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mulderwearingglasses · 1 year

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Stupid Cupid

Summary: When a work emergency prompts the FBI to call in their best and brightest on Valentine's Day evening, Mulder shows up in a tuxedo, prompting Scully to wonder what kind of hot date he had just abandoned.

Scully must quiet the jealous storm brewing within as the two work together to search for a little boy. Scully soon finds all is not as it seems, and maybe this won't be the worst Valentine's Day, after all.

Word Count: 5,325 // Read on AO3

The shrill ring of a phone snapped Scully out of a dream she wished she could continue -- one that she’d been having more often lately involving a certain coworker and the olfactory overwhelm that happened whenever she got near him and inhaled the leather-y, salty, aftershave-y musk that was Fox Mulder.

Groggily fumbling the phone to her ear, she answered with a sleep-thick “Hello?” and grew increasingly alert as she heard an addled Skinner on the other line telling her about a kidnapping of a senator’s kid, how this was of utmost importance, top priority, how the bureau needed their top people on this and how he needed her to get down there ASAP.

It was clear he was surrounded by bustling agents peppering him with questions -- God, was it only 9:30 p.m. on a Friday? It felt so much later, but, then again, it didn’t really matter -- so she just responded in the affirmative and told her boss she’d be right there.

“Agent Scully, have you had anything to drink?” he asked.

“Uh...no, sir,” Scully said, eyes shifting to a half-full glass of chamomile tea on her coffee table. She assumed that was not the kind of beverage her boss was referring to.

“OK, great,” he said. “Please, hurry.”

He said to come as she was -- that everyone had. That time was of the essence.

When the line went dead, she stumbled into the bedroom so she could at least throw on a clean sweatshirt over her favorite New York Knicks t-shirt, which no longer smelled like its original owner but felt symbolic in the same way writing Brad McDonald’s name in her sixth grade social studies notebook over and over felt like it meant something.

She ran a toothbrush through her mouth, which felt filmy and dry in the way only falling asleep on the couch could do, and grabbed her bag, out the door and to her car before her thoughts could even catch up with her.

Cranking the ignition and speeding out of her parallel parking spot, Scully’s mind wandered to her partner and imagined him doing the same dance she was, although his insomniac tendencies -- and the fact that it was 9:30, Jesus Christ, she was lame -- meant he was at least probably awake when he got the call.

As she drove in silence, Scully let her thoughts warm up along with the car engine. It made sense to call in profile boy genius Mulder, but she wasn’t quite sure what her medical know-how could add to a kidnapping case at the moment.

She smiled as she imagined Skinner hanging up with Mulder and taking a beat before calling her, knowing that Mulder worked best when she was around. That they were a team. That they were something special together. That she was with him and he was with her, a package deal.

She let herself have these warm and fuzzy thoughts while she could, knowing that the frantic fight to save a child’s life was ahead of her and all that entailed.

She pulled into the parking garage and hustled up the operation room where she could see a frenzy of activity.

When Scully walked through the door, a room full of curious eyes landed on her and gave her a quick once over before returning to their activities.

Everyone was so...dressed up, Scully thought. Like, really dressed up. Several female agents stood before her in cocktail dresses with updos and pristine makeup. Men wore suits and ties, but the kind they save for outside office hours.

The air was thick with perfumes and colognes.

As Skinner -- who looked just as dapper -- finished up a phone call, Scully stood in the doorway awaiting further instruction and scanned the room looking for -- oh my god, Mulder.

His eyes were already locked on her when she found him toward the back of the room, standing over the printer.

Mulder was dressed in a tuxedo?? A tuxedo! With dress shoes!

When her eyes locked onto his, he smiled and held up his hand in a wave, motioning that he’d be over once the documents finished printing.

Was everyone going undercover? Was her outfit en route? Was this some kind of bizarre-o dream? Why did everyone look like they were about to do some sort of red carpet event when she was clad in black leggings, a sweatshirt and -- oof -- she didn’t think she’d even run a brush through her hair, gone puffy and scraggly from her post-work couch nap.

