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Title: Lunch with Tara, Dinner with John
Author: Sarah Segretti Email address: mrsblome@yahoo.com Rating: SA with memories of R; ScullyAngst Classification: PG-13 for a few bad words and memories of discreet smut Spoilers: Mostly Arcadia, plus 2F/1S, Tithonius, Christmas Carol Disclaimer: Not mine. Just playing. A fictional version of San Diego, where I’ve never been. Archive: Anywhere, just keep my name and address on it and tell me so I can bookmark your site. Summary: What Scully did while Mulder was trashing mailboxes, planting flamingos and drinking orange juice. Author’s note: It always bothered me that Scully had to play married in a city that would have serious emotional resonance for her and no one bothered to mention that. Then the title popped into my head, and voila, story. Oh, and a confession. Until Biogenesis, I thought colonization was still on its way. Since I began writing this before Biogenesis, Scully does, too, sort of. Lunch with Tara, Dinner with John
By Sarah Segretti
San Diego County Mulder waves at me from the concrete slab that passes for our porch. The architectural monstrosity serving as our temporary home looms over him, dwarfing even his tall frame. In his blue polo shirt and olive green Dockers and that horrible braided leather belt, he looks fat and suburban and happy. Not that he’s really fat. I’ve seen evidence to the contrary. A little thicker in the waist than he used to be, maybe, but he’s getting older. We’re both getting older. Why do Dockers make even a thin guy look 15 pounds overweight? “Have a great day, honey muffin!” he calls out gleefully. “See you tonight!” He’s enjoying this all a little too much. And he had the balls to accuse *me* of wanting to play house! I wouldn’t be surprised to find him mowing the lawn when I get back. My hand on the door of the minivan, I turn to look at him. He’s still waving, but then he blows a kiss at me, the son of a bitch. One of the neighbors is in his driveway, about to climb into his Ford Explorer. He’s watching us. I grit my teeth in an approximation of a perky smile and reach out to catch the kiss. Mulder looks absurdly pleased. “You have a great day, too –“ oh, crap, nicknames, I’m awful at this… “—love puppy.” Now he just looks like he’s trying not to laugh. I am going to shoot him again someday, honest to God I am. The neighbor gets into his stupid useless vehicle, and I climb into our minivan. In the shopping bag I’ve already tossed on the passenger seat are two Ziploc bags containing blood and hair samples we took from the ceiling fan in our living room and the snout of Cami Schroeder’s Chihuahua. Yo quiero a little evidence. Too late I remember that Mulder was driving the last time either of us was in the van. He’d found the most tasteless classic rock station on the dial – one I remember Bill listening to when we were kids, as a matter of fact – and relived his high school days at the top of his lungs all the way from the San Diego Police Department’s impound lot to the front gate of this charming planned community. I think he’s still miffed that I wouldn’t play Joe Perry to his Steven Tyler. What boils out of the speakers as I turn the key in the ignition, though, is not Styx or Skynyrd, but Nirvana. Guess the definition of classic rock has changed. “Married –“ Kurt Cobain’s dead voice howls. “Buried—“
I turn up the radio, and this time I sing along. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Interstate 5 How do I hate this assignment? Let me count the ways. I hate that our AD clearly sees it as couples therapy. Thank you *so* much, Walter. I know how much money you’ve got invested in that damn pool, and not only is interstate gambling a federal crime, so is insider trading. I hate that we’re in my hometown and shouldn’t let anyone know we’re here for fear of blowing our cover. Okay, I did just see Bill and his family at Christmas, but it still seems wrong not to call him. Mulder was disappointed, too; he was dying to flash his wedding ring in Bill’s face, even if it was just a plain gold nothing he borrowed from the evidence room back in D.C. At least I think that’s where he got it. I don’t recall him actually picking out anything when we went down to browse through the spoils. Anyway. I hate that I may not have the time to visit Emily’s grave until the case is solved. Enough said there. I hate going undercover on general principles. In fact, I’ve never been undercover. I’m a terrible actress and a worse liar. Mulder’s the bullshitter, not me. I would have loved to have had some time to prepare for this case, but we were just thrown into it with no chance to decompress from our last one. Speaking of which, I hate sitting here, in rush hour traffic in my minivan, watching the strip malls and office parks crawl by, knowing what I know about extraterrestrial retroviruses and civilization-saving vaccines and governmental conspiracies and being sent off to investigate disappearing yuppies instead. Mulder says not to worry about it, that it’s been taken care of. There’s nothing for us to do, he says. When I ask him how he knows that, he just shrugs, and won’t answer. His attitude really pisses me off – and scares me, too. This is the last topic I ever thought he’d be cavalier about. There’s something he’s not telling me, as usual. Frankly, I’ve begun to wonder if he hasn’t finally slipped over the edge into clinical depression. He’s been showing signs of it for months – the careless grooming (that haircut!), the sloppy clothes, the erratic work habits – ever since we lost the X-files. But seeing him in this new setting, I have the awful feeling that now I know what Mulder would be like on Prozac, and it’s not a pretty picture. And that brings me to the number one reason I hate this assignment: I want to play house, too.
But it’s too late.
