Eight-Nights-of-Mulder

She spends more and more time in the office. Only here does she feel like she’s upholding her unspoken promises—to never stop looking for him and to never give up on his work. The more time passes since his abduction, though, the more it feels like she’s spinning her wheels. She’s in constant contact with the Lone Gunmen but they’ve all but admitted the chatter on abductees in rural Oregon has dried up. There have been no reports of a man who fits his description wandering into a hospital or turning up at a morgue in months.

So she crisscrosses the country with her new partner hunting down humanoid bats and parasitic slugs, telling herself it’s what Mulder would have wanted. Ironically, if he were here, he’d tell her to go home, to rest, to take care of the baby and herself, but he isn’t here. 

Now that it’s winter, she comes in before sunrise and stays long after sunset. Surrounded by his yellowing news clippings, file cabinets of notes written in his indecipherable (to all but her) scrawl, and array of trinkets and memorabilia, this is where she feels closest to him. Holed up in the basement, she lives in darkness.

Doggett is out for the week and she cherishes the time she can spend in the office on her own. He’s been a good partner, but sharing this space with anyone else but Mulder feels like a betrayal. Even Skinner left early for the day. He came down to the basement to tell her he’d be out until late next week and wished her a happy holiday. He does things like that now–checks in on her. She just nodded, gave him a tight-lipped smile, and wished him well. 

She declined her mother’s invitation to join her at Bill’s in San Diego for Christmas this year, and when Maggie offered to stay back in DC with her, she begged her not to. If she can’t be with him, she only wants to be alone. 

It’s getting late, even for her, but she isn’t ready to go home. Her apartment is too quiet and empty.

To bide the time before she can sleep, she walks around the downtown shopping district. She likes the anonymity it provides. Here, she can be just another woman doing last-minute Christmas shopping. 

There’s an upscale baby and children’s clothes boutique that she often walks past but doesn’t dare go inside. It’s full of beautiful but expensive and impractical items like dry-clean only cashmere sweaters that will inevitably be covered in spit up, drool, and mashed up food. There’s nothing she would ever buy but she knows Mulder wouldn’t be able to resist the impossibly small pieces. She imagines rolling her eyes, but smiling, as he drapes tiny onesies over her belly and insists on spending hundreds of dollars on clothing their baby will outgrow in a matter of months.

She hasn’t bought anything useful or necessary for the baby, either. It wouldn’t be right to do it without him. Her mother keeps asking if she wants help cleaning out her second bedroom for the nursery, but she still imagines that there will be time to do it with Mulder once he’s back. “Once,” she repeats to herself. Never “if.”

Down the block from the children’s shop is a small Judaica store she hadn’t noticed before. A warm glow of light emanates from inside and she’s drawn to pull the door open. 

She’s the only customer inside. The store is full of merchandise—intricately carved mezuzahs, Kiddush cups, servingware, and a wall of books in Hebrew and English—but it feels cozy, not crowded.

An older woman with wiry gray hair and black-frame glasses stands at the register near a glass case of jewelry. “Let me know if you need help with anything,” she says as Scully surveys the shelves. 

She finds a small selection of menorahs and examines them one by one. There’s one made from shiny silver with inlaid blue stones, and another angular, more modern style. Then her eyes land on a small brass menorah. It’s tarnished in spots but still catches the light. Tiny olive leaves are sculpted along the branches.

“We’re a little picked over,” the woman calls over to her. “Last minute and all, you know?”

Scully smiles and nods at her. “This one is beautiful,” she says, picking up the brass menorah. It feels solid, heavier than she expected. 

“It is, right? I found it at an estate sale. I wish I knew more about it but I can tell it’s old, possibly from the mid-1800s, and it’s similar to ones I’ve seen from the Netherlands.” 

“I’ll take it,” Scully says. She’s never known Mulder to own a menorah, but it feels like something she needs to do to honor him.

At the register, the woman carefully wraps the menorah in tissue paper before placing it in a shopping bag.

