TITLE: The Naughty Leprechaun
RATING: PG
KEYWORDS: Mulder/Scully Romance, Humor
SUMMARY: Scully's upset when Mulder doesn't want to spend St. Patrick's Day with her.
Disclaimer: The characters don't belong to me. I'm just borrowing them for my own therapeutic purposes. They will be returned relatively unharmed to Chris Carter, or whoever wants to borrow them next, when I'm done.
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The door closes harder than I intended. I stare back at it through narrowed eyes as if it did it on purpose. The noisy bang is still echoing through my head and I let out a small groan, expecting to see a knowing grin on Mulder's face. But luckily, he isn't here yet. I let out a relieved sigh and search my desk for the bottle of pain reliever I know is there.
You see, yesterday was St. Patrick's Day. And being the good little Irish girl that I am, I took the day off to spend with my family and friends. Actually, it was my mother and a bunch of her friends. I barely recognized any of them. That was a pretty depressing thought and I decided that a green beer or two would help me forget about my pathetically lonely life. Well, one turned into two, two turned into four, four into . . . twelve, I think. Let's just say that by the end of the day, I had many, many friends because I was seeing double and triple images of everyone there.
When I think about it, it's all Mulder's fault that I'm standing here in the office with the worst hangover of my life. I invited him to come with me. In fact, I invite him every year to my mother's annual party, but he always turns me down. He claimed he had too much work to do, but looking around, I notice that the office looks the same as it did two days ago. It doesn't look like he's been in here in a while. It certainly doesn't look like he spent the day here doing all of that work that he supposedly had to do.
Mulder chooses that very moment to walk in, meeting my suspicious glare with one filled with guilt. I know he didn't spend the day here yesterday. And he knows that I know he didn't spend the day here. He lied to me. And has probably been lying to me for years about why he won't spend St. Patrick's Day with me.
But, being the calm, reasonable person that I am, I decide to give him a chance to explain himself to me. That's only fair, right? I mean, he could have a very good excuse for misleading me about having to work all day. He might have decided to work from home, unable to spend even a moment alone in this office without me. Or, he could have decided to volunteer his time spending the day with poor, forgotten orphans who have no one else. But, something tells me neither of those are the reason.
"Well?" I say. In a reasonable and calm way, of course. I calmly cross my arms across my chest, lift my eyebrow higher than even I have known it to go and give him a reasonable amount of time to answer the question. Two seconds is enough, don't you think? "Mulder, you didn't work yesterday, did you? You lied to me about that, didn't you?"
"Scully, I . . . "
"No, Mulder," I interrupt him. "If you didn't want to spend the day with me, then I understand. I mean, we spend more time together than most married people. I realize that you need a day to yourself once in a while. I know I sure do."
"Never, Scully. I cherish every moment . . . "
"Next time, I'll know to just not even ask because you're just going to say no. Same goes for Thanksgiving and Christmas. I'll just tell my mother the truth. That you hate the very thought of seeing me or my family any second longer than necessary."
"You know that isn't true. Why are you . . . "
"It'll probably break her heart, but that isn't your concern, is it?" I give him an icy glare and think about rolling my eyes. But my head hurts too much for that, so I just let out a pitiful sigh instead, my tirade ending with a whimper instead of a bang.
"Are you done?" he asks, a look of annoyance aimed at me. He waits for my nod before continuing. "Will you give me a chance to explain?"
Again I nod and sit wearily on the edge of my desk. I knew I should have called in sick today.
"By all means. Let me have it. But Mulder, if you so much as hint at alien involvement . . . "
This time he's the one with the glare on his face. And I decide now probably isn't the best time for bad jokes. Maybe I should listen to him. Really listen to him. I can admit to myself that I may have be a little bit hasty with the conclusions I've drawn.
"First I want to apologize," he starts. "I'm sorry I lied to you, Scully. I hope you can forgive me. You have to realize that I wouldn't have done it without a good reason."
He's right. He wouldn't lie to me without a good reason. I've known Mulder for a lot of years. I should know that about him. But then again, there often is a big difference between his idea of a good reason and my idea of a good reason. So I'm still a little leery.
"Okay, Mulder," I sigh, willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. "Why did you lie about having to work yesterday?"
"I lied and told you that I had to work because I didn't want to admit that I didn't want to go."
I just gasp in disbelief, wishing for the second time in twenty minutes that I called in sick.
