II

Pendrell was right. It was good Sichuan.

It was good, too, to see him sitting at the kitchen table instead of lying in bed, although the journey there had been hard to watch. Pendrell—who darted like a dragonfly across the lab, who bounced on the balls of his feet as he stood at his workstation and gesticulated wildly to emphasize his point when he explained test results—reduced to gingerly creeping along with one hand pressed against his side. Seeing it hurt Scully in a way that she wasn't able to define, even to herself.

And it concerned her. He looked so frail. He lost his breath so easily. The doctor in her wanted to haul him back to the hospital for bloodwork and a pulmonary function test.

His sister Finola seemed worried, too. Scully saw her watching him out of the corner of her eye as she bustled around the tiny kitchen, preparing her own meal.

"Honestly, Sean. I don't think that is what you need to be putting into your body right now. The amount of sodium alone..."

"Don't forget the MSG. There's an incredible amount of MSG." Pendrell threw Scully a smile as he spoke. He'd warned her, as he dialed in their food order, how much his sister wouldn't like it. She would scold him when she got back from the pharmacy.

"She's on a health kick," was his explanation. "She thinks she can heal me through the power of macrobiotics."

"And you disagree?"

"She wants me to eat things like boiled millet and Bancha twig tea. My organs would shut down out of spite."

And Scully, who'd been known to eat boiled millet herself on occasion, if only to detox from all the fast food she subjected herself to when she and Mulder were on the road, laughed.

He was good at making her laugh, she realized. Why hadn't she noticed before that he was funny?

And as she dug into a carton of spicy noodles, she had to admit that Pendrell was also right. Healthy or not, this was certainly tastier eating than the steamed brown rice and collard greens his sister insisted on cooking for herself.

Pendrell's table was so small the three of them seemed in constant danger of whacking elbows or knocking over each other's drinks, but Scully didn't mind. She had wondered, when he asked her to stay, just what Pendrell planned to do with his sister during dinner. Now she knew the answer: nothing. His intent had never been to be alone with her, merely to keep her in his company.

Which was a relief, Scully told herself. It took the pressure off to define the meal as anything more than she wanted it to be.

Except, perversely, a part of her missed the tension from before. In the presence of his older sister, Pendrell was far less shy—and far less focused on Scully herself.

Still, Finola was a pleasant enough person. And Scully enjoyed listening to the way they bantered as they ate. It reminded her of her own siblings, and the closeness they had shared—until Missy's death ruined everything.

Eventually, conversation turned to the rest of the family. The throng of redheads Scully remembered so clearly from the ICU waiting area, now apparently cloistered in a mid-grade D.C. hotel.

"How long will they be in town?" Even as she asked, Scully wondered if the question was too personal. It had been so long since she had a normal, non-work-related conversation, that she was beginning to forget what constituted small talk. But Pendrell only shrugged.

"They've been kind of alternating already over the past couple of weeks. You know, coming in town in shifts so they won't have to miss too much work. Everyone except my parents, that is. They've been here the whole time. I can't get rid of them."

She smiled at the way he said it. Deep affection mixed with just a little genuine exasperation.

"I'm sure they're just worried," she told him.

"We've all been worried," Finola agreed. "I think Mom wore a groove in her rosary beads over the last month. Sean always was her favorite."

Scully smiled. "Well, I'm not surprised." And she wasn't. Pendrell was exactly the kind of son a mother would be apt to adore.

Pendrell ducked his head toward his plate, as if trying to hide his pleasure at the compliment. It was such an artless gesture, and so boyishly Pendrell that Scully felt a rush of heat in her own face. And the same impulse that had driven her to touch his hand earlier now compelled her to turn slightly in her chair, so that her legs angled toward him instead of away. Her knees brushed against his underneath the table.

Immediately, he pulled back, shifting his chair a little in order to give her more room. Mistaking her intentions, she thought, and gentlemanly to the last. But she moved, too, following him so that their legs remained pressed, ever so slightly, against each other. Then he understood.

He smiled and looked up—

—And Scully felt the drip of blood at the same second she saw the expression of horror cross his face.

"God. I'm sorry."

She grabbed her napkin and pressed it to her nose. The warmth in her cheeks wasn't from the pleasure of flirtation now. She felt embarrassed, disgusted with herself, and oddly ashamed. Maybe it was the look in his blue eyes. The sense that she had managed to hurt him again.

"Are you all right?" Pendrell moved as if to stand, but Scully shook her head and waved him back.

"I'm fine. I just—it happens sometimes. Could I—?"

She didn't finish, but it didn't matter. He understood.

"The bathroom is right there." He motioned to a door off the living room. "There are towels in the cabinet by the shower if you need—"

"Thanks." She pushed her chair back from the table and fled.

