From: Kbxf@aol.com Date: Tue, 21 Dec 1999 00:08:23 EST Subject: NEW: The Wrappings of Intimacy (1/2) by KatyBlue Source: xff TITLE: The Wrappings of Intimacy (1/2) AUTHOR: KatyBlue CLASSIFICATION: UST, MSA SPOILERS: How the Ghosts Stole Christmas. Put yourself back there now because all the other stuff hasn't happened yet. RATING: Pg-13. DISCLAIMER: None of the characters belong to me. I make no legal claims upon the characters or the infinitessimally slow development of said characters that has already been done for me. Thanks for that go to that wonderful grinch, CC! ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: To my editor, Meredith, who puts up with my delayed postings and my blatant insecurities. AUTHOR'S NOTES: I actually wrote this shortly after the ep and just never posted it so hopefully someone will still read it. I also wrote it before 'Alpha' and I like my view of the reentry of the poster better so I kept it in! Sorry for those of you who'd rather that the "dog-woman" gave it to Mulder.... :) If you have a hard time imagining that Mulder and Scully's relationship might be...just ever so slightly, mind you... dysfunctional ;) read no further! And expect some of that yucky season five angst which we've almost forgotten existed! FEEDBACK: Send me feedback at katy2blue@aol.com! *************************************************************** Part (1/2) "Mulder, you shot me." "No, Scully, you shot me." We sit on his couch. A new couch that I don't know when he got. My life, lately, has seemed like a dream. Like I don't quite know what is happening to me. Or what has just happened. We clutch our gifts in front of us as if they can somehow protect us from each other. From these two people that we have become. He got me a poster. The poster. Familiar. Somehow comforting. It is a foggy shot of a spaceship, with the big, blocky message underneath. All in caps. Self-important. I WANT TO BELIEVE. It is a gift that I should have thought to get for him because it holds meaning for him. But for me? Do I want to believe? I don't think so. I'm still shaking from the evening and from the memory of Mulder shooting me. A memory that never happened. Intimacy through codependency is the slogan currently running through my head. What I want to believe in is Mulder. However well meaning my intentions, I try to fit him, a square peg, into my round hole. I think that I might want him to be someone that I'm not sure he is. Imagine, me, Dana Scully. The girl who studied and worked so hard to learn the answers to life. Who spent so much time shunning opportunities to become my mother, whom I saw as tied down and selflessly giving. Whom I've used as an example of what not to become. I've spent years trying not to be my mother. The woman who was successful in raising a family. Keeping a home. I imagined that I was trying hard to be more. To accomplish things that my mother never got to. And sometimes I think that, despite all my lofty higher goals, I might be trying to be the one thing I cannot be anymore. My mother. Let's face it...a career where I ride on the coattails of someone who is a visionary, a barren body, and an apartment that I come home alone to every godforsaken night. I couldn't even keep a dog, for god's sake. I am as self-destructive as someone else that I know. Tragic, really. I see it reflected in his eyes...the tragic part. Mulder. This man that I follow. My failure. My obsession. My child. My lover. I don't know if its love that I see looking back. I see his own obsessions, which have nothing to do with me. Half the time, he doesn't even see me when he's looking right at me. I think that he's with me only to fight off the demons of his own loneliness. I see in his eyes that I am not nearly what he imagines for himself. Nevermind that what he imagines is a cold lonely grave, lamenting the tragedy of his life or the fiery pits of hell for all his imagined sins. But does he feel what I'm beginning to suspect...no, what I'm beginning to dread...that I feel? Does he love, I wonder? I don't need to wonder. I think I know. He laughs about the video. He gives me a little half-hug. I feel tears sting my eyes. I hear the phrase again in my head like a mantra. Intimacy through codependency. I think, how can it be codependency when Mulder doesn't feel it? But then, I think, he feels something in the codependent bent. He seeks my presence because of those aforementioned things. Guilt. Responsibility. Friendship. His sister. Loneliness. I am the pathetic parody of a woman in love. Mulder is just pathetic. Unable to love. Hypothetically, he is able only to commit one-night stands. And even those are rare for him. When did it become all about this thing between us? "I should go..." I say finally. Hearing too much of the voice in my head. Wishing that I could escape it. Knowing that I can't. "Don't go yet, Scully." He puts a hand on my arm to keep me there. He is lonely, I tell myself. "I really should," I insist. In the morning, I will have to face my family, in all my career-oriented, child-less, husband-less failure. I will have to smile and oh and