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When he looks back on his life, he thinks he can remember the exact moment he felt himself love her for the first time.
Not desire her. Not covet her.
(He can also remember those days of merely wanting her - and who wouldn’t want her? She was cute from their very first meeting, looking way out of her depth in those clothes that were too big for her, that she’d probably borrowed from her mother or a friend to make herself look more mature. Yes, he’d wanted to impale himself on her, in her, deep inside her, from the very first time he saw her. It was only common sense (and maybe his past experiences) that told him he shouldn’t.)
Indeed, he’s pretty much always wanted her, but he’s talking about truly loving her. The way life partners love each other, the way true friends love each other, the way a child loves their parents. The way Plato described the ladder of love in his works. A love that transcends the needs and desires of the body. A love that may begin with lust - because love is born out of a desire for something that is lacking - but that surpasses the needs of the body and reaches the need of the soul.
The love of soulmates.
She’d been recently diagnosed with her cancer back then, which means she had somewhat recently slept with Ed Jerse too - and just thinking of the man’s name irks him, but no longer because of jealousy; nowadays, it annoys him that he’d been so puerile back then. Anyway, what’s important here is that, back then, he’d been volatile, impulsive, fraught. He'd been afraid.
He’d read her Brontë-styled ramblings in her cancer journal, and he’d feared his own death if she were to perish. He’d refused to believe she would ever leave him, voluntarily or otherwise, and so he’d alternated between showing her how important she was to him and keeping her at distance, between offering her feather-like touches and restraining her in mithril chains out of his heart’s reach. He’d always been mercurial in his early adulthood, and because he’d needed her like air, he’d also resented her for being unable to live under water away from her.
They’d been on an airplane then, that day he’d felt true love for the first time, coming home from a case they’d brilliantly, seamlessly worked together to solve. Just the day before, she’d had a nosebleed while they’d been in his room sharing a pizza after hours, and for the first time she’d confided some of her feelings to him, as predictable as they’d been - her obvious fear of dying, of cutting her life short. She’d also allowed him to care for her that night, allowed him to accompany her back to her room, to lay her down on her bed and enfold her protectively under covers as he lounged on top of the scratchy blanket and eventually engulfed her in his arms.
He should’ve been in a good mood that next day, but he hadn’t - something trivial, maybe her taking a little longer than he’d expected to gather her things in her motel room that morning, he can't really remember, had arisen the beast of impatience in him, made him punish her in his mind and, consequently, ignore her when she’d tried to be cordial to him.
She should’ve been hurt, or even irate - he wouldn’t be able to begrudge her either sentiment - but she’d been stoic. Somehow, she’d understood him.
Their cross-country flight had been close to full when they’d managed to procure their tickets, so they’d ended up sitting in separate rows. At first, he’d been glad for the distance; but somewhere over Tennessee, she’d walked up to him and mutely handed him a folded piece of paper.
And that's when it all changed.
Mulder,
Thank you so much for being there for me last night, and these past few weeks, and throughout this process overall - and I don’t mean just personally, but with our careers as well.
Everyday I get to work with you is a day I get to learn and be better in my profession and enjoy myself. Not every single day, not “every day”, but yes, everyday. Everyday I get to engage in intellectual sparring with you is a day that is special.
I know we are not as close as we could be, but I understand that circumstances and personal differences play an important factor in that. We are not the same, and we’re not batteries - polar opposites should not attract in human relationships. Polar opposites do teach us, on the other hand, how to evolve as individuals, in the sense that we get exposed to so much information that didn’t cross our minds in the first place, and they put a different perspective in front of us.
Being by your side over these past four years is akin to being handed a heavy, dirty rock out of the blue. At first, it makes no sense to carry it; yet, sometimes, once you assess it, study it deeply, clean it up and scrape the bits and pieces that are in the way… what do you know? You are somehow left with a completely unforeseen gem in our hands, a diamond in the rough we didn’t even know existed. And after all that, you see how lucky you are, and you come to appreciate it, and you work hard on that gem, until you have the most valuable of jewels in your possession.
At the end of the day, I am truly thankful for having you by my side as I find myself in this life, for however long I still have. You are my diamond.
With all the love,
Scully, Dana
He hadn't mentioned it to her then, and he thinks she'd expected that reaction of him.
It had taken him a long time to understand that the way she’d signed her letter - Scully, Dana - meant that both his partner and the woman behind her armor had been present then; that she’d given herself completely to him that day. It took him even longer to understand that the love he’d first felt back then - the love that has since only grown - is a love much greater than he’s ever felt for any romantic partner he’s ever had before. A love that won’t fade, that won’t compare to anything else.
To call them soulmates is almost simplistic. He’s loved her, as a person and a woman, for most of his life now. He can barely even remember a time when he hasn’t loved her. Probably because his life had been on hold, waiting for her to come along and show him what the meaning of love - of life - actually is.
He spent half of his life searching for everything that was out there when everything he’d ever truly needed had always been right here, beside him, in her.
He feels her arms snake around his torso from behind, can make out the weight of her head as it rests against the broad expanse of his upper back, the sensation of her nipples through the undershirt she wears to bed these days. Her physical presence alone is enough to put a smile upon his face.
“What are you doing here in the dark, all alone in the middle of the night?” she asks after a moment of silence, voice raspy from sleep.
“D’you miss me?” he questions her back without moving positions, only taking one of her hands in his and bringing it to his lips for a reverent kiss.
“Hmm,” it’s all she allows him, but he can feel her loving smirk against his naked torso. “Do you want some time to yourself?” she adds in a compassionate voice.
He thinks she’s much more forbearing and kind hearted than he deserves. You are deserving of love, he reminds himself in her voice inside his head.
He’s had to lose her to truly accept that it’s her daily choice to be with him, and that he’s earned her love with actions. Nowadays, he truly understands putting in the work to make their relationship work.
“Not particularly, no,” he responds eventually, turning in her arms to take her face in his hands and kiss her worshipfully.
He doesn’t tell her he’s only come to his home office to look for that letter of yore - now that he thinks of it, he realizes she doesn’t even know he still has it.
He did find what he was looking for in the first place - confirmation that the date on that letter matched a very important date in their lives some years later -, and it’s enough for him to know that he will do everything in his power to be worthy of the love she showers him with.
“Honey?” he says as he gathers her in his arms and plants the softest of kisses to the top of her head. “Happy anniversary.”