Peace
She thought it would be different, this reunion of theirs. She thought he would understand and accept and then suddenly they would live happily ever after. She didn't think about his side of the story when she planned the script inside her head.
She tries to explain to him, but she lacks the right words. She fails to make him understand that believing he was gone for good for 6 months almost killed her.
She can see that he is telling her to give him some space, to leave him alone for a while. But she can't, how can't he understand that? How can't he understand that all she wants right now is to never leave his side? She just wants to sit down and listen to whatever he has to say, even if it hurts. She just wants to make sure he is okay. But he doesn't want that, he has made it clear. So she just tells him she is going to send Kersh a request for his reinstatement to the X-Files and leaves him alone, closing the door behind her and fighting back the tears that threaten to come once again. He is back, she shouldn't be crying. He is back, so why does she still feel like crying?
She goes home thinking about what it must have been like for him. She wants to understand what he has been through. She wants to find a way of making him adjust again, so why won't he let her in?
She tries to be understanding for she has no idea what it must be like to come back to a life that is completely different than the one you left six months ago. But does he really need to act like this? He is being such a jerk about so many things that she has to fight back the urge of punching him in the face and shaking some sense into him. But she also knows that she might be letting her feelings get in the way, so she lets it slide. Maybe he just really needs some time, maybe he'll come to his senses when he gets his job and whatever he thinks he lost back. Does he think he lost her too?
The understanding only comes when Langly points out the obvious. She can see his face change when he looks at her with questioning eyes. His eyes are saying, "Is Langly right? Am I the father?". She answers back with her eyes that they will talk about this later, but she feels like shouting. She only lets it go for now because they have more pressing matters to work on, and she is worried sick that he has just come back to life and he is going to risk dying again for a stupid case he can't leave alone. But she follows and indulges him because she has no choice. She has never had any choice when it comes to him.
He barely escapes from those trying to prevent him from uncovering the truth; she barely keeps it together while she is driving them back home. The tears come without warning when she turns off the ignition; the words come out of her mouth before she can stop them. She keeps her eyes on the steering wheel.
"I don't know if I am able to keep on living if you die again. I don't know if I want to."
She finds it strangely funny that some of her most important confessions to him have happened inside a car and she almost chuckles through her tears. She doesn't because she is too anxious about his response.
She doesn't look at him, she doesn't want to see his judging look. She doesn't look at him, but she knows his eyes are on her, she can feel them staring at her as if she were an alien. Then she feels his hand on her hair, tucking a strand behind her ear, then his thumb rubbing her cheek slowly. She doesn't want to look at him, but she does. And what she sees in his eyes is nothing but love.
His voice is calm, soothing, and it's suddenly like her Mulder has never been gone at all.
"Thank you for never giving up on me."
She chuckles this time, because she has the perfect answer to that.
"You taught me to never give up on a miracle, so I never did."
She sees his eyes well up and a smile take over his face. She wants to kiss him, she hopes he knows that.
But he knows, he always knows. His thumb moves from her cheek to her lips and lingers there, as if waiting for a sign. She closes her eyes and kisses it slowly, trying to memorize his fingerprints with her lips, marveling in the feeling of having him so near once again. And as if in answer to her silent prayer, he comes even closer.
The touch of his lips on her forehead feels so good that she wants to stop time. She wants to stop time and pretend that nothing bad ever happened to them. She wants to stop time and stay in this moment forever. But she can't stop time and his lips lose contact with her skin way too soon.
She opens her eyes just in time to see the look on his face as he whispers, his breath mingling with hers as their foreheads touch.
"I'm not going anywhere, I promise."
She is not sure it works that way, that he can just promise to never leave, but she believes him. She believes him because his eyes are so pure and so full of love she has no choice but believe him. She believes him because there is no reason for her not to believe him.
Their foreheads only break apart when he invites her up and welcomes her back into his life. He invites her up and he tells her what it was like for him, how it feels to have no recollection of the past 6 months of his life. He tells her how it feels to have only bad memories about being tested and being hurt so much that at some point the pain simply gives way to numbness. He tells her how it feels to be back, he tells her how unreal he still thinks it all seems. He talks and talks and talks to her until she can barely keep her eyes open.
He offers her his bed when he realizes; she accepts it gladly. Her only condition is that he stays with her. She wants to make sure he is real. He accepts her invitation as gladly as she accepted his bed. He says he wants to make sure she is real too.
She falls asleep as soon as his head lays on the pillow next to hers.
When she wakes up in the morning, his arms are around her waist, encircling her belly, his breath is tickling her neck softly as he exhales. It is still hard to believe that he is breathing. It is hard to believe that he is breathing and that he is here. It is hard, but she believes.
She turns around in his arms slowly, careful not to wake him, and analyzes his features. She feels so happy that it makes her forget for a moment all the tears she has shed since she lost track of him.
She realizes by looking at his very real pouting lips that the moments of doubt are in the past now. Mulder is present tense once again.
He is back, she believes, she is at peace.
She says a silent prayer so that they never have to part again. She has a feeling that they won't.
