You Want The Moon?
November, 2004
When was the last time she took the subway? Scully has a vivid memory of running through College Park station at nineteen with Olivia, that green-eyed girl who went on to have three children and move somewhere in Ohio. College Park station at midnight in 1984, tripping through it with blushed, youthful cheeks and a mind dizzy with beer, arm linked with her best friend's. Olivia had shouted something about how they would live in the city after college, how things would never change. Strange, Scully thinks, what memories come back to you.
It is 2004. How young she had been, then. How naïve. How filled with hope. At nineteen, the world had been open to her, a wide ocean. And she had plunged into it, knowing how to swim. It was exhilarating, Scully remembers, that feeling of newness, of possibility. Living and being young was extraordinary. If she closes her eyes and takes a deep breath Scully can almost feel the same confident joy that she had been known for among her friends. Reserved, yes. Bookish, certainly. But she was young and alive, full of intelligence and passion. The world felt as if it was in her hands, almost. Ready to be molded.
It is 2004 and Scully has just turned left onto 12th Street NW after leaving the Hoover. The air does not hold the same newness and light as it once did. She is older, now. Older and wiser, as they say. Only she does not feel so much wise as she does tired. She is weary of learning new things that will further taint her view on the government, discovering new secrets that have been kept from the public all this time. Scully passes restaurants that have just lit up for the evening, a hotel, two bums being scolded off by a bakery owner. He shrugs as he sees Scully, as if he expects her to lament with him over the ever increasing number of D.C.'s homeless. She looks at him for a moment, then continues down the street. The city makes her feel small, whenever she is here. It seems that buildings should not be this tall, that they should not be this close together, that it should be quieter and calmer. Mulder never makes her feel small. She may look it, and he may think her little for all she knows. But, unlike other men in her life, Mulder treats her as an equal, and because of this she has felt sturdy all these years. He has been protective, but never to the point of making her feel closed in and cornered. He has kept his distance and stepped closer when needed, and for that she is grateful.
As she walks, Scully is ferried along with all the other nine-to-five government rats, men in their Armani and women in Calvin Klein, towards the steep downward climb into Federal Triangle station. She smells various colognes and perfumes wafting around her, all unremarkable in their widespread appeal and marketable prices. The early evening fades away as they all descend into the station, where Scully can finally disentangle herself from the crowd and breathe.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing, I just want to go home."
"Well, I can be done here in fifteen."
"No, no. I'll take the subway."
"You sure?"
She hated herself when she couldn't bring herself to talk to him about certain things. Nothing was wrong, really. Nothing that couldn't be remedied with a nap or a bath, or mindless late night television. He worries about her, more than he ever did before. Scully knows this, and neither finds it stifling or annoying. He is entitled to it, she rationalizes. Someone should do the worrying, and if it's not her, it will be him. She is glad of it, because she is simply too tired to think of it any more than she has to.
So, here she is, in Federal Triangle. She will take the Orange Line to Georgetown, then she will go home and make dinner. No, she'll sleep. She should make dinner, but she won't, not today.
She barely recognizes the station, it has changed so much since the last time she used it. Or maybe her memory is wearing thin after all the years she's had a car. Scully buys a one way pass and swipes it, walking down to the far end of the right side, away from the bulk of the people, until she finds herself standing a little ways off from a tired looking tourist family. The kids have hats from the Zoo and are carrying gift bags from one of the museums halfheartedly. Overhead, the roof of the station is curved and designed in such a way that the rectangular chrome holes appear almost toothlike, like the grid of a car or an open mouth of some frightening aquatic animal. As usual, sound ricochets through the tunnel, so when the toddler behind her begins to cry, the sound bounces off the round walls, careening over and back again as his wails intensify.
Scully turns slightly to see the mother bending to placate her child in another language (Russian?). The little boy's cheeks are ruddy and streaked with tears and he drops his souvenir bag to the ground angrily. His mother scolds him, and their second child looks on with a certain air of triumph that only the older, better behaved sibling can pull off. Scully inevitably wonders how old the younger one is. He can't be older than two or three, but she doesn't have time to attempt to hold off unwanted tears because the train begins to scream through the station, blowing her coat every which way as it whooshes by and then, finally, screeches to a stop. Thank God, Scully thinks. No time to think about it anymore.
The doors hiss open with a ding and Scully steps inside, only to find the car hopelessly full. What did she expect, at this time of day? So, she stands, holding onto a pole as the train starts again, tempted to rest her cheek against the cold metal even if only to feel something acute for one minute besides the infernal beating of her own heart, but then she remembers that it is filthy, as is this whole train.
"Ma'am?"
Scully snaps her head up and looks at the older man in front of her. He is gesturing with his shaking, wrinkled hand, down at the seat he has just vacated. Scully's eyes rest for a moment on his shaking hand, the gold ring, before looking back to his face.
"Oh, no, I'm alright."
He pats her arm and looks at her with kind, old eyes. "Please, it's no trouble."
Scully thinks of protesting, but, seeing the expression of fervent politeness and consideration on the old man's face, she nods gratefully and takes the empty seat.
