#no longer a wip

[aliasalias]

who is it they'll think of when they think of you?

[zizzy-rie]

Throughout the Centuries (I still love you)

Rock Monkies AU

Glimpses of their relationship from the beginning unto the present

[jrooc]

The final chapters of Light My Fire are live! Complete with a drag show and a private dance 👀 and incredible incredible art by @sgtmickeyslaughter

Read it now!

Thanks to my teammates for making this really fun ❤️ @sgtmickeyslaughter @solitarycreaturesthey

[slippinmickeys]

Three Part Harmony (25/25)

You can read this fic in its entirety here.

(This post includes the Epilogue which is in a separate chapter on AO3.)

As he entered the doorway, Mulder heard a feminine shout, and he paused midway in, as a dozen men were hurled through the air, sailing past him as if they were scraps of paper blown by a stiff wind. They landed limp as rag dolls against the outer walls of the lodge. One of the men’s goggles were knocked off when he landed and a pair of sightless eyes stared up at Mulder. 

In the center of the room lay the prone body of Rhonda, her blonde hair light against the dark wooden floor. She was not moving. 

Mulder shouted Scully’s name as she leapt off the low dais in the back of the room and ran toward the older woman, William bouncing along on her hip. The boy noticed Mulder in the doorway and shouted an excited “Hi!”

Scully turned to Mulder, her surprise at seeing him the briefest of expressions before she held out their son. 

“Take him,” she said, breathless. Mulder tucked the big Smith & Wesson into the back of his pants. 

“She okay?” Mulder asked, swinging William up into his arms as Scully knelt over Rhonda, her fingers held to the woman’s pulse point. He turned the boy so that he couldn’t see their friend on the floor, not knowing how he would react to the sight. 

“She’s breathing,” Scully said, relieved, then started to explain. “I was distracted with the chopper and-”

Out beyond the lodge, through the windows facing the lake, Mulder could see the smoking wreckage of several helicopters, a fire burning an oil slick on the surface of the water. She didn’t have time to explain to him what had happened. 

“There are more men, Scully,” Mulder interrupted. 

She shook her head once, winced. 

“How many?” 

“I don’t know. A lot.”

Scully glanced up at him, her hand on Rhonda’s unconscious shoulder. 

“You’re hurt,” she said, looking at his arm.

“Grazed me,” Mulder said, though it felt like a little more than that, and the sleeve of his shirt had a slowly growing stain of warm blood. More leaked out as he repositioned William.

There was no more time to address his injury, as there was a loud noise from the direction of the kitchen and the pounding of boots on the floor. 

Scully rose, throwing an anxious look at Rhonda, and Mulder darted for the small stage, which was surrounded on three sides by thick, muscular log walls; no one would be able to get to them from behind.

Scully followed him and they turned to face the men who pounded into the room, weapons up, a dozen of them streaming in from the kitchen with more darkening the doors that led in from outside. 

William reached up and pressed his starfish of a hand onto Mulder’s face and looked at him earnestly. Mulder, feeling Scully’s anxious thoughts skittering along the edges of his mind, pressed a long kiss to the boy’s soft rounded cheek. 

“It’s okay, buddy,” he whispered.

Zero hour had come.

XxXxXxXxXxX

When the men started streaming through the doors of the lodge, they did not shoot. Scully looked briefly at Rhonda who lay still as the grave on the floor of the lodge. She could feel William and Mulder at her back. She’d killed the men who had hurt Rhonda when she’d been distracted by the incoming helicopters, but she couldn’t worry for their friend now. She stood serenely on the small stage, her arms out to her sides, like she was about to bow at a curtain call. The men rolled in, one after the other, purling around Rhonda as if she were a boulder in a river. More and more of them filed in, crouched and in formation, guns all trained on Scully’s chest. 

When the flow of troopers finally slowed to a stop and the room was nearly filled, one of the men stepped forward. 

“Give us the boy,” he said, the laser sight on his automatic rifle hovering shakily over the center of her chest. 

She could feel William, a little confused, but happy to be held by his father, who was cooing sweet words into the boy’s ear. As it was, the door to his gifts and his thoughts remained fully open, despite the fact that the music had stopped. Scully didn’t think he’d seen Rhonda go down, struck on the head by one of the mercenaries when Scully was bringing down the helicopters. The boy had seen his adoptive mother killed, and Scully wasn’t sure how he’d react to seeing someone else he cared about go down in a similar way. He might slam the door closed on their connection. She needed to move fast. 

The man took another step forward. 

“Give us the boy,” he repeated, “and no one else gets hurt.”

“Despite appearances,” Scully said, raising her voice so that all of the men could hear her. “You’re not in a position to be making demands. Put your weapons down or I’ll put them down for you.” She’d killed the men who’d rushed in and attacked Rhonda when she was otherwise engaged, but she’d just as soon these men surrender as have to kill again.

To punctuate her statement, she sent the rifle of the man who’d spoken flying out of his hands to clatter into the now empty piano bench.

The stunned man didn’t react at first, but behind her and in her mind, she could feel William’s thoughts bend toward confusion and very quickly turn to concern. 

“Wan?” the boy said.

“Shh, it’s okay,” Mulder tried soothing him. 

Scully turned her attention fully to the men in front of her. She could hear them breathing, could smell their cortical sweat. Leather gloves creaked as hands gripped weapons and one or two of them began chewing gum nervously. There was no more time to lose. With no small amount of concentration, she reached out and sent all the rifles of all the other men into the air and out the open doors of the lodge. 

At least half of the men then went for their sidearms. 

“Ah!” she called out to the room like a school marm. “Put them down!”

“Wan!” from William. Scully could feel his confusion, his alarm. He was now looking for Rhonda in earnest after he’d noticed the piano bench empty. 

She was clocking where all the other weapons the men were carrying were when William saw Rhonda’s body laying on the ground. He began to shriek, an animal sound. A fox in the woods. 

Several things happened at once: One of the men lost his nerve and drew his pistol, firing a single bullet directly at Scully’s chest. And Scully, thinking she was about to feel the mental door between her and her son slam closed, instead felt a surge of power so large that she was practically lit from within.

The single bullet the soldier fired stopped in mid-air about two feet in front of Scully and then dropped to the floor with a light tinkling of metal. 

There immediately followed a moment when the world held its breath. A moment that contained all of the potential energy that existed. It was the stone knife to the lamb’s neck, it was angor animi, it was a Pompeiian raising his eyes to the hills. Everyone felt it.

And then, against the backdrop of William’s wails, every black clad militant in the lodge went completely rigid in unison, their arms falling stiffly to their sides, their heads thrown back, and each of them rose twelve inches off the floor, hovering in suspended animation; like columns in the air, like string hanging from a floating balloon.

Scully thought back to the two men in William’s nursery when she first entered it those weeks ago; it was a more otherworldly thing than anything she had yet seen. And she’d seen a lot. But she hadn’t done this on her own. William had sent the power through her, and she could feel it knocking around her skull like a pinball. Their son whimpered in his father’s arms, overwhelmed. She was overwhelmed, too. Something wasn’t quite right. A shot of weakness looped around her once, as if the surge of energy had tapped her well dry.

She felt a warm hand on her shoulder. 

“Mulder?” she said shakily, her voice wet like she had a runny nose. The lodge was quiet, and she felt a warm trickle on her upper lip as she turned to him. 

Mulder, still standing behind her and holding their son, paled, his eyes wide. 

“Scully-” he said, but before he could go on, she heard the scrape of a shoe on the floor from behind the floating men. Then the acrid scent of cigarette smoke. 

They both turned to look.

