Summary: Set immediately after Triangle. A telling of MSR from Scullys POV - with some (lots of) artistic license

Rating: Soft M for now

In The Beginning

Ours isn't an ordinary relationship. There's nothing 'normal' about it. It is codependent and dysfunctional, if you were being kind you might go as far as to describe as reliable, close, even loving. The one thing it is not is sexual. Ever. I've spent the better part of 6 years with this man, we've had our ups and downs, our share of death and abduction and critical illness to last a lifetime. Yet throughout it all there has been an invisible wall between us, a barrier preventing our relationship from being anything other than platonic. My feelings regarding this metaphorical line have changed over time. To begin with I was grateful that I was working with a man whose main goal wasn't getting in my pants. But as time has gone on we've grown closer both professionally and personally and it now seems as though this line is nothing more than an obstacle we've put there to prevent the inevitable heart break that would most likely occur should we pursue anything romantic. A self-protective fence, if you will. I've convinced myself that our work is far more important than our potential individual happiness, that we are making the ultimate sacrifice for a cause much greater than ourselves.

I may appear straight laced and dedicated to my work, but I do consider myself a sexual person. I have been tempted before, and given into that temptation a handful of times - I have the scars (and tattoo) to prove it. Mulder doesn't see me like that though. In fact after Ed Jerse he made it clear that he had lost some respect for me that day; how dare the virginal Scully engage in such lude and promiscuous behaviour. I sometimes wonder how he would describe me. Perhaps in terms of my work ethic he'd say 'pragmatic, skeptical, objective'. Maybe he'd use less clinical words like caring and dependable. But never attractive, or god forbid, sexy. I'm embarrassed to admit it but it hurts that he doesn't appear to appreciate, or at the very least acknowledge, my femininity. Does he even see me as a woman? As a sexual being? Or just a scientist that likes to prove him wrong? Having said that there have been times where we have come incredibly close to crossing that line I mentioned earlier. No, not close crossing it, more like placing a toe over it. Three times in total. Maybe two and a half would be more precise.

The first time had been fairly early on in the game, still new companions. We were in some middle-of-nowhere dive bar down the road from a middle-of-nowhere motel in a middle-of-nowhere place; as later became the norm to my dismay. We filled ourselves with tacos and beer. One became two and two became five; that goes for both the tacos and the beer. We were close, physically that is, sitting on high chairs propping our heads up with our elbows on the top of the bar. Our faces inches from one another, laughing and teasing and flirting. Amongst the chaos and ridiculousness of the day to day life I was slowly becoming accustomed to, we were having fun. It ended in a long drunken walk back to the motel, a few stumbles along the way, Mulder vomiting up his taco beer mixture, and a sore head in the morning. But somewhere between the food going in and the food coming out - we shared a kiss.

There was nothing weighty to it, it was a throwaway moment between two colleagues who'd had too much to drink and had lost their sense of appropriateness. It's hard to believe now that a kiss between Mulder and I had had so little meaning at the time; it went undiscussed - not in an attempt to avoid the gravity of the situation but because of the lack of gravity entirely. This was when we were young, before life felt so serious and the stakes got so high.

I was diagnosed with cancer a couple of years after this as a direct result of the work that had become my life. It was inoperable and fatal; only a matter of time before it would lead to my demise. As a medical doctor I didn't have the hope that most sufferers of the disease have, the hope that comes with ignorance, that has been proven to aid in recovery, defying science time and time again. I could read the scans and understand the jargon and I knew the likelihood of survival was slim to none. In my darkest days Mulder was my hope, I found the strength in him to never stop looking for an answer. He is the reason I'm alive today.

When the terror of imminent death became unbearable I turned to Mulder for something I needed that I couldn't possibly get from anyone else, something I shouldn't have asked him to give. It felt alien to be visibly weak, to be vulnerable in a way I hadn't been before and I wanted to free myself of the burdens of impending mortality if only for a brief moment. So when he came to my door in the middle of the night, as he often did, I found myself putting a foot knowingly over that line with every intention of dragging him over it with me. I rested my hands on his cheeks and pressed my lips against his lips. Before this I'd looked him directly in the eyes and not a word was spoken but my face told him that I needed him to help me with this. Mulder was kind in his rejection, he gently put his hands over mine and slowly pulled them away from his face, parting our lips in turn - convincing me that this isn't what is best for me right now, that for him it would be taking advantage of a dreadful situation, that he couldn't possibly enjoy it. I believed him. Instead I cried myself to sleep in his arms as my embarrassment turned to overwhelming fear and I woke up in my bed the following morning alone.

The last encounter was fairly recently, this is the 'half' time. It's that age old story of a man professing his true feelings to a woman, the pair of them going in for a kiss, only to be interrupted by an almost deadly bee sting - you know the one. It should have been a turning point in our relationship; had that bee not stung me at the exact moment it did, had it not infected me with a unidentifiable virus, had it not caused me to become gravely ill, ultimately leading to the closure of the X-files, Mulder and I would have kissed. He would have picked me up and carried me into his apartment, he would have pressed me up against the door, and we would have made love, again and again no and again. Chaos theory. The flutter of a butterfly's wings can cause a typhoon halfway around the world. Replace the butterfly wings with a bee sting - that single non-event would have set off a chain reaction that could have drastically changed the course of my life.

