Simple Gifts -- Part 3 of 7 See Disclaimer in Part 1 I-95 just southwest of Baltimore 3:47 p.m. Mulder smiled at the fuzzy, drowsy sound of her voice right before she hung up. He couldn't believe she'd actually agreed to his suggestion. She must be really exhausted. He sobered a little when he realized that part of the deal was having to call her mother. It shouldn't be a problem. He'd called Maggie a lot during the time when Scully was missing. They'd spoken often and at length during that awful time when they'd both been naive enough to believe that that was as bad as things could get. That was before all the things that had happened to Scully since, each seemingly worse than the one before. He hadn't spoken to Maggie since they'd spent time together in the hospital in New York when Scully had been shot. This wasn't going to be easy, especially in light of what Scully had told him about the family Christmas. But it had to be done and it wasn't going to get any easier. He pushed Mrs. Scully's button on his speed dial. "Hello?" Maggie answered. "Mrs. Scully, it's Mu... It's Fox." "Hello, Fox," she said without hesitation. He wished he knew her well enough to read her tone. "Are you looking for Dana? I think she's probably on her way here." He grimaced slightly. "Well, that's what I was calling to tell you. She's not on her way there." "Oh? Why not?" "I asked her not to go." "You asked her not to," Maggie repeated. "She's so tired, Mrs. Scully." He waited, but she didn't say anything. Gap in the phone conversation. Maybe that's where Scully got it, that ability to just listen--to wait for information to come to her rather than to press for it. "You know she just got back into town. Did she tell you anything about the case?" "No," Maggie answered, her tone sounding sharp to his ears. "She hardly ever tells me about her work. She just left a message on my machine. She didn't even tell me where the two of you were going." "It wasn't the two of us. It was just her," he explained. "I was on light duty this week and she was sent on another assignment." "They sent her on an assignment without you again?" she asked tightly. Maggie had been livid when she found out that her daughter had been shot by a fellow FBI agent--the only person more outraged than he himself had been. "She wasn't in the field, Mrs. Scully," he said, trying to offer the only idea that had given him any comfort over the past week. "Have you seen the news--the thing about the mass grave they found in Idaho?" "It was all over the tv, the papers," Mrs. Scully replied. "Thirty-seven bodies, from what I heard. You mean Dana...?" "Yeah," he said on a sigh. "Some of the victims appeared to be Mexican nationals, so the Bureau was working jointly with the local authorities. The nearest town of any size... Their coroner just couldn't deal with it, so they sent Dana out there to help him out." It felt strange to call her *Dana,* even when talking about her with her mother. "It was pretty bad, Mrs. Scully. She did twenty- two autopsies between Monday and Thursday. It's hard to sleep when you see something like that." "Oh, Fox," she said sadly. "How could she do it?" "Because she's the best there is," he replied with sincere admiration. "But if she got ten hours of sleep in all that time, I'd be really surprised. She's exhausted and I didn't think it was a good idea for her to drive like that. I convinced her to let me check with you to see if I might be able to pick up the stuff you wanted to give her. I'm already in the car and not too far from you." "I was hoping to talk to her, but if you don't think it's safe for her to drive, I can't ask her do it." "I told Dana that if you really had to talk to her, I'd go down and get her and bring her to your house." "No, Fox," Maggie replied. "If Dana needs rest, she needs rest. Come on by. I've got everything in a bag waiting for her." "Thank you," he said wondering if his voice reflected the relief he felt. "I should be there within an hour." "I'll be watching for you. Bye, Fox." "Bye, Mrs. Scully." It was after five when he finally pulled up at the curb in front of Maggie's house. It had been years since he'd been there and he didn't think he'd ever be able to go there-- with or without Scully--that it wouldn't remind him of the time she was missing. He'd visited often in the months that Scully was gone, ostensibly to bring Maggie progress reports on the status of the search for her daughter. But more often just to be in the presence of the only other person in the world who knew how much it hurt to be without Scully. Mrs. Scully would talk to him, make him a meal-- often the only food or conversation he'd had in days. He recalled that time, as well as the day he'd pulled up in front of the house to drop Mrs. Scully off after they'd seen the grave marker she'd selected for her daughter. Mrs. Scully had seen it more than Mulder had. After a brief initial glance, he turned away, unable to bear to look at it anymore. He could not, would not, absolutely refused to believe that she was dead. And blessedly, miraculously, she hadn't been. Mulder popped the door open and unfolded himself from behind the steering wheel. He stretched to work out the kinks from the long drive and moved his head back and forth resulting in several quite audible pops. Nothing more he could do. There was just no getting around approaching the house and ringing the doorbell. Maggie answered almost at once, throwing the door open and greeting him with a smile that Mulder didn't know how to interpret. Not the warm welcoming smile she used to give him way back when, but still one that felt genuine to him. Or maybe that was wishful thinking. "Fox," she said. "Please come on in." "Hi, Mrs. Scully. Took me a little longer than I thought to get here." He stood awkwardly in the foyer, his hands folded in front of him, bouncing slightly on the balls of his feet. "You just never know what the traffic will be like," she said, seeming as uncomfortable to him as he himself felt. "I made some coffee. Would you like a cup?" He felt anxious, as though she were simply being polite. "No, thanks," he said, fighting the urge to look away, down at his feet like a nervous teenager. "I should get that stuff to Dana." Even without seeing her face, he could feel her looking at him curiously. "Dana's probably asleep right now, isn't she?" "I hope so," he replied automatically. "She was almost there when I hung up from talking with her." "Then if you stay and have a cup of coffee with me, she'll be able to get a little more sleep." She smiled at him reassuringly. "I wish you would, Fox. I'd like to talk to you if you have a little time." "Sure," he replied, trying not to be too reassured by her smile. He wouldn't be lulled into a false sense of security about how Scully's mother felt about him. But she was right--Scully would at least get a little more sleep. "Why don't you go into the living room and I'll bring the coffee in there?" He walked through the double doors to the living room, recalling the feeling of finding Scully here--paranoid, crazed and pointing a gun at him. Would she have shot him if Maggie hadn't stepped between them? He hadn't believed then that she would shoot him, and he was still certain of it now. She'd have fought it off, listened to that part in her head that corresponded to the part of him that hadn't allowed him to shoot her when Robert Modell had tried to *push* him into it. Pacing the room, he found he was somehow too wound up to sit down alone in Mrs. Scully's living room. A couple of pieces of furniture seemed different--the sofa and an armchair. He drifted over, just as he used to do when he'd visited her, to the large bookcase in the corner of the room that she had decked with photographs. Many of the pictures were ones she'd had on display before, but there were other, newer ones in among them. Bill and the mythical Charlie with their families. One of Melissa that he hadn't seen before, standing on a pier in what appeared to him to be San Francisco. A fairly recent one of Scully- -about two years old, according to her hairstyle--at what appeared to be a family barbecue. He smiled when he noted a gap in the group of pictures and wondered if she'd kept them that way for all these years, or had rearranged them knowing that he'd wander over to look at them like he used to do. During one of the last times he'd visited Maggie during Scully's abduction, he'd finally given into the temptation he'd fought off for so long, and took a small brass-framed picture of Scully and slid it into the pocket of his jacket. He'd seen the photo during his first visit and it made him ache when he realized he didn't have a single picture of Scully--other than the surveillance photo of her gagged in the trunk of the car driven by Duane Barry when he'd taken her. For weeks, he'd stared longingly at the picture on Maggie's shelf, wanting more than anything to have a different image of her in case she was gone forever. The night, weeks later, that he'd slipped it into his pocket was the night he first admitted to himself that he loved her--enough to steal her picture from her mother. It was the picture she'd had taken for her graduation from medical school. Her hair was longer and smoothly styled and she looked so young and beautiful--so much like she had that first day she'd walked into his office. Her eyes sparkled with her smile and she looked so poised and confident and stunningly gorgeous. He'd kept his jacket on during his visit with Mrs. Scully, but couldn't stop his fingers from surreptitiously reaching into the pocket to touch the frame. He'd taken it home later and was happy to be able to close the file containing the grainy abduction photo and have something good to replace it with. Staring at it for a very long time, he was stunned at how much he missed her and by the gaping hole her absence had left in his heart. That first night, he'd kept it standing upright on the coffee table next to the sofa. But when he'd seen it upon awakening from another fitful night's slumber, he felt ashamed that he had taken it. And somehow disloyal to Scully, as if he'd accepted a good image, a happy image, as his final memory of her. Like he was giving up. He'd opened the file again and stared at the picture of his terrified partner until he could feel and anger and rage banking in his heart like a carefully tended fire. And with it came a grim determination to keep going, to search for her for as long as it took. But even then he hadn't been able to return the picture, to slip it back into the place where he'd found it. Instead, he'd placed it in a drawer in his desk, where he'd kept it for years--taking it out every so often, just to look at it, just to remember what her smile looked like. He'd looked at it a lot over the past year. "I counted those pictures, Fox. I'm hoping the same number will be there when I count them again later." Her voice started him, interrupting his thoughts, and he turned quickly hoping his expression didn't look as guilty as he felt. He strode across the room to take the tray laden with coffee things from her hands. "I'll empty my pockets before I leave." Maggie smiled and indicated a space on the coffee table for Mulder to set the tray down. He waited for her to sit before seating himself. Maggie poured coffee into two mugs and handed one to him. "Just black, right?" He nodded and took the cup she offered. She smiled apologetically and passed him a plate with a sandwich cut into quarters. "I was hoping to find something for you to eat. I just got back Tuesday, and I haven't had a chance to do any real grocery shopping. But still, you look like a peanut butter and jelly man to me." He smiled with delight at her offer. Peanut butter and jelly, cut into quarters like tiny tea sandwiches. He was surprised to find that she hadn't removed the crusts. "Who doesn't like PB and J? One of the few things I can make for myself that I can eat virtually without fear." He bit into one quarter and realized that he was hungry--something that hadn't happened in a long time. Had he eaten anything all day? "You're too thin, Fox. Is something wrong?" she looked at him with genuine concern. "I'm okay now," he replied and took another bite of the sandwich, hoping that a full mouth would keep him from having to answer questions about his recent state of health. "But there have been some problems?" she asked. He nodded, not seeing the point in lying to her when she could see for herself. He hoped she wouldn't ask for details. "Is that why you were on light duty and Dana had to go to Idaho?" "No, that was a separate thing. Dislocated my shoulder last week." "You should still have your arm in a sling," she chided him gently, still with a look of worry on her face. "Took it off a couple days ago. It was..." "Too constricting, gets in the way, too hot, itches. Generally a pain in the ass." She noted his surprised look. "Four kids, two sons involved in every sport that was ever invented. I've seen dislocated shoulders. Your arm should be in a sling. You're thinking, what? Maybe Dana won't notice?" "Not likely, huh?" he said with a chuckle. "It's in the car. I'll put it on before I go to see her." Maggie smiled at him knowingly. "Five bucks at ten to one says that she'll be able to tell that you haven't worn it all week." "You don't think I can fool her, huh?" "My daughter is not easily fooled," she replied, not without a great deal of pride. "No, she's not," Mulder replied, and suddenly felt inexplicably somber and uneasy. Scully was not easily fooled--unlike her too often gullible partner. She seemed to pick up on his