Work Text:
October 2025
“But you promised!” a child screamed from the next aisle over, causing Mulder to raise his eyebrows in surprise. “I want it! And you promised I could have something!”
“I said if you were good, you could choose a treat. This is not the behavior I meant,” her parent replied.
“Ahhhhhhh!” the child screamed again.
Mulder looked at Faith as she stood on the front of the grocery cart, looking to her left, her eyebrows furrowed.
“Millie! That is enough!”
“I want it! I want it!”
“Hey,” Mulder said softly and Faith turned her head to look at him, her face concerned. “You still want to get ice cream?”
“Yeah,” she whispered. “Can we?”
“Of course,” he said, smiling at her with a nod. “Let’s go see if they have any new flavors.”
“Okay,” she whispered again.
“Hold on,” he said, gripping the handle of the cart and pulling it back and forth a couple of times. “This baby is about to take off at a break neck speed. You ready?” He watched her grab hold and then smile.
“Ready.”
“Here… we… gooooooo!” he said, running a few steps and making whooshing sounds. She laughed and then let out an excited squeal. “It’s the Mulder cart, coming around the corner, will they beat their previous time?”
“Yes!” she shouted, still holding on tightly.
He turned the cart to the right and went over two aisles, mindful of the other shoppers. He turned to the right again and then stopped halfway down the frozen aisle, right in front of the ice cream section.
“A new record!” he said, raising his arms in the air. “I knew we could do it.”
“Hooray!” Faith said, letting go and stepping off the cart.
“Now, let’s see about those ice cream flavors huh?” He grinned at her and she smiled back.
“I want it!” the child called Millie shouted again and Mulder watched Faith as she drew in a deep breath.
“That little girl is loud,” she said, looking up at Mulder.
“She is,” he agreed with a nod. “We should try to ignore her and go about our own business.”
“You’re being mean to me!” Millie yelled.
“I’m not. You’re being rude and extremely loud. We are leaving.”
“But I waaaaant it! No, Mommy. I waaaaaant it!”
“Absolutely not. Your behavior is unacceptable.”
Her voice began to fade as they walked out of the store, her mother telling her to hush.
“I think she’s having a bad day,” Faith said, looking down the aisle although they could not see the little girl.
“It sounds like it, yeah,” Mulder said, watching her carefully.
“Maybe she’s hungry?” Faith asked, looking back at him. “You tell me that a snack will sometimes help me feel better if I’m being grumpy.”
“I do,” he said with a nod.
“Maybe… maybe that little girl was hungry and so she didn’t know how to behave,” Faith said with a shrug.
“Could be a lot of things,” Mulder said. “Could be that she’s hungry or tired, or maybe she could have been allowed to act that way without being told no before and now that she’s having consequences, she doesn’t like it.”
“Maybe,” Faith said, looking back down the aisle.
“Even if she was,” he said, tugging gently on Faith’s braid to get her attention. “It’s not acceptable to act that way. Screaming and acting up… hmmm.” He sighed and she nodded.
“It’s not nice.”
“No. It’s not.”
“I don’t do that,” she said quietly, her face serious.
Kneeling down, he reached out to her and she came over to him. He took her hands and squeezed them gently.
“No. No, you don’t.” He smiled, but she frowned. “What?”
“Did I ever do that?”
“Not once.”
“Not once?” she asked quietly and he squeezed her hands again.
“Never,” he assured her. “Do you wanna know why?”
She nodded, squeezing his hands and stepping closer to him. He smiled, letting go of one hand to stroke her cheek, and then tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear.
“You never did that because Mommy and I didn’t raise you to behave that way. We didn’t put the idea in your head that you had to act a certain way somewhere and it meant you might get a treat or a toy if you were good. We’ve raised you to speak up, have an opinion, and reason with us about things. We’ve spoken to you with respect and therefore we’ve received respect from you. If you wanted something, you just had to ask and we would have a discussion about it.”
“And you almost always say yes when I ask,” she stated, putting her hand on his shoulder and fiddling with the collar of his shirt.
“I do,” he said with a smile, knowing it was hard to say no to her when she asked for something that he knew would bring her joy. “But… I don’t say yes because I don’t want you to act up or yell, it’s because I like seeing you happy and most of the time, whatever you want, will also be fun for me.”
“Like the Lego sets?” she asked with a smile.
“Heck yeah. Or even just ice cream,” he said, gesturing to the freezers beside them. “I love ice cream.”
“And popsicles?”
“Of course! How can you not like popsicles?”
“I love them.”
“What? I had no idea,” he said, feigning surprise before booping her on the nose.
“I like both,” she said with a smile.
“And I do too. So, saying no to an ask for them means you’re sad and then I don’t get a popsicle or ice cream.” He smiled again and she nodded. “But, if you had demanded them or screamed the way that little girl did, I would have said no to buying them.”
“Because it’s not nice to act that way.”
“How did it make you feel when you heard her?”
“It scared me at first because it was so loud.”
“Me too,” he said. “Or maybe not scared, but startled. Like… a bad surprise… sort of.”
“Yeah. I guess it was more like that.”
“Hmm.”
“Then I felt… sort of uncomfortable. Like… when I don’t know the answer at school.” She stared at him and he nodded with a soft smile.
“A completely understandable feeling. It also made me feel uncomfortable.”
She nodded as she looked down, her fingers still worrying his shirt collar. He waited, not pushing, and gave her hand a little squeeze. She looked up and let out a deep breath.
“I never did that?” she asked again and he shook his head.
“Never,” he said, squeezing her hand a little tighter.
“Okay. That’s good. I wouldn’t want to make another little kid feel uncomfortable.”
“Faith Mulder,” he said quietly, pulling her in for a hug. “You have the kindest heart.” He closed his eyes and held her tight. “You get that from your mama you know.”
“She said I get it from you,” Faith said and he grinned. Pulling back, he shook his head as he looked at her.
“She did, huh?”
“Yeah. I told her I shared some of my lunch with a friend at school and she said it sounded like something you would do. She said that you have a big heart and you think of others and how they feel.”
“Well,” he said with a chuckle. “She would do the same, so maybe you got that from both of us.”
“I think so,” Faith said, nodding solemnly.
He laughed and hugged her again.
“I can agree to that,” he said, kissing the side of her head. Pulling back, he rubbed her cheek again. “You good?”
“Yes,” she said, smiling brightly. “I’m good. Thank you, Daddy.”
“You got it, Kindheart,” he said and she giggled. “Now, let’s get some ice cream. If your old dad can get off the floor that is.”
He grunted and groaned, exaggerating the effort of getting to a standing position. She pushed and pulled, laughing as she helped him. When he was up, she wrapped her arms around his waist.
“I love you, Daddy.”
“I love you too, baby,” he said softly, savoring the moment. He rubbed her back and gently scratched the top of her head.
“Can we get popsicles and ice cream?” she asked, looking up at him.
“Of course we can!”
“Yay!”
And so a serious discussion was had, debating over which flavors and brands to buy.
Items procured, the Mulder cart raced to the checkout line amid much laughter, the previous moments not forgotten, but used as a learning experience of understanding and empathy.