Blood of Abraham – Chapter Twenty
by Mik
To say that things were different from the moment I stepped across the hall to use the shower would be a massive understatement...it would be the subway under the street under the elevated train of understatement. I know the argument could be made that things actually changed when Skinner discovered that Bram was mine. Or maybe they changed in the parking lot of the mall when he greeted me for the first time like a fellow human being and not a piece of glass in his shoe.
Arguments aside, something more had just changed. And the more I thought about it the more things changed exponentially. My life, which I could never say had been my own, was now spinning in microscopic fragments in the universe, out of control, out of my reach, lost. And at the same time, it had snapped into sharp focus, crystal and clean and easy to see, right there in that blue and white tiled shower stall.
It wasn't the sex. It was the act. Yes, there was a difference, a profound one. He could have chosen any one of a dozen gestures to show me that my life was going to be different now, that someone was going to care...not about my work, my beliefs, my connections, my father, my name, the brink of insanity upon which I so often teetered, not about my son. Someone was going to care about me. He chose sex because it was immediate and intimate.
I suppose another argument could be made about consent. I did not acquiesce to his attentions but only because the offer was never put before me. But I can't honestly say it was rape. I wanted to. I wanted to be indignant and wounded. I wasn't. So, was that flaw in my psyche or his?
At that point in the analysis, I shut off the analytical chorus in my brain and settled back against the wall to let hot water pour over me, cleanse me, purify body and soul. Family. He said we were a family now. Two men and a UFO...unidentified fantastical offspring. The dreaded gay daddy syndrome as defined by Isaac Asimov. Well, not necessarily, I reminded myself, turning the water off with an almost savage jerk of determination. He said it wouldn't happen again. And it won't.
I stepped out of the shower and groped for a towel. Yeah. Right.
By the time I was dressed and my still damp hair had been finger combed into something that didn't quite resemble a bird's nest, I came out of the bathroom and heard banging, bumping and soft swearing from the room across the hall.
I leaned backward enough to get a look into the room. Skinner was wrestling with a wooden cage. Well, a very stylish wooden cage. It was painted white and seemed to have woodland creatures scattered over it. Bunnies abounded. I frowned at his exasperated expression. "What is that?"
"Well, I..." he paused to twist the wrench in his hand, "noticed you didn't bring Bram's bed and he can't stay in that basket forever." Every few words were punctuated with twists and grunts. "I had this in storage and I thought..." he twisted faster.
His daughter's crib. He was lending my son his late daughter's crib. I swear I felt a lump come up in my throat. I had to cough to force words around it. "Thank you."
He answered with a nod, and lowered the wrench. "I suppose it's a little too dainty for a boy, but we could paint it," he offered. The expression on his face seemed to suggest he'd rather repaint his spleen.
"You will not," I said emphatically, the lump getting bigger. I guess it was all in the family, now. "I'll put some coffee on," I offered.
He gave me another jerky nod and began to apply the wrench again, complete with banging, bumping and soft swearing.
I can say with some measure of pride that I managed to spend the day with him without any residual emotion or alarm. I only flinched once when he brushed by me as we moved furniture. He only stared me down once. We seemed to find and acknowledge one another's position after that. I couldn't tell you what his was, but I knew where it was, and how to avoid it without looking like a clown.
By the end of the day, Bram had a pretty proper nursery. While I was busy moving his things into a knock together bureau, Skinner was painting a tree, grass, blue sky and a kite with a ridiculously long tail on the wall opposite the crib. When he started the project, ostensibly to cover up where the former shelving had left marks on the walls, I wasn't paying any attention to him. Painting to me is an anathema and should be avoided at all costs, so I like to pretend it doesn't happen. Yet, when I was bringing the last of his things downstairs, I happened to look up, stopped short and stared in amazement, as Skinner was painting the tail of the kite.
