xfc: New: Whimsy (1/1)
Ladi...@aol.com
Title: Whimsy
By: Lady Myra (Ladi...@aol.com)
Category: S, R, A
Keywords: Alternate Universe, MSR, a bit odd
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Nothing drastic - a little movie and a little Max
mention.
Summary: Scully and Mulder are separated by fate. When she finds
a way for them to be together again, can he make the sacrifice
necessary to join her?
Disclaimer: The X-Files and characterizations associated with it
belong to Chris Carter, 1013 Productions and Fox. As far as I
know, that's it. Not mine.
Archive: Gossamer, Spookys: yes.
I'd appreciate a note from anyone else, but I'm likely to say
yes if you're kind enough to ask <g>
~*~
I remember it all.
But the colors are faded, or maybe I never took the time to give
them proper consideration. I may have been incapable of
appreciating them. And it's a shame, really, for more than one
reason. I cloaked myself in black and gray. But maybe the world
was like that. I remember, for instance, a lot of brown.
Brown is an underestimated color; I know that now. The fertile
soil is brown, damp but not wet, creative and full of texture.
Grass in the winter isn't the green they talk about on the other
side. It's brown: a washed out, yellowed brown. His hair is
brown, too.
My mirage-life has a sleeping life and in that sleeping life, I
dream. I dream of brown. I dream of gray and black, the colors
that were once my shroud. But the mirage, the life I've created,
is decorated in vibrant colors. It's picture postcard perfect, a
refuge if only he would join me in it.
Make a list, check it twice. I'm telling you how to build a
world here and how to make it count.
The first thing you'll need, and you should underline this
twice, is a foundation. But, of course, any Cleetus at the Home
Depot could tell you that. And what will your foundation be? I
must admit mine was shit to begin with (ah-ha, more brown).
Science, justice, whatever else it was I said I believed in just
to be so God-damned right all the time. Worlds sink in shit.
Make yours of stronger stuff and no, I won't say love, because
that's just hokey and I'm not your Sleeping Oprah Beauty. But a
wise man once said that all you need is love. Yes, Virginia, he
was wrong, too.
For your foundation, I highly recommend concrete. Boring, yes.
Gray, too. I think we have a theme here. Gray is a good color,
hues of white and black intermingling, with perhaps some blue
thrown in - strong, substantial. Gray is almost, but not quite,
ready to commit to the absence of light. It's what you want
under your feet. Anything lighter is too airy and unreliable.
Anything darker can drag you down with it.
Next, and I'm no builder mind you, but the frame comes next.
You're not building a house, remember, you're building a whole,
entire world and everything in it. No four-wall boundaries, no
ceilings, not even vaulted ones, will do. It took me some time
to learn that one. I first built for myself a new world of
constriction, but then I missed him and the walls came down.
He's forever tearing down the walls, even when he's way over
there and I'm way over here -- an entire breath away.
Our first real kiss was like that, yes. And I mentioned that I
remember it all, didn't I? I do. Oh, Sweet Mary, Mother of God,
I remember it all. It was right before the beginning of the end.
I don't quite sound the same now as I once did, do I? I
apologize if I seem out of character.
But he did kiss me and walls did come down.
"Scully," he said, "Scully..."
"Yes, Mulder?" I was alert; his mood was odd. He didn't often
trip over his words, especially my name.
"Sorry." He raked a well-tanned hand through his cinnamon hair.
"Do you ever wonder why we never, well you know?"
It didn't come from nowhere. It had been a particularly
difficult case, involving a lovers' pact and alien abduction and
I remember thinking that if I was abducted again, it would be
nice to have a lover with me. And someone had said to us that we
made a nice couple and we had to correct them. No, we're not a
couple. Which led to the inevitable question of why on earth
aren't we a couple and what's so wrong with me and I don't want
him that way anyway, right? But it's all so much foolishness.
"No, I don't know. What do you mean?"
He must have been charmed by my bravado, and for once in love
with a lie. For, he kissed me then.
I've never been struck by lightening, but I imagine it would
hurt. Mulder's kiss was more like static electricity. My hair
stood on end. A balloon would have stuck to my head -- socks
attach themselves like Velcro to my black skirt. What on earth
wouldn't want to be part of me when I was part of him?
