waitin’ for you to settle down. You just kept movin’. Never had anyone too close to ‘ya, ‘cept for your sister. That wasn’t right, though. I’d never hurt a man’s sister. Just not right,” he repeated. “A man can’t go against his morals.” Keep him talking. Above all else, =keep him talking.= “Finally, though, all my waitin’ paid off. Cause you met her.” He nodded toward Scully and Mulder followed his line of sight. Like him, she was protecting Kelly with her body. Between the two of them, the child was completely obscured. Kelly’s eyes were vacant and he almost took it as a blessing. “I figured out who she was. Name was all over that conference you met her at.” Jesus. Elders had been =stalking= him and he’d never noticed? Did he walk around =stoned= all the time? Mulder turned his head, looked at Scully and shut his eyes. Breathe. Clarity, Mulder, clarity. He thanked Melissa mentally and regained control over his breathing in seconds. Once again, he focused on Elders. “That’s very resourceful of you, Ray.” Eye contact. First name. Calm tone. We can work it out. No one has to die here. “Heh. Didn’t feel right still, though. Then I saw ya at the park together. I saw her. That little brat. And I figured I’d let you chase after another one. See how it feels to wonder what you coulda done different all over again. Not to mention save her,” again, he indicated Scully, “from a life of servin’ the ungrateful garbage.” “I love her.” It was the first time Scully had spoke and both Mulder and Elders turned to look at her sharply. “I love her,” she said more clearly, her voice remaining neutral. “It hurts me . . . so much to think of losing her.” Elders shook his head sadly. “Don’t you see? That’s how my sister was, too. Couldn’t see how her life was bein’ pissed away.” “You’re a very good brother, Ray,” Scully continued. “Yeah.” His eyes shifted between Mulder and Scully. “You got any brothers?” “I have two.” “They’d know. Hell, Foxy, you should know. Your sister ain’t got no kids, so you ain’t never seen her at her worse. You ain’t never seen her cryin’ cause she can’t make the rent. You ain’t never seen her run down cause her brat’s sucked all the life outta her.” “That’s right, Ray, I haven’t.” Fuck, I almost said no. Do NOT use the word no, even if you’re agreeing with him. “You don’t know nothin’. And now you’re trying to play Mr. Family, right? You’ll be there for awhile, then you’ll get tired of ‘em.” He looked at Scully again. “He’ll get tired a you. Your looks’ll go and he’ll decide to get a younger model, you’ll excuse the expression. And then you’ll be stuck with the kid, all on your own, and it’ll break ya.” “I was on my own with her before I met Mulder, Ray.” Good, Scully, thank God you were FBI . . . “It would be the same as it was before.” “Yeah, well, my sister never had that chance. She never got used to doin’ it all on her own. And that husband a hers just stopped comin’ home some nights. He’d come and take the brat out, sure. But he didn’t want nothin’ to do with my poor sister.” Elders rage seemed to focus itself on Mulder again. “You’re just like him. You’ll do the same thing to her.” Back to Scully again. “Where’s your brothers? Why ain’t they protectin’ you?” Erratic, Mulder thought. He’s about to lose it. Running out of time. Won’t be able to negotiate the situation. Suspect is too irrational. “My brothers are in the Navy, Ray,” she explained. “They’re serving our country.” “Oh. Well, that’s mighty decent of ‘em. Good boys. They should be here, though, they should be takin’ care a their sister.” He nodded, coming to a decision, it seemed. Running out of time . . . “I’ll hafta do it for ‘em. We brothers gotta stick together.” He smiled at her, as though it were some kind of joke she should appreciate. “Ray,” Mulder began hesitantly. “SHUT UP! Just shut your damn mouth!” Elders brought his gun close to Mulder’s face. “This is all your fault, Mr. Ex-FBI Foxy Boy! I went to prison cause a you! My sister had to spend three more years cryin’ her eyes out cause a you! And now, this woman here, she’s gonna end up like my sister, cryin’ her eyes out, all cause a YOU!” He could smell the fear and rage in the room. Boiling point was how he privately referred to it in his profiling days. The situation was stretched taut and it had to be brought to a close. “You’re right, Ray. It’s about me. It’s all about me. And you have me now. You have me exactly where you want me. So why don’t you let them go. Let them go, Ray, and it’ll just be you and me.” Eyes shifting, Mulder watched him consider it. There would only be one shot at this. Whichever way it went, Kelly and Scully had to make it out. It was the only surety he had in his mind. Finally, he reached a conclusion. “I’ll let her go,” he said, jerking his head toward Scully. “I won’t--” she began. “Deal,” Mulder said, louder. Scully’s eyes crackled as they met his. Trust me, he implored silently. It’s the only way we’re going to get out of this alive. Trust me, please, Scully. Her mouth moved a few times in a futile effort to speak. There was nothing to say. At least, nothing that could be said at the moment. “Go on,” Ray said. “I ain’t gonna give you much longer.” “Go on, Scully,” Mulder said pointedly. It had to be quick . . . clean . . . no room for hesitation or error. Scully passed one last gentle hand over Kelly’s leg, even though the child didn’t seem to feel it. Any minute . . . wait for it . . . not too soon, not too late . . . Scully rose and moved directly in front of him. And then she stopped. With her back to him. As though they’d planned it from the start. Jesus, I love you. Smooth. It has to be smooth. His right hand closed around the butt of her gun. As soon as she felt it free of her waistband she fell to the ground. He heard her knees crack as she ducked and rolled and some distant part of his mind hoped it didn’t feel like it sounded. This was why movies slowed down the action, he thought, ignoring the buzzing in his ears. Every moment =did= feel like an eternity. He couldn’t possibly be moving fast enough, cleanly enough. When you’ve fired a gun with any frequency, you don’t consciously take aim. It’s all instinct. You are trained to hit the perpetrator center mass, thus making it less likely to miss. Therefore when Mulder finally snapped out of the trance he’d been in enough to look at Elders, he was un-surprised to see that the man had two bullet holes in him – one in the right shoulder, the other just above his ribcage. But he was still alive. And Mulder didn’t know he if could let it go at that. If he got off on a technicality . . . he would come after Kelly again. No one would touch Kelly, not as long as Mulder drew breath. And this man -- this =monster= -- would not hesitate. He had =stalked= him, for years it sounded like. That much focus, that much concentration didn’t just go away. There was no redemption for this man, no help. There couldn’t be. He would do it again. “Mulder.” Snap out of it. Get a grip. Breathe. Clarity. Be rational. Don’t leap before you look. Don’t act before you consider. Amazing what the inflection in someone’s voice could convey. Scully rose in his peripheral vision, came to stand at his side. “Mulder, he’s down,” she whispered. She was right. Elders was unconscious. He posed no immediate threat. “He could still hurt her.” He didn’t even recognize his own voice. Hell, he hadn’t put thought into speaking. The words just poured out. Deepest fears. Blurring Kelly and Rachel in his mind. His emotions were so raw where they were both concerned. He could still hurt her. He hurt Rachel. Even after it was all over, he had found a way to destroy her. That couldn’t happen to Kelly. He had to keep her safe this time. “Mulder, they have him dead to rights. It’s not like before.” Her hand, so gentle, so firm on his forearm, calming him, bringing him back. “Don’t let him do this to you. Don’t let him take away your life. We’ve got him.” He began to lower the gun as he heard footsteps sound outside the door. When Lamb and his team broke through the door, the gun fell from his fingers to the floor. I win, he thought. I win, you son of a bitch, and you lose. I’m sorry, Rachel. I’m sorry it took this long. Turning away as Lamb cuffed Elders, Mulder and Scully once again crouched beside Kelly. The paramedics descended on Elders, then made a move toward Kelly. Mulder nearly growled, his posture clearly telling them to back off. He must have convinced them he could snap if pushed, because they didn’t come toward Kelly again. “I need a pair of cuff keys!” Scully called out. Chen tossed her a pair, sending Scully a glare that could cut through glass. Scully quirked her eyebrows in apology, though Mulder didn’t think she really meant it. Of course, he wasn’t in the right state of mind to make judgments about lunch meat, let alone tackling what Scully’s facial expressions meant. Instead, he concentrated on Kelly. He put all his strength into figuring out how to bring her out of this catatonic state. She was free, but still she did not try to move away from the wall. If anything, she huddled closer. Scully’s hands were not idle, once again moving over Kelly, checking for injuries. They both breathed huge sighs of relief when, physically, she was relatively unharmed. “Kelly.” He kept his voice neutral, firm without being dominating. “Kelly, you need to come back to us.” “Mulder,” Scully whispered. “Please, you have to help her.” “I don’t think I can,” he said slowly. Scully’s head snapped up to meet his eyes. “What?” “But I think you can,” he continued. “Scully . . . you formed a bond with this little girl the first time you found her. That bond may be the only thing strong enough to bring her back.” “Mulder, this is no time for some theory you’ve been mulling over for the past few years--” “This isn’t about a theory!” His eyes gentled as he looked at her. “And even if it was, it may be her only hope. You’ve got to try, Scully.” He knew she was irrational, pushed to the edge and then some. The temptation to crash and burn after the stress of the past few days was nearly overwhelming. But she couldn’t. Kelly couldn’t afford it. “Tell me what to do,” she surprised him by saying. Although he shouldn’t have been surprised at all. She was so damned strong; she wouldn’t still be here if she weren’t. “Talk to her. Give her something to come back to.” Scully sat fully on the ground, Indian style, facing Kelly. One of her hands began rhythmically stroking the hair back from her head, the other took one of her much smaller hands and held on tight. Good, he thought. The urge to be gentle, to treat Kelly as fragile was hard to resist. But it was the wrong message to send. “Hold on tight,” he whispered, though he was beginning to think she already knew what to do. “Hold on tight and refuse to let go.” “Kelly.” She adopted the same tone he’d used earlier, commanding but not threatening. “Kelly, sweetie, you have to come back to us. There’s nothing here that can hurt you and I . . . I love you.” Her eyes were filling with tears every second Kelly didn’t respond. “Let it out, Scully,” he urged. “It’s now or never. Holding back only hurts her.” “Shut up!” she hissed. “Just shut up! This isn’t easy. I . . . I don’t know how . . .” “Just do it! Just fucking do it, Scully! Don’t think about it, don’t wonder if she’s ready to hear it. Just say it!” “I want you!” The tears were pouring down her cheeks now and her hands shook as she perpetuated the physical bond between Kelly and herself. “God, Kelly, I don’t think I ever told you that. Not the way you needed me to. I want you in my life. I need you there. And not because I feel responsible, or because there isn’t anyone else. Baby, I love you. I love you like you were my daughter . . .Kelly, you are, you’re my daughter now and I love you. Please . . . Please come back to me. Please let me get this right. Let me have the chance.” Bowing her head, Scully rested her cheek against Kelly’s shoulder, clutching the child’s hands with both of hers. Mulder ached for her, for both of them and he pressed a hand to her hair. “Don’t cry, Mommy.” They both took an audible gasp of air. Mulder finally noticed the officers standing around, watching this little drama unfold. Interactive TV, he thought glibly before all his attention was once again focused on the two people in front of him. “Kelly,” she whispered, tracing her daughter’s features reverently. Biting her lip nervously, Kelly looked down. “It’s . . . it’s okay if I call you that . . . right?” “Sweetie,” she whispered, pulling Kelly into her lap, wrapping