Her face was barren, having washed off her work makeup before she crashed in front of the TV. Her freckles were on high alert.

Come as you are! Everyone had! And everyone had just happened to leave the opera, or what?

Scully could see Mulder watching her.

His eyes followed hers as the wheels in her head spun.

Finally, Skinner walked to the center of the room, and everyone seemed to snap to attention. He cleared his throat, and the room settled.

“Thank you all for being here,” Skinner said, before launching into a rundown of the facts of the case, the players involved, a couple leads.

Everyone took notes, paying close attention.

“I know this isn’t how you wanted to spend your night, especially on a night like tonight, but I’m sure I don’t have to tell you how critical the next couple hours will be for getting Julian back safe and sound.”

Skinner started handing out assignments.

“Especially on a night like tonight?” Scully mused internally.

She could feel Mulder’s eyes back on her as her eyebrows knitted together in contemplation. With the intensity of his gaze, it felt like he was reading her running inner-commentary.

“Agent Mulder, Agent Scully,” Skinner said, snapping her attention back. “I want you to head to the Hilton downtown. Julian’s parents were there at the Valentine’s Day ball, and I want you to be on scene.”

Valentine’s Day. Valentine’s Day. Jesus Christ. Of course.

She had been cognizant that it was coming, obviously. The heart-shaped chocolates and sad red rose arrangements were popping up in the drug store and the sitcoms she kept on in the background on the rare occasion she was home at a reasonable hour to make dinner were having their holiday episodes where the lead characters dangled in front of audiences across the span of too many episodes in agonizing “will-they-won’t-they” fashion finally shared a kiss or a candy heart exchange.

Scully didn’t hate Valentine’s Day -- she thought giving the day that much power was worse than simply letting it wash over her. Another Valentine’s Day alone. Another Valentine’s Day where her mom would call a few days prior, an eagerness in her voice that made Dana angry, to ask if she had any plans for the weekend.

Sure, the day was fun when you were freshly coupled or when you were in the second grade and got to make one of those Valentine mailboxes out of a shoe box, but it was now just a day to Dana Scully. Maybe a day where she’d snag a cupcake with frosting that would turn her mouth pink from the bureau’s cafeteria, but just an average Friday, nonetheless.

And on this Friday, she and Mulder had been busy from morning till he cut out a few minutes early, chasing down leads and making plans for a potential mothman reconnaissance mission the two were embarking on next week. She hadn’t had time for the cupcake, hadn’t had time to think about the day or why Mulder had left the office a few minutes earlier than usual.

She’d simply bid him a goodnight and headed home, tired from the long week, and conked out on the couch after noshing on some leftover pizza.

Happy Valentine’s Day, indeed.

And here she stood, surrounded by agents with grand-plans-now-interrrupted. Agents whose ensembles told a story of fancy dinner reservations, dances, theater tickets, parties. Whose winged eyeliner and bobby pinned curls meant they were desired, loved, lusted over.

Whose dress shoes and tuxedo meant Mulder was desired, loved, lust over.

Her stomach lurched. Cheeks burned.

She self-consciously tugged at the bottom of her sweatshirt, tried to tuck a frizzy curl behind her ear.

She could feel Mulder’s eyes burning a hole in her skull, but she couldn’t dare meet his gaze. She could feel her eyes burning, praying they weren’t red-rimmed.

She didn’t want to know who he was with...where...how long.... She couldn’t know. Not now. They had work to do.

“And Agent Bender, please go with Agents Mulder and Scully,” Skinner said. “I know you talked to the parents on the phone earlier. You’ll be familiar to them.”

Suddenly, Mulder’s hand was gripping Scully’s arm.

“Scully...” he said, in a tone laced with guilt, almost as if the next words out of his mouth wanted to be “I can explain” but what was there to explain?

