Momma Series
Momma (1/1)
Date: Sun, 14 Sep 1997 16:37:10 +0000
Author: RocketMan >[email protected]<
Disclaimer: The characters of Mulder and Scully are the property of CC,
1013, and Fox. No infringement is intended.
Ratings: G, VS, Scully is dead. Future possibility.
Momma (1/1)
I went through Momma's stuff yesterday, for the first time.
I went through it again today.
I guess I'm doing this because I didn't know her. And she fascinates me.
Her courage and will. The way she had totally captured Dad.
He can't think of anything else but her.
I want to know her.
She's my mother.
I found a lot of suits, professional clothes, nice clothes that I'd
never wear.
Maybe I'm not too much like my mom.
Dad says I am all the time though.
He'll hug me and laugh and say "Your momma was just as small as you."
I'm five foot three inches and I hate it.
I bet momma did too.
She was a professional, I knew from her clothes.
Even her casual clothes were nice.
I didn't find any pairs of jean shorts and only one pair of jeans.
I think that's sad.
I hate wearing stuffy uptight clothes for things.
Dad will let me go to work with him sometimes and I have to wear
something respectable.
I hate it.
But mom must have loved it.
I also found a diary written to Dad.
She was sick.
I knew she had died from cancer, but cancer was always this ambiguous
killer that lurked just below reality and struck at things that really
didn't affect me.
I didn't know her.
I assume I would have loved her.
I love my Dad, and he loved her beyond belief.
He loves her still.
I read her journal and I cried.
I think it was because she was real to me then.
My mom.
Someone I'll never have, never see except in pictures, never touch.
And here were her words, written in a clear precise hand, detailing the
horror of knowing that her body was against her.
I got that far yesterday and had to stop.
And today I read a bit more.
It made me cry for a different resaon.
She was falling in love with my Dad, but had this looming death that she
knew wouldn't go away.
I never really had Mom as any one thing in my mind.
There's this image that is always up there, of the woman in the picture
next to Dad's desk, smiling and looking beautiful.
But in this journal, her emotions are dark, complicated, revealing.
She isn't this image I had created.
I'm glad I'm getting to know her.
She called Dad by his last name, as do most people, but the way it was
used, the note it had attached to it, implied something so much more.
They had something.
I wish she were still here.
I want a Momma.
I want to know what it is, what that feels like.
I remember when I was six, the first I'd ever realized I didn't have a
mother and everyone else did.
A little girl was talking to me about her mother, and her making her
lunch for school and I said my Dad did.
She looked at me funny and said that daddies aren't supposed to make
lunches, mommies are.
Well, I cried so hard that the teacher had to call my Dad and get him to
pick me up.
I asked Dad why Momma didn't make my lunches and why I never had seen
her.
I guess all those times Dad told me that Momma was in heaven hadn't
really registered the actuality that she was dead.
And Dad told me.
He said that Momma was in heaven to watch over me much better, and that
she kept me company when I was all alone.
Well, I eventually figured out what that was.
And I don't really miss her.
She died when I was a little baby.
How can I miss someone I don't even know?
I just miss the mom part.
And reading that journal made me miss her.
Dana Scully.
A person who gave up her life so that I could be born healthy.
Oh God . . .
Dad never told me that before.
I had to read it in her entry.
The very last journal, the very last page.
She needed chemo but she was pregnant.
Dad wanted to go on with it, abort me, and let her live.
She didn't.
I can't believe it.
For me.
She didn't even know me, and she was laying down her life for me.
I wish it had been different.
I see pain on Dad's face whenever I talk too much about her.
It hurts.
She said it would.
On the last page of the last journal.
She told him that she would die anyway, with or without the chemo. She
told him that she would rather he have something to live for than to
extend her life any more.
She was ready to go.
She didn't want to leave me . . . but she knew she was going to.
I sat on the floor of the attic for a long time, thinking about how much
had been sacrificed for me to live.
How many times had Dad wanted to escape from the pain but hadn't because
of me?
How many times had he hated me before he finally loved me?
I carefully pulled down a light sundress from her closet.
Momma's dress.
The only casual one she had.
It was the one in the other picture we have of her.
The one beside my Dad's bed.
The one that I'd always hated because she had looked so sick there.
Dad thought it looked more like her though.
The dress was pale blue, with white widely patterned flowers.
I slipped it over my head and adjusted it on my body, then took my
shorts off that were underneath it.
My hair was a lighter shade of red than Momma's, little more blonde to
it, and my eyes were a dark green grey. Not pretty eyes, but hard and
tough, just like in the bedside picture. It acentuated my form in just
the right places and I knew then she really did have the same figure as
me.
I twirled around and the skirt billowed up and swirled around my legs.
I looked at it in the mirror for a long time and then smiled, softly.
It was exactly like the picture.
Mom must not have smiled a lot.
That's sad.
Dad doesn't smile unless I say or do something.
I make him smile.
Did Momma make him smile like I do?
Dad must have made her smile for that picture.
I turned halfway and then walked into the living room.
Dad glanced up at me from the desk, not really noticing until he had
already turned back to his work.
His face paled and he shook his head.
"Take that off."
I stood there, shocked, ready to cry at the harsh whisper coming from
him.
"What?"
"Go take that off. I don't want to see you wearing it again."
I trembled, then my anger took over.
"But-"
His steel cold look from across the room shot across at me and struck me
to the core.
I shut up and went back to the extra bedroom.
I took off the dress and put my shorts back on.
I came back into the living room but Dad wasn't there.
I went to my room and waited.
I knew Dad would come for me.
Punish me for going through that stuff because Momma was such a
precious, fragile subject for him.
He never really talked about her.
I wish I knew her.
She died for me, and I'm not even allowed to know her.
Dad came in at about midnight, sitting on my bed and stroking my back in
the darkness.
"I'm sorry baby. I . . ."
"It's okay Dad. Don't worry about it. I just wanted to know her."
He choked a bit and I winced.
"I wish you did. I wish could have. I wish she hadn't . . . left."
What had he been about to say?
That he wished she hadn't made that choice?
"I read her journals Dad."
His hand stopped rubbing and he leaned in.
"What journals?"
I stayed still and realized he didn't know about them.
"What journals, baby?"
"The ones in the box of stuff. That you said was Grandma's stuff."
"Her mother's box?"
"Yeah." I was afraid he would do something.
He was scaring me.
"Dad?"
"Show me, baby."
I jumped up and practically ran to the bedroom with him right behind me.
"Momma's stuff." I said as I got out the box.
He collapsed beside it and I heard him stifle a sob.
"Go, baby. Go back to bed."
