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ashmulder · 6 months ago

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A Christmas Story, Chapter 1/2

2409 words | Rated X | Read it here on AO3

The opening chords of Jingle Bell Rock are barely audible beneath the din of a dozen conversations, but it’s at least the third time the song has played, by Mulder’s count. He’s managed to stay in the same spot for the majority of the evening, holding the same half-empty bottle of warm beer and making the same glib conversation with Maggie Scully’s church friends, who all raise their eyebrows knowingly when he introduces himself as Dana’s coworker. That’s something he’ll have to ask Scully about later.

Scully herself has been milling around the room explaining time and again that no, she isn’t married yet and no, she’s not seeing anyone special. In return, each congregant, aunt, or cousin tells her how lovely she looks and how easily she could find a nice man to settle down with, and Scully smiles politely before changing the subject.

Mulder isn’t even sure she wanted him to come, but Maggie issued the invitation directly and he didn’t feel right saying no when it’s not like he had somewhere else to be. And a month ago when he got the invite, things between him and Scully were different than they are now, which he couldn’t possibly have anticipated. Not different enough that her saying she isn’t seeing anyone special is hurtful, but different enough that when she said it within earshot, she glanced at him to gauge his reaction.

He catches Scully’s eye across the room and throws her a reassuring smile, to which she draws in a deep breath and then takes a gulp from her wine glass. She’s refilled it at least as many times as Jingle Bell Rock has played, by Mulder’s count.

“Are you having a good time, Fox?” Maggie asks, appearing beside him and giving his arm a squeeze.

“You definitely know how to throw a party, Mrs. Scully,” he says sincerely, and she either doesn’t notice or doesn’t mind his artful avoidance of the question.

Maggie surveys the room and clucks her tongue.

“Would you mind helping me round up some of these empty glasses and bringing them into the kitchen?” she asks in the rhetorical manner that a mother does, and Mulder dutifully abandons his beer so he can make himself useful.

He has four champagne flutes and a teacup in his hands when he crosses paths with Scully in the hallway, and she smiles at him affectionately with pink cheeks and shining eyes, markedly more relaxed than the last time he saw her.

“Is Mom putting you to work?” she asks, taking the teacup.

“I’m happy to have something to do,” he assures her, taking advantage of their relative privacy to give her a long look from head to foot. She’s wearing a velvety green dress he’s never seen before with opaque black tights underneath, which isn’t objectively sexy but does give him a little thrill, given that he rarely sees her in anything but a suit or pajamas. “You look really nice,” he says as his eyes wander back up to her face. “Did I tell you that already?”

Her dress has a V at the front that he’s not sure whether he’s allowed to appreciate, and her lips are stained red from wine. He meets her eye and she just looks at him for a beat before slowly shaking her head. Something hot coils in his lower belly, threatening to embarrass him, and he swallows hard.

If his hands weren’t full of champagne flutes, he’d kiss her. If they weren’t at her mother’s house surrounded by people, anyway. And if they weren’t in public. But if they were at his apartment, or hers, and she was looking at him like that, he’d absolutely kiss her.

“Dana, come say hello to the Campbells,” Maggie calls from the far end of the hallway, and Mulder makes a run for the kitchen before he spontaneously combusts and ruins her nice carpet.

Two Jingle Bell Rocks and as many glasses of wine later, he’s on the back porch separating the recycling and enjoying the cooler, quieter atmosphere as the party begins to wind down.

“There you are,” Scully says with a thick tongue, and he looks up to see her peeking around the open door with a wide, wine-drunk grin on her mouth that he can’t help but return. She shivers and scrunches her shoulders up as she leaves the warm house, quickly shuffling over to him. “It’s freezing out here,” she says, stepping up close, and he immediately wraps his arms around her.

“Then why’d you come out?” he teases.

Scully tips her face up to look at him. The weak yellow porchlight doesn’t allow him to read her expression, but he can smell the sweet wine on her tongue and feel the press of her chest against his sternum as she leans heavy into him. From inside, he hears the sound of breaking glass followed by a round of applause.

“Because you’re out here,” she says, and the white vapor of her breath blinds him just enough that her kiss is a surprise.

They have yet to do more than kiss, but Mulder is far from complaining; Scully kisses with such diligence and intensity that it feels like a sex act. And drunk Scully, he’s currently learning, makes kissing feel downright pornographic. She sucks on his lips and tongue, hums into his open mouth, cants her body forward and back. When he feels her fingers fumbling with his belt buckle he panics and breaks the kiss, taking a step away from her.

