HOW I SLEPT WITH MY PARTNER
(WITHOUT REALLY TRYING)
By Jaime LynTHE END, PART TWO
*Hey guys. Nope, this isn't the END, end, but it's close. I'm thinking that I may break the rest of the ending up into two more parts: Three and Four. Then, expect an epilogue. I know, I know. This is absolutely crazy, how long it is taking to post this story. But I swear to you, I will have the whole she-bang up before Thanksgiving, so those of you who want to print it out or archive it can have some Turkey reading material. On behalf of Mulder, Scully, William, and as-of-yet-un-named-baby, I thank you for getting this far. Oh--speaking of babies, anybody have any good names in mind? (And I totally don't mean that as a spoiler. heh.)
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Mulder and Scully:
On Reaching a Conclusion... or a Beginning.
Whatever.
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MulderWasting Time, Wasting Time
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WELCOME TO "MULDER'S
THOUGHTS WHILE AVOIDING THE SITUATION, 101"BACKTRACKING
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When I think of Scully and I, I picture our apartment only a few months earlier. The air was incredibly musty and thick, as the power had gone out and had taken all the lights and air-conditioning with it. One window remained open above Scully's antique writing desk, and the curtains filtered fresh air into the all the dark places. William was asleep in his playpen by the couch, untouched by the electricity failure, and for once our world seemed at peace, at ease.
Scully lit a few candles and turned my halogen flashlight backside-up towards the ceiling. She rested the butt of the flashlight on one of the living room end tables. The yellow lighting flickered on and off her face, highlighting her blue eyes and then throwing them back into darkness. Her shadow flashed behind her, played an illusionist's game with my vision.
The dark was almost unsettling, the room unnaturally silent. I adjusted the black and white Yankees cap on my head and sighed, my hands on my hips.
"Guess you can't watch the game," Scully said, and she flipped a red, handheld flashlight from one hand to the other.
I grinned. "Oh yeah? That's what you say."
Scully shot me a look. "I don't say, Mulder. I know."
"Do you really?"
"Yes."
I made my way to the hall closet, watching as my shadow twisted and played on the wall. With one quick twist of the knob, I pulled open the closet door and surveyed the space behind a few boxes. I grabbed Scully's old, dented radio from beneath an ironing board and yanked out the radio's metal antenna, kicking the closet door closed with my foot. Setting the old metal box down on the coffee table, I tried flipping the dial to a station that might be hosting the Yankees vs. Red Socks game. I mean...I just had to watch the game. I'd been waiting all week for that game.
At first, there was no sound from the old Sony. I banged the top of the tape deck once, then twice. Then the blue display on the tuner finally lit up and I nodded to myself. When the radio sputtered to life, I turned my head to gloat over my victory--but Scully was no longer in the living room. Frowning, I twisted my neck a little further, hoping to spot her within 'I told you so' distance. Frustrated with my efforts, I finally stood up and circumnavigated the couch.
"Hey Dahli Lahma," I called. "It works. What do you think of that? "
In a chair at the kitchen table, Scully idly sat staring into the flame of a scented candle. She ran her index finger up and over the fire, back and forth, back and forth, her eyes widening as she repeated the action again and again. She didn't answer me. Rather, she looked incredibly bored.
"Hey--I didn't start the fire," I teased.
Scully slowly turned to me, rolled her eyes, and went back to the candle. She cocked her head to one side and rested her chin on her fist, her elbow slack on the table.
I sighed and glanced down at the old, Sony, portable radio. I'd been going on and on about the Yankees game for days, and had even bought William a tiny black and white jersey so that he could sit and watch with me. Scully, on the other hand, could not have cared less about baseball. She had informed me on tuesday that if I intended to watch the game, she intended to grade papers in another room. 'Fine with me,' I had said to her.
But of course the power was now out. And thus, grading papers was out of the question.
I shook my head. Moving the dial about halfway down the tuner, I rested the needle on an oldies station. Crackling static, a slight wave of feedback, and Sitting on the Dock of the Bay filtered lazily into the room.'Sitting in the morning sun. I'll be sitting till the evening comes, watching the ships roll in. Then I watch them roll away again, yeah...'