her in a bear hug. “I am so honored to be your mommy.” ~ Chapter 15- The Inherent Reality of Things “Entreat me not to leave you, or to turn back from following after you; for wherever you go, I will go; and wherever you lodge, I will lodge; Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God. Where you die, I will die, and there will I be buried. The Lord do so to me, and more also, if anything but death parts you and me.” –Ruth 1:16-17 ~ “I want Goodnight Moon.” He didn’t explain the funny little look that crossed his face when Kelly made the demand, but he could tell Scully was curious. How could he explain it, really, without going into a lot of things that could wait for later? Things she didn’t need to hear until they had talked about whatever it was that had been going through her head since they left Nevada. The ride back hadn’t been as quiet as the ride there. Kelly had talked a bit about her time with Elders. From what she told them, it seemed that he hadn’t done more than yell at her a few times and force her to go where she didn’t want to go. He was lucky, Mulder thought. Because if he’d hurt her there wasn’t a jail cell or judge in the world that could have kept Elders safe. Scully only made eye contact with him a few times, and each and every time he felt as though she was trying desperately to talk herself into something. He didn’t like that at all. It worried him almost as much as her continued silence worried him. When they’d arrived back at Samantha and Charlie’s, she had embraced both them, and her sister, warmly. But then she had retreated almost completely. At first, he’d thought she was coming down from the stress of the past few days. Plus, he tried to cajole the part of him that was prone to panic, she most likely wanted to concentrate all of her energy on Kelly. The child was exhausted and fell asleep halfway to Pasadena. Mulder carried her from the car, into the house, and up to Scully’s room. She didn’t move once, except to curl closer to his body, displaying a level of trust he didn’t think he’d earned, but wasn’t about to question. It should have scared him how much he felt like a father. Not just =a= father, he corrected, but =her= father. It was so natural to remove her small shoes and socks. An extension of that was when Scully appeared in the room with a wash cloth. He went to the bag of Kelly’s clothing Melissa had brought and took out a pair of pajamas while Scully undressed her the rest of the way. She sponge bathed her daughter and they both dressed her in a pair of Tigger pajamas, taking great care to let her sleep. Her exhaustion was obvious and he almost, but not quite, envied her the blissful rest. Still, though, even after they had tucked the covers warmly beneath Kelly’s chin, Scully didn’t make any effort to begin a conversation with him. They recounted the events of their mad dash to Nevada with various family members, and Lamb took their statements. He assured Mulder that he wouldn’t face any legal considerations for shooting Elders. It was a clean shoot, clearly self-defense. The only time Mulder remembered Scully speaking without being spoken to was when she confirmed his version of events. Lamb left soon after that, eager to get home to his own family. For the rest of the night, what little there was of it, Samantha, Charlie, Melissa, Scully, and Mulder sat around, talking quietly, drinking more of Melissa’s special tea and, at Samantha’s insistence, playing board games. It was calming, in a surreal way. It was sanity saving normal and it kept everyone occupied. The entire night, Mulder watched Scully out of the corner of his eye. It amazed him that she hadn’t crashed yet. Although he was having the thought, so obviously they were both pretty wound up. As the sun was coming up, Charlie finally dragged Samantha to bed, muttering something about this “really is the last time,” and that he =meant= it. The way his sister had been cackling made Mulder smile, remembering all the times they’d had almost the exact exchange as children. It never was the last time with Sam, though, and as nuts as it made him, Mulder was grateful for it. Melissa retired to her room, leaving Mulder and Scully alone. “Scully,” he had begun hesitantly. “Not now.” She had even held up a hand to forestall him. “I can’t now. Later. After . . . after I believe it’s real and not another dream.” Kelly. Of course. She had still been trying to convince herself it was actually over. And not just Kelly’s kidnapping, although that was surely foremost on her mind. Pretending she wasn’t Kelly’s mother, that she didn’t love her more than life, had finally come to an end. She was free to shower Kelly with all the love, adoration, and affection she was capable of, and Mulder felt she was more than up to the task. That is, as soon as she was sure, of reality and herself. “Scully,” he had begun again. A tiny smile had pulled at her lips. “What?” “Let’s go to bed.” He’d been half expecting her to refuse him. Instead, she took his hand and led him upstairs. He paused outside the door to her room, sending her an inquisitive glance. Instead of answering, she opened the door and pulled him in behind her. Kelly slept soundly, her form outlined by the pre-dawn light pouring in through the window. Scully pulled her industrial curtains shut and he was temporarily blind. When he adjusted to the dark, he felt Scully near him. She pressed a pair of sweats against his chest and he took them. They both changed, for when he felt her again she was wearing long sleeves, and felt soft, like flannel. Kelly was curled up on the left side of the bed, on her stomach, hugging the edge, just like I used to, Mulder thought, smiling at the memory. Scully crawled into bed first, inching as close to Kelly as she could. One of her hands she laid flat on the child’s back, over her heart, Mulder saw as he, too, climbed into bed. He pressed his front to Scully’s body, spooning, and gently ran his hand along her arm until it rested over the one she’d placed on Kelly’s back. He pressed his nose into her hair and inhaled deeply, taking the smell of home and love into his lungs. They were both asleep in minutes, dead to the world. Six hours later, Kelly woke first and Mulder found a pair of intelligent, curious eyes carefully studying his face. She sat Indian style on the bed, hands folded beneath her chin as they regarded one another. Scully was still asleep, breathing deep and even in-between the two of them. “You love her.” It hadn’t been a question. “I do,” Mulder had replied calmly, his eyes firmly on Kelly’s. “Me too.” She had been silent for a moment then and, not wanting to push her, Mulder had let her take the lead. Finally, “You gonna stay with us?” And that, ladies and gentlemen, was the sixty-four thousand-dollar question. He had thought about the question for a good, long while before he answered. He weighed the pros and cons, the wisdom of answering this kind of question for a child that technically wasn’t his. Stepping on Scully’s parental toes was inadvisable, but Kelly needed an answer, an honest, straight from the heart answer. And so, he had given it to her. “Yes. I’m going to stay with you.” “Both of us,” she had felt the need to clarify. He hadn’t been able to contain a chuckle at the honest, innocent vulnerability in her voice. She was so damned earnest for someone so young. “Both of you.” Silently, he promised that he would get through to Scully, wherever her current state of mind rested. Because this was his family now, damn it, and he would fight to the death for his family. Shortly thereafter, Scully had regained consciousness. At the time, he had mused at how absolutely, irresistibly adorable she was when she first woke up. A little confused, sleep tussled, almost like a kitten in those first few seconds. Her confused state =might= have been affected by Kelly bouncing up and down on the bed beside her the moment Scully’s eyes flickered open. “Can we go to a movie and have ice cream and go to the library?” The library, it turned out, was one of Kelly’s favorite places. She liked to go through a few picture books, then move on to some of the more advanced things, like “Where the Wild Things Are” and “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.” After two solid hours of browsing through books, and checking some out for further perusal, they finally got Kelly =out= of the library with the promise of ice cream and a movie. The ice cream was chocolate, vanilla and strawberry (Scully completed the set of boring favorite ice cream flavors) and the movie was “The Neverending Story,” brought home compliments of Blockbuster. Throughout the day, Scully remained detached. Her detachment sparked Mulder’s ire continuously, but still couldn’t diminish the sheer contentment he felt at spending this extended amount of time with his two girls, as he’d begun to think of them. Most amazing of all was the change he saw in Kelly. Gone was the somewhat reserved child he’d met a week ago. In her place was a vibrant, if hesitant, curious little girl who had one of the three most beautiful giggles he’d ever heard. It had been a pleasure and a privilege to hear all three of those giggles in stereo that night as they watched the movie of Kelly’s choice. Charlie and Samantha had turned in, at Charlie’s behest, right around the same time Kelly’s eyelids began drooping. Again, Mulder was afforded the great joy of carrying Kelly up to bed. Her tired limbs wrapped around him and he smiled into her hair, inhaling the scent and identifying it with the same feeling of security, love, and home he found in Scully’s. The ritual of getting Kelly ready for bed had began again, aided slightly this time by her being awake for it. Once the covers were tucked securely beneath her chin, she made her demand. “I want Goodnight Moon.” When Kelly had gravitated to that particular selection earlier, Mulder had tensed up. Somehow, he knew it would come to this. Because she hadn’t been looking at Scully when she announced her selection. Scully was on the bed beside her and Kelly’s eyes were firmly focused on him. “Whatever her majesty wishes,” he assured her lightly, plucking the book from the pile on his way to the bed. Kelly sat like a true princess, flanked by her royal servants, ready, willing and able to do whatever was needed to insure her continued happiness. Cracking open the book, Mulder paused at the first few words. He didn’t want to hear Rachel’s voice, haunting when he read them aloud. He wanted to be free of it, to feel the peace of the letting go. “In the great green room there was a telephone and a red balloon and a picture of the cow jumping over the moon.” He felt nothing, except a feeling of warmth when Kelly slid further under the covers, feeling safe with him, with them. A balm to the soul, he thought, as he continued reading the way he hadn’t in years. His favorite book, a cherished childhood memory stolen from him. It was his again, he owned it and was able to share it with Scully and her . . . their daughter. Running a hand over Kelly’s hair as he continued to read, he encountered one of Scully’s. He looked up from the book, not missing a beat, the words so familiar, so easy to recite from memory. Her eyes were big and bright, as blue as the sea. There was still pain in them that yearned to be purged. Fear, too, if he wasn’t mistaken. And something in her was still preventing her from joining him in this blissful letting go place. Twice he read the book before Kelly finally fell asleep. Scully shut the small bedside lamp off from her side of the bed, and they both tiptoed out of the room, shutting Kelly into a safe cocoon of darkness for the night. In silence, they trudged through the hall, down the stairs, and into the living room. Samantha had opened the blinds earlier when she noticed storm clouds building. It was going to rain, she’d predicted then, and he hadn’t missed the subtle tremor that went through Scully’s body. Now, the midnight blue sky grew even darker as the clouds gathered closer. Stars weren’t even visible and Scully’s eyes were fastened tightly to the glass doors. “Is it later yet?” At first, he thought she didn’t hear him. When she answered, he realized she was deciding. “I don’t know. Can you prove to me this is real yet?” “Scully, I can’t conclusively prove that our entire existence isn’t some bad trip from a hit of acid I did back in the late seventies.” “Touché.” She considered something for a moment. “You did acid back in the seventies?” “Once, at a party. It was when they were putting LSD