Scully opted for a long shower to chase away the chill while she waited for the heat in her apartment to catch up, regretting having turned the thermostat down before she'd left. Drying her hair as best she could, she bundled herself up in her warmest pajamas and a pair of thick socks before dragging her suitcase into her bedroom so she could unpack and sort through her laundry. At least it was Friday, and she would have the whole weekend to dawdle through the mundane tasks of taking in her dry cleaning and grocery shopping even if her jet lag got the better of her. It was always so much worse adjusting back afterward as opposed to going there.
Once she'd finished, she made one last pass through the apartment to make sure the door was locked and the curtains were drawn before crawling under the covers of her own bed with a grateful sigh. She felt tired and hoped she would sleep all the way through until morning.
It was still dark when she stretched and opened her eyes, her internal alarm clock helpfully nudging her awake for the day ahead… at two o'clock in the morning here in D.C. but seven A.M. in London. Scully rolled over, snuggling her face into the pillow that still smelled faintly of fabric softener. She'd washed her sheets before she left, knowing she wouldn't want to have yet another load of laundry to do when she got home. She was warm and cozy… and wide awake. Dammit.
She lay there for another twenty minutes with her eyes closed, trying to clear her mind of conscious thoughts, concentrating on the steady in and out of her breath. While very relaxed, she was still no closer to sleep. Might as well get up then.
She padded into the kitchen, flicking on the small lamp in the living room on her way by, and filled up the kettle and set it on to the front element of the stove. While she waited for the water to boil, she grabbed a mug from the cupboard over the sink and a sachet of Earl Grey tea from the box on the counter. She was out of milk, she'd drained the last of her previous carton down the sink before she'd left for the airport, so she didn't even bother looking in the fridge.
With a yawn, she headed back to the bedroom to grab her book from her night stand. It was the same one she'd brought with her to London and yet she was hardly even past the halfway point.
Dropping it on the couch, she went back to the kitchen and stood there, leaning against the counter with her eyes half closed, waiting for the water to boil. She wondered what Stella was doing right now. Probably up and off for an early morning swim. Scully had a hard time picturing her sleeping in, even on a Saturday morning.
Mulder was probably awake, too, probably hadn't even fallen asleep yet. Or maybe, like her, he had dozed for a bit and then woken up, although he would likely have just stayed curled up on the couch, watching whatever old movie happened to be on TV at this time of night. She could call him, but she didn't feel much like talking. And, if he had actually managed to fall asleep and stay asleep, she didn't want to be the one to wake him.
She switched off the element before the kettle began to whistle, not wanting to disturb her neighbours, and poured the nearly boiling water over the tea bag in her mug. She didn't leave it to steep too long, not having any milk to temper the bitterness.
A few minutes later, she was cocooned in a blanket on the couch with her book in her lap and her mug of tea cooling on the coffee table. Flipping through the book to find where she had left off — her bookmark must have fallen out at some point — she began to read… and the opening few sentences took her right back to the train on the way to Edinburgh, Stella picking up the book and handing it to her after she'd dropped it when she'd been nodding off to the rumbling rhythm of the tracks. She had to fight the temptation to smell the edges of the pages, hoping they might carry a faint trace of her perfume and knowing, at the same time, that she was being ridiculous.
Looking around her perfectly ordered living room, it was like she had never left. Everything in its proper place, like it always was. Everything in the exact same position, moved and touched by no one's hands but her own. Perfectly… lonely. Sighing, she set her book down on her outstretched knees and reached for her tea, blowing on it cautiously before taking a sip.
It wasn't all exactly the same as when she'd left. She was different, wasn't she? The Scully who had sat in this same spot a week before had no notion of Stella, no idea that her life was about to be shaken gently like the snow globe that had sat on her dresser all summer when she was eight because she'd refused to let her mother put it away with the other Christmas decorations that year. Her perceptions had been turned over and shaken, and now the glittery sparkles of fake snow were starting to resettle themselves. Did she want them to fall where they had been before, or was she willing to let it settle somewhere new?
She missed Stella. She missed Mulder. Was she really content with ordered and perfect and alone?
As scary as it was to contemplate, she knew in her gut that she should talk to Mulder. She'd been able to talk to Stella about how she felt about him, which was more than she'd ever been able to say to anyone about it before — not to her mom, not even to herself. But, if she ever wanted anything to change, she was going to have to take the terrifying step and tell him.
