A Little Teapot and Even Less Faith

"Like a long-legged fly upon the stream
His mind moves upon silence."

Long-Legged Fly
W.B. Yeats

He already believed; now all he needed was a little faith. He kept that thought with himself, turning it this way and that, a daily examination that eased the paranoia, stemmed the desire to take the short road to the big fuck-up. It comforted Mulder in the same way a pickpocket taking a turn around a deserted square is comforted by keeping his hands in his pockets, all the while flexing and unflexing his fingers.

Hearing a noise, he turned and saw a broad-shouldered shape making its way towards him. Skinner or maybe his brother. Anthony had the same barrel-chested build. His hand found another pebble and sent it skimming across the lake’s surface. He watched the silvery ripples spread in uneven circles and then smooth out again. If he listened a little harder, he was probably drunk enough to imagine he could hear the small piece of gravel sinking. Instead he turned his head again and followed the figure's cautious progress. Whichever Skinner it was, he hadn't found his night eyes yet.

After a minute, he felt his neck begin to crick and went back to staring out over the lake. The sheer breadth of the water, limited only by the horizon, soothed even as it alienated him. Yet as hard as he stared at it, he couldn’t stop himself from tracking the other man’s approach from the corner of his eye. The impulses were sent, staccato, from cornea to brain, a series of staggered images that had his pulse spiralling and his jaw throbbing. Each became superimposed upon the other, in greater and greater detail, until there wasn’t any part of him that was interested in anything else.

Footsteps crunched loudly on the gravel path, making their way towards him. Finally a voice, low and irate, and he schooled himself not to wince when the question was put to him.

"What the hell are you doing out here?"

He shrugged. What was he to say to that? Just looking for my reindeer, sailor. Wanna come back to the Pole with me, see my etchings? Strangely enough, he didn’t feel like saying either of those. Even tagged them as inappropriate. Jesus. He glanced up at the sky for one doubtful moment. Not falling.

"Walked in a straight line when I left the house and ended up here," he said.

"I’ve been looking for you for the last half-hour."

The admission hung in the air between them and though he couldn’t see Skinner’s face, he knew what particular skew those words would have wrought. He didn’t understand why he couldn’t tap into the same vulnerability that the other man did. He could see the power of such gestures but couldn’t make them himself. Skinner, isolationist supreme, could. Mulder found it unfair and enviable and wonderful, all at the same time.

The sounds from the house, full of people and music, were far away. Apart from the occasional clear laugh or yell or fragment of a song, carrying over to them on the still night air, they stood next to each other in silence. Skinner was waiting for a reply.

"I’m sorry I wrecked the party."

An impatient sigh was all he got for one, cheated moment. Then Skinner put out a hand and found his arm. Despite his best attempts, he twitched violently as warm callused fingers closed around his own hand.

"It’s not a fucking party. It’s just a few friends and family at a Christmas dinner. You know that."

Mulder stood there uselessly for a second or two before curling his fingers up into the warmth of the other man’s hand.

"Besides," Skinner continued, "You didn’t wreck anything. They’re just worried about you. This isn’t the best place to go charging around by yourself at night."

A slight increase of pressure in the hand that gripped his own, followed by another admission.

"I didn’t know where the fuck you’d gone. You could have gone anywhere."

"Nothing would have happened to me. I’m an FBI...guy."

"Agent. That’s the word you’re looking for. And you’re a little drunk. I’ll worry if I want to."

"You’re not exactly sober yourself," Mulder said gravely but felt the constriction in his chest give a little, knowing that Skinner would easily mark the moment when evasion turned into the lesser crime of tease and joke. Then things would be alright again.

A snort of disbelief next to him confirmed this. "I know. Can you believe I didn’t bring even one of those goddamned candles down here with me? I couldn’t see a thing all the way down here. And there’s my mother, filling her whole fucking house with them."

Mulder smiled at that, not caring it could be heard in his voice. "She said she’s thinking of calling up Vogue Living. She thinks that’s the most innovative christmas dinner display she’s ever done. They’ll want to feature her living room in their next issue, she said."

"You don’t have to tell me. I know. Everybody fucking knows. The thing that gets me is that she probably got the idea from one of those stupid magazines in the first place."

The tone of exasperation was just enough to widen Mulder’s smile to a grin. He had an idea that Skinner was smiling too, although he couldn’t see him as more than an indistinct shape.