XxXxXxXxXxX

William had settled to a distressed quiet in his arms. Mulder watched as two figures picked their way through the floating men as one would move through a cornfield. He vacantly wondered if the militants would part like party balloons if pushed. 

There was a leaden thing in his stomach, something dark that twisted his insides when Scully turned to him, blood leaking from her nose. 

And here, coming through the mass of suspended bodies was a further nightmare: Special Agent Bryson and a dead man with a tracheostomy port slowly leaking smoke into the stale air.

“Well,” said the Cancer Man hoarsely. “This is impressive.”

He felt Scully go rigid under his hand. 

“You’re dead,” she said, like she was talking to a corpse that had yet to be convinced.

“Am I? I feel quite the opposite.” 

The Smoking Man appeared to be dressed for a business meeting; pressed suit, black wool coat. Bryson was dressed down, jeans and leather sneakers, a black leather jacket like the kind Mulder wore in another life. He had a gun in his hand. The men stopped their approach in front of the first row of militants, Rhonda’s unconscious body only a few feet from Bryson’s scuffed shoes. They didn’t even look down at her, and Mulder was insulted by proxy. 

“Give me one reason why I shouldn’t blow you both apart right now,” Scully said.

“I only need one,” the Smoking Man replied, arrogantly blowing a column of smoke out of his trach tube. “And it’s drying on your upper lip right now.”

Scully reached up to touch her lip, drawing her hand back to look at the blood.

“I probably wouldn’t shop for my next Faraday cage in the snack aisle,” the man went on.

Mulder thought of the greasy Lay’s bag they had shipped Scully’s chip in. The heavy feeling in his stomach, already in his socks from witnessing Scully’s bloody nose, plummeted further. 

He could hear Scully swallow thickly, could feel a flutter across their connection–a confusion and sharp pang of concern–but she didn’t flinch.

“If you’re implying that I have another nasopharyngeal mass eating its way behind my eyes,” she said, “then I have nothing to lose.”

“But your son does,” the Smoking Man said.

Mulder could feel the anxiety from both Scully and himself twist together like the snakes of a caduceus. William squirmed. Scully, standing next to him, began to tremble. 

Bryson still had the pistol in his hand, but he wisely kept it lowered. “Give us the boy,” the agent finally spoke. 

Mulder had held his own silence for long enough. 

“We all know that’s not happening,” he said, stepping forward to stand by Scully’s side.

“Then perhaps we’re at an impasse,” the Smoking Man said. 

“No,” Scully disagreed. “We’re at the part where I kill you both and take my chances with cancer.”

Cancer had been a nagging and very grave concern in the back of Mulder’s mind since he’d reluctantly pulled the chip out of Scully’s neck in the veterinary office, but hearing the word out loud raked the air in a way that made his shoulders tense. 

“If you kill us, you’ll never stop being hunted,” said the Smoking Man. 

Next to him, Scully shifted on her feet.

“Mulder,” she said in his head. “Something’s not right-” and then their mental connection was cut. Mulder could no longer feel Scully or their son.

Alarmed, Mulder tried to keep a cool head, and a cooler facade. 

“What do you care?” he said, stepping forward and angling William more toward Scully. “You’ll be dead.”

“I care about what happens to my grandson,” the old man said. 

Mulder felt a surge of rage so strong he felt almost incandescent with it. If he’d been the one gifted with using William’s powers, there’d be a smoldering depression where the Smoking Man stood, nothing left of the man but pieces. In his arms, and despite their lost connection, William whimpered. 

Beside him, Scully fell to one knee with a quiet groan.

Mulder immediately reached down to help her. 

“Are you feeling alright, Agent Scully?” the Smoking Man asked. There was no concern in his words. He seemed to be enjoying himself. 

“Scully?” Mulder asked quietly, flitting his gaze back and forth between her and the two men. 

Scully looked up at him with a look of grave concern. “Mulder, I can’t,” she whispered. And Mulder immediately knew she’d lost the ability to wield William’s power. Whether it was the surge of force they’d used to send all the militants skyward, or if her cancer had indeed come back and was weakening her to the point of inability, Mulder couldn’t be sure. 

“A boy needs his mother, and she’s dying,” the Smoking Man said. “I’m willing to make you a deal.”

Bryson had been watching the exchange warily, and, with one eye on an ailing Scully, and another on Mulder’s bastard of a father, he raised the gun halfway up.

“Deal?” Bryson said, incredulous. “Since when was a deal a part of the plan?”

The Smoking Man turned slowly to look Bryson over with an air of cool indifference. 

“Plans can be changed,” the old man said. He then turned back to Mulder and Scully. 

Mulder’s mind was flailing in a hundred directions at once. Scully was still on one knee, her hand on the floor as if it was the only way to keep herself from keeling over.

“The chip,” the Smoker said. “And your lives back. No more running.”

“No, Mulder,” Scully said weakly from knee-level. Mulder wanted to vomit. He’d either lose Scully or his son. She looked up at him with a beseeching look. 

“No,” Mulder finally said, looking up at the two men, the choice killing him. “You can’t have William.”

The Smoking Man held the burning cigarette in his hand up to the trach tube and took a deep inhale. 

“You misunderstand me,” the man said, exhaling from his throat. “You’d keep your son. What I’m offering you is the chip to save Agent Scully’s life, and your name cleared in the death of Knowle Rohrer and the boy’s adoptive parents. The child is yours. You can live together as a family. Free from pursuit.”

Though Mulder found the idea of being beholden to Cancer Man abhorrent, a part of him wanted nothing more than Scully and his son and their freedom at whatever cost the universe–or his repellent biological father–deemed necessary. 

That part of him spoke. “In exchange for what?” He could barely get the words out, and he felt Scully’s small hand grip his ankle. 

The Smoking Man smiled. “Blood and tissue samples. Bi-annually. From all three of you.”

Mulder’s stomach curdled. “For what purpose?” 

“For the sake of all mankind,” the old man replied as though he were a god-like distributor of benevolence. “You three are humanity’s last chance. You’re our hope. Our Purity Control.”

Scully’s hand on his ankle tightened and he looked down. Her eyes were raised to his, her skin pale. She shook her head. “No,” she whispered. The blood on her lip was drying, a dark smear the color of regret. 

It already felt like he was losing her, and he couldn’t bear it, not again. His lost son was warm in his arms. 

He was going to take the deal.

XxXxXxXxXxX

Rhonda hadn’t seen it coming. She was playing her heart out, men streaming in from behind her, but she hadn’t turned to look. Play, she told herself. And keep playing. No matter what. 

Then there was a giant conflagration outside the window of the lodge, and the bright light of an explosion lit up the piano in front of her, and then: darkness. 

When she began to come back to herself, it was to ringing in her ears and a headache to end all headaches. If she lifted her head, she was sure she would puke up whatever was in her stomach, so she just didn’t move at all; curled up like she was, the hard floor was better than nausea. 

As the ringing in her ears lessened, she began to hear voices, and she fluttered her eyes open, trying to take in what she was seeing. 

Above her, impossibly, there were black-clad military men floating in the air. All in the same prone position. Like penitent men before their god, they hovered, unmoving, arms down, hands out, as if seeking benediction. And then, at her far left, up on the small stage the kids used to put on rainy-day shows, was Mulder, William and Scully, the latter with blood oozing out of her nose and on a knee, barely able to hold herself up. Adrenaline flooded Rhonda’s veins. 

She was about to leap up and run to their aid, nausea or no nausea, when she began to register what the voices she was hearing were saying. 

“A boy needs his mother,” a rough voice said from very close to where she was laying. “I’m willing to make you a deal.”

A hint of movement and then:

“Deal?” came an incredulous voice, even closer to her. “Since when was a deal a part of the plan?” 