That brings us to now. Right now, at this very moment I am sat in my parked car. I can see Mulder's apartment out of the back window if I crank my neck slightly. I've been sat here for what feels like a lifetime but has probably been no more than 15 minutes, and my stomach is in knots at the thought of what I'm considering doing. I will sit here for a while longer before I decide to turn around and drive home. This isn't the first time I've done this and it probably won't be the last. I continually disappointment myself with my dull predictability; we work a case that hits close to home for either one of us, sometimes even both, and amongst the comfort and understanding we show one another there is an underlying feeling of wanting. Wanting more than just friendship. And every time I say to myself that this is the time to tell him how you feel and every time I fail.

I have spent the last few years being in a relationship with my imagination. I've thought about the two of us being intimate. A lot. I've imagined a spectrum of detailed scenarios ranging from holding hands as we peacefully stroll through the park, to him fucking me from behind against the basement office desk. The latter end of this thought spectrum is where I spend most of my alone time. It began out of boredom, lonely nights in motel rooms lead to me touching myself thinking about him, thinking about whether he was doing the same thing on the other side of the wall. It became more of a need as time went on, praying for the end of the day when I could finally be alone and live in my fantasies, stifling my moans with a pillow. It's possible that he's heard me before, the thought of that humiliates and arouses me at the same time.

I have created a problem for myself here though, because should anything ever actually happen between the two of us the real Mulder has an awful lot to live up to. My imaginary Mulder knows exactly what I like, he is a sexual savant and there isn't a time with him when I don't come. Not too long ago I had an odd experience; I began my usual night time routine, I slid my fingers inside myself and palmed my clit thinking about him until I let myself go screaming his name. Except this time my eyes began to stream and tears rolled down my face; something was missing. I needed to feel his weight on top of me, to feel his hardness inside of me, have him breathing against my neck, I needed for him to be real. The realisation washed over me that for all his real faults and real flaws, a real Mulder will always be better than an imaginary one. My high school philosophy class came flooding back - 'A being that necessarily exists in reality is greater than a being that is imagined'. Aquinas was talking about God not Mulder, but lately for me it feels as though they are one in the same.

I haven't created these feelings in a vacuum, I know Mulder must feel something for me in return. He must. Mustn't he? Sometimes he looks at me in a certain way and it's almost as though I can read his mind and we are thinking the same thing. Or when his hands have 'accidentally' brushed against mine and there is a moment of intense electricity. Oh god, what if I've projected my own feelings onto him and I've been misinterpreting these signals from the beginning? What if he sees me as nothing more than his colleague, just his work partner? No. Because then I remember the time when the heating in the car had broken and the freezing cold had caused my nipples to stand to attention. My jacket was in the trunk so there was very little I could do about it other than wish I'd had chosen to wear a padded bra when I got dressed that morning. He was driving but there was nothing subtle about the glances in my direction, and even less subtle was the following boner in his pants. It was amusing to see him shift in his seat in an attempt to hide it. In typical Mulder/Scully fashion we ignored the elephant in the room, and when I say elephant I mean elephant because from what I could tell Mulder is stacked.

There's a women who knows exactly what Mulder feels like inside her. She is tall and beautiful and they share the kind of history I thought was exclusive to Mulder and I. Except she can give him the one thing I can't; belief beyond a reasonable doubt. I refuse to believe his account of what happened on the ice, I don't doubt what he saw rather how he interprets it. That is the foundation of our relationship; he comes up with a crazy theory and I debunk it with science. Without that I don't know how we would work. She doesn't stifle him like I do, she encourages him, and they work, or they did work. I have been consumed with jealousy and when she was shot a thought crossed my mind, one that I have pushed deep deep down, but nevertheless I can't deny - a small part of me was glad.

Not so long ago Mulder found out the news that I knew was inevitable, his reassignment to the X-Files has been denied. Moreover he found out that his ex-lover has taken his place in the basement office with, in my opinion, a clear intention of destroying our work. We were called in front of a panel and were told unequivocally and under no exception must Mulder and I have any association with the X-files from here on out. His fondness for her and history with her has allowed her to convince him that she is trying to protect the X files. He is mistaken and I have no doubt that he will be betrayed. I gave him an ultimatum, me or her, although not in so many words. I said to him that it comes down to a matter of trust, and that he should trust my judgment - about the evidence, about the science, about Diana. It appears that I have won the battle, but I feel a war is imminent.

We are now in a state of limbo, and Mulder is going out of his way to search for X files, he seems to have a knack for stumbling across them wherever he goes. His latest lone expedition lead him to the Bermuda Triangle; it resulted in a nasty head injury for him and an existential crisis for me. Considering the work I do you'd think every day would be a bizarre one, but today more than most. Mulder told me he loved me. Okay so I'm ignoring the fact that he was high on pain relief in a hospital bed and in the breath before had told me a story of how he and I were on the Queen Anne in 1939 in true Dorothy Gale fashion. But he said it. And for the sake of self preservation I rolled my eyes and dismissed him. He was high, he said it because he was high. Didn't he?

And so here I am. Where I'll most likely stay for only a minute more unless by some miracle the Wizard of Oz flies down here in his hot air balloon and hands me the courage that I'm desperately lacking, before it's too late.