TITLE:  Reflections

AUTHOR:  Kelly Keil

EMAIL:  kellylynn73@comcast.net		

WEBSITE:  www.geocities.com/kellychenault73

ARCHIVE:  You want it, you can have it.  Just leave it 
intact with all my info attached.

FEEDBACK:  Is more than welcome.  Please drop me a 
line to tell me what you thought.

SPOILERS:  A very small one for all things.  This 
happens before any of the events in Requiem.

RATING:  R 

CLASSIFICATION:  S, A, MSR

DISCLAIMER:  I don't own Mulder or Scully.  I was not 
Chris Carter the last time I checked.  FOX and 1013 
have better things to do than sue me.

SUMMARY:  Scully reflects, in more ways than one.  

AUTHOR'S NOTES:  This story completes a trilogy 
started with Nothing and No One and followed by 
Terrible Aspect.  Reflections, however, can be
read as a stand alone story.

ACKNOWLEGEMENTS:  Thanks to Alicia, Jood, Robbie, 
and Chris for their excellent betas.  Also, I must 
thank YV for its constant support.  I couldn't do 
it without you.  

_______________________________

Reflections
By Kelly Keil

      For now we see through a glass darkly; 
but then face to face:  now I know in part; 
but then shall I know even as I am known.
			I Corinthians 13:12



She has become fascinated with her reflection.

She sees herself in mirrors, car windows, polished 
marble, and even her partner's black sunglasses.  Each 
time she is surprised.  The person looking back at her 
is not whom she expected.

She doesn't feel any different.  Not really.  Not in 
any way that matters.  Things have changed, of course.  
They always do.   Still, she is the same person she 
always was.  Isn't she?

The face she sees is hard; cut in diamond.  Its lines 
are stark where she feels there should be soft curving 
of cheeks and chin.  The eyes have lost their innocence, 
and there are shadows beneath them.  There are fine lines 
where the skin should be smooth.

She is getting older.  

This shouldn't bother her, but stubbornly it does.  Life 
is flowing through her fingers, and she wants to tell it 
to just stop already and let her catch up.  Perhaps 
it's too late.  Time waits for no man.  No woman, 
either.  

Her eyes see a matching set in the sun visor's mirror.  
She hurriedly flips the visor up, regardless of the sun 
that nearly blinds her coming through the windshield.  
It's rude to stare at a stranger.

*  *  *

"You're beautiful," he says, watching her fidget in the 
car seat.  The words have come out unbidden, but it is 
too late to recall them now.

"Hmm?"  She isn't paying attention to him.  He's seen 
her studying her reflection when she thinks he's not 
looking.  She doesn't seem to like what she sees.  He 
wishes he knew what was going on behind those blue eyes.

"I love you," he says as an experiment, and she turns.

"Excuse me?" she asks, pinning him with her gaze.

He has her attention now and he's not sure what to do 
with it.  Swallowing hard, he begins, "Ah..."

"You're joking, right?" she scoffs, but he senses an 
undercurrent in her.  A yearning for...something.

"And if I wasn't?"

"Don't answer a question with a question, Mulder.  It's 
annoying."

He almost makes a flippant remark--there is one 
trembling on the tip of his tongue--but instead he says, 
"I'm sorry.  I seem to annoy you a lot these days."

She looks out the car window.  "I have a headache," she 
says.

He takes this as his cue to shut up.

*  *  *

She doesn't bother knocking on the door between their 
adjoining rooms, just opens it and walks in.  He's 
grateful that he hasn't undressed yet, and is also 
cynically aware that he could probably be stark naked 
and she wouldn't care.

"Did you mean it?" she asks.

He is lost.  "What?"

"You said you loved me.  Did you mean it, or was that 
just more Mulder bullshit?"

He doesn't remember when he's seen her this agitated 
before.  She's strung so tight that he can almost hear 
her twang as she paces in front of him.  The wrong word 
out of his mouth could fuck things up irreparably.  He 
sits on the edge of the bed and tries to regroup.

He is somewhat surprised that she even needs confirmation 
from him.  He thought his feelings for her were obvious.  
Of the two of them, he is the one who wears his heart on 
his sleeve.  He has been waiting for her all this time.  
Could it be possible that she has been waiting for him?

"I love you," he says.  He wonders what happens now.

She still paces angrily.  "Why didn't you...that night, 
after you came back from England?  I practically threw 
myself at you."

He isn't sure what to say.  He wanted to make love to 
her that night, but he had felt the invisible barriers 
between them and could not.  "I held you," he says 
softly.

"That isn't what I wanted."

He knows this, but flinches anyway.  He thinks of how 
she woke up in his arms hours after he had taken her 
to his bed.  She had tried to turn toward him, but he 
wouldn't let her.  "Just let me hold you," he'd 
whispered.  She'd lain passively in his embrace and 
left before he'd awakened.

