| Title: I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face By: Triple Pirouette catagory: kinda MSR, Mulder angst, Song-fic, vignette Spoilers:nothing really- set sometime during season one. Rated: PG Disclaimer: They're not mine. No, honestly, they're not. Neither is Rex Harrison, Professor Higgins, or My Fair Lady (which, by the way, is a wonderful movie) I'm just playing for a while. Feedback: please at [email protected] AN- This is also archived on Gossamer, but I've updated it here with my new e-mail and my pen name (neither of which I had when this was first posted) XxXxXxXxXxXxX Mulder stretched out on teh dark, soft leather of his couch. It was around 2 am, but his insomnia left his restless and flipping mindlessly around the channels on his TV. Being a Saturday, he had gone for his obligatory run, but did nothing else truly of note. He had looked at a few case files, but found them less than stimulating. Which left him in his current position, mindless, and looking for something to occupy the time. His mind wandered, as it often did, to Scully. Mulder, over teh course of their partnership, had speant dozens of hours thinking of her. Most often it was frustration over thier constantly clashing personalities, and sometimes wonder at how they got along so well. Every so often he'd get this unbeatable thought about how beautiful a woman she was, but in interests of professionalism, he did his best to squash those thoughts immedietly. Tonight, though, he pondered somethign very different. He pndered her life. SO many times, in the middle of cases, he wanted to just put her in a cab headed for Dc, and never let her look back. SO often he wanted to shelter her, put her in a bubble, and never let her see the horrible things they saw. So many times he got so frustrated with her he wanted to just wring her neck. And so many times they encountered life threatening situations, and he feared for her life. Mulder, in thinking of all this lately, had come to a decision. He had to remove her from the X-Files. There was something about her envolvement that spelled doom to him, something that told him she would suffer for joining him. SO the best thing to do; fire her, get her reassigned, anything but let her suffer professional and personal suicide by staying with him. These thoughts always made him a little meloncholy, and left him feeling defeated, but there was a rumbeling in the pit of his stomach tonight, like if he went through with this, it would be the wrong thing. And yet, it seemed the logical thing to keep her safe. True, she was making her own choice, but he'd rather hurt her than see her hurt herself. Why? He asked himself that now. His eyes lazily watched an infomercial while he pondered why he cared for her so much. She was just his partner. He'd had partners before. they mattered, but never this much. He grew weary of the unrelenting perkyness of the paid programming, and began to flip again. He slowly progressed, and stopped when he heard a string of curses come from the TV. "Damn, damn, damn,damn!" A distinguished englishman swore. Mulder looked at the channel, and would have moved on, seeing it was the classic romance movie station, but for some reason he stayed on for a few seconds, just long enough to hear the beginings of a musical number. "I've grown accustomed to her face." And just as it was a revelation for Rex Harrison's Professor Higgins, it was a revelation for Mulder. That was what was stopping him, what made him care for Scully. It was basic, but it was the truth. Slack jawed, he put the remote next to him and listened to the rest of the song. "She almost makes the day begin. I've grown accustomed to the tune She whistles night and noon. Her smiles, her frowns, Her ups, her downs Are second nature to me now; Like breathing out and breathing in." Mulder was almost breathless at how this seemed to be him, this seemed to be his relationship with Scully. The words were so simple, and not even sung, really. They were kind of half spoken by the actor, but so emotional and torn between his professional side and his love for this woman he sang for. "I was serenely independent and content before we met; Surely I could always be that way again and yet I've grown accustomed to her looks; Accustomed to her voice; Accustomed to her face." Serenly independent. Yes, Mulder was before he met Scully, a serenly independent man. The question was, could he really be that way again, or would sending Scully away hurt him as much as it would hurt her, or would it hurt him more? "But I'm so used to hear her say "Good morning" ev'ry day. Her joys, her woes, Her highs, her lows, Are second nature to me now; Like breathing out and breathing in. I'm very grateful she's a woman and so easy to forget; Rather like a habbit One can always break and yet, I've grown accustomed to the trace Of something in the air; Accustomed to her face." And Mulder knew right then, that Scully was not a habit he could break, but a love he had but yet couldnot posses. Scully was like breathing to him. Her science, her passion, and her rationalism kept him on his toes, and he knew that he'd never be the same without her now. He watched the final scene, sad that he'd missed most of the movie. Now he wanted to know who this girl he was singing about was really like. hell, he didn;t even know what the movie was. Mulder scrambled across the couch and pulled out the TV Guide. He smiled, and planned a trip to the video store in the morning. XxXxXxXxXxXxX Monday Morning "Good morning, Mulder." Scully half smiled to him as she continued to read some file infront of her. He had just walked into the office and handed her a cup of coffee. He Heard Rex Harrison in his head, *But I'm so used to hear her say "Good morning" ev'ry day* and smiled back at Scully. "good morning. What have you got there?" "Nothing really, just some old paperwork." She looked up as he sat across from her at his desk. She gladly sipped her coffee and looked unusually relaxed. "You look... relaxed Scully. Do somethign special this weekend?" A glimmer was in his eye. He so rarely got to just talk with her. "hummm... not really. Just turned off the phone and slept, watched a couple of old movies." Mulders eyebrows shot up in his "Oh, really?" pose, and she just laughed at him. "yeah, Mulder. I just rested. You know- running around the country after you is not as easy as it looks." He smiled at her and tipped his chair back- putting his feet on the desk, "Well, you know, running around the country like me isn't easy, either." She smiled at him, and then turned back to her work mode. "Well, Mulder, what did you do this weekend?" "Rented a movie, turned off the phone and didn't sleep, you know, the usual." They smiled at eachother for another second, Scully slightly shaking her head as if to say, "You'll never change, will you?" and Mulder had to let out a small chuckle, for if Scully knew that he'd rented "My fair Lady" insteadof his usual fare, she'd probably have him commited. She gave him a questioning look, then turned back to her papers. "Well, I have to go over these papers for skinner, then I'm off to Quantico. There's an ME out and they asked me to help pick up the slack." She got up and walked to the area of the office that had become "her corner," which really was nothing mroe than a place to plug her laptop in and a chair. She sat down and began to type. A minute later she heard Mulder clear his throat. "hey Scully?" "yes?" "Have you ever seen "My fair lady"?" "It's one of my favorites, why?" "No reason, just one of thise random questions." Scully stared at him for a moment, her eyebrow raised, but he had already gone back to pouring over a file. Another few minutes had gone by before he started humming, and she knew the tune. As she gathered her stuff to leave for Quantico, she couldn't help but get the tune in her head herself. She almost laughed out loud at what it could mean. Mulder, accostumed to her face? Not likely. but she couldn't help but send her own message, one that said, " I know what you're doing" to him. She hummed the tune along with him, but he didn't seem to notice. He reached the end of the song and was silent by the time she reached the door. She lifted her coat off the rack and turned to him, his face still burried in his file. Putting on her best cockney accent, she surperised Mulder with a throaty and dead on quote from the movie, "I'm a good girl, I am." the she smiled, and with a playful wink, she was out of the door. Mulder laughed out loud, and smiled. He had decided not to make her leave, but to allow her to continue to make her own decisions. My fair Lady was not really like his situation, but it was still a good movie, and made him realize a few things along the way. Going back to his file, he sang softly to himself, "I'm very grateful she's a woman and so easy to forget; Rather like a habbit one can always break and yet, I've grown accustomed to the trace of something in the air; accustomed to her face." Fin |