I ran out.
"Daddy?" I said, confused at what time it was.
"Love, did you read all of them?"
I was instantly awake.
I looked at he clock and saw it was three in the morning.
Dad must have skipped to the end.
"Yeah." I said softly.
"You know she loved you. She didn't even know if you were going to be a
boy or a girl and she still loved you."
"Actually she says in there that she knew I'd be a girl."
I smiled and Dad came around to sit on the bed.
He drew me to him and hugged me tightly.
"I guess you deserve to know about her, huh? I was wrong to keep it from
you. I guess it hurt too much."
His voice lowered.
"I didn't want it all too touch you."
"You mean about the abduction and all that?"
He didn't say anything.
"Dad, that's crazy stuff. I don't believe it's true."
I saw his smile.
"That's the Scully in you talking, child."
"She said in there that you did."
"Yeah, I did."
Hmm........emphasis on did.
"Will you tell me about her? Will you tell me about my mother?"
He rubbed my back and made me lay down again.
"Tomorrow. But I will. I promise."
Dad turned and went back to the extra bedroom.
I couldn't sleep.
All I could think of was the woman in the picture next to Dad's bed.
I was finally going to know my savior.
end
adios
RocketMan
Momma 2
(1/2)Date: Tue, 23 Sep 1997 20:55:55 -0500
Author: RocketMan >[email protected]<
Disclaimer: Mulder and Scully belong to CC, 1013, and Fox. No
infringement is intended.
See Momma 1 for other.
Character is dead. Future.
Momma 2
Dad sat across from me in the extra bedroom, the box labeled Margaret
Scully beside him, and Momma's belongings in his hands.
She was shaking a little bit and he was biting his lip.
I knew he was afraid.
But I wasn't sure of what.
Maybe me.
"Love, did you see this?" he asked and pulled out an envelope.
I shook my head and he handed it to me.
My name was written in a steady, neat handwriting.
A letter from the dead.
"She worte this for me?"
He nodded. "I found it in the box last night when I looked for more
journals. I guess your grandmother didn't realize what she had."
I felt my own hands shake at reading something expressly written for me,
from a mother I did not know.
"Are you going to tell me about her, Dad?"
He nodded but did not begin.
I stayed silent, I knew this was how Dad began his long hard speeches.
ike the one he had to give me on puberty and all that. He was a wreck.
Dad wasn't cut out to talk to a girl about being a woman.
That was the first time I ever really wished I had my mom instead of my
Dad. I felt bad for thinking it afterwards, but then, I was embarrassed
and frustrated.
Dad sighed and I knew he was getting ready.
"Do you remember anything at all?" he asked first.
I frowned and squeezed my eyes shut to think.
My eyes popped open and I nodded. "I think so. But it was a dream I had,
so I don't know if it's right or not...."
"Tell me."
"Well, I dreamed that I had a bad dream and Momma came in to soothe me,
and she couldn't even pick me up because she was so weak, but I crawled
into her lap."
Dad sighed. "Yeah, that's right."
I beamed and he smiled slightly at me.
"Scully was really weak after you were born, love. She could hardly get
out of bed some days and those were her good days. But one week, when
you were about eighteen months, she heard you crying and I moved to get
up, but she stopped me. She struggled out of bed, didn't even let me
help her and went as quickly as she could to your room. It hurt her that
she couldn't hold you, but she hurt even more when she couldn't comfort
you."
I nodded and Dad sighed again; I could see tears in his eyes.
I took a breath and then made a decision.
"Dad, you don't have to tell me this if you don't want to." I said.
He looked at me, and seemed very tempted.
But then he shook his head.
"No, you deserve to know her."
And he proceeded to tell me about the X-Files.
end part one
adios
RocketMan
Momma 2
"She came in and I thought she was a spy. A spy."
Dad chuckled and fingered the soft material of the journal cover then
looked back to me.
"I tried my hardest to make her want to quit, ask for reassignment, just
leave. I didn't want to share, and I thought, well, I thought she'd hurt
me. Make fun of my reasons. She didn't do that. I told her right off why
I was with the X-Files and she listened. That's it. She didn't say I was
right, or depressed, or crazy. She listened. I guess that's what touched
me the most about her. She was so willing to give. Everything. For me,
for others, for you."
That was the most I'd ever heard about Momma in one sitting. I've caught
ideas and thoughts, but never actual events or whole sentences even.
"Well, she became very important to me. And so she got taken one night
while we were separated."
"What?"
Separated?
"See, the X-Files got shut down because we had been finding out too much
of the truth. And she was abducted by a man named Duane Barry, who gave
her to the aliens instead of himself."
Dad must have seen my face, because he nodded and shook his head. "My
own flesh and blood, and not a Believer." he murmured.
I laughed and said, "It's the Scully in me."
He smiled but his face went pensive again.
"She had some bad things done to her, love. Bad things that were never
resolved. She got cancer because of it. She was even infertile."
"But-"
"Wait." he said sharply and I shut up. Dad doesn't like to be
interrupted.
"Anyway, she had cancer. Inoperable. All that. Crushed me, but I was
stupid and foolish and I ignored it, thinking that eventually, if we
found the ultimate truth, we'd find her a cure too."
I looked at him with disdain, but the pain on his face made me stop and
take his hand.
He'd been punished for that thinking over and over no doubt.
"But she got worse . . ." His vocie stretched thin and I shuddered,
thinking of all this in the past that I hadn't been a part of, yet had
effected me so drastically.
"She got worse and I got crazy. I did really . . . suicidal things to
find the truth. I hurt her a lot. And then one night, after one
particularly stupid thing, she exploded at me. Actually, it was a very
quiet explosion at first. She started by talking quickly like she did
when she was angry, telling me that what I was doing wasn't going to
save her, that miracles are found in my belief, but in her science. She
said I had to believe in her, in us, to make it. She was telling me *I*
had to make it, like she had already given herself up for dead. I got
angry at that and we fought. Loudly, quietly, hurting each other. But at
the end, she was crying. I had only seen her cry twice I think. Once
when her father died, and once after she'd almost been killed by a
serial....."
Dad trailed off, seeing my face.
"Uh..."
"Dad!" I yelled. "A serial killer!"
He frowned. "Yeah, with a fetish for fingernails and hair. And Scully's
hair was beautiful...."
"A serial killer?"
"Yeah.....why?"
"You *never* told me what the X-Files were! Serial killers?"
"And mutants, aliens, paranormal activity...."
"After all this Momma still didn't believe?"
He snorted and tousled my hair, as he had when I was littler.
"That's the Mulder in you."
I smiled and he continued.
