Title: By Her Side: Tara's Story 
Date: Mon, 09 Nov 1998 

Summary:  Continuation of By Her Side, this time with Tara Scully
giving her thoughts on the matter
Category:  S MSR (discussions, not actions) Muldertorture,
ScullyAngst
Rating:  PG-13 for language
Disclaimer:  Die, Fowley, Die!  Now, with that out of the way, I
don't own these characters or this show, because if I did, Mimi
Rogers would still be in the unemployment line.  However, since
Mr. Carter has never been that good at writing season openers
(Redux as a perfect example), I will calmly wait until the REAL
season starts next week and in the meantime, not infringe on the
copyright held.
Archive:  Yes you may
Comments:  Love some, thank you.  Send them to me at
vickiemoseley1978@yahoo.com <mailto:vickiemoseley1978@yahoo.com>.
Dedication:  to Susan and Kathy and Donna and Windsinger and
Sally and Katrina and Kronos and Esther and Luvmulder everyone
who sent me their best wishes before and after the election.  The
99th district's loss is Fan Fiction's gain . . . <VEG>  besides, the
people around here deserve what they got.
Note:  This is a series and should be read as follows:  Bill's story,
Tara's story, Mulder's story, Scully's story and Bill again in the
epilogue. 

By Her Side:  Tara's Tale
by Vickie Moseley vickiemoseley1978@yahoo.com

I'm not a light sleeper, usually.  There have been times when I've
slept through thunderstorms and hurricanes and once I slept
through a car wreak right out side my window.  But since Matty
was born, I just sleep with my ears open, I guess.

Which isn't all that easy when you have a buzz saw like Bill Scully
sleeping next you.  He wasn't this bad before we got married.  On
the nights when he'd come to my apartment, when my roommate
was visiting her boyfriend, he slept like an angel.  He'd curl up and
snuggle and looked like a little boy.  Like Matty does now.

Marriage changes a lot of things.  Now, Bill hogs the bed, hogs the
covers, and snores to wake the dead.  More so when he's been
drinking.  Like tonight.

Oh, I can't fault him two beers.  I mean, geez, the guy works hard
and he deserves to relax when he gets home.

Poisoning his sister's partner.  That I can fault him for!  And believe
me, he got an ear full before I finally let him fall asleep.   He knows
he screwed up, royally.

But it sounds like trouble might still be coming.  See, while Bill
Scully, Lt. Commander USN, sleeps the sleep of the dead, poor
Mulder is in the bathroom, throwing up his insteps.

Poor Mulder.  Poor Dana!  She's the one down there, holding his
sides and rubbing his back.  Pressing a wet cloth to the back of his
neck in the hopes of easing the rolling in his stomach.  She put a
call into the doctor a few minutes ago, but from what I overheard,
it's damned hard to find a good medicine to use for a hangover.
Especially when the guy wasn't supposed to be drinking to begin
with.

Mulder is not a quiet drunk.  At least not when he's retching.  And
I'm grateful that Matty sleeps like me or he'd be up squaling his
eyes out from the noises coming out of the bathroom down the hall.

I have to do something.  Since Attila the Lug here isn't going to
give me back my half of the mattress anytime soon, I might as well
be helpful.

I go downstairs and consider my options.  After scrounging around
my cabinets, I finally come up with the chamomile tea.  It used to
help me when I was having morning sickness and didn't want to
take any drugs.  It might help Mulder.  I make up a pot and take it
back upstairs.

Dana must have gotten him back to bed.  I notice the bathroom is
now empty and the door to their room is closed.  I almost think
twice about this little plan, and then I hear a low moan.  A
masculine moan.  It sounds a lot like the wounded elephant they
showed on the Discovery channel a few nights back.  That's all I
need to push forward.

"Dana, I've got some tea, maybe that will help."

Dana comes to the door, looking a little like death warmed over
herself.  She's wearing her blue pajama's but the sleeve is wet and
looks like she wrung it out.  He must have missed the bucket
somewhere along the line.  I try not to think about it while she lets
me in.

"How're you doing?"  I direct the question at Mulder, but Dana
answers.

"He's miserable.  But then, part of me is having a real hard time
working up any sympathy."  That's a bald faced lie, but I'm not
going to cross her on it.

"It's chamomile.  I drank tons of it when I was in my first trimester.
It's great for settling the stomach."  I hand the cup to Mulder and
get a chance to look at him.  He's positively green.  And he's
clutching his stomach with one hand and his head with the other.  If
he had a third hand, he'd be holding his chest, too, I suspect.  I
can't imagine that much pain.

