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It's magical and difficult, and wondrous and painful, and frustrating and joyous, as any intense, intimate relationship is.
David on his relationship with Gillian - Entertainment Weekly, 2000
1993
For thou has borne a universe
Entirely away.
His motel room smells like her, like three days of sex and sweat and room service. His balls and his dick ache when he takes a piss, takes a shower, pulls on his jeans. He can't imagine how she must feel.
She opens her door and he finds himself having to adjust his gaze down to her. She's so much smaller than he is, so much smaller than he seems capable of remembering. In his bed she was the whole world.
He follows her into the room. "Almost ready?"
She nods. "My flight's in two hours."
Her hair is still wet and curling at the ends. Without makeup, her skin is translucent, her freckles bold against it. Two days ago he'd told her he wanted to lick them all and she'd laughed. Before he was halfway done she was moaning and digging her nails into his shoulders. The memory sends a pulse to his groin.
"So," she says.
"So," he says, uncomfortable and stupid with it.
She smiles like a rose unfurling. "I had a really good time, David."
"Me too," he says. His hands are stuffed in his pockets so he can't touch her. Inside he's cringing. He has degrees from several fancy schools--he's an actor for fuck's sake--but he can't seem to find anything to say to the pretty woman who just spent three days screwing his brains out.
"This is awkward, huh?" she says after a few moments, and begins to laugh. Her laughter is like no one else's: intoxicating, contagious. With her, laughing is almost as good sex. Almost.
The laughter shakes loose his tongue, pries his hands out of his pockets, and then she's in his arms and he's holding her tightly against him, like he's trying to imprint her on his body.
She reaches up and kisses him softly on the mouth. "Take care of yourself, okay?"
He's eight years older than her, but there's something maternal in the way she says it, the way she touches his cheek.
"You too. Do you want some help with that?" He gestures at her suitcase.
She shakes her head and they stand, looking at each other for a few moments until he forces himself to pull away.
"Good luck with the audition," he says, playing with her right hand. Nobody, not even the rain.
"Thanks. And thanks for all of your help. For everything."
It feels wrong to accept thanks for doing something that gave him so much pleasure. He's not sure he's ever had so much fun acting with anyone before. So he smiles and shrugs. "I should go, get out of your way." His fingers are telling hers, I think I'm in love with you.
She squeezes back once and then her palm slides away from his. He tries not to feel the emptiness left where she was.
1997
Lest they should come — is all my fear
When sweet incarcerated here
They find a secluded alcove away from the throng of reporters, celebrities and hangers-on. Their statues clink together heavily and they snicker like children.
"I'm sorry I forgot to thank you in my speech," she says.
"Make it up to me later with sexual favors."
She snorts her amazing, goofy laugh and he can't help but grin back.
"After you kissed me in front of all those cameras, that's what everyone's going to think we're doing."
"They've been thinking that for years. Anyway, you kissed me first."
"Yeah," she says with a wide smile. "I did."
Tonight she glows, more luminous than anything in the sky. He thinks about the way she reached for him, held his face and kissed him directly on the mouth. That's how it happened the first time, too.
They lean against the wall companionably and he watches her body relax as she closes her eyes.
"Am I really the best co-star anybody could have?" she asks.
"Actually, I meant to say Mitch, but - hey!" He throws her an injured look when she slaps him on the shoulder and laughs. Part of him wishes they could just hide here forever.
His kiss was ostensibly a joke, playing up to the reporters and their ridiculous questions, but it was as much for the pleasure of her skin under his lips as it was for humour. All the attention makes her uncomfortable, he knows. He wanted to make her relax, make her laugh.
In four years he has never quite managed to fall completely out of love with her. He suspects he never will. Even during the days, weeks, months, when he hates her, when the angle of her sharp little chin makes him want to do violence, he knows that whatever he's feeling is only a part of everything else he feels for her.
"Thank you for tonight," she says, squeezing his hand.
"You're welcome."
Even with her mascara smeared a little and her skin shiny with the heat from the lights, she's still incredibly lovely. Sometimes her beauty startles him.
She turns and drops her head against his chest, sweet and kitteny. He rubs her back gently, careful of her Armani dress.
"Tired?" he asks.
"Mmm."
"Why don't you take off? If anyone asks I'll tell them you got a call from the nanny."
She lifts her head and offers him a grateful smile. "You don't mind?"
"Not at all. I'll probably get going soon myself."
She yawns and hugs him around the waist, small and warm in his arms. "Goodnight, Best Actor David Duchovny."
He drops a kiss on top of her curls. "Goodnight, Best Actress Gillian Anderson."
2000
Oh Sumptuous moment
Slower go
It's the last day, the last scene, the last shot. Mulder moves in to kiss Scully and she hesitates for a moment before kissing him back. Her right arm comes up to hold his left elbow and she opens her mouth to him. It is slow and loving and the culmination of eight years of struggle.
Separating himself from his character has become reflex for David, but for a moment he allows himself the luxury of believing it's not just Mulder kissing Scully anymore; it's him kissing Gillian, too. How long has it been since he's kissed her like this? It's almost unbearably sweet.
Then from somewhere far away, Kim says, "Cut."
Gillian pulls back first and their lips cling together for a moment before releasing with a soft sound. She is so close he can see every stria in her blue, blue eyes. The doll in his arm drops to the ground as he moves in to hold her fully. The
cameras are off and it's nothing but them.
"How do I do this without you?" she whispers into his shirt.
