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Her plan had been simple. They’d be away for the week, down in Florida, with wine and cheese on the house. They’d get a little too drunk and she’d drag him off somewhere quieter, tell him she wanted some fresh air. And she’d kiss him, because she was alive and what the hell were they waiting for. From there, who knew where the evening would go? Well, she had some ideas on that, too. Hadn’t waxed for the first time in nearly half a decade for nothing. They’d use their new-gained communication skills to talk it out, to work it out. It was the perfect plan.
But no.
No, he’d managed to wrangle his way out of the conference, jumped ship only twenty miles out.
So, her plan had changed. She’d had to adapt. Minibar wine charged to a bureau card, just the two of them in his motel room. They’d drink; confess truths. She’d taste the grape off his tongue, slide herself into his lap as she showed him what she wanted from her life.
But no.
No, he ran off into the forest. More accurately, he ran off to save a child – how could she complain when he was saving goddamn children from mothmen? And so she’d downed her plastic tumbler of expensive cheap wine and followed him, because what else was there for her to do?
They spent the night alone together, at least that part of her plan came true. There was a conversation about life and about death – that was hardly something they would have avoided in any circumstance, for life and death was the ebb and flow of them.
But it was cold and he was injured and getting down to it on an uneven ground covered in twigs and rocks whilst being hunted by so-called mothmen was not exactly what she had in mind. So she held him and she sang to him and she spent the entire night running her fingers through his soft hair and listening to his snores as she wondered whether all of these obstacles were actually signs telling her to stop chasing him because she wasn’t what he wanted.
They’d bickered their way into and out of a hole, getting no credit for the work they’d done in finding most of the missing people from the area, and she’d left him, needing just a moment alone – away from him – after two insufferable days in the forest. She’d packed his bags for him, knowing where everything went, taking a wisp of pleasure from such an every-day, domestic act. She wondered whether Agent Stonecypher knew her way around Agent Kinsley’s clothes and toiletries in the same way; doubted it.
He’d hammered her door down to find her in his room, hurried her away without a second glance backwards or an explanation of sorts. Her Mulder; easily spooked.
And so, she ended up in a bar, after a car ride of shared rolled-eyes and a flight spent dozing against his shoulder. Because otherwise, she’d have to spend her evening at home, unpacking her bags with the underwear she’d packed, her nice underwear, the matching bra and panties set in red lace that she thought might have tempted him. After one hour, two negronis and three tequilas she got a cab to the only place she wanted to be.
Her head against his door, she knocked. He wouldn’t be asleep, he didn’t sleep, he never slept. She had a key. She could use said key. Let herself in, take what she wanted.
But that wasn’t the point.
The point was that she wanted him to want her to take what she wanted. Or something like that. Maybe she should have slowed down with the tequilas.
She stumbled when the door opened, gazed up at him with dark eyes. ‘Scully?’
‘Hey.’
‘It’s past midnight. Something wrong?’
She sighed a melancholy little sigh and fixed her stare on his chest, patted the soft heather of his tee, ‘nothing ever seems to go to plan, does it?’
‘Come in.’
Door open wide, ducking under his arm, heels slipped off on her meandered way to his couch. He shut the door, bolted it. Slumped against it momentarily as he watched her prop her chin against her palm, elbow pressed into knee as she filtered through the files on his coffee table. The flip of manila folders made him feel at home, more at home in his own apartment than ever, and he made his way over to her, dropping into creaking, cracked leather.
‘Wanna talk about it?’
‘Yes. No. I don’t have anyone to talk about it with.’
‘I’m here.’
She snorted, rolled her head to look at him, ‘that’s the problem.’
‘I don’t follow.’
She shrugged, brow furrowed. ‘Four years. That’s how long we’ve worked together. When I started on the X files, I had friends. I had a sister. I had a boyfriend and when I broke up with him I had people I could talk to about it.’
‘Boy trouble?’
Another snort, ‘you could call it that.’
‘I didn’t know you were seeing someone?’
Was that a touch of jealousy she sensed or was it the tequila talking? ‘I’m not. That’s the problem.’
‘O-okay. So...you want to go out and meet people.’
‘No. God no. I don’t want to meet anyone. I...I want to feel alive. I am alive, for Christ's sake, and I want...I want,’ her eyes were pleading with him, trying to get him to see, to see her sitting in front of him. Perhaps a clearer head would have been better for this particular conversation.