I forgot to feel my tongue for a minute and it got all mixed up
with his, but I know that sounds juvenile. Guess what? Lean in
closer. I'll tell you the truth: I felt like an adolescent in
that moment; all the years of raging hormones and stark
humiliation, shy resignation, rebellious indignation, and bold
experimentation. Yes, it was like adolescence.
So, he kissed me first, but I made love to him that night.
There, on his living room floor, because he never meant to take
it that far. But when we made that connection, it was imperative
that I deepen it.
I pushed, he pulled and so I ended up on him, on the floor, in
too many damn clothes. I ripped into him, raging and whimpering,
clawing and caressing. So much, wrapped up there in him, at
once. Hot and wet, the world's best natural sauna. Good for the
pores, too, making my skin silky soft. I was more aware of
myself than I was of him in a way.
I never felt smaller, or stronger. So fine, he must love the
feel of my hip there, and the way he strokes my cheek. Yes, I am
soft and beautiful.
"God, Scully. You smell so good."
"I love you, Mulder. I love you." I scraped my fingernails along
his nape. He cried and at first, I worried it was because I
scratched too hard. But it ended up being some kind of unnamed
joy and I cried too. I wasn't crying for myself; before that
moment when it happened, I had no desire to cry. It was just
that he cried, and so I cried. A contagious reaction.
And after you have your foundation, and after you have your
frame, you should choose your material carefully. This is a
world you're building after all, and not some damn shop project.
Twice, when I was a child, my family vacationed at the seascape
town of Whimsy on the upper-left-hand Coast. The citizens of
Whimsy worked hard to make the town live up to its name and
attracted many summer tourists for their trouble. The main road
ran parallel to the water and the Doll-beach-houses were painted
with sharp, brilliant colors of coral pink, ocean blue, and
sunflower yellow with pretty, ivy-green trim. It seemed an
enchanted place. All around the town, I heard the ocean waves
pounding the shore and smelled the briny sea.
When I stopped building walls and ceilings, I decided to build
my world in a different way. Choose your material carefully. I
made mine out of whimsy, a thing sorely missed from my other
life. Whimsy is something I would have rolled my eyes at once
upon a time.
It's never too hot here, and never too cold. At night, the stars
and moon shine bright, their golden light falling gracefully,
filtered through a clean, navy-blue sky. Sunrises are purple and
sunsets orange russet. During the day, the sun keeps a
respectful distance and the sky is dappled with an armada of
white, copious clouds.
And there's a church. I built it first, mirrored I'm sure from
the European Catholic Sanctuaries I've visited once or twice and
seen in pictures countless times. It is gray stone, and the pews
are a rich, deep mahogany with velvety blood-red cushions. But
what's important, what keeps me here, is the glass.
Light pours in to the church through colored glass, creating an
elegant prism. It falls like a soft, thick blanket over the
stone floor and heavy pews and spotlights the Alter. It is rich
and ambient. I stand in the middle and the warmth of it
envelopes me; I find my solace there.
In the life I left I never would have considered the solace to
be found in warm light, or thought it sensible to build a world
of whimsy. But the foundation is strong, the frame sturdy and
light filters through. Many of the scenes set in glass have
blood in them, so red is prevalent. Amber, brown-gold, glows; it
is luminous. Sage and heather purple and blue, clove green,
fuchsia Japanese peony - a field of colors, growing like poppies
through cement-soil and just as intoxicating.
It is beautiful and warm, but I am without him now, and so cold.
That first time - on his floor - I was remembering that. Our
clothes were off and we were frantic and we cried and he turned
it all around. I was under him, flesh brushed flesh, soft and
sticky and pulsing. We breathed heavily and panted out moans and
sighs and it was messy and beautiful, as it should be. He
entered me and I clenched around him, he moved inside of me and
I rose and fell to match his rhythm. Every nerve ending screamed
in exaltation, and I felt like some Technicolor vision, super-
real and beautiful.
"Love you, Scully, love you. I love you."
