From: eponine119 Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 00:19:38 -0700 Subject: NEW: Water Line 1/13 - 7- Deeply embarrassed but thankful for her first good night's sleep in weeks, she made him breakfast the next morning. He was disgustingly cheerful for morning, but well rested she could handle it. It was nice not to be alone. She set a bagel and the open container of cream cheese in front of him and he gave her a look. "Not up to your gourmet tastes?" "Is that all you're having?" Spender eyed her coffee mug. "You need to take better care of yourself." "Thank you, again, for staying with me last night. I was...particularly vulnerable, and you didn't try to take advantage. I'm grateful for that," she told him. "There's a price," he said and her stomach sank. "Don't look so serious. Let's do something this weekend." "Like?" she asked warily. "Go out. Have some fun. Who knows," Spender replied. "I can't make definite plans. This case -" "Scully," he needled. "Okay," she agreed at last. "Okay. We'll get together." "I wish you'd stop looking at me like I've got some ulterior motive," he said, munching on the bagel. "It makes me feel bad. It makes me think no one's ever been nice to you without wanting something in return." "Don't people always want something in return?" Scully asked. "Only if you trust the wrong people," Spender advised with an intensely serious look. "I've got to get to work." He got up from the table. "Thanks," he said, his eyes lingering on her before he headed out of her apartment. "What the hell is going on?" Scully asked the air, but it didn't answer. She got herself another cup of coffee and wondered what Mulder was doing. She wondered what Spender's definition of fun was. He had a set in stone serious expression, much like hers. She hadn't expected that fun would be a priority in his life. She hadn't expected a lot of things. Like his penchant for showing up when she was feeling needy, and his newly founded habit of feeding her like she was a helpless kitten. Scully wasn't a helpless kitten, though, and she knew it was only a matter of time before Spender realized that. --- She didn't open her email until eleven o'clock that night, about two weeks later. Scully felt like she'd been through the wringer. Easter had been hell and she was just beginning to recover for it. Another rare Sunday off found her spending most of the day in bed, catching up on sleep and then sipping hot cocoa and watching old movies on cable. Life was looked so great in black and white, she thought. But she'd had too much chocolate and too much sleep and was wide awake, even though she had to be at work in about eight hours, ready for Mulder to take her away from all this again. She deleted interoffice memos left and right. It amazed her how they piled up. Did she care about street closures or the charity food drive or the raffle? She supposed that she should, but there was enough to worry about without all that. She almost deleted the email from Spender but found herself staring at the words. "Thinking of you," it said. So simple, so earnest...it stopped her in her tracks. Scully stared at the screen, her mouth slightly open. He'd surprised her. She realized she wasn't supposed to have received the message until the next day, sometime, at work. She put on her overcoat and set off on foot for his apartment. The second thoughts hit her when she was at his doorstep. It was dark and it was cold and most of all, it was late. He wasn't expecting her. Scully made up her mind to just go home and give him a phone call in the morning - maybe she could even manage to act surprised, as though she'd just received her email. He opened the door, rubbing one eye sleepily. "Scully?" "I, um." Her mind had suddenly gone blank. He was wearing red plaid flannel pajamas. The bottoms hung low on his hips and the top only had a couple of buttons done. He looked like the perfect intersection of innocent boy on Christmas and cologne model in a magazine ad. "I heard you were thinking about me." "Where -?" Realization dawned across his face. "A little bird told me." Scully leaned against the wall and looked up at him with a grin on her face. Next you'll be flapping your eyelashes, she thought derisively. He looked a little embarrassed. "I didn't expect you to get that until tomorrow." "Couldn't sleep. But if you were...asleep...I can -" "C'mon in." He gestured into the apartment and Scully stepped inside. He rushed ahead of her to turn off the television and sat down on the couch. She sat down next to him, thinking again that this had been a bad idea. "What were you thinking about me?" she asked. Her question seemed to catch him off guard. "That I hadn't heard from you in a while. That you are beautiful, and smart and funny -" "Stop." "and modest," he finished, touching her hair. "Why did you come?" She shook her head. "You surprise me. You say things...you just make me feel so *warm* inside." "Warm is good, isn't it?" he asked. She nodded, staring deeply into his eyes. "Warm is great," she replied. "Why did you come here?" he asked again. "You could have just given me a call. Sent me another email. Talked to me at work." She shrugged. "Flannel," she said, finally, rubbing her hand against his fuzzy pj's. "Scully?" "Flannel. You have my answer. Do you want me to leave?" "Do you want to stay?" "Why do you always want to do what I want to do?" she demanded. "I thought it'd be a nice change." She didn't want to think of Mulder now. "Where do I fit in, Spender?" "You don't," he informed her. "I had it all planned out." "Do you have flannel sheets?" she asked and he began to shake in silent laughter. "Why don't I show you?" he offered, taking her hand and leading her from the couch into his bedroom. Her heart was suddenly in her throat and she yanked back on her hand. Spender turned around and met her eyes, questioning. "I - don't -" At the first sign of her protest, he let her hand drop and she found herself feeling sad about that. She looked down at the thin white fingers hanging at the end of her arm. He nodded once and turned his back on her, walking into the bedroom and leaving her standing in the hallway alone. It was cold and quiet and she could only picture him in there. She knew that she should leave. While she still could. The door had swung shut between them and she pushed it open tentatively. He wasn't watching for her or waiting for her. He'd gotten back into bed, slid underneath a black comforter and turned to face away. The intelligent, sensible voice in her mind was telling her to leave. Get out of here, Scully, now. But she could only think about his mouth and his kiss and how soft the flannel of his pajamas had felt under her hand. She walked into the bedroom, feeling self conscious. There was a big bookcase in the corner, piled haphazardly with books. It could have been plucked straight out of her apartment, but it didn't make her feel any more at ease. The black fabric of the blanket felt silky as she reached for it and dove underneath. Spender didn't move or make a sound. She was starting to believe that he didn't care and it was starting to make her feel hiccupy scared inside. His arm went around her and pulled her more tightly against him, solid as she shivered. He kissed her hair and she could barely feel it, but she could hear the pucker of his lips. Scully closed her eyes and burrowed in closer to the flannel warmth of him and the way he made her feel, and managed to fall asleep. She woke in a panic in the darkness hours later, disoriented. She wasn't used to waking up in strange places. Well, places, yes, endless motels across the country, but not cuddled next to men she hardly knew who smelled of rain in the winter. Once open, her eyes would not close again and fear began to overtake her with every breath he drew next to her. A burst of thunder startled her from his arms and he didn't stir. She fled before the next flash of lightning, running for her life, not certain what she was running from. Hiding behind the door of her apartment, soaked to the skin, all she could think was: safe. But she didn't know safe from what. Safe from what, she asked herself again, looking at the green glow of the clock on the VCR. It was a little past four. He was going to wake up alone and there was nothing she could do about it. She wanted him to get good and angry; she would be furious to wake up alone and so would Mulder. Mulder, damn it, she didn't want to think about him, make the inevitable comparisons between the two men. Mulder was just Mulder. And Spender was a man she was just beginning to get to know. She turned on the television without thinking and flipped through the channels, finding an old black and white movie. But after a moment the glamorous stars of the 40s began to talk of love and Scully pressed the button on the remote again until she found an inexpensively produced Canadian show, a mystery of some sort. The voices were soothing and she found her eyes drifting closed again as she rested her head against the arm of her couch. "Late night last night, Scully?" Mulder's voice was ugly and accusing when she walked into the office the next morning, already sheepish from oversleeping. She'd called him when she woke up to apologize for her tardiness. Her alarm clock had gone off, but it wasn't in the same room as her couch where she'd finished the night. "Oh my -" Embarrassment blossomed across her cheeks, a full fledged hot blush when she saw what was waiting for her on her desk. A dozen fat yellow roses. Unable to close her mouth, Scully looked at Mulder, stunned. "Don't look at me," he advised and she managed to command her knees to function, to carry her to the desk to admire the flowers. She could smell them from halfway across the room and it wasn't a smell she usually associated with the cluttered, dank basement office. She stroked one of the petals with her finger, finding it soft and moist. Now the scent would cling to her. "What's going on?" he asked her. She looked at him because his voice sounded so worried and anguished. Mulder was frowning as he stared at her and her flowers. Then he glared at the flowers and it made her frown back. She wanted to hug them to her chest and protect them from his look. "None of your business," she said softly, and it wasn't, she realized for the first time. No one had ever given her flowers in her whole life and they were from a man she liked, whose company she enjoyed and it had nothing to do with Mulder. She looked at him, shocked by her revelation. "This has nothing to do with you, Mulder," she said, plucking the card from the bouquet and taking it with her out of the office, so she could read it without his prying eyes. There was no message in the card, she discovered once she was locked in one of the steel gray bathroom stalls down the hall. Just the name Jeff written in a strong and steady hand. She held it against her rapidly beating heart for a moment and tried to calm the irrational giddiness. She didn't act like this. she didn't behave like this. Most importantly, she didn't feel like this. But why the hell not? she asked herself. Why the hell not. She had to find him. It wasn't difficult. She ran into him as though he'd been lurking at the watercooler on the second floor waiting for her. He didn't smile when he saw her and she worried she was grinning like a fool, like she was going to give the whole game away. He took her arm ever so lightly, barely touching her, and guided her into the filing area. There, hidden from the rest of the room behind five drawer metal file cabinets, he asked too seriously, "Did you like them?" "They're yellow," she said, surprising herself, looking down at the white card between her manicured fingernails. She looked up at him. "Why are they yellow?" Her question had him without an answer from the look of it. Confusion clouded his eyes. "Yellow is for friendship," she explained and started to feel scared again when he looked like he was going to laugh. "There are rules?" "For roses, yes," she instructed. How could he not know? How could anyone not know? "Yellow for friendship, white for purity, red for passion and love." "You forgot about pink," he said, half teasing her. "I don't remember pink," she conceded, beginning to feel mesmerized by him. Their breath had become synchronized and she didn't know how it had happened. Suddenly she felt like she was drowning just standing next to him and she didn't like the feeling at all. "It's okay," he said, putting his hands on her shoulders, grounding her at the precise moment she needed to be. "Should I send you red roses, Scully?" "Uh-huh," she murmured, drawing a deep breath full of his scent and closing her eyes as she sought his warm, soft mouth with hers. His fingertips became more intense, digging into her shoulders until she opened her eyes again. "Not here," he cautioned her. He was right, she knew, thankful that no one had discovered them there together. How could she have forgotten where she was? "I'm sorry." She tugged down her shirt, which had risen when she put her arms around his neck, trapping him against the cabinets. "I'm so sorry." She had no idea what she was doing. She had completely lost control of herself and it terrified her. She took a step back and fought the urge to apologize again. She tried smiling but it didn't feel natural or comfortable on her face, so she let her lips settle into their usual slightly downturned expression. She shook her head and went back to the basement, pacing in the empty hallway, trying to figure out what she was doing. She didn't know. All she knew was that her cheeks were scarlet and the knowledge embarrassed her more. She pressed the backs of her cold hands to her face and felt the heat. She was acting like a schoolgirl, which was stupid because she was an adult woman. She took a deep breath and straightened her spine and began to feel more like herself before she walked back into their office. The flowers were gone. For a second she thought she'd imagined them, but she still had the card in the palm of her hand and she knew they were real. She looked at Mulder, but he was hunched over his desk, deep in thought. It didn't look as though he was pretending and usually she could tell. Why would he care? she asked herself, walking around to the other side of the desk. The vase, top-heavy, appeared to have fallen onto the floor, crushing half of the yellow roses. She bent and picked it up, wondering if Mulder had anything to do with this. Why should he care? she asked herself, salvaging the blossoms as best she could. Why indeed, she thought and settled in for a quiet day, not noticing that Mulder was surreptitiously watching her from across the room, unable to tear his eyes away from her still rosy skin. end of 7/13 - 8 - A dozen deep red roses arrived at her apartment door shortly after she did. Bowed under the weight of their long stems, she walked immediately to her telephone. "Don't send any more flowers," she said to Spender. "Don't you like them?" "I love them, that's not the point." "What is the point?" he asked her and she had no answer for him. She did like them, she loved them, she wanted to put them in her hair and rub them against her skin and stare at them for the rest of the night. "I don't have the faintest idea what either of us are doing," she confessed. "You seemed to have an idea this morning when you said they were just for friendship," Spender told her. "Was that kiss just friendship, Scully? Because it felt like more." She couldn't say anything and she knew he was waiting for her answer. "It's up to you." "Come over?" she choked out and he agreed. She put down the phone and stood there hugging the flowers, thorns and all, until the knock came at her door a few minutes later. He smiled when he saw her on the other side of the door. He just stood there and smiled. She shook her head when she saw that they were both being ridiculous and went into the kitchen to tend to the flowers, snipping the bottoms of their stems at an angle individually before arranging them in the biggest glass she had. She was an adult woman and didn't own a vase. She'd never needed one until now. She heard the music, but didn't realize he'd put it on until she stepped out of the kitchen and saw him crouched down by her stereo, sorting through her CDs. The opening chords of her favorite album resonated through her. He'd found it on his own - she was tidy and never left CDs in the player when she wasn't using it. They were indestructible but she didn't want to damage them. Sensing her presence behind him, he rose to his feet and turned around and it was just their bodies and the music filling the space between them. She went naturally into his arms, which folded around her. He could put his head down on top of hers if he wanted to, but they relaxed against each other. She liked the spot she'd found on his lean chest and she liked the way he moved against her and the way the music seemed to be filling her up. Filling her up with him. He didn't kiss her but they both knew. She wished she'd put the flowers in the bedroom because they would have been so beautiful in the soft white glow of the lamp. She would have liked to look at their perfect buds as she lay like a stranger in her own bed, with him above her, undressing her as she tugged at his clothes until they were both naked and free and comfortable with each other. Lovemaking had never felt as natural or as easy to her before. She'd always had worries about things going wrong, or where their noses should go when they kissed or whether her hands were going to be cold when she touched him or if she was going to become pregnant or if she was going to be able to relax enough to have even a halfway decent time, but this time none of the worries materialized. "This is right," she whispered and was certain he didn't realize just how much she meant by it. Her breath caught as his hips slid against hers, putting him inside of her, and it felt good. Her head fell back and her eyes closed and she was lost to him, to experiencing the way he felt. It was all good. She moaned and sighed but the intensity of emotion that filled her caught her by surprise and left her breathless. He lay against her, his chest rising and falling sharply and his eyes wonderfully dark and pacified when she opened her eyes and smiled at him. He smiled back, his fingers playing at tangling her hair, completely comfortable with his possession of her. "What do we do after that," she sound, amazement battling