Adopted Consequences
Chapter 9
St. Mark's Hospital Telluride, Co
May 15, 2005 12:30 pm
It had been almost three days and he had yet to hear a response back from Scully. Neither he, nor Skinner had had any contact with her. Mulder was starting to get worried. Worried that maybe she never wanted to see him again, worried that he had ruined his chance to have his happily ever after with her. He knew he had promised to give her the space she had asked for, but it was pointless for him to wait there for her. He knew he would wait an eternity for her to want to be with him, but he had a job back in Washingtonand a son who needed his father.
Hesitantly he stood outside the door to her room, unsure of the wrath he would receive once he stepped inside without being invited. He knocked on the door, before opening it and letting himself in. Scully was sitting up in bed, staring out the window at the park across the street. "Scully," he said apprehensively.
"I thought I said I would call you when I knew what I was going to do," she said refusing to turn and face him. The pain was still evident in her voice. He had thought that in the three days she would have seen that he was just trying to protect her. He hated hurting her the way that he did, but it was for her own good. "Why are you here?" she asked.
"I had to see you before I left," he replied quietly. "I couldn't go back without seeing you one last time. I was hoping you would be coming back with me."
She turned around to face him, more hurt and angry than she was before. How could he show up, just to ditch me again, she thought. "Well you saw me," she spat. "I guess you can leave in peace. See you again in another three years."
"You don't get it, do you," he asked, starting to get annoyed with her attitude about the whole thing. "You think this was easy for me don't you? This has been the longest and hardest three years of my life. You weren't the only one suffering. One day you're going to realize that I did this to protect you."
"Is that all you want to do? Protect me?" she yelled back. "I survived fine on my own before you, and I dealt when you were gone. So now you show up again and tell me you're protecting me? Where was that protection when I was faced with a child? Where was that protection when I was hurt and scared because you were gone? Now that everything's all said and done you want to protect me again? Go back to Washington, Mulder. You saw that I'm okay, you can run away again."
"One of these days, you're going to realize the mistake this is," he said. "And when you do come find me, I'll always be waiting for you. But right now I have to go and raise our son." He turned and walked towards the door, mentally kicking himself for his slip of the tongue. He silently prayed to God that she hadn't caught the slip.
"What the hell do you mean by that, Mulder?" yelled Scully. Yep, she heard it, he thought.
He turned resting his hand on the doorframe. "You were so hurt that I had a child, Dana," he explained. "But you never took half an instant to think about how, or why. Yes, I have a son, Scully. He's four years old, and a spit-fire just like his mother. You would adore him, just like he adores you." With that he grabbed his bag from the doorway and walked out of the room towards the elevators. He had to get back to his son, their son.
Scully watched him go, and when she heard the ding of the elevator down the hall she fell back against the bed and sobbed. When she had calmed down enough to form coherent words, she grabbed her cell phone off the table besides her bed and rang Skinner. "Sir," she said when he answered. "I think I just made one of the biggest mistakes of my life."
To Be Continued