They were not together.

Well, they were quite literally always together, but they weren’t together together. They simply called each other in the middle of the night when one or the other had a nightmare and knew each other’s coffee order depending on coffee chain and had spare clothes at each other’s places and nursed each other back from the brink of death on countless occasions and had broken down in each other’s arms and spent too many a tension-filled evening falling in love in clandestine seclusion on a shitty motel bed over styrofoam boxes of lukewarm takeout.

Agents headed out the door to their respective assignments staring at the Mulder and Scully locked in a grip, parting around them like the Red Sea.

Agent Bender -- a brown-haired, brown-eyed woman who Scully noted always wore lip gloss and was wearing a beautiful blush satin spaghetti strap dress tonight -- sidled up next to the two, eyes darting back and forth from Mulder to Scully to their connected arms and back again.

Sensing this was not the time, Mulder let go and Scully flinched back into herself.

“Um,” Bender said, breaking the tension. “I’ll drive.”

By the time they made the stilted walk to the bureau car lot, Bender had regaled the two with wistful details about her evening cut short: her boyfriend-of-one-month Lloyd had bought her that designer bag she had always wanted and taken her for drinks on some rooftop somewhere in the city. Before she could get a drink in her, Skinner was calling.

“If only I had downed something faster, I could have gotten out of this,” she said, followed by an exaggerated sigh.

“What about you?” Bender said pointing to Mulder as she unlocked the car. “What were you doing ton-”

“While I appreciate the recaps, I don’t think we have time for all this bonding,” Scully said bitterly, cutting Bender off.

Mulder cleared his throat, subconsciously loosening his bow tie.

He opened the passenger door for Scully who stalked past him, throwing the back sedan door open and sliding in with her arms crossed.

“Scully, I -”

“Mulder, you get car sick,” Scully said, briskly. “Get in, take the front, and let’s go.”

Bender looked in the rearview mirror, eyes dancing between a pissed off Scully in the backseat and an anxious Mulder in front a few times before she started the car and took off toward the Hilton.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Mulder’s head was muddled as he flew to the bureau after getting a call from Skinner about a kidnapping.

His thoughts were already in a weird place -- his Valentine’s Day was not exactly what he had expected -- and now a kid case. Kid cases always messed with his head. His mind drifted to Samantha, to the Eve’s, and, as always, to Scully.

He was hoping he might see her tonight. He didn’t know what her Valentine’s plans were. He had tried to suss it out a number of times in the previous weeks, but it seemed like Scully didn’t want to talk about it. Maybe she was already half a bottle of wine deep with some guy she met at the gym.

About 15 minutes after he made it to the bureau and was put to work while Skinner organized the crew, he spotted a tuft of copper hair bouncing toward the operation room, and he felt a warmth spread throughout his bones.

When she stepped through the door, he couldn’t help but smile.

She hadn’t seen him yet, but she looked adorable. Like the version of herself Mulder had the privilege of knowing when they’d had an especially long travel day and she was sleepy and not the pristinely put-together Scully she worked so hard to present to the world.

He liked her when her freckles started peaking through her makeup and her hair got fluffy and she got a little loopy with tiredness. Hell, he liked her all the time.

As she looked around the room, he watched her head cock to the side and her eyebrows furrow increasingly.

When she spotted him, he gave her a dopey grin and waved like a dork before he could stop himself.

Her eyes bugged out at the sight of him. He looked down at himself and remembered he was wearing a tuxedo.

Oh, right.

He watched her hands glide over her hair, tug at her sweatshirt. She smiled at him and waved back, but had a befuddled expression on her face.

A quick scan of the room, and it was suddenly evident to Mulder that one of these things was not like the other.

Everyone but Scully was dressed to the nines. Everyone was coming off of Valentine’s dates....except for Scully?

His heart clenched. He didn’t want her to feel self-conscious. She was easily the most beautiful woman in the room. No one else could even compare.