Dana takes the cup from my hand and sits on the edge of the bed.
She holds it before him and puts her hand behind his head, bringing
it forward.  "Just sip it, it's hot."

"What, think a burned tongue would really make a difference?" he
rasps.  But he does as he's told.  Slowly, he drinks about half the
cup.  She helps him settle back against the pillows.

"Better?" she asks him.

He thinks about it for a minute.  "Yeah.  A little.  Wish you had
something for my head."

"Tylenol.  The normal stuff, not the good stuff you should be on,"
she tells him.  Her voice is almost harsh, but her eyes are tearing up.

"I'll take it," he answered and closed his eyes.  She reached over
and took a small pill bottle out of the bag on the nightstand and
shook out two capsules.

"You want water or can you take a sip of the tea?" she asked,
handing him the pills.  He opens his eyes, looks down and then nods
toward the tea cup.  He swallows back the pills and closes his eyes
again.

"Great house you got here, Tara, but could you get it to stop
spinning?"

I pat his leg and smile.  "Just try to sleep, Mulder.  Hopefully, it will
be stationary in the morning."

In a couple of minutes, he's breathing more evenly and even letting
out a gentle snore or two.  Geez, and they aren't even married yet!
Or maybe you just don't notice it when you aren't married.

Dana stands up and stretches.  "I think he'll sleep for a while."  She
starts to hand me back the tea cup.  "Mmmm, that smells
wonderful.  Is there any left?"

I smile and nod.  "Plenty more in the kitchen.  C'mon, I'll make you
a whole pot."

"Oh, Tara, you don't have to.  I'll go get it myself.  No sense both
of us losing sleep."

"Hey, I'm up, and I'm kinda thirsty, too.  I drank so much of this
stuff for a while, I haven't been able to stomach it since then.  But it
does smell pretty good right now.  . . . Unless you want to be
alone?"

She shook her head.  Since Missy died, I kind of get the feeling that
I've stepped into the role of 'big sister'.  Missy and I were the same
age, and I've got four brothers so I have some experience with
siblings.  But even at that, it's often like pulling teeth to get Dana to
open up.  Getting the chance to talk to her twice in one night is
almost unheard of.

We'd had a good time at McDonalds.  Matty can easily down the
chicken McNuggets and fries in his little Happy Meal, and helped
Dana clean up her fries as well.  Then he was off playing with the
'ball pit' and we were left to ourselves.

We talked about a lot of things.  How quickly Matty is growing,
when Bill might be going out to sea again.  The next time we'll be
able to get home and see Mom.

And then the topic came around to Mulder.

"He's still so weak.  I hope he feels up to going home by the end of
the week," Dana told me.

"He just looked happy to be out of the hospital," I'd told her.
Truth of the matter, he looked about ready to climb the walls when
we got there to pick him up this morning.  But the look on his face
when he saw Dana . . . I've seen that look before.  I've seen that
look on my very own Billy when he's walking off the gangplank
after a six month cruise.

But there was no way I could say that to Dana.

Oh, I know how they look at each other.  I wasn't so occupied with
my labor and delivery to miss the silent conversations they kept
having when he came out to be with her last Christmas.  She'd told
me over the phone that she was glad to be getting away for a few
days.  Then, the minute the trouble started, he was the first person
she called.

I'm not a matchmaker.  I believe everyone should come to those
realizations by themselves.  But it does drive me to distraction to
see two healthy, strong individuals so perfectly suited for each
other and they don't have a clue about it.

Makes me want to tear my hair out.

But right now, I'm busy making a fresh pot of tea.

"I can't believe he can be so monumentally stupid!  I mean, the man
has a degree from Oxford, for God's sakes," she was muttering,
half to me and half to the walls.

"Obviously not in biology," I murmur to myself, but flash her a
smile as I pour her a cup of the hot tea.  The fragrance is bringing
back lots of memories.  Finding out that I didn't have the flu after
all.  That the years of waiting, of wanting a child had finally come
to an end.  The joy of telling Billy.  Oh, and the frequent trips to the
john to flush down my latest meal.  But all in all, they were good
memories.

"I love this tea," Dana says with a soft smile as she takes another
sip.  "I remember Mom used to make it for us when we'd get the
flu."

I smile.  That sounds like Mom.  Mom, the tea maker.  Mom, the
blanket tucker.  I wish my own Mom was still around, but since she
died, I have Maggie.

"It's a mother thing.  I bet Mulder's mom made it for him, too."