"I didn't think it was the right time," he says, 
sounding defensive even to his own ears.

"Will there ever be a right time?"

"I don't know," he says softly.

"What was that, Mulder?"

"I said, 'I don't know,'" he shouts, becoming irritated.  
He is struck by her unfairness.  He's chased her for 
years.  Now she suddenly has reversed her position, and 
has the gall to be angry when he doesn't follow as 
quickly as she'd like.  

"Well, when you figure it out, let me know.  I'd like to 
be able to get on with my life.  Just don't take too 
long.  Time waits for no man, Mulder."  She swings around 
and starts for the door but he quickly stands and grabs 
her hand to stop her.  Even in his anger, he marvels at 
the sensual power her hand--so delicate, so strong--has 
over him.  He wants to caress it, to bring it to his lips 
and taste each finger, but his anger wins out and he holds 
it tight enough to hurt her.

"What do you mean by that?" He growls out the words.

"I've waited a long time for you, Mulder.  Too long.  I'd 
like to think that I haven't been wasting my time.  I'm not 
getting any younger.  Neither are you."

She tries to pull from his grasp but he won't let her go.  
"And if I said the right time was now, what would you do?" 
he challenges her.  She looks at him, calculating and 
categorizing every nuance of his expression to try and 
determine his feelings.

He pulls her forward and kisses her.  It is a kiss borne 
out of anger; it is a kiss borne out of love.  It punishes 
and soothes.  She won't back down from him, and grips him 
as tightly as he grips her. 

It is too much, too soon, and he is the first to retreat.  
He struggles for control.  "Damn it, Scully," he rasps.  
"Not like this.  Not..."

She takes hold of his face in both her hands and brings 
his lips down to hers.  "Shut up, Mulder," she says, then 
silences him with her kiss.  She is the aggressor, herding 
him with her tiny frame closer and closer to the unmade 
bed.  She tears at his clothing and buttons fly off with 
soft pops that just barely register on the outside of his 
consciousness.  He is utterly powerless before her, his 
doubts caught between his desire and hers.  It is so right, 
yet so wrong.  

She pushes him down onto the bed and undresses before him, 
carelessly throwing her clothes down on the floor, shedding 
each article as if she cannot wait to be rid of it.  He's 
seen her naked before, of course he has, but now he can 
barely look at her.  Her beauty and anger unman him somehow, 
and he has to close his eyes.

"Look at me, Mulder.  Aren't I everything you've ever 
dreamed of?" She takes his hand and holds it to her 
breast.  "Is this not what you've wanted to do since 
you met me?  Touch me, damn it!  Isn't this what you've 
always wanted?"

He grabs her waist and she lets out a startled gasp as 
he throws her onto the bed and covers her body with his 
own.  "Is this what you want, Scully?  Is it?"  He grinds 
his hips into hers, hating this but reveling in her 
warmth.  "You want me to fuck you here, in this shitty 
little room?"

She doesn't want to examine her feelings.  What she wants 
is the delicious press of his flesh on hers, the taste 
of him in her mouth, and his scent surrounding her.  He 
is so large that she is swallowed up by him, and this 
is good.  She wants him to block out everything--her 
past, her future, this dingy hotel room, the stranger's 
reflection in her mirror--and make her back into what 
she once was.  She has become an icon; she wants to be 
a woman.

She takes her nails, so carefully manicured like the 
rest of her, and rakes them down his back and sides.  
This will leave marks, her mind dimly registers, but 
that doesn't matter.  Only now exists.  "I don't care.  
I want you right here."

He hangs onto his sanity by a ragged fingernail.  "You 
don't," he says, his body betraying his mind's restraint.  
He kisses her with desperate need and runs his hands 
over her silken skin, touching everywhere.  This is 
wrong, his mind screams.  You know it is.  No I don't, 
is his body's response.  I don't know that at all.  
And even if I did, I don't care.  

The moment he enters her body is exquisite.  The tenuous 
hold he had on his sanity is gone and he mindlessly 
thrusts himself into her.  It has been too long, and 
this is too good, too sweet.  He gorges himself on her.  
He feels her climax around him and is lost.  "I love 
you," he moans.  "Oh, God, fuck, I love you."  

He comes into her and the jolt of pleasure he feels is 
gradually replaced by doubt again.  She lies beneath 
him, satisfied as a cat with a dish full of cream, but 
there is a niggling thought in the back of his mind 
that something isn't right.  He pulls out of her and 
lies beside her, one arm gathering her close, the 
other flung over his eyes.

She hasn't said the words.  His eyes snap open and he 
half sits up, looking down at her.  "I love you," he 
says again, this time with deadly earnest.  "I won't 
take it back, Scully.  I can't.  I have to know..."

She stretches sleepily.  "We'll talk about it in the 
morning, Mulder."  She closes her eyes and begins to 
drift off.  

