Title: She was Mine Author: mlb e-mail: mlb@ipass.net Rating: pg Category: V Spoilers: none It makes a bit more sense if you read "Mine First, Children" first. Keywords: None Summary: Walter Skinner angst Disclaimer: All characters in this story are the property of CC and 1013. No personal gain is intended. Feedback: Welcome (mlb@ipass.net) Case from hell 30,042 is over, and finally, finally, we are going home. I lean back in the airplane seat and close my eyes. I am tired enough that I can probably fall asleep although these seats are not designed for anyone much bigger than Scully. I consider upgrading to first class, but my agents don't have that option, and I won't abandon them now. We were together through pain and fire and blood for three months. I can share their discomfort a little longer. At least the plane isn't full. I have commandeered two seats: having a ferocious scowl serves me well in some cases. The other agents are dotted around the plane, everyone asleep or almost. Mulder and Scully sit together. Scully leans against the plane wall, the shutter to her window drawn down, her bright head resting on a pillow. Mulder sprawls in his seat and across half the aisle. They don't touch, but I suspect that if the other agents and I weren't here, they would be wrapped around each other, two children lost in a dark wood. I carefully don't examine my suspicion for anger or envy or jealousy. My God, let them take comfort where they can. I have a sneaking feeling that, if I gave them a sign, they would share their comfort with me. Not that I would accept. I fall into a semi-doze, and my mind starts to wander. It's another case, another time, and I begin to feel better. It was a bad case, hard to solve, and far too many died, but it's over now. In a few hours, I will be home and Sharon... Won't be there. I open my eyes as reality comes crashing back down. Her not being there isn't exactly a surprise. She hasn't been there in more than a year since the last time I pushed her away and she, reasonably, enough, elected not to come back for another futile try. I can still feel her hand on my cheek as she tried to comfort me. There was nothing I wanted more in the world than to let her give it, but I was afraid for her, terrified for me, and so fucking embarrassed by the sordidness of it all. It was easier to freeze up and send her away. I could even blame her for the entire situation since, if she hadn't divorced me, I wouldn't have been in bed with Corrinna Sayles in the first place. But if Sharon hadn't left me, she might have been the one to die, so maybe it worked out for the best. I wish she were waiting for me though. I want to kiss her, touch her, make love to her, sleep beside her. I want to listen to her rant about the idiot customers in her bookstore and rage about having to offer coffee. "I might as well take the books out and just run a deli!" She stormed around the living room, waving her hands. I was as supportive as possible, given that I was biting my tongue to keep from laughing at her indignation. It reminded me so much of how she was in college. She wanted to run a bookstore even then. The other girls were going to be models or actresses or rich men's wives. Sharon Hughes, with her waist-length black hair and giant pair of glasses that made her look like a baby owl, was going to run a bookstore. A feminist bookstore. Nothing for the male oppressor. Certainly nothing for a hot shit Vietnam Vet who thought he was big man on campus. She taught me that women were more than my personal sex toys and I taught her that men could have redeeming qualities if you hit us over the head hard enough. I wish I could take back that teaching, for I don't want her out there finding redeeming qualities in other men. I am not without resources and could find out who she was seeing if I wanted, but I don't. My mind paints an adequate picture. He's handsome, younger than me, with lots of hair. Maybe he's not built quite as well, but that's because other things are more important than working out. After all, he's a brain surgeon who plays concert violin on the weekends that he doesn't work with underprivileged kids. Any free time from all of this is spent perfecting techniques for sexually pleasuring her or learning to communicate his deepest feelings. I should hope that she finds someone like this. Don't I love her and want the best for her? Well, fuck that. She was mine once and I want her back, but it's not going to happen. She's moved on. She doesn't care about me anymore. She probably doesn't even know I've been gone. The End