Title:  Fade (1/1)
Author:  Maraschino
Feedback to:  maraschino@ibm.net

Summary:  When a mother lives a life of threats, lies, and secrets, something
will eventually break.  Implied character death.

Rating:  PG-13

Category:  SA

Disclaimer:  Not mine.  Belongs to CC.  Not making money.  'Nuff said.

Many thanks to Anna... for being there, and for dreaming weird dreams.

***

FADE (1/1)

***

	Teena Mulder ignored the sunlight that streamed through the windows
and played amongst the dust.  Instead, she sat silently at her kitchen table, 
focusing on the intense cacophony of conversation occurring in the next room.

	Her son and his partner were speaking in harsh tones, trying to mute 
emotion behind urgent whispers.  She felt guilty for eavesdropping, but the 
crime paled in comparison to what she knew would be her most ultimate 
betrayal.

	"... you have no idea, Mulder.  She could have lied to you."

	It was the voice of the skeptic.  The disbeliever.  And a small, 
withered part of her wanted her son to listen to a voice of reason.

	"But she called me here.  This," and the word was emphasized, "could 
be it."

	She winced.  So much optimism, still.  So much determination.  Much 
to their surprise, it was one of the many things that Bill hadn’t managed to 
kill.

	"I have to go," she heard him say resolutely.  "I need to see for 
myself."

	She put a hand to her mouth, silencing a scream, knowing the price 
that would be exacted.

	I did my job, she tried to convince herself, self preservation 
rearing its ugly head.  The Smoker's voice tickled her ears.  "There's 
nothing you can do."

	She heard the door slam and feet walk away.

	After twenty years, she convinced herself that she preferred it 
that way.

	She closed the curtains, creating long shadows across the kitchen.  

	"There's nothing I can do," she whispered.

	Tomorrow she would forget that she had sentenced her son to death.

***

	Twelve hours later and she knew it was wrong. The address and the 
information she had given her son were wrong.  

	She thought her lips no longer spoke in tongues.  But, behind the 
words Fox had so eagerly listened to, would be no answers, no truth -- only
armed men with weapons to kill.  

	She stared at the phone, the guilt waiting to consume her.

	Wrong, wrong, wrong, and the silent gun against her head was no 
excuse.

	A faltering whisper spoke, a parched conscience that was slowly 
dying:  "Tell him".

	Memories of long lost arguments guised behind cigarette smoke 
prevented tears; truths that she had sworn to keep, hid behind hollow eyes.

	Her fingers crawled towards the dial pad.  She had to tell him 
before he went to *them*.  Before they could... before...

	The phone bleated, jarring her out of the past, the present, the 
future.  Fox’s partner's panicked voice spoke, her breaths hitched, and the 
receiver fell.

***

	Nonsensical elevator music whined as old metal cogs and gears 
protested two floors below.  Stucko yellow tile, the colour of cream 
infested coffee, reflected one another, surrounding and cornering her so 
that one hand wavered as it pushed the number six.

	Her hands were brittle.  Cold.  The flesh on her palms had never 
clasped another, unless it was one of her own.  With nails that were yellow, 
whose half moons had disappeared, she straightened the thinning tendrils of 
silver on her head.  She had considered wearing black only momentarily, 
trying to convince herself that it wasn't too late.  Her jaw ached, the
stress of waiting was measured out by biting the inside of her mouth, the 
tip of her oppressed tongue.

	A bell forewarned her of its stop, and the forthcoming painful 
sterility of intensive care was all too familiar.

	Something settled in her gut as she vowed she would be professional.

	Lead parched her throat as she resolved to be calm.

	Needles burned her eyes as she reminded herself to remain collected.  

	Her steps were weighted with familiarity and regret -- echoing 
tonelessly amongst the murmur of printers, the smell of disinfectant, and 
the watchful eyes of pastel scrubs.

	"No, thank you," she heard herself reply to a masked stranger.  She 
knew where she was going.

	The dimples on the intern’s face disappeared and he blinked.  "Oh, I 
just assumed... Well, he’s only had one visitor in the past three days."  
Confusion marked his face, and he suspiciously asked her relation to the 
patient.

	Teena Mulder stared, her face faltering.