She isn't going to say it, he realizes.  She's used him, 
knowing how he feels about her, for some purpose unknown 
to him.  The small doubt that was left in his mind 
crashes to the forefront.  He pulls away from her.  
"Scully, get out of my room.  I want you to leave."

She looks at him, both puzzled and annoyed.  "What's 
gotten into you?"

"Now.  I want you to leave now.  Before I do something 
I regret."  He barks a short, ugly laugh.  "Too late.  
I already have."

She reaches to touch his face--to placate or strike, he 
doesn't know which--and he pulls away from her.  "Go," 
he says, and she looks up at him with eyes that nearly 
kill him.  He cannot look at them.  "Go.  Now."  He looks 
away from her, facing the wall.  The wall won't wound him.  
The wall is safe.  "Get the hell out!" 

She stalks out of the room, gathering up her clothing 
as she goes.  He hears the door slam.  She's left him 
alone.  

He curls into a ball and cries.  He cries for the pain 
she makes him feel, and pain he feels without her.  He 
cries for all the wasted time.  He cries for the ass he 
just made of himself.  He cries for damaged pride, lost 
hopes, impossible dreams, and bad endings.  He cries for 
every time he wanted to touch her.  He cries because she 
has driven him to this point.  He cries because he loves 
her and cannot stop.

*  *  *

"I'm sorry," she says the next morning over runny eggs 
and burnt toast in a small diner.  

She feels alive this morning, and awake to the world 
around her in a way she hasn't been for months.  Her 
endless introspection has been replaced, if only 
temporarily, with stark awareness.  She is seeing her 
partner with new eyes and he looks like hell.

He glances up at her and she flinches back from the 
lash of pain in his eyes.  The hurt she sees is her 
fault and not her fault.  She sees now how stupid 
it's all been.  She also knows that with this man 
she cannot erase all that lies between them with a 
few simple words.  She has regained her faith; he 
has lost his.  She will have to help him find it.

She also realizes that it didn't help matters at all 
that she lost her temper with him.  She wanted to push 
him, to see him react.  She's tired of being treated 
with kid gloves.  She didn't mean for it to go as far 
as it did.  In clumsily trying to make things right 
she has damaged him.  

He turns his haunted eyes back to his runny but 
blameless eggs, and she is grateful for that at least.  
She can't think when he looks at her that way, and she 
needs to think very hard right now.  

"What are you sorry for, Scully?" he asks dully.  

"I hurt you," she says.  "I didn't meant to..." She is 
lying to him and herself.  Part of her had wanted to 
hurt him as much as he'd hurt her.  She'd wanted him 
to bleed like she'd bled for him.  Then, after she had 
cut into him, she'd fled to the safety of her own room 
and her own bed, and left him to tend his own wounds.

"I'm sorry," she repeats.

"It doesn't matter," he says.  "Are you ready to go?"  
Without waiting for an answer, he grabs the check and 
heads for the register.

It does matter, though, to both of them.  She looks at 
herself in the napkin holder.  The woman looking back at 
her seems anxious.  She fingers her short hair and traces 
over the bones in her face.  This is me, she thinks.  
This is who I am.  

"What are you looking at?" he asks.

"It's not important," she says, but hears her inner 
voice whisper, but it is, but it is, but it is, as she 
follows him out the door.

*  *  *

She makes herself look in the mirror.

She remembers what the other face desired.  She wanted 
respect and power.  She craved answers.  She wanted 
the key to the universe wrapped up for her with a big 
satin bow.

Doesn't matter.  You aren't her anymore.  What do you 
want?

She thinks hard.  She has been looking into herself 
lately, but not in the right place.  She's been looking 
at what she was, not what she is.  She knows it is time 
to let all that go.

I want to forget, she thinks.  I want to remember, but 
be able to move on.  I want to be strong.  I want to 
be whole.  I want to be with him.

She looks these truths in the eye squarely.  This is 
me, she thinks.  This is who I am.

Is it enough?

She hopes that it is.

*  *  *

He is trying to forget that night but she won't let him.  
She looks at him with half-lidded eyes and he knows what 
she is thinking.  He wants to yell at her and tell her 
to stop it.  He wants to drag her to the floor and make 
love to her.  He doesn't know which he wants more.

He is back to sleeping on his couch.  Or rather not 
sleeping on it.  His short, fitful dreams are always 
of her.  It is easier to pace his apartment than dream 
of her burning eyes.  Eventually, however, even he must 
sleep.

She stands before him, naked.  From out of the air she 
pulls a shining orb and holds it out to him.  He stares 
at it, mesmerized.

"Take it," she says.  "It's all I have."

