Continued from To Disclosures or Crescendos (2 of 3)
buckingham15@yahoo.com



Right now, she deserves a few hours of normalcy.
Given what his life has held lately, he wouldn't
mind them either.  He wouldn't even turn up his nose
at the damn mini van at this moment.  It's all so
fucking relative.

He coughs, breathing in steam, and feels like he's
choking.

"William is down for the count," he shouts to her,
reaching.  "I don't have a lot of go on here, but I'm
guessing he's inherited your sleeping patterns."

"I don't know," she calls over the roar of the shower.
 She raises her arms over her head to rinse her hair.
"When he's in the right mood, he can be
something of a night owl.  I don't think he gets that
from me."

He smiles, and rubs at his eyes.  The steam is
starting to make him sweat.  He hears the shower turn
off, and Scully's pale hand pushes the shower curtain
back slightly, so her pink face and shoulders are
visible.  He watches the water drip from her hair,
down her face, along her neck, watches the way her
eyes carefully avoid his. Drenched and flat against
her skull, her hair seems even longer where it curves
over her shoulders.  He grabs a towel from the rack,
the largest one but when held open it seems like
nothing more than a scrap to him.  She steps out of
the shower and into the towel so he can cover her with
it.  He dries her carefully, stunned by the raw need
of the moment.

"Thank you," she whispers, and he pulls her back
against him, kissing the sweet, wet crown of her head.

- x -

With the state of things in their world being what
they are, she especially hates disappointing him now,
and that's really the only reason that she manages
to finish half of the creamy onion soup that Mulder
ordered for her. Her turkey sandwich lies virtually
untouched on the hotel china, though, sitting
forlornly in an oily puddle of extra mayonnaise.  He
doesn't comment on her eating habits, just quietly
sets about demolishing the cheeseburger and fries
on his own plate.  Her lack of appetite is hardly a
new development, but she can tell he's contemplating
it when he takes the room service trays into the
hall.

"So what's going on with the X-Files these days?"
Mulder asks, joining her on the sofa again.  "You got
anything interesting to share?"  He does his best
to sound playful, flirty and carefree, but she knows
he's holding back too, that they spent an entire meal
without discussing what really matters.

"I only get involved if Agent Doggett or Reyes ask me
to," she tells him.  "As hard as this might be for you
to imagine, most of it feels like the same old, same
old to me."

He rests his elbow on the back of the sofa, leaning in
towards her.  His eyes look dark and sleepy,
unfathomable, like he's thinking very carefully about
what she's said.

"You're wrong," he says after a moment.  "I can
imagine.  I felt it myself last year.  When I came
back..."  He shakes his head.  "I guess death has a
way of changing your perspective."

She looks down and realizes she's tracing patterns on
his knee, all five fingers swirling against his jeans.
 He nudges her by lifting his leg slightly.

"More important things in life, right?" Mulder muses.
"Still, I have to admit that it will never sit well
with me.  Two people down in that office that aren't
you and I."

He smiles, a bit sadly, and takes her hand, studying
her fingernails.

"I think John and Monica are doing the best they can.
I think they're about as trustworthy as we're going to
get," she says, and it feels like she's been
practicing that line for months.

What else can she tell him, she wonders.  You're damn
right, Mulder.  The X-Files belong to us and no one
but us.  I walk around that office and still look for
you in every corner.  It seems obvious, selfish,
beside the point.

"It's not really the quality of their character that
I'm questioning," he tells her, sounding absolutely
serious.  "It's more a question of temperment. Doggett
walks around like he's had a bad case of constipation
for the last ten years, and Reyes is so out there, she
makes even *me* uncomfortable.  You know that's
something."  He meets her eyes without cracking a
smile.

She grins despite herself, but manages to shake it
off.

"Even if all that is true," she says diplomatically,
"They've both gone beyond the call of duty where
William is concerned.  You--"

He nods, cutting her off.

"Of course, I'm grateful.  That goes without saying."

She shrugs, not knowing where else to take this.  She
and Mulder have been together for so long, have been
the X-Files for so long that it's difficult for her to
objective.  She thinks of a road in Oregon, Mulder and
a can of spray paint, Mulder shouting like a lunatic
at the sky, and her alongside him, shaking her finger
with schoolmarm precision, reciting sections of the
Bureau handbook from memory alone, hands on her hips
to prove she meant business.

