Title: Thinking of you: Behind Closed Doors Writer: Xphila Rating: G Keywords: MSR/Memories/Vignette Spoilers: Beyond the Sea, Duane Barry/Ascension/One Breath, Minor for Season 6 but not specific. Feedback: Pretty Please? or hit reply! Writer's notes: OK, I've been meaning to write this for a while, PLEASE tell me what you think. ---------------------- Behind Closed Doors Xphila ------------------------- It's funny. Not amusing funny, but strange funny, what people assume to know about things they don't. Actually maybe I'm wrong. For those who know the truth it is amusing funny. And I know the truth about one topic of conversation at the workplace. Since when did I call it that? Anyway, I know about a topic of conversation at the FBI. Yeah, I know all about it. The topic's me. Me and my beautiful partner. Whenever we walk by heads turn. I find it kind of uplifting to watch the Agents turn to look at us and then whisper about the nature of our relationship. Uplifting because I know that even thought Scully and I aren't in the kind of relationship they talk about. We do have a special relationship, and it's worth more than what they think. The people that presume to know us. Know about us, judge us on what we let them see. The shows of affection in public are measured. They only see what we want them to see. There are so many private moments with Scully than no-one has ever seen, or would ever know about. If they saw the whole picture they'd be completely one hundred percent sure we're sleeping together. But they're already one hundred percent sure, aren't they? Well, unfortunately, they're wrong. Six years is a long time to be partners with someone. In fact, six years is a long time to be friends with someone you haven't known from childhood and who, frankly, you have very little in common with. Six years. God, that's a long time. And in those six years, we've become close. Understatement of the millennium. There have been hundreds of little intimacies we've shared behind closed doors. I mean, the first case we went on she de-robed in my motel room. Okay, it was innocent but... We weren't that close for the first year. I was too scared to let her in, the only time I did was because it was her that needed consoling. When her father died, Luther Boggs freaked her out, I got shot and ended up in Hospital. After the nurse left us alone, we had one of the most honest conversations we had ever had up to that moment. It seemed only natural for me to let her cry in my arms. Come to think of it, that wasn't when I realised but I think it was then that it happened. I think it was then that I fell in love with her. And I fell very in love with her. I still am. When did I realise? That's not a hard question. When she was abducted. Those months broke my heart. Actually, I think her disappearance broke more than that. I was a mess. That's probably what made everyone think I was in love with her. Or that we were together, or whatever they believe is between us. Suddenly I am jolted from my thoughts. What was that? I look over at Scully, she's laughing at something on her computer. I decided to ignore it and look at her instead, she's more beautiful when she smiles that ever. When I fell in love with her, she was so beautiful. I'm not saying she isn't now. She's more beautiful now that then....or maybe as beautiful. It doesn't really matter. I still think she's gorgeous. But she's changed a lot since I met her, she's changed because of me. Because of the things I've put her through. I came so close to telling her I loved her as soon as she woke up from the coma she was in after her abduction. I went back to the hospital that night when her mother and sister had left and I came so close to telling her. We were closer then that either of us was willing to believe of face. Having said that, she let me cry in her arms and listened when I told her I couldn't live without her. It was a stupid thing to say to her then, we weren't really ready for that kind of admission. She told me I was still alive and all I could say was 'am I?' That had a lot of weight to it and she looked over me and then held me tightly for the rest of the night. The nurse was not impressed. Thankfully that night was forgotten by both of us. Well, not forgotten, but put into the 'I Love Scully and this is the proof' filing cabinet in my mind. I don't know where Scully put it. Those were the moments that stick out when I think of the first few years of our acquaintance...our partnership. Her cancer and all the terrible, appalling things that happened to her and us because of me and the X Files, meant that we grew closer. In the last year we have got closer. Even though there have been times when I've wondered if we're not further apart than we were in that first year. That isn't true though. Only one thing. One person has made me think that. Scully's jealous of her. OK, maybe not jealous, maybe that's just what I hope, but anyway, territorial of me at the very least. That's why our relationships been on the rocks a few times. But not too badly. That won't change until I admit to Scully I love her. And hope and pray she feels the same way. She's smiling again and I can't let it rest, I ask her what she's doing. She smiles at the computer screen, just reading an e-mail, apparently. I'm curious, what kind of e-mail makes you laugh. It's from a friend. A male friend. Jesus, I'm getting jealous now. A man she knows only from the internet. I breath a sigh of relief and leave it. A few minutes later I look up at her and open my mouth. She presses the off Button to turn the computer off and looks as if she's ready to leave. "Scully?" "Yeah?" "Where are you going?" "I know it's strange for you to grasp this concept, Mulder, but, home." I s smile at her, not a sarcastic twist of the lips, but a natural smile. She smiles back and I'm suddenly happier than I have been for a long time. "You know I love you, Scully?" Scully rolls her eyes, "I know." She steps towards me, "I love you, too. I was just waiting for you to tell me first. Now come on," She glances at her watch, "What kind of time is 6:30 for dinner reservations?" she asks and I shrug, following her out of the office. I have butterflies in my stomach. First date nerves. #END# Come on, feedback PLEASE?