Regular People Still
By Cathleen Faye / Email: kimerikal@aol.com

Genre: MSR
Rating: NC-17 for explicit sexual content, adult language, and adult issues.
Summary: The sequel to the story started in Regular People. We're back in 1998 where Mulder and Scully are continuing their sojourn. This means talk about issues between them, discoveries large and small, lots of sex, some laughter, some sadness, and a touch of urgency as they are fast running out of time to be regular people.  Time wise, the story takes place in December 1998, after Dreamland and skipping over HTGSC. Nothing after that date appears, as it hasn't happened yet in this world.
Author's Notes: I wrote the first part of this about a year and a half ago. If you haven't read the first part, you probably can still follow this as I've backed up at the beginning a bit before going forward. This sequel was a long time coming because of other life obligations, but I'd like to thank everyone who wrote feedback and kept encouraging (i.e. badgering me <g>) to finish up this sequel.

Usually when Mulder opened his eyes in the morning, the first thing in his line of vision was his lithograph of an old Royal Typewriter, a thing that usually received strange looks from people who saw it upon entering his apartment the first time. Of course, they didn't know that the typewriter in the picture looked much like the one that had sat on the desk in his father's study some thirty years ago.

When he was eight years old, he'd wanted to be a reporter, mostly due to the fact that his class had recently visited the local newspaper and he'd found the process fascinating. He'd spent many evenings sitting at father's typewriter, jamming the keys together and messing the ribbon up as he would hunt and peck away through a story.

That was a time before cut, paste, and spell check. A time when making a mistake meant starting over from the beginning if it was to be perfect, without erasures and cover-ups. He showed his father what he'd written and asked him to help him fix it, help him make it right. Together they sat with heads bowed as William Mulder went over each story with him. He helped him correct his grammar and spelling, showing him how to tell the story honestly and fairly. Mulder still remembered the day his father had handed his paper back to him and told him that he didn't need to change a thing because it was perfect.

Like the typewriter, that time of closeness with his father was long gone now. It was true that his lithograph was his reminder of a time when the frenzied information age hadn't yet dawned; when his life was slower, a little more pure. But mostly, it was his reminder of when he learned that making it right took perseverance, tenacity, and a willingness to start over.

But on this morning, as he pushed unaccustomed deep sleep from his mind, he saw very different view before him. One of trees and blue sky and morning sunlight streaming through the branches, turning the pines a brilliant green, and throwing shadows about. And for just a moment in time, he didn't know where he was. Then, in the blink of an eye, the knowledge was there.

He was home. Not home in Alexandria, but his childhood home on Martha's Vineyard. He lay curled up on his stomach in his parent's large bed, a place of sanctuary he hadn't slept the night in since he was six years old and frightened by closet monsters.

It was December and outside the warmth of the blankets, the air was cool on his hand. As he shifted slightly under the blanket, he felt the brush of heat from Scully's body radiate lightly against the skin of his back. That was another sensation that he couldn't remember feeling for a very long time, a sweet presence within his personal space. The warmth against the left side of his back was enticing given the chill of the morning. His instinct was to turn towards it, but instead, he kept his gaze fixed on the tranquil scene visible through the French doors as he lazily drank in the winter beauty. Cold weather always made the colors so clear and he noticed that there was a slight breeze outside. The boughs on the trees swayed gently back and forth causing the sun to make dancing patterns of shadow on the redwood deck outside the window.

Mulder unfolded his curled-up legs, flexing his feet and stretching, unkinking the muscles. But as he moved, he felt small toes graze up against his calf. He carefully moved his body again, now slowly nestling back towards the warmth, feeling her skin contact lightly against his body. Suddenly, she moved too, and he felt a brush of hair tickle his back as it feathered by. The sensation caused him to smile and the urge to turn over and take her into his arms was becoming a need.

Good God, he was on the verge of becoming a cuddler. Mulder laughed quietly as he rolled his eyes. That was just about a nine on the scale of ten of male wussiness, maybe one step below admitting you liked a chick flick. But he didn't care because he found that he was quickly adapting to the new feeling that this simple physical intimacy invoked. It was strangely compelling, this calm after the storm. Content. That was the word. He couldn't remember being this content in a long time. And he knew the feeling was a fledgling-- newborn and ill prepared to endure in the harsh world that was often their existence. He feared for the feeling's capacity to survive, let alone thrive.

He yawned deeply as his thoughts rambled about in that marvelous world of half-sleep. Before full consciousness came to put them in order. God--he'd made love to Scully last night. Actually, just a few hours ago. And, unlike everything else in theirs lives, it had happened with an astonishing lack of fanfare; a simple, natural moment six years in the making and yet only one day in the fulfillment. And somehow he'd ended up in bed with the last person he'd expected to see yesterday morning.

She'd showed up unexpectedly at his father's house in West Tisbury when at that moment she was supposed to be with her family in California. He'd dropped her off at the airport himself the previous day. He'd gone on to Martha's Vineyard where he was going to spend the holidays getting his father's house ready to sell. But as he worked in the yard, he'd heard his name called and recognized her voice before he'd even turned his head. And there she was, standing at the gate, waiting for him to let her in. How prophetic.

At first, it seemed that she was simply there by default. She'd had no where else to go after winter storms caused her holiday plans to fall apart. But no matter the reason, he'd been absurdly pleased that she was there. And although he appeared to be sympathetic to her plight, the reality was that he was just doing a very good job at hiding the fact that he was delighted by her misfortune. And so began a day unlike no other in all their years together. A day that regular people would call mundane or even boring. Fools, he thought, dumb shit fools. They had no clue how lucky they had it or how fortunate they were to be ignorant of what he and Scully knew.

He discovered Scully yesterday. Certainly nothing big, nothing dramatic, she just filled in some of the gaps, little bits and pieces that he didn't know, or that she hadn't let him know, before. She'd insisted on helping him clean up the yard at his father's house and they'd talked, played, flirted, and generally acted like a couple of teenagers whose parents were out of town. But even so, when they'd returned to his childhood home in Chilmark, it might have gone no further. They'd danced this dance before and had always gone their separate ways when it was over.

But then late last night, just before she left for Midnight Mass, she told him something that had rocked him. Perhaps he'd started it by opening his big mouth and saying something incredibly sentimental to her. Jesus, he'd even brought God into it and feeling embarrassed, he'd immediately made for the kitchen to hide out, pretending to rinse the dishes. But within moments, he'd heard her call his name for the second time that day and reluctantly, he came back to the doorway of the kitchen and hovered there, slowly raising his eyes to meet hers. Scully stood at the front door and he'd thought she was simply going to say goodbye. But instead, she told him something that he hadn't even realized he'd needed to hear.

"Mulder, I could have still made it to my family's if I'd wanted to."

Whoa. He wasn't expecting that at all.

Chosen. He'd been chosen. As those words sank in, he felt a smile cross his face and Scully returned it softly as though she also was a little self-conscious by her own outburst of sentimentality. And then she was gone, leaving him alone to cope with his newfound knowledge and its implications. With a simple sentence, she'd tossed the ball back right back in his court. And now he just had hours to think and wait.

He'd gone upstairs and glanced in Scully's room, realizing that the bed wasn't made. No matter how his plans turned out, he knew she was tired. He found the flannel sheets in the closet and put the bed together, then just stood there as he considered his options. Finally, he turned off the light and headed back down the hallway to his old room where he flopped himself down on the bed in the dark. He folded his hands behind his head and waited. Several hours later he awoke from his light doze when he heard the sound of the front door opening and closing and then her footsteps on the stairs. For a brief moment, he hoped she might actually bypass her room and come to him, but she didn't. And so instead, he went to her last night.

Well, actually, he almost didn't. The usual insecurities decided to plague him a bit, along with that deep-rooted fear that he was about to make a colossal ass of himself and then have to live with that humiliation. All in all, it'd taken two trips down the hall to open that damn door. She'd taken him in, just as he'd really known all along that she would. And he'd made love to her right here in his parent's antique sleigh bed. The same bed that he'd been conceived in back when his mother and father had actually still been in love and wanted to create a living expression of how they felt about each other. In other words, a very long, long time ago.

There would be no such expression for them, he thought and his reaction to that sudden, random perception was an soft melancholy that washed through briefly and then faded away. He nestled in back closer to the warmth behind him. He could now feel her faint breath on his back. He wanted to turn and look at her, but he didn't.

The truth was that in his thirty-seven years the only baby he'd ever held in his arms had been his little sister. His parents had prepared him carefully for her arrival. Hoping, as all parents do, to ward off whatever sibling rivalry they could. They'd tried to make him feel involved and excited by telling him how much his little sister would depend on her big brother to show her around. Perhaps they hadn't realized that he would take that responsibility so much to heart. And when he first looked down at the big baby-gray eyes staring back solemnly up at him, he remembered telling her that he was going to share all the things he knew so far in the world. As he had all the confidence that a four-year-old who'd experienced few failures could muster, it never once occurred to him to wonder if he was up to the task. And that confidence had lasted until he was twelve.

