When Mulder comes to get you and bring you back with him, you think he is joking at first.
"What?" you mumble, and watch him cringe a little before repeating himself.
"Come back to my place. The...the dog misses you."
"Oh." You are momentarily stunned and then a coughing fit hits you and you
bend forward, trying to ride it out in shakes and wheezes. When you rise up
again, Mulder has a pained look on his face.
"You...you're not feeling better?" he asks, not meeting your eyes.
"I'm fine," you mutter, wrapping the afghan more tightly around you. The
heater is still not working and suddenly you feel ashamed at Mulder seeing
you like this, in a place like this. You start to wish you had at least
shaved this morning.
"Well, okay, um, can you walk on your own?"
You realize he is serious about taking you back to his apartment, and you
nod.
"Yeah. Let me just get my...stuff."
You end up not bringing more than a couple of changes of clothes, and Mulder
ends up having to help you out to the car, one arm under your shoulders and
the other holding your bag and you accept his help with as much grace as you
can. Then you have another coughing fit and almost collapse on the
side-walk. Mulder clutches you tighter to keep you from falling over.
The ride to Mulder's apartment takes place in almost complete silence.
As Mulder and Alex entered the apartment, there was a soft tapping of feet,
a moment of silent confusion, and then an array of movement when a small
furry bundle of running legs and furiously wagging tail jumped up at Alex,
attacking him with wet licks and not too hurtful bites. Alex laughed,
momentarily forgetting his weakened state, and hugged the animal close,
stroking and petting it, and as he fell down on the floor onto his knees,
Mulder reached out to grab him.
"No," Alex assured him, still not able to wipe the idiotic grin he felt on
his face off. "I'm fine. I just..." and he released the dog which rolled
over on it's back, still barking and wagging it's tail, waiting impatiently
for Alex to start scratching his belly, which Alex did without a moments
hesitation.
"You miss me? Huh?" He scratched harder. The dog playfully growled at him.
"Didn't mean old uncle Mulder take good care of you while I was..."
He stopped. The words had tumbled out before he had thought about them, and
now he turned to Mulder who was standing behind them, looking down at the
dog on its back on the floor. Mulder met Alex' eyes, shrugged and went out
into the kitchen to put away some groceries he had bought before going to
Alex's place.
"You can go lie down if you need to," he called from the other room.
Alex looked around the nice, though somewhat untidy, apartment, trying to
understand that the violent, sarcastic and hot tempered Mulder that he was
familiar with apparently wasn't the same one that he was now going to share
a place with for some time to come. This was a different Fox Mulder. Or, was
it perhaps that this was the real Mulder, calm, collected, and that the
Mulder Alex usually met was only for him?
Alex scratched his head, rose up from the floor and followed Mulder out into
the apartment's kitchen.
You actually don't like when it's too calm, when things go too well, and
when you for some reason or another feel safe. You think those things never
last anyway.
So Alex moved into Mulder's apartment with his small bag, and the days
seemed to pass surprisingly quickly and surprisingly smoothly.
Alex slowly got better. The coughing finally stopped and his temperature
went down and he kept waiting for Mulder to tell him to leave again, he even
prepared himself for the inevitable fight over who would get to keep the
dog, but Mulder never said a word about it. Granted, he didn't speak much to
Alex at all, but whenever he did it was never to tell him to get his stuff
and leave.
Alex kept waiting for it, though.
Mulder went to work every morning as usual. Alex stayed home, did some
cleaning, one thing he was actually fond of doing, took the dog on long
walks around the nice neighborhood, watched day time TV and read almost all
the books on Mulder's shelves.
The only conversations they had were either food-related or dog-related,
usually in as few words as possible. But it wasn't an unfriendly atmosphere.
It was just...silent.
It was also kind of beautifully domestic. Mulder would come home at nights,
put his coat up and go into the kitchen where he would immediately ask, "How
is the dog?"
To which Alex replied, "Good. We practiced some commands today" or, if maybe
the puppy had been ill the night before, "He's better. The vomiting stopped.
How was your day?"
"Fine. Supper's ready?"
It turned out the only thing Alex knew how to make in the kitchen was
Russian tomato salad, and after having been served that particular dish five
times in a row, Mulder finally complained a little and Alex started to order
in from the Chinese restaurant across the street that Mulder liked so much.
