So I randomly remembered I had this sitting in my google doc, it's a little shaky, and totally out of my comfort zone - but I hope you like it. Just little domestic snippets of Mulder, Scully, and their love child.
Mulder always thought he'd die alone. That's not in the self-deprecatory sense, just honesty. He didn't think he would ever find someone that would put up with him. Someone who would willingly want to, at that. He was obsessive, he was intense, and he had a hard time opening up to people. Let alone the fact that his head was constantly in the sky looking for aliens and UFOs, missing any opportunities that were right in front of him to make human connection. But he supposed the anecdote was right: if one's head goes high enough, they're bound to find an angel. He sure did. A scientific, rational, passionate angel.
Scully.
With her red halo and ability to absolve him with her touch, give him penance with her words. He thought he was lucky enough just having her. Living side by side with the woman who meant the world to him. Then, in some cosmic phenomena, someone else came into his life.
Katherine Mulder-Scully. The ultimate combination of the two of them. A little girl with hair as red as a fox, and eyes so blue he found a new sky to get lost in. He thinks the nurse might have been concerned with how much Scully and himself were crying. Born exactly on the due date, 7 pounds and 11 ounces, and in perfect health. After years of struggling with this or that, he was happy he finally had something so exactly as planned.
Scully said fatherhood suited him. He hoped that was true. When she cried in the night, he'd be running. If she needed a diaper change, a bottle, a hug, or a kiss, he was right there. He was at the beck and call of an infant and he'd honestly have it no other way.
"She's a daddy's girl, you know that, right?" Scully teased him once as he bounced the giggly girl on his lap.
"Why do you think that?" he asked, peppering the giggling baby with kisses to prolong the music in the air.
"The first time she crawled was to get in your lap, her first steps were in your arms, she wails if you aren't paying her any attention," Scully laughed.
"May I remind you that you were right beside me for all those examples. Impossible to determine," he offered.
"No, I know I'm right," she praised with a smile, placing a kiss to his shoulder. "No grudges here, I understand completely where she's coming from," she added, wrapping her arms around him as she made faces at Katie.
Then the little baby confirmed Scully's hypothesis. "Dah-dee," she babbled, grabbing onto Mulder's nose, her favorite part of him. Mulder and Scully gasped and turned to each other in proud enthusiasm.
Her first word.
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When she was three, she went through an 'everything makes me cry' phase. He liked to argue it was harder for him than it was for her. Every time those bright blue eyes filled with tears and her bottom lip quivered, he felt like he wanted to do the same. Scully teased him a lot for being the most emotionally invested father in the world, but behind her teasing tone he could see the adoration and happiness she really felt. What could he say? He just wanted his girls to be happy.
Her crying wasn't out of not getting her way, like with most three year olds; it was out of a profound empathy that Scully liked to joke was genetically passed down from him. He didn't know about that, but what he did know was that he loved his daughter. The daughter who cried hysterically when she saw a sick person on the tv, when a dog on the street didn't appear to have an owner, whenever she realized the world was mean, despite his best efforts to shield her from that one truth.
Once she spontaneously started crying during breakfast, big, fat tears that rolled down her cheeks like waterfalls. They had just been eating when she stared between them for a moment, as if truly seeing them for the first time, before the waterworks started. They had no idea what could have caused her outburst. When she was able to catch her breath, she whimpered, "Is daddy sick?"
Mulder looked down at himself. He was wearing an old grey t-shirt and some sweatpants. He hadn't had taken the time to brush his hair since it was Saturday and they had nowhere to go, but he didn't think he looked that bad.
"Why would you say that, sweetheart?" Scully asked kissing her cheeks as if she could kiss away her distress.
Her face crumpled and she turned to Scully, keening to the gods "No red hair!" From her throne on her stool, she pointed a chubby finger at his offending head, glaring at the strands of brown hair through an ocean of tears.
Scully's face took on that impenetrable mask of an adult trying not to hurt a child's feelings by laughing at them, but struggling to contain their adoration. "You're worried because Daddy's hair isn't red?" She asked, her voice drenched in amusement.
Katie haphazardly pulled at a strand of Scully's hair with a fist as she held it up to her own scalp, a crimson masterpiece.
Mulder's heart overflowed with love. In his daughter's world, her hair was red, mommy's hair was red, so something must be wrong with daddy. Seeing the big fat globs of tears streaming down her face at the prospect of something setting him apart from them made him want to rush over and smother her with love. So he did.
He kissed her all over and reassured her that he was healthy, even though he was a brunette. In true Scully fashion, she had to tug on his scalp to make sure everything checked out before believing him. Then, as if she hadn't been bawling a moment ago, she sniffled and asked, "Do you wan' red hair?"