At first, I didn't speak. It wasn't perfection, but it was recognizable. It had a sort of Impressionist feel to it, like Monet and Cezanne mated and their child had expressed himself all over the wall, with lots of apparently random daubs of paint that didn't look like anything 'til you stood at the door, as I did, and saw the tree, the grass, the sky and the kite. And suddenly, I was seeing Skinner in yet another new light. "That's incredible."
He looked over his shoulder, and gave me a dismissive shrug, but I could see a little blush of pride color the top of his head. "I've always wanted to do a mural in here."
I risked moving closer. "It's pretty cool. I just have one question?"
He sent me a slit eyed glance sideways. "Ask carefully."
"Who's flying that kite?"
He lowered the brush and stood back to consider. "I haven't figured that out, yet."
I looked around the room. "It should be a rabbit," I decided.
"A rabbit."
"Yeah." I put things in a drawer. "Why not?"
He rolled his eyes. "Why not, indeed." But I know I heard him chuckling as I left the room.
Bram had been moved downstairs and was on a blanket on the floor in the living room, wriggling his arms and legs like Richard Simmons without the glitter and tears. He seemed to be having a good time, but he stilled as I moved nearer and looked down at him. He'd grown some since I'd gotten my hands on him, but I wasn't prepared to take credit for that. He turned his face toward me as I moved around him. He made a face that might have been called a smile. "Skinner?" I called out thoughtfully.
Skinner came to the door and looked out, one hand cupped under the brush in his other hand. "Yes?"
I kept looking down. "I'm no expert on these matters, but shouldn't he be doing more now?"
"What would you like him to do? Run for President?"
"God, no!" I said with feeling. "Rolling over would do. Or sitting up. Or something like that."
Skinner took another step out into the hall. "You should ask Agent Scully. As a physician, she'd have a better idea about infant milestones and what we should be looking for."
I laughed grimly. "Welcome to my world, kid. You're probably the only baby on the planet with a pathologist as your physician of record."
Bram thought this was funny and wriggled again.
Skinner stalled in the hallway. "I've...I've taken the liberty of contacting an agency about hiring a nanny. We should be seeing applicants next week." He waited to see if I would react to that, but I was still looking at the kid. "I guess we should get the nanny's room arranged next, don't you think?"
I looked up again. Skinner had asked for my opinion on something? "Yeah, sure. I guess." Well, there was an opinion to be recorded in the Library of Congress. "I mean...yeah, you're right. Can't be prepared too soon." That wasn't much better. I swallowed. "Yes."
He disappeared into the room again.
I knelt beside Bram, and said, in a soft, conspiratorial tone, "Your father's an idiot. Sorry, kid, but it's a demonstrable fact."
He just laughed. He made a wide open, laugh out loud expression, and a little clicking sound with his tongue. For him, that was riotous laughter.
Father. Once again that simple word smacked me in the chest like a concrete post. How was it possible? It wasn't. Yet, like my idiocy, it was demonstrable. With each day, Bram's face took on a little more of the face I knew in the mirror. Even I was seeing it, now. While I pitied him a bit, I couldn't help being a little pleased for my sake.
I lifted him from the blanket and bounced him in my arms. He still didn't like being in close proximity to me, and always fussed when I held him, but he tolerated this attempt without breaking into full scale hysterics. The wide mouth laughing expression disappeared and was replaced by a worried little frown that drew his brow down and pulled his mouth into a lopsided 'O', but he didn't howl.
I passed a hand over his fuzzy head and pulled him closer. My heart was feeling squishier than one of his diapers. What the hell is going on? I let my ex boss manhandle me into orgasm and now I was feeling positively weepy about a baby. I needed another field assignment - and fast!
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Because of the fresh paint in Bram's new bedroom, I decided to keep him in the room I was taking over. Formerly, Skinner's guest room, it now had touches of Mulderdom all over it. My books, my porn, my mess. The only thing missing was a window to tape an X in, and a fishless aquarium.
