Scully, of course, looks incredible. It probably cost at least half an hour of staring in the bathroom mirror that morning, but her makeup tastefully accentuates her beauty, her clothing does the same, and the ends of her hair flip in a way that probably requires one of those big curling irons and a paddle brush. The mysterious ways of professional womanhood always look natural on her, despite everything he'd learned about their complexities, back when they were together; when he sees the results, the desire to kiss her hello and reach for her hand is still instinctive.
So he's doing well, but he's not blind. And he tells himself that it's good to be able to see her and be friends with her, to exist a normal social distance apart. If a dull ache still comes with it (Scully left, even Scully left), at least he's not still at rock bottom.
"Great." He takes a sip of his coffee and takes the moment to glance at her hands, like any normal friend making sure his ex didn't get engaged since they last saw each other would do. "I've got some shots I still need to blow up in Photoshop. How's medicine?"
It'd be nice to say she didn't go to any particular lengths to look good for him, but she definitely spent more time getting ready than she should have. Picking an outfit that says we're friends and this isn't weird-- a cream-colored shell with a gray cardigan over, smart slacks and low heels. She looks put-together but-- she hopes-- not intimidatingly so.
Friends should be easy; they've been friends for decades, since long before they were romantically involved. It's too important a connection to wholly sever-- at least, that's how she feels about it; and he's here too, so she imagines he must feel the same-- but limited contact, in its way, is harder than none at all.
"Same as ever-- never enough coverage, always too much to do. But it's good." It tears her apart, and at the same time she thrives on it. "Thank you-- for coming out to meet me, I mean."
Friendship was easy, at one point. But friendship had come with sixty-hour work weeks and nights spent next door to each other in crappy motels. Three AM phone calls, near-death experiences. Not meeting up for some all-American fare every couple of months, sitting across from each other without touching.
Even when he'd only known her a few weeks, he'd always had a hand at her back.
There's a too-long silence during which Mulder looks at Scully, internally rallying the desire to answer her like the normal, distantly friendly person he is to her. And just looking at her, too, swallowing down every detail of her appearance just in case it's the last time they do this. Scully's still got it; someday, she'll meet somebody, and she'll call him, apologetic, and say things about moving on and valuing everything they did together, all the little breakup lines reapplied to a friendship. "Any time."
And since the purpose is, ostensibly, mail delivery, he pushes the manila envelope her way. "I junked everything I could tell was junk, but they're getting really good at making ads look like important notices these days."
Maybe that's the problem-- even their early friendship was oddly intimate; they're trying to return to a normal they never actually had, and without the convenient distraction of shared work.
(Part of her had hoped he'd return-- if not to the FBI and the x-files, at least to something; some puzzle to keep him occupied, some structure to his days. It's not why she left, but she wonders sometimes if it might have made a difference.)
"They really have," she agrees with a faint smile; it's small talk, but easy small talk doesn't come so easily. It feels like an accomplishment. "Our new receptionist can't tell the difference either." She slides the envelope over to her side, sets in beside her on the bench. Now there's no reason to stay, really.
She stays.
"Really," she asks, a little gently. "How was your trip?"
He'd like to think he's keeping busy: research of both the book and field sort, communications with other paranormal enthusiasts, half-hearted attempts at writing a book that the US government would never allow to be published. There are days when he walks around in the middle of nowhere until his legs ache, then comes home and pulls a new recipe from a cookbook and tries to master it. And, these days, there's weekly sessions with a head-shrinker. It's almost like having his own private insane asylum, strolling the grounds and being asked about his mother. Sometimes it's enough. Frequently, it's not. But it's something.
He hasn't told Scully about the way he's Girl, Interrupted himself - albeit without the chicken carcasses and dramatic suicides. He's not sure if he can, or will.
Not that he's doing a great job of talking to her about anything else. He's about to answer when a waitress comes over, and that's the moment of truth. He looks at Scully, trying not to betray hope in his voice. "Are you up for dinner?"
(They came here for dinner, but that doesn't mean they're going to commit to an actual meal. Mulder's not sure how far to push this.)
