It had been a week since Scully had seen or talked to her daughter. A week, 2 hours and 33 seconds to be exact. She had been emailing her once a day for the past week. It had started as a simple email apologizing and wishing her a Merry Christmas and how sad she was that they were spending it apart. Now, she found herself writing to her about her days.
Now, it was New Year's Day, or Morning rather, it was 1 a.m. She had spent it alone. She couldn't remember the last time she spent the holidays alone. She didn't think she ever had. She'd received invites from her friends in Texas, but she was not up to it. Although none of her emails had been returned yet, she held on to hope that maybe she would return it. Sadly, she had hoped that her daughter would show up tonight and spend New Year's Eve with her. She'd been disappointed. She took another sip of her wine as she finished typing her first email to Amy for the year.
That same week she decided to email Mulder. To which he replied with a phone call. A phone call that led to a 3 hour conversation. They made this a routine. They would talk each night before they went to bed, which was tricky with the difference in time zones. From him she learned that Amy had been seeing him trying to get to know him. They never discussed what Amy's feelings were towards her.
A week after New Year's Day, Scully came home from work and immediately felt something different about her house. She walked around making sure everything was in order, as she walked into her daughters room, her first thought was that she'd been robbed and that the robbers were probably still inside waiting to come attack her. If it hadn't been for that note, she would've never thought it possible. All the note said was, Came for my things; and she knew. She knew her daughter had come around, grabbed her clothes, her pictures, her belongings, and taken them with her. Away from Scully. Their deal was over. Their deal for Amy to live at home until she obtained her Bachelor's degree, to which she would later move out, and most likely to another city, on to obtain her PhD.
The first thing she thought of to do was call Mulder.
"Mulder." He answered into the phone.
"Why didn't you tell me she was going to do this? Why?" Scully said realizing her emotions were quickly getting out of control.
"Tell you what Scully, are you ok?" Mulder said sincerely
"Tell me that she was coming home, that she was coming for her things while I was gone at work. Why would she do this?!" Scully yelled into the phone.
"Scully, I didn't…I…what…she…she did what?" Mulder asked truly confused, "She said she was going back home." I assumed she was going back home to you, not back home to Texas.
"Mulder, I…I…I" Scully started hyperventilating while sobbing heavily into the phone. She dropped the phone onto the floor to try to get a hold of herself. After a few minutes, her breathing returned back to normal, but the tears kept on coming. She crawled onto her bed and hugged her legs up to her chest. She cried until she couldn't cry anymore. She could hear her cell ringing in the distance, then her home phone, but she ignored both. She fell asleep to a restless sleep.
The next morning, Scully woke up hoping that all that had happened recently had been a nightmare, but when she woke up to silence she realized that this was her reality.
The next couple of weeks were some sort of grieving period for her, first she tried to deny what was happening; her own daughter, the person that had become her life, could not be doing this to her. She then became angry, with herself for messing up so much, and with her daughter for acting this way. Then she became depressed. She seemed to be stuck in this stage.
Her birthday had come and gone without much acknowledgement. The only call she received was from Mulder, and she hadn't even bothered picking it up. He left her a nice message though. Her co-workers gave her the typical birthday cake everyone received on their birthday. It was more of an excuse to get out of the office and eat some cake without feeling guilty for most of them. She felt like she was becoming dark and twisty inside. Working with all the dead bodies didn't help much either. Her students were worse. Her friends forced her into a night at dinner then drinks later. She bailed after dinner, but they had been happy enough that she was out of the house. All of them were aware of her situation so getting her out of the house had been a small victory.
Scully kept sending her daughter an email each night, some asking for forgiveness, others scorning her for leaving without an explanation, others just telling her about her day, but most about how much she missed her.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
Now, 5 months later after that night in which her daughter found out the truth about her father in Washington, she was turning 20; probably spending it with Mulder. She thought. Now she was bitter.
Her morning had been worse than her regular bad mornings. She spilled coffee all over her suit right as she was walking out the door, which made her have to run back inside and change. Which made her late to class. Her students had left by the time she made it to class. If only she could leave her class each time one of her students arrived late to class. Just as she walked into her office she realized she had forgotten her lunch on her dining table at home. Then during her lunch hour, as she went to pay for the lunch she had on her tray, she realized her wallet was not in her purse as she believed, so she had to go through the embarrassment of putting everything back and starving to the end of the day and through her next 2 classes. If only she knew her day was about to get worse.
