With a vague hum, she turns her attention, mostly, back to her salad. It's not a comfortable silence, but it's not as awkward as she might have feared. That has to be a good sign, right?
(She feels superstitious. It's unscientific, looking for evidence to support a theory she's already decided on. We can do this, we can be friends.)
They eat, and eventually she decides to try a question that feels a little more dangerous.
He laughs a little, the surprise on his face a clear indication that he's never, in fact, thought about this. "I don't think Quantico wants a class on how to lose your mind tracking down serial killers."
They certainly wouldn't want anything on the X-files or Military Tribunals 101. However meaningful his years at the Bureau were, they were fraught at the best of times; either he was making their lives hell, or they were making his life hell. The skills he possesses are undeniable - the more he thinks about it, the easier it is to see the logic - but can he justify teaching profiling when he's been out of the game so long? Hell, can he justify teaching profiling when it nearly destroyed him multiple times?
It's impossible to articulate why she asked. Part of her is on the cusp of saying I just hate to see you wasting your brilliance like this, but even in the sanctum of her mind she hears it in her father's voice, and even at her age it makes youthful indignation rise in her gorge. Mulder will take it the wrong way because there's no other way to take it, and if he were to teach anything it'd be a master class in contrariness.
But the truth is, she does hate to see him wasting his time, his potential, his incredible mind.
"Not necessarily at the Academy," she reasons. "Maybe not on paper but in practice you'd be qualified to teach psychology, I bet." She offers a little smile. "Or mysterious courses meeting at strange times of day to discuss the history of the paranormal."
He has connections, he has time and opportunity, she'd bet he could figure something out.
"Fox Mulder, the nutty professor," he says dryly. He could teach psychology as effectively as she could medicine, he suspects - which is to say, well, but he probably couldn't justify it to any school looking to hire him. Maybe at a community college, but in his heart of hearts, he'd feel like he was slumming, regardless of whether it was actually true. "We could both be teachers in our old age, Scully."
And, some part of him thinks, they could be bored out of their minds. He tries to think back to anything that might come close to teaching: younger agents trailing behind him, trying to build alliances or friendships, and he, closing himself off to them at every turn. "But I'd lack the pedagogy. I've never taught anyone."
"I think that's true of a lot of college professors."
It's the kind of thing he could look into, at least. And-- it's a matter of self-image, she thinks; just because he's never consciously taught anyone doesn't mean they haven't learned. A man with a curious mind, she imagines he'd be suited to it if he had the temperament to try.
"No, no. Meddling from you is..." Welcome is probably too obvious as a lie, if a partial one; he doesn't mind when she sticks her oar in, but when they're not together, it - as the kids say - hits different. Not unexpected is more cruelty than she deserves, especially after what she's taken today. He drags a fry through ketchup like he might find the answer there, in the viscous trail it leaves. "It's worth listening to."
That, at least, is true. Even if he can't imagine himself standing at the front of a class, refusing to let a lesson on staging versus signature get boring, Scully can, and that means something. Maybe he should contact Quantico, make not-overly-sarcastic ha, ha noises when they inevitably ask if he's thinking of a class on little green men, and see what he'd actually be on the hook for. Or, hell, the local community college, where he could drone on about Maslow's hierarchy of needs and wonder where he landed on it.
He wants so badly to touch her foot under the table, to ask why they're torturing themselves like this, to scoop her up into his arms and carry her away someplace neither of them have ever been before and make love to her like they'll die tomorrow. By her metric, this was probably a terrible idea; he's supposed to be over the idea of them. But being around her feels more like living than anything he does on his own, no matter how deliberate he is about it. Running and cooking, medication and therapy, cleaning on nights when he can't sleep - it's all rote memorization of what life's supposed to look like, a fake-it-til-you-make-it existence. Time spent with Scully feels real.
So maybe she's right. He might have to allow for that. Maybe he needs something else to fill his days than a half-assed attempt at a memoir and endless collections of newspaper clippings.
"But that does put me in position to meddle back." He eats his fry and doesn't try to touch her. "You're opening yourself up to some risk, Scully."