In the bathroom, Scully couldn't bear to spoil his spotless white towels. She grabbed a wad of Kleenex instead, leaning over the counter until the flow of blood finally stopped. She rinsed the red spatters from the sink first, and then cleaned off her nose and chin.

Her face in the mirror looked white and haggard, as she daubed at it with a moistened tissue. Her chin was quivering.

Stop being so stupid, she told herself sternly. Stop being so weak.

She thought of Pendrell, so hurt and thin, greeting her cheerfully when she walked into his bedroom that evening. He wasn't weak. He wasn't sniveling like a child over his predicament.

Well, neither would she.

Scully straightened her shoulders and drew a deep breath. She swallowed hard until the aching lump dislodged from her throat.

Okay. Good. That's good. I'm good.

She tidied her hair and hid the bloodied tissues under a mound of clean ones in his wastebasket. Then she unlocked the door.

Finola had gone from the kitchen. Pendrell sat alone at the table, his fork lying idle in his plate of uneaten food. He gave an anxious start when he saw Scully standing there, and he climbed to his feet.

Scully motioned him back down.

"Please," she said. All false brightness and cheer, because her only alternative to that felt like a breakdown. "Don't worry. I'm fine. It was just a nosebleed."

He hesitated, one shaking hand still resting on the back of his chair.

"You're sure?"

"I'm a doctor, aren't I?"

Pendrell waited until she sat down before resuming his own seat. After she was settled, he pushed something against the edge of her plate. But he didn't say anything.

Scully looked down. A tiny box wrapped in silver Happy Birthday paper lay on her fresh napkin.

"What—?" The desire to cry came back with a force that scared her. She was grateful Pendrell didn't look up to see it. He was staring at the top of the table with a determined expression.

"Well, I told you I had something for you," he said. "That night."

That night. Scully dug deep into her memory and sure enough, it was there: the memory of him telling her he had something for her.

She touched the box with the tips of her fingers. A thin red ribbon tied into a perfect bow.

"How did you even know it was my birthday?" she asked him.

"Oh." He gave an embarrassed laugh. "Well, I was there when Mulder had the waitresses sing to you, so that's how I found out. I just happened to be there. But I had this gift from before…months before. Only the paper is new."

"Why?"

Pendrell shrugged.

"It reminded me of you. Go on." He nodded to the package.

So she picked it up. Faint, rust-colored specks covered one side of the wrapping. Pendrell lifted his eyes and saw them at the same time she did. He grimaced.

"Sorry about that."

"Don't be sorry." Scully spoke almost harshly, but he didn't seem offended by her tone.

She slid the ribbon from the package without untying it—"It's too perfect"—and started prying back the tape. The box inside was plain white with a lid, like a jewelry box. For half a second, she thought it was jewelry and fear seized her. But what lay on the nest of cotton was actually a tiny piece of curving bone, yellowed with age. A Celtic cross had been carved into the surface with painstaking precision, obviously by hand.

"I found it last summer when I was on vacation," Pendrell said, answering the question she wasn't sure how to ask. "In a flea market outside of Boston. It's not real scrimshaw," he added quickly, seeing the look on her face. "I mean…it's not that old or worth that much. But I saw it and I…"

"What?"

"It made me think of you."

He was looking at the tiny, perfect piece of art that lay in her palm, not at her. Scully was glad of that.

"You kept it all that time?" She tried to say it lightly, but the words came out all wrong. Strangled, almost.

"Well, I needed an excuse." He offered her a lopsided smile, as if acknowledging his own foolishness.

Scully shook her head.

"An excuse to what, Sean?" she asked.

"To give it to you."

The simplicity of this response left her momentarily speechless. To cover her confusion, she turned the bone over in her hand, examining it from every angle. What patience it must have required to do that, she thought. A thousand tiny scratches in a piece of material no longer than her smallest finger.

"I'm glad you waited." The words seemed inadequate, ungrateful. She cleared her throat and tried again. "It's beautiful. Thank you…for thinking of me."

"I always think of you," he began. Then stopped, clearly shocked by his own audacity.

Under different circumstances, Scully might have laughed at the look on his face. But the notion of him thinking so highly of her, when she hadn't thought of him at all, kept her from seeing the situation as remotely humorous.

"Were you sad that night?" she asked suddenly. It was something that had been gnawing at her. That he'd been in some kind of crisis, or pain, and she had callously tried to brush him aside. She'd been annoyed by the interruption when he caught her arm. She remembered wondering why he wouldn't just leave her alone.

And then he nearly died on the floor in front of her.

"I'm sorry, Sean."

"You don't have to be sorry. I wasn't sad." He shrugged. "I was drunk."

Why, though? It seemed so out of character for him, and there must be a reason. She wanted to know, but he clearly wasn't planning to volunteer the information.

She cast about for a different topic, a safer one, and finally landed on his now-absent sister.

"Where is Finola?"