The second voice sounded familiar, and Rhonda slowly turned her head slightly until she saw a scuffed leather shoe very close to her face. Her gaze followed the length of the man’s leg and up, up until her eyes settled on the last person she’d ever hoped to see–the man who had caused such heartache from the day he set foot in her little diner: Agent Bryson. 

She swallowed the knot in her throat and listened intently. 

The rough-voiced man was offering a deal to Mulder and Scully. A chance to live their lives openly with their son. At least that’s what it sounded like. Rhonda looked at Mulder. He looked agonized, defeated. 

“All right,” he said quietly. “We’ll do it.”

“Mulder no!” hissed Scully.

But then, from above her, “No deals!” Bryson shouted, and she watched him raise his gun at the little family. “We’re taking the boy. Now. She’s in no position to stop us!” Scully, who had been such a wonder the rest of the day, made no move to defend them, and Rhonda realized with dread that they were at the mercy of Bryson, and this other, perhaps more benevolent man. 

Bryson shifted on his feet and took a step past her toward the raised platform. He was still very close to Rhonda, but now his back was to her. 

Rhonda’s mind raced. What could she do to help? Was she even capable? She could no longer feel the gun that they’d given her tucked into her pants. It must have fallen out when the militants attacked her, a memory that was now groggily coming back. However, the pencil-thin syringe of ketamine that the family had stolen from the vet clinic to make it look like they’d broken in to rob the place was still in her back pocket. If she could just move her arm a little, she could pull it out.

She shifted slightly. Bryson didn’t seem to notice. She eased her hand into her pocket and slowly, ever so slowly pulled it out. 

“Give me the boy!” Bryson said, taking another half step toward the family.

Rhonda eased the syringe up to her mouth and put the cap between her teeth, slowly baring the needle. 

Bryson took another menacing step forward. One more step and he’d be out of her reach. 

Rhonda had the syringe out and the needle free, but she began to shake. Her heart was fluttering in her chest like a songbird trapped in a fireplace. She took a deep breath. I will never be a victim again, she thought. 

And then she lunged forward, her head screaming as she did so, and plunged the needle of the syringe through Bryson’s pants and deep into the flesh of his calf, shoving the depressor down and sending the entire contents of the syringe into the man’s leg. 

The agent shouted and jumped back, swinging around and pointing his gun down at Rhonda, but he was too late, the damage had been done, the empty needle still sticking out of his leg. 

Elated, Rhonda laughed. Irreverently, the laugh of a man walking the Last Mile. Still laying on the floor in all her fifty-five year-old glory, probably looking like a hog tied down for slaughter, Rhonda Fitzsimmons belted out a victorious guffaw. The man was going to shoot her, but she didn’t care. He took a stumbling step to the side, the drug taking effect, but she could see his finger tightening on the trigger. 

Then the explosive blast of a pistol. 

And Rhonda, who was certain she was on the very brink of death, watched as the man she’d known as Special Agent Bryson fell to the floor with a gaping, bloody exit wound where his forehead should have been. 

Rhonda scrambled to her feet. 

Mulder was standing on the small stage, smoke still leaking out of the barrel of his gun, holding William in his other arm. The baby had started wailing at the sound of the gunblast and Rhonda rushed to take him from his father, who looked dazed and was breathing hard. 

Behind her, there was a calamitous THUMP! She turned and saw that all of the hovering bodies had fallen to the floor. The only man still standing amongst the pile of black-clad flesh was an older gentleman in a suit, who had a mechanical round hole in the center of his throat. He took a step away from the body of Bryson with a distasteful wince and brushed at his sleeve. 

“You’ve made the right choice, son,” the Smoking Man said. 

Mulder, looking even sadder and more defeated than ever, finally lowered the gun. Rhonda noticed there was blood weeping from his upper arm. 

From the floor, Scully looked up. “Mulder,” she said weakly. Rhonda eased her way down next to the woman with William still in her arms. Scully rolled shakily into a sitting position and took her son, pulling him in and holding him close. The baby started to calm. 

“I’ll include your new friend here, too,” the Smoking Man said. Rhonda inhaled, surprised. The old man was thrilled with the young family’s capitulation, and was further sweetening the pot. “She can go back to her life.” He smiled, snake-like. “You have my word,” the Smoking Man said.

Mulder laughed mirthlessly. “Your word doesn’t mean much.”

“I saved her life before,” the man said, nodding toward Scully. 

“But that’s not what you’re doing right now,” said a voice from the doorway closest to the lake. 

Everyone turned, en masse. 

Standing in the doorway with a gun trained on the Smoking Man was the bald FBI agent who had given her his card in the diner. Assistant Director Skinner. And behind him stood another man with a narrow face and narrow features, who was holding a large manila envelope and the package that Rhonda had mailed for Scully the first morning they’d woken up in her cabin. 

“All you’re doing now is peddling lies and writing checks you can’t cash,” Skinner went on, walking through the door, never taking his eyes off of the smoker. “Agent Doggett,” Skinner barked, and the other man stepped forward. 

“I have your chip, Agent Scully,” he said in a broad New York accent. “And the merc you sent to take it from me,” Agent Doggett went on, now looking at the Smoking Man. “Who is in protective custody and willing to testify he was part of a hit squad you hired that killed young William’s adoptive parents.”

From beside Rhonda, Scully inhaled expansively. 

“I also,” the man went on, walking into the room to stand before them, “have surveillance footage from not five days ago showing Knowle Rohrer walking into a pharmaceutical plant in San Jose, California.” 

Skinner, his gun still trained on the older man, looked over at Mulder and Scully. 

“Doggett and Reyes have been on this since you left. Digging through the mire. This son of a bitch has been behind it all, pulling all the strings. But he doesn’t have a damn leg to stand on. He doesn’t have Scully’s chip, and he doesn’t need to clear your damn names. We’ve already done that.”

At this, Agent Doggett kneeled down and looked directly at Scully, speaking in a more tender voice. “You don’t have to run anymore.” 

The younger woman sagged in relief. Mulder seemed to wilt, lowering himself to the floor where he wrapped an arm around Scully and their son. 

“Your timing is impeccable sir,” he said to Skinner. 

“All credit to the agents on the X-Files,” Skinner said. “They brought it all to me last night.”

“What about William?” Scully asked tremulously, interrupting. “How do we know he won’t keep coming after him?”

Everyone, Rhonda included, turned to look at the Smoking Man, who had the audacity to look magnanimous. 

“He’s my genetic legacy,” he said, his hoarse voice still somehow a little prissy. “And the hope of all mankind. One day, you’ll bring him to me.”

Rhonda wasn’t even sure which gun the blast came from, but the old man crumpled to the floor, a round hole in his forehead. The sound of the shot reverberated, bouncing off the log walls of the lodge until its echo degraded into a long and powerful silence.

“Maybe this time,” Skinner said after a long, quiet moment, holstering his gun and turning to the little family, “he’ll stay dead.”

Agent Doggett walked over to the old man’s body and toed his shoulder until he flopped loosely onto his back, his head lolling like a rag doll. A long line of smoke drifted from the trach tube up and into the air above his body, dissipating into nothing. The agent, seeming satisfied, nodded to himself and pulled a phone out of his pocket. “Monica,” he said, and meandered to the door of the lodge and out with the phone to his ear. 

Skinner walked over and knelt down next to Mulder and the two men spoke in low voices. 

Beside her, the baby pulled himself away from his mother’s shoulder and leaned back to turn, however improbably, toward Rhonda. His eyelashes were clumped together with tears, but he was calm, and with the countenance of an old soul, he looked her dead in the eye. 

