My Life as a Puzzle (1 of 2)
Title: My Life as a Puzzle (part 1 of 2)
Author: msk
Email: msk1024@yahoo.com
Rating: PG
Keyword: M/S,
Spoilers: None
Summary: It's 11 years after the events of the Fringe
Series and 13 year old Kate has a lot of questions
about her parents, her life and the secrets that
surround her.
For as long as I can remember, my life has felt like a
puzzle with a bunch of missing pieces. It's not like
I have this crazy, exciting life or anything. We live
in the middle of nowhere--the most boring town in the
whole world. But in the middle of this dullness is a
mystery that I just haven't been able to solve.
My mom says we lived in Washington, DC until I was three,
but I don't remember. I try and imagine what it was like
living in a big city. On TV, people in the city rush around
all the time, doing exciting things. It's not like nobody rushes
in Sachem, but it's pretty boring wherever you go, so there's
not much point to getting there fast.
I asked my dad what it was like in Washington, and he said
it was noisy. He said it was better here in the country where
you could hear yourself breathe. Mom says that we're safer
here, away from "urban crime."
My mom is the medical examiner for Litchfield County, but
she consults all over New England. She puts a lot of miles
on her SUV. Mom sees urban crime, country crime and a
whole lot of human stupidity--everything from hunters
mistaking each other for deer to teenage gangbanger
casualties from the streets of Hartford.
I know that Mom and Dad worked for the FBI before I was
born, but neither of them talks about it much. Dad said
they investigated weird stuff--mutants and monsters. He
might have been kidding me, though. Dad's got a strange
sense of humor sometimes. I mean really--monsters
made of garbage? Monkey-babies? The FBI couldn't
possibly get involved with stuff like that.
I know they were partners; I guess I'm the product of that
partnership. My mom has a picture on her desk of the two
of them at a crime scene, looking all young and intense.
My mom's hair is shorter in the picture and Dad is
clean-shaven.
But back to my totally boring life. The school bus bumps
along the road, and I wonder if Dad has already driven
to Torrington to look at the chest of drawers in the used
furniture store. I hope he waited so I could come along.
I love watching him study a piece and run his fingers over
the wood.
Dad doesn't look for antiques, just sturdy old furniture he
can make into something wonderful. He does more than
refinish stuff--he practically rebuilds some of it. Like he
might have the good top part of some broken shelves and
graft them onto a little cabinet and make a whole new thing.
Once in a while, he finds something like what they have on
the Antiques Roadshow. He calls an antique dealer friend
for those pieces. That guy returns the favor when he finds
something he thinks Dad could use.
The bus screeches to a stop at the end of our driveway, and
I walk down the aisle to get to the door, stepping over Kevin
Haystrup's ginormous feet.
"See ya tomorrow, Beanpole," he says as I pass by. He's
sprawled out in his seat, grinning at me from under the
mess of his long curly hair.
"Not if I see you first, Haystack."
I hate being called Beanpole, but, let's face it--I'm a
head taller than all the boys except for Haystack, and
skinny, too. Straight up and down, skinny. My mom says
girls develop at different rates, but this is ridiculous.
She says I have "breast buds" and before I know it
I'll have all the normal secondary sex characteristics
as I move through puberty.
God, I wish she'd stop talking about it already. It's
so totally embarrassing. I'm thirteen already and wish
my breasts would show up, so I could stop being a freak.
The wind is biting despite the bright November afternoon
sun. I open the mailbox by the curb and pull out a bunch of
letters and catalogs. Leaves crunch under my feet as I
carry them up the driveway. I'm happy to see that Dad's
truck is parked over by the old barn he uses as a workshop.
The barn is empty, but amid the sawdust, I spot the table
he's been working on for the last few days. It had been
covered by a coat of ugly green paint, but somehow Dad
knew that once he sanded off the paint he'd find beautifully
grained oak. I'm not sure how he knows this stuff. I call
it furniture ESP. He thinks that's real funny.
I head over to our house, which is really old. The floors are
uneven and it's drafty in the winter. Sometimes I wish we
lived in one of those nice houses in the new subdevelopments.
I don't think we're poor, or anything: Mom's a doctor and Dad
does a pretty good business. Mom and Dad like living in an
old house. They say it's got character.
I let myself in the back door. I do love our kitchen, though.
Dad built the cabinets himself and refinished our big pine table.
He comes into the kitchen pulling his shirt over his head.
