Life in Parts by simplytoopretty Feedback: alyssafanfiction@hotmail.com Rating: PG Classification: Mulder/Scully Spoilers: IWTB Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine. Summary: It's the navigation of a life not chosen, the traveling of what comes to exist. A life which alters in stages, dynamic like life often is. Starts a year after "The Truth" and goes through IWTB. -- The news arrives in January. Early January, just after the new year has began. The symbolism isn't lost on her. Their current location is Seattle. Seattle in January is cold and damp. The rain never really leaves. Misty rain at times falls and rain which stings falls at other times. The sky is a dull grey color. Word comes from Skinner. Concise, no unnecessary words, just the facts. Like a telegraph. It's safe (STOP). The manhunt is over (STOP). Resume life (STOP). Three sentences, that's all. They debate whether they can believe these few words, whether they can trust what they're being told. Belief and trust, harder to find these days, harder than ever, but then again it was never that easy for her. It was easier for Mulder back then, to believe, to trust, but not anymore, not in this fugitive life that has become theirs in the past months. "I don't know," she says sitting on the bed. Mulder stands. What she means is I hope it's true. Fugitive life, endless motels and stretching highways, holds little appeal. It's a cheap life, an empty life, a stalled life. No sunlight so everything withers, even them. Silently withers. The fights which are more implied than yelled. They fight quietly now. Once they didn't. Once believing divided them. Mulder had his aliens, she didn't believe. She had God, her religion, Mulder didn't believe. Now they have to believe nothing so that they can survive, make it to tomorrow, to another sunless day. Belief can be dangerous in this world, in this life on the run. "I don't know," Mulder says, echoing her words. Sometimes it seems like all they do is repeat each other, repeat themselves. She doesn't know what he means though. Her ability to read between the lines not of her own creation has disappeared. It's hard to find truth these days, in this barren life of motel rooms and grey highway roads and companionship of just one. She nods. "I guess we wait." "Yeah." They wait. It rains. -- Near the end of January there's a break in the rain. They're in Vancouver now, closer to the Canadian border. The air smells of smoke, that fire scent which fills the air after it rains. It's time to leave again. They're always leaving or on the verge of leaving. She misses permanency, having roots. Her childhood was spent moving from one base to another. As an adult she traveled on a weekly basis, but there was always a home to return to, her apartment, her city. She misses that. "What about the East Coast?" she asks. They're discussing what the next city should be as they pack. In the past year they've stuck to the West Coast and the Mid-West. It's safer, she knows, but less familiar to her. She misses the city which became her home all those years ago. Mulder looks at her, pausing in the stuffing on his clothing into his duffel. His gaze is contemplative, searching, evaluating. His hair is shaggy and he looks little like the FBI agent he was. So much has changed since those days of chasing little grey men on the government's dime. "How about Boston?" he asks, a question and not an answer. But it's acceptance of her wishes, perhaps even a tentative step towards accepting what Skinner has told them. "I'd like that." She leaves her packing and goes to him, settling in his arms. Mulder holds her tightly. He presses a kiss to her forehead, like old times. So they drive to Boston. The trip takes days. When they arrive there's snow. She smiles at the sight. -- Overnight acceptance was never really her thing. It took her years to believe in Mulder's little grey men. Even God became a gradual thing, from lapsed Catholic to practicing. She's lapsed again, but she still believes. Or so she likes to think. Belief comes gradually, although she isn't sure belief is the right word. Acceptance might be a better word she muses one late afternoon as she walks through the park near their motel. It's February and cold in Boston. She doesn't mind, enjoys the way the wind nips at her cheeks. Acceptance is the more appropriate word. They accept what Skinner has told them. Whether they ever truly believe perhaps doesn't even matter. Belief is a tricky thing in this day and age. -- It's harder to believe the simple truth than the most complex of lies. This is how it's always been with them, to an extent. Why it took them years to acknowledge being in love. Love, the simple truth. Just partners, the complex lie. Safe, it's safe, the simple truth. Can't be safe, the complex lie. It means I'm afraid and I don't know and everything else that implies uncertainty and fear and not being brave like they're supposed to be. (I'm afraid. ) "Who isn't?" she wonders aloud in the bathroom. Voice a whisper, the mirror fogged. The air is hot around her. "Scully?" Mulder calls. "Coming out anytime soon?" She rubs the mirror, but the glass isn't clear. The image of her face is blurry, indistinct. It matches how she feels. "Be right out," she yells. For a moment she stares at the hazy image of her face. Then she pulls on her rub and exits the motel bedroom. Mulder lies on the bed. The curtains of the room are shut tightly against the inky