Originally posted: 20 October 2003
Summary: a typical day will be anything but typical for him.
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: Characters belong to Fox etc.
Spoilers: SUZ and Closure
Everything on the street seems so normal. The lawns of the quaintly manicured homes are so perfectly green, they appear painted on. The leaves, each moving independently in the breeze, somehow also manage to move together in symphonic harmony. The sun glows brightly over everything. He wishes he could immerse himself in this simple perfection and aches because he can’t.
He notices a young couple with their baby – a girl, he thinks – walking their dog and enjoying the lovely morning. The couple is doing their best not to look at the hearse parked along the curb, but can’t help doing so out of respect – or at least acknowledgement that today, while a typical day for them, will be anything but typical for someone else.
He stares solemnly out the window of a bare, third-floor room, hands in his pockets, feeling desperately alone. He knows now that his sister is dead, his father is dead, and now his mother is dead, too. The nakedness of the room he stands in befits him, as he feels stripped of any protective armour he may have once worn. Instead, he feels exposed and vulnerable.
He wasn’t especially close with either of his parents as an adult and wonders if they knew that what drove him all these years was the search for the security and comfort he knew for such a short while with them and his sister. He feels regret like a sunburn now and closes his eyes wishing he were anywhere but here.
When his eyes open he sees Scully approach the driver of one of the vehicles parked behind the hearse and has a brief conversation with him. He notices how tiny she looks and fleetingly wonders if others see her that way when she’s standing next to him. He sees her turn to look up at the window of the room she left only minutes earlier. It’s his cue that they’re ready to make their way to the cemetery. Slowly, he pulls himself away from the spot he’s been rooted to and moves his leaden feet, carrying his leaden heart along with him.