More Than You Think You Are Part six
 
 

Half a Xanax dulled any trepidation I might have had about the flight, and although I slept some, there were no nightmares that I can recall. At one point I remember surfacing briefly from the dreamy stupor I was in to find my hand in Skinner’s and him watching me with a sad half-smile.

Before the trip, Skinner had tried to explain what happened. How he’d gotten a golden handshake from the Bureau; how Scully and I had been drummed out far less ceremoniously; how he—or we, now—came to be living in a house in Norfolk, Virginia. 

It was almost too much; when his description of duplicity and alien mayhem in the FBI earned him nothing more than a skeptical frown from me, he just waved a hand at the file folder he’d given me. Most of what he was telling me was in there, in my own words sometimes, and even more paranoid sounding than his version of events.

In the end, I couldn’t find any arguments against him, and beyond that, I just wanted out. Out of the hospital, out of New Mexico. And if my doctor was right, then memories of the life I was about to return to would come back eventually. A kiss only slightly less intense than the one we shared the night of Skinner’s revelation sealed the deal, and twenty-four hours later I was dressed in new blue jeans and a shirt and coat a little too big for me (“I had to guess at the sizes,” Skinner told me) giving my fish to Constance with a stern warning not to over feed them, and filling out release forms. Twenty-four hours after that I was yawning in front of the baggage carousel, more aware of Skinner’s warm hand on the small of my back than of the people milling around me. 

Skinner distinguished our bags from the others and scooped them up effortlessly, and then he was steering me out of the small airport and towards the long-term car park, and a dusty Explorer.

“Nice truck,” I muttered. “Very butch. You must have picked it out.”

“I haven’t had it long,” he replied. “You didn’t see it.”

I wasn’t sure what that meant, but I accepted his words and closed my eyes. My mind conjured up a generic car, blue, maybe black. Completely inconspicuous. And Walter Skinner behind the wheel, all shoulders and confidence.

I opened my eyes to look at the truck again. “Definitely not your average company car.”

Skinner opened the door for me, and as soon as my ass was seated and belted, I felt my eyes closing again. I heard the door close, and a moment later, felt the truck give some as Skinner slipped behind the wheel. His hand was warm on my shoulder, and his voice soft in my ear as he said “I’ll wake you when we get there.”

“Home,” I muttered. “I’m going home.”

He didn’t reply, and the movement of the vehicle lulled me into sleep shortly thereafter.

*** 

“We live here?” It hadn’t been a long drive, but I’d slept heavy, and woke at Skinner’s nudge feeling dopey, with just a tiny bit of relief that there’d been no bad dreams. I stumbled a bit in the doorway, caught myself, and kicked off my running shoes.

Walter replied with a shrug, then dropped our bags and bent down to untie his boots. I stepped hesitantly into the house, and directly into the living room. Pausing at the large wooden desk that effectively bisected the large room into a work space and a living space, I ran a hand over it and marveled at the smooth polished surface for a moment, then turned towards the bay window, letting my body move of its own accord, hoping it would act appropriately.

I stopped just short of pressing my nose to the glass and stared out into the dark. One hand came up without me realizing it, and brushed the cool glass lightly, then pressed firmly. It felt like I was trying to reach through the glass, trying to retrieve something…a memory, maybe. But there were none to be had here.

I turned to Walter with a sad smile. “We live here.” I said again, firmer this time. Even as I said the words, I was rolling the thought around in my mind like a wine taster with a fine Chablis. 

Walter just stood across the room, watching me, and for a moment, something gleamed in his dark eyes, and I felt like a mouse being watched by a cat. It didn’t scare me, exactly, but it did make me uncomfortable, and I felt a small shudder work itself up my back.

Then his eyes cleared and he smiled, and it was better. He came across the room with sure practiced ease, and I noticed again how he moved his large body with such simple grace.

When he took me in his arms, I went willingly. He held tight for a moment, still smiling, and I couldn’t help but answer the grin. No small part of me wondered if I should make some sort of move; we were lovers, after all, and it felt well beyond good to be pressed up to him, our bodies connecting in a neat and effortless way.

The decision was taken from my hands when my stomach growled loudly. This coaxed a blush out of me, and startled a laugh out of him, and then he kissed the tip of my nose and asked, “What would you like to eat?”

