Another Lunch at Will's

It's actually getting kind of ridiculous. Yeah, the flirting and the games were fun for the first five years or so, but the whole innuendo thing started getting really old quite some time ago. I'm sick of avoidance, of circling around this thing we have between us. I'm tired of preserving the distance. It's just a sham by now, anyway. We could rip our clothes off and start going at it in the lobby of the Hoover building and I doubt anyone would be surprised.

Except for me. I'd be surprised. In fact I would probably be paralyzed with shock, up until the time I had a coronary episode. I'm not a kid anymore, you know.

But oh, what a way to go.

I shake my head to clear the sudden, all-too-vivid image of us locked in a passionate embrace atop the FBI seal near the metal detectors. I wonder what the tour guides would say about that; the school kids would probably love it. I glance down at my watch. Time to go. Scully's been at a conference across town most of the week, but it ends today at noon and I'm meeting her at Will's Deli for lunch.

I know Mulder loves this place, but sometimes it really annoys me. I just don't see the purpose in charging an extra three dollars for a sandwich because it has a cutesy name taken from an Elizabethan drama. And the oh-so-manufactured "Ye Olde Luncheon Shoppe" decor does nothing for me either. But when Mulder asks me here it means that he's in a good mood, and good MulderMoods are few and far between. I like to enjoy them while I can. So when he asked me to meet him here today, I agreed. I figure the chance to eat with HappyMulder is worth another lunch at Will's. I don't know if he has some juicy new mutant for me to autopsy, or if he's just happy to have me back after a week of catching up on paperwork by himself in the office. I'd like to think it's the latter. It would make me feel less self-conscious about how much I'm looking forward to seeing him again. I mean, it's only been four days since I talked to him last, and I haven't even been out of town. I shake my head in exasperation at my own foolishness and start reading the menu.

"Eggs Benedick" looks like pretty standard eggs benedict to me. Its companion, "Eggs Beatrice," is a spicier version. Get them both and it's a "Sarcasm Sampler." Gimme a break. Even Mulder makes better jokes than that. Maybe that's why he likes it here; it makes him seem funnier by comparison.

I'd never tell him this, but I actually do think Mulder's pretty funny. One cannot, however, burst into hysterical laughter while examining bodies in various stages of decay, dismemberment, and what, for lack of a better word, we pathologists call "ickiness." It's just not professional. So I've learned to bury my laughter beneath a sigh or a raised eyebrow. My lack of response just makes him try all the harder to break my composure. Little does he know that sometimes, when I'm alone, in the middle of cooking dinner, or taking a bubble bath, or something else normal and inane, I'll suddenly remember one of his smart-ass comments and laugh until my stomach hurts.
 
Without him, my life would be dry and dead. He brings me warmth and color and vitality where, left to myself, I would be as chilly and antiseptic as a biocontainment facility. I try to keep my life in rigid order, regimented and categorized like a scientist's lab. His is a whirlwind of disorder and craziness, and yet it somehow saves me from myself. Sometimes I wish I could convince him of how important he is to me. I want so badly to be able to tell him that he was wrong that time in his hallway, that I do owe him as much as he owes me. But I've spent so many years being the strong silent one in this partnership that I just can't make myself give voice to the truths I think about every day. And somehow, despite being the Profiler Extraordinaire, Mulder doesn't seem to be able to figure me out without help. I've become convinced that it's going to take the emotional equivalent of a two-by-four to make us acknowledge this thing that we both know is there--out loud, and at the same time, and when neither one of us is under sedation. The only problem is, I'm not sure either of us would survive the encounter.

Sighing, I resume my menu perusal. Item #2B is a "Grilled Cheese and Hamlet" sandwich. I hate this place.

I love this place. The combination of an Oxford education and an eidetic memory renders me very receptive to Shakespearean puns. So when I found a Shakespearean deli within an easy distance of the Hoover building, I was thrilled. I know people think of me as this twisted loner psycho, but I'm not like that at all. Well, not all the time. Well, OK, not today. But be that as it may, I do have the capacity for happiness, and sometimes it makes me happy to take my partner to lunch at Will's and smirk to myself when the menu informs me that the Julius Caesar Salad is not served on March 15. So I'm in a good mood for once. Bite me. Even I can't be morose all the time.

Scully is already seated when I walk in. I'm not late; she must have finished early at the conference. She's reading over the menu and shaking her head at the corny jokes. She'd never admit it, but she likes that kind of thing as much as I do. Just one of the many reasons we work so well together.

She has her back to the door. It's obvious she hasn't been a professional paranoid for as long as I have. The only time I can stand having my back to the door is when she's facing it. I ate with the Gunmen once, during a time when we were a little more on edge than usual, and we all lined up on one side of the table. The waitress kept asking in a bewildered voice if we were expecting more people to join our party. Anyway, I never have to do that with Scully. I trust her to watch the door for me.

