N as Night
"Voici mon secret. Il est très simple : on ne voit bien qu'avec le coeur. L'essentiel est invisible pour les yeux."/"And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
Le Petit Prince/The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Notes: Some inspiration and all the quotes in italic are coming from the novella "Le Petit Prince" by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (English translation).
The female red fox stepped out of the woods and trotted towards the unremarkable house she was used to frequent on her nocturnal wanderings. It was a safe and suitable place in her territory to find some tiny preys and various food. Every now and then, she could observe movements inside or outside the house and she would satisfy her curiosity about the humans living here, sticking around far longer than necessary. Sometimes, if she was lucky enough, she could watch the tall man sitting on the porch or standing in the yard eyes raised upon the sky. She would then spend time circling slowly around him, or staying quietly on the grass a few meters away, feeling attracted by this non-threatening being, his odor and his hypnotic low voice. Was the human aware of her presence? She wasn't sure, but if so, she felt no danger. Tonight, the weather was cold and quiet, a three-quarter moon in a cloudless sky bringing a bright light on the landscape -surely too much luminosity to remain unseen and discreet for the whole wildlife but the gracile red fox wouldn't mind moving into the open yard.
In the shared bed upstairs the unremarkable house, Mulder abruptly waked up from his recurrent nightmare. As usual he had been in that damn alien spaceship -or whatever hellish place it had been- reliving too vividly the horrendous torture he had been through so many years ago. He knew that he would never ever come in peace with this part of his life, that the traumatic event would haunt him till his death. Though, time passing, he had somehow subdued and controlled the induced fears and traumas, lessening the toughest effects of the nocturnal nightmare on his body and mind. Tonight was one of these relatively preserved nights. He had been extracted from his bad dream suddenly but rather softly, knowing in a second where he was -in the safest place he could be, beside his beloved Scully- and not being completely soaked by sweat. Hopefully, he hadn't awaken her -she was still sleeping deeply- so, in an instant, any remaining trace of angst vanished.
Anticipating the one to two hours of insomnia he would have to go through, he took time to appreciate Scully's presence by his side. He noticed that she was lying askew in the bed and was hugely invading his personal space -actually, they weren't even located in their usual sides of the bed. They both had quickly fallen asleep while snuggling in their intimate postcoital cuddle and their positions hadn't really changed since, they were just more disentangled. Mulder was highly tempted to touch Scully, to slide his hand along her warm naked body then to linger on her miraculous swollen belly, but that would be unwise -she deserved the most peaceful sleep in the world. Instead he inhaled and sniffed her scent on every accessible part of flesh and hair, even on the pillows, the sheets and his hands. Among the mixed smells he was trying to discern Scully's different fragrances, to specify them -the long-lasting ones that would bring memories of their first close encounters in the basement or in his apartment, the recent ones that would recall him how blessed he was to have her once again by his side.
Now completely awaken and fulfilled by comforting and warm feelings he left the bed, grabbed clothes, dressed in the corridor and walked down the stairs. He poured water in a glass at the sink, and while drinking it beside the window he noticed the quiet weather and the cloudless sky. That was perfect to carry out some night rituals. He put on his warm coat and boots and got out. Once outside he slowly moved forward on the porch, allowing time for his eyes to familiarize with the semi-darkness, all ears and attentive to the surroundings. He finally walked down the yard, and raised his head to the stars and the moon.
"I can sense you are here, my little alter ego," Mulder said with a soft voice. "That's good to see you once again. Seems that we have always the same schedule."
He spent time to contemplate the sky, to let the starlight and the weight of the universe unleash his deepest emotions and thoughts, the ones that could only been revealed in such circumstances.
"I already told you, I'll be a father. It's huge and overwhelming, as much as the universe upon me. Time to redefine priorities and responsabilities."
He paused a few minutes.
" 'All men have stars but they are not the same things for different people.' Mine are Samantha. My sister has settled in any one of them and she is happy there, laughing loudly as she was used to do when we rode our bikes to the beach. 'At night I love to listen to the stars. It is like five hundred million little bells.' And if I'm lucky enough I can also witness falling stars. It's when Samantha remembers that's I'm here on Earth, waving at me and calling out my name... Fox."
He smiled and turned his head, looking in the direction of the red fox he could only vaguely discern.
"Fox. Can you imagine what it takes to be called by this name?"
He then gazed at the moon, its three-quarter face facing him and keeping an eye on the planet below.