He knows there's nothing he can say. For eight years they've been in this strange forced marriage, eight years of being other people together. There's no way to mend the bond that he's breaking.
The crew is still out beyond the doorway, allowing them this moment. Their voices are hushed.
It was easier at the end of the seventh season. He was worn out, worn thin, every nerve stretched and desperate for it to be over. He wanted - wants - a chance to do different work, to write, direct, be someone other than Mulder for five damn minutes. But now he knows that he doesn't want this to be over: this, them, her.
So he holds her and is held, rubs her wet cheek with his own, and grieves for what he's losing in this mourning ceremony for two. The fabric of her costume is slippery under his hands as he pulls her tighter against him. Her breath hitches softly.
He can feel himself shaking, the fine tremors of his muscles. He's saying goodbye to Mulder and to Scully, to Gillian, to the part of himself that will be left here with her when he goes. I cannot hold thee close enough.
Later there'll be a wrap party; there'll be food and laughter and public goodbyes. But for now David holds on to one of the surest things in his world. It's going to have to last him a long time.
2007
I know not which, Desire, or Grant —
Be wholly beautiful -
After the read-through they stay for dinner. It's sunset; the same colours are shifting in her hair and in the sky. When she came through the door he'd hugged her and said, "You're really short, aren't you?" Made her laugh.
Despite the passage of years it had been surprisingly easy to slide into their well-worn groove. He'd watched Chris' eyes fill and felt a pressure in his own chest at the solid familiarity of being with these people, of being who he is with her.
But now it's sunset and they're drinking beer on Chris' patio and it's wonderful. It's like a homecoming when you hadn't even realised you'd been gone. All the divides have been bridged.
She walks up to stand next to him and he puts his arm around her. She's barefoot, the top of her head not even reaching his shoulder. Just as high as my heart, he thinks. Such a little body to house so much.
"I've missed this," she tells him. "I didn't think I would."
The breeze off the Pacific is cool and salty; it blows away the sounds of Chris and Frank talking behind them. "It feels good again," he says.
Her hair is longer now than he's ever seen it, even longer than when they first met. It whips around his arm, so soft he almost doesn't feel it. It seems inappropriate to say the words I missed you because he spent six years away from her, six years not seeing her movies, not looking at photos, not calling, not. But there's no denying that she is as much a reason as any for his campaign to get this movie made. And now they're here for this one day and it's a small and perfect gift, a wish granted.
She burrows into his armpit with a yawn. "Jet lag?" he asks.
"Mmm," she mumbles. "I shouldn't have had that beer." She lifts the wrist with her watch up to her eyes. "And I should go. Oscar's been sick and cranky and Mark is coming down with whatever he had."
She pulls away and looks up at him, her eyes as wide and blue as ever. "See you in December?"
With a nod, he kisses her quickly on the cheek. He watches her find her shoes, say goodbye to Chris, to Frank. Something he always admired about her was the way she could move differently, in character. Scully doesn't walk like Gillian, but Mulder walks exactly like David. He's always known Gillian is the better actor. But he appreciates it more now than he ever did before, being able to tell so clearly the difference between what is fiction with her and what is real.
2008
Sweet — You forgot — but I remembered
Every time — for Two —
Christ, he's tired. The last eight months have been a beautiful, exhausting high: the premieres, the press junkets, trying to wrap Californication, too much caffeine and too little sleep. He misses his family.
They're sitting together at the foot of his bed and it reminds him of the first time he said goodbye to her in a hotel room. Only this time he's the one who's leaving. It's an odd book-ending of their sixteen-year relationship, a weirdly appropriate metaphor.
"I don't know what to say," she says, eventually. "I wish you'd stayed with us."
She'd offered him a room at her place for the London premiere and though he'd been sorely tempted, he'd refused. Everything was already so fucked up and complicated, he didn't need to add to it.
"You know why I didn't," he says.
She laces her fingers through his. "I know."
The way she fits against him is so familiar; his hand automatically knows where to sit on her back, her shoulder. He used to know exactly how she smelled underneath her perfume and how she tasted under her lipstick. He used to know what she sounded like when she came. Now he wonders if time and their distances have changed any of that. What hasn't changed is her sparkle, her radiance. Sometimes she shines so brightly it's hard to look at her.
He remembers when, after three weeks of filming separately, they finally met in front of a camera as Mulder and Scully for the first time in six years. He'd recognised her and he'd recognised himself and the world settled with an inaudible click. Getting on that plane this afternoon will be like flying back in time. He wonders if he'll know it the moment when the world un-clicks.
"Everything will be okay," she tells him with her solemn voice, the one she used with Piper; the one she must use with Oscar now, and soon this little one, too.
"I'm not so sure," he says.
"I'm sure of you. You're a good man, David, and you're doing the best you can."
"What if my best isn't enough?"
She touches his cheek and holds his gaze. "It will be."
Perhaps it's because he still sometimes watches old episodes on TV, or perhaps it's because of some quirk of memory, but he suddenly recalls a line from one of the earlier seasons. Although multidimensionality suggests infinite outcomes in an infinite number of universes, each universe can produce only one outcome.
The outcome for this universe has already been determined, he knows. And he wouldn't really have it any other way. Sometimes, though, he wonders about the others. If there is one in which he doesn't have to keep telling her goodbye, in which he made a phone call in 1993 that he hadn't had the guts to make in this universe. And while a beginning is no guarantee of any particular end, he knows - still, he wonders.