“I’ll throw in some candles for you, too,” she says. “Happy Hanukkah.” “Thank you.”

“And, I don’t mean to assume,” the woman says, her eyes dropping to toward Scully’s belly, “but b'sha'ah tovah.”

“Excuse me?”

“May your baby be born at a favorable time,” she says. “It’s a traditional Jewish blessing. We tend to be a little superstitious around pregnancy so we don’t say mazel tov until after the baby is born.” 

“I appreciate that, thank you,” Scully says, bringing her hand to her stomach.

The shopkeeper’s words echo in her mind on the drive home. It feels like the only appropriate thing anyone has said to her about her pregnancy. She’s given hollow smiles and nods to ultrasound technicians who’ve congratulated her and asked how happy she was to be having a baby. Her mother has been a little more sensitive, but Maggie still insists on trying to cheer her up and look on the bright side even though her blessing is tinged with darkness. But: b’sha’ah tovah, at a favorable time. It gives her comfort—the hope that the right time will come, that Mulder will return to her and their child. 

Back at her apartment, she gently unwraps the menorah and sets it in the center of her kitchen table. Looking closely at it, she sees there’s even more detail to each individual olive leaf, lines and shading etched into the brass, than she noticed in the store. 

The next night, she comes straight home from work and digs a box of matches from her kitchen drawer to light the menorah. She and Mulder once celebrated an improvised Hanukkah with battery-powered candles in an airport bar, so she knows to light the center candle, the shamash, first. Then she places a candle in the far right branch and uses the shamash to light that one, too. 

She grins at the improbability of it all: Dana Katherine Scully, star Sunday school pupil and lapsed Catholic, lighting a menorah. She doesn’t know the Hebrew prayer that Mulder recited to her once so she silently says her own. She prays for her baby and for Mulder, prays they’ll be together again soon. 

More than two millennia ago, a group of Jews kept a menorah, just like this one, lit for eight nights through the power of their beliefs alone. Like the Maccabees, she’s exhausted nearly all of her resources. To the FBI, Mulder’s disappearance is essentially a cold case with no leads left to track. There’s no evidence for her to analyze or put under a microscope hoping it will guide her to him. All she has left to go on is faith. 

The warm glow of the candles reflecting on the brass cuts through the darkness surrounding her. She feels the tiniest flutter within her and it nearly takes her breath away. She brings a palm to her belly and feels it again. Life perseveres. 

“Your mom is the most amazing person in the world. You probably know that already.” The child’s eyes remain closed, and his body slack. “Already not listening. Yeah, you’re my son.” He chuckles softly, just watching. This tiny nose that Mulder hopes will take on Scully’s shape as it grows. The tuft of reddish hair on his small head that’s softer than anything Mulder has ever touched. He has never felt so whole, or so much at home with himself, and in the world. He didn’t think he’d get here. Decades of running after the truth, of following every light in the sky, and this time, the light led him here. To William, and to Scully.

He tried explaining it to Scully earlier, with their son between them. The light. How all he did was follow it. But she was just smiling, probably not listening at all, and then, a moment later, she was asleep, looking so much like William. Mulder picked him up, hoping he’d, too, sleep a while. So far, he’s in luck. That same luck that has been following him ever since he set out to find Scully.

The light that led him. He looks at William and he feels it. It’s there. It’s a warmth, a bond. Love. If Scully were awake, if he said this to her, he knows she would roll her eyes at him. He’ll stick to his story. There was a light and he followed it. That, to him, is William. He has brought light into his and Scully’s life, leading them onward from now on. His son chooses that moment to open his eyes. They’re still unfocused, lost in this big, big world, but Mulder can’t help but smile.

“Knew I was thinking about you, hm? You’re clever like that. We should wake your mom.” He will never tire of this. Scully is a mom and he’s a dad. The product of their love is in his arms, just waking up, just getting to know the world around him.

“You know what? We should think of a gift for your mom. I’m gonna tell you a secret, Will.” The baby shuffles in his arms, his eyes closing again. “Your mom loves presents. Oh, she pretends she doesn’t, but she loves them.”