San Diego Police Department labs The lab technician – Carlos is his name – holds one of the Ziploc bags up to the light. “Hair and blood?” he asks doubtfully. “That’s what we thought when we recovered the samples.” But suddenly I’m not so sure either. The color is all wrong, too dark, and the texture too lumpy. In fact, it almost looks like the gunk I saw growing in the bottom of our old office coffeemaker after we’d been out of town for a couple of weeks. Took a fire to clean up that mess. “Well, this looks like the most interesting catch I’ll get all day.” Carlos smiles at me. That carefree flash of teeth, that unconscious toss of his longish dark hair, makes me think he’s got a boogie board waiting for him in his locker. He looks like a sweet guy – and for some reason I think of Pendrell. Poor Pendrell. I thought of him a couple of days ago, too, as I recited the date into the video camera and realized that I’d turned 35 years old the day before and no one had noticed. Not even me. 35. I feel like I’m 75 some days. I looked at myself in the mirror this morning as I fixed my hair and put on my dumpy Laura clothes and saw a very old, very tired woman. I looked better when I was dying. Thank heavens “Rob” didn’t seem to notice the date, either. I don’t even want to know what he would think an appropriate gift for a milestone birthday like that would be. “—Agent Scully?” “Sorry.” I pull myself out of my mini-funk and search the part of my brain that had been listening. Ah. “Today, if you could. I’d like to get the results to my partner tonight.” “No problemo.” He smiles at me again, and I’m surprised to detect something more than mere professional courtesy in his expression. I’m also surprised to feel my cheeks warm. It’s been a long time since I noticed a man looking at me like that. A man, that is, who isn’t a vampire, or trying to kill me, or Mulder. I tell Carlos he can reach me on my cell phone or at the local field office, and I leave him to his work. In the hallway I think, Mulder. He didn’t understand that I was joking last night about the toothpaste and the toilet seat. I grew up with two brothers and one dad in cramped Navy housing, for heaven’s sake. Does he think I’ve never seen a raised toilet seat before? But I’m not good at leavening a tense situation with humor, and Mulder’s a tough room right now. He thinks that just because he explained his actions during the last couple of weeks – explained, but never apologized for – that everything is going to be okay. Sometimes I almost think that, too, but then I remember the way he insulted me in front of the Gunmen and my hopes come crashing down again. If we’d been sent on this assignment three, four weeks ago, before Cassandra was found at Potomac Yards, after we’d spent Christmas Eve sleeping on his couch – spooned up, God help me, like baby cats – If, if, if. He doesn’t suspect the real reason I shrug him off every time he tries to touch me. It’s not because I’m still mad at him over Diana, although I am – and that thrill-is-gone crack last night didn’t help any. Fuck you very much, buddy. No, every time he touches me I want to cry over what we had, and what we lost, and what’s been nearly damaged beyond repair. It’s going to take time for me to get over his lack of faith, a lot of time. It’s going to take more than a pat on the bed and a wiggle of the hips. “Scully, FBI.” That dry voice stops me short, and I look up into a very familiar face. “Detective Kresge!” He gives me that half-suspicious, half-amused look I remember all too well from the Sims investigation, when he thought I was nuts. “What brings you to town?” “The FBI was called in to consult on a series of disappearances…” “Oh, the Falls at Arcadia.” He nods. Right. Of course he’d know. “That one’s been a baffler. I thought we were going to tap the local field office.” “My partner and I have –“ I hesitate. “We have expertise in this kind of case.” I never told him just what Mulder and I specialized in. He gives me a very peculiar look. “I’ll bet you do.” He’s thinking about Emily. He took a faceful of green alien ooze. He’s not stupid. He still thinks I’m nuts. “That Mulder character, is he still your partner?” I nod, wondering where he’s going with this. It didn’t sound like he’d meant any offense. “Don’t know if he ever told you this, but I called your office a few weeks after you two left town, wanting to see if you had an explanation for what happened at the nursing home. He said you were on vacation.” Mulder never mentioned that. A few weeks after, I was in Maine, trying to regain my bearings but microwaving killer dollies instead. I feel a sudden twinge of nerves. You. Me. Not “you two.” Of its own accord, my left thumb slides up over the base of my left ring finger, covering what’s there. “Did he have an explanation?” Kresge laughs. “Not one I believed.” He pauses. “I was sorry to hear about the little girl.” “Thanks.” I duck my head. Thinking about Emily isn’t so hard any more. Talking about her is. There is an awkward silence. Death is such a conversation killer. “So, uh, what are your plans for the day?” he asks. “Well, your lab is running tests on some possible evidence we uncovered, and I’ve got to check in with the field office – “ “Would you have time for lunch?” The question is casual. Way too casual. My thumb rubs over the ridges and edges of my ring. The answer comes automatically. “Ah, no, I couldn’t. I’ve got – “ What? What possible excuse could you have for turning him down? “To meet my sister-in-law for lunch.” “Maybe next time, then.” He has the grace to sound disappointed – and then I realize he is. “See you around, Scully FBI.” The sound of his voice lingering on that final “I” feels like a soft finger caressing the line of my jaw. Luckily, he’s already walked away, so he doesn’t see me shiver. Now, apparently, there are two men in the world who can turn me on just by saying my name. Nervously, I twist and pull at the ring. Dammit, my finger’s swollen. It won’t come off. Wait a minute. So what? I’m not really married. “Detective Kresge!” He’s about to round a corner, but catches himself in time. “John.” John. Well. “Are you free for dinner instead?” His smile is slow and sweet. “As long as I don’t get caught up in a case, sure. You know where to find me. Dana.” Indeed I do. My heart is pounding as we go our separate ways, with fear and nerves and schoolgirl jitters and something else I don’t like. Guilt. There is no reason to feel guilty, absolutely none.