“Whoa there,” he says lightly, very aware that he’s at least half hard. “Danger zone.”

He cringes at his own ineloquence, but she doesn’t seem to notice. She steps forward to close the space he created and touches the waist of his jeans at the hip.

“There’s nobody out here,” she whispers with a smile in her voice, then kisses the corner of his mouth.

“That’s not—” He sighs and lets her kiss the other corner, and then his cheek. “You’re drunk, Scully.”

She shivers, and he wraps his arms around her again.

“Only a little,” she slurs coyly, and he feels her fingers creeping back toward his fly.

His brain knows he can’t let her do this, but his dick has no such moral misgivings and she’s dangerously close to learning that firsthand.

“You have no idea how much it pains me to turn you down,” he tells her gently. “I just don’t want you to do something you’ll regret tomorrow.”

Scully groans in frustration, which does absolutely nothing to help his situation below the belt.

“I won’t regret it,” she says, a bit petulantly.

He’s about to tell her again that it’s a hard line for him, all puns intended, when two things occur almost simultaneously: Scully slides her open palm down the front of his jeans, and Maggie steps through the back door with a bag of trash in her hand.

Mulder lets out a sound that’s part gasp, part moan, and snatches Scully’s hand by the wrist, pulling it away from his body. Maggie mumbles a surprised, “Oh! Sorry,” and the door closes again before either of them have an opportunity to address her.

For several agonizing seconds, nothing happens. Mulder keeps hold of Scully’s wrist, and she stares at his chest, not speaking.

“Scully—”

“Excuse me,” she says urgently, shaking free of him before she rushes unsteadily back inside.

Mulder stands on the porch until he can no longer feel his extremities, then finally bites the bullet and returns to the heat of the house. He can hear Maggie’s voice from the foyer saying goodbyes, so he ducks into the bathroom and spends a few minutes collecting his thoughts. If not for the fact that he drove Scully here, he would probably just sneak out and hope the whole thing blows over by Monday.

“Fox, is that you in there?”

Reluctantly, Mulder leaves the bathroom and finds Maggie in the kitchen washing dishes. There’s no sign of Scully.

“What can I do to help?” he asks, and Maggie briefly looks at him over her shoulder.

“Dana went to lie down,” she says. “I think she had a bit too much wine. She’s upstairs, if you’d like to check on her.”

Mulder takes her direction and quietly creeps up the stairs, making his way to the bedroom at the end of the hall he knows once belonged to Scully. The door is open a crack and it’s dark inside, so first he just listens, though he’s not totally sure what he’s listening for.

“Scully?” he says softly, but there’s no response.

He pushes the door open a bit wider and light from the hallway falls over her velvet-covered hip on the bed. She’s curled up on her side with her back to him, and he watches her even breathing until he’s confident she’s asleep, then heads back downstairs.

“She’s out cold,” he says, reentering the kitchen. “Is it okay if I let her sleep it off for a bit?”

“I think that’s for the best,” Maggie says ambiguously, and Mulder takes over washing while she dries.

They work quietly, and the silence makes him think that she is also replaying what happened outside over and over in her head. He’s not sure exactly what she saw, but lord knows he isn’t going to ask her.

“I hope I didn’t interrupt something…new,” Maggie says, apropos of nothing, and Mulder freezes for half a second.

Scully feeling him up actually was new, but he doesn’t imagine that’s what Maggie means. He also doesn’t imagine that Scully would appreciate him filling her mom in on their budding romance, private person that she is.

“Uh, no, not quite,” he says. He feels his face getting hot, so he keeps his eyes on the dishwater.

“I’m glad to hear that,” Maggie says. Another loaded silence. “Dana has never been very forthcoming about her personal life, but I’ve always wondered…” Mulder keeps his head down and keeps scrubbing. He can’t even explain the nature of his and Scully’s relationship to himself, much less could he begin to explain it to her mother. Thankfully, he doesn’t have to. “Well, for the record, I think it’s wonderful. I’ll just leave it at that.”

Gratefully, she doesn’t bring it up again. Mulder helps her get the house back in order, including taking the chafing dishes to the basement, and they’re watching It’s A Wonderful Life with steaming mugs of tea when Scully comes plodding down the stairs in her party dress and stocking feet, pillow lines on her cheek and her hair fluffed up on one side.