Dana gets a funny look on her face.  Not quite angry, but more than
wistful.  "I don't know.  Maybe, when he was little.  When he was
older . . . I kind of doubt it."

"Well, then you can make it for him," I quickly point out.

She smiles.  "I do.  I end up being quite proficient at 'tea and
sympathy'.  When we're stuck in quarantine, it's often all I can get
down him.  He hates being confined, makes him claustrophobic.
Then he won't eat and that just makes the doctors crazy because
they're looking for abberant behavior and here he is, not eating,
pacing the floor, not sleeping like a normal person.  I end up almost
force feeding him just to keep the doctor's happy and then he gets
mad at me for fussing after him."

"Oh, I don't think he minds it as much as he lets on," I tell her.  At
least, not from what I've seen.

"But take tonight for example.  I know he didn't plan it, but how
does it look?  The minute I'm out of the house, the minute my back
is turned, he's shooting a six pack with my brother!  And that alone
is enough to make a person suspicious.  You and I both know the
two of them are hardly 'best friend' material."

Personally, I was happy to find them both alive and relatively intact.
I was certain that Billy was ready to kill Mulder last Christmas.
Getting him drunk seems sort of tame by comparison.

"I've never understood what Bill sees in Mulder that makes him
hate him," Dana says, sipping her tea.

Ah, the dilemma.  To keep the secret or show her the light.
Decisions, decisions.  But sometimes, the opportunity to reveal is
greater than the need to conceal.

"Dana, hating boyfriends is the number one job of a big brother," I
finally let slip.

"He's not my 'boyfriend', Tara.  He's my _partner_.  We work
together."

Yeah, right.

"Dana, face it.  You two are joined at the hip.  When I talk to Mom
and I ask her what you're up to, the conversation never fails to
include the name 'Fox' at least three or four times.  Bill sees that,
too.  It's a guy thing."

"So why did Billy get him drunk?  To poison him?"

I shake my head.  I might be pissed at Billy, but I know he'd never
intentionally hurt Mulder when he was under our care.  No,
something else was going on between the two of them, and it was
deeper than a six pack of beer.  Billy wouldn't tell me what they
talked about, just said they were watching the game, but his whole
attitude toward Mulder has changed over the last week.  I think
he's finally seeing Mulder as a person, and not just a threat to his
sister's safety.  That's a small miracle, in itself.

"I just think they were, you know, bonding."

"Well, they can jolly well wait until Mulder is healed before they do
any more 'bonding'," Dana declared and reached for the tea pot
again.

We both jump out of our seats when we hear the shout.

"Dana, get the hell up here!  QUICK!"

Dana runs a lot, I can tell.  She broke a few speed records, taking
those steps two at a time to get to the bathroom door ahead of me.
Once I'm in view, I can see why my husband's voice was so
panicked.

Mulder is lying in Billy's lap, eyes closed, a spattering of blood
across his lips.  Then he's wracked with coughs and more blood
sprays out of his mouth.

"oh my god!"  I've never seen so much blood.  I've never seen
someone who's bleeding internally like that.  I never wanted to see
it and especially not in my bathroom.

"I'll call the ambulance," I tell them, but Dana grabs my hand.

"There's not enough time.  We're only a few blocks from the base
hospital, we'll take him there.  Tara, get the car started.  Bill, help
me get him downstairs."

I look at her in amazement.  I would be hysterical if it was me.
Hell, I've been hysterical, when Matty started to choke on a hot
dog when he was 10 months old.  I went beserk.  I ran outside with
Matty in my arms going blue and probably because I was shaking
so hard, the hot dog popped out of his mouth and he started to cry.
But I am not the person to be around in emergencies.

Dana _is_ that person.  She's talking to Mulder softly, pulling him
into a standing position.  I realize that he's awake, he's just in a lot
of pain.  With that thought in mind, I race down the stairs, stumble
at the bottom, turn my ankle, right myself after knocking into the
phone table with my hip.  I'm outside before I remember that my
purse and car keys are in the hall closet.  I run back in, grab my
purse and I'm out the door, but as I look up I see Bill and Dana
almost carrying Mulder down the steps.  He looks awfully pale, and
I hope it's just the horrible lighting on the stairs.

I want to pull the car up on the grass, anything to get closer to the
door so that they don't have as far to go, but Dana lets go of
Mulder's right arm and is yanking open the back door before I have
a chance to move.  Billy helps him into the backseat, and Dana runs
around and gets in the other side.

Bill starts to get in the front seat, but then I remember one small
detail.  Matty is asleep upstairs in his crib.  "Billy, you can't go.
Someone has to stay with Matty!"

