My Obsessive Partner By Red - ds4fm@orange.net DISCLAIMER: I didn't do it. I was drugged. M and S aren't mine (god, how I wish they were). I'm not making any money from this (no sane person would pay for work of such a low quality). Don't sue. I'm a student and I literally don't have a penny. FURTHER DISCLAIMER: I also don't own the TV show or characters named in this piece who aren't related to The X-Files. Please forgive me for any misquotes etc. Don't sue me. See above. RATING: Don't know - no bad language or anything, so a U, I guess. CLASSIFICATION: Humour SUMMARY: For Sybil's Rotting Your Brain challenge on the Haven (great topic, Syb!). Scully discovers that Mulder has a bit of an obsession to a certain TV show... THANX: To Naff for getting me quasi-hooked on the TV show in question! AUTHOR'S NOTES: I'm English. Any odd spellings that you Americans discover in this piece of art (right!) are probably due to my Brit status ;) ARCHIVE: Anywhere, just keep my name on it. ------My Obsessive Partner------- I can't believe it. Mulder took off early today, mumbling something about not feeling too good and asking if I could interview our last suspect alone. He resisted my attempts to fuss over him, instead heading back to the motel, supposedly to get some sleep. Supposedly. Now I'm stood in the doorway to my motel room and the offending male is laying, stomach-down on my bed, watching the TV. But not some monster movie this time, and not even Star Trek... oh, no. He's watching Friends. Friends! My Mulder! I'm so amazed that I must stand here for a good ten seconds before having the presence of mind to slam the door and get his attention. He jumps with fright, flips over onto his back, and then a look of pure guilt quickly passes across his face. I raise my eyebrows. "Friends, Mulder?" Guilt is swiftly replaced with a sheepish look. He shrugs. "I really wasn't feeling well." "Mulder! I just can't believe that a man of your age, living the lifestyle that you do, is even remotely interested in a show about normal peoples' social lives." I look him right in the eyes for a few seconds before shaking my head. He nods slowly and pats the bed next to him. I fold my arms, but go and sit with him anyway, pouting to indicate my distaste. "No, seriously," I say. "C'mon, Scully. I know you like to imagine how nice it would be to live a normal life -" I try my best to respond but he raises a hand and cuts me off. "I like my life. I like who I am and what I do. I like us." He grins at me. "But that doesn't mean I can't pretend as well, does it? Everyone wonders what it'd be like to live an unusual life, right? Well, for me 'unusual' just translates into 'normal'. "This is normal." The words are out of my mouth before I'm even aware that I'd thought them. He chuckles. "What have I done to you?" I just smile before turning my attention to the TV set. Now, I don't watch the show on a regular basis, but I know enough to get by. From what I can tell, this is an early episode - Matthew Perry looks about ten years old and Matt LeBlanc's hairstyle is seriously out of date. The three guys are all crowded around the strangest-looking laptop computer in history and seem to be making some sort of list. Mulder has turned the sound down low and I strain to hear what the characters are saying, but just manage to catch what I presume is an important line - Ross sighs, gazes into space and mutters, "She's not Rachel." I suddenly become aware of the face that Mulder is staring, transfixed, at the screen, a similar far-off look in his eyes to that of David Schwimmer. I roll my own eyes. "Mulder! C'mon, it's just a TV show, is it really that enticing?" "SCULLY!" He leaps off the bed and grabs me, covering my mouth with his hand. "No, no! Ssh! They'll hear you!" He gestures towards the television set and widens his eyes. All I can do is stand there until he finally releases me. I pat him gently on the arm. "It's okay, Mulder. I can help you. Let's deal with your problem. We'll start by - TURNING OFF THE TV!" "No!" He lunges for the remote control and looks around for a moment, thinking, before stuffing the control down the front of his jeans and nodding defiantly. "Ha!" He cries, triumphant. I walk over to the door and bang my head against it. "I despair. I despair. I despair," I mumble. "Really, Scully, I thought you'd be less... weird about this. You know I have an obsessive personality." I turn and lean against the door whilst regarding him critically. "But I just don't get it. It's a TV show. You're acting as if it's... real people walking around inside that box." He nods slowly. "Okay. Um... yes. It is just a show. But it deals with real things." He raises a hand, again cutting me off before I can start to protest. "Yes, it is a comedy show so of course things are exaggerated. But... take the Ross and Rachel storyline. They both love each other. They're obviously destined to be together. But no matter how hard they try, things always go wrong, they can never make it work. It's just heartbreaking - but it's also true. Now, I will never have five dear friends to share my life with, I will never live in a purple apartment and I will never have a pet duck. I know that. Really, I do. But it's fun to pretend, just for twenty minutes, that I'm a part of something that special, no matter how unrealistic it is. Much as I love my life, much as I love what you and I have, what we're working towards..." He flushes and I'm overwhelmed with feelings of affection for him, no matter how deranged he may be sometimes. he clears his throat and continues. "Um... yeah. Much as I love my life, sometimes one of those" - he points at the screen, where Ross is looking thoroughly miserable and also soaking wet - "just seems so very appealing. I don't speak; just watch the show as the credits eventually roll and the characters wink out of existence. Mulder fiddles around, trying to extract the remote control from his jeans with minimum embarrassment and failing miserably. Eventually he manages to retrieve the thing and clicks off the TV, before padding off to the bathroom, leaving me alone with my thoughts. In my heart, I know that he's right. We all need to escape. I escape into books, picturing myself as the tragic Catherine of Wuthering Heights, locked in a bitter love story. If Mulder wants to pretend he's a twenty-something palaeontologist in love with Jennifer Aniston and with Courteney Cox-Arquette for a sister, who am I to begrudge him that vision? No, he's not hurting anyone, and I need to chill out. I curl up on the bed and pick up my notepad, intending to scribble some case notes before I forget them completely - and find something in Mulder's writing, headed "Ross And Rachel Get Married". The word that instantly pops into my mind is _fanfiction_. I jump off of the bed and run to the bathroom door. "MULDER!" ---------fini----------- FURTHER AUTHOR'S NOTES: Can anyone tell I'm a Ross/Rachel whore? ;) I know this whole thing is out of character but I just enjoyed writing it so much! Copyright/wrong Red 2003 ds4fm@orange.net . Flames gratefully accepted as I'm a poor student who can't afford luxuries such as heating.