It'd be a surprise, for sure-- though a pleasant one, more or less. Even if they never spoke again she'd wish him well-- she wants him to be healthy and happy, even if it's not with her. And-- she'd started to wonder if maybe with her wasn't part of the problem.
"Sure," she says casually. Like it's not a decision at all, like she hasn't been debating since they made the plan whether she should get out of it. But she just lowers her gaze to the menu for a moment, scanning it and ordering a salad with chicken and an iced tea-- probably unsurprising. At least this means she won't have to do dishes.
It's not so different from the way things used to be. He orders a burger and fries, she gets her salad, and it could be anywhere in America, the in-between on a case.
And then the waitress leaves again, and they're back to being Dr. Scully and Itinerant Mulder. It's quiet for a moment, and then he says, "There've been five Bigfoot sightings in Nicholas County, West Virginia, since the late 80s. So I spent a few days in Monongahela National Forest with wide-angle lens."
As awkward as things have been, something about this is so familiar it puts her at ease. It's not the same-- she won't steal fries off his plate or tangle their ankles together under the table. They won't head back to adjoining rooms in some awful motel and spread crime scene photos over one of the beds and argue theories all night. He'll go home, and she'll go to her condo. (That is-- she'll go home; her condo is home.) And in a month or more they'll text about something else, and if they're really lucky, it won't be strange and fraught.
"How credible do you think they were?"
She's humoring him a little-- he doesn't need to ask to know she's doubtful about all Bigfoot sightings on principle-- but not totally dismissive; they have, after all, seen stranger thing in their time.
"Well, one of them was a five-year-old, so that's probably about as believable as a sighting of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles," he says dryly. "The others are more credible, if you ask me. You're looking at close to a million acres of trees in the Allegheny Mountains; there's a lot of room for large mammals to hide, and some of the terrain is rough going.
"Of course, it's almost all second-growth forest, stuff that was planted after loggers came through the first time. But the key word there is almost - and once their land was rewilded, the Sasquatch population would have room to grow again." Explaining these things makes it almost - almost - feel like old times. Scully won't believe a word of it, but that doesn't matter; the fact that she listens anyway is what he loves about her. Forcing him to construct good, scientific arguments is her superpower. It animates him beyond here's my ex, here's her mail, at least she isn't engaged to anyone.
She never would have believed a word of it, and she still doesn't. But it doesn't sound impossible the way it would have twenty years back. Unlikely-- but unlikely used to be most of what they saw.
And there's a part of her that almost wishes it were true. A world where Bigfoot is only a short drive away might be a world where other impossible things could happen-- where, maybe, they could be close again, and happy.
(Stranger things have happened.)
"And until that new-growth habitat is threatened you probably wouldn't have much activity getting attention. Reminds me of that case in New Jersey."
"A Jersey devil that never catches the media's attention," he agrees. It's exactly the right comparison, and the look on his face says as much. "Until the government decides to carve up national park land, any Sasquatch in this forest should be safe."
Which is possible, of course, but it feels far less likely an outcome than any privately held part of the Pine Barrens.
"There's actually a place up in Alaska I'd like to check out sometime - Wrangell-St. Elias, biggest national park in the country. Even you have admit that thirteen million square miles leaves a lot of room for mystery, Scully - but that's still in the planning stages." He'll price it out eventually. For now, it's mostly coming up because he's got something to prove - namely, that he hasn't yet been swallowed up by the darkness she saw in him. "But enough about me. What have you been up to?"
Frankly, Alaska is far more interesting than anything she could offer up. It's funny, because she needs that-- the mundane day-to-day, to keep her grounded in the real world. She doesn't exactly love it, the world of small talk and expense reports and paying bills. But without some balance she starts to lose herself.
"Nothing interesting, I'm afraid. Working on some grant proposals-- most of the cases I see aren't... a high priority, for the administration." Some things never change. "I tried to join a book club, but couldn't find the time to actually read any of them."
"Wall-to-wall work," he says sympathetically. Scully in a book club, he can imagine. Scully spending all her time doing medicine and then coming home exhausted - that, too. But there's something about it that bugs him, and he has to take a moment (and another sip of coffee) before he can decide what it is.