"Shit, I completely forgot," he answers.  He looks torn, but I'm
already in the driver's seat.  "Call me the minute you get there."

"I will," I promise.

"Hang in there, Mulder," he says and swallows.  I don't remember
him looking that scared before.  He's still standing in the driveway
as we pull out onto the street and I speed off down the road.

"What happened?" I finally have the courage to ask.

Dana is positioning Mulder on her lap, keeping him elevated.  "I
think it was the vomiting.  Bill heard him in the bathroom, he must
have gotten there himself.  When Bill got to him, he was coughing
up blood.  That's when he called us."

"Is that normal?  I mean, he's going to be OK, right.  He's not
going to . . ."  I'm too scared to think of the word, much less say it.

"He's not going to die, Tara.  He's going to be fine."  She's staring
at me in the rear view mirror and I can tell that she's convincing
herself of that fact as much as she means to convince me.

"Not going anywhere," Mulder says, with a half smile, then coughs
a little more.  He grimaces and clenches his eyes shut.  "Hurts,
Scully."  God, he sounds so weak.  I press on the gas.

"I know, Mulder.  I know it does.  We'll get you to the hospital and
they'll see what's going on.  I imagine you popped some stitches
inside, and that's where the blood is coming from.  Maybe next
time you'll listen when I tell you not to drink and take pain killers."

Mulder moans a little, but I get the feeling it's not from the pain
he's in.  "Scully, I'm not in the mood to have you bust my chops
right now."  This was said around a number of impressive hacks
and coughs.

"Shhh!  Quiet now.  Just relax, take it easy.  I can see the hospital,
we're almost there.  And I'm saving up this 'chop busting' for when
you feel better and it's more effective."  I can almost hear the grin
in her voice.  It puts me at ease, but I still pull up to the emergency
entrance.

The guard starts out to tell me that I can't park here.  I resist the
urge to flip him off and instead jerk my thumb toward the backseat.
"I have an emergency.  FBI agent, staying at my home.  He's just
out of the hospital today and now he's coughing up blood."

He looks in the back and his eyes get wide.  "I'll get the orderlies,"
he says, running for the double sliding doors.  In seconds, he's back
with a whole contingent of orderlies and nurses and they're pushing
a gurney.  Mulder is loaded and through the doors in a split second.
I start to go after him when the guard grabs my sleeve.

"Sorry, ma'am, but you still can't _park_ here.  Visitors parking is
in the front lot.  Sorry, but I'll have to ask you to move the car."

"But Mulder . . . I have to go with my sister-in-law," I try to tell
him, but he's shaking his head.

"We have to have room for the ambulances, ma'am.  I'm sorry.
It'll only take a minute and you can stop at the desk and tell them
that your brother's in the ER."

For a second, I'm ready to tell him that my brothers aren't here,
and then I figure out he means Mulder.  And I also realize that
unless I move the car and get my ass in the hospital, I'm not going
to find either Mulder or Dana for a very long time.  I put the car in
reverse, pull out and try not to ride on two wheels around the
corner to park in the visitor's lot.

It takes forever to get through the lobby and into the ER.  I've
never understood why they insist on building hospitals like
perverted bee hives.  I can get to the ER from the back, but not the
front and the only floor I'm really sure of is maternity.  I'm sure we
aren't going there tonight.  Ten minutes after we arrived, I'm find
Dana.

"Where's Mulder?"  I'm trying not to be frantic, but I couldn't help
but notice how the medical staff rushed around him, moving like
ants over him.  You don't do that unless there is a big problem.

"He's getting an x ray.  He'll be back soon.  They started him on
oxygen."  She's staring out the curtained area and toward a door at
the far end of the busy ER.

There's only one chair, and I'm not going to sit in it if Dana's not
sitting in it.  I look her over.  She's exhausted.  She's been running
back and forth from our house to the hospital.  Even after Mulder
was out of ICU, she still would stay at his room until he'd fallen
asleep and then come back to our place only to be gone before we
were even up in the morning.  If she's gotten 7 hours of sleep a
night, it's a miracle.

The worry is wearing her down, too.  I could absolutely kick the
crap out of my idiot husband for bringing the six pack of beer up to
the guest room.  I know how he is with ball games on TV.  A beer
is a requisite.  But this time, his little idiosyncracy might have
caused us more trouble than it was worth.

For a moment, I think that it's just because I'm thinking of him that
I see Billy walking into the ER.  Then, I realize that he's really here,
and coming toward us.