At nights they had their routines. They took turns showering and using the
bathroom, and then just turned the lights off and went to bed. Alex slept in
the bed, something Mulder had insisted on, with little Alex curled up next
to him on the blanket, and Mulder slept on the couch—alone.
Alex kept thinking how strange it all was.
You watch him come home at nights, take his shoes and his coat off, and you
wonder what he has been doing today, where he's been, and if that tired
look on his face is always there or if there is something that could make
it go away.
Calm and non-hostile as the apartment was these days, Alex was feeling
uncomfortable.
He didn't know why Mulder was being so nice to him, letting him stay at his
place until he felt better, letting him use his bed and just...letting him
stay. He wasn't stupid enough to think the dog was the only reason, although
Mulder seemed to have convinced himself it was.
He was silently wondering why he had deserved this act of kindness from the
FBI agent. Was Mulder doing it out of pity? Had Alex and his dog become some
sort of charity case for him? What was he expecting in return once Alex was
feeling well again?
As the weeks passed, Alex thought about this, and thought hard.
Slowly, things progressed from almost ignoring each other to actually
holding up longer topics of conversations.
Mulder started telling Alex bits and pieces from work, stuff that had maybe
happened to him that day or things he had thought about in the car on his
way home.
"I've been thinking about buying a new couch. What do you think?" he said
one time at the dinner table.
Alex slowly swallowed his bite of rise and eggrolls, said, "Yeah, why not?
Since you..."
He was going to say "Since you spend so many nights on it lately" but for
some reason he stopped himself before the words came out. He didn't know
why. It wasn't an inappropriate thing to say, but somehow he thought it
would come out sounding that way.
Mulder nodded and they continued their meal in silence.
"So," Mulder said one day, standing in the doorway to the bedroom. "Do you
think we should, like, get Alex neutered?"
Alex, who was sitting on the bed with the dog in his lap, wearing only
boxers and a T-shirt, jerked up at the surprising question and stared at him
in the door. "Wha...What?"
For a second Alex thought maybe it was meant to be a joke, which, granted,
weren't exactly plentiful around this place, but Mulder looked dead serious.
"I mean the dog. Do you think we should take him to the vet and...you know."
He didn't do the snip-snip thing with his fingers, but Alex saw it in his
mind. He shuddered.
"Well, I hope you mean the dog!" he said, and when Mulder showed no
indication of smiling, Alex continued in a softer tone. "Why, um, do you
think we should get him...do that to him?"
Mulder shrugged. "I just thought...to stop him from, you know, with female
dogs."
Alex hugged the puppy closer to his chest, until little Alex made a small
protesting sound. Mulder was looking at the dog in Alex's lap, and Alex was
looking at Mulder, warily. "Um, I think you only do that with cats," he
said, finally. "Because they usually run around outside and stuff. We...we
shouldn't need to do that with...him."
The "we" word sounded foreign in his ears. We...we...He tried it a couple of
times in his head. It still sounded strange.
Mulder nodded carefully, listening attentive to what Alex said. "Okay. What
about shots then? Do you think he needs any?"
Alex thought about it for a minute, making a decision. "Why don't I call a
vet tomorrow and found out? Then, if he needs to, we...we can take him down
there."
We....we...
Mulder nodded again. He rubbed his forehead a couple of times, let his eyes
drift over the pair on the bed a moment, then turned on his heel and exited
the bedroom without another word. Alex frowned, stared after him, unmoving,
until the dog nudged him impatiently on his arm. Then he sighed, folded the
blankets down and got in the bed.
He didn't fall asleep, though.
You never have had a place you actually remembered calling "home". Not
>since you became an adult. You think this has probably affected you in many
>ways, more than you care to think about.
Alex was lying on his back on the bed, staring up at the ceiling, thinking.
What did Mulder want from him? Why was he even here? Was this a game of some
sort? A trap? A way to get...something from Alex without him being able to
figure out what that was? He hated not knowing. In his eyes, it made him the
weak one, never a good thing in his world. This...kindness... was all new
territory to Alex, and he didn't like not knowing how to handle a situation
he was in. He had to figure out what was going on.