"Anyway. She was crying. For me. I didn't know what to do. We never got
very personal, really. I mean there were times when all we had was eahc
other, but it wasn't.....it wasn't sexual attraction. It was spiritual.
And so here was my strong, capable Scully, crying in front of me and I
freaked out. I grabbed her and tried to make her stop crying. I kept
saying 'Don't cry Scully. Don't cry.' Then she started laughing, and
that scared me even more. Until she explained that she was laughing at
me, at how frightened I was."
Dad smiled ruefully and rubbed a thumb across the journal again, as if
he were stroking Momma.
"Well, we ended up talking. Like we needed to from the very start. And
the talk healed us. We realized that we had this connection, and she let
me share her fear, her sorrow. I let her love me, she let me love her. I
was never one for feelings, or actually showing them. She showed me that
love isn't a bad thing. We got married as soon as possible. She knew she
didn't have much time."
Dad stopped and looked away from me, his next words showing me the
feelings he'd had then. How much he wanted her to live, and me to die.
"She told me she was pregnant; I asked her why the pill hadn't worked."
He drew in a shaky breath and looked at me apologetically. "She said she
had decided I needed you for when she was gone. I told her that she
wouldn't die and that I'd . . . I'd hate any child that had killed her."
My face paled and I had to swallow down the urge to throw up. His words
hurt me, and I knew he didn't mean it, but had then.
"Oh, babe, I'm sorry I ever felt like that. But you deserve to know the
truth. I'm big on that." He smiled hopefully and I smiled back, but
there were only tears behind it.
"She really didn't take to that idea. She wouldn't let me near her for a
week. And then I got caught up with an X-File and things got very tense
within the government, and I . . . well, I realized that I needed her.
Stupid me forgot in the first place. I apologized and she took me back.
Always giving....."
He trailed off, lost in some image, some memory that I wish I had known.
"It got worse, she hurt more, but she was determined to see through the
pregnancy. She always wanted a baby girl, a family, and she wanted it
for me too. It got so bad that a few times your heart stopped and scared
us to death. The doctors were telling us that there was no way you'd
make it. And that there was no way she'd make it. And I was telling her
she didn't have to do this; we could start over as soon as she was
better."
"But Momma wasn't getting better...." I said softly.
"No, and she knew it. Scully got so weak and sick that it began to
damage your health and so we had a C-section a month before your due
date. Everyone was afraid neither would make it."
He looked lost and I crawled up into his lap like I did when I was a
child.
He absently began to rub my hair and I close my eyes. My Dad was always
a good storyteller.
"I saw Scully the day after, finally. They wouldn't let me in before.
Actually she wouldn't let me in to see her; she said later that she was
truly sick, pale, wanting to die because she was in so much pain. She
wouldn't let me see that. So, I saw her the next day; I came in holding
you and she smiled so brightly, and I told her that I felt ashamed for
everything I'd said and I asked her for forgiveness."
Dad took deep breath, stopping as if his tale was finished.
"Go on, Daddy."
"No, love. I think you should learn her side before you do mine." Dad
nodded to the envelpoe and I remembered that fleeting dream of a weak
woman coming in to hold me after a bad dream.
"She loved me alot, huh?" I said, because I needed to know that.
"She fought for two years to stay with us, babe. Two years."
I nodded. So I was two when she died..... I never got memories of her
because of that.
"How did she die?"
Dad shuddered. "How about you read that and give me some time, huh?" he
said, and the joking manner he put it in gave way to the real fear
behind his eyes.
I realized why he was afraid.
He'd just conquered the sorrow, he'd just made it bearable and here I
was dredging that old, painful river.
"Okay Daddy. Maybe later then, right?"
"Sure babe. Later."
I waited, but he stayed and I realized he wanted me to leave him alone
with the remnants of Momma.
I left and bolted for my room.
The letter tumbled out and in it I found a necklace.
A cross necklace.
"Daddy?" I called.
"Yeah, love?"
"Where'd this come from?" I said, walking back to him.
His face went white and he shook.
He trembled.
"Daddy!"
He stopped me and took the necklace from my hands.
"Where'd you get this?"
"In the letter."
"Oh....God....." he whispered.
"Dad?"
"I'm okay. I just thought it was lost. I'm glad it's not."
He was more than gald. He looked like a huge weight had just been lifted
from his shoulders.
"It was Scully's. I found it in the trunk of Duane Barry's car . . .
it's almost a symbol to me, of her trust in me...."
I nodded. "Here, then."
"No, you wear it. You're the Scully."
I smiled and put it on, the gold cross shimmering a bit in the new light
and fresh air.
"Looks good," he said roughly.
I left him then to the tears, and the mastering of his sorrow.
I read the letter in my bedroom, fingering the cross.
end Momma 2......he he he..now you have to read Momma 3 to know what's
in the letter......=-P
adios
RocketMan
Momma 3
Date: Sun, 28 Sep 1997 22:08:18 +0000
Author: RocketMan >[email protected]<
Disclaimer: Mulder and Scully are the property of CC, 1013, and Fox. No
infringement is intended.
Rating: A, future story......read Momma before.......sorry for that last
one, it was short, but I had to get off and let my brother use the
computer.
Momma 3
The letter was written on regular notebook paper, with a black pen, so
that her handwriting was distinct and clear.
I could tell near the end she was getting weak by the way the letters
wobbled.
I sighed and began.
<Dear Julia,
I'm not writing this letter to make you or Mulder cry (or me). I'm
not even sure this will touch you in any way either. If not, give it to
Mulder and let him read it, babe. I'm sure he'd like it.
I'm writing this to let you know what your Momma was like, who she was,
why she chose to have you instead of chemo, maybe even why you look like
you do. Hopefully you got Mulder's lithe body and not my hips. If so, I
am so sorry, babe.
I'm going to give this to my mother because Mulder would think I'm
giving up and that I don't have faith in the truth, therfore, no faith
in him. That's not true. I do have faith in him, but the answer to this
is in science, not truth, and so far, science is unhopeful and truth is
elusive.
I guess, first I want to tell you about Mulder. Yes, I know you're
thinking that I was going to talk about me, but Mulder is so much a part
of me, that he is me. You have to know how I see him to understand me.
Mulder's very sensitive, though he never shows it, adn his story is a
sad one that he needs to tell you someday if he hasn't. Love is hard to
fathom for him, but I hope I've shown him what it really is. I think
that you will be good for him. He needs soemone that will love him
unconditionally. I do, but I may not be around.
Don't let him make himself out to be the bad guy in this. I chose to
go ahead with the pregnancy because I knew he wanted children very
badly, to have something that was both him and me. And I knew I would be
dying from this cancer......