His hair looks wet. He must have showered to wash off the
sawdust.
"Hey Katydid," he says. "I didn't hear you come in."
He tugs the shirt down, quickly covering the scars on
his chest. Dad's kind of self-conscious about them and
doesn't talk about them at all. There is another scar
under his beard--I remember from when he used to still
shave.
The scars on his chest are the worst--they come up from
his stomach to each shoulder and then around to the back.
Kind of like a "Y" incision that took up another couple of
letters.
I asked about them when I little and Mom said that
Dad was in an accident. I asked Dad about the accident,
but he just shook his head and said it was a long time ago
and then he changed the subject. Around our house, the
subject gets changed a lot.
"Are we gonna go to Torrington?" I ask, as I rummage
around the fridge looking for a snack. I pull out a
container of yogurt.
"Do you have homework?"
"I can do it later."
"Your mom will have plenty to say about that,"
he says.
Mom has plenty to say on just about every aspect of my
life and most of it falls into the category of bitching.
I really don't see the point of homework. I get "A"s
on every test. Teachers and parents must have some kind
of deal going to keep kids busy every minute of the day
so there is no time to have fun.
"Oh, all right," I sigh. "I'll do it in the truck."
We drive to Torrington, the radio tuned to a sports
station. I work on algebra equations, my books and
papers spread over my lap and the seat between us.
When we get to Second Hand Ralph's, we're greeted by
none other than Ralph, himself.
"Hey Mulder, I see you brought the 'enforcer'."
I grin as Dad inspects the chest. He's the smartest
guy in the world, but he lacks the killer instinct when
it comes to doing business. Dad is the artist. I'm
the one who haggles with the buyers and the sellers.
I move close to Dad. He pulls out a drawer and turns
it over. "See how the joints dovetail? That's good,"
he says so only I can hear. "Too bad about this crack
in the wood, Ralph."
Dad crouches down to run his fingers along a crevice
where the wood has split. He holds up 4 fingers out
of Ralph's line of vision.
"We'll take it off your hands for $30," I say.
"I oughta throw you two out of my shop," Ralph growls.
I open my eyes real wide in my best "innocent kid" way.
"Nobody's going to want it with a crack," I say sweetly.
"Not to mention the water damage on the feet."
Dad shoots me a smile, proud that I picked up on the
warped feet without having him point it out. The chest
must have been stored in a basement that flooded.
"Minor issues," Ralph insists. "This thing is worth
at least $50."
We settle on $40, which is exactly what Dad wanted to
pay in the first place.
"We're a good team," Dad says as we get back in the
truck after the chest is tied down in the back. I feel
myself blush with pride.
We get home, and I help Dad get the chest off the truck
and into the workshop. When we go into the house, the
message light on the phone is blinking. I hit play.
"Hi guys," Mom says on the tape. "I'm going to be stuck
here, so don't wait on me for dinner. It may...it's...I'm
probably going to be late."
Her voice sounds weird--cloggy and tense. Dad leans back
against the kitchen counter and frowns. He worries about
her when she drives home late at night.
We order pizza from Salvatore's, the only pizza place in
Sachem. Dad grumbles as he goes to pick it up, saying that
it's sucky pizza, that you have to drive to Hartford or
New Haven to get the good stuff.
The suckiness doesn't seem to stop him from eating four
slices. I wrap up the leftovers for Mom and go upstairs
to finish my homework.
It's pretty late when I decide to get some ice cream. I
fill a soup bowl with rocky road and leave the kitchen
light on, since Mom isn't home yet. I walk through
the living room to go up the front stairs.
After several additions over its 150 year history, there
are two stairways in our house. The back stairs are
right off the kitchen, but they're steep and narrow and
shadowy despite the bare light bulb at the top. I used to
be scared of them when I was little. I still avoid them at
night.
I'm just about to climb the front stairs, bowl in hand, when
I hear the back door open. I move back into the darkened
living room--Mom hates when I take dishes up to my room
because once in a while I forget to bring them back down.
I decide to sneak up when Mom isn't looking. A deep shuddery
sigh from the kitchen catches my attention and I edge toward the
doorway.
When I see Mom I know something is really wrong. Her
face, which is pale on a good day, is as white as milk
and her eyes look haunted. She grabs onto the counter
as if she'd fall to the ground without it. Her free hand
shakes as it covers her mouth.
"Are you okay, Mom?" I ask, walking back into the kitchen.