“Are you talking about me?” There she is, his Scully. She’s leaning against the door frame, looking utterly exhausted and happier than he’s ever seen her.

“Just explaining some things to our son. I can’t stop looking at him.”

“He really is cute,” Scully agrees, joining Mulder and leaning against him now.

“Hey, why are you up? You should be sitting down. Come on.” Together they make their way back to the bedroom. “How much did you hear?”

“Just you saying I love presents. And Mulder, who doesn’t love presents?”

“Knew it,” he whispers to a fussy William before he kisses his downy head and hands him to Scully, who expertly nurses William. She leans against the headboard, her head tilted toward Mulder.

“Hey you,” he says, grinning. “I meant what I said when you were eavesdropping.”

“Wasn’t eavesdropping,” she says, smiling.

“You just tell yourself that.” He kisses her hair, her temple.

“You already gave me a gift, Mulder.”

“Courage, yeah. You said that.”

“That and Samantha’s doll. You came back to me. Because of you, there’s William. I already have everything I could possibly want.” Tears roll down her face and he realizes he’s crying too. “All I want is more moments like these.”

“You can’t get rid of me. You'll have to share these moments with me. Unless… do you think we can find space for my fish tank here?”

“I think we can arrange that.”

As much as he relishes the sight, he knows he can't let her sleep. She's due at her family soon, and he's not going to get in the way of that.

"Scully," he whispers, gently tracing his finger against her cheek. Her skin is rosy and feels warm against his own. Butterflies take flight in his stomach as he watches her nose scrunch before she blinks her eyes open.

"Did I fall asleep?" she mumbles. "What time is it?"

"Early something. I didn't want you to miss Christmas with your family." She groans and stretches, her sweater riding up and revealing milky white skin. He's trying not to stare and knows he's failing.

"I need to get going." She uses Mulder's shoulder to heave herself up from the couch, leaving him in a cloud of her scent. She smells like vanilla and cinnamon, intoxicating him.

"Are you- have you thought about it?" Before she fell asleep, she asked him to accompany her to her mother's. Like every year. And like every year he said he'd think about it, knowing well he's going to decline. That was before he woke up to a sleepy, adorable Scully on his couch, whose face is so disarming that he's no longer sure what he should do.

"It would make my mom happy," she says. "It would make me even happier," she adds quietly. He can't say no. Not when she looks like she does. Or when she looks at him like this.

"How about," he begins and he sees her face fall. "I drive you to your mother's and then when you and her still want me there-"

"Mulder," she cuts him off, exasperation in her voice that he decides to ignore.

"Then I might stay an hour or two. What do you say?"

She observes him for a long, languid moment before she says, "let's go."

The roads are empty and they get to her mother's easily. And way too quickly for Mulder to have made up his mind. He parks the car and Scully throws him a smile, sweetly asking him to help her with the gifts. There's no way he can deny her.

They make their way to Mrs. Scully's house, their arms full with gifts. He's carrying a few more so that she can ring the doorbell. He hears a happy "Fox!" and mumbles a hello as he's ushered inside.

"Put the gifts over there." Maggie Scully pushes him into what he presumes is the living room. Once he's put down the boxes, he finds himself looking at a brightly smiling Mrs. Scully. Mulder has never seen her this delighted.

"I'm so happy you've finally decided to join us for Christmas, Fox." She engulfs him in a hug so tight that he's afraid he won't be able to catch another breath. A typical Scully hug. But usually, he receives them from her daughter and after he's almost died. He prefers it like this.

"I told you," Scully says smugly once her mother lets go of him.

"I had a feeling," she says, taking his hand into hers and pulling him toward the kitchen where various pans and pots are filled with pleasantly smelling delicacies. His stomach grumbles. Neither he nor Scully have eaten in a while.