with fear in her voice. "This." He kissed her sweetly and she wanted to hold onto this moment forever, afraid it was going to be ripped away from her before she had the time to savor it. Feeling this way made her impossibly vulnerable and she clutched him against her. "Don't go," she pleaded, hating that she was acting this way. He shook his head, making a promise before he returned to lying next to her, nuzzling the intersection of her neck and her shoulder until he fell blissfully asleep. He looked like a painting when he slept, she thought, a marble statue. She couldn't help touching his cheekbone, playing a game with herself, seeing how far she could go before he opened his eyes again, woken by her. But she didn't wake him, even when she slipped unwillingly from between the sheets to stand cold and naked in her kitchen, staring at the red roses in the darkness, sprouting out of a commemorative Coke glass. It was so perfect she wanted to cry, but she climbed back into bed again and attached herself to him with arms and legs so no one could tear him from her in her dreams. No one could make the nightmares real again. She was finally safe. He had made her safe as no one else could. She believed at that moment that he would keep her safe from a bad ending and from pain. It was what she wanted to believe. He didn't awaken alone the next morning, but she could feel panic flowing through him with every beat of his heart, which was racing like a hunted rabbit, trapped in the woods. She put her hand over it, claiming it, as she snuggled against him in the first rays of sunlight, sliding her inner thigh against his. She didn't like to make love in the mornings, usually, but usually she didn't feel like this. He was changing her somehow, just by being, and she had no idea how he was doing it. She was relaxed. He was like a tightly wound watch. Another turn of the stem would break the spring. At the touch of her smooth skin, he bolted from the bed, grabbing at his clothes and racing from the bedroom. "J-Jeff?" she asked, his name feeling weird in her mouth as she followed him. He was dressing in the hallway, throwing his clothes on haphazardly, the pants and then buttoning the shirt before he had the chance to zip his trousers. "What's wrong?" He stopped when he saw her and she wondered if she should have put her robe on. His eyes were startled and she could feel the cold air in her apartment tugging at her breasts. She crossed her arms, uncomfortable with him staring at her, and waited for an answer. He just shook his head, worrying her all the more. He'd realized he'd made a terrible mistake. That was all she ever was, a terrible mistake, a woman no one ever really wanted. "We're going to be late," he said. "I have to go home and change." He shoved his feet into his shoes without his socks. She didn't move, feeling increasingly vulnerable and dirty as she stood there. "I'm overwhelmed," he sighed, his shoulders dropping unevenly. "So am I," she confessed. "Go on home." She was releasing him. If he came back, then it meant he really cared about her. If not, things hadn't gone far enough for her heart to be broken, she told herself. If not, at least she'd gotten a good time out of it. She could feel her lips trembling the way they had in elementary school, when if the other girls had known their power to make her cry, she would have died. She had to hold it in. "It's okay." He knew his words were weak, but he hoped his kiss would make it up to her. He enfolded her gently, as though she might break without the protection of her clothing and kissed her with all the passion of the night before. She felt his morning whiskers scratching her and played her thumb over his cheeks, smiling when he released her. He smiled back and the moment was incredibly intimate. She could feel her soul and thought he could see straight through her to it. It had been a long time since she'd felt anything like that. "Scully?" he stopped at the door and she popped out of the bedroom, just pulling her huge terrycloth robe around her. "Do you want to go away this weekend?" Dumbstruck, she just nodded. Going away on the weekend together was serious, wasn't it? It meant this wasn't only a one time thing. She didn't want it to be a one time thing. She didn't want to wonder where their relationship was heading. "Sure," she said. He nodded and raced out the door. They were going to be late, she realized as she looked at the clock in her bedroom. Mulder had been angry enough with her being late one day. She ran her fingers through her hair and put on her clothes, skipping her normal morning routine. If she hurried, she would be there on time. She didn't want him to be angry with her again. He didn't look up when she walked into the office just as the minute hand swept past the twelve, marking the hour and stopping as all of the clocks in the building momentarily synchronized at eight. She wasn't late, she thought with a tiny smirk, looking at the clock before sitting down at her desk. She sat down and pulled out her work and turned on the computer, thinking about the previous night and the morning that followed it. "Scully." Mulder's voice sounded angry and she started, looking up. "What?" "I've been trying to get your attention for ten minutes, where's your mind?" He demanded, then shook his head. "Never mind. Come here so I can talk to you for a minute." She obliged, walking over to his desk. "What's wrong?" Mulder hadn't been acting like himself lately, and she saw that his eyes were puffy and unrested. Worry for him obliterated everything else in her mind and she lay a hand on his arm. He brushed her off. "Mulder?" "What's going on with you?" he asked, his voice rough and his eyes small and jealous. "What have you gotten involved with?" Not who. She stiffened her back, feeling like she was sixteen and had slipped in past curfew to find her father waiting up for her. "Scully? It's written all over your face." He touched her then, his thumb brushing the seam of her upper lip. It was still tender from kissing and sensation sparked through her. He traced the line where her lip began and then pressed his thumb against the red burn next to her mouth. She couldn't breathe, just look up into his eyes which had turned green this morning from their usual cloudy grey. He inhaled deeply and his other arm around the low part of her back pulled her against him. She was too confused to say anything. Mulder...wanted her? Why hadn't he...he'd never given any indication...but now he was staring at her lips with a gaze she could feel and in a moment she was going to close her eyes and the man she loved was going to kiss her, finally, after six years of quiet yearning. "No," she said, pushing against him, pushing him away from her. The spell was broken. "No," she snapped. "What the hell is this, Mulder?" she demanded and he looked embarrassed. "The first time anyone shows interest in me in years and you jump. When no one else wants me, neither do you. This isn't jealousy. I don't know what this is, but I don't like it." "Don't do this, Scully," he said, begging with her and she didn't know for what. "Do what? Abandon you to have a life?" she demanded. "I've made your work my life. I've been the good little girl, Mulder, and it's lonely. It makes my heart hurt with how lonely I've been and I'm sorry if your nights are as empty as mine were but they don't have to be." "He's using you." Mulder had gathered enough courage to touch her again, his fingers wandering back to the spot that fascinated, the redness near the corner of her mouth that had been created by another man's kiss. "That's exactly what you would say, isn't it, Mulder? Paranoid to the last," she snapped. "I didn't think you would be like this." "Like what?" he asked quietly. If she'd looked at him, she would have seen real pain in his eyes, but all she could see was the red of her anger. "I wanted to believe you would be happy for me." He was too sad to even laugh at such a ridiculous idea. "I guess I was wrong," she said and turned her back on him, sitting down at her desk and moving her chair so she wouldn't have to see him. A moment later, he got up and walked out of the office, his footsteps fast paced and ringing in her ears. He'd almost run from the room and she could only stare after him once he'd gone, unable to look at him when he'd been there. What have I done? she asked herself, her anger seeping away and leaving her deep in confusion. She'd thought she loved him. She'd thought she'd been playing with fire to make him jealous. She thought she would have enjoyed his jealousy. But last night had changed that. It didn't change the way she felt about Mulder, but she cared about Spender more. She couldn't hurt him. Even if it meant she hurt Mulder, which she'd never wanted to do. She was angry with him for kissing her, for hugging her so she could feel just how much he wanted her. She was angry with him for doing it now, instead of weeks ago when she'd been terrified in her aloneness and needed it. Needed him. Mulder only did things when they suited him, which led her to believe that he didn't really care about her. Spender didn't make any demands. She felt like she didn't know what to do, but she didn't have any choices to make. They'd already been made. She got up from her desk to find Spender, but he wasn't at his desk so she walked all the way out of the building, into the cool spring air, not realizing this might be where Mulder had gone, too. Mulder had been driven from her thoughts as she crossed the street, scanning the names of the shops she'd never had any use for before. Of course there was a flower shop and she went inside. Several minutes later, she held a single white rose. Purity, she'd said. She couldn't remember what pink stood for - the beginnings of love? For a second she hesitated, wondering if there was a better choice to be made. She could still go back inside and make an exchange. But she didn't want to. She crossed the street again and left the flower amid the mess on Spender's desk, still unoccupied. She didn't look back to see how incongruous the strong symbol looked in the middle of paperwork and file folders in a room stuffed with suited men and women, all of them looking dour and serious. Mulder didn't come back that day and Scully told herself she was enjoying the silence. Spender didn't call or drop by. He had work to do. So did she. With the singular powers of concentration she'd developed in school, her fingers moved confidently over the keys of her computer, putting her work thoughts into a report to hand in. She'd gotten behind in her reports. Sometimes she didn't want to write them, feeling as though she was an informer going behind Mulder's back, but she never wrote anything untrue. Everything she wrote was her opinion and was stated as such. She wasn't betraying Mulder. Betraying him was still her greatest fear. Not only for what it would do to her, but because of what she knew it would do to him. She pushed the keyboard away and stretched, thinking it was time to end the workday. It was after five and he wasn't coming back. She hadn't betrayed him in caring about Spender. Mulder never made any claim on her heart or her personal life. Were they supposed to have continued in nonsexual limbo for the rest of their lives, working together until they were old and dried up and going home to no one but the memories of soft, firm flesh and the monsters in their cases? He couldn't want that for her, and she didn't want it for him. Her phone was quiet that night, and around ten she finally called Spender. He answered, sounding surprised to hear her voice. "Hi," he said. "Work sort of exploded over my head today." She nodded, but he couldn't hear that over the phone she held clutched to her ear in the dimness of her living room. "I stopped by your desk earlier." "I noticed," he said in a blatantly sexual tone. "White for innocence?" "Purity." "I don't know what to make of that," he confessed. "Neither do I," she admitted. There was silence on the line. She didn't want to tell him about Mulder. She didn't know what else to say. "So, work was rough?" "It's just work. You know." Silence again. This was getting awkward and it was making her heart race. Mulder's words rang in Scully's mind - he's using you. "Are we still on for this weekend?" Spender asked. "Uh-huh, sure," she agreed, her tone too bright, her response too fast. She was letting him see all of her cards and pick which ones were useful to him. "Where are we going?" "You'll see," he promised mysteriously and her mind flashed on a dirty motel room, the kind serial killers took their prey back to. She shook it off and wondered why she was having such dark, ugly thoughts. He'd never done anything to make her think that. She trusted him. She trusted him enough to make love to him, and that was such a rare thing in her life. "I could use a little time away. From work." She didn't say anything. "Look, Scully, I'm sorry but I'm really tired..." "I understand," she said quickly, her face flaming again. "I love you," he murmured almost inaudibly, as though he'd taken the phone away from his ear to hang up. "Jeff?" she said. "I'm here," he said swiftly. "You're not using me, are you?" she asked, feeling stupid even as the words came from her mouth. Even if he was, he wasn't going to say yes. "Why would you even think that?" he asked her, and she had no answer. "I wish I could be with you tonight. Every night." His voice had turned soft and velvet, even through the telephone wires. "But I have to concentrate on work for a couple of days. You do the same job, you know..." "I know," she admitted, feeling like a stupid, clinging girl. "I'm sorry I said that." "You should say what you feel, Scully," he counseled her. "I won't hold it against you." But she couldn't say anything. "I'll see you this weekend," she replied and put the phone down before he could say he loved her again. Had he really said it or was she imagining things? She wouldn't imagine something like that. She could still feel the words resonating inside the chambers of her heart and they scared her. They scared her a lot. She got the message that Mulder was avoiding her the next day when he only stopped by the office for a few minutes at noon. The look in his eyes told her he was surprised to see her behind her desk at her usual lunchtime. He'd come intending to miss her, she realized. "I was just catching up on some stuff," she said, closing the game of FreeCell on her computer screen. "I just needed to grab a couple -" Mulder picked some files up from his desk and went to the cabinet to pluck out a few more. Cases they'd worked on. "You don't have to work at home, or the library, or wherever you go," Scully said, hoping to smooth things over between them, but she didn't really know how. "My office..." She couldn't say my office is your office to him. "This is your office," she told him. "It's always been your office. Your name is on the door and mine isn't. I've just..." She found herself getting up and reaching for her bag, offering to vacate for him. "Scully, I don't want to talk about who gets custody of the office," he said and it stopped her. She could feel her mouth hanging open as she stared at him, but he'd ducked his head back down to find the file he was looking for in the S drawer. "Custody?" the word frightened her. That was what happened in divorces, with the children. His office wasn't their joint product, but if he was thinking of this as a professional separation, if he was divorcing himself from their partnership...She didn't want to be without him. At work. "I'm working on a special project for VICAP. Consulting. So I'm up in their area. It's not you, Scully, God," he said as though he was disgusted by her ego. "Not everything is about you." "I never thought it was," she said as he huddled the files close to his chest, as though he was hiding them from her. A slip of paper dropped out of one of them and slid under the desk, but she didn't tell him. She found an apology on the tip of her tongue, but she wasn't going to apologize to him. He'd grabbed her and kissed her yesterday and while there was a time that was the only thing she'd wanted in the world, it was inappropriate. She wasn't going to apologize for things she hadn't done. Mulder closed the door gently when he left and Scully closed her eyes for a moment, feeling mixed up inside. She got up and reached for the paper he'd dropped. It was a handwritten receipt and it took her a moment to recognize it for what it was. Tears burned in her eyes when she realized it was from her file. It was the receipt for the headstone her mother had purchased for her empty grave when she was missing. Mulder had taken her file. She didn't know why. And she wasn't going to think about it, she decided, going back to working at her desk and waiting for the weekend to come. Her bag was packed and sitting at her feet. She couldn't concentrate on the news. It had been more than a decade since she'd run off with a lover for the weekend. It felt four hundred times longer than that. She used to be a happy, dedicated confident girl, back in the days she'd gone off to Jack's cabin. She didn't suppose she was really that different now, except she was no longer a girl. It wasn't her travel bag for work. It was a casual, brocade overnight bag with two short shoulder handles. Almost a carpetbag, really. Her mother had given it to her in college, trying to encourage her to make overnight trips home to visit. She never had. She'd been too busy studying and trying to be her own person, away from the siblings who'd been her world for eighteen years. That hadn't changed much, either. Scully had always been different from the other people in her family, more intense, more determined, but she'd always relied on them, needed their presence. Just like she'd grown attached to Mulder now. She didn't like the idea of being tied to a person like that. She got up, even though it was earlier than the time she'd agreed to meet Spender, and she knew it wouldn't take more than three minutes to cover the distance between her apartment and his. She couldn't wait any more, sitting and thinking and wondering. She couldn't make her thoughts stop. It wasn't worry, exactly, or even uneasiness. She just wasn't sure she knew how to act any more. "Hello?" For a second, she thought she had the wrong door. She could hear music from the hallway, classical music played on a piano. She frowned, thinking of the piano Spender had