"They're us," she says, remembering.  "They're us ten
years back."

He smiles wryly, and she gets the distinct impression
that he knows what she's thinking.

"No," he asserts, with conviction.  "No, I don't think
so, Scully.  Not even close."

She studies the lines of Mulder's face closely, most
of them earned while she was at his side.  She thinks
of every story he ever told her, every mystery he ever
wanted to solve with her.  She thinks of how she
trusted him no matter how far gone he seemed, no
matter how insane he sounded.  She thinks of how many
times she wanted him to be right, how many times she
hoped they'd come back from the ends of the earth with
Mulder's proof on a silver platter, served up pretty
and validating.  She thinks of how they've loved one
another, through every dark, miserable year, through
the frustration and boredom when it was easier to snap
at one another than try and listen, through the crazy,
blissed-out months when it seemed like they were the
only two people on earth.

She smiles over at him, nods.

"You're right, Mulder."  Moving closer to him on the
sofa, she leans into his body.  "Not even close."

He shuts his eyes, like he's listening to music.  His
arm goes around her, while his other hand plays with a
throw pillow.  They have made an art out of talking
around their feelings, in conveying what they feel by
saying every but what really matters.  Easier to talk
about Doggett and Reyes than to actual acknowledge the
truth: they are lost without one another.  They are
utterly dependent on each other, can barely feel
anything without one another.

"Fuck," Mulder groans against her forehead.  "I miss
you so goddamn much, Scully.  You're sitting here,
right next to me, and I already miss you.  Missing you
in anticipation or something."

She runs her hand along the space where his t-shirt
has ridden up from the waist of his jeans, and
stretches up to kiss the corner of his mouth.

"I know," she whispers.  "I know."

She closes her eyes when he pushes her back against
the cushions.  Even in her arms, he seems as elusive
as starlight, moving too quickly for her to really
hang on.  She wraps her body around his, and refuses
to let go.

- x -

Tomorrow night there will be at least three states
between them, and a week from now, there could be as
many as a thousand miles separating them.  All he
wants is something to hold onto, something to prove
that the life he remembers isn't some dream or
delusion.  He wants to ask her to tear up his back
with her nails, so he'll have scars to carry with him,
so every time he steps under the spray of a shower,
he'll feel the sting of reality telling him that it's
all true.

The sofa is narrow, and he feels like they're clinging
to the edge of a cliff, about to free fall into an
abyss.  It would be easier to just roll onto the
floor, but maybe that's not the kind of memory that
Scully wants to take with her, quick and desperate on
a rough hotel carpet.  He's not about to stop and ask
her.  No words, because that's not how things are done
between them.  Why do they need words when they have
this, he thinks.  What could he possibly need to hear
that she isn't telling him right now?  His fingers
grip the fabric of the sofa, trying to keep both of
them from falling.

Scully bites her lip, and throws her head back, like a
spooked horse.  He sinks his teeth into her pale
throat, gifts her with a purple bruise, her own
personal reality check.

- x -

She is piled atop Mulder, feeling broken down to her
essential elements, boneless and rubbed raw, and she
worries that she might fall off, with his chest
heaving as it is.  She is definitely sore, vaguely
uncomfortable, but she loves the feeling.  She loves
that she can still feel the burn in every place Mulder
touched.

She has never been one to dwell on life's small
cruelties or injustices; it has always simply been the
way the world worked.  She remembers her father, in
his naval uniform with its gleaming brass buttons,
bending down to her five year old eye-level, saying
softly, over the thwack, thwack of Bill playing
basketball, of Melissa singing jump-rope rhymes 
and beating nylon against the pavement, "You have to
understand, Starbuck.  Life isn't always fair.  It 
is what it is."  She's never forgotten, never really
took the time to shake her fists at the heavens
and demand answers.  Not until Mulder was taken
from her.  Now she has lost all pride, and rails
against God, the sun, stars and moon, everyone who can
hold their loved ones close and safe at the end of the
day, on a regular basis.  What would Mulder think if
he knew, she wonders.

She sits up carefully, settling in the space between
Mulder's legs, and drags her fingers across his chest.
His eyes are closed, but the corners of his
mouth twitch to an almost smile while he tries to
catch his breath.  Beneath them, the couch is a mess,
but she tells herself that it's someone else's
problem.  The stickiness between her thighs does
remind her of one thing, though.

