Title: Graveyard Shift
Author: Sarah Stella
Distribution: Most anywhere is fine! Gossamer, Ephemeral,
Spookys, etc. of course. Anywhere else drop me a line,
I don’t bite.
Classification: V, A, UST-ish
Keywords: Mulderangst
Rating: PG just to be safe
Spoilers: second season time frame, but not a single
explicit one
Summary: Mulder's alone with the files, a photo and his
thoughts.
Disclaimer: Are they mine? Are they??? Um, no.
FEEDBACK: Lovingly embraced! at starbright_89@hotmail.com
*** THANKS TO: Namejumper, Lenore, Lady Disdain, Jane
Lindamood, Michelle Kiefer, Kelly and her fan fiction
site, Tam, Alanna, Joe, Pete at the Cutting Room Floor,
Jen & Patti at the MSR Library, Lynn at Further X ***
Infinite appreciation to Maria, my wonderful beta. Don't
sweat it, I know how that family stuff gets (I had a bit
of a reunion myself last weekend). I appreciate
everything!!
***************
Graveyard Shift
"On the other hand, talk about himself was always like
plowing up a graveyard."
--Bernard Malamud, "The Natural"
Sometimes he stays the night in the basement. He's
waiting for the halogen light to be replaced by dusty
slants of sunlight angling through the tiny windows.
Walking along linoleum hallways at midnight where he
feels like an alien intruder. His footsteps rebound
inside his ears because he's the only one around to hear
them. A tree falling.
It's hard to say what he thinks about during those nights.
Sometimes he thinks of nothing at all. But it's cold
comfort to turn off his brain for a while because he
doesn't realize he's done it until afterwards.
He likes the mystery of the building at night. Shadows
gather, first in corners then spreading outward like
wings. The quiet is cotton in his ears, pressing gently
at his eardrums. In the office, he turns off all the
lights and the floor becomes like a pond, with only the
faint glow from outside trickling along one corner.
In ancient English poetry, the water was called 'the
swan's road.' He thinks of this briefly, moving,
graceful in the dark, graceful away from other eyes.
There's a photo tacked to the wall behind his desk and
he takes it down now and looks at it carefully, as if
he wants to paint a picture of the picture. The idea
of something twice removed from reality appeals. It
occurs to him that this thought is thrice removed and a
smile taps the corners of his mouth upwards.
He balances the picture on the very tips of his fingers,
moving them to watch the light from outside flash along
the glossy surface. Now he watches the flashes without
really looking at the picture.
The room he's in now used to be filled with files.
It's still filled with files, only someone, some
nameless custodial worker, found space to cram a desk
in as well. He considers this for a moment and finds
himself suddenly surrounded by the ghosts of all those
old files--clippings and memos and coroner's reports.
Black words on white pieces of paper that flutter
clumsily, like bats: letters winging on paper, paper
winging on air. These ghosts stifle him. They crowd
against him, trying to jump down his throat so that he
might speak them. The air is hot with the overabundance
of ideas. He roasts in his own skin.
The picture crumples and he looks down on it, horrified
to find that his hand is the thing that crushed it. He
unclenches his hand and the photo eases open like a
flower. He places it on the desk and tries to flatten
it, pressing on it with his hands. Under his palms,
creases run through the photographic paper like veins,
as if the picture has become something living. It's ruined.
Light breaks along the surface now instead of gliding off
in one satin pane. One vein cuts across the face of the
woman in the picture, creasing one corner of her mouth,
rippling through her red hair.
Beside the woman is another person, a man. His arm rests
lightly across her shoulders as if he's afraid she might
shrug it away at any moment. That fear is in his eyes,
which seem so bold at first glance. Both people face the
camera directly, like soldiers preparing for battle.
Scared but ready--ready for what? Ready for something,
not anything but something.
His brow furrows as he considers the people in the
picture. Pleats around his mouth deepen. They look so
young. The woman's right arm stretches across her body--up,
up, up over her waist, her stomach, the surprising swell
of her breasts--reaching for the man's hand, she stops,
never reaches her destination. He wonders if her skin would
have been warm or cool.
At night, he can feel words bursting inside him, misfiring
and falling back like premature fireworks. During the
day words are easier to ignore. He can cover them up with
more words, burying them under a stream of conversation.
His control slips. "After my sister was taken, sometimes
I'd sleep in my closet because I was frightened that whoever
it was would come back and take ME." He looks down at the
woman in the picture and swallows hard. He feels like
spitting.
The woman in the picture looks out past him serenely, her
hand lingering inches away. His scalp prickles. He feels
as if droplets of water are threading through his hair like fingers. "When
the X-Files were closed, I forgot how small
they were, how hidden."
His stomach feels hollow. He brushes his hand along his
shoulder, searching for the woman's fingers. His own
fingers close on air. The imagined feel of the phone
curves smoothly across his palm. Numbers rise up under his
touch like fate. The woman's hand moves, clasping his own
with comforting strength.
THE END
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