From: ephemeral@ephemeralfic.org Date: 12 May 2001 01:14:35 -0000 Subject: Watercolors (1 of 1) rated R by Flynn Source: direct Reply To: flyn121@yahoo.com TITLE: Watercolors AUTHOR: Flynn DATE: May 7, 2001 E-MAIL ADDRESS: flyn121@yahoo.com DISTRIBUTION: Please let me know where it goes. SPOILER WARNING: Know the show. Passing references to S7, 3, Fire, The End, The Unnatural; Per Manum, DeadAlive, Three Words, Empedocles. RATING: Strong R for language, adult conduct CLASSIFICATION: Empedocles post-ep KEYWORDS: MSR, MulderAngst, Mulderbation DISCLAIMER: Characters belong to Carter. No money involved here. SUMMARY: I don't trust my memories. They're watercolors .... blending and merging, until I can't tell where one ends and another begins. Special thanks to Christine for helping me stay sane this past year. Oh, and she's great at beta. ~~~~~~~~~~ Watercolors by Flynn ~~~~~~~~~~ I don't trust my memories. That isn't entirely accurate. There are some that I still trust. Like the ones from my childhood, grim though they may be. The ones from my college days, and from the Academy. I know I can trust what I know about the X-files. I have no problem remembering the day I met Scully. I remember watching our relationship evolve over the years from mere partners to something more like friends. I remember a baseball lesson. I remember stakeouts and meetings and times when I could make her laugh. I remember being more than a friend. I think. Therein lies the problem. We're friends. We are friends. That's what I depend on now. That much I can be sure of. So I do remember a lot. It's just the last year or so that I'm not sure about. I can recall certain things, of course. The trip to Los Angeles and the banker with the magically detaching head. The guy in Chicago with the pop-out eye and the knack for screwing up dumb luck. My mother's suicide, and my last encounter with the spirit of my sister. That I remember. Unfortunately, that's just about when things start to get hazy. There are other things but they're blurred, like dreams only half remembered. Besides, they seem too extreme even for me. Camping out near Stonehenge? Someone making a movie about my life, my work? Talking to Skinner while he takes a bubblebath, for God's sake? I don't know WHAT to make of that one. I've tried to reconstruct the months leading up to my abduction, of course. One of the last things I can recall with total clarity is that night in Scully's apartment when she told me the IVF hadn't worked. Guess that part wasn't a dream, me standing in that room in Parenti's office with a cup in my hand and my heart in my throat. No, I hadn't exactly been joking when I made that comment there in her apartment. I AM a pro at that part of the procedure. As many times as I've gone through the motions, I could have set up my own sperm bank. What stopped me cold that day was what had led me to that very moment. See, I love my partner. I don't remember a time when I didn't. But what she had proposed .... it took my breath away. She wanted me to give her a child. She didn't mean the old- fashioned way, granted, but with any luck the end would be the same. There would be someone in the world that was half Scully, half me. Maybe a guy with red hair and a big nose and crazy notions about reality. Or a woman with hazel eyes and ambidextrous eyebrows and an unswerving ability to recite scientific text verbatim. The possibility excited me as much as it frightened me. We didn't discuss it exactly, but I'm fairly sure Scully felt the same. Jesus, we were making one hell of a leap. Except it didn't happen. That evening when she told me, my heart broke right alongside hers. I held her as she cried. I sat on the couch with her for hours, and when I left, I kissed her gently on the cheek. I was so fucking pissed at God that night, I couldn't even say the words. I'd wanted to give her something of mine that she could keep and love, even if I couldn't be around to see the kid take its first steps. That was why I had agreed, I suppose. I couldn't leave her all alone, and by dying, that was precisely what I was going to do. The headaches and the dizziness and the times I just lost words, they really did mean something. Whatever Spender had done to me, it wasn't gonna go away. She asked me with gentle reproach a couple weeks ago why I never told her about my condition. I didn't have an answer for her. I couldn't tell her I loved her so much that I just wanted to give her the most precious gift possible, right? Besides, Denial isn't just a river, you know? Pain and sorrow and loss. Too bad I don't have any trouble remembering those. Things start to fade right after the IVF thing. She's told me about the cases we worked those last few months, and