WAITING (Parts 1 - 3 of 6) by Kipler@aol.com ............................................................ Do not forward to ATXC. I will. Please archive to Gossamer. Spoilers: Gethsemane//Rated: G//Classified: XA Summary: A bit of an X-File while Scully deals with the loss of Mulder. Meant to be read during the endless hiatus of 1997. ............................................................. All the characters are the property of Chris Carter, Fox TV, and 1013 Productions. No copyright infringement is intended. ............................................................. Part 1 There is always waiting to do, here, and it is always heavy with fear. I wonder if by sitting together like this we pile our fear in one place, so that we feel the sum of it. Of all these people in their pasty-white skin who spend more time sitting under fluorescent lights than they do walking and moving in the real world. If the fear is additive, my own is not the greatest part of the total. I am only here once a week, still. They are here every day, some of them. James McMullen comes with his mother, a woman who holds a rosary in her hands and habitually crosses herself as she waits. Frances Delario is dropped off and picked up by her fianc. There is an old, old man named Benny Buchanan. He comes alone, as I do. These are the people whose days center around this place. They own the greater part of the fear that piles up around us. I am not at the top of the scale. Unless you count previous losses, in which case I am unbeatable among the dying. At any rate, the waiting is long, and the smell is thick and close, and the magazines are old. So I have made myself a path through other places, and I route it slowly, to kill the waiting. They know me. They will page me if my turn comes before I get back. I find the neonatal unit, where the squalling red and brown babies lie, objecting to the scratch of cloth against their skin, to the cool of air and the shock of light through closed eyelids. They are held tightly against the skin of the ones who love them, are pressed and coddled and memorized, fingers counted and stroked. The mothers and fathers touch the silk hair and say, "My baby, my baby, my boy, my girl." In English and Spanish and a dozen languages I don't know. "You are here. You are mine." Who days ago were only imaginings and now are visible, felt. The parents huddle the small ones against them, and if they ask I tell them I am visiting my sister, my cousin, my friend. The things that happen on the other sides of these walls should be forgotten, here. I hide my truth from them. The nursery is not where I stop, now. I pass through and move down the hall to pediatrics. Once, it would have been hard for me to see the sick children, but now we have a union, a solidarity. I stop to talk to several of them. There is a mother, a young woman with beautiful dark twin boys. One sits beside her, watching solemnly through black eyes like cameras. The other lies across her cushioned lap, asleep and not dreaming. His eyes are still as he lies there. There is a third child, too, a girl of maybe eight. She has long brown hair in a single braid. She smiles at me. She knows me from another time. I've seen this family before; the mother is more frightened this time. I think she does not speak English, so I turn to the girl. "How are your brothers?" I ask. I think it's one of them, one of the twins, who is sick. "They sleep too much," the girl answers. "And my mother doesn't know why they don't talk to us." I look at the one who is awake. He is a beautiful child. Under his one eye is the thin line of a scar, pale against the dark skin; it makes him look strangely adult. A nurse comes out from behind the main desk and hands the woman a small card - an appointment card. Then she turns to the little girl and speaks slowly. "You have another appointment for next Wednesday," she says. "It's at the sleep disorders clinic. On the third floor." The little girl is confused. Disorders. It's a big word for a small child. "You don't have a translator?" I ask the nurse. "Not full-time. We share her with the other floors... and she's on duty downstairs." I take the appointment card and read the time. It is a week from now. My next appointment, too. "How about if I come with you?" I ask the girl. She smiles and turns to her mother and repeats what I've said. The woman smiles, too, and shakes my hand. "Thank you," she says, with the first familiar words of those who are accustomed to asking for help. "Thank you." And then they are up and the little girl tells me her name is Alma, and that her brothers are Tomas and Daniel. I'll meet them here next week. I ride the elevator up one floor, to look over the sleep disorders clinic. It's a new unit, popular among researchers and freelance magazine writers. Sleep disorders are friendly to outsiders - curious, but not threatening . You could read about them in the beauty parlor, in the dentist's office, without feeling a knot form in your stomach, without crossing yourself. The rooms here are blocked off, but I imagine what I've seen on television: loosely-clothed people with electrodes attached to their heads, EEGs flickering their brain waves out to the eager hands of grant recipients. My pager goes off; they're ready for me in oncology. I retrace my steps, go down where before I went up, shuffle back through the babies and the waiting