	"I am," and the sour metal in her throat made speaking painful.  "I 
am family."  An unbidden memory surfaced and she blinked furiously, her hands 
clenching furiously against each other.

	The intern nodded, his beeper suddenly squealing.  His figure soon
disappeared into the bowels of a hospital corridor that was too dark and 
morbid to be hidden behind bright fluorescent lights.

	Her steps were resolute.  The knowledge that death was a close 
companion, that life, on this floor, was held by a mere gossamer, was 
banished from all thought.

	The doctors were tending to him, checking plastic and metal -- 
seemingly annoyed with the intrusions of flesh.

	A hiss.

	And she had sworn that she would never get close enough to feel this 
ache in her gut again. 

	A beep.

	And half a century could still never erase the familiarity of the 
noise.

	Harsh whispers invaded her ear.  The masked men in scrubs hid behind
the safety of medical jargon, no longer daring to offer a prognosis out loud. 
Her nostrils flared.  After so many years, silence was the only language she 
could speak.

	Foreign hands fiddled once again with metal implements, toyed with 
flesh, handled clear solutions in transparent plastic bags.  They shone 
lights into vacant orbs, speaking and calling for someone who wasn’t home.

	They turned to her with pity in their eyes.

	Shhh, a contraption hissed.  Just turn the machines off.

	Surprised at the sharp pin pricks that were forming at the corner
of her eyes, she shook her head mutely, resolutely.  No... no matter what 
that piece of paper said.

	Her denial echoed off the walls.

	Angry steps could be heard approaching from across the hallway.  Red 
hair and blue eyes stared vehemently at the foreign intruder.

	Feeling the threat and a flare of possessiveness, she extended a 
hand to awkwardly stroke her son’s singed hair.

	Barely controlled fury flung words with the precision of knife 
assaulting bone, and the red headed woman, known only to her as "Scully", 
spoke angrily, her body wedging itself in front of the prone figure on the 
bed.

	"I am his executor, and I will see out his living will."

	The elder of the two could not offer a defense, only offering a meek 
reply as the two men in uniform pulled her away.  Her hands grew numb, her 
heels clicked in an unrhythmic fashion, and she watched her son’s partner 
finally let down her defenses and begin to cry.

	The lump in her throat momentarily dislodged, but the words coming 
from her mouth sounded foreign, even to her own ears.

	"But... I am his mother."

***

	"You have no right."

	She was silent.  It was the easiest pattern to fall into.

	"You have no right to take this decision away from him."

	Her lips refused to move as the accusations were flung.

	"You did this."

	Had she been too naïve when she had tried to convince herself that 
forgetting was for the best?

	"Your fault."

	All the photographs.  So much money for a camera, whose still shots 
had long since been thrown away.

	"How could you?"

	She longed for a pill.  Back on the coast, waiting for her, would be 
too many amber coloured bottles in the medicine cabinet.

	"He’s your son."

	Pictures invaded her mind -- mental photographs that were as fresh 
and raw as if they had been taken yesterday.  She looked at Fox, lying pale
and still in the bed, and wondered why she was risking opening old scabs
by challenging Fox's living will.  Words filtered across her throat like sand 
paper.  "I gave him life."

	Her blue eyes softened momentarily, turning to wards sadly in the 
direction of her partner’s isolated cubicle.  "And now you must allow him to 
die."

***

	His footsteps would echo off the porch stairs.

	A door would slam.

	A fridge would open.

	Too many sounds, and she could remember closing her eyes as they 
rebounded through a fogged brain.  She had tried to maintain any errant 
thought, managing to grasp only onto that it had been awhile since she had 
last seen her husband.

	He would offer a brief greeting before his footsteps echoed upstairs, 
a chair squeaked, and text books cracked open.

	Only then could she open her eyes slowly, casting longing glances 
towards the bedroom door, willing a little girl to come home.

	But only silence would engulf the room, the house.  This life.

	If she listened carefully enough, she could swear she heard the sound
of Fox crying.

***

	"Why?"

	The only thing she could offer was a painful shrug of the shoulders.  

	"Why her?"