He suddenly wanted to whisk her out of the room, take her somewhere else and away from the harsh lights and wandering eyes of the operation room.

Scully still looked confused as Skinner began talking. Mulder couldn’t take his eyes off her, but he dutifully took notes with his eyes trained on his partner. He’d been doing it for years now. No sweat.

Suddenly, Scully’s eyes went wide, and a deep rouge overtook her ivory cheeks.

Skinner had given them their assignment at the Valentine’s Day ball.

Oh, shit.

She forgot it was Valentine’s Day, didn’t she? They hadn’t mentioned it at all during the day, had been too busy planning for a mothman adventure in the next week.

She didn’t even ask questions when he ducked out a few minutes early.

He wanted to explain, wanted to tell her everything but she wouldn’t even look at him.

He broke out into a cold sweat which only intensified when Skinner assigned Agent Bender to go with them.

Great.

The woman who practically bathed in cotton candy-scented body spray that gave Mulder a headache whenever he passed her in the hallway.

He tried to get her attention before they left the room, but she refused to meet his gaze and then the two of them were following behind Bender, left to fend for themselves downwind of the lethal sugar aroma.

After a painfully awkward car ride in which Bender talked their ears off about some poor sap named Lloyd who sounded as boring as Bender, the crew arrived at the hotel and transformed into work mode.

Mulder and Scully had worked together plenty of times under awkward circumstances -- fights, petty jealousies, when the sexual tension had gotten too thick and made things weird -- and the work always saw them through.

They worked together efficiently and professionally, communicating as the three of them took statements and interviewed witnesses at the hotel and began the tedious task of watching hours of security camera footage.

The missing kid, 7-year-old Julian, had been in a hotel room watching Disney movies in bed while his 16-year-old sister Carla was in an adjoining room talking on the phone with her boyfriend while their parents danced the night away in the ballroom below them.

“A 16-year-old was having a more exciting Valentine’s Day than me,” Scully thought glumly before kicking herself for having such an insensitive thought.

Bender interviewed the parents while Mulder and Scully talked to Carla.

They sat in a corner of the bustling lobby, teeming with local law enforcement and federal agents, as moonlight filtered in through the hotel’s big windows.

Scully spilled a big splotch of coffee on her sweatshirt as they got settled and cut a glance at Mulder who she expected to be cracking a grin at his clumsy partner, but he hadn’t noticed. His eyes were faraway and pleading.

Scully knew this was exactly the kind of case to get her partner in a funk. She was sure he related to Carla -- a sibling taken right from under their nose. The guilt and shame of it all.

He was being especially kind and careful with his questioning. When Carla started to get emotional, he offered her an olive branch.

“My sister was taken when I was watching her too, Carla,” he said. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“Your sister...” she said. “Did they find her?”

Mulder looked away, cursing himself for mentioning it.

“They....” he started. “We’ll find Julian. I promise.”

With that, he stood up and left the room for a minute while Scully took over.

When she was through, she reunited Carla with her parents and went to find Mulder, who had wandered to a stairwell in the hotel.

His bowtie was untied, and he was standing with his head hung.

“Hey,” Scully said, softly resting her hand on his shoulder from behind.

He lifted his head and turned around to face her.

“Hey,” he said back, softly.

“You okay?” Scully asked, plucking the bow tie from around his neck and stashing it in her purse.

“I’m an idiot,” he replied, rubbing his face over his hands.

“Well, sure, but we knew that already,” Scully said, a teasing lilt to her mouth, as she rubbed Mulder’s arm soothingly.

Mulder huffed out a laugh through his nose.

“But really, Mulder, you were very good with her,” Scully said. “You have shown her kindness in a dark time, which is not always something you were shown.”

“It is now, Scully,” he said, pulling a flyaway curl from Scully’s head and tucking it behind her ear. “You show me kindness.”