And then she remembers. The Russian couple and their children have found seats somewhat across from her, and Scully sees the older one pointing at her and smiling. Oh, she puts a hand on her abdomen, this. This that she has been simultaneously ignoring and thinking constantly about, this baby. Their baby, this time, because she is not alone in it. Scully grants the child with a small smile and then glances at the younger one. He is sleeping, open mouthed, against his father. William would be his age, now. He would be a little boy, tired after a long day at the Zoo.
No, Scully corrects. Not 'would be'. Is. William is a little boy, now. Today is his birthday. He is celebrating it today with his happy parents, he is licking blue icing off candles and staining his tongue. He is not thinking about her, he probably doesn't even remember. But he is hers, he is theirs, and Scully doesn't even know what he looks like. Inside her, William's own little sibling is moving, excited, perhaps, by the lurch of the train. It is too much. Scully closes her eyes and leans her forehead against the dark, cold window. Nothing is wrong, it's just too much.
April, 2004
"I'm sorry," Mulder is saying, "I'm sorry."
"What's wrong?" Scully asks, out of breath, brushing hair out of her face. Her mind is still hazy. She sits up and looks at Mulder.
"I was going to pull out," he says. "I'm sorry, I wasn't thinking."
Scully runs a hand over her face, cheeks still flushed, heartbeat still racing. "It's okay," she says. "I'll go…clean up." Mulder looks miserable so she leans over to kiss him. "It's okay."
Mulder watches as she goes to the bathroom, hears the whisper of the shower as she turns it on, and then its changed sound as she steps under the spray. He gets up and decides to pick up after them. He pulls on his boxers after finding them in the sheets, then follows the trail of damp clothes to the front door, picking up articles like breadcrumbs. They had barely been inside before beginning to devour each other. Scully's mascara had been smeared by the April rain, and her blouse soaked through. He had fumbled over the buttons.
"Don't be nice."
He hadn't been, and he hadn't been thinking. Scully had been adamant about birth control ever since he had come back to her. She had been checked since having William, and while it was true that his conception would remain unexplained, Scully didn't want any more surprises. Especially after William.
Mulder goes back to their bed, also shared since his return, and pulls the fitted sheet back down over the mattress, picks pillows up from the floor, and sets the picture frames right on her bedside table. Her family, unbroken. Them, with William. And, tucked behind that one, Emily. Suddenly, he finds her collection somewhat morbid. This small shrine to the dead and lost.
He hears the water turn off and Scully step out of the shower. They are not married, Mulder still keeps his apartment, although he knows soon he will let it go and they will finally take the plunge and admit that they are living together. Theirs is a strange life, now. At times Mulder almost feels that home is when they're on the road, when they're sleeping in motels and eating complimentary continental breakfast, when they're bickering in their rented car about a case, or when she moves her legs in airplanes so he will have more room. Because at least then their relationship is timeless, it is as it has always been, give or take a few surprise caseload resembles what it was ten years ago, allowing them a life as well as a relatively interesting career.
In D.C., home is where they fall into bed, exhausted after a long week out on a case. Home in D.C. is where Scully cooks and cleans, does the laundry, reads the paper cover to cover, and picks up their dry cleaning. Home in D.C. is where they end up bickering over stupid things, sometimes. Stupid, mundane things, like not changing the toilet paper roll, or tracking mud in from outside. They both prefer arguing about giant lizards.
May, 2004
They are in a rented car in Idaho when Scully begins to realize something is wrong. Mulder is talking to her, saying something about a zombie movie that's just come out, but all she can think about is how terribly her head is pounding. She looks out the window, down at the road, and hopes that this will do something to soothe her headache -is it a fever? There is an almost holy silence for a moment, and Scully closes her eyes contentedly, ready to sink into that moment's velvety, dark depths and nap the rest of the way to the motel.
"Scully, I was thinking-" he stops short at her pained sound of protest. "What?"
She waves her hand vaguely. "Headache. Shh."
At the motel Mulder leaves her in the room and goes to bring back dinner. Scully feels much better now, out of the car, and she takes the time to soak in a bath. She is almost asleep in it when she hears the key turn in the lock.
"Scully?" his voice sounds nervous, as if an empty room means she is gone from him forever. She tells him she won't be long, and then reluctantly pulls herself out of the tub and into an unfamiliar robe. The light in the bathroom is harsh and unforgiving, and reflected in the mirror Scully sees a woman who looks sad, tired, and guilty. She looks at herself with a critical eye. Guilt.
"You okay in there?" He is unpacking whatever he brought back, and for his sake Scully hopes it's not Chinese.
"I'm fine," she says, a little uncertainly, to her reflection, then turns off the fluorescent light that has been buzzing in her ear for the past hour, and goes out to meet him.
Mulder smiles at her. She knows, somehow, that he is immensely relieved to see her. She tries to break the moment by asking him what he brought back, and when he tells her pizza she almost bursts into tears. Then, he picks up a salad and sets it down beside her, and she decides to kiss him.
"What was that for?" he asks, laughing quietly.
"I'm just happy to see you." He kisses her again, quickly, then pulls out the case files as she dresses and sets up a picnic dinner on one of the double beds.
She is nervous as they eat, has been jumpy all day, now that he thinks about it. To calm herself, she slips into her monotonous, scientific voice. She states facts and brings up complicated medical terminology he needs help deciphering, and before he knows it she's worn him out and dinner is over. They throw the gruesome pictures over to the other bed and Mulder curls himself around Scully.