And since then, the thought of having a small, squirming life placed in his arms for safekeeping seemed absurd. In the few times he'd thought of kids at all during the ensuing years, it'd always been with the concern of not being able to keep a child safe from the horrors he knew to be in the world already. And in later years, he wondered how to keep a child safe from the horrors he knew to be coming. After all, they hadn't been able to protect Emily; it had been beyond their power. They'd felt useless and helpless.

He knew that Scully had been especially confused about what she felt and what she thought she was supposed to feel about a child that was genetically hers and yet a complete stranger. A child she'd not even had the chance to know before that prospect was taken away. He knew that she'd struggled hard to reconcile her conflicted emotions and because he always saw under her façade of control, he knew that struggle had broken Scully's heart in small ways. And for his own reasons, for his own suspicions, it had broken his to watch her. No, there was no question that children were a ridiculous notion. But in another type of life, one they would never have, he thought that he might have been brave enough to try with Scully. They might have done OK together.

He now felt the slim body behind him move again, breaking his flow of thought as it molded to his, and he felt her hand touch his shoulder blade, caressing gently. Oh, that was nice, very nice. Thinking she'd awakened, he finally raised his head and turned over to look at her. But her eyes were still closed and her breathing soft and even. Her touch was being done in her sleep. She was apparently as unused to sharing her sleeping space as he was and she seemed to be testing the limits of her area in the bed. It was very true that having sex and sleeping together were two entirely different things and each took some getting used to. He smiled at the way her face was slightly smushed up against the pillow. It was cute.

He shook his head. Oh Jesus, now he was using words like "cute." On Scully, of all people no less. He thought about waking her but decided that would be selfish. Mulder pulled back the blanket and sat up, feeling the shock of cold air against his naked skin. He got out of the bed and bent to pick up his T-shirt and sweat pants that had been tossed to the floor last night in their rush to get at each other. As he pulled his clothes on against the chill of the December morning, he was already wondering about the next time that he would make love to her. His body was responding to the idea of seeing Scully's body in the light and feeling her touch again.

Last night had been exactly what it should have been, intense, fierce, concentrated. And quick, too damn quick. Not that he'd left Scully behind in the sexual pleasure department. He'd felt her, he'd heard her and even in the dim moonlight, he'd seen her. But next time he wanted long and slow, with lots of talking about what they liked, what they wanted, what they might have fantasized about. Of course, maybe he was just being egotistical and arrogant to think she might have fantasized about him. But surely, she had--God knows, he had about her. From her ardent response last night, he felt sure that there was just no way he was alone in that.

Mulder bent down over Scully, tucking the blanket back about her as he placed a kiss on the round of her shoulder, and then another into the curve of her neck. He sniffed deeply as he did so and was rewarded with the scent of them together. Oh God, this was a good feeling. Better than anything he had a memory of in recent years. Suddenly feeling overwhelmed, Mulder left the bedroom silently, avoiding the squeaky floorboard in the hallway, and headed back to his old bedroom. He entered his small bathroom and started the shower, letting it run a moment as he knew it took a while for the water heater of the old house to actually send any hot water upstairs. He went into the hallway and turned on the gas heater, another thing that barely worked.

Returning to the bathroom, he stripped off his clothes again and took a long shower, emerging clean and renewed. He hadn't shaved in a couple days so he did so now. He razored the beard away and then rinsed his face with the warm water. As he touched his face, his fingertips grazed over his lips and that touch brought back the memory of hers. His fingers lingered and Mulder closed his eyes a moment before as the feeling washed through him. How long had it been since he'd allowed himself to just feel normal? Emotion closed his throat up and he sat down on the edge of the tub to regain his composure. He shook his head as a self-mocking laugh escaped him. Oh man, he was in love. Not that the in love part was any kind of a self-revelation, but he was feeling pretty damn selfish about it. He wanted to hang on to this feeling of contentment, it was addicting, and the first he'd let himself have in so long.

It was so ironic that people thought his single-mindedness came naturally when nothing could be farther from the truth. People tended to think of Scully as the one with control and it was true that her will was formidable. But they liked to joke that his was an obsession when the reality was that it was a conscious choice he made everyday. Every single day. And everyday, he felt a little more drained by that choice and its responsibility. Everyday, it wore him down, the constant emotional battle over which lie to believe or which path to follow. Everyday, many of the choices he made were quite literally a matter of life and death. For himself, for Scully, for the people they cared about and the fortunate oblivious who had no clue what danger they were in.

And everyday, the sky fell a little faster in spite of his and Scully's best efforts to hold it up.

He finished dressing and headed downstairs. It wasn't until he was actually in the kitchen and looking out over the field behind the house that he remembered it was Christmas morning. He'd lost his sentimentality about holiday many years ago, but even so, this day usually brought an empty feeling, a sensation of being left out, left behind somehow. He knew it wasn't at all unusual to feel that way during this time of year. Many felt disconnected or disenfranchised so in one sense, he was no different than other people. But the wonder of it was that he didn't feel that way today. And it wasn't because he'd made love to Scully last night, as extraordinary as that had been. No, the reason for the feeling was much less complex. It was because she'd spent the day helping him clean the yard at his father's house. She'd chosen to be with him. She'd needed to be with him and for just once in her life she'd let him know that.

This was a feeling that he liked and it was a feeling he could get used to having on a daily basis. But to do so, he'd have to turn his back on everything else that had driven him all the years. He'd willingly put up with the humiliation and bullshit over the years because he'd believed that they were helping people who'd had no one else to turn to, no one else to believe them. And after the events of last summer, it was even more apparent just how vital this work was.

But for a long time now, it had been hard to find a reason to get up in the morning, get dressed and head off to the Bureau to see his life's work handed to someone else to fuck up. Where he was publicly and deliberately humiliated and degraded on a daily basis. It'd had been damn hard to rise above the depression caused by the loss of his work, the thing that had defined what he was for so long. He'd spent the last months trying to get his sense of purpose back and he hadn't achieved it. He and Scully both kept going and they managed to keep defying A.D. Kersh where they could, slipping in under his radar as Scully put it. But he wondered if it was only a matter of time until they were separated again and Kersh found a way to drive his ass out of the bureau. It was hard, just damn hard to find a hope to hang on to.

But this...this was so easy.

And fun. This was a word he didn't often get to use in anything relating to his own life. Doing backbreaking yard work had seemed like play. Going grocery shopping with her had been entertaining. Cooking dinner together had been enjoyable. Hell, tossing her on that pile of leaves had been downright carefree. And he didn't have a word to describe the lovemaking. But it was all so easy. And so tempting.

He looked out the window at the bright sun and thought about the woman upstairs who slept so peacefully by his side last night. Scully had asked him just a short while ago if he ever wanted to slow down and live a normal life. He'd made a flippant reply but the question hadn't left him for a moment and the fact that Scully had even asked it of him had stayed with him too. Maybe it was time to turn away from it all. Admit that one man and one woman couldn't fight the future. Maybe they could just learn to live in the present. Other people got to do that, why shouldn't they?

But he already knew the answer, even as the temptation beckoned. Because they had work to do. Work that only they could do. It wasn't arrogance that made him believe that, it was simple truth. Right now, except for Scully, all that he'd cared about was gone. He was off the X-Files with what seemed little hope of ever getting back. Sleeping with Scully didn't change that and of course, their continuing to sleep together wouldn't change that either. And he had every intention of continuing to sleep with Scully, but he was not so sure that they would be returned to the X-Files.

And he wondered what Scully was feeling about all this. He wondered if she was feeling as enchanted as he. He needed to talk to her and he realized the beauty of that concept, found it comforting. But then, as if on cue, he heard the shower go on upstairs and he suddenly felt just slightly panicked. Shit. She was up. In a few minutes, she would be down here, looking him in the eye and things were going to start getting real again. What was she going to say to him? What would he say to her? How should he act? What...

God, you moron, it's Scully. Just stop it.

As the sound of running water continued, his mind drifted elsewhere, to a Scully who was naked in the shower at this very moment. He hadn't yet seen her body in the soft light of day. Desire washed through him at the thought of her wet and washing her hair and running her hands over her soapy, slick body with those perfect breasts that he'd finally gotten to touch and taste and...

Stop this. Stop this right now.

A flushed Mulder decided that busying himself with making coffee would help him keep himself in control. As the coffee brewed, he got out a few breakfast things and generally putzed until he decided that maybe he should take the coffee up to her. Maybe she was waiting for him to approach her. Mulder was just pouring the coffee into mugs when he heard the telltale squeak of floorboard at the top of the stairs. Taking the mugs in his hand, he moved to the doorway in time to see Scully's feet appear on the stairwell and then descend as the rest of her came into view. She was looking over at the living room as she came down, not seeing him in the kitchen doorway. As he watched her a moment, he thought it must feel very strange for her, this holiday with no family, no Christmas, nothing that was familiar to her. Except him.

"Good Morning," he called out softly so as not to startle her.

But she turned at the sound of his voice and the smile that graced her face made his heart quicken. God, she was so beautiful. She paused at the foot of the stairs. "Morning, Mulder."

