TITLE: "Just Another Day" AUTHOR: Jen EMAIL: JenR13@aol.com RATING: PG SPOILERS: 100% Spoiler free CLASSIFICATION: SH KEYWORDS: Mulder/Scully UST SUMMARY: A Mulder hospital stay from a third person point of view.
Disclaimer: I'm just borrowing them, Chris! Honest!
Author's Notes: I currently have two stories in the works, but I got this little idea and just decided to write it. Be gentle, the only other POV story I have written came from the mouth of a fish. :-)
"Just Another Day" By Jen
Hospitals. I hate hospitals. Ironic, because I am forced to be in one. Not by choice though. At least not by my choice. I just happen to have a father who is a doctor and thinks I spent too much time on my butt. Which is probably true. I have probably set the world record for "sitting and doing nothing" in the 16-year-old division. So, here I am. Working as a candy striper from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m., Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and 12 to 4 on Saturdays.
It's not a boring job, though. Sure, I have to run things to radiology and stuff, but I've met a lot of interesting people. Especially the cute guy in 339 that broke his leg skiing. I've been keeping a real close eye on that one.
But lo and behold he's going home today. Oh well, I've have to remember to get his phone number before I leave today. I stop by the nurses station to get my assignments today. I'll be fine as long as I don't have to see any blood. I had one experience with that, when I was working on the pediatric floor. A little kid cut his stitches open when he tripped over a wheelchair. There was a lot of blood and a lot of whining. I never want to see that again.
"Afternoon, Mary Anne," Christine says to me. She's the head nurse on this floor. A real nice woman I met at my dad's Christmas party. She tells me to call her Christine, but my dad corrects me every time I do. She tells him there is nothing wrong with it and then they argue. Not like my mom and dad used to argue, before their divorce, but almost like simple lovers' spat. I wish he would juts ask her out. God knows I am going to do it for him if he doesn't do it soon.
"Hi, Christine," I answer back. Christine's 39, but you would never guess it by looking at her. Why is my dad so blind?
She places some flowers in front of me. "I'm sorry to do this, but I need you to deliver these to room 223." She pointed to bouquet of flowers with a white card sticking out of them.
"Why are you sorry?" I ask as I picked up the flowers. I like deliveries. I rarely got to do them and they give you a chance to meet new people. That's how I met Mark, AKA the cute guy in 339.
"He's not what we call the 'best' patient."
"So? I wasn't the best patient when I broke my leg last year." That one experience that helped turn me off hospitals. Well, at least the medical aspect of them.
Christine laughed. "Don't I know it. Now deliver those flowers, because I've got some duties for you and Kelly."
"Duties for me and Kelly?" Kelly is my best friend, and also a candy striper. But, unlike me, she wanted to be here. I still to this day do not know why.
"Yep." She turned around to her paperwork and I started to walk to room 223. I looked down at the card in the flowers. It had a name on it. Fox. Weird name, but interesting. I would love to have an interesting name. Anything other than Mary Anne for sure.
I reached the door of room 223 and peered in. A man was sitting up in the bed, a very unhappy look on his face. He glared at something I couldn't see. I moved to get a closer view and could hear a woman's voice.
".......Mulder, you're staying put, end of discussion." I stayed by the door afraid I was interrupting an important discussion.
"But, Scullee," the man whined and I decided to knock cautiously on the door. The man and his companion turned to me and I got a better look at them. The man looked a little younger than my dad, probably in his mid-thirties, I supposed. He had brown hair and hazel eyes definitely set on getting his way. The woman, I guessed also had to be in her early to mid-thirties. She had a head of red hair that reminded me of my mom's. Of course, if hers was a dye job, it was done a hell of a lot better than my mother's. Her blue eyes scan me and then turn back to the man, an annoyed/determined look in them.
"Delivery," I say and hold the flowers out in front of me. "For a....." I glance down at the name card Christina had given me. "Fox Mulder." So, his first name was Fox, just like it said on the card. I'd have to remember to look that one up in my book of names when I got home.
"That's Fox right here," the woman said, pointing to the man on the bed. He grimaced at the use of his first name, so I guess he doesn't like it. Well, I can identify with that. I still blame my father for naming me Mary Anne.
The woman gets up and takes the flowers from my hands. "There's from Mom," she says and places them on the window sill. Mom? Did she mean her mom? Our their mom?
"That's nice of her," the man says casually and I decide to slip out. Just seeing them together I have decided she meant her mom and his mother-in-law. They must be married. They certainly act like it. Glancing at each other with looks only reserved for each other. My parents never gave each other those looks. My dad will give Christina a look like that from time to time, but he never acts on it. Maybe I should introduce him to these two.
I return to the desk to find some duties awaiting me, so I spend the rest of my time doing them. On my way down the hall after a run, I just happened to pass that man's room again. Trying not to look obvious, but dying of curiosity, I peer into the room quickly. The bed was empty, the blankets tangled at the edge of the bed. I would have thought he had gone home, if not for the comment his red-haired companion made before. Sure enough, I heard the clickly click of computer keys, and after I glance into the room at a different angle, I can see him typing at a laptop computer in one of the very uncomfortable plastic visitor's chairs. The IV stand was next to him, the needle discarded on the floor.