Sure, he'd already told her how he felt, in theory, anyway, but it had been easier to believe that it was simply due to the amount of painkillers that had been pumped into his body at the time, no matter how lucid he might have sounded. He cared for her, he'd gone to Antarctica for her, there was no refuting that. But was there anything more between them than a shared goal, a platonic partnership, and a deep friendship?
There was for her. She wanted it all.
It was easy to admit that in her head, in the quiet and the dim light of her living room, but was she brave enough to say it to his face? What choice did she have? The water in the snow globe was already in motion. And, if he didn't feel the same way, then what? Her rational brain neatly checked off the options.
The worst scenario would be her confessing that she loved him and him not returning the sentiment and telling her that he still had feelings for Diana. She let the thought congeal like a heavy lump in her stomach. If that were the case, she would leave… quit the FBI for sure, minimize any contact with him. Their work had already been taken away, after all, and Mulder was the only thing keeping her there. Even if Mulder was to get back on the X-Files, she had no doubt that it would be Diana's doing anyway, and there was not a chance in hell that Scully would ever work directly with her, X-Files or no X-Files. She would rather cut her losses and walk away.
Okay, so at worst, she'd have to see Mulder and Diana together for a few weeks while she worked out her resignation notice period. She could manage that.
With her background and experience, there would be a wide variety of positions available to her. She could go back into medicine, look into teaching at either Quantico or a university program. She could apply to be a field agent in another jurisdiction or move over to a police force. Lots of options.
She could go back to London.
But that was rash and unrealistic. Stella had been quite clear that what had happened between them was a one time thing. She would just be setting herself up for more disappointment. And that would be so hard on her mother, having already lost one daughter, to have the other one move so far away.
She took another sip of her cooling tea, tapping her fingers restlessly on the side of the mug.
Was that what she wanted, to leave her partnership with Mulder? No.
Could she live with that outcome? It would be hard.
It was difficult to imagine a life without Mulder in it. But if it was a choice between no Mulder or a Mulder who was romantically involved with Diana… she would learn to live with no Mulder. What choice would she have? The thought made her curl herself up a little tighter under the blanket.
She moved on to the next possibility: Mulder didn't have feelings for her but didn't have any for Diana either. The thought was infinitely more palatable than the first option. She would still have him as her best friend, but she wasn't sure if that was enough for her any more. She was tired of being lonely, tired of wanting something just out of reach. At the end of the day, she wanted someone to cook dinner with, to lie together on opposite ends of the couch reading books, someone who would be brushing their teeth while she washed her face as they got ready for bed, together. Having someone to lie close to at night, making love… The whole thought of it made her heart ache. That was what she wanted. The whole deal. And Mulder was the only person she could see being that someone.
If that wasn't what he wanted, could she go on as they were, close but never close enough?
She closed her eyes tightly for a moment, forcing her fingers to relax around her mug.
What if he did feel the same way about her? She let out a slow breath. As much as it was what she wanted, the thought of upending everything as it was now was still terrifying. She had lived alone since med school… was she just picturing an idealized version of what she thought it might be like? Mulder wasn't exactly tidy, and she tried to imagine a toilet seat left up, toothpaste smears in the sink, sweaty runners kicked off by the front door. And that was the easy stuff to deal with…
How would they handle work? How many times had she been grateful to be able to stomp out of the office after an afternoon of arguing with him over a case and go home to the quiet stillness of her apartment? Would they end up sneaking around, trying to keep their relationship a secret even though she knew full well that everyone already thought they'd been screwing each other for years? How was she going to feel when he ditched her to chase a lead he thought was too important to wait for her?
Her tea had gone cold, but she drank it anyway.
She had one final option. Do nothing. Leave things as they were. On the surface, it felt like the safest choice, but was it really? She thought back to how she had felt on the flight to London, that lingering sense of moroseness, that her life was stagnating and that she was just letting it happen. That wasn't her. She was focused, determined… a fighter. Did she want to sit passively and wait for things to change, or did she want to change them herself? Even if the outcome was bad, it would give her the momentum she needed to move in a new direction. She needed to be honest with herself, she needed to talk to Mulder, and, if need be, she needed to move on.