"What's wrong?" he asks her ear. "You're so quiet." She moves against him, tucks herself in further. She is staring at the opposite wall, deep in thought. Tomorrow she will go out to the store without waking him. She will come back and take the test. Everything will be fine. She turns off the light.
"Let's go to sleep, I'm tired." Scully closes her eyes and feels Mulder's arm relax around her. Her stomach is churning with a mixture of fear and sorrow. She does not want a baby. She wants William. To have a baby now would be like replacing a fish in Mulder's tank. She is afraid of having another baby, she is desperately sad because she does not want it. Suddenly, Scully is terrified. She remembers a time not so very long ago, another bed, laying with Mulder like this, trying to get warm.
Mulder sits up and turns on the light. "You're not fine, Scully. You're shaking."
"I am?" She sits up, too, and leans against the headboard, taking a deep breath before opening her eyes. Mulder's hand is on her arm.
"Are you sick?" Scully shakes her head. She gently takes his hand off her, holds it in her own.
"Mulder, I need to do something. I need to go to get something, okay?" She is getting out of bed, going to her suitcase, pulling a pair of jeans out of it. He is beside her.
"Scully? Scully, stop!" he says, and she stops, pajama bottoms down and jeans halfway on. "Tell me what's going on."
"I'll tell you when I get back," she says, pulling the jeans up and buttoning them. "Hand me that shirt."
He holds the shirt away from her teasingly, and Scully laughs despite the complete lack of humor in the situation, holding her breasts and lunging for it. "Just tell me where you're going, at least."
Scully grabs the shirt and pulls it over her head. She walks to the door, it is past midnight. Mulder is looking at her curiously. "I'm going to buy a pregnancy test." She says it simply, uncoated, and watches as Mulder's knees give out a bit before walking out the door and to the car.
June, 2004
It is a warm, cozy morning, and Mulder is scared to move lest he wake her. She hasn't slept past five in the morning for the past month, and it is Saturday. Outside, it is raining. He can see it trickle down the window pane on the other side of the room. When he was young, with Samantha, they used to pick sides of a car window and see which drops raced to the bottom first. He should have let Samantha win more often, although it was really just a silly game. Mulder hopes this child will be kinder than he ever was. He hopes this child will be more like Scully, because he knows, without any proof, really, that she was a sweet child. It is June. William is a little boy, and Mulder knows relatively nothing about him. Scully has pictures of William, hundreds of pictures, some of which she had started to compile into a scrapbook, before taking them out and throwing the scrapbook away.
It is all there, in those boxes. Pictures of William sleeping, of him chewing on Scully's hand, of him laughing. Mrs. Scully must have been there, too. There are pictures of Scully holding him, Scully nursing him, Scully sleeping curled around him. It's all there, and Mulder has missed all of it.
"I can hear you thinking," Scully says, her voice rough from weeks of vomiting. Mulder looks at her from across the bed. She is laying on the bed like a fetus, legs drawn up to her chest.
"What am I thinking?" he quips.
Scully opens her eyes and looks over at him. "About William." The scratchiness of her morning voice adds a certain wisdom to the statement, and Mulder wonders how she knew.
"I think about him a lot. I think about you a lot, how it must have been for you."
"I know."
They are quiet for a moment. It is a silence so pure, so filled with meaning, that Mulder feels he has to touch her, somehow. He moves closer to her, kisses the top of her head.
"Careful," Scully warns, leaning into it. It's a miracle she isn't in the bathroom already, praying to a porcelain altar. If the bed shifts too much, however, she'll be running to it in an instant. So, he is careful with her.
July, 2004
When they hear the baby's heartbeat, Mulder cries. Scully looks at him a moment, nervously fingers the hem of her raised blouse, then turns back to the technician.
"So, everything looks good?"
The young woman beams. "Everything looks great. Perfect."
Scully is wiping the gel off her abdomen and touching Mulder's shoulder. She sits up and stands up. "Thank you," she says to the woman. And they leave, Mulder in awe, Scully indifferent.
At Scully's apartment she goes straight to the bedroom and shuts the door, crawls into bed, pulls the covers up to her neck and curls up. She can't bear to see his carefully contained joy, and so, an hour later, when Mulder opens the door, she steels herself against it.
"Can I get you anything?" he asks.
"No."
"Are you all right?"
Scully hesitates, then shakes her head. She hears him take off his shoes and jacket, then get into bed beside her. He doesn't get under the covers, and there is something telling about her being covered and him being open to the air. Scully can feel his aura of happiness, and she closes her eyes. He brushes the hair away from her ear and moves his hand down to her blanket sheathed belly. She squirms and his hand leaves her instantly, going to her hip, instead.
"Are you happy about this?" she asks.
"Yes." He kisses her ear. "Are you?"
"No." Mulder knows it's the truth, but it doesn't sting any less. He has seen her, these past months, treating her wretched morning sickness in a businesslike manner, taking her prenatal vitamins quickly with dinner, as if she wants to get it over with and not think about why she needs them and, most recently, stubbornly trying to button pants and zip skirts over her changing body, refusing to admit that soon she will need a new wardrobe. "Not yet."
Carefully, he says, "Why aren't you happy about it?"
