<![CDATA[From: Brandon Ray <publius@avalon.net>
Date: Sun, 18 Oct 1998 21:07:40 -0500
Subject: NEW: Ummers (1/5) by Brandon Ray
TITLE: Ummers (1/5)
AUTHOR: Brandon D. Ray
EMAIL ADDRESS: publius@avalon.net
DISTRIBUTION STATEMENT: Anywhere and everywhere, so long as my name
stays on it and no money changes hands.
FEEDBACK: Oh, hell yes....
Ephemeral: *FEEDBACK*publius@avalon.net
SPOILER WARNING: Little Green Men (very oblique; a virtual cookie to
the first person who spots it); Small Potatoes; The End; FTF. I think
that's it.
RATING: PG-13, mostly for language (the "f" word).
CONTENT WARNING: None
CLASSIFICATION: SRHA; UST, then MSR
SUMMARY: Mulder can't get Diana Fowley to leave him alone, so Scully
pitches in to help.
NOTE: *sigh* I hate it when the characters take over the story. I was
all set to do a short, comic hit piece on Diana Fowley, but she insisted
on morphing into a human being instead. Hopefully this will still
entertain. I guess you can chalk this up to the same impulse that has
made me try to humanize Bill Scully, jr.
DISCLAIMER: Nope, I do not own these characters or situations. If I
were THAT smart, I would be rich.
UMMERS
by Brandon D. Ray (publius@avalon.net)
SUNDAY, 11:05 p.m.
Dana Scully sat on her sofa, her left knee drawn up so that she could
get at her toenails with the nail polish applicator. It was important
to have a steady hand, and one of the side benefits of her pathology
training was that she was able to apply the polish in smooth, even
strokes. There; that foot was finished. She admired her handiwork for
a moment, then let the foot return to the floor and drew up the other
one.
<<Another weekend shot to hell,>> she thought as she rapidly but
carefully painted the toes on her right foot. She'd spent the last two
days right here at home, filling out expense reports and reviewing back
issues of professional journals that she'd fallen behind in reading.
<<And to cap it all off, I have the hectic excitement of doing my
nails. Lovely.>>
Finished. She let her right foot drop back to the floor and leaned back
into the sofa cushions and closed her eyes. She really ought to get to
bed; work would roll around far too early in the morning, and Scully was
not one who did well when she was short of sleep. The problem was that
she wasn't really tired. Maybe a cup of decaf tea would help her get
ready for bed.
Before she could act on that thought, there was a knock on the door.
Scully started, and glanced reflexively at the clock. 11:15. There was
only one person it could possibly be at that time of night. The
knocking was repeated, and she heard a muffled voice calling, "Scully,
it's me! Let me in!"
"You've got a key!" she called back. "Use it."
A few seconds later she heard the key in the lock. The door swung open,
and Fox Mulder stepped across the threshold. He shut the door behind
him and leaned back against it, eyes closed, a strange mixture of fear
and relief on his face.
"Mulder?" Scully said, reflexively rising to her feet. "Mulder, what's
wrong?"
Her partner didn't say anything, but opened his eyes and turned and set
the deadbolt on her door. He then turned again and purposefully strode
past her to the window, where he cautiously nudged the drapes apart and
peered out through the gap.
"Mulder!" Scully said again. "What are you doing? What's going on?"
Mulder turned to face her. There was a look of wildness in his eyes,
and now she also noticed that his hair was even more disheveled than
usual. "You've got to protect me, Scully," he said. "You've got to
save me."
<<This is sounding ridiculously melodramatic, even for Mulder,>> Scully
thought. Aloud, she said, "Save you? Save you from what?"
"Not from what," he whispered, running his hand through his hair. "From
whom."
"Mulder, if you don't stop talking like a Grade B horror movie and
explain yourself, you're going to need someone to save you from ME."
She walked over to stand in front of him, and crossed her arms across
her chest. "Now cut the crap. Who, exactly, are you hiding from?"
He looked at her for a moment, then nodded. "Diana."
Scully raised an eyebrow at him. "Special Agent Fowley?" She kept her
tone carefully neutral. "Why are you hiding from HER?" <<And why did
you come HERE to do it?>> a voice in her head added.
"She's after me, Scully," her partner replied, a note of desperation in
his voice. "She wants me." He walked over to the sofa and sank down on
it.
Scully followed him, but did not sit down. "Mulder, every woman you
have ever met wants you." <<Whups. A bit more truth in THAT statement
than I intended.>> Fortunately, Mulder appeared to be in no condition
to notice. Quickly, she went on, "Why should Agent Fowley be --"
"Because she KNOWS me," he said, cutting her off. "She knows me Scully,
better than anyone but you. That's why she's dangerous."
<<Now THERE'S an interesting set of assertions,>> Scully thought. <<I
know him better than she does, but I'm safe and she's not.>> She wasn't
sure how much she liked that. Scully had never been one to be coy, or a
tease -- but she didn't like to be taken for granted, either. Then it
occurred to her that maybe it wasn't MULDER that Fowley was dangerous
to, but something else. <<Let's not go there, shall we?>>
"She's stalking me, Scully," Mulder went on. "She's trying to trap me.
Last week she popped into our office four separate times, and always
when you were out for some reason. She always had some excuse, but it
was utterly transparent. And tonight," he drew in a breath, and Scully
almost laughed out loud. The poor man was on the verge of a panic
attack! "Tonight I went out running, and when I got back she was
waiting for me. INSIDE my apartment."
This time Scully raised both eyebrows. "And how did she get INSIDE your
apartment, Agent Mulder?" she asked.
"She has a key," he replied guiltily. "I, uh, gave it to her, years
ago. I had no idea she still had it."
"What did she want?"
"She said she came over so I could refresh her memory about one of the
old cases she and I worked on." He looked at Scully soulfully, his eyes
begging for understanding. "But I ask you, Scully -- who would do a
thing like that? Would YOU drop by a fellow agent's home at ten o'clock
on a Sunday evening just to talk BUSINESS?"
<<No, Mulder, *I* wouldn't,>> she thought, struggling to keep a straight
face.
"I had no idea she still had her key," he repeated, shaking his head.
"I asked her to give it back to me, but she said she might need it
again, if she had to feed my fish or something. I told her it's YOUR
job now to feed my fish, but she just laughed."
