Lisp - Requested by Anonymous - June 28th, 2019

Season 5 - "Mulder brings attention to the fact Scully has a teeny-tiny lisp"

They had to interview a little girl, probably around five or six, who had a very prominent lisp. While he wanted to reassure the girl that she'd grow out of it with a little help, that it's nothing to be upset about, he didn't want to make her think that it was a flaw that needed to be corrected. For a while he considered ignoring it, but the way the girl was obviously trying to avoid any words with the letter 's' and the way she'd look at the ground when she accidentally made a 'th' sound instead broke his heart. After hearing her mumble an apology for the umpteenth time this conversation, he had to say something.

"You don't have to apologize for the way you speak honey," he reassured in a gentle voice, leaning his head down in hopes of catching her eyes.

"It'th embaraththing," she frowned, brows furrowing.

"It's more common than you'd think," he promised. "Lisps sound different from person to person and they change as you get older."

"Really?" she asked, looking hopeful for the first time since they sat down.

"Yeah, lots of people have a lisp," he nodded, sitting up a bit. "My partner has a small lisp. Sometimes it's not there, but other times you can notice it just a tiny bit" he told her.

"The does?" The girl smiled, beside herself. She'd stared at Scully everytime they came to interview the family, smiling so wide her eyes squinted and making sure to wave from out the window as they left. She adored Scully, and this was the best news she could have heard.

"Mhm," he hummed with a smile. "Scully, can you say garage?"

There was a slight pause and he looked over to see Scully looking at him with an unreadable expression. "Garage," she repeated flatly.

"Did you hear that?" He asked the little girl. "Her lisp comes out through either an exaggerated 'sh' or 'zh' sound. Instead of hitting the second 'g' in that word she says 'gara-shh'. Sometimes it comes out when she says 'science' and a few other words," he explained.

"It'th very thoft," the girl nodded, agreeing with him.

"It's not like Holly Hunter or Barbara Walter where it comes out every time, but since I'm with her so much I notice it," he added.

"Do you teathe her?" the girl asked, playing with the hem of her sundress in her little fists.

"Never," he replied seriously. "And she's the smartest person I know, and everyone likes her. She never lets her lisp get in the way of anything." And she'd shoot him if he ever tried. From the forced smile that was on her face right now, he wasn't so sure he completely avoided getting in trouble anyway.

The conversation moved forward with ease since the girl took so much pride in having something in common with Scully. After an hour, they'd finished talking to the girl and her parents about the fires that'd been happening in their neighborhood. The girl gave them both big hugs before they left to get into their rental. "I think we should ask the fire department if they found anything strange in the ashes after the fires were put out," he said as he opened the car doors.

She hadn't answered him and he looked over to see she was waving sweetly back at the girl who had her face pressed against the glass. When her hand dropped she turned and saw Mulder staring at her, realizing he'd asked her a question. "Mhm," she hummed as an answer.

Little did he know these type of answers to his questions were going to be a recurring theme throughout the ride.

"Do you think the neighbors have anything to do with it?"

Shrug.

"Maybe it was a ritual gone wrong?"

"Eh."

"The sheriff said this happened back in 1987, ten years ago. Maybe there's a connection?"

"Hmm."

He looked over at her and noticed she was looking at her feet and playing with her nails, a posture that was strikingly familiar. She almost looked like the little girl did when-

Then it hit him like a ton of bricks.

"Scully are you upset that I pointed out your lisp?" he asked, shock evident in his tone.

She was silent for a moment and he thought she might be giving him the silent treatment until she softly mumbled, "I didn't know I had a lisp."

He felt guilty and tried to do some damage control. "Well, to be honest, I'm not sure if it's necessarily categorized as a lisp. I just didn't want to say speech impediment and have her not understand."

"Oh, it's a speech impediment now?" she chuckled sardonically.

"It's-"

"You knew exactly what word to ask me. Is this something everyone knows about but me?" she asked. He was shocked at how upset she seemed to be and he didn't know what to say. Had seriously no one ever mentioned it to her? Her voice was one of his favorite things about her and her little affects were a huge component to that.

"Scully, all we do is talk to each other every day for hours for the past five years. I know your voice better than I probably know my own," he defended.

She didn't say anything in response and he decided to try his luck by saying, "Did I hurt your feelings? I didn't mean anything bad by it."

"Whatever. It's fine," she replied shortly.

"Why are you acting like me saying you have a lisp was me saying something's wrong with you when the exact opposite just so happens to be true!" he proclaimed, getting agitated from accidentally offending her.

"What?" she asked, not sounding as cold this time.

"I meant what I said to the girl. It's not very noticeable, I notice because I pay attention to you," he explained, trying to backtrack a little but still reassure her.

"No, what did you mean by 'the opposite just so happens to be true'?" she asked.

"Nothing,-"

"No, what did you mean, come on," she persisted, nudging his elbow with her own.

He didn't want her to take his refusal to answer as evidence that he was 'hiding' something else he knew about her from herself, so with a deep breath, he simply stated, "It's um, it sounds good."

"My lisp sounds good?" she repeated and he realized how lame that sounded. He looked over and saw that same sentiment reflected on her face.

He went through his mental rolodex of words he could use to describe what he thought of her lisp while trying to decide which one wouldn't result in him getting punched or offending her further.

"It's…" Cute. Tantalizing. Hot. Invigorating.

She interrupted his search for a good word with an impatient "It's?"

It wasn't something he usually would have admitted to her, but he was backed into a corner.

"It's sexy."

There was a beat of awkward silence as he waited for her response. He waited for her to tell him that was unprofessional or tell him to pull over the car. However, when he glanced over to see if she was giving him a death glare, he instead saw she was failing at holding back a smile as she looked at her hands. He felt his entire body relax as he realized he'd finally done something right.

"Um, thank you, Mulder," she mumbled, obviously trying not to allow her smile to be audible through the words.

"Just telling the truth."