soporific
by Pares

Someone in Mulder's building must be having a party. The shadowy bass of large speakers and some sort of house music makes the door in front of her fairly shudder. It seems to be... She places her palm against the door and notes that it is indeed vibrating.

Rapping smartly on the door, Scully glances at her watch. It is well after midnight. She briefly pities his neighbors. Perhaps the music is keeping a few of them awake enough to report a petite redhaired prowler.

Special Agent Dana Scully is standing outside her partner's door unannounced, and with no good reason for it. Outside of the fact that she hasn't slept a night through for three days. Still, her insomnia can't explain the sudden whim to arrive unbidden at her partner's doorstep. In her blue flannel pajamas.

"Scully?" He's flung the door open and now leans toward her, brows frowning.

Scully is struck by three things: the unusual speed with which Mulder has opened his door, the volume and resonance of the music that washes into the hall, and the fact that he is naked to the waist and sheened with sweat.

"Mulder, hi. I thought..." She trails off. This had stopped seeming like a good idea at about the time she'd arrived at his door. "Is this a bad time?"

Mulder looks puzzled, and wary.

"Is everything all right, Scully?"

"Fine. Everything's fine... I just... couldn't sleep. Thought I'd consult an expert."

He grins at her, and steps aside to let her in.

The music is so heavy it's like a color in the room-- magenta maybe, or a rich violet. Scully thinks back to her physics classes; did sound, in fact, *have* a quantifiable weight?

She hears Mulder say something, but doesn't quite catch it over the flood of sound.

"What?"

Mulder lowers the music to a low, strumming undercurrent.

"I said, do you want a turkey sandwich?"

She smiles at him. "Turkey sounds pretty good. My father used to nap through every Thanksgiving football game. Eventually, we bought him a VCR."

Nodding, he pads into his kitchen and even with the music she can hear the way his feet stick to the linoleum, the soft suction of the fridge door opening. She listens to the crinkle of wax paper, and Mulder's experimental sniff. This is followed immediately by a sharp exhalation and finally the mangling whirr of the In-Sink-Erator over the rush of the tap. There must be something else at least vaguely edible in the fridge, however, as she hears a second foray and the clink of bottles.

"You're in luck. It was my turn to host poker night, and Byers stashed the leftovers here."

He returns with a paper plate and half a listing Turkey Club.

"His cousin owns a deli. It's the only place Langly will eat these days."

"What was it that you threw away?"

He looks sheepish.

"Ah, that was turkey, too. Once."

She eyes the sandwich, its wilted lettuce leaves, the oddly jaunty transparent blue sword toothpick, and decides that she doesn't want to know how many days it's been since said poker night.

"Thanks, Mulder." She nibbles cautiously at a corner of marble rye. Probably safe. "I apologize for stopping by so late--"

"Don't apologize. You know I never sleep." He studies her intently for a moment, and then taps the arm of the couch.

"You want to sit down? I have some tea--"

Nodding, Scully sits on Mulder's low leather couch and tucks her feet beneath her. A dreamlike bassline hums soothingly in her chest.

"Some tea would be nice." The caffeine can neither help nor hinder her at this point.

He must have had some already steeping. "Two sugars, no cream?"

Scully smiles, pleased that he knows this. The ring of the spoon tapping against the lip of the cup rouses her slightly. She's suddenly drowsy, and now perversely frustrated by the fact. She wants to see this side of Mulder, Mulder in shorts, bringing her tea. She sets the sandwich on the end table and stands up when Mulder returns to hand her a cracked white mug.

"Who is this?" she says, before taking a sip. Green. A fringe benefit of hundreds of Chinese take out orders.

"The music? Massive Attack. ''Protection'."

Scully makes an approving sound and paces the wall near the stereo, reading the titles of Mulder's cd's. Orbital, the Orb, Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Cole Porter Songbook, Rolling Stones, more Massive Attack, Frank Zappa, house music compilations, Various Artists electronica, Best Of Summer Heights Blue Grass Festival...

"Pimp Daddy Nash, Mulder? Right next to Judy Garland's Golden Hits? Is there a feather boa in your closet I should know about?"

"Funny you should ask, Scully..." At her arched brows he smiles sweetly and continues, "No, actually."

After a brief perusal, Scully looks up at Mulder. "No Elvis?"

"I gave my records to Frohike. He can give them the reverence they deserve."

"Mmm hmmm."

"Tired yet?"

She ignores the question; she's been *tired* for three days straight.

"How did you get to be such a big techno fan?"

Mulder just looks at her for a moment. Scully remembers that she's in her pajamas, and wishes she'd changed before coming over. Mulder hasn't mentioned them yet, but she doubts seriously that he hasn't noticed them. But then, he's still in just shorts, and his hair is matted with drying sweat...

"It clears my mind. Distracts me. Helps me sleep. Sometimes, when I don't want to think anymore, I'll turn it up and just... well, mostly, I do sit-ups."

That would explain the sweat, and the sleekly muscled torso...

"Most of it doesn't have a lot of words, so I can tune out a little."

"It helps you sleep?"

"I don't actually sleep to it, but it... It helps me wind down. Most of the time." He looks grave for a moment, but scrubs his face with his hands and smiles again.

"I could lend you something," he offers. "I have a maxi single by the Orb that usually works for me..."

She shakes her head.