It's the fact that the stated problem in their relationship was the fact that he haunted their home like a ghost, dragging both of them further into a misery that she was, admittedly, correct in spotting. The idea that we're not living our best lives was reason enough to leave, when the life she describes doesn't sound all that much different or better than what they had together. It's mostly Mulder-free, of course; she probably goes days at a time without thinking about poltergeists or cryptids or the Illuminati, and maybe that's enough to make everything else worth it.
But it still bothers him. So he asks the inevitable question. "Are you happy?"
(If nothing else, at least it's not confrontational or accusatory. He genuinely wants to know - he just doesn't really care that it's not the kind of thing you're supposed to ask people, especially exes. When has he ever cared about that?)
It's a fair question. It's not one she expected, but he's got the right to ask-- has the right to ask far more bitterly than he has. Maybe that's a good sign, the honest care in his voice. (Maybe it's a terrible sign, the tenderness he still holds for her. They're supposed to be moving on.)
And... she can't say, really, that she's happier than she was when things were at their best. But it's evened out-- the peaks don't come with valleys; she doesn't feel like she's drifting further, inevitably, into darkness. It's a tradeoff that felt necessary.
"I am," she says evenly. "I think so. It's... been an adjustment. But things are... good." She takes a breath.
"It's good to see you," she adds.
It could be a platitude, but she sounds too earnest.
He wants to touch her. Grab her hand, bump his foot against hers, maybe come around to the other side of the booth so the edges of their bodies can touch - he's not picky. That's not really a friend thing, though. Or rather, it's not a post-breakup friend thing, even if it was a completely reasonable gesture pre-relationship.
The problem is, he can't quite believe her. Sure, Scully's always struggled to take a break from working, but it's different when the job isn't the X-files; it feels weird and lonely to think of her going home and sitting in an empty house, ten hours away from doing the whole thing all over again for another twelve hours.
(Maybe that's unfair. Maybe she's got non-book-club hobbies, or a TV show she watches to unwind, or a lover who shows up occasionally to screw her brains out and wake up the whole...apartment complex? Neighborhood? It occurs to him that he doesn't actually know where she's living, and that feels weird, too.)
(Really, the weird thing isn't what Scully's doing or not doing. It's that Mulder doesn't know and can't entirely guess, and he spent close to twenty years knowing just about everything about her. It's that he'll never know everything about her again, and a year hasn't been enough time to resign himself to that. There might never be a point when he's totally comfortable with that fact.)
Instead of doing anything - besides drumming his fingers lightly on the table, he allows himself that - he says, "It's good to see you, too. I, ah, think about you sometimes, so it's good to hear you're okay."
She's always been a workaholic, but it's different at the hospital. When they were on the x-files the odds were always stacked against them, but in medicine it's sure to be a losing game. The house always wins in the end, and that does take a toll on her. (It's rewarding work. That's the truth-- it's not just something she tells herself-- but it weighs on her, too.)
And... yes. She's happy, or happy enough. It's not the life she'd planned on having-- but that's been off the menu for decades. It's maybe not the life she'd pick now, if she could have anything-- but they aren't good for each other. It's not even that he's not good for her. She thinks maybe that's what he took away from her leaving, and of course he did-- of course that's what it sounded like on his end. That she was trapped and so she was escaping. But neither of them were doing well, living like that. She'd been at a loss to fix it, so she--
Well, she ran away.
It's so strange to sit across from one another like strangers. Like colleagues, at best, except when they were colleagues it was never like this. Objectively it's a good thing that they're able to do this-- that they can stay in each other's lives in some capacity. (That she can keep an eye on him, if only occasionally, from a distance.) But at the same time it's impossible, knowing what they used to have, not to wish for more.
"Maybe we should talk more," she says softly. It feels like a dangerous suggestion.