“There she is,” Mulder says affectionately.

Scully stops in her tracks and regards him with surprise, though she quickly tries to mask it.

“Hi,” she says demurely, smoothing her hair down with her hand. “Sorry, I didn’t mean for you to wait around for me.”

Mulder shrugs dismissively, but Maggie doesn’t pass up the opportunity to give her daughter a hard time.

“It’s lucky he was here; the girl who was supposed to help me clean up got drunk and passed out in my spare bedroom, if you can believe it.”

Her delivery is so flawless that Mulder snorts in his attempt to suppress a laugh, and Scully glares at him half-heartedly.

“I’m sorry, Mom. I have a raging headache, if it’s any consolation,” she says miserably.

“I’ll get you some Tylenol,” Maggie says, standing and giving Dana a pat on the arm as she leaves the room.

Scully stares intently at the TV screen, which makes it fairly obvious she’s avoiding looking at him, given that the movie is paused.

“Hey party girl,” he says, and she cringes before she reluctantly turns her head. “You okay?”

Scully sighs and looks at the floor. “Technically, yes,” she says, “though I think my ego may have suffered irreparable harm.” She slowly lifts just her eyes, looking at him woefully from beneath her lashes.

Mulder just smiles at her, because she looks so cute, all sleepy and embarrassed, and because the idea that her getting drunk and frisky would negatively affect his opinion of her is so outlandish it’s laughable.

“Here you are, dear,” Maggie says as she returns and drops two Tylenol into Scully’s hand. “We’ll have to take a raincheck on the rest of the movie, Fox.”

Mulder takes the hint and brings his teacup into the kitchen. He can hear the murmur of their conversation in the living room and does his best not to eavesdrop, but when they move into the foyer the acoustics make that difficult.

Mumble mumble not my best moment mumble mumble

Mumble mumble not the first time I’ve walked in on you with a boy, Dana

Mumble mumble Mulder mumble mumble mistake

Oh, honey, don’t mumble mumble mumble

Mumble mumble mumble

I’m sure it’ll be fine

Mulder’s heart sinks. He makes a point of clearing his throat as he rounds the corner into the hallway, and the conversation abruptly ends.

By the time they reach the end of Maggie’s street, Scully is resting her head against the window with her eyes closed. Mulder knows she isn’t really sleeping, but he plays along. He even pretends to wake her up when they pull up outside her apartment building, and she pretends to be surprised that they’ve already arrived.

“Thanks for driving,” she says, already pulling on the door handle.

“Hey,” he says, reaching out to touch her arm.

Scully stills, then sighs, then looks at him.

“Do we have to talk about it?” she asks reluctantly.

Mulder cracks a smile. “I was just gonna ask if I could kiss you goodnight.”

She heaves an even bigger sigh, which means something else entirely. He’ll have to catalog them someday.

“To be perfectly honest, between the wine, the vomiting, and the four-hour nap, I think it’s in your best interest to take a raincheck on that, too,” she says matter-of-factly.

“Aw, Scully,” he says, pity on full display, which he knows she hates. “You’ve got a toothbrush up there, don’t ya? Let me walk you up.”

She gives him a long look and he decides not to push it any further. He just doesn’t like the idea of her spending the rest of the weekend feeling like she committed some kind of unforgivable faux pas.

“Okay,” she finally acquiesces, and Mulder does his best to conceal his delight.