He wouldn't be able to sleep until he had.
And that was when he heard it.
There was a sound coming from the living room, a small one, but Alex heard
it anyway. He pricked up his ears, listened to see if he would hear it
again.
There it was. A faint sound of...movement. Of something moving, making small
noises, out in the living room.
But what was it? Was Mulder awake? He could hear the sound of the television
droning away at a low volume, but that didn't mean anything. Was Mulder
dreaming, perhaps, making those sounds in his sleep? Or was someone in the
apartment with them?
Never one for taking any chances, Alex unfolded the bedcover carefully, so
not to disturb the sleeping puppy, and got up from the bed.
The TV was on, just as he had expected, but the sound was almost all the way
off, and in any case the small noises he'd heard had not come from it. Alex
carefully approached the living room, standing still for a couple of
seconds, listening, trying to hear if there was an intruder in the house.
The rhythmic sound was still there, and Alex still couldn't place what it
was coming from.
He took a few more steps forward and peeked around the corner.
Mulder was awake. He was awake and he was lying sprawled on the couch and he
had his head turned towards the TV and he was naked and he was jerking off
to some late night soft porn movie.
That was, of course, what was causing the sounds Alex had heard. He couldn't
believe he hadn't figured that out until now. It wasn't exactly a sound he
was unfamiliar with. Was there any man that was?
He had frozen still standing in the doorway to the living room, fully
visible, dressed in boxers and one of Mulder's T-shirts, and staring
wide-eyed at the scene before him. He couldn't move. He couldn't stop
staring. His mouth felt dry and he tried to swallow.
Mulder's hand sped up. His breathing did too. He was still watching the
people on the screen.
Alex blinked. His mind still racing, the only part of him that seemed to be
working at the moment.
Mulder's hand. On his own dick. Eyes on the television. Face looking tired
and sad, despite the undeniable strain towards a fast approaching orgasm.
Something in Alex's mind clicked. It was a weird moment for it to do so, but
nevertheless an idea began forming in his head. He had spent a lot of time
wondering what he could do for Mulder in return for what he had done for
him.
Suddenly, with an almost blinding clarity, he knew.
He took a deep breath. Then he moved forward, into the room.
Mulder jumped when Alex approached the couch, eyes leaving the TV and
staring up at him, hand stilling on his body, lips parting to say something.
Alex didn't let him. He took two quick steps forward, crouched by the couch
and put a trembling and, he had to admit, excited hand over Mulder's. "Shhh.
Don't."
Mulder's eyes were wide. Alex tried to give him a reassuring smile, but he
was too nervous himself to make it believable. What was he doing? What if
Mulder slept with a gun under the pillow? Alex thought the other man could
very well be shocked into using it.
"Shhh," he tried again. "Mulder. I. Let me..."
He gently lifted Mulder's slack hand off his dick and replaced it with his
own. It was warm, smooth, and hard. Mulder was hard. He was still hard, even
though Alex had just wrapped his fingers around his dick. Or maybe because
of that. Or at least not softening as Alex looked up at him, into his eyes,
asked, no, begged, "Mulder, please let me do this for you. I want to.
Please."
He meant it. He meant every raspy, pathetic, begging word. He hadn't know
that he wanted this, but he did. He knew the feeling of insecurity, the lump
of fear in his throat, that he had carried ever since arriving at Mulder's
apartment, would dissolve and go away if he would just be allowed to do this
for Mulder. That was how he worked, how things in his world worked.
He was willing to get down on his knees if he had to, to be able to do this.
Oh, wait, he was already on his knees. On his knees in front of Mulder's
couch. Mulder, who was hard and wide-eyed and maybe working up to yell at
him to get the hell away.
Alex shifted his position slightly to find balance, and at the same time
made a couple of jerking movements with his hand, testing, stroking, holding
Mulder's gaze while he did it. The flesh in his hand felt incredible. Alive.
Hot. Wonderfully, beautifully, appreciatively hard.
Mulder flinched, his hand suddenly reaching up from his side and landing on
Alex face, sliding into his hair, stopping there. Alex closed his eyes.