His expression sharpens at the idea, like he's coming into focus around the premise of getting to talk to Scully again. More is impossible to quantify - does it mean you can text me once a week when you see a calf in a field and think I'd like a photo of its big brown eyes, or does it mean actual conversations? Two AM questions - that can be answered long after two AM - and news articles he reads and opinions on politics and yes, baby cows and garden flowers and the monarch butterfly chrysalis he'd discovered a few days ago.
(And asking about her, of course, but that's the stuff he doesn't really have tacit permission for anymore. There's a certain danger to investigating Scully too deeply: What are you doing tonight, oh I'm going out with someone, it's a third date, feels pretty significant. She's always been more private a person than Mulder, anyway; he'd rather she threw him the things she wanted him to know about, without his probing for them.)
The food arrives, and that gives him an excuse not to reply for a moment. When the waitress has walked away, though, and he's squeezing ketchup onto his plate, he asks, "How much more?"
And there it is-- that spark of interest in his eyes, confirmation that it's a dangerous offer. Not a bad one, necessarily-- when she left it seemed like nothing stirred much interest for him. For either of them, really; they'd been going through the motions of life, rudderless and drifting. But seeing him intrigued and animate she feels that base desire to chase after him, to explore whatever it is that's caught his attention.
Even after years together, she's not sure Mulder has ever understood the pull he has on her. It's not quite right to say like a moth to flame, because-- until the last year or so, at least-- there was no element of self-destruction to it. But he overwhelms her-- he always has, from those early days of professional admiration to the last time she walked out their door. In a room with him, she can't help being in love with him-- she can't even question it. With his magnet to her brain there's never an option but to follow him, to trust him, to adore him.
In his absence, yes, she loves him still; but away from his lodestone it's possible to see the course they'd charted. His brilliance squandered in newspaper clippings and undone chores and half-abandoned notes and charts; her need to care for others focused wholly, frantically, on Mulder-- and still insufficient to keep him whole.
"I don't know." She toys with her fork at the uneasy admission, poking at a piece of chicken as though it has a better answer. "I just-- I'd like if we didn't have to find an excuse for it. If it didn't feel like I was prying when I ask how you are."
Mulder could probably make jokes about animal magnetism, maybe even mesmerism - but the truth is, he has no idea why Scully's so drawn to his particular charisma. Theirs has always been a synchrony without much logic to it beyond opposites attract. Sure, the balance of science and what some people call pseudoscience, normal and paranormal, is there - but they're uniquely suited to each other in disposition as well.
He thought so, anyway. He's back to hoping it might be true.
"It's not." That part is easy: Scully's always entitled to know how he's doing, even when the answer is something like I feel lost without you and I'm angry that we have to be apart. Maybe especially then - some part of him would have liked to have lashed out. He knows better, sure, but those early days were hard. The first November without her felt like dying. Dipping a fry in some ketchup, he goes on, "I don't know how to do this halfway, Scully. If we're not together but we're talking - you're going to have to be the one who hits the brakes."
Considering they've ended up where they are because of her choices, it seems fair enough to her. That doesn't mean she doesn't inwardly wince at it. But he's got a point.
"Do you think-- would that be okay? We've never really been good at boundaries." He's never been good at boundaries, and she's never been good at it with him, even if she's an enigma to everyone else.
"If it's going to hurt you to hear from me but have me step away sometimes... I don't want to make things worse for you."
"Scully." Around a mouthful of burger - not the most auspicious way to reply. So he chews and swallows before he goes on. "You already left. How could you make things worse?"
Okay, even Mulder, the wronged party in his own mind, has to admit that that's cruel. There's no room for an apology in him at the moment - or ever, possibly - but he tries to clarify, the look on his face pure wait, let's walk that back.
(He maybe doesn't deserve the chance to rephrase it, but damned if he's not going to try. He's missed her so much, even if he can't keep hurt and cynicism from surfacing.)
"I'm not expecting you to be on call for me. If you don't respond, you don't respond." Like it's that easy. He'd like to imagine, though, that he'll let go an unanswered text in favor of a long run or an Outer Limits marathon.
This time the wince is a visible one. She isn't upset-- it's true, and she deserves that-- but it's part of why she's so hesitant. He has every right to still be angry, but if that's where they are, it's no foundation to build a new relationship of any sort.