Scully felt a slight flush spreading on her cheeks, and turned away from
him and walked back to the window. "So to get back to the main point,"
she said, "why are you here? And what do you expect ME to do?" Having
regained her composure, she turned back to face him again, and smirked
slightly. "Want me to scratch her eyes out?" She made a clawing motion
in the air.
Mulder raised his eyebrows, and she could almost hear the wheels
spinning in his head. <<Uh, oh,>> she thought. She wasn't sure what
was coming, but she didn't think she was going to like it.
"You know," he said slowly, "maybe that wouldn't be such a bad idea."
He stood up and walked over to stand in front of her. Placing his hands
on her shoulders and looking deeply into her eyes, he said,
"Scully...Dana. Will you be my steady?"
Her eyes widened, and in her mind, alarm bells were ringing. "Will I
WHAT?" <<This isn't happening, and he did NOT mean what he just said!>>
Mulder's eyes were twinkling. "I asked you if you'd be my steady, but
if you don't like that word, we can find a different one. Girlfriend?
Mistress? Main squeeze?"
"What are you talking about?" Scully was deeply confused. Her
partner's chains of logic often veered wildly from what most people
would consider normal, but this was pretty weird, even for him, and she
couldn't for the life of her figure out how he'd gotten from Diana
Fowley to -- <<Oh. I get it.>> She shook her head. "No, Mulder. No
fucking way." She broke away from him and went over to the sofa and sat
down; he followed and sat down next to her.
"Aw, c'mon, Scully," he pleaded. "You've got to. You owe me." He
leaned closer. "Didn't I save you from Eddie Van Blundht?"
Her cheeks colored again. "Mulder, that was completely different. Van
Blundht was a mutant --"
"So's Diana," he insisted, cutting her off. "You don't know her like I
do." He winced at his own phrasing. "Please, Scully. I'm begging
you."
Scully knew she needed to think clearly, and that was not being made
easier by having her partner leaning into her personal space, his warm
breath brushing against her cheek. She got up from the sofa and walked
back to the window, then turned to face him. <<Treat it like a case,
Dana,>> she thought. <<Work it out logically.>> "Let's see if I've got
this straight," she said. "You want me to pretend that we
are...involved. And your reason for this is...what? That you hope that
Agent Fowley will decide you are spoken for and leave you alone?" He
nodded. "Mulder, you're nuts! That's not real life; that's the plot of
a Doris Day movie! You can't possibly expect it to work."
"I've always been partial to THE GLASS BOTTOMED BOAT," Mulder commented,
getting up off the sofa and moving towards her. "Scully --"
"What about our reputations in the Bureau?" she interrupted. "Can you
imagine the gossip?"
"People already gossip about us, Scully. You know that. We haven't got
anything to lose in THAT regard." His face took on the pathetic,
yearning look that always drove her mad, and she felt her insides start
to melt. "Please, Scully," he repeated. "Please help me."
She stared at him for a long moment. Finally, she said, "Ummers."
Mulder looked confused. "Ummers?"
She nodded. "Ummers. Don't you ever read Miss Manners?"
"I have to admit that Miss Manners is not part of my usual --"
She waved him to silence. "Never mind. Someone wrote to Miss Manners
once asking how she should introduce her lover. The letter writer
thought 'lover' was too explicit, 'boyfriend' too juvenile, and
'significant other' too trendy. One of Miss Manners' suggestions was
'ummer', as in, 'I'm pleased to meet you, Mrs. Jones. And this is Fox
Mulder, my, um, er....' So we'll be ummers."
"Does that mean you'll do it?" he asked hopefully.
Scully sighed. "Yes, Mulder; I'll do it." She waved a finger at him.
"But not one minute longer than necessary; you hear?" But her heart
wasn't in the last statement. She wondered if he knew that.
# # #
MONDAY, 7:43 a.m.
Scully stepped across the threshold into their basement office and
looked around. Empty. Good. For once she had beaten Mulder to work.
She smiled wryly to herself. Of course, she'd had to walk out of her
apartment while he was using her shower in order to do it, but at least
it was a victory of sorts. .
After hanging up her coat, she placed her briefcase on her desk and
snapped it open. Inside was the usual collection of casefiles,
half-finished reports, and other miscellaneous bits of this and that.
This morning, there was also a photograph of herself, as well as a paper
bag holding a picture frame she had picked up at Wal-Mart on the way to
work.
Scully picked up the photograph and looked at it for a moment. It was a
candid shot her mother had taken the previous summer, when the two of
them had taken a picnic lunch to Assateague. It had been a wonderful
day, and mother and daughter had figuratively taken their hair down and
shared their memories of the past, as well as their hopes for the
future. <<Well, SOME of my hopes for the future,>> Scully thought as
she looked at the picture.
At one point, the older woman had produced a camera and taken several
pictures of her daughter, saying that she didn't have any recent ones
"to show to prospective buyers". Scully had been embarrassed, but
allowed the pictures to be taken; much to her surprise, they had turned
out pretty well, especially this one. It showed Scully standing at the
water's edge, gazing out to sea, her hair in slight disarray from the
light breeze.
Scully liked the picture very much. It was very dreamy and romantic;
much better than the stiff, posed portraits produced by commercial
studios. She thought it looked like the sort of picture a man might put
on his desk to remind him of his sweetheart, and so she'd brought it to
work this morning.
Now she was having second thoughts. This WAS all a game, wasn't it? A
make-believe? A pretense, to make that damned bitch Fowley -- in the
privacy of her thoughts she did not bother to conceal the disdain she
held for the woman -- leave her Mulder alone. <<MY Mulder? Now where
the hell did THAT come from?>>
Scully shook her head. Her first instinct, the night before, had been
the correct one: This was a really bad idea. Unfortunately, she'd
already promised Mulder that she'd do it, and Dana Scully was not one to
break promises, especially to people she cared about. Sighing, she took
the picture frame from its bag and slipped the photograph into it,
finally placing the entire assembly on the corner of Mulder's desk,
angled to be easily visible from his chair, as well as to any visitor he
might have.
A few moments later her partner breezed into the office. He bustled
around for a few minutes, hanging up his coat, drawing a cup of coffee
from the coffee maker in the corner, and finally settling down at his
desk. Neither of them were much for small talk, especially first thing
in the morning, and for a few minutes it was quiet, with only the
creaking of Mulder's chair and the shuffling of papers to disturb the
silence.
