From: cantwaltz@aol.com Date: Sat, 3 Jun 2000 00:42:54 EDT Subject: xfc: Pink (1/1) by Liz Owens Source: xfc TITLE: Pink AUTHOR: Liz Owens E-MAIL ADDRESS: cantwaltz@aol.com FEEDBACK: Proudly hung on the refrigerator DISTRIBUTION: Gossamer and the usual atxc haunts. Anywhere else, just let me know where it's going and leave my name and such attached. SPOILER WARNING: Post "Requiem." RATING: PG CLASSIFICATION: V, A KEYWORDS: MSR DISCLAIMER: No, Mulder and Scully aren't mine--they belong to CC, the fine folks at Fox, and 1013 Productions. "Never for money, always for love...." But I'd like to be a fly on the wall at her dinner with Maggie. SUMMARY: A simple object sparks complicated emotions. AUTHOR'S NOTES: This is a font fic, inspired by the font Pink. This font is by Sadandotcom and is available at http://newdream.net/~meir/type. Thanks to Jori for her Eberting and "photographic" memory. This one is for Kristin and Mish, who understand that sacred spaces can be almost anywhere. Thanks for putting up with my discussion topics and my crazy schedule, and, most especially, thanks for loving me. How did I ever get along without you? You can visit my other stories at http://members.aol.com/cantwaltz. Pink "Only in a house where one has learnt to be lonely does one have this solicitude for things. One's relation to them, the daily seeing or touching, begins to become love, and to lay one open to pain." - Elizabeth Bowen Cascade Cafe National Gallery of Art Washington, D.C. Saturday, 10:45 a.m. The last time Scully was here, the most difficult decision she had to make was which flavor of gelato she was going to treat herself to. How times change, she thought as she glanced at her watch. There was still more than an hour before her mother was supposed to meet her for lunch. She knew she was abominably early. But after a restless night, she had simply gotten up and come to the museum, hoping that the bustle of tourists would distract her from the cacophony of thoughts careening through her head. This cafe, buried between the two buildings that comprised the National Gallery, was one of her favorite places to relax. The rush of the waterfall, the murmur of a hundred different languages, and the sweet smell of baking that always hung in the air had always provided a diversion when she needed one. Sometimes she came here when she couldn't shake a case, letting the soothing splash of the water cleanse her spirit. Or, at least, she *used* to come here. It had been a long time since she had sat at what she considered "her" table and let the sounds and scents wash over her. At some point--she wasn't sure exactly when-- turning to the outside world for comfort had become--well, unrealistic For as much as she hoped for and spoke of a normal life, that very normalcy scared her to death. When she had chanced upon Daniel just a few weeks ago, she had at first grasped what he offered with both hands. His love was familiar, flattering. But she had seen soon enough--had let herself see--that the "normal" life he held out to her was but an illusion...a twisted, sick version of what love should be. And she had made her choice then...the choice that was the only right one of all the options open to her. And that path led her here, where she sat waiting for her mother. Waiting for an answer. Just...waiting. It had been so long since she had opened herself up to all the possibilities that life had to offer that she had forgotten that very openness also meant accepting both the pleasure and the pain that could stem from any decision she made. And today she needed to make a major one: to tell her mother about her pregnancy, or to wait. Wait until there was less danger of miscarriage. Wait until Mulder returned. Wait until the baby came and she found out if it was healthy. Waiting, always waiting. She hated it. But as much as the waiting grated her, it seemed somehow degrading to reach out; she despised admitting that she needed help. After all, Dana Scully was the strong child. Her parents had carefully avoided labeling their children, but in a large family that was always on the move, each of the young Scullys had found his or her niche and staked a ferocious claim to it. And to this day, she wanted to do things on her own and on her own terms. She knew that her fierce independence had become her own worst enemy. Loneliness, as she had admitted to Phillip Padgett in a moment of heart-wrenching candor, had become her choice. It was safe. And security was what she craved, had desired all her life. A place to call her own, one that she didn't have to leave until *she* was ready. A family. Someone to love...and someone to love her in return. When had what she most wanted become the risk she wanted least to take? She sipped her lukewarm orange juice, wanting to laugh at her own foolishness. Choosing to be alone was as perverse as choosing to be with Daniel. She had consciously made the wrong decisions, even though she had felt at the time that her reasons were sound. She knew herself to be a terrible liar, but she had been astonishingly adroit at self- deception. And even now, when both logic and her heart told her that it was time to reach out to her mother--just as she had reached out to Mulder in Oregon--that stubborn little girl who had stood up to Bill's bullying and Melissa's tantrums came to the surface once more. Dana Scully could handle this, that inner voice taunted. She could handle being without Mulder. She could handle the demands of an insane job and a new baby. She would find Mulder, even if she had to...well, she would do what she had to do. Finishing her juice, she fished in her wallet for some singles to buy some milk, then started toward the busy counter. Saw a flash of pink. And stopped. In front of her, a dark-haired man leaned over a stroller and carefully picked up a squalling infant loosely wrapped in a pink blanket. He tucked the baby against his shoulder and swayed unconsciously, trying to soothe her cries as he hunted for a bottle in a cavernous diaper bag. Scully felt her heart skip, then stop. The back of his head--the curve of the skull, the texture and cut of the hair, the strangely vulnerable nape of his neck--was terribly familiar. She felt as if she were standing outside herself, watching her life play on as if she were no longer a part of it. Her hands started to shake, her breath hitching in her throat as a sob tried to escape. Then the child's blanket slipped to the ground. Scully reached for it reflexively, grasping the soft cotton in instant before the man caught hold of the fabric. Then she saw his face for the first time. And the shaking intensified. Not because she knew him. But because she didn't. "Thanks," the