But it means something that he catches himself that he so obviously regrets the barb. It doesn't mean it doesn't sting, or that he didn't mean it, but it's a step in the right direction.
"Okay." It sounds a little more sure than she really is, but not by much. But she misses him; she worries about him more than she should, and it's not like Scully has ever been good at relinquishing control over anything in her life, Mulder's well- being included.
"You can keep me up to date on your hunt for Bigfoot," she adds.
He fires a shot, and it lands - and he hates himself a little for it. But Scully doesn't comment on it; she's taking the high road here, and Mulder knows he doesn't deserve that mercy. What he deserves is probably a tense argument in a diner booth and six months of silence. When he gets something kinder, he takes it and tries to return it in kind.
"We'll see what kind of cell reception I can get in the mountains. Last time I was up there, smartphones didn't exist." He doesn't want to talk about that occasion, though - making his way to an ice cave in search of an alien corpse while Scully lay dying of cancer. It'll be summer this time, warm and green, and he won't be on a mountain. He'll still be alone, but this time, it'll actually be his fault, and he can live with that. "And you can tell me about..."
He's still not sure what she does in her spare time. He's not sure she knows, either; sometimes he wonders if half the reason she works so hard and so long is to avoid having to think when there's no more work to do. If she's taken up hobbies, she hasn't shared them. If she has friends, she hasn't told him about them. If all she does is lay down on the couch to watch TV or read a book, he'd still be interested, but even he knows he's lost any right to make demands.
"Whatever you want," he finishes, and something in his voice softens. "I just want to hear from you."
It isn't pure magnanimity that gives him some leniency to be angry, to lash out. It isn't only her desire to face her sins either. Simply put, she misses him terribly. She's not totally alone in life now, but no one else is Mulder. It's hard not being able to turn to him and invoke some strange ancient memory, remember the time in the volcano, that time in the woods, that terrible turbulence flying to Texas, remember that small town we stayed in for a month before the cops drove by three nights in a row and we bolted? No one else understands the things she's experienced like he does, and without that history she can't help holding people at arm's length.
Ironic then that she's trying to keep him close but at a distance. But the truth is that while being cut off from him is probably healthier than being together was, it isn't much easier. Maybe they can have a healthy friendship.
"There's not much to tell," she admits. "Mostly work. I was thinking about adopting a dog but I'm not home enough. But... we can check in, once in a while."
It might make things hard for her, to have more frequent reminders. But she already left. How much worse could it be?
"Then you can tell me about work - everything that won't violate HIPAA." Because as it is, it sounds suspiciously like they'll talk about him for a while, and then she'll disappear until it's convenient to ask him about himself again. If they're going to do this, then he wants some of Scully, too, to be allowed back into the privacy of her life.
(Maybe he should have suggested they get a dog, back when they were still together. He hadn't liked the idea, because he hadn't really liked Queequeg, and on some level, he knows that it'd probably be like other couples having a kid to try and save a marriage. But maybe it would have made a difference. Maybe some long-legged, non-cannibalistic creature who'd go on runs with him would have given them both enough purpose that they could live in the same house.)
"When you want to," he adds after a moment, because we can check in, once in a while isn't a continuing conversation. He's imagining something besides what he's likely to receive - for all he knows, checking in means awkwardly conversing every three months, not every four. "Or when you give in and get a dog, and you need a sitter."
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So he's doing well, but he's not blind. And he tells himself that it's good to be able to see her and be friends with her, to exist a normal social distance apart. If a dull ache still comes with it (Scully left, even Scully left), at least he's not still at rock bottom.
"Great." He takes a sip of his coffee and takes the moment to glance at her hands, like any normal friend making sure his ex didn't get engaged since they last saw each other would do. "I've got some shots I still need to blow up in Photoshop. How's medicine?"
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Friends should be easy; they've been friends for decades, since long before they were romantically involved. It's too important a connection to wholly sever-- at least, that's how she feels about it; and he's here too, so she imagines he must feel the same-- but limited contact, in its way, is harder than none at all.