"Here stands my mother. She looks after me but her care and attention periodically fluctuates. She sometimes even hides herself in the daylight, still having guilt and shame, not being able to completely and permanently face me and her past. But it's okay, I understand her feelings. Right now she's quite bright and radiant."
Though, not wanting to dig too much in his feelings about his mother, Mulder turned around and scanned the part of sky opposite to the moon, searching for satellites.
"There," Mulder said after a few minutes, pointing a moving tiny light. "There are the Lone Gunmen. Always together, packed like sardines in this highly technological van, spying and hacking, checking the whole planet and seeking conspiracies."
Mulder lowered his head and faced the animal.
"And my father? I must find him a place somewhere if I want to be one myself. It's hard and still unresolved. My feelings about him remain too wild and still troubled... For lack of a better, I could pretend that you would be him, whatever your gender, for how long you would want to encounter me. I sense that you are attracted to me, as I am to you, and yet we would have to tame each other. And when you are gone, I will still remember you, sticking around the house. What do you think of that, little wild fox?"
The red mammal was half hidden by a bush down the porch since the human had stepped out in the grass, searching lazily for odors and -unsuccessfully- for tiny food. She had raised her head on these last human words, sniffing the air and trying to figure out why she was compelled to get closer to this being each time she was visiting the yard. The man turned back and softly climbed the stairs to the porch. Before entering the house, speaking more loudly in her direction in a authoritative tone, he said: "Don't leave! I'm coming back quickly!" After a few seconds of indecision, she walked forward to the place he was standing moments ago, lingering there, once more not able to leave, too intoxicated by the intricate smells hovering above her.
As soon as she heard the door creaking the red fox groveled instantly on the grass and remained still, hoping not to be seen by the human coming back, yet not at all afraid. Her instinct should have made her flee away or take shelter into the bushes or under the porch, but, once again, she behaved incautiously as if she was under a magic spell.
Mulder came back arms filled with his laptop and smartphone, a warm blanket and a sunflower seeds bag. He delicately dropped all his stuff on the relaxing chair, picked up the seeds and quietly moved to the top of the steps. He looked for the fox but couldn't see her, flattened as she was in the grass.
"I don't know if you are still here, but I believe so. Let me give you some seeds. It might not be a delicacy for you, yet it's something that links me to my father... the one who raised me," Mulder said out loud while spreading handfuls of seeds in the grass surrounding the foot of the porch stairs.
Then he settled into the armchair, making himself comfortable for the hour he would spend outside.
"Well, should I pretend you listen to me? If not... I'm just talking to myself out loud, is that a problem? As long as Scully doesn't know..."
He opened his laptop, picked and chewed some sunflower seeds. Waiting for the computer to start, he resumed his monologue.
"I have to make precise plans and projects for the future, when the baby is born. I want to stay at home for a while, be a full-time father before school arrives. Scully would soon need to socialize, to go to work, to save lifes at the hospital or wherever. You know, I have to convince her that I won't go astray or meet again the big black dog..."
At these words, the little red fox stood up. She had sniffed the sunflower seeds and, as she hadn't eaten enough since the night had fallen, found the odor very attractive -even intrinsically associated to the tall man. Keeping her eyes and nose on him -he seemed less threatening from where he was now standing- she walked forward to the bottom of the steps.
"Go on, treat yourself my friend, those are harmless seeds," Mulder said with a huge smile.
"Those are not 'seeds of the baobab'... I had done my duty for so many years, I had suffered so much and made my beloved ones suffer even more. I'm tired of watching out for all the threatenings, all the darkness seeds growing up on our damn doomed Earth. True that 'a baobab is something you will never, never be able to get rid of if you attend to it too late. It spreads over the entire planet.' But for now, for a while, Scully and I deserve some peace..."
Mulder glanced at the fox, its head leaned over the sunflower seeds. The vision warmed his heart and gave him hope. Hope that he and Scully would be indeed in a happier path, hope that he would make peace and sense about his paternal linkages and feelings.
"Scully once said to me to write the darkness down, to put it in a book. It's what I will do. It's what I have begun to do these last nights. That would convince her that I'm serious about my plans. And there's more I want to do. Write stories for our kid, maybe for all the kids. 'I do not much like to take the tone of a moralist. But the danger of the baobabs is so little understood. Children, watch out for the baobabs!' That also sounds like a respectable purpose, isn't it?"