Rhonda smiled. He was a flower, pressed between the pages of a book. She glanced toward the piano. He was the first person in forty years who had made her want to play. 

And here, Rhonda thought, their story ended where it had begun; under the outstretched arms of a lofty hemlock, where an out of tune piano played a bit of Chopin.

THE END

EPILOGUE 

Late fall in Maryland normally saw dreary skies and drearier temperatures, but the day was sunny and the Japanese maple in Margaret Scully’s backyard was a brilliant orangey red in the dappled light. Three Dog Night played quietly from the tinny radio that sat in the kitchen window, and Maggie swayed quietly to it as she stood in front of her sink, dish soap suds up to her elbows. The doorbell rang.  

She was not expecting company, and had been jumpy about visitors for months after a visit from law enforcement not long after her daughter had gone into hiding. 

Maggie wiped off her hands and thought sadly of Dana, whom she hadn’t heard from in weeks. If it was the police again, or that dreadful agent from Director Skinner’s ‘task force’ who had visited once and asked invasive personal questions, she’d give the man a piece of her mind. She didn’t believe a word of anything that had come out about her daughter and Fox, and when Agent Bryson had shown her a local newspaper article from one of the mountain states, she’d shoved it back at him without reading it and had told him to get the hell out of her house. 

Everything that had happened to her family in the last decade, that had happened to her daughter, the man Dana loved, her grandson…The country had changed from the one her late husband had fought for, and she was glad Bill wasn’t around to see what it had become. 

She took a deep breath before she gripped the doorknob. It was just as likely to be Girl Scouts or a neighbor asking to borrow a cup of sugar, but she’d become accustomed to expecting the unexpected. 

Nothing could have prepared her for what greeted her when she opened the door. 

“Dana!” she practically shouted, reaching out to pull her daughter into the house before anyone saw. When she noticed who was standing behind and a little to the side of Dana, she froze. 

Fox Mulder stood there, a smile on his face, holding an also-smiling little boy; her grandson, whom she had thought was lost to her forever. 

“Dana?” she said again, this time breathlessly, her knees weakening beneath her. 

“Mom,” her daughter said, wrapping her in a warm embrace. “Are you all right?” 

Dana must have noticed her shaking. 

“Yes, yes!” she said, stepping back so the three of them could trundle inside. 

Once they were all standing in the entryway, her daughter stopped in front of her and Maggie finally got a good look. 

Dana’s hair was appalling; long and dark, her red roots showing in a slash of color at the top of her head. Her hair was pulled back in a loose ponytail, and on the back of her neck Maggie could see a small bandage taped in place. It looked familiar somehow, but she didn’t have time to recall. 

“What are you doing here?” she asked, not knowing what to do with her hands. She wanted to smell the baby’s head. She wanted to squeeze Fox’s hand. She wanted to take up her daughters face and cant it to the light. She wanted to reach out and embrace all three of them at once. Instead, she pushed her hands into the loose pockets of her cardigan.

Mulder seemed haggard and perhaps a little gaunt, but the baby he held was bright-eyed and smiling, and by the looks of the way he was leaning in Fox’s arms, eager to get down and explore the house. 

“We wanted to reintroduce you to your grandson,” Fox said, connecting eyes with his son for a moment. 

“Gama?” the boy said when Mulder looked away. 

Maggie felt the sting of tears. 

“How?” she said. Then, “I don’t care how,” she reached for the baby and Mulder handed him over. “Are you safe? Is he safe?”

Dana reached out and touched her arm. 

“It’s over, Mom,” she said, squeezing gently. 

“Over?” Maggie said. Her grandson had grown, felt heavy in her arms. He gazed up at her. Rounded cheeks, soft lashes. He looked like Charlie. A little like Fox. 

“Skinner is bringing the paperwork over this evening. We’ve been cleared of all wrongdoing,” Fox said.

Maggie felt her mouth slacken in shock. “And William?”

“He’s ours,” Dana said. “He’ll always be ours.”

Margaret Scully’s prayers had been answered. All those candles she’d lit, all those matches she’d shaken to smoke, suddenly worth all the melted wax. Thanks to St. Sebastian, St. Anthony; patron saint of runners, patron saint of things lost. She’d go to church first thing in the morning.

“We were hoping…” Fox started, rubbing the back of his neck. He traded a look with Dana. 

“Can we stay with you for a bit, Mom?” she asked. “Untying all the banking stuff may take some time, and then we’ll need to find our own place.”

“My god, of course!” Maggie said, elated. In her arms, her grandson was wiggling, eager to be let loose. She leaned down to set him on the floor, but he swung his feet down and began toddling around the second she let go. 

“He’s walking!” she said. 

Both of his parents smiled proudly. 

Maggie was fit to be tied. She was two seconds from crossing herself. Her daughter would get to watch her son grow up. Dana would get to watch with maternal pride as the bones of him grew as long and lanky as his father’s. She’d get to watch him grow and stumble with the capricious energy of youth, rangy and uncoordinated as a colt. As a mother of sons herself, the thought made her tender hearted.

As it was, he was uncoordinated now, and the boy stumbled as he approached a side table and grabbed onto a doily that was hanging gently off the side. The bit of lace slid, and with it came the lamp that was resting on top of it, toppling off the table and headed directly for the tender head of the baby. 

Maggie gave a shout of alarm, but the sound arrested in her throat. 

Instead of falling, the lamp hung in the air for a moment and then gracefully re-alighted, setting itself gently back on the tabletop. William, unaware that he’d escaped disaster, made a gurgling sound and then toddled happily toward the sofa. 

Maggie swung her eyes to the boy’s parents. Dana’s gaze confidently followed her son’s movements, but Fox gave her a chagrined smile. 

“There are,” he said, “a few things you should probably know…”

[thresholdbb]

Bad ideas need a bat’leth

[gimlilithegreat]

My first finished fic

163k... in 4 months? Honestly not sure what came over me.

Unbelievably proud of myself.

Check it out here :)

Just spent a couple of hours uploading it on Fanfiction.net and Wattpad as well as Ao3. Makes me so glad I published on Ao3 first, damn do I hate fiddly backends.

Now... On to my Hobbit fic!

[howdyrowdypartner]

that's all she wrote :,)

[cloverthemonke]

OMG IT'S DONE?!? I might of forgot to post the coloring process but whatevs

Very proud of this one 🔥🔥

[lightthewaybackhome]

(www.pinterest.com)

This reminded me distinctly of Sul's bike, Destrier. Just add some guns and a freshbox with some bounty's head.

@alana-k-asby

[onthewaytosomewhere]

Fic posted!!

Ok, so I did a thing! Yes, that thing is a fic. Yes, it's RWRB cuz yeah....

This was supposed to be a quick, maybe 1500-word PWP, and well, now it's almost 3000 words of smut with feels. With the possibility of more fics to come along and go with it - who knows. I can't seem to get the Alex in my head who thought this was such a good idea to 'just zip it already' so we'll see who wins, lol.

The silly idea for this stemmed from a random thought about Alex being quite enamored with the feel of their rings on his cock, and well, that led to a long crazy spiral down a rabbit hole of articles about people using their non-dominant hands for self-pleasure. Since I needed to base this off more than just my own experience, and when I asked the hubby if he always 'got off' with his dominant hand, he just gave me the "WTF" look followed by an IDK. So, to the google-mobile, I went, and it was informative, and now that Alex in my head thinks we should use more of that info.

Her's the important part though, the fic:

It’s been five days. Five days of just them, no phones or computers, no outside contact or interruptions of any sort, no one else knows, and Alex is still so high off the feeling that they have this one thing for themselves. It might also be all the sex they’ve been having in those five days, so much sex that he’s not sure the endorphins will ever leave his body, and he’s quite content with that.