"Same as ever-- never enough coverage, always too much to do. But it's good." It tears her apart, and at the same time she thrives on it. "Thank you-- for coming out to meet me, I mean."
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Even when he'd only known her a few weeks, he'd always had a hand at her back.
There's a too-long silence during which Mulder looks at Scully, internally rallying the desire to answer her like the normal, distantly friendly person he is to her. And just looking at her, too, swallowing down every detail of her appearance just in case it's the last time they do this. Scully's still got it; someday, she'll meet somebody, and she'll call him, apologetic, and say things about moving on and valuing everything they did together, all the little breakup lines reapplied to a friendship. "Any time."
And since the purpose is, ostensibly, mail delivery, he pushes the manila envelope her way. "I junked everything I could tell was junk, but they're getting really good at making ads look like important notices these days."
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(Part of her had hoped he'd return-- if not to the FBI and the x-files, at least to something; some puzzle to keep him occupied, some structure to his days. It's not why she left, but she wonders sometimes if it might have made a difference.)
"They really have," she agrees with a faint smile; it's small talk, but easy small talk doesn't come so easily. It feels like an accomplishment. "Our new receptionist can't tell the difference either." She slides the envelope over to her side, sets in beside her on the bench. Now there's no reason to stay, really.
She stays.
"Really," she asks, a little gently. "How was your trip?"
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He hasn't told Scully about the way he's Girl, Interrupted himself - albeit without the chicken carcasses and dramatic suicides. He's not sure if he can, or will.
Not that he's doing a great job of talking to her about anything else. He's about to answer when a waitress comes over, and that's the moment of truth. He looks at Scully, trying not to betray hope in his voice. "Are you up for dinner?"
(They came here for dinner, but that doesn't mean they're going to commit to an actual meal. Mulder's not sure how far to push this.)
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"Sure," she says casually. Like it's not a decision at all, like she hasn't been debating since they made the plan whether she should get out of it. But she just lowers her gaze to the menu for a moment, scanning it and ordering a salad with chicken and an iced tea-- probably unsurprising. At least this means she won't have to do dishes.
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And then the waitress leaves again, and they're back to being Dr. Scully and Itinerant Mulder. It's quiet for a moment, and then he says, "There've been five Bigfoot sightings in Nicholas County, West Virginia, since the late 80s. So I spent a few days in Monongahela National Forest with wide-angle lens."
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"How credible do you think they were?"
She's humoring him a little-- he doesn't need to ask to know she's doubtful about all Bigfoot sightings on principle-- but not totally dismissive; they have, after all, seen stranger thing in their time.
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"Of course, it's almost all second-growth forest, stuff that was planted after loggers came through the first time. But the key word there is almost - and once their land was rewilded, the Sasquatch population would have room to grow again." Explaining these things makes it almost - almost - feel like old times. Scully won't believe a word of it, but that doesn't matter; the fact that she listens anyway is what he loves about her. Forcing him to construct good, scientific arguments is her superpower. It animates him beyond here's my ex, here's her mail, at least she isn't engaged to anyone.
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And there's a part of her that almost wishes it were true. A world where Bigfoot is only a short drive away might be a world where other impossible things could happen-- where, maybe, they could be close again, and happy.
(Stranger things have happened.)
"And until that new-growth habitat is threatened you probably wouldn't have much activity getting attention. Reminds me of that case in New Jersey."
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Which is possible, of course, but it feels far less likely an outcome than any privately held part of the Pine Barrens.
"There's actually a place up in Alaska I'd like to check out sometime - Wrangell-St. Elias, biggest national park in the country. Even you have admit that thirteen million square miles leaves a lot of room for mystery, Scully - but that's still in the planning stages." He'll price it out eventually. For now, it's mostly coming up because he's got something to prove - namely, that he hasn't yet been swallowed up by the darkness she saw in him. "But enough about me. What have you been up to?"
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"Nothing interesting, I'm afraid. Working on some grant proposals-- most of the cases I see aren't... a high priority, for the administration." Some things never change. "I tried to join a book club, but couldn't find the time to actually read any of them."
