It is interminably boring being dead. You have a great deal of trouble
interacting with the world around you when you don't have real flesh and
blood to interact with.
For example, dead people don't eat. Yes, I know this goes counter to every
single zombie movie I ever made Scully sit through, and just forget the
vampire myth and that whole "undead" thing. Either you is or you ain't, as
my grandma used to say, except she used to say it about being pregnant, if I
recall correctly.
Solid objects present a bit of a problem to the dead, too. True, we walk on
floors and sit on chairs and that sort of thing—old habits die hard.
However, if you don't have any corporeal form, it's tricky getting objects
to move unless you were psychic when you were alive, or force them really
hard. This is why poltergeists either scoot things around slowly, or make
them fly across the room, this last only possible when we throw things. It
can be frustrating enough to make you want to throw things, believe me.
Dead people don't sleep. I mean, what would be the point if we could? So
there's a lot of hours in the day to kill (pardon the expression).
It's a lot harder than one would think to haunt the living, too. Most of
them don't listen, for one thing. With all of the electronic devices,
cellphones, car horns, televisions, radios, beepers, and general
conversation out there, it's a wonder that the living can hear themselves
think, much less notice the transparent people speaking in a whisper over
their shoulders. Oddly enough, we can touch the living, but it tends to
freak people out, so we only do it when absolutely necessary. It's sort of
a code with us dead folks.
Oh, yeah. In case you got here late, and you're sitting there wondering how
I, Special Agent Fox W. Mulder of the Eff Bee Eye, came to be the late Fox
W. Mulder of..., well, of nothing much in particular, allow me to fill you
in. You remember Scully, right? Red hair, blue eyes, itsy bitsy thing that
could take you out with a single shot? Yeah, her. Well, it seems she
stepped out in front of a speeding car over on Hegel Place one day, and I
saw this from my window. I didn't take this well, as you might imagine, so
I introduced my cranium to one of my handy-dandy Government Issue bullets.
Not pretty. In fact, I still have a nice hole in the side of my head, but I
try to comb my hair over it, so you really have to look to find it.
So we're dead. Forgive me if I sound a little crass about it. I mean,
we're used to it on this side: it's a state of being, kinda like a living
person saying "I'm a Democrat", though no amount of money can make you less
dead.
And being dead, we're usually bored. I mean, I told you what we can't do,
so what's left that we can do? We observe. A lot. We watch the living.
We sneak into movies. We watch TV—it helps pass the time. Some of the
cleverer folks can read books just by staring at the covers really hard. I
can do that, but it's really hard to look at the illustrations that way, so
naughty magazines are right out of the question.
Which brings up the matter of sex. Oh, yeah. We can interact with each
other just fine, so a lot of our time is spent fucking. For this reason
alone, I'm a little happier to be dead than alive, given my "dry spell" in
that arena. And there's not as big a deal about monogamy over here, because
in the long run, it just plain doesn't matter. Oh, sure: I fuck Scully a
lot of the time because I'm crazy about her, but I don't like to limit
myself. When Scully's busy playing cards with her dad (cards are one of the
solid objects we can manipulate without too much trouble), or my dad, or
Deep Throat, or X, or some combination of them, I've been known to settle
for a tumble with her sister Melissa (who is so loud I'm surprised there
haven't been more televised reports of hauntings on Capitol Hill), or even
Jeffrey Spender. Hey, it's something to do...
I suppose you're wondering where we're doing all of this carrying on. Well,
we can travel anywhere we want. We can sneak into cars, subway trains,
airplanes—yes, ghosts can fly: I usually fly United... But for the most
part, we walk. For this reason, we tend to pick a place that was well-known
to us in life to stick around in death. I don't go to my old apartment any
more. It's been rented by some neat freak, and the place makes me twitch
now. It sort of makes me sad, too, because cold-blooded animals don't
become ghosts. All those poor fish... However, my old basement office has
sat more or less untouched since my untimely passing, so it's familiar, and
I hang out around there most of the time.
Diana Fowley had shown up on our side of town, so to speak, not terribly
long after my passing, but I did my best to avoid her, for Scully's sake, if
nothing else. I won't mention her further here, except to note that she
brought us some valuable information from the other side, namely the exact
location of Alex Krycek's secret base of operations—well, okay... his
one-bedroom apartment with a view of the Washington Monument.