It didn't matter that the world was dark and cold. Monsters and
liars and madmen waited around every corner. I had no control
over that. I did not create that world; I only struggled to make
sense of it. I was with him and it seemed a perfect Paradise.
And now I've built one, and damn it, he's not here.
~*~
I've forgotten so much, too much.
Scully has been gone for five years, and too often I forget her
clean, vanilla scent, the sound of her infrequent laughter, and
the way the sun got tangled up in her copper hair. I have a
snapshot memory of these things, but their motion is lost to me,
except in dreams.
Contrary to my own expectations, I have gone on without her.
First, I lived for revenge. And I got it, killing the men who
forced her off that bridge. In the process, I lost my job. And,
I thought: now. Now is when it will kill me. But it's never that
easy. Despite myself, I live on.
Without her, I lost the will to truly fight. I had believed that
it was I who drove the quest -- that it couldn't go on without
me. But without her, my heart was no longer in it. What was
there to fight for anymore? She made it worthwhile. When she was
absent from that equation, I became what I held in contempt: a
hack like Kurtzweil, a joke like Max Fenig. I lost credibility
and I couldn't have cared less.
I lost my faith in miracles. I lost my faith in the unknown.
But, I have continued.
The only substantial thing in my life is a woman, once sharp and
vibrant - the most vivid person I've ever known despite her
attempts to hide it - who now lies in a persistent vegetative
state at the Secret Garden Sanitarium in Richmond, Virginia. I
used to visit her every night. I kept it up for almost one full,
sleepless year. That was the year of my revenge. I searched, I
pushed, I begged, bribed and blackmailed. Then, each night, I
made the long drive out to Richmond and sat at Scully's side.
And cried at Scully's side. And slept at Scully's side, allowing
my body to believe that she lay beside me in a lover's dreamless
sleep.
I wondered how the hell it had ever come to that.
That night - I still see it so clearly. It was The Fourth of
July and we were on the Timothy Leary overpass. Night had fallen
and the city was alive with celebration.
We had created our own fireworks the night before, when we made
love for the first time. We only had the one night, and one
morning, and that afternoon in the car when she made me pull
over into a grove of trees. I knew I would spend the rest of my
life worshipping her body, loving the soft gasps and keening
noises she couldn't control. Why the hell did we wait so long? I
ask myself that every day.
We weren't even on a case that night, but someone was on ours.
Unlike most of the maddening crowd, we were driving away from
the city; she was laughing at my imitation of Skinner. I didn't
see the dark sedan pulling up behind us, accelerating and
speeding into us. It caught us both by surprise, jerking the car
out of the lane and onto the median. I slammed down on the
accelerator, spinning, trying to avoid contact with the cars
around us.
"What the hell?" Scully murmured, and turned in her seat to try
to get a look at our attackers. "Black-tinted windows. I can't
make them out." Her voice was clipped, professional. She was
scared and tense, but completely in control.
They kept pushing, playing bumper cars. Rubber was burning, the
smell acrid. Metal screamed against metal, then against concrete
railings. We were whipped around like rag dolls, unable to make
out our attackers. At the height of the overpass, around the
sharpest curve, they finally hit us so hard I went up on the
railing and stuck there. They stopped behind us and without a
word spoken, Scully and I crawled out the driver's side window.
Two men in standard-issue CIA black suits and dark sunglasses
rocketed out of the sedan and ran after us. They were armed. We
were not.
I relive those last couple of minutes on a near-constant
subconscious loop. It was all sensation and desperate flight.
Most of the city was at home or in the Mall celebrating, the
overpass was practically empty. She was wearing those damned
heels, but I wasn't going as fast as I could've and adrenaline
pushed her, so she was only half a step behind me. I felt and
heard my heartbeat, keeping time with our footfalls, and heard
her explosive exhalations. Fireworks were detonated in the
distance: red, white and blue light exploding in giant mushroom
clouds.
A shot was fired, and she careened away from me, toward the edge
of the overpass, falling back against the railing and flipping
over it onto the grassy median below.
It's painful to relive what happened next. I'll tell you about
the dreams I've been having instead.