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It's the fact that the stated problem in their relationship was the fact that he haunted their home like a ghost, dragging both of them further into a misery that she was, admittedly, correct in spotting. The idea that we're not living our best lives was reason enough to leave, when the life she describes doesn't sound all that much different or better than what they had together. It's mostly Mulder-free, of course; she probably goes days at a time without thinking about poltergeists or cryptids or the Illuminati, and maybe that's enough to make everything else worth it.
But it still bothers him. So he asks the inevitable question. "Are you happy?"
(If nothing else, at least it's not confrontational or accusatory. He genuinely wants to know - he just doesn't really care that it's not the kind of thing you're supposed to ask people, especially exes. When has he ever cared about that?)
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And... she can't say, really, that she's happier than she was when things were at their best. But it's evened out-- the peaks don't come with valleys; she doesn't feel like she's drifting further, inevitably, into darkness. It's a tradeoff that felt necessary.
"I am," she says evenly. "I think so. It's... been an adjustment. But things are... good." She takes a breath.
"It's good to see you," she adds.
It could be a platitude, but she sounds too earnest.
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The problem is, he can't quite believe her. Sure, Scully's always struggled to take a break from working, but it's different when the job isn't the X-files; it feels weird and lonely to think of her going home and sitting in an empty house, ten hours away from doing the whole thing all over again for another twelve hours.
(Maybe that's unfair. Maybe she's got non-book-club hobbies, or a TV show she watches to unwind, or a lover who shows up occasionally to screw her brains out and wake up the whole...apartment complex? Neighborhood? It occurs to him that he doesn't actually know where she's living, and that feels weird, too.)
(Really, the weird thing isn't what Scully's doing or not doing. It's that Mulder doesn't know and can't entirely guess, and he spent close to twenty years knowing just about everything about her. It's that he'll never know everything about her again, and a year hasn't been enough time to resign himself to that. There might never be a point when he's totally comfortable with that fact.)
Instead of doing anything - besides drumming his fingers lightly on the table, he allows himself that - he says, "It's good to see you, too. I, ah, think about you sometimes, so it's good to hear you're okay."
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And... yes. She's happy, or happy enough. It's not the life she'd planned on having-- but that's been off the menu for decades. It's maybe not the life she'd pick now, if she could have anything-- but they aren't good for each other. It's not even that he's not good for her. She thinks maybe that's what he took away from her leaving, and of course he did-- of course that's what it sounded like on his end. That she was trapped and so she was escaping. But neither of them were doing well, living like that. She'd been at a loss to fix it, so she--
Well, she ran away.
It's so strange to sit across from one another like strangers. Like colleagues, at best, except when they were colleagues it was never like this. Objectively it's a good thing that they're able to do this-- that they can stay in each other's lives in some capacity. (That she can keep an eye on him, if only occasionally, from a distance.) But at the same time it's impossible, knowing what they used to have, not to wish for more.
"Maybe we should talk more," she says softly. It feels like a dangerous suggestion.
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(And asking about her, of course, but that's the stuff he doesn't really have tacit permission for anymore. There's a certain danger to investigating Scully too deeply: What are you doing tonight, oh I'm going out with someone, it's a third date, feels pretty significant. She's always been more private a person than Mulder, anyway; he'd rather she threw him the things she wanted him to know about, without his probing for them.)
The food arrives, and that gives him an excuse not to reply for a moment. When the waitress has walked away, though, and he's squeezing ketchup onto his plate, he asks, "How much more?"
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Even after years together, she's not sure Mulder has ever understood the pull he has on her. It's not quite right to say like a moth to flame, because-- until the last year or so, at least-- there was no element of self-destruction to it. But he overwhelms her-- he always has, from those early days of professional admiration to the last time she walked out their door. In a room with him, she can't help being in love with him-- she can't even question it. With his magnet to her brain there's never an option but to follow him, to trust him, to adore him.