He tends to magnify one small thing and blow it up to colossal
proportions until it seems that a grave injustice has been done. Don't
let him tell you that he wanted you to die. He didn't. He wanted me
safe, and he wanted you safe, and it was very foolish what I did. We
could have both died if he hadn't been there, if I hadn't listened to
him. He told me at the beginning that it wasn't the best idea but once
I'd made up my mind, he followed. Mulder was very suportive and when he
saw you . . . oh babe, he fell in love. Like I'd hoped.
During the pregnancy I was so weak that I couldn't even stay
conscious, so I don't remember much of it. It was C-section because of
health issues, but I felt so sick and weak afterwards that I wouldn't
let him see me. I thought . . . I just didn't think he needed to see me
like that. I've always been his strength.
But for someone as unloved as he was as a child, he does a good job of
fighting back.
And I'm right there fighting too.
I *am* crying.
And I really didn't want to do that. I wanted to show you who I was and
this isn't me. Not usually anyway. I'm not a crier. I'm the sttrong one.
That's why it's so hard to sit here and know that I can't be the strong
one.
I'm strong willed and obstinate and Mulder says I'm beautiful, and
says he wants you to have my hair and my eyes.
I hope you don't hate the hair. I did as a kid because everyone called
me Red or Flame and I hated it.
Let me tell you about your name. We picked Julia because it had no
attachments. It didn't remind us of something awful that happened or a
horible case we went on. It's about the only name we could think of that
we both liked and didn't bring back bad memories.
(We went through a lot of names simply because of your father's video
habit. Ask him sometime. Oh boy, he's going to hate me.)
So, it's just a name, but refreshing in that fact.
It's not so easy to describe myself I see. I hope this gives you
enough. I am being as honest as I possibly know how. If not, talk to
your father. He's really going to love all these questions you probably
now have.
Right now, I'm sitting beside your crib bed, babe, and you're looking
up at me with those blue eyes and I can't help but wish that I could
live. But when I'm too weak to even hold my you, babe, I don't really
see how I'm going to last.
But I'll never give up.
Take care of your Daddy for me.
Mulder's very . . . Mulder. There's no way to describe him.
Oh! You just said Momma and held up your arms to me. I'll get Mulder in
here to pick you up and let me hold you. He' so gentle . . . I know
you're taken care off.
I love you Julia.
Love, Momma
Dana Scully.>
I sighed and let the letter drift to the bed.
I'm going to let Dad read it.
I now know her.
My mother.
And it hurts that she died, but I'm glad I at least know her now.
But before I ask Dad more about Momma......
"Hey, Dad! What's your video habit that kept you from naming me
something else?"
I heard a groan, then, "Thanks a lot Scully!"
Adios
RocketMan
Momma IV
Date sent: Thu, 23 Oct 1997 22:12:42 +0000
Author: RocketMan >[email protected]<
Disclaimer: Julia belongs to me, but Mulder and Scully do not, so
technically, any of their prodigy wouldn't belong to me either, huh?
Author's Notes: AHHHHHH! It's been way too long.
Momma IV
I run into Dad's bedroom and bounce on the bed as he talks on the phone.
He shoots a killer look at me and patiently listens to the caller on the
other end. I think it's a client of his, one of those crazy obsessive
compulsive people he tries to counsel every day.
I am not as patient as Dad, and I can tell I'm no where near as patient
as Momma. I have zero tolerance.
Dad sticks his tongue out at me and I giggle, jiggling the bed again.
He sticks his feet to my legs and pushes, trying to knock me off the
bed, a game we played when I was littler.
He always won then, and he's winning now.
I slide off and stick my tongue out at him back, standing up with as
much grace as I can muster and stalk out of the bedroom.
I wanted to know if he had read Momma's letter.
Of course, it's a known rule in this house that when Dad's on the phone,
no one makes noise of any kind.
So, I go back to the extra bedroom, where Momma's stuff still is and
look at myself in the full length mirror.
The sun glints off the cross around my neck and My hair seems more red
today, my eyes more blue.
Usually my hair is a dark auburn with red highlights, and my eyes are
grey green, but today things seem different.
Ever since that letter lots of things are different.
I seem to be doing better in school even.
I'm a smart kid, but school just doesn't agree with me. When I'm
interested, I get perfect scores.
But most of my classes are boring and so I never study, never try.
Lately, I seem to be doing pretty well, I'm almost even interested.
Is it because of the letter?
Or just that my mystery is explained?
I hear Dad hang up the phone and search for me, scattering newspapers
and dishes as he goes.
"In here, Dad." I call out, turning to see him in the doorway.
"Yeah." he says softly. "I found you."
I smile a bit and give him a quick hug. Dad has seemed more down lately,
since the letter, and I wonder why.
"Dad, did you read the letter?"
"Yeah. Yeah, I did."
He offers nothing more and I stare at him until he grows uncomfortable
and clears his throat.
"Well," I say, finally prompting him.
"It makes me sad, honestly."
Dad has been into this honesty of emotions thing lately, where he keeps
asking me if that's what I relly feel, or if I'm not just hiding things.
"Oh?"
"Yeah. I guess because I had kind of kept her a secret and now I have to
share her."
"With me? You kept it a secret so you wouldn't have to share?"
That seems like the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard.
"Well, no. I kept most of it a secret because I know I have a horrible
guilt complex, and I didn't want to risk that for you, too."
I feel a small thread of fear slither through me.
Should I have a reason to feel guilty? Momma said I didn't.
Did Dad blame me?
"Jules, stop it. See that's why I didn't tell you. No matter what I say,
you're going to have doubts. Scully told me all the time that it wasn't
my fault, but do you think I ever believed her completely?"
I turn my face.
I hate it when Dad can see everything I'm thinking right on my face. Of
course he's trained to do that, but it's still not fair.
I want to keep my thoughts private.
"Jules?"
I glance at him and I can see this has him really upset.
"I don't have your guilt complex, Dad. Not yours at all. Remember that
time I was roller skating and you let go of me, because I told you to
and I fell? You blamed yourself and instead of me crying over the cut on
my knee I had to be brave so that you ouldn't feel so bad."
His surprised look was classic. I wish I had a camera.
I never surprise Dad, not even on his birthday.
"You did that?"
"Yeah, Dad. You looked more hurt than me!"
He grins goofily and I smile. "I'm tought, Dad. Don't worry about it."
"Well, I guess them you want to know some things, huh?"
I nod.
"Where should I start?"
I know exactly where.
"Tell me what she looked like to you . . . when . . . when she told you
she was having me."
