Work Text:
By Tuesday afternoon, they had a full house, five kids, two FBI agents, an injured Maggie and as Mulder included in his head, quite possibly a partridge in a pear tree. The kids knew to steer clear of Grandma/Aunt Maggie but sometimes, kids just have to see their Grandma/Aunt Maggie and they hovered on the stairs, one on each step, peering through the banister railings, quietly waiting until she was settled on the couch, feet up, pillows under her arm before, “Grandma?”
Oh, she had missed their voices, surrounded by nurse matter-of-factness and doctor ramblings for four unbearable days. Waving her arm in their direction, they took that as the ‘go’ sign and scrambled, politely remembering not to crash into her but definitely skidding to stops very close to injured parts.
The cacophony of stories made Mulder’s ears ring, five kids with five lives that needed to be relayed immediately to their favorite person. He watched Scully smiling a concerned grin, worried someone would jostle her mother right back in the hospital but again, to the kids credits they were on best behavior, finally calming after a few minutes so Maggie could speak, “and tell me, when is your last day of school again?”
Sam piped up, “Thursday. It was supposed to be a half day but since we had so many snow days, they made it full.”
Mulder realized he’d better make some damn good lunch bag drawings because he’d only be doing them two more days. He felt three-headed monsters and Tribbles with sunglasses were in order for Wednesday.
&&&&&&&&&&&
It took until after 11 to get everyone settled in and quiet, Maggie under the influence of painkillers and the kids under the influence of an hour of flashlight tag in the park down the street. Mulder met Scully as he left the kitchen, “ready to collapse?” He could see the weariness in her eyes, purple shadow below darkening blue above, the surrounding skin pale. As she nodded, he held out his hand, “come on, lumpy bed awaits.”
“Lunches done?”
“Yup. Maggie drugged?”
“Yup.”
Switching off lights as they walked, “and the monitor’s plugged in?”
“Yeah. She can wake me up if she needs me but I’ll set the alarm for a few hours and go check on her.”
It took a few minutes to get in bed but once there, Scully melted into the mattress, face buried in the pillow, “it might be lumpy but I adore this bed right now.”
Laughing into her shoulder, “go to sleep. I’ll listen for your mom and go find out what she needs. If it’s the bathroom, I’ll wake you up, otherwise I’ll deal with it.”
“But you have to go back to work tomorrow? You’ll be exhausted.”
Kissing first her nose then hugging her toes with his, “I’ll be fine. Trust me.”
She snored her answer back.
&&&&&&&&&
It was truly strange for him. He helped Maggie once with painkillers, crawled back in beside a warm body, woke up to small Toby eyes and a request for breakfast, dropped kids at various schools, went to work, thought about Scully, kids, Maggie, dinner, grocery shopping, what to do that evening, what stories he would tell the littles before bed, how nice it would be to settle in beside Scully again that night, then left work promptly at 5, drove home with a smile, entered the loud, boisterous house with a wider grin and stopped dead when he saw Scully standing in the kitchen at the sink.
His chest squeezed so tight, his throat constricting, blocking life giving air from traveling to heart and brain.
He was a hair’s breath away from having the perfect, wished for, sought after life and suddenly realizing this might very well be as close as he’d ever get, his heart skipped.
Then skipped again.
The third thudding had him grabbing the stair railing for a moment, the tunneling stars in his vision signaling either passing out or heart attack. He preferred passing out as he called Scully’s name, her arriving at his side just as his body corrected itself, normalized beats pounding the blood in his ears.
“Mulder?! Are you okay? What happened?”
He really should tell her the truth but instead, “slammed my finger in the door but it’s better now.” Flexing his hand for good measure, “still moving but for a minute, thought I was gonna die.”
Hannah came down just then, appearing beside him on the steps, keeping Scully from calling his bullshit out for the world to see and knowing a golden opportunity when it came to him, he turned to the little girl, “hungry?” After the smaller human nodded, Mulder took her hand, leading her to the kitchen and circumventing any sort of questioning from his partner, a win-win situation in his opinion.
The rest of the evening passed uneventfully, everyone eating hot dogs in Maggie’s room, dinner plates on laps, drinks clear and non-staining, hot dogs and mashed potatoes hitting the spot before proceeding to Monopoly and Checker and Hi-Ho-Cherry-O themselves into oblivion while loud thunderstorms kept them inside instead of out.
Mulder kept his eyes on the game, avoiding the penetrating gaze of one Dana Katherine Scully at all costs.
&&&&&&&&
“Mulder.”
“I’m asleep, Scully. Don’t wake me up.”
“Mulder.”
“Can’t you hear my loud and raucous dreams about loud and raucous sex with you?”
Rolling him towards her, she looked down at his face, head cocked sideways, “what happened?”
“Banged the shit out of my hand. I told you that.”
“Then how come you haven’t looked me in the eye all night long?”
She would be the definitive death to his lying abilities in the very near future if not right this very minute. Scrunching his eyes shut, then keeping them at squinched half-mast, “why the hell can’t I lie to you anymore?”
“You could never lie to me. I just normally chose not to fight you on your crap but now, given we’re sleeping in the same bed nightly, you’ve seen me stark naked and I’ve got a few minutes to spare, I’m gonna ask what happened.”
“I feel like an idiot but, um … I just … all day,” hand going to rub across his temple then arm curling around the top of his head, “I woke up with you and dropped kids off and thought about dinner and games and you and I left work at five, then, when I came in the door, you were standing at the kitchen sink and complete 50’s sexism reared its ugly moniker but … just for a second … and this is what really scared the hell out of me … is that they could be our kids and I came home to our house and you made dinner and we were all going to sit down and be that unnervingly perfect family that I have never experienced even a day of and my heart started pounding and I thought there was a really good chance I was dying.”
She adored his rushing, run-on sentences when they weren’t filled with government angst and clenched fists and conspiratorial rage, “you realize our family would be very far from perfect, correct? Even if you do pass genetic muster, they’d be loud and clumsy and have rather prominent feet which they’d trip over then break things, themselves included and there would be a tendency to cheat at cards and belch like my brother at inopportune times and their teeth would be horribly crooked ‘cause, let me tell you, there was a reason I never smiled with my mouth open as a child.”
“Yeah. Perfect, like I said.”
She’d finally come to terms with her barrenness but in the realm he was speaking, she could feel her lightness, her firm, walled off soul bending under the weight of reality. Burying herself suddenly in his shoulder, “let’s just enjoy the week, all right?”
That was the last thing he expected, then, his brain kicked in, thinking of her instead of himself, “oh, God, I’m sorry.” Bringing down his arms, he hugged her head to his chest, “I’m sorry. I should learn to lie better.”
With a nearly sad chuckle into his neck, “I’m okay. I’ve accepted life as it is but I’d rather lie here and discuss just where the hell we’re going to keep the mattress when we buy it because this sofa bed is leaving something to be desired for my back.”
Because he was completely cheesy and pathetically in love sometimes, he whispered, his hands in the vicinity of her inner thigh, “I constantly desire you on your back … and front … and on top and underneath.”
She’d known it was coming, she expected it to sound just as cliché as anything ever said in the universe but instead, it was soft and warm, underlying tones of utter adoration and acceptance of her just as she was.
If only her mother wasn’t in the next room and there weren’t five kids upstairs and the bed didn’t squeak, “I’d give you an entire bag of red M&Ms if I could.”
Squeezing her tight, “right back at you, g-woman.”