For disclaimer, etc., see chapter 1!!
Mulder had never seen his wife look more beautiful. The last time he had seen her in the after math of a birth, she looked frightened, terrified, even, and her body exuded the energy of anguish. But this time, she was glowing. A small girl was cradled in her arms, cooing with her eyes closed and a tight fist curled around her mother's extended index finger. If, at this very moment, he had been required to put a title on the image in front of him, Mulder would have called it perfect.
"What are you going to name her?" The nurse who was cleaning up the medical equipment asked, smiling at the happy family.
Scully looked up at Mulder, and they shared a quick smile. Choosing their daughter's name had been somewhat of a predicament for Mulder and Scully. They wanted their daughter to have the last name "Mulder", but at the moment, their names were Jane and Daniel Johnston. Any names close to Samantha or Melissa were likely to draw attention. In the end, they decided to pick a name they liked, and they would change the girl's last name when they left Canada. Unable to decide upon a name, they had asked Scully's mother for assistance. She quickly came up with a name, different, and suiting to the child of such a pair.
"Evelynne Smith," Mulder told the nurse while Scully looked back at the baby, smoothing a small tuft of hair down.
"That's an interesting name," responded the nurse as she started to leave the room.
"I helped pick it," Maggie said from the chair next to Scully's bed. "I think it's beautiful."
"Me too," Scully said, still grinning at her child.
********M&S********
Maggie had gone home to get some rest, Mulder was reclining on the bed with Scully, their bodies pressed closely together so that neither one would be in danger of falling off. Evelynne lay sleeping between the two of them. "You should get going, you'll be late for work," Scully told Mulder, pressing her forehead to his hand as he brushed her hair back.
"I know. But I don't want to leave."
"You can come back tonight."
"I know." He pressed his mouth to her forehead, letting his lips linger for a moment as he placed a kiss there. "But you both look so beautiful. I just don't want to leave."
"Don't worry," she assured him, "We'll be here when you get back."
Mulder nodded, and pushed himself over the bed, bending over to plant a last kiss on each of the girl's faces. He grabbed his uniform shirt off the back of a chair (Scully had made him take it off so it wouldn't wrinkle too much) and pulled it on. "You ladies behave while I'm gone."
She grinned and let her eyes fall shut, listened as he quietly pulled the door shut.
A half hour later a nurse came in to take Evelynne and put her in her bassinet so that Scully would be able to rest easier. She found the loss of heat that her daughter shared with her to be disconcerting, and instead of sleeping, rolled over on her side to watch the infant sleep, her tiny chest rising and falling with each breath. It was hard to hold back the tears welling up in her eyes – Scully yearned more now than ever for her first born. How perfect would it have been, her toddler, standing on his tippy toes, trying to see his sister's face?
Scully tried often to avoid thinking about how things could have been if they weren't so hard. Her and Mulder could live at home, Maggie could come over for dinner every Sunday, children would run around their house, screaming and laughing. Mulder could still see his strange friends, the Lone Gunmen, because in Scully's perfect world, they never died. They never had to. Doggett and Reyes were still a part of their lives, as was Skinner. They wrote a yearly Christmas card, and signed it "Fox and Dana Mulder". They went grocery shopping and didn't glance around every corner for a sign of danger.
But thinking about her perfect world only hurt, because Scully knew it was never attainable. She would never see her son again, and her stomach burned with guilt whenever she thought about him. Evelynne marked a new start for them, a new chance for a happiness. But things could never be what she imagined.
Scully finally closed her eyes and succumbed to sleep, listening to low, keening whistle of her daughter's snores.
********M&S*******
"Ready to go home?" Mulder asked, leaning against the wall, watching his wife do up the final snap on his daughter's onsie.
"Just about," Scully told him, smiling down at Evelynne, running the tip of her finger over the soft skin on her pudgy cheek. "Just want to put some clothes on, if that's okay." She was still in her pyjamas and a robe. Mulder nodded, walked over to pick up the girl, and cradled her in his arms. He watched Scully intently as she dressed, folding her pyjamas, tugging her shirt over her head, her pert nipples tenting the soft cotton.