families. ~~~ I don't sleep anymore. Not often, and not much when I do. I imagine that the sleep will come later, when I begin to be really sick, when my body is tired. But for now I'm awake long into the night, thoughts rolling in my head. If I had more time I would have to change. Life has a way of falling forward and dragging you with it. I know this. I know that the sharp edge of grief cannot be first in your mind always. If I had more time, I would move with life. But this way, I will not. I don't have to adjust. I am lying here and I'm thinking of him, and time will not push the thoughts away because I do not have time. I can stay here in this first place where he sits heavy and alive in me. I am thinking tonight of his hands, of the rough skin of his palms, of his fingers. That's what I own of him tonight. Part 2 A week is still a short time, but I measure it, up against the changes in the faces of the people in the waiting room. Benny Buchanan looks the same, but he is an old man, already ravaged by time, wearing the clear dreamlike face of old age; this disease does not paint him so unkindly. James McMullen's face has become rounder as the drugs begin their work on him. Frances Delario looks tired, and her fianc worn through. A week is a short time, but a strong time. People let go their souls in a week's time. This week, two days ago, Skinner called me into his office. A demand, an expectation of a return on the money they pay me. Officially, I am still working. Usually, no one asks me to and no one questions my absences. I came into his office and I felt his eyes watching my face, looking for changes in it. There are none, yet. I think. He spoke to me. "I have some information that might be of importance to you, Agent Scully." "What is that, sir?" "A report from the DC police... they shuffled it over to me finally, after all these weeks. A woman phoned in a report of suspicious activity, late on the night of May 18." The night Mulder died. "Sir?" I asked. "Scully, the report states that the woman saw unusual activity outside of Agent Mulder's apartment building. A van approaching, and men moving about in the yard adjoining the building." So. "What do you think it means?" I asked. "It leaves open the possibility that Agent Mulder's death was not a suicide." "That is a possibility, sir." I could see that he was disappointed in my non-reaction. Maybe he thought this lead would rouse me, spark my interest. Maybe he doesn't know that I've thought of this already and moved beyond it, because there is no justice either way; the tracks have been covered and Mulder is dead and gone by their hands no matter who pulled the trigger. "I'll keep you updated as information becomes available, Agent Scully." "Thank you, sir." I went to the basement after that, for just a few moments. ~~~ Now I'm leaving oncology, hoping to make it to the third floor quickly. My doctor clasps my arm as I move towards the door. "You're too thin, Dana. You need to eat more." Easy to say. Maria Ruiz, the mother of twins, meets me on time in pediatrics, with Alma and the boys. One of them is asleep, draped over Maria's shoulder. The other eyes me nervously and earnestly. The sleep problem, as near as the translator can figure out from the nervous mother, is that Tomas and Daniel are not often awake at the same time. Tomas, the one with the scar, is awake during the day, and when he drifts off to sleep at night, Daniel wakes up. "It's quite natural, if not common," the doctor tries to explain, "for twins to have different sleep/wake cycles. You'll have to try to regulate Daniel so that the family can get some sleep, but it's not dangerous to his health, that he has odd waking hours." I listen as the translator repeats the information to the mother, and watch the woman's eyes grow wider and her voice more hysterical as she breaks in. The translator shakes her head in exasperation. "She says it's not just their sleeping. She says they're not normal. She says their brains are not normal. That there's something wrong. They don't connect to her the way the girl did." My brain quickly flashes to autism. The doctor pats Maria on the shoulder. "Try what I've suggested, come back in a week if you don't get anywhere. I'll schedule some tests if you don't have any luck." The translator translates again, and Maria's eyes do not lose their panic. I pick up Tomas and carry him behind the nurse's station, where I see a canister of lollipops. He smiles the shadow of a smile as I hand one to him and one to Alma. His mother tries to smile, but cannot. I'll come back next week. ~~~ I am not asleep. I am remembering. I thought at first that I wouldn't be strong enough to accept the dying, and then I knew I would be. I knew that Mulder would remember me long and well - better, perhaps, than I really am. So there I would be - we would be - in his mind. Some kind of alive. But it seems strange, now, that when I'm gone the remembering is done. It's a catalog that I have, and I scan the pages each night, as I lie here. The quiet rasp of his voice in near-panic. The sound I hated to hear, because it was desperation and fear. And tonight I listen for him - I'm holding his voice for him - and he is afraid for me again, and I can be the strong one. Part 3 I am in watching through the thick glass as mothers hold their babies. Alma Ruiz is with me, while her brothers and mother are with the