"I was just coming to wake you up. The place comes with room service you know."

Scully came to him and took one of the coffee mugs from his hand, her fingers grazing his as she did so and he almost dropped the other mug. "Thank you."

He searched her face for any sign of regret or awkwardness and found none. Then he realized he couldn't just continue to stand and stare at her like an idiot so he gestured to her to sit down as he retreated to the kitchen. Down boy, he thought, it's just breakfast. Scooping up the muffins and the orange juice, he returned to the living room where Scully sat on the couch, sipping her coffee. She watched him as he set them on the coffee table before taking his place next to her, the warmth of her body and her sweet, clean smell making him weak. "I forgot something," he told her.

Scully turned from the meal in front of them to meet his eyes. "What?" she asked.

"This." Mulder slowly leaned towards her, kissing her lightly, before drawing back as the quicksilver tightening in the pit of his stomach shot through him. The same as he'd felt last night. He kissed her again, deeper, feeling her respond, feeling her move to caress his lips with her own. God, he could just kiss Scully forever. When he finally drew away, he saw that she was as moved by him as he was by her. Exactly the way it should be, he thought. What would it be like to have this kind of freedom all the time. That thought sobered him again, and he turned away, picked up his coffee mug, and stared down at it. Scully seemed to sense his mood change, and he felt her arm slide across his back as her other hand came to rest on his forearm, stroking back and forth.

"What?" she asked, her tone was low and coaxing.

"Scully, you asked me a question a little while ago that I never really answered."

"Which question, Mulder?"

"You asked me whether I ever wanted to settle down, and live something approaching a normal life. Well, the answer is yes." He turned his eyes to hers, nodding slowly. "Yes, Scully, every once in a while I think exactly that. Especially if that normal life could be like this. Like yesterday. Like last night." He took a deep breath, not sure how of to say the rest without sounding pessimistic, but truth was, he felt pessimistic. "But I don't know that it's something that I'll ever be able have because so much else in my life conspires to prevent it. But I do think about it, Scully. More and more lately." He glanced over at her and she nodded. Mulder set his mug back on the table. "But I have a question for you too." He stood and retreated to one of the windows, putting some distance between them as he looked out on the lawn covered in morning dew, wondering if he even wanted to hear the answer to his next question. He turned back to her.

"Scully--do you believe that my sister was abducted by aliens?"

He saw a startled look cross her face. Clearly, this wasn't a question she expected on this morning. The only other time he'd asked the question of her, she'd been unwilling to reply, unwilling to hurt him by saying it aloud. He hadn't pressed her and they'd let it go. But he needed to hear the answer today. Where they went from here depended upon it. He waited in silence and somewhat to his surprise, Scully never looked away from him. Not once.

"Mulder..." she paused a moment. "Yes, Mulder. I believe it's possible. I've believed it for a long time. I just never told you."

And that wasn't the answer that he'd been so sure he would hear. He crossed back over to her and knelt before her, searching her face. "Really, Scully?" She nodded as a sad, hesitant smile crossed her face and he could see that she knew what they were giving up. But she'd given him the truth he'd asked for. "Thank you," he pulled her into his arms. "Thank you for telling me." He drew back and touched her face. "That's the best Christmas present I've ever had," he said lightly to cover his emotion. "But I didn't get you anything."

She shook her head and a bittersweet look crossed her face as she touched him. "Yes, you did, Mulder. For six years, you and I have been on a journey whose nature doesn't allow us the opportunity to be regular people. We're different, you and I. Different both by circumstance and by choice. But we're still different, we're still outsiders to many of the things the rest of the world gets to take for granted. But yesterday, last night and today, we did all the regular people things that regular people get to do. I wanted that gift for a long time." She took his face in her hands. "I know that we'll get the X-files back soon because we have a job to finish. And I know that by necessity, things will return to how they were before. But I'll have these days forever. You gave me that and it's the best gift I could ask for...even if I know I have to give it back soon." Scully wrapped her arms around his neck as she held him close again. "And I did get to go home to my family for Christmas, Mulder."

"Scully..." He started to say more but his throat felt painful as he realized how well this woman understood him. "Yes," he agreed simply. They would return from this sojourn with their original determination intact. They would somehow get back what was theirs and continue their journey together. There was a certain relief that they'd made their decision. While they would most assuredly continue in this new phase of their closeness, they'd have to forfeit the open freedom they found here on this island and in this cottage. And that normal life she'd talked about on the road to Nevada would not be theirs for the keeping.

But it would be theirs for the next few days.

He rose back to his feet and she followed him as he moved back up the stairs. He felt slightly awkward, nervous even. He was going to take Scully to bed and make love to her. No, it wasn't their first time, but last night seemed dreamlike somehow, spontaneous and unstructured. But this was different, this was very deliberate. As he looked down at her, she met his eyes briefly then glanced away, causing him to smile. Oh good, she was self-conscious too, it wasn't just him. Mulder's usual defense mechanism was humor and he became amused at the thought that at their age, this would make them feel like clumsy adolescents. But since that was actually pretty close to how he felt, he might as well take advantage of that.

At the top of the stairs, she reached out to open the door to her room, but he caught her hand. She looked up at him again and saw that he now wore that playful, wicked smile from yesterday when he'd tossed her in the leaf pile. "What, Mulder?" She asked with cautious curiosity, knowing him well. As she stepped toward him, she hit the creaky floorboard.

He raised one finger to his lips as he bent low to her ear. "Shhh, you'll wake my Mom," he whispered. "Come on, my room's this way," he said as he nodded his head in the direction of his room. He tugged on her hand as he walked backwards down the hallway towards his old room, leading her to his domain.

Scully smiled, remembering their conversation about his bed from yesterday. God, was that only yesterday? "OK," she whispered back as he led her down the hallway. "But I should warn you that my dad will kick your butt if I'm not home by midnight."

He pushed open the door to his room with his foot and drew her inside as he grinned at her. "Midnight of what year?"

They stood in the center of his room and looked at each other. "So, you bring a lot of girls from school up here, Mulder?" she asked.

"Only the ones with a high tolerance for listening to theories of government conspiracy."

"Oh, so I'm the first then." He smiled at that. "Well, I'd listen to anything to get out of Home Economics, but I was kinda hoping for not too much talk here."

"I can do less talk." He bent down to kiss her, pulling her up against him. The height difference that had never been a problem before, now became a source of further amusement. Laughing slightly, he drew away. "OK--I need to be shorter," he told her. "Or, you need to be taller."

Scully gave him that amused look that he'd seen more of in the last twenty-four hours than in the last year. "Well, if I'd brought some spiky high heels with me, Mulder, I'd be happy to put them on. But since I didn't, I'm afraid you'll have to settle for getting less vertical."

"Damn, I like the high heel thing, but your solution works too."

"I thought you'd think so."

He sat on the edge of the bed and she came to stand before him. He reached out and wrapped his arms around her waist, laying his head against her belly. He felt her cradle her against him and he closed his eyes and enjoyed the sensation. After a moment, he felt her kiss the top of his head as her voice reached him.

"I want to know the story, Mulder."

He shook his head in confusion as he looked up at her, not understanding her question.

She stroked the back of her fingers down his face. "Yesterday, you told me that you didn't have as many stories as you'd hoped about this bed. And I asked you if there was at least one."

"Oh God, are we back to that conversation?"

"Uh, huh."

"Same deal goes, Scully. You gotta tell me about yours first."

"OK. Deal."

Her quick agreement surprised him. God, was Scully really going to tell him about how she lost her virginity? He gave a small laugh as she stepped back out his arms just a bit and he looked up now to meet her eyes, seeing the wicked gleam there. She'd called his bluff and he'd walked right into it, he thought with a silent laugh.

"It was my senior year of high school, Mulder. I'd waited a long time. Longer than most of the girls in my class if their stories were to be believed." As she talked, Scully lifted her left foot and placed it on the top of Mulder's thigh. She leaned over and slowly began to slide the white sock off, rolling it slowly down her ankle and then her foot. Mulder's eyes followed her movements as she bared her toes, complete with painted nails, flexed them slowly over the muscle of his thigh and lowered her foot back to the floor.

Mulder swallowed hard.

"I was feeling like I was missing out on something, that somehow everybody but me was in on this big wonderful secret." Scully placed her other foot on his thigh and this time, Mulder got the idea. He reached over and rolled the sock off himself as she continued talking while he worked. "I'd been going out with a boy named Marcus. He was a nice combination of cute and smart, a science geek like myself and we'd been lab partners in a couple of classes."

As she talked, Mulder ran his hand over fine bones of her foot, and skimming his fingers over the toes. With his index finger, he traced the arch of her foot and she jumped a little. Ah, Scully was ticklish. He made a mental note and stored it away for future use.

"I guess I had a habit of falling for partners even back then," she said with soft irony as she slid her foot gently from his grasp. She stood before him again, and he raised his eyes to meet hers. "Anyway, we'd planned on doing it after the prom. But that didn't work because of a long story I won't go into now." She raised her hand and unbuttoned the cuff on her white cotton shirt, slowly sliding the two buttons back through the holes as Mulder watched closely as though he'd never seen such a wondrous thing.