Scully turned to face me again, her head still resting on her palm. Her pinky tapped against her cheek, and she had a quizzical expression on her face. "So, what happened to the game there, slugger?"
I shrugged. "Oh, still raring to go, I'm sure. Good old Yankee Stadium. As a matter of fact, I think Christina Aguilera is singing the National Anthem--" I paused to click the indiglo on my watch--"as we speak. Damn. And me without my 'girl power' t-shirt. I guess it's just as well."
Scully shot me a raised eyebrow, and a look that clearly said, 'your planet is not my planet.' Stifling the urge to laugh, I turned the volume up and made my way across the living room.
Sitting on the dock of the bay, watching the time roll away...
"Yeah, well--" She waved an arm as if in explanation. Her voice was flat and her eyes looked uninterested. "I thought you were irrevocably invested this season. Isn't this the year you finally get that 'Yankees' tattoo on your ass?"
I smirked. "Only if you get 'Rule' stamped across yours."
Scully snorted, the corners of her lips fighting a smile. I stopped just short of the kitchen table and extended a hand to her. "Come on. Didn't you hear, lady?" Scully said nothing, merely furrowed her brows. I grabbed her hand and yanked her up. "The power's out," I finished.
Scully's arms wound reflexively around my neck to steady herself. Our stomachs smacked with an audible 'slap,' and her legs crossed at an odd angle; she had to stomp hard upon my foot to steady herself. I winced, and my knees nearly buckled. Scully had to grind her knuckles into my back to keep me upright. The whole thing was very ungraceful, even if it had been well-intentioned on my part.
Oh, sitting on the dock of the bay, wasting time, ah ha ha...
"Huh. Is the power really out?" Scully asked, her eyes twinkling, her lips dark and inviting in the half light.
I cocked my head to the side. "You hadn't noticed?"
Scully licked her lips. "Hmm...Not sure. I was actually wondering if perhaps something was just amiss."
"Awry."
"Askew."
"Out of sorts."
"That's not an 'A' word."
I let my thumb brush over her cheek and trail down, down to the place where her thoat met her upper chest. "You're right. You win," I said.
Everything I touched seemed to throb and hum. If felt that if I listened hard enough, I could feel her pulse thrumming out of every limb in her body. Scully's heart beat faster, faster--not too fast, but just the right amount of fast. Each beat ticked between us, vibrated against my chest. Her skin was warm, smooth, and sweet--one sensation of Scully blending into another sensation, until there were no rules and no boundaries between us, and I swear she was all around me.
Left my home in Georgia and headed for Frisco Bay, 'cause I have nothing to live for...
Scully and I danced by moonlight, her laughter floating out through the window and into the night. I tried to get her to sing, but Scully refused. Instead, she rested her head on my shoulder and kissed my neck until her lips tired of the task. We swayed back and forth and I whispered into her ear, "Sitting on the dock of the bay, wasting time, wasting time..."
---
BACK TO THE PRESENT:
--I pause at the memory of darkness and music, Scully's lips at my throat, her hands at my shoulders. Once upon a time, Scully and I had fallen in love, and we had dreamed up a life where nothing mattered but the power of that love. We moved in with each other thinking not of marriage or of more babies, but of simply waking up every day next to one other. First we said that living together couldn't work. Then we said that it could. And then for awhile, we just stopped talking about it altogether. And for those few months that we pulled away from over-thinking every tiny detail of every tiny thing... our lifestyle just... clicked. Our situation wasn't right or wrong, or my vision of perfection or Scully's version of perfection, but it was nice. Life was good. For a time, we were happy.
Now, Scully's pregnant. Jesus. I mean... she's PREGNANT. You know?