She immediately wiggles out of his arms altogether and strokes her hair back behind her ears. "Damn it, Mulder, don't pull that psychology crap on me. It's going to take awhile for me to come to terms with it. I wasn't prepared for this to happen."
"I'm not pulling psychology crap on you, Scully. I'm in this just as much as you are. I just want to understand."
She is angry, now. "You want to understand? You want to understand how it was to know you're carrying a dead man's child, only to have him come back and leave again?" Scully is pacing. "How it was to hold this beautiful baby that looked just like you and wonder if we'd ever be a family? Or, maybe you want to know what it was like to hand him over to strangers, this baby you carried inside of you for nine months, this baby that was all I had left of us! Mulder, I don't think you can understand what that was like, however much you may wish to."
Mulder wonders if she knows she's crying.
"I feel guilty about this baby. I feel angry at you. I think of how different it will be when this baby is born, and how I don't have to go through a pregnancy alone again. I don't want it, not yet. So just…let me come to terms with it on my own time, Mulder."
He is surprised when she walks back to him, crawls back into the bed he is sitting up in, and wraps her arms around him, burying her face in the crook of his shoulder. Tentatively, just as he did in Oregon on their first case together, in that dark motel room, he puts a hand on her back and smooths it over her. "I'm sorry, I know how much you want this. I know how much you love it already, Mulder. I do. You don't have to hide it from me. I'm sorry."
"It's okay."
She laughs and sniffs, pulling away. "It's not okay, I've been stifling you in my own poor attitude."
"Losing our son hurt me, too, Scully."
She kisses him for that. "I know, I know." Scully kisses him again. "I know."
August, 2004
If there were any doubts about if Mulder and Scully were sleeping together, it is now confirmed by the way Scully's shirts are pulled across her stomach, and the golden glow of her skin. She never looked like this, before. Everywhere she goes, work or the grocery store, people congratulate her, and she bears it with a tight smile before going about her business. Mulder has acquired a glow of his own, the proud father whether it is in their tiny office, in roadside diners, or in the living room at night when he can't sleep, listening as she sneaks a midnight snack now that her appetite has returned with a vengeance.
She hasn't let him see her yet, so he can only guess at what she looks like under the maternity clothes her mother forced her to buy one Sunday afternoon. The ultrasounds show a healthy, normal baby, with nothing in the world to worry about. They have decided to let the baby's sex be a surprise, although Mulder has a feeling Scully might know from her short course in medical school all those years ago.
They avoid the subject, mostly, except one Friday when Mulder asks Scully where they'll put the baby in the apartment. He has gotten rid of his own, now. Moved his belongings in with hers, and they now live together officially, although neither of them has really broached that subject, either.
"William's nursery is the office, now. I didn't think I'd need another." She is sorting through the existing file cabinet of X-Files at work, looking for something related to astro-projection, and doesn't look up.
"Do you…want to put it in there again?"
She nods. "Yeah, we can do it this weekend, if you want. The sooner the better, I guess."
Mulder smiles. "Can we put stars on the ceiling?"
Scully looks over at him. "Sure, that sounds nice, Mulder."
She sits on the couch all weekend watching old movies and, on one sleepy occasion, the tape Mulder gave her after her abduction. He has insisted on moving everything himself, and she can feel anger growing at where he has inevitably placed things he's moved in various locations around the home which she will have to rearrange later. But she is tired and glad to be off her feet while he bumps around in the small room, taking measurements and making a list of things he'll need. He is practically planning the nursery himself.
"Green for the walls?"
She shakes her head. "Too hospital-y. I've had enough of those."
"White, then."
"No, something warmer."
He thinks for a minute. "Yellow?"
He paints the room yellow, and Scully snaps at him when he gets paint on the floor, promptly running to the bathroom to gag above the toilet at the awful, chemical smell of the fresh paint.
September, 2004
Scully sits up in bed with a gasp one morning in early September. She puts a hand to her belly and Mulder snaps awake as well, heart pounding.
"What is it?" he asks, panicked.
Scully makes a strange little noise between a laugh, a choke, and a cough, and stays still for a moment before laying down again. "The baby moved. It's…moving." Her hand is still on her belly, low on the left side. If possible, Mulder's heartbeat races even faster than before, and he doesn't breathe as Scully takes his hand in her own trembling one and gently puts it on her side. It is the first time she has let him touch her there.
"I can't feel anything," he laments.
"It stopped." Her hands fly to her face to cover her eyes in time for her tears to fall. She is unable to contain them, especially now with all the hormones boiling inside her. It is too much. She immediately thinks of William, how shocked she had been when he moved for the first time, in the car on the way home from work.
"Hey," Mulder says, gathering her up. Her shaking subsides almost instantly, she doesn't want to be held, but he holds her anyway. "It's okay."
She manages to relax, but spends the whole day remembering how she would lay in bed in the later parts of her pregnancy, pressing on different parts of her belly and waiting until her baby responded with a little kick of his own where her hand had been. He had liked music, she remembers, how he would roll around when she listened to the radio. She wonders if he has started preschool, what he is learning, if he is right handed or left, if he has a nickname.
Mulder won't be able to feel the baby move for a few weeks. Scully reads this as she flips through a book on pregnancy her mother gave her three years ago. She knows he is dying to touch her, maybe even make love to her. She, in turn, aches at the thought of sex. An orgasm would make her forget everything. She is taking a bath and her body begins to hum, so Scully quickly gets out and sets about making spaghetti. At night she dreams of sex and disfigured babies, of oceans and aliens.