Everybody in our merry band knew that I'd long carried a torch for the
charming criminal, even Scully, so this news was especially priceless to me.
To pass the time, our friends took turns scouting out his building, checking
for patterns of door openings and closings (doors are solid
objects—remember?) and in general getting a feel for when he came and went.
At a staff meeting (something I'll bet you thought ended after you died,
right? Wrong, except that, to the dead, they're recognized for what they
are: a means of getting from now to then while pretending something is
getting accomplished), we voted to try to haunt him, just because it sounded
like fun. We made up spying schedules: Jeffy took a turn, as did Melissa,
and Deep Throat, but I decided to prolong the agony of not seeing him a
little longer. Besides, I got even more bored on stakeouts now than I
used to, and the one time I tried it, I dragged Scully along for company,
and we ended up tearing off one another's (metaphorical) clothes in half an
hour and boinking like bunnies for the rest of our stint.
A side note. Yes, the dead can usually be seen in the clothes in which they
died, or the ones they frequently wore while they were alive, but they're
not real clothes, of course. They're just part of the illusion, the same as
maintaining our fatal injuries. If we really wanted to put on nun's
habits, or look like we didn't have huge gunshot wounds in our bodies, we
could concentrate and produce that effect, but one moment of distraction,
and we'd be back to our "normal" appearance. Luckily, sex involves a
certain kind of concentration that is easy to produce, so gettin' naked and
gettin' busy is an efficient way to spend the time.
So anyway, one day (evening, afternoon, midnight, whatever) I had my pants
around my ankles and Scully spread like a gymnast doing the splits across my
old desk in the basement as I plowed my favorite furrow preparing to plant a
few ghost seeds. I guess we were both grunting pretty loudly, because I
never heard Melissa walk in.
"Knock, knock," she called out, looking at us en flagrante delicto. "Sorry
to interrupt something important..."
I glanced up but didn't stop what I was doing, and Scully tipped her head
back over the front edge of the desk and looked at her upside down.
"Whaddya got?" I wheezed, pumping away.
"Important information about somebody's dream double-agent! Are you gonna
be finished soon?"
"Yeah," echoed Scully. "It's almost time for "All My Children". Can I go?"
Giving her a quick kiss, I pulled out and helped her get her feet back
together, then tucked myself in and sat down to consult with the elder
Scully as the younger one took off for the employee cafeteria/TV lounge.
"This better be good," I growled.
"Well, better than "All My Children", anyway," she answered, twisting her
head around to listen for her sister's retreating footsteps. "So," she
resumed, turning back to me, "I've got a solid schedule for when he comes
home to sleep, and I found out he doesn't have air conditioning."
"So what? Lots of older buildings don't have air conditioning."
She looked at me like I'd just fallen off the turnip truck. "What month is
it?"
Having virtually no idea, I spun to look at the calendar on my wall.
"November?" I read.
Rolling her eyes, she corrected me. "You never change that thing. It's
July."
"And?"
Sheer exasperation crossed her face, since she obviously didn't appreciate
the fact that most of a man's brain dropped into his dick while he was
having sex, and it took a little while for it to come back up. "Hel- lo ?
Washington, D.C., in July? Ninety-eight degrees and a hundred and ten
percent humidity?"
To be perfectly honest, I never noticed temperature much when I was alive ,
so I had even less reaction to it after I was dead. "And this means what?"
Slamming her hand on the top of the desk abruptly, making the pencil
directly under her palm wiggle slightly, she hollered, "Doofus! He sleeps
with the window open!"
"Ohhhh..." I replied, suddenly seeing her point. "Fire escape?"
She sat back in the chair with a pleased look on her face at last. "Yes,
sir!"
"Great!" I chirruped, bolting up to get the haunting squad together. If I
recalled correctly, Jeffy liked soap operas, too. On my way to the door, I
asked, "I forget. Do you want in on this?"
"Naaah. I've forgiven him for bringing that Cardinale punk over to do me
in, so I've got nothing against him."
It was my turn to roll my eyes. "The plan is to have a little fun, not to
hurt him. You could have a turn if you wanted..."
"That's okay. He's not quite my speed. Too pretty. Say—any plans to
haunt that Skinner guy anytime soon?" she piped, her interest finally
piqued.
