NEW: FLY 9/17

[eyore]

Fly (9/17)
by Shell Brown
ey...@mindspring.com
Disclaimer in Part 1

Part 9/17

I can feel myself leave this body and begin to
fly. I turn around and see my battered body in
the family room at home. I'm lying on the
braided rug grandma made. Blood is everywhere.
I can hear mom crying. It doesn't matter.
Fly.

Up I fly away from that house. I fly past the
park where there is a pick up game of baseball.
Hey Nick! Hey Sandy! Look at me I'm flying!
I fly towards the water. I fly low so I can
feel the spray of cold salt water on my face.
And then I fly high, so high that the Vineyard
looks as small as my thumbnail. Over the
airport I fly, playing tag with the commuter
planes.

I swoop down to visit Christopher Columbus Park
at the North End of Boston. There is an old
man tossing bread crumbs from a bench near the
water. I am hungry and I gratefully accept a
few of the generous crumbs. Up I fly, towards
the fragrant dogwood blossoms at St. Leonard's
church and then over to sit on top of the Paul
Revere statue. Here I will watch the people.
There are tourist and groups of school children
gathering around the statue. No, there are too
many of them. It's time to leave.

I fly up and soar again, higher than the peak
of the Old North Church, higher still. I am
intoxicated by the smell of anise used for the
pizzels and biscottis that are made every
Thursday at the North End bakeries. Flying
higher now. Yes, it feels good to be free of
an aching body and overwhelming feelings of
guilt and shame. No, don't think about that
not now.

High I fly to the North Shore, to visit Singing
Beach. People walk on the sand crystals and
their footsteps create a cacophony of bright
sounds that constitute a haphazard yet
beautiful choir. I perch on top of the building
that sells ice cream cones and tonics to
children. This was a good place to be, indeed
a joyful place.

A familiar sound. Yes, he recognized the tone
and cadence. What? Who?

No. He wouldn't allow himself to be drawn into
that other world. He was going to stay here,
at Singing Beach and watch the children play.

"Mulder! I want you to try and move your
fingers. C'mon, just move your fingers for
me," urged Scully.

Slam! He was back in his body. The vertigo
was almost unbearable. He didn't want to be
here. He wanted to go back to the beach.

"Mulder, please, wake up," she insisted.

It was lost already. The ability to go back to
Singing Beach. He did what he was told. He
was a good boy. Right now, someone was asking
him to wake up.

He opened his eyes slowly. The sounds, the
smells, the colors were familiar to him. He
was in the hospital.

"That's it, Mulder, open your eyes. Can you
hear me?" Scully asked.

He turned his head toward her voice and nodded
slightly.

"Good. Good. Can you tell me how you are
feeling?

Feeling? He didn't know. He felt numb. I
need to concentrate, he thought.

"Confused," he said, noting the rasp in his
voice and the discomfort in his throat.

Scully nodded. "How do you feel physically?"
she asked.

He sighed. I don't want to know. I don't want
to do this. He couldn't ignore her request,
not one from Scully.

He raised his head slightly and saw the plastic
IV tubing in his right arm. His right side was
on fire. He rubbed his hand across his belly
and felt some sort of contraption made of cloth
wrapped around him. Oh, no. He had a foley
catheter.

"Mulder?" she said softly.

"I think I'm a mess, Scully." He tried to
swallow and get some moisture in his throat.
"What happened?"

She took his left hand and held it in hers.
How could such a tiny hand radiate so much
heat?

"You were in another car accident, right
outside of my apartment. Do you remember any
of it?"

He became aware of beeping sounds. Looking
over to the right he saw a EKG read out. Why
would he be hooked up to an EKG? he wondered.

"At your place, got your stuff out of the car,
started to cross the street and BAM! here I
am. I'm a little afraid to ask but what's been
going on since then?"

She lowered the bed rail and sat gently down on
the bed. He swallowed the scream of pain that
leapt to his throat when she did so.

"I need to know why you would walk in front of
a moving vehicle?" she asked. Her eyes were
downcast.