in his living room. Somehow she'd never imagined that he played it. A note went wrong, then two. She heard him curse and then the door opened. "How long have you been standing out here?" he asked, running both of his hands through his hair, which was wet and tangled from the shower. "Not long," she said, stepping inside and dropping her bag on the other side of the door. "I know I'm early but I -" "Eager to get going?" he teased, because he knew it would embarrass her. She sat down on his couch, aware that it was not her own, that this was still a foreign place to her. "I'm not ready to go yet. Sorry." He shrugged casually and she admired his the way his shoulders moved under the plaid print of the cotton shirt he wore. "Practicing for your recital?" she asked with a quirk of a smile. "Something like that," he said and ducked his head. Now she'd embarrassed him. "You're good," she called to him, wandering over to the ivory keys as he moved about in the other room, the bedroom, presumably gathering his things. As a long haired bratty eight year old, she'd been made to take lessons. She hadn't liked sitting still long enough to practice and she'd hated her teacher. But she remembered "Fur Elise" and began to pick it out with one finger, wishing she'd learned "Chopsticks" like everyone else in the world. She stopped short and walked into the bedroom. It looked as though the fashion terrorists had struck, with pants and shirts flowing from the dresser and an explosion of socks in one corner. Spender had one brown shoe in his hand and was on his knees, digging in the closet for it's mate. "Are you okay?" she asked him and he started and turned. "Sorry about the mess," he said. "Quite all right," she replied, sitting carefully on his bed. It was her bed they'd inhabited together. She felt like she was somewhere forbidden, like a freshman on her first foray to the mysterious land of the boys' dorm. They were going to make love later, in a motel or a hotel. She could feel it in her belly, the tension building already, because she knew it was going to happen. Spender seemed shaky as he shoved things into a nondescript black leather carryon bag, darting from dresser to the bag next to her and back again, adding to the mess on the floor. "I'm not usually this messy, I promise," he said, and she believed him. "It's a nice bag," she said mildly, stroking the leather. It was expensive. "It was a present. To myself," he added. "When I got into the FBI. I thought maybe I'd have call to use it." "And have you?" she raised her head to look at him. He just nodded. Now he was using it. To go away with her. He zipped the bag, which seemed over filled. "Got everything?" "I hope so." His skin was pale and he looked almost ready to panic. It would have amused her if she hadn't felt so close to the same way. Two whole days together. Two days and three nights. He was going to be sick of her in a matter of hours. They would fight and it would end and she didn't want to think about that. Because she didn't want it to happen that way, but it was hard for her to believe anything good could happen to her at this point in her life. It had been such a long time. "Shall we?" she asked, playing it cool. She wasn't letting her emotions show. Someone had to be calm for both of them, and calm was Scully's specialty. They walked out of the apartment and she snagged her luggage before joining him in the hall. He patted his pockets down twice. "What's wrong?" "I forgot my keys." He hadn't closed the door yet, so he slipped back inside after casting her an apologetic look. end of 8/13 - 9 - She let out a sigh that betrayed her tension. When he hadn't returned after a few seconds, she walked back into his apartment. "Jeff?" she called, and saw him dart past her, over to the desk, where he began rifling through the drawers. She frowned. "I swear I just had them." He patted down the pockets of his khaki trousers again and knocked a book and a stack of papers off the desk's cluttered surface. He dug his fingers through a bowl of change and attacked the coffee table next, getting down on his hands and knees to look underneath it and the couch. "Where do you usually keep them?" she asked, but he only shook his head. She began to walk around, trying to see things differently than he did. Where would she set her keys if this was her apartment? He'd been at the piano when she came inside and Scully walked over to it, uncovering and covering the keys and dusting the top with her hand. She lifted the top of the bench, exposing sheet music stored inside. Some of it was hand-written and she paused to look at it. Spender grabbed the pages out of her hands and she looked at him. He stuffed them back inside the desk and plucked a ring of keys with a University of Indiana tag on them from between the books. "Found them." "University of Indiana?" she asked. "I had to go somewhere," he explained, looking relieved she hadn't asked about the music. She didn't even know where to begin with that. "State school, low tuition." "You had to pay for yourself," she said. "Always." The look on his face was almost hard and she could tell he was lost to the past for a second. She found herself thinking of his missing mother, but before she could say anything, she felt his hand at her back. "Let's go," he said and swept her out of his now-ravaged apartment. "Where are we going?" she asked as they walked out to his car. She waited after she deposited her bag in the trunk, but he didn't answer her question. "It's not a secret. I'll find out anyway," she said. "Why do you have to know everything?" His tone was not as annoyed as the question implied. He walked around the car to open her door for her. "What's wrong with wanting to know everything?" she asked him before she stepped into the passenger seat. He merely closed the door and got in on the other side, buckling his seat belt and adjusting the volume of the radio to a low hum before he turned to her. "You can't know everything, Scully. It just isn't possible." "Someday it will be," she argued stubbornly. "Someday when?" he asked gently. "When humans retrieve the ability to use one hundred percent of their brains and have enough storage space and synaptic power to connect it all? How is that going to happen?" "Evolution." "Why would that be evolutionarily useful?" he asked. "So much for a fun weekend," she said, wanting to change the subject. This was too deep and argumentative for when they were supposed to be enjoying themselves. "What's that mean?" he asked, glancing at her. "I don't want to argue with you. I want to have a good time." That was becoming her new watch-phrase. It was Friday evening and she didn't have to be back at work until Monday morning. Her cell phone was in her bag and she didn't intend to answer it. It shouldn't ring, she'd told Mulder not to disturb her and he'd just shot her a dark look that told her she wasn't fooling him. He wouldn't have called her anyway, he'd been quick to assure her. Whatever he was working on with VICAP was important and keeping his hands full. It was just as well. "You wouldn't have fun with a pretty boy who couldn't carry on a conversation," he told her. "What makes you so certain?" she asked and his double-take made her burst out laughing. "I know you, Scully," he said fervently, and reached to grasp her hand without taking his eyes from the wheel. His hand flailed blindly for a moment before connecting with her skin. He gave her fingers a possessive squeeze that she could feel all the way through her body, tightening the coil of tension already springing within her. Just as quickly, he released her and popped a tape into the stereo. Oldies, perfect music for driving. "It isn't going to be a long drive, is it?" she asked, looking out the window. Already they seemed to have cleared the lights of the city and were surrounded by trees and open country and darkness. When she looked up and saw the stars in the sky she shivered. They always made her feel cold now, ever since they'd beckoned her to the bridge, the bridge that would remain shrouded in darkness in her memory. It was cold in space, and airless. And like they said, no one could hear you scream. "Getting there is half the fun," he said hollowly and she looked at his profile in the darkness. He wasn't beautiful, that was certain. Yet there was a certain something about the carved precision of his lips and jaw and nose that she found affecting. And of course that tousled mop of curly hair like you'd see on a perfect Greek statue. Unable to resist, she reached over and ran her fingers through it. At first his hair felt wet to her touch but th curls were that sleek and shiny even when they were dry. He made a noise in the back of his throat and made her nipples stiffen against her the rough fabric of her cotton blouse. Maybe she should have worn a bra, she thought belatedly, wanting to cover the protrusions with her hands before he noticed, but that would only draw the wrong kind of attention. She never went braless and it made her feel brazen. Suddenly it wasn't such a great feeling. "Where are we headed?" she asked again wondering if he would answer her. "An inn on the beach," he said. "I've always loved the beach in winter," she commented. "Look around you, Scully," he suggested. "It isn't winter anymore." She realized he was right. It wasn't cold, even though it was dark. She wasn't wearing a sweater and her jacket was slung over the backseat. Suddenly she worried about tourists bothering them on their holiday. "Why the beach?" she asked, trying to remember if she'd packed any sunscreen. She knew she hadn't seen any go into his bag, but then he didn't have impossibly white skin like she did and she'd never seen a freckle anywhere on him. She could feel the sunburn already and sighed. "Don't you find the water peaceful?" he asked her. "There's something eternal about the tide." She snickered and he looked at her. "I'm sorry," she said but he didn't look away. "It's the way I feel," he said and sounded almost hurt. "The water is definitely the best feature at the beach," she stated. "I wanted to be a marine biologist when I was a kid." He glanced at her and she went on, crossing her arms against her stomach. "I almost went to UC Santa Barbara instead of Berkeley to study it." How different her life would have been if she'd done so, she thought. "What stopped you?" Was he thinking that their paths wouldn't have crossed if she'd done that, she wondered. Did she want him to think about that? "A lot of things. I grew up in San Diego, home of Sea World. And one time during my senior year my sister and I went there together. She was into new age kind of stuff and was really into the dolphins. You could work here, learn to talk to the dolphins, she told me and I think that's what changed my mind." "You didn't want to talk to the dolphins." He didn't understand. "I didn't want to be stuck in San Diego, working at a theme park and hand feeding fish and narrating a show three times a day for screaming kids and tour groups. I didn't want to try to force intelligence on sea creatures. I didn't want to work in a glorified zoo and keep animals caged that were supposed to be free. So I went to a different school and became a different kind of scientist. Plus, if I worked at the beach I'd look like leather by now." He half smiled at the notion. "You've never mentioned your sister." "She's dead." Scully turned her head to look out the window, but a black emptiness greeted her. "I'm sorry." He sounded like he was. She shrugged. She didn't want to think about it. "How much further?" she asked, swinging her legs like she was on a car trip with her parents. She notched the radio volume higher and stared out the window, trying to drive the void out of her mind and her soul. We're supposed to be having a good time, she told herself again. "Are we there yet?" he mimicked lovingly and when she glanced at him, he caught her eyes and held them, thinking the same thought she was having, about a different sort of life with children and families and road trips in the summer. He flicked on the turn signal to exit the highway and she looked around, out the windows, with renewed interest, trying to see where they were and where they were going. All she saw was a gas station, which he pulled in to. "Want some coffee?" he offered before getting out of the car to purchase more fuel, and she nodded, slumping down in her seat. It was getting late and she was getting tired. She was beginning to remember, though, the wonder and the mystery of travel. She'd done too much of it for business, driving endless roads in endless rental cars. Tonight, it seemed exotic to be somewhere unfamiliar, even stopped for gas. She yawned and stretched and got out of the car, figuring she should use the restroom and that she should walk around while she had the chance. Night had settled firmly and she shivered, finding it was cold in the darkness. She had no idea where they were. "Here." Jeff appeared at her side and put a steaming paper cup of coffee into her hands. It felt good and she shivered again, a reaction to the difference between the warmth and the cold. "You want...?" she offered, and held his coffee for him as he pumped gas into the car. When he finished, he took his cup back from her and sipped it. Their silence was companionable, friendly. "They just don't have roadside stops the way they used to," she remarked, remembering road trips with her family when she was a little girl. "There used to be diners and truck stops and gift shops, places with character. Now we've just got gas stations with serve yourself coffee and sodas." "We never took a trip when I was a kid," he said, turning away to throw his half-filled coffee in the trash. He looked at her and she took in the way his shoulders were slumping and knew there was a bad memory associated with it and she'd managed to dredge it up to hurt him again. "Once we almost did." "When your mother was taken," Scully extrapolated. He nodded and she watched his throat work. She reached over and patted his arm, friendly and comforting, as they stood there and she drank her coffee. "Are you ready to go?" he asked her finally. "How much further?" she asked. She hated gas station restrooms. "Maybe a hundred miles." He was guessing. "Yes, I'm ready," she agreed, and he pulled the car door open for her. She slid inside and reached over to unlock the driver's side door for him. He started the car and they pulled back out onto the freeway, only the fading static of the radio filling the vehicle. "Melancholy," she observed. "I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't mean to start things off this way." "It's okay," she said, and she really meant it. "This is what it's about." She's almost said that this is what love is, but the thought startled her so much she couldn't say it. Did she love him? It was such a stupid question and she decided quickly she didn't want to think about it. If the answer was no, would she have to go home and stop enjoying his company? If the answer was yes...then what would she do? "I like the quiet." She did. It made her feel close to him, although she knew that could just be an illusion. Everything in life was an illusion to some degree. She rested her head against his shoulder, which she felt tense for a moment before he got used to having her there. It wouldn't disturb his driving. After several minutes of listening to his breathing and watching the white broken line skip past the hood, she closed her eyes. Just for a moment. "Scully." His voice was soft and she opened her eyes, surprised to find her face pressed against the passenger side window. She turned and looked at him, wondering if he'd shoved her out of the way or if she'd naturally drifted into a more comfortable position. The car was no longer moving. "We're here." She blinked again and rubbed her eyes, feeling weary. It wasn't a motel, or a hotel. It looked like a fancy Victorian house. She nodded and pushed out of the car, braced instantly by the salt smell of the ocean. She had seawater in her veins and couldn't help feeling invigorated. There was a wooden sidewalk and apart from that was sand. She could hear the waves close by. "Beautiful," she murmured. It was a bed and breakfast. A young man was watching black and white television inside the lounge area and he showed them to their room in a whispery silence, turning on the light and showing them the modern bathroom with hot tub, the cable television, the huge flouncy white bed. Scully watched Spender tip him and the door closed. They were alone. "This is amazing," she said, walking through the spacious attic room. A bottle of champagne was chilling in a bucket of melted ice on the dresser. She rubbed a finger against it and Spender nodded. "You're exhausted." His eyes looked bleary from focusing on the road. He didn't answer, but agreed by sitting on the bed and sighing as he sank into the soft mattress. He pulled off his shoes and then his socks and lay back, spreading his arms wide on the bed. Scully looked at the champagne as though it was something she wasn't allowed to touch. "Is this the honeymoon suite?" she asked suddenly, looking around again, cataloguing the clues in her mind. "Is it?" he asked, not moving. She was embarrassed for speaking that thought aloud and joined him on the bed, bouncing down next to him on her stomach. One of his arms curled around her and he smiled, but didn't raise his head. "This feels too good," he said, his eyes closed blissfully. "You're exhausted," she diagnosed. Maybe she should have offered to drive. She pushed herself up from the bed and began to unbutton his shirt. She couldn't let him sleep in his clothes. She wasn't going to sleep next to him if he was dressed. He opened his eyes, watching her carefully as she exposed his chest. His lips curved into a smile as she pulled his trousers off with a little wriggling help of his hips. "Now you can go to sleep," she allowed. "Now I don't want to," he sighed, looking at her with a dopey expression in his eyes and reaching for her clothes. But after a few minutes, he let his hands fall away as she efficiently shed the garments. The air was chilly and as soon as she'd neatly folded her clothes on a chair, she jumped under the covers and pulled the blanket over both of their bodies. There was a moment that she felt awkward, looking into his eyes and wondering what was going to happen. They had made love before. But this time it was premeditated. As though he could hear