"That didn't come out right," he cringes, seeing how upset his admission made me.
"How else could you have put something like that?" I shriek, despite my headache.
"It's not like I didn't want to be with you, I just didn't want to be at a St. Patrick's Day party. I hate St. Patrick's Day."
This time, my mouth just falls open in a soundless motion. He hates St. Patrick's Day?
"You hate St. Patrick's Day?" I manage to say, the disbelief obvious in my voice. "How can you hate St. Patrick's Day, Mulder? Is it just St. Patrick Day or is it also all things Irish?"
Okay, so much for calm and reasonable. I know I'm sounding a bit defensive and judgmental, but what else am I supposed to think?
"This is so hard," he says, burying his face in his hands. And I can see that this really is hard for him. And that again, I'm jumping to conclusions. This time, I'm going to listen and be understanding. We're friends. I doubt Mulder's going to tell me he hates me or my ancestors.
"I'm sorry," I apologize walking over to stand next to him. I take his hands in mine and pull them away from his face. "I'm listening, I promise. Why is it you hate St. Patrick's Day?"
"It's stupid, really," he starts. "But . . . "
I don't say anything. I just give him time to get all of his thoughts together. St. Patrick's Day probably has some horrible memory attached to it. He has a lot of bad memories from his childhood. I can't believe I thought the worst of him.
"Okay, it all started when I was a kid."
Just what I thought. A childhood trauma.
"The thing is, Scully. I, uh . . . I'm afraid of leprechauns."
Okay, so maybe it's not what I thought. It takes everything in me not to react to what he just said.
"Le-leprechauns?" I stutter, trying to hold back the giggles dying to break free. But I can't help it. Leprechauns? He's afraid of leprechauns? "Mulder, you do know they're not real, right?"
I have to fake a cough to camouflage the laughter.
"Go ahead and laugh, Scully. It's funny. I mean, I'm a grown man. I know that leprechauns aren't real. But the fear came when I was little. Something like that just doesn't go away."
"Mulder, you're priceless," I say with a chuckle. "This is just too . . . "
"Ridiculous?"
"Yeah," I say, bursting out into full bodied laughter. "It kind of is." But I eventually get my mirth under control and calm down enough to ask the twenty thousand dollar question. "What caused this, um . . . aversion to St. Patrick's Day?"
"Like I said, it all started when I was a kid. I was in kindergarten, I think. At school, they made a pretty big deal about St. Patrick's Day. The whole week leading up to it, the teachers would tell us stories about the leprechaun and how he likes to play jokes on little kids. I just thought it was a story. But then I saw it. It was a streak of green running around the school, knocking books off of desks and tipping over chairs. No classroom was left untouched. I had nightmares about that leprechaun for months."
"You poor thing," I giggle, shaking my head. "Mulder, it wasn't a real leprechaun. It was just a teacher or someone dressed up like a leprechaun."
"Scully," he whines. "Of course I know that. Now, I do. But when you're a little five year old, seeing is believing. It didn't matter how many times my mother told me leprechauns weren't real. All I know is that I saw one. You know how I am when I get an idea like that in my head."
"Yeah, I guess I'm lucky we don't chase little green men after all," I joke. And I finally get the reaction I was waiting for. He smiles that beautiful smile of his and starts to laugh. It's makes my stomach flutter. Or maybe that's the hangover, I think as the fluttering turns to nausea. In either case, I realize that calling it a day and going home sick isn't such a bad idea after all.
As it turns out, a few more aspirin, a gallon of water, and a five hour nap can work wonders on a hangover. I wake up feeling good as new, my St. Patrick's Day disaster all but forgotten. But something was still nagging at me. I may be cured, but Mulder still has issues. If I don't do something now, we'll be spending St. Patrick's Day apart for a long, long time. I refuse to let that happen.
With my mind made up, I jump out of bed and into the shower. If I hurry, I just may make it before he gets home from work.
Two hours later, I'm in Mulder's apartment, putting the final touches on the living room when I hear his key in the lock. I panic briefly, but then realize that it's too late to turn back. I've come this far. There's no backing out now. I duck into the kitchen just as he pushes the door open.
Mulder steps into the room and immediately notices the changes I made. A few videos and CD's were tossed around the floor. And his computer chair and coffee table were knocked over. But that's all I'll own up to. The rest of the mess is his.
"Is anyone there?" he calls out, a distressed look coming to his face. I step out of the shadows to put an end to his confusion. Of course, when he gets a good look at what I'm wearing, a different look is added to the confused one.