"I wouldn’t take that up with her, if I were you. She lives to redecorate. You know that."

A sudden shotgun laugh from the other man, its occasional appearance no longer as startling and out of character as it used to seem to Mulder. Though it still had the same power to jumpstart his libido.

"Do you know that she spent fifteen minutes yesterday trying to convince me of the virtues of a ‘darling little teapot that she just knew I would love'?" Skinner asked. "$500. It's some kind of antique. $500. A teapot. An honest to fucking god teapot. Tell me what the fuck do I want with a teapot?"

"I can see that it would be difficult to think of you and not instantly think ‘Darling. Little. Teapot.’" Mulder replied immediately, unable to pass up the opportunity. "It must be the way you move y--"

"Watch your mouth, Mulder, or I'll have to wash it out for you. There’s no need to bring the way I move into any conversation which has both my mother and teapots in it. You can’t afford to pay for the therapy."

Mulder snickered, helpless to stop himself. In sympathy, he bent down and located the beer he had nearly forgotten about.

"I got a beer. Want some?"

"Beer? Warm beer? Like a hole in the head," Skinner said, disengaging their hands in order to take the proffered bottle, anyway. After a long swallow he pushed it back at Mulder, pressing it into one jean-clad hip and they shared it that way for a minute or so until it was finished.

Then Skinner said, not unkindly, "If you're done, you think we could go back to some decent whiskey and a bit of light?"

"You don’t want to know why we’re out here drinking warm beer in the first place?"

"Only if you want to tell me."

"Asshole," Mulder said without heat. "Why do you have to be so reasonable?"

"It’s the beer talking," Skinner said mockingly and then, in a softer tone of voice, "and you never talk unless you’re pushed and I’m not sober enough to do it the right way."

Mulder rose to the same old bait, in the same old way.

"What about what you said to your sister?"

He could practically hear Skinner’s brows coming together in an exasperated glare.

"Give me more to go on, Mulder."

Mulder sat down heavily on the ornamental rock behind him and heard Skinner follow suit, carefully leaving a space between them.

"She asked you whether I was coming back. Whether you were serious."

Skinner said nothing, waiting silently for more. Christ, Mulder thought, this was just the kind of holiday cheer he’d spent his whole life running away from.

"Don’t you remember what you said? Your brother was standing right next to her. He probably heard the whole thing. Christ, I feel like five kinds of shit for coming here with you."

"I’m missing something then," Skinner said, his voice taking on that half-promise of violence that Mulder now knew to discount. "I thought I explained things very clearly."

"That’s what you think of me?"

Even to himself, Mulder sounded more miserable than angry. He winced. Insult to injury. But he couldn’t help it. Booze and the high-strung half hour spent alone with himself had tired him out.

"I’m good to fuck but when it comes down to it, you say you don’t need me? That’s what’s been going on? Stupid me. I th--"

He clamped his teeth down on the words, terrified he had said that much. Just keep moving, he counselled himself. Another shitty moment, that’s all. It doesn’t have to mean anything. Keep moving. He felt exhausted, tired of trying to read the shifting ley lines of Skinner’s moods.

"You thought what?"

"Nothing."

"Want to hear how that conversation ended?" Not really a question.

Mulder said nothing. Skinner's hand found its way around his waist to his hip and settled there. Yes. No. Go. Stay. It was never enough. Too much was always too little and too little was always unbearable. But he stayed where he was. And told himself that he chose to be compelled. Skinner's fingers had slipped under the edge of Mulder's tshirt and were stroking lightly against his skin. Mulder wondered if Skinner was aware he was doing it. By the way that kind of touch was sometimes abruptly removed, he knew there were times when the other man's hands moved independently.

"I said that I wanted you. Do you understand? Not need. Want. And so yes, it’s serious. And then I told her to shut up and quit asking questions. Got it?"

Mulder thought of the mad exit he’d made from the house, the bleak, malevolent contemplation of self he’d indulged in by the lake. Ridiculously, it seemed like far too soon to let Skinner off the hook even though he had been in the clear the whole time. Why didn’t you come looking for me sooner? Why did it take you so long to find me? He recognized the thoughts for what they were but couldn’t stop them anyway. Like everything else he did when it came to Skinner, he moved without reason, operating on a mix of intuition and longing. He felt disconnected from himself at these moments as though it was some other body charged with intentions and memories while he drifted, separated and vanishing. A little faith, that’s all he wanted. Just to light the way. Not an unreasonable aspiration.