stranger said gratefully, reaching for the blanket. Automatically, she handed it to him. But not before she had memorized the color of the fabric, the faint scent of powder and milk, the soft, nubbly texture of the weave. "You're welcome," she murmured. Before she could help herself, she stroked a finger down the infant's chubby cheek. "What a beautiful baby." "Thanks," he repeated, a grin splitting his handsome face. "She's a handful, but I think we'll keep her." Scully gave him an answering smile, fully understanding what it cost her to keep that hard-won mask of "fine" on her face. Then she turned away and walked blindly out of the cafe, past the gift shops and up the stairs. She all but burst out of the West Building on the Constitution Avenue side, pausing only to pull her phone from her pocket. She dialed her mother's home number, hoping that she could catch Maggie Scully before she left. "Hello?" She stopped, drew in a deep breath to calm herself. "Hi, Mom, it's me." "I was just on my way out the door," Maggie said breathlessly. "Everything OK?" "Everything's fine," she lied, struggling to control her voice long enough to complete the call. "I just won't be able to have lunch today. I got a call from A.D. Skinner, and he needs to talk to me about a case." "It's not about Fox, is it?" Maggie's voice sharpened. Her shoulders sagged momentarily before she reached down and found a pocket of strength. "No, Mom," she said softly. "We still don't know anything." A sigh. "Honey, I'm sorry. Are you sure you don't want me to come into town--" "No! No," she said more quietly. "I'm fine, Mom. I'll call you later, OK? I've got to get to the office." After a quick goodbye, she turned off her phone--something she seldom did--and stuffed it back in her pocket. The two blocks to her car seemed like two miles, but eventually she was unlocking the door and sliding into the driver's seat. How long she sat there with her hands locked on the steering wheel, she didn't know. Eventually the heat in the closed vehicle forced her to turn on the engine and, a minute later, the air conditioning. The cool air against her flushed face was a welcome, albeit temporary, relief. Finding one last reserve of strength, she pulled out of the parking space and drove home. She felt a strange urgency--one that dogged her until she had closed and locked her front door. If she could just...just.... If she could just get through the next few minutes, she would be fine. All her strength would return and she would be able to...to... Angry at herself now, she stripped off her sweat-dampened clothing and tossed it into the hamper. She stalked into the bathroom and turned on the shower, then went to the linen closet for fresh towels. Blindly grabbing the first two her hand touched, she turned toward the bathroom once more. Saw a flash of pink. And stopped. The towels in her hand were pink. Baby blanket pink, baby blanket soft. The image of the familiar back of a strange man's head, his daughter's small body cradled against his shoulder, came to her mind unbidden. And other images began to flicker through her mind, faster and faster, until she thought they would tumble out of her head to spill on the floor. Mulder with Emily. With Gibson Praise, Michelle Bishop, Kevin Morris. Careful, gentle, tender. His single-minded determination to find his sister...a love that had only deepened over the twenty-seven years she had been missing. Fox Mulder could be thoughtless, insensitive, reckless--but she had never met anyone who had a greater capacity to love. She all but stumbled into the shower, automatically shampooing her hair and soaping her body. "It has to end sometime. That time is now." Gasping, she dropped the soap, which slid and bounced until it came to rest, drunkenly, over the drain. "Mulder?" she whispered. But there was no response, just as she knew there wouldn't be. She quickly stuck her head under the spray, rinsing the lather from her hair. The warm shower enclosure was suddenly terribly confining, and she was almost desperate to be in an open space. But as she stripped the last of the soap from her body and reached for the knob that would turn off the water, the voice whispered once more in her ear. "I'm not going to risk...losing you." The sudden silence as the water stopped was almost as startling as the voice. Shakily, she stepped out of the stall and stood on the plush rug, looking around wildly for someone she knew would not be there. "Don't do this to me!" she exclaimed finally, fear thick in her throat. "I can't...I can't...." Shivering from reaction and cold, she grabbed the towels from where she dropped them on the bathroom floor. Saw a flash of pink. And stopped. In an instant, all her control fell away and shattered. With a sob, she fell to her knees on the cold tile floor, gathering the soft pink cotton to her chest. The keening howl that came from the depths of her was almost inhuman--and all the more poignant for the fact that it came from the throat of a woman. Long moments passed as her grief spent itself. Like the child she carried, it had a life of its own, and it demanded a voice. Finally she understood the cracked words that tumbled from her mouth, and sobs shook her until she couldn't breathe. "I can't do this, Mulder...I can't do this on my own. I can't do it alone." She wanted to scream it, for the whole world to share the anguish of her loss, the joy she felt at knowing new life grew within her. She wanted everyone to understand the conflict that haunted her every breath. She wanted arms around her, telling her that it was perfectly all right, for once, not to be strong...to let someone else be strong for her. She wanted more than anything for those arms to belong to the man she loved, and her heart broke anew as she realized that those arms might never hold her again. When the tears slowed, then stopped, she uncurled herself from the floor. In an emotional haze, she pulled on her robe and brushed her damp, tumbled hair. Then she padded into the living room, drew the blinds, and collapsed onto the sofa, her overtired body lapsing instantly into sleep. Hours later, she sat in the same place she had fallen asleep, her feet tucked under her. Her cell was on the cushion beside her, and she spun it in lazy circles by flicking one nail against the antenna. The decision she had struggled with this morning still weighed on her. But now...now, the way seemed a little clearer. With no intent firmly fixed in her mind, she picked up the phone and dialed a number, almost sighing in relief when a familiar voice answered. "Mom? It's Dana. I finished up at the office and I was wondering...maybe I could come by for dinner?"