Shuddering inwardly, I replied, "Ugh! Not you, too?" Before I left the
room, I pivoted back to my informant. "Oh, and Melissa?"
"Uh-huh?" she answered, though she was grimacing at the large-breasted babe
on my out-of-date calendar.
"You don't have to call me 'Sir' unless we're in bed. Okay?"
"Whatever," she shrugged, brushing me off like a piece of lint.
I headed off down the hall toward the elevator, which some blessed soul had
set to make random stops in the basement even if the button wasn't pushed,
then pause briefly on each floor from there to the top. Before the car
arrived, however, I heard a small skittering on the linoleum.
"Arf!" barked Queequeg.
"What do you want?" I turned and asked the dog.
"Arf!" he replied.
"Oh, all right. I'm going up to see your mistress now. You can come along
if you want..."
Yet again the little tan fluffball arfed in response, and followed me
dutifully as I stepped onto the elevator when it opened. Several moments
and a few happy arfs later, the doors opened on the bullpen level, and we
headed over to the TV lounge. There I scanned the crowd of heads, spotting
Scully's red locks easily. The dog followed me as I slipped between the
tables of faces, both living and dead, upturned to the television.
However, when I stood beside her at last, Scully didn't seem to be very
interested in the show on the TV. "Oooooooh," she moaned delightedly,
making my forgotten erection twitch a little in my pants.
I peeked under the table before her to find the source of her distraction.
"Oh, hi, Jeffrey," I addressed the wanking gentleman with his head tucked
firmly under her skirt. "Rat-haunting meeting, here, now. Grab a chair."
Sheepishly, he put himself together and crawled out to take a nearby seat,
while Scully regarded me with a scowl. "Don't you even wear underwear
anymore, Scully?" I chided gently.
Her expression shifted immediately to one of amused disdain. "I haven't
worn panties for years Mulder. Shame you never bothered paying attention
until now ..."
"So, what's up, boss?" Jeffy asked with his typical annoying enthusiasm.
"Melissa has hard facts about the rat's schedule. I propose we begin our
assault tonight. Are you up for it?"
He scoffed cordially. "Aw, you know me. I'm up for anything anytime!"
Rolling my eyes, I muttered, "Yes, I know. How about you, my dear?" I
added, turning to Scully, who was cooing over the small dog in her lap.
"Maybe tomorrow... I want to spend some quality walking time with Queequeg
tonight—okay, Mulder?"
"Oh, all right," I sighed. "Y'know, I really think you ought to rename that
dog 'Sandy'..."
She looked up at me, puzzled. "Whatever for?" she asked, punctuated by a
perfectly-timed "arf!" from Queequeg.
"Never mind," I grumbled. "Come on, Jeff. We've gotta plan our attack..."
I led him out of the room, whispering, "Oh, and you don't have to call me
'boss' unless we're in bed, okay?"
Several hours later, Melissa, Jeff, and I were standing next to Krycek's
apartment building, waiting for his bedroom light to go off and arguing
about who was going up the fire escape first.
"I can't jump up there," protested Jeff. "I'll fall off and kill myself!"
Melissa and I exchanged a look. I grabbed the babbling junior Spender by
the necktie and pulled him in for a quick, probing kiss. "Dipshit," I
purred into his ear, "you're dead already. Just jump. You'll be fine.
Trust me."
As he stepped back a few paces to take a run at it, Melissa turned to me
warily, her arms folded stubbornly across her chest. "Whatever happened to
'Trust No One', huh, Fox?"
"Shuddup," I snarled in her direction, then called to Jeff, "That should be
far enough. Now go ahead. I'll catch you if you slip."
"Okay, here goes," he called, nearly half a block away. Sure enough, he
bounded easily up to the first floor access of the fire escape, then stood
there on the cast iron mesh panting and looking triumphant. "I did it!" he
crowed.
"Good for you," I praised, then leapt up to join him. "M'liss, you standing
guard down there?"
"Yeah," she replied in a bored voice. "I'm not feeling much like a monkey
tonight."
"Oh, well," I hollered back down as we made our way up the steps. "Maybe
you'll find a pliable squirrel ghost down there before we get back. I bet
they can do fabulous things with those big furry tails..."
"Uh-huh," agreed Jeff, still slightly winded from his vault. "Squirrels are
great..." he sighed, looking a little wistful.