Still he kept it simple. "Well shit, Walter. Why’d you let me leave like that?"

The hand stroking his side faltered a moment before it pinched him hard, Skinner betrayed into a choked laugh.

"Asshole. I had my mouth hanging open like everyone else."

Mulder grimaced and pushed his head into Skinner’s shoulder.

He could hear Skinner grinning as he said, "Oh no. No, you don't. You have to come back inside, Mulder. Better get it over with. We’ll say it was a misunderstanding. No one’s going to ask any more than that. One half’ll be too scared of me and the other half’ll feel too sorry for you. You’ll see. It won’t be that bad."

"Christ!" Mulder said savagely. "This is hell."

"At least the drinks are free."

"Ha-fucking-ha. You’re enjoying this."

"I didn’t when you walked out," came the swift reply, heat in Skinner's voice. "I had no fucking clue what happened or where you went."

"Okay, okay, not all of it. Shit, I said I was sorry."

Skinner's fingers bit into his side. Mulder was nearly sure he didn't know he was doing it. "I don't want 'sorry'. I know you weren’t really convinced about coming here. I know you’re the only stranger here. But try to be smart. You've profiled me a million times over. You know better than this."

"Easy for you to say," Mulder muttered, moving himself cautiously out of Skinner’s grip and added as an afterthought, "Mouth hanging open, Walter? Wouldn’t that qualify as a change of expression for you? In public? I don’t believe you."

Skinner made no effort to recapture him or rise to the bait, asking instead, "Why easy for me to say?"

Mulder shrugged. "I'm not cut out for all this 'happy family' shit."

He heard Skinner give one of his controlled, angry sighs and bristled. Skinner shorthand for ‘Mulder, you give me ulcers.’ They both knew if it wasn’t Mulder, Skinner would find something else to be angry about. But it wasn’t wise to point that out. He had learnt that.

"You're not giving it a chance. It's just for a few days."

Mulder shook his head, still eager to find a scar or two to poke and show. "It's the same everywhere. It’s just worse here, that’s all. And your family turn out to be one big, repulsively supportive clan..."

He petered off, unable to really press home his point.

"Don’t be such a jerk," Skinner said angrily. "What, you'd be yucking it up if instead I had my mother's skeleton up in the attic like something out of Psycho?"

A pause. Mulder knew he should stop but he couldn't. "So, no doubts even if I leave? Are you that big a man, Walter?"

He nearly jumped out of his skin when Skinner slammed his hand down between them.

"Fuck! What do you want Mulder? Have your cake and eat it too? I'm so sick of this shit. If you want to leave, leave. I told you before we came that you could do that. I'm not going to hold it over you. Doubts? Yeah, but no more than usual."

Mulder waited out a tense moment, not sure if it was going to turn ugly. Tried to keep his mouth shut, all the wrong, mean words wanting to come out.

He closed his eyes in relief when Skinner finally said in a tired voice, "If you want a fight, you'll have to find it somewhere else. I'm not in the mood. Is this what it's all about? You change your mind about something more than coming here?"

Mulder started to shake his head, then realized Skinner couldn’t see him. "No," he said quietly, feeling like he was admitting to torturing small animals to death. "No, no more than usual."

"Okay. Good. You want to leave?"

"No," Mulder said again, desperate to end this yay-nay conversation. "Alright? No."

"Good," Skinner said after a pause.

Mulder heard him shift closer. He tensed up again, not quite ready to trust Skinner at his word as yet. All Skinner did though was fit his hand to Mulder's face, blunt fingers splaying across his cheekbone. His thumb slid under his jaw, found his pulse and pressed hard against it. Hard enough to bruise. Just the way Mulder liked it best. A reminder that Skinner knew, that he took the time and trouble to remember. A peace offering, then. Warmth spread through Mulder, despite himself.

"Feels so good, Walter," he murmured, feeling his throat working the words against Skinner's thumb.

If anything, the pressure increased. But Skinner's voice was lazy with affection when he spoke. "Shut up, Mulder. Let’s have a meaningful silence if you need to have something. You like those right?"

