Work Text:
Opening her eyes slowly, she yawns and stretches her arms out to the side. The sunlight is pouring in through the window, winter bright, the kind of light that came to earth, found it covered in white, and danced hopelessly in the atmosphere, franticly looking for a surface to absorb into. This light has reflected off of a million surfaces and finally found her pupils, which retract quickly; it is all too much to take in, this desperate light.
She stretches her arms out farther, seeking her own surface to absorb into, but he’s not there. She opens her eyes, the light once again painfully rushing in, and sees what she already knew. The blankets are still disturbed from his slumber, but her partner is nowhere to be seen. Her heart hesitates for just a moment of panic before pulling itself back together, not ready to break. She will not allow herself this irrational fear after they have only just now gotten back together. They still have some things to talk about, but they have forgiven each other. Scully closes her eyes again, sees the red of her lids, and takes a deep breath, in through her nose to collect any olfactory clues she can.
There it is: coffee. In her mind she can see him waking early, opening the curtains to let the light in. She sees now that this was a subtle clue. He wanted to wake me, but he couldn’t, she thinks, so he opened the curtains to let the sun do it for him. He must have shuffled out, made the coffee, and sat down to read articles on his tablet.
Determined to sneak up on him while he is engrossed in an article, she pulls on a robe and steps into her slippers. The door to the bedroom is quiet when she opens it, and mentally thanks herself for oiling it last weekend. The stairs are creaky, but she knows all of the worst spots, tiptoeing along the edge of one to the middle of another, she makes it down almost silently. She smiles to herself at this. My agility skill is still high, she thinks, actively pushing her age out of her mind.
The rooms are all empty. She checks them all, and pours herself some coffee with half and half. She looks out the kitchen window of the farm house, and her mouth opens in surprise. There is a thick blanket of snow on the ground where last night there had only been about an inch and a half. It’s beautiful the way it clings heavily to the branches of the trees, and as she stares at it she knows. His boots and his coat are gone.
He’s gone to get wood for the fireplace. She opens the back door, and it collides with something when it is only a few inches wide. Wood. He put it too close to the door. So he isn’t getting firewood. She looks up, into the yard. There he is, about a hundred feet out into the snow, making a snow angel.
Only a few minutes later she is dressed and pulling on her boots, her puffy coat with the fur on the hood, a pair of thick, blue mittens. When she steps out the front door, the air is cold but windless. She can see her breath as she walks around the house to the back. He’s still there. He has a couple of rectangular plastic containers on the ground next to him, and he is flattening out a circle in the ground.
“Have you moved on from crop circles to snow circles, Mulder?”
“You’re awake,” he comments, rather than answering her question. He looks up at her face, which is red from the cold already, and smiles. She rubs her hands together and stomps her feet to chase away the cold.
“I’m awake. What are you doing?”
“Have you ever built an igloo, Scully?” He kneels down on the ground at the edge of what she can now clearly see is an igloo shape in the snow. There are several snow bricks already in place on one edge.
“ I remember trying. I don’t remember finishing one.”
“Here,” he offers, holding out one of the plastic containers he picked up off of the ground, “let’s finish one.”
She hesitates for just a moment, smiling down at him. She doesn’t want to break eye contact;she has missed this magnetic feeling, the spell his gaze puts her under. She is pulled down to her knees in front of him, one mitten-protected hand on his cheek. She kisses him lightly, lighter than she wants to, but she plans to savor each moment slowly and separately.
“Gimme that,” she says, snatching the container out of his hand and starting to pack snow inside it.
“Make sure the snow is packed tight. We can’t have our bricks falling apart,” Mulder warns, waving his index finger in the air. “We’re going to do this right.”
“Yes, sir,” she jokes, saluting with her giant mitten.
She turns her back to him to stack a brick, and the sound of the thud registers before the feeling. Her giant coat has protected her from a devious snowball attack. Retaliation is necessary, but she decides to play it like mature Scully so he won’t see it coming.
“Very mature, Mulder. I thought you were the boss in charge of this very important project. How can I get the job done effectively with all this horsing around?”
She picks up her brick mold, which still has some snow in it, and starts walking toward him. She keeps talking to keep him distracted.
“You know, I think this container flimsier than yours. Let me see that one,” she demands, filling her right hand with snow.
“They’re exactly the same, Scully. You can’t use different containers or your bricks won’t be uniform, you see, it’s very important t--aa-aahh!” he shouts as she shoves snow down the front of his coat.
They both collapse on the soft snow, laughing. When Mulder gets up he brushes the snow off of his back with his gloved hands, the offers one of them help to pull her up. She accepts, and they get back to business. After a few minutes, they are wordlessly focused on stacking the bricks just right. Their ability to take on a challenge together invigorates them both, and they each steal glances at the other when they think they’re not looking.
It doesn’t take as long to build an igloo as she thought it would. They stand for a moment, admiring their work, each with an arm around the other’s waist. She rubs her hand along his back before pulling away.
“C’mon," she calls, not bothering to turn around as she practically jogs toward the opening of the igloo. She dives inside and rolls over to lie on her back. She is looking up at the igloo ceiling when she hears him coming in a moment later. He grunts as he collapses onto his back next to her.
“What do you think?” he asks.
It’s just big enough for the two of us, she thinks, exactly as you planned it, I'm sure.
“It’s even better than I hoped,” she answers, turning to face him and propping herself up on her elbow.
“I agree. I had a vision in my head, you know, like any good architect, but I never imagined it would be this beautiful.” His eyes flicker to hers to let her know he is not just talking about igloos.
She leans down and allows herself to kiss him finally, deeply. I missed you, she thinks into the kiss, hoping he will hear. I don’t ever want to be apart again. When the kiss ends, she looks him in the eye again, and sees the a familiar sadness there, sees what he has been thinking.
“I know we talked a little about this already, but I just keep thinking...” he starts off, carefully. “I don’t want to start another fight. I just keep thinking about how I would have liked to do things like this with him. I know you will never really believe me, as much as you want to, but I don’t blame you. But this, Scully,” he gestures to the structure around them, “is something I would have built bigger to make room for him.”
They pause for the length of several breaths before she speaks.
“He would be a teenager now.”
“Yes. But I could tell him. I could tell him all of the things I wanted to do with him--for him--even if I already missed out on doing them.” At this, he looks down at the ground, digging lines in it with his finger. He sighs. “I mean, if it were me, I would want to meet us, even after all these years... especially after all these years.”
She puts her hand on his.
“OK.”
“OK?” he says, his head lifting in surprise.
“We’ll look into what your source says.”