TITLE: Lady Lazarus AUTHOR: Suture RATING: PG-13 EMAIL: holly_springs94706@yahoo.com CATEGORY: Pre-XF, Mrs. Mulder POV FEEDBACK: I live for it. SPOILERS: None that I can think of SUMMARY: "Fox answered my tentative questions about his final term at Oxford, and his two weeks in France with the impatience of a tennis pro determined to end the rally against an inept amateur. He had done well his final term. Paris was beautiful in the early summer. Yes, Chanel was making a comeback. When he looked at his watch and said he had to go, I couldn't bring myself to ask him to stay longer." DISCLAIMERS: I don't own these characters, etc. DISTRIBUTION: Archive as you will and let me know if possible. xxxxxxxxxxxxxx My stay of execution comes via the telephone. "Mom, the car got a flat right by the Gruders'," Fox says in his customary uninflected mumble. "I thought I'd stay with you tonight and change the tire tomorrow morning when it's not raining so much." I push the almost-full, yellow bottle of Valium away from me and sit up in bed, feeling as if Fox had caught me in the act. "I'll be right there to get you," I say. I hope that the two pills I've taken already won't start to work while I'm driving. . I can hear Daniel Gruder's basso profundo voice in the background. It's a deep, resonant, lulling sound. If Hollywood decides to remake the Ten Commandments, Daniel Gruder should audition for the Voice of God. "Don't worry about it, Mom," Fox tells me. "Mr. Gruder said he'll drive me over." "I'll unlock the door for you." My tongue, suddenly thick, drags a little over the word "door." "No," Fox says sharply. I start a little at the sudden authority in his voice. "It's late. I'll ring the doorbell, okay? I'll be there in about twenty minutes." "All right, then," I soothe him the way I did when he was five and cried hysterically at the sight of circus clowns. "I'll be up waiting for you. Tell Mr. Gruder thank you," I say before I can stop myself. "I will, Mom." This last, delivered in the dry tone of a twenty-six year old poking gentle fun at his mother's inability to see him as an adult, makes me smile. Fox doesn't joke with me very often, so when he does, it seems like the first hints of sun after too much gray. The momentary warmth I feel tips over into a long-forgotten heat as I remember another wry, amused voice from a summer long past. The smell of cigarettes drifted up from rumpled sheets and I laughed and laughed as a man with the knife-sharp profile of a young Paul Newman drawled, bourbon-smooth and serpent-sly in the dark, "Was it as good for you as it was for me?" Daniel Gruder rumbles something indistinguishable and then I hear nothing but the dial tone. Even at twenty-six, Fox still scores on the lower end of the telephone etiquette learning curve. I avoid looking at the blurry woman in the mirror as I put the Valium back in my nightstand drawer, smooth the sheets on the bed, and find my bathrobe. My ears are ringing slightly and I stumble a little as I walk down the stairs. In the dining room, bowls and plates piled high with food sit untouched, mute testimony to the awkward domestic scene that played out a few hours ago. I find containers for charred meatloaf, runny mashed potatoes, an indistinct green mass of over-boiled peas. A faulty mother's offering to the unappeasable gods of parenthood. Three hours before Fox arrived, on his way back from his father's house to a brand new apartment and new beginning in Washington, comforting smells filled my kitchen. I mixed and peeled and boiled and each action brought back memories of warm summer evenings when I presided over a cozy dinner table of three. Samantha would try to feed her vegetables to the dog while Fox recounted the plot of the science fiction novel he'd finished that afternoon. Talk and laughter flowed in Bill's absence. Sinking my hands into the warm muck of ground meat, eggs, and breadcrumbs, I kneaded, and imagined Fox driving back to Washington tomorrow with a pile of Tupperware containers packed to the brim with leftovers next to him in the passenger seat. I could be the kind of mother Mildred Barrett next door was. Her three strapping sons, students in Boston, came home every weekend and filled Mildred's house with their careless, unquestioning love and raucous male laughter. Surely, I could be like Mildred for a few hours. Perhaps I shouldn't have