I even read the files myself. A genie popping up in Missouri? Yeah, that sounds like something I'd come up with. How about the time I almost died from an infestation of tobacco beetle maggots in my lungs? Yeesh, maybe I'm glad I don't recall that one. A housewife in Vermont doing decidedly un- neighborly deeds to the women her husband was boffing on the sly? How about Scully taking off with Spender? That one hurts. I don't remember it, but it still hurts. I look at her now and I do the math, and I have to wonder: did the bastard do something to her? She denies that anything at all happened, but by her own admission there was a long stretch of time that she still can't account for. I don't know. Something clearly happened in my partner's life. If it wasn't the IVF, and if the cigarette-smoking motherfucker wasn't responsible, then what the hell happened to her? Just who is the baby's father? See, I remember other things. At least, I think I do. I just don't know if they really happened, or if they're merely fantasies resulting from male lust and that saddest of afflictions, unrequited love. And I'm too much of a coward to find out. It's easier to be her friend and to kid her about the whole thing than be serious and find a way to talk around my anxiety. She's home from the hospital again. Things are back on track. She's due in four weeks. Her doctor strictly curtailed her activities after what was only the latest scare in a difficult pregnancy. No working. No exerting herself. A lot of bedrest. A regular pharmacy of meds to take morning and night, and she's supposed to contact the office if she has so much as a single Braxton-Hicks. No such trouble tonight. She may not have felt up to eating right away, but she does take great delight in yanking my chain about the pizza guy. I play along. I hang my head in disappointment and defeat, and with a smile she makes it all better again. The power of that woman's smile .... We watch TV and we hold hands, and I simply cannot bring myself to ask her. I can't admit to her that I have great blank areas where .... well, where we may have been more than good friends. Of course, if we were, then that off-the-cuff comment Langly made would make a hell of a lot more sense. No, I can't ask, although that's probably what she's waiting for. Jesus, this is driving me crazy. The suspense, as they say, is killing me. I try to cover it. I tell myself it really doesn't matter. I have her and she's going to have a baby, and that's the way of it. We both have what we wanted most out of life. I tell myself that a lot these days, and sometimes I can almost believe the words. But then something happens, she says or does something that on the surface is casual and of no consequence - maybe she rubs her stomach, or she asks me if I like some particular name she hears - and it snaps me back to the here and now and I realize that, yes, the pizza is the same, and the movie and even the apartment might be the same, but the woman sitting beside me, the one swathed in satin pajamas and a cotton sweater, is a month away from giving birth and I have no idea how she got that way. Were we something more than friends? Were we lovers, as my body seems to remember? Have I ever leaned close, whispered something inane in her ear, then gently kissed her cheek? Has she turned her face to me, looked me in the eye, and kissed me right back? Is that what she's expecting tonight? I wonder about that. Sometimes it's so damn familiar, this scenario, that I swear I can taste her. I can feel her fingers in my hair, and I want so badly to kiss her .... but something stops me. What if it's not real, this thing I want to exist between us? I'd like nothing better in life than to have this woman as my lover. But if we're not, if we're just friends - if she found another donor for the IVF and she just hasn't found a way to break the news to me .... or if she found another way to proceed, maybe with a donated egg - then something as simple as a kiss could wreck a friendship I value above anything else in my sorry life. But sometimes I catch her looking at me with that little frown she gets when she's trying to think her way through a puzzle. Sometimes I think I see a hint of something in her eyes. Impatience, maybe. Like she's tired of waiting. Maybe it's just wishful thinking on my part, but it's like she wishes she had the courage to do .... something. The thought makes me smile. That Dana Scully would need the courage to do anything .... After enduring the desert with each other, and risking icy death for each other .... facing the metaphorical firing squad of Professional Review in my defense as much as hers; after quarantines and bombs and guns held to our heads .... The thought of