‘What do you want, Scully?’
She licked her lips, considered her words, before giving up completely and leaning towards him, reaching out at the last moment to grasp his chin so their lips met.
It was...not the kiss either of them had ever dreamed of. It was clumsy and particularly one-sided on her part, and the tastes of tequila and teeth that had only briefly been shown a brush in the airport bathroom whilst waiting for their flight far too strong.
‘Scully,’ he pulled away, hands on her shoulders.
‘You. I want you.’
A heavy sigh, one that felt far too patronising for her liking, ‘how much have you had to drink?’
‘Not so much I don’t still know what I’m doing,’ she swallowed thickly, turned away at his sceptical look. So she was wrong. The tension and the attraction and heat that had been swelling between them for the past four years was all in her head.
He’d held her close as she died, but he couldn’t touch her when she flowed with life.
‘I’ll let myself out,’ she gave tightly, setting her jaw and desperately holding back the tears she wanted to shed as she stood.
‘Scully, wait-‘
‘I shouldn’t have come here, Mulder. I made a mistake. I will not be bothering you with it again.’
‘Scully, stop,’ his hand on her wrist, tight enough that she actually did stop. His eyes were pitying when she looked up to meet them and she had to look away again out of fear he might destroy her, ‘what are you doing, Scully?’
‘Leaving.’
‘No, before that. What are you doing here, Scully?’
‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘I want to know.’
‘I made an error in judgement. I thought...I thought it wasn’t just me who felt...something, and I brushed aside all the times you’ve run off into the forest as your obliviousness to women, to me, but now I’m thinking it was just your way of letting me down easily, so I’m going to go home, and I won’t ever bring anything about the way I feel up again. I am sorry for bothering you so late at night, Mulder, now if you’ll excuse me,’ she slipped her arm from his grasp and made her way to the door.
‘Scully,’ she turned, tear-tracks reflecting in the lamplight, ‘I wasn’t oblivious,’ her shoulders shook as she turned away again, bringing a hand to her face to wipe her eyes so she could see what she was doing, realising too late she’d shed her shoes halfway through her trek to his couch. After a moment of deliberation she settled her resolve to leave sans shoes, being the fleeing Cinderella from this disaster, and reached for the door. ‘I was scared. I was scared you didn’t know what you wanted, that I was seeing only what I wanted to see.’
She paused on the threshold, waiting to see if he was just trying to get her to stay, just trying to calm her down so he could call her a taxi, or worse, suggest he drive her home himself.
‘Stay. You’ve been drinking, I can’t...stay.’
She shook her head with a soft chuff of breath, somewhat amazed he still had the ability to build her hope and shatter it in the space of ten seconds. ‘I don’t think that would be a good idea, Mulder.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because-‘ she sighed, turned to face him, ‘because I know what I want, Mulder, and what I want is you to ask me to stay not because I’m drunk but because you want me to stay-‘
‘I do want you to stay-‘
‘No, not the way I want you to want me to stay,’ she clenched her jaw, balled her fists, the urge to stomp her stockinged foot on the hardwood floor overwhelming. ‘Christ, Mulder...’ her voice dropped to a whisper, ‘I want you to fuck me, and I want you to love me, I want- I want you to never let me go. And that’s...that’s not what you want, and it hurts so bad, Mulder, so, so bad,’ she was crying now, stood in the middle of his dining room at a loss for what to do with her hands, her emotions just boiling over with the loosening of the alcohol burning her veins. ‘I spent a year dying, Mulder. I thought I was going to die. And I wasn’t afraid of dying, God, I really wasn’t, but I was afraid of never being held by you and never telling you everything I felt for you. I was so scared that I was going to die and you’d never known how much I love you, how towards the end you were my reason for keeping trying, for not giving up on treatment after treatment, because I know that I do not think I would ever survive losing you, and I thought you were the same. And because I fucking love you, Mulder, and you don’t ever seem to have gotten it through your fucking thick skull that I would do anything for you.’
Sober, she would not be confessing her deepest, darkest secrets to him in the middle of the night, face a wet mess of tears and snot, a hole laddering its way up her stockings. Sober, she would have had the self-respect to not go over to his place. Sober, she wouldn’t be begging for his love and devotion. Sober, she’d live the rest of her life regretting not telling him.