No birth control.

She feels the panic of a teenage girl, the 'Oh God,
what will I do if...' alarm of girls in tiny
cinderblock dorm rooms.  Six months after his birth,
and she still doesn't know how they were able to
conceive William.  It could happen again, she panics.
Another innocent child used as a pawn in a game so
much bigger than any one of them.  She could kick
herself for being so stupid, so shortsighted, so
careless.  Mulder would too, if she brought it
up.  It'll probably hit him sometime in the next
couple of days, and he'll torture himself endlessly.
She knows him too well.

He shifts, his lashes sticking to the sweaty skin
under his eyes when he blinks in the light.  She tries
to pinpoint what it is that makes him so beautiful to
her, but it's as impossible as when she watches
William sleeping and searches for it in him.  There is
a still a scientist, alive and well, in her head that
wants to analyze everything, to know the reason behind
everything she sees.  She wants answers.  Her heart,
however, has learned to look the other way, to do
nothing but feel.

"You okay?" Mulder croaks.  He lifts himself up so
he's leaning back against the arm of the sofa, and
rubs her neck.

She nods, cupping his knee in her palm.

"Cold?" he asks, with a strange tenderness in his
voice.  Stupid question, she thinks.  The room has
been too warm since the moment they first checked
in, and now they're both sweaty and feverish.  He must
catch on because he doesn't wait for a response.
"Thirsty?"

He is smiling now, aware of how awkward this all
feels, that his solicitousness is only making matters
worse.  He reaches stiffly for the bottle of water on
the table, shakes it in his hand, like he's trying to
tempt her.  Smirking, she takes it from him, twists
off the cap, and takes a long swig.  When she hands it to
him for his own taste, a small bit trickles down his
chin, and he wipes it away, with his usual grace. In
the barely there light of the room, he looks
star-kissed, silvery and luminous, like no one else
she's ever seen.  He has always been that way.

Two years ago, April in full swing, Mulder freshly
returned from England, and Scully had had one of those
rare moments of stunning, gripping clarity that
pushes a life forward.  They left the basement
together one evening, walking away from the Hoover
Building without a thought as to where they were
headed. When she finally came back to herself, pulled
out of some Mulder-induced stupor where the heat from
his body was the only thing she was aware of, they
were on the Mall.  Above, the sky was dark as
eggplant, with indigo swirls near the horizon and
behind the trees.  The wind that blew across smelled
like rain and freshly cut grass.  The cherry blossoms
seemed to have bloomed overnight, and they were pale
and fragile against the plum sky, like sugar flowers
on a cake.  Somewhere, a street performer was playing
the flute, and she could hear some tragic, beautiful
melody just beyond the trees.  Mulder tipped his head
back, closed his eyes and breathed in deeply.  This is
what the world looks like with him, she thought.  This
is how Mulder makes the world look.

Two months later, he was abducted, and the world went
back to its colorless, soundless monotony.

He is rubbing a knuckle into his eye, yawning.  She
reaches over to trace the puckered scar on his
shoulder.

"You amaze me," she tells him, shaking her head.
"From the very beginning really, but you're always
becoming something else, something more to me."  He
smiles, as if he doesn't quite believe her, and plays
with her hair.  "I hate being apart from you, but I
hate it more that William doesn't get to know you,
that he doesn't know what it's like to have you in his
life.  I don't just want him to be safe, Mulder.  I
want him to have everything."

Mulder licks his lips, and his mouth hangs open while
he tries to think of something to say.  She kisses his
cheek, just because she wants to, and he turns into
her, like he's searching for the sun.

"We're going to find a way," he whispers. "We're going
to make sure that kid is safe and happy and healthy.
You have to believe that."

She swipes at her tears with anger, annoyed with
herself.  Mulder takes her chin between his thumb and
forefinger, and kisses her, short and sweet.

"I believe that," she tells him, her eyes still
closed.  "I trust you, Mulder.  You know that."

When she looks up at him, he nods briskly.  She's made
him nervous, she knows, and her guilt rages again.
She strokes her fingers through his hair in apology.

"I should check on William," she says, rooting around
on the floor for basic clothing.

