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[jowls]

Leave prompts, you'll get nonsense.

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[rockitlike]

You'll enjoy blowing things up more.

[jowls]

You got me there.
I'll clear out the field, we'll do it away from the house.

[rockitlike]

I think we can manage.

I trust you.

[jowls]

I'll get started on it after the nursery's done.
I think we can start moving furniture in by the end of the week.

[rockitlike]

We've got some time for worrying about fireworks, at least.

Sometimes I still can't believe we're doing this.

[jowls]

That's what you think. I might get some for when we bring the turnip home.

Me, too. It doesn't seem real, even though I'm covered in paint.

[rockitlike]

It's not like moving in was. I think I was still waiting then, like we were going to have to go on the run again.

Let's have a fire tonight. Maybe you can drink a glass of wine on my behalf.

[jowls]

You want to have a practice bonfire?

I think there's some of that sparkling apple juice in a cupboard somewhere. We'll suffer sobriety together.

[rockitlike]

I want to sit together and lean on your shoulder and a bonfire seems likes a nice place to do it.

I can work with that.

[jowls]

As soon as you get home, after you've inspected the turnip's new digs.

How's the nausea? Think you can eat a steak?

[rockitlike]

Right now I think I could eat anything but the great thing about pregnancy is, at any second that could change and I'll find everything revolting. But she's been behaving this week.

[jowls]

I stocked up on matzo ball soup mix just in case. I hear it's edible when everything else isn't.

You really have a feeling about the turnip, don't you? I'll have to stop calling her "it."

[rockitlike]

It's just a feeling. There's nothing scientific about it. But-- I do have a feeling.

If I get any odd cravings I'll let you know. We can make a chart. It wasn't too bad last time-- I don't think I'm at risk for pica.

[jowls]

Don't underestimate yourself, Scully. Pregnant mothers have been shown to be connected to the developing fetus in more than just physical ways. You might just know.

If I see you eating gravel, I'll intervene.

[rockitlike]

That much I can believe. Given everything we've seen... There's something to say for intuition. Or maybe I just feel bad saying 'it' about a person I spend so much time with. If I'm wrong, that's all right, too. But it feels right.

At least make sure I've got nice gravel.

[jowls]

Our little hypothesis. Considering you're the one who's hooked up to her, I'm willing to go on your intuition.

Bright blue, fresh from the aquarium.

[rockitlike]

I'll let you know if my intuition changes its mind. Maybe apples and turnips feel more feminine than cantaloupe will.

That's the stuff. I think I can head out in another half hour or so-- need anything on the way?

[jowls]

If I remember my high-school French, and I really don't, I think 'cantaloupe' is already feminine. La cantaloupe.

[ it's not, actually, but who's going to correct him. ]

Just you. I think I'm ready to hang up the paintbrush, but I want your opinion first.

[rockitlike]

[ Not Scully, who took German and is somewhat terrible at it. ]

Then I'll see you in a while. Open the windows to air out a little, ok?

[jowls]

On it.

[ And so all the windows get opened, some flank steak gets marinated for tacos, and a bottle of Martinelli's gets stashed in the fridge. Real date-night stuff, especially once he's set up some logs in the fire pit. ]

[rockitlike]

[ There are any number of reasons Scully is determined to work through as much of her pregnancy as possible. The biggest one admittedly might be sheer stubbornness. For now it really hasn't been an issue-- no one can really tell, and she isn't sharing; she's taking it fairly easy, but staying occupied keeps her from fretting too much. Very little about their lives is normal, and she's come to cherish that; especially their unexpected tendency towards miracles. But work is a little corner of normalcy that keeps her grounded.

Maybe, though, the biggest advantage to working is that it means she gets to come home every day, cruising down their endless driveway to a house that again feels like theirs-- maybe now more than it ever did before. It's not just Mulder's relentless nesting and his newfound interest in cooking-- though she never could've imagined him doing either. Something about committing to a future, however she's sidewound her way to doing it, has finally let her relax a little. She's stopped pretending she's only staying over a while, started folded clothes in the drawers, put her little collection of old books back on a shelf.

Setting her purse on a table and hanging her coat, she heads toward the nursery-to-be. ]

Are you ready for us?

[jowls]

As I'll ever be. C'mon in.

[ He meets her at the nursery door, swinging it open after he pecks her hello. After she enters, he pulls on a pair of violet-lensed glasses and follows. Without them, the room is a muddy mush of browns and olives, with some blue thrown in for good measure; with, he doubts he sees exactly the same as, say, Scully, but he can at least tell the different layers of paint apart.