He brought up his right hand and started to rub
his forehead; it was covered in gauze. What?

"I just wasn't paying attention, I guess. I
don't know, Scully, it was an accident," he
said.

She shook her head and did that thing with her
mouth, a half frown and a half pucker. "I
don't believe you. You've been acting strange
since the last case. I almost think that you .
. . " she closed her eyes and took a deep
breath.

Uh-oh. Here it comes. "Just say it, Scully,"
he said louder than he had intended to.

She looked at him. "If I didn't know better,
I'd say you were trying to hurt yourself."

He smiled. Not because what she said was
totally ridiculous but because possibly she was
correct. She got right to the core of the
problem and he was ashamed. The shame made him
smile. It was either that or cry and he didn't
want to cry.

There was an uncomfortable pause. He had no
witty comeback, no dashing repartee.

"Mulder, you've been asleep for close to four
days. You have some injuries, but nothing that
would cause you to be unconscious for this
amount of time. We've run every test and what
we could come up with is that you didn't want
to wake up."

He shrugged. "I don't know what to say."

She got up from the bed. "Don't give me that
bullshit, Mulder. I've spent the last few
months fighting for my life. Fighting to be
here on this planet. I didn't fight so damn
hard just for you to give up on me. You owe me
answers. You owe me."

He heard the beeps increase in frequency on the
heart monitor, betraying his feelings.

"It's not that easy, Scully."

"That's bullshit! Surviving cancer isn't
easy," she yelled.

"What do you want me to say? I know that what
you've been through hasn't been a cakewalk. I
was there! What do you want from me?" he
yelled back.

"The truth, Mulder, I want you to tell me the
truth!"

He felt his face contort in different brown
furrowing poses. "It's a shameful thing. I
want to tell you but . . . " he looked up at
her.

"But what, Mulder?" she asked softly.

He searched for the words to tell her. Well,
gee, Scully, you know I was a regular punching
bag when I was a kid, but that's okay. I
protected Samantha when she was around and then
later when she wasn't I accepted the beatings
because I figured I had it coming to me.
Right. Just tell her that, he thought.

His ears closed up and that blanket that caused
his body and mind to become numb had descended
upon him. Oh! What a relief. Yes, that is
much better.

"Mulder, stop it. Do you hear me? Stop it?"
Scully pinched his arm.

He looked towards the direction of the pinch
but said nothing.

"I know what's happening," she said. "I know
you have been in and out of dissociative states
since sometime during the Bobby Rich case. The
temporary lapses in memory, your lack or
coordination, the inattentiveness all are
classic symptoms of a dissociative state. What
I don't know is why and what I can't possibly
begin to understand is why you are so hell bent
on getting yourself killed!"

The core stepped back and away from the shell.
He hovered near the body but not too closely.
He observed Scully. Why does she care if I'm
alive or dead? I'm not sure if I care, he
thought.

The core found the words and allowed the shell
to speak. "I don't know if I can tell you. I
mean, I don't know if it's possible. It's like
something is preventing me from forming the
words and telling you." He noticed the pitch
of his voice was high and that his speech
sounded strange.

He watched her come closer to the bed and pull
up the railing. She was leaning against it.

"Look, Mulder, I'm tired. If you want to try
and explain things to me, fine. I'm here for
you. But, if you're just going to lay there
with that stupid expression I'm going home and
getting some rest. I can only do so much for
you."

He nodded. "Why don't you go home, Scully.
You're right, you should rest. I need some
time to think." He looked up at her. "So, why
don't you go home. That's a good idea," he
said evenly.

Her head dropped down. After a few very
uncomfortable minutes, she walked over to the
chair and put on her coat. "If I can, I'll try
and stop by later."

He licked his lips and nodded, not trusting his
voice. He watched her thrust her hands in her
coat pocket. One of us should say something,
it occurred to him. She paused just for a
moment and then she walked out of his room. He
wondered if she had just walked out of his life
as well.

End Part 9/17