black sky. She joins him on the bed. The night passes and she doesn't sleep much. -- The first time they accept the possible truth of Skinner's words is when they head to Boston. The second time is when they're in Hartford, the city they travel to after a week in Boston. They stay longer than the normally do. They stay for almost a month. The world doesn't collapse. No one finds them. She breathes. When they pack their stuff and leave Hartford, driving to Harrisburg, Mulder asks, "Where should we live?" She looks through a newspaper and finds furnished apartments that can be leased on a monthly basis. She circles a few and hands the paper to Mulder. "I like the one with the yellow wallpaper," she says. Yellow, the color of sunshine, of brightness. She'd like to chase away the darkness lingering in their lives, even with them far away from the FBI. The darkness always seems like it's just around the corner, like if she walked down the street and turned right she'd come face to face with it. Although she gets that one can't actually come face to face with darkness. But she feels like she could anyways. "Not bad." She isn't sure what he means, if he means anything at all. He must rarely how they ever said anything that wasn't littered with more meaning. They're meaning-laden people who leave so much unsaid, letting the other find the meaning on their own. "It could do," she says. Her fingers drum against her thigh. Mulder takes her head, stilling it. His fingers are warm around hers. He squeezes her hand lightly. "It will." And this time she thinks she can find the meaning behind those two words. She thinks he means It's okay, we can settle down for a bit, live in a place that isn't a motel. -- The first time she uses her real name again is for a job at a medical clinic. She answers phones and pulls patients charts and gets yelled at by patients when the wait is long. She's overqualified, but her resume is a fake, the only truth being her name, Dana Scully. Mulder says nothing when she tells him. It's early morning when she arrives home from the interview. Later that night he says, "We should keep a low profile still." What he means (and she's pleased she can read through the lines again, at least sometimes) is We still need to be careful, we don't know for sure if we're safe. She takes his caution and it's reflects her own. But there's excitement there too. Her name is hers again, she can use it, can be Dana Scully again. She feels more like herself. Names are important and she never really understood this until she lost her name. Mulder's watching her, the dim light of the bedroom casting shadows on his face. She offers a smile, tries to. "I know," she says. "I will." His hand traces her cheek, slightly rough fingertips against smoother skin. "I know." What he means she can't decipher. Maybe nothing, maybe something and maybe it doesn't matter. -- There are two more cities of furnished apartments and one city of a regular apartment before they purchase the small house in rural Virginia. They feel safer putting down roots in the countryside. "Very rustic," she comments when they drive to the house and look around. They're alone, surrounded by browning grass. It's late July and the greenery is dying in the heat. Mulder wraps an arm around her shoulder. "It could be us." "It could." She lays her head on his shoulder and adds in her thoughts the new us. They were never rural-living individuals, not before they had to go on the run. They lived in cities and apartments. This is a house, in the middle of nowhere, the nearest neighbor miles away. The new them. She smiles and tries to banish her wishes for the old them. There's no going back, not really. She can regain her name, but so much has been lost and she doesn't see them recapturing everything. She'd say they had everything perfect back then, but that's a lie. Most of the time she isn't sure of the truth anymore. It's become muddled and she focuses on surviving, on seeing tomorrow. She relies on Mulder to anchor her. He does the same she thinks. Their truths consist of love and their beliefs consist of their faith in each other. It's maybe not enough. It's all there is. "We're going to be homeowners, Scully," Mulder says. There's a forced cheeriness to his tone and she does her best to do the same, to pretend. She tilts her head up a bit and says, "Yeah Mulder, we're going to be homeowners." She thinks she sounds a little sad. Mulder says nothing. They buy the house, under Mulder's fake identity. The name on the deed is George Ahab. They move in, unpack, and become rural country folk. They cook and clean and live in this old house plopped down in the middle of a field in the middle of nowhere. Really, they're only pretending. She's tired of pretending, but this is their life, for better or for worse. The life they can have; the consequence of actions they've made and actions made against them. Sometimes she thinks about asking Do you miss the city? But the words never leave her mouth. Instead she says, after three months of living in the house, "This is nice." They're watching the sun set. The sky is pale blues mingling with pale pinks. The sky looks tired, not a vibrant sunset. A sunset that isn't magical, merely mundane, like their life these days. "Isn't it?" Mulder answers. Not a real answer, but maybe the correct answer. They don't say anything else. Mulder wraps an arm around her shoulders and pulls her close. She rests her head against his