But she wasn’t sober. Maybe hadn’t been since the word remission finally sank into her consciousness. She was high on life, filled with hope of a future and a desperation to live it to her full.
And God, she wanted to fuck the man she loved, and she wanted him to love her back. Was that so bloody hard?
At his stunned silence she wiped her face with the back of her hand, sniffed and dropped her head, ‘I apologise. If you don’t feel comfortable working with me anymore, I understand and appreciate that, and I can talk to Skinner about reassignment. I’ll see you on Monday, Mulder.’
And she was gone, door thudding shut behind her as she kept her footsteps carefully paced on the parquet floor of the corridor, silent without her kitten heels and an inch and a half shorter.
It took him two minutes to process the entirety of what she’d said. Another minute to realise that she’d fled and thirty more seconds to trip over her shoes on the way to his door.
He heard her before he saw her, wretched sobs wracking the chilled night air. She had a hand clutched at her chest, her head bowed as she leant into the brick wall of his building, body shaking violently.
‘Hey.’
She started, ‘Mulder.’
‘Come upstairs. Please?’
‘No, Mulder. I’m going to call a cab.’
He nodded and shrugged, walking over to her and leaning against the wall next to her, ‘you never gave me a chance to tell you what I wanted and how I felt.’
‘I don’t think I can do this tonight, Mulder,’ she murmured through her tears.
‘I don’t want to leave things how they are. You’ve seen my fridge, Scully, you know how good I am at leaving things to go stale. This isn’t a conversation I want to go stale.’
‘Mulder-‘
‘No, Scully, please? I don’t- I’m not good with communication-’
She scoffed, ‘you can say that again.’
‘I thought...I thought you- Scully, you...you are...everything. I don’t know how else- I have spent the last year waiting for my world to end. The first time I lost you I realised just how much you meant to me, and then...and then when I almost lose you again...but I’m not- I’m not a good man, Scully, and I’m not good to be around, and you’re so...good, Scully. You’re just so good. I thought...I thought you knew that. If I knew...? Christ, if I knew how you felt...do you know how many times a day I think about how much I love you? Every second. Every time you smile, every time you do that thing with your hair that you do, every time you chew on the end of your pencil when you’re reading my reports, and you’re rolling your eyes. Every time you smile. When you laugh at my jokes? I feel like I’m on top of the world. I...I’m lucky to even know you. I don’t deserve your love.’
‘That’s bullshit,’ she huffed, having stemmed her tears as she listened.
‘It’s not, I love-‘
‘You deserve so much, Mulder. You’re so...’ she looked up at him, at a loss for words, ‘you’re kind and you’re honest and I don’t understand how anybody couldn’t love you.’ He held his arms out to her and she folded herself into him, burying his face into his soft t-shirt, ‘you’re so fucking dumb, Mulder. How could I not love you?’
‘Come upstairs, Scully. Stay the night.’
‘I, uh, don’t think that’s a good idea,’ she murmured, leaning more weight onto him.
‘To sleep. Just to sleep. Come on, I’m tired and so are you. Besides, I want someone to sing me to sleep.’
‘Shut up, Mulder,’ she murmured, slipping her hand into his as he led her back into his building and up to his apartment. Soft moans were coming from his tv set when they entered and she looked up at him with raised eyebrows.
He blushed, ‘you seriously didn’t notice it the entire time you were in here?’ he asked, hurrying to switch it off.
‘No, I- seriously?’
‘Uh-huh. Come on, I’ll grab you something to sleep in.’
She woke with a headache, a full bladder and Mulder’s cock hot and hard against her thigh through his pyjama pants. She shifted, biting her lip when he groaned behind her, tightening his grip on her waist.
‘Sorry,’ he murmured into her ear, nuzzling his nose into the crown of her head.
‘It’s okay. I just need the bathroom.’
‘M’kay,’ he released her, keeping his gaze on her back as she slipped off of his couch and disappeared into his bathroom.
She untied the knot in the pair of his boxers she was wearing, relieved herself, then washed her hands and face in the sink. Her eyes were reddened in the mirror, her pallor pale, hair greasy. Her mouth tasted furry and stale, and she rinsed with some of his mouth wash. They had just slept, folded like origami on his couch. She hesitated at the bathroom door, hoping somewhat he was not still on the couch so she could sneak out, forget the whole of the night before.