mood change and noted that he'd only eaten three of the four sandwich sections she'd given him. "Fox, I don't mean to pry..." He saw her eyeing his plate and forced down the last quarter of the sandwich in an unsuccessful bid to erase the worried look on her face. His appetite was not yet back to normal, and he couldn't put away near the gargantuan portions he could when she used to cook him meals. "I had some medical problems a couple months ago," he said quietly. "I'm getting better every day. Dana knows about them and she's helping me keep an eye on things." Maggie nodded, "Except when she's out of town and you don't take care of yourself. If she hasn't slept well since she's been gone, I'd be willing to bet that you haven't been eating regularly since then either." She gave him a skeptical look that was almost identical to one in Scully's rather impressive repertoire of doubtful expressions. "Well, maybe that's part of the explanation." Explanation? "For what?" he asked. "For the way Dana was at Christmas," she answered. "That's what I wanted to talk to you about. Did she tell you anything about Christmas at Bill's house?" He shrugged in a non-committal way, reluctant somehow to discuss things she'd said to him, even with her mother. Not that he knew that much to begin with. She smiled at him in sad understanding. "Don't worry, Fox, I won't ask you for details about your conversations with her. She told you that she and Bill had a fight and that's why she left early, right?" He nodded. "Did she tell you what the fight was about?" She paused. "Never mind, I said I wouldn't ask for details. I'll tell you what happened." "Mrs. Scully," he interrupted, uncomfortable with the idea of his mother sharing things with him that Scully might not actually want him to know. "I know you think that I'm telling you our family secrets. But you're in this, Fox. And I think our failure to recognize that is part of what happened on Christmas Eve. You're in this and it's not fair for everyone but you to know what happened. And I'm pretty sure Dana didn't tell you all the details." He suddenly realized that he did want to know the details. Maggie was right, he was in this. He was the one who'd had to watch the quiet and subdued Scully who had returned early from San Diego and gone right back to work. "We haven't had much time to talk," he said defensively. "We had a... fairly demanding case right away when she got back. That's where I hurt my shoulder. Then she got sent to Idaho." Maggie nodded in understanding. "You know we got to San Diego on the twenty-third. Bill picked us up at the airport. Maybe I should have said something right away. Bill picked at Dana for little things right from the start, but she didn't seem to take much notice. She was, I don't know, preoccupied, I guess. Now I know she was probably worried about you. I wish she'd have told us. But anyway, she didn't react to anything he said to her and that seemed to make him even more determined to get a rise out of her. I probably should have told him to stop. But Fox, my kids are grownups. I just figured they'd have to work out any problems between them on their own. So I didn't say anything. "By the time we got back to Bill's, Charlie and his family had arrived in their Winnebago, and there was lots of catching up to do. So things weren't so bad, at least until bedtime. You remember Bill's house in San Diego?" Mulder nodded. "Our family was stationed on that base when the kids were young and we lived in a house with an identical floor plan to the one Bill's living in now. Three bedrooms upstairs, so the boys shared a room and the girls shared one. Anyway, Bill put Dana and me in the room that she and Melissa used to share when we lived in the house like that. It seemed so sad and strange to be in that room that used to be Melissa's. I miss her so much of the time, but it's really bad at Christmas. It's been years now, but it just seemed worse this year." He nodded in understanding. "It's Matty's room now. Tara put a whole bunch of glow-in- the-dark stars on the ceiling. It was kind of eerie that first night. I woke up in the middle of the night and was startled by those stars, then I rolled over to face the other bed where Dana was sleeping and there were those alien head slippers of hers. And they were glowing in the dark, too." "She wears the slippers?" he asked, surprised and unbelievably pleased. He'd thought they were really cool when he found them in the store while looking for a gift for her. But he never thought that she'd actually wear them. "A gift from you?" she asked and he nodded. "Fox, we have to talk about gifts." She chuckled a little, then sobered. "I think I did better this year," he said, but not feeling too sure of it. "You did fine last year," she said reassuringly. "Yes, she wears them. And she washes them by hand even though the label says you can put them in the machine because she wants to make sure they don't stop glowing in the dark." Embarrassing as it was, Mulder could feel himself grinning as he looked down, adding hot coffee to the cooling liquid in his cup. She liked the slippers. "But just being back in that room, all I could think about was Melissa, and then Ahab and all the Christmases we used to have. The next day was Christmas Eve and we all pretty much went our separate ways. You know, last minute shopping and things. That afternoon we all got back together and worked on trimming the tree. Dana helped right along with everyone else, not saying much but joining in. We have a Scully traditional lineup for Christmas Eve. We trim the tree, we eat some dinner, then we gather round and sing carols. I was keeping an eye on her and Dana just got quieter and quieter all through dinner. She smiled, she spoke when spoken to, but it was like she wasn't really there. Then we gathered around for the singing. Of course, Dana never joins in on the singing but..." "She doesn't sing with you?" he asked, surprised. He sometimes heard her absently humming carols in the office in the weeks before Christmas and he loved the low, slightly off-key sound of it. When she did it, he had to concentrate on not looking at her. Sometimes out of the corner of his eye, he'd see her bobbing her head slightly in time with the song. She'd stop if he caught her, but he liked catching her, too. It made her smile and blush just a little, like he'd caught her at some secret activity. "No," Maggie answered. "She hasn't for years, not since she was a kid--twelve, thirteen maybe. That year at Christmas, she was just getting over a pretty bad case of bronchitis. So while we were singing, Billy made fun of her and said she sounded like a dying cow, which for some reason he found astonishingly funny. Then Bill--my husband Bill--joined in and said *more like a dying cow in a hailstorm.* Well, that was it. If it had just been her brother teasing her... She was just at that age where young girls can get hurt by a glance. She had braces, and chubby apple cheeks, and red hair, and about a million freckles. Sounding like a dying cow in a hailstorm was just one more thing to add to the list of things she already didn't like about herself. If it had just been Billy, it would have gone in one ear and out the other. But her father said it, too, and I think that really hurt her. He didn't mean to be cruel, he was just joking, but it was the wrong joke at the wrong time. She never said anything about it, just stopped singing and never sang with us again, although she did move her lips and pretend. She still tries to fake it." "I think she has a nice voice," he said quietly, almost to himself, and his lips tugged in a small smile at the memory of her singing to him. "You've heard Dana sing?" she asked and he nodded. "We never heard her sing again. Not even with the radio in the car. I've always wondered if she even sings to herself when she's alone. I hope she does." Mulder half expected Maggie to ask how he'd come to hear Dana sing, but to his relief, she didn't. Mothmen in Florida wasn't something he wanted to try to explain to Scully's mother. "So we were all gathered around the piano. Tara was playing, everybody was singing--or pretending to. I was holding the baby and singing to her. I glanced around for a second and saw Dana just standing there, not even pretending to sing, with the damnedest look on her face. She'd been acting strange all night, so I just went back to paying attention to the baby. And when I looked up again, she was gone." She twisted her hands together as if they were cold and looked away from him. "God, Fox, I just didn't think. Suddenly I was just so tired of how she'd been over the past couple of days. Hell, the past couple of years. And I got mad--mad about her moods, about her *need* to abandon her family right in the middle of the Christmas Eve thing. So I went to go look for her and looked out the back door and saw her sitting on the porch. Just sitting there in the dark with that ever-present cell phone pressed to her ear. And I knew she was talking to you." "Who else would ruin your family's Christmas?" he said sardonically. "No, Fox, that's not how I knew," she replied with a quiet despondency. "I knew it by the look on her face. I just stood there for a while watching her through the window. She didn't even know I was there. She was just sitting on the porch, her knees drawn up, the phone propped up against her shoulder. Not saying a word." "I was telling her a story." "It must have been a good story, Fox. She had her head tilted back and she was smiling. A smile like I hadn't seen from her in years. Maybe ever. And she looked so pretty, sitting there in the moonlight. It was almost like I was seeing her for the first time, like she was so beautiful that she couldn't possibly have come from the likes of Ahab and me." Mulder felt a pang in his heart that he hadn't been allowed to see that smile. But at the same time, he was elated that he had been able to bring it to her. She had let him see a smile like that one night, in exchange for something as simple as baseball, and he'd do anything to see it again. Maggie took a deep and shaky breath. "This is where the hard part starts. I stood there watching her, seeing how lovely she was, and I could literally feel myself filling with anger. Just pure rage. At her... and at you." He nodded his understanding and placed his cup on the tray, readying himself to leave. She placed a hand on his forearm. "No, please stay. Let me finish explaining. Please, Fox?" He did not reply, but stayed in his place on the sofa, sitting straight backed and not allowing himself to relax against the cushions. "I'm so ashamed of this," she said softly, lowering her head. "But I stood there getting angrier and angrier that she'd spent the last two days creeping around, looking like it took every bit of strength she had just to stay in the same room with us. But for you, she could smile. Not just smile, she glowed. And instead of being glad that someone- -that you--could bring a smile to her face, I was resentful that it was you and not us, not her family. And I thought of last Christmas when she chose to be with you instead of us. And the dinner party she left because you called. And all the canceled lunches and movie plans." Her voice was getting shakier as the tears that brimmed in her eyes spilled over. "And the fact that I learned that my daughter had an inoperable brain tumor from you. She told you first. Fox, I'm so ashamed, I'm so sorry, but right at that moment, I hated you." He swallowed hard and closed his eyes against the blinding pain of holding back tears. This wonderful, strong, resilient woman--who'd kept him alive and sane while Scully was missing--had hated him. And for so many good reasons he could use both hands and feet and still run out of digits before he ran out of reasons. Yet he was here in her living room, drinking her coffee and eating food she had prepared for him. How could she? What did it mean? Maggie continued. "Bill came along, looking for both of us, I guess. Dana had already seen me looking at her and hung up from talking with you. I went back to the living room and she came in and he started right in on her. I could hear him in the next room. About how she should be spending Christmas Eve with her family. She tried... I think she was really trying to avoid an argument. She ignored him and came into the living room where Charlie and I were. And he just wouldn't let up. And I just couldn't seem to make myself stop him because I was mad, too." She pulled a handkerchief from the sleeve of her blouse and dabbed at a tear that sneaked down her face. "He was yelling about you, about her job. Charlie tried to intercede and Bill told him to shut up and stay out of it. Bill told her he'd met an agent from the Los Angeles field office and he..." "Told him about Mr. and Mrs. Spooky," Mulder finished for her and she nodded. "Word gets around. I guess working with me has pretty much finished any high career aspirations she had with the Bureau." "Fox..." she began. But he kept on talking. "That's why they sent her on that case in New York last year. One last chance to save her career." "And look where it got her!" Maggie exclaimed in disgust. "Fox, Dana doesn't consider her career ruined. Bill always says that when he talks to me about her, and I guess I believed it because she never talks about her work with me so I just didn't know how she felt about it. But I heard her that night. She's proud of the work you two do and set Bill straight on that one right away. She told him that you have an eighty-three percent solve rate on cases and that she doesn't