	Her voice came out hoarse, weathered -- protesting the abuse it had 
endured under the unwavering scrutiny of the federal agent.  "It was one or 
both.  If we didn’t choose one, then... then both would go."

	"Your husband made you choose?"

	Her dry eyes stared back, and she recited a script long since 
engrained in her mind.

	"Yes... yes... He made me... forced me.  There was nothing I could 
do.  A hopeless situation."  She looked yearningly towards the figure on the
bed, willing him to open his eyes, to listen to real words.  The lies burned 
like acid in the back of her throat, and she grasped for anything, not 
hearing a whisper that would be overshadowed by the hiss of a ventilator.  
"Not my fault..."  

***

	The rocking chair would squeak a comfortable rhythm as the darkness 
engulfed her.

	She remembered closing her eyes, concentrating on the toneless tune 
in her mind, so that the darkness would intensify.  

	It was the only way to make a comfortable peace.

	A bearable loneliness.

	A light would play across the room, causing her to squint at the 
bright intrusion, glare at the too-thin frame silhouetted by the door.

	Despite her fatigue, the desperation that clung to her room, she 
would make her voice whip sharp, effectively destroying the silence.  "What 
now?"

	Fox always hesitated before stepping into the room.  "It’s five 
o’clock, mom."

	The report would always register dully in her mind, but indifference 
prevented her from offering an acknowledging reply.  

	"You wanted me to bring you these at five, remember?"

	"I remember," she would shoot back impatiently.  The two words were 
always enough to cause a familiar ache in her chest.  "I remember," she would
say softly, the rocking increasing in frequency.  

	Six pills, and it was always at this point she would try to recall
happier times, wondering why Fox always looked so sad... 

	Teena grabbed for her son's limp hand, struggling with the emotions
of remembering, trying to find an anchor in the steady beeping of machines.

	She remembered that she had always swallowed the pills dry, always 
ignored the protests of her stomach.  

	She could recall vowing not to throw up, resolving that tomorrow she
would quit.  Because, her mind would desperately grasp, tomorrow would be
better.

	There were times when she could feel his eyes on her.

	At thirteen, his arms were still not in proportion to his legs which 
were only then starting to grow.  His eyes already held a wariness, his 
posture was permanently slumped into defeat.

	She would stare at everything but his face.  "Go do your homework."

	Teena shook her head, shaking away the last remnants of the reverie.
She stared at Fox's long hand, wondering if the homework had been long
completed.  Perhaps he had set a table for four, eating a meal for one.  

	Or perhaps he had watched the clock, like she had, talking to a 
ghost, wondering if there would ever be an end to the pain.

	There was one time, she remembered, when Fox had broken from the 
routine, uttering three words that had caught her fuzzy mind off guard.

	"I... I love you, mom."

	She had mouthed his name, then cursed her weakness.  She tried to 
ignore the teenager in front of her, biting her lip so hard that it had bled.  

	It would be the only time she would see her son flee from the room.

***

	"You killed him."

	"No..."

	Scully grew more insistent, her eyes shining with more passion in one 
statement than Teena realized she had ever managed to muster in seven decades 
of silence.

	"You sent him to that place.  They told you to send him there... with 
those people.  You knew..."

	She shook her head, once again stealing a glance at the figure in the 
bed.  Blood still stained some of the bandages, fingertips poked out of pus 
stained gauze.  She wondered when his fingers had become so long.  Hair that 
was singed in some areas, eaten away at others, was mostly bark brown.  She 
wondered when the gray highlights had first started appearing.

	She wondered how she could have missed everything.

	She held onto false hope, grasping the bed rail with white knuckles.

	She mouthed his name, praying for him to come back -- repeating a 
mantra that had begun seemingly eons ago in a bungalow in Chilmark.

***

	The airport had bustled and fluorescent lights shone.

	The black bruise around his left eye was slowly turning green around 
the edges.  He had stood apart from the vacationing crowd, arms crossed over 
his chest.  Teena remembered never feeling so far apart from her son, 
despite standing only ten feet away.   

	Families had been chattering, airport speakers had been blaring, and 
she watched as Fox had left for Oxford.  He had headed to the terminal with 
steps that were a little too anxious.  His hand gripped the airplane ticket 
as if it were a lifeline.