[anon-art]

Roxy and Cassie

[slippinmickeys]

The Mesas of Deuteronilus Mensae (37/37)

Epilogue

Scully looked down at her son, and was reminded, if only for a moment, of his birth. He came into the world—this world—the first of his kind—squalling, a compressed little spitfire of a thing, affronted at being expelled from the quiet dark of his mother’s womb and into the loud, bright reality of Mars. He was quieter now, these years on, pensive like his father, who hailed them from the airlock of the biology lab, the forest green stripes of his hardsuit bold in the bright artificial light.

“Hello, family,” came Mulder’s voice over the comm, nodding at them from behind the gold-plated shield of his helmet.

“Hi, Dad,” William said, his voice just starting to lower from the high-pitched sweetness of his first decade of life.

“Something to show you,” Mulder said, as the three of them trundled inside the airlock door.

The biology lab had been built over and amongst the quicksand pits that Mulder and Scully had accidentally discovered all those years ago, and vast amounts of research and science had been done in the interim. In fact, there was a whole small community built up around them, manned by the planet’s newest colonists, who showed up by the dozens every six or so months.

William was a minor celebrity amongst all of them, and, being one of only a few children on the whole of the planet, was doted on. To a fault, thought Scully, though Mulder always said, “Spoiled is okay as long as he’s not spoiled rotten.”

“William, my man!” called out Erickson as they shucked off their suits, approaching the trio with clipboard and a smile.

“Hey, Brian,” said William sweetly, as he removed the bottom half of his suit, the legs showing the candy-cane-like twining of blue and green, indicating who he was and who he belonged to. “Got any more Snickers for me?”

“Not in front of your mom!” Erickson chided the boy, but slipped him a candy bar anyway, leaning down to whisper confidentially, “Fresh off the latest resupply.”

Erickson winked at Scully and handed over the clipboard. “Forms for you to sign, Commander Scully.”

Scully took the clipboard from the scientist and flipped up a few pages, familiarizing herself with what she was signing. She could hear the crinkle of the candy bar’s wrapper in her son’s hand. As she took the pen from Erickson, she spoke to William without looking at him.

“You know the rules, Will. You can’t eat that in here,” she said. “Save it for the mess.”

“I was gonna!”

She gave him a side eye.

“I was!”

“I’ll save you the trouble,” Mulder said, and then neatly nicked the candy bar away from the boy, holding it up over his head while William laughed, jumping up to try to get it back. The three of them had spent the last six months on Earth, all of them suffering from different forms of culture shock. Their saving grace had been William’s late-in-life discovery of the richness of the Earthen junk food scene. They were easing back into life on the red planet now – and the less than plethoric food choices thereof.

Scully handed Erickson back the clipboard. “Thanks, Brian,” she said. “Is the sample ready for us?”

Erickson nodded and pointed. “All set up in Lab 5.”

She thanked the man again and turned back to her son and husband as her subordinate walked away.

“You ready, Will?” she asked as they fell into step together, Mulder handing the candybar back to his son, who slid it into one of the cargo pockets of his jumpsuit.

“I already know what it is,” Will said smugly, looking up with delight at both of his parents’ shocked expressions.

“How?” Mulder asked, incredulous.

“Shaw told me. You discovered another new bacteria, Mom.”

“That’s highly classified information!” Scully said.

William shrugged. “I’ve got clearance!”

“On whose authority?” Mulder asked shrewdly.

“Admiral Ehrlich’s,” William said, smiling at them proudly.

“Well,” Mulder said, giving a long-suffering sigh, but wearing a smile. “In that case, maybe we don’t need to do this. Since it was your mom’s third discover, she thought you might want to name this one, but if this is all old news…”

“Wait!” William, all but shouted. “I want to name it! I want to name it! Will it be on CNN?”

“Probably,” Scully laughed. William had been fascinated by the news ticker while they had stayed at Mulder’s family’s summer home on Quonochontaug, and had spent hours parked in front of the television, watching it. Scully would have thought the ocean would have had more draw, but she supposed kids tended toward overstimulation.

“Then we’d better go take a look,” Mulder said. “You can’t name a new life form without ever having set eyes on it.”

William ran on ahead of them, and Scully felt Mulder reach out and take her hand. She looked up at him.

“Have I mentioned lately how proud I am of you?”

“Only once or twice,” she said, squeezing his hand and giving him a warm smile.

“Then remind me to do it again.”

Through the door of Lab 5, their son lowered his eye to the microscope eyepiece and then looked up at them as they approached, beaming.

“Same species classification as the first two?” the boy asked, his eyes alight.

Scully nodded at him as she and Mulder stepped up to the scientific apparatus, hands still clasped. “Genus is up to you,” she said.

“I’ve got the perfect name,” William said, the devilish glint in his eye so like his father. Scully felt an almost overwhelming swell of maternal pride and love.

“Lay it on us,” Mulder said.

“Snickersichia muldiodurans,” Will said.

“It’s perfect,” Mulder said proudly. “Might even score us a corporate sponsorship that could pay for years worth of science.”

Scully turned to her husband. “How’s that?” she asked.

Mulder grinned down at her. “Know who owns Snickers candy bars?” She shook her head. Mulder reached out and ruffled his son’s hair, then leaned down to press a kiss to her forehead. “Pretty sure it’s Mars, Incorporated,” he said.

[thresholdbb]

Happy Cardassy

[beebo-the-jellyfish]

I love you last words of a shooting star by Mitski

[unreadablehandle]

SIMPLE OR NOT

Louis and Harry know each other since... forever. They're best friends and they obviously love each other. But one day, Harry realizes that his love is maybe a bit bigger than how it's typical for friends. He opts for confessing and as Louis explains that they could never work, nothing in the world seems worse than the pain from rejection to the younger boy.

But that's before the school excursion to the museum after which he somehow ends up in a girl's body.

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18

[morganski-19]

Conversation 5: Movie Nights

This takes place during chapter 6 of the main fic but can be read as a stand-alone. also available on ao3

Nancy was never one to have many friends. Close friends that is. There were plenty of girls in her classes that she would get along with and her table was never exactly empty when she was at lunch. Were these people that she would hang out with outside of class without the excuse of doing a project together, no. That was reserved for only the people who knew her the best, and the people she knew the best in return. 

For a long time, that role in her life was reserved for Barb. Until sophomore year happened and she lost her best friend forever. Her heart was ripped out of her chest the day she heard that Barb was never coming back. That unlike Will, her best friend was unable to escape her fate. She tried everything to fill the void that day left her. Luring and attacking the creature that took her, staying in a relationship just so she had somebody to lean on, exposing the lab responsible for her death. Nothing worked. 

She still felt this hole in her heart that would never be filled. The same hole that was carved out by a childhood best friend, and meant for her and only her. No one else would compete to fill it. It was just meant to be the pain that never goes away, one that just sits in your chest until it gets so dull you can’t even feel it anymore. 

That pain has made her cautious to get that close to someone again. At least someone who was just a friend. She might have held back part of herself from Steve, but she never did from Jonathan. It was always boyfriends that were her friends afterward, never friends, and never girls. 

Until Robin. Nancy never planned on befriending Robin, not until the recent upside-down disaster. Even then she tried to keep her distance. She didn’t need to open herself up to someone she was just going to lose again. But she didn’t. They all made it out alive, and Nancy didn’t know what to do with that. 

It’s not like she’s unhappy that they didn’t lose someone. The opposite actually. She was ecstatic that she could go through one of these events without someone going through the same loss as she did those years ago. But that didn’t stop her from thinking that it was just around the corner. That if she misstepped, a landmine would go off and she’d lose someone again. 