We'd had a brief discussion about the wisdom of moving my bed out of my old place, and I had decided that I had long needed a new bed, and this was the perfect excuse for buying one. We agreed I could make do on the narrow guest bed for a week, and made plans to go out and buy a new one at the next weekend. I balked a little at the notion of him coming along to help me buy a bed, but he insisted, saying I'd need help moving it. If I hadn't been suffering from terminal brain farts, I would have told him I could have the thing delivered. But as it was, we were set to go bed shopping in a week's time. But so help me...if he started looking at curtains, I was gone.
Since reading in bed would be impossible without disturbing the baby, I turned out the lights at the ridiculously early hour of ten o'clock. From across the hall, I could hear the faint hum of Skinner's television. Suffering from a sort of mental mouth watering, I shut my eyes and tried to imagine what he might be watching. News? Political commentary? Law and Order SVU? I wondered if he ever watched pornography...of either persuasion. I wondered if he enjoyed those home design programs, or World Wrestling Federation. At that moment, I would have been happy to watch Bob Ross painting his happy trees. I considered, briefly, going into Skinner's room to watch television with him, but that carried with it too many implications I didn't want implied, so I remained in bed.
Eventually the hum died. Skinner must be asleep, or near it, I decided, twisting to look at my alarm clock. It was only ten thirty. I could tell this was going to be a real party house.
From that moment, there was nothing to keep me from thinking about the events of the day. I can't really say I reviewed the entire day. But the highlights got some lingering consideration: my conversation with Scully, the fireworks in the soon-to-be nursery, the mural, the quiet, not quite awkward supper in the kitchen. Mostly, of course, I thought about the look in his eyes before he lurched upward and forced me into that room. It wasn't passion - well, not sexual passion. It was more like a need on his part to change something, someone. And the thing, the one, was me. And he changed me, no doubt.
Now in this dark silence, I couldn't help thinking the things I'd forbidden myself to think about. The roughness of his hands, the strength, the skill. The heat of his body pressed against mine, the fire of his breath on the back of my neck, that deep chuckle that was both indicting and forgiving. I almost didn't realize my hand had slipped beneath the waistband of my shorts as I replayed that calculated coupling. My fingers retraced his touch but it wasn't the same. I wrapped my free hand around my waist, trying to simulate the sensation of him holding me against his body, but that wasn't the same, either.
Frustrated, I pulled my hands away from my body, breathed deeply and scrambled around in the dusty archives of my mind for something as far away from sexual behavior as possible. Eyes shut tight, breathing shallow, I could actually hear the words slipping between my lips in a ragged whisper, 'Hello, I must be going. I'm glad I came but just the same, I must be going.'
Going. Coming. Coming. Going. Coming. Coming. Coming. A sound started somewhere inside me. I felt it erupting...it might have been intended for a moan, or even an adolescent giggle but it came out a frustrated sigh, a sigh that pushed me upright in bed. I shoved the blankets back, looked down at the basket where a sort of shadowy lump assured me Bram was asleep, then at the bedroom door. No, I told myself firmly, and pulled myself back into bed.
Hello...I must be going...right out of my mind. I shut my eyes tighter, as if that would keep me from seeing him sprawled magnificently on his bed not forty feet away, like some lion at the head of the pride, or...or...a bear. A great, lumbering bear with claws and fangs and a mighty roar. A new song slipped into my mental iPod. A song I'd heard him sing softly to a captivated infant. Waltzing with bears. It was no love song, I'm certain it never wooed anyone before, it was the damnedest excuse for lust I could ever imagine, but with the memory of his voice, crooning out 'I'm afraid we might lose Uncle Walter for good', I found myself slipping out of the bed and moving, not so much with trepidation but with care, toward his bedroom door. I was about to go waltzing with a bear.