"Shut up and climb," I ordered.
Eventually we were in sight of our prey's window, now darkened for the
night, though the sash was far open to let in any cool breeze that might
have wafted in from the Potomac. Jeff and I crouched down outside of his
sill and peeked over to get a good look at the room. It was simply
decorated and neatly kept, his weapon all shiny and clean next to his
prosthetic arm on the dresser the only indications that this was the abode
of my biggest romantic disappointment.
Jeff's eyes nearly bugged out of his head as he caught a glimpse of the
naked form of Alex Krycek sleeping on rumpled sheets. "Fuck!" he exclaimed,
noting the size of his male member.
"That was the general idea," I whispered in reply, starting to negotiate
the path into the window and through the room.
"The man is hung like a horse," he marveled, following me into his bedroom.
I paused, turning to my partner-in-haunting. "Thank you very much," I said,
lacing my voice with as much resentment as I could muster. "He's not that
much bigger than I am."
"Yeah," he argued, "but he's not even hard yet! Can I touch it?" He gawked
like a kid admiring his big brother's freshly-painted scale model of a
Fokker triplane.
"Sure. Tonight's your turn anyway. I'll just watch. Do whatever you
want," I encouraged.
"I used to work with him, you know," he hesitated.
"So did I. Get on with it already," I scolded.
"Sorry," came his muffled apology, as he crouched by the bed and reached out
tentatively to touch Alex's sizeable penis. He slowly slid one finger from
its root down to its uncircumcised tip, making it shudder visibly from the
chair where I sat to watch the show. His bravery escalating gradually, he
stroked it gently with his whole hand, then gripped it snugly as it started
to become erect.
Jeff's manipulations were having a similar effect on me, so I opened my
trousers and started playing with myself as I watched. In unison, we petted
the cocks in our hands, fondling and pulling at them with increasing force,
as the three faces in the room assumed similar expressions of tension and
delight. I tried not to make too much noise when I came, but can't vouch
for how successful I was. At least there wasn't any cleanup involved: the
nice thing about ghost semen is that it doesn't have any real substance,
either, but the sensations it involves are the same as if it did.
"Dammit!" he shouted suddenly, dropping Alex's organ and jumping away from
the bed.
"What's wrong?" I asked, irritated at being roused from my afterglow too
quickly.
"I came in my pants," he complained sheepishly, shaking out his virtual
clothes.
"Wonderful," I grunted. "Never mind. We'll try again tomorrow. We'd
better get out of here. Can you walk?"
"I think so," he answered, following me carefully back to the fire escape
without waking up our still-hard hauntee.
When we hopped back down to street level, Melissa was still laughing at what
she'd heard through the open window, and she kept breaking out in a
hysterical guffaw at us from time to time all the way back to the Hoover.
The next day, Scully debriefed us in the basement office, and she asked us
about our previous night's mission, as well. She couldn't get anything from
Jeffrey, who was too embarrassed to say much, but pretty soon she and
Melissa were giggling at us in stereo.
"Didn't you schmucks even have a plan ?" she chortled, shaking her head
incredulously.
"Well, no," I confessed, feeling a little stupid.
"I'm coming along tonight," she announced, sitting back in her chair
decisively. "I think it's time to play succubus."
"If you suck a bus, don't you burn your lips on the exhaust pipe?" joked
Melissa, wiping a helpless tear from the corner of her eye.
"Does Krycek even like girls?" Jeff wondered aloud.
"What difference does it make?" responded Scully. "A mouth's a mouth..."
"Speaking of which," I interrupted, leering at her eagerly. Before long, we
had hustled the others out of the office, and she spent the rest of the
afternoon perfecting her technique on me—a grueling task with which I was
more than happy to assist.
By the time Krycek's bedtime rolled around, we were once again stationed
outside his window, Scully and I perched on the fire escape, and Jeffy
standing guard beneath.
"I wouldn't deep-throat him if I were you," Jeff warned in a stage whisper
from the ground. "That thing would choke a hippopotamus."
"Very funny," she called back down to him. A momentary panic crossed her
face and she leaned in close to my ear. "He's kidding, isn't he?"
"Yes," I replied. "Alex isn't much bigger than I am."
Peering over the sill at our intended victim, she opined, "Uh, I don't know
about that. He is pretty damned thick compared to you." With that, she
crawled quietly into his room.