	She had watched him pause, unsure at the gate, when he impulsively 
leaned over to hug her.  She had stepped back, surprised, uncomfortably 
patting his shoulders in a crude impression of an embrace, inwardly relieved
that he was finally escaping the insanity of Bill and his work.

	Fox had stepped back, resigned.  "I lo..." he stopped, and Teena 
could still remember his sad sigh.  His long fingers had resolutely grabbed 
the handles of his suitcase and his even longer legs carried him away from 
any further embarrassment.

	She had kept her head held high, hands still at her sides -- Bill's
smoking friend would have been proud of her resolve.  But she had turned away 
before she could watch him disappear into the faceless crowd -- before he 
could see her tears of regret.

***

	"How did you choose?"

	The response was reflexive.  "He made me choose."

	"You don’t fool me anymore."

	"You don’t understand," she could hear herself pleading.  "She was 
special."

	Cold, hard eyes stared back.  "And he wasn’t?"

	Memories assaulted her, betraying what she was going to say.  Three 
simple words, from a little boy’s mouth, that died at the same time the boy 
became a man.  Fox had loved her unconditionally, and she looked around
nervously, searching for smoke or Bill's hard glare.  Would it be possible
to reciprocate what Fox had given her?  After so many years, was it worth
investing herself even though her son was at his death bed?  "He was..." 
the lines of the script faltered for the first time, and the words stuck
to her mouth like tar.  "Yes.  He was special."

***

	By the end of the fourth day, she began to resent the vigilence of
Fox's partner, the closeness that they shared.  When Dana Scully spoke, the 
EKG registered her presence, Fox's face took on a calmness.  When she spoke,
there was... nothing.  

	"He’s not yours," she finally snapped, tired of Scully's ministrations,
the strength with which she carried herself.  

	She looked surprised at the statement, her eyes turning cold.  
"He’s not a possession," she snapped.  "I’m only executing his living will."  
Her steel façade faltered, and she drew in a ragged breath.  "I’m only doing 
what he wants."

	"You have no right."

	"And you do?"	
	
	"I... I care for him."  The words were foreign in her mouth, and how 
she wished she had the courage to say the three words twenty years ago.  

	"You slapped him."

	Dizzying photographs assaulted her mind once again.  An endless loop 
of fairytales and songs in the bathtub bleated in her ears.  No one could 
forget -- it was useless to even try.  Her first tear escaped, and something 
broke inside.  "But... I lo..."

	She heard Scully sigh as she stopped herself.  Fearful, she looked
around again, wondering if mechanical ears were listening.  

	Was it finally safe enough, she wondered, to reach out again?

***


	She approached the bed one more time, hearing words come unbidden
from her mouth.  "I don’t deserve your forgiveness..."  The words after were 
a torrent of secrets, apologies lauded at her son's prone figure.  She held 
his hand while she talked, feeling the assurance of bone and sinew, and a 
steady beat at the wrist.

	Across the room, blue eyes bored into her head, the unsaid thought 
resounding between the metal machines.

	You deserve no absolution.

	"I do not want absolution," she whispered.  She spoke of all the 
photographs that she remembered, mentally trying to catalogue them all, the 
heaviness that had long since lived in her, slowly lifting.

	A priest came, and was quickly dismissed.

	A doctor arrived, with the instructions to kill, his hands ready to 
disconnect wires and disable equipment.

	He paused.  "Did you want to wait outside?" 

	Scully quickly shook her head no, a hand covering her mouth, tears 
starting to well.

	A hand maternally traced the contours of the still figure’s 
cheekbone, trying to memorize the planes of his face -- seeing, for the first 
time, a resemblance to her lineage.

	"No," she spoke softly, kissing the hand, trying to engrain the smell 
and the feel of the long fingers into memory.  "I love you, Fox William 
Mulder.  Never forget, I love you."

	She smiled sadly, savouring the words on her lips.  The EKG spiked
slightly in acknowedgement, before straightlining.

	She turned away.

	Tomorrow will be better, she vowed.  Tomorrow, she would refuse to 
fade to black.  

***
***

End

***
***

Gratuitous self advertisment:  
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Chamber/9588/index.html