"No bra?" He asked quietly. His voice had suddenly taken on a mildly husky tone.
"No," she laughed, turning to look at him. "My breasts are so sensitive lately, and I thought since we're just going home..."
"Mhm." He rocked Evelynne a little, to remind himself his daughter was in the room. Scully pulled on a pair of pants and zipped her overnight bag closed. Mulder handed the dozing baby to her and picked up the bag. "Ready now?" he asked her, leading the way out the door.
"Yes, am I ever."
"Your mom's waiting at the house." He held the wheelchair steady while Scully sat in it.
"I don't need a wheelchair Mulder," she protested, but let him push her to the elevator, none the less.
"Scully, I wasn't even there when my last kid was born. I'm pulling out all the stops this time, okay?"
She giggled while he pushed them through the open doors, and while the elevator descended, she craned her head back. He bent over and kissed her. "I love you," she whispered in his ear.
"Me too," he told her, pushing her out to the car. He opened the back door so Scully could put Evelynne in her car seat. She buckled her daughter in and then shut the door quietly, trying not to wake the still slumbering baby.
"I know she's safer in the back seat," she told him as he stuck his keys into the ignition, "but I hate letting her out of my sight."
"I know." He put a hand on Scully's once he had pulled out of the parking space, and drove his family home.
********M&S********
Maggie had gone home a week after the baby was born, she couldn't be gone too long or it would stir up suspicion. It was four o' clock in the morning, the day after they had dropped her off at the airport, and Scully was currently rocking a screaming baby, trying to coax her to nurse. Mulder was in bed, a pillow over his ears, not doing anything to drown out the noise.
"Shh, shh, shh, baby, it's okay." Scully rocked back and forth in the pink chair which had been a gift from Skinner, who had somehow found out about the baby, and had had the chair delivered. (Scully had it in her mind that there might be something between her mother and the man, but she wasn't sure enough to ask.) Finally Evelynne latched onto the proffered nipple and began to nurse, closing her eyes as she did so. Scully felt the baby's body relax, and decided it was safe to stand and go to the bedroom, stretch her legs. Mulder was sprawled on the bed, he legs atop the sheets, trying to cool down.
The AC had broken the night before, and even with all of the windows open, the fan on, and a shedding of all clothing, Mulder was down right burning to death. Scully sat down next to him, reclining against the headboard, still cradling her baby with one arm, and reached out to push some of the sweat soaked hair off his face.
"I'm dying," he told her matter-of-factly.
"I know. We are too." She gestured to the baby in her arms, clad only in a diaper and sweating (as profusely as a baby can) and then to herself – no shirt, and a skimpy pair of panties. "Evelynne's not going to be able to sleep like this. I think I'm going to run a cool bath for us."
Mulder rolled over on his stomach, trying to let his damp back dry off. "Scully, if we're all dying of heat here, how can we move to South America?"
"Maybe we shouldn't go there." She continued to talk to him as she walked to the bathroom adjacent to their room. "Maybe we should look at moving to somewhere in Europe. Or, oh! Mulder, what about Ireland?"
"It rains all the time, there."
"It would be cooler."
He gave a non-committal grunt as a response and closed his eyes, continuing to fight nobly in his battle for sleep. The water gushed into the tub, and Scully sat on the edge, continuing to nurse Evelynne as she tested the water's temperature. She was tempted to make it as cold as she could, but knew that it should be at least lukewarm if she was going to bring Evelynne in with her. Soon the baby finished nursing and unlatched. Scully took her into the bedroom, lay her on the bed next to her dozing father, who reached out an arm, fumbled around blindly, and finally placed his hand on the baby's abdomen. Unwilling to take this moment of bonding away from them, Scully stripped out of her underwear, grabbed a book, and climbed into the bath on her own.