Alas, when she poked her head back into the living room, there he was, sat with a soft smile on his face, cushion on his lap, and a cup of coffee, glass of water and bottle of aspirin on the coffee table in front of him. He’d drawn the blinds, too, anticipating her headache, and the room was a comforting dimness.
They said each other’s names in unison, Mulder motioning for her to go first when she cringed. ‘I should go.’
‘It’s Saturday.’
‘Yeah. I’m...I’m not sure this is such a good idea,’ her voice was trembling, fingers twisting in the fabric of the shirt she’d borrowed from him to sleep in.
‘Scully?’
‘We work together, Mulder. And you’re my best friend. And...what happens if we don’t work?’
He looked down at the steaming mug in front of him and nodded slowly with a frown, ‘w-well, if – if – that happens, if we don’t work, then...then I guess that’s something we’ll have to figure out. But I don’t think that’s something we need to figure out.’
‘I guess I’m...’
‘Scared?’
‘Yeah,’ she smiled at him softly.
‘Come ‘ere,’ he beckoned her over and caught her hands when she got close, reeling her in so she stood between his knees. ‘Want to know a secret?’ She nodded and he grinned, ‘I’m terrified. I’m worried you’ll see the real me and won’t want me anymore. I’m scared I won’t be good enough for you. It’s...it’s been a long time since I’ve been with anybody, and it’s been even longer since I’ve had any sort of romantic relationship. I don’t really know how to do this, how we make this work. But...I’d say we’re a pretty good team. We don’t need to build a tower of furniture to prove that.’
‘But-‘
‘No buts. Look, maybe we won’t work. But let’s try at least? Just so we know?’ he watched as she deliberated, watched the processes of her mind turning before she nodded subtly.
And then a smile split across her face, and she shuffled closer to him so her knees hit the edge of the couch, discarding his pillow as she climbed on and straddled him. She lowered herself onto his lap, pressed her forehead to his, pressed a kiss to the corner of his mouth.
‘We don’t have to do anything, you know. We can take this as slow as you want.’
She leaned back from him, shook her head with a smile, ‘I’m alive, Mulder. I got a wax. I even shaved my toes. So unless you really don’t want to solve your-’ she smirked as she looked down and rolled her hips ‘-problem? I have no qualms about what we do. And, as you so rightly say, it is Saturday.’
‘So, what do you propose, Agent Scully?’
She gave a hum, cupped his cheek with her hand, fingers chaffing against the stubble from the past few days, ‘kiss me.’
A grin spread across his face as he nodded, leaned in, brushed his lips against her own. Her lips were soft and pliant beneath his own, her breath sweet and pepperminty. She opened her mouth on a soft gasp as he ran his hands down her sides, resting on her hips before sliding around to her ass, lifting slightly as she pressed back into him, and he used the opportunity to slip his tongue past her teeth, engaging it with her own.
Moans elicited from both of them as she sank rhythmically down onto his lap, her hands dropped onto his shoulders for leverage, the scratch of manicured nails as fingers skirted the neckline of his t-shirt. He groaned her name, hands tightening on her ass as she sucked his tongue.
‘This okay, Mulder?’
He laughed, disbelieving, ‘this couldn’t be better, Scully.’
‘Really?’ she snickered, ‘you can’t think of anything better? Because I’ve got some ideas,’ a smirk crossed her face and she licked her lips as she shifted back and dropped her hands to his pyjama pants, fingers curling around the bulge there.
‘Perhaps you should enlighten me,’ he murmured, eyes locked to the pink flush of her cheeks, her blown pupils dark and dilated with lust.
She grinned, slipped her hand into his pants, and he jerked as her small hand wrapped around his cock. He gasped, his head thumping back onto the leather of his couch, eyes flickering shut as she established a slow rhythm with her hand and started peppering kisses along his jaw. Her tongue flicked around his earlobe before sucking it into her mouth, clamping down gently with her teeth.
‘Fuck,’ he whimpered as she tightened her hand on him, swiped a thumb over his head, gathering precum and smearing it down his shaft, ‘Scully, slow down, or this is gonna be real quick,’ another gasp and he gripped her wrist, forcing her hand away from him. ‘I want to see you. That okay?’