"What she looked like? Not what I thought?"
I shake my head. "No. What did you see?"
I am starved for images of my mother. Any image that is reality. Or it
may not be, since its through the eyes of my mother's greatest lover,
but at least it's something.
"I saw this defiant little women who looked too fragile to carry a
child, but to fiery not to be. I saw her standing there telling me that
we together had created a life and that life was worth more than
anything or anyone. I saw her standing proudly as I stared at her like
she was killing me with her words and all I could think was "God don't
let her die." I saw her in the truest sense of the word. In that moment,
I saw everything she was and everything she hoped to be. And it was
beautiful."
Dad lapses into silence and smiles.
I smile back. "That's so beautfiul Dad." I say and hug him.
He looks at the stuff of Momma's in the box, the odds and ends she
collected for some reason or another. Her entire life remaining in its
stiffness.
"If you want this stuff, Jules, go ahead and take it."
Dad turns away and I know the matter is closed.
We won't probably ever talk of her again, until one day, I'll find
something else and pull it out and get up enough courage to ask and hurt
my Daddy again.
But I have enough for now.
And it will get me through until the next time.
I finally know my Momma.
And in that, I know who I am.
Julia Scully Mulder.
A Scully woman.
And a Mulder's child.
I finger her cross and pick up the box.
New treasures await me.
end of series.
adios
RocketMan
Momma V
Author: RocketMan >[email protected]<
Disclaimer: Julia belongs to me, but Mulder and Scully belong to CC,
1013, and Fox. No infringement is intended.
Please read Momma I-IV in order to understand this. They can be found on
Gossamer under RocketMan.
Momma
"Jules?"
I run from my bedroom into the living room where the tree is and Dad
laughs at me and my nutty grin.
"Ready?" he asks.
I roll my eyes. I have only been waiting to open Christmas presents
since eight o'clock this morning. I know I'm not a child anymore, but I
love Christmas.
"I'm definitely ready. What took you so long?"
"Santa was talking my ear off."
"Ho ho." I say, sticking my tongue out at his lame joke, and following
it with my own.
He pulls me down on the floor next to him and holds my shoulders.
"Now, see all this?"
He motions at a huge pile of presents under the tree. I nod.
"They're not all for you, Jules, so be careful when you're opening
things, all right?"
"Hey! I didn't *mean* to open Uncle Charlie's present last year!" I say
and stick out my tongue at him again.
He smiles and nods. "Go at it kid."
I start passing out the presents, some to me, some to Dad, some to Uncle
Charlie and his wife who laugh at me as I do, and then some to Matt and
his parents.
Momma's whole family is here. Everyone who is still alive anyway. I bet
Momma and Gramma are here too, watching us have fun.
I wish I could have Momma on Christmas, just once.
Tara is nice and Uncle Bill is kind of mean to Dad and I don't think he
likes me very much, but he gives me money every year, so it's not too
bad. And Matt is a great cousin. He does whatever I tell him to.
But my favorite is Uncle Charlie. He's always laughing and smiling and
trying to cheer me up. He reads the stories and poems I write and makes
comments about them and really talks to me about them. Dad just smiles
and says they're 'nice.'
Uncle Charlie says I'm too moody, too much like Mulder, but then he says
that I look more and more like Momma every day.
I love Charlie.
I finish giving out the presents, everyone making comments along the
lines of 'Santa's little helper' or 'Jules the Elf.'
It's the same every year.
I wonder what Momma would say.
Dad hasn't said anything more about Momma since the letter and I wonder
why. I thought, or really, I hoped he would talk about her all the time.
But he doesn't like to be reminded of all that pain, I suppose.
Charlie won't even talk to me about Momma. He says that it is Dad's job.
"Okay, Jules. You go first hon." Dad says and waits for me to settle
back in my spot.
I open the one from Charlie first; I just can't wait this year.
The paper tears at the corners and the tape pulls away easily. It's a
red and green print of snowflakes that would look guady anywhere else,
but here is pretty. I come to a department store box and slit the tape
with a fingernail. The lid comes off easily and I pull away the
wrapping.
I see Dad at the corner of my eyes getting anxious. I'm a slow opener
adn he's fast.
I find a journal in the bottom, in black and green like my room, and I
start to open my mouth to say thank you, when I notice what's below it.
Another journal, but in a dark maroon.
I pick it up and open the front cover.
It's Momma's journal.
I didn't know she even had one.
I look up to find Charlie staring right through me. At my glance he
smiles softly and nods.
"Thank you so much, Uncle Charlie." I say, barely able to even speak.
Momma's journal.
"She sent it to me one day, out of the blue. She wrote in a letter that
she had a notebook of poems and stories and thoughts and she knew I'd
appreciate it. I never read it because I felt like I was intruding. When
she died, I just couldn't. But you're safely immune to that. I think
she'd like you to have it."
I nod and feel the tears and Dad pulls me into his chest to hug me back
to happiness. I cling to his sweatshirt for a moment and I can almost
feel the tears in him too.
I pull away finally and we open the rest of our Christmas.
I hardly even notice.
****
Because the whole family is in our tiny apartment, Dad sleeps on the
couch and I sleep in the extra bedroom, where I found all of Momma's
things. I almost think of it as her room.
So it is where I go to read her journal.
The very first page is addressed to Dad and it talks about the day she
found out she had cancer and what that meant.
My Momma is a good writer.
But then she just ends and doesn't finish and I wonder what happened to
make her stop writing it.
Maybe she decided she didn't need it.
The next page is a fairly odd drawing of a man raising his arms to the
sky and sort of giving himself over to the storm. It's not particularly
great, but it's odd. And it's a glimpse of my Momma.
The page after is a poem she had found in a book.
I read it once and felt her right there with me, reading aloud and
pressing her fingers to the page in rememberance.
This was the poem:
enter my mother
wearing a peaked hat.
her cape billows,
her broom sweeps the nurses away,
she is flying, the witch of the ward, my mother
pulls me up by the scruff of the spine
incanting Live Live Live!
After I read that again I could see her in the hospital, feeling already
dead and Gramma coming in and trying to infuse life in her with her
presence. I wonder if Dad ever went to see her. I had my tonsils taken
out once and he couldn't come see me afterwards. He called and talked to
me all day, but he said he was sorry. Hospitals scared him too much.
Maybe that was because he had seen Momma in the hospital and this was
too soon afterwards. All I know was it hurt to not have my Daddy to hold
me while my throat hurt and the funny men came and talked to me but I
couldn't even answer.
Gramma was there and she held me, but Gramma wasn't Daddy.