Again, he gives her an eminently reasonable reply. It's a surprise, and mostly a pleasant one, though there's that little part of her, still frustrated by the bad years, that can't help wondering if it's intentional-- a way to needle her, to say see, you had no reason to leave, everything could have been fine if you stayed. She knows he doesn't mean that-- even apart she trusts him too much to seriously entertain the idea-- but quieting her own worst impulses is easier said than done.
She doesn't expect him to be over them, exactly. Obviously she isn't-- if she was she wouldn't be here, watching him across the table and wishing they were leaving together. Her brand of fantasy is both more and less intimate than his: she misses being able to lean on his shoulder, misses waking up on cold mornings in a warm embrace. Scully has always been good at being alone, and that's why she's all right without him. But she misses not having to be alone.
"I guess I am," she concedes, careful. "That seems fair."
But if he'll be as reasonable in meddling as he has been responding to it, maybe that's not the end of the world. She'll at least hear him out.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
(She feels superstitious. It's unscientific, looking for evidence to support a theory she's already decided on. We can do this, we can be friends.)
They eat, and eventually she decides to try a question that feels a little more dangerous.
"Do you ever think about teaching, or something?"
no subject
They certainly wouldn't want anything on the X-files or Military Tribunals 101. However meaningful his years at the Bureau were, they were fraught at the best of times; either he was making their lives hell, or they were making his life hell. The skills he possesses are undeniable - the more he thinks about it, the easier it is to see the logic - but can he justify teaching profiling when he's been out of the game so long? Hell, can he justify teaching profiling when it nearly destroyed him multiple times?
no subject
But the truth is, she does hate to see him wasting his time, his potential, his incredible mind.
"Not necessarily at the Academy," she reasons. "Maybe not on paper but in practice you'd be qualified to teach psychology, I bet." She offers a little smile. "Or mysterious courses meeting at strange times of day to discuss the history of the paranormal."
He has connections, he has time and opportunity, she'd bet he could figure something out.
no subject
And, some part of him thinks, they could be bored out of their minds. He tries to think back to anything that might come close to teaching: younger agents trailing behind him, trying to build alliances or friendships, and he, closing himself off to them at every turn. "But I'd lack the pedagogy. I've never taught anyone."
no subject
It's the kind of thing he could look into, at least. And-- it's a matter of self-image, she thinks; just because he's never consciously taught anyone doesn't mean they haven't learned. A man with a curious mind, she imagines he'd be suited to it if he had the temperament to try.
She shakes her head a bit.
"I'm sorry-- I shouldn't meddle, I know."
no subject
That, at least, is true. Even if he can't imagine himself standing at the front of a class, refusing to let a lesson on staging versus signature get boring, Scully can, and that means something. Maybe he should contact Quantico, make not-overly-sarcastic ha, ha noises when they inevitably ask if he's thinking of a class on little green men, and see what he'd actually be on the hook for. Or, hell, the local community college, where he could drone on about Maslow's hierarchy of needs and wonder where he landed on it.
He wants so badly to touch her foot under the table, to ask why they're torturing themselves like this, to scoop her up into his arms and carry her away someplace neither of them have ever been before and make love to her like they'll die tomorrow. By her metric, this was probably a terrible idea; he's supposed to be over the idea of them. But being around her feels more like living than anything he does on his own, no matter how deliberate he is about it. Running and cooking, medication and therapy, cleaning on nights when he can't sleep - it's all rote memorization of what life's supposed to look like, a fake-it-til-you-make-it existence. Time spent with Scully feels real.
So maybe she's right. He might have to allow for that. Maybe he needs something else to fill his days than a half-assed attempt at a memoir and endless collections of newspaper clippings.
"But that does put me in position to meddle back." He eats his fry and doesn't try to touch her. "You're opening yourself up to some risk, Scully."
no subject
She doesn't expect him to be over them, exactly. Obviously she isn't-- if she was she wouldn't be here, watching him across the table and wishing they were leaving together. Her brand of fantasy is both more and less intimate than his: she misses being able to lean on his shoulder, misses waking up on cold mornings in a warm embrace. Scully has always been good at being alone, and that's why she's all right without him. But she misses not having to be alone.
"I guess I am," she concedes, careful. "That seems fair."
But if he'll be as reasonable in meddling as he has been responding to it, maybe that's not the end of the world. She'll at least hear him out.