I stand outside her room with my fingers poised over the doorknob. My feet feel nailed down to the floor. My arms are shaking. Everything good in my life comes down to this moment, to this twist of the knob and the first words that come out of my mouth. I have to go in there. I have to do this right. I know I do---
Not even an hour ago, I was convinced that leaving Scully would be the best thing for both of us. I thought I would be doing her a service, giving her a second chance. Now I know that I was wrong. I could never leave her, no matter how hard I tried or how much I wanted to. Maybe I'm just selfish or inconsiderate, but I need to have her. I need to feel her arms, warm and soft, splayed across my chest every morning. I need the rational arguments, the sound of her heels clicking on tile that tells me she's come home from work. I want her with me wherever I am, wherever she goes. I know that it will take time, that we both need to open up and talk about this canyon that seems to have developed between us, but we've been through so much worse, right?
I close my eyes and think of the baby, new and small and growing inside of Scully. We've created another life together. We made love. We made a child. That means something, doesn't it?
The metal of the door knob feels cold and smooth.
I can do this... I can.
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Scully:Unattainable things:
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SCULLY GOES BACK IN TIME
FOR THE ANSWER:--------
When I was young, I thought I wanted to be a veterinarian when I grew up. I don’t know why—maybe it was because of the Johnsons, who lived across the street from us when I was ten, and had three toy poodles that I used to baby sit for—Poopise, Moopsie and Hannigan. Or maybe I was upset because I had accidentally killed my baby rabbit, Kelsey, not too long after my brother Billy had threatened to use him for bee-bee gun practice. Or maybe I just really liked dogs. I seem to recall wanting a dog very badly. But, as my father often said, “we move around a lot, Dana. It’s just not fair to take an animal halfway across the world, now is it?”
The first time my father said this to me, I was only five years old. We were standing in the middle of a Japanese fish market, the odor of sushi and dark coffee floating around our heads like a fog. Behind us, half a dozen oriental men wearing gray t-shirts with odd letters on the front, jeans with holes at the knees, and black, wet boots, threw wooden boxes back and forth from the edge of the dock, down a long assembly line, all the way to the back of a large truck with some other strange letters on the side. Makeshift, wooden-slatted stands and metal carts were filled with blank, dead-eyed seafood, and stony faced merchants stood in wait. Patrons spilled out from the indoor markets and moseyed down onto the pier, where tall buildings aligned by wire and multicolored paper lanterns towered over the crowd.
Billy, Charlie and Mom had gone off in search of a place to eat breakfast—‘a place that doesn’t make that icky rice,’ Billy had requested. We’d been eating rice with every meal for days now, as was the traditional fare in most Japanese places, but we were starting to crave anything that didn’t get served with chopsticks. So Dad, Missy and I stayed behind while the rest of the family went scouting for food.
Melissa had perched herself in front of a red and white souvenir stand that sold only colorful fans and Japanese parasols. "These are pretty," she said to the merchant, tiwrling a lock of strawberry blonde hair over her shoulder. "Can I spin these, please?"
The dark haired lady behind the counter stared at Missy with an expression of mild confusion. She huffed, but allowed Melissa to twirl one of the pink parasols, although I doubt the woman even understood what Missy had asked of her. Missy was always able to win people over that way. She had 'spirit,' as my mother once told me: 'An inner light.'
Missy threw the parason over her shoulder, giggled, and spun around again and again with her new toy.
I had never realized how lonely it was, having only my brothers—who thought I was too girly for everything--and only my sister—who thought I was too much of a tom-boy for her liking. My mother was my good friend, of course, and she tried really hard to play all my drawing games and all my tree-climbing games with me. My father said that I was his “special girl,” and he took pains to read with me and talk with me, but my family wasn't enough. I didn’t have any real friends. Or at least—I never had them for long.
Us Scullys were always on the move, always picking up and leaving. My mantra was 'never stay too long, never get too attached.'
But I pretended to understand, of course, because I was only a little girl at the time, and because my father was a big navy man and his job was paramount.
Not that this made life any easier for me.
Just as soon as we would settle down someplace, start a normal life for ourselves, the navy would request Dad’s presence to oversee some struggling naval base, or head up some classified operation clear across the coast or worse—clear across the Ocean, and we would have to move again. For the first seven years of my life, until my mother finally put her foot down when we settled in San Diego, the whole family went wherever Dad went. Anywhere Dad got a new position, we went with him.