He reaches out to touch it, but she draws back and 
tosses the ball to him instead.  "Don't drop it," she 
admonishes. "Don't drop it, don't drop it, don't drop--"

He awakes with a start, wet with sweat.  Wrong or not, 
he needs her.  It is too late to protect himself anyway.  
If he is damned, he might as well enjoy the sin.  He 
throws on yesterday's clothes and leaves the empty 
torment of his apartment.

After the interminable car ride he stands before her 
door, trying to decide whether to knock or use his key.  
He might have stood there until morning but she 
unexpectedly yanks open the door.

"Mulder?  You look awful.  What's happened?  Why didn't 
you call?"  She ushers him in through the door.

"How did you know I was out there?"

She shrugs.  "I don't know.  I thought I heard 
something..."

"I'm sorry.  I probably shouldn't have come."  His words 
hold little conviction and he looks at her hungrily.

"No, no.  I wasn't asleep. I haven't been sleeping well 
lately."  She smiles ruefully and pleats the edge of her 
robe with her fingers.  "What did you want?"

"You."  The word hangs starkly in the air.

"I...ah...was under the impression that I was the last 
thing you wanted, Mulder.  I seem to recall you shoving 
me out of your bed."  She doesn't know why she's goading 
him.  The words seem to be coming out of her mouth of 
their own volition.

"Do you want me to leave?"  His voice is cool.  His eyes 
plead with her to make him stay.

She clears her throat and walks over to stand directly 
in front of him.   "No."    

"Why do you want me to stay?"  

"I want you.  Isn't that enough?"

"No."  His voice is wistful.  "I need everything.  Can 
you give me that?"

"I want to try to love you, Mulder.  I won't let you 
give up before we've even begun."

"It'll hurt, Scully."

"Whom will it hurt?" she asks, her fingers reaching up 
to stroke his face.

"Both of us."

The movement of her hand stills.  "I understand that."  
Her fingers trace lightly over his brows, nose, and 
the curve of his lips.  "It's a risk I'm prepared to 
take."

He buries his hands in her hair and kisses her, drinking 
in her desire.    His lips travel along her throat and 
she shivers in his arms.  "Are you sure you want to do 
this?  You'll be opening a door that you won't be able 
to close."

"I think you worry too much, Mulder.  We'll be fine.  
Let me show you."

And that night, if her mouth doesn't tell him that she 
loves him, her body does.

*  *  *

She has begun touching him in front of others.  He 
isn't sure if she's aware of it or not.  Even with 
their superiors looking on, she reaches over to brush 
lint from his sleeve.  

The gesture seems almost possessive.

They have started again, or perhaps they have just 
started.  They are spending time together.  She is 
talking to him, with him, about herself.  He thought 
he knew everything about her but he was wrong.  

The mask she has worn for so long is slipping off of 
her face, letting him see the feelings she's kept 
hidden.

He fears he loves her too much.  Loving her is both 
easier and harder than anything he has ever done.  
She completes him and destroys him at the same time.  
It's a torture he would not give up for any price.  
The paradox pleases him.

Together they are trying to rebuild something that 
didn't really exist.  This is perilous work at best.  
She knows that he loves her.  He thinks that perhaps 
she loves him.  The world hasn't come to a screeching 
halt because of this.  Perhaps together they will get 
it right.  

Or kill each other trying.

*  *  *

This is me, she thinks.  This is who I am.

The familiar mantra is easier to believe with each 
morning.  She no longer fears her reflection.  The 
thin woman with short hair who is tottering on the
edge of middle age no longer shocks her.  She has 
embraced the woman she sees and is embraced in return.  

She smiles at her reflection.  The reflection smiles 
back.

It is enough.

*  *  *

He wakes to find himself all alone in the bed and 
momentarily panics.  His heart pounding, he finds 
her in his bathroom, staring at herself in the mirror. 

She sees him behind her and turns, reaching out to 
touch his face.  There is a refugee feather from his 
pillow sticking to his chin that she brushes away 
because she wants an excuse to feel his skin under 
her fingers.

He catches hold of her hand and folds her fingers 
against his mouth so he can kiss them.  

"I love you," he says, and a little thrill runs 
through her.  She feels this way each time he says 
it, no matter that he has said the words countless 
times by now.  

He draws her forward and cups her chin with his other 
hand and kisses her mouth.  She leans into him, her 
tongue twining with his.  He tastes so good, better 
than she had thought he might.  She remembers all the 
dreams she's had of him, and how they are pale compared 
with the real thing.

She no longer dreams of him at night--she has no need 
to.  Even asleep she can feel his warmth beside her 
and this lulls her into peaceful dreams.  She feels 
as if she doesn't deserve him, but perhaps he doesn't 
deserve her either.   She doesn't care.  He makes her 
feel alive.

"I love you, too."

He looks at her reflection in the mirror and smiles.  

"What were you looking at?" he asks, gesturing toward 
the mirror.

"Me," she says, then adds, looking into his eyes, "You."

"Us?"

"Us."



End