She hadn't been in the tub long, maybe she'd read five pages, when a snort caught her attention. The bed clothes were rustling in the room next to her. Tempted as she was to and check on the two of them, she was sure they were fine and so she stayed in the tub a little longer. But Scully's mind wasn't focussing on the words she was reading over and over again – she kept thinking about Mulder and Evelynne – what had that snort meant? Just when she was about to give up her internal argument and go check on them, a mussed Mulder appeared in the doorway – sans Evelynne.
"Where is she?" Scully asked, setting her book on the closed toilet seat.
"Sleeping. I put a few pillows around her. She's in the middle of the bed – just like it's all supposed to be." He came further into the bathroom, dipped a hand into the water and then placed it on her abdomen, trailed his fingers over her breast and stopped on her cheek. "Can I join you?"
"I'm trying to cool off here, Mulder."
He laughed quietly, but climbed in anyways, not waiting for a real answer. His long legs wrapped around her body, he settled in behind her, letting her dampened hair cling to his chest. Scully ran her hands over his legs and then turned so that she could lean her head back and get a better look at him.
"Can't sleep, huh?"
"No," he sighed, moving the water with his hands. "It hasn't been coming easily lately."
"I've noticed," she told him, relaxing her neck, and choosing to stare at the wall for a while instead of him. She pressed a hand to his forearm, stilling his constant motion. "Is there something wrong at work? Is there something going on I should know about?"
"No." But she could feel him tense behind her. She knew when he was keeping something from her.
"Are you not allowed to talk about it?" she asked him quietly. In the past they had always been able to share the details of cases together – they had worked on them together. It was hard for both of them to deal with this necessary secrecy.
"I'm not supposed to."
"It's upsetting you." She rolled over, manoeuvred her body so that she was stomach to stomach with him, his hands were resting on the small of her back. "Can't you just tell me why it's upsetting you?"
He sighed. "Uh...sometimes I just feel like, if I could know more, if I still had access to information like I used to, maybe I could be getting somewhere. I could be preparing us for what's to come. But as it is, I'm cutting out God damn newspaper clippings and stuffing them into a drawer. I'm pulling at straws on everything, and coming up with nothing. How can I protect you? How can I protect Evelynne, if I don't really know what's out there?"
Scully's hands roamed over his chest, and she laid her cheek on his shoulder. "Mulder, when we were on the X-Files, there was still a lot of cases where we had no clue what was going on. We didn't know what was out there, but we were still fighting. We knew that eventually, we'd find the truth and it would all be worth it. We did find the truth, we know what's going to happen. It's only a matter of time – all we can do it wait. What more do you want to know?"
"What if they're following us, bugging us? What if they know we had another baby, what if they try to take her, too? When we were on the X-Files, at least I had a chance of finding that information. Now I'm just...we're just sitting ducks, waiting for the bullet to hit."
"We always were, Mulder."
He heaved another sigh, but didn't reply. He agreed with her, but voicing his assent to opinion would have made it all too real.
********M&S********
They noticed something was up when Evelynne was about 2 months old. Scully had taken her in for a check up with the family's doctor. "She's been having trouble making eye contact," she said, bouncing the giggling baby on her lap, "and she doesn't look at anything I try to show her. Right past toys. Isn't this the age when they're supposed to start really exploring their surroundings? Do you think something could be wrong with her...progressively? Mentally?"
Dr. Grey shook her head. "I think she's very healthy, Mrs. Johnston. But I think we should keep an eye on this. When you bring her in for her check up next month, I'd like to know if there's been any change in her behaviour."
"Okay." Evelynne tugged on Scully's cross and popped it in her mouth awkwardly. "Thank you Dr. Grey." Scully forced the metal out of her daughter's mouth, placed the baby in her carrier, and shook her doctor's hand.
She had walked to the clinic, even though it was a little chilly outside. Autumn in the north seemed to bring with it an abrupt weather change – how she longed for the boiling hot days of July. A blanket was tucked over Evelynne's body, leaving on her pink little face sticking out. Scully bundled herself up, too, and picked up her daughter, carrying her out into the wind. Dr. Grey's orders, rather than waylaying Scully's fears, had only served to increase them. She found, in the medical field, the only time you told someone to "wait and see" was when you had a terrible diagnosis, and you wanted to give God a little time to work a miracle.
