From: skmcam@aol.com (SKMCAM)
Subject: Trinkets 1/1
Date: 6 Jul 1997 16:44:04 GMT

Please reply to shell at skmcam@aol.com 

Title: Trinkets
Author: shell (skmcam@aol.com)
Rating: G
Classification: SR
Spoilers: Ascension, One Breath
Keywords: Mulder/Scully romance
Summary: Mulder helps Scully find what she has lost.

Disclaimer: The X-Files belong to Chris Carter, 1013, and Fox.  
Special thanks to Mary for dealing with the phrase from hell.

Authors Note: Friendshippers Beware!!!  Well maybe not ;> Just read it,
make your own decision, and let me know what you think.

Mary, thanks again for putting up with the phrase from hell.  

Trinkets 
by shell

	Scully stormed into the office, hung her coat, and threw down her
briefcase on a chair.  Then she started the search.
	Mulder sat back in his chair.  She didn't even noticed that he was
in the office.  He looked on as she flipped through folders and shook out
books.
	"Good morning Mulder!  How are you this beautiful day?  Oh, I'm
wonderful Scully, how are you doing?  Oh lovely."  Mulder just smiled at
his partner as she walked over to the desk.
	"Get up."
	"OoooKay."  He stood and moved out of her way.
	She proceeded to sit down and tear his desk apart, opening drawers
and shuffling their contents.  
	"Scully are you looking for something?"
	She just grunted and started searching through the top of the
desk.
	"Scully, stop."  He put his hands on top of hers.  "What are you
looking for?"
	"I lost my necklace."
	"Which necklace?"
	"My cross."  She stood up and went to search a file cabinet.
	"Where did you lose it?"
	She turned to face him.  "Now if I knew that why would I be
looking everywhere for it?"
	"Oh right."  Mulder frowned, realizing the stupidity of the
question.
	Scully sat down in a chair across from him.  "I have no idea where
it is."
	"When was the last time you remember seeing it?"
	"Yesterday.  I don't remember taking it off and I couldn't find it
this morning."
	Mulder knew what the cross meant to Scully.  She wore it all the
time.  The only time she was without it was when she was abducted.
	Mulder sighed.  "It'll turn up."
	Scully started to do some paper work.  Every few minutes she would
get up, search a new place where she thought her cross may be, not find it
and sit down huffily. 
	About the hundredth time it happened, Mulder stood up.  "Scully,
go home."
	"Why?  I'm working."  She wasn't really listening to him.  She was
searching another file cabinet.
	"No, you're tearing the office apart and you know as well as I do
that your cross is not here."
	"Well maybe the cleaning staff found it."	
	"When was the last time the cleaning staff dared to come in here?"
 He walked over to her and put his hands on her shoulders.  "Go home and
look there.  You'll find it.  It's not a big deal."
	At his last statement she glared at him and shook off his hands. 
"It's not some trinket, Mulder.  It means a lot to me."	
	"I didn't mean it that way and you know it."  He walked back to
his desk.  "Look, I'll take another check around here, if it makes you
feel better. But at the rate we're going neither of us are going to get
any work done.  So go home."
	She grudgingly got her coat and briefcase.  At the door, she
turned to Mulder.  Her face had softened, but there was an overwhelming
look of defeat in her eyes.  "I'm sorry for yelling at you.  Thank you."
	As she left, Mulder put his forehead against the top of the desk. 
He knew Scully never got upset over stupid things like losing something. 
Even when he would hide things from her on purpose she never got mad. 
Well maybe mad, but never flustered like she was now.
	All he wanted to do now was something to help Scully.  He hated
seeing her like this.  Then he realized what he could do for her.  It
might not make up for losing her cross, but she would definitely like it,
he thought.
	He looked down at his paper work.  "This'll keep.  Hell I wasn't
getting anywhere on it anyway."
	He closed the folder, got his coat and left.
	