on the back of stickers.” He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. Don’t try to sidetrack me, Scully.” “I’m not.” “The hell you’re not.” “Fine,” she snapped, picking absently at the back of the chair she stood behind. “I’m trying to sidetrack you because I don’t want to have the conversation you seem so hell bent on having.” “Scully, I just want to help--” “Maybe I don’t want your help!” “If that were true, I don’t think you’d still be here,” he told her quietly. “I think that as soon as we found Kelly, you would have split and gotten as far away from me as you could.” “Right. Cause you’re Mr. Know-It-All. Mr. Goddamn I Know What’s Best. Well you don’t know what’s best for me, and you don’t know how to help me!” “Only because you won’t tell me the truth!” He shouldn’t be shouting at her. The psychologist in him was very insistent on that point. However, the man who loved her wouldn’t listen. She was hurting, she was hurting him with her refusal to face that pain, and they were damned well going to have it out, whether she wanted to or not. “I can’t tell you the truth! I can’t explain to you what’s wrong, okay?” Her voice was becoming more and more unsteady. Rain was beginning to pour down and her eyes kept darting between him and the window. “Why the hell not?!” “Because I can’t trust you!” She was hurting, he tried to rationalize. But it still ripped his heart out that she didn’t feel she could trust him, no matter how motivated by fear her statement might have been. “Bullshit,” he spat, before he could think better of it. Wrong thing to say, the psychologist piped in. Her eyes snapped and crackled. Rage, hot and sudden filled her eyes. Whatever wrath she was about to let loose on him, Mulder didn’t regret what he said. At least it blotted the fear from her expression. “Don’t ever tell me what I feel is bullshit,” she seethed in a deadly quiet voice. “I didn’t. I’m not.” He shook his head. “You don’t feel that you can’t trust me. You feel that you can’t trust any man. Singling me out =is= bullshit.” “Fuck you,” she spat. Succinct, he thought glibly, glad he managed to keep that word on the inside. She was refusing to confide in him. And he wouldn’t allow her to do that, not for another second. If he thought she didn’t care about him, sincerely didn’t want anything to come of what was between them, he would back off, he promised them both silently. But that wasn’t the case. She =did= care about him and he was sure she =did= want something for their relationship, something real and forever. There was an invisible cord pulling between them, and until she was able to unburden herself of the mounds of luggage she pulled behind her, there would never be an opportunity to strengthen it. And he wanted to strengthen it. He wanted to make it so strong that no one and nothing could ever sever it. “I’m not going anywhere,” he informed her quietly, reining in his own temper. “No matter how hard you push me away, no matter how much of a pain in the ass you pretend to be, you aren’t getting rid of me. Not unless you convince me that you honestly want me gone.” “I hate you,” she whispered, deflating like a balloon. “It would certainly make everything easier if you did.” He moved toward her, close but not touching. Ever watchful, he noticed her attention was being diverted more and more toward the impending storm. It was more than raindrops pelting the glass now. Lightning was beginning to crackle, thunder rumbling in the distance. He split his time between watching her, and the storm. Tentatively, he placed a hand on her shoulder. She flinched slightly, but it was a reaction to the lightning, not to his touch, he realized, as her eyes welled up with tears. How to approach this . . . what to say . . . How did he comfort someone when he didn’t know what was causing them so much grief? “Do you ever feel like you’ve died, and someone forgot to tell you that your presence in the world is no longer required?” They had been quiet for so long, her voice startled him. It was distant; far too calm for the meaning behind it. “Scully, I know how badly you were hurt. By your husband, by the way he disillusioned you, betrayed you, hurt Kelly . . .” She laughed, the sound bitter. “You have no idea,” she muttered. Finally, she turned from the window and looked at him. “Part of me wants to hate you. Because before I met you, I was perfectly fine being closed off. I was perfectly fine going about my life the way it was.” “And how was it, Scully?” he asked, his voice reflecting the tears he wanted to shed for her. Tears she wouldn’t let flow from her own eyes. “Tell me what was so good about your life before.” “I didn’t say good.” Something akin to gallows humor lurked in her tone. “But it was safe, if lacking substance, and I was perfectly fine never wanting to be close to anyone again.” “You weren’t fine,” he denied before he could stop the words. Her pain was palpable, a living breathing thing that lurked around her, waiting to pounce the moment she laughed, or even cried. “I died the moment I realized the full extent of his betrayal,” she whispered. “The other woman . . . Lula . . . what the hell kind of name is Lula, anyway . . . the child he had with her . . . it destroyed me. But not nearly as much as the realization that I was married to a monster. That I had let him into my life and somehow failed to notice what kind of man he was. I loved him. How could I love someone capable of . . .” “You couldn’t have known,” Mulder reminded her. They both knew that she knew that, rationally. But emotions weren’t rational and self-flagellation didn’t allow for logic. “I told you I found Kelly after Jack . . .” She jumped as thunder and lightning collided outside. It took her a moment to remember what she’d been about to say. “I went home after I called the police. I was going to pack a bag and leave . . . but he was there. Jack.” Mulder felt his gut clench. It’s not that, he repeated over and over in his own mind. It’s not that, stop thinking the worst, it’s =not= that. Please, God, if you’re out there, don’t let it be that. “It had just started to drizzle when I got home. He was waiting for me in the living room. His hands still had her blood on them.” A sniffle was the last thing he would have expected, but there was no mistaking it. Before his very eyes, an intelligent, beautiful, grown woman was turning into a lost, scared little girl. The hand he’d placed on her shoulder remained, though he wasn’t sure she even felt it. “I froze. I still can’t believe it to this day. I was an FBI Agent at one time, and I =froze= when confronted with the perpetrator. The murderer.” “He was your husband,” Mulder whispered. It’s a big difference, Scully. “I was an idiot,” she muttered. “I am an idiot.” “You were emotionally overwrought. You didn’t freeze with Elders yesterday, did you?” She considered that for a moment. “I didn’t,” she agreed, as though the thought hadn’t quite occurred to her before. Damn it, this self-confidence problem she had was something they were going to work on. Just as soon as they finished their current discussion. “What happened that night, Scully?” “The rain got worse . . . and the thunder was so loud, the lightning was blinding. He kept saying how we could raise Kelly together now that Lula was out of the way. That he’d done it for us. We could start over.” She shook her head. “Our marriage was so lifeless. I still don’t understand why he thought then . . .” “He fixated on you. After he killed Kelly’s mother, he placed all his hopes and chances of life directly on your shoulders.” “When I finally snapped out of my paralysis, I tried to run. But he was faster. And he was so much bigger, and stronger . . .” Another sniffle, this one angrier than the last. “I pulled away from him, wrenched the door open and ran outside. He was too fast, though, and too big, and he tackled me in our driveway. We were both soaked instantly and my face hit the asphalt on the way down.” Her head turned from the storm long enough for her to look into his eyes. “You can’t see the scar on my chin anymore, can you?” Carefully, he examined her skin, tracing a finger over her jaw. “No,” he whispered. “Can’t tell it was ever there.” “Good,” she whispered, more to herself than to him, as she looked back out the window. “Good,” she repeated. “Scully,” he began hesitantly. “His body pushed me down into the ground and he kept muttering in my ear how I shouldn’t try to run, that I should just accept what we have together. That he . . . loved me. And the entire time, I couldn’t see his face and I remember at the time that was the worst thing. I couldn’t see his face. But then he moved and turned me over and it was so much worse, because now, I could see his eyes. The eyes of the man I loved once, who I took to be my husband, for better or for worse, in sickness and in health. Guess they leave out for normal or for psychotic. “Every illusion I ever had about myself, about my own judgment, my own soul, was shattered in that moment I looked into his eyes. The rain kept hitting him, dripping down his face and onto mine and . . . I wanted to vomit. I nearly did, I think. I said he was hurting me, that I wanted to get up, and he started to hit me. He tore at my clothes and there is no doubt -- no doubt -- in my mind that he was going to rape me.” His hand must have tightened on her shoulder too hard, or his breathing grew too erratic. Once again looking away from the glass doors, her eyes found his and the vacant look that had so dominated them faded somewhat. “Our neighbor chose that precise moment to arrive home. His headlights shined right on us. He pulled Jack off me and they struggled. I couldn’t move. I was just lying there, staring up at the sky, letting my mouth get filled with water like a goddamn turkey.” A few tears leaked out of her eyes, making room for more to just hang there, refusing to fall. “You were in shock,” he said finally. “Yeah.” Her arms hugged her waist and she shut her eyes tightly. “A few police officers arrived soon after that. One of them helped me up and I coughed and sputtered and spit . . . and then I bolted for a squad car. I didn’t care where I was, I just had to get out of the rain . . . Every time after that, every time I hear or feel the rain, I remember that moment when I knew he was going to destroy me.” That sentence hung in the air for a moment. He forced himself not to speak. He felt that she had something else to say. What it was, he couldn’t hazard a guess. She had pretty much just emptied the contents of her soul. When her eyes finally opened and she looked at him again, though, his suspicions were confirmed. “Every time, that is, until the first time we kissed.” That cost her so much. He didn’t want her to have to pay so much for an admission that brought him so much joy. “The fear is so big, and so strong that . . . it takes precedence over everything. But . . . there never even used to be anything else there =but= the fear. And now . . . in the back of my mind, when I watch the rain, or hear the thunder . . . I feel your lips against mine and I feel your hand cradling my cheek and I begin to believe that there might be a light at the end of the tunnel. Even if I can’t see it yet,” she added in a whisper. Cupping her cheek in his palm, he turned her head toward him. Slowly, gently, he leaned in until their lips pressed together. Her eyes stayed open and so did his. They both pulled back at the same time, but he left his hand where it was. “I’m always here, Scully. I’m always going to be here, to kiss you, to hold your hand, to make love to you, to eat way too much chocolate with you, to help you raise Kelly, to love you and her, to do anything and everything you need me to.” “I need you to help me,” she whispered, more tears spilling over her cheeks. He hated to watch her in pain, but it was good to see her cry. “Anything,” he promised again. “How do I stop being afraid of the rain?” Excellent question, Dr. Scully; thanks for making my first assignment an easy one. Think, Mulder, think, he ordered. Her fear was based on a past trauma. The rain had nothing to do with what Jack did to her, it was merely present at the time, like the song that was playing on the radio the first time you got your heart broken. He had tried the slow approach, easing Scully in with increments, but that hadn’t worked. She was an all or nothing girl, and if he was to be of any help to her, they would have to approach it from that stance. “Come on,” he said suddenly, taking her hand in his and pulling her toward the glass