I trust her for everything. With my life, that goes without saying. With my health; there's no doctor I'd rather have, even if most of her patients are no fresher than the OJ in my fridge. With my happiness; lately I've tried to share more of that with her, playing baseball and eating at this cheesy restaurant. With my hopes, my fears, my frustrations. I've laid it all on her small, sturdy shoulders, and she's taken it without a word.

Sometimes I worry that I lean on her too much. But it's so easy, at times when everything is shattering around me, to latch onto her like some kind of parasite, draining her strength to keep myself alive. Forget Flukeman; I'm Leech Boy. Your liver is safe, but your sanity is fair game.

My good mood begins to evaporate as I start remembering all the ways I hurt her, just by being part of her life.

She turns and squints into the doorway, looking for something. Looking for me. When she picks me out against the glare she smiles widely and beckons me over to her. Her smile is like calamine lotion on chicken pox, and I remember again why I can't just suck it up and find a way to make her save herself by leaving me. Loving Scully is like breathing for me now; I can try to stop it, even succeed for a time, but eventually I have to begin again or die.

I take my seat across from her, sighing with relief as the chill of my thoughts fades, driven away by her warmth and light. My psyche is like one of those old "lost in the wilderness" movies where the wolves skulk around the edges of the campfire, but are held at bay by the flames. The night is always filled with danger, but as long as the hero stays by the fire, he's safe. He can rest.
 
Scully is my campfire.

I glance at my watch. Mulder should be here by now; punctuality is not one of his strengths, but he's usually on time for meetings with me. Usually.

I turn around and look for him. Squinting, I try to see through the annoyingly bright sunlight reflected off several parked cars into the restaurant. It's a good thing Mulder is paranoid and doesn't like to sit with his back to the door, because I hate facing the glare. It gives me a headache. Ever since the cancer, headaches give me this tight nervous feeling somewhere down around my spleen. It's not fear so much as unpleasant association, but I still try to avoid the situation altogether.

I'm good at avoidance.

I pick him out easily; even in silhouette he is distinctive. I can tell by the set of his shoulders that there's something wrong; maybe Skinner chewed him out again this morning. Much as he tries to hide it, Mulder really respects our boss. A lecture from him, deserved or not, always induces that look. It makes me think of a puppy that knows it really deserves to get whacked with a newspaper for eating your shoes, but wishes you'd pat it when you're through and tell it you love it anyway.

Mulder's childhood, from the little I can gather, was characterized by the everlasting futile quest for approval from his parents. The practice has stood him in good stead for all his other everlasting quests; I hope they don't all turn out to be as futile as the first one was. I still don't think he understands that when someone really cares for you, they don't make you earn it. He doesn't realize that even when I'm furious at him, he is still my partner, my best friend. I think that's why he acts like such a jerk sometimes. He gets panicky and possessive and protective and pushes all my buttons. But then he looks at me, and all his love and fear leap out and beg me to understand him, plead with me to forgive him. And I do. Because when all is said and done, I feel the same way about Mulder that he does about me.

I've done things for him that would have shocked the person I was before I made that fateful journey into the bowels of the Hoover Building. Before Mulder, I was a rigid adherent to rules, a stern believer in doing things according to proper procedure. If someone had tried to tell me then that I would end up breaching military security, holding my superiors at gunpoint, being held in contempt of Congress, threatening the life of a colleague, and committing God only knows how many other misdeeds large and small, I would have started legal proceedings for involuntary committal. But all that changed one gray day in Idaho, when I realized that I had to choose between saving my partner and following orders. By now, the only difference between us, at least as far as our mutual protective paranoia goes, is that Mulder likes it when I hover over him. What I perceive as a sign of doubt, he recognizes as a sign of care, as proof that I value him highly enough to risk myself.

I know he loves me. Frankly, I've probably known it longer than he has. I realized that I loved him in Dead Horse, Alaska, when I blocked his gate to Heaven with little more than determination and a pair of defibrillator paddles. The bond goes so deep in us now that I doubt we could separate even if we wanted to. Leaving Mulder would be like choosing to have my right arm amputated; the emotional phantom pains would cripple me.

Knowing, indisputably, within our souls, that we love each other is easy. Admitting it, however, is hard. Especially for people like us. The Ditch King and the Queen of Denial, ruling the kingdom of emotional repression from their palace of the paranormal. What a picture we would make if we ever dared to try a romantic relationship. It would be like some kind of warped soap opera.