The pair smiled, Mulder’s hand still lingering behind her ear, retracting when Bender barged through the stairwell which suddenly reeked of cotton candy.

She paused, studying the two agents for a moment, before saying “They got him. Julian. He’s safe.”

Mulder and Scully exhaled loudly, bodies sagging in relief.

“Turns out, the kid wandered out of the hotel by himself, off looking for his own Disney adventure,” Bender said. “The hotel clerk who said she saw a man run off with a little boy matching his description has shit vision, it turns out. Must have been his own little screamin’ demon. Those damn astigmatisms, will get you every time. Anyway, Julian was found curled up asleep in a McDonald’s play place a few minutes ago. They’re going to get him checked out, but looks like not a hair out of place.”

“Thank God,” Scully said.

“Yeah,” Bender said. “Can’t believe I ditched cosmos with Lloyd for some kid who wanted to go down the slide. Anyway, local PD has it from here. Skinner’s called us off. I, uh, called Lloyd, and he said he’d forgive me for ditching him if I -- well, I’ll spare you the details, but are you two able to get the car back?”

Mulder and Scully exchanged amused glances.

“We’ll manage,” Mulder said. “Give Lloyd my regards.”

“Thanks,” Bender said. “You two have...plans for the rest of the evening?”

“Coming down from a cotton candy-induced stupor,” Mulder mumbled under his breath, and Scully put her hand over her mouth to stifle a laughter.

Bender, who hadn’t heard Mulder’s quip, narrowed her eyes at the two.

“You two are weird,” she said. “And I’m gonna go. See ya.”

“Mulder!” Scully hissed when Bender was out of earshot.

“Well, I hate that perfume!” Mulder said. “She’s gonna trigger a migraine one of these days.”

“I thought you’d like working with her,” Scully said, twirling her finger around a piece of her hair.

“Bender?” Mulder questioned.

“She’s...” Scully pursed her lips, trying to decide how she’d like to finish that sentence. “Tall.”

Mulder guffawed.

“Yes, her height was refreshing,” Mulder teased, knocking his hip against his partners as they started walking toward the car.

Scully yawned and stumbled into Mulder, her cheeks coloring as he grabbed her side to steady her.

“Woah,” he said, righting her. “Sleepy?”

Scully shook her head vehemently.

“Nope,” she said, a stubborn rigidity to her voice. “Wide awake.”

At least they were about to be alone where he could explain his evening to her in private -- something he wasn’t sure why he felt the need to do, but he did. Very much so.

A light snow had started to fall, so Mulder opened the passenger door for Scully while he took the ice scraper and got to work on the car windows.

By the time he was done, Scully’s head was tilted against the passenger window, and she was fast asleep.

He smiled to himself. She could fall asleep anywhere, any time.

He warmed the car up for her and started heading toward the bureau garage before reverting course. He couldn’t drop her off at her car to drive the rest of the way home. He wasn’t about to have her fall asleep behind the wheel.

His place wasn’t far away. She could have the couch, and he’d make do elsewhere.

The warm car ride must have lulled Scully into a deep sleep. Her gentle snores were accompanied by occasional twitches and murmurs. Mulder kept his hands at ten and two, but his eyes did wander to his sleeping partner every so often.

When he noticed what looked like a shiver run up her small body curled against the side of the car, he shrugged out of his tuxedo jacket and draped it over Scully, enveloping her in his body heat and that Mulder smell.

Reflexively, she pulled the jacket closer and inhaled, a sigh escaping her lips.

“Mulder...” she mewed in sleep.

He couldn’t wipe the cheeky grin off his face.

By the time they got to his building, he didn’t have the heart to wake her up. He knew his partner could sleep through a jackhammer convention, so he hoped that held true because if she woke up through this, she’d surely kill him.

He got out of the car gently opened her car door, letting her dead weight lean on his sturdy body. He cradled the underside of her knees and her back in his arms and lifted her out of the car, making sure to keep his jacket tucked around her. She stirred in his arms and snuggled closer into his chest, another sweet sigh escaping her lips.

