Classification: V, A, MSUST verging on MSR Keywords: MAJOR Angst, on both parties parts...MSUST verging on MSR, um...well, you name it...if it's depressing, it's in here. Rating: A couple bad words...PG-13, let's say. 4am An X-Files Story by CW AKA Meg NOTE: The author's new and CURRENT e-mail address is elsewherecw@shaw.ca Disclaimer: Look, I'm really starting to get tired of this. They're not mine, okay! Bug off, Chris! I'll give 'em back when I'm done! The song '4am' belongs to Our Lady Peace. The character of 'Ms. Dinsmore' (If you've seen 'Great Expectations', you'll understand the allusion) belongs to me, but you can bloody well have her if you want her. Distribute: Wherever. Just keep my name and introduction attached and don't try to make a profit off of it (yeah right). Spoilers: None, really. Brief mention of Emily, cancer, abduction, Samantha, etc. WARNING: Impending MSR. If you're not into that sort of thing, I have no idea why you opened this story...but anyway, you'd better turn back now. Note: This one is a late-night vignette inspired by the above-mentioned song, '4am'. The lyrics are perfect for Mulder, don't you think? Anyway, if you like, let me know...I could write a sequel, maybe... Thanks: To Faye, Lia, and Johannah again, just for being friends. And Faye, thank you so much for the postcard...really helps out on a lonely Valentine's Day, you know? Summary: It's 4am and not all is right between M&S... ***** I walked around my good intentions And found that there were none I blame my father for the wasted years We hardly talked I never thought I would forget this hate Then a phone call made me realize I'm wrong ***** "Damn it!" Mulder cried out in frustration as his keys hit the floor. He heard the slight creak as the nearest neighbor's door cracked open and the overly-paranoid woman living inside peeked out, saw him, and hurriedly tightened the latch on her door. "Good evening Mr. Mulder," she said in her soft, frightened tones, her eyes flitting wildly between him and the offending keys, as though she thought that they were his newest weapon against her. "How are you this evening?" "Fan-fucking-tastic, thank you," was what he answered under his breath, but to her hearing, it sounded like, "Fine, thank you, Ms. Dinsmore. You?" "Oh, I'm just fine," she replied with a somewhat nervous chuckle which she subsequently choked on---the result of too many cigarettes and not enough vacations, Mulder mused. "You're not having any trouble then, Mr. Mulder?" "Don't worry Ms. Dinsmore," Mulder said with a forced smile. "No dead people outside my door tonight, for once." With that he shoved his key into the lock and turned, stumbling through the door and shutting it loudly behind himself, leaving the poor woman to shriek and slam her own door, in the process losing two or three of her curlers. Mulder tossed his coat onto the couch with a few choice murmured words and stomped into the kitchen to make coffee, and in the process he spilled half the tin onto the floor, of course. "Goddamn it Scully," he muttered as he slammed the cupboard open and pulled out the honey, then slammed it closed again. "Goddamn it." That bloody woman was up to her old tricks again, doing everything she could to get on his nerves. And she knew exactly where to get him, too. Bringing up Samantha again...how could she? So they were working on a kidnapping case. So what? He wasn't so unstable as to transfer his feelings for his lost sister onto every kidnapping victim that passed him by. For Christ's sake, he wasn't quite that dense. She'd lost her faith in him again. Her trust in him. What the hell did it take for him to have her on his side permanently? He tried to amend for what he'd done to her, but she still blamed him for everything. The abduction, the chip, the cancer, Melissa, Emily...everything. The nerve. He couldn't believe that she would think...God, was he mad. He ought to just call her up and...no, he didn't want to continue this fight tonight; he didn't have the strength. But Lord Almighty, would he have words for her in the morning. He glanced down, his hand stilling its ragged movements as he realized that he'd just filled an entire empty coffee cup with honey. "Fuck!" he shouted into his empty apartment, wishing she were there to hear him. "Fuck it all!" He hurled the spoon into the sink, then the honey jar against the wall, then the mug against the other wall. The jar and the mug shattered one after the other with a satisfying sound of devastating completion and pieces of pottery and globules of honey sprayed out in odd patterns across the floor. Mulder dropped his head into his hands, almost as if to hide from his own anger, but when he brought his head back up, the things he had taken his rage out on were still