Okay, I did lie to him about lunch. Guess I’d better call Tara now.
Downtown San Diego Carlos recommended a new brew pub a few blocks from the police station. He swore it was suitable for kids, that he’d taken a college buddy and his family there a couple of weeks ago, and darned if he wasn’t right. The high chairs are lined up against the low barrier that separates the brewing area from the restaurant proper. I lean against one, waiting for Tara and Matthew. Bill’s trapped in a meeting at Miramar. Just as well. While I scan the doorway, I think about Carlos’ preliminary results. Neither hair nor blood. Not even human. Puzzling. “Dana!” Tara’s voice carries over the murmur of the lunch crowd. I *knew* I should have told her to call me Laura. She’s pushing a dozing Matthew in a light blue umbrella stroller, her hair pulled back in a ponytail. She hasn’t quite lost all of the baby weight, but she still looks good. Happy. She’s hugging me, and touching my hair. “You look great! How are you feeling?” Thanks to Mulder, my entire family found out I’d been shot by Special Agent Peyton Moron. It sent them all into a huge tizzy, but I was glad he’d told them. I need to stop keeping important information like that from the people I care about. “I’ve recovered,” I tell her. The word “fine” has been banished from my vocabulary. “I love your hair like that!” “Thanks.” I pat it self-consciously. The curls give me a softer look, and I kind of like it, too, but I can’t imagine taking the time before work every morning. Tara’s face freezes, and I realize she’s looking at my left hand. Before I can explain, she lets out a shriek that can probably be heard clear out on Autumn Terrace and grabs my hand. “Oh my God Dana when why didn’t you tell us let me see oh my God this is so great—“ Heads are turning to look at us. I try desperately to shush her, but she’s on a roll. Please, God, don’t let any of my new neighbors be here. This is why I shouldn’t have contacted her. Shit. “Fox it is Fox isn’t it it’s about time Mom will be so thrilled –“
“Tara.” I actually put my free hand over her mouth, wondering when
she got permission to use that other F-word. “It’s not what you
think. Sit down and I’ll explain it to you.” “Well, it’s still a pretty ring,” Tara sighs after I give her the real story. “And at least I won’t be responsible for giving Bill a heart attack.” At that, I chuckle. “We thought about having you out for dinner, but Mulder said he preferred his windpipe intact.” Tara laughs, too, and reaches over to pull Matthew out of his stroller. He woke up while we were talking, and is squirming to reach the basket of chips the waiter placed on our table. “No, sweetie, chokable.” Holding Matthew in her lap, Tara rummages in her bag, comes up with a container full of Cheerios and sets them out on the table. I watch this little tableaux for a second, my heart aching unexpectedly. Then the feeling passes. “You know Bill’s just overprotective,” Tara continues, as though she’d never been distracted. “So what kind of husband does he make?” I stare at her blankly, then realize who she’s talking about. I’m not sure what to say. “About the kind you’d expect, I guess.” “Clothes on the floor, toilet seat up, refuses to run simple errands?” A wild giggle threatens to bubble out. He’d had to fish Big Mike’s caduceus out of the sewer grate last night because my arms were too short to reach it. And he *was* the one who went flamingo shopping. “Well, he does run errands.” “Bet he snores, though.” Tara’s sly look doesn’t register at first. “How would I know that?” And then it does. “Tara, we’re on *assignment*.” “So?” She lifts an eyebrow at me. That particular Scully trait seems to be not only hereditary, but contagious. “Aren’t you two…“ “No!” Christ, my own *family* probably even has a pool going at this point. Matthew reaches for the sugar rack and Tara pulls it away from him without taking her eyes off me. She seems puzzled. “But – Christmas – you were late, and you looked so –“ My voice is challenging. “What?” Tara shrugs. “Happy.” Speechless, I press my fingers to one temple. The memory of waking up on Mulder’s couch on Christmas morning with his arms around me, my body tucked neatly into his, is suddenly so fresh it hurts. To my horror, tears sting at my eyes, but luckily Tara's attention is elsewhere. She’s standing up, holding Matthew, grimacing. That’s quite the hazmat incident he’s created, judging from the smell. “Ewww. I’ll be back.” And she’s gone.
Leaving me, unfortunately, in the grip of a memory I wish I no longer had.