I wonder if she hit a deer on the way home. She did that
once and it upset her a lot. She jumps, letting go of the
counter.
"Kate," she says, her voice wavers. "You startled me."
"Sorry. We saved you some pizza. I can nuke it for you."
"Thanks, Honey," she smiles, weakly. "I'm not very hungry,
actually. I...I'm going to go up to bed."
She kisses my cheek as she passes me. I look down at the
melting ice cream in my bowl and then I really start to
worry.
Mom was so distracted, she didn't even notice I was
bringing food upstairs.
~~~~~~~~~
"Scully, you look like hell," my Dad says a few nights
later. I'm up in my bedroom, in my favorite spot--lying
on the floor next to the grate, reading and being enveloped
by the warm air.
Mom and Dad must be in the little room they use as
an office. I wonder if they realize that our old farmhouse
has these weird acoustics through the heating registers.
"Gee, thanks, Mulder. It's so good to know that you
think that."
"I'm sorry, but you look like you haven't slept in
days and I haven't seen you actually eat a full meal
in as long."
"I'm fine. It's been crazy at work this week, that's
all. Two traffic fatalities, one stabbing in Winsted
and a suspected overdose--you'd think we were a big
city ME's office."
"It's more than that and you know it, Scully. Work
has been busy before, but it's never tied you up in
knots like this."
"I'm tired, Mulder. Can we just...not do this now?"
They must have moved away from the heating vent after
that because I can't work out what they're saying.
I fall asleep to the low murmur of their voices.
In the morning, I can tell that Mom hadn't told
Dad what was really bothering her. Tension hangs
in the air and they're hardly talking.
Dad's eyes stray to Mom every once in a while as
he drink his orange juice and eats cereal. Mom keeps
her eyes down, concentrating on her coffee cup like
there's a million dollars hiding there.
It's so quiet that the scrape of Dad's chair echoes
in the kitchen. The sound of his bowl dropped in
the sink sounds like a clap of thunder. He ruffles
my hair before he goes out the back door and across
to his workshop.
It's hard to keep my mind on school all day. Mr.
Giotto has to call on me three times in Western
Civ before I hear him. I'm so distracted, I hadn't
been listening to the discussion and stammer as I
ask him to repeat the question.
I have this unfortunate tendency to forget that I
have homework for certain classes. Health class
homework is always so completely and utterly
pointless that I forget to do it and I find that
today, I hit Mrs. Hemenway's limit of 5 missed
assignments. Which means I have a ninety minute
detention.
Which also means I miss the late bus. Ninety minute
detention is diabolically arranged so that the late
bus leaves 10 minutes before it ends. I note with
a kind of perverted gratification that Haystack is
sprawled at a desk in the back of the detention
room.
The juniors and senior "detainees" drive to school
and most of the freshmen and sophomores call some
annoyed parent to pick them up.
I don't want to bother Dad, and I would rather chew
my right arm off than call Mom to come pick me up.
Haystack lives with his grandparents and they...well,
he says they've made it clear that he's on his own
when it comes to detention. So, Haystack and I are
the only kids who decide to walk the four miles home.
Mom would probably have a cow if she knew I was
walking home with Haystack. His family is kind of
rough. His dad is in prison and his mom lives
in Hartford. Haystack says she cares more about
meth than she does about him. It makes me so
sad to think about it.
We walk along, not really talking about anything
important. Haystack says Mrs. Hemenway is offended
by my lack of enthusiasm on the subject of good
nutrition. I laugh when he keeps repeating "we
must eat more legumes" in Mrs. Hemenway's
high-pitched voice.
The sun is starting to set when we get to my driveway.
There is an awkward moment as the two of us look at
our feet and nobody talks.
"I better get home," Haystack says. He lives
another mile down the road.
"Well, see you, then," I respond, pulling my
hoodie around me as I suddenly feel cold.
"Not if I see you first," Haystack says with a
wave of his hand. I watch him walk away
before turning and heading up the driveway.
"Where were you?" Dad asks when I come through
the back door. "I was getting worried."
"I had detention," I say. When I look into his
eyes, I feel bad that he was worried. I hadn't
thought about how late it was or that Dad would
wonder where I was. I could lie and say the land
lines weren't working, or my cell didn't have any
reception, both of which happen all the time.
The truth was, I think I just wanted to walk home
with Haystack and Dad would have insisted on
picking me up.