broken. Scully, he thought, staring at the mug, a mug which she had given him on their last anniversary...the anniversary of the day they'd met. It proclaimed in bold white lettering his foremost motto: I WANT TO BELIEVE. The glass had shattered between the BE and LIE, then again between the LIE and the VE in BELIEVE. Now all that was left was LIE. Lie. Oh my God, what have I done, Mulder thought, dropping his face into his hands again. I took my anger out on Scully, and now I've broken her. In four swift strides he was in the living room picking up the phone. With the touch of a button, he was speed-dialing Scully's number. It rang twice before the answering machine picked up. "Hi, this is Dana Scully. I'm not he..." He cut it off mid-sentence and pressed speed-dial #2. Scully's cell phone. No answer. "Damn it!" he shouted again, slamming the phone down into its cradle. He stared at it for a long moment after that, willing it to ring. Then he bent his head, took a deep breath, and sat down on the couch to feel sorry for himself. ***** I walked around my room Not thinking, just sinking in this box I blame myself for being too much like somebody else I never thought I would just Bend this way Then a phone call made me realize I'm wrong ***** Mulder was on his feet before the second ring had finished its penetration into his sleep-boggled mind. He glanced over at the clock. 4 am. He'd fallen asleep just over an hour ago, after finally deciding to leave a short message on Scully's machine consisting of seven words: "Scully, it's me. I'm sorry. Call me." It had to be her. He reached over and picked up the phone. "Hello?" he said, wincing as his voice cracked into the higher registers. There was a short silence, and then her voice, trembling ever so slightly. "Mulder?" Mulder cleared his throat, but his voice still managed to waver. "Scully?" "Yeah, Mulder, it's me." She sounded tired, relieved...she sounded a million things. "Where've you been?" "I've been...out. I just got in. I found your message..." She trailed off. He bit his lip. "Scully, I wanted to talk to you, to tell you..." "That you're sorry. I know. I'm sorry too." "Oh," he said simply. Why did they always have to make it so easy when it was always so goddamned hard? "So, what've you been doing?" she asked almost casually, and Mulder blinked and ran a hand through his hair. "Um...I dunno...nothing, really." "Oh," she echoed. "I fed the fish," he said suddenly, and listened to the ensuing silence. Well, it seemed like the right thing to say at the time, he thought glumly. "Good," she answered eventually. "That's good." There was another long bout of silence. "Scully..." Mulder trailed off. "Yes Mulder?" she almost whispered. "Can we talk about this?" he asked almost pleadingly. He heard her take a deep breath. "Mulder..." she trailed off as he had done. "Yeah, Scully?" "Come to your door." He blinked again and walked over to the front door, opened it, and leaned out into the hallway. Scully stood about a metre down from his door, leaning against the wall and turned towards him, one hand holding the phone to her ear and the other arm wrapped around herself as she shivered, being soaked through to the bone from the pouring rain outside. She was dressed in a pair of jeans and a shirt with a plunging neckline, and her summer jacket dripped tiny droplets of water onto her hiking boots. She'd been walking in the rain, wearing the opposite of appropriate clothing. She'd been punishing herself. Unconsciously. It was something he always did, but he hadn't been aware that she had as little control over it as he did. He stared at her in the silence of the corridor, and she stared back, her hand still clutching the phone, her teeth chattering slightly as she watched him, her gaze as mournful if not more so than his. "I couldn't get all the way to the door," she said finally, her state of severe shivering coming through in her voice. Her eyes stayed firmly attached to his. "I was...I was scared, Mulder." He held her eyes for another moment, then walked back inside his apartment, hung up the phone, and walked back out into the hallway. With shaking hands, she closed her cell phone and placed it in his outstretched hand. "Be careful with that," she muttered as he took it and dropped it onto the table beside the couch in his apartment. "If I wreck another one, I don't think the Bureau will give me a new one." His next trip into the hallway was to retrieve her. He walked up to her and reached down to take her hands, rubbing them between his own to warm them, and then he put one arm around her and guided her into his apartment, uncaring about the fact that her proximity was soaking his clothing. He gently pushed her down onto the couch, where she sat with her hands