********************************************************************* This author's e-mail address has changed to: xanaduxf@yahoo.com ********************************************************************* From: "Shannon" Date: Mon, 29 Nov 1999 19:45:47 -0500 Subject: NEW Convergent (1/1) Source: xff Convergent by shannono shannono@iname.com Distribution: Okay for Ephemeral, Gossamer, Further X-Plorations. Others, please link to it at my XF page (URL in sig); it'll be there within a day or so. Vignette, MSR, Rated PG, Spoilers for "Millennium" Summary: A kiss and a promise. Author's notes: Post-ep number one, in the spirit *I* got from The Kiss. Further insanity, including some smut, to follow. ;) Thanks: To Paulette, Lisa, and Robbie, for beta services rendered. Love ya, dolls! ========== Convergent by shannono Where to start? Well, at the beginning, I suppose. All the good stories start there. Once upon a time ... Yes, I know; it's a cliche. That's all right. So is the ending. Once upon a time, I had a dream. Not the kind of dream you have at night, nestled all snug in your bed. This was the kind of dream you build in your own mind, in those hours when you sit and stare at a wall, or out the window, or at the yellow dashes etched on your vision as you drive down yet another lonely highway. My dream -- a pipe dream, I guess most would call it -- might not be what most would expect of me. I mean, I give off this air of single-mindedness and egotism, sometimes edged with a flare of insanity. I think big, wrapping every little tiny event up in the ribbons of interstellar conspiracy. It's what I do. But it's not who I really am. My dream was alarmingly ... normal, for want of a better word. And it was made up of everything I was so sure I could never, ever have. First and foremost was my sister. Yes, that wish had become a part of "the big picture"; was really the reason for the path I'd taken. But at the foundation of my never-ending search was the pure desire to have a sister. A family. A nice, simple, normal, nuclear family. Dad, Mom, Brother, Sister. If I couldn't have all that, then at least my sister. Then I wanted friends. Not paranoid conspiracy buffs and internet geeks, but regular, upper-middle-class types. Suburb dwellers, with wives and kids and minivans. Of course, I'd have to fit in, right? So I wished for the same thing for me. Well, maybe not the minivan. But the wife and kids. Maybe for that most of all. A wife, a woman by my side always, looking after me, taking care of me, letting me take care of her. Loving me -- mentally and emotionally and physically. Great sex, sure, but secondary to the rest of it. The security of loving and being loved. I wanted a normal, "safe" kind of job. College professor, maybe, or even a practicing psychologist. Or an author, writing about conspiracies instead of living them. And then, suddenly, I had my dream handed to me on a silver platter. The suburb, the friends, the wife and kids. Even my sister, with the extra bonus of nieces and nephews. I was stunned, but amazingly receptive. Feeling rather like a cross between George Bailey and Ebeneezer Scrooge, I floated through the story in fast-forward, watching my life progress in snapshot moments. And in the end, my life was worthless. I have never felt more empty than I did in the moment when I realized what I'd done. To myself, to the world, but most especially to Scully. In that instant, my pipe dream dissolved into so much sand at my feet. And a new one took its place, this time based in reality. My new dream, my deepest hidden wish, sprang into my mind fully formed. And at its center was this brilliant, strong, beautiful woman who pulled me back from the abyss yet again. I see us together, following the same parallel paths we've been on for the past seven years, side by side but almost never touching. Only now, our paths will be convergent. We'll grow ever closer, reach out more often, share those parts of ourselves we've held back. And by the time we reach the end, when we've saved the world and ourselves in the process, our paths will be one. And we can turn some of our attention away from what's ahead of us and toward each other. Of course, that doesn't mean we can't ever spare each other a glance before then. I'd like to think it's inevitable that we'll end up together when it's over, but I'd also like to think we can do a little exploration before we reach that point. Something to sustain us for the journey; bread and water for our souls. So it was midnight on New Year's, and everyone in the world was grabbing the person next to them and laying one on them, mostly in meaningless tradition. And as I looked at her, her smiling face upturned to watch the Times Square pandemonium, I knew it was time for one of those glances. And so, cliched or not, I kissed her. And she kissed me. We kissed, and it wasn't passionate or sexual in the least. It was soft and tender and loving, and it meant more than all those other traditional kisses going on all over the world put together. It was traditional, yes, but it was the farthest thing from meaningless. It meant everything. It was a promise, and a fulfillment of a promise, and a little glimpse into the future. And it was enough. What? You were expecting "they lived happily ever after"? No, I wouldn't go that far. We don't have that kind of life. But we do have a life. Together. And right now, that's enough for me. ==========END========== "Just because it's positive and good doesn't make it silly or trite." -- Melissa Scully, "One Breath" ========== Gimme a B! Gimme an F! Gimme an M! http://homepages.infoseek.com/~bfmarchive ========== Find Xanadu at http://shannono.simplenet.com/