her doubts, he pulled her against him and wrapped her in his arms. She closed his eyes and hugged him back, burying her head in his chest and then looking back up at him. He just watched her, then closed his eyes and slowed his breathing. They were just going to sleep tonight. And that was all either of them really wanted, after the long, tiring drive. But it's also lying to ourselves, Scully thought before she drifted off. They'd come for sex in a different, more neutral environment. not making love wouldn't change the reason they were there. He smelled so good, she thought, and slipped into dreams. She didn't open her eyes when she woke the next morning to sunlight beating on her eyelids and the feeling of Spender's hands touching her ever so lightly. He knew exactly what he was doing. She sighed before she looked at him, smiling and shifting into a mild stretch as he intensified the massage he'd been giving her, now that he had her conscious permission. "Don't stop," she urged, and moments later she was gasping as his hand dropped between her thighs. He grinned at her, well aware of what he was doing and she struggled just to breathe. "Give in to it, Scully," he prompted, watching her, caressing her most intimate places. She didn't have a choice as the waves of orgasm crashed through her body, as sharp and metallic as the cymbals on a drum set. She clutched the sheets until her muscles stopped moving. Just when she could breathe again, he slid into her. "So sweet," he said, closing his eyes as he often did, letting sensation take him somewhere far away, deep inside her. As he grew more tense and his breathing was ragged, she felt more languorous. The second time she came it was as though her entire body had melted into warm honey and she'd pooled on the bed, a gooey, pliable mess. He lay against her for what seemed an eternity as she traced random, whimsical shapes on the skin of his back with her fingernails, teasing him lightly. He whispered something that sounded like "I love you," but she chose not to hear it. You couldn't believe a man in this position anyway, she knew that already. She wasn't foolish. She whispered back something that sounded like, "Shower," and moved from the bed even as he clung to her, trying to pluck her back into the bed. She started the hot water and closed her eyes again as she waited for it to strike her hand as hot, rather than tepid. Her eyes opened suddenly when she felt Spender's mouth on the back of her neck. She turned as well as she could with his hands taking possession of her body. "Company," he offered and stepped into the shower ahead of her. She tried to be annoyed but couldn't be. As though intending to shatter the dreamlike mood of the morning, he began to sing at the top of his voice while vigorously lathering his body with the provided bar of soap. Scully just stared at him incredulously, making a valiant effort not to laugh, crossing her arms because it was cold in the shower when you weren't the one standing beneath the spray. She let a giggle erupt and he looked at her seriously. She put both hands over her mouth but he continued to stare at her with a dark, intense frown. "I'm sorry," she said. "I just...didn't expect...." She bit her lips to try to keep another giggle from bubbling forth. "Why not?" he asked. "I'm happy. aren't you?" She nodded wordlessly, watching suds slide down his skin. "If you're happy and you know it, why not show it?" he said and couldn't help breaking into a smile at such a goofy statement. "No," Scully said fervently. "Yes." He was reaching for her again, his fingers attack missiles in the beginning of a wet tickling war. She flinched and tried to get away. "Sing for me, Scully." She shook her head. "You don't want me to do that." His fingers tore at her ribs and she couldn't breathe. She'd heard stories of people who'd laughed themselves to death, as they couldn't bring in enough air amid the spasms of laughter. She thought she was rapidly approaching that giddy point as slapping his hands away only renewed his efforts to tickle her to death. "Stop," she pleaded. "And stop hogging all the hot water." His hands gentled as he turned around in the small shower stall, positioning her under the hot water. She felt herself relax instantly, dropping her arms and raising her face to the heat and warmth. He began to wash her, lathering the soap in his hands before rubbing it into her skin. She wished there was something to hang onto inside the shower. As he laved her body with long, warm strokes, he began to sing again, what sounded like opera. Gooseflesh rose all over her body. "What the hell are you doing in the FBI?" she asked, opening her eyes and looking down at him. He'd knelt at her feet, still washing. She felt like she was being worshipped. He raised his head to meet her eyes, the amazing notes resonating off the bathroom walls. "Quit and give Pavarotti a run for his money." "Too skinny for opera," he said, but he had a smile on his lips that looked almost shy. She'd embarrassed the show-off. She stood under the water and let it wash the soap away and Spender got out of the shower. A moment later, she turned off the water and emerged too. He enfolded her in one of the bath towels - it was thick and fluffy, unlike anywhere she'd stayed before, and it wasn't even white. "This day is already too perfect," she remarked, standing there wrapped in her towel as he washed his face and shaved. She watched the razor moving in his capable hands. He looked at her. "Just wait," he promised. She smiled and left the bathroom, putting her clothes on before he finished what he was doing. The intimacy between them was fading the face of the everyday, mundane tasks that never went away, not even on vacation. She really wanted to brush her teeth and waited for him to come out of the bathroom. When he did, he'd left his towel behind and she was amazed by his lack of modesty. True, she'd seen him and touched him, but this was different somehow. Maybe it was the difference in their upbringings. She was Catholic; shame had been impressed into her mind from an early age. His eyes flicked over her jeans and T-shirt just as hers had flowed over his nakedness and she went into the bathroom, brushing her teeth for longer than usual and trying to comb her hair with her fingers. She didn't know where her comb was and she didn't think she cared. "Ready to go?" He was wearing khakis again and a wide-striped polo shirt, open at the throat. She smiled and they set off down the stairs on their day of relaxation and casual adventure. They didn't get far. "Are you going to have breakfast?" A man accosted them at the bottom of the stairs. Spender's arm instantly unwound from her shoulders and they stood and looked at the interloper. "I'm Hank, the owner of the inn. I missed you last night." He stuck out a beefy hand for them to shake, which they did. "Breakfast is included," he added. Spender looked at her, and she tried to gauge whether he wanted to eat or not. She didn't really want to eat with this man and the other guests in the inn. She wanted to be alone with Jeff. "It is the most important meal of the day," he said, just the sort of thing she would have said on any other situation. She nodded and they followed Hank into the dining room, where they found there were no other guests. He noticed Scully's curious look at the empty tables and chairs and said, "The summer season doesn't pick up for another week or two. But don't you worry, there'll be plenty for you to do. And solitude." Hank disappeared through a door that must have lead to the kitchen. "Solitude," Scully echoed, sipping the huge glass of orange juice she'd been provided with. It wasn't usually a good thing in her mind. She was used to being alone, but solitary had another connotation. It brought back the memories of all the long, lonely nights she'd spent quietly yearning for someone to talk to. "We wouldn't like the crowds," Spender told her, but she wanted to tell him he was wrong. She wanted the streets so full they couldn't move, of laughing children and families on vacations and other young lovers and college kids on spring break. She wanted to hear the music of the carnival and happy voices and the smack of the volleyball in the sand. "I wanted to get you to myself." She smiled at that, still feeling uncertain. "You've got me," she said, as Hank slid a plate in front of her. It was heaped with eggs and sausage and pancakes with syrup dripping everywhere. She looked up, overwhelmed by the sheer volume of the food, and saw Hank sitting across the room. Watching like a parent to make sure they ate every bite. Just last night, she'd been yearning for a greasy diner. This was as close as she was going to get. "Thanks," she said, even though she hadn't been able to eat much. Spender had obviously been raised as a member of the clean-plate club and she found herself staring at his wiry limbs, marveling not for the first time at the male metabolism. Mulder was the same way, but she wasn't going to think of Mulder this weekend. They rose from the table together and Jeff's hand settled onto her back, in that warm, familiar spot. Mulder's spot. But she wasn't going to think about him. "I got used to eating where and what I could," he said by way of explanation as they strolled down the wooden sidewalk away from the beach, in the direction of the tiny town. "I guess it's still with me." "Your family was poor?" "My mother wasn't very good at having a job," he explained. "Even before...this alien stuff...she'd been a hippie before it was fashionable, against the establishment and normalcy." "Weren't there...assistance programs?" she asked, feeling like she was walking on quicksand. But he'd brought it up. He shrugged. "Government run," he explained. "We were never on welfare, and I never ate out of trash cans, if that's what you're worried about." She'd been picturing that very thing and glanced at him for speaking her thoughts. "We took a lot of charity." Scully nodded, thinking of church fundraisers and food drives she'd participated in from the time she was old enough to bundle cans into shopping bags and boxes. They'd never had an excess of money in her childhood, with four children in the family, but she'd never wanted for anything. Her mother had given a lot to charity. "Let's not talk about the past," she said, taking his hand in hers. "I don't like to think of the future," he said, serious enough to make her look at him for a long time. She felt the same way often. The future was unimaginable. Things would happen, things had a way of doing that. If the past six years hadn't taught her that, nothing ever would. The future couldn't be planned or predicted or purchased. It just was. "That leaves the present," she said and he kissed her impulsively on the lips, stopping her in her tracks for a second, a smile stretching across her face. She moved to kiss him back, but he'd dropped her hand and moved away. "Race you to the end of the boardwalk," he said and before she could argue that she didn't think it actually was a boardwalk, even though it was a bunch of boards laid down so they wouldn't have to walk on the sand, he'd taken off running. She had to sprint to catch up with him but he just ran faster. She finished mere seconds after he did, but he'd clearly won. She flopped down onto the sand, trying to remember what air felt like in her lungs and looking at him as she wiped the sudden sweat from her face. He wasn't even winded. "I hate you," she glared, panting. He put a hand against her back and it helped her concentrate on evening out her breathing, which made her look at him in surprise. "Next you'll tell me you do yoga, too," she said and he shook his head. She lay down on the warm sand and looked up at the clouds in the impossibly blue sky. "Now that you've proved your physical superiority, even over me, I guess we should mate," she said playfully and heard him choke. She raised her head and looked at him. "I've never heard it put quite that way," he admitted. "That's what you've been doing, though, isn't it?" she challenged, even though she had the feeling she should close her mouth before she went off on a tirade and ruined their beautiful day, but it was too late. "A peacock preening with his beautiful feathers, wooing me with your endless musical talents and now your endurance and stamina." "I thought you'd already been wooed," he countered. "Wooed but not won," she said, wondering if she'd transformed into a shrew named Kate in a very famous play. That was certainly a new feeling and she sort of liked it. Banter was exciting, like playing tennis and being able to keep the ball in the air. "What would it take to win you?" "I'm not a prize and I can't be won," she informed him. "I'll have to stick to wooing then," he vowed, his voice dropping off to almost a whisper. They were both lying in the sand, staring into each other's eyes, but he made no move toward her. She wondered why it was his job to do the wooing at all, and why it was her role to be the standoffish female, but it apparently went back to Shakespeare's time, if not to the beginning of time itself. And he'd chosen her. She hadn't chosen him. end of 9/13 - 10 - "Let's take a slower look at the boardwalk, shall we?" he suggested, getting to his feet and holding his hand out to help her up. She wasn't used to accepting such assistance, but she let him pull her to her feet, admiring his gentleness. There hadn't been that feeling of her arm being ripped from its socket she'd experienced with other men helping her up. Just gentle guidance. He wrapped his arm around her sandy waist, which pressed her against him as they walked. Her strides were shorter than his, even strolling, and he kept almost outpacing her and then catching himself. She tried to walk faster just as he began to walk slower and they stumbled and laughed together. She'd never wanted to be a conjoined twin, thought it would be too much trouble and not enough privacy. The shops along the sidewalk were mostly antique stores and they went inside, marveling at the craftsmanship of times that were far in the past, the solid wood put together with notches rather than nails. "The equivalent of Ikea," Spender said as they inspected a massive bedframe, making a game of spotting the nails. There didn't seem to be any. Scully tried to imagine pilgrims in their buckled shoes and bonnets struggling with pegs and that little twisty thing that was the answer to every question in the packed-flat home assembly world of Ikea. She tried to imagine the pilgrims giving up and just making do with plastic milk crates for furniture, as she and everyone else had done in college after abandoning their carpentry skills and vowing to get good jobs so they could buy already assembled furniture. "Don't you wish times were more like that?" she asked, running her hand up and down the pole of the four poster bed. "I'm surprised to hear you say that," he said. "Why?" She kept moving her hand, feeling the grooves carved smoothly into the wood. "You're yearning for a time before the age of reason and microscopes and antibiotics?" he asked her. "Why does everyone always think science is the only thing I hold dear?" she snapped. "There's more in here," she insisted, putting her hand against her chest, irritated. "I was admiring the craftsmanship, the caring that had gone into all of these pieces. Pride of workmanship. That's something that doesn't seem to exist any more." "Hey, where did that come from?" he asked, reaching to put his arm around her again, but she dodged it, barely avoiding stomping her feet. "I'm tired of the people who think of me as some kind of logical robot, Mr. Spock or whoever, someone who cares only about theories and hard, tangible proof. I'm so sick of it. That's only one aspect of me and it's become my whole personality and the way I'm perceived." She knew she was ranting and felt dangerously close to tears and she had no idea why. Maybe because she wanted to be falling in love, she wanted to believe that he loved her for who she has, inside, not who she was pretending to be. She wanted him to really see her when he looked at her, not the makeshift image she'd constructed from fear and uncertainty. The shopkeeper was staring at them, she noticed and only felt worse. "I'm sorry," she whispered to Spender, hoping it would spread to the shopkeeper and herself. "You can't have it both ways," Spender told her as they walked out into the brightening sunshine. "You get angry at being irrational and now you're angry because you are the person you set out to be." "I'm not," she said softly. There were still girlish dreams living in her heart, ones she hadn't achieved and ones she probably never would. The ones she'd shoved aside to become the organized, detail-focused robot everyone saw. The dreams were shut away with her emotions, packed away like her grandmother's tea set, so they would be safe. "Who did you set out to be?" he asked, and she shook her head. She wasn't sure she could even say it anymore, or even think of it. She just had a feeling of wrongness and emptiness from being on the wrong path. "Let's go down to the beach," he suggested and she followed. The last shop on the strip was a tourist haven, brightly colored and flashy, filled with sand toys and plastic sunglasses and sunscreen. Scully sighed in relief and began to inspect the SPF ratings. "Your freckles are gorgeous," he told her and she wanted to put both hands over her face until she could go back to the inn and put some foundation on to cover the brown splotches. She shook her head and went back to deciding based on ingredient lists. When she turned around again, Spender was at the checkout counter with his arms full of plastic buckets and shovels and a towel big enough for a family of four. He had orange plastic sunglasses covering his eyes and she walked over to him. "Those won't block the UV rays," she advised. "Don't you have any fun?" he asked her mildly and she felt severely chastised. She paid for the tube of sunscreen quickly with most of a ten dollar bill and walked out, following Spender down the beach, where he dumped his new toys close to the water line. "What is all this stuff?" she asked, spreading out the blanket neatly, even as the wind curled it at the corners. She opened the sunscreen and began to slather it on every inch of exposed skin. "You have white streaks," Spender advised, touching her face to rub in the lines of errant lotion. "Want some?" she offered, but he took the