give a damn who calls her Mrs. Spooky. Because you two do good work and you save lives." "She told you that?" he asked, astonished. "She could do so much better than me. I told her once that she'd be Director someday. And she could have been if she'd have transferred out when I said it." "What makes you think she wants to be? She'd never trade in a chance to save lives for a title. And she'd never trade you in for one either. She let us know in no uncertain terms that she's where she chooses to be." She paused and cleared her throat, as if a lump had formed there that was difficult to talk around. "I should have seen it coming. I would never have let him say it if I'd known he was going to." "What?" he asked suspiciously. "I should have known he wasn't thinking when he brought up Emily," she said miserably. Mulder took a shaky breath, rubbing his fingers across his forehead. "He brought up Emily on Christmas Eve? He brought up her dead daughter on the anniversary of the day she found her?" "I should have stopped him. But he never believed that the child was Dana's daughter." "I don't suppose it mattered to him that she believed it," he said coldly. "But that's not what caused the blowup, was it?" She shook her head sadly. "No, no it wasn't. She hung on pretty well through that. But then, then... He basically blamed her for Melissa's death. Said that Melissa was dead because of the choices Dana made. It stopped her cold, Fox. He'd never said anything like that to her before and I was stunned." "Fucker," he whispered under his breath. He could feel his heart constricting in pain and rage. "I know he's your son and you love him, Mrs. Scully. But if he was here right now I'd kick his ass all the way back to San Diego. How the hell could he say something like that to her?" Tears spilled from her luminous blue eyes, so like Scully's. "Fox, I know it hasn't been your experience with him, but Bill is a good man. Really. He's a good husband and a good father. And I really believe that he wants to be a good brother and protect Dana, but she won't let him. Since my husband died, I know Bill sees himself as the head of the family." But Mulder's fury would not be appeased. "And as head of the family, it's his job to destroy her," he said bitterly. "Fox," she said gently. "You know yourself that sometimes people say angry, hurtful things before they even think about them." Her words brought him up short. How many times had he himself blurted out things that he knew had hurt her as soon as he said them? How many times just in the past year? "Besides," she continued softly. "There's plenty of blame to spread around. After Bill said those things, she turned to me and asked if I blamed her for Missy's death. I don't know what came over me, but I started to say I couldn't help thinking that she'd still be here if... I stopped myself but it was too late. She knew what I was going to say." He felt his own eyes fill with tears at how that must have hurt her. Knew her pain from the blame his father had always placed on him for losing his sister. "Mrs. Scully, you should have put the blame where it belongs. Do you have any idea how guilty she feels about Melissa? How much she blames herself?" She nodded looking down at her hands clenched together in her lap. "Let me finish, Fox. After that, she went upstairs and the rest of us went to Midnight Mass. She wouldn't go with us, said she'd stay there with the kids. By the time we got back, she had her things packed and had called a cab. She insisted on leaving, and I couldn't blame her for it. I wanted to apologize for everything and I know Bill did, too. But she wouldn't have listened. She just hugged us all and left. I watched her face and all I could think of was how beautiful she'd looked before, out on the porch talking to you. And it tore my heart out that I'd taken that away from her. I took that away from her. She wasn't beautiful when she left." "She's always beautiful," he insisted and Maggie graced him with an indulgent smile that was heartbreaking in its sorrow. "After she left, I went upstairs and found a note from her on my pillow. To answer your question Fox, no I didn't know how much she blames herself. I really didn't know until I read her note. We Scullys always had plenty of love, but none of us talk about emotions very much. It's just not our way. I knew she was heartbroken about Melissa's death. They'd just started to get close again when Melissa was killed. But she never talked about the guilt. She was too ashamed to, I guess. Maybe too afraid of upsetting me more than I already was. "But I sat there in that room and read her note and she apologized for the fact that it was Melissa and not her who'd died. Dana thought... thinks I'd rather have had it be her who was killed instead of Melissa. She apologized and promised to keep at it until everyone responsible for what happened to Melissa was brought to justice. Said that it was the only way she could live with what had happened to her sister." He nodded his understanding, knowing that about Scully, knowing that about himself. "I did a lot of thinking that night, Fox, and in the next few days. It broke my heart to think that Dana believed I would rather have had her die than Melissa. I can't imagine my life without Dana. And I thought a lot about Melissa, too. About how I hadn't come to grips with her death because there were so many things between us when she died. For so many years, I disapproved of the way she lived and the things she believed. When Dana was abducted, it took me weeks to track her down. I didn't have any idea where she was or what she was doing and when I finally got ahold of her to tell her about her sister, I just *had* to blast her for how irresponsible she was, always had been. If she hadn't loved Dana so much, I don't think she'd have come home at all after the way I talked to her. I wasn't even sure she was coming home until I saw her in the hospital standing next to you doing that aura thing or whatever they call that New Age crap she was so into. And even then, even when she'd come home to be with Dana and me, I still got so angry at her when she started spouting that spirit communication stuff. But she stayed around after Dana got better and she and I started trying to work things out. But there was still so much that was nresolved when she died. And I think that I've never resolved those things. That my own guilt about Melissa made me unable to see the truth. Made me blame Dana somewhat. But mostly, Fox, I blamed you--for Melissa, for everything that's happened to Dana." He swallowed hard, alarmed to find himself shaking with grief. "I'm sorry, Mrs. Scully. I'm so sorry." He wanted to leave, just get away from all the hurt he felt, the hurt he'd caused. But he couldn't, wouldn't, until she was finished. Maggie Scully had earned the right to vent her rage at him and he wouldn't deny her the chance. He lowered his head in submission and waited for her to continue and was amazed to feel her hand on his, gently squeezing. "No, Fox, no. Listen to me." She reached over and raised his head with two fingers beneath his chin. "I was wrong. I was wrong to blame you or Dana." Shaking his head, he tried to avert his gaze, unable to bear the kindness of her eyes, the compassion there. He found, though, that he couldn't look away from eyes that were so like Scully's--vivid blue and almost breathtakingly full of strength and simple humanity. She dropped her hand when she saw that he wouldn't look away. "My daughter was murdered. It's an awful thing but thousands and thousands of parents have had to live through the murder of their children. The man who shot her, the men who ordered him to kill Dana... They wouldn't have done it if you and she hadn't been trying to keep them from doing something wrong, something bad. Something so bad that they'd murder over it. You were trying to stop them?" He nodded. "Then you were doing what both of you took an oath to do. You swore to protect us--just like my husband did when he joined the Navy. Just like my son did. *Those men* killed Melissa. Not you and not Dana. I wanted to tell her that. I wanted to tell you that. "I did so much thinking in San Diego. I realized Dana does what she does... She does it because she truly believes it is the right thing to do. But I think she also does it as her way of coping with what happened to Melissa. She wants justice for what happened to her sister." "We both do," he said quietly. Maggie nodded. "And your sister, and your father, and Dana and you. So much has happened to all of us. I thought a lot about what Dana does, as much as I know about it. I know she doesn't tell me a lot of things because she doesn't want me to worry about her. Though I can't see how the real thing could be more dangerous than what I imagine." Mulder closed his eyes in a moment of anguish. He could never tell Maggie that her imagination couldn't come anyplace close to their reality. Or that he was glad that it couldn't and afraid for it, too. "But the fact of the matter is," she continued, "that no matter what I imagine or believe or want for her, Dana is doing what she's doing. And she's doing it for justice. I have to believe that's why she joined the FBI. Even if all these things hadn't happened to us, I think Dana would have wanted justice against anyone who would do the things that those men have done. She's going to keep on doing what she does. If I didn't believe it after all that's happened, she didn't leave me any doubt after I'd read her note. She's coping with Melissa's death in the best and most honorable way. I wish she wouldn't. I'm scared to death for her. But I'm proud of her, too." Mulder smiled and swallowed back the lump that was forming in his throat. "I should have brought her here," he said regretfully. "It would mean so much for her to hear you say that." "She will, Fox," she reassured him. "I plan on telling her that a lot from now on. But I needed to talk to you, too. To apologize to you for what I was feeling about you." "You don't have to apologize," he interrupted. "I do," she insisted. "You were in my thoughts a lot, too. I didn't think, Fox. I forgot to think about the fact that I still have a daughter because of you. You're the one who never believed she was dead when she was missing, refused to believe she would die even when everyone else-- even her sister and I--thought she should be removed from the respirator. Missy told me you stayed with her all that last night, when they made me go and rest. She said you sat there and talked to Dana all night. We'd been there for days, just waiting for her to die. That's the difference. We were saying goodbye, giving her permission to go. You were asking her to stay and she did." In fact, he'd begged her to stay--many times in that long and awful night when it didn't seem like anything he was doing was making a difference. When nothing about her condition indicated that he had been right to stay with her rather than kill some of the men responsible for what had been done to her. "I'd like to think that I had something to do with it," he said wistfully. "But I think it's more likely that she just came out of the coma because she's incredibly strong and I was... we were lucky enough that it just wasn't her time yet." "I think you're wrong," she replied simply. "But even if you aren't, you're still the reason she's here. That thing you brought to the hospital and had them insert in her neck. You don't get something like that at Radio Shack. What did you have to do to get it, Fox?" She paused and he looked away, hoping not to have to explain something so completely unbelievable. "Don't worry, it was a rhetorical question. I know that I'm even less likely to hear about what you do from you than from Dana. The point is, you did whatever you had to do to get what would save her life." "They didn't prove that the chip was responsible," he said, not understanding his own need to deny what he knew to be true. "It could have been the radical treatment the doctor was giving her. Hell, it could have been the Rosaries everyone was saying for her." "Do you believe it was the treatment or the prayers?" she asked challengingly and he did not reply. "I didn't think so. But even if it was, it doesn't change the fact that *you* did something and Bill and I just waited for her to die. And I believe that what you did saved her life. How many other times that she didn't tell me about? How about Antarctica?" He stared at her, his brow knit in concern and confusion. "She told me she wasn't going to tell you. Made me promise not to say anything." "She didn't tell me," Maggie said sadly. "I found out from Mr. Skinner. I was trying to get in touch with Dana and when I couldn't reach either one of you, I called him. He tried not to tell me but I pretty much browbeat him until he couldn't take it anymore. He chuckled, acutely aware of how good it felt to laugh a bit. "You browbeat Skinner? I wish I could've seen that." "Scully women have always been gifted with the power of persuasion--even those of us who married into it. You think it's harder dealing with an ex-Marine than a Navy captain? Piece of cake," she gave him a little smirk, then grew serious. "He told me--finally--that Dana had been taken again and that you had left a hospital bed to go and get her." "I was okay. I didn't need to stay in the hospital," he said, almost defensively. "I had to go get her. The man who told me how to find her, he wouldn't have given that information to anyone but me. And I couldn't let her be gone again..." His voice drifted away. "You've saved her, Fox. How many other