After the New York doctors had given me clearance to go home, Mulder and Mom split nursing duty between them. She took days, he took nights, since Kersh wouldn’t give him any more time off, the bastard. Mulder was careful to sleep on my couch for appearance’s sake, since Mom tended to show up at ungodly early hours of the morning, but I could tell he didn’t want to. I didn’t want him to. He tried to sneak in a couple of times, but then he’d jostle the bed and it hurt like hell, so I’d have to chase him out. Mom still glowed at us every morning and every evening as if a dream had come true. I thought the Catholic in her would at least try to pretend that Mulder wasn’t spending every night in my apartment, but who knows how mothers really think? One night I drifted off to sleep early, lulled by the painkillers and the comforting sound of Mulder surfing through my cable offerings. I woke later to find him kneeling at the side of my bed, his chin pillowed on folded arms, watching me. Light spilled into my darkened room from the hallway, casting interesting shadows on his face. I was lying on my back, pillows propping me into a semi-recline. I couldn’t put full weight on my exit wound yet. Slowly he slid one hand under my quilt and drew it down to my hips. I held my breath, wondering what was going through his mind. His gaze locked on mine, and his hand slipped under my pajama top, pushing it up to expose my wounded stomach. He pressed his lips to the smooth skin above my healing incision, and oh my God, I felt it everywhere. “I wish I could kiss it and make it better,” he murmured against my belly, and I melted. His hands traced random patterns on the outside of my pajama bottoms, teasing me. “I’m the lucky man,” he said, almost to himself. Shut up, Mulder, I wanted to say, but my ability to speak had vanished. Then his mouth moved south of my injury. His fingers hooked into the waistband of my pajamas, pulling them down to reveal even more skin for him to kiss. I touched the back of his neck – C5, C6, C7, T1, oh, he’s not wearing a shirt. <Better than Percocet> flashed through my fogged mind as I rolled ever so slightly towards him and – <Oh ow shit goddammit that hurts.> My tiny movement sent pain spearing through entrance and exit wounds and somewhere in the dim recesses of my memory was a faint remembrance of how much physical effort this sort of thing takes and you know what I didn’t care I don’t care don’t Mulder no don’t stop please *dammit* – He noticed, and pulled back. Frustrated, I reached for him, and caught only air. He was shaking his head. “I can’t do anything that would hurt you, Scully,” he said sadly. A beat. “Although some women like that.” Automatically I reached for a pillow to belt him, but that motion made the pain even worse. I curled in on myself for a second, gasping, waiting for it to stop. The plane of the bed shifted, which didn’t help, but made me glad. It meant he wasn’t leaving. He slid down so that he was laying beside me, and gathered me gently against his chest. He was wearing pajama bottoms I’d never seen before, tawny, unbleached cotton, brand new. Did you go shopping for me, Mulder? We lay there like that in the half dark until my pain subsided. His heart beat rapidly under my ear, but his breathing was even. I toyed with the little chest hair he’s got, and I felt his respiration go ragged. Those pajama bottoms didn’t hide a thing. He took my hand and held it tightly, ending my play. It made me smile. Enough tormenting him for one night, especially when I couldn’t follow through. “It was a nice idea, Mulder,” I told him. “I’m sorry.”
He kissed my hand, then the top of my head. “It’s okay. There’ll
be all the time in the world once you’ve recovered.” I believed him. But once I recovered sufficiently to get around on my own, he crumbled. That was when he began sleeping late, ditching assignments again, working on his threepointer rather than at his desk, even, I suspect, drinking a little at night. It was as if he’d used up the last of the strength he needed to endure the day being strong for me. I understood, I thought. Delayed shock. He’d be fine. Give him time. And then they found Cassandra, and there was no time. “Dana?” Tara’s back, settling a cleaned-up Matthew into a wooden highchair and popping a stretchy Winnie the Pooh bib over his head. Somehow she does all this without looking at him, while studying me. “Are you okay, Dana?” She’s sitting down now, concern on her face, and suddenly I want to tell her everything, this woman who is the closest I’ll ever come to having a sister again. Run, hide, your lives are in danger, in the hands of a man who believes fighting is futile, who refuses to help me fight, who destroyed any chance we had… I cover my face with one hand and squeeze back the tears. “Dana, Jesus!” Tara grasps my free hand. I grip her hand tightly, a lifeline back to sanity, trying to compose an answer that will give her a hint of the truth but not scare her to death. “What did he do?” she asks darkly. She’s given me an out. Tara is a dear person and I love her, but she’s not the deepest well in the oil field. If she wants to see this as a lovers’ quarrel, I can work with that. Easily. I take a deep breath, will the tears away. “We just finished a very difficult case. Classified,” I add. Tara will understand if I don’t go into detail. She’s a military wife. “We disagreed on how to handle it. It got … personal.” “Oh, honey.” Tara shakes her head, the sane married woman counseling the flaky single friend. I see her fall into the role as easily as I become the Skeptic and Mulder the Believer. “How long ago was this?” “About –“ I do the calculations in my head. That’s all? It seems like forever ago. “We wrapped it up last week.” “Oh, my goodness. And now you’ve got to play married. Oh, Matthew, no. Here.” She deftly plucks a knife and fork from Matthew’s hands and tucks a spoon into one instead. As she does this, the waiter puts down our food, and that sparks another round of plate shuffling to keep the breakables and spillables out of Matthew’s reach. He’s going to be a handsome boy, you can tell, blond and friendly like Tara, stocky and tall like Bill. I hope for Bill’s sake that he gets his little football player, his upstanding citizen, not a crystal waving, UFO chasing Scully like his sisters. I hope for Bill’s sake that he gets to see Matthew grow up. I hope Matthew gets the chance to grow up. Mulder might claim that he’s never wrong, at least about driving, but he is wrong about this. We can’t leave the battle to others. We can fight it. We can prevent it. I just have to figure out how to stand to be in the same room with him for more than five minutes. I sigh and stick a fork into my chicken salad. Can’t even go to Dr. Kosseff on this one. I’ll have to work it out myself. Suddenly the food looks completely unappetizing, and I set the fork down with another sigh. Tara was scraping Gerber Graduate apple chunks onto Matthew’s plate out of a jar she produced from nowhere, but stops. “I don’t like seeing you like this, Dana. I hope that partner of yours has apologized for whatever it is that he’s done.” Her use of Bill’s phraseology stings, and I automatically leap to Mulder’s defense. I do that a lot. People have noticed that about me. “Why does everyone in my family always assume it’s his fault?” “Oh, Dana, whatever. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it to sound that way.” I raise an eyebrow at her. “Okay, maybe I did,” she admits. “I just want to see you look the way you did at Christmas again.” “Dream on, Tara.” Because that’s all it will ever be. A dream. She laughs, and scoops up a dinner roll just as it leaves Matthew’s hand and before it hits the floor. “I hope you’re at least making him sleep on the couch.”