Anytime we see someone out of bed that isn't supposed to be, we are supposed to report it one of the nurses. And this man, Fox Mulder, definitely did not look like he should be out of bed. Although I was only near the doorway, I could see the paleness in his face. He looked tired, but was concentrating on typing. He was so into what he was doing he never even noticed me at the door.
Candy-stripers are supposed to help out, and maybe even brighten someone's day. Kelly even likes to go into people's rooms and just learn something about them, something that would brighten their day a little. She meet this one woman, with breast cancer, who loved the beach, loved to touch the sand. So Kelly had her friend, who lives by the beach, FedEx her a bag of sand. Just the look on that woman's face was enough to brighten anyone's week, let alone their day. I wish I had Kelly's passion, but I don't. She wants to be a doctor someday. I know she'll make a great one.
I looked at the man again and knew what would happen if Cathy caught him. Cathy's a pretty brown-haired nurse with a very stern voice. She's a stickler for the rules and _no one_ ever wants to be caught be her. I should know. I was caught by her once. And from what I gathered from Christina, Mr. Mulder wasn't the world's greatest patient. That's fine by me, by not by Cathy.
"Sir," I say from the doorway, knocking softly on the edge. "You might want to get back into bed. Nurses are making rounds."
The man looked up from his typing. "And I suppose it's the lovely Nurse Cathy's turn," he says with a smirk.
I smile back. "You don't want to get caught by her. Trust me, I know." I may only be sixteen, but I'm a fast learner. I had a feeling that Mr. Mulder was one two, he just didn't listen. Kinda like a teenager. And hey, I can identify with that.
"I can't get yelled at anymore then I already have been," he commented with a shrug.
I turn toward the hall and see the familiar red-haired woman walking this way. "Well, never mind Cathy, I think your wife might be a bit annoyed with the fact that you're out of bed."
He thinks for a minute. "My wi-, oh jeez, Scully." He immediately grabbed the computer and set it on the table. Then he pulled the IV pole back toward the bed and climbed under the blanket. He conveniently put the IV tube under the blankets along with the hand it used to be in. He must have done this before.
I watch this in amazement, wondering how one woman could have such an effect on one man. He straightens out his blanket just as the woman arrives at the door. I move to let her in, and she immediately eyes him with a critical eye.
"Just been resting, Scully," he says casually, and both of them seem to forget I'm in the doorway. I'm surprised to hear him call her Scully. That's has to be the oddest name I've heard, Fox aside. She narrows her eyes and walks over the bed, by his left side.
"Really?" she says. She glanced at the laptop, still on and plugged in. "It's hard to reach the computer from over here, isn't it?" She pulls part of the blanket off of him. He looks down at his hand sheepishly.
"I, well..," he stammers.
"Save it, Mulder. I know you too well." Mulder? Well, if she calls him Mulder, then maybe Scully is her last name. But why would a married couple call each other by their last names?
"Darn it, Scully. I had a good excuse this time and every- thing," he says with mock exasperation.
"Well, save it for next time," she answers with a smile, and sits on the edge of his bed. I know I should be here, but I can't seem to leave. She picks up the IV tube. "You know you're going to need a new one."
The man, Mulder, looks down guilty. "Sorry, Scully."
"You shouldn't be working on that case anyway, partner. Don't you remember it was the reason you're here in the first place?" Partner? That could account for the last names. My friend's father is a police officer and calls his partner by his last name. Of course his partner's of the male gender. And they don't share the same bond that these two so obviously share. But the partner thing may dismiss my idea that they are married. But still, those looks they give each other are not the same looks you give friends. Even good friends. I sure as hell don't look at my friend Mike like that. And he is of the male gender.
"Yes, I remember. But I needed to write a report for Skinner." His eyes dropped from exhaustion. It seemed his energy reserves were dying down.
"Reports can wait, Mulder." She saw him falling asleep and tucked the blankets around him closer. "You almost died. If he had only aimed a little higher....." She said those words softly, as if she couldn't bear to think about that thought.
"I know," he said sleepily.
The only word I could use to describe the look they gave each other then is love. I don't know what love is because I've never felt it, but I knew then that those two loved each other. No question about it. Whether partners or lovers, it didn't matter. As she leaned closer toward him and kissed him on the forehead, I slipped out.
Every time I passed room 223 after that I saw them together. On the day he left, she pushing his wheelchair, they were laughing and smiling. I asked Christina about them. She says, we'll see him again, he always comes back, that his medical file is long than "War and Peace." As I watched them disappear down that elevator that day I thought about my dad's and Christina relationship. And I told him about seeing those two partners together.
It must have had some impact on him, because I had to help get ready for a date. Yes, a date. It's a start.
End.
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