her seeking and not finding courage was laughable. And yet just tonight she thanked me for giving it to her. If I were to know this woman for a thousand years, she would find ways to surprise me. Somewhere in my musings I've lost track of myself, and I'm almost startled when she asks what I'm thinking. I can only cover my response with a completely contrived yawn. Tired, I say. It's good to be back in the thick of things, but I must be getting old. Besides, isn't she getting sleepy? She acquiesces with a private little smile, the kind I get the distinct impression from that I should be able to decipher, and says yes, she's ready for bed. So while she readies herself in the bathroom, I put the pizza in the refrigerator and then wash the dishes and put them to drain. Then I follow her to the bedroom and watch as she places the doll tenderly on the brass bookcase in the corner, then arranges herself in bed, a large pillow against her back and another between her knees. I tuck the blankets carefully around her, then bend and kiss her on the forehead. See you tomorrow, I whisper. Her hand tightens around mine. Wait, she whispers. I hesitate, and for just an instant I see that same impatience in her eyes. Then she smiles and it's gone. Thank you, Mulder, she murmurs, and a dimple appears in her cheek. I smile too as I lean in to kiss that dimple - it's okay to kiss a platonic friend if it was only on the cheek, right? - but at the last instant she moves and takes the kiss on her mouth instead. It was no different from its predecessor .... soft and chaste, very like that little smooch on New Year's Eve - but her eyes are different when I look at her again, and I can't help but wonder if I've managed to screw up. We're friends. A kiss good-night .... that's okay, right? Have I let her down somehow? Unless we were lovers. I muse over the possibilities on the drive home. Were we? I don't have anything at her apartment. She doesn't keep anything at mine. But her eyes when the kiss broke .... it was as if I had disappointed her, maybe not by kissing her in the first place, but rather by not following through with .... something. But I don't trust my memories. They're watercolors, the different shades and textures blending and merging, until I can't tell where one ends and another begins. And not just colors, but images and sensations, too .... pain and screams and flashes of light, and faces so ugly that they can't possibly be real, but which seem too clear not to be. My arms and legs tied down, my face twisted and cut and mangled .... and then the slow, exacting agony of vivisection .... .... a blur of tangled limbs, the sounds of panting and soft groans that have nothing at all to do with pain .... .... hair tickling my face as she bends and kisses me .... Not a chaste kiss like tonight's, but the hot, feral kiss of a lover .... .... a lover that could be anyone, any memory of any woman I have ever been with - Phoebe, Diana, Kristen, to name a few - were it not for the flashes of red hair I remember with such clarity .... But I don't trust those memories. If they are valid, then I might conceivably have played a part in Scully's condition. But if they aren't .... I can't do that to her. I can't do that to myself. She's my friend. I can't lose that. I make the drive home in almost total silence. I can't stand the radio these days. Irritating personalities yacking on about utterly pointless topics, or music stations playing shit I don't recognize. Both merely underscore the fact that I was gone for six long months. I don't need to be reminded. My apartment is just as I left it. The new computer Scully helped me pick out sits on my desk in the old one's place, compact and clean and utterly foreign to me. The fish tank bubbles and glows in the corner. I frown as I turn away from it. I can't believe I said what I said to her the day she first brought me home. Yet there were so many changes, to me and especially to her, that it was easier to comment on what was absent rather than address the most fundamental change .... What the hell had happened to her? Were we lovers? The memories are so clear tonight. Holding her, kissing her, helping her drag our clothes off and flinging them everywhere .... I stand in the doorway and stare at the bed. It's just a bed. Big, but I've always been something of a hog about space and blankets. I slept in it that first night, fresh out of the hospital. I mean, it's my bed. Why shouldn't I sleep in it? Why do the images persist if they are not real? I can see us .... I can see her .... there beside me, deeply asleep. Lying under me, burning me with her heat, her mouth soft and so unbelievably sweet .... I can feel her, her arms and her legs wrapped around me