"So the next time the opportunity arose was about a week later." She now extended her other arm to Mulder, who took her wrist in his hand as his long fingers deftly made short work of the tiny button. "We decided to get out of town a ways, so Marcus borrowed his Dad's Lincoln Continental and we headed up to the mountains."

Mulder slowly bent and pressed his lips to the inside of her wrist, kissing his way slowly into her palm. He heard her quick breath intake as he did so, and he felt her other hand thread softly though his hair. He was amazed at the sensation that coursed through him at that touch and it sent a quiver of feeling through his body. "You would have been proud of me; we told our parents that we were going to go watch an unusual meteor shower for astronomy class."

Mulder grinned as he looked up at her again.

"So, we're up in the mountains parked on a back road by the lake, and we're in the back seat of the Lincoln Continental, making out like teenagers in heat do." She paused, remembering something. "Marcus wasn't a terribly artful kisser, he just kind of clamped his lips on to you and ground away." As she spoke, Scully slowly pulled the tucked-in shirt from her pants. "But anyway, I'm feeling this hard thing bumping into my hip and I know it's not his belt buckle. So I'm figuring, OK-- now's the time and I'm gonna do it in the back of a Continental and just how cliche is that?"

When done with pulling out her shirt, she stepped close into his body between his spread legs, her legs rubbing against the insides of his thighs. She took his hands, which had been gripping his knees, and placed them on the bottom buttons of her shirt, urging him to start on them while she started on the top ones. Mulder curbed his instinct to simply rip the shirt off and send the buttons flying. This was Scully's game and he was actually enjoying it, which was remarkable considering he was hearing about the first bastard lucky enough to touch the woman he loved.

"So I give Marcus the go-ahead and in the dark I can hear him fumbling desperately in his wallet for that condom he probably acquired somewhere during his sophomore year." Scully had opened most of the buttons on the top part of her shirt. "And he keeps saying, 'thank you' over and over, although I was never quite sure if he was talking to me or God."

Mulder laughed at that, burying his face briefly against Scully's belly again before continuing his task of opening the shirt. Their hands met in the middle and they undid the final button together. She took his hands and held them as she bent down to kiss him. He parted his lips and let her have full access as she took his mouth, her tongue soft against his lips. He caressed her lips his own, teasing and nipping gently. She drew back slowly and opened her closed eyes. "Now, here's a man who knows how to kiss," she whispered. Mulder reached to kiss her again, but she straightened back up. Taking the shirt in her hands, she slowly dropped it from her shoulders to the floor.

Mulder was going insane and she wasn't even halfway undressed. He felt his cock hardening and pushing at his sweatpants. He reached out for her again and this time, he succeeded in pulling her back against him. He applied his kiss to her warm belly and felt her muscles twitch under him. He unbuttoned the snap on her jeans and lowered the zipper, laying wet, soft marks on her navel and below. Splaying his hand over her lower back, he pressed her to him and he felt her hands slide into his hair and grasp on.

"So anyway..." she continued, her voice sounding just a bit strained now as his hands moved over her. "So anyway, I'm laying on the back seat trying to find a way to gracefully wiggle out of too-tight jeans while Marcus is snapping on the old rubber." And he laughed, as she intended him to, at her reference to their old argument.

Scully stepped back and caught the waistband of her jeans with her thumbs. She lowered them slowly, moving her hips in a delicious to watch side-to-side motion, revealing her lovely thighs that Mulder remembered feeling closed around him like an embrace last night, holding him within. The memory of that flooded back and left him sweaty, as though the sight in front of him wasn't enough to make him pass out with want.

Scully placed a hand on his shoulder, which he reached across his chest to hold, as she stepped delicately out of the jeans, kicking them aside. Mulder appreciatively took in the sight of her slender hips that curved beautifully into to a small waist. He reached out and wrapped his hand around the curve of her waist, then leaned in to kiss the warm skin of her belly. His long fingers kneaded the soft flesh as his own body was now aching with hard need, his balls and cock feeling heavy.

Scully couldn't help but make a warm pleasured sound at his touch and she smoothed her hand through his hair before continuing her story. "So finally, we'd taken off the right things and put on the right things and with foreplay that consisted of Marcus kicking his shoes off, he rolls on top, then shoved up into me hard and got right to it."

Mulder looked up at her, and in his beautiful eyes she saw a flash of that protective fierceness that he always carried for her. His lips parted slightly with an unspoken question and she shook her head to reassure him. "It didn't hurt, Mulder. Not really. I had kind of expected it to, but it didn't." She stepped forward and crawled on to his lap, sitting astride him on the bed as he took her in his arms.

Mulder nodded as he looked at her and she felt his hands on her back, moving in soothing circles as he nudged her forward to kiss her again tenderly. God, this was just too much, she thought. Sensory overload kicked in as the warm skin of his chest pressed into her. She felt Mulder's growing erection straining against her damp panties as she moved just ever so slowly against him and she felt his breathing deepen. She finally drew away from the kiss, caressing his face.

But as he watched, she looked down just slightly, as though the next part was a little hard to say, her deeply ingrained self-constraint always there. But he dipped his head down too, maintaining eye contact with her, not letting her hide from him as she continued.

"Actually, to be honest, I didn't feel much at all, and I wondered what the hell all the fuss was about. Needless to say, I didn't have an orgasm and it wasn't until much, much later that I began to figure it out what the big deal was."

He tilted his head slightly as he looked at her, but he didn't make the glib comment that he could have so easily. Instead his gaze became tender as he put his hand to her face, cupping her cheek as he caressed her lips with his thumb. "I wish it had been better for you, Scully," he said finally said quietly.

She smiled slowly at his words, then hugged him close. This was exactly why she loved this man and for a moment, she stayed motionless, just feeling his hardness of his body and the softness of his heart. "It wasn't unpleasant, Mulder, but even if it had been, it wouldn't have been too bad because it was over pretty damn quickly. Poor Marcus was pretty embarrassed about that and of course, I kept lying through my teeth like a good girlfriend and telling him it'd been wonderful."

She laughed lightly, as did he. And they nuzzled slowly together, playfully touching lips to noses, eyebrows, and cheekbones. Scully sat back just a little to undo the single front clasp of her bra and Mulder slid it from her shoulders where it joined the heap on the floor. He looked at her breasts in the warm sunlight for the first time and she could see the desire overwhelm him. His hand came up to mold itself over the rounded softness as he bent his head to kiss the other. When his lips covered her nipple to suckle and tease, she felt the warmth flood through her, causing her to squirm against his shielded cock.

"You know Scully," he said lifting his warm mouth for just a moment, "I gotta say, out of all the stories I could have thought of, you doing it in the back seat of a Cadillac--"

"--A Continental."

"...A Continental, was just not on the list."

She caressed him, sliding her hands along his shoulders and playing with the hair on the nape of his neck, as he tasted her nipple, hardening it to a peak with his tongue. God, he was making her feel good, both hot and relaxed. It was a moment before she could answer him. "It wasn't on my list either, Mulder," she said wryly. "It didn't exactly happen like I'd always imagined."

"What had you always imagined?" he asked as he placed wet, laving kisses over her breasts that felt comforting and exciting at the same time. She looked at his bowed head and trailed her fingers through his thick hair.

"Exactly what happened with you last night," she answered softly.

Mulder went still and then looked up at her. He blinked slowly, touched by her words as he drew a long breath. "God, Scully--" he broke off, his voice tightly emotional.

But Scully saved him. She ran her fingers over his lips, stopping any other words, as she smiled. "I want to make love to you, Mulder," she whispered. "I want to make you feel so good." And she kissed him completely, sealing her request as she delved deeply into his mouth, feeling his grip on her tighten as he melted into the kiss. It was a long time before he came up for air.

"But I haven't told you my story," he teased, breaking the kiss. His hand crept back up to cover her breast, kneading firmly again as the woman sitting on his lap made some wicked little movements against him with her soft, sweet ass.

"Later, let me make love to you first," she insisted.

"Oh, OK..." He said with mock resignation as he leaned back just enough to strip his T-shirt off quickly over his head, tossing it on the floor and causing her to laugh at the same time. Scully raised herself off his lap so that he could wiggle out of his sweatpants, which he kicked off over his bare feet, before he settled back up against the pillows on the bed. He reached up to gather her back into his arms, but she caught his hands. She gently pushed them back against the bed on either side of his head, holding them in place as she kissed his eyes closed and worked her way slowly across his face and then down his neck.

She rubbed over his nipples with her thumbs, teasing them easily to hard peaks before she kissed and licked each of them in their turn. She lightly scraped her nails through his chest hair, tracing a pattern lightly, tickling and causing his belly to twitch. He started to caress her but she caught his hands again and gently pushed them back by his side. "Relax and enjoy this, Mulder," she requested lightly. He gave up and crossed his arms behind his head as she wanted and let her have dominion over his body.

