Character: Dana Scully
Fandom: The X-Files
Rating: PG-13
Prompt Norman Bates: Uh-uh, Mother-m-mother, uh, what is the phrase? She isn't quite herself today. (Psycho) Vol 2. Week 40 on scifi_museson LiveJournal
Setting: Season Four Episode: Home
I never saw you as a mother…
Scully blinked at the wall between their rooms, hearing the scraping noise of Mulder doing something in there. Judging from the amount of static she could hear from the television and the occasional swearing, he was fiddling with the antenna. As predicted, Mulder far away from cable television and regular cellular service was quickly becoming antsy. He'd never make it in the country, the quiet, the peacefulness; the lack of gunfire or alien conspiracies would drive him slowly mad.
She couldn't say she was too settled herself.
Sadly she picked through the Polaroid snapshots she had managed to get of the dead baby. The tiny, horribly malformed body was twisted and red, but sadly pathetic on its tiny tray in the middle of a sink in a small bathroom. While a part of her was horrified by the very notion of this child's existence, another was heartbroken at the manner of its death. The little one had not asked to be created, hadn't asked to be made the way he was. And he equally hadn't asked to die in this manner. What was that verse her priests always used to mention, "Suffer the little children to come unto me?"
All the thousands of women out there who wanted children, who were unable to have children, and someone would toss this little one out into an abandoned field, defects and all. It bothered her on a primal level, that part of her that was a woman, who wanted to be a mother. Wanted to be a mother…that was a thought that hadn't really occurred to her clearly before.
Scully swallowed around it, twiddling her pen haplessly in her fingers. Till that moment motherhood had been a rather vague concept. It was something she thought about from time-to-time, especially as she got phone calls from friends with happy news on their latest offspring. Her best friend Ellen now had two, Trevor the boy Scully had served as godmother too, and his newest little brother Jacob. Ellen's newest child had come as a surprise to Scully, who had once been so close to her college best friend. And though she often served as Jacob's impromptu babysitter on the weekends, it only highlighted the fact that she had grown so very far away from Ellen and her other friends, with their families and children. Here she was, thirty-two years old, still single, not even looking for a relationship, no children, no home, no legacy….
Outside of a friendship with a man who would likely go mad fairly soon if he didn't get his television working right, she snorted, as another knock sounded on the other side of the wall. Mulder had said he had never seen her as a mother before. Why? Had it even occurred to him she might want that one day, to leave his quest behind and settle down with some stable man, buy a home, a dog, raise a pack full of rambunctious kids? She had never vocalized that desire out loud, especially not to him, but it had floated there, in the back of her mind. Babysitting adopted nephews was all well and good, and she had to admit she took an inordinate amount of pleasure watching over Jacob when she had that time with him. But he was still Ellen's son…not hers. And somewhere inside of her that biological clock ticked on and on.
It wasn't only the Peacock boys who felt that biological imperative, she sighed, rising from the bed. Sadly, when was the last time she had even gotten to entertain that imperative? Ethan? That had been years ago. And she hadn't wanted children with him….Ethan had been a dalliance, a fun way to pass the time, like Jack…like frankly anyone since Daniel. That had been the last time she had seen herself with children, her girlish fantasies of living with Daniel, marrying, having his children. Perhaps that was why it horrified her so to know he hadn't left his old family behind. How could she sit there, dreaming of a life with him, of children, when he clearly couldn't be fair to the family he already had.
Perhaps that was why, at thirty-two, she was still single, still childless…she couldn't forgive herself for the sin of falling in love with a married man. She paused, staring at herself in the mirror above the worn dresser in her room. Mulder would say that this was a logic line of reasoning, her reticent to form new, personal relationships was hampered by her own personal guilt over what had happened and tempered by the aching hurt Daniel's betrayal had caused. She didn't have a relationship because she didn't want to face that sort of pain again.
Except for Mulder….
She paused, stock-still as she let that thought mull in her mind. Where had that come from? Mulder was her partner, her friend, her best friend when she admitted it. He was the reason she was standing there alive at that moment, and not dead at the hands of Schnauz, or Pfaster, or any other crazy they happened to find on a case. Of course she would feel beholden to him emotionally for everything that he did for her. And she of course would feel tied to him through all the hardships they had suffered, the mutual loss of family, the many hospital stays by each other's bedsides, the mutual awareness of the large conspiracy that had drawn her into it and had taken her away from him. There was a lot to link her to her erstwhile partner, good and bad. But would she really consider it a relationship?
Not a romantic one, at least not in the strictest sense of the word. Much as she hated to admit it, Scully knew and had known for a while that the feelings that lay between herself and Mulder were far from strictly professional. It wasn't totally unexpected, she chided herself, often those sorts of bonds formed between partners in the FBI, close connections of friendship and trust born over stake outs and deadly situations. She and Mulder would hardly be the first.
But there were times…such as Mulder's observation earlier, when she became painfully aware that they were more than just partners or even friends. He was a very attractive man, and she was a reasonably attractive woman, and they were together…a lot. Her face flushed in the mirror as she turned suddenly, the idea twisting in her brain uncomfortably. It was Mulder, her partner, a man she worked with everyday. Yes, he was handsome…her sister Melissa had referred to him as a "hottie," much to Scully's horror.
She couldn't pretend not to notice how women would occasionally eye him, even in the hallways of the Hoover Building, where he was called "Spooky." And frankly she remembered all to well the string of women he once had calling the office when she first met him, though those were long gone now. Much as Mulder had never seen her as a mother before, Scully had to admit she hadn't really thought of Mulder as…well more than Mulder before. Attractive, yes, there were always those moments of embarrassed realization, when's he felt herself physically attracted to her partner…who wouldn't be? And she was certain that not all his playfully inappropriate banter stemmed from some deep-seated need to annoy her. The scientist in her shrugged this off, it happened. It was a perfectly normal, human response, just as normal as the Peacock brother's desire to procreate. But that was all it was…just a response. He was her friend, her very best friend, closer to her than even her family at the moment…and yet…
There had been that painful awkwardness when's he had pushed him on the Schnauz cause, of what he would do if something had happened to her. Mulder didn't want to face that possibility. Why? She'd long known she was the only thing keeping her partner from jumping off the deep end totally, the one pulling him back from the edge. But what if she wasn't there? What if she did decide to walk away from all of this…to find a husband, raise a child, and become a doctor? What if she dropped this tomorrow and walked away to become a mother?
What would Mulder do without her? A better question, she privately wondered, what would she do without him? Could she walk away from all of this, his work, their quest, the questions about what had been done to her, to pursue a life more ordinary? Was she willing to leave Mulder behind to do it? And did she really want to walk away from him at all?
Well, aside from the need for corrective lenses and a tendency to be abducted by extraterrestrials involved in an international governmental conspiracy, the Mulder family passes genetic muster.
Down that path lay madness, she cautioned herself, shutting her eyes to all the possibilities that it brought up. Her friend…her very best friend…a man who she would give her life for if necessary…but still only her friend….
The knock on her door caused her to leap, yelping as she scrambled to answer it, swallowing the guilt of her own, errant thoughts, she barely glanced up at Mulder's perturbed face. He didn't seem to notice as he gestured to his room.
"You care to help me for a minute, I'm trying to get the TV to work right, and…"
"No, not at all," she muttered, willing away the flush on her cheeks as she reached for her notes on the table. "Besides, gives me a chance to go over some of these case notes with you."
"Was hoping to get the game," he sighed forlornly, shuffling back to his room.
Mulder wouldn't make it five minutes in the country.
