How by Hth Of all people, it was my mother who first brought it into the open. As we sat down to Easter dinner, just the two of us, and she said, "I suppose Fox is all alone on a holiday." "I doubt he's noticed. At eleven-thirty, I doubt he's awake yet." "Why didn't you invite him?" Every conversation we have about Mulder these days is an accusation. I understand, but it still annoys me. I served out her green bean casserole as efficiently and ruthlessly as I would perform an autopsy. Mothers are supposed to have a mystical kind of intuition. Mine never did; it is so easy to lie to her in tone, if not in words. Just a little smile, a drink of water to show I am not rushed or tense. "Mulder sees me every day. At least give him Sundays off." "How can you be so blind, Dana?" "Mom. Don't, okay?" "He loves you." *Do you think I don't know that? Do you think it doesn't break my heart time after time? Am I the Ice Queen now in your eyes, too?* My mother adores him. She credits him with every miracle that keeps me from death, forgives him for every fleeting insanity that brought me to the edge to begin with. She is charmed by his wit, his occasional awkwardness, his protectiveness, his ties; he is a world apart from the military man she chose, and she loves him for being wild and endangered, like some animal featured on the Discovery Channel. Other parents talk about ponies and cocker spaniels; my mother would like to give her little girl a cheetah to keep her company. As usual, I didn't cry, but please understand, it isn't always easy. She is my mother, and it hurts that I have to deny her those cherished dreams: the church wedding, the small-voiced "Grandma," the peaceful nights knowing that I am not alone, but only one heartbeat away from everything she chooses to believe can keep me safe, save me. He is Mulder, and it hurts me to deny him anything at all; he has so little. But I am dying, and I cannot help thinking, *If not now, when? When is my pain about Dana Scully? When can I so much as be sick without it being about Agent Mulder?* How can I not love him? He inspires me, enrages me, unnerves me, ennobles me. I am with him in spirit every hour of every day. And how can I love him? Does anyone particularly love to breathe? Mulder is biology, chemistry, and physics. Mulder *is.* And there is little else. * * * I knew when they had their Policy Meeting about me. I was holing up in the parking garage of an apartment building in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, clicking back and forth between radio stations in a borrowed Celica. It's not stealing if you don't move it out of the parking space, right? I could imagine their cold voices perfectly. *How could this have happened? You told me he was well in hand. We had everything under control. What went wrong?* I indulged in a little fantasy of crashing their party, just to answer the question. I might have, if I hadn't been afraid it would be the final insult, the one that would mean his death. I would actually enjoy telling those smug bastards the lunatic, but inevitable truth. Mulder happened. You noxious, carcinogenic shit, you took a hard and untouchable young operative who valued nothing but his own life, and you gave him into the hands of the only man in the world who still loves the truth, who still longs for light. You put me in the presence of true grace and true faith, and you said, "Reduce him to nothing. Make him like you." Yeah, I was well in hand. Who knew that I was still human when you left me alone with Mulder? I sure as hell didn't, so I don't know how you could be expected to recognize the quality in others. He always fascinated me. I told him the truth; I *did* follow his career at Quantico, as part of my own lifelong interest in science fiction, in a future of ships and stars. I jumped at that assignment. How could I ever have been that naive? I thought I was jaded, that I could loot him for knowledge, for insight, and then ruin him, and then walk away, richer in the Consortium's money and in Fox Mulder's secrets, too. An almost perfect deal. I never intended to gain any more than his secrets, and sure as hell not *him.* Now I carry him everywhere I go, and he is a double-edged blade, drawing blood from each side of me. Alex Krycek, user and killer and hedonist, living his short, experience-soaked life to its dregs, carries a sweet, torturous need for him that never goes away, and can never be filled. He is temptation given a body and an Italian suit, and the part of me that must touch anything exceptional bleeds, because he is not for me. But Alex Krycek, the man who still tears up over Ray Bradbury and worries about highway safety and actually fucking liked being an FBI agent while it lasted -- that man carries Mulder like a too-perfect mirror, and his undoing is that now he can *see,* really see, what a good man is, and there is no denying now that he has never been one. I believed that one job was as ethical as the next, and who was really ethical, anyway? Powerbrokers, hit men, conspiracies, and fall guys --these things have always existed. If I was determined to thrive in a bleak and unsympathetic world, well, weren't we all? Mulder is the most extreme of possibilities. A man of honor in a world where honor is as much a mutation as eyelids on a flatworm. And I was more open to extreme possibilities than anyone knew I could be. Especially me. * * * There are days I don't know how I let him do the things he does. I have wild fantasies of clubbing him over the head with my stapler, smuggling him into Canada, forcing him to live an ordinary life. I can see him fishing (he takes a gory delight in baiting the hook; his sense of the macabre always made my toes curl), driving me into town to rent movies (he berates the hapless Blockbuster girl because they don't stock *Baron Munchausen*; he's developed a true love-hate relationship with country living), and searching the web for used CDs from obscure '70s bands (marking his territory with sunflower seeds, like a giant nesting squirrel; God, I've become a pathetic sap). Anywhere but here, Fox. Anything but this. And yet I say nothing, and sign his 302s, and wait for him to come home again, battered and electric and more devoted than ever to his quest. I love him, but I'm no fool. I love him for having the courage of his convictions, but if I had the choice, he'd be doing surveillance for the rest of his life. Anything to make him safe; how do you protect a man like Mulder? Either way I lose him. And I never had him. So I grit my teeth, and sign his 302s, and tell myself that he's a comet, an omen visible from my world for this one moment in history, and all I can do is let him be beautiful, and try to be standing somewhere else when he comes crashing down. He has no idea how I feel about him, thank God. If he were ever mine, how could I sign the 302s? How could I open my hand and let Fox Mulder seek the sky one more time? I couldn't, that's how. Not if my eyes alone could see the ghost-marks of that same hand on his body. When he is dead (and this will kill him; I cannot bring myself to believe otherwise), I will leave the FBI. I will find someplace clean. If I were a rational man, I would leave now. But, dammit, dammit, I can still see him through the smoke. He is a fire that will consume me before he burns himself out, and the hell of it is I don't think he'll ever even notice. Or maybe the hell of it is that I will let him. When you've only got the one source of light, you just can't be picky. << Back to previous page <<|| Archive Home ||>> Forward to next part >>