"Dana said you're half Jewish," Mrs. Scully explains. "And I asked around, wanting to make something that would show you how much we appreciate you, Fox." With every word she says, the noose around his heart tightens. "I made latkes. Now, this is the first time I made them, but I had my neighbor try one and he said if you don't show up, he'll eat every single one of them. Do you like latkes, Fox? Oh, I hope you do." The knot in his throat prevents him from speaking, so he just throws his arms around Mrs. Scully, hoping she understands what this means to him.

"He loves everything that's made from potatoes," Scully says to her mother, and both women smile at him. A feeling of warmth spreads in his stomach. It feels very much like love.

"First things first," Mrs. Scully says, clapping her hands. "We have several little children - and a few adults - who want to open their presents. Come on you two."

In the next few hours, Mulder experiences a Christmas like he never has before. People he's never met treat him like he's part of the family. When Bill Jr. shows up, he grumbles exactly three times and then his expression softens. He pats Mulder on the back, lets him hold baby Matthew, and if he's heard right, gives him his blessing. For what, Mulder can only guess.

Scully remains by his side like a shadow. She falls asleep on him once while they're waiting for dinner. When she wakes up, and he moves a strand of hair off her forehead, her smile is like the first breaths of spring after an ice-cold winter. It takes his breath away.

She brushes his cheek with a finger, wiping away an invisible piece of lint, and her touch lingers. He still feels it when he stuffs himself with latkes, unable to stop himself. He thanks Mrs. Scully profusely in between bites, making her grin from ear to ear.

"Leave some for the rest of us," someone says to the amusement of everyone. He holds his breath while Bill Jr. tries one and only lets go of it once he announces that he likes it. There's laughter and joy, happiness and love. To Mulder, it feels surreal, like a dream. He barely dares to blink, afraid that if he does, he'll wake up in his cold, dark apartment, all alone.

"You look like a deer caught in the headlights." Scully is leaning against him and has her face tipped up. She's smaller than either of them is used to without her heels.

"Not to be pathetic," Mulder says, "but this might be the best Christmas I've ever had."

"Does that mean I won't have to talk you into this next year?" When she laughs, he feels it vibrate through his own body. Her eyes are sparkling and he's sure it's from the mulled wine they've had. He feels the effect of the alcohol, too, and can't stop glancing at her berry-red lips that are so deliciously inviting.

"You're going to get sick of me."

"Hmm, not gonna happen." She wobbles and he puts his hands on her waist to steady her. "I like having you here."

"I like being here."

"Then it's settled," she says, sighing. She turns in his arms, looking up at him. Should he dare? Should he try and make this night perfect?

"I wish there were mistletoe here," he whispers.

It’s the first weekend in December and they’re holed up in his apartment after returning from Southern California where he shot a brain-eating fast-food employee. It’s not a normal life, but it’s theirs and he wouldn’t want it any other way. Her only rule is that they keep it strictly platonic in public, but he’s already looking forward to breaking that one.

He wakes up on Sunday morning with his arms wrapped around her listening to her snore. Yes, Dana Scully snores. That wasn’t a surprise when they started sleeping together. Years of overnight stakeouts and crosscountry flights will teach you your partner’s sleeping sounds. He’s always loved her snoring. Just like her, it’s gentle yet persistent, not a deep and guttural utterance but a soft and steady rhythm of air catching in her throat.

He closes his eyes and tries to let the sound of her breathing soothe him back to sleep, but his dick has other ideas. Lying here naked with Scully’s also-naked, velvety soft body pressed against his is just too much stimulation after too many years of drought. He traces her lips with his fingertips as he buries his face in her auburn hair.

“Mmm, Mulder,” she whispers nearly inaudibly.

“Good morning,” he says, letting his hand roam from her mouth to left breast.

He lazily circles his fingers around her nipple, just barely making contact as it hardens into a tight little nub. By the time he repeats the pattern on the right side, she’s rocking her hips back against him. The pressure of her ass grinding against his erection is a sublime form of torture.

“I need you,” he whispers in her ear, and it isn’t hyperbole. He’s known for years that he couldn’t live without her, but it’s only in the past couple of months that he’s learned how much his body simply craves hers.

