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Mulder stood, fumbled, stumbled, dragged himself from the bed, Scully’s arm trapped up inside his shirt for a few moments until she woke enough to grab a fistful of cotton to slow him down, “Mulder? Wher’you goin’?
She could see his eyes still shut, hands groping for traction, finding her shoulder instead, “Toby. I thought I heard him fall out of bed again.”
Blinking towards the alarm clock, “Mulder?”
He stopped, blood circulating enough to help him remember, “they’re not here, are they?”
“No. Come back to bed.”
He swayed another second or two, then crawled his way back to their pillow, having lost the second pillow to the floor sometime earlier. Slinging his arm over her hip, settling hand on bare belly beneath a non-judgmental Ernie smile, “I miss them.”
Her hand ran up and down his forearm, “I know. I do, too.”
Lips searching, finding, kissing her raised scar, his warm breath drifted through neckline flyaways, “can I tell you something?”
She loved his 1am conjectures, his 4am secrets, his 2:45am rants and his 10:48pm cravings but most of all, she worshiped his soft, luscious, midnight smooth confessions, sweeter than honey to the ear, sleeker than velvet to the touch, “of course.”
Tightening his grip on her waist, truth dropped from his lips to shatter on her soul, “I would like to have a baby with you. I would love to see her running in that pack of hoodlums you call nieces and nephews. I want her to do her best to keep up with Jake and be best friends with Toby and constantly ask Sam questions and build sandcastles on the beach with Betsy and call Maggie ‘Grama’ and look so much like you that I stop and stare every time I see her, wondering how in the world I could have ever hoped to produce someone with even an ounce of your beauty.”
Midnight smooth confessions triggered 12:05 wonderment as she questioned over her shoulder, afraid that looking at him would break her glass shield into 10,000 pieces, stumbling words holding staggering weight, “you … want … you want to have a baby with me? Mulder, I … you know that I …” Finally turning to her back, not meeting his gaze but speaking to the ceiling, “I can’t.”
He hadn’t known he’d been churning the idea until he produced the finish product, clean, complete and ready for contemplation, his mouth beside her ear, studying each eyelash in turn as he told her quietly, “I know … but can you imagine it?”
Her eyelashes twitched, closing, scrunching, finally releasing the smallest of tears to remain unfallen on her lashes, “every day.”
“Can we imagine it for a little while right now? Would that be okay?”
Keeping her world dark, she nodded, her voice quiet, “girl?”
“I like the idea of a girl. A whirlwind flurry of questions and comments and concerns, open to answers and always wondering what else was out there. She’d have dark red hair but skin that tans in the summer, green eyes and those beautiful ears of yours.”
“Definitely some of your height, though, at least get her to 5’ 6”. Give her a fighting chance at clothing stores and with tall cupboards.”
He nearly snorted his amusement in her ear but was too far enmeshed in the fantasy to surface for anything, “I’ll do my best. If the first one looks like they’re gonna be short, we’ll just keep trying until we get one that can look me in the eye.”
“I can do that.” Finally able to open her eyes back up, take in his close proximity and earnest expression without blubbering outright, “I want her to be able to draw or play an instrument or just … have that one good thing she can go back to when her world turns on itself and she feels all alone in it.”
Hand on her cheek now, thumb lazily running lines from cheekbone to ear, “I’ll start a piano lesson fund tomorrow.”
“And buy lots of crayons and paper.”
“And buy lots of crayons and paper.”
Scully could see that world, almost touch it, craving the warmth of a child inside her, “I’d be all enormous. I’d need you to tie my shoes.”
His hand drifted from face down chest, up and under shirt until his hand spanned her lower abdomen, stretching wide, finding both hipbones and pressing lightly in between, “they would live right here. You’d be someone’s home, Scully. You’d be their first home, their safest place, their comfort, their world. They’d only know you, know your heartbeat, know your stomach gurgles. They’d hear you all the time, your blood in their veins, your voice in their ears, they’d know you from their first moment to their last. I’ve never thought about it but they will know you their entire life. You will be their first and greatest.”
He had her at ‘somebody’s home’ and tears filled, then ran, overflowing her ears and soaking the pillow below, “I changed my mind. I can’t play make-believe with you right now. I’m sorry.”
His hand tightened on her, his voice filling her, “I’m the one who’s sorry. I shouldn’t have pushed you.”
She shook her head, “you’re not pushing me, I just … I’ve had that dream for so long I had to let it go. Self-flaggelation is one thing, outright soul destruction is quite another.”
Smushing his nose into her temple, he skimmed kisses over her skin, “I love us just like we are, big maps and scary guns and Smurf t-shirts all rolled into one. I don’t care that we’ll never have kids, I swear, I just went stupid for a minute and buried you in my fantasy. I should have kept it to myself.”
Finally, she turned, nose bumping nose, a quick kiss before drifting her hand up to cradle his face, “I have the same dream, I promise you. My heart just can’t take it right now. Not after the last week. Besides, do you really see either of us toting big guns and diaper bags?”
“We’d quit. You’d quit. I’d quit. I’d teach somewhere. You’d slice somewhere else. We’d come home and help with homework and make Play-Doh and cookies.”
Having to shut down right then or fly to pieces, she moved her head in order to reach his mouth, kissing him lightly, then more insistent, “I need to stop thinking. Can you help me with that?”
Mulder put his dreams back behind their door in the far corners of his mind and roaming a hand from her side to under the loose fabric of her shorts, “roll on your back for me again, please.”
As she complied, she held his gaze, “still love me even though I’m crazy?”
And he smiled, fingers finding their mark with warm, flowing ease, “couldn’t love you more if I tried. Now shut up and kiss me again like it’s 1939.”