October, 2004
During dinner the baby decides to roll and kick inside her. Maybe it likes steak. It has been quiet for weeks, just the occasional kick or roll or bought of bedtime hiccups, so while it continues to practice gymnastics in her belly, Scully decides now is as good a time as any.
"You want to feel the baby move?" she asks Mulder. He nods and watches as she stands up gingerly and moves to him, taking his hand in hers and guiding it to her abdomen. Immediately, he recoils, and she laughs, bringing him back. The baby continues to kick, and Scully watches as Mulder's eyes widen and his fingers spread out over her.
"Jesus, is it always like this?"
"No, it hasn't been like this yet." She moves his hand and smiles as the baby kicks his palm with its little heel.
"What does it feel like?" Mulder asks, his dinner forgotten. He brushes his hand over her, feeling her belly everywhere, and shivers run down her spine.
"Like I'm a drum being played from the inside." She runs a hand over her stomach and says, "Okay, that's enough." Mulder isn't sure if she's talking to him or the baby, but in any case the baby quiets and moves less at hearing her voice. He looks up at her.
"Can the baby hear you?"
Scully nods. "It can hear both of us."
That night, in bed, Mulder kisses her over and over. He kisses her mouth, her cheeks, her hair, her neck, sucks at her collar bone. And all Scully can think about is trying not to flail and trash in the bed from the sheer joy of it. His hand whispers over her breast and she cries out, a bit too earnestly, and Mulder mistakes it for pain or a protest of some sort.
"Sorry," he says, breathing heavily, pulling away.
She brings him back. "No, don't stop." She hears Mulder chuckle against her neck, and she smiles and giggles, throwing her head back into the pillows so he can continue to kiss her there. This time, his hand travels from her breast to the swell of their baby, to the hem of her shirt. Scully watches him from under heavy eyes as he sits up to almost reverently unbutton it, then part the fabric delicately. She sees his face light up in the darkness. He runs his palm over the taut skin, his fingertips tickling, and it takes monumental restraint from Scully to not grab him back to her so they can make love. He is looking down at her body now with a sort of expression she has never seen from him in all the years she's known him. Pure, unabashed adoring wonder. He bends to kiss her belly, and she can see now that he is crying.
They make love slowly, carefully, and Scully finds that she does not want to forget, now. She discovers that she loves the feel of their baby between them as they move, how there is no awkwardness when, afterwards, Mulder sweeps his hand across her again.
"I love you," he says.
"I know."
November, 2004
It's too much, Scully thinks as the train continues to whoosh underground. She feels heavy and tired and moody. Lately she has been consumed with worry. She worries that this birth will also be dramatic and life threatening. She worries that despite all the ultrasound pictures Mulder has put on the refrigerator, the baby will be horribly disfigured. She worries about how she will react to this child once he or she is born. Having remained mostly indifferent and detached during this pregnancy, she worries that she will continue to feel this way towards this innocent child.
The train screeches to a stop and Scully waits for the last lurch before standing and exiting along with the other travelers. She leaves the station, walks across several streets before reaching the park. It is dusk. The sun is setting against a grey sky, a white disk sinking lower and lower behind a dingy apartment building.
What a thing, to be alive and well in this park on this normal night! She has lived a life of loss, one after the other. Once, she even lost herself. Some of her losses came back to her, but most did not. Scully chooses a nondescript park bench and brushes a cigarette butt and lollipop wrapper to the ground. She watches as the November wind blows the wrapper along the cement, making a lone scratching sound. It is quiet, now. Quiet at six in the evening in this darkening park. A night like every other, except this night is far from normal, because it is her child's birthday. He is happy, somewhere. He doesn't remember her, somewhere.
Scully does not cry. Instead, she allows her imagination to take the guilt-ridden trip she rarely allows it to take. She imagines them all, together. William is blowing out candles, he is opening presents, he is crawling in between them for a bedtime story in his spaceship pajamas. They are kissing him goodnight. Maybe he is leaning down to tell her belly goodnight. Perhaps they will ready him for school the next morning, and he will complain that he doesn't like ham sandwiches.
She shakes herself out of it. No, she mustn't think of that. She will be happy for him, wherever he is. She will pray for him every night, and she will thank God that he is safe. Occasionally, she will lift the little hat he wore in the cold and inhale the fading baby smell of him. Now she must think of this new baby, and she will not think of it as a replacement, but rather as another gift.
It is dark, and Scully stands up from the bench, suddenly on edge. She should not be out this late, alone, without anyone knowing where she is. She hurries home.
Mulder is furious when she finally unlocks the door.
"Jesus, Scully, where the hell have you been?"
"I'm sorry, I lost track of time." She takes off her coat, scarf, and shoes.
He scoffs, then goes to the couch to get a blanket. "Come on, sit down. Your lips are blue." Scully puts a hand to her mouth and realizes her fingers are numb. "I'm going to make you some tea."
He must have microwaved it, because he returns within two minutes and hands her the mug. "You can't disappear on me like that, Scully. It scares me."
The feeling is coming back to her fingers. "It's his birthday today. William's."