times that I don't know about? You've earned your place in her life." He shook his head. "Probably about as many times as she's saved me. I'm alive because of her." Maggie shrugged. "Then she's earned her place in your life, too." Her words gave him an inexplicable chill. "What I'm trying to say is... I don't know if I can explain this right. Dana is doing what she wants to do, what she's chosen to do--maybe even what she needs to do. She chose the Bureau well before she knew you. She was assigned to work with you and I imagine it wouldn't have been that hard to get a transfer but she never did. She's still there, with you, seven years later. There's a great deal I don't know about my daughter, but one thing I am sure of is that she would never have put so much time and energy and sacrifice into something that she doesn't believe in. And I think she'd have done this even without everything that happened to her, because she believes it's right. God forbid, if anything ever happened to you Fox, I think she'd still keep on." She stopped to swallow and look at him in frustration. "What I'm trying to say is, thank you for Dana's life and..." She was thanking *him* for Scully's life? When it never would have been in danger without him? His face must have given him away, for she turned to him and spoke before he could. "She. chose. this." She spoke each word distinctly, her hands raised for emphasis. "That's what she was trying to tell us on Christmas Eve. I think she's been trying to say that for a long time but none of us got the message, including you it seems. Well, I've got it now. I can hate it, I can wish it weren't true. But I have to live with the fact that it's her choice. The way she lives is up to her, just like the way Melissa lived was up to her. I don't want the same regrets with Dana that I have with Missy. "I have to accept the choice that she's made. It's so difficult, Fox, to know that she's choosing something so dangerous, something that's already cost her so much. But if she has to choose that, I want you to know that I'm glad it's you who's beside her in it. It's the only thing that's ever given me any comfort in all of this. You've shown over and over that you'll do whatever is necessary to protect her. You've earned your place in her life and a better place in mine. I'm so sorry about my resentment, Fox. I owe you her life, many times over. Bill will have to believe whatever he believes, but never doubt that I understand what you've done and what we owe you. And how much a part of Dana's life you are." He wanted to thank her, to say something to let her know how monumentally her words had touched him, but he was rendered speechless--barely able to absorb what she was saying to him. The concept that she was forgiving him nearly blotted out the concept that she was expressing gratitude to him for protecting a life that was more vital to him than his own. He felt suddenly restless, needing to get away to ponder what all of this might mean. Maggie seemed to sense his uneasiness. "I know you want to get to Dana's house," she smiled, trying to ease his discomfort. "I've got the things I wanted her to have right here." She reached into the space between the sofa and an end table and pulled out a large paper shopping bag with looped string handles. "These are her Christmas presents I brought back from San Diego. I guess it's up to her what she does with them." She pulled another, smaller canvas bag from the space. "This other bag... I realized so many things after Dana left, Fox. Things I wish I'd realized before I let things get to where they are. Another thing I figured out is that I've never let Melissa go. I was just so full of regret for what we never got to say, for the closeness we were never quite able to achieve. I buried her, but I never let her go. And I realized that if I didn't let go of my dead daughter, I was going to lose the one I had left. For years, since Missy died, I've had all of her things in boxes in my basement. I never went through them because that would mean putting her away in my heart and I just couldn't do it. "Well that's what I've been doing since I got back on Tuesday. Going through Missy's things, saving some things, giving away things that other people might be able to use. And it surprised me. It felt kind of... I don't know. I don't want to say *good.* It wasn't that. It hurt to do it, but at the same time it felt like something she would have wanted me to do a long time ago. I just went through her things and remembered. So many of the things didn't hold any memories for me, but still they were things that at one time or another, she'd taken to herself as something she wanted or needed. They were small keys to who she was. And some of them told me things about her that I never guessed. Things I wish I had known years ago." She grabbed the canvas bag and brought it to her knee. "Tucked away in a corner of a steamer trunk, I found what I think she intended to be Christmas presents for all of us, if she'd lived till Christmas. And a manila envelope addressed to Dana and me. The thing I really needed to give her is in that envelope. It's in the bag along with Melissa's Christmas present to her and one for you, Fox." "A present for me?" He was surprised, amazed really. He hadn't known Melissa Scully well. Aside from the time Scully was in a coma, he'd only met her a few times when she came down to the office to drag Scully away for lunch. Melissa wasn't unpleasant, nor was he. They smiled, they made small talk. She was Scully's sister, but hardly someone he'd expect a Christmas present from. Maggie nodded. "I think it will all be clearer when Dana reads what's inside the envelope." "What is it?" "I can't tell you before my daughter knows," she said simply. "It wouldn't be right. Let her read it first and then she'll tell you." "Will she?" he asked quietly. "Yeah, I think she will," Maggie replied, her brow knit in confusion. "Is there some reason you think she wouldn't?" He had a sudden, overwhelming urge to spit everything out-- how he felt about her, how he'd always felt, how he'd hurt her, how she confused him, how scared he was sometimes that he'd finally say or do the thing that would be the last straw and she'd decide to leave him forever. Tell her all these things and beg her to help him figure her out. But he tried to bite back the urge, knowing somehow that that was not how he should learn the things about her that he needed to know. Still, he couldn't ignore her question and it would be so good talk to someone about this. "We've had some problems for..." For how long? He couldn't even pinpoint the time when the possibility of her leaving started being the most frightening prospect of his life. "Especially since the thing in Dallas, where we were reassigned. I've made so many mistakes, so many..." He paused, looking for the right word. "Monumental errors in judgement." "Everyone makes mistakes, Fox. We're only human." He winced briefly at the irony of her statement. "I think I've made more than my share and some that have hurt her-- hurt us--badly. I almost died because of those errors in judgement--errors that hurt her. But she still saved me." "Of course she did." Maggie's tone reflected slight disdain at his astonishment. "She always will. Dana is the most forgiving person I've ever known. She always has been. I'm counting on that myself." "But I've never apologized," he said quietly. "It's like... I want to but I'm afraid that if I bring those things up, she'll remember all over why she should just get out." Maggie nodded in understanding, "Maybe she will remember. And maybe she'll tell you how she feels about those *errors in judgement* as you call them. And then maybe you'll tell her why you made the decisions you made. And maybe you'll both know something new about each other that you didn't know before. All that might happen if you apologized. But you know what, Fox? She'd forgive you if you didn't apologize, probably already has, because that's her nature. Quick to forgive everyone but herself. Sound familiar?" She arched her eyebrows in a rather eerie mirror image of Scully's own soaring eyebrow. "I'm not that quick to forgive," he said abruptly. "Aren't you? she challenged. "Has Dana been perfect through all of this?" "Yes," he whispered without hesitation. "Has she? Fox, I know my daughter. I know that she keeps things inside her, that there are times that you don't have the first idea what she's thinking or feeling. That's not something she made up just for you. She's always been that way. Sometimes it would make me crazy. I always knew when she was sad or hurt or upset at me about something, but so much of the time I didn't know what it was about. She'd go all quiet on me, sometimes for days at a time, and I just couldn't get it out of her what was wrong. Probing her about it usually just made it worse. But it was like she had to process it through, look at it from different angles. I think... I think she's always been able to see peoples' motivations, even as a kid. And it was like, after she'd worked it out in her own mind--figured out what had happened and why--she'd be okay again and all would be forgiven. She never explained, she just forgave. But sometimes I didn't know what I was being forgiven for because she wouldn't say what had hurt her--or what made her sad or what scared her. And sometimes it hurt me that she wouldn't let me know, wouldn't let me in so I could help her. Doesn't that hurt you, too?" Mulder didn't answer. He didn't have to. "But you forgive her for that," she said. "You accept it and forgive it. You're so amazed that she's still with you. Well, maybe she's amazed that you're still with her, too. Maybe the fact that you are still here means to her that you're the one she can tell those things to. I don't know. I only know that I want her to be able to say them to someone." "I want her to be able to say them to me," he said before he thought about the fact that that might not be an admission he should be making to her mother. "She already does. Dana tells you more than she tells anyone else, and maybe even more than you realize because sometimes it's hard to hear what she says. But you already know that because you can hear a lot of the things she says in what she doesn't say. And that was part of the resentment, too, Fox. I think I felt that as her mother, she should tell me a lot of the things she tells you. But that's just not right. I can't expect her to tell me about things I can't possibly understand. Of all the people in the world, you're the only one who could understand what's happened to her, what she's afraid of. What you're both afraid of. I see that same fear in both your eyes." He didn't even bother to deny it. "But I can't make her less afraid," he countered. "If there's something to be afraid of--and I've felt that from Dana for a long time--maybe you're not supposed to make her less afraid. I think the reason for fear is to keep you alert and aware. It's good sometimes to be afraid. But it's hard, too. Sometimes it helps to have someone to be afraid with. When Melissa was in the hospital and you and Dana were gone, I was so afraid that she was going to die. And there was no one to share that fear with until you sent Mr. Hosteen to us. He didn't make me less afraid. He never told me anything but the truth, never gave me false hope. But he was there with me and he was afraid with me. He was a remarkable man, Fox." Mulder nodded. "But the point is, you and Dana have each other to be afraid with. And really, only each other. And it doesn't seem to me that either of you wants anyone else." Anyone else? Mulder couldn't remember a time when serious consideration of anyone who wasn't Scully came into his mind. Of course, he noticed other women and found them attractive. It was a hetero male thing. But pursuit hadn't entered his mind in a long time, some part of him knowing on sight that none of the women he saw could possibly measure up to the only woman he needed in his life--on whatever basis she wanted. He was startled from his reverie when Maggie continued. "So if you can share the fear why not the joy, too? Listen to me," she said urgently. "You can't be afraid all the time, neither of you. There has to be some joy in there, otherwise you forget what you're fighting for. But joy doesn't always just happen. Sometimes you have to make it, and you've got to because everyone needs joy sometimes. And if you're strong enough to share the fear, you've both earned the right to share the joy." "Most of the time it doesn't seem like there's a whole lot to make joy out of," he replied quietly. "Then you better take it when it comes." She pointed to the manila envelope in the canvas bag. "I think this will help both of you. I know it helped me. And I know Dana will share it with you because she'll know what it means to you, too. Because you're a part of this and you have been for a long time." Maggie stood up and Mulder automatically followed suit, sensing that she felt it was time for him to leave. And he was eager to go, to see Scully, to bring her a message from her sister. He felt a surge of excitement for her, imagining what it would be like if someone gave him a message from Samantha. They walked together into the foyer, Mulder carrying the bags in his left hand. Maggie turned to face him, placing her hand on his arm. "Fox, Dana's father and I were married for a long time. But you know what? It wasn't long enough. You don't know how many times I've wished for just one more day. I still miss him so much. The only things that get me through it sometimes are the