From: winged_squirrel@my-deja.com
Date: Wed, 03 Jan 2001 12:22:37 GMT
Subject: NEW: All to Time by Squirrel

Title:  All to Time
Author: Squirrel
Category: A little angst morsel with MSR in the middle
Summary:  Mulder's back.  Much blather ensues.
Feedback:  Yes, please.  Winged_squirrel@my-deja.com
Disclaimer:  None of them are mine, don't sue.
Distribution: I usually say yes, but please ask first.
Author's notes: This was in response to a challenge issued by Beduini.



It's just a touch.

Just the brush of skin on skin.

But, oh what a moment it is, to hold her and feel her.  Eight, nine, ten
years of loving her all boiled down to the fleeting whisper of flesh
meeting flesh, the fierce, head-on collision of cells.

That's all we are really, flesh and blood and bone and muscle.  Gristle,
strength, and courage. Feel that arm. See?  Brawn in an arm as fragile
as a sparrow's throat.

And hair falling like a waterfall in waves of red.  Pick up a strand,
rub it between my fingers, savor how real it is, how solid and soft.

I wait patiently for the dream to end, but I also know that it won't.
The Scully of my dreams would cry and sob when I came back, not act like
this quiet, lifeless mannequin set before me.

The dream continues, but so does her silence.  It's not the silence
after death, the resounding knoll after the lights have faded, or even
the silence of someone who's had their hopes realized.

She's waiting, eyes closed, neck arched gracefully.

Touch her.

See, Scully, need can go both ways.  I don't remember the last year, but
I've missed you.  I miss you all the time.

Hold her, Scully, partner, love.   For Melissa who's been gone for so
long she's not even a dream.  For her father whose presence remains a
briny reminder of the seas.  For your mother, oh for your mother who's
stood at the hospital rails for so long.

I continue to touch, to hold, and press, caress and explore.  Making
love to her, even if it's only with my eyes.  Yet, she remains rigid.

And then, slowly she reaches out.  Her hand moves as fast as it would if
it were wading through heavy, blue black waters.

Contact.

With most moments you have to look back on them to see their worth.  Not
so this time.  I understood it was a defining moment from the second her
hand met my cheek to the whirlwind in my arms.  The sobs that bounced in
her chest, held like a secret.  She didn't say my name; she branded me
with it.

Tiny kisses.  Small hands jumping from place to place, never still.
Mulder. Mulder, Mulder, Mulder her ragged breathes said.

And my heart, protesting frantically against its bone cage raged in
reply.

Scully.

I haven't forgotten.


********


Thanks to all the incredibly talented members of IWTB.


~Squirrel

"I could give all to time except- except
what I myself have held."
~Robert Frost