Mulder said nothing, helpless in the face of the same old thrill, made worse by its matter-of-fact invasion of each and every part of him. He shifted a little and Skinner immediately began stroking his side again with his other hand. Petting him, for fuck's sake. He bit back an urge to toss his head and whinny. Skinner wouldn't take to jokes right now. Instead he turned around and found the other man’s mouth by the expeditious route of bumping hard against it, cutting off his curses by kissing him.

After a long, sweet minute, Mulder made his point and grinned into the darkness as Skinner slid his hands into Mulder's hair ungently and made a fist in it. He moved his mouth off Mulder's and stared at him. Mulder tolerated it for a moment even though he knew it was too dark for their faces to be anything but indistinct shapes. Then, impatient and unable to move his head, he made a grab for Skinner's shirt instead. Skinner let him and he spread his hands greedily over his chest, knowing the feel of it against his back, the way the hair curled under his fingers, the white flat scar that ran a quarter of the way down Skinner's sternum. Skinner didn't relax his grip on him but neither did he protest until Mulder moved his hands down, skimming over his belt buckle with obvious intent.

"Behave."

"Why?"

"Why do you think?"

"I'm trying not to think. Can't you tell?" Mulder rubbed a thumb up the seam of Skinner's crotch.

For all the steel in Skinner's voice, his cock was ready to exchange vows, straining against Mulder's touch.

"I could suck you right here. I want to."

Another pause while Skinner stared at him again. Why, when his face was still as obscured by the darkness as before, Mulder didn't know.

"Not now."

"Yes, now. C'mon, Walter."

The hand in his hair tightened a fraction. Not enough to make his eyes water; not yet. "You can do anything you like, later."

"No one will know."

"I mean it, Mulder."

Mulder knew he did. Push any more and there would be an end to Skinner's humor. He relented and moved his hands back up, now only tracing the muscle under Skinner's ribs. Skinner, for his part, pushed Mulder's tshirt up and laid his face against his chest, idly stroking over his right nipple with skilled fingers until Mulder asked between gritted teeth, "Is that all you’re going to do?"

He felt Skinner smile against him before turning his head to lick the same nipple. His tongue moved in small, catlike strokes that had Mulder hissing his name and grudging the darkness the sight of that smile, all too rarely seen. Then Skinner was getting to his feet, bringing Mulder flowing up along with him in a confused, throbbing heap of flesh and bones.

"What--?"

"Come on." Skinner gripped him by one wrist and pulled him firmly into his own body. "Come here."

Mulder moved a little and began unzipping himself, only to find Skinner’s hands over his own, stopping him. And then Skinner was whispering in his ear, "Don’t. Don’t do that. Just come here."

Mulder stopped and Skinner pulled him back into his arms, wrapping them around him. Strong hands massaged his back and ass and even though it was a little painful, Mulder found himself asking for more, telling Skinner not to stop. He waited for the moment when that hard touch gave way to a softer type of persuasion, all the more persuasive for its refusal to be denied. He wanted to make his pleasure known and use his admission to ask for more but as always it was too early for such frankness. They were both startling mirrors of each other in their lovemaking; Mulder began with social decrees and cautious advances and Skinner was led by impulse, following his whim and invading Mulder with a reckless anarchy which aroused as much as it antagonized Mulder. So, as he did each time they began this progression, he started from higher ground, making strategically vague demands.

"Please," he said, his voice thin with effort. "Please. More."

A kiss ghosted through his hair. "No more now, Mulder. We have to go back."

Mulder stilled in disbelief. "This? This is it? Jesus wept, Walter."

"Do you think you'll ever let me just hold you without fucking you for the privilege?" Skinner sounded wholly unsympathetic. "As much fun as the only other option is, I haven't anything to gag you with. Or the time to talk you into it."

Mulder stiffened at such careless discussion of things that were supposed to stay out of conversation, knowing the rebuke laid within it. Then slumped in resignation and said irritatedly, "You’re a hack, Walter. I’ll probably get pneumonia. You’re going to have to spend the rest of the holidays nursing me back to health."

Skinner rubbed one side of his jaw against Mulder’s hair. "You’re guaranteed a more attentive audience inside the house."

"Shut up," Mulder said balefully, staying right where he was.