“So take me,” she says firmly, turning over to face him. She tilts her chin up as if to dare him, and he can see her full lips, the milky white skin of her throat, her perfect breasts.

It’s almost enough to make him come on the spot. He accepts her challenge, rolling on top of her and pinning her wrists above her head with his hands. She lets out a gasp. That’s one new thing he’s learned: Dana Scully likes it rough.

The first time they’d made love, they’d both been so gentle, so afraid that one false move would wake them up from this impossible dream. He’d only just recovered from his impromptu brain surgery but even if he was at his full strength he wouldn’t have dared touch her with anything less than tender reverence. He knew she was tough but he needed her to feel safe with him.

By their third time, she told him, You don’t have to treat me like glass. I’m not going to break. And while he would sooner put a bullet through his own brain than hurt her in any way, he’s enjoying learning what she likes—a little nibbling on her ear lobe, a firm hand behind her head when she sucks him off, no handcuffs…yet.

He presses her wrists into the bed and kisses her hard on the mouth.

“Don’t move,” he says, taking his hands off her wrists to trace the outline of her torso.

He runs his fingers over her breasts and the narrow indentation of her waistline before firmly gripping her hips. He lowers himself until he’s facing the damp curls between her legs. He bows his head, nose first, into her pubis. He fucking loves how she smells.

She spreads her legs open around him and he uses his thumbs to part her outer lips and pauses to admire her swollen, glistening center.

“Please,” she whimpers.

“Oh, Scully,” he whispers into her clit. Then he gives her one long stroke with the flat of his tongue and she shivers around him.

He draws circles with his tongue, savoring her sharp, salty, Scully taste as she makes hot little moans. He picks up the pace and she starts bucking her hips into his face. He wraps his arms around her and squeezes her ass. She’s moaning harder now, a deep involuntary sound from the base of her throat. She tremors against him.

“Don’t stop, don’t stop,” she begs, as if there’s anything else in the world he’d rather be doing.

He’s humming against her clit now as he licks and sucks on her. He glances up and sees her eyes are shut tight and she’s thrown her head back.

“Oh, fuck, Mulder,” she utters. “Get up here and fuck me.”

Her hips keep thrusting up against him as he presses a wet kiss to her inner thigh, then her navel, then the space between her breasts and rises to meet her. She snakes a hand in between their bodies and guides him inside her. She is so fucking hot and wet all around him. She’s already got one foot over the ledge, so he doesn’t hesitate, just drives into her. Each time the base of his cock grinds against her clit she gasps and quivers, and it doesn’t take long before she gives in to her orgasm. She’s thrashing against him and all he can do is hold on for dear life. He buries his head in between her neck and shoulder and thrusts into her wildly. His heart is hammering out of his chest and he realizes he would happily die in this moment, balls deep in Dana Scully. But he doesn’t die. He comes hard, exploding inside her as he greedily sucks at her neck. It’ll likely leave a mark and he’s glad it’s turtleneck season.

Once he’s fully emptied himself, he rolls off of her, taking one of her small hands in his and bringing it to his racing heart. They lie in silence, catching their breath.

“Why didn’t we do this years ago?” she asks

“Because I’m a goddamn idiot,” he replies, staring at the ceiling. “If I’d known it would be this good I would have bent you over my desk the day I met you.”

He feels her shake her head next to him. “Not then,” she says. “We didn’t even know each other.”

“Well, what about three years ago? If I recall, you were ready to go with Eddie VanBlundht.”

It’s been a long time since either of them has mentioned that name. He knows she’s embarrassed by nearly falling for VanBlundht’s facade.

Scully sighs and turns on her side toward him. “Only because I thought he was you.”

“Is it weird that I was a little jealous of the guy?” he asks. “For having the balls to do what I could only dream about?”

“Mulder, I did think something was off about you—or him, rather. But maybe I just wanted so badly for it to be real that I didn’t question it.”

Her words bloom in his chest. She wanted him enough that she was willing to suspend her disbelief.