This actually makes me smile. “Mulder *always* sleeps on the couch.”
SDPD labs Carlos and I are completely stumped now. “Coffee grounds,” he says. “Banana peels. Eggshells.” “It’s garbage,” I say. “Out of a sewer, that makes sense. Off your ceiling fan? Must have been some food fight.” “I think food fights are a violation of the CC&R,” I tell him, staring at the lab results, thinking. “You know, Arcadia isn’t that far away from downtown, and it’s relatively new. I didn’t realize there was that still that much open land that close in anymore.” Carlos shrugs. “Can’t help you there. I’ve only lived here about three years. Hasn’t Arcadia been around longer than that?”
“Yeah, but not by much.” My memories of San Diego geography are
limited to the areas around the naval bases and the beaches, and I haven’t
lived here in years. “Where’s the recorder’s office?”
5:30 p.m. I page through dusty land deeds at the county recorder’s office and I’m thinking of Mulder, because somehow he always escapes the real scut work. I double check what I’ve found in an online search at the field office, and I’m thinking of Mulder, because I’m trying to look at perfectly obvious evidence in a new way, possibly an extreme way, like he does. I try to figure out why the fact that Arcadia sits atop a closed garbage dump has anything to do with our case, and I’m thinking of Mulder, because making this kind of wild connection is his department, not mine. I notice the time, and realize there’s only half an hour or so left of daylight, and I’m thinking of Mulder, and hoping that he isn’t doing something careless, that he’ll be safe when I get home. I’m standing in front of John Kresge’s desk, and I’m thinking of Mulder. Scully, you’re nuts.
“Are we still on for dinner?” I ask.
Downtown San Diego This restaurant is part of a chain, but you’d never know it. High ceilings, rich textiles and mosaics on the walls, pumpkin and navy blue and mocha décor bathed in a low, warm light – the soft textures absorb the usual clatter of fork against plate, the chatter of the patrons surrounding us. Not like the usual greasy spoons we haunt when we’re on the road. This cavernous space, part of a new downtown mall, feels cozy and comfortable. For a while, I do, too. We talk about nothing, about the weather, the end of the NBA lockout, impeachment. That’s been over for a couple of weeks, but the subject hasn’t quite died yet. Surprisingly, John falls into the it’s-just-about-sex category. Those of us who believe differently have never had luck convincing those on the other side otherwise. I barely noticed the acquittal, anyway; I’ve had other things on my mind. And we talk about work. He tells me about a few hot cases he’s worked, and I give him the G-rated version of my year. Division closed, reassigned, scut work, suspension, reinstatement, division reopened after a particularly nasty case. John seems genuinely sad that I’d temporarily lost my assignment, which I describe only as classified. If he didn’t believe Mulder’s explanation of the Sims case, he’d never buy the X-files. Briefly I wonder what Mulder’s doing about dinner, and decide that pizza delivery is probably permitted by the CC&R, as long as the pizza box is stored completely within the regulation garbage receptacle when you’re done. Our food arrives, and suddenly I’m ravenous. I never did finish that chicken salad at lunch. Butternut squash ravioli for me, Hawaiian pizza for John, pineapple and ham. With a pang, I remember a time I’d ordered that very pizza – we’d been working late on something or other, paperwork, probably, and Mulder had reacted as if I’d suggested monkey chow with a side of cyanide. He’d gone on and on about the horrible gastroenterological, ontological and spiritual woes that would befall anyone who dared to place fruit on the sacred food pizza, and then ate all but two pieces once it arrived. That was one of the good times. “You’re a million miles away.” “Sorry.” How embarrassing. To cover, I toy with my ravioli, arranging it into neat patterns with my fork. “I was just thinking. It’s been a tough couple of weeks.” “I can understand that. Sometimes getting what you want is as stressful as losing it.” My head snaps up, and I stare at him. As far as I can tell, he’s just waxing unexpectedly philosophical … but I’m not really sure. Whether he meant to or not, he’s just hit a nerve with a baseball bat. The air in the room changes somehow, and I find myself studying him closely. He’s wearing a nice suit – not an expensive one, but a decent one. His dark blond hair is the same, closely cut on the bottom, floppy up top, generously laden with gel, although it looks as though he’s got a little less hair along that hairline than I remember. Sitting down, I can almost look him in the eye – I think his height is all in his legs. His brown eyes, set in that finely-boned face, are alert, wary, watching the room even as he watches me. A cop’s eyes. He is nothing like what I’m used to, at least on the surface. A curious look crosses his face, matching the one I think I have on mine, and he sets down his slice. Without warning, he reaches out and takes my hand in his. My left hand. His thumb caresses the diamonds and sapphires, brushes against my fingers. I shiver again. I want to pull away … but I don’t. I should. I can’t. “Someone’s got good taste,” he says. I had no idea he was so skilled at statements laced with double meaning. My head is spinning. The wine. Plus I’m tired. That’s it. That’s all. John releases my hand. “Who’s the lucky guy?” My hand brushes against my stomach. “Nobody. Our AD thought we should handle this assignment undercover, pretend to be married.” “So some thief had good taste in swag, then.” His eyes twinkle. I smile back, but he looks unconvinced. “Are you comfortable with the assignment?” “I don’t feel that