Mulder was working the change over shift, and came home around noon, exhausted, but exciting to see his girls. Evelynne was napping, so he wrapped his arms around Scully, kissed her on the cheek. "How was your day?" Scully asked him, pulling a chicken pot pie out of the oven.
"Boring," he said, unbuttoning his shirt and walking into their bedroom. She could hear him through the walls. "Nothing exciting. What about your day?"
"Well, I took Evie to the doctor."
"And?" he asked her, coming back into the kitchen in an undershirt and sweats.
Scully turned around and leaned against the counter, wiping her hands on her jeans. "I don't know, Mulder, I'm worried."
"About what?" he asked, opening the fridge and getting out a beer. He grabbed her one too, and offered it, but she shook her head, pointing to her chest. Still nursing, dummy. He mentally slapped himself.
"Well, I've noticed that even though Evie is at an age where she should be exploring the world around her and taking it all in, she's not making eye contact – she's not looking at her toys, she never looks at you or me. She'll turn her head in our direction if she hears our voices, but she never actually looks at us. Sometimes, when I'm feeding her, I notice her struggling to find a nipple. I'm worried she might be...handicapped. I brought it up with Dr. Grey, and she just said to wait and see."
Mulder was now sitting at the kitchen table, he took a swig of his beer and leaned on one hand. "Well, if she said to wait, I guess that's all we can do..."
"But Mulder," Scully protested, feeling tears of frustration welling up in her eyes, "I know something's wrong, I just know it. I don't want to wait, I want to know now."
"Well, what can we do to find out?" he asked her earnestly.
"I don't know," she said, sitting down across the table from him, placing her head in her hands. "Get a second opinion, I guess."
"Well, we'll start there. We'll find another doctor-"
"I don't want to hurt Dr. Grey's feelings!" Rebecca Grey was one of the few women Scully considered a friend – her world was very small, as she didn't work and spent most of her time at home with Evelynne.
"We don't have to tell her. She'll only find out if she was wrong. In which case, I'm sure her feelings won't be hurt, she'll just want to be there for us and Evie." Mulder reached across the table and took Scully's hand. "Hey, it's gonna be okay, we'll figure this out. We've been through worse."
Scully smiled at him and nodded. "You're right." She swiped hastily at her eyes. "Would you like some lunch?" she asked him, rising a walking to the cupboard.
"I'd love some," he leaned back in his chair and watch her small body reach, standing on tip toe, grasping for a plate. She finally placed her fingers around two plates and turned back to him, grinning. "I'm starving."
********M&S********
"Rebecca? Hi, it's Daniel Johnston. Yeah, Jane's husband. Well," Mulder turned over the quarter he was holding. It had landed on heads, so he had called Dr. Grey without saying anything to Scully. "Look, Jane doesn't know I'm calling you. She's very upset over this whole thing with Evelynne. She wants a second opinion, but didn't want to say anything to you because she didn't want to hurt your feelings. But we're still pretty new to the area, I was wondering if you could recommend anyone?"
Mulder stared at the coffee table and dropped his quarter. It made a loud clanging sound as it hit the glass inlay. "What do you mean, blind?"
"Mulder, what's going on?" Scully had come in through the back door with a bag full of books - done at the mall already. He wasn't sure how much she'd heard. He shook his head at her before trying to focus on the woman talking to him on the other end of the phone, but his hearing had suddenly gone odd, there was a buzzing in the air and it was hard for him to differentiate one noise from another.
"I'm sorry, what did you say? An ophthalmologist? I...okay, what's his name? Hold on." He waved at Scully. Pen, he mouthed at her. She came back with a pad of paper and a pen, handing them to him, scrutinizing him. "Dr. William Fabrie? Okay, do you have a phone number? Thanks. Thank you. Okay, yeah. I'll do that. Thanks again." Mulder hung up the phone before looking guiltily at Scully. She crossed her arms and looked at him angrily.
