Little Pieces
by Katie Schmidt

Email: kaydschmidt@hotmail.com 
Summary: Mulder's first birthday following IWTB.
Disclaimer: Don't own them, if I did I sure wouldn't be living here!

Notes: I want this to get up before Christmas, but it didn't happen due to errors.  Happy 
Birthday anyway, this is my little gift to you.  

No regrets.

XX

Little Pieces

XX

"Happy Birthday." She grinned climbing into the bed beside him and sinking into the 
ugly bedspread. Handing him a small box wrapped up in simple blue paper and topped 
with a navy colored bow, colors his eyes could process, she pressed a kiss to his 
forehead.  He pulled the bow from the package, and stuck it to her long auburn hair.  

"Thank you." He smiled.

"I hope you'll like these.  I saw a few in the gift shop beside a contact card; I had the rest 
made just for you."  His eyebrow quirked up in curiosity as he pulled the tape loose 
and then tore the slender box free from the paper.  When the lid lifted he looked a little 
puzzled staring down at many gleaming pieces of glass.

"What are they?" He marveled, picking up the first piece.

"Well that one is easy." She smiled.  He held up the tiny prize, no bigger than his thumb 
nail; it was a classic UFO, made of melted glass, complete with little chips of colored 
glass appropriately placed around the edges as lights.  He carefully set the little treasure 
down beside him on the bed, before picking up another piece.

"A seed." He marveled at the larger than life sunflower seed, clear glass with stripes of 
whites, blacks and greys blended inside.

"A running shoe." She added, as he pulled the white and blue sneaker, complete with 
melted strips of white as laces and ridged soles.

"A parrot?" He questioned, holding the tiny yellow and blue bird by its long tail feathers.  

"In remembrance of our time away from life." She whispered.  

They'd lived in 5 different countries besides the US the two years that followed the events 
in New Mexico, including Canada and much of Central America.  They'd never stayed in 
once place long enough to be remembered, pretending to live plenty of lives that were not 
completely theirs. Sometimes they'd been family, often they'd been lovers. For a long 
while when they'd lived in Peru, they'd worn rings and had appeared married, complete 
with forged paperwork.  "Ah, I hated this bird." He moaned, remembering how it had 
woken at the crack of dawn, alerting its feathered friends and every person in ear shot 
that the day had begun.

"We had a lot of nice mornings." She smiled suggestively, leaning over to run her fingers 
through the hairs on his chest.  He nodded in agreement.

"Well, I was already up." He joked. 

They'd been 'married' in Peru when John had called to tell her the news, her name was 
cleared and she could come home.  The time away and the transition back had been hard 
to say the least. Now, whenever they talked about the times her family and the world 
thought of them as dead, they simply referred to it as 'their time away from life'.  Her 
family had been thankful she was alive, but furious at her for the missing years and grief 
they'd endured.  But the running had drawn the two of them together and returning to life 
had put the rings in a box, buried deep in the closet, despite what they felt.  What they 
knew in their hearts was shoved to the side for his protection and invisibility.  Paper and 
two pieces of metal were simply that. Paper and metal.  They didn't need them to know 
what they'd loved and lived through together. 

"There's more." She motioned to the tissue.

He produced a stout yellow #2 pencil, a tiny genie's lamp, and a happy smiling bee. "One 
in five billion." He whispered, drawing her face close for a gentle kiss.  She hummed her 
satisfaction, before pointing at the bee. She told the artist simply that she'd nearly lost her 
life from a bee sting and it had been a turning point in their relationship.

"I really didn't want him to be smiling.  But, the artist insisted he should be happy so we 
didn't have a reason to hate this one.  But I swear, if you stick him in my collar, I'm going 
to break it." She threatened with laugh.  

"These things are awesome." He commented, picking up each one and studying it with 
care a second time.  "The artist has real talent with glass."

"There's something else." She sighed. "I didn't really know if it was a good time to bring 
this up.  I started to think of Peru because of that macaw... and I missed it." She finished 
nearly whisper quiet, as he pulled the two bands from the tissue paper in the box. His 
heart thumped amazingly hard, and he struggled to swallow.

"I didn't think we'd ever go back to this." He studied her face, his hazel eyes searing into 
her blue ones. "I thought we'd just decided it was paper and metal?" He asked confused.

"It was paper and metal we couldn't have while you were hiding away.  We don't need 
them to prove anything, to anyone," She whispered softly, treading on unsure waters. 
"But it's been 6 months since you got to be Mulder out in the open again. I miss being 
your wife for the entire world to see.  I want to be able to talk about you at work and not 
put my position in a strict Catholic hospital in jeopardy. I want to go out to dinner and be 
able to tell everyone that you're my husband." She whispered.  He pulled her lips to his in 
response, caressing them with his own brand of reassurance. When they parted, her eyes 
smiled relief.

"I want that too." He smiled in return, sliding the ring onto her finger and placing a kiss 
on her hairline, as she did the same.  "Best. Birthday. Ever." He sighed, knowing the 
piece of paper would have to wait a few more hours, or days.

"Happy Birthday, Mulder." She sighed into his mouth and pulled him down to meet her 
again.

XX
"A true friend stabs you in the front." -Oscar Wilde