I can't be angry when I see him.  He's almost as pale as Mulder was
when we first got here.  He's sweating a little, and he's pulled at the
collar of the tee shirt he threw on when he got out of bed.  I bet if I
looked at his hand, I'd see the telltale dots of blood on his cuticles.
If he didn't bite his nails all the way over here in the car, I'll eat my
hat.

He tries to smile when he sees me and I smile back and go to him.
He really is a good man.  I wouldn't love a complete loser.  Sure,
he makes me mad sometimes, but he has a heart as good as gold.  I
know he didn't mean for any of this to happen to Mulder.  It's not
in him.  He talks a good line, but he's not a vengeful man, really.
Right now, he's scared and feeling more than a little guilty.  I reach
my arms around him and hug that heart for all it's worth.

"How's Mulder doing?"

"Where's Matty?"

We both mutter apologies and he answers me first.

"Gloria saw the lights and then watched us get Mulder in the car.
She came over right after you drove off and offered to stay with
Matty while I came up here."

Gloria Tanner is the wife of a Chief Petty Officer and our next door
neighbor.  They have two children, 14 and 11.  I'm always teasing
her that I wish I had even one that old.

"That was sweet of her.  Mulder's been taken to x ray.  We should
know more in a minute."

Bill nods and looks over at Dana.  So far, she hasn't said a word of
acknowledgement.  He frowns a little.  "Danie?  How's he . . ."

"Don't ask how he is, Bill.  We all know your feelings on this,"
Dana snaps.

Ouch!  I can see Bill's face fall.  I know Dana's hurting, she's
scared right now.  After being scared for most of the week, and
thinking that things were finally going to be ok.  But this is uncalled
for.

"Dana, Bill didn't mean any -"

"I'm going to see what's taking them so long," she announces,
ignoring me completely.  She doesn't even look at Bill as she takes
off down the hall.

I look over at Bill and his eyes are closed.  He's shaking a little, but
I'm probably the only person who would notice.  I put my hand on
his arm and reach up to give him a kiss on the corner of his mouth.

"She's upset, Billy.  She didn't mean to go off on you.  She's just
scared and you were the easiest target," I reason with him.

He shakes his head slowly, eyes still closed.  "No, she's right.  She
left me in charge, left him in my care.  This is my fault."

OK, this has gone on long enough.  "Sweetheart, we don't know
that this has _anything_ to do with the beer he drank."

He's still shaking his head.  "I was there, Tara.  I saw him throwing
up.  It was . . . bad, ugly.  I'm sure something tore.  He wouldn't
have been throwing up at all if I hadn't gotten him drunk."

Bill has always had an overgrown sense of responsibility.  I suppose
it goes with the territory when you're the oldest boy in a Navy
family.  For our part, my dad was never farther from us than the
back forty.  He was a farmer, and he was always home.  I know it
was hard on Bill when his dad would leave for sea.  He was just a
little boy, but so much was expected of him.  Even so, he's way off
the mark this time.

I push him, eyes still clenched shut, over and make him sit down in
the chair.  The man is entirely _too_ tall some times.  Not that I'm
complaining, mind you.  I like it when he can reach the top cabinet.
But right now, I want to be face to face.  I have to settle for face to
chest, since there's only one chair and I'm still standing.

"William Dennis Scully.  Look at me," I say in my best 'yes, I am a
mother' voice.

He looks up and a ghost of a smile forms on his lips.  He knows this
voice.  He's the one who made me a mother.

Now that I have his attention, I can talk to him.  "Billy, this is _not_
your fault.  You gave Mulder a couple of beers -"

"Four," he corrects me.

"OK, _four_," I agree.  "But I'm gonna go out on a limb and say
that Mulder probably has had _four_ beers before in his life.  I
mean, that just stands to reason!  But Billy, look at this for a
minute.  He's just out of the hospital.  They gave him all kinds of
medicine that he'd been getting through his IV but now it's in pill
form.  Isn't it just possible that one of those caused the trouble?"

He's not buying it.  But he loves me for trying.  He reaches out and
wraps his arms around me, burying his head in my chest.  I wish
more than anything to be home, in bed, holding him instead of here
in the middle of an emergency room.

I look up and see Dana coming back.  She doesn't look happy.  On
instinct, I pull away from Billy.  I can see his shoulders tense as he
stands.

"What's wrong?" we both ask.