He doesn't say more on the subject, not like
Mom who would harp on it until I'd want to
scream.
"Mom called. She's going to be late tonight,"
he says.
"Again?" I gripe. "She hasn't been home for
dinner all week."
"She doesn't like that any more than we do, Kate."
I'm not so sure of that, I think to myself. Mom
is hiding something and maybe it's easier for her
not to be around us.
We make spaghetti for dinner. Mom usually does
the cooking, but there are a few things Dad and I
can manage. We open a jar of sauce and boil the
noodles. I survey the food when it's on the table
and shrug. Pulling a bag of salad out of the fridge,
I dump it into a big bowl.
"Mom would be proud," Dad says.
"Yeah," I say as we sit down at the table. If she
was here, she'd be thrilled with the iceberg lettuce.
I don't say that though.
For a few minutes, the only sound is the scrape of
forks on plates. I look up to see Dad smiling at
me.
"The first time we all had dinner together, your
mom made spaghetti."
"Really?"
"You made such a mess with it. You were just about
two, and you ate spaghetti with your hands.
Mom and I had to give you a bath right away."
He smiles at the memory. I push the last strands
of spaghetti around on my plate, watching the
patterns they make.
I wonder why our first dinner as a family didn't
happen until I was two. Mom and Dad never talk
about any of this stuff but I've always wondered
why it's only Mom and Grandma holding me in my
baby pictures. When I'm a little older, there
are lots of pictures with Dad.
"Why...um...where were you when I was a baby?"
I ask.
Dad's smile is sad and wistful. "It's a long story,
Katydid."
"I've got plenty of time," I say.
"You've got plenty of homework," he says. "Or am
I mistaken about why you had to stay after school?"
"How'd you know that's why I got detention?"
"Let's just say I spent my share of time avoiding
my homework and paying the consequences."
I try to get that little window of conversation open
again but Dad had gently but firmly closed it.
When the dinner dishes are done and the leftovers
put away, Dad goes upstairs to watch a basketball
game on TV. I sit at the kitchen table, catching
up on the five health class assignments that got
me stuck in detention.
I'm slumped over my work, doodling a heart and
lungs in the margin of my notebook when Mom
lets herself in the back door.
"Hi Sweetheart," Mom says, taking off her coat.
"It smells good in here. Did you and Dad cook?"
"We made spaghetti," I respond. "There's some in
the fridge if you want."
She fixes herself a plate with a teensy amount of
pasta and a whole bunch of salad and sits down at
the table.
"How was your day?" she asks between bites.
"Boring. The usual."
Mom sighs and looks at me with tired eyes. I can tell
that she wishes I would talk to her, but I don't tell
her about the detention and walking home with Haystack.
It's not like she's been opening up to *me* lately.
Mom finishes her dinner and with a long glance in my
direction, puts her dish and fork in the dishwasher.
"I have some work to do," she says as she kisses
the top of my head. "I'll be in the office."
I pack up my books and papers and go up to my room.
Few traces of my life as a little kid remain. A couple of
years ago, I begged to redecorate, so the pink walls are
now mossy green. Dad refinished my white dresser
and headboard and now they're coffee colored.
About the only things childhood items I kept are some
books and the doll furniture Dad made when I was little.
My favorite piece is a tiny carved cradle. He must have
made it when I was really little, because I don't remember
a time when it wasn't there.
My conscience nags at me as I brush my teeth and pull
on flannel pajama pants and an old sweatshirt. I don't
want to go to sleep without saying goodnight to Mom.
The office door is ajar as I walk down the hall. We
have a house rule as far as Mom and Dad's office and
the bedrooms--even if the door is slightly open,
we still knock. My fist is raised to rap on the
woodwork when I hear Mom on the phone. Here I am
eavesdropping again. I know it's wrong, but nobody
tells me anything around here, and something is
really wrong.
"It's out of the question, Walter" she says. "He's
been doing so well."
I try and remember who Walter is, but all I can
come up with is a name on a Christmas card. Mom
and Dad don't have many friends--a few people in
town, but nobody really close. Nobody Mom would
be talking to like this.
"No...no, I can't tell him. It'll send him into a tailspin."
Mom has never sounded like this, so upset, her voice
trembling. I hate hearing her sound so worried.
She continues on, but her voice is lowered and I can't
hear any more of what she's saying. But I can still
here the tone in her voice, how fond she seems of this
Walter person. It hurts that she's opening up to some
guy over the phone and not to Dad. Or to me.