Which is why this moment makes her so scared. Robin’s parents were out of town for the day and she invited Nancy over so she wouldn’t be alone. She understood the feeling completely and accepted. They’ve hung out before and it’s been fine. But looking back there were other people there, other people that Nancy could talk to to make this fear of losing someone close to her again away. 

She and Robin were making cookies, something she and Barb would do all of the time. It brings a warm melancholy feeling to her chest. Seeing her do something that was once sacred between best friends, not to be done with anyone else. 

It feels almost like a betrayal to Barb. That Nancy would move on and replace her. 

But then she remembers that Barb isn’t lost, not to her. There will always be a part of her in Nancy, she knows that. Nothing will ever come close to replacing Barb in her heart. The torch of the best friend title was just passed on, but not snuffed out. Robin isn’t Barb and isn’t going to replace her. 

Plus, Nancy doesn’t feel the same about Robin as she did about Barb. Barb and her were like sisters, Robin and her are not. 

That’s not to say that they weren’t close, they were. Closer than Nancy was initially willing to be. But it was so easy for Nancy to open up around Robin, tell her all of the things she would rather hide. Be vulnerable around someone without feeling like she was being a burden. That the other person didn’t care that she was being vulnerable or mad at her for killing the mood. Just wanted to be there with her and help her through the pain. 

Opening up about Barb to Robin was probably the first time she realized that she had feelings for her. 

It was scary, to say the least. Nancy had thought all of the weird feelings that she’s been having about Robin were because she was scared of replacing someone from her past. In reality, it was much different. The way that Nancy felt about Robin was different than the way she had felt about Barb in the past. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to become friends with Robin, she did. And the friendship she had with Robin was the best thing that has happened to her in a while. It was just that it was different. 

Because Nancy always was left wanting more with Robin. After every hangout, it was as if she wished something had happened that didn’t. That there was a piece missing that she didn’t quite understand, even though it should have left her perfectly fulfilled. But it never did. 

Then it hit her. She would always want Robin to be closer, hold her a bit longer when they hugged goodbye. Maybe curl up together when they watched a movie and cover her eyes when a part was too scary, even though she’s sure Robin was the one who needed their eyes covered. Spend the night together sharing one of their beds instead of one of them sleeping on the floor. Normally she would have done that already, it’s not like she minded. But it always felt weird sharing a bed with Robin, now she knows that it was because of feelings she didn’t quite understand. 

It scared her at first, accepting that part of herself wasn’t easy. Now all she’s scared of is messing it up. Just because Robin’s a lesbian doesn’t mean she’ll like Nancy back, she knows that. It doesn’t stop her from hoping. It doesn’t stop her from thinking about what it would be like if Robin would come to wrap her arms around Nancy and hold her close, swaying together while they watch the timer tick as the cookies bake. Press soft kisses to each other’s foreheads and cheeks, just content being in the moment together. 

That can’t happen, Robin doesn’t like her like that. It doesn’t stop Nancy from wanting it though. Constantly with guilt. She feels as if she is taking something from Robin that she’s not giving out, but can’t get herself to stop. 

“And then I thought we could, I don’t know, like make some popcorn and put on a movie or something,” Robin starts to ramble as she slides the cookie trays into the oven. “I have a bunch so you should be able to pick something you like, and if there’s nothing we could just find something that’s on tv. Or we could just not watch anything at all and just like, listen to music and talk. Do some of those cliche sleepover tropes of like painting each other’s nails and talking about boys. Except not the second one because boys, gross. And you just got out of a relationship so I doubt you’d have feelings for somebody this soon.”

Nancy gives Robin an amused smile when she finally turns around, shutting her mouth. “Go on,” Nancy teases. 

Robin shakes her head slightly. “No, I was rambling, it must have annoyed you.”

It was quick for Nancy to realize that Robin was insecure with the way she was able to just talk a mile a minute without thinking. Honestly, Nancy thought it was a talent that she was able to do so without running out of breath. Sometimes it could be annoying, especially in high-stakes situations. But in situations like this, it just felt comforting. Like Robin trusted Nancy enough to open up and let herself go. 

“It didn’t. I like hearing you talk, rambling or not,” Nancy assured.

“Really?” Robin asks with a skeptical glare. 

Nancy nods, “Yeah, really. And I’m sure we can find a movie that we both want to watch.”

“I don’t know, I have some pretty underground stuff. Steve likes to call it interesting but he never really gives it that much of a chance. Not that I blame him, a lot of them are foreign films and he can’t read the subtitles fast enough and I sometimes forget to put them on because I can speak the languages they’re in. But like we don’t have to watch any of that stuff, we can find something else to watch.”

“I’ve seen a few foreign films before, they were good. But mostly just in middle school French class.”

Robin’s face lights up. “You took French?”

Nancy nods. “Yeah for a few years. I wasn’t very good at it.”

“Nancy Wheeler, not good at something,” Robin scoffs. “Unheard of. Give yourself some credit, you were probably fine.”

“I was not,” Nancy fiddles with the mug of tea resting in front of her. “I dropped it my freshman year because it would have messed up my transcripts.”

“Hey,” Robin reaches out at grabs Nancy’s hand. Warmth flows up her arm, filling her with comfort even though he heart starts beating faster. “It’s ok. Believe it or not, you’re allowed to not be good at something. You are perfectly imperfect, Nancy Wheeler.”

She ends the sentence with a sincere smile. One filled with warmth and love. One that makes Nancy feel like she’s about to explode. Because she feels like she’s around someone that sees her, the real her. Not some picture in their mind of what they should be, but what she is. A smile that makes Nancy keep wanting to be Nancy, if that means that Robin will smile at her like that again. 

“Thanks,” Nancy replies, hiding her blush behind her mug as she takes a sip. 

“Anytime.”

The two sit there chatting about random things until the timer beeps. Robin sets the tray on the stovetop to cool as her phone lights up. She glances at the screen as she sits down and rolls her eyes. “What the hell does Eddie need?” she mutters under her breath as she annoying taps away at her phone. 

Not long after, her face contorts from annoyance to that mischievous smirk that Nancy has come to enjoy. She raises one of her eyebrows and tilts her head to the side. “Something interesting?” she teases. 

Robin’s head shoots up from her phone screen, smiling big at Nancy. “Oh you know, just Eddie complaining about his major crush on Steve.”

Nancy rolls her eyes, having been at the end of that conversation too many times. “He still thinks he doesn’t have a chance?”

“Yes,” Robin exclaims. “It’s so annoying, especially since Steve has liked him back for a while now. And like, I get it, you’re crushing for what you assume is your straight friend but he’s never explicitly told you that and just because he’s dated a lot of girls in the past doesn’t automatically mean that he doesn’t like guys. But it’s also rude to just ask and Steve’s not ready to tell him yet, I mean he’s just told us and I’m proud of him for even telling someone who wasn’t me so fast.”

“But you wish that they both would realize that they’re crazy about each other and scared to do anything,” Nancy finishes her thought. 

“Exactly,” Robin takes the last sip of her tea, her face falling into thought. “And I’m not forcing Steve to do anything, he’s struggled trying to figure out who he is and accepting that part of him. But I just wish that he saw the way Eddie looked at him. It’s lucky for people like us to find that here. I just want him to see that there’s someone who wants to make him happy, even after all of it.”

A part of Nancy still blames herself for how things ended with Steve. She couldn’t help but think that she is the reason that it’s so hard for him to see it. The reason that he hasn’t had a long relationship since they split. Not that any of that is her fault, but it could be. Maybe her actions broke someone so badly that they were left scarred forever. That she hurt them so badly with her pain that when she inevitably pushed them away, she didn’t do it fast enough to protect them. 