Mulder feels guilty for keeping me from the "normal" life he thinks I should have. What he doesn't realize is that I wouldn't be able to have one anymore; it would bore me to tears, for one thing, and besides that I would feel guilty for abandoning the work that I have come to feel, despite my initial reservations, is not only valid, but vital.

Sometimes I do wish for a life of peace. But it isn't peace for myself alone that I dream of; it's peace for him. For us. The rare times that I have seen him relaxed and happy gave me glimpses of what could have been--of what, perhaps, may still be, in some hazy future after all the battles have been fought. Lately, he seems to be finding more intervals of contentment, and I treasure the ones we share. That's why I pretended not to know how to hit a baseball; that's why I come to this corny, overpriced sandwich shop to eat with him and roll my eyes at the menu.

He turns slightly and sees me; in an effort to lift his mood I give him my "I'm-so-glad-you-came-out-of-the-coma-after-all-Mulder" smile. It seems to work. His head lifts and his shoulders straighten as he crosses the restaurant to our table.

If the people that write export laws ever saw Scully smile, they would revoke her passport and forbid her to leave the country, under that same munitions law that prohibits non-US citizens from downloading the good version of Netscape. She is always a beautiful woman, but most of the time it's kind of understated; her presence is so strong that it's like some kind of cloaking device. When she's in SpecialAgentScully! mode she can blast suspects, mutants, rogue livestock, and uncooperative local law enforcement out of her way without rumpling her composure or her Donna Karan suit. But when she smiles like that--and it doesn't happen often--it's like the scales fall from your eyes and you realize you've been discussing crime scene photos and eating takeout with an angel. Or maybe a goddess. Something divine and mythological anyway. God, I'm such a sap.

She knows how powerful that smile is; that's why she saves it for the times when she needs heavy artillery. Usually a near-death experience is involved. I have no idea why she pulled it out today; when I take my seat, I regard her with slight wariness.

"What's up?" I ask casually as I take the menu she hands me. "You look like Ed McMahon just came to your door with balloons, a camera crew, and a giant check."

She grins at me--another rare occurrence--and shrugs. "I guess I'm just in a good mood, now that the conference is over," she replies. "It was a big waste of time. Only one of the sessions had anything to do with our work, and that was on the second day."

"Why didn't you just skip out on the rest?" I ask, although I know what she's going to say.

"Mulder, the Bureau paid for me to go to that conference. We just got the X-Files back; the last thing I need to do is waste funds like that."

"So you sacrificed yourself to the cause? Very noble, Scully."

"Well, actually I got caught up on my correspondence and finished our latest expense report," she says smugly. "So it wasn't entirely wasted time. I wished you had been there today, though. Tom Colton gave a presentation on 'Inter-unit Cooperation During the Joint Investigation of Violent Crimes.'"

"Colton? You've got to be kidding."

"It was so funny, Mulder. Colton doesn't work with the guys in VICAP any better than he worked with us, and everyone knows it. I could hardly hear him through the ambient snickering. Like I said, I wish you had been there."

When I told Mulder that I had missed him I felt like I had patted his inner puppy. It sounds horribly cliched to say this, I know, but his eyes really did light up; I could almost see his tail wagging. For a minute I allowed myself to mentally morph Mulder into my neighbor's beagle puppy. It was a good fit, except that Mulder doesn't wet the floor with excitement every time he sees me. The thought strikes me suddenly and I have to choke back a laughing fit. Mulder gives me that look he usually saves for unidentified viscous substances found at crime scenes and asks if I'm OK.

"I'm fine," I reply. "I just need to eat something. Wave to the waitress so we can order."

The waitress catches my eye and nods before picking up a tray and crossing to us. She sets drinks and an appetizer sampler platter--I think they call it "Groundling Grub"--on the table between us.

"I ordered these before you got here," she explains. I grin at her; ever efficient, my Scully. I sip my drink appreciatively. Iced tea, cool and sweet with a sprig of mint and a twist of lime. Perfect. I shoot her an appreciative leer and lower my voice into a faux-intimate croon.

"Oooo, Scully, you know what I like."

He looks at me like I just gave him something precious. Who knows, maybe I did. Across the table, I can feel contentment radiating from him like heat on Georgia asphalt. It slips past my defenses and warms me with its comforting reality.

Mulder has offered me the power to make him happy. And I realize how unfair it is that I never let him know that he has that power, too. Suddenly, I want to tell him. I want to let him know.

A memory hits me with the force of revelation. Mulder, a stakeout, a glass of root beer.

I think it's time to get out the two-by-four. If he can't take it... well, I know CPR.

"What can I say, Mulder?" I take a deep breath, forbidding my voice to betray the fear that is making my stomach lurch and my hands tremble.

"Must be love."