Mulder buried his nose in her hair, lightly kissing the crown of her head before hauling Scully up into his building.

In a genius maneuver Mulder was excessively proud of, he hiked his leg and anchored it to the door to help balance Scully on top of while he unlocked his apartment one-handedly, sweeping her into his place that glowed green with aura of fish tank.

Setting her gently on his couch, he repositioned his jacket over her while he drew back to go get changed.

It was only when she lost his body warmth that she stirred enough -- mumbling in protest -- to wake herself.

Mulder turned around once he heard her sleepy groans and watched as her eyes popped open.

With cat-like reflexes, she darted up and looked around, a panic in her eyes.

Mulder rushed over, placing his hands on her shoulders.

“Hey, hey,” he said. “You’re alright. You’re in my apartment. You’re OK.”

She slumped back into the couch.

“What the hell, Mulder?” she said, annoyed. “What's going on?”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to freak you out,” he said. “You fell asleep on the way back to the bureau, and I didn’t think you should drive if you were that tired. I just took you here to crash. Is that....OK?”

“I would have been fine to drive,” she muttered.

“I’m sure you would have been,” Mulder said. “Do you want some tea?”

“I -- well. Yes. Please,” Scully said, her expression softening a bit.

“Coming right up,” Mulder said, smiling at her.

As he puttered around his kitchen, a place that felt foreign to him in his own home, he thought now would be a good time to casually bring up what had been nagging at him all night.

“So, I wanted to tell you about tonight --” he started, his back turned to Scully as he searched through his cabinet for some honey.

“Mulder, you don’t need...I don’t...You don’t owe me an explanation,” Scully said, measuredly. “I’m.....happy for you.”

He turned around and quirked his head, inquisitive eyes boring into her.

“Um,” Mulder started again. “I’m...happy for you, too, Scully. I was at the Butterfly Kisses Valentine’s Dance.”

“I don’t need details, Mulder,” Scully interjected, turning red with an envy she couldn’t keep at bay.

“It’s a father/daughter dance,” he said.

That shut her up.

Her head snapped up to look at him as her jaw fell.

Finally, he could talk.

“I was there with Maya,” Mulder said, walking toward Scully, two steaming mugs in hand which he gently set down in front of her and took a seat beside her.

“Maya is nine. She’s the daughter of Joseph Richter. Agent Richter and I worked together quite a bit in my first years with the bureau. One case, there was a serial convenience store robber in town who kept shooting the convenience store clerks. They couldn’t catch the guy. We thought it would be an easy day. Things, uh....” Mulder scratched the five-o-clock shadow appearing on his chin and stared off through his window, the snow falling gently through the beams of streetlights.

“Things didn’t go as planned,” Mulder said. “We, um, well, Agent Richter was shot. We had just switched positions as we approached the suspect. The bullet was meant for me. Richter had a wife and a little girl at home.”

Mulder didn’t notice until now that some time during his speech, Scully had grabbed his hand and was rubbing soft circles against his skin with her thumb.

“We lost Agent Richter. I had to tell his wife, Ann. They had only been married a few years. Anyway, I told her that myself and the rest of the agents with us on that case would always be around to help. Sometimes I’ll change their porch light or clean their gutters. This year, Ann called and said there was a father/daughter dance at Maya’s school for Valentine’s Day. She asked if one of us could take Maya. The rest of the guys had dates but I...was available, so. Anyway. I was with Maya tonight. That’s where I was.”

Mulder pulled back and picked up his cup of tea with shaky hands and took a ragged sip, steam masking the hurt played out across his face.

Scully stared at him with big, wet eyes.

“I’m sorry your evening with Maya was cut short,” she said, hiding a tremble in her voice.