	Dana Scully had never been one for fits of emotional outbursts,
but at the moment she couldn't hold it back.  She sat on her bed now,
sobbing.
	She had left the office at noon and started searching as soon as
she got home.  In the process she had spilled bleach on her favorite black
skirt, ruining it, and forcing her to change into sweats, wasting valuable
searching time and making even more of a mess.  
	She looked around her bedroom with tears in her eyes.  It was a
disaster area.  Books and clothes  littered the floor.  Papers once in
neat piles were now scattered everywhere.  She knew the rest of her
apartment was in the same condition which made her feel even worse.  It
was now after 8 pm and she still hadn't found her cross.  
	<<Knock, knock, knock.>>
	"Scully, it's me.  Open up."	
	She carefully maneuvered her way to the door, sidestepping a pile
of medical journals.  She opened the door to see Mulder standing there. 
He was wearing jeans, a t-shirt and his black leather jacket.  
	He looked at Scully's red eyes and tear stained face and then at
the condition of her apartment.  Her apartment, usually immaculate and
orderly, looked like a tornado had hit, and she had been caught in the
middle of it..
	"Redecorating?"  He walked in.
	"Mulder what are you doing here?"  
	"I wanted to see if you found it."  He cleared a seat on the couch
for them and sat down.  "But I guess, by the looks of things, you
haven't."
	She sat down next to him.  "No," she sighed.
	"So, I like what you've done with the place."
	"Mulder if you're here to tease me you can just leave."  She
picked up a tissue and blotted her eyes.
	"No actually I have something for you."  He reached in his pocket
and pulled out a white rectangular box.  He handed it to her.
	"Mulder?"  She raised her eyebrows questioningly.  
	"Just open it."
	Scully opened the box and took out a small black pouch.  She
emptied its contents into her hand.  It was a gold chain with a charm
attached.  The charm was a gold heart with a cross engraved on it.
	"Read the back," Mulder prodded.
	Scully turned the charm over.  The inscription read- To Dana -
Mulder.  She smiled.  Not Fox.  Not Love Mulder.  Just Mulder.
	"Mulder I don't know what to say."	
	"Ah, it's just a trinket."  He smiled and squirmed nervously on
the couch.  
	"I love it." She smiled but her voice betrayed her true feelings.
	"But it doesn't replace your cross."
	Scully looked down, not wanting to answer him.
	"It's ok Scully.  I understand."	
	"It's just that...well my mom gave it to me..."
	"You don't have to explain."
	They sat together in silence for a few minutes.
	"Mulder," Scully looked up at him, "do you think you could help me
look for a little?"
	"Sure."  Mulder smiled.  "Is there any place you haven't looked?"
	"Well the bathroom, but I don't think it would be in there."
	"Can't hurt to look."
	Mulder went into the bathroom, while Scully searched her bedroom
again.  He walked over to the sink and looked around the room.  He glanced
at the bottled of creams and lotions all lined up on her vanity.  Then his
eyes caught a glint of gold.
	"Scully where do you keep a flashlight?"
	"I'll get it, why?"  Her voice tried to contain her growing
excitement.
	"Just bring it in here."	
	Scully handed the flashlight to him and he shown it into the drain
of her sink.
	"You have a monkey wrench?"	
	"Yeah, why?  Do you see it?"
	"I don't know."
	She ran to get the wrench.  Mulder positioned himself under the
sink. As she handed him the tool.
	"Oww."
	"What?"
	"I hit my head."
	Scully tried to stifle a giggle.  She heard him loosening the
pipe.  "Mulder do you know what you're doing?"
	"Sure, how hard can this be?"  At that moment some water spilled
out of the freed pipe onto his shirt.
	He came out from under the sink wet and with a bump on his head. 
Scully ignored him and took the curved pipe out of his hand.
	She ran to the kitchen, with Mulder following, drying himself with
a towel.  She dumped the contents of the pipe on to the counter.  Along
with clumps of red hair and a dime, lay a gold chain.
	She picked it up and cleaned the hair off it.  She smiled. 
Suddenly Scully threw her arms around Mulder's waist.   "You found it!  Oh
my God, you are the best!"  Her arms were still around his waist, as he
slowly hugged her back.  She looked up at him, radiant now.  "I must have
taken it off when I took my bath and it fell down the drain."
	Realizing their closeness, Scully stepped out of their embrace,
embarrassed. "Sorry.  Just a little excited."
	"Just a little."  Mulder was sad to have had to let her loose. 
"Well you did find it."
	"You found it."  She looked down a the cross in her hand.  She
picked up the charm that Mulder had given her and studied them both.
	"You better put that on before you lose it again."
	"You're right.  Can you put it on me?"  She handed him the
necklace that he had given her.  
	"What about the cross?"
	"I'm going to put it in a safe place.  It's part of my past.  I
just like knowing that I have it."
	Mulder put the chain around her neck and with a little work
secured it.  "So are you saying that this is part of your future?" He
asked tentatively.
	"I hope so."  Scully smiled at him.  "So what are you doing
tonight?"
	"Why?"  Mulder knew she was up to something.
	"Well I have to clean this place up and since you were so good at
finding my cross I thought..."	
	"Where do you want me to start?"  He smiled back at her.
	"Well you can start by putting the pipe back in, then..."
	"Anything you say, Scully."
	Scully started to straighten the living room.
	He watched her for a moment, admiring how beautiful she looked
wearing a trinket.

	-End-

A lot shorter than Best Of What's Around, huh?  Let me know what you
think,skmcam@aol.com