A MAKESHIFT KISS 1/1 by Jill Selby (jillselby@socket.net) Archiving Note: Do not archive at Gossamer. The text of this story will be housed exclusively on the author's homepage. Permission to link will be cheerfully granted upon request. Summary: A promise made in a hallway. (A missing scene from the movie) Disclaimer: Characters from the X-Files are the property of Ten Thirteen Productions, the Fox Television Network, and 20th Century Fox. Classification: VRA Relationship: MSR Rating: PG Spoilers: TXF movie ____________ A MAKESHIFT KISS 1/1 She didn't reveal her playful side often, which might explain her lousy timing. When she jerked away from his kiss claiming to have been stung, he was certain it was a prank: a heart-paralyzing, ego-deflating practical joke designed to send him crashing backwards through time to the days of Clearasil and awkward teenage passes attempted in the front seat of a Chevy Vega. Then, as quickly as anger and embarrassment had taken hold, they fled, and he found himself desperately wishing for their return. The terror that replaced them was infinitely worse than any emotion a bruised bit of male pride could conjure. Fear shaded the light in her eyes, broken words squeezed from her throat and gouged him like jagged shards of glass, her arms clung to him for balance as her body mutinied against her will to stand. There was nothing in the universe more sobering than bearing witness as Dana Scully withered like a flower in an early frost. He laid her on filthy tile. Bits of gravel and dried mud scraped his skin as he pulled his hands from beneath her body. While his mind was engaged in recording every word she said, every symptom she described, some chivalrous little piece of conscience was nagging him to pick her up, carry her inside, and lay her on soft, clean sheets where she could rest until help arrived. In fact, he might have done that very thing had a tortured, wheezing breath not been dragged from his partner to remind him of the urgency of her condition. Practicality grabbed Mulder by the collar, shoved him inside his apartment, wrapped his shaking hand around the telephone receiver, and forced him to speak to a heartless 911 operator who had no idea the entire world would end if the woman fighting for her life in a dingy hallway ceased her struggle. His call completed, he turned back toward the hallway, intent on running, in actuality barely able to walk. Dread, like an obstinate child, clung to his legs and whimpered reasons to stay safely inside the apartment and away from Dana Scully. She blames you. She hates you. She could die. She could be dead already. It would have been easy to let anxiety have its way and hold him back had something stronger not taken him by the heart and pulled him to her side. As he knelt beside her, he couldn't help but notice the picture she presented. In a different context it would have been beyond erotic seeing her like this, with disheveled clothing and flushed skin, oblivious to rules of social acceptability that deemed public hallways inappropriate for wanton displays. Her rapid, shallow breaths were not all that different from those of a woman lost in a mindless passion. But no testosterone-soaked delusion could reshape the nightmare her eyes described. He saw in them all the questions she was asking, all the answers she feared, the desire for comfort, and a plea to spare her any banal reassurances. She wasn't going to let him off the hook, he knew. They were going to wait for the ambulance and he was going to help keep her conscious, not with trite observations about baseball or the weather, but with talk of bees and viruses and the implications for the future of humankind. "So, Scully, did you catch the Yankees game Monday night?" Well, it was worth a try anyway. How did she manage that, he wondered. Her concentration was clearly focused on the act of breathing, on quelling the urge to panic, yet she was able to throw him a look so deeply layered it short-circuited his synapses before he could fully comprehend its import. All he knew for certain was that small talk was not an option, which left him searching for something to say to her. He was having trouble recalling any words except those he'd been crying from the depths of his soul since she fell -- don't die, don't die, don't die, don't die. He refused to say those words aloud. Maybe if she didn't hear them, she wouldn't realize that dying was an alternative to fighting for every breath as she was doing now. "Mulder?" It wasn't so much a word as an exhalation with a question mark, but he heard his name in the sound. He realized, with a guilty start, that he'd been absently staring at the top button of her blouse, watching the rise and fall of her chest, while mulling possible topics for a one-sided conversation. Could he possibly seem any more perverted? How must it look from her vantage point on the floor? Unable to move and being mentally stripped by your cretin of a partner. Oh sure, he'd fantasized about seducing her out of those constrictive suits she wore, but he would never . . . not under these circumstances. . . She knew that, didn't she? He flinched as he brought his gaze to her eyes, making ready for the censure he would be