And Scully took advantage of him while he watched. She kissed and trailed her tongue down the outside of his arm, working a pathway down his side and back over his rib cage. She then latched on to his nipple again before turning to his cock that waited at attention for her. She ran her tongue down its length, tip to base. She wetly traced the ridges of vein and flesh, paying particular attention to the underside, flicking her tongue, teasing, and feeling the heat of him.

"Oh God, Scully. There, right there." As he requested, Scully went to work on a spot right below the crown, laying the flat of her tongue against it. She rubbed in a circular motion, feeling him squirm. She rolled the tender skin covering his balls, reaching under them and massaging the perineum area in a deep, firm touch that sent bliss waves and a low cry from him rewarded her efforts. His legs and hips moved from the sensation as the feeling went on and on from her touch, building slowly and reaching a peak. To keep him from going too fast, she moved her hand to grasp the base of his cock, squeezing in firmly and then gently tugging on his ball sack, bringing him back just a little. She trailed her tongue along the length of his penis, giving it a little bath, cleaning away the small bit of juice that formed at the tip. She then took him back in her mouth as she began to build the sweet pressure back up, then released him again.

She heard Mulder's hushed voice. "Please, Scully." She turned her eyes to look at him. He lay sweat burnished and breathing hard through parted lips as he gazed at her through narrowed eyes. "Please. I need to come...Help me."

Mulder's unconstrained want and ability to ask for what he needed was the most erotic thing she could ever remember hearing or seeing. His erection was strong and weighty under her hands again, she could see the hard need in him, dying to get out. Scully covered the head of his cock with her tongue, then slipped it into her mouth, massaging with quick sharp movements. She worked his flesh deeply with her mouth as she began to stroke him with her lips and tongue, pressuring hard on the upsweep, repeating the movements over and over. "Oh, God, that's good...More." She lightly tickled his pubic hair with her free hand countering the hard deep movement with the light tease. Mulder made a dark thrumming noise from deep in his chest with each stroke. She heard him call out a word that sounded like "Yes," but it came out as a long low hiss.

She could feel the tightening of his balls as they drew up against his body again, getting ready to release and bring him into pleasure. But she wanted to kiss him as he came, she wanted to see him and feel him. So she slowly withdrew her mouth from his cock, wrapped her hand around the base of his shaft tightly and began stroking, a smooth transition.

As her firm hand took control of his body, harder and quicker than her mouth had been, Mulder opened his mouth and groaned deeply with pleasure. Sully lay beside him as she covered his lips with her own and his hand cupped the back of her head to pull her into him, thrusting his tongue into her mouth as he thrust his hips into her hand. Suddenly he pulled his mouth from hers, gasping for air, as his eyes slammed shut and his head tossed back against the pillow. "Oh, God. God...Ahhhhh..."

He turned his face back to hers and his eyes opened briefly, looking at her with glazed craving as he came. Then he closed them as another pleasure contraction took him away and he thrust his hips with each pulsing stroke of his orgasm. She reached over to kiss him again, his hot breath and deep moans vibrating their way into her mouth. Scully felt the tremble of his body under her hands as she stroked him through to his completion. As the tremors rolled through him, his semen spattered the skin of his belly and chest. As the hard spasms eased, he spiraled down and she slowed her hand movements, bringing him down delicately back to earth. His mouth under hers became soft, his kiss gentle.

Finally, her hand went still, no longer sliding over the slickened flesh and her hard grip relaxed as she felt his cock began to soften. She stroked once more slowly from base to the rounded head as Mulder's entire body jerked with hypersensitivity. He drew away from her kiss slowly, taking a cooling breath. He lay against her, his sweaty face so near hers, his breath brushing her face as he recovered. He swallowed and moistened his lips with his tongue and his face had that exhausted, depleted look that he sometimes had when he returned from a hard run. When he'd pushed his body to its limits.

She let go of his cock and reached to smooth his spiky hair off his forehead. At her touch, he opened his eyes and looked at her before closing them again as his lips curved in a gentle smile. She cradled his head against the crook of her neck and his hand came up to caress her face before falling back weakly. She felt him nuzzling against her skin as he fell into what appeared to be a contented deep languor, his body still and heavy now against her.

She wasn't in the least unhappy about that; in fact, it made her smile. She knew that the harder a man came, the faster he fell afterwards. Her purpose well accomplished and she felt a sweet satisfaction in that. Watching Mulder thrash in unbearable pleasure at her touch and hearing the deep-throated sounds he'd made as the orgasm ripped though him had been the sexiest thing she'd ever seen in her life. She looked down the length of his splendid body. So alive and so beautiful.

It was no accident that she'd come beautifully their first time together last night. She'd never been able to achieve that her first time with anybody before Mulder, it has usually taken a while to get comfortable enough to allow herself to take the pleasure too. Of course, she thought with amusement, they'd had six years of foreplay. Even for her that was plenty. God knows, there'd been more times than she could count when a simple look from him across the desk in the office had made her stick to the chair.

But right now, she was aching with want of release, a burning that nagged to be doused. She longed to send a hand down to take care of herself, but the truth was she felt hesitant about that with him so nearby. Certainly not from any sense that it was wrong, she'd become well acquainted with her right hand in recent years and she came quickly and easily when she stroked herself. But at those times, she was alone; there was no one there to see her, to hear her.

No one there to know her.

As a young girl in Catholic school, she'd been amused by the seemingly quaint use of the phrase, "to know," when the bible talked of sexual relations. It was only later that she realized how accurate that phrase actually was. It wasn't quaint at all--it was the stone truth.

With the men before Mulder, it had become simply easier to do the pleasuring than to receive it. It had made her feel good to make someone else feel the ecstasy and she'd quickly learned what was needed to deliver that. However, with one hellish exception that she barely remembered because she'd done so well at pretending it hadn't happened, she'd pretty much been in a long dry spell for the last few years. But in this case, absence hadn't made the heart grow fonder, instead, it only made it insecure and unsure and she protected it the only way she knew how--with control. And in the end, it didn't matter if her control was professional, emotional or sexual, she feared its loss in front of another. Even one she trusted with her life. It was one thing to make love to Mulder in the protective darkness and another entirely to ask for what she needed in bright, open sunlit room where he could see into her eyes, into her mind. Where she couldn't hide and couldn't pretend.

Where he would know her completely.

God, why did she do this to herself, she thought. Why did she have to fucking think the joy out of everything, even Mulder. The well-sated man lying against her was uninhibited in his feelings, so open and deeply sensual. So willing to take risks, to let her in, to let her take control even in his rare weak moments and in doing so, he became more fearless and braver than she was. He could show her much about living that way, if she could bring herself to let him.

Exasperated with herself, she looked back over at Mulder and as she did so, a wave of tenderness for him washed over her. She reached down, picked up one corner of the flannel top sheet and gently wiped Mulder's belly dry of its baby batter. As she did so, she scooped one small remaining dollop on her finger. She lifted it to her lips and tasted it. Tasted him.

"I'm not asleep, Scully," she heard him say.

Oh God. As she looked up, she saw that Mulder had been watching her with dozy eyes. She felt herself blush and his lips curved into a smile at that. He rolled towards her and his hand skimmed down her body. She felt his fingers quickly slide underneath her panties, between her thighs and into the slickness there. He brought his hand back up to his own mouth, running his fingertips over his lips as she watched. Then he leaned in and kissed her, their individual flavors mingling on their lips.

Releasing her slowly, he began to kiss his way down the length of her body, curling over her. He delved into her navel with his tongue, something she'd never thought of as an erogenous zone. But it was, oh, it was. He snagged a hold of the panties, sliding them down and off, where they were abandoned to the floor. His hand pressed gently at her inner thigh, pushing it apart from the other and she felt his rough tongue run over the delicate, tender skin of the crease and the sensation caused a tremulous feeling. As he continued to kiss her lower belly, she felt his fingers sliding over her, again seeking the hard nub of her clit and then down lower to press up inside her. He lifted his head from where it lay on her belly and she knew where he was headed. And suddenly, the unwelcome interference of her mind took her body back from him and she drew back slightly.

Mulder felt her tense up, felt her pull away and he stopped what he was doing. "Did I do something wrong?" he asked turning his head to look at her. Although she didn't look at him, she shook her head. "I'm sorry, I just wanted--"

"Oh God, Mulder. It's not you," she blurted out. "It's me. You didn't do anything wrong."

As he looked up at her, she finally met his eyes for just a second and he could see the chagrin there before she turned away on her side. He saw the blush run on her skin and Mulder finally realized she was embarrassed by her own reaction, by her pulling away.

He sighed a bit in relief. God knows, it'd been a while since he'd touched anyone and he'd been worried about pleasing her. Really worried. It was one thing to indulge in pretty conventional sex in the dark of the night and another thing entirely to move things along to even more intimate pleasures. So the pressure had been on him so to speak. Especially considering Scully had just almost made his ears bleed with her mouth and hands. And yet here she was feeling shy about wanting him to touch her in the same manner, about letting him see her let go her tight rein and indulge in pleasure as he had. The extremes in Scully never failed to amaze him, but this he could deal with. Reluctant Scully was someone he'd dealt with nearly every day for six years and he knew how to reach her.