And I hated moving. I hated that I didn’t have a house, or a fence, or a swing-set, or just a special door to point to, a place on the wood paneling where my growth had been marked with a permanent marker. I hated never knowing whether we would have snowy weather for Christmas that year, or if I was going to have to learn how to say “Excuse me, where is the bathroom?” in Polish. But most of all, I hated the inconsistency. I hated not having friends my own age—American friends my own age. Sure, Nagasaki was beautiful when the sun disappeared behind the turned-up, triangular roofs, and walking all over the place practically barefoot was great, but I wanted something more: a life unattainable. I wanted to listen to the Beatles and to Fleetwood Mac, and I wanted to watch The Sound of Music for once without subtitles.
But I was, as you know, the youngest Scully. And the youngest Scully figured in quite low on the totem pole--especially when compared to Billy and Charlie, who thought moving around was so cool they had to learn the languages, and to my sister, who only wanted to buy a lot of colorful fans and parasols and never go to school. And then there was my mother, who had given up stability and normality to be with the man she loved.
So anyway, there we were, my father and I, both of us just standing in the middle of a Nagasaki fish market waiting for Mom and Billy and Charlie to come back. We’d come to this fish market every morning for a week, as the view was nice and the pier was on the way to town, but already I was bored to tears with all aspects concerning fishing. The smell was bad and the fish kind of scared me; I didn't like watching people gut them, as I felt terribly bad for the fish.
So, I watched quietly as little men with funny shirts hauled boxes back and forth, all of them jabbering on and on in a strange language. It had been almost two and a half weeks since we had all come here, since we had started shopping in the villages, and still I hadn't been able to learn "where is the bathroom?" in Japanese. This fact troubled me. Usually, by two weeks, I had 'where is the bathroom' and a few other phrases down pat. Somehow, something was wrong with my brain. I wasn't comprehending anything anymore.
Just then, an incredible wave of loneliness hit me. I realized something that bothered me immensely: nobody in Japan dressed like me or talked liked me. Nobody looked like me either, and with my red hair and my blue eyes, I stood out like a brick house in the middle of a desert. I was sick of being gawked at. I was sick of the sound of words I didn't know. I didn’t speak Japanese and I didn’t want to. What I really wanted was a bagel and some fruit punch.
So I turned to my father, intending fully to ask him about the fruit punch. But instead of words concerning food, the following random items just tumbled out of my mouth. I don’t even know where, exactly, the idea came from.
“Daddy, can we please get a Doggy? Please, please. I promise to take care of him. I'll walk him and play with him and make sure he is never hurt. ”
Now, my father wasn’t a small man. Standing nearly six feet tall, he had a proud, stout waistline, and broad, perfectly poised shoulders. He had thick, warm hands that were the safest hands in the world, and a round face framed by small tufts of gray hair that he brushed back above both his ears. Daddy was regal and stern, and he usually dressed in his navy blues, as he was almost always working. But that day in te fish market, my father had not gotten into uniform. He had pulled on an old pair of jeans and a crisp, white shirt. He looked more like a dad at that moment than I had ever seen him look before, and maybe that was why I chose to ask him.
At my request, my father kneeled before me and smiled.
“Now Starbuck,” he said, using his special nickname for me, “You know we can’t get a dog.”
I turned for a second to spy on Melissa, who was giggling and prancing about in front of the Japanese vender with her pale pink parasol spinning over her head. I had never been interested in parasols or lacy fans like my sister was, although I had tried very hard at pretending. I had nearly forced myself to go shopping with her at all the booths in town. Missy was my only friend here in Japan, and she liked pretty things. If I didn’t like what she liked, I didn’t get to do anything at all. It just wasn't fair. I wanted something for myself.
“Please,” I said to my father, and I really meant it. I really, really wanted a dog. “If we can just find a good dog maybe he can come with us and be my friend.”
My father looked at me then—as if perhaps he had never really looked at me before, and he smiled a very sad looking smile. “Now, now,” he said, and he patted a firm hand to my shoulder. My father was never the most affectionate man, and our relationship usually was more awkward when he hugged me than when he didn’t. So a squeeze of the hand or a pat to the shoulder generally meant that Captain Scully loved you, or that he was proud of you.
