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A light tap at the door.
It wasn’t the outside door, it was the adjoining door, and Scully stirred in the covers, waking up. “I’m up,” she said. Mumbling it a little. Closing her eyes.
The door cracked open. “I can tell,” Mulder said, saying what he always did, “Morning, sunshine.” She squinted one eye open, looking up to where he stood there in his pajama pants and t-shirt and smiled. She didn’t move from the pillow.
Her eyes drifted closed again. “Wilkes didn’t call yet, did he? Or did he? So early?”
Wilkes was the Blount County sheriff assisting them on the case. He was supposed to call with tox reports for her as soon as he had them, first thing that morning.
Mulder had crossed the room. “Not yet,” he said, going around the bed to sit on the edge of it at her back. The mattress dipped. He kissed the back of her neck and she smiled a sleepy smile into the pillow. “Any time now,” Mulder said. “I guess. You see Wilkes sleeping in?”
Scully moved her head on the pillow, shaking it, no. They had slept apart in their separate rooms, the luxury of a bed all to herself. She had been on her feet all day in autopsy, had let Mulder talk through dinner with barely a word herself, and had gone straight to bed by nine. She stretched in the covers now, feeling less sore. Rested.
Mulder rubbed her back idly through the pajamas.
“Mulder? I was thinking.”
“Mm-hmm?”
“Darryl Hamish was six-four. Two-eighty. He wants to run that cell block, he runs it, doesn’t he? Why—” Scully made a sound of approval, Mulder massaging her spine— “why all the theatrics?”
She shifted in the bed, moving over. Not to get away from him. To give him room on the double bed and he laid down behind her, pulling a pillow under his head.
“You tell me,” he said.
“You’re the profiler with the grand theory.”
Mulder pressed his face into the center of her back. She smiled into the pillow again as he kissed her there where the wings of her shoulder blades met. He nuzzled his face against her a little and raised his chin to rest on her shoulder. He told her again, talking into her shirt, the finer points of his theory.
“Mulder?”
“Hmm?”
His hand had moved around as he talked, under the shirt. He sounded drowsy himself now.
She countered with one of her points from the day before that he seemed to forget. His hand made slow circles over her belly, drifting ever higher, then lower.
“Oh,” he said. “Right. The evidence still stands, though, Scully. So to speak.” He paused to give her time to appreciate the pun. “We have wounds on the guy made by somebody shorter than five-four. Shorter than you, Scully.” He wrapped his long leg over her much shorter one, letting her feel his lazy grin. “Would you have the strength from your height to get the guy a foot taller, weighs twice what you do? Hypo—” he stifled a yawn into her shoulder— “Hypothetically?”
His face was rough, a night’s growth of beard but a hint of peppermint toothpaste. She stretched back against him and that’s what he was waiting for, her line of dialogue. He shifted his weight, rolling her over beneath him, flat on her back as she pulled him into her arms. “Mm,” he said. “Scully,” like a smile, like a secret, he pressed into her neck.
Sometimes she could keep it up, the inconsequential talk about anything and everything but what their bodies were doing, getting as much of a kick out of it as he did, but this morning, his weight against her felt too good, he was chasing all the words out of her mind. She loved it when they fucked like this. It was a game, completely unthinkable, completely forbidden, to see how easily they could get away with it, making no sounds or signs of what they were doing. Silence or mundane conversation, that’s all anyone listening would hear.
And for them: just the rustle of sheets. Sleep-warm skin, the soft change of their breathing. Mulder’s easy weight, his big hands moving over her, his mouth tasting every inch of her skin. Behind him, the new, pale light of morning as it fell through the curtains.
The phone was ringing. Scully lifted her head from the pillow, hearing it for the first time. Mulder, sprawled half on top of her, stirred when she pulled away from him to reach for the nightstand. He mumbled something against her, stretching to reach past her, grabbing her cell phone with his longer arm. “Scully,” she said, taking it from him, holding the phone to her ear.
Wilkes gave her the rough sketch of the report as Mulder rubbed his face awake. She touched his arm and pointed. He gave her the pen, then the paper, that she had left on the nightstand. “Thorazine?” she said, writing it down. Mulder turned at the edge of the bed, raising his eyebrows. She nodded, writing down more, keeping one eye on Mulder as he picked his clothes off the floor and headed for her shower. She asked Wilkes a question, waiting through the long pause as he shuffled the papers. The water popped on in her bathroom. Never mind, she told Wilkes. She’d get Agent Mulder and they’d be right there.
“Water’s hot,” Mulder called, hearing her hang up the phone, move around in the room. She found him at the sink, still dry, towel tied at his waist, soaping his face for a quick shave. Steam wafted out from the shower. “Thorazine,” she told him, pulling off the pajama top that she’d pulled on for who knows what reason.
“Yeah,” he said, glancing up to watch her step past him, climb into the shower. She pulled the curtain closed, hearing him say, “I guess we were right. Now we’ve got our hands full.”
Scully picked up the shampoo, cheap motel shampoo that smelled the same anywhere. “So who gets to tell Wilkes?” she said over the sound of the water.
Mulder, quickly: “Not me.”
“It’s your grand theory.”
He let that one go, finishing up at the sink, scraping his face, tapping the razor. When the curtain rattled she had lathered her hair, rinsing her face clear of soap. “Mulder,” she said, wiping the water out of her eyes.
He said, “Switch with me,” tapping her shoulder, gesturing back and forth. She did, slipping past him, catching hold of him to keep her balance, letting him under the water. He had to duck to get his scalp wet, reaching around her to grab the shampoo. “Why are these places built for your height, not mine, Scully?” he asked her.
She looked at him sideways, barely dodging an elbow. “Mulder, why are these places built for one person, not two?”
“Hey,” he said. He stopped scrubbing his scalp. “We’re on the clock. I’m just being practical.” He brought her close, turning them both with no space to spare, tipping her head back under the water. “That’s you, Scully,” he said. “Always practical.”
She would try not to smile. It was. That was her.