They began not too long ago. Of course, I've dreamed about her
countless times before, but those dreams were different -
composed more of memory than imagination. Real events twisted
into fairy tales in a way, bent sometimes toward the happily-
ever-after and sometimes toward the whatever-you-do-don't-go-in-
there.
Several weeks ago, after a few too many beers and another mind-
numbing day of listening to ill-gotten satellite transmissions,
I dreamed of a church. Double-doors, strong and heavy, opened
into a large sanctuary filled with light. It filtered through
stained glass windows and sun-catchers that were hanging from
high rafters. Churches usually seem cold to me, imposing and
basically undesirable. They always make me think of sin. But
this church was warm and it was filled with all the colors of
the spectrum, dancing on the stone floor.
I walked toward the Alter and realized that beautiful music was
playing, something I had never heard before. It was soft, but
full and distinct and very soothing. The effect was
intoxicating.
I don't know why I said, "Scully?" because I never saw her there
that first time...but then the dream was over. I remembered the
church in the dream for days after that, but didn't see it again
for a couple of weeks.
In the second dream, I was already in the church, kneeling in a
pew. I was praying the rosary, though I'm not a religious man
and certainly not Catholic. The beads of the rosary felt smooth
and cool in my hands, comforting.
"Mulder, you came."
I had expected her voice, knew somehow that she would be there,
but still it surprised me. In memories, her voice had faded,
become one dimensional, losing pitch and tone. But in this
dream, it was her voice again, real and imperfect - as low and
full as snow falling on a rooftop.
"Did I have a choice?" I turned around to look at her.
She was breathtaking, more alive and real than any memory. More
alive and real than her physical body, lying in that institution
with drool trailing down her chin and hair cut short for easy
care, atrophied body and slack-jawed face. No, the Scully in
front of me was as vibrant as the colors in the church. Her
beautiful hair was silky and fell to her shoulders in waves, her
alabaster skin was lit from within, and she wore a long, white
dress that reflected the colors shining through the glass, an
ever-changing palette. She was luminous.
"I think maybe you did. I could never control you, or take you
where you didn't want to go." She spoke softly.
"That's not true, I'd go anywhere."
"Still? Would you go anywhere, Mulder? What if it meant giving
me control?" She walked slowly toward me, but didn't come close
enough. Though I wanted to close the distance between us, I
found myself unable to move. She did have control -- it wasn't
mine to give her.
"This isn't real," I said. I felt the need to say that, to stake
a claim on reality. "This isn't real."
"What is real, Mulder? I always thought I knew, but I was wrong.
For all you know the world you live in could be somebody's
elaborate dream. It could be the atom in the fingernail of some
giant who is, in turn, part of a world that is the atom in the
fingernail of some even larger giant. All it takes is
imagination."
"You sound like me, now." I stopped, struggling to understand.
"Whose dream is this?" I finally asked.
She walked past my pew, to the Alter and sat on the step,
curling her legs up to rest her chin on her knees. "It's not a
dream, Mulder. It's mine. I built it." She paused for a moment,
looked down, seemingly unsure. "For us. It's as real as anything
and you can join me here, if you are prepared to jump the
chasm."
"This is just a dream," I said. "An impossible dream."
"All you have to do is believe, Mulder."
And it was over. I woke up to find my hands clenched, as if they
still held the rosary. But there was nothing there. It was only
a dream, it was impossible, it was only a dream. This wasn't
happening.
I worked hard to forget, to dismiss the dream. But I smelled her
scent, heard her laugh and remembered the silk of her hair
caressing my chest. Everything I'd forgotten was remembered. I
couldn't give it up.
For several nights, I didn't dream, and it seemed that the more
I tried to sleep, the harder it became.
Last Sunday, I went to visit what's left of Scully in Richmond
for the first time in months. I despise that place, with its
medicine-clean smell, as if everyone in it is already embalmed.
Scully's in the vegetable ward, five rows beyond the broccoli
and just before the carrots.
Her body is a whitewash, dry and colorless. She gets sponge-
baths, and she's turned on schedule to avoid bed-sores. She
would hate this life; she would want to die. But her condition
does not require life support, and though she's fed through a
tube most of the time, she can swallow baby food when it's
placed in her mouth.