“You’re my strong girl,” my father said to me. “And you make me so proud because you’re so smart. I know you understand why we can’t have a dog. I know you understand that it would be unfair to the dog, and that it would be impossible for us to take him around with when we go places.”
I nodded as if I understood, but really I didn’t. I wanted a dog. I wanted a home. I wanted a friend.
“Yes,” I said, and I forced the tears out of my eyes with the back of my hand. I steeled my face and, using the nickname I had given my father, said, “I understand, Ahab.”
“Good,” my father said. The thin smile on his face indicated that he considered the subject closed. I waved my arms back and forth unhappily at my sides, and Dad pointed towards the white and red booth where Missy stood with the parasol. “Looks like your sister’s in love.”
“Uh huh,” I answered, although I didn't care. I had turned back to the little men who started throwing the boxes again.
My father's hand rested on my shoulder. “Do you want a parasol, sweetie?”
“No thank you Daddy,”
“A fan?”
“No thank you, Daddy.”
"Are you sure?"
"Yes, Daddy."
I took my father’s hand and stared out at the endless, gray sea bordering the fish-market’s port. How long till we leave again, I thought? A month? A week? Would I ever be able to have a normal life? A place to call home? Would my mother finally tell Daddy to stop—that she was sick of all the moving around?
For years after that day at the fish market, there would be tension between my father and I. My mother said that we were just too alike, that our ability to distance ourselves from difficult situations rendered both of us incapable of coming to an impasse.
I don’t know. I think I was just angry--about the dog I didn’t have, about the years of stability I’d lost as a young child, about never being able to grow past the image of that small child my father saw in the fishmarket.
"I just want what's best for you," my father would say. "You're so smart, Starbuck. You can do anything you want to do if you'll just keep a good head on your shoulders."
More often than not, Ahab would make my decisions for me. He’d tell me what I wanted, what I needed, and how I should go about obtaining it, even if what I wanted was truly the antithesis of what he suggested. And I listened to my father even when I wanted to scream. Everything was yes Ahab. No Ahab. I promise Ahab. I did what my father wanted me to do because I loved him, and because I was too wary to fight with him. I loved my father too much to see him disappointed in me. I gave up on my dream of veterinary school because my father said that veterinary work would not be as lucrative as a career in practicing actual medicine, or actual surgical medicine. (I believe he used the word actual several times.) I attended Georgetown University instead of U.C Berkeley, because my father insisted that Berkeley was too radical a place for a young girl. I listened to my father right down to the letter, right up until the day I decided to join the FBI.
The day I signed the papers to attend Quantico, the FBI Academy in Virginia, was also the day I finally broke away from my father. I knew he was unhappy with my decision, but I felt justified in finally doing what *I* wanted to do. For the first few years following graduation from Quantico, and my first few years with the bureau, my father and I barely spoke. We just didn't know what to say to each other. I knew he loved me, even if my life had turned out differently that he expected, but he didn't know how to communicate with me. I'd like to think that he was proud, just as my mother said he was, but I could never truly make myself believe. The last time I ever saw him alive was also the first time in years that he hugged me. I remember believing, at that moment, that things would turn out alright. I was finally free.
But then everything changed.
During the last year of my father's life, I was assigned to the X Files, and to Mulder. Soon everything in my life-- instead of coming back to Ahab-- came down to listening to my partner, to following him, to doing what he wanted to do, even if it wasn’t necessarily what I thought was best.
During my early years, I’d been my father’s girl: Yes, Ahab. No, Ahab. I promise, Ahab. When my father died, I became my older brother’s girl: Fine, Bill. Okay, Bill. I know, Bill. As my time with the X Files progressed, I became Mulder’s girl: Okay, but this is crazy, Mulder. Fine, I'll come and get you, Mulder. Yes, I'm on my way, Mulder.
I think that perhaps I’m sick of following people. I’m sick of those I love telling me what is and is not for my own good.
I want to figure out who I am—by myself.