tube from her and set it aside, replacing it with a lime green plastic shovel between her fingers. She looked at the foreign object and began to smile. Spender was already packing wet sand into one of the buckets and when he overturned it, the first turret of what was to become a mammoth sand castle was constructed. They worked hard in near silence, crouching and crawling and climbing over each other until the fortress walls were tall. Scully abandoned her shovel and bucket and began to cake the sand with her bare hands, enjoying the feeling of it between her fingers. Her jeans were wet from the knees down and hung limp and heavy around her feet, drawn down by the weight of the sea water saturating them. Spender's pants were loose enough for him to roll them up, exposing winter pale legs. She couldn't wait until they went inside and she could look at his farmer tan. He'd wandered away as she slaved over the big, octagonal tower where she'd decided the king and queen of the fictional sand land had their private chambers. After several minutes of his absence, she looked up and walked over to where he was writing in the sand with his fingers. He'd drawn a big square and written their names in the sand. He looked at her. "Just in time," he said, taking her hand and leaning down, pulling her off balance in order to press her palm into the wet sand. He pressed his handprint next to hers so the world could see the difference in their sizes. He pulled her shoe off but by that time, she'd realized this was their private square in the style of the Chinese Theater in Hollywood and squished her toes deep into the sand. He did the same and they stood there, one shoe on and one shoe off, admiring their handiwork. Immortalized, she thought, but the water was already kissing her heels. They didn't have a lot of time. The sun had crossed the line into afternoon and would soon dip back into the sea as the evening came. She put her foot into his footprint, comparing her size seven to his much larger foot. He put his sand crusted hand around hers and they smiled at each other. "So how do you feel about being immortalized for all time?" he asked her. Just then a wave swept in, farther than before, obliterating their square. They hadn't been immortalized at all. Everything was temporary, she was reminded, and it made her feel sad again. She started to turn away, but he grabbed her wrist. "What have to say, darling, about your first Academy Award nomination?" She looked at him like he was crazy. Now he was doing impressions? Was there anything he didn't do? How did he hide this theatrical side under his normally dour expression? "Frankly, Ms. Rivers, I think you're a bitch," she replied, and laughed in spite of herself. He looked shocked. "Is there anything you don't do?" she asked, and he looked blank. "You play the piano, you sing opera, now you do celebrity impersonations?" "I just wanted to see you smile," he said. "It wasn't even very good." "I never would have guessed," she admitted. "I never would have wanted you to," he told her. "Uh oh." There was such alarm in his tone that she expected to turn around and see Mulder standing there with a sawed off shotgun. But when she turned, she saw that the nameless kingdom of sand was being threatened with a terrible tidal wave. "Tsunami," she cried, racing back to their creation and digging at it with her fingers, trying to channel the water into a moat before the castle could be destroyed. She was working against time and when the next wave came in, it drenched her as it reduced the castle to a lump. "I guess that's the thing about sand castles," she said as she knelt in the sand, tasting the salt dripping down her face. Spender was smirking at her bedraggled state and she reached for his hand. "Get down here," she invited, yanking him down into the ocean with her. "Not so fast," he cautioned, even though he was already soaked. They both laughed as they wrestled, now destroying the remains of the castle themselves, their wet clothes clinging impossibly to their skin. She fought with her arms and legs but knew it was a losing battle even before he pulled her shirt up and started tickling her stomach again, causing all of her breath to fly out of her body. A wave rolled over them and Spender pushed his hips against hers, mimicking lovemaking as he captured her mouth with his. She'd seen that scene from the old black and white movie with the couple on the beach countless times but never imagined what it would feel like, with water flowing all around them and his mouth making her oblivious to the flow of the waves and the sand dragging through her clothing and the real potential for drowning. He tasted like salt and the sea. When she was a child, she would surreptitiously drink seawater, wanting to carry its wonder inside of her. That was what it felt like now. The sun disappeared behind a cloud and she shivered. Spender put his arms around her, but the shivers didn't stop. "I guess it's time to go in," she commented reluctantly, allowing him to drape the sandy towel around her shoulders. "Do you want to?" he asked, and she shook her head. "Then we won't." He pulled out a thick novel - summer reading - that he'd purchased with the beach toys and put into her hands. "This ought to warm you up." "Summer Flame?" she asked, looking at the torrid, half-dressed lovers on the cover of the romance novel. But she opened the cover and skimmed the first page. "Aloud," he prompted, from where he was burying her toes in the cold sand. She watched her toenails disappear and began to read from the first page, her voice steady and clear. Soon her entire foot was gone and she wanted a drink of water, but kept on. When her other foot was covered by sand, she was engrossed in the tale of Lady Guineveire and the dashing dark highwayman Jack, although she would never admit interest in their plight. Spender's fingers dug through hair and she missed a beat in the book as he ran down the back of her skull to the tender spot on the back of her neck. She felt him lift strands of her drying hair and twist them. This was bliss, she thought, closing her eyes and relaxing against him as he played with her hair, curling it between his fingers. "Sun's going down," he said, a second before she heard his stomach rumble with hunger. It had been a long time since breakfast. "I never want to leave," she said honestly, even as she kicked free the sand from her feet and stood up, helping him gather their toys. Shopkeepers hanging out their "Closed" signs gaped at them as they trooped back to the inn. When Scully looked down, she saw that she was caked with sand, and so was Spender. "We can't go in like this," she told him. He looked oblivious. "We can't track sand through their beautiful house." "It's an inn and this is the beach, so I'm sure they're used to it," he told her. She walked away, circling around the porch. "What are you doing?" "Looking for a garden hose so we can rinse off before we go inside," she said, trying to spot the telltale green coil somewhere nearby. As she was bent over looking, the first gush of water hit her smack in the chest. She sputtered and straightened up as saw Spender holding the hose on her. He was standing next to the faucet. Why hadn't she thought to look there? He ran the hose over her until her clothes were sopping and she started to feel chilled. The sun had gone down and it was starting to get truly dark. "Stop," she protested, wanting to take the hose from him and turn it on him, but taking a step closer only made the force of the water stronger. "Stop it," she said again, her voice turning annoyed and Spender dropped the weapon immediately. She ran over and grabbed it. "Let's see how you like it," she said but he stood mildly still as she drenched him, washing every last bit of sand away. His clothes hung on him like they were borrowed when she was finished. Even though she was quick, he was shivering when she reached down to turn off the faucet. "Not so much fun, was it?" she asked. "It was great," he told her, smiling, as he hugged her hard before they went into the house. He was either the best liar or the best sport she'd ever met. She was glad they didn't run into the owner of the bed and breakfast on their way up to the attic room. "Ugh," she said, peeling her clothes off and looking for a place to set them. Fresh towels had appeared and she spread one on the floor, knowing it wouldn't make much of a difference. Scully looked around for hangers and heard water running in the bathroom. "Aren't your fingers pruny by now with all this water?" she called, knowing Jeff couldn't hear her over the running water. She wished she had her bathrobe to wrap up in, but settled for another towel, walking into the bathroom. He'd started the hot tub. It was steaming and bubbling and he was naked, getting ready to climb in. "Company," he said, as he'd said that morning. Scully got a glimpse of herself in the mirror and she started at the sight of a stranger. The lines she worried about in her face had disappeared and despite the sunscreen, she was tinged pink. Not badly burned, but she wasn't used to seeing color in her face. Her hair was stiff and twisted into dreadlock like curls as Spender had styled it out on the beach. She shook her head and watched the ringlets dance. "You coming?" he asked her and she tossed the towel away, easing into the hot, hot water across from where he was sitting in the small, round tub. She sighed and let her head fall back, closing her eyes. This felt amazing. His foot nudged her leg and she opened her eyes to find his watching her, dark and intense. She returned the caress with her own foot and soon they were kicking each other and splashing water everywhere. When he rose up, dripping, moving toward her, something like panic flashed through her heart because she thought he was going to start tickling her again. "No," she squealed as he covered her in the water. She felt buoyant and let the bubbles lift her against him. So this is what hot tubs are for, really, she thought ironically and closed her eyes again. He was really very good at this, she thought. She never wanted the moments to end, but of course they did. They had to. No one could do this forever, no matter how good it felt. He made the most intriguing noises as he climaxed, anguished and blissful at the same time. She was overheated from the water and what they were doing and it was making her dizzy. Her chest was heaving as he snuggled against her, his eyes still closed. She wanted to close her eyes too, but fought the urge. It was hard to breathe all the steam. Spender finally shut the tub off and opened the door, flooding the chamber with cooler air from the bedroom. Her muscles felt like limp spaghetti and she didn't think she could get up. He lifted her out of the tub and she regained her tone quickly, going rigid and trying to fight against him as he carried her to the bed. She was too afraid he'd drop her to really struggle. The bed bounced beneath her as he placed her on it, none too gently. It only took her a second to think of the bedding, which would be wet from their dripping bodies. In another second, she didn't care because he lay next to her, kissing her. Scully loved kissing, she loved kissing him. "How many more times are we going to do this?" she asked breathlessly. "Total, or before we head back tomorrow?" he requested, taking her seriously. He removed his fingers from the magic they were working on her skin and looked at her. "You're not having a good time." He sat up, pulling away from her and she looked at his stomach and the way his arms folded over his knees almost protectively. "I'm doing the best I can, but sometimes I think I'll never understand what you want." "I'm having a good time," she assured him, but he looked doubtful and hurt. "All I want is you. Really. This just feels weird to me, all this time to ourselves. All of this." "You don't enjoy being happy. I've never met anyone like that." "What do I have to do to convince you?" she frowned, suddenly feeling angry. "Scream and weep and put on a show? Wear a smile all the time? What the hell will it take? I'm having the time of my life. I never imagined I'd ever..." She ran out of words to say. It was true. If anyone had suggested she would be having a wild weekend on the beach, she would have laughed. This wasn't like her, and yet she was still behaving like herself. A change in location didn't change who she was. She wondered if he'd expected it to. She felt a stab of despair at the idea that he didn't want *her* but some idea of her that he carried in his head. "Why not?" he asked simply. Seriously. "What?" "Why did you never imagine?" he asked. "I don't think about the future. I can't picture the future any more. I don't dream." "Everyone dreams," he said, as though coaxing her. "I don't," she said shortly. "I don't have dreams any more. Nothing good can come of it, only disappointment." "Do you know what I dream about?" he asked. He wasn't looking at her. He was staring through the space between the lacy window panels. The stars were looking back at them, watching them actively. Scully couldn't look at them. "I dream of a lifetime, of a life I haven't known. The kind of life where there's a mom and a dad and a couple of kids and maybe a dog and a minivan." "Even if you had that, you wouldn't be happy," she told him. "How do you know?" "Darkness lurks everywhere," she said. "Maybe for you it does," he said, sounding like he was in complete denial. "You've seen it too. It's why you haven't known that life you want. It doesn't exist, Jeff. And maybe you can pretend for a couple of days, but when we get back in the car tomorrow, we have to go back to being who we were. And being here doesn't change who we are, then or now. I don't want it to." "Maybe we just shouldn't talk about it," he said. "What do you want to do then?" she asked, guessing they weren't going to make love again. They couldn't go back to what they were doing, not with the tension between them that they were so unable to ignore. "I want to go swimming," he said. "I think you're a fish," she informed him. "You don't want to go swimming?" His forehead creased as he gave her an incredulous look. He was so cute, she thought, falling for him again over something as simple as an expression. "It's night, it's cold and I don't have a bathing suit." "When did that ever stop anyone?" he asked. "We can't go to the beach and not swim." "What are you suggesting?" she asked seductively, toying with the bit of comforter she'd pulled across herself so she wouldn't be sitting there talking to him, completely naked. Even though it didn't seem to bother him very much. end of 10/13 - 11 - "I think you know what I'm suggesting," he said back, just as seductively. It sent a hot sizzle straight down her spine. "Have you ever?" "I've always wondered what it would feel like," she admitted, choosing not to think about where exactly all the sand would get. It would be at least as bad, if not worse, than their afternoon's escapades. But when she thought about the water flowing over her...through her...She jumped up from the bed, pulling her clothes on quickly. "Ironic we have to get dressed to swim naked," he commented. She only smiled back, watching him slide his shorts up over his slim hips and tug his t-shirt on over his head. She headed for the door, but his hands caught her, pulling at her hips and stopping her before she reached the handle. She turned and he pressed a kiss to her forehead. Her mouth dropped open as his palms cradled her face. "I don't want you to say anything back," he whispered, "But I'm in love with you." She was so stunned she could only comply with his request not to speak. She could feel the softness of his tone and the emotion in the pit of her stomach, as though she'd swallowed velvet. He nodded and dropped his hands, watching his feet as he walked out of their room, skipping down the stairs so quickly she had to hurry after him. He kept up his fast pace all the way down to the beach. Her calves burned in protest of their direct route to the water, straight across the sand. They faced each other in the darkness next to the waves. "I'm afraid someone will see us," she confessed, aware that they were her first words after his admission. He'd said he didn't want her to say anything. Had he said that just to make sure he wouldn't be hurt? Or was she supposed to protest and respond in kind? She could only watch his eyes and ask herself if it was true. "No one will see," he promised. "We can't be sure." She turned and looked back toward the inn. None of the windows were lighted and it looked empty. "That's half the fun," he said, trailing one finger up underneath her shirt. She raised a studied eyebrow at him, daring him to undress her. A smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth as he pulled the top off over her head, exposing her breasts to the chilly night air. She watched his eyes as he looked at her, gauging whether he liked what he was seeing. He looked pretty content, she judged, shoving off her pants and striding into the sea, spreading her arms and reaching out for the waves as she reached deep water that threatened to knock her down. Laughing, she turned to look back at him. He was hopping on one foot, trying to free his feet from the leather straps of his sandals. She raised one hand over her head to wave to him and went back to frolicking in the ocean. Seaweed wrapped around her ankle and she kicked it away. It set her mind thinking about what else might be lurking in the ocean - fish and stingrays and sharks. An image flashed through her mind, something out of Jaws, of her body naked and bitten and bloody on the sand. She closed her eyes for a moment and felt the wind and the flow around her. She turned around and watched Spender wading into the water. "Chicken!" she shouted to him. He'd left his shorts on and she watched them grow wetter and wetter as he walked through the water, struggling to get to her. He didn't look as though he'd heard her. She tread water for a little while longer, and then ducked her head, getting ready to actually swim. She let the waves propel her and then lay floating on her back. "There you are," he said, standing behind her head. She tilted her neck farther back and met his eyes upside down. She spread her arms over her head and wrapped them around his back. "I've never seen you look happier." "I love this," she said. "You're a chicken." She tugged at the back of his shorts, but