undercover work is one of my strengths, no.” But that’s not what he’s asking me, and we both know it. “I’m comfortable with the assignment,” I tell him firmly. “Mulder and I have had some hard times lately, but I’m comfortable.” The thought flickers across his face just as it passes through my mind: then what are you doing here? To his credit, he doesn’t say it. “Partner trouble, huh? That’s rough. I’d almost rather be fighting with a spouse. Most spouses don’t have as much firepower.” I think of all the times Mulder and I have pulled guns on one another, and a completely inappropriate snort of laughter escapes me. Air returns to the room, and we fall back into a less-charged conversation. At one point, he wonders about Arcadia, and I fill him in on what we’ve found so far – which is basically some frightened neighbors and garbage on the ceiling fan. We toss around some theories, most of them absurd even by my falling standards, but one thought keeps occurring to me: Garbage. Throwing out the garbage. For some reason, I think of Mulder again, and how he’d never really fit in to a community like Arcadia no matter how hard he tried, and I find myself hoping once more that he hasn’t done anything dangerous. I tend to have a sixth sense about his well being, and it hasn’t gone off yet today. Then again, he hasn’t called, and he always calls. See you tonight, he said. Remember? Maybe he’s backing off a little. Maybe he’s just busy tormenting the neighbors. Boy, I hope that’s all. I resist the urge to call him. If I call him, he wins. “Sinkholes,” John says, and I look at him curiously. “Great big sinkholes open up in the yard and the Kleins and Big Mike fall in and the sinkhole closes over them. In the morning it looks like a bad landscaping job.” I consider that. It must be the wine that’s making me take this idea seriously. Then again, I’ve had plenty of practice at taking ideas like that seriously. “From garbage they came, to garbage they shall return.” John laughs, a series of short barks that have the potential to be obnoxious but that serve to light up his craggy face. “I like the way you think, Scully FBI. Never did understand why people thought those planned communities were so great. I’ve busted up my share of domestics in places like Arcadia. Sometimes all that perfection hides a wealth of psychic garbage.” Throwing out the garbage… “Maybe the garbage came back to get them,” I say, mostly to myself. “You’re kidding.” John snorts, and grins at me, and I blink. The thought vanishes. I hadn’t meant for him to hear, hadn’t really meant to say it aloud. “Yeah. Kidding.” He shakes his head, still smiling, and waves down the waiter for some coffee. I smile weakly back. I’m lying to him again. This is something I’ve only recently admitted to myself, something I had a lot of time to think about in the hospital in New York. Without Mulder around, when I’m partnered with another man – Ritter, a county sheriff in Maine, even John – I become Mulder. I encouraged that sheriff to consider extreme possibilities. I treated the Fellig case as an X-file almost from the start, even ditched young Peyton a couple of times. I refused to accept that Roberta Sims had simply killed herself in a fit of depression at Christmas. I don’t know when this happened. I don’t know how. But I’m only myself, my scientific, skeptical self, when I’m with him. This idea lingers in my mind like a retrovirus that won’t clear as we finish our coffee, and as John walks me back to the minivan. The streets are quiet, the nightlife elsewhere on a weekday night. It’s cooled off considerably, and I can see his breath. February nights are chilly, even in California. There’s a stillness in the air that feels familiar, somehow. Expectant. I turn, my back to the driver’s side door, and see a look on John’s face that I’ve seen before on other men, on Mulder. And he takes both my hands in his and kisses me. A little rough in a good way, firm enough to let me know he means it, technically proficient. Yes. For a moment I wonder, my eyes briefly closed, what it would be like to get to know this man. He might be easy to be with, he might be difficult. He might be a complete workaholic, or he might have been working Christmas because he’s Jewish. He might chew his pencils instead of spearing them into the ceiling, he might like gum over sunflower seeds. Again, I’m curious. He takes my silence, the fact that I’m now staring openly at him, as approval, and kisses me again. This time, I return it. It does nothing for me. That’s another lie. It would, if I’d let it. He’s awfully attractive. I guess my subconscious picked up on that last year. I may even have used my rusty feminine wiles to get a case file out of him. But although John was at the hospital with me once or twice, he wasn’t the one who was mistaken for Emily’s father. John watches me patiently. I lick my lips while I search for my voice, try to understand why I feel suddenly upset. You make me a whole person, he told me once. I’ve never told him this, but … I think he may make me one, too. “I’m feeling awfully disloyal to my partner right now,” I finally manage to say. He gives me a knowing look, and I want to scream: We’re not sleeping together! But no one believes that any more, so I don’t bother. “Might have known you’d be one of those for-better, for-worse types.” He says this ruefully, with a wry smile. I marvel one last time at his choice of words. Because there’s a ring on my finger, and I halfway believe it belongs there. Because no matter how angry I am at him now, no matter what reckless thing he’s doing to endanger himself (my Muldersense has suddenly gone off), no matter how badly he’s treated me in the past, no matter how promising this situation unfolding in front of me appears, I still have very, very strong feelings for my partner.