She glares over at Bill and directs the answer to me.  "They found
the source of the bleeding.  There was a tear in one of the arteries
that they'd stitched up.  He's being taken to surgery right now.  I
need to get my purse and go up to the surgical ward lounge to wait
for word."  She looks over at Bill for just a second, and I can see
she wants to say something, but she doesn't.  Finally, she looks
back at me.  "You two don't have to stay here.  Mulder's here for
the night.  I'll stay with him."  She gives me a hug.  "Thanks for
getting us here so fast and in one piece."  She doesn't even say
goodbye to Billy, just walks right past him.

Billy looks like someone just knifed him in the stomach.  I reach out
for him, but he shrugs out of my arms.  "I gotta get back home.
Gloria will need to get the kids up for school.  She said she'd watch
Matty tomorrow if we needed her."  He turns away from me, and I
know it's because there are tears on his cheeks.  "Stay with her for
me, please, sweetheart.  I don't want her to be alone up here.  Call
me if you hear anything."  He starts walking down the hall.

"Billy," I call after him and he turns, wiping at his face.  "I love
you."

He nods slowly, sadly, and turns and walks away.

I love Dana Scully with all my heart.  Growing up with four
brothers, I would have killed for a sister.  I loved Missy, too, but
she was pretty much of a flake, God rest her soul.  With Dana, well,
we could always talk.

But at this moment, standing here watching my crestfallen husband,
I'd calmly wring her neck, if I could.

She's looking for someone to blame.  I know that.  I can
understand that.  When Missy was killed, I spent hours with Billy as
he looked for someone to blame.  Of course, most of the blame fell
on Mulder.

At the time, I didn't know the man, I'd just heard about him from
Mom and Dana.  I didn't know if they were sleeping together, or
just knew each other from work, but his name popped up in
conversations quite a bit.  It was actually pretty easy to blame him
for whatever came up and Missy's death was just as good a reason
as any.  But it didn't take me long to figure out that blaming
Mulder wouldn't bring Missy back.

I think it's time to let Dana know that blaming Billy isn't going to
help Mulder get any better, either.


^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^


She's in the surgical waiting room when I find her.

I really hate hospitals.  They smell funny, the lighting is awful and
the chairs feel like they were packed with cement instead of batting.
How anyone would want to work in one is beyond me.

Dana is sitting close to the double doors.  I can see the tear tracks
that form two faint white lines down her face.  For a moment, I'm
afraid she's heard something about Mulder.  Then I realize that this
pain is all too familiar.  I just saw it in my husband.  She's feeling
guilty, too.

"You were pretty hard on Billy, don't you think?" I ask, taking the
chair next to hers.

"You married a prick, Tara.  It's about time you figured that out,"
she growls, but the tiger has lost her bite.  She's just barely keeping
those tears back from her lashes now.

"Does it run in the family?"  OK, so that was below the belt.  But
damn it, she's making me mad.

She looks at me, and I'd hoped she'd at least be offended.  Instead,
she nods her head.  "I guess I'd have to say it does."

That hurt.  It hurts because I love them both so much and I hate
seeing them hurt each other.  It hurts because it's not even about
the stupid beers anymore, it's about growing up and still hanging on
to the preconcieved notions of childhood.  It's about a big brother
who just wants the best for his baby sister, and a woman who just
wants to be allowed to live her own life.  When did it all get this
complicated?

"Dana, Billy did not poison Mulder, and you know it."  I feel it's
necessary to say the words, even if I'm speaking to the walls.

She sighs heavily.  "I know that.  I wouldn't be surprised if Mulder
would have gone down to the kitchen and got the damned beer
himself.  If he's in a mood, there's no stopping him."  She sniffed
and went back to staring the door.  "But Billy didn't have to help
him."

"Point taken.  But you still didn't have to be so hard on him," I
circle back to my original point.  I wasn't star of the O'Fallon High
School debating team for nothing.

"I'll buy him a bundt cake," she says and a faint smile forms on her
lips.  I can tell an inside joke when I hear one.

"Want to let me in on that one?"

She shrugs and shakes her head.  "Just something another prick told
me one time."

"Ah, a Mulder quote," I reply.  She shoots me a grin.  "Hey, at least
I've made an honest man out of my prick," I tell her.

"Mine was an honest man when I found him," she volleys back.

"Yeah, well, mine was a diamond in the rough," I can't resist.

We fall silent.  I reach out to place a hand on her knee.  "Why
haven't you told him?"

She looks at me in total shock.  "I don't know what you're talking
about," she tells me, but she's lying and she knows I can see that.

"Mulder.  Why haven't you told him that you love him?"

Dana stands abruptly and starts pacing by the doors.  "What the hell
is taking so long?  It's a simple stitch up job!"