I want a house in suburban Maryland, a place where I can carve William’s name on the wood paneling by the door, where he can run his hand over the notches when he’s older and wonder, “where has all the time gone?” I want a garden with daisies and those little signs that have the names of the plants written on them. I want a nursery full of laughter and a bookshelf full of children’s movies. I want a dog and maybe, somewhere down the line, I want a cat as well. I want to drive to ballet lessons and soccer lessons and every once in awhile I want to walk around the house in fuzzy-bear slippers just because I can.
I want stability, and I want it right fucking now. I don’t want to live my life always looking over my shoulder, always wondering whether somebody is after me, or whether some shadow man is going to take my children away. I don’t want to worry about Mulder leaving me, about him going off search of “the next big thing,” because nowadays he wakes up over a cup of orange juice and a table full of dirty dishes, and he just can’t look at me the way he used to.
So maybe Mulder really does belong to the truth, and I really do have a problem expressing my concerns, but I don’t have the luxury of taking the time to figure it out—not anymore.
I’m pregnant. Fucking pregnant.
I need to give my children the very best I can offer them, and I can only accomplish that by putting them before myself. I don’t want my son to one day look at me-- in the middle of some remote desert, as we run and hide from forces unseen and unknown, and ask, “Mommy, why can’t I have a doggie?”
I won’t do that to him. I can't.
And so here I am.
--
SCULLY FINDS THE EXTRA TAPE AND
TURNS ON THE RECORDER:.
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“Agent Mulder and myself have been spending the past few hours…debating and arguing over the best possible ways to define and summarize our lifestyle together. And I think that, ultimately, the truth is this: there is no way to easily categorize or compartmentalize my existence with Mulder. While, according to traditional standards, we probably fall outside the rubric, or the technical definition of the term ‘family,’ we have, in fact, been living together as such a unit for the past year or so…although Mulder and I have been a source of familial comfort and support to each other for much longer than that. The depth of my devotion and my… my affection… for Agent Mulder has never wavered—not during the years we were partnered, nor during my difficult pregnancy, nor during the emotionally trying year that followed the birth of our son. The physical boundaries of our relationship may have changed, but the relationship itself has not. Our son, William Mulder, is the product of that faith and trust-- a miracle of sorts that would never have existed if not for this man that I call… I call….
“I call my partner. Thus, after having considered all possible options and weighing carefully all the consequences, I have decided to do the only thing I can rightly do for myself, for William, for the future of our family, and for this man—Mulder, the person I call my partner… in all things. This is the hardest… the hardest thing….God…
"…
“…I am going to let him go. I have to. I’m doing it for Mulder, for his journey, for his truth, and because I—I—I can’t live in fish markets anymore—“
“Scully?”
“Jesus!”
“You have the tape recorder going again?”
***
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CLICK
---
****---
Mulder:
On dealing with Fishmarkets
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“Mulder. You startled me. I—when did you come in?“
Scully stares at me with widened blue eyes, her right hand fluttering at her chest, the other hand clasped around a tape recorder. A tumble of red hair tangles about her pale cheeks, the ends curling just above her shoulders. Scully's expression is flustered, nervous. Her blue hospital gown crinkles at her midsection; a white bracelet encircles her wrist. I can smell her shampoo from here--honeysuckle, same as always. Her voice echoes in my mind, replays over and over and over and--
I'm going to let him go... I have to.
I'm going to let him go.
Let him go.
GO.
What the hell does she mean? That she's going to leave me? No. I don't--I can't accept that. We've lived through bullets and spilled blood, contagions and retro-viruses, aliens, death. I've followed her to the ends of the Earth and back. I forced her to stay behind when I went back to Oregon because I would never want anything happening to her. I sacrificed myself because I knew it was best. And you know what? I would die all over again in a second if I thought I could keep her safe that way.
Christ. She can't leave me now. She can't go. I'm supposed to be the one--I'm supposed to go first. I'm supposed to make the sacrifice--to keep her safe, to keep William safe, to make sure they're happy and taken care of. How can I protect her if she leaves?
“When you were saying…" I rake a shaky hand through my hair, clear my throat. "You were saying something about… leaving? I ...came in when… you…you want to leave me? Scully?”
