TITLE: Air Supply/Two Less Lonely People In the World

NAME: Mik

E-MAIL: ccmcdoc@hotmail.com

CATEGORY: SRA

RATING: NC-17. M/Sk. This story contains slash i.e. m/m sex. So, if you don't like that type of thing - STOP NOW! Forewarned is forearmed. Proceed with caution. Of course if you have four arms you can throw caution to the wind.

SUMMARY: Furniture, feng shui, bedknobs and broomsticks.

ARCHIVE: Anywhere as long as my name and addy stay attached.

FEEDBACK: Feedback? Well, yes, if you insist...

TIMESPAN/SPOILER WARNING: This is an AU, very vague spoilers for multiple episodes, nothing current.

KEYWORDS: story slash angst Skinner Mulder NC-17

DISCLAIMER: Fox Mulder, Walter Skinner, and all other X-Files characters belong to Chris Carter, Ten-Thirteen Productions and 20^th Century Fox Broadcasting. No copyright infringement is intended and no profit is being made from their use. I'd rather say that they really are mine, but I've been advised to deny everything.

Author's Notes: Alas, if it were only true …

If you like this, there's more at https://www.squidge.org/3wstop

If you didn't like it, come see me, anyway. Pet the dog.

Two Less Lonely People In the World

by Mik

I have to admit this is the first time I've felt awkward around him. I'm accustomed to instilling fear and uncertainty in him, making him feel like the awkward one. Tonight he seems almost like a different man. No, he seems like the man I wanted him to be all along.

He proposed to me. Marriage. Commitment. I'm not so smug that I don't realize he got swept away by the moment. After all, the woman he had loved for the last eight years was suddenly the legal wife of another man. Why shouldn't he want parity and want it now? Still, I don't deny the flood of feeling his offhand question precipitated.

And I stood there, outwardly calm, sipping the last of my champagne, pretending he had suggested nothing more momentous than a midnight movie. "Sure," I said. "When?"

He had been looking at the statue of the Virgin Mary and he frowned at it, as if he was expecting information and She had not been forthcoming. "What does it take for two men to get married these days?"

I smiled at him and then at the statue. "A miracle?"

"Well...we could drive to Vermont and have a commitment ceremony," he said thoughtfully.

I shook my head. "You have to be a resident in order for them to recognize it as legally binding. We can have a commitment ceremony anywhere. It just won't be a legal union." I reached for his hand. "Do you promise to remain committed to me?"

He surprised me by shaking me off. At first I thought he was concerned that someone would see me making physical contact with him. Then he added, almost impatiently. "No. I want to do this right. Okay, a commitment ceremony. We'll do it. Friends and family...you know...all that stuff. How many times does a guy get committed, anyway?" He grinned. "Granted, with me it's sort of an annual event, isn't it?"

And now we're home. Home, we've decided, will be my condominium for the time being. I couldn't live in that little hole he calls home. It's hard enough to spend Friday nights there. I watch him move around the living room as if examining a crime scene. He considers the arrangement of pictures on the wall, the stacks of music and movies on my entertainment center. He touches everything. Sniffs at liquor decanters, rubs wallpaper. He even fondles the fabric of the chairs. I can see him, like some long tailed alley cat which someone is attempting to domesticate, and he's marking the territory as his own.

I remain in the foyer, feeling I must wait for permission to enter, even though this is my home...the signature on the mortgage papers says so. Regardless of what is lawful, moral and binding, Mulder is taking over now, and I wait.

He tilts his head up, considering the vaulted ceiling, the track lighting that shines down on the fireplace, the chair I read in, pulled up at a less than feng shui angle so I can take the air of the fire, and enjoy the light on my book. From his expression, I can see him seeing me there, and all the nights I've spent there, alone, a solitary figure, in his solitary pursuits. What I do not see, and am grateful for the absence of, is pity. There is only comprehension there. He, too, has been a solitary animal.

"Coffee?" It's the only word I can manage.

He doesn't look up. His gaze is still fixed on the chair. He merely nods.

When I return, after grinding and filling and filtering and pushing, he has shoved another chair, the big chair-and-a-half that came with the sofa, up next to my reading chair. He frowns at it, looks up at the lights, and pushes the chair around, so that it can now face my reading chair. I see what he's saying, so symbolically. Rather than move the sofa, a statement of two blending lives, joined bodies, melded purposes, he's saying we will be solitary, together. He looks at me, and there is an almost sheepish expression in his eyes. "We can always put it back when we have company."