doors. “Mulder, wait,” she cried, digging her heels in. “I don’t know if . . . I mean, I can’t just . . .” “Scully,” he interrupted, waiting until her wide, frightened eyes met his. It’ll be okay, he promised her silently. As long as I draw breath, I won’t let anything bad happen to you. “Trust me.” They regarded one another for a few moments. Finally, Scully nodded her head once, jerkily, in assent. Mulder threw open the sliding glass doors and led her out into the warm rain. ~ Chapter 16- Embracing to Music “There is no difficulty that enough love will not conquer; No disease that enough love will not heal; No door that enough love will not open; No gulf that enough love will not bridge; No wall that enough love will not throw down; No sin that enough love will not redeem . . . It makes no difference how deeply seated may be the trouble, how hopeless the outlook, how muddled the tangle, how great the mistake, -- A sufficient realization of love will dissolve it all.” –Emmet Fox ~ Thank God for heat waves, Scully thought, as they quickly became soaked to the skin. It may have been raining, but it was almost ninety degrees outside. Ruminating about the weather also meant you didn’t have to completely acknowledge the fact that you were about to start screaming in absolute terror. Samantha really did have a lovely back yard. There was a small shed Mulder seemed to be heading toward. Scully went along for the ride, letting him lead her wherever he wanted to. Trust, she mused, was a puzzling entity. It wasn’t easily given, but once bestowed it extended in ways you couldn’t imagine. She was in the rain because Mulder had asked her to trust him. And, miracle of miracles, she did. It was so unburdening to trust someone so completely. Hurting so deeply for as long as she had had taken its toll. He was definitely heading for the shed, she decided, as they stopped in front of it. He threw open the door and began rooting around inside. Feeling the hysteria and terror bubble beneath the surface, Scully leaned against the side of the shed, out of the downpour. Let him root around in there to his heart’s content. The longer he took, the longer she could avoid confronting this particular nightmare. She didn’t see how being out here was going to help. It unsettled her to be exposed so fully to something so frightening. It’s just rain, Dana. Quit being such a baby. It wasn’t just rain. That was the problem. It hadn’t been “just rain” in a very long time. She didn’t admit it easily, even to herself, but the terror she felt in the rain was akin to claustrophobia. Suffocating and mind-numbing. She was close to panic when the clouds grew dark and it looked like it =might= rain. When it actually stormed, as it was now, she just wanted to run, for shelter, anything, so long as she wasn’t outside-- “Scully.” His voice cut into her internal ramblings, as it always did. “What?” “C’mere.” Through the fear, she found herself smiling at how sexy he was when he said that. Moving closer to him, she pressed a hand over the gray t-shirt he wore, his heart beating steadily beneath her palm. It was almost okay here, safe beneath the awning of the shed. They were still getting wetter and wetter, but they weren’t caught in the downpour. His solid presence next to her didn’t hurt matters, either. One of his hands moved to her cheek, caressing gently before moving to her hair, pulling her toward him slowly. The sound of music startled her and she looked into his eyes, a question written clearly on her face. “Charlie isn’t the only one capable of making his own tapes of favorite songs,” he murmured into her ear as he pulled her to him. One of his hands landed on her hip as the other slid to the back of her neck. “I would come to visit Sam when I realized it had been months since I last saw her. My head was so messed up for a few years . . . and I started making these tapes. Just great songs that took my mind away.” “You’ve Got a Friend took your mind away?” A grin split across his face. “The one by Carole King did,” he quipped as the very same tune came from the radio in the shed. “I used to come out here to her back yard with a bottle of wine, or scotch, or whatever was handy to numb the mind.” “First you numb the mind, then you let the music take it away.” Her own hand moved to his face, her fingertips exploring, wiping droplets of water away from his skin. “Once my mind was thoroughly wiped out, I would lay back in the grass and float away.” They began to sway slowly, embracing more than dancing. Embracing to music, she thought. Maybe that’s how dancing got started. “One day . . . one day I felt as though I might never come back. I didn’t really want to come back. I couldn’t forgive myself for not being able to save Rachel . . . I was so lost, Scully, so lost . . .” As if she didn’t have enough reasons of her own to cry, she felt tears fill her eyes for him. “I wish I’d known you then,” she whispered, pressing her forehead to his. “I wish we’d been able to help each other before.” “The rain saved me.” Her eyes, which had drifted shut, flew open at his words. His eyes were soft and dark, filled with a thousand pains and a thousand joys. “The first few drops got my attention. It was just like it is tonight, warm and cleansing. I found myself staggering to my feet, staring up at the moon I could barely see, as I became soaked to the skin.” She licked her lips, riveted by his words, the tone of voice he used. He could have been a hypnotist, he was so fucking mesmerizing. “Then, I started laughing. The kind of semi-hysterical, it’s this or break down kind of laughter. Sam came out here, thought I was nuts. But I was finally free. At least, as free as I could be at the time.” His forehead was pressed against hers now, and she was breathing in the little puffs of air he exhaled. “Don’t let what he did punish you, Scully. Don’t let it take this away.” When he said it, the trance she was in broke and she realized the awning didn’t shelter them anymore. They were out in the downpour and she gasped, her heart seizing up. “You’re so perfect,” she whispered. He chuckled, the sound raspy. “Far from it.” “No, you are, and you don’t seem to mind how fucked up I am. I say things, horrible, unforgiving things, and you just let them go. You stay, even when I tell you to leave. You love when the most likely outcome is pain. But I don’t want to love like this. It hurt so badly before and I never loved Jack like this. I’d die if it went bad. I’d =die= if I lost what we’ve made here.” Did I just say all that out loud? It was the only thought in her head. From the look on his face, she had. The song changed, and it was “Hey Jude,” and the muddled thought that Mulder had much better taste in music than her brother did briefly flitted through her consciousness, to be quickly replaced by how beautiful the man before her was. Little drops of rain clung to his eyelashes and his hair was plastered to his head. And he was looking at her like she was the center of his universe. No one had ever looked at her like that. She had never felt like everything to someone. And oh, my, but it felt amazing to be everything to someone. His lips touched hers and while she still felt the fear coiling somewhere in the vicinity of her lower intestine, just as she’d hypothesized, his touch replaced ounces of the fear with pure bliss. “You will see yourself through my eyes, Scully, if it takes me the rest of my life,” he whispered against her cheek. “You are so beautiful and you can’t see it. And I don’t mean physically, although as I’m sure you’ve noticed I’d give you a perfect ten in the looks department.” He shook his head, pressing soft little kisses all over her face. “You’re beautiful here,” he told her, placing a hand over her heart, “and here,” he added, bringing his other hand to the side of her head. “You have a beautiful mind and a beautiful spirit.” Breathing shallow, she could only grip him tightly, tears running down her cheeks. Pressing her body to his, getting as close as she could, she breathed in the scent of his skin, rainwater mixing with Mulder in her nostrils. Oh, and it smelled so good. She had missed that smell. Fresh rain against the grass, making everything smell new. The first time outside after a rain was the only time she’d ever been able to smell the color green. “You say I love when the only possible result is pain, but Scully, what do you do?” This time, he held her face in his hands and forced her to look into his eyes. “There’s only one person in a thousand who would have loved Kelly the way you have. And I can guarantee you that not many would be able to survive what you’ve been through, let alone go on with your life with such fire and passion as I have been witness to.” “Not many people have you,” she whispered, pulling him to her for another kiss, this one longer with even more emotion behind it. Pure emotion, she thought giddily. Fear, love, lust, joy, sorrow, hope and healing, infused into every touch, every word, every kiss they shared. “Don’t,” he whispered against her mouth, his hands on her back as they sort of danced. “Don’t give me credit for who you are. Don’t give me credit for your strength.” “You don’t understand.” More tears spilled down her cheeks. “You =are= my strength. You have no idea how close I was to breaking before I met you. And now . . . now if I were to lose you--” “Stop saying that,” he muttered against her mouth. “You are never going to lose me, Scully. I . . . I love you. ‘I love you’ doesn’t begin to express what I feel, but take that and everything else I have inside me.” “I feel selfish. All I do is take from you.” He was laughing at her. Those little crinkles appeared at the sides of his eyes and she couldn’t help herself, she traced them reverently with her fingers. Then, because she just had to, she stood on her toes and pressed her lips to his eyelids. “You make me better than I am, Scully.” His face was buried in her neck now, his hands roaming beneath the long-sleeved shirt and tank top she wore. “And you saved me, Mulder.” She forced his head back so they were looking eye to eye. Once again, the music shifted and she laughed out loud when James Taylor’s “How Sweet it Is to be Loved by You,” came on. “So sweet, Scully,” he murmured, mirth dancing behind his eyes. “Experience the rain with me,” he all but pleaded. “I’ve always felt anything worth doing, is worth doing right. Let me save you all the way.” All she could do was nod. His hands moved to her shirt and he slipped it off her shoulders, leaving her clad in only her white tank top and jeans. The warm rain hit her shoulders and ran down her back. She shivered, remembering a time when she was sixteen. “I snuck out of the house when I was a teenager,” she said aloud. Her hands slid beneath his shirt, ran over his stomach and pulled the material over his head. It landed in a soaking wet heap somewhere behind him. “It was raining,” she added. “A bunch of friends and I met down at the Dairy Queen. Marcus had a truck and we were driving fifty miles to see The Eagles in concert. I rode for an hour and a half in the back of a pick-up truck, the rain pouring down, laughing my ass off to be doing something so in direct conflict with my parent’s wishes.” She laughed as he twirled her, definitely dancing now. “You were born to be a rebel, Scully,” he quipped, twirling her back toward him again. “No,” she whispered, close to him again, liking it better than dancing for “real.” Her hands moved to his neck, then slid into his hair, holding him steady while she looked into his eyes. And for the first time, she saw the person he saw when he looked at her. A funny little smile broke out across his face as they looked at each other, and she realized he was seeing himself through her eyes. “I think I was born to love you,” she pronounced, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and pressing her cheek to his before he could respond. His arms wrapped around her securely, and his chin rested on her shoulder as he physically bent over her. My human shelter, she mused, thrilled at the notion. Closing her eyes, she forced her mind to stay where it was. That night was over. It couldn’t hurt her. The =rain= couldn’t hurt her. Nothing could hurt her from the haven of Mulder’s arms. Then why was she shaking? Why was her entire body starting to tense, to shiver despite the warmth? The urge to cry was so strong, and not with the release and joy she’d felt a few seconds ago, but with hopelessness and terror because it was all coming back. She could feel Jack’s breath on