I want to burst into the office and ask Mom what she
can't tell Dad about. Instead, though, I'm frozen
with my hand still poised as if to knock. I turn
and go up to bed.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Friday afternoon, a few days after Mom's late night
phone call, I'm sitting cross-legged on top of the
workbench in Dad's workshop. A sandwich in
one hand, I flip through the local "penny saver"
newspaper, planning our weekend itinerary of
furniture trawling.
"Mr. Hastings has a pair of end tables for sale," I
say.
"Probably pressed board," Dad says, with a grunt as
he pushes himself up from the floor. He's just
finished replacing a drawer slide in a dresser he's
repairing. Dad usually works on stuff he buys
to fix up, but this job is a special order. A lady over
in Goshen inherited some old furniture and wants
this dresser restored.
"Still, it's worth a look," I say. Dad's probably
right. Mr. Hastings is a junk man who cleans out
people's sheds and basements for them. Most of the
stuff he advertises in the penny saver isn't worth
much, but once in a while he finds a real treasure.
Dad starts sanding the top of the dresser, and I go
back to flipping through the paper. We both look up
at the crunch of tires on gravel outside. I think
maybe it's a customer.
Dad sells most of his furniture through a few
one-of-a-kind specialty shops in the towns around
here. People show up at our house, sometimes,
through word of mouth. It happens a lot more in
the fall when people are driving around gaping at
the leaves. It's a little late for that now--the
trees are almost all bare.
I turn and peer through the dusty window of
the workshop. A big gray Lexus pulls to a stop on the
driveway and a huge bald man climbs out. Something
tells me this guy isn't shopping for furniture.
Dad's face gives no clue to what he's thinking as he
brushes his hands off against his jeans. I hop off
the workbench and follow him. When I see Dad
break into a grin, I move back in the doorway of
the workshop. Dad approaches the man.
The man walks forward, his wire-rimmed glasses
glinting in the sun. I'm so curious I want to scream.
"Mulder," the man says, smiling and reaching out
to take Dad's hand.
"It's been a long time, sir," Dad says. "You
haven't changed much."
"A little less hair," the man says. "And more gray
among what's left. You're looking downright
shaggy."
"It's the 'country' look," Dad says, running a hand
through his thick hair.
I can't stand the suspense a minute more and move
out into the driveway. My steps catch their attention
and Dad and the man turn to me.
"Is this..."
"This is Kate," Dad says, slinging an arm around my
shoulders.
"You were just a baby when I saw you last," the man
says.
"Kate, this is Assistant Director Skinner," Dad
says. "He was our boss at the FBI."
"Theoretically," Mr. Skinner says. "Your dad had
a mind of his own."
"Let's go inside," Dad says. "It's cold."
We head into the house and Dad makes coffee. He tells
me to take Mr. Skinner into the family room.
"I can't believe how grown up you are," Skinner says
as he stands somewhat awkwardly looking at the photos
on the mantle.
I don't know what to say to him. Did he really expect
me to stay a baby? Why do grown-ups say dumb things
like that? I hope the next question isn't about what
grade I'm in.
We're both relieved when Dad comes back. He has a
tray with mugs of coffee for him and our visitor and
hot chocolate for me. They settle into chairs by the
fireplace. I take my cocoa and wander off to sit on the
windowseat. I flip through a magazine and hope they
forget I'm there.
"So, what brings you to the wilds of Connecticut?" Dad
asks.
"I had a conference in Boston," Mr. Skinner answers.
"Rather than fly back, I thought I'd rent a car and see
some of the country over the weekend. Thought I'd
look you up since I was so close."
Dad snorts with laughter. "Walter, you've never been
a 'take the road less traveled' kind of guy."
Walter. Walter was the name of the guy Mom was talking
to the other night. I try not to show my reaction, all the
while straining to hear the man's soft reply.
"I think about you two all the time. I used to hear from
Scully fairly often, but the last few years, it's dwindled
down to Christmas cards and the occasional email. I
wanted to see how you were doing."
My head spins as I try to figure everything out. Why is
this guy lying to Dad? He's been talking to Mom, so this
visit isn't out of the blue. It makes me mad that Dad
seems to think this guy is a friend.
I listen to them talk, mostly stuff about the FBI and
a bunch of people I've never heard of. Dad seems pleased
that some guy named Colton pissed off the wrong people
and was warming Dad's old chair in the background check
department.
