Title : Coming Together
Author : Shawne
E-Mail : shawne@shawnex.freeservers.com 
Rating : PG-13
Category: VA
Spoilers : One Son, Arcadia
Keywords : MSR
Archive : As you wish, but please tell me where.
Disclaimers : Nothing belongs to me but the words.
Summary : Mulder and Scully come together. Wasn't that obvious from the
title?
Author's Notes : I wrote this before I saw "One Son", so it is effectively a
pre-post-ep fic. I'm not entirely sure if it works, given the episodes I
still have yet to see. But this has been sitting on my floppy for a while,
and I thought it would like a breath of fresh air.
======================================================
Today, Mulder, we came together.
Like the matching pieces in a jigsaw puzzle, like the individual shards of
porcelain from a shattered vase. Like the bricks in a house. Strong and
separate alone, but somehow better together. Better when fitting, best when
joined.
You were quiet today, when you came into our new office. I was working at
my desk, writing notes for a report I was going to type up later. You were
wrapped in some kind of pensive cloud, one I didn't bother to penetrate. I
remember your greeting me perfunctorily, and I remember greeting you back,
politely. The empty words passed between us without meaning.
Something had been subtly different between us for a while, despite having
our positions in the Bureau re-instated, despite getting the X-Files back.
Despite an apparent return to what we would call 'normal'. The comfortable
familiarity of years was gone. It was destroyed that one night, months ago.
So, like always since that night, there was a silence hanging between us
today that hurt, an icy distance that was looking increasingly difficult to
close everyday. Our banter never stopped flowing... nor did the
conversations, or the caring. I could not stop caring. But I was also
pushing you away, using unfamiliar stilted words to hide myself from you.
That night, Mulder, months ago, you destroyed the us I had come to know,
the you I had come to rely upon.
I found that the words we used to surround ourselves with, the common
language we developed over the past six years, had frozen. They were words
that suggested innuendo, light-heartedness, support, trust, love. And those
words had broken when they no longer came out of your mouth. When you told
me, so coldly, so impersonally, that my interest in everything we did was
personal. When you stopped believing in me, and I stopped believing in you.
Until today, I had thought we could never hope to recapture the tone of
those words, of those lost years. I thought that I had lost something so
profoundly important that I had to shut off the pain, the fear, with
mildly-concealed irritation, with bitterness.
You must have known, Mulder, how unreceptive I was to your jokes and
attempts at laughter, how closed I became to you. I stopped reaching out for
you, because I stopped expecting you to reach out for me. If it had been any
time before that night, I would have played house with you, Mulder, in
Arcadia, played house so earnestly you would have thought we'd been married
for years.
But I couldn't, and I had to turn you away. I thought I had lost your
trust, and everything that came with that. Your love. Our lives together. My
sanity.
That night, Mulder, I think I almost broke.
But today, Mulder, today, I am healed. Whole. And you did it.
Thank you.
I smile at you, and you smile back, shyly, beautifully. Your free hand
reaches for mine, squeezes it reassuringly, lovingly. I warn you to keep
your eyes on the road, and I watch you because my eyes want nothing more
than what you can give me.
You came over to my desk, near the end of the day, and stood behind me.
Quiet, uncertain, scared. I could feel your mouth open, wanting to bridge
the distance - then closing, afraid to fall too far in. My hand shivered, as
I wrote, and I wanted to turn and help you, to make it easier. But I
couldn't.
Mulder, you have to understand why I couldn't. What if I had been wrong?
What if I was wrong, again? I used to think that everything in my world was
wrong, or in the process of going wrong, and only you were right. Then, my
fragile reality broke. And I couldn't let you in again, not easily, not
anymore.
So you stood behind me, watching me. I could hear you breathing, wanting,
but I pretended not to notice.
"Scully." I remember the intensity with which you said my name, at last,
brimming with fearful courage and doubtful hope. Should I have turned then?
Turned and acknowledged your hurting? I sensed your pain, Mulder, I did. I
wanted to make it stop. But I was afraid, afraid that I had forgotten how.
And what if I was wrong?
Forgive me.
Thank you for not bolting. For not giving up. For taking my hand the way
you did, stopping my pencil in its frenzied tracks. For holding my hand for
an eternity that returned the warmth to my heart.
You didn't say a word, just gripped my hand, held it so tightly that I
realised I had no idea where yours ended and mine began. You took my hand,
took it in yours, and I knew, I knew for sure, that you would never let it
go again.
So this time, I turned. I turned into you, finding your arms, your scent,
your strength. You pulled me into you, invited me, then held me, so
tenderly, like I was cherished... treasured... understood. As if you were
afraid you might break me again.
The tears came free then, I think, and I wept. I cried for the pain I had
been feeling, the hurt, the sadness, the disappointment. I cried for the
life I had lost when I first touched you. But I also cried for the pain I
knew was going to end, and for the life that I knew was going to start.
Don't ask me how I knew, Mulder. I just did.
And you touched me, traced my face with butterfly-light fingers, scoured my
eyes with yours, filled me with you. I was drowning and floating, dancing
and flying all at once, and I could tell that you were with me, every step
of the way.
When your tears began as well, I did what was natural. I kissed them, kisse
d them away and off your face. I pulled your head down to mine, and your
arms found me again, holding, easing, fusing.
Finally, my lips hovered above yours, centimetres away, yet miles apart. I
know I wanted to, to touch my lips to yours and find a bit of the you I
thought I had lost. To join us again. I exhaled, unsure... and your breath
caught, and held mine in it. We mingled, without touching, and your eyes
promised me a love we were at last ready to acknowledge.
Then, we mixed. We merged, mouth to mouth, kissing for our six years
together, kissing for the years to come. The world as we knew it ended, and
then it began again, and our hearts were tangled, then combined, and now
shared.
We came together today, Mulder, for the first time.
You are smiling again, and I stand behind you, waiting. I know what will
come next, what is right. The keys you are using now will open doors
tonight. Yours opens first.
"Give me your hand, Scully." You stand framed in your doorway, and hold out
your hand to mine. You are beckoning, reaching out, proposing, inviting, and
I know I will accept.
You will take my hand in yours, tonight, and so much more. Our language is
back, refreshed, stronger... and I can tell, tell that between us,
everything wrong has been put right. And that's because, Mulder, because
today, you managed to fix what you broke that night, months ago.
The warmth of your hand around mine comforts me, and my eyes whisper vows
of eternity to you as you pull me through the door, kicking it shut. In your
arms, I drown, I float, I dance, and I fly again as your lips touch mine and
we find our heaven... our home.
Tonight, Mulder, we will come together.
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Feedback on whether or not this works (or blows!) should be sent to
shawne@shawnex.freeservers.com 
If you want to see anything else by me, here's the URL you should follow:
http://www.shawnex.freeservers.com 
Added June 15, 1999