her neck, see the look in his eyes as he hovered above her, the pain, God, the pain of knowing how wrong she was, how completely stupid she had been, and . . . His voice. Mulder’s voice, whispering to her, saying something into her ear, over and over again . . . “It’s me. Scully, it’s me. It’s me.” It’s me, it’s me, it’s me . . . It all began to fade away. The rain was there, but it wasn’t suffocating. It was more of an ever-present mist, enfolding her with the man she loved more than life. “It’s you,” she whispered, pulling back to look in his eyes. Recognition beyond anything else greeted her in his gaze. Dimly, she heard the music change again, become a U2 song she couldn’t remember the name of before it, too, faded away . . . . . . until the only thing left that was real, was Mulder. The two of them, in the middle of a downpour, able to feel only each other. And his mouth on hers tasted like everything she’d ever loved to eat, and nothing she’d ever known. Her fingers threaded through his hair and pulled him closer. The white noise in her ear grew louder and some part of her recognized the elements coming back – the music, which she now quickly identified as With or Without You, and she thought, oh, only with you, as the rain started coming down even harder, if that was possible. They had sunk to their knees at some point, never breaking the kiss, arms still wrapped around each other. This kiss was like no other, each of them pushing and giving and taking in equal measure. His hands were against her back, pulling at her top, pressing into her skin with increasing urgency. Lightning flashed in the sky and they both broke away from the kiss, breathing hard and heavy. He pulled back from her slightly and she followed, clutching at his shoulders. “I don’t want to stop,” she muttered, hoping he wasn’t having an attack of gallantry. If it was possible for a smile to be feral and vulnerable at the same time, Mulder pulled it off. “Neither do I.” He punctuated his words with a teasing nip at her lips. “But remember, this isn’t just for our own amusement. This exercise has a purpose.” Her brows furrowed together for a moment before she remembered. “Right. Purging my fears.” He nodded and pressed a kiss to her forehead. Then, he very slowly laid back against the grass, holding both her hands in his. “We’re in the middle of a storm -- one of the wildest and hardest downpours I’ve seen in years -- and you’re in charge, Scully.” He waited a beat for his words to sink in. “You’re in control. Whatever happens here, happens only because you want it to.” I don’t deserve you, she thought, as she straddled his waist. I don’t deserve you, but I swear, I will love you for the rest of my life. Her lips pressed against his chest. Because she could, she darted her tongue out to taste him. That made her thirsty, though, and she began lapping at his torso, drinking fresh rainwater from his skin. She never wanted to quench her thirst any other way again, especially if she got to hear him groan like that. Sitting on his thighs for a moment, she whipped her tank top over her head and tossed it aside. Pressing her body to his, both of them naked from the waist up, inspired mutual moans as their mouths met again. His arms wrapped around her and his fingertips traced as many patterns as the rain did against her back. Like the last, this kiss went on and on, wet and sloppy and perfect. It was extremely difficult to pull wet denim off skin, but they managed after a few minutes of fumbling and laughing. They were lying on their sides in the grass, no doubt getting very muddy. One of her legs was thrown over his hip, and while she felt his erection hard and insistent against her thigh, he didn’t make any move to bring this encounter to its inevitable conclusion. Instead, he pressed his lips to her face, murmured her name, called her “baby,” whispered words of love and comfort, and let his hands wander over her skin. They had done this before, in his bed, usually feeding each other pieces of chocolate. But this . . . everything was so charged. His hands imprinted his name on her skin everywhere they touched and the rest of her body reacted to his as though she’d known him for years. Centuries, maybe. Mulder had the softest skin, she had found, and he was infinitely pleasurable to touch and snuggle against in the middle of the night. Or any time, for that matter. Why can’t I get enough of your smell? she wondered as she pressed her nose to his neck for the hundredth time. “I don’t know,” he answered, chuckling. Must’ve said that last one out loud. Oh well. She had no secrets from this man, not anymore. “You smell like home,” she said. “Especially with the rain. I’ve always loved the water. Comes from being a sailor’s daughter, I guess. I can’t believe I forgot how much I love it.” This was it. This was the scent she would remember for the rest of her life. Whenever he wasn’t with her, she would think of rainwater, or seawater clinging to his skin, and she would be transported to another place, somewhere she could touch him to her heart’s content. “I didn’t realize you had such affection for the water.” He was hedging, she could tell. He didn’t want to bring bad memories crashing down on her, nor did he want to ignore the very reason they were out here. She smiled at him, letting the look on her face assure him that she wasn’t ignoring the bad stuff. It just didn’t matter anymore. He made it better. He made everything better. A song that was beginning caught her attention. Gasping slightly, she looked at him for a moment. “This is my favorite song,” she whispered. “It has been from the moment I heard it. How did you . . .” “It’s one of my favorites, too,” he answered. “When I fell in love . . . I wanted to be able to feel this song.” He chuckled again. “Don’t know what to say except, John got it wrong. Because nothing describes how this feels, although I admit, this does come close.” John Lennon’s “Love” faded into the same background noise as the rain when he kissed her again. Pressing her hands to his chest, she pushed until he landed on his back again. Crawling on top of him, she brushed her fingers down his face, his neck and his chest until she reached his ribs. Planning her attack carefully, she fluttered her fingers against the skin just below his ribcage. Waiting for his low, rumbling laugh, she wrapped her hand around his cock and guided him inside her body with one long, hard thrust. His laugh turned into a moan and she watched his face change. Leaning down, she pressed her lips against his, finding it difficult to kiss him any way but open-mouthed, with total disregard for technique. It wasn’t about being suave or smooth -- it was about trying to claw inside each other until there was no feasible way to be apart again. The movement of their lower bodies was no more smooth than that of their mouths, but it was beautiful, she thought. Lightning was flashing with increasing frequency, and she laughed at it, and the thunder. Her laughter spilled into his mouth and he stole it from her lungs hungrily as his hands washed over her flesh like the rain, fluid and all encompassing. Building a rhythm was difficult, considering they never moved the same way twice. Her hands were braced against his chest, his flowing up and down her hips and thighs. They were making love the same way they’d been dancing, she realized. It was an embrace that happened to mimic the motions of sex, the rhythm of music that had no pattern. Skin sliding, aided by the rain, she could almost believe they were melting into each other. Her knees pressed hard into the grass and she looked forward to the long shower they’d both take in the morning to get rid of the mud. When it finally happened, the orgasm she had stole her breath. It wasn’t the best ever, on a purely physical level, but the sheer force of it nearly knocked her over. It started from the center of her being, and moved outward, tingling as far as her fingers and her toes, and as deeply as her soul and her mind. It was freedom and cleansing and she screamed with it, her cries lost to Mulder and the storm. He was there with her through it all, his own orgasm seconds behind hers. Collapsing, she slid to his side in a boneless heap of satisfied flesh, her cheek pressed against the crook of his arm. Rolling a bit until they were both on their backs, she looked up at the sky, the storm, feeling the full force of Mother Nature. She was reminded of cloud gazing and the man who saw unicorns where there were horses, and women worth loving where there were only lost souls. If she hadn’t been so tired at that moment, she would have laughed with pure joy. As it was, she shut her eyes and bent her arm until it stretched out over his chest, her hand in his hair. She felt his eyes close, as well, and breathed a sigh of utter contentment. The rain continued to play staccato to the music and their breathing. ~ Chapter 17- Companion, Comforter, Guide and Friend “A soul mate is someone to whom we feel profoundly connected, as though the communicating and communing that takes place between us were not the product of intentional efforts, but rather a divine grace. This kind of relationship is so important to the soul that many have said there is nothing more precious in life.” –Thomas Moore ~ Before he was fully conscious, he felt contentment spread through his body. Drifting, as he was, through the half-hazy reality that existed between sleep and complete wakefulness, he took a moment to examine the contents of his life a bit closer than he normally would. Samantha, his best friend from childhood, a sister in the truest sense of the word, finally had someone worthy of her: a Scully. A few weeks ago, he wouldn’t have thought anything significant in having a Scully love you. But after having felt it first hand, knowing for certain how amazing those Scullys were, he conceded the point. He and his sister were indeed lucky individuals. Speaking of, he seemed to have not just a lover in his life, but an extended family. Charlie had welcomed him with open arms, both of them foregoing the usual brother posturing that so naturally came to the forefront when another male sniffed around The Beloved Sister. This most likely had to do with the fact that they would have both felt like hypocrites if they’d brought the matter up. Melissa had made herself comfortable in the meditation room Samantha set up for her. His little sister didn’t seem too eager to kick everyone out of her house, and Mulder wondered if that was intentional. It was no secret she had always wanted a bigger family, going so far as to plead with Ma and Pa Mulder for more siblings when they were children. The Scullys, it seemed, were finally fulfilling Samantha’s desire for a large family. He had a family now, which extended beyond the one he was born into. True, he had always desired that, longed for it, wished for it. But somewhere deep inside, he hadn’t believed it would really happen. The lone wolf moniker that had hung from around his neck seemed to fit most of the time. If he couldn’t find “the one,” he wouldn’t settle for “anyone.” It had to be right. =She= had to be right. And then, like magic, =she= appeared, an angel with beaten wings and a crooked halo who made him laugh as easily as she brought him to tears. In the most basic way, she moved him and inspired him to be more than the sum of his parts. His eyes finally popped open when someone’s nose pressed against his. Lest he forget the most unexpected, but undeniably special of his new life’s blessings: a bright, beautiful, curious little girl with the eyes of an explorer. “HE’S AWAKE!” Blinking, Mulder tried to adjust his hearing after that outburst, but found it damned near impossible. “Morning,” he mumbled, sitting up much sharper than he normally did. “Morning,” Kelly chirped, wrapping her cherubic arms around his neck and placing a big, wet kiss on his cheek. He couldn’t have contained his smile if he wanted to. “Are you my new alarm clock?” “Nope. But Samantha said I should tell her when you woke up.” “Do you think maybe she meant you should go get her when I woke up?” “No,” she answered guilelessly. “Of course, you’re right, I don’t know what I could have been thinking.” Already wearing pajama bottoms, he snagged a clean t-shirt from the chair of laundry Sam always kept in bedrooms and walked with Kelly downstairs. The rest of the family was gathered in the kitchen, making the most elaborate breakfast he’d seen since he was a child and his father’s family had stayed with them. “I thought I heard