Scully knew the precise instant when he spotted the picture: The paper
shuffling stopped, and she heard him draw in a short breath. Using all
of her willpower, she resisted the urge to look up at him, but simply
sat there, pretending to be absorbed in a memorandum, waiting to see
what he would do. She was surprised to feel her own heart beating
faster; that was ridiculous. She'd only brought the picture as part of
this little melodrama they'd agreed to put on, after all. It didn't
actually matter what he thought of the picture.
Did it?
Mulder cleared his throat. "Uh, Scully?"
"Yes, Mulder?" she replied, not looking up from the memorandum she was
not reading.
There was a moment of silence. Then: "Why is there a picture of you on
my desk?"
Now she did look up. Keeping her face expressionless, she said, "If
we're going to do this, we're going to do it right," she said. "Don't
most men keep pictures of their...special friends --"
"Ummers," he interjected with a smile, and she flushed.
"--of their ummers on their desks?"
He shook his head, still smiling. "I wouldn't know. I've never had an
ummer before."
Jesus. How had this conversation gotten so far out of control so
quickly? She knew that she was blushing, and that knowledge simply made
it worse. <<Composure,>> she thought. <<Composure. I've got to keep
my composure.>> It would help tremendously if Mulder weren't so
obviously enjoying the situation.
"Look, Mulder," she said, trying not to let the confusion she was
feeling enter her voice. "If you don't want the picture on your desk,
you don't have to have it there. I'll just take it home." And she
reached out to pick it up.
He was quicker, and moved it out of her reach, setting it down on his
desk again. "Uh uh," he said. "You're right; it is appropriate. Thank
you." He studied the picture for a moment, then added, "I like this
picture, Scully. You look very...soft in it. Wistful. I don't get to
see that side of you very often."
Trying very hard to control her breathing, she nodded. "I was feeling
wistful," she admitted.
"What were you thinking about?"
<<Dammit, Mulder, even if YOU don't have any boundaries, don't you think
other people do? You'd think a trained psychologist would know
better!>> "I -- I don't remember," she lied, and she looked down at the
memorandum on her desk again, hoping that he would take the hint and
drop the subject. She knew just exactly what she'd been thinking about
when that picture was taken, and she had no intention whatsoever of
sharing THAT with him. Not now. Probably not ever.
He didn't say anything further, and after a moment she heard the paper
rustling resume.
The rest of the morning passed quietly.
# # #
1:05 p.m.
Scully stepped off the elevator into the basement corridor and walked
rapidly down the hallway toward their office, the bag holding Mulder's
lunch swinging easily at her side. As she approached the open doorway
she heard voices, and slowed to a halt to listen. Mulder. And Fowley.
"Really, Diana," Mulder was saying. "I don't have any idea. That was a
long time ago."
"Only six years, Fox." The woman's voice sounded low and....slinky was
the adjective Scully settled on. Like a snake. "That's not THAT
long." She laughed softly, and Scully wanted to strangle her.
"Whatever happened to that eidetic memory of yours?"
"I guess there's a limit to the number of bytes even *I* can absorb," he
replied.
"That didn't used to be a problem for you, Fox."
"Times have changed, Diana," Mulder replied. Scully wondered if Fowley
still knew Mulder well enough to detect the agitation in his voice. "A
lot of things have changed."
"So they have," Fowley replied. There was a moment's silence. "But
they could change again."
"Put that down, Diana!" Scully jumped at the sudden sharpness in
Mulder's voice. A brief pause. "I said put it down!"
"All right, Fox." Scully gritted her teeth at the indulgent "mother
knows best" tone in Fowley's voice. What the hell were they talking
about? "There. It's right back where it belongs. Even if it wasn't
there on Friday."
The picture. It had to be the picture.
Scully suddenly realized she'd been standing outside the office
listening -- eavesdropping -- for far too long. For some reason she
felt like a trespasser, which made absolutely no sense at all. It was,
after all, her office as much as it was Mulder's, and she had a perfect
right to be there. And besides, this was exactly the problem Mulder had
enlisted her to help him with. Taking a deep breath and putting a
cheerful smile on her face, she stepped across the threshold.
"Hi, Mulder!" she said brightly. "I'm back."
Mulder was sitting at his desk, facing the doorway, and looking acutely
uncomfortable. The reason was obvious: Diana Fowley was perched on the
corner of his desk and leaning forward into his personal space.
Mulder looked so pathetically grateful as he registered Scully's
presence that she almost laughed out loud. Struggling to keep a
straight face, she walked around the desk and stepped directly between
Fowley and Mulder. Placing the bag of food on the desk in front of her
partner, and screwing up all her courage, she bent over and kissed him
lightly on the brow. "Here's your lunch."
Scully could feel Fowley's gaze burning into the back of her head.
Good. Meanwhile, Mulder's eyes were glinting with a mixture of shock
and appreciation. Also good. Of course, he hadn't looked in the bag
yet to see what she'd brought him for lunch. After the fiasco over the
photograph this morning, Scully was determined to play this role for all
she was worth, for as long as it lasted -- and hopefully have a little
fun along the way. Mulder's lunch was the first step in that plan.
Mulder was rooting around in the bag, no doubt looking for the dagwood
she normally would have gotten for him. But not today; that wasn't an
ummerly sort of thing to do. She waited in silence while he took each
item out of the bag; then, as he raised his eyes to her in puzzlement,
she said, "I got you your favorite, Mulder -- pasta salad."
"Why...how thoughtful," he replied, staring at her. "You know how much
I love that pasta salad." He popped the lid off of the plastic
container and eyed its contents as if it were a nest of snakes. "What
did you get to drink? Some root beer, maybe?"
"Sorry, Mulder, they were all out." She waited a few seconds while he
picked up the drink container and examined it. As he was about to
cautiously pop the lid off of the drink, she added, "So I got iced tea
instead."
Mulder froze, and his eyes got big and round. Scully was rapidly coming
to understand why he had appeared to enjoy the conversation about her
photograph so much. The control freak inside of her was eating this up;
she almost thought that if she peered deeply enough into his eyes she
would be able to see all the little furry animals frantically racing
about, trying to figure out what the hell was going on.
Time to settle Agent Fowley's hash. Scully swung around, acknowledging
the other woman's presence for the first time. With a sweet smile on
her face, she said, "Agent Fowley, I believe you're in my spot."