I miss Gramma. I imagine Momma to be like her alot. Charlie said they
were almost exactly alike, except Momma tended to forgo church and
Gramma was a devout Catholic. I like church and Mass. Gramma took me and
I loved listening to the choir and the church sing. It made me feel like
Momma was with me.
I read some more of her journal, taking in each word like it is water
and absorbing her handwriting becasue it makes her real.
She talks about a ghost she saw of a dead girl that had been murdered
and how Dad said the ghost only visited the people who were going to
die.
Momma hadn't told him then about her cancer and she felt miserable.
I feel miserable reading this about her. She makes Dad into Mulder, and
not the Daddy I know.
Momma doesn't seem to believe in ghosts even though she is seeing them,
supposedly. I don't think I believe in ghosts because I'm pretty sure
that Momma would come visit me if there were. I've asked her to ever
since I was about five and knew what they were.
At one in the morning I make myself stop reading and I go into the
kitchen for some milk.
I find Dad sitting at the table, his head cradled in his hands.
"Daddy?"
He jerks up and rubs the bridge of his nose seeing me.
"Hey sweet."
"Are you okay Dad?"
He nods and then sighs. "Actually Jules, I need to tell you something."
I have a terrible feeling he is going to say I have a new Momma, jus
like in all the really bad movies.
"Yeah?"
I sit down at his inclination and feel my legs shaking so hard I can't
keep them from bouncing.
"Jules, I'm going back to work for the FBI. In the X-Files again."
Suddenly there are birds and rainbows and relief.
"That's all?"
He frowns. "Yeah . . . "
"Oh good! That's what you did with Momma right?"
He nods. "Will you let me see them?"
"See what?"
"The files she's in."
"What?!"
"Oh, I've been reading Momma's journal. She talks about you a lot and
the X-Files. Some of the stuff she wrote is a little . . . uhm . . . I
probably need to wait until I'm eighteen to read it."
His entire face grows bright red. "What's the date on her journal?"
I smile wickedly. I know it's before they got together.
"I'm not telling."
He blushes even more and I laugh, but softly so as to not wake the whole
house.
"Before. Around 1997."
It feels weird to say nineteen something. My whole life it's been two
thousand something. That feels like it happened a hundred years ago
instead of only sixteen or so years.
A slow smile spreads across Dad's face and I laugh. "Want me to get it
for you?" I say.
He gives me a glare and shakes his head.
"Anyway, I was hesitant to take the offer Jules."
"Why? Momma thought it was the only thing that would keep you going
besides me." I say and his eyebrows twitch.
"Because I'll be assigned a new partner."
I feel the heaviness of that and fall silent.
I don't want a new Momma.
But I do want Daddy happy. "You'll have to go away a lot right?"
He nods with a grimace. "I don't want to leave you-"
"I'll be fine. I could even go over to Charlie's. He lives close enough
for me to still me able to go to school. And during the summer maybe I
could go with you."
He frowns and I know he is definitely opposed to that idea right now.
Maybe later.
"Momma would want you to." I say softly.
His eyes flash to mine and a slow, sorrowful smile appears.
"Okay." he says quietly.
The X-Files.
Again. Just like Momma would want.
I wonder if she'll help him out, if there are such things as ghosts
anyway.
Maybe there are.
Because I sure can feel something right now.
Maybe it's Momma.
end
adios
RM
Momma VI
(1/2)Author: RocketMan >[email protected]<
Disclaimer: Mulder and Scully belong to Chris Carter, 1013, and Fox
broadcasting. No infringment is intended and no payment or profit is
recieved from this story.
Dedication: To Julie <Jules> who is sick and might have to go to the
hospital. Thanks for encouraging me, babe!
Momma VI (1/2)
I don't feel too good and my throat refuses to open up, so I've been
home from school recently.
I don't mind that at all.
It's just that I can't talk and I talk all the time. Out loud, to my
Dad, to friends on the phone, friends that I have met in the street,
just about everyone.
And Dad is very nervous and he keeps looking at me with this face that
says 'I know why this is happening, but I can't make it stop,' yet he
won't tell me what he knows or why it's scaring him so much.
He paces around angrily, gun tucked in his holster even though I had
asked him not to carry it when I was with him. I hate guns: they're
revolting and dangerous. My best friend's brother found his mother's
service revolver and blew his hand off.
But Dad carries it anyway, even though I begged and pleaded and threw a
fit.
But I can't even tell him to take it off now, with my throat gone, and I
can't make him talk to me or even just talk normally. It's very
frustrating.
Dad keeps the blinds tightly shut and I'm not allowed to go anywhere by
myself anymore unless it's down to the grocery store on Fifth or to the
Cleaners on Broad. I used to take long walks outside, roaming the
streets and meeting all the bag ladies and prostitutes and homeless men
that were out there and talk to them. One of my greatest friends is Lisa
and she's only twenty-six but looks about forty and talks about forty so
that anyone would say she's forty. She lives by the side of an antique
shop whose owners bring her lunch every day and help her keep away from
the johns constantly scouring Broad.
But I worry about Lisa because I haven't been able to see her and I
usually give her old chapstick or lotion, especially during the winter.
But Dad is afraid and won't let me out.
I thought his working on the X-Files would be great, but it's only been
hell. I can tell he thinks that someone has given me this strange throat
virus that can't be understood or treated so far, and I think he's just
plain nuts.
Of course, in a good way.
After all, he *is* my father. And I've got some of that in me.
I am going to the doctor again tomorrow because the shot of antibodies
they gave me yesterday hasn't had any effect and Dad is even more
worried and he keeps pacing the floor and receiving strange phone calls.
I really don't think it's as bad as Dad thinks - I have faith in
medicine - but also I think there's something more than just the flu.
Dad didn't go in to work today and almost didn't call in to say he was
taking the day off, but I motioned to him and he finally got it and
called.
I wonder if Mom had to take care of him like this.
"Jules?"
I look away from the window where I was trying to maybe catch a glimpse
of Lisa to acknowledge my father: proud, though anxious, man standing
before me with the cellular phone clutched in his hand.
I nod and raise my hands to him. He takes them and squeezes my cold
fingers and sits on my bed.
"Jules, I have to go in to work, all right? Something . . . they've
found something about your sore throat."
I want to say that this goes way beyond a sore throat but my voice
stills within me and I can't even clear away the haze.
I pat the bed, motioning that I'll be fine here, but he shakes his head.
"No, Jules, I want you to come with me," he says, eyeing me with his
very dark eyes in a way that says clearly I am not to argue.
I sigh and struggle out of bed and put on some clothes: jeans and a
white fitted T-shirt with my black jacket pulled over.