Maybe part of me still even loves him.
Interstate 5 The radio is silent. My brain is not. Replaying conversations. Mulling over evidence. Considering theories. Every so often, I think about the case, too. I’m trying to debunk everything I thought outside the restaurant, feeling a little bit of regret for not letting myself go, even for just a second, to see what it would be like to feel something about another man. Dammit, how can I spend the whole day with him on my mind? Like I’m some idiot teenager obsessed with a boy who doesn’t know she’s alive, whose thoughtless aloofness looks like secret cool. Thinking she’d be the one to make him change, make him just like all the other boys. He’s not going to change. Hell, I’m not going to change. So there you go. Impasse. Wait a minute. Overpass. My exit. There. Traffic is what passes for light in a major metropolitan area this time of night. The strip malls and office buildings slide by, windows dark and signs illuminated. All the normal people have gone home. And I’m going home, too. For better or worse. John’s statement keeps coming back to me. Well, let’s run it into the ground and see if it will go away. This is definitely worse. Better? Harder. My birthday a couple of years ago, with sparklers and a silly keychain I still use. Christmas, except for the ghost part. Flirting with him in the Florida woods, even if it was to keep him from going into shock. The look on his face when I told him I was in remission. For richer or poorer. Hmm. We’re both GS-14s, although he’s a few pay steps above me since he’s been with the Bureau longer. But I’m sure he has money tucked away somewhere; he’s hinted that he blew quite the chunk of change on his jaunt to Antarctica. I guess you can say we’ve done both. In sickness and in health. Jesus. Been there. We’re good at sickness. I think we’d have no idea how to handle long stretches of good health. That period between the time the guys and I pulled him out of the Sargasso Sea and when I got shot was probably a new hospital-free record for us. From this day forward, until death do us part. See, we’ve even cheated that. Colonization, God help me, can’t even hurt us – I think we’re both immune to the black oil. That thought gives me chills, and I make an extra long stop before taking the turn up to our gate. Our password is, of course, a numerical representation of TRUSTNO1. And, of course, I have to physically get out of the minivan to punch it in because I can’t reach the keypad. Next time we go undercover, not only do I pick the names, but I pick the car, too. “Thank you, Mrs. Petrie.” The guard pronounces it “Pett-rie.” “Welcome home.” “Pee-tree,” I say, but the intercom is already off. Our garage door is closing as I drive up the street. I can just see the base of the basketball hoop being dragged inside. Bet the neighbors loved that at this hour. Lord knows his real neighbors do. When I pull into the driveway, though, all the lights are off and the house looks asleep. He’s probably already in bed. I will say that about Mulder; at least he’s not a bathroom hog. At least not at night, and not when we’re not getting ready for work. In the house, I pull out the file Carlos gave me and look it over one more time, just to make sure I didn’t miss anything. A thud comes from upstairs. “Mulder?” No answer. A second thud. My gun is hidden in a dresser drawer, so I curl my fingers around a fireplace poker instead. “Mulder, is that you?” Still no answer. I creep slowly up the stairs, my stomach tightening with nerves, my senses alert. Someone’s in the house who shouldn’t be. Sound. Behind me. I whirl, raising the poker to swing and strike. A gasp. A figure throws up its arms in self-defense. “Scully!” The poker freezes above my head, above Mulder’s head, but the image continues through my mind with the speed of a bullet – I continue the swing, connect solidly with his head, strike him over and over until my anger dissipates and he lies dead on the floor. Aghast that I’m capable of thinking such a thing, I bring the poker to rest on my shoulder, then slowly lower it. Mulder is looking up at me with real fear in his eyes. Something inside me shifts. The anger is gone. The connection is faint, but there. “Sorry, Mulder,” I whisper. There is a beat as we silently acknowledge what I am not saying. “Someone was in the house.” “Tidying up.” He’s still at the foot of the stairs. It’s odd to look down at him. Unnatural. “Whoever it was, they put away my basketball hoop. Somebody’s looking out for us, Scully. Which may not be a bad thing.” “What do you mean?” He brushes past me to go upstairs. He doesn’t have his gun, either. God, I can’t wait until we can be ourselves again. “I got a look at the thing that’s been scaring everybody, and I take it back. This is an X-file.” I follow, watching his back. The anger is gone, the hurt remains, but so does this fact: It’s good to see him interested in something again. I missed that spark.