She bit her lip, nodded, pulled the top she was borrowing up over her head, ‘you too.’
He tugged his own shirt off, tossing it to the side, struggling to take his eyes off her smooth, pale skin, the soft curves of her breasts. He took a breath before reaching up, grazed the back of his fingers across her two puckered nipples, causing her to shudder, ‘you’re so beautiful,’ he murmured, his gaze back on her face and the soft, almost shy smile that graced it.
‘So are you.’
‘Really?’
‘Yes.’
‘Nobody’s ever called me beautiful before,’ he chuckled lightly and she blushed, ‘I’m not entirely certain it’s a good thing.’
‘I think it is,’ she shrugged as she traced the outlines of his face with her thumb, giving him a small, quiet laugh when he kissed the pad of it. She stood up from him then, catching his hands and pulling him to stand up before her, eyes begging for consent as her fingers played with the waistband of his pyjama pants. He hesitated a moment, and she furrowed her brow, ‘what is it?’
‘I just...I don’t have any condoms. It’s...it’s been a while and whilst I’m sure there’s half a box somewhere, even if I did know where they are they’re definitely not in date,’ he cringed. ‘I’m so sorry, Scully. I know this...it’s not ideal.’
‘No, it’s fine, I...’ she sighed and shook her head. There was a pack of condoms in her suitcase, three slipped into the pocket of the blazer she had been wearing to his motel room that was now slung over the back of her sofa. She licked her lips subconsciously, looked up at him, ‘we don’t...I mean, my bloods were clean when they were run after my remission, and the last time I looked at yours they were clean. Obviously, uh, if you don’t feel comfortable with that, then we don’t have to do anything. Or we can get some later, or...whatever, but- what I’m saying is the option is there.’
‘I-I’m fine with whatever you’re fine with. I just...I wasn’t even really thinking about that...I mean I was thinking more as birth control,’ his face was a warm red and he was looking anywhere but at her, which gave her a moment to take a steadying breath, to school her features into something that didn’t resemble the jolting pain that rippled through her chest at the thought.
‘That won’t be a concern, Mulder, don’t worry,’ she smiled, kissing his chest to give herself a moment to hide her face. ‘So, what do you say?’
‘I say, what the hell else are we waiting for?’
‘Right answer,’ she grinned, lacing her hands around his neck and dragging him down for a kiss before running her fingers down and up his arms, down his torso to his hips, admiring how tiny her hands were splayed against his hipbones, before she tugged on the elastic of his trousers, pulled them down over his erection and let them drop to the floor. ‘See?’ she wrapped one of her hands around him, a soft smile gracing her face as she traced a vein from the base to his tip, ‘beautiful.’
‘May I?’ he asked, nodding down to her own bottoms and she smiled, guiding his hands to the waistband.
‘They are yours, after all. You can do whatever you want with them.’
‘Fuck, Scully,’ he chuffed as she batted her eyelashes at him, and having little patience left he tugged down his boxers over the curve of her hips, carefully guiding them to the floor so she could step out, kneeling before her, ‘and you say I’m beautiful.’ He pressed a kiss to each of her hipbones, his hands bracketing her waist, and gazed up at her, ‘is this okay? Can I..?’ she nodded, threading her fingers through his hair as he placed open-mouthed kisses to her stomach, trailing his way down to the neat little thatch of auburn curls. He kissed just above her clit before diverting his way across to the crease of her thigh, his tongue slipping out to trace it as her hands tightened in his hair. He lay his cheek against the top of her thigh as he nuzzled his nose around her mound, ‘do you know how good you smell, Scully? Christ, I’ve dreamed of you letting me do this; letting me be this close to you.’
She whimpered as he used his teeth to graze against her inner thighs, up to the tender flesh of her cunt. The stubble on his cheeks and jaw added a delightful friction across her fragile skin, and she shivered against him. His tongue ghosted against her, his hot breath tingling against sensitive skin as she moaned his name, sounding far more desperate than she desired to. He pulled away at that, a wicked gleam in his eye as he looked up at her, before grasping her waist and spinning her around with a squeal, knocking her balance off and taking her weight to guide her back down to his couch. Her legs had fallen closed, and not too happy with that situation he pressed kisses to each knee and up each thigh as he nudged them further apart, using his hands to help lean her back, relaxing more into the worn leather. With puppy-dog eyes and her hands running through his hair, he rested his chin on the sofa between her legs, gazing up at her and waiting for her quiet nod of permission.
