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The lights were dancing all around the room in crazy and fast movements. The colors were bright, hypnotic. The music was deafening. The bass was vibrating in her rib cage, her heart playing at the same rhythm. Dana Scully was in the middle of a dance floor, in a disco, dancing with all her soul.
Oh, and really much drunk at that point of her night.
It was all so out of character that she could barely recognize herself. Surrounded by strangers, her sweat mingling with the sweat of the people that were pressing, crushing on her little frame, Scully abandoned herself to the rhythm. She abandoned both her body and mind to the music, the alcohol and the anger that was eating her alive. She felt free, for the first time in months she felt liberated. Normally she would have never gone to a disco, that wasn't something Dana Scully would have done, and, after a case that had left her so emotionally drained like the one she and Mulder just solved, going to dance was simply out of question.
But there she was, giving herself completely to the music. She was doing something prohibited, something nobody expected her to do. Dancing between strangers and getting drunk was something Scully herself considered like a kind of taboo for her. Agent Scully, the FBI agent Dana Scully was covered with sweat, her hair were uncombed, her work clothes unrecognizable, her mind numb. It was all so exciting, so new. What would have thought Mulder, had he seen her that way?
Well, fuck Mulder.
At least she didn't have to see his sad, worried face there. After their talk at the hospital she told him she needed to go home, but after crying in her car she was just too angry and sad to go to an empty house, doing nothing else than repeating their conversation in her head and cursing the word for her damn cancer. So, she decided to do something else, something totally new and out of character. That's how she ended up drunk in a disco. To numb her pain and anger with alcohol and loud music.
So loud she couldn't hear her head thinking.
So drunk she could act freely without being afraid of the judgement of other people. Of Mulder.
It was all blurred, she felt so light, as she was floating on the dance floor. Time stopped. She could barely feel something, it was like nothing was important anymore. She didn't care of anything. She could barely listen to the music. It felt like she was in a bubble. She was moving her arms, but she couldn't feel them. People were crushing on her, but she ignored them. She was free. Happy almost.
Men approached her, but she rejected them, one after another. She wasn't interested in them tonight. She didn't want to escape her pain going in a stranger's bed. She wasn't interested in behaving like in Philadelphia. She wanted to embrace the pain this time. Embrace it in the protection that alcohol and loud music could provide her. She was able to see her life, her pain, but in a distance. As if she was on anesthetic. She knew the pain was there, she could see it, but she couldn't totally feel it. She didn't allow the pain to reach her heart, her mind.
Moving her body in rhythm with the music, Dana Scully was analyzing her life, and she didn't like what she was seeing. Yes, she was still there, but for how much time? And what would she leave behind her? What did she archive in her life?
She avoided the answer drinking yet another shot of vodka. Her throat was on fire, but at least that was the only thing she was able to feel, at the moment.
Scully looked around her. Lots and lots of people were dancing, moving, crushing on others. The place was so limited that what they were doing could barely be named "dancing". The music was defeating. She felt so lost that she could feel tears starting to form in her eyes. Too many questions were floating on her mind. Why me? Why now? Is it all part of a conspiracy or was that my destiny since I was born? What's the meaning of it?
Too many questions that would never have an answer. That was what angered her most. She was still so young. She had her whole life ahead. She needed time that she couldn't have to process the cancer, to accept it, to give it a meaning. Time that nobody would grant her. Time she was robbed of. Time that nobody, even Mulder, could give her back. Mulder. Her Mulder. What would he do without her? Would he never recover from her death? Or would he be able to forget her? She didn't know which one of the two she feared the most.
When she exited the disco, the cold air hit her like a punch in the ribs. She felt as someone pushed her in a swim pool full of iced water. Reality can have this effect on people sometimes, particularly when it's hidden behind the corner, ready to kick you in the ass. Always.
Her red hair were fluttering with the wind. The sweat covering her skin was cooling in contact with the gelid air. She looked up at the sky. Millions of stars were dancing and her head was spinning. Her vision was blurred. She cried, hard. The music was still buzzing in her ears. She felt empty, lost, scared.
Oh, and angry, so fucking angry at the word.
Unfortunately her damn brain was always too responsible and attentive to get too distracted. She called a taxi, knowing that she didn't want her drunkenness to have the opportunity to sober up with a walk.
Once that the taxi arrived, she found herself giving the driver Mulder's address. She didn't know why she did that. Maybe she was more drunk than she wanted to admit to herself, or maybe she was just too lonely to go back to her apartment and the alcohol was helping her to find an easy solution to that.