And behaved himself for the five minutes for which Skinner held him, taking care not to tease Mulder when he touched him. It felt good enough to shut Mulder up even when Skinner brushed a kiss against his ear and murmured knowingly, "Not quite the sacrifice you were hoping for?" Any other time and Mulder would have been pushing him away, ready to take a swing at him if it needed that. But Skinner kept on touching him and giving him kisses with such friendly affection that it stripped the words of any sting they might have contained.

Sooner than he wanted, Skinner was stepping away from him, straightening his shirt, tucking it back in where Mulder had pulled it out.

"Come on. They’ll think we’ve fallen into the lake."

Mulder remembered what else he wanted to say.

"Walter? About your present..."

"You don't have to--"

"I tossed it in the lake."

Nothing. Only Skinner, Mulder thought resentfully, could speak through silences. He could feel the disbelief rolling off the other man though he couldn’t see him.

"It was only your fake present," he offered by way of consolation, feeling more and more like an ass.

"Mulder?" Skinner asked quietly.

"Yeah?"

"Why are you giving me fake presents?"

"I thought it would be fun. I have a real present for you."

Another silence.

"But my fake present - you threw that in the lake?"

"Yes, for fuck's sake. Don’t you listen?"

"So," Skinner said almost kindly. "What was it?"

"You don’t want to know why I threw it in the lake?" Mulder asked.

"I think I've worked that out for myself."

"It was a plaque," Mulder said, suddenly hearing himself loud and clear in the dark night and wishing Skinner to the ends of the earth.

Skinner said nothing so he went on doggedly, biting the words out.

"There’s a picture on it. A black and white picture of a man, uh, naked. There’s uh well, lube. There’s lube. And a hand which is, well, inserting the lube with...with all fingers except the thumb which is...making a...well, a thumbs up sign."

A deep breath. Then, "It also said ‘To Walter S. Skinner - For Outstanding Service in...in the Line of Booty."

"And you were going to give this to me in front of them?" Skinner asked tonelessly.

No need to identify who the ‘them’ was. Mulder felt his face heating up, equal parts anger and embarrassment. Playing ‘Open Sesame’ without a password. Hardly a grown up game. Nothing grown up about his reaction when he wasn’t allowed in. Still. Here he was. Still hanging around Skinner Central, pressing on secret panels and knocking on hollow walls. Looking for something to take him that extra distance.

"Walter, what do you think they think we do?" he demanded. "You think they don’t know about lube and where it goes?"

He went on, before Skinner could interrupt. "Okay, I agree - who knows what your mother thinks. She’s from another planet. But do you really think I’m such an asshole that I’d give it to you in front of them?"

"Not really," Skinner said, his tone so mild that Mulder was driven to scuff one shoe roughly into the unresisting gravel beneath their feet.

"I’ve been carrying it around with me all night so I could give it to you when we got a minute alone."

"I didn’t notice," Skinner said and Mulder knew he was trying to be conciliatory.

"Anyway," he said, accepting the truce. "It’s at the bottom of that lake now. So forget about it."

"Good idea. Let’s go back."

They trudged back up the hill slowly, in silence until Skinner slung a companionable arm around Mulder’s shoulders and said with an edge of plaintive inquiry, "Booty?"

Mulder stopped. Leant his head against Skinner’s broad frame and stayed there, shaking with laughter, low and hard. Skinner pulled him in closer for a few moments before shaking him off.

"Asshole."

Mulder's snickers started up again. "Can we stop talking about your ass, please?"

Skinner snorted and kept walking, not bothering with a reply. Mulder had himself under control by the time they reached the warm yellow lights of the house and turned to look at Skinner before they went back inside. Took in the broad, remote planes of his face and the dark eyes turning even darker as they adjusted to the light.

Useless now to wonder whether this way was better than any other. He had been made necessary. He shook his head at the other man then, filled with a painful, inarticulate love of all things Skinner, seen and unseen. Got a bland inquiring look back in return and the faint raise of an eyebrow. For a moment, he was on the brink of unstoppable laughter again. Skinner’s mouth twitched and he elbowed Mulder sharply in the ribs, saying in a low, relaxed voice, "Stop it."

They opened the door and went inside, making their way from the laundry room into the warm, steamy air of the kitchen, where a couple of women in nearly identical dresses were laughing and stacking dishes noisily, next to the sink.

END