counted these particular chickens before they hatched. The acrid stench of burnt meat wafted through the house just as Fox rang the doorbell. Time and nostalgia, those malicious tricksters, had let me down again. Fox ate dutifully, chewing in that unthinking, mechanical way I remembered from the many indifferently prepared meals we'd eaten together during his teenage years. Or rather, back then, we sat at opposite ends of the too-large dining room table while Fox ate and read a book and I nursed my nightly aperitif of anti-depressants, silence, and guilt. Tonight, I picked at my own plate and tried to hold a conversation with this too carefully neutral stranger. Fox answered my tentative questions about his final term at Oxford, and his two weeks in France with the impatience of a tennis pro determined to end the rally against an inept amateur. He had done well his final term. Paris was beautiful in the early summer. Yes, Chanel was making a comeback. He started at Quantico on Tuesday. When he looked at his watch and said he had to go, I couldn't bring myself to ask him to stay longer. The doorbell's harsh buzz startles me. Have I really been standing here between the kitchen and the dining room for the past ten minutes holding an uncovered container of peas? My son takes me aback when I open the door. Fox is a man now. I hadn't realized that during dinner. He stands under the porch-light and I can see that Nature hasn't stinted. Somehow, growing up in the atmosphere of a house so noxious potted plants always died in a few days, Fox managed to flourish. Not in spirit. I know that. But, physically at least. I look at him and see his father's lush mouth and gray-green eyes framing my stubborn nose. "Mom. Hi. Sorry about this," Fox continues to stand on the porch, dripping, and waiting to be asked in. "Don't be silly, Fox," I say before I realize how snappish I sound. I want to cry at the way his face goes blank as he starts to apologize again. I cut him off. "Come in. You're soaking wet." He stands in the foyer, still waiting patiently. Under any other circumstances, I'd want to make a joke about vampires, but this is my son hovering in the foyer like a homeless ghost. "I'll go get you something to change into," I tell him. "I put hot water on so you can make yourself some tea." Fox nods and walks towards the kitchen. Nothing in Fox's old room really fits him now. After fifteen minutes of scrounging, I find an Oxford T-shirt Fox must have worn the last time he was here and a pair of sweatpants Bill left behind a few years ago after a reconciliation attempt that went nowhere. Hopefully, Fox will think the sweatpants are his. There are some things no son needs to know. In the kitchen, I find Fox prowling amongst the cabinets. "Can I have hot chocolate instead?" he asks, holding up a can of Swiss Miss hot cocoa. "Fox, I've probably had that hot chocolate since the Nixon administration." I want to take my words back the moment I say them. Either Fox doesn't make the connection, or he chooses to ignore it. "Scientific studies have proven that hot chocolate has a very long shelf life," he deadpans. I can see a hint of a smile in his eyes. "Go change and I'll put this scientific theory to the test," I say and his smile travels down to his mouth. We're talking to each other the way Mildred Barrett and her sons talk. Teasing, affectionate, and unhampered by the weight of past history. For a moment, I swear I can smell sunshine, brine, and the scent little boys give off after a hard day of playing when Fox comes back into the kitchen. He sits down, long legs jutting out of Bill's too-short sweatpants. I set his cup of hot chocolate in front of him. The cowlick he's had ever since he was a little boy pokes up, stubborn and unruly, and I smooth it down gently, wondering at how soft his hair is. Fox tenses for a moment before he leans, cat-like, into my touch. He turns and hooks an awkward arm around my waist. We stay this way for a minute, uncertain what to do next. "I'm sorry about dinner," I say. "I wanted it to be so nice and then-" Fox shakes his head against my hip and then lets go of me. "Don't, Mom. I know. I just--. I shouldn't act like a little kid anymore." He looks up at me and tries to smile again. I push his hair back from his eyes the way I did when he was younger and needed a haircut. Such sad eyes. "You should go to