Dad looks at me funny, as if saying 'why are you getting dressed in
front of me?' but I mean, it's my *Dad*: he bathed me and everything. I
am really too tired to even care.
I let him lead me out to the living room and grab a book that I have to
read for English and some paper in case I want to write anything and
then let him guide me downstairs.
We usually take the elevator.
I hate how the X-Files have ruined our nice simple lives.
But I love how happy and content Dad would come home after solving a
case.
He didn't get that fullfilment from his other work.
I let him buckle me into the car and I lean across and unlock his door
for him.
And we're off to the FBI building.
I'm even more tired than ever.
~~~
I think that this bald guy is Dad's boss, but I've never seen him before
and I can tell he's never seen me, or maybe not even heard of me, and
that hurts a lot.
He stands and shakes my hand as Dad explains what's going on and why I
couldn't say 'hello' back to him. I read the name on the door as we
leave: Walter Skinner, AD.
Okay, so what's an AD?
We walk to a flight of stairs (stairs again!) and keep going down, down,
down, until I feel dizzy and light headed, almost as if the stairs were
shaking underneath me and pitching me back and forth.
I clutch Dad's jacket and he turns and sees my green face and holds onto
me tightly, letting me find my center of balance again.
We start down once more and after abother flight I see the hallway
leading straight to my Dad's office, just as Mom described it in her
journals.
We walk arm in arm and he unlocks the door and goes ahead of me to make
sure everything's all right and then I walk in and-
and-
and there's Mom.
end part one
adios
RM
Momma VI: (2/2)
I want to talk
I want to speak to her
but even if I had my voice I could not
for she stands there silent
dumb struck as me
her hair red and brown tinged
with the touch of death I think
and I want to run to her
but all I really know is that
she's a stranger today.
"Julia?"
I shake my head, and it swings back and forth like the clock chime, but
I don't want this now, not now.
I turn to Daddy and he holds me and sinks down to me so that I can see
his tears and he is saying I'm sorry and wiping them off my face.
"You couldn't know..." he whispers, and I hate him for keeping my mother
from me for so long that I do not even know her.
"Jules?"
I turn and it's her right there, her eyes the same as I could imagine in
my heart and her hair shining like Daddy always described it and no
wonder Daddy came home happy and content and spent long hours in his
job.
"They gave her back to us, Jules. Just the other week. I didn't want you
to be upset and then they did this to you....I was afraid..."
I look over hesitantly at my mother and her eyes are hurting, weeping
great lamb tears as Uncle Charlie calls them.
I bite my lip and she quivers where she stands, her body shaking in fear
at my reaction.
I want her to come over here but I cannot talk and I have to open myself
to her.
I walk slowly and she opens her arms, but I do not run into them like on
sappy soap operas. I walk to her and look at her carefully and watch her
eyes flicker with fire at me and I can see all of what I have read about
her, from her own hand, and I see my mother.
Momma.
I step into her arms and bury my nose into her shoulder: we are the same
height, I may be a bit taller.
I always wanted to know what a mother smelled like.
It is: roses that are dead but still alive somewhere and remind you of
the joy of getting the flowers and: the beach when it rains and you can
feel the salt in your bones, all the way down to your marrow and: soap
that is used only on special occassions or when you're sick and you want
to feel clean again and: it is love and fear and clean and blue, like a
good thing that you know has to end.
"Oh, Julie, baby, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry."
She clutches me tightly and I feel Daddy come in behind us and hold us
both. I can hug her now and not be afraid of what will happen because my
Dad will always protect me and now, now, so will my Mother.
I let my eyes close because I am so very tired and all my emotion is
being spent in trying to feel as much as I can while I still have her.
I think it's darker in here than when I first came in, but I can't seem
to get things straight and it feels so good with Momma's arms around
me....
~~~~
"Jules? Jules, babe, are you all right?"
My eyes open and vision swirls up and through and away and I close my
eyes again.
"I know you're tired, love, but you have to stay awake."
I open my eyes again, thinking that I will try just for my mother's sake
(my mother!) and I see her face peering down at me.
I'm in Daddy's office still, on his couch that he couldn't get rid of
even after he stopped seeing patients, and Momma is holding my head and
rubbing my forehead.
"Are you feeling better now?"
I nod and actually it's true, I do feel better. I also feel a sharpness
in my arm and I suspect I was given a shot while unconscious.
"Can you try and talk for me, babe?"
I try to say Momma but all that comes out is a garbled mess and I feel
so frustrated that all I feel like crying.
Here's my mother, alive, and I can't even speak to her.
"It's all right. It's all right. I gave you medicine that should kill
off the bacteria and let you talk soon, all right? You're going to be
just fine."
I nod and wonder if this is why she was given back to us: to cure me and
help Daddy....
I hope she's staying. I'd like to have my mother.
She stays right by me, caressing my hair and smoothing away the worry
frowns on my forehead. "You're so beautiful, Julia. Just like your
Daddy, huh? I can tell you're very stubborn. Mulder told me all about
you when I came, told me everything you did from that steel trap memory
of his word for word. It was like knowing you through the radio and
through a slide show. But you're more alive than he said."
More alive? What is that?
"Thank you for not questioning, baby. Thank you."
She kisses my forehead and looks up to Daddy who is standing and looking
out the small window.
I want to tell her that I read her journals and knew her mind better
than I knew my own at times and that I loved her no matter what had
happened, but I couldn't talk and I let my eyes say what I so
desperately needed to say.
She hugged me and continued to lull me back to sleep with her motions.
~~~~
Sometime during the sleep I felt myself drifting toward their voices and
I heard them echo across me:
Mom: "She'll be fine Mulder. I told you it worked before."
Dad: "Yes, but, she's not what you think. I mean, there's somethinf
different about her, Scully. She can do things....."
"Mulder, don't be -"
"No, listen. You don't know!"
I hear her harsh breath break away and Dad moving to her.
"I'm sorry, Scully. I know you did it for her. I wish you would have let
me go instead of you. I didn't know that was the price. But I'm glad,
glad they let you come back....."
"They-they didn't let me, Mulder. I left. I had to. I finally had a way
to get out and I took it. They wanted Julia dead, Mulder. They wanted
you back in your despair. I couldn't let her die.....not after
everything..."
What were they talking about? What was going one? Why was everything so
upside down?
"But, Scully, are you sure, she-"
"Mulder, her fever will break and she'll be fine. Trust me."
I don't understand this. Let me away from this dream, let me leave,
please, make it go away.
Make it right again.
~~~~
My eyes open.