I didn’t relinquish my grip on him as I stated “Pizza” with absolutely no hesitation. “Green pepper, mushroom, pepperoni.”

“No problem, Mulder. But are you sure you don’t want something--” Half smile, shrug, and a step back, “fancier?”

“Skinner, I just spent several weeks in and out of a trauma induced coma, and more weeks after that living on ginger ale and applesauce. Believe me, I’m sure.”

He laughed again and left me in the living room; a moment later I heard the soft rumble of his voice on the phone.

I wasn’t sure at all.

Oh, not about the pizza—on that point my grumbling stomach was clear and certain.

What I wasn’t sure about was myself, in this house, with this man…with…

Terror and arousal, a potent combination. I knew I was ‘with’ Skinner. We were lovers; he said so. And I knew what that meant. I might have been foggy, but I wasn’t stupid. And if the stirrings I felt every time Skinner touched me, held me, gave me one of those dark-eyed looks, were any indication, then I wasn’t naïve either. But—

I couldn’t remember; I had no memories of couplings past, no way to step into the wayback machine and find a basis for this relationship. Beyond the kisses we’d shared since that night in the hospital, there was nothing. I closed my eyes and tried to force the memories, cursing silently when all I got for my efforts was an image of Skinner holding his chin in one hand and scowling at something over a massive, expensive-looking desk.

I didn’t realize Skinner had come back until I felt his hand on mine, and even though I jumped, I’m pretty sure the squeak of noise I made was in no way a girly-scream.

“Sorry,” Skinner immediately apologized. “I didn’t mean to startle—“

I cut him off with a brush of my fingers over his lips, and then followed that with my mouth. He made a startled noise that quickly gave way to a groan as I pressed forward, deepening the kiss, pushing him stumbling back onto the couch and practically crawling into his lap.

His arms came around me and his mouth welcomed my invading tongue with another deep sound like a moan that sent shivers up and down my spine. Shivers that his big hands caught and worked into the muscles of my back. I pushed harder, releasing his mouth with a wet gasp to nuzzle his cheeks and chin, bite at his ears and neck, and then gasp again as he plunged both hands into my hair and dragged my mouth back to his.

Part of me was simply reveling in the taste and textures of the man before me, while a larger chunk of my focus was desperately trying to remember this; trying to find a memory to mesh with the current sensations. And the more those memories refused to surface, the more desperate I became, and the rougher my actions. I tugged frantically at Skinner’s shirt, pulling at the waistband of his khakis, tearing buttons in my haste, almost keening aloud in my need to feel his bare skin, to try and find some sense memory in him, on him. I felt hard muscles contract in his stomach as I swept my hands over his abdomen. The hair on his chest was softer than I expected, and tickled my palms as I pressed them hard to his pectoral muscles. When I scratched my nails over his nipples, he groaned into my mouth and suddenly it seemed less important to find old memories and more important to make new ones.

I just had time for one gasping breath as he released my mouth and then he was burrowing under my chin, licking and nuzzling at my throat.

“Oh, God, yeah…”

His busy mouth moved over my Adam’s apple, around and down and then he was biting at an earlobe, which might have completely unhinged me all on its own if he hadn’t chosen that moment to cup the growing bulge in my jeans. Thrusting into his hand was involuntary on my part; the firm squeeze from him in return was completely deliberate.

And far too brief, I thought, as he sat back, breathing hard, regarding me with unmistakable lust and something that almost sparked with amusement.

I moved forward, intent on nothing more than getting his hands back on me, and he held up one of those hands, brushed my chest, then just stopped. He was touching, but holding me firmly at bay.

“What?” ‘Christ, I’m whining!’ I thought.

He was smiling, breathing hard.

“Making out on the couch?” he raised an eyebrow. “Like high school?”

“I don’t remember high school,” I shot back. It might have sounded smarter if I hadn’t been practically panting while pushing steadily against his hand with a series of tiny frustrated grunts.