He said it himself when he told her about his crush on Eddie. It was the first time he liked somebody comparable to the way he liked her. The way he loved her. Eddie isn’t her, he won’t take that for granted. Not like she did. 

“Yeah, he does,” Nancy whispers, sadder than she wanted it to seem. 

She can feel Robin’s gaze on hers. “You know, Steve never really talked about when you and him were together. Said it was in the past and he didn’t want to think about it. But … one day he was a little drunk, and he told me about that night.”

“That night was … not my best moment,” Nancy supplies, feeling a familiar guilt settle in her stomach.

“Maybe not, but he doesn’t blame you for it, not anymore. He’s thought about that moment a lot, and after some time he knows that you didn’t exactly mean what you said. Not all of it at least. He’s forgiven you, himself a little too.”

Nancy doesn’t wish that she and Steve were still together. They both knew that it wasn’t right, that it was bound to end eventually. But that didn’t stop her from regretting what she said. He loved her and she called it all an act, called it bullshit. She didn’t really love him, but he really loved her. Steve deserved something better than Nancy, and she didn’t deserve his forgiveness. 

“I uh-,” Nancy tries to respond, but the words get stuck in her throat. 

“Maybe you need to forgive yourself too.” Robin’s mouth forms a soft smile, her eyes still searching Nancy’s soul. “Cookie?” she blurts out, pointing to the tray that is still cooling on the stovetop. 

Nancy laughs. “Sure.”

Robin almost falls off her chair as she swivels to go grab the cookies. Covering her mouth, Nancy tries to stifle the fit of giggles that is sure to come out eventually. 

It’s almost a miracle that the mood can shift so fast that Nancy almost forgets what they were talking about. Robin has that effect on her. Somehow, being in the same room can calm the voice in her head that makes her overthink everything. Constantly. It was as if the train of thought in her head never took any stops, any breaks. Just trailing on the same tracks forever until it crashed. 

Forgiveness is a funny thing. It’s not always deserved or given. It’s up to the person who was wronged to decide if it is worth handing it out. Nancy never thought about being forgiven for the things that she did, because she thought she didn’t deserve it. Her action hurt people, people that she cared about, and that was enough to never be given that grace. Yet Steve still forgave her. 

Robin seemed to forgive her too, even though she never did anything to wrong her. But by association, whoever hurt Steve hurt Robin too. And once you get on Robin’s bad side, it’s hard to get off of it. But here Nancy is sitting in Robin’s kitchen, about to eat cookies that the two made together with no malice between them. Whatever tension between the two of them in the beginning was now gone. 

The kind-hearted Robin, ever ready to defend her friends without a second thought, who jumped into a lake after her just because she did, was standing five feet from Nancy, smiling at her. A big smile that makes the sides of her eyes crinkle up a little and the blue in her eyes brighten. A smile that never fails to make Nancy’s heart flutter. 

If Robin could stand across from Nancy and know everything bad she’s ever done and still be smiling, then maybe Nancy did deserve a little forgiveness. 

—

“Are you sure that you really want to watch that? It doesn’t exactly seem like your type of thing,” Robin asks warily. 

Nancy stands across from her holding her copy of Desert Hearts. Which is a great movie but a very gay movie. It’s literally a lesbian romance movie for god’s sake. A lesbian movie with a fucking sex scene in it. Something that Robin does not want to expose to Nancy unless she’s aware of it and even then sitting next to your best friend and straight crush while watching two women getting it on isn’t exactly what she had planned for the evening. 

“I mean it looks interesting and you said it was really good. Plus it might expand my horizons, which is good because you’re my best friend and I want to get to know your … world more. If that makes any sense.”

“Yep, that makes perfect sense,” Robin squeaks out, overcome by the sentiment. “It’s just that there may or may not be a certain scene that could be uncomfortable for you to watch.”

Nancy looks confused before her eyes widen with realization. “Oh, you mean.”

“Yes, yep. That is what I mean.”

She presses her lips together and looks at the tape in her hands. Making a decision, she walks over to the VCR and slides the tape inside. “We’re both adults right?” is all she asks when she turns back around. 

Robin shrugs. “I mean technically.”

“Right. It’s not like either of us hasn’t sat through one before, alone granted. But if we get too uncomfortable or something we’ll just skip it.”

Skipping it, right. Ok, she can do this. She knows exactly where the part of the movie is and might be able to just decide to skip it before it even happens. Nancy would understand, said so herself. 

So, Robin sits down on the couch and pulls a blanket over her legs, picking up the remote on the arm to get the movie set up. 

“Do you mind if I share?” Nancy asks, pointing at the blanket.

Robin shakes her head. “Nope.” It’s a large blanket so it would cover the other end of the couch with no problem. 

Except that’s not what happens. Instead of sitting close to the other arm, Nancy sits right next to Robin, shoulder brushing as she gets settled, adjusting the blanket to cover both of their legs comfortably. Robin takes a sharp breath, trying to focus on the beginning scene of the movie and not the warm presence of Nancy inches away from her. Maybe just an inch if she cared to think about it that much. God, why was she sitting so close?

It’s honestly a surprise that Robin doesn’t spontaneously combust with how much this is affecting her. She tried so hard not to do this again. Develop feelings for her friend, her very straight friend. Nope, not gonna happen, that is not what she should do. That’s how feelings get hurt and how Robin ends up friendless and alone. 

Except she knows that she won’t end up completely alone. No matter what she’d still have Steve and probably Eddie, maybe the kids. But that doesn’t stop her from not wanting to lose the first female friend she’s had in a long time that won’t end when the school year does. 

Robin was never one to keep a friend, especially one that was a girl. Something always happened and they just stopped talking to her or they naturally drifted apart. No matter what, it was like at the beginning of each year she would be restarting while everyone else continued on the path. She didn’t want to do that again. 

So when her heart started to flutter and she had the inability to stop herself from talking around Nancy, she tried to stop it. Tried to push the feelings down and lock them away, hoping that they would just fade on their own. But much like Nancy Wheeler herself, the feelings were strong and persistent, never giving up. The crush continued to grow, and she couldn’t kill it now even if she tried. 

Which fucking sucks because two things keep ringing around Robin’s mind. One, Nancy is straight. Or at least she thinks she is. The massive hypocrite that is Robin just assumes that Nancy is because she has no other evidence that she is just a little bit gay. Not that there is a way to indicate it but it’s just a feeling that Robin would get, and she hasn’t gotten that yet. Two, Nancy just broke up with Jonathan. Like literally two weeks ago. And Robin was there afterward holding Nancy as she cried, telling her it would all be ok and she’s strong enough to get through it. Even though it’s what Nancy and Jonathan both wanted, the hurt was still there. Robin would never swoop in with her feelings and take advantage of that situation. 

Which is what makes this situation so hard. Nancy is just sitting here watching a movie, that Robin loves because it shows a lesbian romance in a way that no one else would even dare to, saying that it would help her understand Robin’s world. A sentence so simple and compassionate that it would send Robin into a frenzy just thinking about it. And instead of sitting where any other sane person would have, she sat directly next to Robin. So close that Robin’s afraid to breathe because it might make their skin brush again. 

Nancy adjust the blanket, shifting her body a bit to lean closer to Robin. Which essentially means she’s just leaning on Robin. Their arms are completely flush now and the warmth from Nancy’s body is radiating through Robin’s. In any other circumstances, Robin would have just asked her for some space, told her it was a bit too close and Robin didn’t like to be touched for this long. Except she can’t seem to say the words. She opens her mouth to say something, but it gets caught in her throat, so she closes it again and says nothing. 