He crawled back up her body until he was lying behind her. But he didn't touch her right away. He just let her have a moment to war with herself because he already knew she was kicking herself in the ass mentally and it was best just to let her do it. Finally he reached out and trailed his finger along her shoulder, just soothing it back and forth as he let the silence build a moment before leaning in to whisper in her ear.

"So, are you afraid I'm going to make fun of your scrunchy orgasm face, Scully?"

In spite of herself, she smiled at his teasing, its warm familiarity putting her at ease. As usual, he knew exactly which button of hers to push, she thought. "No, I'm not afraid that you're going to make fun of my scrunchy orgasm face," she answered, then paused a moment. "It's just... it's so hard for me to let go and be myself, even when I want to, even when I'm with you. God, this is embarrassing..." she muttered as she trailed off.

Mulder propped his head on his hand and smoothed the other through her hair, his fingers sliding lightly over her scalp. "I know that you trust me, Scully," he said and she nodded without hesitation. "And I trust you, so I can tell you it's not like I've had hands-on practice with anyone except myself for a hell of a long time. I mean, you just gave me a incredible, take-it-to-my grave experience...Did it ever occur to you that after that my confidence level at reciprocating isn't what you think?"

Scully was silent as he looked down at her profile but she closed her eyes a moment and he could tell from the expression on her face that his words struck a cord in her.

"I...I..." she paused. "No, Mulder. I didn't think of that, I'm sorry." She was silent a moment and then he saw her lips finally curve again in a wry smile. "I guess, I just figured you had the benefit of watching all those training films over the years."

Mulder grinned at the warm humor in her voice as she came back to him. "Nobody ever has bad sex in a porn movie, Scully. But believe it or not, I do know it's not real, " he said, drawing a small chuckle from her.

He moved closer behind her, sliding one arm underneath her to cradle her back against his body as his other arm closed around her. He began to nuzzle along her shoulder and neck as he felt her relax against back him. He idly caressed her breast with his hand, feeling its soft weight in his hand. After a moment, he stopped his ministrations and rested his chin on her shoulder as he spoke.

"OK, so I guess what we have here is that you're terrified about asking for what you need sexually and I'm terrified because pretty much all my recent expertise comes from watching strangers fake orgasms to bad disco music. Jesus--no wonder this took six years."

Scully burst out laughing as the stupidity of it all and he joined her. She turned her face to look up at him for the first time. "God, we're a mess."

He leaned down to kiss her deeply before drawing back just slightly. "Yeah, but we're a mess together, so it's OK, isn't it?"

She touched his face and nodded. "It's more than OK. It's perfect-- who else would have us?"

"Exactly." Mulder looked down at her and his expression turned more serious. "Scully, I want to make you feel good," he said quietly. "I want to show you how I feel. But I need you to let me...and I need you to help me."

Scully kissed him again. "Don't ever think I don't want you."

He began to stroke the length of her body again as he moved in even closer against her, pressing his chest to her back. He felt her settle in fully against him as he brought his knee up between her legs, separating her thighs with his own. His fingers reached down to brush against her pubic hair again. "Take my hand, Scully," he requested calmly in her ear, his breath tingling through her and she placed her hand over his. "Show me," he asked as he sucked gently on her earlobe, kissed and nuzzled against her neck. She arched her neck so that she could better enjoy what he was doing with that mouth of his. Then she took his hand and moved it down between her legs, settling his fingers in the right place against her body.

Mulder flicked his finger and Scully's body moved in response. "There?" She nodded. "How?" he asked, and after a moment's hesitation, she guided his fingers in a small circular motion. She was actually too wet. Using her own fingers she wiped away some of the slickness so that friction of his touch was rougher. His fingers again touched the place she'd showed him and moved in the motion and rhythm. He looked down at her face, at her eyes tightly shut, her lips parted and he could see her concentration focused on the rising feeling in her body. "What does it feel like, Scully?"

She could barely hear him through the heat flash rising in her, but she tried to tell him what he asked for. "Delicious...intense..." .She moistened her lips. "More..." she asked.

He upped her pleasure, moving in the harder motion she asked for. His other hand pressed against her lower belly, holding her to him as she writhed over the thigh between her legs. He felt her press against his hand and he increased the motion, sharper, and more firmness, climbing the ladder. Then as he watched, Scully gave a sharp exclaim and her head tossed back against his shoulder, her lips parted. He felt her entire body contract, once, twice, three times as her legs squeezed against his thigh. "Oh, God," she whispered, drawing in a deep breath. Then she slowly lost her rigidity, relaxing back against his arms. Mulder stroked back her hair and lay kisses on her damp cheek as she recovered. She took his hand and brought it up to her lips, kissing the back of it softly before holding it against her breasts.

He smiled at the gesture. It'd been good for her and he felt elated about that; last night wasn't a fluke. He gave a small laugh--they were going to be very, very good at this. "Hey, Scully?"

"Hmmmm?"

"Your scrunchy orgasm face is beautiful."

She smiled contentedly. "So is yours, Mulder."

"Oh really?"

"Really." Her voice was sleepy sounding belying the idea that it was only men who fell asleep afterwards. "The most perfect thing I've ever seen...Better than roses."

Mulder laughed with embarrassed enjoyment at the absurd comparison as she fell asleep in his arms. But the truth was, she'd never said anything nicer to him and he'd remember it forever.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

It was very late afternoon when Scully woke up having finally caught up on some much needed sleep. She'd only had about five hours total over the last few days. Mulder was again gone from her bed. Their bed, she corrected mentally. But from the open doorway to the hall, she heard the sound of the TV downstairs and the unmistakable sound of a football game being played. That's right, it was still Christmas day, she'd almost forgotten. Of course, there would be holiday games on.

She got out of bed and dressed. As she did so, she looked out over the fields behind the house. Some clouds had rolled in and the sun was almost down anyway. A winter wind had kicked up and it was blowing the trees about quite a bit; it looked like it might rain later. She wouldn't mind that, she loved the rain when she wasn't out in it running for her life through the mud. It was much more preferable to sit inside with a hot drink and watch it come down. Safe, warm, and secure with Mulder.

With Mulder, she thought again, and words made her smile. How many days and nights had she spent with him in some cheesy motel watching the rain come down, and with always the same secure feelings? She'd come to him in a rainstorm on that first case together when fear had made her chuck off her clothes in front of a man she barely knew and yet had somehow trusted that he would help her. And he'd never made her feel small about that moment or any moment since.

But even so, she'd done her best to grind down that girl who'd showed her emotions or need so freely. But Mulder had never let her kill her completely; in fact, he'd saved that girl more often than he would ever know. It was as though he'd seen a glimpse of her on that first night and knew she always lurked below her other carefully controlled surface. He knew she was there.

Mulder knew her. And her acceptance of that finally left a peacefulness she'd not known before. A Christmas gift to herself, if you will.

A delicious aroma now slowly wafted up the stairs. He was cooking something and her mouth watered as she realized she hadn't eaten since last night. She headed down the stairs and into the kitchen. Hearing her enter, he turned and gave her that slightly shy smile of his. She understood the emotion; they were still getting used to this intimacy. Not just the sex, but the feeling of being unconstrained with each other.

She came to stand next to him at the stove and he bent to kiss her lightly. "I'm making breakfast for dinner," he said. "Ham and eggs with hash browns. Is that OK?"

"It's perfect and I'm starving."

"Me too. Scrambled OK? I pretty much suck at anything else and I know you usually like it over-easy."

It was on the tip of her tongue to make a lascivious double-entendre joke about preferring it over-hard, but she refrained. However, he saw the high spirits in her eyes, got the silent joke and smiled conspiratorially.

"Scrambled is fine, Mulder. Can I help?"

"Yeah, the toast needs to be done. Which wine goes with ham and eggs?"

She loaded the toaster up. "I don't know, Mulder, but my guess would be white, but I can call Martha Stewart if you want an authority."

"Nah, I trust you, Scully."

Of course, they still didn't have a corkscrew, but he repeated the same procedure from the previous night, with much better success this time. When the meal was ready, they skipped eating in the breakfast nook and headed back to the living room where they sat with their feet on the coffee table and watched the game. Mulder felt the need to feed her his toast with his fingers and she enjoyed licking the bits of warm butter and sweet jelly from his fingers.

Food had rarely tasted so good.

After dinner, they decided to go for a walk down the road a bit. Mulder loaned her one of his heavier sweaters and laughed when it fell to ridiculous lengths on her. They were companionably quiet together as they walked, just enjoying the crisp chill of the night. He reached out and took her hand as they looked at the stars. And they didn't talk of extraterrestrials.

As Scully suspected earlier, a dense cloud cover started to form over and they made it home just as it started to rain very lightly. Before going in, they went around back to see if there was some firewood stockpiled behind the garage. Mulder carried it in and set to work building a fire that was soon crackling with warmth. As he worked, she took his coat and hung it up in the front closet. But the heavy thing kept sliding irritatingly off the old wooden hanger and down the closet floor. She bent down to get it and as she did so, she saw the canisters of film sitting in an open box on the floor of the closet. Curious, she picked one of them up. The hand-lettered label was faded and hard to make out, it looked like it said, "4th of July."