memories. You've got to make some good memories, Fox--both of you-- because you're going to need them later on. And we don't get all the time in the world. There's nobody who should know that better than the two of you. And no matter how much time you get, it's never enough." He nodded gratefully, understanding the blessing she was giving him, the gift. Seemingly unable to speak, he set the bags gently on the floor and stepped forward to hug her, not knowing how else to express his gratitude. She returned his embrace then pulled away, wiping a tear from her cheek with her finger. "I want my daughter to be able to smile like she did on Christmas Eve. And I want it to happen as often as possible--for her and for you--'cause wait'll you see her. My baby girl is a knockout!" "Yes she is," he replied sincerely. He opened the door and started to step out, but paused and turned. "Thank you, Mrs. Scully." She gave him a watery smile. "Thank you, Fox. Now drive carefully, okay?" He was already making his way down the sidewalk, but raised his hand in acknowledgement. He opened the front passenger door of his car parked at the curb and placed the bags inside before going around to the driver's side. His hands gripping the steering wheel, he drew a deep breath and exhaled it shakily. He shivered a little, then started the car. About to shift into gear to pull away, he hesitated and reached behind him for the seatbelt, clicking it securely into place. He needed to be careful. He had a message for Scully from her sister. End Part 3 of 7 +++++ Simple Gifts -- Part 4 of 7 See Disclaimer in Part 1 Georgetown 7:26 p.m. Scully came awake slowly with a deep yawn and a stretch. As her eyes came open gradually, she was glad that she'd turned on a few lamps when she got home because it was completely dark outside. The luminous hands on her wristwatch glowed in the dim light, indicating that it was almost seven-thirty and that she'd slept nearly four hours. She stretched again and swung her legs over the side of the couch, just to test the waters, and found things much improved. The throbbing ache in her temples that that plagued her for days was gone. And she didn't seem to be feeling the constant chills she had felt the whole time she was in Idaho. And surprisingly, amazingly, she felt hungry for the first time in almost a week. She rubbed the back of her neck, scratching her scalp a little as part of the process. Seven-thirty. She'd have thought Mulder would have arrived by now. Knowing it was useless, she still felt a twinge of anxiety. She tried to dismiss it--he wasn't really late--and worrying about Fox Mulder was a great way to train for an early heart attack. He was probably just driving around to give her a little more time to sleep. She smiled at the image of him circling the block, checking her window for signs of movement and, on impulse, she went to look out the window. His car was nowhere in sight. As long as she was up, she decided to check the kitchen to see if there was anything she could stand to eat. Hungry though she was, it was still difficult to overcome the images her mind carried of the past few days. She, of all people, knew that there was evil in the world. But there was something different about the calculated evil of the men she and Mulder were up against and the mindless, almost helpless, evil she had seen visited upon the girls she'd autopsied. The latter evil was, strangely, more rightening to her than what the Consortium posed. Those men were always present, always to be watched for. The mindless, helpless ones stayed hidden for so long, people seemed to forget that they could come out of nowhere. The randomness of the horror was what was so awful to her--not just because of the horror but because it was an affront to her sense of order and rightness. She had a hard time wrapping her imagination around the idea that such horrors could be conceived, even by the sickest of minds. Maybe that's why Mulder was the profiler and she wasn't. He could imagine it. Trouble was, he could imagine it too well. Wondering again where he was, she put a kettle of water on the stove for tea. She missed him and the accompanying pang she felt no longer even surprised her. She'd been able to admit to herself at the end of the first day in Idaho that she missed him. It was just after she'd overheard a comment between two other agents about Mr. and Mrs. Spooky taking separate vacations that the realization hit. She didn't resent the agents' caustic remarks nearly as much as the fact that Mr. and Mrs. Spooky *were* taking separate vacations. Field work, autopsy work--it didn't matter. It didn't feel right to be working there without him. The hastily assembled FBI team for this operation was a good one, but she couldn't help thinking that Mulder would have been the better choice as a profiler. Another part of her, though, was glad that he hadn't been assigned to the case. He'd been through far too much lately and he always put way too much of himself into profiling. Of course, Skinner would have been aware of that, too. But there were so many times when she'd tried to brief other members of the team about things she'd discovered in the autopsies, having to explain over and over things that Mulder would have known without asking. Although he'd never actually participated in the *slicing and dicing* as he called it, Mulder had gleaned a great deal of knowledge in the science of forensic pathology during the years of their partnership. And what he didn't understand, he took at her word, not requiring lengthy explanations. But aside from her frustration with the pace of the investigation, she just missed him. Just missed having him there--someone who would understand the nearly mind-numbing horror of the case. Thirty-seven girls whose lives from start to finish had been filled with pain and most of whom would probably never be identified. Coming from lives of abject poverty, their families had decided to do whatever it took to improve their lot by coming to America. Instead, their daughters were taken by a madman and, in most cases, they were too frightened even to report them missing. There would be few, if any, identifications by dental records for these girls came from families where dentist visits were a luxury beyond imagining. No, these girls would be buried unnamed, grieved from afar by families who would never be sure what had happened to them. Sometimes in the midst of it all, Scully had felt such anger and helplessness that it felt like she would explode with it. But she couldn't. She had to hold it together because there were always more until it seemed like it would never end. It would have been good to have Mulder to talk to about it. But would she have talked to him? She could have, though, and maybe that was enough. No, not anymore. For a long time it had been enough knowing that she could speak with him if she wanted to, if she'd been able to make herself do it. But that had changed the morning she'd gone to his apartment to tell him of Diana's death and had learned of Albert Hosteen's first. She'd told him of her fears about not knowing what to believe or who to trust. And he hadn't shrugged off her fears or begged for her belief or her trust. He simply told her that when he felt that way, she was his touchstone--how he measured what was real and genuine. And since that time, though they'd never spoken of it again--so typical for them--he'd shown her in subtle ways the truth of his statement. They were different together now. She wanted to believe that if he were here right now, she would tell him about the case and what she'd felt. And that she'd missed him. She could say that. What would be so hard about that? Maybe he'd missed her, too, and that wasn't a scary thought at all. She smiled as she promised herself that she'd tell him she missed him if he was wearing the gray suit with the black and burgundy tie when he got to her house. Had he made the same kind of deal with himself that night? It made her grin to think so, and kick herself for bringing liverwurst and root beer. Liverwurst and root beer? Eww! What had she been thinking? No wonder he wouldn't let her call him Fox. But the thought of calling him Fox caused her nose to wrinkle more than the idea of liverwurst and root beer. No, he was Mulder, now and forevermore. And she felt a little sorry for people who only got to know the Fox of him and not the Mulder. She heard the key in the lock and set her cup on the counter to meet him at the door. Brushing away a tear she hadn't realized she'd shed, she smiled watching how slowly and noiselessly he opened the door. She pulled the door open so quickly that he was startled into dropping the bags. They stood and looked at one another for a moment, neither of them speaking. He was wearing jeans and his black leather jacket--his day off apparel--and his expression was one of uncertainty. "I missed you," she whispered finally. The suit thing had been a stupid game anyway. The leather jacket was way better than the gray suit. And the smile he gave her in return made her wonder why she hadn't told him she missed him before. She reached for the bags, setting them inside the door, and backed away slightly to allow him to enter. "You, too," he answered, smiling at her almost shyly, and stepped hesitantly over the threshold to her apartment. How strange after all these years to feel butterflies at seeing him and to be fairly certain that he was feeling them, too. Strange and awkward in a vaguely pleasant way. Vaguely pleasant yet mildly annoying to the practical side of her that was trying to tell the butterflies that it was just Mulder. And for once, she had no qualms about telling that side of her to shut up because right now, just Mulder was all she needed. And just to piss that practical side off, she threw caution to the wind and stepped forward to take him into her arms. For no better reason than just because she missed him. Mulder apparently thought it was a good idea, too, as she felt his arms wrap around her in return, lifting her up just a little to nuzzle his face in her neck. Now that's something new, she thought as she felt herself shiver slightly. "Sorry, I should have knocked. I thought... I was hoping you'd still be asleep." His voice was honey and smoke as his breath warmed her neck. "Woke up a few minutes ago," she replied, turning her head a little hoping to encourage him to keep breathing because it felt so singularly wonderful on her skin, but still trying to find some way to keep her face in contact with the leather of his jacket. She chuckled inwardly, remembering how the nuns at school dances had always reminded her and her high school classmates to leave enough room for the Holy Spirit between them and the boys they were dancing with. If nuns only knew what this felt like, they'd realize they were fighting a losing battle. This was much better than it had ever been in high school. To finally be in Mulder's arms... Arms. As in plural. "Mulder?" "Hmm?" His voice caused a gentle vibration against the skin of her neck. She could definitely lose her train of thought here. "Where's your sling?" She felt him tense slightly in her arms as he loosened his grip to allow her to slide back to firm footing on the floor. "I left it in the car," he replied, and she could see his self-annoyance at the fact that he'd forgotten to put it on. He looked at her closely and she could almost see the wheels turning in his head. "You've lost weight. You haven't been eating." She shook her head at the feeble attempt. "Mulder, don't try to divert me when I'm about to nag you for your own good. You know your arm should still be in a sling." She stepped behind him to help him with his jacket, both of them being careful of his still sore right shoulder. Throwing the jacket over the back of an armchair, she led him to the sofa and sat beside him. "I wore it till Wednesday," he said defensively. She nodded, her lips pressed together to avoid laughing at him. "Five days out of two to four weeks. But that probably is a personal best for you. Why'd you quit wearing it this time?" "The usual," he answered with a grin. "Plus, I kept hitting my arm with the file cabinet drawers. I mean, how smart is it for them to stick your arm out in front of you where it gets in the way all the time?" "You hit it with file drawers?" she asked and he nodded. "As in more than once?" "I spent the week cleaning out the file cabinets, getting rid of files that didn't belong there," he said sheepishly. "You culled the files?" Her tone was mildly disbelieving. "What did you get rid of? Three, four files?" "Try a drawer and a half," he replied smugly. "At this point in time, we have one and one-half empty drawers." He smiled with pride at his accomplishment. She looked at him skeptically. "We've been through a lot together, but now you're starting to scare me. The real Mulder would never throw away a drawer and a half of files. Let me draw a little blood. I want to do a quick blood typing just to be on the safe side." He laughed and she loved the low, rumbling sound of it. "You'll know it's the real me when you see the stack of files I want to reopen, and some of the new stuff I've found for us to work on." She watched his grin fade as he brought his hand up to brush his fingers against her cheek. "I wasn't kidding before, Scully. I was pretty sure you'd have a hard time sleeping, but I thought you'd still eat. You've lost a lot of weight." "Not even ten pounds," she countered. "Besides you aren't exactly Mr. Hale and Well-Fed yourself." He smiled at her indulgently. "Scully, don't try to divert me