"Just a naughty little leprechaun," I practically whisper, trying to make my voice sound sexy. Well, that's what I told myself. Really I was trying to keep him from hearing how scared I was of putting myself out in the open like this. I felt naked, even though I had on clothes. I had on very little clothes, but I was dressed none the less.
He lets out a gasp when I step closer and he can get the full picture of my little outfit. I had gone through that trunk of party clothes I keep in the back of my closet and found this little ensemble I've worn to many a college St. Patrick's Day parties. The dress was a strapless, green leather number and very short. It barely covered the green garters holding up the green fishnet stockings. It probably had just a little more coverage than the green go go boots finishing the outfit.
"Scully? What are you doing here?" he asks, his voice squeaking at the end. I had to hold back a smile at the sight of his shaking hand raising to wipe the sweat from his brow. He's nervous too. That's good. It just gives me the courage to carry this out to the end.
"Not scaring you, I hope?" I say, a fake innocent look on my face. I bat my eyelashes at him and give him a coy little smile. "I mean, we leprechauns have been known to cause you to have a nightmare or two, right?"
"Well, I can honestly say that I've never met a leprechaun who looks like you," he says hoarsely, his eyes still wide in awe.
"We're harmless, though," I continue, stepping closer to Mulder and grabbing his hand. "Full of surprises and tricks. But if you catch one, there could also be some treats involved."
I grab his other hand and then place them both on my hips, smiling when his fingers involuntarily grip tighter.
"Looks like I managed to catch one," he smiles, finally starting to relax and go with the flow. He pulls me closer to him and rests his forehead on mine, our mouths just millimeters apart.
"Yep, looks like it."
"Do I get my treat now?"
He still looks a little hesitant, despite my less than subtle attempt at seducing him. I guess I'll just have to show him that this is more than a trick. I stand on my tiptoes and lean towards him, effectively closing the gap between us. My lips crash against his, hopefully driving away any other doubts from his mind.
When we finally break apart for air, we're both grinning like idiots.
"I think from now on, all leprechaun dreams will definitely be of a more pleasant variety."
And I couldn't agree with him more. Who knew St. Patrick's Day could be so romantic?
The end.
RATING: PG
KEYWORDS: Mulder/Scully Romance, Humor
SUMMARY: Scully's upset when Mulder doesn't want to spend St. Patrick's Day with her.
Disclaimer: The characters don't belong to me. I'm just borrowing them for my own therapeutic purposes. They will be returned relatively unharmed to Chris Carter, or whoever wants to borrow them next, when I'm done.
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The door closes harder than I intended. I stare back at it through narrowed eyes as if it did it on purpose. The noisy bang is still echoing through my head and I let out a small groan, expecting to see a knowing grin on Mulder's face. But luckily, he isn't here yet. I let out a relieved sigh and search my desk for the bottle of pain reliever I know is there.
You see, yesterday was St. Patrick's Day. And being the good little Irish girl that I am, I took the day off to spend with my family and friends. Actually, it was my mother and a bunch of her friends. I barely recognized any of them. That was a pretty depressing thought and I decided that a green beer or two would help me forget about my pathetically lonely life. Well, one turned into two, two turned into four, four into . . . twelve, I think. Let's just say that by the end of the day, I had many, many friends because I was seeing double and triple images of everyone there.
When I think about it, it's all Mulder's fault that I'm standing here in the office with the worst hangover of my life. I invited him to come with me. In fact, I invite him every year to my mother's annual party, but he always turns me down. He claimed he had too much work to do, but looking around, I notice that the office looks the same as it did two days ago. It doesn't look like he's been in here in a while. It certainly doesn't look like he spent the day here doing all of that work that he supposedly had to do.
Mulder chooses that very moment to walk in, meeting my suspicious glare with one filled with guilt. I know he didn't spend the day here yesterday. And he knows that I know he didn't spend the day here. He lied to me. And has probably been lying to me for years about why he won't spend St. Patrick's Day with me.
But, being the calm, reasonable person that I am, I decide to give him a chance to explain himself to me. That's only fair, right? I mean, he could have a very good excuse for misleading me about having to work all day. He might have decided to work from home, unable to spend even a moment alone in this office without me. Or, he could have decided to volunteer his time spending the day with poor, forgotten orphans who have no one else. But, something tells me neither of those are the reason.