someone bellow you were among the living.” Sam smiled, then stared down at the pan before her. Without a moment’s hesitation, she took the charred bacon and dumped it down the sink. “You’ll get better at it, babe,” Charlie murmured from her side, a comforting arm around her shoulder. Making a beeline for Scully, Mulder peeked over her shoulder, appraising the omelet she was preparing. “What’s in it?” he asked, resting his chin atop her shoulder. Her head turned slightly to regard him, then went back to carefully studying the omelet. “Cheese and ham.” “That’s my favorite,” he commented lightly. Despite last night, he still wasn’t quite sure how to play this. How =she= wanted to play it. Turning her head again, she kissed his mouth soundly, their lips parting with a smacking sound. “I know. I asked Sam.” Her dazzling smile nearly knocked him flat on his ass. “Figured I should learn what my man likes to eat so I can cook it for him.” It was her way of acknowledging what they were to each other, he understood. He pressed a kiss to the side of her neck. “And what’s your favorite breakfast, little girl?” She giggled. He made her giggle. Damn, that felt good. “Why?” Both his arms wrapped around her waist from behind, her attention supposedly focused on the omelet. “Gotta know what my woman likes to eat, so I can cook it for her on the days she’s not cooking for me.” “Is this an equal exchange I hear? Alternating days, perhaps?” “Nothing but equal, all the way,” he whispered into her ear, nibbling gently. “I like French toast,” she answered finally. “With powdered sugar and maple syrup.” “Hey you two – knock it off. I already yelled at them earlier. The lonely, bitter spinster sister can’t take anymore loving displays of monogamous affection.” “Poor Missy,” Charlie simpered, placing an arm around his sister’s shoulders, “always a new age guru, never a new age bride.” “I can still hurt you like when you were ten.” “Nah, you don’t believe in violence.” He grinned. “But just in case, how about a bribe? What say I build you a room off the side of the house so when the time comes, you won’t have to find a place for you and the cats to live?” “Building rooms?” Scully’s eyebrow hit her forehead and Mulder chuckled, taking a seat at the table next to Kelly. “Chuckie finally decided what he wants to do with his life.” Samantha beamed as she slapped new strips of bacon into the pan. “He’s gonna be an architect.” “Building things is my life.” Mulder caught Scully’s eye, saw the gentle teasing she sent her brother’s way. “We should have known all those years playing with Lincoln Logs would lead somewhere.” Laying out in the rain for hours, coming inside only when they felt sleepy. Climbing into a steamy shower together, soaping and washing each other in a way that was sensual, but not arousing. Dressing in a pair of his pajamas – she confiscated the top, and he the bottoms. Crawling into bed and falling asleep, Kelly between them, their joined hands resting comfortably above her head. Snapshot recollections, exchanged between the two of them as the conversation between their respective siblings faded into a low din. He didn’t want to take his eyes off her; he couldn’t. It was all there, right there, behind her eyes. The bits of life they’d just stumbled through together, and the years – the decades, the whole life they had ahead of them. In her eyes, he saw Kelly growing into a beautiful young woman, he saw the children they would have some day, maybe not biological children, but their children, nonetheless. Had he seen it the first time he looked into her eyes? How could he have missed it? It was so obvious. His future, his life was right there, waiting for him in a sea of blue. Ah, but first, he could hear the tones of his sister, demanding his attention. “Yoo-hoo, earth to Foxy Loxy? Your opinion, please?” He turned his head to look at Sam, feeling the familiar gratitude at having such an amazing, loving person in his life . . . . . . and found himself staring into the eyes of Alexandria Romanoff. The first thing he did was look at his watch. Nine minutes. Nine fucking minutes since he had downed his tea. His entire body was shaking. Tears sprang to his eyes, irrational, angry tears he couldn’t blink back. A few spilled out of his eyes before he was able to control them. Loss was like an intense, sharp jab to his solar plexus. The gypsy who’d left a message on his machine earlier that day looked at him kindly, almost maternally. Using his fingers he wiped the moisture from his eyes and took a few deep, even breaths. When he trusted himself enough to attempt speech, he said the only thing he could think of: “Why?” “Perspective.” She smiled, the first genuine smile he could remember seeing from her. “And because you are a man who seeks answers. All answers. Even those that are often left unknown.” “I don’t understand. I didn’t . . . I never asked to know about that . . .” Samantha, alive and well, but not here, here she was gone. Always gone from his life. And now he knew, he =knew= it was possible that she’d lived, had a good life and . . . Kelly. Jesus, there was no Kelly in this world. There wasn’t a different version of her, she just . . . didn’t exist to him. But she did now. He remembered her, what she smelled like, how her nose crinkled when something confused her, he . . . he knew that. Didn’t he? “She exists in this world.” He looked at her sharply. “Can you read my mind?” “When you put your thoughts so clearly on your face, yes. Anyone could,” she informed him. “And she =does= exist here. Her soul was born, just as it was meant to be. She just does not belong to you, or your Scully.” “I still don’t understand why--” “Why must there be a reason?” It almost looked as though he was starting to tick her off, on a personal level. “Fine. You want reason? I give you reason. Your Scully, she is your destiny. No matter how you live your life, she is there. In every life, in every timeline, in every possible existence she is there. Where there is your soul, there is her soul, where there is her soul, there is your soul.” Her lips thinned into a straight line. “That does not happen,” she added, as though it aggravated her. Mulder’s eyes narrowed. “Why did you call me?” She huffed impatiently, some of the ethereal wisdom she seemed to carry with her fading somewhat. “To show you. To . . . show myself. So that we might both see something we were curious about.” He paused for a moment, considering her. What the hell, he thought. He’d never found a more qualified person to ask these questions of, and they plagued him from time to time, when he allowed his thoughts free range. “You say she’s my destiny . . . no matter what path my life takes, Scully is my destiny. Yet I’ve experienced something I can’t explain. Another woman was . . . appeared to be, my soul mate.” She clucked at him. He’d never actually heard a human being make that sound before. “Agent Mulder, I would advise you to be sure you understand the intricate nature of the universe before you go throwing around words like ‘soulmate.’” Her head shook, as though her star pupil had just disappointed her greatly. “Each trip to this world brings with it different obstacles and challenges, sorrows and joys. Souls continue to touch each other, but in different ways. This woman you call Scully - - she is always with you. She is always touching your soul in the most profound way you have ever experienced. Whether she is your lover, your father, your mother, or simply your friend, she is the most important person to you. Do not doubt that the universe is in order.” “Believe me, I didn’t meant to doubt. I am merely . . .” “Curious,” she finished for him. He felt a smile pull at his lips. “Curious,” he agreed. “Very curious.” “Don’t worry, Agent Mulder. This will not upset you for long. You will walk out that door, shaken, but certainly capable of going on. You will go home, tuck yourself snugly into bed and fall asleep. By morning, you will have convinced yourself I was nothing more than a dream, brought on by the lonely holiday season and too much egg nog.” “I don’t think so,” he replied, decisions and consequences settling in his soul, emotions and longings beginning to override more rational notions. “I hope you do remember me, as you knew me. I hope you remember what I’ve shown you. More than that, I hope it brings you some happiness.” He nodded slowly. “I think that it will. Thank you, Ms. Romanoff.” “Alexandra,” she corrected softly. For a moment longer, he looked into her eyes. Slowly, he stood and turned toward the door. He did not look back. As he exited the building, he turned down the sidewalk and hailed a cab. He didn’t bother checking to see if her parlor was still there. He knew it wouldn’t be, just like he knew the Yankees were going to win the Series and Flukemen lived in sewers. The entire ride home, he thought about his other life, about what it meant, about what he should do about it. About what he =could= do about it. Part of him was still numb. Samantha had never been taken in that life. They were close, siblings, friends. To have that and suddenly realize it was never yours to begin with was . . . Sufficed to say, gut-wrenching didn’t begin to cover it. Something else kept filling up his thoughts, though. She was alive. Somewhere, somehow, even though he would never get to know her like that, she was alive, and happy, and safe. And she existed. What about the life he’d shared with Scully? It had been so different from the one they shared now, yet in many ways, achingly similar. He didn’t know what he would say to her; what he would, should, or could do. Scully would be back on the twenty-ninth. That would be soon enough to see her. Besides, he had to sort out his own feelings about the situation, and he didn’t want to have whatever conversation they would end up having over the phone. No, he would wait until she came back from her Christmas vacation. He would wish her a Merry Christmas, and they would do . . . something. He’d play it by ear. No need to set one particular plan in stone. It wasn’t the real Millennium, but it would be one hell of a New Year, of that he was sure. ~ Epilogue- Love is You, You and Me “Love is the emblem of eternity: it confounds all notion of time: effaces all memory of a beginning, all fear of an end.” –Madame de Stael ~ Maybe the world did come to an end on New Year’s Eve. Or maybe everyone she knew had been replaced by clones, programmed to behave just slightly out of the norm. Scully’s gaze tracked her partner’s progress inside her kitchen. He’d been completely bizarre the past few days, and that was saying something, considering it was Mulder she was talking about. Thirty minutes ago, he’d arrived at her door, groceries in hand, mumbling something about an early birthday supper. Puzzled, she’d let him in, because she always let him in, and he’d proceeded to her kitchen without another word, which was where he’d remained ever since. Why oh why can’t I have a normal boyfriend? Even as the thought occurred, she smiled. The answer was simple: because she didn’t want one; because he was all she wanted, and he was neither normal, nor truly her boyfriend. But those weird, quirky parts of Mulder were known to her; loved by her. The way he’d been acting for the past few days . . . was not =normal,= weird Mulder behavior. It was =abnormal= weird Mulder behavior. How to go about broaching the subject with him? Her gentle inquiry into what was on his mind had been met with more bizarre behavior. Questions about her brother Charlie -- who he had never even met -- and his marital status had puzzled her, but Mulder was wont to bring up random subjects out of the blue. So he wanted to know how many children Charlie had, and if he was happy with his wife. The questions weren’t really what bothered her. It was the kiss. Or, more to the point, it was the lack of follow-through that came after the kiss that irritated her. If he’d just come out and say, “sorry, Scully, I didn’t mean it,” that would be one thing. It would hurt, it would be hard to get past, but they would manage. He did not say he was sorry, or that he didn’t mean it, though. But he didn’t say anything, damn him. He just kept hovering, sniffing around her like a dog in heat, all the while keeping himself removed from the situation, gauging her reaction to everything he did. She didn’t like feeling as though she were his own personal science experiment. It had been going on for almost a month now, and enough was =enough.