Fowley stared at her for a moment, then smiled slightly, and said,
"Funny. I was just thinking the same thing about you." She slid off
the desk and looked over Scully's shoulder. "I'll talk to you later,
Fox." Her eyes shifted back to Scully. "Take care, Dana." And she
turned and walked out of the room.
Scully stood looking at the empty doorway for a minute, trying to figure
out who had won that round. She thought things had gone fairly well, up
to the point where Scully had asked Fowley to move, but the direct
challenge had somehow seemed to give Fowley strength. <<Let's call it a
draw,>> Scully decided.
She heard Mulder clearing his throat, and she turned to face him.
"Scully." He paused.
"Yes, Mulder?"
She could almost hear the wheels spinning in her partner's head;
finally, he apparently settled on the least threatening of the possible
topics of conversation.
"Scully, why am I eating pasta salad for lunch?"
"You haven't actually eaten any of it yet," she pointed out.
He nodded, and looked down at the salad. Picking up a plastic fork, he
scooped up some salad and put it into his mouth and started chewing.
Scully found herself mesmerized by the process, and watched in
fascination as he finally swallowed the mouthful of food. There was
just a little bit of sauce clinging to his lower lip. All she would
have to do would be to bend forward....Scully jumped as his tongue
flicked out and licked off the bit of sauce.
Mulder cleared his throat again, and repeated, "Scully, why am I eating
pasta salad for lunch?"
"Well, Mulder," she said seriously, "you have to understand that as your
ummer it is my responsibility to see that you get nutritious meals."
"I see." He scooped up another forkful of the pasta salad and ate it,
then said, "You know, this isn't actually that bad. Thank you."
"You're welcome." After a moment, she went on. "Also, it occurred to
me that Agent Fowley is probably well aware of your eating habits." He
nodded slowly. "But now your favorite food is pasta salad instead of
cheese steaks, and she DOESN'T know about that. It reinforces the
underlying point: Things have changed, and you are no longer the man
she once knew."
"I see." He nodded again. "That makes sense." He took another bite,
then said, "Does that mean no more cheese steaks?"
She nodded. "No more cheese steaks. Not as long as *I'm* your ummer.
You want cheese steaks, talk to Agent Fowley about it."
He nodded. "That's what I figured. I can live with that." Another
bite of salad, and he actually smiled a little. "I don't think Diana
would make a very good ummer."
# # #
Wednesday, 10:38 a.m.
Scully shifted uncomfortably in her chair and tried to concentrate on
the casefile in front of her. She had court testimony coming up next
week, and she really needed to refresh her memory before she was put on
the stand. Unfortunately, her mind didn't seem to want to cooperate,
and her thoughts kept wandering all over the lot.
And it was all Mulder's fault.
She sighed, put down the folder, and took off her glasses and rubbed her
eyes for a moment. When she had agreed to help her partner fend off
Special Agent Fowley, she hadn't realized quite how much of a full time
job it was going to turn out to be. Three times in the last two days
she had broken up some ploy or other hatched by Mulder's old flame.
Couldn't the woman take "no" for an answer?
<<You're a fine one to talk, Dana.>>
That was another thing. The whole process of pretending that she and
Mulder were involved was becoming increasingly taxing on Scully's own
reserve and self-control. The wall of propriety and discretion which
she had spent five years putting into place had been deliberately
breached, and she was finding it more and more difficult to tell where
the game they were playing left off and reality began. On more than one
occasion she had caught herself casting him unpremeditated looks of
affection, even longing, or dreaming up an excuse to walk over to his
side of the office, just to be a little bit closer to him. And this
morning she had spent an unprecedented 25 minutes going through her
closet, trying to decide just which suit she was going to wear for him
today.
For him.
Still another thing she hadn't figured on when she agreed to this was
that Mulder had essentially moved into her apartment, and had been
sleeping on her sofa for the last three nights. Of course, this was not
the first time he had stayed over at her place -- from time to time in
the past, when they had been up late doing paperwork, or even just
watching a movie, she had invited him to crash on her sofa rather than
try to drive home in the middle of the night. But never for more than
one night, and never when she had been feeling so open and vulnerable to
him.
For her own peace of mind, Scully knew that she should call it off. She
should look Mulder in the eye, and tell him what a really bad idea this
had turned out to be. She should point out to him that it was
unprofessional and immature, and that on top of all that it clearly
wasn't working. She should remind him that all he really had to do to
keep Fowley out of his apartment was to throw the deadbolt when he got
home at night. She knew she should say those things, and she knew she
should do it soon -- now -- before their friendship and partnership was
irrevocably damaged.
The only problem was that she didn't WANT to call it off.
She sighed again, and opened her eyes and looked over at her partner.
Mulder was sitting at his desk, bent over some paperwork of his own.
His brow was furrowed in evident concentration, and he seemed to be
completely oblivious to everything in the room other than the paper he
was perusing -- including the emotional turmoil which was currently
enveloping his partner.
<<How can he not have noticed?>> she wondered. She felt as if
everything she did, everything she said, must surely be telegraphing her
true feelings to him. The little looks; the soft sighs; the seemingly
incidental body contact when they walked down the hall together, or sat
on her sofa watching television in the evening.
The answer, presumably, was that he HAD noticed, and had simply written
it off as part of the game they were playing. Which was a perfectly
reasonable assumption, but happened to be dead wrong. Or, worse, he had
noticed, and did not reciprocate her feelings, but couldn't bring
himself to tell her that to her face. It was not lost on Scully that
Mulder was taking such a circumlocutious means of showing Fowley the
door. He just wasn't very good at dealing with personal issues.
<<And you are, Dana?>>
She had to tell him. She had to end it. This was ridiculous.
She looked over at him again and cleared her throat. "Mulder," she
said.
He looked up from his paperwork, question marks in his eyes.
Oh, god...those eyes. They were hazel this morning, with flecks of gold
and green floating in them. His pupils were dilated, presumably due to
the low light level they maintained in their office. She felt herself
sinking into his eyes, losing herself in them, drowning in them....
"Scully?"
She shook her head sharply. <<Damn the man!>> She didn't know if she
was angry because she had been captured by his eyes, or because his
voice had pulled her back out again. She felt herself start to blush
slightly, and looked away.
"Scully? Is everything okay?"
