Chapter Text
November 18, 2001
“That’s the last of it, Mrs. Mulder.” The nametag sewn onto his blue striped uniform read Chad and he wore a goatee and sunglasses.
“It’s Scully. Dana Scully,” she replied, hands on her hips and dirt smudged on her face. She wore a white fitted T-shirt and jeans. A blue handkerchief was tied around her hair to keep it off her face. Who wore a white shirt to move? Mulder thought. He looked at Scully, shrugged his shoulders and gave her his best “what’re ya gonna do?” look. Maggie Scully sat on the couch that had just been deposited in the center of the room and bounced William on her knee. She did her best to ignore the entire exchange the same way she ignored the fact that they shared a six-month-old and a queen-sized bed together. And now a two-story colonial.
Chad looked nonplussed at Scully’s correction. As long as he got paid, he’d call her anything she wanted. “Um, okay. Just sign here.” He held out a clipboard to her.
After the movers left, Scully retreated to the kitchen to continue disinfecting the hell out of it before she put the dishes away.
“Why don’t William and I start unpacking some of the things in his room?” Maggie Scully suggested, standing and carrying the baby with her toward the stairs.
“That would be a big help, Mom, thanks,” replied Dana.
She turned to Mulder with the posture she reserved for times when she thought there was something helpful he could be doing, but wasn’t. “Mulder, can you please look for my box content inventory list? I need to know which box has William’s bottles and dishware in it so I can get that stuff put away first. And then there’s a box in the upstairs hallway marked BED LINENS. If you could start making up beds, that would be great.”
He nodded and shuffled off in search of Scully’s list. Not surprisingly, she had a system for moving that rivaled even the best disaster relief efforts. Every box had a number that corresponded to a matching number on an inventory list. The inventory list had a detailed description of all the items that were packed in that box. That way, they could find everything they needed in record time. It did make sense, he’d admit. And it probably worked better than his unpacking method, which was: give the box a gentle shake. If it didn’t rattle, it was probably towels or sheets. If that’s what you needed, open it. If not, shake another one. All the leftover boxes from his old apartment were stuffed into the room he would use as his office. None of them had numbers on them. He had no fucking idea what was in any of them.
There was a knock at the door. Mulder opened it to find the Long Gunmen standing there.
“Greetings, Homeowner,” said Frohike. “We can’t stay long. We just wanted to drop off your housewarming gift.”
“Who is it, Mulder?” Scully called from behind a row of boxes at the entryway to the kitchen. Was it wrong that Mulder was amused by the fact that she was too short to be seen behind the stacks of boxes?
“It’s the welcome wagon,” Mulder said.
Scully walked in, armed with a bottle of cleaning spray. Frohike stepped forward and extended his hand toward her. It held a container of bubble bath.
“Wow. You shouldn’t have,” Scully said, looking down at it with a blank look.
“That’s for later because Mulder said you guys had a Jacuzzi tub. Thought it may come in handy, if you know what I mean.” Frohike wagged his eyebrows. “Your real gift is outside.”
Both Mulder and Scully went to the window to look out.
“It’s a lawnmower,” said Scully. “Mulder, they bought us a lawnmower.”
“We figured you didn’t have one yet,” explained Byers.
“And you have a lawn now, so we thought it might come in handy,” added Langly.
“That is very practical of you guys. Thank you,” said Scully, with sincerity. She turned to Mulder. “Do you know how to mow a lawn, Mulder?”
“Um yeah. I know how to mow a lawn, Scully.”
“Good. That’s good,” she said, placing her hand on his upper arm. “I’ll just go and …put this in the bathroom then. Thank you again, guys.” Scully walked off with the bottle of bubble bath.
“Scully’s acting a little weird,” said Frohike.
“She’s unpacking. And cleaning. Chaos doesn’t agree with Scully,” observed Mulder. “She’ll be back to herself when we can see the floor.”
“I like the look, though,” smiled Frohike. “She does the whole tasty housewife thing well.”
Mulder leveled a look at him and shook his head slowly.