didn't have much strength due to her odd position. She lost the rhythm of her kicking feet and her head almost went under water, but his hands caught her and helped her into an upright position, even though the bottom of the ocean had dropped away from her feet. The few inches' difference in their height made all the difference. She turned, embracing him, falling against him so that he had to bend backwards. "Swim with me," she said and he shook his head ruefully. "Lose the shorts, buster," she suggested, tugging at them again, but he only shook his head again. "Cat got your tongue?" she said, teasingly reaching for them to pull them off. She wasn't sure if she would really do it. They would be lost to the waves if she did and he would have to run back and sneak into the inn bare-assed. She took a deep breath, happily imagining it. Then she had to look beyond his shoulder, back to the shore, to make certain her clothes were still there. "Scully," he said seriously and it made her pause. The cat had actually stolen her tongue and he wasn't going to let it drop. He'd said something very serious to her. She flopped over, slipping easily out of his hands and swimming away from him, surfacing and looking back over her shoulder, laughing and inviting him to follow. He seemed reluctant, but the next time he was right there with her, his fingers biting into her upper arms so she couldn't slide away again. His grip was almost brutal and it surprised and excited her. "I feel like one of those sailors who's been tempted by a mermaid," he said in a low, rough tone, barely louder than the sounds of the sea. "You belong to a different world than I do, one that's so tempting and so beautiful..." He broke off as though embarrassed by what he was saying. "It's not a different world," she said, still in his arms because he seemed so afraid suddenly. His brows were drawn tight into a frown. "If it is, it's one that's not as good." Suddenly she wanted to tell him how wonderful and unburdened he was, positive and able to care. None of which she felt about herself. "Kiss me," she whispered and he did, still gripping her arms and pulling her against him. She could feel the cloth of his shorts against her lower body and it reminded her that she was naked. She felt like a mermaid at that sensation of difference from him, her smooth skin against his rough cotton shorts. Feeling shy, she tried to kick away from him, to go back to their teasing chase, but he held her and she could only look up at him. The veins and strings of muscle in his arms stood out and she wondered if his arms had locked. Then he opened his hands and let her go. She floated away, their eyes holding. He'd let her go. She didn't know what it meant. She had to get to shore, to put her clothes on. If they stopped playing this game or whatever it was, everything would be all right. She was just confused, that was all, and who could help being confused with the ocean crashing in her ears and all of her defenses stripped away. She didn't feel like herself. She put her feet down firmly into sand, propelling herself toward the pile she'd left her clothes in. The sand slid out from underneath her feet and she slipped, falling forward as the water pulled her legs out from under her body. Caught unaware, water went up her nose and for a moment, she was lost in the unexpectedly silent world of the sea, dazed and astounded for a moment before she remembered to fight to get her head above water. She was panting when she broke the surface, coughing as her nose burned from the water she'd inhaled. She wanted to let herself fall again, not to fight for breath, even as she made her legs work and carry her back to shore. She stumbled when the water was just around her ankles and fell heavily with a smack. "Scully!" She heard Jeff but just drew a hard deep breath and squeezed her eyes closed. "Are you okay?" His hands, always gentle, touched her back and she sat up, coughing again. "I got knocked down, that's all," she said. "That's all," she murmured again, pulling away from him and reaching for her T-shirt. A moment later, she was dressed and on her feet, still breathing hard and feeling mildly afraid. He touched her again as though he was afraid to, that same splay of fingers against her spine. She relaxed into him and they walked together back to the inn. "What were you talking about back there?" she asked him as they paused for him to pull his shirt back on before they went inside. He shook his head. "I don't really know." He looked as mystified as she felt. "I don't deserve you," she said, feeling it acutely as a knot in her chest. "Don't say crazy things," he suggested, pushing her ahead of him as they went inside and up the stairs. "I'm sorry," she confessed when they were back up in the lavishly wallpapered room with the lights on, confronted with their sodden clothes and used towels. "Why?" "For not saying anything when you said..." She couldn't even make herself say the words. "I asked you not to," he said diplomatically, but he chose that moment to turn his back on her, to toss off another set of damp clothes and efficiently put on a pair of cotton pajama bottoms. She watched him and when he turned around again to look at her, it was as though she'd never breached the subject, leaving her to try to analyze the memory of his expression when he reminded her that he's told her not to answer. "Do you have the top?" she asked finally and he let his mouth form a smile as he handed over the worn cotton pajama top. She pulled it over her head and smiled wryly herself to see that it fell halfway to her knee. Scully pushed her hands through the drapey ends of the sleeves and sat down on the bed, rolling them up to her elbows. "You must be exhausted," he said, putting an arm around her as he put out the light and pulled the covers up over both of their bodies. He put his thigh between hers, holding her close. "And sore." She let out an odd puff of breath at that pronouncement, even though it was true. "It's okay," she said, stroking his face and staring into his eyes. The moments they spent this close went a long way toward erasing any aches between her thighs. "I really do love you," he crooned into her collarbone, as though he was unable to stop saying it. With a loud, luxurious sigh, he relaxed against her body, content to sleep with her. It was easy for her to give in to sleep, too, wrapped in his warmth and the darkness. When she opened her eyes to the light of the morning, he was sitting up in the bed, watching her sleep. She frowned initially to find him staring at her so intently, as though he was committing everything to memory, and then she closed her eyes again, wishing she could go back to sleep for a little while longer and enjoy the warm bed and the soft covers and his body next to hers. But he'd seen her open her eyes and she couldn't pretend that she had. There was never enough time to sleep, she thought, dragging herself up. He put his arm around her before she could sweep out of the bed and stumble into the bathroom to clean herself up for the new day. He cuddled her against him for a moment and then released her as though he hadn't realized what he was doing. She glanced back as she crossed the room to the sink and saw that he knew exactly what he was doing. He was still watching her. Today they had to go back to their real lives, back to DC and the FBI and sneaking around and Mulder. Part of her wanted to hide in the inn forever and another part of her was thrilled to be returning to the familiar. She looked at herself as she brushed her teeth and thought that she looked different. It was the same difference she'd perceived in the mirror after she'd lost her virginity, all those years ago. Something small and subtle, but different. He was dressed when she emerged from the bathroom and started to put on her clothes, packing up the dirty ones as she went, checking the drawers the way her mother had when they went on family vacations in her childhood to make sure nothing got left behind. The silence was beginning to feel heavy and she searched for something to say. Nothing came to mind. His clothes were already packed. "Ready to go?" he asked, catching her look. She nodded and he picked up her bag. Her mouth opened to protest, but she let him carry it for her, not certain why it felt so nice to have someone do something like that for her. "Breakfast?" the innkeeper swooped down on them, much the way he had the morning before. It seemed like a long time ago when she thought of it. They hadn't done much in the sand and the sun, but the day had stretched on forever. Time didn't fly when you were happy, she thought. It went very slowly, even though it was quickly over and never to be reexperienced. Quickly over, she found herself repeating and didn't understand why. Love affairs were all fated to end. It was much too early for such a thought, but she was a pragmatist, more practical than anyone she'd ever met. She wasn't going to get married and that meant this could only end with one or the other of them getting hurt. "Dana?" "What?" she jumped, surprised to hear her name. "Do you want to eat breakfast?" Spender's tone was soft, as though he was sorry to have jolted her out of her thoughts. Her heart was still racing from the surprise. "We can stop for something along the way," she said. "Unless you want to eat now." He shook his head and turned back to the innkeeper, peeling dollar bills into the man's hand, paying for their stay. She watched the green slips of paper and Spender glanced at her. She picked up his bag and hers and headed out to the car, standing with them until he arrived with the car keys. "I'll give you half," she offered. "It's okay," he said. "No, really," she insisted, reaching for her wallet. "I had a good time and I feel like I should." "There is no should, Scully," he told her. "I wanted to go and I'm glad you came with me. I wouldn't have had a good time by myself." It was a weak attempt at a joke and it came through as one. "You can't pay for my company," she informed him. "Scully," he said in a loving tone, saying her name the same way he might call her "sweetheart" if the word wasn't too embarrassing. He put his hands on her shoulders so she had to look up at him. "I'm not paying for you. And if it makes you feel that way, you can pay next time. Okay?" She nodded. She would pay next time. He put the bags into the trunk of the car and opened her door for her. It was a nice gesture, but likewise it struck her as odd. No one ever treated her like she was a lady, and she wasn't sure she had ever really been one. She still felt like the tomboy she'd been as a child, constantly with dirty scraped knees and shorts year-round. She watched him as he started the car, thinking he'd learned that behavior as a child, just as she'd learned to be ornery. His mother had been insane and his parents had probably fought before his dad left, so he'd learned the peacekeeping role in order to survive. She half wanted to liberate him, encourage him to rebel. But he was rebelling, just by being there with her. Because no one else wanted her. She watched the scenery pass outside the window and turned her thoughts away from her self-centered analyzation and them. "I had a nice time," she said, rolling the window down so the fresh air could flow through the car and the wind could muss their hair. It felt good, even though the morning air was still cold. It was early and the sun was shining weakly, still rising in the sky. There was something peaceful about the early morning, whether it was being half asleep or being the only person stirring. "I'm glad," he replied. "So did I." She smiled and nodded. He drove on and she fiddled with the radio, even though their silence was companionable. It had been a long time since she'd met someone she could be quietly comfortable with. She took her hand off the knob and dropped it into her lap. The noise started not long after that. At first, it was a low whining hum from the engine that she thought only she could hear. She thought she was imagining it until she saw the look on Spender's face. She put her head out the window to see if she could hear where it was coming from, and it definitely sounded like the engine. She looked at him again as he turned down the radio. She rolled up the window and for a minute all she heard was their breathing filling the car. "I hate that about driving," she said. "Being at the mercy of a machine that's impossible to understand." The hum got louder, almost angry. Scully saw that Spender's knuckles were white on the steering wheel and she realized that the craning motion of his head was him looking for a gas station with a service bay, somewhere that they could stop. "It's okay," she said, touching his shoulder gently and he jumped. "The car's overheating," he said tensely and signaled to exit the freeway. "It's all the way up in the red." He threw the car into park at the gas station he'd spotted and got out, pulling up the hood. Scully hurried after him, afraid he was going to do something unwise like open the radiator cap and burn himself. He looked into the engine as though he knew what he was doing, but she saw the lost look in his eyes. Like everyone else on the road, he didn't have the faintest clue about the working of a car's engine. He looked to her and she returned the clueless look. The mechanic ambled over to them from the service bay, wiping his greasy hands off on a rag that was pristinely white compared to his stained blue coveralls. The name patch read "Lou". "Got some trouble?" he asked. Spender nodded. "There was a noise and it overheated," he explained, moving out of the man's way, watching as he worked his magic on the engine, dipping his hands in and coming out immediately with a string that used to be a loop. "Broken belt," he said. "Frayed right through." He inspected the ends of it and made a disdainul sound inside his cheek, as though it was a sad thing he was witnessing. "Have to get you a replacement." "Do you have one?" Scully asked, afraid this was going to turn into one of those uncontrollable situations where they were stuck in the middle of nowhere because their car had turned on them. She didn't even know where they were. She realized she hadn't known the name of the town they were in for the entire weekend, and she only vaguely had an idea of what state. She'd let her guard down. "Nope," he said. She looked at Spender. "But my brother runs an auto parts store next town over." "Let's hope he has one," she said, already feeling her regular life creeping back over her like ivy growing across a brick building. It had spread up over her shoulders because she could feel the tightness in her chest and the tension in the muscles. She had to get back, she had to get back to work. The man shrugged as he went inside the station, not saying another word to them. "I'm sorry," Spender said. "What is there to be sorry for?" she asked. "This kind of thing happens." "I feel like the kid who ran out of gas so he could be alone with the beautiful girl." It unnerved her the way he kept referring to her as beautiful. The word was so unfamiliar when applied to her. "You didn't plan this. And if you had, I should probably be flattered," she said. "Looks like we have Sunday morning to ourselves." She smiled and he smiled back and her hand slipped naturally into his as they went into the service station and helped themselves to the complimentary coffee inside. It was bitter but it was warm. "Does he have the belt?" Scully asked the mechanic, who nodded. "He can't bring it over though. The twins are down with chickenpox and he's got to stay with 'em so I'm gonna have to go over there to get it," the mechanic said. "But I gotta watch the store." It was clearly a dilemma he'd never confronted before. Scully looked at Spender. She couldn't sit here until reinforcements arrived, and she wasn't going to wait until the sun went down and it was time for the man to close the gas station for the night. They had to get home, she had to be at work in the morning. There were three of them, there had to be some kind of compromise. "We can watch the store," she offered. The mechanic shook his head slowly. "I can't let you do that." "Then we'll go get the belt," Spender said. "From your brother." "He lives up the road a fair piece. I don't think you want to walk it. And the store's further than that," the mechanic said sadly, as though there were no solution to the problem. He looked down at the frayed belt still on the counter in front of it and lovingly scooped it into his hands. "How did you get here?" Scully asked. "I ride my bike," he said. "I'll take the bike and stay with the kids while your brother gets the belt and brings it back here, how does that sound?" she offered. "I want to go with you," Spender said. "But there's only one bike," she reminded him. "We can walk." She looked at him for several moments, then turned and looked at the mechanic, as though it had all been settled. He shrugged as though he thought they were crazy city folks and they could do whatever they wanted even though it didn't make sense to him. "I'll call and let him know you're on the way," he offered, dialing the phone slowly. "How do we get there?" Scully asked while the mechanic listened to the rings on the other end of the line. "It's just up the road a bit. You can't miss it. It's a house." The mechanic said, waving, and then spoke into the phone as they started on their way. "Those were specific directions," Spender remarked as they started walking up the road which was really no more than a flat indentation in the land where no grass was growing. "Maybe it's all we need," Scully said positively. Her hand had found its way back into his and they set a slow pace, but when she looked back the gas station had grown smaller on the horizon. She didn't see a house anywhere up ahead. "There wasn't another solution." He nodded. "It's beautiful out here," he said and she looked around, seeing it for the first time. Wildflowers were coming into bloom on the large open field on either side of the road. When she drew a deep breath through her nose she could smell all of them and felt the first itch of hay fever. She wiped her nose and hoped the itch would go away. The meadow gave way to trees. She felt like Gretel going into the woods. It was still chilly and Spender seemed to notice, shrugging out of his windbreaker and placing it around her shoulders. She looked at him in surprise, but he was looking