ahh at the gifts they give me that I may never use or wear or even like. I will have to pretend, that once again, I don't mind being regressed into a child. Unable to carry off the role of an adult. Unable to bring along the proof that I am an adult. The concrete evidence of a life. Despite all my accomplishments. And all because I am not dragging along a man and several screaming children to impose on my family for the holidays. The shared failure of every single woman that stands out like a brand on her forehead when she shows up at the door. Hello, here I am...yes, that's right...I'm alone. "Scully, please..." I hear the catch in his voice. I feel the pull on my arm. I remind myself that he is only lonely. But my heart feels that. Allows him to manipulate my friendship. My sick, twisted subconscious desire to have him be something more. I settle back down on the couch and look at him. He looks away. Afraid, maybe, to give me too much. "We should talk about tonight." I feel an anger stir in me. It is an anger I usually keep well in check. Okay, maybe not very well. But I don't let it out often. I try not to this time but it rises in my throat. You believed that Mulder shot you tonight, a little voice reminds me. I think maybe that it is my common sense. It hurt too. Even if it was just an imaginary bullet. I hear a small voice coming out of me from I don't know where. Still, it is mine. "I don't want to talk about it Mulder." "Scully, don't..." He takes my hand. I want to tell him to get his hands off me if he doesn't mean it. He touches me all the time as if people are always doing this to each other. That's not how I was raised. And I know that Mulder's family was much more repressed than mine. I doubt if he is all that comfortable with open displays of affection. No more comfortable than I am. Probably less. I imagine that this touching he does must just be to satisfy his own repressed sexual urges. So maybe he does mean it. And I am starting to be okay as a stand in for silicone and the transitory thrill of a hand and a rewind button. Let's face it. Most men are more sexual than women. After all, I am first, a biologist. I know about the selfish gene. The cheapness of sperm. "I imagined you shooting me," he says quietly. "I came in and found you lying there bleeding. And then you put your gun up into my side and shot me." I feel sick thinking about my own memories. It actually manifests itself as a physical thing. A churning in my stomach. "Were we in the same dream, Mulder? Because that's not how I saw it." "Do you think it was a dream?" I shake my head. "No," I say. "I think it was a nightmare." He sets down the video. I wonder whatever possessed me to purchase it. It was supposed to be funny. At the time I thought it was hilarious. Two scantily clad blonde women doing an alien autopsy. He is frustrated with me. What's new? To Mulder, it must seem as if I have the most rigid mind. All compartmentalized and ordered with my teachings. Spouting science and fact at him like some encyclopedia. I might as well be a library, not a woman. I imagine that I am some huge book, sitting across from him. "I didn't bring you there for that, Scully." "You didn't bring me anywhere, Mulder," I say bravely. "I brought myself. I drove up in my little car and stopped to listen." "I stole your keys," Mulder says quickly. The words rushing out of him. He waits for chastisement from me. His face is a thousand shades of anxiety. In some perverse way, I think that he wants me to be punitive. I don't give him the satisfaction. I shrug. "So?" "What do you mean, so?" He is truly puzzled. I wonder exactly what I think that I am doing here. What possessed me to come over? Late at night. Christmas Eve. As if I expected some neat resolution. Or maybe a festive little party. Or Mulder's body over mine, fulfilling on one hand a deep hormonal drive and on the other, some need to be loved. I look down at the torn scraps of wrapping, lying haphazardly on the table. I want to recapture the few minutes of light heartedness we shared over the exchange of gifts. "Nothing, Mulder," my voice drones. "What do you mean, nothing?" I look at him. Defiantly. He is staring at me like I have two heads. I am perversely pleased to see that he finally looks angry at me. I nurture this for all the other times I have nurtured his ego. "I mean that I let you do it. I let you steal my keys. Not that I knew you were going to do it. I didn't. But I was worried about you going in there alone." "Scully..." He never knows what to say to me. He just looks pained. "So I followed you in there to make sure you were okay. I probably would have gone in even without your little theft, Mulder." I almost add, 'not that you waited for me' or 'not that you ever looked back to see if I was behind you'. His voice is guilty. Grateful. "Thanks, Scully." I feel the flush stealing across my cheeks. Thanks for what? For thoughtfully taking everything that he dumps on me? What we thought we had done to one another tonight was truly heinous. It points out to me, once more, the aching gap between us. The lack of