doctor again. "I remember when the twins were so small," she tells me. "How old are they now?" I ask. "Almost two." "Do they speak yet?" "No. Not like real people. To each other, sometimes. They have strange words" I remember stories from developmental psychology: stories of twins, creating their own languages to the exclusion of their parents and families. "Do you understand them?" "Sometimes." I smile at the brown eyes, so intent on the babies. Alma smiles as well. The mother behind the glass holds a dozing, red-haired baby. She is cooing. "My baby. My little girl." "She is making her real," Alma says. "What do you mean?" "My grandmother in Ecuador says babies aren't real until they know they know where they belong." I smile at this. "What are they before they're real?" The girl shrugs. "Only like... dreams." I smile again. I begin to think it is a quaint story, a cute one for a little girl. But then I think of baptisms, of all the ways we have of solidifying of a child's place. All the undreaming. Maria Ruiz comes down the hall and at last I see the twins awake together, each holding one of her hands. Tomas is on the right and Daniel is on the left. The translator is behind them. I smile at Maria and ask what happened. "The doctor wants to schedule the boys for neurological work-ups. Just to rule out the possibility that there is anything organic wrong with them, since Mrs. Ruiz seems to feel that something abnormal is going on." "When?" I ask. "Monday. It could be all day. You know how these things go." Waiting and waiting. Daniel comes to me and tugs on the hem of my skirt. He mumbles something that I don't understand. I look to his mother, who shakes her head. Strange words. Alma pokes at me and says, "He wants a lollipop like last time." I wonder how he knows me. I haven't seen him awake. ~~~ I go to the FBI building in the afternoon, to meet with Skinner. His voice is strange when he speaks to me. I wonder how my face looks. I think maybe it is thinner than it has ever been - too thin. "How is the investigation going, Sir?" I ask. Skinner opens his mouth but is quiet, and I know that he's started to say something to me but changed his mind. "We're pursuing all leads," he says finally. "How is your health, Agent Scully?" I'm fine. "Stable," I say. "But I would like to take Monday off, for personal reasons." Again he starts to answer me but edits himself. I am confusing to him. I have been since I've been ill, and am more now, since Mulder. "Of course." ~~~ I am lying awake reading my old texts from medical school. Autism in children. It doesn't sound like Tomas and Daniel. The book describes abnormal attachments to physical objects. Repetitive motions. But there must be something. In all these psychology books, in all the chapters about child development. I wish I could speak to the mother directly. They tell me the neurologist speaks Spanish. I wrap the thumb and middle finger of my right hand around my left wrist. The grip is loose, with room to spare. I think I am much too thin. It wasn't only Skinner who stared at me today when I walked through the halls at work. I think I need to sleep more. My thoughts are becoming strange, at night. Stranger. Tonight I feel as though I'm not quite here. As though I'm moving past tired and thin and moving toward transparent. I'm like an imagining of myself, only my powers of imagination are growing weaker. I can see Mulder more clearly. I can see him hunched in the chair in the corner, rumpled shirt and jacket tossed across the table. He isn't saying anything. I want to go to sleep but I can smell him sitting there and I don't want to give that away. (End - Parts 1-3/6) Part 4 This is what the EEG results show: Tomas Ruiz, awake, showing normal brain wave patterns in all areas. A brain that is alert, active. The brain of a healthy, restless two-year-old. Daniel Ruiz, also awake, also normal and active. Brain waves closely paralleling those of his brother. Identical, in fact. A perfect match, minute by minute. Only the EEGs were taken when Daniel was sound asleep. I was there, watching. The neurologist and I are confounded. She orders another set of tests for tomorrow morning. She wants to get a full battery: Daniel awake and Tomas asleep. Both awake. Both asleep. I think that the translator and Mrs. Ruiz don't precisely understand the implications. But Mrs. Ruiz is relieved that someone, finally, has found something to indicate she is not imagining whatever she is seeing in her boys. Myself, I have been awake too long. I see the EEG tracings and I think of Daniel's recognizing me the other day, when only Tomas had met me. I think of two boys and one mind. I argue with myself. There must be a an explanation for the strange neurology. A discord in the machinery. And Tomas might have described me to Daniel, and told him about the lollipop. I convince myself. Who is there to counter me? Alma tugs on my skirt. "My mother wants to know if you can talk to my father," she says. "He's coming with us tomorrow. He's taking a day off work." I run my mind over the schedule I have for tomorrow. I could go to work. I could just as likely not go. I am compiling reports, mindless work. And this... this is strange, an X-File. My job. Not honestly. Anyway. It holds my attention. "Ask her where and when," I say. So tomorrow, at one o'clock, we'll have lunch. ~~~ I am on the Internet reading about