“So you would have been into it…if I had made a move earlier?” He asks hopefully.

She shrugs. “It doesn’t matter. We’re here now. We can make up for lost time.” It’s classic Scully. Grounded in reality.

“You don’t think I’m small potatoes?” he asks.

“Oh, Mulder,” she whispers into his neck. “I don’t think you’re small anything.”

“Thank you, Scully,” he grins and kisses the top of her head.

“Oh, there you are, honey-- welcome home!” Maggie swept under Mulder’s arm with a benevolent hug, an upbeat, infectious party sprite undeterred by her daughter's ramrod posture. “Happy Hanukkah!” 

“Mom, I didn’t know you celebrated.…” Scully began, eyes darting between both of them as they shooed her through the hall to the coat rack. 

“Don’t be silly, Dana, you know we’re Catholic.” 

Mulder clucked his tongue rebukingly. 

“Then what’s this about?” Whirling around, hat suddenly gone and coat pulled half off, Scully clutched at Maggie’s arm-- or Mulder’s-- and held on, demanding answers. 

“We’re celebrating Hanukkah, Scully. You almost didn’t make it in time for the light show.” 

And Mulder-- this incomprehensible, insensible version of him, anyway-- gave her a good-hearted nudge towards the living room. 

“I… you’re Jewish?” Though Scully tried not to let it, the fact that Mulder had told her mother about this part of himself before her… stung. “If I had known--”

“Oh, I’m not. Or I might be. Hard to say.” Mulder vague-speak: an outright challenge.  And he had the cheek to look endearingly smug about it.  

She, as always, rose to the bait. 

“Mulder.” 

To her surprise, it was Maggie who coughed up an answer: “Dana, leave the poor man alone. I had a dream about him a few months back.” 

Another grinding halt: immediately pivoting, she locked eyes with her mother, aghast. “Mo--” 

“I know you don’t believe in them, but it was real and it happened. Since then, I’ve been planning out this event for the both of you-- and I won’t hear any arguments.” And she scuttled off to the beeping oven before Scully could get a word in edgewise.  

Mulder was having much too fun snacking on fried foods and peeking between her and the decorative menorah resting on a nearby side table. It would almost be amusing if it weren’t so tragic. 

“Mulder, I’m sorry. Mom meant well--”

“Scully, it’s okay-- I’m having a great time. Your mom’s been teaching me all the customs and proper words; and I, I even met a few of your relatives who knew more about Hanukkah than I did.” He chuckled, really pleased. 

Wonder of wonders. 

“Mulder, are you really Jewish?”

She watched him tilt his head mid-chew, watched his jaw grind back and forth between ideas. “I don’t really know, Scully. I think my mother was. Culturally, if not religiously. I have a few memories of her mother, fewer of her father; but… but, yeah, they served these potato pancakes--” he waved one of his snacks for emphasis “--when we dropped in for morning cartoons. Sam and I were always more interested in reruns than talking with ‘the old people’.” 

In the stretch of silence that followed, lengthened, she watched regret bloom behind his eyes. “And maybe that was wrong of us. If I’d known…” we’d lose touch filled the gap, unspoken, “then I think I would have wanted to know more about them. We stopped going right… before. I guess we got so used to being Mulders we forgot how to be Kuipers.”  

Scully nodded, grabbed a potato. Decided to join Mulder in whatever this was for him.  

*****

It wouldn’t pass for the laxest definition of Hanukkah-- all eight nights crammed into one, Maggie and Mulder repeating phrases and rituals back to each other, a nameless relative handing out dreidels and no one caring in the least they were for children's games-- but the celebration was, in its own way, a success. Though the crowd was small (not a lot of stricter family members wanted to attend) and the food a little hit or miss, everyone was determined to have a good time; and that determination carried the night.  

Maggie sent her guests home with leftovers and a little party bag of chocolate coins--  “Gelt!” she repeated, over and over, while Mulder licked tasty smears from his eager fingers-- but whisked the cleaned menorah and dreidels away to her holiday storage, before anyone had even left (cleanliness and promptness still wound tight into her military wife gears.) 