squeezed between her thighs and her mouth tightly shut to keep her teeth from chattering, until he reappeared from the bathroom with a towel and some clean clothing---hers, of course, from the drawer in which he kept some of her things in case of an emergency. She smiled up at him in thanks, but put the clothes aside, and only briefly used the towel to rub some of the moisture out of the damp strings of her normally-brilliant red hair. He watched her, then once again shook himself from staring further and offered her some coffee. She said thanks and yes, and then followed him into the kitchen, where she found the scene, which he had not cleaned up, from earlier. "Oh, yeah, right," Mulder murmured sheepishly. "Be careful, Scully. I broke a few things." She didn't answer. Her gaze was transfixed on the broken mug and the encrusted honey. She knew exactly what had happened---she knew his rage. He fixed her a cup of instant coffee, leaving the cold coffee in the coffee pot to be dealt with later. But once again, when he handed it to her, she put it aside, instead looking up at him. He looked back down at her. "Mulder, we can talk about this," she answered him finally. "Okay," he said with a slight nod. "It was wrong of me to mention Samantha...I know she has nothing to do with this." "Okay." There was a long moment of silence, in which Scully blinked several times---she looked like she was trying to hold back tears. "Scully, I shouldn't have yelled at you the way I did," he said quietly. "I know you've been having a rough time lately, and we're both just so tired...we've both been looking for a fight for the last few days. I shouldn't have said the things I did." "Neither should I," she looked down. He tried again. "Scully..." "Do you need help cleaning this up, Mulder?" she interrupted him smoothly, moving over to stand over the crushed honey pot. He didn't answer her, and finally she looked up and met his eyes again. What she saw there scared her. Fear. Vulnerability. A loss of a required innocence. Need. She drew in a sharp breath, and she had to force herself not to back up as he took a step towards her, then stopped. Unfortunately, she was vulnerable too. She walked swiftly into the living room, whispering a hasty, "Maybe I should go..." He followed her, catching up to her in a few rapid paces. He caught her wrist and she stopped. "Stop running away from me," he said quietly, coolly, and she took in another deep breath. "Let me go, Mulder." "No. Turn around." She turned around slowly, coming to face him. The darkness in his eyes had almost overshadowed the sandy hazel. He released her wrist, but she didn't move. He brought up his hand and touched her cheek, and she closed her eyes and let out a small whimper. Not now, she thought. Not now. I can't stop this right now. You know that, Mulder, I can't stop you... His other hand came up to touch her other cheek, and he tilted her head towards him slightly as his mouth descended over hers, lightly, gently, curiously. She whimpered again, and both her hands came up to close over his wrists, pulling them down from her face. He broke the kiss and leaned back to look at her. Her eyes were wide, almost panicked. "Not now, Mulder," she whispered aloud. "We can't do this now." "Why not now? Why is now any different from tomorrow?" he whispered back. "Don't you think that now we're at the worst risk of exposure? Since that escapade with your death...with the Cigarette Smoking Man's death...the Consortium has to have been watching us more closely than ever...Skinner's close monitoring of our activities shows that! He's making sure we don't get ourselves into a compromising situation...well, this is about as compromising as it can possibly get, and Skinner can't do a damn thing about it. The only people who can stop this are you and me." He was silent. "Mulder..." she pleaded, her hands closing over his. "I know, Scully," he whispered, dropping his head slightly to touch hers. She closed her eyes again. "You're right. I'm sorry." She shook her head, moving his. He reached down and kissed her cheek. "I'm so sorry," he whispered. "I know," she said, opening her eyes. She looked at him for a few moments, then picked up her cell phone and walked back out into the rain. Mulder was left sitting on his couch again, feeling even more empty than before. And yet, one thing bothered him. She'd never said no. ***** If I don't make it known that I've loved you all along Just like sunny days that we ignore because We're all dumb and jaded And I hope to God I figure out what's wrong ***** THE END 'Life is like a box of chocolates...' ***Feedback is always appreciated***Flames will be used to decorate the Catacomb*** Don't forget...if you liked it, let me know, and I might write a sequel!