"I'm fine, Mulder," she replied automatically. "I just...have to go to
the bathroom." And she got up from her desk and fled from the room.
# # #
10:52 a.m.
Scully stood in one of the stalls in the women's restroom, trying to
regain her composure. A wadded up Kleenex was clutched in one hand;
from time to time she used it to dab at the tears which insisted on
leaking out.
<<This is absurd,>> she thought. <<How did I ever get myself into
this? More to the point, how do I get myself out?>>
There was really only one way: She had to take the Mulder by the horns
and tell him....tell him what? Tell him that she didn't want to do this
anymore, because it was making her crazy? She damned well knew he
wouldn't let it go at that. No, he'd insist on knowing all the details,
and she wouldn't be able to resist giving them to him; she was never
able to resist him when he focused all of his relentless and
singleminded attention on her. No, if she opened this can of worms, he
was going to poke and prod and chivy her until she came completely
clean, and had no secrets left.
And then it would all be over.
The certain knowledge hovered over her like a crushing weight, ready to
descend on her at any moment. She knew -- she was positive -- that if
Mulder felt about her the way she felt about him, he would have told her
about it long since. HE wouldn't flinch, no matter how difficult the
task; HE wasn't afraid of the truth. The truth was his religion.
She dabbed at her eyes again. Damn; she was going to have to spend some
time repairing her mascara before she dared return to the office. One
look at her in her current condition would tell Mulder that she had been
crying, and that just as surely would lead to him asking dangerous
questions and her giving all the wrong answers. Even if they were
truthful answers, they were still the wrong ones.
Scully heard the restroom door swing open, and then the clicking of high
heels on the tile floor. And a voice. A familiar voice.
"--just don't understand it, Eileen," Diana Fowley was saying.
"Eileen", Scully surmised, must be Eileen Ramirez, one of the team
leaders in the VCU. "I thought...I don't know what I thought." The two
women stopped walking, and Scully heard the sound of running water.
Then Fowley continued, "I guess I thought that if I came back everything
would be the same as it was before. I was such a fool."
"You're not a fool," Ramirez replied. "You'd just been away for a long
time. You didn't realize how much things had changed."
"I wish I could understand what he sees in her!" Fowley exclaimed, and
Scully was startled to hear what sounded suspiciously like a tremor in
the woman's voice. "I just don't get it."
"A lot of people have asked that question," Ramirez said quietly. "I've
never heard a really good answer to it."
"I suppose I should be happy for him," Fowley said, her voice very low.
"I know that's the right thing to do. I knew it the first moment I laid
eyes on...on THEM, last spring." Scully heard a sniffling noise. "But
I can't Eileen; I just can't. It hurts too much. I'm such a fool.
Such a fool." There was a muffled sob.
"Come on, Diana; don't be so hard on yourself. You didn't know --"
"Yeah, yeah, I didn't know," the other woman said, bitterness in her
voice. "But I should have known. I should have."
Scully was feeling more acutely embarrassed with each passing moment.
Unlike the incident in the X-Files office on Monday afternoon, this was
a clear and unambiguous invasion of privacy. It wasn't Scully's fault;
it had just happened. But that didn't make it any less of a violation.
Desperately, Scully wondered just when exactly her life had started to
resemble the plot of a "B" movie.
Fortunately, the conversation then turned to other topics, and a couple
of minutes later the other two women left. Scully sagged thankfully
against the side of the stall and closed her eyes.
# # #
Wednesday (cont.), 8:59 p.m.
Scully lay on her sofa, hands clasped behind her head, staring at the
ceiling. Wondering what the hell she was supposed to do now.
After the incident in the bathroom, she'd stopped back in their office
just long enough to tell Mulder she wasn't feeling well and needed to go
home. He'd seemed to expect it -- he hadn't even called during the
afternoon to check up on her, which she'd half expected him to do.
Finally, around five o'clock, he'd called to let her know he was going
out with the Gunmen for the evening, which suited her just fine. She
needed time to think.
Unfortunately, she didn't seem to be getting much of anywhere. In her
mind she kept playing over the conversation she'd overheard between
Fowley and Ramirez. Scully had pretty much discounted the things
Ramirez had said. As Mulder had reminded her on Sunday evening, there
was always plenty of gossip about the two agents assigned to the X-Files
unit, and Ramirez was one of the leading promulgators of such rumors.
Fowley was different, though. What was it Mulder had said? "She knows
me Scully, better than anyone but you. That's why she's dangerous." If
he was right -- and Scully had no reason to doubt him -- then Fowley's
words had to be taken more seriously. Which meant that Scully couldn't
just assume that Mulder was as uninterested in her as he appeared to
be. Fowley thought that Mulder was in love with Scully -- that much was
pretty clear from the conversation she had overheard. On the other
hand, this was just exactly what Scully WANTED to think, and she
therefore had to be wary of it, at the very least. And Scully herself
was the world's leading expert on Special Agent Fox Mulder, and SHE had
certainly seen no signs of such an attraction.
Of course, it was hard for her to be objective in the matter...but it
was probably just as hard for Fowley to be objective.
She shook her head angrily; this was lay madness.
Fowley herself was yet another problem. In the course of those few
minutes of eavesdropping this morning, Scully had found her image of the
woman being rapidly unraveled. Instead of a wanton, cold-blooded
seductress, Diana Fowley had unwittingly revealed herself to be a human
being, complete with her own unique set of wants, needs and
insecurities. All of which was making Scully feel pretty bad about some
of the things she'd said and done, especially in the last few days.
She wished Mulder would come home, so she could cut off his ears and
feed them to him. This whole ridiculous situation was really his fault,
anyway. It had been his idea in the first place, and it had been his
inability to deal with Fowley on an adult level which had made it
necessary. She didn't really understand how he'd managed to talk her
into it.
<<Oh, come on, Dana -- when was the last time you were able to refuse
Mulder something he really wanted?>>
Scully sighed again, and smiled sadly. One thing was for sure: The
game was over. Finished. Kaput. There was no possible way she could
continue with it. Not after the things she'd overheard Fowley telling
Ramirez. She could only hope that she and Mulder would be able to
salvage their friendship and their partnership when she finally broke
the news to him.
She was startled out of her reverie by someone pounding on her door.
She sat up and looked at her watch. What the hell? <<Maybe it's just a
drunk at the wrong door.>>
The pounding continued, and then she heard a woman's voice. "Dana!
