Title : Not That Different
Author : Shawne
E-Mail : shawne@shawnex.freeservers.com 
Rating : G
Category: VA
Spoilers : none for the episode itself, but set post "One Son"
Keywords : M/S UST, post-ep circumstances
Archive : Please tell me where you want it to go.
Disclaimers : CC wrote Mulder and Scully into life. Collin Raye sang the
song whose title has given my story a name.
Summary : Mulder tries to tell Scully that they're not too different, after
all.
Author's Notes : This is the first installment in a series I eventually hope
to create. It's a very simple idea, really - a series of journal entries
written by Mulder, addressed to Scully. I needed some way to facilitate my
post-ep writing process, and I thought this would be an interesting concept.
The series, when it evolves, will develop both backwards (into seasons past)
and forwards (into seasons to come). I'd welcome any feedback (criticisms
yes, flames no) on this particular vignette, and on the general idea as
well. Heck, just send me mail. ;)
Thanks to Lisa for beta-reading, and to Scarlet for believing in me even
when I don't.
======================================================
Scully--
I've been working with you for six years now, and have been writing to you
for almost four of those six years. Oddly enough, the issue I'll be
addressing today has never before come up. Not directly.
I was actually taken aback today, when you told me what you did. I've
noticed, don't think I haven't, that you've been unusually quiet and distant
around me lately. You've stopped buying me sunflower seeds in the morning,
and those amazing eyes of yours have gone darker and more pensive. We spent
the past couple of days moving back down to the basement, and you didn't
make even one joke about finally getting your own desk. You kept to
yourself, and tidied your own things. You never once offered to help me with
mine, even when all my files threatened to swallow up your half of the
office.
I can't help thinking that, even if my clothes had spontaneously combusted,
you would have continued to sit at your desk, aloof and remote, arranging
and re-arranging the stuff on it at right angles.
Yes, like I've told you before, I do notice these things. How the
stationery on your desktop must be placed neatly and perpendicularly. How
you crack your knuckles after you've been typing a long time. How you
unconsciously tug at your shirt when you get off a chair. How your face
manages to tear up my insides while simultaneously giving them a reason for
existence.
Am I getting carried away again? I know that at least three-quarters of
what I write to you is all about how every little part of you makes me want
to believe in Perfection, and Truth, and Beauty. Are you sick of reading
about yourself in such a good light yet?
Anyway, I did have a point to all this, before I got distracted.
I miss all those little things, Scully. Every morning, I miss waiting for
you to come in and toss me a bag of my comfort food. I miss how your eyes
shine with a light I don't understand, but a light that means everything is
right with the world, with you, and with me. I miss our banter.
I miss you.
You've been so distant, Scully, and already I get so little of you it
hurts. Ordinarily, I have to make do with seeing you at work, seeing you be
professional and strong and composed. I see you typing, drinking coffee,
writing reports, doing accounts. But I never get to see you sleep, or watch
TV, or listen to music. I don't get to see you in the early morning, when
you're waking up, or late at night, when you're falling into a world of
dreams. I don't get to hold you, or touch you, or treat you in anything but
a professional way.
And when you cut me off, Scully, and keep me away from you, not so much
physically, but in terms of your words and actions - I lose you, all over
again. I thought I would lose you to the aliens, or to your cancer, and I
thought I would lose you to the Syndicate. But this time, you've lost
yourself to me. You've cut yourself off.
So when you looked up from your computer today, and studied me, I looked up
at you and met your gaze. Wanting to bridge the gap you'd created between
us.
I still remember every single movement you made, how you looked at me with
such a wealth of sadness in your eyes that I felt bad for being alive. You
cocked your head, in that little way you have, and started getting ready to
leave the office. As you moved to the door, I still recall how you looked
back at me, frowning, perplexed.
You told me, at that point, a truth we'd always known, but one that never
seemed to be much of a problem between us. Your eyes met mine, for the first
time in a century of loneliness, and you told me, quietly, "We are different
people, Mulder. You and me."
And then you left. I didn't have the heart to follow you.