"She stepped out to take a call," Pendrell explained, sounding relieved by her shift in tone. "Cell service isn't great inside the building."

"I hope I didn't put her off her dinner—or you either."

"God, no." As if to prove the point, he picked up his fork and began picking at his neglected food.

Scully raised her eyebrows skeptically. But when he popped a piece of chicken into his mouth and began chewing it with an exaggerated "Mmmm" sound, she gave in and laughed.

"You really are something else, aren't you?"

He grinned. "Oh, I'm such a doof. You'd love being friends with me."

"Oh." She picked up her own fork—if for no other reason than to see the pleased look on his face when she did it. "Well, I'm not a very good friend, I'm afraid."

"I have lots of good friends. I don't need another one."

Scully looked up from her plate. Their eyes met. And this time, he didn't look shy at all.

"Okay then," she said softly. His eyes lit up.

"So, to bad friendship?" he asked.

"To bad friendship," she told him.

And they toasted to it with their cans of soda.

Scully arrived at work almost half an hour early the following morning—the result of a headache that made sleeping any later an impossibility. Even so, she found Mulder already waiting for her in the office.

"What do you know about the Flatwoods Monster?" he asked, speaking, as usual, without preliminary.

Scully hung up her coat and turned to look at him. He was hunched over the desk—his desk—with what looked like the contents of several file folders spread out in front of him. Behind the glare of his reading glasses, his eyes looked tired, or hungover. Or both.

"I don't know anything about it," she told him. Which was an outright lie, but she wasn't really in the mood to go over the little she did know and have him correct her on all that she didn't get right.

Which wasn't fair of her. And she knew that. But—

"I have an appointment with my oncologist at eleven. I'll need to leave by 10:30 to make it."

Mulder's movements stilled. Not all at once, but with a sort of gradual idling down. Like a car stalling. He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes.

"Is it…" His voice trailed away before he could finish.

The whole Mulder-engine was clearly in need of a tune-up, Scully thought. And part of her felt a hysterical desire to laugh.

"No treatment this morning" she told him, "It's just an appointment to discuss lab work."

"Well, are you feeling okay?" He sounded almost irritated now. Or, no. Not irritated. Anxious. Angry at his own sense of helplessness—and maybe even at hers.

And in some odd way it made her feel better knowing that he felt that way. Sometimes the only thing that got her up in the morning was the knowledge that he was getting up, too. That, whatever awful thing she was facing, he was facing with her.

"I'm fine," she said quietly. Another lie. "I'm…the same."

He nodded.

"I tried to call you last night. A couple of times, actually. You weren't answering at your apartment and your cell went straight to voicemail."

And I was worried. The words hung between them, unspoken.

"Oh, I went to see Agent Pendrell. I forgot my phone in the car." Lie number three, spoken so smoothly she almost impressed herself. She sat down in her chair, enjoying the look of open-mouthed surprise the words elicited from her partner.

"Pendrell is home?" he asked finally.

"He is. Three days ago, actually. Didn't Skinner tell you?"

"I didn't ask." He sounded almost ashamed of himself. "How is he doing?"

"Good. Comparatively speaking, that is. He has a lot of recovering left to do."

"Yeah. Of course." Mulder sat back in his chair and folded his arms behind his head, the Flatwoods Monster temporarily forgotten. "You should have told me you were going," he added. "I would have come with you."

"I didn't think of it." She fiddled with her keys as she spoke, tracing the nail of her index finger over the lettering of her Apollo 11 keychain.

Mulder gave a laugh that was partly good-natured and mostly not. "Well, I'm sure Pendrell is glad you didn't," he said.

Scully looked up.

"What is that supposed to mean?" she asked.

He stared back at her, all wide-eyed innocence.

"Only that I know he would prefer to have you to himself. I mean, who wouldn't?"

She could have hit him for that.

"I wanted to apologize to him," she said once the desire had passed. "I mean, I did apologize for what happened. That night. With Frish and…everything. I told Pendrell I was sorry. He was very gracious about it."

"That wasn't your fault, Scully." Mulder's voice was soft now, all the mockery gone from his expression.

"I know," answered Scully. "It was yours."

Silence.

She could tell from Mulder's expression that he knew she was baiting him—and that he was finding it very, very hard not to rise to it.

She waited.

One-one thousand.

Two-one thousand.

Three-one thousand.

Four-one thousand.

He broke the silence on five, speaking in an even tone intended to show her what a patient person he was.

"Did I do something to make you angry, Scully?"

"Not at all." She met his gaze levelly, affecting a sort of vague puzzlement that she knew would drive him crazy. "Why? Do I seem angry with you?"

"To be honest, yes."

"Well, I'm not."

Dropping her keys to the desk, she reached out and tapped the sheaf of papers nearest her hand.

"So go ahead," she told him. "Tell me about the Flatwoods Monster. I'm listening now."

But she wasn't. And both of them knew it.