"A-Alex...?" he heard Mulder ask, and when he opened his eyes again, the
hand in his hair slid back to his face, traced it, stroking it softly. He
parted his lips, felt a finger slide in between them, going deep.
They both moaned. Alex didn't stop the pumping motion of his hand as he
started swiveling his tongue around the finger in his mouth, sucking on it,
tasting skin and sweat and pre-come, all at once.
"A...A-Al....Aaa-aaa..."
Alex knew Mulder was trying to say his name again. He pumped faster and the
words got lost in a moan and he felt Mulder's hips begin to buck, watched
him writhe and thrash through half-lidded eyes of his own. He kept jerking
Mulder off, kept sucking on his finger, kept watching him as Mulder's back
arched, his eyes closed, and he gave in to it.
Alex suddenly had a vision of the finger in his mouth being replaced by
Mulder's dick, and an almost painful wish to do that, to wrap his lips
instead of his hand around that hot hardness, overcame him, but by then it
was too late. Mulder gasped and came all over his stomach and Alex's hand.
Alex's hand stilled. The finger in his mouth slipped out. Mulder sank back
against the cushions again, breath slowly calming, eyes still not open.
Alex sat back on his heels and waited. He wanted to put his own fingers
against his lips, wanted to taste the cum there, wanted to but didn't dare
to do it. He was waiting for Mulder to open his eyes and say something. The
anticipation was making his stomach cramp.
It took a full good minute for Mulder to gather himself enough to open his
eyes. There was a rush of emotions in them, wonder, anger, fear, but also
amazement and...something soft. And he didn't look tired anymore.
Just...sated. Satisfied.
Alex decided to take some pride in that fact, at least.
"Um," Mulder cleared his throat a couple of times, and Alex tensed. Was he
going to be hit now? Thrown out of the apartment? Or just simply turned
down?
"Um, I, um...that...you, and, what..." Mulder kept stuttering and Alex kept
waiting, the sticky hand pressed hard against his own chest, his mouth
slightly swollen from the abuse it had experienced just before.
"Um, you...you...I thought..."
Mulder gave up. He rose into a half sitting position, put both hands on Alex
shoulders and looked him straight in the eyes. "C'm here," he mumbled and
then he kissed those swollen lips, pressed into them, made them part for him
for the second time that night.
When he finally let go again, they were both panting hard and blinking at
each other.
"I can't believe you..." Mulder began and Alex interrupted him before he
could finish the sentence, before he could put words on what they had just
done.
"Me neither," he said, and then they were kissing again, deep and long and
with so much desperation, they were both moaning and clutching at each
others shoulders.
Alex closed his eyes and felt himself being dragged up and forward, until he
was sprawled over Mulder's chest, felt a hand reach down and tug at his
T-shirt, slipping underneath it and touching bare skin. He shivered.
"This is not...this is insane," he heard Mulder sigh. He could only agree.
"I...I just wanted to...give something back," he mumbled, almost low enough
to be drowned out by the sound of skin sliding against skin, but Mulder
heard it anyway.
"What?" he asked, raising his head a little. "Give what back? For what?"
"For...for...you know..."
Mulder seemed to get it. He stared at Alex, stared as if he just remembered
who he was, where they were, the hand slowly tracing his naked skin
stopping, and Alex thought "here we go" with not a little regret.
Mulder's hand was still on his back underneath his T-shirt. He was looking
thoughtfully up at Alex, his orgasm long over with and his mind back in full
working order. Alex waited for the words he did not want to hear.
Mulder opened his mouth, took a deep breath, said, "What do you say we go
into the bedroom instead?"
Alex met his eyes. Swallowed spit along with dread. Feeling warm all over,
all of a sudden. "Okay. We might wake up Alex, though."
Mulder laughed, and Alex felt it rumble between them. "Well, we can't have
that, can we?" His eyes were full of amusement and he blinked at Alex's
anxious face. "The dog can have the bed. We just stay right here and if I'm
not mistaken it's my turn to..."
He didn't finish the sentence. Not with words anyway.
You are worried it isn't real, that it had all just been a dream, but when
you wake up again he is still there, still pressed close to you, one arm
around your waist, his face against your hair.
You are still wondering what you did to deserve this. You think that maybe
one day you will find out.
Silent
by Black Coffee