Mulder sighs and runs a hand over his face, looking into her eyes. "God, I forgot." Scully nods. "I did, too. I didn't remember until this afternoon. I can't believe I forgot." Outside, a siren wails by.
"But you know what I was thinking about on the subway?" Mulder relaxes, leans back into the couch, and looks at her expectantly. "I was thinking about how even if we feel shitty, and guilty, and depressed, William is happy today. He's celebrating with his parents." She pauses, looks at her tea intently. "So, I think I can be happy today. For him."
Mulder nods. He is looking at her as if for the first time. "I think we have some ice cream in the freezer."
"Unless I've eaten it all."
He laughs. "I hid it behind the green beans."
That night they sit on the sofa, watching the ultrasound tape of William squirming around inside Scully, and eating Cherry Garcia ice cream. They talk about William, they talk about the new baby. One more month. They lay in bed that night and Mulder scoots down so he is next to Scully's belly, talking to the baby. At the sound of his now familiar voice, the baby kicks, and Scully lifts up her shirt so Mulder can see the movement.
"Our little alien," he says, after Scully tells him she thinks what he just felt was an elbow. "I'm just joking."
December, 2004
There had been no baby shower. Scully hadn't wanted one, but gifts came pouring in nonetheless. Onesies, hats, rattles, blankets. They have stocked the closet with diapers, folded tiny clothes into drawers in the nursery, and finally set up the crib. The door to the nursery is shut most of the time, but occasionally Mulder opens it to look inside. Scully is officially on maternity leave. She sleeps late and turns in early. It is nearing the end of December.
"Ugh, move!" she moans, pushing Mulder away and awakening him.
"Scully, you've got half the bed!" he grumbles, scooting further to the edge.
She bursts into tears. "I can't go to sleep if the baby won't turn over, and you're crowding me!" Mulder contains his grin, but is sorry for her increasing discomfort.
"Okay, okay, I'll sleep on the couch."
Scully shakes her head. "No, I didn't mean that. Come back."
Now he does laugh. "There's not enough room with the two of you in there!"
Scully laughs thickly. "There's enough room. Just don't come near me."
The days pass, and soon it is New Years Eve. The sky is white, and by noon it is snowing. It is the best kind of snow, thick flakes that stick to the ground, blanketing the world in soft silence. Scully is asleep on the couch, and as Mulder makes sandwiches for lunch he can hear Jimmy Stewart saying, 'You want the moon, Mary? Just say the word and I'll throw a lasso 'round it and pull it down.'
"Mulder?"
"Hmm?"
"In a few hours, we're going to have to go to the hospital." Her voice is calm and sleepy. Mulder drops the knife he was holding and it clatters to the floor. He goes to the couch and watches her sit up and stretch.
"Wh…What?"
Scully looks up at him. "I've been having little contractions since yesterday, but they're getting worse. We can go once my water breaks."
Mulder sits heavily on the arm of the couch and watches, paralyzed, as she sinks back down into her pillows and blankets and yawns. "Since yesterday? Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because it's normal, it's fine. I'm fine. Don't worry."
He is staring at her incredulously. "How can I not worry? You almost died when you had William!"
"That was different," she placates. "Now, shh, I like this part."
For two hours Mulder alternately paces or inquires as to how she is feeling. After her movie, Scully goes to the bedroom to go through her overnight bag and check to make sure she has everything. She sends Mulder into the nursery to pick out newborn clothes, the blanket her mom made, and the stuffed rabbit Mulder had bought. From the nursery, Mulder hears her start to say something about eating an apple, and then hears her sharp intake of breath. He is beside her in time to steady her as her center of gravity immediately changes.
"Can we go now?" he asks.
"Yes, but don't get too excited. It's still going to be awhile."
The car is blocked in by snow, and Mulder curses as he tries to clear the windshield and windows with bare, shaking hands. The hospital is fifteen minutes away, but in the snow it takes the forty-five, and when they arrive Scully is sweating and biting the inside of her cheek.
By eleven at night, Scully has entered a state of calm she had never anticipated. Now there is no fear, no urgency. Around her, the world seems blurred. Sounds are quiet and distorted, and all she is in touch with is her body in this natural, ancient process. It seems that the snow has shielded her, somehow, and the nurses encouraging her say she will have a New Years baby. She can feel Mulder's hand, cold, at her sweat drenched back. He is brushing the hair back from her face, he is kissing her temple.
It is a strange, tormented world she is bringing this child into. Scully has felt relatively no intense, all consuming attachment with this baby, and she laments it with each strong push. Her legs are shaking. Suddenly, she is not ready, it is too soon, she needs more time. She must be saying something because the nurses are telling her no, it will be all right. No, she needs more time, she needs to fully love this child before giving birth to it. She is a terrible mother.
Then, with a last long, terrible push, there is a great release, a swoosh, and a dreadful moment of silence. It is midnight. Scully hears the baby cry, although it is muffled as she stays in her own, shut off world. She falls back on the bed, closes her eyes, and then the world pulls sharply into focus as the doctor lays a weight on her chest that wriggles and cries. Her hands go to it instantly. A baby. Warm, wet, tiny. She can't hear anything anyone is saying. Her hands are shaking. Someone is gently taking the baby from her.
"No! No! Bring it back!" Scully cries, sitting up weakly and reaching out.