The taxi driver waited until she was inside Mulder's building before going away. She found herself in front of his door, with the keys of his apartment in hand, without knowing what to do. She was still mad at him for their talk before, but she felt the urgent need to see him.
Now.
After the fourth try she turned the keys in the door lock and entered in his apartment. It was dark. The only light was the one coming from the muted television. He was asleep on his couch, as always. The noise of the door shouting behind her little, unstable frame woke him up, making him jump.
"Jesus Scully, what the fuck!" He was in a sitting position now. His left hand pressed on his chest, his breath was accelerated.
"You scared the fuck out of me"
She was still, with her back to the door. She was so lost and scared. It felt like she was out of her body, watching the scene like a viewer. He turned his head to her and noted her discomfort.
"Scully what's going on? What happened?" his voice was soft, although worried.
"Y-you're asssking me what's going on Mulder?" Her voice was confused, mad, drunk. At her answer he could immediately say that she had been drinking. A lot.
"I'm dying Mulder. That's what's happening" She said between laughs. Tears were running down her face now. "I-I'm fucking dying" Her laugh was laud now, genuine.
"Scully" he said. A whisper that he was sure she couldn't have heard. His voice was trembling now. "You told me that the doctor said you are fine"
"Bullshits" she shouted "And you know it damn well, Mulder". Her voice was a sharp sound that crossed Mulder's heart with the force of a stab.
He stopped breathing for a millisecond. His head spun, he felt like he was passing away. In that silence he could almost hear his heart breaking. His Scully was dying and he knew it was his fault. He knew she was aware of it too. That's why she was there that night, he thought. "She just wants to tell you what kind of son of a bitch you are" he said himself.
What would he do without her?
He knew the answer very well, he was just too scared to admit it yet.
They looked in the eyes.
She laughed. Hard. She didn't want to argue with him right now. She just wanted some comfort. Some escape. Maybe she did want to sleep in a bed that wasn't hers tonight, after all.
"Can you hold me?" she asked. Her drunkenness lowered her inhibitions enough to make her admit she needed someone tonight, that she wasn't enough strong tonight, that she was just fucking human after all.
She needed someone that could save her from herself. For a night. Just for a night.
"Please" she whispered, her voice was trembling and the taste of the tears was on her mouth. "Just for tonight, please Mulder, I-I need..." her voice cracked. The room was spinning around her. She was losing the control. Her cold facade forgotten.
Mulder went closer, enclosing her partner in his arms. She let him do it. She let herself sink in his hug, like a ship in a sure harbor after a storm.
They dragged themselves to the couch, where they laid one next to the other, still enclosed in their hug. He pulled her closer every time her sobs increased their might, every time he could feel them vibrate in his chest and in his ears. He whispered comforting words trying to reduce her pain. They both knew that if it was possible, he would had gladly died in her place. With a very big smile on his face. But it wasn't possible. She was the one dying.
Tears escaped Mulder's eyes, running slowly on his face until they reached her hair. They were facing, her head hidden in the curve of his neck. She was clinging at him like she was drowning, and he was the life jacket. And he was doing the same, with only one difference.
She was his life jacket, had always been, would always be.
She loved Mulder, but, with time, she could have survived his death. He, on the contrary, would never survive hers. He didn't just love her. She was her reason to live, to get up in the morning and keep breathing. She was his everything, and he knew this very well. He knew that she wouldn't be the only one to die, he would die with her too.
She regained her controlled breath. The smell of vodka spread in the room. He could smell it clearly now.
She could only smell desperation and tears.
She was sweetly kissing his neck. A mix of tears and saliva and low inhibitions.
He was caressing her hair. He knew she was still very much drunk. He gently cupped her face with the hand that was caressing her hair and pushed it away from his neck. He caressed her cheek. Her eyes were red and puffy. Her makeup was undone, a proof of the path done by her tears. The blue of her eyes was deep, wet, hypnotic.
She was beautiful, as always.
"Scully" He whispered, like a prayer. "I'll find a solution, I promise you Scully, I'll find a solution" His voice was slowly raising "Did you hear me? I'll save you Scully" He was sobbing. His voice loud and shouting. "I promise you, did you hear me?" He was shouting to the word, more than to her.
"I won't let you, never. You have to remember this Scully" His voice was angry and resolute.
She couldn't do anything else than nodding in silence, mechanically. She wanted so bad to believe him, her need to believe had never been stronger now.
His need to believe had never been more severe.
They fell asleep hugged on the couch. Their body entwined. Their pain joined.