= “Scully, you mind if I flip on some music?” That was another thing! Out of the blue, he gave her a gift the other day at work. “A belated Merry Christmas present,” he’d explained, something akin to a sheepish grin on his face. Once again, they had both agreed not to exchange presents. And, once again, they had both purchased the other a gift. She gave him a book on writing science fiction, which, for some reason, put the most inscrutable look on his face. It wasn’t an odd gift, she rationalized. He’d mentioned wanting to try his hand at writing before. There was no reason he should get a look on his face like the look that he got on his face. Which left only his gift to her. A thoughtful gift, truly, if a bit unexpected. It was a tape, filled with songs he “just thought you’d like, that’s all,” and one very special song. At the beginning and end of said tape, was John Lennon’s “Love.” “How did you know?” had been the first question she was capable of asking. Instead of the answer she’d been expecting, namely, “Know what, Scully?” she had gotten a reply that, at its essence, was true Mulder. “It’s my favorite, too.” Scully shook away the spooky memory and focused on the issue at hand. “Sure,” she called out to the man in her kitchen. “My Christmas present is in the tape player already.” As he crossed from the kitchen, to her bookcase that held her stereo equipment, Scully appraised him carefully. He seemed right at home here in her apartment. Yet another addition to the list of out of character things Mulder had been doing lately: he been spending an enormous amount of time at her apartment. Not just going over case files, as they had done on occasion. But he came over with stacks of tapes from Blockbuster, telling her she got first pick. Or an arm full of Chinese food, claiming to have ordered too much and would she mind helping him out? As if eating free food with him would be helping =him= out. This was the first time he’d actually cooked for her, but it =was= a month before her birthday special occasion dinner, so that was to be expected, she thought sarcastically. He kept leaving candy bars on her desk. And not the ones with coconut, which she hated, but the ones with peanuts and caramel, covered in rich, delectable milk chocolate that she secretly lusted over. If she had done something that day that pleased him deeply, like laugh at one of his jokes, or let him finish an entire theory before rolling her eyes, the candy had almonds. If she played with his tie, or flirted with him openly, in front of witnesses, she got a Three Musketeer’s. John Lennon stopped singing and Carole King started in, belting out ‘You’ve Got a Friend’ for all she was worth. Indeed you do, Scully thought as Mulder once again disappeared into the kitchen. This time, though, she was too curious not to and she followed him. From the doorway she watched him move about her kitchen like he lived there. Given the smells coming from the stove, he actually had some hidden culinary talents she had been previously unaware of. They had been openly flirting with each other for months now. Ever since Mulder’s miraculous recovery, things that had once been layered with subtext and heated stares were now commented on. His touch was more suggestive and it lingered in places it had never dared to before. For her own part, she felt she had become less reserved. With great effort, she lowered her walls on a daily basis, letting the partner she had loved, respected and trusted for seven years inside as close as she could. Still, though, it wasn’t close enough. Yesterday, after he treated her to lunch, he asked her to go cloud gazing with him. It was such an unusual request, so out there that she hadn’t been able to think of a plausible reason not to go. So there they sat, in business suits with SIG saurs resting comfortably inside their jackets, eating hot dogs and fries (Mulder had been immensely disappointed at the lack of chili and cheese) while they cloud gazed. After the food was gone, neither made a move to hurry back to their regular lives. Instead, they laid back on the grass. He had subtly offered her his shoulder and she had accepted, likening Mulder to a human pillow. A very comfortable human pillow, she now amended as the muscles in his back played beneath his black t-shirt. He bent over the stove, seasoning the salmon he’d brought, and she decided he put the finest down pillows to shame. “I brought double fudge chocolate chip ice cream for dessert.” He never turned around to look at her; she didn’t make a sound, yet he knew she was there. Often, she found herself doing the same thing when he entered his office and she was back there, filing or testing something in her “area.” He didn’t make a sound, but she felt his eyes on her, a visual caress she’d read once in a crappy book amongst a pile of crappy books that were just as much not hers as Mulder’s videos weren’t his. “Mulder, is there an inner chocoholic somewhere in you I didn’t know about?” “Maybe.” Thought I was the enigmatic one, she grumbled silently. One song ended, and another began on the tape he had given her. She grinned at it, annoyance with him melting as easily as the strumming of a guitar. “Joy to the World,” by Three Dog Night, immediately followed by, if she remembered correctly, “Old Fashioned Love Song,” by the same group. “They certainly sing it better than I do,” she quipped lightly, hoping to draw him out of his cooking trance for a few seconds. “Matter of opinion,” he murmured. “I’ll take you singing it any day.” Sensing her desire, perhaps, he turned and gave her a smile, nothing too auspicious, but just beautiful enough to break her heart. There was a time in her life when singing songs in the middle of the woods, after having been attacked and chased by a mothman, just to comfort her ailing partner would have seemed unthinkable. Somewhere along the way, though, she had stopped wanting what other people wanted. There were times, of course, that she still wished, that she still wondered “what if?” What if I’d never been assigned to the X-Files? What if I’d never joined the FBI? Would I be happy now? Would I have two point five kids, a husband who worked a boring nine to five job, and some sort of “normal” career? Whenever her thoughts strayed too far into that realm, she determinedly shook them off with a simple thought: What ifs didn’t matter. And even if they did, she wouldn’t trade what she had today for anything in the world. No matter what she had, it wouldn’t be worth it, because she wouldn’t have Mulder. Her life had been headed in such a predictable direction. That was part of why she’d joined the FBI to begin with. Something in her had craved excitement and change. An FBI Agent was assured more than enough of both. Only later would she learn just how much excitement and change she had gotten herself into; working on the X-Files, and taking on the role of Spooky Mulder’s conscience, savior and touchstone. I would have been so deathly bored by my own life, she told his back silently. I would have gone my entire life without knowing what vampire bites looked like. I might never have known what it felt like to bring myself to the edge, poised to fall into an abyss, only to be caught at the last second by my first, last, and only line of defense against the world. You, Mulder, he who has brought purpose to my life and love to my heart. Like magic, just when she had given up hope of finding a true friend, a companion to walk through this world with, he had appeared, a fallen angel with beaten wings and a crooked halo, capable of bringing her to utter madness, hysterical laughter or anguished tears. He moved her and inspired her to look beyond who she thought she was, to be more than the sum of her parts. She had saved him only after he had saved her, a thousand times over. “When did you learn to cook, G-man?” She was desperate, it seemed, for the sound of his voice. Abandoning her post in the door jam, she walked to his side, peeking over his shoulder at their dinner. It even =looked= good, she was pleased to note. “This particular dish is a recent addition to my repertoire, actually.” When she quirked an eyebrow at him, he elaborated. “I thought you’d like it.” “My brother, Charlie, loves salmon,” she began, only to stop dead at his next words. “It’s his recipe, actually.” The silence seemed to stretch on and on. She kept looking at him, waiting for him to explain. He kept looking right back, a kind of half smile on his face, as though waiting for =her= to say something. What was she supposed to say? That was it. Enough was most certainly =enough.= “Mulder, what the hell is wrong with you?” Oh damn, he looked hurt. She hadn’t meant to hurt him, but . . . What the hell was wrong with him?! “There’s nothing . . . wrong, Scully. I think that maybe . . .maybe something’s finally right.” Maybe it was the New Year. Or maybe when he fell through that floor into Henry Weems apartment a few weeks ago his ass hadn’t been the only thing damaged. Had she ever actually run a full battery of tests on him after their most recent misadventures? “Scully, stop looking at me like I’ve got a screw loose. I assure you, I continue to retain my usual level of carefully managed, chaotic sanity.” “Then would you please, just this once, explain to me why you’ve been acting so strangely?” “I would, but I doubt you’ll believe me.” “You always say that,” she pointed out. “You never believe me,” he challenged. “Mulder.” “Fine.” He flipped the stove and covered the salmon. Carefully, he checked that each and every burner was extinguished. Spinning on his heel, he walked ahead of her into the living room. They were changing rooms. That couldn’t be good. Changing rooms meant the conversation was about to get in-depth and serious. Rubbing the corner of her mouth with her tongue absent-mindedly for a moment, Scully trailed in Mulder’s wake. “Where should I start?” “How about at the beginning?” “Okay,” he agreed easily, leaning against the wall nearest her kitchen. “When, in your professional opinion, did I start exhibiting this ‘unusual,’” he made the little quotation things with his fingers that irritated her, “behavior?” “Right after we spoke before I left for Christmas.” She had taken her time over the past few days to pinpoint the exact moment for this precise reason. “You never did tell me about your fortune.” Something flickered behind his eyes, and she honed in on it instantly. Have we hit pay dirt so soon? Walking toward him, she leaned against the wall at his side. Casually, she let her arm brush against his, the contact barely there, but still, enough to send a shiver up and down her spine. Do you know, she wondered, what it is you do to me? Should I tell you? Do you =want= to know? “The woman I met, Alexandra Romanoff, she showed me something I wasn’t prepared for. Something I still haven’t completely reconciled in my own mind.” “What, did she confirm Clyde Bruckman’s prediction of your death?” The joke fell flat and she blindly took his hand in hers. “Mulder?” “Instead of showing me my future, =this= future, she showed me another life. A life that exists out there, somewhere, far from my grasp.” A trickle of unease ran down her spine. “Mulder, I don’t need to tell you that I don’t believe in psychic phenomena, but--” “Scully, this went way beyond psychic.” He looked at her for a moment, his eyes wild and intense, before he turned his head to stare at the opposite end of her apartment. “She gave me this tea, Scully, and I almost left because I thought she was just reading tea leaves.” He chuckled, the sound a bit unstable. “Can you believe I almost left? I almost missed . . . I could have lived an entirely different life, if just one thing had changed. Everything in that life was different. I had my sister, a career that I loved, but I didn’t have you and my life was incomplete.” That was a touching sentiment, and she fully intended to revisit it in a moment, but first, “I’d say it’s much more likely that she slipped something into that tea. Mulder, did you go to the hospital? Are you sure you aren’t still suffering some kind of reaction to a narcotic or hallucinogen?” “I knew you’d say that,” he told her around a chuckle. “Glad to know I haven’t disappointed.” In truth, she was a bit hurt by his words, although it was ridiculous. He wasn’t laughing =at= her, he was just . . . laughing near her? He placed a hand against her cheek and turned her head so that they were looking each other in the eye. “You have never disappointed me, Scully,” he said quietly, a dark, tortured mist passing behind his eyes. “I don’t think