up ahead as she put her arms through the sleeves that had been warmed by his skin. It was cozy. "Thanks," she said. "What're you thinking?" he asked her and for a second she almost laughed because it was such a traditional woman's question. Scully had even asked it herself a few times before she learned it was usually better not to ask. She told him the truth. "It's amazing how well-tuned you are into me and my body and what I'm feeling," she said. "I didn't have to say I was cold or shiver and you knew that I was." "Your hands have turned to ice, Scully," he informed her and she looked down to see her nails were turning back to pink from a dark purple. They had been holding hands, although she'd dropped his when she put on the jacket because the sleeves fell past her knuckles. "But I'm glad you think so." He put his hands in the pockets of his pants and looked content. "I think the house is up there." "I can't see it," she said, squinting and frowning and not seeing anything that looked like the house. "I'm glad I didn't have to walk this alone." It wasn't something she usually would have admitted. She was used to being strong and it took a lot for her to admit that she preferred someone else's company. It was the first step to needing, and she didn't want anyone to know that she needed anything. Not even Spender. She felt surprisingly safe with him, but it was hard to trust anyone with her feelings. She didn't even trust herself with them. "I'm glad the belt broke," he told her impulsively. "I didn't want to go back yet. I wanted more time with you." She couldn't help smiling. "This is nice." And it was, they weren't hurrying. They were just walking. Even though she could feel her shoe rubbing at the back of her heel and didn't want to think about the blister that would puff up there later. "Sometimes the unexpected is the best thing that could happen." "I agree," he said, although his voice was a little hollow. "You don't sound like you agree." "We've both had enough bad things hit us in the face when we were looking in the other direction," he said. "It's nice to know not all of them are bad, but..." "You're feeling it too," she realized. He just looked at her, as though he wasn't going to admit it. "This general feeling of..." "Too good to be true," he finished for her. Too good to be true is right, she thought, since he'd just finished a sentence for her and she let him. "Maybe it's the fairy tales," he said. "Walking in the woods is dangerous. We might find a gingerbread house with a witch inside or a wolf hiding in granny's clothes." "I'll push the witch in the oven," she promised, but she did feel small under the branches of the tall trees over head, not able to see anything that lay behind or ahead except for more trees. How much time had she spent with Mulder in forests like this, looking for dead bodies and possessed animals and aliens? Or maybe Mulder was the witch lurking on the path, but only in her own thoughts. Every time she thought of him, she remembered the look on his face and the way he'd shut her out by helping the Violent Crimes unit. He couldn't help that, she told herself, but found it hard to believe. end of 11/13 - 12 - "It's definitely a house," he told her. She still didn't see anything and it must have been apparent because he said, "Where are your glasses, Scully?" She thought for a second before responding with complete truth, "On top of my computer monitor at home." "You wear glasses?" he asked, surprised. She nodded. "They always told me reading would ruin my eyes." "I read a lot as a child, too," he said, taking her hand even though he only got a handful of his own jacket. It was a bond between them. There were probably thousands of kids across the world who read a lot, but they all shared some of the same qualities - a taste for adventure, and escape, and the long, lonely hours spent in bedrooms or libraries with the whisper of turning pages their only company. "There's nothing better than a good book." "Nothing?" she teased, letting sexual insinuation slide into her voice. She watched his throat move as he swallowed, but he echoed, "Nothing." It only made the fire in her stomach burn hotter with the need to kiss him, but she didn't. She couldn't. The house was looming up ahead now, a ramshackle wooden farmhouse with an ancient pickup truck parked diagonally on the lawn. They were almost there. Scully blinked because the man who walked out of the house was the mechanic from the gas station. How could he have gotten there before them? Then she realized this man had on jeans and a flannel shirt, and there was no dirt underneath his fingernails. It was his twin. "Hi," he said, offering his hand to Spender, who shook it vigorously. "My brother called to tell me what your plan is. I appreciate your sitting the twins for me while I get the part." "We appreciate your going to get it for us," Spender replied. "Truth be told, I was going kinda stir crazy in there," the mechanic's brother confessed. With that, he jumped in his pickup truck and gunned the engine. Soon he was merely a shadow down the road in the direction opposite the one they'd come. Scully looked at Spender and he gave her the same doubtful look back. "I wonder where his wife is," she said, following him through the front door of the farmhouse. "I don't," Spender said. Scully was faced with the immediate choice of which was more overpowering: the stench of dirty babies and cats, or the screams coming from the children. "Is it too late to run screaming?" she asked. "I'm afraid so," he said. "We've been entrusted with the care of these children. I guess we'll have to make the most of it until he gets back." Scully nodded, but kept her private thoughts to herself. If she was that man, she wasn't certain she would come back. Every surface in the house was littered with garbage - dirty paper plates, cups, pizza boxes, junk mail, automotive magazines, old newspapers. "Where are those pesky kids?" she asked, following the sound of the wailing until she'd ascended the wooden staircase and opened the door to the room at the top of the stairs. Two preschool age children were so startled by her appearance that they forgot to cry. One was a boy and was a girl and their sleeper pajamas were the only clean things in the room. "What's your name?" she asked, but the girl put her thumb into her mouth while the boy simply ignored her. "I'm Dana." She felt the children's' feverish foreheads and wondered if their father had any Tylenol in the cabinet. She hoped he hadn't given them aspirin. She hoped he knew the dangers of aspirin and viruses developing into Reye's syndrome. She wondered why she was so worried. "I know it itches," she soothed, finding nothing in the adjoining bathroom except dirty towels. She tried to think of something that would take their minds off their discomfort, but the only thing that came to mind was television and she didn't remember seeing one. She didn't really want the kids to go downstairs anyway, because their sores could become infected by the germy mess down there. "Spender," she turned to holler down the stairs at him, but he was standing right behind her. "I'm right here," he said unnecessarily since she was looking right at him. "What're we going to do?" she asked and he shook his head. "Is there any oatmeal downstairs?" "I can look," he offered, giving her a quizzical look before he set off back down the stairs. Scully circled the room with her hands on her hips, looking at the kids and trying to figure out what to do next. They were both crying tiredly, as though they'd been at it for so long they couldn't keep it up much longer. "Here." Spender returned with a round carton of oatmeal and stood back, waiting to see what she would do with it. "Run some water in the bathtub. Warm, not hot. And put this in it," she said, handing the tube back to him. He shot her an odd look before crossing into the bathroom to do her bidding. "It'll make their skin itch less," she said, hoping she remembered that right. It wasn't something she'd learned in her years of medical training; it was what her mother had done for herself and her siblings when they'd had the chickenpox. Scully picked up the boy first and had a twinge, wondering if it was appropriate for her to bathe someone else's children while they were away. But she was a doctor, and babysitters did it all the time, didn't they? Plus she wasn't a child molester and neither was Spender and they could be each other's witnesses. She tugged the blue sleeper off the toddler and tossed it onto the floor, thinking a load or two of laundry wouldn't be such a terrible thing. "Here's one for ya," she said, delivering the child into the bathtub and going back for the girl. She had sweetly curling strawberry blond hair. Scully ruffled it gently, and the child managed an expression that looked like a smile around her thumb in her mouth. "And here's two." She carried the kid into the bathroom, where Spender had taken to rubbing the oatmeal into the little boy's skin. The boy lay on his back like a puppy exposing his stomach to be scratched. "I think you met the magic formula," Spender said. "This is going to clog the drain," Scully realized belatedly. Spender shrugged and she smoothed oats into the girl's skin. She wriggled and then stilled, the itching alleviated. "Should we just leave them in here? They seem to like it," Spender asked her. "We can't leave them completely alone, especially in the bathroom," she said. "Why don't you stay here and watch them while I start some laundry." "Suit yourself," he said, sitting back and letting the two children sling oats at each other. There was something new in his smile, she noticed as she headed out, grabbing dirty clothes as she went. She stripped the beds and carried the clothes downstairs in the sheets, starting the washing machine that she found just off the kitchen and searching for more washables. She wondered how Spender was faring and checked herself - she'd just left him. Still, she found herself racing back up the stairs. The tub was equipped with a handheld showerhead and he was rinsing the two kids off as they giggled happily. He glanced at her and then went back to his work. "Did you get their names out of them?" Both children closed their mouths immediately and shook their heads stubbornly. Obviously, it had become a game with them. "They seem to be feeling better," Scully commented. "The oatmeal thing really worked," he said. "I'll find them some clean clothes." Scully liked kids, but Spender seemed to have bonded with them quickly. Which was fine with her. Everywhere she looked and saw clutter, her fingers itched to tidy up. It's not your place, the voice in her mind said as she picked out fresh pajamas. Just as she stood in front of the tiny dresser, a pair of naked children came streaking toward her, practically knocking her off her feet. Spender trailed them. "Got away from me," he explained. She tossed the boy's pjs to him and set about dressing the girl. "What do they want to do now?" she asked. "I bet they're feeling well enough to watch television," he said, but there was no reaction from the kids. "I don't think they have a television," she said. "Sort of like someone I know." He smiled again at her comment, since he had no television in his apartment and she'd noticed it. "Then these'll do," he said, locating a handful of storybooks. Both children's eyes shone and they cheered. "Okay," he said, sitting cross legged on the floor and making room for each child by his sides. "Storytime for Hansel and Gretel." The kids giggled at the names he called them but he met Scully's eyes with meaning. The girl pulled at the book until it was open to the first page. "I, um, think I'm gonna make an effort downstairs," she said, tugging at the pocket of her pants, not knowing why this picture made her so nervous. Actually, she was fairly certain that if she stayed there another moment, her heart was going to burst right out of her chest. "Their dad seemed kind of overwhelmed." With that, she bolted down the stairs. She thought she could hear him reading all the way in the kitchen, but knew it had to be her imagination sending his voice reverberating through her ears. She located a trash bag underneath the sink, happy to note the child safety locks. Scully picked up as she went through the house. Everything was fairly clean underneath the unattended junk and with a few touches, the house was quickly set back to rights. "Hey!" The auto parts store owner looked geniunely surprised to open his door on a newly tidy home. "You didn't have to do that." "Oh," Scully said, not knowing what else to say. "You seemed to have your hands full. Did you get the belt?" He nodded, sinking into a chair and offering her the plastic bag from his shop. "My wife went to her parents' house a week and a half ago. Her dad's sick. I thought I'd be okay since the kids have daycare, but when they got sick, the school wouldn't take them. But I know she needs to be with her dad and I didn't want to bother with it..." "I think they're about over it," Scully told him. "We gave them an oatmeal bath. Even if you don't want to bathe them in it, it'll help the itching until the sores are healed. And you know not to give them aspirin, right?" He nodded and for a second, he looked near tears. "I can't thank you enough...is that the washing machine?" Scully nodded and realized it was knocking, out of balance. She raced back to rearrange the sopping garments and set the washer back to humming. Then she returned to the man's side. "Sorry about that." "Please, don't apologize. I should apologize to you. You cleaned up my mess..." He shook his head. "It can be very stressful," she said, patting the man's shoulder. "Do you and your husband have little ones at home?" he asked. She shook her head, surprised by his question, but she didn't say anything to let him know that Spender wasn't her husband. Her heart bumped in her chest and she knew it couldn't actually be hitting her ribs although it felt that way. "He's upstairs, reading to them." "You're going to kill me," he said. "Why don't you rest here a little while longer," she suggested, going back into the kitchen to see what was there. Canned food. Maybe she could take over story duty and have Spender put together one of his astounding meals for the family. There were dishes in the sink and she loaded them into the dishwasher, starting it up as well. The washing machine stopped and she put the clothes into the dryer. "You don't..." The man had walked into the kitchen after her. "Habit," she said. It was almost automatic. She saw a mess and had to act. "I really appreciate what you've done here." She shrugged. "It's been great to meet you, Mr..." "Call me Frank," he said. "You've done my laundry, I think we should be acquainted." "Dana," she said and shook his hand. "This is the perfect way to end our vacation." "Not many people would say that about having car trouble and doing chores for someone else," he said. "I've never been accused of being normal," she told him. "But we should be on our way, I think. Thank you again...how much do we owe you for the belt?" He just shook his head and leaned against the dryer. "I won't take your money." She nodded. "I appreciate that," she said. After a brief moment, she went back upstairs to get Spender. Inside the kids' room, she stopped again, mesmerized. He was caught up in the story and so were both children. Their mouths hung open as he pointed to the picture in the storybook, indicating it with the hand that wasn't holding the book. Both children were leaning in close and his voice was soft and filled with wonder. Scully sat down to watch, but as she did so, she made a noise, which brought his head up to look at her. She smiled. "Frank's back. He's downstairs," she said. Spender nodded. "Let me finish," he requested and she nodded, waiting as he finished reading the story, unhurried by her presence. Finally, he closed the book and moved the children away from him. Scully grabbed him in a hug and he held his hands up, surprised by her. "What's this for?" he asked, but she only shook her head, breathing in his scent. "It was a good book," he said, "I wanted to see how it ended." "Go find your dad," Scully urged the kids, who scampered together out of the room and down the stairs. "I'd say they're cured," Spender proclaimed. "On the road to recovery," Scully agreed. "You're amazing." "I didn't do anything," Spender protested. "I think Frank wants to adopt us." "I'd say he has enough children already," Spender told her. "Funny that his name is Frank." "Why is that funny?" she asked. "It's my middle name." Scully smiled. Middle names were like that. They weren't particularly secret or intimate, but they struck her that way anyway. "Mine's Katherine," she told him. "Katherine," he said and for the first time, she really liked it. The name had never seemed to have any potential until he pronounced it that way. "I'm almost sad to leave," she said, feeling oddly sentimental. If this kept up, she was going to start thinking there was something wrong with her. But it wasn't wrong, it was just different. She was pretty sure she'd fallen in love. Of course, she realized the sight of a strong grown man with a pair of young urchins was imprinted by instinct to pull at her heartstrings, but there was no denying it. Her heart had betrayed her. "They're like new kids," Frank told them, patting his daughter's hair as his son danced in front of him. "Thanks again," Scully said, picking up the bag with the part in it as they headed out the door, back onto the road and into the woods. Her hand slipped back into its favorite place, Spender's grasp and they walked along together, their hands swinging gently between their bodies. "Do you like kids?" she asked Spender, feeling almost afraid to breach the subject. He nodded. "I never really thought about them much before. You know, the plight of the career driven single man." He said it like it was intended to be a joke, but she took him seriously. "But there's something very special about them. And twins." He was shaking his head as though he couldn't believe it. "Their sweet little faces and the way they wiggle and giggle and squirm." "He seemed pretty overwhelmed, though," Scully admitted. "I noticed you were quick to take off," Spender noticed. "You had things under control." "I think you're more comfortable with laundry than with kids." "I like kids," she protested. "And usually they like me." If he provoked her