like a warm-blooded constrictor; I can hear her say my name in that wonderful, breathy alto .... Shit, this is driving me crazy. I shake myself out of my reverie and turn away from the bed and the phantom lovers I think I remember. The cordless phone is in my hand before I can think. Ask her. Ask her. Just fucking ask her. Scully, what exactly were we to each other? But when the ringing stops and I hear her soft, breathy greeting, my voice fails me. Don't ask. Just don't go there. If she wanted you to know, she'd have told you .... "Mulder? Is that you?" I clear my throat feebly and force the sounds out. "Uh, yeah. Sorry. I just .... I just wanted you to know I'm home. Did I wake you?" I can hear her smile. How many times have we been like this, just like this? Separated by nothing but physical distance, intimate in spite of the miles between us, comfortable and warm and familiar? I could tell her anything. I could ask her anything. Why do you believe in God? How can you still have any faith in a benevolent entity when there is so much pain and sorrow and shit in the world? And I would listen to her answer. I would smile and nod and in the end understand if only a little, because she could do that: she could make me believe just about anything. As I could her. "Mulder? Are you okay?" Kissing her. The feel of her mouth, warm and pliant, her body writhing and arcing, her hands clamped tight in my hair, her legs locked around me, the wet heat of her body and all its secrets conforming around me like a satin glove .... hearing her gasp and pant my name as I feel her take flight .... I groan softly as I sprawl backwards on the couch. "Yeah, I'm fine." At that I hear her soft, irritated grunt, and I have to smile. We both have problems with that particular phrase. If I try, I can see the little crease in her brow, the gentle pout. Have I kissed that succulent lower lip, or was it just vague, wistful longings? What do I truly remember? Images blur and combine and twist in my head. Mauves and lavenders and pastel blues. Watercolors. Shit, these pants have to go. Valid or not, my body has its own memories and it's acting on them. I unfasten my jeans and kick them off along with my shoes, then lay back carefully so that the leather won't groan and give me away, and gently begin to stroke myself. It's the most natural thing in the world, lying there in the dark with one hand holding the phone and the other wrapped around my cock. "You going to bed now?" she asks sleepily, and I wonder what she would say if she knew what I'm doing. "Yeah," I reply, and allow myself a soft groan. My hand does not slow in its ministrations. God, I am not going to last long. "Yeah, I am. I'll see you in the morning, okay? I'll stop by on the way to the office." She makes a little breathy sound, just like she had when we may or may not have made love. I bite my lower lip to stifle another groan. She just yawned. It was just a yawn. "Okay. G'night, Mulder." "'night." A soft click and she's gone. But she isn't. She's right there on the tired leather sofa with me. She's tugging her shirt off over her head and arching her back and pushing her breasts into my hands. I groan as my rhythm steps up. God, I'm utterly rigid and she's kneeling over my lap, reaching down between us in an utterly unselfconscious way and guiding me. My hands are on her hips, my fingers digging in until the flesh around them is white. Her nipples are drawn up into hard points, and she murmurs my name as she sways against me, rising and falling, establishing a slow cadence and making me want to sob. She's hot and fluid, and her eyes gleam as she looks at me .... Oh God, oh Christ, she's riding me, and it's sweet and warm and I love her, God, I love her so much I think my heart is going to stop .... Her expression is rapt and open, her throat working in a silent cry as I feel her shiver and quake .... Breath catches and then escapes in a guttural cry. My hips jerk as pearly semen spurts out over my hand and pools on my shirt. Jesus, it feels like I come forever. It was so real, it was so God-damned real .... She slumps over me, panting and humid and sweaty. I cup my hands around her head, gently touching her face, and I kiss her hungrily, desperately trying to draw her inside me and soothe the ache in my soul. I'm alone. I let my head fall back and I stare at the ceiling. I haven't even turned on a light. I sigh once, and then a sob catches in my throat. I'm crying. I'm lying in the dark with jism on my belly and I'm crying from loneliness. My hands .... they're aching not with pain, but with need. Need to touch what may or may not have been real once upon a time .... I have to know. I sit upright, jerk the stained T-shirt off over my head