We are different, Scully. That's a given in our relationship. There can be
no doubting that. I'm male. You're female. I believe. You doubt. I chase
dreams. You pursue science. I can't do paperwork. You do it all. I'm weak
without you. You're strong without me. I need you. You are me.
All this was never an issue. We knew we were different, and we worked with
it just fine. Oddly enough, in six years, we never really felt the necessity
to discuss it, or even to bring it up. I accepted you for what you are, and
amazingly enough, you accepted me for what I am.
But today, those words of yours chilled me to the bone. It wasn't a casual
observation - nothing about us is casual. You were painfully serious, and I
think I know what you meant. You were wondering how we managed to stick
through the whole six years together, without our differences driving us
apart, alienating us.
In a way, you were implying that our future together, something I always
took for granted, was not an assumption. We weren't going to be working side
by side forever. We are too different, you and me. One day, you will be a
doctor, and I... I will probably end up committed. Without you, it would be
hard to live in any place that isn't padded.
When you left, I thought you were right. I really did. I almost believed
that our differences were a time-bomb waiting to go off. We are different
people, Scully, you and me, and that will be the thing that eventually kills
me.
Not the Syndicate. Not C.G.B. Spender. Not even my own recklessness. No. It
would be you, and our incompatibility.
But with the retrospect of time, Scully, I think you are wrong. In fact, I
know you are wrong. We are not that different, you and I.
Like you, Scully, I laugh when I'm happy. And you? At the very least, you
smile. The world isn't yet so bleak that we cannot find some joy in it.
Like me, Scully, you love what is important to you. You hold your family
close to you, and you care for them with a passion justified only by your
heart. I love you every day, every second.
Like you, Scully, I hope that I'm not fighting a futile cause. I hope that
you will love me as much as I do you, and I hope our worlds will become one.
You hope for truth, and justice, and you hope for life and love.
Like me, Scully, you try to live for what you believe in. You try to keep
unsullied, and you try to care for me no matter how hard I make it. I try to
become the person you need, and I try to give you the love you deserve.
Everyday, I try to be worthy of you.
Like you, Scully, I hurt. I hurt when Samantha was taken, and I hurt when
my father died. Most of all, I hurt when you were taken from me, treated
badly. I hurt when your dreams died and you started to live for mine. And
you... you hurt when your sister died, you hurt for my truth. You hurt with
the cancer, and you hurt because of me.
Like me, Scully, you need something more than you have. You need a
perfection that can complement yours, a person who can show you a world that
can make you smile all the time. I need you with me, I need your love, I
need everything that is you.
Like you, Scully, I fear my own weakness. I fear my inability to win
against conspiracies, I fear losing myself in a quest that was never meant
to succeed. I fear losing you, to anything, to anyone. You fear losing your
strength, your independence, your ability to rely on yourself. You fear
losing you.
And most of all, Scully, like me, you cry. Your tears are shed for a life
you have lost with me, and the life you have begun with me. You cry for me,
for yourself, for a world that doesn't know. And I cry for the pain I have
put you through, I cry for the you I used to know, and I cry for the person
I cannot become for you. I cry for myself, for a world that doesn't want to
know.
So you see, Scully, we are more alike than you think. If you look beyond
the surface, if you look into our souls... you'll see that we're not that
different after all, you and me.
It's late now, and I should be leaving the office before I'm forced out.
Writing to you always comforts me, because I know that one day, you will
read this. I only hope that when you do, I'm still alive to know your
reaction to it.
As usual, Scully, I will end by wishing you a good night. I'll be thinking
of you, like always. Sleep well, sleep sweetly, sleep without worries.
I love you,
Mulder
======================================================
Feedback is very humbly requested by the person who lives at
shawne@shawnex.freeservers.com 
You can find all my fic at this URL, as well as the full lyrics of the song
which inspired this piece in the first place ("Not That Different" by Collin
Raye).
http://www.shawnex.freeservers.com 

*****
Added June 21, 1999
- Recommended on CiCi Lean's Fanfic Recommendations Page, for the week 
beginning 21 June 1999
- Archived at Darkstryder's Fanfic Recommendation Site (stories of 26 June).