when I'm nagging you for your own good." She smiled, allowing him points for being able to use her own words against her so soon after she'd uttered them. "You don't have ten pounds to spare." She thanked him with her eyes for not finishing his thought about how she hadn't really gained back all the weight she'd lost when she'd had cancer. She knew how scared he had been during her illness--she herself had been scared. Now he respected her need not to talk about that time and maybe that respect stemmed from his own need to put it behind them. She still had regular appointments with her oncologist and Mulder never asked her about them, which she hoped meant that he trusted her to tell him if her emission ended. "What's the deal, Scully?" he asked, his tone worried. "So bad you couldn't eat?" Hesitating only a second, she nodded unable to suppress the sudden shudder that wracked her body. He slid closer, bringing his hand up to her neck in response to her shaking. He understood. Mulder had been involved in cases so bad he couldn't eat. Anyone else in her life--those who were left in her life--would have admonished that she should have forced herself to eat. Mulder understood the very real fact that sometimes you just couldn't. His hand at her neck was warm and strong, his touch her undoing. She took a deep, shaky breath. "No time to eat and even less desire," she said with a heavy sigh. "It was ugly right from the start." She told him how she'd arrived in early evening and was picked up at the airport by a county sheriff's deputy who brought directly to the crime scene "The gravesite was all lit up with klieg lights brought up from Boise. Looked like a high school football field for a homecoming game." She shuddered again at the imagery. "The team started drifting in. They were coming from all over. But they'd set up a big tent thing on site and we were all there by about nine o'clock and the ASAC filled us in on the situation and what had been discovered to that point. Thirty bodies and not much else except a high probability that there would be more." She felt Mulder's thumb rubbing light circles over the muscles at the base of her skull. How long had he been doing that, increasing the pressure slightly with each leisurely pass over the knots in her upper neck? Did he even realize he was doing it? His attention was focused on her, his eyes never leaving her face. She was afraid to move in case the he interpreted her movement as a signal for him to stop. "They finished the preliminary meeting at about eleven, which my body thought of as one in the morning. Too late to eat and I was so tired. But I couldn't sleep thinking about the fact that there were thirty bodies waiting to be autopsied. Thirty so far. The county morgue couldn't even hold them all. They had some stashed at the local hospital and some left in the care of the three local morticians. They got mobile refrigeration equipment to us by Tuesday, so we could keep them together near the morgue. It was strange to walk through when they were getting the mobile unit set up and transferring the bodies--surreal, like walking through a war zone or a place that had been devastated by some kind of awful act of nature--earthquake, tornado." Scully didn't know how it had happened, but she found that she had turned slightly away from Mulder. She knew it was a subconscious movement, but she wished her subconscious had been a bit clearer about what it meant. Had she turned away because it was easier to talk to him when she couldn't see him looking at her? Or was it to quietly urge him to use his other hand to soothe the muscles on the other side of her neck? He seemed to have guessed the latter as she felt his fingers work their way lightly over her skin, both hands now working her protesting muscles. But maybe he guessed the former, too, accepting her need, conscious or not, to look away from him. He said nothing, merely waited for her to continue. "By Monday morning when we started the autopsies, they'd found thirty-three bodies. So the local guy and I got to work. His name was Seth--Seth Easley. He was a nice enough guy and did what he could. But he was just a coroner in a rural county out west. So few questionable deaths happen in places like that that being coroner is almost an honorary title. No way was he ready for what we got. Hell, no way was I ready. Nobody should be ready for what was waiting for us. First we had to make some kind of guess as to which bodies were those most recently killed and work chronologically backwards from there, as best as we could determine. The most recent victims would be most likely to have usable trace evidence and they needed more evidence fast for the investigation." "No, Scully," Mulder said softly from somewhere close behind her right ear. "Not the investigation. You. What happened to you?" He was using the index and middle fingers of each hand to make walking motions from her shoulders up the column of tendons on either side of her neck. Slow movements with a pressure that was gentle but that she seemed to feel deep within her tissue, breaking up the knots and easing them away. she thought to herself as she tentatively moved her head back and forth to test the loosened muscles. "We started the autopsies mid-morning on Monday, after discussing how to proceed. That first day, between us, we got nine of the bodies autopsied. Sometimes I have a hard time doing an autopsy first thing in the morning, so I usually don't eat." "Even after all the years you've been doing it? Wow, I just assumed it would get easier and easier." His voice was low and even, soothing her simultaneously with the work of his hands, nearly mesmerizing her. "It's something you get used to, I think, but it doesn't get any easier," she whispered, as if to herself. "I don't think it's supposed to get easier." "Hmm," he replied. "I guess you're right, it shouldn't." "I thought nine was a lot," she continued. "Considering the fact that I had to pretty much talk Seth through the first couple he did--how to gather evidence according to Bureau lab standards, new techniques that he might not have had reason to know about. He was just overwhelmed, but doing the best he could. I thought we were doing okay but the ASAC came by at the end of the day and said we needed to work them faster if possible." Mulder gave a disgusted snort. "Couldn't they get you some help?" She shook her head. "Only two autopsy bays. There wouldn't have been room for another pathologist. On Tuesday, they sent up a couple of surgical residents from the university hospital in Boise to close for us. We'd finish the postmortem, they'd take them to a corner of the room and stitch them up. It did save some time and we worked faster. But early afternoon on Tuesday, it started to feel like someone had inserted glowing coals between my shoulder blades." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Just this white hot pain that seemed to shoot all the way down my back." Scully felt his hand move to rest on her shoulders as his thumbs unerringly found the spot where the pain had been the most intense. She arched into the pressure and he stopped, his hands gently bringing her shoulders into better alignment. He then resumed the tempered circling motions of his thumbs. She luxuriated in the feeling, not saying anything for several minutes, but feeling as if she could breathe in and fill her lungs all the way--something she hadn't felt in many days. Mulder didn't urge her to continue, he just kept rubbing the shoulders she didn't realize were still so sore. She finally spoke. "Somewhere along the line my feet went from aching to numb. And my hands--the saws and cutters, and scalpels. In an autopsy, your hands are constantly pulling or pushing or cutting something. After a while, they just started hurting constantly. And you have to wash them all the time. The soap dries out your skin and it was so cold and dry there." His hands moved from her shoulders to her upper arms and, still silent, he turned her to face him. She felt his hands slide down to reach for hers, placid and still in her lap. She tried to pull away, embarrassed by the state of her hands, but he held firmly, squeezing her fingers and gently caressing the weathered skin of her knuckles with his thumb. She hadn't noticed that her hands were so cold until they were enveloped in his much warmer, much larger ones. Unable to make herself look at his face, she simply watched his hands as he transferred both her small hands into one of his. She followed the path of his free hand as he reached over to the coffee table and opened the flap of her purse. Curious but not alarmed, she watched him rummage through it, finally emerging with a tube of hand cream. She looked up as he brought the tube to his eye level to read the label. His thumb flipped the lid open and he brought it to his nose to inhale the scent. "You always use the same hand lotion," he said, setting her hands on his leg just above the knee. "I'd be able to pick you out blindfolded in a crowded room just by this scent." He squirted a generous amount into his palm. Holding his hands together, he warmed the lotion between them, then rubbed them together, spreading a layer across the underside of his hands. Mulder took her right hand in both of his, moving them over her skin to distribute the lotion. She gasped when he threaded his fingers through hers, and she felt the pads rub the cream into the webbing. His fingers moved in and joined his palm to hers and she found herself squeezing back before she even knew it, relishing the connection between them. She smiled up at him and found him looking at her with such tender concern that it made her heart race wildly in her chest. He added more lotion to her hand, her thirsty skin having quickly absorbed it, and began a slow and languorous massage of her hand starting at the fleshy part of her palm just above where her hand met her wrist, one hand moving up to her pinky finger and the other working on her thumb. His skin glided effortlessly over hers, warming it and causing it to tingle from the stimulation of the tiny blood vessels beneath it. She wanted to weep with how exquisite it felt after days and days of an ache that was so constant and deep that she'd almost started to think that it was a part of her. He began again at the bottom of her hand and worked toward the ring and index fingers, his movements firm and slow. It almost seemed, though, that the motions were unconscious as his eyes were riveted to hers. "Physically, it was one of the most grueling things I've ever done," she said and he nodded encouraging her to continue. "But I think I could have handled the work, if not for... Damn it, Mulder, it was just so wrong. Thirty- seven teenage girls, illegal aliens. Their entire lives probably consisted of poverty and fear, and then they were dead before they got a chance to see that it could be better. And the way they died... Strangulation, slow poisoning, burned, tortured. It was like that bastard just tried out every hideous thing he'd ever heard of. They kept bringing me bodies and each one where there was enough left of the remains to determine a cause of death... each one was more horrible than the previous one. And all I could think of was how scared they must have been, waiting and probably praying to die. I'm a pathologist, Mulder. I'm supposed to be detached enough to do autopsies..." She stopped to swallow, trying to ease the burn to her throat from the tears she was trying so hard to fight. She looked down and saw that he had finished working on her right hand and moved to her left without her noticing it. "Scully," he said on a sigh. "You could never detach yourself from something like that, not you. But you'd still expect yourself to. Sometimes you ask too much of yourself." She nodded, acknowledging the truth of his statement. "When I decided to go into pathology... Nobody understood why I did it--not my family, not my friends. My father was appalled. I guess he expected me to go into a field of medicine where I actually had returning patients. My classmates thought I was *settling*--that I really wanted to be a surgeon but didn't have the guts to face the *good old boys network* that surgery is. And who knows? Maybe that was part of it." "Come on," he said skeptically. "You know that's not true. If you look up the word *guts* in the dictionary, your picture is there. You're the bravest person I've ever known. If you'd wanted to be a surgeon, you'd be a surgeon." The tears she'd been fighting finally won the battle and brimmed over her eyes onto her cheeks. He didn't hesitate, but dropped her hands to gather her into his arms and she went gratefully. With her face pressed firmly against his chest, she wondered at his words. How could she be the bravest person he'd ever known when she was afraid so much of the time? Yet she knew by his tone that the words were true to him. "So what made you choose pathology?" he asked, and she marveled at the fact that she could hear his voice leave his mouth, and feel the vibration of it as it rang through his body. "You know," she said softly, "not one person in my life back then asked that question, not like that. Everyone asked why are you doing this? And it was like they left off the last two works--*to me*--but I still heard them. They acted like I was doing something to them instead of making a choice for me. So instead of answering them, I usually just went on the defensive. I chose pathology. I didn't settle for it and I didn't set out to shock or disappoint people. We all had to take a class in forensic pathology and I