"Great," I grumbled to myself. "How big does a guy have to be to get some
respect around here?"
Once inside, I took up my post in the same chair from the night before. I'd
had such a pleasant afternoon that I didn't feel the need to participate in
the evening's festivities, so just sat down to watch my lovely partner at
work.
Kneeling on the bed over the sleeping Krycek, Scully ran her soft hands the
length of his body, coaxing his cock to attention with her tender
ministrations. He moaned softly in his sleep as she lifted it to her mouth,
but did not awaken.
Like a lipsticked boa constrictor, the tiny redhead seemed to unhinge her
jaw to take in the immensity that was Alex's sex. She was a sight to see,
licking and slurping him, deliberately taking her time opening her throat to
allow him inside. At last she had it all the way down, and her head moved
up and away from his rosy pink balls with exquisite slowness.
Without warning, the formerly motionless form on the bed bucked his hips up,
startling the beautiful woman giving him fellatio and making her disgorge
him quickly, leaving her choking and sputtering in his wake.
I jumped out of my chair to her side at once, hoping to shush her before she
disturbed him further. "Are you okay?" I asked in a hushed voice.
"I'm gonna throw up," she groaned, pushing me away and stumbling to the open
window.
"Throw up what ?" I considered, until I realized that a gag reflex tripped
feels miserable, whether anything can come of it or not. I hurried to help
hold her head over the fire escape, grinning evilly to myself as I pictured
the look on Jeffy's face as he heard her retch directly above where he
stood.
"So," Melissa chuckled, back at home base the next morning, "the ghosts of
Christmas Past and Christmas Present struck out. Any more bright ideas, o
ghost of Christmas Yet to Come ?" This last word she gave particularly
vicious emphasis.
"I'll think of something," I sneered, disregarding my sorry-looking
colleagues flopped listlessly around the office.
"You'd better. Tell me all about it tomorrow," she sang out. "I'm going up
to spy on Skinner in his executive washroom..." Queequeg gave a snotty
little "Arf!" and followed her out the door as she left.
"We suck," whined Jeffrey, perched listlessly on a side table.
"Speak for yourself, Jeff," grumbled Scully, her chin propped desolately on
her fists as her elbows made nary a dent in the papers on my desk.
"He hasn't even noticed that we were there !" he replied. "I was hoping
he'd at least wake up so I could see those green eyes again..."
"Yeah," sighed Scully, a little more dreamily than I might have expected.
"You guys are no help," I stated at last. "Tonight I'm working alone."
"Can't we at least come and watch?" begged Jeff, his face holding the first
hopeful look I'd seen on it since our enterprise had begun.
"Please?" piped up Scully, as well.
I finally took pity on them. "Oh, all right. You can watch, but only from
the fire escape," I warned.
Scully just beamed, while Jeff hissed, " Yesssss! " to himself.
The rest of the day I wandered the aisles of a dirty bookstore getting in
the mood. At last night fell, and we found ourselves for the third night in
a row on a fire escape watching a gorgeous, naked, and hung Krycek sound
asleep in his apartment.
"Do you guys think you can stay out of trouble if I leave you here?" I
whispered as I flung a leg over the sill.
"Sure," cooed Scully, eyeing Jeff lasciviously. "They don't arrest
invisible people..."
Gratefully, I turned my back on them and surveyed the situation in the
bedroom before me. Part of my work was already done, as Alex must have been
having a nice, hot dream, indicated by the luscious erection he was
sporting.
Unfortunately, he was flat on his back, and I didn't feel like wrestling his
legs over my shoulders while he was asleep, so I got my pants off and
prepared to take the plunge, so to speak. I didn't usually take it up the
ass on this side of the shadow, earlier earthly experience with Assistant
Directors who shall remain nameless notwithstanding, but I was too committed
to my goal to give up now.
I lay down over his body, running my fingers through his hair and admiring
his perfect features as I let my cock brush his as if by accident. He
groaned softly, but remained blessedly asleep as I placed a tender kiss on
his strong forehead and sat back to make his dreams even sweeter.
Scissoring my fingers quickly in my own opening, I eased over his hardness
gently, slowly impaling myself on his organ. I felt a grimace of
pain/pleasure cross my face as I positioned him inside me just right against
my prostate, then gripped my own tool to jerk off as I fucked myself on the
supine Alex Krycek.