She was wet already, without him having actually touched her – had been since she woke in his arms – and he had only been working her up more and more, that when his hot mouth descended on her she moaned and lifted her hips to seek out more pressure and friction as his tongue glazed up her slit. His hands were everywhere, massaging circles into her thighs and kneading her tits, gliding up and down the soft skin of her stomach and linking with her own fingers.
God, how she had fantasized about this. His head between her thighs, one leg hooked over his shoulder to draw him nearer, his hair fluffy and rumpled from her fingers as her senses were overwhelmed with the heady scents of her and him and the familiar scent of his apartment. How many times had she slipped her fingers in and out of herself as she imagined him on his knees, rolling her clit in his mouth like one of those sunflower seeds he infuriated her with nearly every day. And, Dear Lord, she had not been overestimating him.
As he sucked on her clit her jaw dropped with a whine and she locked her fingers tightly in his hair, yanking hard enough to get his attention so she could beg him to stop, stop so she could have him, him, him...
He’d dropped one final, almost chaste kiss to her slit before standing up, knees clicking in the process, and taking a moment to admire her. Her hair was a mess, her cheeks and chest flushed, bottom lip trapped between her teeth and she was dripping onto his couch. He had never been more turned on in his life as she beckoned him down to her, shifting so there was room for them to both lay longwise across the cushions.
She welcomed him into the embrace of her thighs, reaching over to him so she could stroke him a couple of times before helping him push into her. She gasped, her other hand moving up to cradle the back of his head, run her fingers through the stubbly hair at the nape of his neck. He took it slowly, an unspoken agreement to make this last, and with gentle pulses he was eventually situated deep within her, filling her so deliciously to the brim. There was a moment of pause, foreheads pressed together, eyes locked, as they relished in just how close they were, how snugly they fit together. Like two puzzle pieces, each of them feeling fully complete for the first time as they sighed into one another’s body, melting to a point of no separation.
She ground her pelvis against his experimentally, shifting with him inside of her, and he joined in until they found their harmony, a perfect combination of efforts that soon had them moaning and gasping and clinging on to one another for dear life.
Whilst their pace was leisurely, the tension between them was winding tighter and tighter, electricity crackling around them. They were livewires ready to spark and combust with only the slightest graze of a finger or lash of a tongue. And no matter how slow they wanted to take it, it had been building for so long that it didn’t take more than Mulder’s finger drifting across her clit once to have her shattering under him, soft cries of his name mixed with the Lord’s as her legs trembled and her cunt spasmed around him.
He grit his teeth, tried to last through it, wanted desperately to give her at least two orgasms before he came, but it had been a long time and she was everything he ever wanted and she was so, so tight around him, that on a particularly hard clench of her muscles he stiffened, grunted her name over and over in her ear as he spurted his hot seed into her, letting her drain him of all he had to give.
When he went to pull out of her she shook her head, gave him a small, whispered ‘no,’ and locked her ankles around his back. So he smiled and held her to him and rolled over so she was on top, quite content to be as close as he could to her for as long as possible.
They lay together, sweat cooling on their skin and a stickiness between their thighs, each quiet in their own thoughts as they regained control of their breathing and processed the events of the morning. It was as Scully was drawing patterns on his chest, raking her fingers through his scrub of chest hair, that her hand landed on his injured sholder and she jolted upright, ‘fuck, you’re shoulder. How does it feel? We shouldn’t have- oh, Christ, you could have torn your stitches, or, or-‘
‘It feels fine,’ he shrugged beneath her. ‘I’m currently more concerned with how you’re head’s doing. I thought it would be killing you.’
‘I’ve worked through my fair share of hangovers, Mulder. The drawn blinds helped. We should change your bandage, check the wound. It probably doesn’t hurt because of the endorphins released during sex. It will start hurting again soon.’
He smiled up at her, shook his head, ‘you’re amazing, you know that? So unbelievably amazing,’ she looked at him with a puzzled expression and he just smiled more, ‘I’m so goddamn lucky.’
She gave him a small smile and settled back down onto his chest, ‘maybe we both are.’