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They developed a routine, after close calls, and hospital stays, and abductions of all sorts: they slept over. But it was a routine, as choreographed as the Three Stooges shorts Mulder watched as a kid.
Scully started, always, with little remarks about how there was a movie she wanted to watch on TV, or, we’re getting in late, aren’t we? And Mulder would agree, thinking about the file on his desk about a killer mermaid in Wilmington and the Knicks’ chances in the playoffs and the color of Scully’s eyes when she’d burst into the room right before he’d been set on fire. He’d say something noncommittal, like, I can come over later tonight to watch it with you. And she’d say something like, who says you’re invited? And he’d say, can I bribe my way in with popcorn? And she would smile because that was the right answer, and no one would say a thing if he showed up empty handed.
Before this, it’d been phone calls at all hours of the night. First, questions she needed answered, apologies about the time. Then later just checking to see if you’re up. Why aren’t you asleep. And he’d tell her about his latest theory, and she’d laugh at him, and eventually one of them would get enough sleep to prop the other up tomorrow and they’d do it all again. But finally Scully had moved to this, to the sleepovers.
The important part was that they didn’t talk about it, because Scully couldn’t and Mulder didn’t know how, and he was happy enough to let it lie.
Scully in his house was good, because even though she wrinkled her nose at the dust and the emptiness of his fridge, she rearranged his desk so he could use it and opened his blinds so there was light and fell asleep on his couch, drooling a little on his pillow, which would smell like her for the next two days. But him in Scully’s house was better, because while Scully moved around his home like it was theirs she liked him here, where the only unpredictable thing was him, where she could trick him into food and sleep.
He didn’t mind being tricked, or he wouldn’t come, and it was true that left on his own he’d spend days without sleeping, or days eating candy bars and sunflower seeds out of vending machines. He trusted that she would catch him before his mind spun out so badly that he crashed his car on the side of the road somewhere and died. She trusted that he would listen to her, would turn the fantastical whirligig of his mind to consider her hypothesis and pull in pieces for its own theories, would stand with her against anything, no questions asked, ‘til they were both safe and panting in the rental car.
Tonight was a bad night; her hands shook badly and she didn’t know what to do with them, but was trying to hide it by folding her laundry.
He chewed on the pen in his mouth and tried not to profile her, because it was rude, she’d said, that she’d tell him how she felt when she wanted or needed to, as if Dana Scully was capable of saying anything about her feelings not under duress. As if she didn’t understand that his brain took off with or without him and he’d learned to cling tight and enjoy the ride. He chewed harder. Pizza tonight. She’d want something simple and greasy whether she could ask for it or not, and it reminded him of sleepovers from before Samantha was taken.
“Hope that’s one of yours,” she said, cutting a glance at the pen. He took it out of his mouth and examined it. White pen, green writing. Annapolis AutoWorks.
“One of yours,” he said. “Never been to Annapolis in my life.”
Scully folded her socks, didn’t just ball them up in pairs. And she folded her shirts with neat creases. The state of his closet would send her into shock. He’d save that for when she really needed a distraction.
“Yours now,” she said, and gave him that look, where she was trying to be disgusted but she was a little charmed anyway. She folded another shirt, the grey ribbed one she wore so much lately. He hummed.
“Your fault for not putting me to work.”
She stopped folding, hand on her hip. “Now you’re blaming me for your oral fixation, Dr. Mulder?”
And that was—flirting, he thought, or somewhere in the galaxy of it, but it was clumsy, for her. Scully talked like her scalpel cut, economical. Precise. Tonight she was off kilter. He leant into it anyway.
“I could never. What kind of psychologist would I be if I left it at one cause?”
She laughed, even though it was a dumb joke. He smiled.
“Want me to order pizza and pick a movie?”
Her shoulders dropped a notch.
“Sure,” she said, like she was doing him a favor. “I’ll be done soon.” And whether she knew he knew the laundry was a task for her benefit and that she’d stop when there was food to distract her, that was the truth. Just like when she insinuated she wanted him over for company because she was having nightmares again, but really she was worried because he hadn’t slept in 3 days. They lied to each other all the time, back and forth, little tricks and traps and puzzles, and the truth in the center of all of it was trust and care. So Mulder didn’t mind it, not even a little bit.
The pizza came and it was half meat lovers’ for him, half green peppers and mushrooms for her, though he picked the mushrooms off of one piece to add to his, despite her complaints, and she stole a piece of his meat lovers’. Today was a bad one, like he’d thought. He rifled through her tapes and picked out While You Were Sleeping, and she fell asleep on him before anyone even started to fall in love. He turned the TV all the way down, leaving Sandra Bullock’s face moving soundlessly on the screen, and stared up at the ceiling.
Scully didn’t snore; she was far too strict with herself for that. She did make tiny lip smacking noises when she was deep asleep. He could feel her jaw working against his shoulder.
If he left her there, she’d stay asleep until about the end of the movie, at which point she’d offer him the couch, because it was late. She’d leave her bedroom door open and he’d hear her wake up crying. She might stand over the couch for a moment in her silk pajamas as he pretended to be asleep. She might stroke his hair before going back to sleep. She’d done that before, on a bad night.
If he moved her to his lap, she might sleep the whole night, because she knew there was someone else there without having to check. He might sleep more than a few hours, the comforting weight of her pinning him down. That was something he didn’t know. He hadn’t done this before.
He pulled the pen out of his shirt pocket and chewed on it a few times. He wanted to know.
He gently lowered her to his lap and tugged the blanket up over her. She squirmed briefly and settled, hand over his knee.
He liked being needed. He liked that he made her feel safe, even though he didn’t actually make her safe. Scully thought that if they were both here, if they were in her home, nothing could hurt them. Even though it had, it had come right through that window while she screamed for him on the phone. Even though if the aliens came back for her there was nothing he could do but watch, just like last time, and the time before it. Even though she was the better shot. She was supposed to be the cynic, but she thought his hand clasped in hers could keep them both here.
Maybe it was just that she still didn’t believe that she was abducted by aliens, and that two guns could stop the full force of the government breaking down her door.
Or maybe she was just lonely.
He didn’t know what to do with that. Or the itch he got when he’d been off on a hunch too long, and the high of discovery was wearing off, and he hadn’t seen her in a few days. Hours. The way it still surprised him that she’d grin when she saw it was him entering the room, and not someone else.
He didn’t have a blanket, but Scully was warm. He turned the TV off. Tomorrow was Saturday, and he would wake up and leave and they would never mention that she slept a whole night in his lap, and he would never mention he got right back to sleep after his nightmares, seeing her there, but her pen would be in his pocket and her red hairs would be on his shirt and she’d ask him to lunch on Sunday and he would say yes.