"Look," he started, but she cut him off.
"Were you talking to Dr. Grey?" she asked him.
"I didn't know who else to go to. I just wanted answers. I know you just want to know if Evie's okay. I told her we just wanted to be safe." Scully turned to walk away from him, striding quickly toward Evelynne's room, even as he continued to talk. He followed her, still trying to explain himself. "She wasn't upset, Scully. She said it's natural to be worried. She said she could only think that it might be a vision problem. She gave me a number, Scully. She said this guy isn't really accepting patients, but if I say who sent us, we've got a good chance of getting in."
Scully lifted Evelynne out of her crib. The baby had been awake, but hadn't cried – it was as though she knew someone would be there to get her soon. Mulder had noticed his daughter was quite often extremely stoic, patient as a sphinx. Scully laid the baby down on a mat, and kneeling beside her, motioned for Mulder to join them on the floor. He squatted down next to them. "Look at this," she said, grabbing a brightly coloured stuffed elephant from the rocking chair. She moved it back and forth across Evelynne's field of vision, with no reaction from the infant. "Mulder, I think Dr. Grey is right. There is something wrong with her vision. I'm mad at you for going behind my back, but I'm glad you got that number. I'm so worried."
********M&S********
Mulder had the day off work and came to Dr. Fabrie's with Scully and Evelynne. There was a sickening knot of worry building in his stomach, and he was sure Scully had one that was at least two times as bad. Evelynne was reclining against his chest, holding one of his fingers hostage in her very wet mouth. He tried to focus on talking to her, making her giggle as they sat in the full waiting room, but Scully's fidgeting next to him, her constant glances at the door, made him feel just as nervous as she was.
After what seemed like ages, an young woman came out from behind the door and called his daughter's name. The trio shuffled into the back of the office, where a number of eye related machines sat on tables. "Mr. and Mrs. Johnston?" The assistant smiled at them as they nodded at her. "And this must be Evelynne," she bent and smiled at the baby, but a small frown flickered over her face when the child looked past her blankly. She quickly plastered the smile back on her face. "You have a beautiful baby. Dr. Fabrie will be with you shortly." She placed a folder on the table and left the office, closing the door until it was only open a crack.
Scully reached over to pick up the file and flipped through it. "Nothing new," she told Mulder, who had been watching her for any reactions. "It's just the file Dr. Grey must have sent over." Mulder nodded and shifted positions. "Do you want me to hold her?" Scully asked, reaching out her arms for the baby. It wasn't really a question. Just as Mulder was passing Evelynne over, the door opened. An elderly man came in, frowning.
"You must ze Johnstons." He had a thick German accent, and seemed to exude apathy with every step. "I heard about 'choo from my good friend, Dr. Grey." He picked up the file and flipped through it. "It seems to me that 'chour daughter is possibly suffering from infantile blindness."
"In...infantile blindness?" Scully choked out, unconsciously pressing Evelynne closer to her chest. "As in, it doesn't last beyond infancy?"
"No. As in it begins in infancy." He told her bluntly. "Of course," he seemed to realize he had been harsh. "I haf only gone over her records. I will require a thorough examination to give a definitive diagnosis."
Scully nodded dumbly and handed over her daughter to the assistant who had appeared, watched as the baby was put through a short battery of tests. By the end, Evelynne was wailing, dripping snot onto her father's shirt as he held her, trying to comfort her. Dr. Fabrie had left them in the room. He said he needed a few moments to go over the test results. He would be with them soon. Mulder was rubbing Evelynne's back, her sobs had reduced to sniffles as she tired herself out. Scully was leaning on his shoulder, trying not to think about what they would hear when the man came back.
It took Dr. Fabrie a while, but eventually he did come back into the room. "Well," he said, taking a seat and flipping open the now marginally thicker folder, "it seems that my assumption was correct. Based on multiple test results, I do believe your daughter is blind."