The look in his eyes told me that my comment had washed away some of his good humor, and I could hear it in his voice as well. “I know. I’m sorry. I wish—“

“Pretend I remember,” I replied, tugging at his arm, trying to force his touch lower. “Pretend this is just another day for us; that we’re doing the same things that we always do.” I felt his resolve falter along with his hand, and now his touch was heating up the skin on my stomach under my shirt instead of my chest. I pushed further. “Let me use your memories. Do what you remember us doing…” I had his hand on the waistband of my jeans now, and while he still looked uncertain, his fingers were moving over the buttons there almost as if he were unaware he was doing it.

“Are you sure?”

I rolled my eyes and shoved my crotch at his questing fingers.

“What do you think?”

He was losing his concentration, losing the ability to hold me back, and that suited me just fine. And then both hands came up to my shoulders and he shook me. Hard. Forced me to look at him.

“I love you,” he told me.

I couldn’t say it back, although I almost felt like it was expected of me. But he didn’t seem to mind. Instead, he finally quit fighting me and gathered me up into his arms, his grip so tight it forced the air from my lungs for a moment.

“I love you,” he said again, sounding like he was enjoying the flavour of the words. “And I’ve been waiting so long…”

I guessed that Scully and I had been on the run for a long time.

Then it appeared that the time for waiting was over. I was on my back in seconds, and moments after that my jeans were being pushed roughly down around my knees. Skinner’s breath was cooling the slick head of my cock and burning the rest of me, and I started to shiver uncontrollably, but definitely in a good way.

And then—then—hand, hand and lips, and only a firm grip on the base of my dick kept me from shooting right then and there as Skinner took me deep into the wet heat of his mouth.

A dizzying array of images battered my mind as he worked his mouth on me, but oddly enough, none of them were sexual. Like a shuttering slide show on high speed the pictures whirled madly through my brain:

…Walter in my arms, both of us in white shirts and ties, him holding a wooden cane…

…Him sitting at a table, looking scruffy and angry, and my hand just touching his…

…Another white shirt, this one open and him sprawled out on a black leather couch, sleeping maybe…

…seeing him from far away through a hazy blue filter and he’s crying, I think—

I felt the same emotional connection I’d felt when he’d first come to me in the hospital, and I groaned and surged forward, forcing more of my cock into his mouth. I could feel my orgasm approaching at something like Mach five.

Moments later I came with a shout, feeling all my muscles contract almost painfully, while every pleasurable experience I’d ever had, and even a few I’d only dreamed of, were pooling in my groin, making me shudder and wail and buck helplessly into Walter’s mouth while he held me tight and brought about the sweetest release I’d ever been party to.

I couldn’t find my voice when he finally released me, but something in my eyes must have alerted him to the intensity of the moment. He didn’t ask stupid questions, he didn’t even ask for reciprocation, although part of my mind was already envisioning what I was going to do to him. No, he just pulled me roughly into his arms, gave me a hard kiss and said “I love you, Fox,” with such fierce authority that I couldn’t have doubted it, even if he hadn’t just sucked my brain outta my head through my dick.

For several minutes I just lay in his arms, relishing the feel of his hard muscles holding me tight, making me feel safe and secure and about a hundred other similar emotions. I had no idea where this craving for security had come from, but I couldn’t see any need to question it when Skinner was here and fulfilling those needs so completely.

When I found myself breathing in a more natural rhythm and approaching something like a normal heartbeat, I looked into dark intense eyes, and grinned in what I hoped was an endearing manner, if not an enticing one. Suddenly feeling just the tiniest bit unsure, I slowly wormed a hand between us, stroked his chest softly, and then let my fingers trail down his torso. He sighed as my fingertips rasped over hard scar tissue, and I took a moment, closing my eyes, to try and remember how those scars had come to be. 

I gave an apologetic shrug to him when I opened my eyes and he whispered, “No worries, Mulder. Don’t try to rush anything.”

We both looked down at my hand, and then it was his turn to shrug. I felt the hard knots across his abdomen shift under my fingers when his shoulders did, and he muttered, “It was a long time ago.”

I didn’t reply, just let my hand drift further down. I just had time to register that his cock was still as hard as mine had been, and then the doorbell rang, and we both startled, exchanging guilty grins.

“It’ll keep,” he told me, rising from the couch with a groan and tugging his shirt closed. “I’m not going anywhere. And neither are you.”