The next morning Mulder was the first one to wake up. He quickly remembered the previous night. The pain came back immediately, sharp, like a bucket of iced water. He looked at Scully, asleep in his arms. She was serene, angelic. He felt the tears returning in the back of his eyes. He promised her a cure for something he couldn't even understand himself. She would clutch on that promise though, and he would not disappoint her. Not this time. Not again.
He disentangled himself form her and stood from the couch. She would have a very bad hangover, considering how drunk she had been the previous night.
He took an aspirin from the cabinet in his bathroom and put them on the little table near the couch with a glass of water. She would need it, once woken up.
He went to the kitchen and started making coffee. He thought at the events of the previous night, at their talk at the hospital and at Scully coming drunk to his apartment. Did she get drunk because of what he told her? Why couldn't she talk about her cancer with him? And, above all, did she told him the truth, when she said that she lied him about the doctor thing? He looked at the wall clock. It was 7 in the morning. Too many questions at a too early hour. He was tired, emotionally drained. And terribly sad.
He poured himself a cup of coffee and went back to the living room. Scully was still asleep. Her knees hugged by her arms. Her breath deep and steady. He sat on the opposite part of the couch and looked at her. She was so fragile, she never looked that way. Maybe going to his apartment drunk was her way to ask for his help, to tell him that she needed him.
Maybe.
He was deciding whether to wake her up or leave her sleep when Scully moved her hands to her head moaning. "ugh, my head". Her eyes were still closed.
"Hey hey, take it easy g-woman" he laughed. It was the first time that he witnessed a post drunk Scully and, after all, it was quite a vision. She sat on the couch with some difficulties. Her hair were everywhere and her makeup was completely undone.
"Here, take this" said Mulder, handling her the aspirin and the water.
"Thanks" Her voice was a mere whisper and there was a hint of embarrassment.
After she swallowed the pill Mulder handed her a cup of coffee. They sat quiet for some minutes. Scully looked around her, a confuse look laid on her face.
"Ok, I surrender. What the fuck happened last night? And why am I in your apartment?"
"You don't remember? Not a thing?"
She shook her head. "Sorry" She felt really guilty. She just hoped she didn't do something that she could regret.
"Well" he began, not knowing what to tell her, what to reveal.
"After we finished the case at the hospital you told me you were going home. But tonight, around 3 or 4 a.m. you came here," He hesitated. "Drunk."
Flashbacks of the previous night started running in her head. She remembered the disco now. Flash of lights and people dancing. She remembered getting drunk, she remembered being upset with him.
"Ugh Mulder, I don't know what to say. I'm so sorry. I should have never come here. I'm sorry. I-I don't even remember..." she stopped suddenly. She remembered the crying, the sweet promises, the hugging and the comforting. "Fuck" she whispered. Her hands went to cover her face. She felt vulnerable all of a sudden. She revealed a part of herself to Mulder last night. A part that she kept hidden for too much time. That part of her that needed someone else aside from herself. The same part of herself she always considered weak. She felt betrayed by herself for having shared such an intimate part of her with Mulder.
"I'm sorry" she babbled "I-I got to go, I'm sorry" She jumped from the couch. Her head spinning and hurting. She looked around, her gaze was confused. She was looking for her things, not remembering well what she brought with her last night. She had a bag, right? She quickly took her stuff and headed to the door.
It was all so sudden that it surprised Mulder. "Wait Scully"
She didn't turn. She was rushing to the door.
"Please wait" his voice was higher now.
Her hand was on the door.
"PLEASE"
He shouted. She stopped. Her hand still on the door handler. He approached her. Her back to him. "Just wait. Please." He laid his right hand on her right shoulder.
"Please don't run. Not this time"
She turned to him, quickly, with a single, fast movement. She looked him right in his eyes.
"Mulder, I can't. I can't do this now" her eyes were wet with tears.
He didn't know what to say, what to do. So, he took her in his arms, his grip was tight. She was too tired and sad to refuse him, so she abandoned herself in his arms. She sighed laying her arms around his chest.
"Please Scully, don't shut me out. I can help you. I WILL help you"
"Mulder, it's not that simple" she sighed in his chest.
"Just let me in. We'll start from there"
She felt tears running on her face.
"If I let you in" she sobbed "It will only make thing worst when...when I.."
"I won't let you die" He interrupted her "What I said yesterday, Scully" he paused.
"I meant that" His tone was firm.
She sighed, trying to regain control and to let her breath go back to normal.
She remembered. She knew what he was talking about.
"Just let me in" He whispered in her ear. He was soft, demanding, afraid that she would refuse him.
" 'kay" It was almost inaudible. She looked up at him, nodding slowly. She was scared, he knew that. But he was terribly scared too.
At least, they could be scared together.
Together.
Till the end.