communication. Of our professed trust. The fact that we are not always as close as I imagine but sometimes more like two strangers, thrown together by the evil seed of despair. The desperate cry of two souls, alone and afraid. I feel insulated from Mulder tonight. I feel insulated from myself. I think about going home now. To my quiet little apartment. My creature comforts. I will make myself drink a glass of wine and invite the numbness. I'll turn up my heat and crawl under the covers. I will forget it is Christmas eve. I will forget Christmas altogether. It is so much simpler to pretend that everything is okay on a normal day. A day that isn't supposed to stand out as special. Sometimes, I would like to take all the holidays and make them go away for all the single people in the world. I would wrap it up in some pretty giftwrap, tie it with a big bow and say, here you go, my fellow sufferers. A gift to end all gifts. The annihilation of 'this is supposed to be great but I don't feel it'. I feel his hands trying to break through my shell. "Scully," he says again, annoying me. "That's my name, don't wear it out," I snap, though it's childish and petty. Besides that, it was never my name before Mulder. My name was Dana. I was a different person. Where was Dana Scully today? What happened to her? Buried in some X-file probably. Ova neatly packaged and filed away into a government lab vial. Prospects for a husband and family stolen away. Literally. Leaving behind this shell I sometimes feel I've become. I glare at Mulder again. He looks a little scared. "Scully, what's wrong?" His voice is almost a whisper. He is holding onto my hands, which feel cold and lifeless. Or maybe it is his that are cold and lifeless. I am tired of these feelings. Suddenly, I blurt it out. This mantra in my head. "Intimacy through codependency," I say. Mulder looks confused. He even rears back a little at my words. "What?" "That's why I'm with you, Mulder." He shakes his head like he knows better than I do. "No it's not, Scully." "Why are you with me?" I demand. I see a flash of guilt on his face. And then anger. "I'm with you because you're my partner, Scully. And my friend...and..." He stops, at a loss, I imagine, at what to add to that. He doesn't say the words but I imagine what they would be. I think he is going to say, other than that he isn't with me at all, though I know I'm being irrational. "He told me," I blurt out. A little crazily, I'm afraid. On the edge and ready to go over. "Told you what?" He's being defensive now. "Who?" He has that little sneer on his face he gets when he might need to protect himself from something I might say. "He told me that you only spend time with me because you're lonely. That you listen to me boringly drone on and on because it keeps the loneliness away." There, I'd said it. It wasn't so bad. I see a flash of desperation in his eyes. It must be frightening to him to know that the truth is out. After all, his dependency on me is to keep himself from being lonely. Any old port will do in a storm. "Scully, do you actually believe everything that you're told?" he demands finally. It's my turn now. "What?" I say. "I mean that whatever happened to us in that house.... ghostly visitation, mass-hypnosis of two, or self-delusion... it doesn't mean that every crazy thing that they...or possibly our minds...said was true." "Did you get told that same thing by that...that ghost, or whatever he was?" I demand. "Scully..." "Not my name. An answer." He glares and then looks away. His eyes find something catching in the scattered wrapping too. Maybe the shiny foil, reflecting the light. "Yes," he finally answers. He stares at his hands for a few seconds and looks like he is trying to think of what to say next. "For Christ's sake, Scully." He reaches out and grips my hands. He is holding them so hard that it almost hurts and I realize that at some point, he had let them go from the first time. He stares into my eyes like he wants to jump down into my body. I feel a little thrill from the codependent part of that soul of mine. I wonder why I never gravitated to an addicted personality before now. Have I just wasted all my truly enabling skills until Mulder came along? What a shame. I could have made some poor alcoholic's life much simpler. "Scully, have you ever looked into a mirror?" he demands. "As a matter of fact, yes, Mulder. Though that has nothing to do with this conversation." "Scully, you are one of the most beautiful women I have ever seen..." he states. "...just not your type." I finish his statement quickly. "Thanks for the effort, Mulder but I'm not the one that needs the constant ego boost." The last thing that I need is his pep talk right now. And then I realize I must have made a little mistake and this is not the pep talk I've wandered into. In fact, I'm not sure where exactly this conversation is heading. Mulder is looking at me as if I have three heads now. Or maybe ten and all of them have spoken the words that just wounded him. "What?" he almost spits. *************************************************** End Part (1/2) Continued in Part (2/2) feedback always welcomed at katy2blue@aol.com TITLE: The Wrappings of Intimacy (2/2) AUTHOR: KatyBlue CLASSIFICATION: UST, MSA SPOILERS: How the Ghosts Stole Christmas. Put yourself back there now because all the other stuff hasn't happened yet. RATING: Pg-13. DISCLAIMER: None of the characters belong to me. I make no legal claims upon the characters or the infinitessimally slow development of said characters that has already been done for me. Thanks for that go to that wonderful grinch, CC! ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: To my editor, Meredith, who puts up with my delayed postings and my blatant insecurities. AUTHOR'S NOTES: I actually wrote this shortly after the ep and just never posted it so hopefully someone will still read it. I also wrote it before 'Alpha' and I like my view of the reentry of the poster better so I kept it in! Sorry for those of you who'd rather that the "dog-woman" gave it to Mulder.... :) If you have a hard time imagining that Mulder and Scully's relationship might be...just ever so slightly, mind you... dysfunctional ;) read no further! And expect some of that season five angst. FEEDBACK: Send me feedback at katy2blue@aol.com! ********************************************************************* Part (2/2) Now, I'm frightened. And intimacy, whether codependent or not, is what has sparked it. "Mulder, I really should go." My statement is firm and carries now, a hint of panic. We are going somewhere that we do not need to go. And I am the one who has started it. "How do you know that you're not my type, Scully?" I can look him in the eye after about a minute. He is still staring at me like I have ten heads. Reaching out, I pat his leg. Poor Mulder. Self-delusional to the bitter end. "I just know, Mulder." "Maybe you're wrong, Scully," he says defiantly. "I don't think so, Mulder," I state carefully. It is a feeling I can't shake, so it must mean something. I look down at my poster. It has curled up on itself. A slight movement from me sends a puff of displaced air towards it and it moves back and forth a little as if it has a will of it's own. I feel a restlessness steal inside me and urge me to leave. A voice telling me it's time to go. And then I hear a small sound from Mulder. I look over to see him staring at me angrily. But strangely, a tear is running down his cheek. And then another follows. He swipes angrily at them as his eyes accuse me. "It must be nice to be so sure of yourself, Scully. To have all the answers." I stare at him, stunned. I feel something inside me start to thaw. I stand firm in my resolve that I will not give in to the ache in me that wants to make it better for him. That wants to make everything better for him at the expense of myself. "I don't, Mulder. But some things, I feel." I insist. "Do you feel this?" he demands. He reaches out and grabs my hand, squeezing it in his own. And then his grip loosens and his fingers run over mine. His eyes are pleading. Mulder does not want to be alone. His hand continues lightly up my arm. I am mesmerized at this desperate seduction. He leans in toward me. I watch his lips until they go out of focus and descend upon mine. They are warm and seeking against my own. The tip of his tongue runs over my lips. I have wanted Mulder to do this for a long time. Whether I admit it to myself or not. He closes the kiss by sealing my lips back together with his own, tasting me. He moves back so that he can look me in the eye. "Do you really think that people feel just one way about each other, Scully?" I am trapped within his gaze. Also, he has moved his hands to either side of my face, holding my head in place before him and his fingers have begun to tangle in my hair so that I cannot move. "No," I answer honestly. "Then yes," he says quietly, a slight catch in his voice. "Sometimes you are difficult for me to listen to. But not always. I've already told you how I feel about that strict rationalism of yours." I close my eyes. Trying to remember where our conversation started and picture where it is going. But all I seem to be aware of is the feel of his hands on me. His body inches from mine. I realize that I am one very horny woman. And that my strict rationalism is beginning to desert me. My twisted romantic side strews the path with soft rose petals and promises that can't be kept. Everything does not always turn out happily ever after. In fact, in never does. Because life never ends until death. And things are always changing. And I don't know of anyone who thinks of death as 'happily ever after'. Or anyone who can halt the progress of time and stop change from occurring. "Mulder..." I find the strength to put my hands against his chest and begin a constant but firm pressure that moves him back from me. His hands desert the erogenous zone of my neck. I move to the left slightly so that I am out of his direct line of sight, breaking the intensity of his gaze. My clouded judgment begins to return, along with the scattered pieces of my common sense. Mulder drops his hands, then his eyes. Sighing, he turns away from me and puts his elbows