The tromp back through the snow was peaceful. Scully took advantage of the moment to slow their walk, gaze fixed on the white winter moon. They paused in front of her car, his enthusiasm and her absorption meeting somewhere in the middle.   

“Well, Mulder? Do you feel celebrated?”   

He nodded, tossed another gelt into his cavernous mouth, smacked twice, loudly, then cleared his throat. “I’ve been to two of your mom’s parties now, Scully, and I think they get better and better.” 

“That’s only because Bill wasn’t there,” she teased, watching him shift his left boot in the snowdrift. He’d made a little angel, unawares.  

“Yes, he was.”

What? “What? No, he couldn’t have been.” 

“Scully, his car’s just over there.” 

In a flash, she remembered-- yes, Bill’s car was there, had been there before she’d even arrived. “But… but I didn’t even notice him.” 

Mulder snorted. “That’s because your mother kept him hopped up on fried food. He was happy as a clam and didn’t want to come over and bother me.”

“Mulder, of course he wanted to bother you. He probably didn’t think it would look good to bully the Jewish boy on his special day.” 

Her partner shrugged; and the silence pushed her more upright to study him closely. 

“Sometimes I… I can’t help but wonder if I’m misremembering things, Scully. Mom never mentioned spoke Yiddish, or practiced cultural holidays, or mentioned Temple; but it didn’t… she doesn’t seem to be avoiding her roots out of shame. And maybe she doesn’t tie herself to being Jewish. Or maybe… what if I made it up in my head, only recalled bits and pieces of my childhood rationalizations and blew them up into a separate identity out of another sense of having been wronged? I’m a Mulder, but….”

But in light of his mother’s denial and rebuke and slap, being a Mulder was shaky ground at present; and escape with a new or reclaimed sense of identity would seem a beautiful salvation to a man scrabbling for any purchase from sheer desperation. 

Scully never weighed in on his family matters-- he hadn’t wanted her too-- but the pieces only fit one way, logically. Rationally nothing else made sense. But as easily as she dismissed the more insidious insinuations of old Spender’s relationship with the Mulders, she also sympathized with her partner’s continual doubts on the subject. Confused by yet another topic Tena complicated by her silence, Mulder was left to drift, clinging to her support and her unflinching, scientific reasoning for reassurance. 

And my family’s open arms and toddled-out traditions. 

“Mulder, at some point a part of us will be lost to time. No one can trace their lineage without it cracking apart under the faults and frailties of common humanity; but more importantly, the common element in all of us is what binds us beyond who we are and what we have chosen to define ourselves by. In one generation, identity can change completely, be it biological or environmental factors. Human wars upend lives and redefine boundaries; and, when a few more wrongs are made right, those lines dividing people collapse, leaving whoever is left to face each other with more in common than not.” 

He was nodding along, mulling over her words. Time to narrow the scope by throwing in a personal illustration.

“Although my family prides itself on its Irish roots, only the very old ones can speak Gaelic; and I’ve learned more about Irish myths and traditions from working with you than I have from an Aunt Olive or a second cousin Seymour. I and my brothers and Melissa were raised Catholic, but only Bill and I chose to remain in the faith. Charlie’s children will turn into different men than Bill’s son, and all three will continue that cycle as they grow up and move out and start families of their own.  

“In short, Mulder,” she said, winding back the spool of her thoughts with a self-deprecating grin, “you’re you. And if that means you enjoy celebrating Hanukkah in the Scully family style, then….” 

She slowed and stopped, puzzled, as he nudged a chocolate from his coin stash at her. “What?” 

“A gelt for your thoughts. I figured you more than earned it.” The expression in his eyes-- starstruck humility and gentle persistence-- undercut Mulder’s flippancy; and brooked no argument. I owe you everything and you owe me nothing, they reminded. It’s the least I can do, they insisted.  