Dana! Lemme in!"
Scully's scalp prickled. It sounded like -- but it couldn't be. Why
would SHE be here? She crossed the room and pulled open the door.
"Agent Fowley," she said faintly.
The other woman blinked owlishly at her, and swayed slightly. She
seemed to be having trouble focusing her eyes. After a moment of
silence, she said, "Oh. Dana. You're here."
"You've been drinking," Scully observed.
"Bravo!" Fowley patted her hands together in mock applause. "Brilliant
diagnosis, Dr. Dana." She pushed her way past Scully and into the
apartment. "Why don't you come in, Diana," she muttered. "Thank you.
Don't mind if I do." She stood for a moment in the center of the living
room, looking around. Then: "You have a nice place, Dr. Dana."
"Thank you."
The other woman's gaze fell on the sofa, and she scowled and walked over
to it and kicked one of its legs. "Is this where he sleeps?"
"When he stays here," Scully said coolly.
"Which has been pretty frequent lately, hasn't it? In fact, he hasn't
been home all week." Fowley walked back over to stand in front of
Scully, and leaned forward to whisper conspiratorially. "Know how I
know? Because I'VE been staying at HIS place." She giggled. "At the
Fox den." She giggled again, and then went through an obvious struggle
to squelch herself. "I fed his fish. If it wasn't for me, th' little
buggers'd be dead by now."
"I'm sure he appreciates that," Scully said.
Fowley shook her head. "Nope. Nope. Nope. He doesn't want me to feed
his fish." She jabbed her finger into Scully's sternum. "He wants YOU
to feed his fish. He tol' me so." She leaned even closer, and Scully
could smell the alcohol wafting over her, almost like a physical
assault. "But I fed 'em anyway. Hope you don' mind. Little buggers'd
be dead by now if I hadn't."
The two women locked eyes for a moment; then Fowley turned abruptly away
and stalked into the kitchen. Scully finally closed and locked the
front door, then went after her.
Fowley was methodically if somewhat sloppily going through all of
Scully's kitchen cabinets. Rooting around, obviously looking for
something. As Scully walked up behind her, Fowley said over her
shoulder, "Where d'you keep your liquor?"
"Don' you think you've had enough, Agent Fowley?"
Fowley swung about and glared at her. "Don't call me that!"
Scully blinked. "Don't call you what?"
"'Agent Fowley,'" the other woman replied, mimicking Scully's tone.
"Don't call me that. You always sound like you're talking about some
kind of lizard, or a spider, or something."
Scully thought about that for a moment, then said, "What should I call
you?"
"How 'bout 'Diana'? It's my name, after all."
"Okay...Diana."
The other woman turned back to the cabinets and continued her search.
"Dammit, Dr. Dana, whereinthehell's the liquor?" She looked back over
her shoulder at Scully. "Or....you're not a teetotaler on top of
everything else, are you? That would be just too fucking perfect."
With a sigh of resignation, Scully walked down to the other end of the
counter, opened a cabinet Diana hadn't gotten to yet, and pulled down
the bottle of brandy she kept stashed there. It was about three
quarters full, and gurgled slightly as she turned and handed it to
Diana.
"Ooh, an import," Diana said. "You've got 'spensive tastes, Dr. Dana."
And she turned and led the way back into the living room and flopped
down on the sofa.
"I still think you've had enough to drink, Diana," Scully said, moving
to stand in front of the sofa.
Diana rubbed her nose, then shook her head. "Nope. I can still feel
the tip of my nose. You're not really blitzed until the tip of your
nose gets numb." She patted the sofa next to her. "Siddown, Dr. Dana;
less chat. But first you need a drink of this." She held out the
bottle.
"I don't want a drink," Scully replied, reluctantly sitting down next to
the other woman.
"Oh, yes you do," Diana said, forcing the bottle into Scully's hand.
"And you're going to have it, too. Now drink up; you'll thank me in the
morning."
"Diana, I really don't want --"
"This is not about what you want, Dr. Dana," Diana interrupted. "This's
not 'bout you at all." She hiccupped. "'Scuse me. This's about Foxy
boy. But before I bare my soul for you, you are fucking well going to
have some anesthetic." The woman stopped and seemed to consider
something. "Tell you what -- I'll sweeten the pot a little. You take a
drink -- a good,healthy slug -- and I will answer any one question of
your choosing."
"Diana, you don't have to --"
"Yes I do!" she insisted. "Yes I do! An' I am going to do it, and if
you don' take a drink NOW, I'm going to do it anyway, and it's going to
be hell for both of us. Now drink up."
<<How did I get into this?>> Scully wondered. She seemed to be asking
that question of herself a lot this week. With a shrug of resignation,
she lifted the bottle to her lips, took a swallow, and then leaned
forward to put the bottle down on the coffee table. The liquor
trickling down her throat gave her a warm, tingly feeling. Maybe this
wasn't such a bad idea after all.
"That's not TOO bad," Diana said judiciously. "Not really what I'd call
a slug, but it's a start. So go ahead: Ask your question."
"You were serious?"
"I was serious. One question. Any topic." She giggled. "If you want,
you can ask me why I used to call him 'swizzle stick'. But I bet you
can think of a better question than that."
Scully thought about it for a moment. There were so many things she
wanted to know. She didn't want to be intrusive -- anymore than she
already had been. But Diana was inviting it. On the other hand, Diana
was clearly four sheets to the wind; she wasn't responsible, and it was
wrong to take advantage of that.
"Why did you and Mulder break up?" she suddenly blurted out.
Diana clapped her hands in approval. "Oh, well, done, Dr. Dana! You
hit the target on your first try. You want to know why I broke up with
Fox Mulder?" She grabbed the bottle off the coffee table and took a
short swig. "A little liquid courage," she muttered. Then she leaned
in close to Scully, and said, "I broke up with Fox Mulder because I am
the stupidest woman on the face of the planet."
Scully sat waiting for a moment, but Diana didn't seem inclined to
elaborate. Finally, Scully said, "That's not much of an answer."
"Not, but it was one hell of a question." Diana leaned back into the
sofa cushions and closed her eyes for a moment. Then she opened them
and looked back at Scully. "Okay, here's the real answer," she said.
"I left Fox because I thought he'd follow me."
Another silence. Then Scully said, "That's not much better than your
first answer."
Diana stared at her for a moment, then said, "Take another drink."
