Show, by Rachel Howard (1/1)
Edited by Dawson Rambo and Scott Carr
Classification: VA, MSR
Rating: PG-13
Summary: No.
Spoilers: None.
Archive: Gossamer, Ephemeral OK, 
all others please ask.
Disclaimer: Not mine, never were, never 
will be, not making any money off this.


For Dawson, although I'm know this 
isn't what he had in mind. And for Scott,
 who is patient with my dashes and hyphens.

# # # # # # # # # #

I'm lucky, I'm the first one out of here - 
professional courtesy, I guess. I trail 
after her, watching her bootheels click 
steadily against the linoleum. She sounded 
alert when she picked up the phone, but it 
was after three -- I must have woken her up. 
She's wearing a leather jacket and a silk 
scarf, tucked in against the November chill, 
and faded jeans that do nothing to conceal 
the slim lines of her legs.

She still hasn't said anything to me. She 
watched me collect my wallet, the few other 
items in the plastic pouch held by the sargeant. 

No keys. Trailing after her into the parking
lot, I rack my brain, trying to remember 
where they could be, without much luck. 
Probably lost them.

She unlocks her side first, and I hear the 
autolock thunk, letting me in.  I buckle my 
seatbelt and watch the glare of sodium lights 
on the metal. She gets in, signals left before 
pulling out of the parking lot, even though 
there isn't any traffic at this hour. 

I wait for her to say something. Anything. 
I wet my lips, getting ready, although I 
don't know how I'm going to answer her.

But she's silent, through three stoplights,
onto the Beltway, past a couple of exits that 
aren't mine, ones I've never taken.

The absence of questions is worse -- it makes 
her silence resigned.

Finally, I blurt out, "Scully, I need to explain."

I'm watching her profile when I speak. Her 
brows draw together, her lips narrow. I can 
read her face like it's my own.

Disappointment. Resignation.

Hurt.

I stare at the few crimson taillights ahead 
of us through the windshield, thinking. God, 
what I wouldn't give to...

Inhaling, I try again. "Scully, please."

"Fourteen, Mulder. That girl, she was--" 

In a humiliating rush, I gasp, "I swear 
to you, Scully, I didn't know. I didn't 
know when I went in there, I just saw the 
marquee, I paid and I didn't know, the guy 
at the door asked if I was there for the 
'special show' and I...I guess I said I was."

God, I wish I was still drunk. Or that I 
had had more to drink -- then I would have 
just ended up puking my sorry guts out in 
a dark alley somewhere. I taste sour bile 
at the back of my throat and for one awful 
moment I'm sure that I'm about to throw up 
in Scully's pristine car. Then the sick 
passes but I still feel wretched beyond belief.

When the cops got there, I hadn't even 
taken off my jacket -- I was just standing 
at the back of the crowd, staring numbly at 
the girl in the middle of the smoky little room. 

She was wearing a g-string, and spiky 
thigh-high boots sagging loosely around 
the knees. She stood, wobbling a little, 
her lower lip hanging slightly. Her breasts 
weren't very big, and it looked like 
someone had put lipstick or maybe rouge 
on her nipples, but they hadn't done a 
very good job. There was a smear of 
something dark on her belly.

Looking at her, I knew I had fucked up, 
that there was a reason the marquee outside 
this dark, dank hole didn't say "Live Women" 
instead of the truth: "Live Girls." And I 
didn't want to know how the 'special show'
was supposed to end. 

But it did end, right after I got there, 
with the police providing the closing act, 
waving silver cuffs like castanets.

Scully pulls up across the street from my 
building, but she keeps the engine running. 
I don't chance another look at her. "I lost 
my keys."

She fingers the keys in the ignition. Instead 
of taking mine off the ring and handing it 
to me, she parks, cuts the engine and gets 
out of the car. I follow her again, this 
time up to my apartment. We share a silent 
elevator ride, anger and disappointment 
rolling off Scully in waves.

She bends slightly to slide the key into 
the lock and I watch her open the door 
for me, bright hair sweeping down over the 
whiteness of her nape. She takes one or 
two steps into my dark apartment -- not 
much, but enough to help me find my tongue.

"Scully? I really, I don't..." I pause. 
"Thank you. For coming to bail me out 
tonight. Thanks." 

"Welcome," she says, and in the dim light 
from the hallway, I can see her eyes directed 
somewhere across the room.

"Scully?" I know I sound desperate. 

I am desperate. 

I shut the door behind us. Finally, she 
meets my eyes, and I work hard at not 
dropping my gaze.

"Why did you go... there?"

I owe her an honest explanation. "I thought 
it was a strip club. A legit one." 

Her fingers flex softly, like she's trying 
to grasp the truth. "I didn't know that 
you went to strip clubs," she says evenly.

"I don't, usually."

I hear her take a deep breath. "Then why 
tonight?"

"Because..." I close my eyes for a second. 
She's giving me a chance, and I need to do 
this right.

I walk over to the lamp on my desk, turn 
it on so that we aren't standing in semidarkness. 
I shrug my coat off, gesturing an invitation 
for her to do the same. Scully doesn't take 
her jacket off, but she doesn't leave. I sit 
down on the edge of the couch, and look up at her.