"I prefer Miles Davis. Or Chopin." She grins. "Or the Clash."

It's his turn to cock a brow.

"Could it be that the straitlaced Doctor Scully was a teenaged hellcat?"

"Wouldn't you like to know."

"I *do* know. You were a punk rock girl, Scully, come clean." He puts a hand to his forehead and pinches the bridge of his long nose, as if receiving psychic impressions. "Replacements? Specials? Wait, the Ramones..."

"The Smiths and Joy Division, actually." She's trying not to smile so much. Smiling at Mulder after dark always feels too much like a risk. "I had a classic Rebel phase. My father didn't know what to do with me."

Mulder laughs, and then stoops down to peer at her. He's millimeters away from her, his nose actually grazes her cheek, before she steps back.

"What are you doing?"

"Looking for the nose ring," he says softly. He meets her eyes and they simply stare at one another for a long moment. "I wish I'd known you then. You could have bummed cigarettes off of me."

A sound that might be described as a guffaw escapes her; she blinks at him.

"You *smoked?*" She shakes off an ugly little thrill. It casts a new light on his seed consumption, however.

He shrugs.

"I did a lot of things," he says lightly. His eyes are dark, though, and she knows better than to ask what those things might have been.

Something else in his look makes her think that now would be a good time to sit down again, and with the mug hot and reassuring in her hands, she makes her way back to the couch.

"So what else do you do when you can't sleep, Mulder?"

"I read case files, usually. Sleeplessness should at least be *productive*." A wry smile. "When I'm really strung out, though, I've been known to try different strategies." As Scully drinks her tea, he counts off on his long fingers. "Warm baths, warm milk, McNeill/Lehrer, melatonin, ironing--"

"Ironing?" Scully blinks. Maybe she's heard him wrong. Her head feels like an overripe melon too heavy for her wobbling neck.

But he nods, and gestures toward an ironing board waiting patiently in a corner, swathed in half a dozen shirts.

"Your shirts," she murmurs.

"I iron them," he says reasonably.
"How progressive of you, Mulder." She feels her brows arch as she surveys the heap of laundry in the basket next to the ironing board.

He shakes his head. "I used to iron my dad's shirts. My mom got tired a lot after..." He pauses, looks distant and unfocused, then suddenly bashful. "Well, it's relaxing. And it smells good."

Scully has to agree; she closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. Clean clothes: starch, hot cotton, the crisp, somehow assertive, scent of his detergent...

And the spicy hint of his sweat. She hears the angry buzz of a dryer, and frowns slightly. It's a cool night, but almost stuffy in Mulder's apartment. He has a window open somewhere, and when he opens the dryer a blast of moist heat swirls against her cheek, only to be freshened and then chased away by a draft from the window.

She stirs, sits up, smooths an eyebrow with her fingertips and glances at her watch.

"Mulder, what--"

"You fell asleep."

He's standing behind the ironing board, spritzing the collar of a pale blue Oxford.

She blinks at him. Scully's eyes feel like peach pits behind her lashes. Maybe she's already asleep, and dreaming. Domesticity is not something she expects from her partner.

But he's guiding the iron with the confident glide that is borne of long practice; it hisses like a tomcat when he thumbs the steam trigger. Scully feels a pang of pity, and suppresses it. How lonely is a man who irons in the dead of night?

But there *is* something restful about it. She finds herself hypnotized by Mulder's smooth rhythm. He sleeks over the rumpled cloth and wastes no motion: a straight armed sweep, tugging the shoulders of the shirt, then swerving over the yoke with nimble precision.

Through lowered lashes, Scully follows each long muscled move that Mulder makes. She enjoys the clumsy slalom of Mulder's profile, the flat little plateau pounded there by too many fistfights. Snorting privately, Scully admits that Mulder is certainly no pugilist.

At least he can run.

The smooth repetitive motions are going to lull her back to sleep. She beats her weariness back a bit, and savors this new vision of her partner. Scully could watch Mulder iron all night. But she won't.

With a discreet roll of her shoulders, Scully gets to her feet.

"I should get going. I think I'll be able to sleep now." She tips her head and smiles at her partner. "Unfortunately, I don't have an iron." She does, however, have ridiculous dry cleaning bills. Perhaps she should send her laundry to Mulder.

"There's always sexual release," he suggests. The iron sputters again and his eyes glint for just a moment; then a kinder teasing light rules his expression.

"It hasn't helped yet," she responds coolly. She is rewarded with a startled gape.

Mulder clears his throat, a soft, wondering sound, and his ears pink. Scully feels a not unfamiliar thrill of power. She hides her smile and hands the now empty cup back to Mulder.

"I'll see you on Monday, Mulder." She curbs an impulse to reach up on tip toes and buss his cheek. For a moment, she considers asking her partner if she can crash on his couch...

He follows her to his door, and opens it for her.

"Goodnight, Scully. Sleep well." His eyes are lambent, astounded, fascinating.

But Special Agent Scully is still stronger than her desires, and Mulder's.

"Sweet dreams, Mulder."

As her entire evening has had a surreal flavor, Scully doubts she herself will need to dream. Sleep may or may not come to her tonight, but at least there's her soft bed to look forward to. She hears the door snick closed, the music rumble again. Sighing, Scully slips down the stairs, filing away the comfort of Mulder's overheated living room and his narrow leather couch for other sleepless nights, and colder ones.

END