"They're just going to clean her up, sweetie, they'll bring her right back to you," a nurse says.
"Her?" Scully gasps.
She feels Mulder's hand on her shoulder. "We have a daughter, Scully." He kisses her brow, and she grips his hand.
"Don't you leave her for a minute," she says, her voice hoarse, and watches as he follows their baby to the other side of the room.
While they are gone Scully delivers the placenta. The nurse pulls a blue blanket over her and gently takes her feet out of the stirrups. She is crying, and the nurse is soothing her with soft words and ice chips. It seems that an eternity has passed since her baby left her body, and when Mulder finally brings her back in his arms she reaches out urgently, taking the baby and clasping it to her.
"Scully? You okay?" he asks, worried. She is still crying.
"It's normal," the nurse says, and gestures for Mulder to take her seat. She squeezes Scully's shoulder as she leaves. "Good job, sweetie. She's beautiful."
And she is. Scully is calming, she is kissing her child's head and cheeks, soothing her until she closes her eyes. She unwraps the blanket and inspects her daughter. So small, just like William. Smaller, maybe. Proportioned like herself. Ten fingers, ten toes, with a shock of dark hair. Scully leans over and kisses Mulder earnestly, then returns to her baby.
How could she have doubted this? How could she ever have resented this perfect, pink, little baby? Now she knows one can never be prepared for the birth of a child, no matter how much one anticipates it, no matter how much one loves it. This feeling is indescribable, miraculous, and Scully smiles as her daughter squirms in her arms, instinctively rooting around for her nipple.
"What are we going to call her?" she asks, lowering her gown and watching as the baby latches on perfectly. The sensation is no less incredible than it was with William, and for a moment she is incapable of thought.
"I don't know," Mulder says, equally in awe. "How about Melissa?"
Scully shakes her head. "Samantha."
Mulder makes a choking sound. "Maybe…maybe we shouldn't weigh her down with someone else's name. Let her live her own life."
Scully is suddenly exhausted, as the whole of the day catches up with her and the lethargy of breastfeeding sets in.
"Elizabeth," Mulder says. It's a name they threw around briefly one lazy Sunday that hadn't raised any arguments.
Scully nods. "Elizabeth."
When her mother comes in minutes later, detained by the snow, her daughter and her granddaughter are both sleeping. Mulder has his feet propped up on the bed and is gazing at them with something that could only ever be described as love. Margaret Scully waves in dismissal as he moves to take his feet off the bed, and she pulls a chair up beside him, kissing his cheek.
"Hello, Fox," she says warmly, tiredly. "I would have been here sooner, but the snow…"
"The doctor said she had another week, we weren't expecting it."
"She's beautiful," Mrs. Scully says softly. "They're both so beautiful."
Mulder nods. He feels a such a loving respect for this woman, bordering on the love he feels for her daughter. These strong, wonderful women and mothers.
"Fox," she begins. "I know you think I may look down on you for not marrying Dana, because of my religious beliefs, but I want you to know that that isn't true. It will never be true." She places a hand over his. "You love my daughter, and that's all that counts in the end."
Mulder is speechless. He wants to argue that he's been the cause of all of the Scully's greatest unhappinesses, that Scully's cancer was his fault, that Melissa shouldn't have died. He wants to make up for disappearing, leaving Scully alone for so long.
"I know what you're thinking. You don't need our forgiveness, Fox. You never did."
They both sense a huge shift in the air, and then Margaret says. "Why don't you go get something to eat. I'll stay with Dana." Mulder doesn't move for a moment, then stands up, his back aching.
"Can I bring you back anything? Coffee?"
Mrs. Scully smiles. "No, thank you, dear."
Epilogue: December 31, 2008
"You want the moon, Mary? Just say the word and I'll throw a lasso 'round it and pull it down." Scully raises her head from the pillow and looks down at her family from the couch. They've thrown blankets and pillows on the ground, and Lily is laying on her stomach, socked feet waving up in the air, absentmindedly taking a bite of ice cream and looking at the television with sleepy eyes. Days after she was born, Scully had decided that Elizabeth was far too big a name for such a small baby, and her nickname had evolved from there.
Mulder is laying beside her, mimicking her posture, and takes the ice cream off her spoon while Lily isn't looking.
"Hey!" Lily giggles, her blue eyes twinkling. Mulder scoops another spoonful and smears it across Lily's nose. She sputters and giggles again, then looks up at Scully.
"Is it midnight yet, Mommy?"
Scully looks at her watch. "It's ten-thirty. You're not tired, are you?"
Lily shakes her head. "No." She squirms next to Mulder. "When will the ball drop?"
He closes the ice cream and pushes it away. Scully gets up and picks up the carton, stealing a bite before walking back with it into the kitchen.
"Midnight," he's saying. "Have you ever stayed up 'till midnight before?"
Lily shakes her head. The movie is still playing. "Let's play the game, Daddy!" she jumps up, rushes over to the window. She pushes away the curtains and looks up. Mulder follows her, kneeling next to the window so he can be nearer her height. Lily is small, like Scully, with dark hair, wet from her bath, tucked behind her ears, and freckles dotting her nose and cheeks.
"Good, it's clear. Which ones can you see?"