receiving, and completely unprepared for what she gave him instead. It was proof that she understood him better than he understood himself when she took hold of his fingers and pulled his hand to her chest, laid it over her heart where he could feel every beat and every breath, and held it to her as if it was her dearest possession. Damn it. She'd somehow found the thread that was holding him together and unraveled him with that touch. Now, no matter how he tried, he couldn't quite blink back the tears or swallow past the lump of unspoken words in his throat. The voice that emerged was only a distant relative of his normal tone. "Scully, this virus . . . if it was engineered, then there's got to be a way ..." With obvious effort, she lifted her free hand and brought it, trembling, to his mouth to halt the words. He liked the feeling of her fingers on his face, and when her muscle control began to falter and her hand slip away, he caught her by the wrist and settled her palm against his cheek. Her message was clear, but he had been so certain that she'd want to discuss the virus and its consequences that he had to ask, "You don't want me to talk about this?" She shook her head. With a growing list of forbidden subjects, he was quickly running out of topics and the ambulance was probably still a good five minutes away. Perhaps, though, companionable silence was what she wanted. "Why don't you just take it easy, Scully. The ambulance will be here soon." When she shook her head for the second time, he knew. He knew what she wanted him to talk about. Just when he thought he couldn't be more afraid, a new dread sucker-punched him and left him sputtering for air and excuses. "What --" his voice broke like an overstretched violin string. He cleared his throat and began again. "What did you want me to talk about?" She couldn't answer, of course. Not with words at any rate. But the brush of her fingers against his lips was answer enough. "Look, Scully, I'm sorry about that. I should never have . . . I mean, we can just forget . . ." He thought he'd seen all the expressions Dana Scully was capable of making. God knew, Fox Mulder could evoke myriad emotions from her with his words, but he'd never seen this look on her face. He'd wounded her deeply and personally with thoughtless dishonesty designed to give her an easy escape. It had never occurred to him that she wasn't looking for one. She averted her eyes and loosened her grip on the hand she still held to her breast. He snagged her fingers before she could pull away. "No, that was a lie. I'm not sorry." His admission didn't faze her, but why should it? Any five-year- old knows how to recant a story to avoid punishment, and he'd just demonstrated almost as much sophistication. Unfortunately, there wasn't anything he could do except blunder forward. "It wasn't something I'd planned to happen, but I'm not going to tell you I'd never wished for it. I'm sorry about that damned bee, and I'm sorry you can't tell me to go to hell right now, but I'm not the least bit sorry for kissing you. If given the chance, I'd do it again." Not for the first time he wished for a failsafe that would disconnect his mouth before he could say too much. He had almost certainly gone too far this time. Slowly, very slowly, she lifted her gaze to his. With the slightest raise of an eyebrow that would have made the actual word redundant, she asked, "Really?" Or maybe he'd gone just far enough. "Really." Her mouth moved and she wrestled for long seconds with a single syllable. Barely audible, he was certain that single word would ring in his memory until the end of his days. "Now." God, Scully. How he wanted to give in to that simple request. It would be the easiest thing he'd ever done. A sweet and beautiful thing. A memory to treasure. A way to say goodbye. No way in hell was he going to kiss her goodbye. He drew her hand back to his mouth and placed a soft kiss on every fingertip. Beneath his right hand, he felt her heart jump a little. Or was that just feedback from his own racing pulse? "Not now." He laid her hand gently on her stomach. "When you're better." She tried to speak again but this time it was he who shushed her with a silencing finger across her lips. He lingered there to trace her lips with the ghost of a touch. "Don't worry, Scully. You'll get your kiss." His hand inched forward to wipe away the vestiges of tears that had fallen. "I'll kiss you here, Scully." He brushed his palm across her cheek. "And here." Slid his fingers beneath her hair to trace her ear. "And here." The dissonant wail of a siren drifted into the quiet hallway and mingled with his soft whispers, but he continued touching her, even as consciousness deserted her, even as the paramedics tried to push him aside. And everywhere he touched, he left behind a promise. ____________ End of "A Makeshift Kiss" Thanks to Shari, Lisa and Carrie for editing and encouraging in equal measure, to Lydia for having just the right words, and to the Screamers for dragging me out of my self-imposed exile. Other stories by the author are available at http://members.aol.com/msselby1013/index.html Seasoned fanfic writers need feedback too! I'd love to hear from you at jillselby@socket.net.