Daddy. His smiling brown eyes like charcoal on a cave wall and I laugh
and feel my throat working again and surely it was all a dr-
"Jules?"
I turn and there is my mother. Regal and beautiful and just a bit
frantic looking, but wonderfully alive.
"No more slide shows, Momma." I whisper and she grins and takes me up
into her arms like a baby.
And that smell.
That mother smell again, only this time it isn't many different things
it is one thing:
Familiar:
Momma.
end
adios
RM
Momma VII
Date sent: Sat, 02 May 1998 23:31:14 +0000
Author: RocketMan >[email protected]<
Disclaimer: Mulder Scully belong to CC, 1013, and Fox. No infringment is
intended. Julia is mine.
Dedicated to Jules (Julie) who is so great at lifting my spirits.
Momma VII
I watch her pace back and forth, her hands poised as if in prayer and
her eyes looking everywhere but me.
I glance to Dad and he smiles reassuringly. I wonder if things will be
the same again.
Here is my mother.
I thought she was dead. Did Dad know she was still alive?
"Are you going to tell us what happened?" I ask, my eyebrows raising and
my eyes narrowing.
This seems so contrived. A beautiful ending and everything.
"I've told Mulder. I guess you deserve to know. How much do you-"
"I read your journals. I know. I hear things. I know things."
Dad jerked and I saw a strange look on his face.
My mother looks at me and tilts her head. "All of them? Even the one I
gave Charlie?"
I grin and slide a look to my Dad. "I skipped over some parts, let Dad
read them, but yeah. Everything." My throat scratches again and I clear
it, drawing a worried glance from Dad.
"I'm fine," I say before he can say anything.
My mother looks at me and then to Dad. He grins.
Okay, so what's the joke here?
"Well, Julia. You were two years old when I finally knew."
"Knew what?"
"Hush, baby, let your mom finish."
I glare at him and pull my feet under me on the couch of Dad's in his
basement office.
"I knew I would die soon. Very soon. I went to you one night and I
couldn't even reach out to touch you, I was that weak. I knew then. The
next day, while Mulder was taking you to the park, I got a phone call
from a man who had been our enemy for a long time,-"
"The guy that smokes?"
She glances at Dad and then nods.
"Yes. Him. He said he could do me a favor. He said I could ensure your
survival and Mulder's if I did something for him. Well, I hung up on
him. And then . . . " She shuddered. "Then you got this cold and I knew
it had been him, somehow, he was showing me he could easily kill my
family, kill Mulder's family. If he didn't have you when I was gone,
what was there? So, of course, he called back and I agreed. I was going
to die anyway, Julia, I knew it. He said to fake my death; he gave me
these pills that . . .What?"
I shrug. "This sounds a lot like Romeo and Juliet, you know? The whole,
posion, but really a sleeping pill thing..."
She smiles and sits down next to me. "I guess it was. Except I woke up
to see that I had truly died. I should have died. I wanted to, after
that. I realized I had made a terrible mistake. I had to help these
people I hated, I had to help them. I cried. They had cured me of the
cancer and left me whole and healthy and utterly miserable. I hadn't
realized they were planning on healing me, on letting me live. I had
only tried to arrange my certain death so that you two would be
protected. I cried."
I look at her and shake my head. So simple as all that?
"Why did you cry?"
"Oh, Jules, I missed you so much. I missed being able to look at you
whenever I wanted to. I missed seeing Mulder bring you in to me to hold.
I love you, baby, and I was without you. Without your father. I didn't
realize how much of my strength was actually his. I wanted them to kill
me."
Her revelation hits me deep in the stomach, a place where feelings are
stored for other times. I take a deep breath and nod.
"But you're back?" I ask, knowing that I know the answer, but that I
need to hear it from her.
"I'm back. But we'll have to leave, Julia. They're not going to let me
stay on the loose like this."
"We can all go with you, though. Me and Dad can go back there with you,
can't we?"
Dad stiffles a growl and I look at him. "What?"
"You don't know what they've done, Jules. You don't know how cruel they
are."
I shake my head and feel tears spring up. "You think I don't know? I
know. Every time a kid talked about their mother, I felt it. Okay? So
don't talk to me like I don't know how you guys feel. I haven't had a
mother my entire life and now she's here, and I am *not* giving her up."
My mother looks up at me and she shakes her head, then slips her arms
around me and holds tightly, squeezing me as if I could comfort her.
But I can't forgive her.
"Oh, Julia, I'm so sorry."
I can't.
"Where were you in third grade when all the kids made fun of me because
I didn't have a mom to make my lunch? Where were you when Dad had to
explain why boys and girls were different? Where were you when I sat on
my bed and cried because I missed having a mother so much?"
She is sobbing into me, her hands clutched around me, small noises
coming from her. Dad looks at me and shakes his head but I can't help
feeling like this. She is my mother and she was supposed to be one, not
go off thinking she's all noble or something. She's back, isn't she?
She's here, so why couldn't she come before?
"I'm sorry, Jules. That won't ever make up for what's been done to you,
but can you accept that I really didn't want it to be like this?"
She's still crying, but her tears are under control.
I shake her loose and and nod softly. "I know you feel like you did the
only right thing. I know that. But I'm just a kid who hasn't had her
mother in thirteen years and doesn't know why it had to be like this,
okay?"
I bite my lip and run to my Daddy, feeling his arms go protectively
around me, even if he is angry that I hurt her.
"I'm sorry, Dad. I know I'm hurting you and her."
He nods and pulls me into his lap, even though I'm too old for it.
"It's okay, Jules. I don't understand this either, but I also have had
her before. I had her and now I have her again and I don't care about
all the pain between. I'm too grateful. But you didn't have that. It's
hard, babe. I know."
I nod into him and look back at her.
She's sitting there, staring out the window with a sad face. I wish I
could feel differently about this, but I can't. I'm angry that she
pretended to be dead, that she deprived me of knowing her when she
didn't have to.
Dad's lips tickle my ear.
"Baby, think about this. If she hadn't done it, she would be dead for
certain today. You would not have her at all."
I pause.
I wouldn't have her at all. Here I have her and I am pushing her away.
Hadn't I wanted a mother? Hadn't I wanted her?
I crawl out from my Daddy's arms and creep up to her. She is sitting
very still, watching me now, waiting for another attack.
"I love you, Momma."
I can't say anymore than this. I can't say it's okay, because it isn't.
But I do lover her.
She smiles and her tears are joyful and she pulls me to her and laughs.
"You don't know how much I've wanted to hear that."
I pull back, taking her hand and squeezing it.
"Yes, I do know. I do."
~~~~
end Momma VII
adios
RM