Author: Daydreamer
Posted: 18 February 2004

After the Fact Challenge - 2Shy
Rated: Hmmmm ... PG-13? R? I'm much
better at rating for violence than sex.
What does that say about me?

2Trust

She woke, not screaming, but barely able to breathe. The phone was in her hand, the number dialed, and he had answered before she realized she had called him. She struggled for breath, struggled to find words to explain her bizarre behavior, this middle of the night call so unlike her usual self.

"Mulder ..." she finally managed to say, her eyes closed to prevent another tear from falling.

She could hear him snap to attention, hear the sofa creak as he sat up suddenly.

"I'm here, Scully," he said immediately, as if a call from her at 1:00 in the morning were routine. "What is it?"

She took deep breaths again, fighting to speak, to make Some sense of the feelings that were overwhelming her.

"He used those women, Mulder," Scully said, her voice barely more than a whisper. "He played on their fears, toyed with their hopes, and abused their dreams." She sniffed, suddenly aware that her eyes were full and her cheeks wet. She swiped angrily at the tears, angry at Incanto, angry for her own weakness. "What he did to them emotionally was as obscene as the way he killed them." She sniffled again, then added, "How can anyone ever trust when people like him are everywhere?"

"I'm coming over," Mulder said, and forestalled any argument on her part by the simple expedient of hanging up the phone.

"You didn't have to come," she said in greeting as she opened the door.

He just nodded and stepped past her into her living room. He wore jeans and a plain white T-shirt, and his hair was mussed. 'Of course, it was mussed, she thought to herself. 'You woke him in the middle of the night.'

She closed the door, followed him into the other room, and then curled up on the couch, pulling the afghan over and around her.

"What happened?" he asked, his voice gentle as he joined her on the couch.

"It's just ..." She stopped, still struggling to shake off the vestiges of the dream. Struggling to put her feelings into words. "I think, maybe, I know what it was like for you," she finally said.

His brow furrowed and he looked a question at her.

"When you worked in VCU."

He shook his head, obviously not following her.

"I mean, I was just thinking that I sort of know how those women felt. I got inside their heads." Now it was her turn to shake her head. "They were lonely, insecure, and he played on that."

Mulder was shaking his head again, but not from lack of understanding. "That's what monsters like him do, Scully. They look for a weakness and exploit it. You know that."

She stared at the floor for a long moment, then gathered her courage and admitted, "Those women -- that could have been me."

Mulder shook his head. "How? You're nothing like them. You're successful, attractive, not an ounce of extra flesh." He smiled disarmingly as he spoke. "There are even rumors that some find you 'hot.'"

She shook her head again. "I'm thirty, not married, not even in a serious relationship. I live alone, live my job, have almost no outside friends and fewer interests." She forced herself to look up at him. "That's not successful by society's standards. Not by a long shot."

"Since when do you worry about society?" he asked.

"Not worry, exactly, just recognize. The way our culture socializes females -- we set those women up for Incanto. His pretty words, his charming ways ... they never had a chance."

He studied her for a long moment, then asked, "What woke you tonight?"

She shrugged. "Nightmare."

"Not the first time since we closed this case," he stated with certainty.

She shrugged again.

"What did you dream? That he got you -- that you were his victim?"

She shook her head slowly. "No-o-o-o ..."

He reached for her, then pulled back when she tensed.

"What, then?" he asked softly. "Please tell me."

"That I would be like them -- alone, always searching, always wanting, but never finding, never having."

He shook his head, touched her arm and waited for her to look at him. "It'll never happen," he said confidently. "Trust me."

"How does anyone find trust in all this madness?" she asked.

"It's not something you do with a conscious decision," he replied. "It either happens or it doesn't." He rose and looked down at her for a moment, then said, "Come." His eyes were dark, his voice quiet. He held out one hand and she let him pull her gently from the couch. Without a word, he led her to her bedroom. He pulled back the spread, lay on the top sheet, and waited, his eyes never leaving her. When she still didn't move, he rolled over, his back to her, and seemed to settle in.

It took her several long minutes before she could bring herself to crawl back into the bed. Once she was settled, his hand slipped out from beneath the bedspread and turned off the lamp. As darkness fell, all she could hear was the steady rhythm of his breathing.

Time passed slowly in that watching the clock way it has, and 2:00 o'clock became 3:00 o'clock and still he never spoke, never moved.

They lay like that, unmoving, until she felt she had to touch him. Slowly, tentatively, her hand reached out and touched his shirt. He rolled immediately, searching her face for something only he would recognize, then pulled her to his chest. She let him hold her, let herself soak up his solid presence for but a brief moment, before she rolled again, turning her back to him. Sliding backwards, she moved to him and he wrapped around the contour of her body, enfolding her until they were tightly joined. Two made into one. When she felt his arousal, she moved slightly away, but never too far to prevent feeling him close.

Sometime in the early hours of the morning, after they had both slept for a while, she woke from no nightmares. She smiled, stretched in the pre-dawn light, and turned to look at her quiet but awake partner. She slid out of bed long enough to remove most of her clothing and return to the bed, under the sheets this time. She looked at him and he did the same. Slowly, very, very slowly, Scully turned her back to him, slid close to him again, and, this time, when she felt his arousal, she moved not away, but toward him. He touched her shoulder, almost reverently, then bestowed a lazy kiss.

"Sometimes," he whispered, "trust finds you."