I watched her intently and saw her eyes making constant sweeps
behind her lids. What did she see? Was she kneeling in her
church, watching the lights dance across the floor? Of course
not. That was a dream, a fragment of my imagination. But she'd
told me to believe.
"Scully." My voice sounded thick to my own ears, full of need
and fear. "If it's real, please give me a sign. I need to know."
Her mouth moved slightly, reflexively. She made soft smacking
noises as saliva slowly trickled down her mouth to her chin.
She'd certainly had more attractive days (like the way she used
to look, so crisp and hard and cold, but soft underneath only to
me, in that black skirt and tailored jacket with one of those
tight little shirts underneath, hair jet-lined and shining in
the sun, blue eyes piercing and alive).
I don't know; maybe her eyes rolled back in her head and I
thought I felt her hand tighten on mine, but I'd had such
delusions before. And still, she lay, no sign given.
After some time of watching her and crying over her and praying,
I became sleepy. It seemed the most natural thing in the world
to crawl into the narrow bed with her. And the thought that the
sheets mustn't have been changed in a while was only a vague
one. I curled up into her, awkwardly pulling her small,
quiescent body to mine. Over the years, she'd lost her distinct,
clean smell. She smelled medicinal now.
We lay there for some time, until I felt tired and languid. I
fell asleep wrapped around her.
And this time I stood on the steps of the church, looking
outward over the town. It was sharp and clean, infused with mid-
October air. Birds flew out over the vibrant ocean and beach-
front homes sat primly on white sand. There were small boats,
bobbing in the water, tied to perfect, white, little piers. The
only sound was that of the water lapping up to the shore. Then,
silence.
In the distance, beyond the vibrant town, the sky fell onto
land, washed into cotton-candy trees, like an Impressionist
painting.
"I'm still working on some things." She approached me from
behind. "I haven't been able to fill in all the details, yet."
"Still, it's beautiful." I was afraid to turn and look at her,
scared to wake from the dream.
"Thank you. There's still so much to be done. I'm glad you came;
I've been hoping you might come to me and help."
"I can do that? Visit?" Her hand touched my shoulder -- real,
physical contact. For the first time in years I felt the
strength of that touch and its effect on my senses. She could
touch me in that world; I was amazed. I turned to look at her.
She gazed out at the horizon, as lovely as the view and so alive
it hurt to look at her.
"Not like this, not temporarily." She moved to face me, and
looked up with beautiful, mysterious eyes. "This is too draining
for me, Mulder - to pull you from the conscious world to my
unconscious one. It's no good. I don't have enough to spare. But
you could join me here. I can teach you how to do this and we
can be together."
"How? What do I have to do?" It could have been part of the
dream, my easy acceptance of what was happening as fact. I'm
still not sure I was there, that it exists.
"You have to join me in both worlds. Mulder, you're going to
have to choose me twice." She was conflicted, I could tell;
she'd considered not asking me, not bringing me in. I was still
unclear about why.
"Let me see if I understand this. Do I need to die?"
"No. When you die, you don't get to create your own world, you
join another one. But I'm alive. I'm here and I'm stronger and
more sure than I've ever been. All I need is you."
"So, I have to do what? Become a vegetable? Scully, I don't know
if that's even possible."
"Yes, then you have to find me. I'll try to help, but you have
to find me. We can be together here, maybe forever. And it can
be done. It can be medically induced, but you'll have to find
someone you can trust to administer the right drugs."
"My God, you're serious. This is insane."
"Insane where? It's not insane here. I've built all this for us.
Every day, I struggled to turn my vision into reality. And isn't
that your specialty? Alternate realities? I love you, Mulder.
Come to me. Be with me."
It could have been a dream. Must have been. Scully never talked
like that, never used words like need and love, when we were
partners. She never begged, never beguiled.
"Just the two of us?" I asked, as if I had no doubts.
"Don't worry," she said, smiling, "I know it sounds like a
recipe for disaster - us alone, together, for all time. We'd
drive each other crazy. But, it won't be like that. I promise.
Mulder, I've never lied to you."