"I went to Casey's, for a drink. Just to 
get out of the house. And I had a few. 
Four, I think."

Her hair is slightly mussed, as though she 
was rushing and didn't take time to comb 
it. No earrings, no wristwatch. She did 
take time to put on some lipstick and cover 
the little mole above her upper lip before 
she left, though. No, probably not -- she 
must have done the makeup at stoplights 
on her way to the station.

"I didn't even want to watch a strip show, 
actually."

That earns me a raised eyebrow.

"I mean it. But it's a pretty fair bet that 
you'll find a naked woman or two at a strip 
club. And that's all I wanted."

There are no traffic noises from outside. 
It's a cold night for November. Lonely men 
are the only ones who stay out late on nights 
like this one, looking for company under 
neon lights, comfort at cheap motels. I 
can see the glow of the marquee inside my 
eyelids again, a burnt-in afterimage.

"You wanted to see a naked woman, so you 
went to see a stripper, but you didn't want 
to see a strip show?"

I rub my eyes until I see spots. "I was sitting 
at the bar, by myself. At Casey's. This 
woman started hitting on me, and I kind of 
ignored her, and eventually she left. And 
there were normal people all around me, having 
fun, having normal lives. And I thought, 
Mulder, you sorry fuck, when was the last 
time you saw a naked woman, in the flesh?"

I can't look up at her now, so I stare at 
my coffee table while I keep talking. "So 
I thought about it, and it had been about 
five years. Five =years=. And when was the 
last time someone shot at us, maybe four 
or five =days= ago? So." 

I wait, examining the grain of the wood, 
but Scully doesn't make a sound. 

"So that's it. I wasn't thinking about 
sex, even. I just -- it had been five years. 
That's all. And I'm sorry that you had to 
come pick me up, Scully. Really sorry." 

There is definitely a water stain on this 
coffee table, down towards the left-hand 
corner. I feel humiliated but lighter. I 
wonder if Scully feels this way after she 
goes to confession. 

I hear her clear her throat, so I look up. 

"I'll call Detective Arbelo tomorrow."

I must look puzzled.  Scully says, "From 
the Cupp murder case?  I think his name is 
Cesar.  That's his precinct. I'll ask him 
to make sure your name doesn't go into the 
report about the bust. He'll do that for us."

I nod, feeling tentative relief. Not about 
the report, but that Scully said 'us'. That 
she's using the same tone of voice she gets 
when she's trying to solve a difficult problem. 
That she isn't angry any more. 

I watch her thinking. Her brow twitches a 
couple of times.

When she moves, it's to reach for the zipper
on her jacket. 

Regarding me seriously, she tugs the zipper 
down, shrugs the brown leather off her shoulders, 
lays it over the back of the chair. She has a 
simple black sweater on underneath, with a 
row of buttons down the front.

She loosens the single knot in her little 
blue-and-white patterned scarf and pulls 
it free. It drifts down to the floor. I 
look at the fine white skin at the base 
of her throat. 

She undoes the button at her neck, then 
the next button. 

I look into her blue, blue eyes and try to 
understand what I'm seeing. I can't. She 
looks back at me calmly as the buttons on 
her sweater keep coming undone, one at a time, 
until it hangs open and I can see the bow 
at the center of her lacy bra. It's dark 
brown, but the cups of the bra are cream 
colored, with delicate looking 
chocolate-colored lace over the satin. It 
looks like a confection. 

She reaches for the button on the front of 
her jeans, and I hear the zzzzzk! of the 
zipper coming down. She starts to pull them 
off, then stops, and flushes. 

She hesitates, and then awkwardly toes off 
her boots and socks while holding her jeans 
up. Then she stops again, looking at the floor.

"Please," I say, softly, and she pushes 
the jeans off her hips, down her legs. 

Her underwear matches her bra -- thin, 
cream-colored satin, brown lace, with a 
little bit of lace at each hip, high-cut. 
Through the sheer lace, her skin glows paler 
than the satin. She picks up her jeans and 
folds them in half, sets them down on the desk. 

The lamplight spills over her curves like a 
kiss. She raises her eyes to my face, and 
whatever she sees there convinces her to 
slip off her sweater, then reach around and 
unsnap her bra. She puts both down on top 
of her jeans and slips her thumbs under the 
delicate fabric at her hips.

And then she's there, in front of me, 
exquisite beyond belief. 

Five years, and I think I remember why now. 
If it wasn't her, it wasn't worth it.

She bites her lip, the way she does when 
she's worried. "Do you want me to turn around? 
Or sideways?"

I shake my head no, drinking her in. She 
stops nibbling at her lip, watches me 
watching her.

"Mulder?" 

I look up at her beautiful face.

"You didn't ask me how long it had been 
for me."

How long it had been for...oh. Oh. 

"Six years."

She's radiant, resplendent, but I can't take 
my eyes off her face. She smiles, a naughty, 
secret smile that sets me on fire.

"Your turn, Mulder."


END