She sat there, thinking, until the sky outside began to lighten. She put on a pot of coffee and drank a cup as she watched the sun rise. With one hand, she rubbed her lower back over the spot where she'd had the ouroboros permanently etched into her skin a lifetime ago. She felt like she was at a similar crossroads now. Although she had chosen the design on a whim — like the rest of that ill-fated evening — thinking, at the time, about how she always seemed to be running in circles, she had done some reading on the meaning behind the symbol not long afterward, not realizing how fitting a choice she had unconsciously made.
The first records of the ouroboros were from early Egypt, although the name itself came from the Greek words for 'tail' and 'food' and 'eat'. It was an alchemical symbol as well, tied to the element mercury. Perhaps the most famous drawing of an ouroboros came from an ancient alchemical work, The Chrysopoeia of Cleopatra, likely dating back to the third century. That ouroboros, half black and half white, encircled words that translated to "the all is one", symbolizing the universal unity of all things, the simultaneous clash and combination of opposites — light and dark, death and rebirth, male and female, yin and yang. It represented a cycle of infinite renewal and it could be seen as a representation of immortality; that thought had made her think of Clyde Bruckman with a sad sort of fondness.
The idea of opposites had first made her think about the differences between herself and Mulder, the passionate believer versus the logical skeptic. The only time they ever seemed to waver in those roles was when it came to matters of religion and faith, something that Scully still struggled with from time to time, but that Mulder rejected outright. She believed it was one of the reasons that she and Mulder worked so well together, as they each supplied the perspective that the other lacked. Sure, it had led to more than one heated argument but, more often than not, it led them to an insight or idea that helped break open a case or lead them in a new direction.
But it was more personal than that. There were opposites within herself as well, the biggest being between her heart and her head. She had always been the kid with 'a good head on her shoulders', as her mother was fond of saying to the neighbour, Mrs. Johnson, who came over for coffee sometimes in the afternoons. 'It's a good thing, too. I don't think I could handle two of Melissa!'
Missy was the wild one. Impulsive. Heart first, always, in everything she did.
When Missy was sneaking out to meet the group of older teenagers that gathered near the old quarry to drink on Friday nights, Scully was at home, reading or doing homework. She fell in love so fast that it almost always ended in heartbreak, and she felt everything much more deeply than anyone else Scully had ever known. When she was young, Scully had idolized her, had wanted to be exactly like her, but it wasn't effortless for her like it was for Melissa, like trying to stroke the fur of a cat the wrong way.
By the time Scully was a teenager herself, she'd come to accept the fact that that wasn't who she was. She liked it when things were comfortably predictable, she liked math and physics where there were clear methods for solving problems and only one correct answer to a given equation. Everything could be broken down into smaller and smaller logical steps to achieve a desired final outcome. Sure, she still envied Missy at times, but her life wasn't the life Scully wanted for herself. She was going to get into a good university. She was going to be a doctor. She was going to contribute, she was going to help people, she was going to make a difference.
As she'd gotten older, the black and white way of thinking in those earlier years had faded into the muted grey of adulthood, and she'd made her share of decisions where she'd let her heart and her emotions get the better of her. Daniel Watterson had probably been the worst of those, although at least she had broken it off when she'd found out he was married and not let it go any further. God, she'd been so dumb.
She picked some lint off the blanket as she stared down at her knees. Was she about to make the same mistake again? Daniel, Jack… both of them had been authority figures, people she interacted with on a professional level.
She wished Missy were still alive, wished she would just bounce through her apartment door one more time with the vibrance she always exuded, wished they could be having a heart to heart talk about the mess Scully's life had become. She already knew what Missy would say in this situation… Of course she should tell Mulder how she felt. Then she'd know, one way or the other, how things stood between them. Stop dithering at the crossroads. Piss or get off the pot. Scully couldn't help the soft huff of laughter that escaped.
With a long sigh, she stood up and stretched, folding the blanket back neatly over the back of the couch. Sunlight was streaming in through the front windows now on what looked to be a bright Saturday morning, full of promise.
She could feel it, like the whisper of hot water right before it began to boil. Something needed to change, and it was going to happen whether or not it was a planned out, logical decision or a sudden impulse that she couldn't fight any longer until it dragged her, kicking and screaming, over the edge. Her toes were curled over the edge of the cliff and it would come down to jumping or being pushed. Either way, she was going to fall.
Hugs and a giant thank you to my most wonderful beta, Josie Lange!