"Yeah," he agrees absently, watching her dress.  He
gestures at the mess they've made.  "I'll try to do
something about this."

She stands in front of him in what amounts to nothing
more than underwear, and they stare at one another for
a long moment.

"Okay," she says, turning.

"Okay," he agrees.

- x -

This is what he is working for, a moment of
astonishing normalcy, of wasted time and evening
routine.  He stands at the foot of the bed, pressing
his fingers against the knot in his neck, and watches.

William's pajamas are bright blue, with small
footballs, baseballs, and basketballs scattered across
them.  Propped up against a couple of pillows, he
looks like a little prince, holding court in their
warm hotel room.  Scully sits beside him on the bed,
in just her tank top and panties, looking through her
travel bag.  The bedside light is harsh, but it only
makes her skin seem paler than bone, thinner than air.
 Her small feet, with their shiny red toes clutching
the dull metal of the bed frame, fascinate Mulder.  He
knows that he could hold one in the palm of his hand,
and it reminds him again how fragile she is.  She
smiles up at him, just as William tries to stuff his
entire hand in his mouth.

"I really wish I had a camera right now," Mulder says,
ruefully.

Scully lowers her head, hair covering her face, but he
can see curved line of her mouth.

"I actually have some pictures for you.  There're a
couple from Christmas when my mother insisted on
putting him in a little Santa suit.  You'll like
those."

Mulder smiles, leaning back against the dresser.

"Any chance I might get a couple of you?"

The hair is carefully pushed back from her face,
though her eyes shift self-consciously.  "I think
there might be a few of the two of us together,"
she says.

He nods, pleased.  Beside him, William's stuffed bunny
lies on the dresser.  He hands it to his son, who has
abandoned the idea of a fist in his mouth and is
looking around for something else to cram in it.
William takes it very gingerly, and starts sucking on
one of the bunny's ears.

"What's this guy's name?" he asks, lying across the
bed beside William.

Scully looks over, and shrugs.  "He doesn't really
have a name.  We call him 'Bunny.'"

William moves his head minutely, almost like he's
nodding, then blinks slowly at Mulder, waiting for him
to react.

"We can do better than that.  Right, buddy?"  Mulder
rubs his finger against the pale terry cloth material
of the rabbit's belly, scrutinizes it carefully.
William laughs, thinking they're playing some kind of
game.  He slaps at the toy trying to mimic his father.
 "He's short and pretty squat.  And let's face it,
this is one funny-looking face."

Scully is at the dresser, unfolding her pajamas, but
he can still hear her restrained laughter.  William
looks up at Mulder, bouncing himself slightly.

"I got it!" Mulder declares.  "How about Melvin?"

Scully laughs outright, turning with her pajama
bottoms fisted in her hand.  "Oh, Mulder, that's not
nice."

"What?  It's a good, honest name.  Right, William?"
He holds up the rabbit, so it's at the baby's
eye-level.  "Say hello to Melvin the Bunny."

William grabs the toy, holds it for a moment, then
dumps it on the bed and goes back to sucking on his
fingers.

"I think you've been vetoed," Scully says sagely,
wandering off to the bathroom.

Mulder huffs out a laugh, smiling despite himself.  He
picks the toy up and plays with the floppy ears.  It
wouldn't be difficult to swipe the rabbit tomorrow
morning, stuff it in his bag and carry it off to parts
unknown, with Scully and William none the wiser.  He
wants so badly to have something to take away with
him, and one fuzzy bunny doesn't seem like too much to
ask for.  But then, it's the one stuffed animal that
Scully brought with them, so it's probably the kid's
favorite.  He rolls over and watches William grab at
the corner of the comforter, try pulling it loose.

He looks down at the bunny.

"Sorry, Melvin," he says, quietly.  "No road trip for
you."

- x -

At home, there are tricks that she employs to fall
asleep.  If William is in the room with her, she tries
to match her breathing to his.   She's counted sheep
on occasion, and silently recited the Declaration of
Independence, Shakespearean sonnets, whatever she can
remember, until she drifts off.  She is almost always
forced to resort to the same last measure, though:
imagining Mulder's heartbeat in the dark and quiet of
her bedroom.  There have been more than enough times
when she's flanked hospital beds, resting her palm or
head on his chest, willing him to come back to her, so
she's well-acquainted with its sound.  She tries to
hear it now, with Mulder lying beside her, but
she can only hear her own, the sheets rustling around
her, a bird warbling out in the parking lot somewhere.