on his knees, clasping his hands together hard. He focuses back on the wrapping paper. His lips press tightly together. In profile, he looks sad. Defeated. I have won my independence. I sigh. I can feel it building in me like a storm. I cannot be near him like this and not feel it. I cannot see his suffering and not respond. I feel myself reaching out... And just like that, I have lost the battle. My independence means no more to me than a lonely night in my own apartment does. I want to make this better for him. My codependent urges strike a victory chord. "Mulder," I say gently. I reach out and take his hand back. He is reluctant to give it to me. He doesn't look me in the eye either. Why is this so hard? "I know that I'm a know it all, Mulder," I state matter of factly. "But I really don't take pleasure in trying to prove you wrong." "Once again, Scully, I didn't say that. They must have," he snaps at me. 'They' being the mythical ghosts or some shared delusion. Now that would be an X-file. If Mulder and I experienced the same delusion. "And once again, when have you?" He is being mean now. Striking back because I have pushed him away. He grows braver. "And don't try to tell me how I feel, Scully!" Wow. This last statement is with emphasis. Half-shouted. It is not at all like Mulder. Mulder is very taciturn when it comes to feelings. Usually he just gets that pained, constipated look and hopes that I can read what he's thinking. Usually, I just read that he's in pain or constipated. "I never tried to tell you how you're feeling," I say. He points an accusatory finger in my face and practically sprays me with his next, sputtered words. "You just did, Scully, not five minutes ago. You don't even hear yourself!" "I do so," I argue. "Really? Good for you." There is a muscle in his jaw jumping which means, in Mulder, that he is clenching his teeth. Or more accurately, biting back words. But then he lets them go. "Maybe it's just me that you don't hear, Scully. Why should you have to listen to my demented brain, churning absurdity out of my mouth? That's about how you see me, isn't it? You must not even have to concentrate, everything that I say is so irrational." "Mulder..." Now, he is being ridiculous. Doesn't he know how much I admire the way his brain works? Well, most of the time, I do. It is a singularly amazing entity to me. His thought processes are dark and mysterious wonders in my categorized world. His questionable dips into insanity only evidence of the precariousness of genius. To me, he is nothing short of magical. Even the 'I want to believe' poster is moved by his words. It teeters perilously close to the edge of the table. I reach out and catch it, just before it falls. And suddenly, we are both staring at the table. At our gifts to each other. Remembering the exchange of them, removed only by minutes. Recognizing the difference in mood between then and now. I remember smiling as I took the gift. Feeling my insides light up along with my face. I showed Mulder teeth, a rarity for me. I feel guilty that I have destroyed that. I readjust the poster's position so that it is safe in its spot. It will not fall. Mulder's gift to me seems like a message. As if he is trying to see inside me or teach me something. My gift to him is a front. A joke at his expense. It hides me from him. I glance at the torn wrapping paper. The brightness of it draws my attention to the bleakness of the room around it. I realize that Mulder does not have up one single decoration. There is nothing in this room to say it is a holiday outside of the waste matter from our gifts. I know that, at home, I decided not to put up a tree this year. Nor did I bother digging out the box of assorted ornaments and decorations that go along with that. I did not analyze this too closely. I knew that I would go to my mother's for celebration. I have managed to somehow postpone the holiday from occurring until then. My apartment too, is barren of cheer. Nothing to say Christmas outside of a few bags of neatly wrapped gifts, hidden behind the sofa. I wonder now what this means. "I have to go, Mulder..." I say gently. He nods. "Go ahead." I am angry suddenly. He is dismissing me. As if he is too tired to deal with me anymore. But I am trying to dismiss him. "Mulder, look at me." He looks up. Oh yes. Definitely angry. Those wonderful, full lips of his are pursed. He is biting back words again. "You still want to talk," I observe. "No, Scully. I want to throttle you." He sighs. He reaches out and picks up a piece of shiny paper. He examines the pattern for a moment. Then his fingers slowly crumple it into a small nondescript ball. It is when his eyes are unfocused like this that I glimpse the true emptiness he feels inside himself. "The whole time I was separated from you in that house, all I did was worry about you," he says quietly. I wait. I take his pause to think, did I worry about him? Funny, I did a little, but not that much. I always think that Mulder will take care of himself. That he is somehow invincible. I might have to do a little patching here and there but overall, I