The door was not so much open as it was not closed. Just a crack of darkness between the white frame and the white door, it was a tiny invitation to enter. I leaned into the door slightly and felt it swing away slowly. I could see him on the bed, then; a shaft of moonlight from the windows at the top of the wall splashed across his bed. He wasn't sprawled, as I'd pictured him. He was merely lying there, head on pillow, hands on chest. He looked almost posed. I might have backed up and left then but for a whiff of something...faint...perhaps his soiled shirt in the hamper, perhaps soap from his bath, perhaps the way my cock suddenly throbbed while I was looking at him.
I didn't struggle with my indecision anymore. My body had made up my mind. I moved carefully to the far side of the bed, lifted the bedclothes and slid in. He didn't jerk, he didn't yell, he didn't roll over and embrace me. He shifted and sighed, "Welcome."
I answered with something...a word, a murmur, a sigh...I don't remember anymore. Might have even been a plaintive whimper. I just remember moving closer to him, lifting my hand, sliding it over his belly. I wasn't surprised with how firm it was, I'd always known he was as solid as granite, but the silkiness of body hair surprised me. I know I'd seen him more than once without a shirt, and never noticed much body hair, but I could feel it. My fingers played in it, reveled in it, stroking and tugging lightly.
Beside me, his breathing had gotten softer, as if he were trying to cease all movement. He didn't speak, he didn't try to touch me, he just stayed still, letting me explore. Eventually my hand moved down his belly to find what we both wanted me to find. He was already fully erect, like hot marble in my hands as I worked my fingers around him and slid downward. Only when my fingers brushed the swelling of his balls did either of us make a sound...a soft, unison sigh.
He turned then, pulling me into an embrace I didn't resist. He didn't kiss me, but his mouth moved over my face, my neck. My fingers tightened on him as I tipped my head back, giving him access to my throat. "What do you want... Fox," he breathed against me.
"Call me..." I swallowed hard as his hand moved up under my tee shirt, "...Mulder."
He bit me. Not hard. Just a little nip near my Adam's apple. "No. Not in bed."
I should have been concerned then. He was being far too toppy for my comfort. I liked compliant men. Men who let me take without effort or fuss. I never wasted time seducing. I only took what was offered willingly. "Mulder," I repeated, squeezing slightly.
His teeth set a little tighter on my skin. "Fox," he whispered around my throat.
I shook my head slightly. This was a mistake. I released him and started to roll away.
That just seemed to amuse him. "Fox," he repeated and with one movement had me on my back and he was on my front. "Only in bed," he promised, pinning my wrists to the bed. "But in bed, I will call you Fox." He rubbed his erection against mine.
I opened my eyes. "No," I repeated, feeling myself harder than I expected when faced with resistance. "I'll...I'll call you Wally," I warned.
He chuckled and rubbed against me again. "Call me motherfucking asshole, I won't care." He kissed my mouth lightly. "But I'll call my lover by his given name, in bed."
"Lover?" I tried to say that, anyway, against his mouth teasing mine. Who said anything about lovers? This was just release, this was taking advantage of a nearby and likeminded body. "Lover?"
"Mmm," was his only answer, as his mouth moved down toward my throat.
"You said...you said...ohhhh fuck...you said this wouldn't happen again."
"It's happening," he agreed, sucking just under my ear.
"We're not...listen to me," I gasped. "We're not lovers, we're just...you said...listen to me, motherfucking asshole."
"I'm listening." He moved downward, his tongue flicking over my collarbone. "But before you say anything else..." He raised his head and looked into my eyes. His eyes were dark, smoldering, even in moonlight, "...remember who came to whose bed?"
Well, he had me there. "Not lovers," I repeated, but with less conviction. "Just...oh...shit...stop that. We're not lovers."
He pulled back onto his knees, releasing my hands. "I only have lovers in my bed." He made a gesture that indicated I should leave.
Only I couldn't. I couldn't move. I wanted him so fucking bad. I groaned, loudly. "Okay," I said gracelessly. "But only in bed."
He slid down over me, covering me in heat and power and hard, hard body. He kissed me.
End Chapter Twenty