The rest of their conversation is boring, about how
the FBI was changing. I tune them out.
For the first time in about three weeks, Mom comes home
from work early. There is much hugging and happy, happy,
joy, joy with our visitor. Mom asks Skinner to stay for
dinner and he agrees pretty quickly. Then she says
it makes no sense for him to find a motel when we have
tons of room. This is all getting weirder and weirder.
We never have house guests except for my Grandma
a few times a year.
The three of them talk about the old days while we eat dinner.
Actually, Mom and Mr. Skinner do most of the talking. Mom
is animated, telling stories about freaks and mutants. I look
from one to the other, my mouth open. I'd heard about the
crazy stuff from when I was little. When he told me about the
Flukeman, I thought he was teasing and that Mom was
going along with it.
Apparently, though, it was real. Mr. Skinner doesn't strike me as
much of a joker. Dad describes one guy could spark fires just
from his body and another one who ate people's livers.
I watch Dad while Mom and Mr. Skinner talk. He laughs often,
his eyes sparkling with enjoyment. Dad occasionally offers a
comment about Mom's skepticism in the face of piles of evidence.
But he says he had to hand it to her--she never flinched when
it came to the dirty work.
"She performed an autopsy on an elephant," Dad says,
affection warming his voice. "From the inside."
"And then there was the invisible man," Mom says, laughing.
"I was so excited about presenting him to the scientific
community."
"I don't remember an invisible man," Dad says.
"And with the entire Harvard Research team there, I pull
out an empty tray. Nobody. No. Body. You thought it was
pretty amusing as I recall." Mom finally comes up for air
and that's when she notices Dad's face.
"I don't remember." Dad looks worried. "It's a blank."
"I'm sorry." Mom lays her hand over Dad's.
"I don't remember anything for months before..." Dad
closes his eyes. He's never talked like this before. I
don't know what it all means.
"I didn't realize Mulder still had gaps," Mr. Skinner says,
looking at Dad with concern in his eyes.
"We hoped it would come back, but he doesn't have any
memories for months before his disappearance," Mom
says.
"Disappearance?" What are they talking about? The adults
all turn to me as if they forgot I was there. "What did they
do to you, Dad? Is that how you got your scars?"
Dad shakes his head and looks at Mom.
"Before you were born, before we even knew that I
was pregnant, your father went missing on a case."
"Went missing?" I ask. "Like someone kidnapped him?"
Pain flashes across Dad's face.
"We really don't know what happened," Mom says quickly.
"When we found him, months later, he had the scars on his
chest and he was very sick. It was a long time before he
got well again."
I'm embarrassed to have this all dragged out in front
of a stranger. Skinner looks like he wants to disappear
into a hole in the floor. Mom looks like she wants to
cry and Dad looks like he's in pain.
"Dad, what did they do to you?" I cry.
"I don't know," he says, the pain in his voice hurts me.
"I don't remember."
"Somebody kidnapped and hurt Dad and you never
told me?" I ask Mom, my voice screechy in my ears.
"Why?"
"We...we were always going to tell you, when you were
older," Mom says.
I'm older, I want to say, but Dad is pushing himself
away from the table.
"I'm sorry, Kate," he says. "We should have told you
sooner."
"Mulder, are you all right?" Mom asks.
"I have a headache. I'm going upstairs to lay down."
Mom nods and says she'll come up in a little while
to check on him.
I can't bear to stay in the dining room and ask to
be excused. It's only when I get up to my room
that I realize I left Mom with all the cleanup after
dinner.
Part of me says that it serves her right for keeping
me in the dark for so many years about what happened
to Dad when I was born. I sit on the bed and listen to
the drum of the shower in my parent's bathroom.
I worry about Dad and hope the hot water makes
his headache feel better.
Guilt creeps up over me and I decide to go downstairs
and help Mom with the dishes. I pass my parent's
room as I head for the stairs. It's quiet inside.
As I reach the bottom of the steps, I hear voices.
Mom and Mr. Skinner are in the kitchen. Water
splashes and dishes clink as they do the dishes and talk.
"Sometimes I'm jealous," Mom is saying. "Kate is so
close to Mulder, which is natural, I suppose. I'm gone
so much for my job and he's here."
I hate that Mom is talking about me with this guy.
Maybe he's an old friend of hers, but he's a stranger to
me.