and toss it away as I reach for the phone again. She only hung up a moment ago. She won't be asleep. I punch the speed dial and hold my breath as the connection is made. I'm dizzy. Shit, three rings. Four. What the hell is going on? Five. Six. Don't chicken out. Don't. "Hello?" "Did I wake you?" Dammit, I sound terse and pissy. Calm down. Breathe. Just ask the question. She immediately sounds concerned. Fuck. I don't want to upset her, and yet I seem to do nothing else. "No, I was just .... I was in the bathroom. Don't worry, I'm in there quite often at night now. Mulder, is something wrong? Are you okay?" "I'm fine -" Screw it. I'm not fine and we both know it, or else we wouldn't be on the phone in the middle of the fucking night. "No, Scully, I'm not okay. No, I mean .... I'm not fine. There's something .... Scully, I need to ask you something ...." I pause. "Scully, what - ?" Her concern and confusion are quite clear in her tone. "What - what? C'mon, Mulder, you're scaring me here." "Scully, were we lovers?" Silence, so utter and so drawn-out, I can't help wondering if the line had broken and I just hadn't heard it. Then a sound, one that I love almost as much as I hate it. A sob, soft and muffled. Fuck, I've made her cry. Blown it big time, asshole. Take a friendship and screw it up with bullshit questions. In that instant I utterly loathe myself. Dammit dammit dammit. "Scully? Listen, forget it. I'm just .... I'm just trying to get some things straight in my own head. I don't mean to make you .... God, Scully, don't cry. Please don't cry." Please don't cry, because if you do then I will .... A soft sniffle. "No, Mulder. It isn't anything. I'm okay." There's a pause and another sniff, louder this time. I can imagine her pushing herself up awkwardly and reaching for the lamp. How pretty she would be, all rumpled red hair and pale skin and blue, blue eyes. I sit motionless, nude except for my socks, my dick now flaccid in my lap, and listen to her try to control herself. Scully, I love you so much. Please just talk to me. At last I hear her clear her throat. When she finally manages to speak, her voice is tiny and lost. "Mulder .... how things were before Oregon .... don't you remember?" My eyes sag shut. God, she sounds so small. Helpless. I wish she was here right now so I could hold her face and kiss away her tears and her loneliness and her pain. Wait. I missed something. What did she say? Don't you remember? I am such a weenie, tears immediately well up in my eyes. "You mean, it isn't .... It's real? What I remember, what I see when I close my eyes ...." A single sniff was her only response, and I am suddenly, uncontrollably angry. Please let it be real. "Dammit, Scully, answer me! Did it really happen, or are the things I remember just more fucking illusions? I don't know what's real or not anymore .... I see things and I feel things ...." She shushes me gently, and with very little effort I swear I can feel her lips on my face, I can smell her and feel her everywhere as she wraps her warmth around me. "Mulder, tell me. Tell me what you remember, and I'll tell you if it's real." I draw in a shaky breath. The words tumble out of me, images one after another of moments and hours and days. Cases and conversations and interludes in my bed, in hers. Images that have plagued me since I woke up in the hospital and found her sitting there, watching and weeping silent, lonely tears .... There is only a stony silence when I finally run out of breath. Oh, the images are there, and the emotions and the sensations, but I've said enough, my words have begun to run together like .... watercolors. She is silent. "Are ... are you still with me?" I breathe. Another soft sound. "Yeah." A pause. "Am I imagining all this? Or was it real? Was any of it real?" Soft sounds and a little grunt. She's standing up. "Mulder, I'm coming over." I sit up sharply. Naked and sweaty and smelling of semen .... this is not how I want her to find me. "No, you're not." "Mulder, don't fight me on this. I have to see you. We have to talk." I lunge to my feet and grab for my pants, lying knotted with my boxers on the floor. "Fine. I'm on my way." "You just got home." "And you just got out of the fucking hospital. Again. Stay there. I'm on my way." Grab keys. Shove feet in shoes. Shirt? Fuck, not that one. I half-run to the bedroom and dig frantically through my bureau drawers until I come up with something clean. Her words bounce endlessly in my head. We have to talk. I have to see you. We have to talk. About fucking time. ~~~~~ end ~~~~~ Scribbler's note: Okay, I seriously tried to include the Talk, but it didn't work. The piece kept ending here. Sometimes you just gotta let things dictate their own path.