I missed him. Two days later The case is over, crumpled into a heap of chicken bones and egg cartons and newspaper bags on the remains of our mutilated front lawn. Gogolak is dead. We’re free. Mulder leans against the side of our borrowed van, looking trim and more himself in a dark gray sweater and blue jeans. I’m kneeling at Emily’s grave. We weren’t exactly speaking on the drive out of Arcadia, but at least the silence was tolerable. I’d been thinking about how to ask that we make this stop – debating whether I should ask, really, since I’d wanted to come alone – when he suddenly veered off the route back to the SDPD impound lot. He didn’t say anything, still hasn’t said anything. He brought me here, and left me alone, and I’m grateful for both. I spend a few moments with my daughter’s spirit – I know there’s no body in that grave – then rise, a hand on the headstone to steady me. What an odd moment. Here with my ersatz family, my dead alien hybrid daughter and my virtual husband. It takes a second for the woozy feeling to pass, and then I turn for the van. Mulder pretends he wasn’t watching me, then gets into the van himself. When I take my seat, he’s staring straight ahead, fingers drumming restlessly on the steering wheel. Something’s on his mind, and he’s clearly not going to leave until he spits it out. I put my seatbelt on and wait. It’s about time he talked. “I overdid it, didn’t I, Scully?” he finally says. “Yes, Mulder, you did,” I answer without hesitation. He flinches, as if he’d been expecting a more conciliatory response. He works his jaw for a second, bites his lip. The sun dapples shadows from the trees over his face. I can sense his raw emotion, but it’s hard to tell just what he’s feeling. Our connection is like an AM radio right now, and we’ve just driven under a bridge. “I haven’t told you where I got this ring,” he says. The sudden roaring in my head drowns out any coherent, rational thought. He’s going to tell me something awful, something unbearable, something about her, something that fills in that evil blank the Gunmen and I noticed in both their personal histories, something that will shatter this fragile détente. It’s all I can do to keep myself from putting my hands over my ears and babbling to shut out his voice. As it is, I find that I’ve shrunk back against the door, away from him. Mulder gives me a sad, sidelong glance. Thank God he hasn’t looked straight at me yet. He must know what I’m thinking. “It’s my father’s ring.” “What?” Shocked out of my selfish fear, I sit up straight, interested in spite of myself. “I’ve been thinking about him a lot lately.” His voice comes from far away. “The choices he made, the life he led, the company he kept…” We shudder involuntarily, simultaneously. Mulder is too lost in his past to notice, but I do. “I know what he knew, Scully. I could be him. I’ve even been offered the chance.” The darkness has crept back into his voice, that bleakness I’d heard regularly over the past few weeks. “But I don’t want it. I don’t want to be my father. That’s no kind of life. And so I wore his ring, as a reminder to be everything to you that he never was to my mother. Even if what we were doing was just pretend. And I went overboard. And I’m sorry.” If I say anything now, I’ll cry. And I’m not quite ready to let down my guard like that yet. Not in front of him. So I say nothing. “I’m sorry I hurt you,” Mulder says softly. “I’m not sorry for what I did, but I’m sorry that what I did hurt you.” Finally, he’s looking straight at me. I want him to be sorry for what he did, but this is still more than I’d expected. I meet his eyes and nod in acknowledgement. I still don’t trust myself to speak. One of his hands finds its way to mine, clasped together tightly in my lap, and covers them. I missed that, I wanted that – and of its own accord, my body twitches away from his touch. My subconscious speaks: Too intense, Mulder. The wound is healing, but it’s still raw. “I need some time,” I say. “Time.” He nods, and I hear the lingering sadness in his voice. He misses me, too. “I can do that.” “And space.” I hate myself for resorting to relationship cliches, but I don’t want to go too deep right now. I don’t want to give him an opening to get all the way back in. “Space.” He sighs. “I guess that means I don’t get to fall asleep on your shoulder on the plane.” I shake my head no. You have to admire his persistence. He’s trying so hard to scale the wall I built around my heart with the bricks he handed me himself. That high-grade mortar I used, though, is going to be difficult to chip through. “Mulder?” His hand on the key, he turns to look at me. His guard is up, he’s afraid of what I might say. Afraid I’m going to hurt him. And I’m afraid I will, a few times, before I work my way out of this. And that’s why I say what I say, to give him something to hold on to in the meantime. “Thank you for bringing me here.” “I wanted to.” That wasn’t what I expected him to say. Oddly, he avoids my gaze. “One night on the couch, I was thinking about her, and –“ He stops, as if he’s gone too far. “And?” My voice catches. I had no idea she meant anything to him except what she symbolized for me. The few times they’d been together, he’d been so good with her… “What?” “No. Let me start over. You’re welcome, Scully.” And damn him, he just starts the van and pulls into the lane. “Mulder! And what?” “Nothing.” His attention is largely on the road, but I can tell he’s still struggling with a few emotions. “I don’t want you to get angry with me, to shut me out again because of an idle thought I had when I was falling asleep. Someday I’ll tell you, but not now. Okay?” He threads into traffic on the main road outside the cemetery, leaving me breathless with fury and relief. How dare he decide what’s right for me, and thank God he did. Listen to your heart, Dana, not your mind. You’re not all the way back yet. Time. Oh, God, is this going to take some time. -30-
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