She tries to imagine their lives a year from now,
tries to imagine that they'll have found some
semblance of peace, by their standards anyway.  She
tries to imagine that Mulder and William will have
really gotten to know one another, that she'll be able
to play doting, overjoyed mother without looking
over her shoulder every moment, without waiting for
objects to fly through the air by themselves.  She
tries to imagine that she and Mulder will have had the
chance to get used to the change between them, that
their relationship will not be the same stop-and-start
series of stolen moments that it is now.  She tries to
imagine being able to say it to him, tries to
imagine being able to hear it from him without feeling
her chest constrict -- I love you, said simply,
easily, without death looming, without the fate of
the world on their shoulders.  Just the truth and
nothing but.

"Scully," Mulder says, out of the blue darkness.  He
sounds annoyed.  "I can hear you thinking all the way
over here.  You've got to get some sleep.  There's a
long drive back for you in the morning."

She rolls toward him, but doesn't answer.  There's a
long drive back for her in the morning.  Away from
this room.  Away from Mulder.  She feels a twinge
of homicidal rage.  Mulder presses his lips against
her shoulder, not kissing her but breathing against
her.  Across the room, William makes a groggy,
barely awake sound, then settles down again.  She
can't reach him where she is, so she blindly reaches
out to stroke Mulder's hair.

"He looks like me," Mulder says, quietly.  "He has
your eyes, but otherwise he looks like me."

She remembers what that realization felt like for her,
how it seemed to break her heart and put her back
together all at the same time.

"Yeah," she whispers, but not without her voice
breaking.  "He's beautiful."

Mulder must be shaking his head, because his nose rubs
back and forth against her shoulder, like a tease.
She wonders what he's thinking.  Her mother, she
knows, has avoided pointing out this quirk of
genetics.  She laughs at William's full smile, but only
says, "Oh, he's definitely got those beautiful blue
Scully eyes!"  Maybe she thinks it would be too
painful for her daughter to hear the truth, that as
William's gotten older, his hair has only grown
darker and darker, that his smile is so achingly
familiar, it's no stretch to imagine what Mulder's
baby pictures look like.  Her mother is only trying to
protect her. It hardly matters at this point, Scully
thinks.

Her fingers skip along Mulder's rough cheek.  "I can't
look at him without seeing you," she tells him, but
feeling like she's speaking only to herself.

Mulder lifts his head, but she only sees the shadows
of his face in the dark. She feels him reach out to
play with her cross, the only slash of light in
the room.  "Don't saddle the kid with that baggage,
Scully," he says.  He tries to keep his tone light,
but she understands what he's really saying.  "I mean,
getting stuck with this nose is bad enough."  He
nuzzles against her neck, like a particularly friendly
puppy.

She thinks that William has actually lucked out, that
along with whatever special junk DNA he may have
inherited from Mulder, he's got a face with
character to spare, with a rare kind of expressiveness
that breaks hearts.  She hates herself for despairing
at the sight of his familiar, pretty pout.  She hates
herself for being so ungrateful.

In the dark, she cups the back of Mulder's neck, and
tries to dream.

- x -

He's starting to get sick of these melodramatic scenes
they find themselves forced into again and again, like
they're stuck in some mawkish black-and-white movie
where a fatal illness or shameful secret keeps them
saying good-bye, good-bye, good-bye.

Standing back, balanced carefully on a concrete
parking slab, he watches Scully settle the baby in his
car seat.  The lot holds a few other cars, but it's
barely six a.m., so they're entirely alone.  If there
weren't church bells ringing somewhere behind the
hotel, he might think they were the only ones left in
the world.  There we go again, he thinks.  Buying into
this tragic, overly romantic bullshit.

When William is comfortable, his bunny tucked snugly
under his arm, Scully gracefully backs away, avoiding
Mulder's eyes, so he can say good-bye to his son.  She
is fighting a losing battle with her tears, and he
wants to tell her to pull herself together, get a grip
and accept that this is the way things are, because he
simply can't stand the sight of her weeping openly,
wearing her broken, burning heart on her sleeve for
him to see.  It's just not the Scully he knows.  But
he imagines it's something she heard often as a
child; he can picture her no-nonsense father telling
her to 'Buck up, little sailor,' encouraging her to
smile through the tears, to be stoic in the face of
her pain.  He forces himself to bite his tongue for
that reason alone.