Attempting to strike a balance between hurrying up and taking my time, I
glanced briefly towards the fire escape, where I couldn't see anyone, but
familiar voices grunting with well-known effort wafted in through the open
window. My amused smile was soon replaced with another grimace, and before
long, heat suffused my belly and I came all over my hand and Alex's chest.
Still riding the man on the bed, I felt his balls tighten, and a sudden
whoosh of heat inside me let me know that I'd been successful in meeting my
goals for the day.
Successful, that is, until I spotted terrified green eyes open on the face
beneath me, and the glint of gunmetal shimmering in the moonlight in his
right hand. Oh, shit.
I couldn't move. Luckily, the barrel of his Glock wasn't really aimed at
me, nor were his eyes. They frantically scanned the room for me, but he
couldn't find me, even though I was still straddling his softening penis.
Being dead, however, had made me reckless, so as I released him and pulled
away, I couldn't resist bending over him one more time and pressing my mouth
against his, tempting fate in a genuinely spooky kiss. When I sat back up,
I had to chuckle at his frightened expression, and added, just loud enough
for him to hear me, "I love you, Alex."
That did it. Bam! He started shooting through me, more or less, making at
least one hole in the wall opposite the bed. I leaped off of him, gathered
my clothes around me, and made a beeline for the window. Scully and Jeff
were already peering inside with laughably startled faces.
"What the hell happened?" asked my other former partner, her eyes nearly
as wide open as her mouth.
"Victory!" I grinned, as one more bullet flew through the window and
ricocheted with a ping off of the cast iron railing.
"Perhaps we'd better go," suggested Jeff, tugging on both of our hands as he
started running down the metal steps.
Before we left for headquarters, I took some satisfaction from noticing that
Krycek had turned the bedroom light on again and was shouting anxiously,
though pointlessly, into his opened closet at his disappeared intruder.
Krycek's car squealed to a stop on Hegel Place, and he bolted up the stairs
to apartment 42 in Mulder's building. His heart raced as he pounded his
fist on the wooden door.
In a moment, the door was opened, and Fox Mulder stood before him, his hair
forcibly tousled and his lips noticeably pinker than usual. The apartment
behind him was a comfortable mess, dark but for the blue glow of the light
in the fish tank and the blink of some horror video playing on the TV,
illuminating the equally tousled Dana Scully on the sofa.
"What do you want, Krycek?" Mulder grumbled, obviously annoyed at being
disturbed at this late hour.
"Call off your dogs, Mulder!" he panted, his breath ragged from fear.
"What?" asked Mulder, authentically confused. "You look like hell. What's
wrong?"
"Look—I don't know how you're doing it, but you've been fucking with my
dreams for the past three nights."
"Fucking?" he repeated, grinning slightly as he noted Krycek's cheeks
pinkening visibly.
"Never mind. Just knock it off. I haven't slept for three days. Maybe
this will get me a moment's peace." He reached into his jacket pocket and
pulled out a CD-R in a jewelbox, which he shoved into Mulder's hand.
"What's this?"
"Names, addresses, freight transit records... It's not everything, but it
should be a start. It's the best I can do on short notice. Just leave me
the hell alone!" Green eyes rimmed with dark circles fixed on sultry
grey-greens. Krycek took a deep breath and swallowed, his voice softening
as he added, "Please."
"Okay, Alex. I'll see what I can do." Mulder patted him warmly on the
shoulder, smiling without anger and saying, "Thanks. Go home and get some
sleep," before shutting the door gently but solidly in his face.
Through the closed door, Krycek could hear Scully's voice asking, "What the
heck was that all about?"
"Hell if I know," came Mulder's reply.
"You gonna look at that now ?"
"Yeah, right. Now, where were we?" he asked, answered by her throaty
chuckle, whereupon both voices became too muffled to understand. Krycek
shook himself, then trudged back down to his car. Before he turned the key
in the ignition, he stopped to listen. He could have sworn he'd heard a dog
go "Arf!" in his back seat, but there was nothing there, so he shrugged and
drove home to bed.
If You Have Ghosts: A Halloween Carol
by Janet F. Caires-Lesgold
"If you have ghosts, you have everything..."
— "If You Have Ghosts" by Roky Erickson