Lily squints. Her breath is fogging up the window near her mouth. She points. "Orion."
Mulder nods. "Good. Can you find the Big Dipper?"
Lily looks up and shakes her head. "Nope." Mulder points it out.
Their daughter is fascinated by stars. She knows a dozen constellations and can roll off facts about each planet with the same confident, scientific tone as her mother. Tonight, she is wearing navy pajamas with little yellow stars sprinkled over them. "It was snowy the night you were born," Mulder says, standing up and swooping Lily into his arms. She giggles wildly, and only when he catches a withering glance from Scully as she comes back into the room does he put her down.
"Look what I found," Scully says, holding out the small, cream colored bunny Lily has been missing for a few days, causing teary bedtimes. Scully's voice has acquired a certain softness, a warmth Mulder hadn't heard in it since he had last seen her with William. The voice of a mother. Lily scrambles over to her mother and grabs the rabbit out of her hand, smiling.
Scully eases herself down to the spread out mess of blankets and pillows and smiles sleepily, opening her arms. "Come here, Lily." Lily obeys, crawls into Scully's lap as Mulder puts on his glasses and sits down at the desk to take notes on a case. Scully kisses the top of her daughter's dark, damp head and breathes in deeply. Bunny in hand, Lily begins to settle, her eyelids drooping as Scully sways slightly, side to side.
"Mmh, I love you," she says into Lily's hair.
"Love you, Mama," her daughter says in her sweet, small voice. Then, "D'you think William gets to stay up to watch the ball drop?"
Mulder glances over at them, Lily's head tipped up to look at Scully, her little body all gathered up in her mother's arms. "I don't know, baby. What do you think?"
Lily yawns. "I think he gets to stay up, he's older than me."
"You're probably right," Scully says, kissing her cheek.
Within ten minutes, Lily is asleep and they've tucked her in among the covers. They will wake her five minutes before midnight and put her in her own bed five minutes after. Now, alone, Mulder and Scully stretch out on the floor near their daughter and hold each other, foreheads resting against each other.
"Are you happy?" Mulder asks, looking into her eyes.
Scully smiles, nods. "Yeah, I'm happy." He kisses her gently, between the eyes. Scully is thinking about Lily, about the moment she was born, the instant she was put on Scully's chest, the crescendo of love that had crashed through her chest and into that tiny baby. Now she looks at Lily with a certain wonder, this little girl who comes up to her hip, intelligent, with kind eyes and a sweet, caring heart. Her mother tells Scully this is what she was like as a child. Mulder dotes on her unendingly, lets her carry his badge around after work and arrest various stuffed animals, takes her to the park every day to ride her bike or to practice catching a baseball.
After she was born, they had both decided to alter their careers. It was difficult, at first, to pull away from what had been their reality for so long. Now, Scully performs autopsies at the hospital and occasionally works with crime units who need her medical expertise along with her investigative background from the F.B.I. Mulder has stayed on with the Bureau, focusing more on profiling in the behavioral science unit than searching for the truth. But Scully has felt, even from the beginning, that in Lily he has found the ever elusive truth he has been looking for.
Lily likes aliens, much to her mother's chagrin. She plays with generic extraterrestrial plastic bath toys Mulder triumphantly brought home one day, and watches the sci-fi channel avidly when specials on unexplained phenomena air. Scully had scolded Mulder at first, convinced Lily would have nightmares, but she never had any.
This is their life, now. And in ten minutes it will be Lily's birthday. Their little new beginning.
Scully leans up and kisses Mulder softly on the mouth, eyes closed. There is a moment of silence, of contentedness, and then Scully sits up, turns.
"Lily," she coos. "It's almost midnight." Lily squirms and makes an annoyed expression, then opens her eyes.
"Hey, Bug," Mulder says as Scully changes the channel. "It's almost your birthday."
Lily sits up, rubs her eyes, and climbs into Mulder's lap, sleepily drooping against him and clutching her bunny close to her heart.
"Ten…Nine…Eight…Seven…"
This must be it. This, just this. A moment so golden, so pure, that it must be what everyone calls 'true happiness'. Only it isn't quite that, Scully thinks. It's still bittersweet, somehow, because she knows her son is out there, too. Maybe he's dreaming, maybe he's awake, too, staring at the same screen and counting down along with billions of others. And Scully knows, somehow, that he's happy, just as they are.
"Three…Two…One…Happy New Year!"
"Happy New Year!" Lily chirps, and as couples kiss on screen, Mulder and Scully both kiss their daughter, then, laughing, each other.
"Happy Birthday," Scully says, kissing Lily again. Now she is truly worn out, and she lunges into her mother's arms.
"I'm tired."
"I know, honey. Let's go to bed." She hoists Lily up into her arms, her daughter's little legs wrapping around her waist, and takes her to her small bed, tucking her in. Lily is asleep before Scully closes the door.
The TV clicks off and Scully yawns as she walks into the bedroom. Mulder is behind her, kissing her near the ear and on her neck.
"Shh," Scully warns as they fall into bed together.
"Oh, she's out, she won't hear anything," Mulder placates, unbuttoning Scully's pajama top. He kisses her chest near her tiny, gold cross. "Happy New Year, Scully," and he turns off the lamp.
Disclaimer: I don't own The X-Files. I hope you liked this as much as I liked writing it.