Beside the open car door, he crouches down, knees on
dusty pavement, and looks in on William, who seems
groggy and about to drift off.  Mulder takes
his small hand, strokes it, shakes the curled fist.
When he kisses the baby's forehead, William smiles
through a few impressive spit bubbles, then closes his
eyes.

"See you soon, buddy," Mulder whispers.  "Be good for
your mom."

Scully is standing back by the trees, arms crossed
over her chest.  She tilts her head, looking up at the
dingy sky, and he sees her lips tremble around a
ragged sigh.  He rummages through his bag, and finds
the torn, battered file folder that he's been holding
off on giving to her.  He takes a deep breath, and
offers it to her.

"I want you to take a look at this when you get home,
all right?"  He watches her turn the folder over in
her hands.  "It's a possible answer.  A temporary
solution maybe."

She nods.

"Read it and see what you think."

She nods again, clutching the folder to her chest,
like it's a love letter, a romantic offering from the
heart.  In their fucked up world, he supposes that's
what it is.  It's his way of saying that he wants to
give her everything she's ever wanted.  He hopes she
understands.

"You better get going," he says, checking his watch.
"Me too."

"Mulder--"

"Wait to hear from me, okay?  I'll be in touch."

"How long?" she asks, frowning when she realizes that
he isn't about to answer her.

He lays his hands on her shoulders, feels hard bone
beneath the soft material of her jacket.  She's still
the steely Scully that he knows so well.  Underneath
all of it, she's still there, holding the pieces
together.

"Be careful," she whispers, stepping in close,
wrapping her arms around his waist.  "Take care of
yourself."

"Always."  He smiles against her forehead.  "I know
you'll kick my ass if I don't."

She lifts her head, chin tipped back, and he bends,
presses his mouth to hers, remembering a thousand
moments when he felt like doing this very thing
but held back, savoring the feel of her lips because
it'll have to last him for a while.  When he pulls
away, her eyes are still closed.

"Go on.  Get going.  Before Skinner and Doggett launch
a manhunt," he says, pressing his body against hers,
pushing her toward the car.  She blinks at him,
confused.  "Come on," he teases.  "You know no one can
resist the Scully charm."

She sniffs once, but moves mechanically toward the
car, tugging on the sleeve of his jacket as she turns.
 He waits as she settles herself behind the
wheel, turns on the engine.  He hikes his bag up on
his shoulder, and watches her dark car disappear from
the lot.

He knows how she sees him.  She thinks that he is
driven by some virtuous mission to save the world and
all its inhabitants, and she sees him as noble
and self-sacrificing because of it, if not hotheaded
and reckless at times.  She sees herself as selfish,
as concerned solely with personal tragedies and
dangers.  But he knows the real score: for nine years,
she's saved his world on a daily basis, in ways that
no one else will ever know about.  If this thing is
going to work at all, it's going to be because of the
two of them together.

He looks down at the empty parking space that just
held her car.

Under the lead-colored sky, he starts walking in the
opposite direction.

- x -

Here, then, is their same old life.

Mulder is the answer man, with a pocket full of ready
explanations and a head full of unorthodox ideas.
Scully does the analysis, shoots them down or
helps them float.  It's give and take, point and
counterpoint carried to the extreme, their very own
problem-solving dance.  They've long stopped looking
at their feet.

He is flighty, prone to spilt-second leaps of logic
that would make a lesser man's head spin.  She
requires facts, the simple, basic truths that will do
the job of illuminating their path.  He is driven by
the fundamental idea of family, of holding his
together by whatever means necessary.  She finds her
faith in him, in knowing that wherever he is, he is
moving the black, hopeless heavens and the crumbling
earth to do the right thing, to do what he thinks is
best for her.  Never wavering.  At least once an hour,
he wonders why the hell she's stuck with him this
long, what the hell she sees in him, and she
contemplates all the ways he's blown her life wide
open, every miracle that he's allowed her to see.

At the end of the day, she only prays that he will be
safe, and he only hopes that he won't let her down.
Same as ever.


- x -

The End

- x -



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