“Too far, huh?”
“Just a little,” said Mulder.
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Mulder retreated to his office to contemplate the wall of boxes there. He and Scully had mutually agreed that he would take the den on the first floor as his office. It made the most sense because he would be home taking care of William while he was writing, so he needed to be in the middle of the action. Scully took the smallest bedroom on the second floor as her office. Then there was the master bedroom, William’s room, and one other bedroom. Scully referred to that one has the guest bedroom, but he couldn’t miss the fact that she instructed the movers to put all the boxes with the outgrown baby clothes in that closet. There hadn’t been any discussion about birth control since it had come up back in July. She seemed content to go along with his suggestion to just see what happened. He didn’t think there was any chance of anything happening quite yet. He didn’t even think she had gotten a period since weaning the baby, but then again, it’s not something she would have mentioned even if she had. He had detected no evidence of it, though. He remembers one time, several years ago when they had been working a case out of town. Scully had asked him to stop by a pharmacy. She had come out to the car with a bag and he could see the label on a box of tampons clearly through the thin plastic. He remembers that it had struck him as so intimately female and strange – the concept that Scully got her period, just like every other normal woman. She was so fiercely private that little things like that had boggled his mind.
He looked around the den. His familiar things were there. His desk was in one corner with his computer on it. A bookshelf was next to it and there were some built-in shelves above the desk. His leather sofa rested against one wall. It looked happy to be there. He had offered to put his fish tank in his office too, but Scully said she wanted it in the family room. It apparently had a calming effect on the baby. He knew it was because Scully and the fish had bonded during their stay in her apartment. They were his fish, but they liked her better. He couldn’t blame them.
Mulder opened up boxes of books and began lining them up on shelves. In the bottom of one of the boxes marked MULDER ESTATE there was a small metal box with a combination lock on it. He knew the combination by heart and he opened it, spinning the dial without even paying attention. Inside, buried beneath miscellaneous documents and bonds, was a small black velvet box. Mulder opened it and looked at the ring inside. He took it out and slipped it over his pinky finger. It only fit over the first knuckle and then stopped, too small to go further. The stone was exquisite, a two carat diamond solitaire, appraised at more than five times what he had ever had in his bank account before his parents died. It had been his mother’s ring and Mulder knew who should have it. It had stopped becoming a question of “if” for him and became a question of “when” over a year ago, before he went missing, maybe even earlier if he were being honest with himself.
He regarded it carefully now. He had learned some things about Scully during these last few months of cohabitating with her. One of them was that she had a taste for the finer things, yet her style was simple. The clothing that hung on her side of the closet was well-made from quality designers. Her preference was to sleep in silk. She would rather own fewer items of higher quality than an overabundance of mediocrity. She liked things that were simple and conservative. She owned very little jewelry and what she did have was classic and tasteful. Looking at the ring now, it struck him that the stone suited her, but the setting was a little too showy for her tastes. He made a mental note to take it to a jeweler this week and have it reset into something that would better suit her. If he had even a chance at getting the answer he hoped for, he needed to put his best foot forward.
Mulder had put the ring back in the box and was returning it to its safekeeping when he heard the sound of glass breaking coming from the kitchen, followed by an utterance of profanity. He headed that way.
“Scully? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, I just broke something and I don’t have any shoes on.”
Mulder glanced down at her bare feet, pink toes peeking out from the bottom of a pair of faded blue jeans. He still wasn’t entirely used to how short she was without her work heels. She was positively child-like.
“Hang on, Scully.” He walked over to her and scooped her up, swinging her legs over his forearm in one smooth movement and removing her from the mess. “Does this count as carrying you over the threshold?” he joked.
She just gave him an amused look and a smile. It warmed him to see that marital innuendos didn’t send her running for the hills, like they used to. That was a very encouraging sign. He deposited her gently on the oriental rug in the formal living room. “There’s a broom and dustpan in the pantry,” she said. “I’ll put some shoes on and be right there.”
