Agapé (Love's Addicts)
by Elizabeth Gerber

Rating: PG-13
Classification: VA MSR
Keywords: Lust and longing <g>
Spoilers: Nothing very telling, but assumes general knowledge through Redux II.
Summary: Mulder longs for Scully and for the closeness they shared in Redux II. He considers the risks involved if they should get involved. I consider this MSR but it's safe for USTers.
Disclaimers: The X-Files and it's character belong to 1013, and Chris
Carter, etc. I've decided that being born on 10/13 myself gives me the
birthright of being a temporary member of the team. LOL Once again, this is based on a poem by Galway Kinnell. The whole poem is included at the end of the story.
Archive: Gossamer, please do. Otherwise, just ask me first.
Author's note: This is just sort of an angsty moment-in-time piece. It's not as good as I wanted it to be, but I don't think it's going to get any better, so I though I might as well post it already. <g> I'm working on something longer that I hope to have out in the next couple weeks.

~~~~~~~~~
"I want to touch her.
Once. Again. I will wait
if I must. Outwait.
Wait so long she will age,
pull even, pass."
--from Agapé by Galway Kinnell

The only good thing about that terribly time was that I could touch her.
Somehow, as the line blurred between life and death, the line between us
blurred as well. And, now, I find we've solidified into separate bodies
again, separate beings, and I still want to touch her. Just once, but once again. I will wait if I must. I'll outwait time, outwait our youth. I see already the wrinkles etching themselves on her face, small lines raying out from her mouth, pointing to the place I want to kiss.

I wonder how many of those lines were put there by me. Her pursed mouth as I explained one of my theories. Her mouth smiling tightly all those times I woke up in the hospital with her hovering over me gently. It pains me to think that I've hurt her in any way, taken away that innocence she had when we met. But something in me is also satisfied to see myself written on her face. To know that I am a part of her as she is a part of me.

Agapé, I read once, is defined as love that is spiritual in nature,
surpassing the sexual, and I tell myself that is what I feel for her. Her sister, Melissa, saw it before she died, saw it when we sat in that hospital waiting for Scully to choose between life and death. She saw my soul, saw that it was Scully's and hers was mine. Missy knew that without Scully I was a dead man.

And yet I'm drawn back to that definition. Why must the spirit and the body be seen as separate entities? I've seen enough, god knows, over the years to refute that. And, I have to admit, I want to hold her, in the flesh, all night. Her skin like the petals of one perfect white iris closing over me, the flashing in her eyes as she looks at me. Clearly, it's more than her spirit I want.

And yet her spirit enthralls me. I wonder at her sometimes. Was she scared when I stood on the precipice at the edge of her beliefs, beckoning her to go forward with me? Did she fear I saw an illusion, that if she passed the point I stood on she would be left alone in the darkness of confusion? And if I died? She has gone to a place, now, where her mother, her brothers, cannot be with her. If I died, she would have to walk alone, at least for as long as it look her to find her way back to them. Back to the reality they live in.

And the chance of a normal life? All the love addicts, these spouses and lovers, lie back, sip their civilized drinks, listen to their Mars and Venus tapes and look at each other with soft eyes. They try to cure us sometimes, as though a touch, an evening in their world can bestow the kiss of normality on us.

Everyone I knew from the university, her friends too I imagine, has found this place. I can see them all, married or whatever, kissing succinctly at 6:30 home from work. Sharing quiet evenings while we chase nightmares down poorly lit alleys. As though they've drank from some cup I've never even tasted.

And what if we drank too? Met in one perfect moment beyond the spirit or body alone, melding the two in the flame of one candle? And what if it fell apart? In fear and longing we could fall into pieces. If she stood before me and told me to understand, to let my love go . . .

And I couldn't do it? It's not really a question. What, then, put a gun to my head? And shoot her into shards as well. Or if she died, could I understand that? To see her dissolving in dry sunlight in a hospital bed? I don't want to lie in a double bed knowing that the other side is empty, that the one who moved beside me is still. The half of my heart that lives, filled with a corpse.

But I know I could let myself sink into that love. I could smile and sit up half the night, laugh. Forget about the pain gone before, the nights when my nightmares went uncomforted. Forget that not all who are out there rejoice in love like this. Perhaps, for now, I shall hold it before me. For if our bodies never break upon each other we can never crumble. I will wait. Outwait. Her youth passes, she will soon pull even and perhaps even pass me. One day, we will touch again.

~~~~~~~~~

Here is the poem I based this story on. If you like it, please check out When One Has Lived a Long Time Alone by the author, or else his selected poems. Both contain a lot of excellent poems, many of which are very Mulder-y to me.

Agapé by Gallway Kinnell

I want to touch her.
Once. Again. I will wait
if I must. Outwait.
Wait so long she will age,
pull even, pass. How
will she like it then if
when I bend to kiss wrinkles
ray out around her
mouth? I want to hold her.
In the flesh. All night.
Flesh like the night
puffs the flower-god
puts on in spring, flimsy
for needing to last
but this one flashing
circuit through her
apparitions. Did she fear,
when I stood with the
precipice at my back
and beckoned, that I was a specter
she would plunge through.?
At the *agapé* love's addicts
lie back, listen
to a priestess discourse
on love rightly understood.
As soon as cured anyone
can get up and go over
and bestow the Kiss
on anyone. Now the others
have disappeared--maybe
cured, probably joining lips
behind doors. It is
the Fourth Cup--the hour
for the breaking of the
transubstantiated body.
What if we break, the priestess
and I, the body
together. And I fall
in fear and longing? And
she commands me to
dissolve in the light
of love rightly understood,
or if I can't, to put
a gun to my head? I don't want
to know that on the other
side of the pillow nobody
stirs, I don't want ever
again to sit up half the night
and laugh and forget not
all of us will rejoice
like this always.

Feedback always appreciated at elixia@mindspring.com