"Mulder?" she called.

He came back into the hallway to see her crouched down, halfway in the closet. "What are you doing?" he asked.

"What are these?"

He looked over her shoulder at what was in her hand. "They're just what they look like, Scully, old eight-millimeter home movies."

"Can we watch them?"

He stared down at her incredulously. "Let me get this right--you actually *want* to watch someone else's home movies? Don't you know that's considered an alternative to capital punishment in some states?"

"Well hell, I've already seen my share of dead, rotting, exsanguinated cows in your slide shows over the years; how much worse could this be?" Scully tugged the box out of the closet.

"This is the Mulder clan, Scully. Trust me, it could get pretty strange. Are you sure about this?"

"No, I want to see them. Really." Suddenly, she thought the better of it and looked up at him. "I'm sorry, I wasn't thinking...of course, we don't have to if it makes you uncomfortable."

"No, no, it doesn't bother me." He smiled a little at her concern. "But I am beginning to think you're a little weird."

"Of course, I'm weird--or have you failed to notice that I cut up bodies for a living?" She stood up, dusting her hands off as he chuckled. "Of course, this is all a moot point if you don't have a projector. I don't see one in here."

"We had one. Unless Mom took it with her, it's probably out in the garage."

They headed out into the garage and after several minutes of shoving around dusty boxes, they found the projector on a back shelf, still in its case. They carried it back inside and decided that the white wall above the fireplace would work just fine as a screen since the couch faced it. Mulder unpacked the ancient projector and set it up on a table behind the couch. He stared at it a moment before turning to her. "I suppose you're going to expect me to know how to thread this thing?"

"We can call The Lone Gunmen if you need help. I'm sure Frohike had a lot of experience with projectors before the advent of video tape."

She giggled a little at her own joke and he looked up at the unusual sound, it made him smile. "Wow--you're in a mood tonight, Scully. I'm going to have to watch your wine consumption."

Scully just squinted at him in reply. Mulder found a spare bulb in the little storage area of the case and inserted it in the housing, then set to work loading the first reel on, threading it carefully through the machine. She watched him work, admiring his hands. She loved Mulder's hands, she always had. Almost as much as the sound of his voice, which had been the first thing she fell in love with. She was feeling absurdly grateful to be able to just sit here and observe him as much as she wanted. Thank God for Frohike, she thought suddenly. And that reminded her of something she'd meant to say to him. "Mulder, did I tell you that Frohike is the reason I came here?"

He stopped what he was doing and looked over at her. "How so?"

"When I was stuck at the airport, I called around trying to find you. He answered your phone at your apartment and told me where you were. He's the one who suggested I come up here."

"He did?"

She nodded. "He told me that he was sure you wouldn't mind. I don't know if I would have had the courage to come up here if he hadn't. Oh, and by the way, he said to tell you that he is feeding your fish and he's not going to just replace the dead ones like last time."

He smiled a little. "I'll have to remember to thank him."

"For me or for the fish?"

"For you, Scully. I can always buy new fish."

She smiled at his reassurance. "He's a good friend to you, Mulder. He once told me you were redwood among mere sprouts."

He looked up again, clearly surprised. "Frohike said that?"

"Yes. Of course, he thought you were dead."

He laughed at the qualifier. "I guess I'm going to have to take back some of the crummy things I've said about him. Ok, I think I've got this ready. You sure you want to do this, Scully? Last chance."

"Let her go, Mulder."

He started the projector and then climbed back over the back of the couch and settled back against Scully as she held him. She pulled the blanket down off the back of the couch and tucked it over them, reached over and turned out the light as they focused on the flickering images on the wall.

Over the next several hours, Scully watched, in no particular order, movies of babies coming home with beaming mothers and proud fathers, first days at school and visits to the beach. She saw Indian Guides and Girl Scout meetings. She saw Christmases, birthday parties, and family picnics as they worked their way through the rolls and Mulder became adept at changing the reels in about thirty seconds.

His narration was also typically droll and their laughter got out of control on occasion. Of course, the bottle of wine they finished off helped that. As they watched, she noticed that there were many more reels from the time before Samantha was taken, and only a few in the years after. It was as though documenting the family events had taken on considerably less importance. But even so, in one of the later reels, obviously on his way to a homecoming dance, there stood a shaggy-haired Mulder wearing one of the typically awful polyester tuxedos from the late seventies. She opened her mouth...

"Don't say a word, Scully," he warned, glancing at her over his shoulder. "Not one word or I'm shutting this off. "

Scully bit her lip and nodded meekly, although he could hear the barely suppressed snicker under her breath. With the next reel they went back in time again, to what appeared to be a summer barbecue in the back yard with lots of adults and kids running about while his mother played hostess. Her hair hadn't been gray then; it was light brown like her son's. And as she laughed at something one of the guests said to her, Scully realized she'd never seen Mulder's mother smile. She was actually a beautiful woman. He pointed out his grandparents, both deceased now. He also pointed out his mother's sister and some assorted cousins. At one point, Mulder sat up a little straighter. "Shit."

"What Mulder?"

"That's Kurtzweil. In the background there, standing with my father."

"The Doctor you met last summer? The one who told you about the bees?" Scully looked the image of the tall man, beer in hand, talking to Bill Mulder. Everything seemed friendly and at one point, Kurtzweil even laughed at something Bill Mulder said.

"Yeah, I saw his picture in an old family photo album. I didn't realize he was in this too." Mulder stared at the flickering image then slowly relaxed back against Scully as he shook his head slightly. "I was surrounded by it, even as a child...I just didn't know."

She stroked his hair and said nothing for there was nothing to say. But as she looked down at his face, his mood didn't seem changed. In fact, he seemed to be enjoying the memories that he hadn't looked at in years and he laughed affectionately at something Samantha did as she played with another child at the picnic. The next images showed a little league baseball game. "Oh God, I remember this," he said excitedly as he pointed at the screen. "Watch this, Scully!"

She focused on the tall, slender boy who stepped up the plate, gripping the bat tightly. Strike one, strike two and then the boy proceeded to hit the ball clear over the center field fence. He ran the bases and came back to the plate to the cheers of his teammates. The boy turned towards the camera and grinned broadly for his father who photographed the moment. Young. Beautiful. Truly innocent. For probably one of the last times in his life. Scully looked at the boy on the screen and then down at the man in her arms, as she smiled proudly at him. "You were the hero."

He gave a small self-effacing chuckle. "Well, on that day anyway. I can still remember the crack of the bat in my hands, I knew it was long gone."

The next image flickering on the screen showed a different day and very young Samantha dressed up as a fairy princess. Tormenting her mercilessly behind their mother's back was her older brother who was wearing...Scully leaned forward slightly.

"Mulder...are you wearing Vulcan ears?"

"Of course, all the cool kids had them. Didn't you?"

"No, I guess I wasn't a cool kid. So you were a Star Trek fan?"

"Oh yeah, big time. I also liked the Outer Limits, The Magician, The Man from Uncle, and The Avengers. But Mr. Spock was The Man. I watched the re-runs all the time."

"So let me get this straight. As a kid you identified with the man of science, a man who suppressed his emotions and was ruled completely by logic?" She touched his hand where it lay over his belly, teasing his fingers with hers.

Mulder laughed as he toyed with her fingers and she moved hers with his in a playful dance. "I identified with Spock because he was always an outsider," he answered. "Never fully human, never fully Vulcan. Never quite at home."

Scully squeezed his fingers briefly before letting them go. "You felt that way? Even before what happened to Samantha?"

"No, not as much, but I've always felt a little off-kilter. I think trying to understand that is what led me to study psychology."

"What conclusion did you come to?"

"That I'm actually no different than anyone else and that everyone in the world is fucked up in their own way."

Scully laughed as she hugged him to her, kissing his ear and temple. "Ok, so who did you like better, Kirk or Picard?" she asked.

"Oh, Kirk. Definitely Kirk."

"Why? Because he got all the green alien babes?"

"Exactly. I may have felt out of step, but I wasn't crazy. Green alien babes look pretty damn good when you're fourteen."

"God, that reminds me. You didn't tell me your first time story."

"You sure you want to hear it now? It's late and it's a long story. A really long story."

"I'm not going anywhere. You have a captive audience." She reached up behind them and turned off the projector and now the only light in the room came from the fireplace. She refilled each of their glasses with the remainder of the wine and Mulder settled back against her as her arms came around him.

"You make a good pillow, Scully."

"Thank you."

"OK, when I was sixteen years old, I got a summer job working with my friend Robert for his father's construction business, which pretty much meant that we did all the shit work the regular crew didn't want to do. We were renovating a small house near the beach. One day, it had to be over a hundred degrees and we were unloading pallets of bricks from a truck without the benefit of a forklift. We were dying in the heat. The woman who was renting the house next door must have seen us on the brink of sun stoke because she came over with glasses of ice tea and cold wet towels.