In his absence, yes, she loves him still; but away from his lodestone it's possible to see the course they'd charted. His brilliance squandered in newspaper clippings and undone chores and half-abandoned notes and charts; her need to care for others focused wholly, frantically, on Mulder-- and still insufficient to keep him whole.
"I don't know." She toys with her fork at the uneasy admission, poking at a piece of chicken as though it has a better answer. "I just-- I'd like if we didn't have to find an excuse for it. If it didn't feel like I was prying when I ask how you are."
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He thought so, anyway. He's back to hoping it might be true.
"It's not." That part is easy: Scully's always entitled to know how he's doing, even when the answer is something like I feel lost without you and I'm angry that we have to be apart. Maybe especially then - some part of him would have liked to have lashed out. He knows better, sure, but those early days were hard. The first November without her felt like dying. Dipping a fry in some ketchup, he goes on, "I don't know how to do this halfway, Scully. If we're not together but we're talking - you're going to have to be the one who hits the brakes."
Not a fair thing to ask of her, but a true one.
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"Do you think-- would that be okay? We've never really been good at boundaries." He's never been good at boundaries, and she's never been good at it with him, even if she's an enigma to everyone else.
"If it's going to hurt you to hear from me but have me step away sometimes... I don't want to make things worse for you."
Which might seem laughable, considering.
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Okay, even Mulder, the wronged party in his own mind, has to admit that that's cruel. There's no room for an apology in him at the moment - or ever, possibly - but he tries to clarify, the look on his face pure wait, let's walk that back.
(He maybe doesn't deserve the chance to rephrase it, but damned if he's not going to try. He's missed her so much, even if he can't keep hurt and cynicism from surfacing.)
"I'm not expecting you to be on call for me. If you don't respond, you don't respond." Like it's that easy. He'd like to imagine, though, that he'll let go an unanswered text in favor of a long run or an Outer Limits marathon.
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But it means something that he catches himself that he so obviously regrets the barb. It doesn't mean it doesn't sting, or that he didn't mean it, but it's a step in the right direction.
"Okay." It sounds a little more sure than she really is, but not by much. But she misses him; she worries about him more than she should, and it's not like Scully has ever been good at relinquishing control over anything in her life, Mulder's well- being included.
"You can keep me up to date on your hunt for Bigfoot," she adds.
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"We'll see what kind of cell reception I can get in the mountains. Last time I was up there, smartphones didn't exist." He doesn't want to talk about that occasion, though - making his way to an ice cave in search of an alien corpse while Scully lay dying of cancer. It'll be summer this time, warm and green, and he won't be on a mountain. He'll still be alone, but this time, it'll actually be his fault, and he can live with that. "And you can tell me about..."
He's still not sure what she does in her spare time. He's not sure she knows, either; sometimes he wonders if half the reason she works so hard and so long is to avoid having to think when there's no more work to do. If she's taken up hobbies, she hasn't shared them. If she has friends, she hasn't told him about them. If all she does is lay down on the couch to watch TV or read a book, he'd still be interested, but even he knows he's lost any right to make demands.
"Whatever you want," he finishes, and something in his voice softens. "I just want to hear from you."
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Ironic then that she's trying to keep him close but at a distance. But the truth is that while being cut off from him is probably healthier than being together was, it isn't much easier. Maybe they can have a healthy friendship.
"There's not much to tell," she admits. "Mostly work. I was thinking about adopting a dog but I'm not home enough. But... we can check in, once in a while."
It might make things hard for her, to have more frequent reminders. But she already left. How much worse could it be?
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(Maybe he should have suggested they get a dog, back when they were still together. He hadn't liked the idea, because he hadn't really liked Queequeg, and on some level, he knows that it'd probably be like other couples having a kid to try and save a marriage. But maybe it would have made a difference. Maybe some long-legged, non-cannibalistic creature who'd go on runs with him would have given them both enough purpose that they could live in the same house.)
"When you want to," he adds after a moment, because we can check in, once in a while isn't a continuing conversation. He's imagining something besides what he's likely to receive - for all he knows, checking in means awkwardly conversing every three months, not every four. "Or when you give in and get a dog, and you need a sitter."
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