A few minutes later, Scully reappeared in the kitchen with tennis shoes on. He had most of the big pieces picked up and was sweeping the tiny fragments onto the dustpan. She slid the garbage can over to the remaining mess.
“Thanks, Hon. I think I got it from here,” she said, her eyes sweeping the vicinity, trying to spot any errant pieces of glass that may have taken a detour toward the stove or underneath the counter. She reached for his dustpan, but he held it tight and stared at her from his crouched position. His eyes were cautious and unsure, as if teetering on the edge of something steep and meaningful.
“What?” she asked.
“Did you hear what you said?”
“Yeah, I said I got it from here.” She held out her hand for the dustpan again, a bit more urgently. He was clearly holding up progress.
“You called me Hon.”
“No, I didn’t. Mulder, you’re hearing things.”
He knew what he heard, clear as a sunny day, although he’d never convince her of it. But it was enough. He’d just wait for it again. And in the meantime, he’d get that ring reset.
Mulder stepped toward her and grasped her outstretched hand – the one that had been waiting for the dustpan. It would have to wait a little longer. He pulled her to a standing position, then hooked his hands underneath her arms and hoisted her onto the counter, facing him.
“What are you doing? We need to get this mess-“
He captured her moving lips in his and drank her in. She tensed for a second, her task-driven side vying for control. Then he felt her concede and respond to him, relaxing into his kiss. The kiss deepened and they changed angles mid-stream. His slipped his hands just inside the back of her T-shirt to feel her smooth skin and he felt her wrap both legs around his waist. They were making out, he mused, almost allowing a laugh to escape him. On the kitchen counter in their new house. Making out like kids.
Suddenly, another voice rounded the corner into the kitchen. “Dana, is everything okay? I had William on the changing table and I heard--- ooops! Oh my goodness, I’m sorry.” Maggie’s face turned bright pink and Mulder knew where Scully had inherited that endearing little quality from. Mrs. Scully spun on her heels and started to head back out of the kitchen. “I can see that you’re perfectly fine, so I’ll just-“
“It’s okay, Mom. I um…broke something and Mulder was just helping me clean it up.” Scully hopped down off the counter and smoothed her shirt with her hands. Her cheeks were also a deep rosy color.
“Actually, it’s about time I headed home anyway. The baby is asleep in his crib – he just couldn’t keep his little eyes open a second longer. We got most of his clothing put away, but you might want to rearrange the drawers to your liking.”
“Thank you so much, Mom, for all your help with William today.”
“Yes, thanks, Maggie,” Mulder added, trying to forget that he had just been caught with his hands up her daughter’s shirt.
Maggie gathered her purse from the table. “Oh, and I put a dish of chicken parmesan and a tossed salad in your refrigerator for dinner. Just heat it up, okay?” She leaned to give each of them farewell hugs and Mulder realized that it actually wasn’t all that weird hugging Scully’s mom anymore, which was cool.
“And by the way, I’d really love to take William overnight again soon. Maybe next weekend? Think about it. I know you two could use the time to get settled in. Alone.” She leveled a look at them both. Nope, not the least bit awkward.
Maggie left and Mulder realized they were alone in their new house for the first time. Well, as alone as they could be with a sleeping baby who was scheduled to wake up and eat again in about an hour.
“Where were we, Scully?” He wrapped his arms around her and started nibbling at her neck.
“I think we were cleaning up this mess.”
“Mmmm, no, not ringing any bells, I’m sorry. But this…this I remember….” He slid one hand up the back of her shirt and kissed her hard on the lips.
“Mulder,” she moaned a weak protest through the kiss.
“Scully, one hour. We might have one hour, if we’re lucky. Whattaya say we go upstairs and do some housewarming of our own?”
She giggled. “Mulder, your unpacking skills need some work.”
“Maybe, but I’m really good at figuring out where to put things. Come on, let me show you.”
He grabbed her hand and she allowed him to lead her up the stairs and into their bedroom and to the moon and back, and she even got to see stars – twice, actually. And it didn’t even take a whole hour.
THE END