"But --"
"I answered your question, Dr. Dana; if you want the all the messy
details, you have to take another drink."
Scully hesitated just an instant, then took the bottle from Diana and
drank from it again. She didn't normally drink very much; maybe a glass
of wine if she and Mulder went out someplace for dinner. Already she
was starting to feel a little bit tipsy.
"That's better," Diana said, and sighed. "Okay, here's what happened.
Fox and I met at the Academy, and became close. We continued to be
close after we graduated, and when he discovered the X-Files he somehow
managed to rig it so that I was assigned to work with him." She closed
her eyes for a moment and smiled. "Those were the good times."
Scully nodded. "Go on."
"After awhile, though, I started to realize that things weren't going as
well as they'd seemed at first. Oh, we were solving cases -- some of
them, anyway." Tears started to leak out from beneath her eyelids.
"But the more we worked on the X-Files, the clearer it became that I was
more of a hindrance than a help."
She opened her eyes and looked around. "Where's that fucking bottle?"
Wordlessly, Scully handed it over. "Thanks." Diana took a deep
draught, then lowered it to her lap and looked over at Scully. "Y'see,"
she said, "I don't have your skeptical mind, Dr. Dana. I'm more like
Fox: I want to believe. I thought that through acceptance I could help
him find the truth that he was searching for. I was wrong." She shook
her head and smiled bitterly. "Do you know why?"
Wednesday (cont.)
Scully shook her head.
"Oh, come ON, Dr. Dana! You can't be THAT stupid. Now look me in the
eye. Look at me!" Diana waited until Scully had reluctantly complied.
She was feeling decidedly woozy, but somehow she was having no trouble
at all focusing her thoughts. Quite the contrary; her mind seemed to be
exceptionally clear tonight. The physician part of her knew that this
was an illusion created by the alcohol, but that knowledge was way down
deep, and barely impinged on her consciousness.
"What is the one thing that you give to Fox that I don't?" Diana went
on. "The one thing that I CAN'T give him?" Scully didn't say
anything. "Okay, fine; play dumb. I'll tell you anyway. The one thing
I couldn't give Foxy-woxy, the one thing he needed above all else, was a
challenge." Her voice took on a sneering tone. "I was too easy, too
compliant. I accepted everything he said and believed at face value. I
was his sidekick, not his partner."
Diana took another hit from the bottle, then continued. "And so we
started drifting apart. Day by day, I could feel him drawing away from
me, losing interest. At the time, I didn't know what was wrong, I
didn't have a fucking clue, I didn't know how to fix it. So I just hung
on for dear life, which of course just made matters worse, and prayed
that somehow things would get better again, and we could go back to the
way we had been."
She held out the bottle to Scully. "Take another drink. We're about to
do the really intimate part." Without argument, Scully took the bottle
and drank from it, then handed it back.
"Then came the explosion," Diana said. "I don't even remember what it
was about -- some damned mutant, or a UFO sighting, or Bigfoot or
something."
Scully smiled and nodded, trying to establish a connection with the
woman. "I know what those are like."
Diana glared at her. "No you don't. You don't have the slightest
fucking idea, Dr. Dana. When you fight with Fox, you fight about facts
and evidence. Don't try to deny it; I've seen you. When *I* fought
with Fox, it was about trust." Again tears welled up in her eyes. "He
didn't trust me. He COULDN'T trust me, because I didn't give him the
challenge he needed." She buried her face in her hands and sobbed.
Scully sat watching her for a moment, acutely embarrassed, not knowing
what to do. Hesitantly, she reached out and laid a hand on the other
woman's shoulder, but Diana knocked it away. She looked up at Scully, a
look of pure hatred on her face. "Don't touch me!" she snarled. "Don't
you dare touch me! I don't need your pity. That's not why I'm here."
"Why ARE you here?" Scully asked softly.
Diana stared at her for a long minute, then gave a "what the hell" sort
of shrug. "I'm here because he needs someone, and it can't be me." She
took another swig from the bottle and passed it over; Scully followed
suit.
"Let's see...where was I?" Diana stopped and rubbed her nose. "Ah. I
do believe I am drunk," she announced.
"The fight," Scully prompted.
"Ah, yes, the fight," Diana said. "It was a hell of a fight.
Screaming, yelling, broken crock'ry...the whole nine yards." Her lips
quirked. "Foxy-woxy and I never did anything by half measures.
"Anyway, there was the fight. He said a bunch of stuff at me; I said a
bunch of stuff at him. It ended when I stormed out of his apartment in
tears, expecting him to come after me. That was my big mistake."
"He didn't come after you?"
"Nope." The other woman shook her head. "I hung aroun' in the parking
lot for maybe an hour. No Fox. Finally, I got in my car and drove
away.
"At first I just drove around, nowhere in partic'lar. Eventually I
wound up at Headquarters, and I went inside and went down to his
office." She hiccupped, and made a face. "It was always HIS office,
you see. Never OUR office."
Scully nodded. "I know how THAT is."
Diana shook her head again. "Would you PLEASE stop trying to 'relate'
to me?" she said querulously. "You really don't get it. He got you a
desk, and he got you a nameplate. I'm sure you had to put him through
the wringer to get him to do it, but he did do it. He never did that
for me."
Scully nodded. She was feeling pretty buzzed from all the drinking, but
she thought she was starting to get an inkling of what Diana was driving
at.
Diana drew in a deep breath, then expelled it. "So I went down to
Headquarters and went downstairs to his office. And waited. It was
almost 10:30 at night when I got there; I was sure he would come after
me, if I just gave him enough time."
Her face was now completely expressionless, and her tone of voice
matched it. "So I waited for him. I waited. Nine. Fucking. Hours.
Finally, I realized he wasn't coming. I went and checked into a motel,
and called in sick for the day. I lay there on that ratty, lumpy bed
all day, staring at some stupid picture of some fucking birds that was
hanging on the wall, trying to think things through. The next day I
called the A.D. and requested a transfer, and went on leave status until
it went through. And that's how I came to spend six years of my life in
Europe chasing tourists and making the world safe for Democracy."
She shook her head and laughed bitterly. "And you know, the really
pathetic thing is that I never stopped believing he was going to come
after me." Another deep breath. "Then last spring, after more than
six years, it occurred to me that *I* could go after HIM." She smiled
sadly. "But when I got here, it was too late. Somebody else had
already taken my place."