"God, she was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen up until then and I fell hard right there. I saw her every day for the next month and it all turned into the classic infatuation with an older woman. And when we weren't working on the house, I found all sorts of excuses to stop by; I was always offering to help her with something around her place. Hell, I even helped her carry her groceries home once. She must have known I had a crush on her. I followed her around all summer like a damn puppy. But you know what? She never embarrassed me over it. You know how it was at sixteen, Scully--adults who know you still treat you like a kid. But she made me feel like an equal, like what I said mattered or was interesting. She listened to me, she laughed at my jokes, she never once made me feel like a geek, although that's probably exactly how I was acting."

Mulder laughed a little and so did Scully. But when he spoke again his voice was softer with memory. "I would stop by in the early evenings and we'd sit on her porch, watch the sunset, drink iced tea and talk about a million different things. She'd been a navy brat like you and she'd lived all over the world growing up. One day, she showed me a picture of her husband--She was married, or at least she considered herself married. She'd married him when she was seventeen. He was in the Special Forces in the military, but in 1973, he'd been reported missing in action. But she'd never been able to find out what he was doing when he went missing. It was all classified. But she believed that he'd been captured during a reconnaissance mission of some sort and that he was being held as a POW. There were over fifteen hundred men still unaccounted for when the U.S. left Vietnam and she was working with other military wives who had information that some of these men were still held captive in Southeast Asia. And even as I was dying inside to find out that she was married, I felt outraged at her treatment. I admired her refusal to give up on him until she had an answer. The odds weren't on her side, but her resolve was amazing. Her love for him was amazing."

"It was almost the end of summer when I came by her house at the usual time. I saw that most of the lights were off, but the porch door was open. I heard music on the radio somewhere but I didn't see her so I called her name from the door. After a moment, she came out from the kitchen. Even in the low light, I could see something was wrong. She seemed so strangely calm and I felt something thick in the air, a tension. I didn't know what it was back then. She told me to come in and sit down and she went back to the kitchen. As I sat on the couch, I saw an opened telegram on the coffee table. It wasn't my business and I had no right, but I picked it up and read it. It was from the military. They'd found and identified her husband's remains. They were being shipped home."

Mulder fell silent a few moments. "They'd killed her hope, Scully," he finally said regretfully. "She'd hung on to it for years and with two sentences they took it all away from her. He wasn't in a prison camp and he wasn't coming home to her alive. I remember just staring at that telegram for a long time, knowing how the words must have hurt her as she read them. I stood up to leave, I knew I was intruding. Just then she came back into the living room and I looked at her as she set the drink on the table, trying to carry on like it was any other evening. When I looked at her face, I saw that she'd obviously cried herself out in the hours before I got there and now she just looked hollow. She saw the telegram in my hand and she simply took it from me and folded it carefully back into its envelope on the table then looked up at me."

"I didn't know what to say, this was beyond my experience. I just put my arms around her, she laid her head on my shoulder, and I just held her. And that was the first time that I really realized that I was taller than she was. She'd always been so strong, so confident, that she'd seemed bigger....I guess I'd idealized her because she was older. But in reality, she was just twenty-five. That seems so young now, but back then it seemed such a difference. But she was just twenty-five and her heart was broken. And she suddenly felt so small and so vulnerable as I held her."

"After a moment she looked up at me and I saw that she needed me. I don't mean sexually, I mean she needed me to make her feel strong again, make her feel that she wasn't alone. I didn't know what to say to make her feel that way, so I took her face in my hands and kissed her, and she kissed me back so softly. It wasn't my first kiss, but it was the first one that went straight into my heart. Then she took my hand and led me back to her little bedroom where I made love for the first time. And for the first time, I felt like a man. Not because I was having sex but because she needed me."

"She sent me on home a few hours later. When I came back the next evening, the little house was closed up. I expected that I think. I'd always known she was going to leave when the summer was over. But she left me a note pinned to the front door. She'd told me she'd left the island that morning. There were still other families who needed their answers and she had a responsibility to them. She...she thanked me for taking care of her that night, and told me that I'd been important to her that summer and that she'd always remember me."

Mulder's voice trailed off as he fell silent again and Scully knew his thoughts had wandered back twenty years to another woman who'd held him in her arms. She threaded her fingers through his hair, then caressed his face and she felt him rub his cheek into her hand, his reverie broken by her touch. She pulled the blanket up a little closer around them and he nestled in a little closer, as his breathing fell slow. She could tell he was on the verge of sleep, but she wanted to know one more thing before he went under. "What was her name, Mulder?" she asked.

"Her name was Amy," he answered quietly.

She smiled gently as she thought of the bittersweet story, feeling strangely grateful to Amy for treating Mulder's young heart so tenderly and that she'd understood his value. She'd given him something he'd needed too, although she probably hadn't realized it at the time. Scully kissed the top of his head, as he yawned, causing a responsive yawn in her. But then he spoke quietly. "You know...I've never told anyone that story, Scully."

She understood that. It wasn't the kind of story that teenaged boys wanted to tell each other during that time of adolescence when it was more about conquest and bragging rights and so little about love. "I'm glad you told it to me."

"You're the only person I could trust with it."

Savoring those words, Scully closed her eyes too and they feel asleep together on the couch.

When Mulder awoke a few hours later, he felt a sense of familiarity because he was on the couch. However, the fact that he was in Scully's arms with his head cradled against her breasts was certainly something he wasn't accustomed to. But he could be, he thought, oh man, he could be.

He turned over carefully and looked at her long time. She looked so damn beautiful by firelight and he felt such a tender desire for her that he needed to touch her, feel her warm skin under his hands. He moved up her body to kiss her awake softly. Just enjoying the languid pleasure of brushing his mouth to hers, teasing lightly. After a moment, she responded and he felt her hands slide through his hair. When he drew away, she looked at him with sleepy eyes and smiled as she drew him back to her. Having started this, he was content to enjoy her affectionate exploration as he held her. Her breath was warm on his skin and her mouth caressed his.

Scully moved to kiss his face where she could, his nose, his eyebrow, his closed eyes, slowly, gently. Then she pulled his sweatshirt off over his head as the blanket slipped to the floor. She ran her hands over the sleek skin of his back, feeling the curve of his shoulder blades and the long hollow of his spine under her fingers.

He grasped the edge of her sweater, tugged it off her, and lowered his face back to her naked breasts. The curve and pliant weight of her breasts felt wonderful. He nuzzled his nose and face against her smooth skin and over her nipple, which hardened in response to his touch. He ran his tongue over the flesh, and then closed his mouth over it, sucking deeply and nibbling gently.

Scully closed her eyes as the wet tugging on her flesh washed a warm tide over her. She cradled the back of his head, holding him against her as her other hand smoothed over the skin on his shoulders. Mulder lifted his mouth just long enough to look at her as he kissed her again, feeling her slide her tongue along his lips, gaining entry. After a moment, he moved back to her other breast, sliding one arm under her to hold her against him. He sat up slowly, bringing her with him. He pulled both the sweats and then her panties off and they worked together to get his remaining clothes off, separating only moments between kisses and caresses to dispose of the fabric obstacles between them.

Mulder sat back against the couch and Scully moved astride him as his arms circled her body, guiding her very slowly. She wrapped her arms around shoulders, pressing her face into the curve of his neck as he entered her, filling and stretching as she settled down slowly upon him. There was a considerable amount of Mulder to take in and the fit pleased them both in different ways. She began movements that were shallow, unrushed, just enjoying his feel within. "Oh, God, you feel so good, Scully," he said in her ear.

She kissed his neck and smiled at him and the simplicity of the words. "You feel good too, Mulder. All of you." His hands settled on her thighs on either side of his. He stroked up and down her skin, first deeply and then dragging just his fingertips so lightly, tickling, as she rocked so very gracefully against him. Mulder flexed his hips slowly up into her as he looked into her eyes, enjoying the bliss he saw there. And together, they moved with exquisite care, completely unhurried, just receiving pleasure and satisfaction from the feel of the other's body.

Scully took Mulder's face in her hands, watching his expression, as she loved him with her body. His hands moved over her and she felt the coil tightening within, ready to break free. His fingers moved between their bodies seeking her center. "There. Oh yes, there," she told him softly. His own slight thrusting stopped as he filled her completely and held her against him as only his fingers moved, increasing the delicate arousal inside her, leading her to the edge and then pushing her over it within minutes. Scully's arriving orgasm was a long one. Not the hardest one she'd ever had, but the most emotionally satisfying, the pleasure born of his tenderness and devotion, not just of physical release. She opened her eyes to see him watching her come with satisfaction in his eyes. She needed to tell him how she felt about him. "Mulder, I..." but he covered her mouth with his own before she could say more, kissing her slowly, pulling her close in his arms against his chest as he now continued his deep and slow movements within her.

It seemed to go on forever, he seemed in no hurry, and she'd never felt so completely possessed by another. Mulder's face turned into her neck, his breath hot and moist against her skin. She cradled his head against her, holding him tightly as she felt him now begin to increase his movements as she tightened around him as his own release commenced. She heard just a barely audible his low moan and he held his breath as he came, low and shuddering. He was almost silent, she could feel him more than hear him, and it w