Mulder's never been known for artistic talent, and that probably won't be changing any time soon. He's spent hours on YouTube and Pinterest tutorials, though, not to mention leafing through various books from the library and projecting various shapes on the walls to trace; at this point, he's pretty sure he's at least hit "mediocre imitation of Grandma Moses" levels of skill. Which, as far as he's concerned, is pretty good.

He's cleared the drop cloths away, so the hardwood floor is once again visible. Painter's tape still protects the baseboards and window casement, but the general effect is basically complete. Long, thin pine trees encircle the room, with slender trunks that get feathery green needles about halfway up. A thin brown layer of earth wobbles around the bottom of the wall, in a way he's hoping reads as realistic rather than sloppy. In one corner, the trees form a familiar shape at their crowns, and a UFO floats lazily in the air, missing only an I WANT TO BELIEVE amid the foliage. In another corner, two stiff figures, each the length of his forefinger, stand beneath the heavy green canopy in suits; one has red hair, the other brown, and neither has a discernible face. A silhouette of the Patterson-Gimlin Bigfoot hides between a few tree trunks, a red-eyed face peering around another. A little flock of V-shaped bird silhouettes fly above one copse of tree tops, just visible against the sky, which starts out a sunset-y orange and becomes blue, and then black - to match the ceiling, where constellations are daubed out in silver.

None of it is in proportion, but it's not really supposed to be. The feeling of it is what he wants, and to the best of his knowledge, he's gotten that: out in the woods on a nice night, the whole world beckoning. ]

[rockitlike]

[ Once, Dana Scully imagined her life would go this way: she'd come home from a long, challenging day at her high-profile job, she'd greet her handsome professional husband with a quick kiss, and they'd spend their evening alternating between intellectual conversation and the sort of obnoxious all-consuming affection only young people imagine is sustainable.

She'd given up on those daydreams early-- and in her thirties, having found and lost and found the love of her life, having borne and given up a child, standing on the precipice of an uncertain future on the run-- she'd thought, then, that she understood life, and love. She'd looked back on those naive dreams of youth with a rueful laugh. She'd let them go.

But here she is-- home from her interesting, challenging job; kissing her brilliant, handsome-- well, Mulder-- and looking at what he's done for their baby.

She gasps in surprise as she steps into the room, hand falling to her stomach as though to get their turnip's attention-- to show her what her father's been up to.

He'd mentioned a sky of stars, and somehow that's what she'd gotten stuck on-- and left him to it in peace, aside from a standing offer to help if he wanted. And though she'd thought he'd do something wonderful-- though she really hadn't known what to expect-- she hadn't expected this. ]

Mulder-- you could get lost in here.

[ Without turning back to him-- she's craning her head back to look at the stars-- she reaches out blindly for his hand. ]

[jowls]

[ Having essentially declared a leave of absence from the Bureau - a test retirement, as though that wasn't what he'd done with himself for years before he went back - Mulder might not count as a brilliant professional at this point. But at the moment, her reaction is enough to cement him as at least a little brilliant. It's gratifying, not least because it's classic Scully: effusive by her standards, easily read if one knows her, maybe less so if one doesn't.

She likes it, that much is clear. She likes it, and she really wasn't expecting what she got. Those sleepless nights spent watching tutorials on his phone with his airpods in clearly paid off.

Stepping a little closer, he slips his hand into hers, squeezing lightly. He touches her, and she touches the turnip - a hand at her belly and everything sloshing around under it - and in that moment, it's nearly like touching the kid himself. See that, he thinks at it, just in case there's something to be said for paternal psychic ability as well. I did this for you. ]

Tell me the colors are right. [ And, teasing (but also, seriously, it was necessary) - ] I made the guy at Home Depot match paint to a photo of your hair.

[rockitlike]

[ If her hand weren't so much smaller than his, her answering squeeze might be too tight. Lately it's easy for anything to overwhelm her feelings, if it catches at the right moment-- but this, there's no way she wouldn't be awestruck at what he's done. It's everything he was denied with William-- a testament to his hopes, his love for their unexpected and perfect little family. A reflection on the life that's brought them to this moment, together.

She's keenly aware of their daughter's presence, in this room-- to an extent she nearly always is, but dreaming and unconscious as she is, Scully knows when she thinks back on this moment she'll remember Katherine here with them, the child they haven't yet met.

(It's still so strange, the second time around, to think of it-- how this handful of cells is on its way to becoming a person, a being with thoughts and wants and immeasurable potential. In a couple of years they'll get glimpses at her perspective on all this, and everything else; she can't wait.)

She shifts closer so she can lean her head against him, with a wavering little laugh and a delicate sniff to hold off overwhelmed tears. ]

Did you really? [ Of course he would. ] It's incredible. It doesn't feel like a room in our house.