The fox was tasting the sunflower seeds, cracking and chewing them in her mouth, making too much noise. At first, she didn't notice that the human had moved unusually and swapped his laptop for his smartphone. Soon, she sensed the man's agitation even if he hadn't left his position on the porch. She raised her head in his direction and a bright flash hit her eyes. This time, she fled in a blink.
"Oh, shit!" she heard while running towards the woods.
When Mulder came back afterwards to the bedroom, he discovered that Scully was now lying straight on her side of the bed, still deeply sleeping. He undressed and settled under the sheets, delighted to feel remnants of Scully's presence on his side -her warmth, smells and some slight cavities on the mattress and the pillow. He fell alseep instantly.
Hours later, when the night was about to give way to the dawn, Scully waked up, needing to go to the toilet. The room was filled by Mulder's audible breathes, a sign he was profoundly sleeping. She wanted to linger a while, to get closer to his body, but she had imperatives to satisfy. She left the bed, put on her robe and went to the upstairs bathroom. Then she walked down to the kitchen and poured orange juice in a glass. Stepping towards the couch, she noticed all Mulder's stuff that had been laid on it hours ago. She knew that he was regularly up in the middle of the night, going through insomnia by working on something. Something he would explain to her later, when he's ready. She noticed that her smartphone had been moved, prominently displayed on the coffee table. A green light was blinking on it.
"Mulder...," Scully muttered.
She checked her phone and, indeed, she had received a message from him. Actually, two. On the first there was a photo, full of darkness, with a kind of blurry shape in its center. She read : "My new friend, a red fox I have tamed with sunflower seeds." She smiled, thinking of Mulder and his love for blurry photos of monsters. The second one was lightened -he must have used the flash for that one- but she could only see a movement, red colored. She read : "I screwed up using the flash."
Remembering Mulder and his supposedly pictures of a were-monster, she grabbed the two notebooks and a pen she kept nearby. Months ago, when she had known she was pregnant, she had decided to write down memories for her future child. One notebook related to her childhood and her family, one other focusing on her relationship with Mulder. She would note every anecdotes, facts, remembrances, whenever they came to mind. She felt compelled to leave traces, clues that would explain her -their- convoluted lifetime story. She had as well hope that her son William would read these words -she could sense that this was bound to happen, one day. That was also a way to ground herself for good in the unremarkable house and in their renewed couple. Soon they will form a true family, an almost common one -as they have so much desired it- and they will have to redefine their lifes, their priorities, their responsabilities. Finishing to write the were-monster pic story, she thought about a day in her childhood, when she was out in the woods with Bill and Charlie and they had probably seen a big threatening animal. She wrote it down into the other notebook.
She didn't spent a long time downstairs and she was soon eager to get back to bed. She knew she would be able to quickly sleep again till late in the morning -this was the week-end- apparently an advantage of her pregnancy. When she laid down and closed her eyes, Mulder began to snore.
"No, no... That can't be," Scully whispered.
But she was a woman of science and she had already made experiments. She slid her right thumb along Mulder's jaw line, appreciating the sound the stubble made under her nail, and reached his mouth. She rubbed his lower lips several times, then, as Mulder sightly opened his mouth, she leaned in and kissed him. Mulder exhaled a long breath coupled with a low moan and changed his position. His breathes became inaudible and Scully fell asleep.
Both the sunlight reaching them through the window and the songs of the birds on the roof made them give up their morning dreams. They both wake up late, almost at the same time.
Mulder was the first to completely emerge and, this time, he didn't prevent himself to touch Scully.
"Morning," Scully replied to his caresses.
"Morning, my beautiful rose."
"Oh? I'm a rose today?"
"Well, that suits you, isn't it? You have thorns to protect yourself 'against all the world'."
"Is it because you have read The Little Prince?" Scully said, pointing the book on Mulder's nightstand.
"You can say that. You know, this book is very inspiring."
"You have encountered the Little Prince's fox this night?"
"So, you have seen my messages... I hope I didn't screw up the whole taming process. I have frightened the poor animal with the flash I didn't want to activate."
"I'm sure the fox will come again."
"If you say so... 'You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed.'"
"'You are responsible for your rose.'"
"Oh, Scully, you know how to turn me on."
Mulder get closer to Scully and took her whole body in his arms.
"'It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important.' Now, I don't want to waste any time," Mulder whispered into Scully's ears while sliding his hands on her naked body.
"Neither do I," Scully replied, giving him back all his caresses.
"Do you love me, Scully, after all our misguided paths?"
"'Of course I love you. It is my fault that you have not known it all the while.'"