"I'm sure she loves you," Mr. Skinner says.
Who is this guy to speak for me? He knows nothing
about how I feel. Okay, I do love Mom, but it's none
of his business.
"I know she does, but we're at odds so much of the
time. I feel like the 'bad cop' to Mulder's 'good cop'.
He's not trying to curry her favor, it's just that rules
aren't his thing."
Skinner laughs. "I can attest to that."
"Sometimes I think it's because of all he went through.
Wet towels on the bathroom floor and crumbs on the
table are *so* not worth worrying about when you've
suffered like he has. Maybe he's right."
"Dana, I don't think it's about being right or being
wrong. "
"I know," Mom says. "It's just...it's just so hard
to be on the outside looking in."
I hear clinking and rustling and then soft murmuring.
My throat feels prickly as I wonder why they stopped
talking. I don't want to look, but I have to find out.
I slip into the doorway where I see my Mom
wrapped up in Skinner's huge embrace.
How could Mom be hugging somebody other than Dad?
I can't believe it. I back out of the doorway as quietly
as I can, dropping into a crouch as soon as I'm safely
out of sight. My stomach hurts.
After a few minutes, I hear shuffling and then the
cabinet door open. "Coffee?" Mom asks, her voice
sounds like she's crying.
"Sure."
I listen to the swooshing of the coffee maker overlaid
by the sound of Mom blowing her nose. Why does the
thought of Mom sniffling make me want to cry too?
"Tell me again about the victim," Skinner says.
"You were so upset when you called, I don't know
if I got it all straight."
Chairs scrape against the kitchen floor and a spoon
tinkles against the side of a mug.
"Hikers found the body of a man in a wooded area
near Wononskopomuc Lake," Mom says.
"Wono-what?"
"Wononskopomuc. It's about five miles from here.
Anyway, the local police took one look at the
condition of the body and called my office."
There is a few seconds of silence and I picture Mom
looking down at her coffee. I remember seeing an
article in the newspaper about a body found by the
lake, but I didn't connect it to Mom. I try not to
think to much about what Mom actually does at work.
The quiet is broken when Skinner clears his throat.
"What was it about the body?"
"The body was...mutilated. Barely healed scars on the
torso and face. And other places." Mom's voice is
thick with pain. "I recognized the pattern immediately."
"Like Mulder," Skinner says.
"The placement of the scars was identical--the main
cut running up the abdomen and chest and then radiating
over each shoulder to the back. The scars in other areas
matched, too. Of course, by the time we found Mulder, his
level of healing was more advanced, but I'm convinced
they're from the same cause."
My hand flies to my mouth and I stifle a scream. I never
believed the story that Dad got the scars in an accident,
but I never really thought about him being in terrible
pain or anything--maybe I blocked that out, I don't
know.
I never pictured somebody torturing him.
The scars had always just been a part of Dad the way her
blue eyes were a part of Mom and my mop of brown hair
was a part of me.
But they weren't just patterns on Dad's skin. Someone
had cut him and hurt him deliberately. This person was
still out there; he'd cut this other man and killed him.
"What was the cause of death?" Skinner asks.
"That's the thing," Mom says. "In spite of the scarring,
there was no clear cause of death. Whatever had been
done to him, the wounds were healing. "
"There must have been something."
"Nothing conclusive. Lack of muscle tone, slight dehydration,
possibly the result of a period of captivity."
"That's one way to describe it," Skinner says.
The kitchen is quiet for a couple of moments, and I'm
wondering how I'm going to get upstairs without making
noise. Then I hear Mom's voice again.
"I made a few inquiries," she says. "Two other bodies
have turned up in the last three months--one in New
Hampshire and one in Pennsylvania."
"With scars like..."
"The same pattern. Varying stages of healing on the
cuts."
"What do you think?" Skinner asks.
"I don't know what to think," Mom answers. "I'm so
frightened. I can't tell Mulder. You saw him tonight
when he was reminded of what happened."
"You may not have a choice, Dana. He deserves to
know about this new development."
"I know," Mom says. "I just hope he's strong enough
to hear it."
My face is wet with tears. I can't bear to think about
something happening to my dad. My mind is racing.
I hear the scrape of chairs again, and wonder how I'm
going to get upstairs without Mom finding me. But
Mom's compulsive need to leave the kitchen clean
comes to my rescue. I sneak up the stairs to the
sound of water running.
Continued in part 2.