"Well?" I say. In a reasonable and calm way, of course. I calmly cross my arms across my chest, lift my eyebrow higher than even I have known it to go and give him a reasonable amount of time to answer the question. Two seconds is enough, don't you think? "Mulder, you didn't work yesterday, did you? You lied to me about that, didn't you?"
"Scully, I . . . "
"No, Mulder," I interrupt him. "If you didn't want to spend the day with me, then I understand. I mean, we spend more time together than most married people. I realize that you need a day to yourself once in a while. I know I sure do."
"Never, Scully. I cherish every moment . . . "
"Next time, I'll know to just not even ask because you're just going to say no. Same goes for Thanksgiving and Christmas. I'll just tell my mother the truth. That you hate the very thought of seeing me or my family any second longer than necessary."
"You know that isn't true. Why are you . . . "
"It'll probably break her heart, but that isn't your concern, is it?" I give him an icy glare and think about rolling my eyes. But my head hurts too much for that, so I just let out a pitiful sigh instead, my tirade ending with a whimper instead of a bang.
"Are you done?" he asks, a look of annoyance aimed at me. He waits for my nod before continuing. "Will you give me a chance to explain?"
Again I nod and sit wearily on the edge of my desk. I knew I should have called in sick today.
"By all means. Let me have it. But Mulder, if you so much as hint at alien involvement . . . "
This time he's the one with the glare on his face. And I decide now probably isn't the best time for bad jokes. Maybe I should listen to him. Really listen to him. I can admit to myself that I may have be a little bit hasty with the conclusions I've drawn.
"First I want to apologize," he starts. "I'm sorry I lied to you, Scully. I hope you can forgive me. You have to realize that I wouldn't have done it without a good reason."
He's right. He wouldn't lie to me without a good reason. I've known Mulder for a lot of years. I should know that about him. But then again, there often is a big difference between his idea of a good reason and my idea of a good reason. So I'm still a little leery.
"Okay, Mulder," I sigh, willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. "Why did you lie about having to work yesterday?"
"I lied and told you that I had to work because I didn't want to admit that I didn't want to go."
I just gasp in disbelief, wishing for the second time in twenty minutes that I called in sick.
"That didn't come out right," he cringes, seeing how upset his admission made me.
"How else could you have put something like that?" I shriek, despite my headache.
"It's not like I didn't want to be with you, I just didn't want to be at a St. Patrick's Day party. I hate St. Patrick's Day."
This time, my mouth just falls open in a soundless motion. He hates St. Patrick's Day?
"You hate St. Patrick's Day?" I manage to say, the disbelief obvious in my voice. "How can you hate St. Patrick's Day, Mulder? Is it just St. Patrick Day or is it also all things Irish?"
Okay, so much for calm and reasonable. I know I'm sounding a bit defensive and judgmental, but what else am I supposed to think?
"This is so hard," he says, burying his face in his hands. And I can see that this really is hard for him. And that again, I'm jumping to conclusions. This time, I'm going to listen and be understanding. We're friends. I doubt Mulder's going to tell me he hates me or my ancestors.
"I'm sorry," I apologize walking over to stand next to him. I take his hands in mine and pull them away from his face. "I'm listening, I promise. Why is it you hate St. Patrick's Day?"
"It's stupid, really," he starts. "But . . . "
I don't say anything. I just give him time to get all of his thoughts together. St. Patrick's Day probably has some horrible memory attached to it. He has a lot of bad memories from his childhood. I can't believe I thought the worst of him.
"Okay, it all started when I was a kid."
Just what I thought. A childhood trauma.
"The thing is, Scully. I, uh . . . I'm afraid of leprechauns."
Okay, so maybe it's not what I thought. It takes everything in me not to react to what he just said.
"Le-leprechauns?" I stutter, trying to hold back the giggles dying to break free. But I can't help it. Leprechauns? He's afraid of leprechauns? "Mulder, you do know they're not real, right?"
I have to fake a cough to camouflage the laughter.
"Go ahead and laugh, Scully. It's funny. I mean, I'm a grown man. I know that leprechauns aren't real. But the fear came when I was little. Something like that just doesn't go away."
"Mulder, you're priceless," I say with a chuckle. "This is just too . . . "
"Ridiculous?"
"Yeah," I say, bursting out into full bodied laughter. "It kind of is." But I eventually get my mirth under control and calm down enough to ask the twenty thousand dollar question. "What caused this, um . . . aversion to St. Patrick's Day?"
