TITLE: 'Constant' reflections of myself

AUTHOR: Sue Pyper

EMAIL: spyper@globalnet.co.uk

RATING: PG

CLASSIFICATION: Scully introspection/angst UST

SPOILERS: Amor Fati, All Things.

SUMMARY: The Past becomes a mirror through which Scully gains insights about her life and her future.

ARCHIVE: Please ask,

DISCLAIMER: Would I want to own two such dysfunctional people?

AUTHORS NOTES : Authors notes and thanks at the end:

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It was only a dream.

I looked down into Daniel's hospital bed and I saw myself. The sickly pallor and dark rings around my eyes were startling reminders of the time I nearly lost myself to cancer. "Speak to me," I pleaded. Even now it amuses me. Speak to me. Everyone in my life wants me to speak to them, and yet how can I, when I will not even admit things to myself?

In that strange dream state, staring at my half-dead body, I realized I have to start talking. I told Daniel it was no accident he was sick. The words had hardly left my mouth when the deathbed image of myself stared back at me once more and I knew it was there to remind me, that I too, could so easily be in Daniel's place. All the emotions held inside of me all these years, eating away at my body, and my mind, until they erupt in a dis-ease. A dirty reflection of my inner turmoil.

I see it clearly now for the first time. But now I am in unfamiliar territory. How do you start opening up when the doors have been closed for so long? How can I make the opacity that is my life translucent? It is one thing being aware of changes that need to be made. It's quite another to know how to go about changing them. The habits that are as familiar to me as breathing seem unwilling to leave me without suffocating my whole existence. I don't know how to do it, I just know that somehow I must find a way to make changes, before I am consumed.

It reminds me of a talk that I once had with Mulder. Another one of our "conversations in a hallway." It seems appropriate somehow, that our dialogues about our deepest feelings take place in areas that are only used to get from one place to another. A transient space for two emotionally transient lives.

His words all these months later still echo in my ears. "You are my constant, my touchstone."

The dictionary defines constant as "A component of a relationship between variables that does not change its value." Unchanging, faithful, dependable.

Is that how he really sees me? The calm at the center of his storm? Now I find myself in the stage of my evolution that I have fought so hard against and realize that I no longer wish to be constant, nor unchanging.

I think Daniel's appearance in my life shattered Mulder's illusions. My past, it seems, is not the picture he had painted for me. It was not my intention to hide myself from him. But it's so hard to let people into my inner shell, and once they are firmly ensconced inside, it is difficult to give them their freedom. There are many life sentences inside of me.

Sometimes I feel like I will explode. That one more emotional denial will be the one that breaks my dam, the one that will shred me into a million pieces that could never be reconstructed into anything vaguely resembling me. How hard I fight the impending flood, hoping that each day that I will not drown. Mulder is my life-jacket, my savior, who, in the hope that he will rescue me, has been allowed into my inner sanctum. A dysfunctional deity in a world of religious perfection. It is a precious gift I have bestowed on him, even though the receiver has no idea it has been bequeathed.

This "constant" reflection of myself stares back at me, and I wonder if it's possible to change myself when my life and habits are so ingrained that I would feel incomplete if they were no longer there.

It's so easy to slip back into the familiar, the comfortable shoes of my existence. Once more I could find myself reading the lines of the play he has written for me. I know my role, and I fall into it with such ease that I wonder where I stop and Scully begins. Have I lost myself? Have I become only what others see?

The past few days have opened up alternatives that I never knew existed, and opened up a past that I wish did not.

Mulder was surprised I shared these experiences with him. I do not readily open myself to others, in case one day someone gets too close, and breaches the walls I have spent all these years building.

Daniel was the first to storm my fortress. Of course, I had lovers before him, but they experienced only the parts of me that I chose to reveal. Sexual amity is after all, easier for me than emotional intimacy. Daniel changed that. His passion and intelligence wooed me like no other. My mind reminded me of all my Catholic values about adultery and loyalty, but my heart was deaf to its cries. I have realized you cannot choose who you love. I learned this the hard way, during the year Daniel and I were together. A year of mental, emotional and sexual stimulation beyond my wildest dreams. A year of snatched moments, surreptitious phone calls and midnight goodbyes. But people change, and having laid myself bare, I am careful now whom I give my heart to.

The offer from the FBI coincided with the time that I realized I could no longer be the "other woman." I wanted something he could not give me. Something medicine alone could not give me, and so I made his choice for him in the hope that his family would be saved the misery that was no doubt going to follow me to Washington. I was looking forward to once again being the custodian of my heart and my life.

Oh how noble it all seemed at the time. In the naivete of youth I had no concept of what lay ahead of me.

It has taken many years to get to this space. Ten years of missing, loving, regretting and hurting. Ten years of "what ifs?"

How simple life seemed then. But now, after abductions, cancer, gunshot wounds and conspiracies, the world seems so dark sometimes, that if I stop and think beyond the surface of my life, I may well be consumed by the blackness. I tell myself I am fine, but the encroaching darkness threatens to swallow me whole, so I fight every day against its hunger. Then suddenly Daniel's face appeared like a light at the end of the tunnel, and I saw a glimmer of my life unlived. I longed for the familiarity of his touch and his love as it had been all those years ago.

I felt safe in his arms and was once again transported back through time until I was twenty-five again. My life lay ahead of me and all the dreams of love, a husband, children and a home were still possible. I mourn the loss all these years later, but I thank Daniel for helping me see that the future is still mine to choose.

I thought of spending the rest of my life with this man, but now I know that Mulder has eclipsed him, and I am thankful that I can now move forward. I have turned a corner. Mulder, I now realize, breached my bastion long ago and crept into my heart. I have surrendered, and my white flag has been flying all this time. If only he could see my acquiescence from the battlefield that is his life. Then maybe for once, we will both end up on the same side.

So, I have decided to walk new pathways and explore new possibilities. My epiphany during the last few days has made it impossible for me to stay on the same rigid path.

I am reminded of a passage in a book I read, which said, "Sometimes the energy it takes to stay tight in a bud becomes greater than the energy it takes to bloom." And I now comprehend, that for all these years I have been afraid to bloom.

I hope Mulder is there when I finally blossom into the person I know I can be. The water from my dam will nourish, not destroy, and when he smells the heady aroma of my spring, I will, once more, become transparent.

END **********************************

Authors thanks

Many thanks to the wonderful folks that have helped me with this my second story:

Firstly to my wonderful friend Marie who is unwavering in her encouragement, to My beta Bigade – Alcott (thanks for bringing me in from the cold), Marie, BoneTree, Leslie, Nlynn and all the other wonderful folks at X-Scenes.