knew--I think maybe from the first day-- that that was what I was supposed to do. The professor, Dr. Carmani, said on that first day that an autopsy is the victim's final chance to say what happened to him and that the pathologist is the victim's voice, his last chance for justice. Those words have stayed with me and I try to think of them every time I do an autopsy and I try to give them the dignity after death that they didn't get while they were dying. I want them to have... They deserve to have my attention and my thoroughness and to be treated like valued individuals. They deserve it and so do their loved ones." She shuddered and felt his arms tighten around her. "But those girls, they just shuttled them in one right after another--an assembly line right out of Henry Ford's worst nightmare. They weren't treated with dignity. I passed them off to the medical students before I was even inished. I couldn't take the time to listen to their voices, but they'd still come to me. Later, when I'd be trying to fall asleep I could hear them talking, telling me about their horrible lives and even worse deaths. And I'd hear their families, weeping with the agony of never knowing what happened to them." She pulled away slightly to see his face. "It made me hurt for them because I know what that's like, that uncertainty. I know from watching you. And I missed you because I knew you'd understand if I just told you. I promised myself that night after you phoned that I'd tell you about it and about Christmas at Bill's so you'd know why I was the way I was when I got back." "You mother told me about Christmas," he said quietly, his head resting easily on hers and his mouth near her ear. "My mother?" she repeated, feeling slightly fuzzy headed and unable to understand. She pulled away slightly to look at him, to clear her head. And somehow, looking at him did nothing to clear her head at all. "Yeah," he answered. "That's where I've been till now. We talked for a long time and she told me about what happened on Christmas Eve. She's pretty anxious to apologize for it." "She doesn't need to apologize," Scully insisted. "I should be the one to apologize. But I can't because she'd expect an explanation and I can't give her one." "What do you have to apologize for?" he asked, his expression confused. "The whole thing was a mistake right from the start. I shouldn't even have gone. I didn't want to." She sighed deeply. "I mean, I wanted to see my family but I didn't want to be there. I was..." "You were worried about me," he finished for her. He must have seen her perplexed look because he continued. "You mother figured it out once she got a look at the new emaciated version of Fox Mulder. You don't have to worry about me, Scully. I'm f..." "Don't," she interrupted as unexpected and inexplicable tears rushed to her eyes. "Not fine, Mulder. Please don't be fine." He brought his hand up to lightly caress her cheek. "You're right. How 'bout we both retire fine? You saw the test results--the blood work, the CAT scans, the EEG. They all said everything's okay, right? That's what you told me." He gave her a look that was slightly anxious. "Yeah," she reassured him, reaching up to touch his face as he had hers. "You tested normal. But Mulder, we don't know what they did to you. What they took out of you--or put into you." Her fingers found their way to the scar at the base of her neck. "You can't expect me not to worry. Has telling you not to ever stopped you from worrying about me? We're supposed to worry about each other." He nodded and smiled at her--the smile with all the teeth-- and Scully was struck by how incredibly handsome he was. She'd always known it, of course, had been aware of his attractiveness from their very first meeting. But it was different now, after all these years and everything that had happened. Always attractive, now his face--older and more knowing, as was her own--was one that was beloved to her. And she knew the smiles he gave were for her. Very few others ever got them. And the one he was giving her now caused her pulse to quicken. Unable, unwilling to resist, she used the hand still resting on his slightly stubbled cheek to urge his face toward hers. Finding no resistance, she felt him move closer and their lips met for the first time in a week. A week that felt like a year. And the third time was the charm. His mouth was warm and welcoming over hers and she felt his fingers move into her hair as he held her head close to his and his other arm wrap around her waist to draw her nearer. Her own arms wound around his neck as she simply let the feelings wash over her. He felt so good and he tasted so *damn* good. And suddenly she couldn't think of a single reason for all the years they had denied themselves this. She tightened her grip and sought control of the kiss, wanting more than anything to show him what she'd never yet been able to say. He made a small groaning noise that sent a shiver down her spine and she intensified her effort to see if she could get him to make that sound again. To her delight, he did but that sound was followed quickly by the simultaneous growling of their stomachs, each of them loud enough to be audible to the other. They both started to laugh, their mouths still fused, and she was filled suddenly with a feeling of all-encompassing joy. They broke apart slightly, their foreheads still resting against one another. "Am I to assume that means you're hungry?" he asked, his voice, low and breathless, adding to her own breathlessness. "Ravenous, actually," she whispered back. "You, too?" He nodded and with their foreheads pressed together, it made her nod with him. "Got anything here?" "Nope," she replied. "I haven't been shopping in weeks. My kitchen looks frighteningly like yours. Oh, except for the science projects you keep in your refrigerator. Of course, I didn't check the vegetable bin. No telling what's growing in there. I have saltines, pasta, and rice." Mulder gave her a look like the one he'd given her when she told him about the tofutti rice dreamsicle. "Yikes," he said with a shudder. "You wanna call out for something?" She wrinkled her nose. Delivery food was pizza or Chinese and she couldn't stand the idea of either of those. "I don't think I can handle the kind of food that people bring to you. I must have some soup or something out there." This time it was his nose that wrinkled. "You need some real food." He was quiet for a moment, then smiled. "I know just what we need. I'll go get it, but it'll take a while. It's in my neighborhood, but I'll go get it and bring it back." "That means you'll be gone almost an hour," she protested. Not only did she not want to wait that long to eat, she didn't want him gone that long. "I'll be as fast as I can. Just nibble on some saltines to take the edge off. This'll be worth the wait, I promise." He looked at her enthusiastically. "What about you? You're hungry, too." "I'm okay," he replied. "Your mom gave me a peanut butter and jelly sandwich." "My mom gave you a sandwich?" He nodded. "She thinks I'm too thin. We talked for a long time, Scully. I'll tell you about it when I get back. In the meantime, I have what she wanted you to see. She says it's from Melissa." He moved away slightly and touched her face. "Melissa?" she asked, a shiver passing down her spine at his touch and his words. "Yeah," he said standing up to cross the room where the bags still stood by the door. "Your mom said she was going through some of her things and found these." He returned to the couch and pulled the manila envelope from the canvas bag. Taking it from him, Scully looked down to see her sister's familiar flowery handwriting--Mom and Dana. "Do you know what this is?" she asked, looking up to meet his eyes. "No," he said, shaking his head. "Your mother wouldn't tell me. She said you should know about it first." She turned the envelope over in her hands. The flap was not sealed shut, just held in place by the metal clasp. But she had absolutely no doubt that Mulder had not even considered reading the contents. She folded the clasp to the upright position and opened the envelope. As she started to remove the contents, she felt his hand cover hers. "Wait," he said. "I'm gonna go. I'll go get us something to eat and that should give you enough time to read this." "No," she interrupted. "Stay. You should see it, too." He shook his head. "Your mom said you first. I'll be back and we can talk about it if you want to." He moved to stand and she followed. But he stopped her, taking her hand in his and pressing it to his lips. "Just stay. I can find the door. I'll be back in a little while." Scully watched him walk to the door, where he turned and gave her a little wave. She smiled at him and he left. She heard the lock snick into place behind him and looked down at the envelope in her lap. End Part 4 of 7 +++++ Simple Gifts -- Part 5 of 7 See Disclaimer in Part 1 Mulder's car 9:28 p.m. Mulder looked down at the speedometer, trying to stick to the posted speed limit. He was fighting back an urge to floor the gas pedal and get to Alexandria and back to Georgetown, and Scully, as quickly as possible. But he also wanted to give her enough time to read and digest whatever it was her mother had sent her. He was admittedly curious about the contents of the envelope, and was pretty sure she'd share it with him. Almost certain. She'd already shared so much with him that evening. It had nearly floored him that she'd told him so much about how she was feeling while she was in Idaho. It had made him ache for her and with her, but at the same time the fact that she was letting him know her heart filled him with both awe and gratitude. He'd loved her for so long, and so many times had silently begged her in his heart to give him a glimpse into hers. And for so long it seemed as if it would never happen, as if every time there was a chance, he'd say or do something stupid that hurt her or scared her. Or else, shit just happened--as it did so often in their lives. But tonight he'd just listened, lulled by the low softness of her voice as she gave him her pain and her life. He hadn't been able to keep himself from touching her and was amazed--and a little apprehensive--when she hadn't moved away. But his apprehension vanished as she encouraged him to continue, allowing herself to let him help her feel better. Touching her, he found, was exquisite torture. He couldn't remember a time since he'd known her that his hands hadn't wanted to roam her skin and, once allowed, they'd longed to touch her everywhere. But somehow he'd found the strength to keep them in control, to make them do what she needed rather than what he wanted. And in doing so, he found a need within himself that he'd long since given up hope of indulging--a need to give her what she needed. He'd given up hope that she would ever allow that. Well, maybe he hadn't completely given up hope. He had watched the video, after all--twice. One evening a few months back, he'd found himself at the video store. Surrounded by tens of thousands of videos, he hadn't been able to find a single one that interested him enough to rent it. Not in the mood for his usual choices--porn, sci- fi or action adventure--he drifted over to a rack he'd never really paid much attention to in the past. Special Interest. There he found documentaries--historical, nature films--public service videos, how-to for home and autos, videos about various medical conditions. He'd never even been aware that things like this were available. He was about to reach for a video about Hiroshima when another title caught his eye. *Fundamentals Of Therapeutic Massage.* He shrugged his shoulders and grabbed it, not even bothering to read the blurb on the box. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he was pretty sure he'd been expecting something like soft-core porn that was trying to be educational, but the film surprised him. It really was a video about therapeutic massage. The woman performing the massage demonstration talked about the process as she went along, using the proper names for the muscles and carefully explaining why she was doing what she was doing and the benefits derived from it. The person receiving the massage was carefully draped with a sheet, showing nothing revealing, and the therapist only uncovered the area she was working on. As he watched, his mind wandered--as it often did--to Scully and he wondered what it would be like to touch her like that, to try and ease some of the tension she was so obviously and so often under. It was a few weeks after the evening they'd played baseball and the first time in months and months that it didn't seem totally beyond the realm of the possible that he'd ever be able to touch her like that. They'd slowly been working their way back to each other after the awful way he'd treated her that night at the Lone Gunmen's place when his complete and utter stupidity should have cost him everything--should have cost him her. Somehow in the midst of disaster--both personal and professional--they'd been reassigned to the X-Files, and though it had been painfully awkward at first, they'd been working their way back. So he'd watched the video twice just to be sure he'd know what to do if, by some miracle, he would ever get the chance to rub Scully's neck. And he got the chance. And though feeling her muscles loosen and relax beneath his hands was a wondrous experience, it was nothing compared to the feeling of listening to the strings of her heart loosen as she spoke to him. She'd given him her emotions, her life, and he was awed by the gift. Then, even more miraculously, she'd let him give her comfort. She'd allowed him to hold her without her walking away, had let him see into her eyes deeper than he'd ever been. There was so much there, he wondered if he'd ever be able to see everything. But suddenly his eyes were closed because she was kissing him--the kiss he'd been trying for on New Year's Eve. The one he'd wanted for years. And to his delight, he hadn't imagined it nearly as fabulous as it really was. Kissing Scully was an all- sensory experience--the feeling of her in his arms, the silky texture of her hair beneath his fingers, her taste, her scent, the soft throaty noises she made. He'd reveled mindlessly in it, just letting it wash over him--until he felt his stomach growl with hunger. He was mortified, until he realized that she was making growling noises herself. And as much as he didn't want to let her go, he wanted more for her to eat something, worried at her thinness. It was time to feed this phenomenal woman. Finally, he reached his destination and pulled into the parking lot of Rose's Diner. It was just a couple blocks from his apartment and a favorite place to eat. He'd taken Scully there for breakfast early Christmas morning a year ago when they'd eaten so many blueberry pancakes he thought they'd explode. He'd taken her that morning and several times since then and she seemed to like it. Rose served good hearty food. Comfort food. Food like Rose's chicken and dumplings, so much like Sophie's. Sophie had been the Mulder family's cook when he was a kid. His mother took care of their home because his father had said he didn't want some stranger poking through their things. Now, of course, Mulder knew it was because his father had things to hide. But Bill Mulder did allow them to have a cook, probably because his wife was, perhaps, the worst cook of her entire generation and had absolutely no interest in remedying the situation. So Sophie had been with them for as long has he could remember--up until he left for college in England. She lived in the apartment over their garage, but there was no doubt in the whole Mulder family that she owned their kitchen. She did all the shopping and cleaning and meal preparation and his mother gave her a wide berth, only visiting the kitchen to discuss weekly meals and schedules, as closely as she knew schedules. His father was away a great deal of the time and his mother's social obligations often kept her away from home for dinner during the week. But Sophie also had to be prepared to make and serve large meals often on very short notice, for sometimes his father would show up unannounced with three or four other men in tow expecting them all to be fed and fed well. A task that she performed without batting an eye. But for the most part, she'd cooked for him and Samantha. And just for him after Samantha had been taken. During that sad, strange time when none of the Mulders seemed to speak to one another, it was often just he and Sophie for dinner and she'd make them a big steaming pot of chicken and dumplings with cornbread on the side. Then she'd sit down with him at the small table in the kitchen and talk to him while they ate. She'd ask about his day, his schoolwork. Sometimes she'd tell him about her childhood in Mississippi and make growing up poor and black in the segregated south sound more like an adventure than a travesty. After Samantha was gone, sometimes he felt as if he were invisible. He could drift through rooms where his mother and father were screaming at one another and they never stopped, never acknowledged that he was even there. So sure of his invisibility was he that he sometimes would try walking right between them and it never made any difference in the pitch or volume or vehemence of the arguments. And it frightened him to be that nonexistent. At those times, it was only because of Sophie that he believed he was real and able to be seen. She always knew when they couldn't see him. Or when his father would finally remember he had a son--a son who hadn't been able to protect his own sister--and scream at him or smack him or belittle him. She always knew and was always ready with a hug and a brownie or an attentive ear if he felt like talking. But she never pushed. She knew when he needed to be quiet, too, and she'd just let him stand beside her while she made the chicken and dumplings she knew would help him feel better. And together they'd pinch off the dough she'd made for the dumplings into the boiling water where the chicken was stewing. And the warm steamy smell and the mindlessness of the task would soothe him as he stood beside the only person in the world who actually seemed to care about him. She passed away during his third year in the Bureau. Although she no longer worked for his family, he'd kept in touch with her after returning from England, visiting her in the assisted living center in Boston where she'd taken up residence while he was away. His life had pretty much always been lonely and he needed the visits with Sophie as much as she did. He'd bring groceries to her small apartment and she'd make him his favorite meal and they'd talk for hours. When she died, he'd taken care of everything making sure she had the kind of funeral she deserved and he was heartened to see how many friends she had. He still missed her and the comfort and love she'd always given so freely. One day he'd gone to Rose's Diner and saw chicken and dumplings on the menu and felt a craving for them that he hadn't known in years. Although he was certain that he'd be disappointed because nobody could make them like his Sophie had, he ordered them anyway and was pleasantly surprised. They were close to Sophie's and he'd made a point of telling Rose how good they were. They'd struck up a conversation about home cooking and how nobody seemed to do it much anymore and Mulder found himself coming back again and again for good food and conversation. As always, the door jingled as he entered. This late in the evening, the diner was nearly empty--just a few hearty souls sharing coffee in booths in the back. Rose was behind the counter, filling the sugar dispensers and humming to herself. She looked up at the sound of the door and greeted him with a smile. "FBI Guy!" she called out as he approached the counter to sit in front of her. "Haven't seen you in a while. From the looks of things, nobody who makes food has seen you in a while." She eyed him critically and waved him to a stool to sit down. "Jesus, Rosie!" he exclaimed. "Lay off. You're the third person today to tell me I'm too thin." She rolled her eyes. "Don't you investigative types call that a clue? You could use some fattin' up, Mulder, so I guess you come to the right place. You got that chicken and dumplin' look about you." "Ah, Rosie, you must be psychic." Without asking, she pulled out a mug and poured Mulder a cup of coffee. "So where's that pretty redhead you been bringin' in here? How come you're here on a Friday night and not with her?" "Actually, that pretty redhead needs fattin' up as much as I do, so I thought I'd take her some of those chicken and dumplings. Can you make me up a pretty good sized container and some cornbread if you've got it?" "If I've got it," she snorted. "Have you ever known me not to have cornbread? You should have brought her in, Mulder." "She's had a tough week," he said simply. "I just wanted her to stay home and rest." "You gonna take care of her, right?" Rosie gave him a knowing grin. "I hope so, Rosie," he said, before he was aware of the double entendre she made. Strangely, it made him blush-- something he thought he'd gotten over years ago. "Don't doubt it, Slim." She laughed at the arch look he gave her. "I seen her looking at you. She's crazy about you." He chuckled and shook his head. "She's my partner, Rosie. We work together." "And that means...?" She looked at him skeptically. "It means these *crazy 'bout ya* looks you two give each other are purely professional? Not buyin' it, Mulder. You are smitten, son, and last time you two were in here, I watched that girl checkin' out your ass when you went to the men's room. And she was smilin' like she liked what she saw. 'Course your pants fit you better then." He gave her a warning look that she didn't seem to take too seriously. "I get the message, so knock it off. And don't toy with me. Scully does not check out my ass." "Just because I'm old now don't mean I didn't check me out some asses back in the day." She threw her head back with laughter. "I know the look, Mulder. When she gives it to you and when you give it to her. Now why don't you sit here and drink your coffee while I go back and get you some food to take to your lady? I made some pie today, thinkin' I might see you in the next couple of days. Sweet potato pie, fresh this afternoon. Want a piece while you wait?" Rosie's sweet potato pie--nirvana with a fork. "Want to save my appetite to eat with Scully. But why don't you put in a couple of slices and we'll have it for desert." "You got it," she said as she walked back into the kitchen. Mulder reached over the counter and grabbed the pot to refill his coffee cup. Rosie said Scully checked out his ass! Not even the realization that he was sitting alone at the counter grinning like an idiot could wipe the idiotic grin from his face. *And she was smilin' like she liked what she saw.* It was strange to think that Scully might find him physically attractive. He'd wondered off and on over the years if she ever thought of him that way, but he didn't dare dwell on the idea for a lot of reasons--the biggest of which was, what if she didn't? But the idea that she might... To hear someone else say it... It filled him with... with something he couldn't name, but that made him grin like an idiot. He'd been attracted to Scully from the start, although she definitely was not his usual *type.* When she first walked into his office, he'd thought she was cute in a fresh- faced, head cheerleader kind of way. She'd dispelled the *cheerleader* notion in his mind before she'd spoken a hundred words to him. Smart, self-assured and quick witted, by the end of their brief initial meeting, she'd gone from cute to pretty in his mind. Mulder couldn't pinpoint as easily when she'd gone from pretty to beautiful. Whenever it was, it must also have been the moment he'd fallen ass over ax handle in love with her. And now he wondered how he ever could have thought of her as anything but beautiful--in all her incarnations, and through whatever shade of red she and Andre, her stylist, decided on over the years. She was lovely in dowdy suits and bad hairstyles and drop-dead gorgeous in sleek black and hair so smooth and shiny it was all he could do not to run his hands through it. Fathomless blue eyes and lips he'd wanted to run his tongue along from the first time he'd seen them. No doubt about it, she could never be anything but beautiful to him. He could look at her for hours at a time if she'd just let him. Her physical beauty, though, had little to do with who she was, but was more like a reward for who she was. He loved that she was beautiful, but he didn't love her because she was beautiful. Her face was lovely to look at, but it was her expressions that he lived for. You could look at Scully's face and see the intelligence, the compassion, the determination. There was so much that was good in her--her integrity, her loyalty and strength, that quirky dry sense of humor. How could he not love her? But it wasn't blind love for he knew she could also be opinionated, closed off, stubborn and self-righteous. But the thing was, he loved those qualities, too. Sometimes he stood in awe of her, sometimes she frustrated him beyond even his own imagining, sometimes he loved her so fiercely it felt like his heart couldn't hold it all. And sometimes she hurt him--she'd done it both by accident and on purpose. She made him feel all those things. She made him feel everything. She made him feel--something he hadn't done in so long that until she came along, he thought he'd lost the capacity for it. How could he not love her? He looked up at the sound of the door to the kitchen swinging open and Rosie coming back carrying a large brown paper bag. He walked beside her on the other side of the counter toward the cash register, reaching into his back pocket for his wallet. He felt the sag of the denim as it drooped across his butt. Damn! He was too skinny. If by some chance Scully actually was scoping out his ass, there was hardly anything there to look at. Maybe he should have Rosie mix up a milkshake or something. It probably wasn't realistic to expect to gain weight by the time he got back to Scully's. "There ya go, Mulder," Rosie said with a smile. "Enough food to feed a small regiment. Should help fatten the two of you up. Here, take this candy bar, too, and eat it on the way." She handed him a Butterfinger from the display case beneath the register and he slipped it into the pocket of his jacket. He gave her a twenty and waved her hand away when she tried to give him his change. "Tell Scully hi from me," Rose said, coming around the counter to walk with Mulder to the door. "This'll make you both warm and comfy. Things are always better when you're all warm and comfy. Now get going and bring her in next time." "Will do, Rosie. See you soon." He found that he couldn't be as patient on the way home with the smell of their dinner wafting up from the empty seat beside him and a picture of Scully waiting for him floating in his mind. Taking short cuts, breaking speed limits, he made considerably better time on the return trip. End Part 5 of 7 +++++