I check my watch.  It's about an hour and half since we got here.
"They're probably taking their time, doing it right."

She shoots me a look of pure disbelief.  Hey, I let these people
bring my baby into the world.  Denial is all I have.

"We don't talk about it," she says to the doors.

"Talk about what?"

"Us.  Our . . . relationship.  It's as if talking about it would make it
disappear.  You know, when you're little and you make a wish on
your birthday candles and you don't tell anyone because if you tell
your wish, it won't come true?"

Yeah, I know that.  But when did we start talking about wishes?
Finally, the dawn comes.  Wishes.

"So if you tell him that you love him, your wish won't come true?"

"Pretty stupid, huh?  But I tell him in other ways.  I mean, I try to.
I stand up for him, I've lied for him.  I go after him when no sane
person would follow.  And he does things for me, too.  Everyday,
in the way he respects me, asks for my opinion.  In the way he
looks at me."  She stops talking and I realize she's crying for real
now.

I can't sit here and watch her hurting like this.  I get up and wrap
her in my arms, her back against my chest.  "Then I'm sure he
knows.  He'd be blind not to see it."

"I need to apologize to Billy," she sobs.

"Later.  There'll be plenty of time.  I'll remind you, OK?"

"Tara, I'm so scared," she sobs into my shoulder.  I could have
guess, she'd like a piece of cold steel in my arms.  Her shoulders
are tight and tense and they've got to hurt.  She wound tighter than
a two dollar watch, as my dad used to say.

"I know, I know you are.  But it's all going to be all right.  I
promise, it will all be all right."  I truly believe that.  I have my
reasons, but I can never tell Dana.

Mom, . . . Maggie, and I talk a lot.  She talks to Billy and says hi to
Matty and then it's our time.  And she tells me things.  Last year,
when there was so much craziness over that bombing in Dallas and
Dana and Mulder were somehow involved, she called me one day
when Billy was still at work.  She'd had a dream.

It had started out scary, with Dana in some dark place, surrounded
with ice.  But then, Mulder showed up and he broke through the ice
and got her out and carried her to safety.  But that wasn't the end
of the dream.

The dreamscape changed and they were together.  Standing
together, but they were much older.  Mom said they were standing
in a cemetery and she was watching over them from somewhere
above.  Mulder, or Fox as Mom always calls him, leaned over and
put flowers on a grave.  She described him exactly.  He had grey
hair at his temples and laugh lines near his eyes.  There were tears
in his eyes, but he was smiling.

And Dana's hair had gray in it, too.  It was longer and pulled back.
Mom pointed out that she wasn't as 'stick thin' any more, and only
a mother would think that a good thing.  But Mom said she looked
softer, not chiseled in stone like she tries to make us think she is.
And off in the distance, Mom heard kids playing and shouting.  One
of them called out 'Daddy' and Mulder looked up and Dana smiled
and that was the end of her dream.

Mom had a few ideas as to what the dream meant.  I'm more likely
to believe her theories than to make up any of my own.  But one
thing is certain:  there is no way I can tell the dream or any hint of it
to Dana.  She gets nuts about dreams, especially Maggie's.

So, here I am with all this good information, and I can't tell her any
of it, except to keep saying 'it'll be all right'.  Which just makes me
feel more helpless.

"It will be all right."  She pushes back and walks over to the chairs
to sit down.  "He won't leave me," she says defiantly.  "Not after
everything.  I wouldn't leave him, he won't leave me."  Then, in a
whisper, I hear her add, "I'm his one in five billion."

How do I possibly answer that.  I know she's right, I can see it in
his eyes every time she walks into the room.  But she never meant
me to hear in in the first place.

Now, I'm staring at the stupid doors.  When the hell are they going
to tell us something?

"Mom thinks I'm crazy."

"No she doesn't," I respond automatically.  That's more lie than
truth.  Maggie and I have had _this_ discussion, too and yes, she
does think Dana is a little 'around the bend' for her lifestyle, her
job, the friends she keeps.  Oh, Maggie adores Fox, but she'd adore
him a lot more if Dana had a normal job, didn't end up in the
hospital quite so often and would settle down and marry the guy.

Dana knows all this, too, apparently.  She gives me a raised
eyebrow look.  "Yes, she does and you know it, Tara."

Caught.  Time for the truth.  "She wants you to be happy."

"I am happy."

"The first time I've seen you smile in the last two times you've been
here was when we went to pick Mulder up yesterday morning."

She blushes hard.  God, I'm glad I'm not a red head.