I don't even remember how or when I walked into the room. I just did. Somehow I opened the door and I got my feet to move. I managed to open my mouth. I even felt optimistic about it. God, what was I thinking?
I blink and stare at the clock on the far wall. Clocks everywhere. Clocks all around me, ticking the time away.
I look down at my shoes and try to calculate the amount of time it took for me to muster enough courage to walk through that doorway. Ten minutes? A year? Seems like a year. Jesus Christ, she's pregnant. She's pregnant and she's going to leave me. She's going to take the baby with her. William and now... now---
Scully shifts one shaky hand from her chest to her lips. Her eyes are watery but the tears don't spill over. “Oh.... Mulder. I didn’t—“
Angry.
Very.
Angry.
“I don’t quite… understand, Scully." I shove the hand through my hair again, wishing like crazy that I could turn back the last eight hours of my life. "Help me out here. You want to leave me? To quit? After everything we’ve been through, you're walking out. Just like that?”
Scully's saying something else, her knuckles pressed over her mouth, but I can barely hear her. She's mumbling. The roaring in my head is loud, way too loud. I think it sounds vaguely like “—Mean for you to hear—“
I shake my head. "What?" I ask.
Softer this time, and without her hand over her mouth. "I didn't mean for you to hear that."
The roar of blood thumping through me sounds like lightning crackling through the trunk of a tree. I can't deal with this. I can't. Scully's pregnant. Did she know that before we got here? Was this what she was keeping from me? What about her lost fertility? What does all of this mean? Either Scully got her fertility back or she had never lost it in the first place. Frankly, neither option is wholly convincing.
I'm going to leave him. I have to...
Damn it. No.
I would have walked away if I thought she'd be better off. I even spent an hour today contemplating when and how we would go our seperate ways. I wanted her to have a normal life, a picket fence, a man worthy and capable of giving her all the things she insists I cannot give her. I would have pushed my feelings aside to see her happy, to see her living her life the way she always wanted to live it. But Jesus Christ, I'm not going anywhere now. She has to know that.
I close my eyes. “You… you what? You WHAT?” I ask, not knowing what else to say.
Scully sighs. “Mulder....calm down,” she says. "Please. I need you to keep a level head."
My eyes flutter open, and I'm not quite sure I heard her right. “Calm—level head? God, when did you mean for me to hear about this? When I come home from work one day and everything in the apartment’s gone except for the fish tank? Or maybe you wanted me to hear it from someone ekse. How about Assistant Director Skinner? He sure is a swell guy--”
“Mulder. Don’t do this.”
“Don’t do what?"
Scully's eyes, blue like the sea. I teased her once--
So, I'm sitting on the dock of the bay, watching the tide go away...
I swallow. My throat feels tight. "Christ… Dana—“
She closes her eyes and shakes her head. “Dana," she repeats in a low, disbelieving voice.
Sitting on the dock of the bay...
“Damn it…" I wait for her to open her eyes and when she does, we stare at each other over an expanse of unspoken questions. "I love you.”
“God, Mul---" She stops. A tear finally travels down her cheek, but she ignores it. "I love you. You know this. I…I’m sorry.”
Sorry? Sorry, right, sure. I forgot that sorry makes it all better. Fuck.
Sitting on the dock of the bay, wasting time...
I can't get that fucking song out of my head. Driving me crazy. All these thoughts I can't stop from thinking--and that song. That motherfucking song. I feel like throwing something, like banging my fist against the wall until I break every single bone in my hand.
“Sorry about what?" I ask. "Sorry that I knocked you up again, or sorry that you’re leaving me because of... because of..." I throw my arms up in the air, exasperated. "I don't even know what...”
Scully's face flushes red, then white. Her hands fly to her throat. “Oh God…”
I narrow my eyes. “Pick one.”
The air between us thrums with pure energy. For a half second there is silence. Christ, I feel like I'm going to pop.
“You....You know,” Scully says, her voice strained, her eyes wide and rimmed with pink.
I take a step closer to the bed and clutch the foot of it with shaky fingers. “I know.”
----
Continued in "The End, Part THREE."