you could.” Swallowing deeply, she nodded, feeling the air between them charge. His eyes fell to her mouth for a moment, before once again returning to her eyes. Oh my God, she realized in the quiet confines of her soul. “You’ve been wooing me,” she said aloud, amazed. There it was, that smile again, almost sheepish, but there was too much arrogance in him to completely pull it off. “She showed me a world where the sky was purple, up was down, black was white, and you and I spent the last seven years without each other.” “I hope you’re speaking metaphorically about the first three,” she muttered, at a loss for anything more to say. These visions of lives he could have had that Mulder kept telling her about were starting to frighten her a little. Maybe he wasn’t as satisfied with the path they’d chosen to walk together as she was. “Scully, it was amazing,” he whispered. “I remember every detail so clearly as though I’d lived them. Which, thanks to her, I did.” He brushed a lock of her hair away from her eyes. “I like your hair longer,” he commented absently. “I love the way it feels against my cheek.” That was unexpected. Her eyes narrowed slightly. “It’s easier to comb alien goo out of short cropped hair,” was all she could think to say. “So it is,” he murmured. “Mulder--” “I thought you were my touchstone before. I was wrong. Touchstone doesn’t even begin to cover it.” He laughed, a bit unsteadily. “You are, quite simply, the center of my universe.” Okay . . . so that was . . . what? Mulder’s way of saying “Let’s go steady?” “You were there,” he added, almost as an afterthought. “You were there, and we saved each other, just like always.” Oh God, not this again. Not another insistence that he’d been in some kind of time warp where I saved the world. Don’t do this, Mulder, don’t tell me you love me again when I fear some gypsy gave you a drug that’s been slowly working through your system-- “I’m not crazy, Scully, and I can assure you, I’m in full control of my faculties.” A grin this time, an honest to goodness grin broke out on his face. “I know exactly what it means when I do this,” he murmured, leaning forward to brush their lips together, “and this,” he added against her mouth as he intensified the contact, “and this,” whispered a second before his teeth nipped her bottom lip with the gentlest pressure. It was still enough to coax a moan from her. So surprising, her Mulder, and she had been, thus far, unable to devise a single method of predicting his behavior. The only thing she knew for certain was that if she needed it, he would always save her, in every way a person could be saved. “Mulder, before this goes too far, you should be warned that I’m holding you responsible for anything you say and do in the next few minutes, so if there’s even the slightest chance that you don’t mean it--” “Scully.” Pausing, she looked at him finally, as she’d been addressing his feet until now. “I mean it,” he whispered a moment before his mouth came down on hers, possessive and hard. This must be what flying is like, she thought dizzily as his arms wrapped around her back and pulled her toward him, taking her off her feet. It was like a movie kiss, something written into the end of a fairy tale as the story dissolved into happily ever after. But this wasn’t the end of anything. This was a beginning. The last seven years was a prologue, something to get the audience ready for the real story. This was how it really began. Once upon a time, a man kissed his partner . . . She was climbing him now, as though he were rope, yet he was so much more substantial than rope, softer and harder and warmer and stronger. Their tongues were tangling in each other’s mouths, and just as she had finally gotten into the position she wanted, his back against the wall, her legs around his waist, their almost bruising kiss turned suddenly gentle. Reverent, in the way their mouths made love to each other. Flowing now, in and out. Into his mouth went her tongue, retreating, followed back by his. One of his hands in her hair, sifting through the strands, mouth slanting for the better, cleaner, more complete angle. The hand on her back, moving up and down her spine, tracing each individual vertebra, straying lower, brazenly squeezing her ass without asking permission. Permission granted so long ago, her hands now, not idle, slid from his neck to his hair, down his beautiful sides, to his hips, back again, everywhere she could touch. Caressing slowly, softly, touching everywhere she’d always wanted to. Drinking from his mouth, offering him everything she was, reminding him he already owned it all. Sinfully erotic, his mouth finally left hers, affording her the ability to breathe. It blazed a trail from her jaw to her neck, where it stayed a long while, biting, licking, sucking, marking, adoring. She emitted wordless moans, the veneer of civilization slipping from them both every second their bodies remained in such close contact. Growling, he let her slide down his body and regretfully released her skin from his mouth. She mewled her disappointment, but only for a moment. Her turn, now, as she latched onto the tendon along the side of his neck, paying as much attention to his flesh as he had hers. Fair was fair and besides, he was already occupied again, ridding her of clothing that was quickly becoming intolerable. Blouse, bra and jeans were at her feet in seconds. Amazing skill, Mulder, she commended silently, the chance to say it out loud abandoned as his mouth came down on her breast. He spent not a moment hesitating, nor teasing, nothing but firm, rhythmic sucking, just as she liked it. Beautiful, she thought, once more tangling her fingers through his hair, cradling his head to her breast like a child. But how could he possibly know my body this well? Changing nipples now, his hands sliding down to her hips as he continued his single-minded pursuit. His hands were against her bare bottom for barely a second before her underwear joined the pile of clothes at her feet. Perhaps he had taken a class somewhere, she decided. How to drive your partner senseless. A six-week seminar, with a bonus lesson for the first ten students: removing a woman’s clothing in five easy steps. Sliding, his mouth pressed open-mouthed, adoring kisses over her stomach, moving emphatically downward until his nose brushed her wet curls. And they were wet, yes sir, she was almost, but not quite, ashamed to realize she’d been wet from the moment their forearms had come into contact -- what was it? -- hours ago, at least. It had to be. He’d been doing these things to her for hours, they’d been touching and kissing for-- Oh, his tongue slipped between her folds with unerring aim, skillfully finding her clit. He only lingered there for a moment, though, before going deeper, exploring further. His hands he placed on her ass, copping a feel and keeping her body upright at the same time. A multi-tasker at heart, my Mulder, amazing Mulder, Multi-Tasking Mulder . . . Thank God for the wall, or Mulder’s support or no, she would have fallen down. As it was, her head hit with a thud she barely felt and her hands became anchored in his hair, communicating in their silent way that he =must not move=. How he was able to do this, she would never know. It wasn’t the easiest position in the world, yet he was managing just fine. Better than fine. It felt like his entire face was . . . oh, God, it was. His tongue was buried as deeply inside her as it could go, stabbing and swirling until she thought she would scream at the feel. And then she did scream, because his nose, the nose he thought was too big but which was =just right= brushed over her clit, once, twice, three times and she was out of here, and she had been wrong, =this= was what flying was like. Not even the wall was enough to support her now and she slid to the floor, her boneless body supported by her knees and the strong bulk of the man who took her in his arms. His mouth again, kissing her deeply, tasting different, she could taste herself now and it reminded her of what he’d just done, what it felt like, and that simple memory was almost enough to make her come again. Pulling herself closer to him, she wanted to press her skin to his and . . . was utterly shocked to find him still fully clothed. Her eyes flew to his, dismayed that he had rendered her so completely oblivious to anything but his touch that she’d forgotten to . . . Oh, but now he was kissing her again, and who really cared, she’d get him undressed now. Already she was clawing at the bottom of his t-shirt, breaking the NASA space shuttle worthy seal of their mouths long enough to rip it over his head. And good God, that was better, his chest against hers, warm and fuzzy, like the teddy bear she’d had growing up, but with a decidedly sexual bearing. Yes, her Mulder, a teddy bear to cuddle and fuck, keeping her safe for the foreseeable future, for the rest of her life, forever . . . She had his jeans and boxers halfway down his legs when he made a distressed sound against her mouth. “Scully, not here, we should . . . the first time, the first time should be--” “Wherever we are,” she murmured against his mouth. End of debate, Mulder, as her mouth covered his again. Any further protests he might have made were silenced as her hand wrapped around his cock. A need inside her desperately wanted to be filled. To explore every inch of his body with her mouth, to discover what each patch of skin tasted like. But there was a greater need, something that could not, would not wait. Lying on the floor, she urged him on top of her. Not that he needed urging. The earlier metaphor that occurred to her, that Mulder had been sniffing around her like a dog in heat was further explored as he practically devoured her, panting against her skin as he worked his way up her body. No hesitation, flowing again as her legs wound around him, caressing his ass with her foot, his sides with the tender skin of her inner thigh. His hands braced against either side of her head, her own threading through his hair, eye contact a necessity. There had been seven years of foreplay, most of it conducted through every look and glance they shared. It would somehow betray that if they were to lose the windows to each other’s souls now. Inside her now, thrusting slowly, not getting used to her, not learning how they would move together, but enjoying this first time. There was only one first time, after all, and it was to be savored. Kissing again, their eyes still wide open, languidly thrusting in and out of each other, melding as much of their physical selves as they could. Speeding up, losing patience, the urge to complete, to release the tension overruling the need to stay joined, to stay whole as long as possible. There would be other times, many, many future couplings where they would eradicate the separateness they lived with in their day to day lives. Minutes later, his semen spilling into her body, she felt pleasure that rivaled the orgasm she’d had. He filled her, in every conceivable way and it was everything. As he lost the ability to support his own weight, he collapsed on top of her and she held him tightly, arms and legs securing his body to hers. Their hearts beat against each other, the rapid, enraptured pounding of celebration. His forehead rested against hers, his eyes still open, still communicating silently the thousand truths they shared and experienced. “There aren’t enough realities in existence to fully describe all the ways that I love you,” he whispered against her mouth. “Why now?” she asked, returning his sentiment enthusiastically with the way she still held him in her body, the way her eyes spoke so many volumes to his. “What changed?” “My perspective,” he answered, as though it were a joke she should get. His lips brushed over hers a few more times, gently, paying her the worship he thought she deserved. Maybe she did. But if that was so, then he deserved the same in return. “My perspective is as it has always been,” she began softly, so close to him that their lips touched as she spoke. “And I love you now, just as I always have. With the full depth of my understanding, not only of myself, but of you.” Finally, finally, his eyes shut and she felt hers do the same. Breathing the same breath, bodies melting around each other, souls inexorably twined past the point of distinction, foreheads resting comfortably against each other, their smiles kissed. End “She fights and vanquishes in me, and I live and breathe in her, and I have life and being.” –Miguel de Cervantes