“We got through the dance, so that’s good,” Mulder said. “I was just about to take her for ice cream to make up for my two left feet, but luckily her mom was there, too, so I told her I’d take a rain check for some rocky road, scout’s honor.”

Scully smiled softly.

“I bet you made that little girl feel like a princess,” she said, smoothing the collar of Mulder’s crisp, white shirt.

“I hope so!” Mulder said. “She certainly looked like one -- purple, sparkly tutu and all. Speaking of...” he said, scooting closer to Scully. “What happened here, princess?” he said, a teasing gleam in his eye as he pointed to the coffee stain on Scully’s sweatshirt.

“Oh,” Scully said, softly, embarrassed. “I’m a mess. When I walked in...everyone looked so dressed up and there I was looking like...well, like this. I sort of...forgot...what day it was. Lame, I know. When Skinner called tonight, I was actually asleep on the couch, if you can believe it. I’m sure you can. When I saw you dressed like this....and then Skinner said it was Valentine’s Day....Well, I’m sorry I was so unpleasant all night. I just felt.....I don’t know. Silly, I guess.”

Sometime during Scully’s rambling, Mulder had picked up her hand and was rubbing soft circles against her skin with his thumb.

She smiled down at his reciprocated act of comfort.

“You don’t look like a mess to me,” he said, quietly, staring deeply into Scully’s blue eyes.

“No?” Scully questioned, their soft breathing the only sound that could be heard as they gazed.

“No,” Mulder responded, snapping out of the moment after too long of a pause. “Aside from this coffee stain. Take that sweatshirt off, and I’ll pop it in the washer. I’ll give you something of my mine in the meantime.”

“Uhhhh,” Scully said. “No, no, that’s fine. It’s not a big deal.”

“Scully, while I promise it’s better than cotton candy, you smell like a Starbucks,” Mulder said. “C’mon, it’s no trouble. It’ll be good as new in the morning.”

Eyes glued to the floor, Scully grumbled as she tossed the sweatshirt over her head and clamped her arms over the front of her New York Knicks T-shirt.

Mulder tried to fight off a smile.

“Heyyy,” he said, in mock discovery. “I know that shirt.”

He rubbed the material between his fingers.

“Thought I lost it,” he said. “Haven’t seen it in a while.”

“Hmm,” Scully said, busying herself with her tea. “Must have been at the bottom of my laundry hamper. I just did a load this evening and threw something on before leaving the house.”

“Interesting,” Mulder said, stifling a grin.

Scully shrugged nonchalantly, blowing on her mug, followed by a massive yawn.

“Right,” Mulder said, standing. “You’re tired. Let me get you a pillow and some blankets.”

Scully blushed as she realized she was still hugging Mulder’s jacket close to her body. She picked it up and folded it neatly beside her.

When Mulder came back, he looked at the jacket next to her and the goosebumps rising on her arms.

“That’s OK,” he said, handing her a sweatshirt. “You can keep it tonight. I’m sure you’ve got it all warmed up to your liking.”

He picked up the jacket and laid it back over her, placing another fleece blanket on top and lying a pillow on the end of the couch for her.

Scully reclined, settling in under the soft, Mulder-y warmth of multiple items of his clothing.

“Mulder, where are you going to sleep?” she asked, through another yawn.

“Don’t worry about me, Scully,” Mulder said, sitting on the floor with his back propped up against the couch. “I’ve got some late-night infomercials to catch up on.”

He turned the TV on low and heard Scully getting comfortable behind him, snuggling deep into the leather indents of his couch.

Scully wondered if nestling against Mulder’s couch imprint was the closest she’d ever get to cuddling with the real thing. But the back of his head was sat close enough for her to run her fingers through if she wanted, so she was more than content to fall asleep wrapped in his clothes, his scent so close.

As she started to doze, she heard Mulder whisper “Happy Valentine’s Day, Scully.”

She smiled and hummed back to him.

“Happy Valentine’s Day, Mulder.”

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