am usually more angry that he has left me behind than I am worried about him. My worry was all about myself. My sanity. I just wanted to get the hell out of there. "You saw me shoot you?" he asks. I roll my eyes. "Okay. One more time. I had my gun on that guy when you came through the door. You were crazy Mulder. You were yelling that it was me or you." I couldn't even tell him the part about me pleading with him. Telling him that I would never shoot him. It was still a very raw wound. "And then you fired the gun." He is shaking his head. "That wasn't me, Scully. I heard the sound of a gun going off. When I finally got through that god damned brick wall that was pretending it was a door, you were lying on the ground. I ran to you to make sure that you were okay and realized that you must have shot yourself. That's when you put the gun up in my side and fired." "And that wasn't me," I say slowly. "I didn't shoot myself or you." That part didn't happen in my delusion. Or maybe I was just too out of it. Or we did not share the same delusion. Strangely, this thought comforts me. Because mine was pretty bleak and horrific. But his doesn't exactly sound like one I'd want to have been in either. I do remember the slow torturous crawl to the door, alone. I remember Mulder suddenly showing up behind me, dragging himself along the wet, slick trail I'd left. Of almost shooting each other again. What if that time, we had pulled the triggers? Would those bullets have been real? What had stopped us? It had been our both admitting that we were afraid. And somehow, that had made us not afraid of each other anymore. Mulder and I have the most complicated relationship that I've ever imagined for myself. Not that it is a relationship, I remind myself. "Scully, stay tonight." His voice is quiet but the words startle me. "What?" He puts his face in his hands and mutters into them. "Stay with me tonight." He raises his head and looks at me. These next words are more bold. "I don't want to be alone." I look around me. The couch doesn't look very comfortable. I don't know what his plea means for me. "I've got that new bed." His smile is self-deprecating. I've seen the bed. For some reason, I actually believe that it was not Mulder's doing. It had to have been the consortium, trying to make him seem crazy while we snuck off to Nevada. Or some practical joke by the Gunmen. But he told no one but me and I told no one. That's how things work with Mulder and I. A confidence of two. So the secret remains ours. I also know that Mulder would never buy a waterbed. "Can you even sleep in that thing without getting seasick, Mulder?" He grins. "If I don't move around too much." I feel the smile on my lips though I try to stifle it. Mulder allows himself to smile with me. I find it amazing that this situation has somehow turned humorous on us. He doesn't want to be alone, a voice reminds me. And neither do I. You are seeking intimacy through codependency, the voice niggles. Yes, it was a tough night for both of us. Yes, we rely on each other too much. And maybe I have grown to rely on him more than the other way around, though I'm skeptical of this. But I'm not seeking codependency, I tell myself. In my twisted world, it has just happened to me. Am I seeking intimacy? Maybe. Okay, probably. Are Mulder and I good for each other? He leads me towards the bedroom. Somehow, the lightness of the moment stays. We find this funny, what we are doing. Or maybe we are just using humor to mask the underlying seriousness of what we are doing. We make our way toward his bed. We crawl into it, both fully clothed, removing only our shoes. Okay, Mulder has taken off his jacket and thrown it into a chair near the bed and I slide mine off from under the covers and dump it onto the floor. I don't care that my suit will be rumpled tomorrow. The alternative is too terrifying. I may be horny, but I've never managed reckless abandon. Are Mulder and I good for each other? As the crazy eight ball would say, it's doubtful. But he puts an arm around my waist and pulls me up against him, snuggling his face up against my neck. "You smell good, Scully." Really? I look up and see the mirror. The bed is rolling us in not so gentle and then, finally, gentler waves. "I move around a lot at night, Mulder," I warn. He groans. "It figures." We stare at each other in the unbelievable mirror. He is looking at me and I am watching him. He reaches out and touches my face. It is Christmas. Mulder and I are lying side by side in his bed. We are alone, but together. And I imagine that's how it is for every two people thrown together by life and time. There is hurt. And there is comfort. And there is someone else beside you that makes you laugh and cry, and looks at things differently than you do. I stare at us in the mirror and almost don't recognize these two people. "Turn off the light, Mulder." He does. ************************************************************ THE END Please send feedback to me at katy2blue@aol.com. I wish you and all you hold dear a wonderful holiday season... :) Let's hope we're all still here in 2000!