He was curious what she would have offered if he said yes, but he just shook his head. "Nope, it doesn't matter what color hair I have, because I spend all my time looking at you and mommy."
He received two beaming smiles, and an affirmation that he'd made the right choice. "Good," she stated, picking up her neglected Cheerios. Scully burst out laughing and he couldn't help but join her.
She insisted Katie's empathy came from him, but only someone with Scully blood had ever cared for him like that.
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When she was four, Scully brought her into his office and he could tell it was going to be good from the way Scully was biting back a smile. The smile that screamed "Our daughter did something adorably cute, but she's taking this very seriously and I don't want her to think I'm making fun." A smile they each wore multiple times a day. As they got closer to him, Katie all the sudden seemed to get shy and buried her face into Scully's pant leg, peeking at him over the stretched fabric with a mischievous smirk as she held something behind her back.
"Hello my loves, what's going on?"
"So," Scully began, amusement dancing in her eyes. "Katie saw on the calendar that next Sunday is father's day-"
"Tha's you!" Katie squealed, jumping up once on impatient feet.
Mulder gasped and opened his eyes in mock-shock, "Really?" he exclaimed.
The little girl took a step over so he could see her nod her head enthusiastically, still grabbing onto Scully. The taller redhead snorted lightly before continuing, "-but someone got a little excited and wanted to celebrate right now."
"Celebrate?" he asked. Katie had been too young to understand the past few years, so usually Scully and him just celebrated in bed when the evidence of his fatherhood went to sleep.
"She made something for you," Scully explained. She bent down so she was closer to eye level with the blushing little girl. "Go show him, okay? He's going to love it."
Katie regarded her with her big eyes before they latched onto him. Slowly she padded her way towards him and he held his arms out to lift her onto his lap. "What did you make sweetheart?" he asked, kissing her ruby ringlets.
Instead of answering, she shoved a piece of paper at him. He took it gently and looked at the top.
1040 U.S. JOINT INCOME TAX RETURN
He glanced up to Scully and she mouthed 'other side'. Flipping it over he saw an elaborate crayon drawing. In the middle there was a figure with brown spiky hair and a big smile holding up a shorter, smiling red headed figure with black high heels and an even shorter red headed figure with manic curls and a smile so big you could see all her teeth. "Oh, Katie, is this us? I love it?" he praised earnestly.
"Mhm," she affirmed, nodding her head so hard her whole body moved. She pivoted on his lap so she could point. "Tha's you, a-and you're holdin' up me an' mommy," she explained.
"Wow, I must be really strong," he exclaimed.
"Mhm, mhm, look, I gave you mus-muscles." Taking a closer look, he saw that she quite literally made him more muscular than he'd even been in his entire life. "Because-because, you're so strong an' you always hug me and mommy and I like it when you pick me up," she rambled adorably, stumbling over her words a bit in excitement.
Mulder looked up and saw Scully using a hand to cover her smile, enraptured by the scene in front of her. He kissed her temple a few times until she squealed in laughter. When he stopped a different part of the drawing stood out to him and he pointed at a red rectangle attached to his neck. "What's that Katie-bear?"
"Issa cape," she proclaimed. "Because you are my sooperman, an' you always make me feel safe and you al-always take care of me. An-and you make me happy. See," she said pointing to the smile on cartoon-Katie. "You make me smile an' I love you!" she declared, pointing to all the hearts surrounding them. She had to have at least drawn close to one hundred hearts in waxy precision.
"I love you so much, Katie," he whispered, hugging her tightly against him. It was hard to get the words out through the clenching of his throat. His face felt hot and he could feel the tears pooling in his eyes as his lip quivered.
Scully must've noticed because she walked around to the other side of him and placed a kiss on his head, rubbing circles into his back, misty-eyed herself.
He felt so loved. So unconditionally loved.
When he was a child, safe and loved were just dreams he had intermittently mixed within the nightmares. He got disdain and resentment, and he was determined to give his daughter a better life. Hearing her so innocently confirm he was doing that was overwhelming. In her eyes, he did no wrong. For a man tainted by self-doubt, it was the best gift he could receive.
"Daddy are you sad?" she asked, bringing an uncoordinated hand up to wipe at his face.
He grabbed the tiny little hand and brought it to his lips, placing a kiss to her palm. "No, honey. You make me so happy. I love you and mommy so much, you two are my whole world."
"But you're cwying," she said, kissing his cheeks like her mommy did for her when she was sad.
"Because he loves you so much he can't contain it all in his body," Scully explained from above him. He could tell by her voice she was having a hard time containing her love in her body too.
"You guys are silly," she giggled, hugging him back.
His journey started when a little girl was taken away from him, and never in his wildest dreams did he imagine it would end with him getting the gift of bringing a new little girl into the world.
A little girl birthed by the love of his life. His, hers, theirs.