twins, tonight. There's an account of one twin in Florida who felt the labor pain of her sister in Minnesota. There's a story about a man who called his mother to tell her that his twin brother had died in a car accident - even though the body hadn't yet been identified. All apocryphal, all interesting. The weight of a single report is minute, but a hundred of them begin to have heft. I argue with myself a bit more. Then I argue with Mulder, whom I create in the chair. I have been spending too much time in the hospital, in the nursery and the waiting room. When I close my eyes and dream now, I see newborns. There are angry, red-faced children in my mind. I see newborns and the ancient, seamless face of Benny Buchanan. Part 5 Eduardo Ruiz meets me in the hospital cafeteria. The boys are still in neurology with their mother, and Alma has been sent to an aunt's house today. Maria has learned how slowly things move in the hospital. "Thank you for all the help you've given my wife," Mr. Ruiz says. "It is very hard, with her not speaking English, and I have to work. I can't come here all the time." "It's no problem, Mr. Ruiz," I say. "My schedule has been rather...flexible... lately." The man looks at his hands uncomfortably. "You... you are sick?" I look up in surprise. I hadn't realized that Maria Ruiz knew of my illness. But then I ask myself what I thought she saw when she looked at me. A thin, pale woman who spends all her time haunting the halls of a hospital. I am not so ill, not in my body. If I could eat more, I wouldn't be so thin. "I'm... I'm all right, Mr. Ruiz," I say, and this part of the conversation is done. "Tell me about your sons. The more I know, the better the questions we can ask." Eduardo Ruiz smiles. I see a sudden flash of the boys in his face. "The twins were... a surprise. We didn't know we were having two until the last month. Maria was in Ecuador then, taking care of her mother, and she didn't have all the tests she had here, with Alma." "But the pregnancy and delivery went normally?" "Yes... yes. Everything seemed fine until the babies were a few months old. And then Maria started noticing that they seemed to sleep strangely. Almost never together: one would be awake and the other was asleep. Or they were both awake. But we almost never have a night where they sleep straight through, together." "And besides the sleep... your wife said that there were other things that seemed wrong?" Mr. Ruiz runs a hand through his hair. "They are so... apart," he says. "Disconnected, you know? I am not a psychologist, but I have read things. The boys didn't form an attachment to us the way Alma did. I read. I was afraid they were autistic. I read a lot about it. Sometimes they seem that way, except..." "Except?" "Except they are connected. To each other. Tomas always knows where Daniel is, and what he's doing. Daniel won't let us go anywhere without Tomas. They have a way of talking that we can't understand. I know that's not so uncommon. But... well, this will sound strange... maybe I shouldn't tell you..." "Please, Mr. Ruiz. Anything that you know." "My wife says that Daniel knows things that happen to Tomas. And Tomas knows things that happen to Daniel. Even if they are not together when they happen. She says they share memories." "And do you believe her?" "I can't say as surely as she does. But I have seen enough to know... to know it scares me. Miss Scully, have you read any of the stories about twins and parapsychology?" "I have," I say. "But no conclusive tests have been done in a controlled scientific environment." "Well, maybe today there will be." There is a long silence and Eduardo Ruiz looks down at his hands. "It must be very difficult," I say. "I worry for the boys. They are so different. So apart from the rest of us. I can't explain it. It's almost like... like to them the rest of the world is only a dream. I worry for Maria. She feels so separate from her own children." I have no words of consolation. The tests must be over. Maria and the boys cross the cafeteria, and the wife and husband confer closely in Spanish. "I'm sorry," Eduardo says after a few minutes. "The tests are done, but the doctor was called away on an emergency. Only the technicians are there. So we will have to wait for the results." ~~~ I am in at Quantico, going over some old files, when Skinner walks in. I am surprised. He must have gone to a lot of trouble to find me. "Sir," I say, "I hope you didn't inconvenience yourself coming down here." "No... no. I had to drive by anyway. How are you, Agent Scully?" Always the same question. "I'm fine, sir. How can I help you?" "Agent Scully, it's been rather difficult for me to find you these last few weeks." "I'm sorry, sir. There haven't been any pressing cases, and I've been spending a great deal of time at the hospital. If that's a problem, I can..." "It's not your absence from work I'm worried about, Agent Scully. But I would appreciate it at this time if you would keep me informed of your whereabouts." I blink stupidly. He's checking up on me; he's concerned for my health. "I'll try, Sir." ~~~ I am telling myself that an identical genetic makeup and a shared prenatal environment do not provide any scientific explanation for the sharing of brain waves. Mulder is telling me that we can't know until we see the results of the EEGs. That this may become a classic case study in a previously ignored area