Scully shifted her weight uncomfortably. "Actually, Diana, things
aren't quite --"
"Oh, shut the fuck up, Dr. Dana," Diana said tiredly. "Yeah, yeah, I
know -- the picture and the pasta salad and all that crap was all a
setup. I may be stupid, but I'm not THAT stupid. But, you two are so
far gone on each other it's sickening to watch. And if you and Fox
don't know it, you're the only ones in the entire fucking Bureau who
don't."
Scully shook her head, only to find that it made her dizzy. She held
still for a moment, waiting for the room to stop spinning, then said,
"But there's not really that much difference, Diana. You said Mulder
didn't come after you, but he ditches me, too. All the time."
"I'm not talkin' about ditching, Dr. Dana," the other woman insisted.
"That's just the ol' Mulder monomania at work. I'm talkin' about what
he does after a fight. Does he come after you? Or does he make you
come to him?" She looked at Scully for a moment, then shook her head.
"Sorry; stupid question. You don't have that kind of fight, do you?"
She tipped her head back and stared up at the ceiling. "Do you know
that when I was in the hospital, after I was shot last spring, he never
came to visit me? Not one single time. Not even a phone call."
"We were busy on a case, Diana," Scully protested. "I'm sure he thought
about you --"
"Oh, cut the crap," Diana interrupted. "Don' try to bullshit a
bullshitter. I got the same line of shit from Skinner, but I asked
around, and I found out what happened." She pulled her head upright and
looked at Scully. "You disappeared, and he had to go find you," she
said accusingly. Scully didn't say anything, and Diana nodded to
herself. "That's what happened, Dr. Dana. Of course, I couldn't get
all of the details, but I found out enough." She leaned forward and
looked into Scully's eyes. "Tell me, Dr. Dana. How far did he have to
go to find you? Just exactly how far?"
Scully stared back at her for a moment. Finally, she said,
"Antarctica."
Diana stared at her for another minute, then she whooped with laughter.
"I think you've just proved my point," she said. "ANTARCTICA? Fucking
unbelievable, Dr. Dana. Fucking unbelievable. He couldn't drive across
town to visit me when I was in intensive care, but for you he travels to
the fucking end of the planet." She shook her head, and repeated,
"Fucking unbelievable."
At that moment, Scully heard a key in the lock, and she swung around to
look just as the door swung open and Mulder stepped into her apartment.
He took one look at the tableau on the sofa, and froze.
Diana was the first one to regain her composure. She struggled to her
feet and stumbled across the room to stand in front of Mulder. "Hiya,
Foxy-woxy," she said, giggling. "Bet you wonder what I'm doin' here."
She threw her arms around his neck and gave him a big kiss on the
mouth. Scully noted with interest that Mulder didn't seem to know what
to do with his hands -- either that, or he was suffering from a grand
mal seizure.
Finally, Diana broke the clinch. "That was just for old times' sake,
Foxy-woxy." She withdrew her arms from around his neck. "And now I am
going to get out of your life and leave you in Dr. Dana's capable
hands." And she brushed by him, pulled the door shut behind her, and
was gone.
Mulder just stood by the door, staring at Scully, a stunned look on his
face. She stared back at him, thinking warm, comfortable thoughts.
Finally, she realized that she was going to have to do something, or
Mulder would wind up standing there all night and probably into the next
day.
She rose to her feet and weaved across the room to stand in front of
him. "Hi there, partner," she said. She suddenly felt very shy. "Did
you have fun with the Gunmen?"
He looked down at her, and she saw his eyes widen. "Scully," he said.
"You're drunk."
"I am?" She rubbed her nose with her fingertips. Completely numb. She
nodded solemnly. "I think you're right, Mulder."
"What...uh, what was going on here tonight?"
Scully smiled slightly. "Oh, just this and that. Diana dropped by to
visit. We had a nice chat." God his eyes were beautiful. As had
happened earlier in the day in their office, she felt herself falling
into his eyes. She could get lost in those eyes, and never come out
again. She felt herself start to tremble. She was so lonely; she'd
been denying her feelings for so long, and she just wasn't going to do
it anymore. She didn't know where it was heading, or what the outcome
would be, but she was past the point of no return.
"Mulder," she said.
"Yes, Scully?"
"Mulder, I think she's gone."
He nodded slowly. "I think so, too."
"That means we can stop pretending."
He continued to nod, a sad look in his eyes.
"I mean we can REALLY stop pretending, Mulder," she said.
He gave her a confused look. "What -- what do you mean?"
She took another step towards him, until their bodies were almost
touching. She had to crane her neck in order to keep looking into his
eyes, but she didn't care. "I mean," she said, "that we can stop
pretending that we're pretending." And she closed the final gap,
wrapped her arms around his neck and went up on her tiptoes and pressed
her lips against his.
It took only a few seconds, yet it seemed to last forever. His mouth
was warm and soft, and the sensation of his body pressing against hers,
and the uniquely musky Mulder smell combined to assault her senses and
send her mind reeling. At last she broke the kiss, and rested her head
against his chest, eyes closed, just listening to his heart beating.
Finally, she drew back a little. Her partner was staring down at her,
eyes wide and pupils dilated. She smiled at the expression on his
face. "I think I surprised you," she said.
He nodded solemnly. "I'd say that's a safe assumption." He cleared his
throat. "Um, should I assume this is just the liquor talking?"
She shook her head, still smiling. "If you do, I think I might cry."
"I wouldn't want to make you cry, Scully." He nuzzled his face in her
hair.
"Oh, good." She kissed him again. "Mmmm. I could get used to this."
After a few moments of silent cuddling, he said, "Scully?"
"Yes, Mulder?"
"Does this mean I get to keep being your ummer?"
She chuckled. "I insist on it."
"Oh, good." Another moment of silence. "So do I have to keep eating
pasta salad?"
"Every day. Breakfast, lunch and dinner."
"I guess I can live with that. As long as there's plenty of iced tea to
wash it down with." And this time he initiated the kiss.
It was a long time before either of them spoke again.
Fini
--
"It's not till you get back to nature that you realize EVERYTHING'S out
to get you."
--Special Agent Dana Scully, "Quagmire"
================
Okay, I succumbed. I've established an online archive of my own X-Files
fanfic:
http://www.avalon.net/~publius/MyStories.html
]]>