much more, she was going to march straight back there and prove to him that she could get along with children. "But there's more to it than just stories and bathtime. He really appreciated the simple act of cleaning up the house," she said. "Touchy subject," he said, poking her gently, teasing her slightly. She just nodded. "You know, the plight of the career-driven single woman," she said, turning his words back on him. "You could make the time, you know." "So could anyone," she said lightly, wishing to drop the subject. He seemed to get the message and they walked along together in silence for what felt like a long while. "Did you ever study botany?" she asked, looking up at the tree trunks and tops and the way they grew out of the ground. "You're such a science geek," he told her. "Maybe you're right, we're incredibly mismatched." "When did I say that?" Scully demanded. She didn't remember saying that. She certainly wasn't thinking it. "You like science, you like things neat and unemotional. And I -" "Play the piano and cook and see movies," she finished for him. Now she was finishing his sentences, she thought, wondering where this could lead. She could see his point about their mismatches. "Like normal people do." "You're just as normal as I am," he said. "I'm a firm believer that we should celebrate our differences and learn from one another. Differences are what make us human." Her heart ached. He was such a diplomat, she thought, and not for the first time. He should have a long, terrific career ahead of him. "I love music and movies and eating," she told him, by way of agreeing with him. "You've found balance." "I'm just as driven as you are," he told her. "Is this a contest?" she asked. There was a long pause where the only sound was their footsteps, synchronized, on the road. "Do you really think I'm unemotional?" She looked at him, wanting to know. "You've closed yourself to it," he told her. She'd heard the words before, from her sister and from others, but they didn't hurt any less. "I know it's because you're afraid and because it doesn't make any sense to you. It doesn't make any more sense to me. But I think we can find our way." He squeezed her hand. "You mean we're not lost in the woods?" she quipped and they both choked out awkward and much needed laughter. "I loved seeing you with those kids," she said. It was as close as she could come to saying that she loved him. "I know," he said, and she knew that he'd heard the words she intended to transcend the words she could manage to say. His thumb brushed tenderly over her knuckles and her stomach melted. "I know," he said again. "I don't want to go back." She was walking slower as they approached the edge of the woods, returning to the gas station. "Yes you do," he reminded her. She prided herself on such honesty and she was being dishonest with even herself. He raised his hand to rub her back. "We're doing okay," he said. "We are," she said and they came to the gas station. "Frank sure loves you two," the mechanic told them, taking the bag from Scully. He pulled out the belt. "It'll be an hour or two." He disappeared into the service bay. Scully and Spender frowned at each other. It had taken him only moments to pull the old belt out of the car. "What's going on here?" Spender asked casually, ambling into the service bay after the mechanic and joining him at the head of the car. "I gotta pull all this stuff out to put the belt back," the mechanic explained. "But it only took you two seconds to pull it out," Scully protested, trailing after them. "That's cause it was broken," the mechanic said, grinning and showing them teeth. "There's a nice table with an umbrella and I got a pack of cards if you ain't got anything to talk about," he offered. "It'll be a couple of hours. Sorry you got stuck out here in the middle of nowhere on your Sunday, but..." He shrugged. "That's life." "It sure is," Scully said, feeling her familiar frown settle over her lips. "That's fine," Spender said and took her elbow, guiding her back outside, to the table the mechanic had mentioned. "Cards," he said, finding the battered pack. Scully took them from him and began to sort them by suit. "There's some missing," she judged. "Not a good deck for solitaire." "Or Old Maid," Spender said. "I'm really good at Old Maid." "What about poker?" she asked him. "I'll take you on," he said. "You'll be sorry," she promised, and that made things competitive. Now they had to play. She shuffled and dealt the cards. Spender studied his. "What do I get if I win?" She shrugged. "I don't think I have enough change for us to play for." But she started to dig through her pockets anyway. "Isn't gambling illegal?" "Is it?" she asked back. "Then why are you suggesting we should do it?" They stared at each other for a quite some time before Spender put three of his cards face-down on the table. "Three," he said and she gave him three cards, beginning the game. "You kicked my butt," he said several hours later, when he couldn't take it any more. They were both tired, mostly of the game, but also of sitting and waiting. Every so often they heard a grunt from the mechanic and once a loud crash, but he showed no sign of becoming any closer to finished. The soda cans and candy wrappers were piling up on the table. Spender gathered his cards and hers and shaped them with his hands, assembling them into a neat package and setting them aside. Then he put his chin into his hands and stared at her, saying nothing. After several seconds, it began to freak her out and Scully got up to wander away. Her knees both popped when she stood, and it made her feel old. She was sleepy from sitting so long, and she looked at her watch. "Are you okay?" He must have sensed she wanted a little space, because he didn't follow her, except with his eyes. She nodded. "I just want to go home." "Why not enjoy the extra time?" he asked. She wasn't certain why she shook her head, but she did. She didn't want to enjoy any extra time. She wanted to go home and start her laundry. "What's wrong?" he asked. "I think I'm one of these people who has to have time alone," she said, knowing this was going to sound mean or stupid or hurtful. "And it's been almost three days." She could feel his presence prickling at her skin. "It's not that I don't love you...love being with you," she caught herself, watching his eyes to see if he'd noticed her slip. She hadn't meant to say that. He'd heard her, all right, but his eyes hadn't lit up. She wouldn't have been able to stand that. He continued to watch her, seriously, almost suspiciously. "I just..." "I know," he said and at the sound of his voice, she realized she wanted him to come and put his arms around her. Except she'd just told him to leave her alone. She plopped back into her chair, sighing tiredly, and resting her chin on her folded arms on the table. "You can take a rest," he said, not giving her permission so much as promising to guard her and keep her safe while she did so. It wasn't like her, but Scully closed her eyes. Just for a second. His hand was warm and his skin was roughly textured as he brushed her cheek. She opened her eyes, feeling confusion, until she remembered what was going on. He continued to touch her cheekbone for several more seconds, until she picked up her head and his hand fell away. "It's finished. It's time to go." "When did it get dark?" She heard a little girl tone in her voice and realized it was cold. She shook her arms, which were numb from her lying on them, and checked her watch. The sun must have just set. "Sorry for not being much company," she apologized. "'s okay," he assured her, opening her car door and giving a last wave to the mechanic, who waved back. He got into the car and started the engine and the heater. Then he turned the volume on the radio down and reversed out of the gas station. Soon, they were back on the highway, heading for home. She knew he must have sat at the table, perfectly still, watching the world around him while she slept. Scully felt guilty for falling asleep, not just because it was probably rude and definitely unfriendly, but also because it was so characteristic of her life at the moment. She was sleepwalking. When would she learn to sit still and observe the way she had before, when she was young and found the world entrancing? It frightened her that something had changed along the way. "You should have seen the sun on your hair," he said, his voice husky. "With the fire of the sunset lighting it..." "I wish I could do that," she said, even as her cheeks warmed with embarrassment. "What?" He looked at her. "Use words so prettily. I wish I could make you feel the way I do when you give me compliments like that." Scully didn't wish for much in life. But she wasn't going to try her hand at goopy words. She wouldn't be good at it, she knew, and it would seem too much like she was trying to return a favor rather than being sincere. "You already do." He turned his head away, checking the side mirror even though they were the only car on the dark road. "Why do you look ashamed when caught with the fact that you care about me?" she asked. "Why do you?" he shot back, still not looking at her. When he turned, his eyes were inky with a barely restrained anger. "I know I'm not much, Scully, but you seem to enjoy being with me. I don't want you to play with me. I don't want you to fill your time with me until someone better comes along. I don't think Mulder's ever going to love you, and I'm sorry, and you can wait for him if you want to, but it's going to break my heart if you do." "Whoa, where did all that come from?" She said the first words that came into her mind - she had to, because she was overwhelmed. A small voice inside of her asked, I could break his heart? Really? Me? He shook his head, regretting that he'd spoken. "I need more time," she said and the words were pitifully hollow. "We just had two full days," he said. "You're angry," she stated. "You noticed." She flinched. She didn't like him sarcastic. "Why?" "I just told you why." His shoulders were tightening, his chest constricting so his voice was thin. She could see the tension in his arms and the way he gripped the steering wheel. "Because you don't think I love you?" It took a lot of courage for her to ask. "Do you?" She nodded, not able to say the words. And she looked out the window so she wouldn't have to see his reaction. The sky was black and stars twinkled overhead. The site of them made her feel sick to her stomach. Then she noticed one of them was growing brighter and larger as though approaching them. Her stomach dropped, expecting a 747 to fall out of the sky. "Jeff," she said and he looked at her. The brakes screeched when he saw the bright object, which was now illuminating the entire sky. "Oh, my god," he said. end of 12/13 - 13 - The next thing either of them knew, they were sitting in the turned off car in the middle of the freeway. It was dark and still and the scent of ozone burned Scully's nostrils. Her seatbelt was unfastened. Her head didn't hurt, but she nevertheless felt as though someone had knocked her out. The sound of the engine starting made her jump. "I guess the car died," Spender said, his voice shaky. She saw his hand tremble as he reached for the headlights to turn them on. "I don't think that's all." Scully twisted around in her seat, looking around them to see if she could see...what? Aliens? Cars rushing up to hit them as the engine strained to reach a freeway speed from a dead stop in the middle of the highway? "Why aren't there any other cars?" "It's pretty late for a Sunday, I guess," he said. Scully checked her watch and saw that the second hand had stopped sweeping it's face. Her watch had stopped at a little past five. The clock on the dashboard said it was ten minutes until eight. Her heart was in her throat in a second because she knew what had happened, and she didn't believe in it, and yet she did. "It's almost eight." "What?" She watched Spender check his wristwatch and discovered it stopped. To her surprise, he stripped it from his wrist and tossed it on the floor almost angrily. "I can't keep a watch running," he said, seeing her wide eyes. She pointed at the clock on the dashboard and saw him jump. "Do you lose time a lot?" she asked him. "No!" His voice had the hard edge of anger. "Do you?" "Not usually," she said calmly. "You sound like your partner. Or my mother. There are no aliens and there are no alien abductions," he told her fervently. "I used to say the same things. But now I'm not so certain," Scully said and he looked at her again, his glance half crazed. "They took you with your mother. When you were a child. You're a part of this just as surely as I am." "Well, gee, Scully, maybe we should just get married and have a bunch of little abductee children," he snapped. "That's how it's supposed to work? Generational abductions, so they can double check the success of their genetic experiments? It's a lot of crap." "Where did the time go?" she asked. "Time doesn't disappear." "Neither do people," he said stubbornly. She let that statement hang in the silence, since they didn't know where his mother was or if she would ever be found. Cassandra hadn't run away; she'd been taken. Spender looked almost ready to cry and she wanted to comfort him, but she didn't know how. Now she understood why Mulder had turned from her side after her hypnotic regression. He'd felt as she did now. There was nothing to say or do to make it better. Oddly, her concern for Spender made her less fearful for herself. She wondered if that meant they'd only taken him. She couldn't help thinking how insane it all sounded, even to her own ears. "There's something you should know," he said in a soft voice. "What's that?" "My father...a man claiming to be my father, anyway..." He paused for a long time. "Has come back into my life. And I think you know him." "What?" Scully asked gently. She didn't understand. "He has a high level security clearance at the FBI. I've seen him in AD Skinner's office. He smokes Morley cigarettes constantly." Spender snuck a glance at her to see if she was getting the picture. She couldn't say anything. She felt like a five hundred pound brick was sitting on her chest. She was wondering if she could have heard him incorrectly. "He, um, says he can do things for me. My career. He seems to know a lot about the X Files. About you." "Did he send you here?" Scully screamed. Spender almost lost control of the car at her shriek. "Is he the reason you're doing this? Did he tell you to do this to me?" She felt sick, and dirty. She put her hand on the doorhandle, trying to gauge how badly she'd be injured if she jumped from the moving car. "Scully, calm down," Spender said. He hadn't anticipated a reaction like this one. "I won't calm down. I want to know what he said to you!" She took her hand off the door handle, knowing it would be suicide, and tried to regain her rationality by digging her fingernails into the tender flesh of the palm of her hand. "That was all he said. That he was my father. And he could help me. And that he knew about us. It was only a couple of days ago, Scully, please don't think I'm here for any reason other than I want to be." She watched the scenery pass out the window. They were getting closer to home. If the CSM had sent him, why would Spender be foolish enough to tell her these things? But if CSM had sent him and he was afraid of being found out, wouldn't it be smarter to tell her in this way and beg her not to hold it against him? "Scully?" Spender said. "I need some time to think," she said, apologetically, but she was scared. The rest of miles slid under the tires in silence, until he pulled up in front of her apartment building and looked at her. She shook her head and got out of the car. He followed her, pulling her bag out of the trunk. Scully took it from him. Spender leaned in to kiss her, to pretend that everything was all right, but she stopped him with a glare. He pressed his lips against her cheek instead and for a second it hurt so badly she thought she would cry. She'd wanted this to work out, she realized now that it was much too late. But her work had gotten in the way. "I'll call you," Spender said, but she could tell by his posture that he'd gotten the message. She walked away, not saying anything, and her shoulders tensed when she heard him slam the trunk with all his might. The car was gone when she reached the door and looked back. It made her sad, but she wanted it to be gone. She wanted him to be gone. It would be easier, she thought as she went into her familiar, comfortable apartment, if he'd never come into her life at all. That didn't overpower the notion that they could have had something, that they were just at the beginning of something. It was over now, she told herself firmly, and she wasn't going to think of it. Regardless of her vow to herself, her thoughts wouldn't stop running like a drip from a faulty faucet and she didn't sleep much that night. She gave up finally and got out of bed early, dressing and going in to work. There, something would take her mind off of this fiasco. At work, she wouldn't have to think about what a fool she had been. How many things had she told Spender that were personal or private? How long would the image of him whispering them to the CSM burn in her mind? "Long weekend?" Mulder's tone was acerbic when she walked into the office. Apparently, it didn't matter how early she got there, he was always there. Maybe he lived there. It had never bothered her before. She nodded. "I thought you were helping VCS." "I am, do you want me to leave?" She shook her head wearily. "I'd like it if you'd stay, actually," she said and he looked at her curiously. "It's over," she said firmly, facing him squarely. "Your love affair?" He tried not to look interested, and he didn't mention that he knew or suspected whom it had been with. She nodded, certain her voice would betray her emotions if she tried to speak. She could be so much stronger if she were silent. "What happened?" Mulder asked. "It didn't work out," she said simply. He didn't question her. "It's good to have you back," he said just as simply and met her eyes. She felt the old bond between them, almost a magnetic pull in her chest. She always had Mulder. He might not cook for her or play concertos on the piano or whisk her away for beach vacations, but he would always be there. It was the best she could do. the end. comments appreciated. eponine119@att.net