That day on her way home, the person in the car in front of her decided to stomp on their brakes while they were in the middle of the freeway going 70 mph. "Great!" was all she thought as she heard and felt bangs coming from all directions, and then everything went black.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
It had been 2 weeks since Amy had received an email from her mother. She didn't admit it to anyone, not even to herself, but she looked forward to reading her mother's emails every night before she went to sleep. On her birthday she had opted to not go anywhere, she wasn't up to it. She had asked Mulder to stay in D.C. and not come for a visit. She had been down lately. All she really wanted to do was pick up the phone and call her mother and make up with her and have everything go back to normal. But she was so damn stubborn she couldn't get herself to do it. Mulder, which is what she called him, she still could not bring herself to call him 'dad' or 'father' yet. She knew her mother must've had her reasons for doing what she did, and Mulder reminded her of this every day; keeping the details to himself saying that she and Scully needed to discuss that amongst themselves.
Her birthday email never came. She figured she deserved as much as she didn't even bothered to text her mother to wish her a happy birthday.
Now it had been a two weeks since her last email. She hesitated to ask Mulder about her mother but wanted to know if she had finally reached her wits end with her.
"Mulder." Mulder answered the phone groggily, it was 2 a.m.
"Hi, it's me." Amy said, the all too familiar phrase for Mulder, but so unfamiliar for Amy.
"Ames, is everything ok? What's going on?" he said sitting up immediately on his bed, checking the time.
"Everything is ok, dad," she called him dad for the first time. His heart jumped, "I...I uh…was just wondering if you had spoken to mom" She asked nervously.
"Not in a while. I just got done with a case, and I had been busy, I think she must be busy as well since she hasn't called ME in a while." Mulder said still half asleep, "what is this about Amy?" he asked her.
"Well…mom's been emailing me, once a day, ever since that day…and um, she…she hasn't emailed me since the day before my birthday…." Amy said. This was new to Mulder, he had no idea that Scully and Amy had been emailing back and forth. He was under the impression that all communication lines had been cut.
"Well, honey, if she hasn't responded to your last email I'm sure she'll get to it as soon as she isn't so busy, isn't it around finals time now?" Mulder half asked half told her.
"No, I never responded to any of her emails. But I read them all." Amy said ashamed of herself.
Mulder wasn't sure if no communication was worse than writing emails to your daughter and never getting a response.
"Well Amy, you know then that she's been having a very rough time. She has not had it easy. You've been upset and angry all of this time, but she's been dealing with you leaving her and not wanting to listen to her explain to you her reasons." Mulder repeated this for the millionth time in the past 5 months.
Amy felt a tear roll down her cheek, "you're right; I think she just got tired of it." Amy said matter-of-factly. "I'll call her tomorrow and see how we can start to fix this." Amy said.
"Good girl. Now go to sleep, its late." Mulder ordered while smiling into the phone.
"Ok, I will, have a good night." Amy said. As they hung up the phone, she wasn't sure if she wanted to wait until the morning, so she dialed the all too familiar number. Straight to voicemail. Hi, you've reached Dana Scully, please lea--- she hung up, she probably turned her cell off. This would have to wait till the morning. She would get up extra early and make her way across town from the apartment she was sharing with her best friend, to her mother's house.
THE NEXT MORNING—6 am
As Amy parked her car in the driveway, she immediately knew something was wrong. It was still dark outside but she could see that he lawn had not been mowed in what seemed like a while. She exited her car, as she noticed the porch light was not on; her mother always turned it on and only turned if off as she left for work in the mornings. The mailbox was overflowing with mail. She still managed to ring the door bell. No answer. Hoping her mother had not changed the key locks to the door, she tried her key. It worked. She walked inside and looked around. The place was empty. It looked as though no one had been there in a while. There was something seriously wrong. She had that feeling.
"Mulder."
"Dad, something is wrong." She said standing inside the home she once occupied and at another time abandoned.