shoulder and he leans his head against hers. The silence is comfortable. The blue sky darkens, turning a slate-colored blue before becoming dark navy and finally an inky jet black color. -- Two years after the manhunt started, she gets a job at Our Lady of Sorrows Hospital. It's a residency, a new field for her, and it'll take her three years to complete. She's drawn to pediatrics, the morgue revolting to her now. She's tired of death, of the darkness which accompanies death. There's still death with pediatrics, but there's life too. She talks to Mulder before she applies. Once she has the words out, he just looks at her for a long time, the minutes slipping by. She holds his gaze, open to him. Finally he nods. "I think you should," he says quietly. His hand reaches over and brushes a few strands of hair behind her ear. They're lying on their bed, and the night is a mixture of sounds, human breathing and the occasional animal. There's the low hum of the generator, but otherwise there are no mechanical sounds. Outside the air is still. No trees rustle in the breeze. It's mostly just them and the sound of their breathing mingling in the cool night. She nods, thankful he accepts. She prefers it when they're in agreement, doesn't like going around Mulder's back. They're supposed to be together, although sometimes their independence exerts itself. Co-dependent most of the time and independent at rare moments, they're a pair, that's for sure. Instead of voicing her thanks, she leans over and kisses him. His lips are soft against hers. After she rests her head against her pillow and plays with his fingers. "Are you scared?" She lets her eyes drift from their hands to his face. "A little," she admits. "It's a new field." Her voice is a loud whisper. Mulder echoes her tone when he speaks. "You'll wow them. I know it." She hopes he's right. This job is one of the few new things about their lives she doesn't yet hate. She needs something, needs something familiar, and not just the smell of the East Coast air. She needs more than Mulder apparently, can't breath properly when all she has is Mulder. Medicine provides what Mulder can't, a balm for what's been lost. Again she nods. She doesn't say I hope so. There's no need to voice that feeling, it's shared. In the end there's hope. There usually is. -- Working at Our Lady of Sorrows becomes difficult quickly. The job she doesn't mind, it occupies her time, gives her hands something to do, grants some sort of meaning to her life. A healer, a meaningful job. It's the administration that grates on her nerves, like the FBI administration once did. Only there's no Skinner at Our Lady of Sorrows. There's just a rigid belief system, one she doesn't adhere to anymore, and one she finds problematic to pretend to obey. She manages to, has Mulder to come home to at night. It'd be easier if she stayed in the city, but she can only leave Mulder alone for so many hours. Too often as the hours accumulate all she can feel is the urge to get into her car and drive back to Mulder, drive to her home, his arms. There are nights they can't spend together and those are hard enough without adding to the number. So she goes home each night that she can, making the two hour trek back to the wilderness, to the house they own. "You could quit," Mulder says when she complains for an extended period of time. She always shakes her head. "I can't." To which Mulder responds, "I know." He expects her answer and it's the truth. She can't just quit. This is their life, for all its flaws, for all its imperfections. Things lost and things gained and the balance is tipped in favor of what has been lost. The careers they had chosen in their youths, the city they had called home for over a decade, his name, her family, William. Still they have to live, put one foot in front of the other. She wishes Mulder could offer an It'll get better. But they stopped offering potentially hollow promises a long time ago. -- One day six years after the manhunt started the FBI comes to offer forgiveness in exchange for assistance. The case gets solved and six years after they started running they both can use their real names. Dana Scully and Fox Mulder. Life isn't suddenly better. It doesn't even really change. Mulder goes out more, engages in non-official investigations. She continues to work at the hospital, watches Christian recover, not that he'll ever be completely whole. He'll be alive and that's something. Not a lot, but something. "Do you want to go back to the city?" he asks one evening six months after the charges are dropped. The sun is setting. The clouds which have lingered all day are lit up with golden hues. The sky is a brilliant cornflower blue, freckled with pinks and reds. She stares at the sky before answering, letting a long beat pass. "A city," she says, "Someplace not here." "That sounds good." They could stay here, but they would still be pretending. This isn't them, has never been and will never be. There's an opportunity to start fresh, to begin again as Fox Mulder and Dana Scully. Life will never be what it once was, but she's gradually become to accept this. It no longer pains her, this truth. There's something freeing about acknowledging and accepting this truth. It doesn't make the baggage accumulated over the years disappear, but it makes the weight feel a little lighter. "How do you feel about the South?" Mulder asks. She smiles. The sky turns a darker gold. -- End. Thanks for reading.