"Like I said, it all started when I was a kid. I was in kindergarten, I think. At school, they made a pretty big deal about St. Patrick's Day. The whole week leading up to it, the teachers would tell us stories about the leprechaun and how he likes to play jokes on little kids. I just thought it was a story. But then I saw it. It was a streak of green running around the school, knocking books off of desks and tipping over chairs. No classroom was left untouched. I had nightmares about that leprechaun for months."
"You poor thing," I giggle, shaking my head. "Mulder, it wasn't a real leprechaun. It was just a teacher or someone dressed up like a leprechaun."
"Scully," he whines. "Of course I know that. Now, I do. But when you're a little five year old, seeing is believing. It didn't matter how many times my mother told me leprechauns weren't real. All I know is that I saw one. You know how I am when I get an idea like that in my head."
"Yeah, I guess I'm lucky we don't chase little green men after all," I joke. And I finally get the reaction I was waiting for. He smiles that beautiful smile of his and starts to laugh. It's makes my stomach flutter. Or maybe that's the hangover, I think as the fluttering turns to nausea. In either case, I realize that calling it a day and going home sick isn't such a bad idea after all.
As it turns out, a few more aspirin, a gallon of water, and a five hour nap can work wonders on a hangover. I wake up feeling good as new, my St. Patrick's Day disaster all but forgotten. But something was still nagging at me. I may be cured, but Mulder still has issues. If I don't do something now, we'll be spending St. Patrick's Day apart for a long, long time. I refuse to let that happen.
With my mind made up, I jump out of bed and into the shower. If I hurry, I just may make it before he gets home from work.
Two hours later, I'm in Mulder's apartment, putting the final touches on the living room when I hear his key in the lock. I panic briefly, but then realize that it's too late to turn back. I've come this far. There's no backing out now. I duck into the kitchen just as he pushes the door open.
Mulder steps into the room and immediately notices the changes I made. A few videos and CD's were tossed around the floor. And his computer chair and coffee table were knocked over. But that's all I'll own up to. The rest of the mess is his.
"Is anyone there?" he calls out, a distressed look coming to his face. I step out of the shadows to put an end to his confusion. Of course, when he gets a good look at what I'm wearing, a different look is added to the confused one.
"Just a naughty little leprechaun," I practically whisper, trying to make my voice sound sexy. Well, that's what I told myself. Really I was trying to keep him from hearing how scared I was of putting myself out in the open like this. I felt naked, even though I had on clothes. I had on very little clothes, but I was dressed none the less.
He lets out a gasp when I step closer and he can get the full picture of my little outfit. I had gone through that trunk of party clothes I keep in the back of my closet and found this little ensemble I've worn to many a college St. Patrick's Day parties. The dress was a strapless, green leather number and very short. It barely covered the green garters holding up the green fishnet stockings. It probably had just a little more coverage than the green go go boots finishing the outfit.
"Scully? What are you doing here?" he asks, his voice squeaking at the end. I had to hold back a smile at the sight of his shaking hand raising to wipe the sweat from his brow. He's nervous too. That's good. It just gives me the courage to carry this out to the end.
"Not scaring you, I hope?" I say, a fake innocent look on my face. I bat my eyelashes at him and give him a coy little smile. "I mean, we leprechauns have been known to cause you to have a nightmare or two, right?"
"Well, I can honestly say that I've never met a leprechaun who looks like you," he says hoarsely, his eyes still wide in awe.
"We're harmless, though," I continue, stepping closer to Mulder and grabbing his hand. "Full of surprises and tricks. But if you catch one, there could also be some treats involved."
I grab his other hand and then place them both on my hips, smiling when his fingers involuntarily grip tighter.
"Looks like I managed to catch one," he smiles, finally starting to relax and go with the flow. He pulls me closer to him and rests his forehead on mine, our mouths just millimeters apart.
"Yep, looks like it."
"Do I get my treat now?"
He still looks a little hesitant, despite my less than subtle attempt at seducing him. I guess I'll just have to show him that this is more than a trick. I stand on my tiptoes and lean towards him, effectively closing the gap between us. My lips crash against his, hopefully driving away any other doubts from his mind.
When we finally break apart for air, we're both grinning like idiots.
"I think from now on, all leprechaun dreams will definitely be of a more pleasant variety."
And I couldn't agree with him more. Who knew St. Patrick's Day could be so romantic?
The end.