Tagging @today-in-fic

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ashmulder · 1 year ago

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You are welcome for the lists! This one is fics recs for "Orison". They are all related to that episode, though they're not all angsty smut fics. So it's not quite the ask, but I hope you and others enjoy the stories! Another Dark Forest by @aloysiavirgata Post-Orison sex Anyone with a Gun by V. Salmone (Punk and Sab) Mulder, Scully, and a gun. Atomic Split by Pteropod The world is glued together by the strong force, the weak force, the electromagnetic force, and gravity. Better Angels by wonderland (@amplifyme) “She’s okay, Maggie, I promise... No, no, just forget whatever you might hear. Don’t even watch the local news. She’s okay. She’s safe and resting. I got it.” Jesus, how many times had he had this conversation with her, or one very much like it? More than he’d ever wanted to. Black Hole Season by Penumbra (@mashnotesofthemythopoeic) Mulder muddles through the aftermath of Orison. Ceremony by @darwin-xf What’s left when words fail? Cold Comfort by Joann Humby When 3 men die, the killer seems to have a story to tell, but is it the same one that people are hearing? X-Files are dangerous, very dangerous if you're working alone. Exorcist Stairs by Elanor G Scully is adrift and on her own after the events of Orison. A chance encounter forces her to confront the banality of evil... fluorescence and night on all sides by audries (@audriesfic) He steps over a corpse to touch her. Ghast by @leiascully (No summary provided) Glub-Glub-Glub and Calming Spells by PostApocolypticAlien (@scullysexual) “you can stay here, tonight. for as long as you’d like.” / “Hey babe, babe, wake up.” The Devil's Instant by Maria Nicole Post-ep for Orison Incorruptible by Anjou A submission for an epistolary challenge on the Scullyfic/E-muse list in January of 2000. Set mid-season 7, immediately after the events of Orison, when Scully has been faced with an evil from her past. Mytharc heavy. i have your dreams and your teeth marks by audries (@audriesfic) Also in the trunk of the car: the latest edition of JAMA, The Amityville Horror on VHS from Blockbuster, Moby Dick, a Jewel CD, a bag of clementines. Her still-closed Bible. - post-orison. mulder takes scully on a witch hunt. there's nail polish involved. Imperfect Shadow by Nicknoc In a dark time, the eye begins to see, I meet my shadow in the deepening shade. Intuituve Reasoning, I Say Obsessive, You Say Compulsive, and I Can Eat Glass by Mish You can’t fool *all* of the people, *all* of the time. / Kosseff vs. Mulder - one analysis, seven minute time limit. / A late night distress call shatters the calm. The Nearness of You by a_steady_wish Her first night back in her own bed after the events of Orison, and Mulder is there to comfort and love her. Neptune's Ocean by M. Sebasky (No summary provided) Nothing Apart by Dyann Zimmerman What happened after the events in 'Orison'. Noyade by Rocketman Noyade--(french) whirlpool. Of Ladies Most Deject And Wretched by Circe Invidiosa and Helen Quilley (@invidiosa) It wasn't a question worth answering...post Orison. Orison by @scullywolf The aftermath of Pfaster's attack takes its toll in more ways than one. Possession by @mldrgrl Based on this prompt request: Mulder and Scully have both dealt with abductions and kidnappings where they were held against their will. I imagine that it took a while for them to feel comfortable with any type of bondage. I think it’d be interesting to explore how or when they became comfortable with that and if it felt really empowering the first time. I especially see Scully having reservations at first but maybe requesting it. the praxis of a water bed by skuls (@ghostbustermelanieking) Five of the first times Scully woke up in Mulder's bed. Right Here by @smalldisbeliever The soft thud of her duffle bag hitting the floor marks their arrival at her apartment. It’s been a little over a week since Donnie Pfaster tore through the space.

Sedimentation by Maria Nicole Musings on the edge of sleep Sins Remembered by rah What happens after they leave her apartment. soap bubble memories by @softnow five times mulder and scully showered together + one time they bathed. Some Nights by otto_tis_eratai Or "Six times Mulder and Scully slept together, and one time they did something more". A collection of seven one shots, all post/mid episode (although it can be also read as one story). Some fluff, some angst, some hurt/comfort elements, eventual smut, a lot of friendship. Submerged by hellsteeth (@wexleresque) Mulder helps Scully cope with her post-Orison anxiety Taller Than Other Waves by amyhit (mayhit) She read Salem’s Lot at ten years old, was brave enough to kiss her partner by thirty-five. That Was Then, This Is Now by @mldrgrl The difference between how Scully deals with the aftermath of Donnie Pfaster in Orison v. Irresistible.

Unintended Consequences by Sarah Segretti Just when you think you know how you’d react to a horrific event, life steps up to surprise you. Scully and Mulder deal with the aftermath of the Pfaster shooting. Untitled by @aloysiavirgata Prompt: alternate post-Orison where Scully doesn’t get to her gun and Mulder is the one that kills Pfaster. Untitled by @aloysiavirgata Prompt: Scully to Mulder: Make me feel alive again... Untitled by @o6666666 Prompt: can't wait to read their argument for anniversary date. who would win??? Walls by Ellie I can't hold out forever; even walls fall down. An Orison post-ep. The Weight of Water by @dashakay The aftereffects of trauma are sometimes unexpected.

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