Then it happens. 

Halfway through the movie, Robin feels a weight rest on her shoulder. It doesn’t take a lot to imagine what happened, but her brain can’t seem to wrap her head around the possibility of it happening. So, she glances to the side and confirms what has happened. 

Nancy fucking Wheeler is curled up next to Robin, laying her head on her shoulder. 

Robin can barely breathe, think, or keep living. What in the world made her deserve this? The most beautiful girl she could ever think of having leaning on her shoulder and she can’t even appreciate it. She needs to get the nervous energy out of her body before she explodes. 

Whipping out her phone, she frantically starts texting Steve about her situation. Needing to freak out before she starts hyperventilating.

Robin: AND THEN SHE MOVED CLOSER AND IS NOW LEANING HER FUCKING HEAD ON MY SHOULDER

Steve: Nice

She really doesn’t know why she thought he’d be any sort of helpful. 

Robin: THAT’S ALL YOU HAVE TO SAY JACKASS

Steve: What do you want me to say?

Steve: She got closer to you and now is leaning her head on your shoulder

Steve: Move your arm around her shoulder or something

Robin: HOW WOULD THAT HELP ANYTHING

It would just make it a million times worse. Because then they would be cuddling and Robin would start fantasizing and fantasizing leads to pining which leads to giving it all away and ends in Nancy thinking she’s a freak who just crushes on all of her female friends and leaving her alone again. 

But Steve seems to think that Nancy wants this. That she wouldn’t just lean her head on Robin’s shoulder for no reason and he might just have a little bit of a point there. She can’t think of a time when she accidentally leaned her head on someone’s shoulder. It was always her way of asking for a hug or just some support to ground her. So maybe that’s what Nancy was doing too, right?

It wouldn’t be unreasonable to think that was something that Nancy wanted. But what if it wasn’t and Robin was just reading into things that weren’t there? What if Nancy just does all of this with her friends and Robin would make a total fool of herself and ruin all of this forever? 

She could do nothing about it and just finish watching the movie with Nancy’s head on her shoulder and everything would be fine. Maybe she could get up and use the bathroom and when she came back she and Nancy would be sitting normally again. 

But then this could be her only chance to do something about this useless, hopeless crush that she can’t seem to get rid of. She could do this one thing and then it’d be done. If Nancy says anything, it’s not like she won’t pull her arm away. 

Because she totally would. Anything that makes Nancy uncomfortable would be undone immediately because that is the last thing Robin wants to do. It’s the reason she counts the seconds so she doesn’t get caught staring or apologizes for rambling too much. Those things have made other people uncomfortable before so she doesn’t want to replicate it. Not with Nancy. She can’t have her giant gay ass mess this up like she’s done with every other female friend she’s ever managed to have. 

So if she wants to do this, she needs to think of something clever. Not the stupid thing Steve would do where he would fake a yawn and stretch his arm over the couch. That was the stupidest and most obvious move in the book, in Steve’s book. Nancy would know Steve’s book since they’d dated before so she needed to find something that was hers. Something that was distinctly Robin. Which was hard as hell because Robin is so used to just copying what other people do that it’s sometimes hard to find something that’s uniquely hers. 

Robin takes a deep breath. Or as deep as a breath that one can take to not alert the person still leaning on their shoulder. Nancy’s hair, as beautiful as it is, is tickling Robin’s cheek and she’s been ignoring it to the point where it’s become unbearable. 

Without thinking, Robin wiggles the arm that is basically resting behind Nancy up to scratch at her face and rearranges the strands so that they aren’t bothering her anymore. She was in the middle of debating on how to get her arm back to where it was while also trying to lightly shake out the tingles when it hits her. This is her opening. One she didn’t even plan for but it was perfect and seamless because she did it without thinking about it. 

Once her arm has stopped tingling, she gently places it on the back of the couch. Careful not to place it on Nancy’s back so she doesn’t feel pressured, but it’s there. Robin’s leg has been bouncing nonstop throughout the movie and the blanket has pretty much fallen off her lap. She leans forward to grab it with her other hand while being cautious about Nancy’s head on her shoulder. Her arm on the back of the couch slips and lands on Nancy’s back, her fingers instinctively grabbing onto her shoulder lightly. 

As Robin sits back on the couch her heart is beating faster than she ever thought it was possible. She is just about to move her arm when Nancy shifts in her hold, leaning more on Robin and bumping her wrist to lay over her shoulder. 

They were officially cuddling? Robin has no clue. She’s never cuddled with someone before and this might constitute that. But she can’t help but think that might also include her fingers running through Nancy’s curls, carefully taking apart the knots and massaging the stress out of her scalp. Maybe a few kisses to her head, maybe a few kisses to her shoulder in return. Just sitting in each other’s presence knowing that that’s all they would ever need. 

It hits Robin all at once, that she wants that. Moments with Nancy that were between them and only them. Time spent together not as friends but as girlfriends. She can’t keep pretending that the want doesn’t exist when it does. She can feel herself falling deeper for Nancy, and she won’t be able to dig herself out of the whole she’s making. 

But she has to stop it if she wants Nancy to stay a friend. 

—

Nancy’s heart is beating so loud that she swears that Robin can feel it thumping. She was already pushing it tonight, sitting closer and closer to Robin as the movie went on. It was just so easy to do. The setting was all right. The lights were off and the movie was playing, they were already sharing a blanket. It was simple for Nancy to shuffle closer to Robin, let herself get close to her in a setting where it wouldn’t be weird.

But then the advice Jonathan gave her earlier that evening kept coming back to her. She could do something that could be read as platonic if Robin questioned it, or be brushed off as an accident, just to see how she would react. See if she could do something about this stupid crush instead of brushing it off entirely before she gives it a chance. 

She’s been saying that she’s not ready for a relationship after the breakup with Jonathan. While that has an air of truth to it, she doesn’t want to not act on these feelings either. Especially when there is a chance that Robin could actually like her back. Nothing would happen now, just some simple experimenting to see if her feelings were reciprocated. 

So she decides to do it. Lean her head a bit on Robin’s shoulder to see what happens. Robin tenses for a moment before relaxing under the touch. Nancy lets out a small victory, leaning her head more onto Robin’s shoulder. She’s not so secretly texting Jonathan about it underneath the blanket when Robin shifts. 

Nancy starts to freak out, wondering if what she did crossed a line with Robin. That this was farther beyond the platonic line than she hoped and this definitely would be read the way she wanted it to. But then Robin moves her arm to the back of the couch, and when it slips to rest on Nancy’s shoulders, she decides to run with it. 

She shifts closer to Robin, shrugging her shoulder a bit to bump Robin’s wrist over it. Making sure that Robin knows that she wants this. Robin seems to get the hint, pulling Nancy closer and leaning her head on top of Nancy’s. 

Nancy smiles to herself, feeling content with the steps she’s been able to make tonight. It’s not definitive proof that Robin likes her back, but it’s something. It’s proof that Robin feels close enough to her to let her do this, close enough to be physically closer to Nancy. 

They were already close, became that way after that day in the library and even more so after their infiltration at Pennhurst. But this type of close takes time, dedication. Robin took the time to learn about Nancy and she took time to learn about Robin. Maybe with more time, Nancy would be able to tell Robin how she feels. Tell her how this moment makes her heart soar and each time Robin so much as looks at Nancy it makes her blush. Tell her that she wants more from this and she’s scared. But being scared doesn’t matter to Nancy, she’ll persevere through it anyway. Eventually at least. 

Right now Nancy is fine sitting here wrapped up in her friend’s arm, watching a movie about a love story that Nancy only hopes she can live one day.