bed," I tell him. "You're probably exhausted by all of the driving you've done today." He yawns as if on cue. "I'll get you fresh sheets and a toothbrush," I say. The ringing in my ears starts up again. For a moment, I wonder if I'm just unused to so much domesticity in one day. I fight against the insistent buzzing in my ears as I climb upstairs. It sounds like the rasping of a thousand dry husks of grain. Fox follows me to his room and snorts at the circa 1978 decorating scheme. "Geez, Mom," he grumbles as he eyes a Farrah Fawcett poster uneasily sharing space with a poster of a tuxedoed Marlon Brandon as Don Corleone in The Godfather. "You don't have to keep the room exactly the way I left it." I'm having a hard time focusing on Fox. He looks so far away. "-teenage tastes preserved for posterity-" Unconsciousness, when it overtakes me, comes so fast. xxxxxxxxxxxxxx It's the last day of our second week at Quonochantuag. Bill and Charles play football on the beach as I lie in the sun and wait, hand on stomach, for the baby to kick again. A dog-eared copy of East of Eden rests face-down in the sand next to the latest Life. The real-life Cain and Abel taunting each other forty yards away from me are so much more interesting than anything the Bible or Steinbeck has to offer. As they face off, Bill stands tall and sun-gilt. He's every inch the fortunate son. Charles, on the other hand, has the dark, intense beauty of a seductive second son. A Richard III minus the hunchback but possessed of the same scorching ambition and silver tongue. My own private archetypes taunt each other and pretend it's only a game. Ever since Charles showed up at the summer house last week, we've been entangled in this unconsummated menage-a-trois. At dinner, Bill feeds me pieces of lobster from his fork while, under the table, Charles drags his foot against my bare shin. Bill buries his face in my hair as Charles smokes a cigarette outside, silhouetted against the evening sky. Charles helps me wash the dishes and steals a clandestine kiss. We can hear the clink of glasses and bottles as Bill mixes nightcaps for us all. If Professor Tati were here, he would smile knowingly at me and say, "You see Teena? The French farces. Even today they still have life." Charles scores a touchdown and looks over in my direction. "Some applause from the stands would be appreciated, Teena," he tells me. I clap and avoid looking at Bill as he frowns. Instead, I think about the taste of tobacco and skin. The waves suddenly crash against the shore, loud and demanding. I see something huddled at the foot of the beach where sand turns into water. Bill and Charles play on, oblivious. I stand up and walk towards the sea. It's a little girl curled up tight as a seashell. I brush her hair away from her face and realize it's Samantha. Her eyes are closed. Her skin is a sickly, pale gray. Snarls of seaweed cling to her like worms. I don't think she's breathing. My little girl's returned to me and she's not breathing. I pull my little girl into my lap, open her mouth, place my mouth over hers, and breathe. Inspire. From the Latin. To give breath. To animate. She tastes of the sea and death. I swallow against the bile that surges up in my throat. Breathe, Samantha. Breathe. You can't come back to me to die. Footsteps continue to pound against the sand. I look down and see myself lying in my own lap. I'm a little girl. Eight years old. My eyes are shut, sealed tight against the setting sun. Worms the color of pearls crawl out of my mouth. "Do you have a favorite child, Teena?" a voice asks. I think it's Bill, but I can't be sure. I'm lying in bed and I know I should get up, but I can't. I'm so tired and I don't know what day it is. Time passes the way it does in a badly filmed movie. I look out the window one day and see that the season's changed from winter to spring without any warning. "Mom," I hear someone say. Fox, maybe. I huddle deeper into the blankets. I should get up and make dinner for my son. I should ask him how his day was and watch him do his homework. "Mom. Are you okay?" "Mom." Since Fox is so insistent, I sit up. He's standing by the foot of the bed, dressed the way he was his freshman year of college. Artfully torn black jeans. A black T-shirt with the words "The Clash" scrawled across the front in white. Two silver studs in his right ear. Fox smiles