"It's not like that, Tara.  You're making too much out of it."

Dropping the subject has never been my strong point.  If it had, I'd
still be single.  "For that matter, it's probably the first real smile I've
ever seen on Mulder."

Dana sighs.  I know that sigh.  It's her 'just drop it, all right' sigh
and I'm not letting her get by with it.

"Of course, like you say, I'm sure he knows how you feel."

She flinches.  Not just a little sigh, like before, she actually recoils
at my words.  And turns her head to wipe at her face.

"No, he doesn't."  I watch her as she gets up and starts to pace, still
staring at the door.  "He has no clue as to how I really feel."

"Dana, I didn't mean to pry . . ."

She turns a cold smile at me.  "Yes, you did, Tara, and you know it.
Face it, the whole family is dying to hear what the hell is wrong
with us.  We act like we're two halves of a walnut and yet we've
never said the words, never really told each other how we really
feel.  We act more married than most people I know and yet, we've
never even . . ."  She stops herself just short of giving me too much
information and stands, staring at the door.

"Sometimes, you need to hear the words, Tara.  Sometimes, actions
don't speak loud enough."

"Do you need to hear the words, Dana?"  I'm not asking that to
upset her, I'm just getting a little confused here.

She shakes her head and the sound that comes out of her throat is
almost a laugh, but more of a sob.  "No, I've heard the words.
More times than I could count.  'You are my one in five billion.'
'You make me a whole person.'  'You are the _only_ one I trust.'
And the list goes on and on."

"But never just a simple 'I love you'?"

She turns a sad smile at me.  "I think he's afraid of that one.  I did
shoot him once, you know."

I can't help but grin at that.  But the look in her eyes tells me
there's a lot more to that story that I'm not likely to ever hear.

"And you're telling me you've never told him those same
sentiments?"

The sad smile disappears and her whole face grows angry.  I realize
after a second that the anger is directly inward, not at me.  "He
asked me to marry him once.  I knew it was a joke, he was trying to
distract me.  But my response, it was so typical of our entire life
together.  Mulder opens up to me all the time and I take every
opportunity to shove him away.  Do you know what I told him
when he 'proposed'?"  She doesn't even wait for an answer.  "I
told him 'I was hoping for something a little more useful.'  Just like
that.  So what if it was a joke?  With Mulder, that's how he deals
with the most painful parts of his life.  He makes them a joke.  It's
his defense mechanism.  I know that.  And I use it.  All the time.
To make sure I never have to move.  That it's always him, moving
closer to me, never the other way around."  She sits down.  I don't
blame her.  Her little tirade left me tired just watching.

"So move.  Move closer to him.  You can do it.  You can do
anything."  It's what I've always believed of her.

She looks at me like I've just grown a second set of eyes.  "I can't.
Don't think it hasn't been on my mind, but I can't.  I can't tell him.
All I can do . . . I tried to tell him once.  I ended up kissing his
forehead.  And then he was going to kiss me back, and . . . that
damned bee . . ."  She's pacing again.  I'm trying to follow her train
of logic, but I got lost a while back.  "Why bees?  Why a stupid
insect?"  She glares at me, like the least I could do is give her the
answer to that one.  I shrug.  She shakes her head and goes back to
pacing.  "Aw, hell.  If it wasn't a bee, it would be some other
damned thing.  The water, fried chicken batter, hell, the air we
breathe!"  She's working herself up again and we've strayed pretty
far off course.

"Dana.  Stop a minute."  I get up and stand in front of her so she
can't pace past me.  She tries to move past me and I reach out and
grab her arms.  "Dana.  Stop."

Her lip trembles and she refuses to look at me, but she doesn't try
to break my grasp.

"Dana.  You still have a chance to make it right.  You still have a
chance to tell him."

She's shaking her head and the look on her face is more painful
than any I've ever seen.  I'm watching her heart break right before
my eyes.

"I can't."

I squeeze her arms, drawing her attention back to me and away
from that stupid door.  "The Dana Scully I know isn't afraid of
anything.  Least of all is she afraid of the man she loves."

"I'm not afraid of him," she tells me and I believe her.  "I'm afraid
of me."

Before I have a chance to ask her what she's talking about the
double doors open.

"Agent Scully.  The surgery is over.  You're partner is going to be
fine."

the end.

Yes there is more--Mulder's take on the next part.
Vickie

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Donna:  Where does Disco come from?

John:  Hell.  And not the really cool part of hell with
all the murderers.  It comes from the lame part of hell
with all the bad accountants.

That 70's Show
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^