If eating a piece of candy was what Mulder needed from her, then Scully was determined to do it and do it right. She ripped the foil off, popped it in her mouth, and chewed and swished vigorously until every last bite was gone. I do it all for you, Mulder, she thought, this proof and my words and even who I have become. 

Scully watched his eyes twinkle, thankful, before he turned, parting ways after a promise to compare leftovers on Monday.  

*****

She was back in the car, back on the road, almost to her apartment; this time clutching the gelt wrapper like a talisman, swishing her thumb back and forth across the crinkles during the long red lights.  

Scully made a mental note to thank her mother. Whatever tonight was, Mulder had needed it.

*****

Thanks for reading~

Enjoy!

For once, this isn’t his fault. The snowstorm hit them unexpectedly, with temperatures dropping rapidly. Now here they are, in some ditch in the middle of nowhere. Mulder rubs his hands together and turns up the heat. Scully glances at him.

“We have enough gas,” he assures her. “The tank is basically full.”

“We don’t know when AAA gets here.”

“The gas will last, trust me.” Scully merely sighs. “What should we do?” It’s been less than ten minutes since they’ve had to stop, but he feels restless already.

“There’s not much to do, is there?” Scully opens her coat, the sound of the zipper loud in the small car. “All we can do is sit here and wait.”

“We could play a game,” Mulder suggests. “Or we could- remember what I said about crawling naked into a sleeping bag with someone who is already naked?” He waggles his eyebrows at her. One day it will just have to work.

“Still no sleeping bag, Mulder,” she says and grins at him. So not today then. This time he is the one who sighs.

“Truth or dare?”

“What’s the dare going to be? Go out and eat snow?”

“So not that either.” Mulder taps his fingers against the steering wheel. “Is there anything in the glove compartment?”

“Like what?” Scully asks, opening it. She hands him his bag of sunflower seeds she stored there earlier when they stopped at the gas station. A blush appears on her face when she takes out a small bag of chocolate chips she must have bought while he was using the restroom.

“There’s something here.” Her arm almost disappears in the compartment and when she pulls it back, she’s holding something small and colorful in her hand. Mulder recognizes it immediately.

“A dreidel,” he says, in awe.

“Do you know how to play?” Scully asks him, turning it around in her hand.

“My grandmother taught us when we were kids. I’m not sure how much I remember. That,” he points at one of the symbols, “is gimel. It means you get everything. I remember because It was Samantha’s favorite. She always wanted to win the whole pot.” He smiles, remembering.

“Did she?” Scully asks in a gentle voice.

“Sometimes. She tried to cheat a lot.” They both laugh softly.

“So did Charlie. No matter what game he played, he always wanted to win. It drove Bill mad.”

“I can imagine.” Scully hands him the dreidel and he inspects every symbol, tracing them with his fingertips. After his grandmother died when he was around eight, his parents threw away almost all reminders. He never knew why. He never asked either. Their Christmas trees got bigger and brighter with each passing year and then Samantha was taken, and more family history was swept under the rug.

“I’d like to keep this,” Mulder says quietly.

“Maybe you can teach me how to play once we’ve made it out of here and we’re back home.” He didn’t think it was possible, but his adoration for Scully only grows, and he gives her a soft smile, the knot in his throat preventing him from speaking. “I’d say we play a round now but…” She’s right. There’s no way to spin the dreidel here in the car.

“I’d like that,” he says, clearing his throat. “We really don’t have the best track record when it comes to snow, do we?” They have never talked about Antarctica, neither of them quite knowing how to bring it up, or what to say. They just left everything that happened – or didn’t – out there buried under the snow.

“We don’t. But at least this time we’re warm and not running for our lives.”

“Next time I’ll pack a sleeping bag, just in case.” Scully chuckles softly.

“If you play your game right,” she says, moving the dreidel in his palm. “You might just end up getting everything.”

“Do you mean-”

A knock at his window startles Mulder and kills the moment before it becomes too real.

“AAA,” someone yells. “We’re here to get you out of this ditch.”