of research. It is two o'clock in the morning, and my body is so tired. "Go to sleep, Scully." I think of Daniel Ruiz, lying asleep against his mother's lap while all the time his brother's thoughts play into his head. Closed-circuit cameras, recording and saving the world as it is while a small boy's body takes its rest. One mind doing the work of two bodies. That would be easy. My way is hard. One body doing the work of two souls. I am spread too thin, keeping myself alive and Mulder, too, every night. Part 6 The woman in the hospital cafeteria knows my order now. I'm a regular. Alma and I are looking at the EEGs. I am showing her the different lines, explaining what each one means. She has decided that she wants to be a doctor. The results of the EEGs are dramatic, and already the sleep disorders people are arguing with the neurology department over who will take credit for the initial discovery. I vote for Maria Ruiz. So here is what we've learned: When Daniel is asleep, his mind registers the same brain waves as Tomas does, awake. And when Tomas is asleep, Daniel's mind takes over. Somehow they are connected, linked to each other beyond our understanding. There is talk of sending them to MIT, to the Mind Articulation Project. There is a twins study going on there, at the center for linguistics, and the brain and cognitive science people are anxious to see the boys as well. Everyone in a dozen fields is drooling for CAT scans and MRIs and every probing that can be done. Maria Ruiz is overwhelmed, and Eduardo has been called and advised to seek the counsel of a lawyer. Alma is only fascinated by the delicate tracings of her brothers' brains, somehow made visible on paper. They have promised her that she will get her own tracing, of her own brain. "Will you get one, too?" she asks me. I smile. "Maybe." We walk to the nursery when we are done eating. It has become our favorite place. I think that Alma believes it is the part of the hospital that belongs to me. I let her think that. My pager is buzzing. I look at the number. Skinner. I consider going to a pay phone and calling him, but change my mind. I'll check in with him later. There is great excitement in the nursery, today. There is a new set of twins. They are named Marisa and Annisa. I wonder how much they will appreciate that later in life. Alma watches in fascination as the mother and father hold the infants, huddle them close as if they can't believe in them. They talk softly, in sing-song voices. "Our baby girls." "Making them real," I say as I smile at Alma. She shakes her head. "Twins don't need anyone else," she says. "They already make each other real." I think today will be the last day that I see Daniel and Tomas. And Alma. They'll be pulled somewhere far away from here, whatever happens. I go back to oncology to reschedule my next appointment. James McMullen is there; his mother is still crossing herself. Frances Delario is missing. I don't ask where she is. Benny Buchanan is sitting by the nurse's desk. I wonder how old he is. I guess ninety. He's different from the rest of us; his face is set and calm. He doesn't own fear anymore. I think he knows he doesn't belong here. Alma said that babies are only dreams until they know where they belong. I wonder if the reverse is true, that when we stop belonging we become dreams again. I think about my own nights, my transparency. ~~~ It is early but I'm very tired this evening. The answering machine light is blinking, and I push the button. There is a message from my mother. There is a message from a telemarketer. There is a message from Skinner. He is agitated. "Agent Scully, I have been trying to reach you all day. It is imperative that you get in touch with me as soon as possible." I lie on my couch. I mean to return my mother's call, and Skinner's. I just want to rest for a minute or two. Mulder sits on the coffee table watching me. I tell him about Tomas and Daniel. He tells me to sleep. I do. The phone rings. I sit up, startled. It is dark here, now, and for a moment I'm disoriented because I'm in the living room and not in my bed. I pick up the receiver and stumble to answer. Skinner is on the line. "Agent Scully? Are you all right?" "Yeah," I murmur with a sleep-thickened voice. "I've been trying to reach you. Look... stay there. I'm coming over." It is so strange for Skinner to say this that I wonder if I'm dreaming. I collapse back on the sofa, too tired to argue with him. I'm not sure if I fall back to sleep; it seems only a minute later that there is a knock on my door. I move to the door and pull it open. I'm surprised, for a moment, that it's not Skinner. I'm surprised that it's Mulder, that he has waited at the door, that he is dressed in clothes I have never seen. "Scully," he says. He looks at me for a long minute. Then he reaches out and touches my hand. I can feel his skin. It is a surprise. I move to touch his shoulder, his cheek. My fingers feel solid and thick against him. "Mulder," I say, looking into his eyes. He doesn't move. He is so still, not even his eyes move. I touch his hair, his hands, his fingers. The air is cold, here, and the light from the hallway bothers my eyes; I tug at Mulder and he steps into the room. He takes my hand and holds it tightly against his skin. We are like this for a moment. One of us speaks. "You're here." ~The End~ All feedback is cherished! Send to Kipler@aol.com.