I'm sure that she has lied to me once or twice, but I've lied to
her, too. That's all in the past.
"What if I do this, Scully, and none of it's real? I'll be
ending my life for nothing."
"You're so skeptical. I've taught you well." She seemed pleased
with me in a way. "Take a walk with me."
She led me down the steps to her quiet street below, and we
strolled, arm in arm. It felt for a moment old-fashioned, like
this was a courtship -- slow and leisurely. When I was close
enough to the small, colorful houses, I peeked in. Most were
empty and blank inside.
"Where do you live?" I asked.
"I live in the church. I have a bed behind the Alter." She gave
me a look that dared me to question that.
"I'm not living in a church, Scully." And I realized for the
first time, that I was giving her proposition real
consideration. She must have known it too, because she smiled.
"We'll live anywhere you want, Mulder. We can live on a boat in
the middle of the ocean, if you'd like. We can sleep under the
stars." She steered us out onto the pristine beach. Looking
down, I noticed that she was barefoot and sinking gently into
the sand with each determined step.
"You're asking me to give up everything." I wondered if I was
fooling her, or if she knew just how desperate and lonely my
life was without her.
Her eyes were sad when she turned to look up at me. She reached
up to brush her fingers over my cheek, trailing them from my
brow to my chin. I felt a rush of energy and desire wash over me
at the small physical contact.
"I'm asking you to start a new life, Mulder. If you give
yourself over to it, we can build a perfect world."
"Together." I finished for her. And I angled myself to her for a
kiss, feeling certain that before my lips touched hers, I would
wake and the dream would be over.
Fate allowed the kiss, though. Kissing her was everything it had
been in life: passionate, tender, never enough. Over too soon.
Her mouth opened under mine, warm and soft and she pressed
herself against me; I felt desperation in her -- a desire to
make me need her more.
It was she who finally broke it off. Scully stepped back, and
turned to face the horizon. It was Sunset and the ocean was a
brilliant reflection of the sun's fire. Her world was a
beautiful one. I pressed myself to her back and wrapped my arms
around her; she raised her hands to hold onto mine.
"I'm afraid," I admitted.
Her voice was soft. "I know. So was I, I was afraid when I was
with you out there - afraid all the time of the unknown,
constantly paranoid about what was around the corner. But, no
matter what, we always turned that corner. Didn't we?"
"Yes." I wanted to be the voice of caution, to tell her no, I
couldn't do it, wouldn't. It was crazy and unreal, but I'm not
the voice of reason or fear. That's never been my role. All I
wanted was to believe.
"So, turn the corner." Her voice was firm, meant to reassure.
"I don't know -" I would have said more, then. But I awoke to
find myself tangled up in Scully's sheets, clinging to her
comatose form. My face was pressed into her neck. Neither of us
smelled very good. I looked at her infirm, motionless face and
found no sign of the woman from the dream.
For the first time in five years, I feel I have a decision to
make that is meaningful and real. Meaningful and real only if
what I believe is the truth. I've come this far - if it's real,
it's a risk worth taking. If it's real, I'll join her. My life
now is colorless, there's little left to lose.
But, how do I know if it's real?
~*~
The large, stone church is notable for its stained glass and the
vibrancy of color. A small woman kneels alone in the front pew,
praying. All her energy and desire seems to be taken up in
prayer; her face is tense, eyes closed tightly and she clings to
the rosary like a lifeline.
From behind her, the doors are suddenly opened and heavy, white
light rolls in. She does not notice at first, so intent is she
on her prayer. She does not turn to see the man who walks slowly
through those doors. He's tired, the slump of his shoulders
reveals that much, but his face reflects his wonder and joy.
He begins walking toward her, respectful of the silence in the
room. Still, she has not noticed him; she does not hear his soft
footsteps on the stone floor. She believes she is alone,
believes it might be so forever.
And softly, so softly, and with joy, he approaches.
- The End -
I dig feedback with a spoon ---
Please send it to: Ladi...@aol.com
====
You know we live in light and shadow --
that's what we live in, a world of light and
shadow -- and it's confusing.
-- Vee, in "Orpheus Descending,"
by Tennessee Williams
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