I nod, accepting the future he's laying out for us. "Coffee's going." I look around the room. "There's a bedroom down here, and two up there. I use the second one for my office, but we can change that, if you'd like."

He answers by taking the stairs, slowly, running his hand along the oak banister. I go back to the kitchen, disappointed. He doesn't want a marriage. Not the way I want a marriage. He wants to show Scully she's not the only one to get a mate. He doesn't want to be lonely on his own, anymore. He wants to be lonely with me. And yet, and this is the saddest part, I accept.

As the coffee makes its final, and most persistent perk, I pull out coffee cups and search for cream and sugar. With my head in the refrigerator, I nearly miss the faint call. "Walt?"

I lift my head, frowning. Something not right. Something...concerned...alone? I push the door shut and take the stairs, two at a time. What has he found up there, the Cigarette Smoking Bastard napping on my bed? Krycek dead on my floor? Neither. Something more unexpected, exhilarating, terrifying. Mulder, naked, sitting at the edge of my bed.

I come to a dumbfounded stop. He looks...almost beautiful. As beautiful as a long tailed alley cat can look. His body has always been a source of longing and fascination to me, lean, hard, marked by life, strong legs, almost graceful hands, but it is his face that catches and holds my attention. He looks slightly shy. He sits coyly at the side of the turned down bed, his hands between his long legs, covering that part of him I hunger for, just as his hair hangs down enough to cover his eyes.

Not knowing what to say, I reach for my tie and start to tug.

"Stop."

I stare at him, bewildered, almost angry. What the fuck is he doing sitting naked on my bed if -

He rises, unfolding himself, moving toward me. For the first time in the many, many years I've known him, he forces his way very deliberately into my personal space, leaning his warm flesh against my body as his artless fingers slide my tie away. He lifts his eyes to me as he unfastens the first two or three buttons. Then he licks his lips and lowers his mouth to my throat, my chest. Each button opened reveals more skin, more skin revealed receives more kisses. I stand still, breathless, not wanting to disturb or distract him.

He works his way down the shirt, tugging it free of my slacks, pushing it off my shoulders, his mouth hot on my skin, his tongue exploring, his teeth grazing lightly. Fingers work my belt and zipper expertly, and he shifts and lifts my burgeoning erection to his mouth. He settles to his knees, his hands reaching up to tug down slacks and shorts, a soft contented sound coming from deep in his throat as he nurses on me.

I can feel my knees tremble, my hands shake. I want to force him back, pin him down, claim him. But having become a master in the art of waiting, I display my mastery now...and wait.

His fingers glide over my thighs, up, around, over my buttocks, now across my belly. He is like a child, exploring the place he finds so comforting. Looking down, I see his eyes are closed, his face relaxed. I almost feel that he feels he's … come home. I have to smile.

He opens his eyes, looks up, smiles around me and eases himself away. Rising slowly, he meets my eyes. I see a faint blush steal over his face, and rush down his body. His cock is standing up, hard, insistent, between us. He looks down, sees that I am looking at him and he looks up again. Smiles. That sweet shyness is back, but there is more … a light burning deep in eyes I have never seen so green. He leans in again, teasing his way into my mouth, coaxing my tongue into his. His hands slip around my arms, and tighten. He is trembling.

He pulls away. "Please..." he murmurs.

I take him in my arms, roughly, hungrily. I can no longer wait. I walk him backward to the bed, devouring his mouth. I let him fall into the mattress, and tumble down over him, pinning him, spreading his legs with mine, fingers tangling in his hair. "I want you so much," I growl, fastening on his neck, rutting against him.

I feel him arch against me. There is no struggle. There is no surrender. There is only complicity. He's mine, and he wants me. This is our commitment, alone, in this darkened room. No friends, no family, no legalities. This is my lover, and I am his.

I search his eyes. I see that binding love there … it's been there for months, but I've been blinded by my own jealousy and insecurity, unable to see that he loves me. He wants me. This isn't about Scully. This is about me. And him. Us. I have a feeling that after tonight there will be two less lonely people in the world.

- END -