and, for a moment, I see Charles's slow, sinful smile spread across my son's face. "You should sit on a rock off Cornwall and comb your hair," Fox says. Mascara-rimmed green eyes glitter at me. "You should wear tiger pants. You should have an affair. Don't you know, baby? Gee, you're rare." He holds his hand out to me and I see a wedding ring and a cake of soap. He closes his hand and opens it again. Presto. Nothing in the palm of his hand. "You are your opus, your valuable, your pure gold baby," Fox bends down and kisses me on the forehead in benediction and farewell. There's a shriek and a burst of flame and I'm rising and rising into the air. xxxxxxxxxxxxxx I open my eyes to find myself sitting arms and legs akimbo on the floor of Fox's room. Fox crouches in front of me, worried green eyes trained on my face. He gives my arm a helpless pat. "Mom? What happened? Are you okay?" I try to stand up, but Fox pushes me back down onto the floor. In his anxiety, he's not as gentle as he could be. "Don't try to get up yet, Mom. Just rest for a few more minutes, okay?" I close my eyes for another moment and then open them again. "What happened?" I ask. My voice sounds normal at least. "I-I don't know," Fox tucks my hair behind my ear for me, fingers fluttering against my cheek. "I was saying something about how embarrassing it is to be reminded that I used to be a Farrah Fawcett fan when you suddenly sort of sat down like your legs just gave out. I think you lost consciousness for a little bit. I kept asking you what was wrong and you didn't answer." I shush the perverse imp that sometimes takes up residence in my head. He's suggesting I make a joke about missing time. "Could you get me a glass of water, Fox?" I don't know if I can bear to look at my son's frightened face any longer. Fox nods and heads off to the bathroom after he tells me again not to move or try to get up. I hear the tap hiss and the medicine cabinet doors clink open and shut. I hope he remembers I keep paper cups in the cabinet over the toilet. I'd prefer not to drink out of my bathroom mug. He comes back into his room carrying a Dixie cup and wearing a studiously blank expression on his face. I take the cup from him and sip at the tepid water. He sits down in front of me Indian style and braces his arms against the floor behind him. Long, slender fingers, his father's fingers, beat out an agitated tattoo. "So what do you think happened, Mom?" Fox asks me. I can hear anger thrumming underneath the surface of his casual question. I steel myself to look into his eyes and smile a silly, false smile that will fool no one. "It's nothing, Fox. I didn't eat very much today and I had glass of wine after you left. The wine probably went to my head. That's all." Fox considers me with hard, knowing eyes. An investigator's eyes. I want to laugh at my own absurdity. My son has a degree in psychology from Oxford and plans to be an FBI agent. He knows all about the evil and weaknesses that lurk in men and women's hearts. The silence stretches out thick and heavy. I drink the last of my water guiltily, feeling as if our positions have somehow been reversed and I'm the fifteen year-old caught offering flimsy excuses to her stern, disapproving father after he catches her kissing the neighborhood Lothario. I try again. "And I haven't been sleeping all that well this week. The heat. All those things combined made me dizzy for a moment." Rage and fear flash over Fox's face, making him look so much older than twenty-six. "Bullshit, Mom," he spits the words. "You could open a pharmacy with all of the drugs you've got in your medicine cabinet. What did you take after I left? How much?" "Don't you dare speak to me that way, Fox," I say, but my voice cracks mid-sentence. "Was that what you were doing when I called you? Were you just going to leave the door unlocked so I could come home and find you?" He's leaning forward now, hands gripping my arms hard. "How much did you take, Mom? How much?" The words tumble out, but he doesn't raise his voice. "I only took two," I tell him. "Two Valium. That's all." I sound on the verge of hysteria even to my own ears. Fox takes a deep breath and lets go of my arms. "Why did you do that?" he asks in a soothing murmur. His eyes are soft. Green shot through with gold. His father's eyes. For a moment, I want to tell him the truth. I want to tell him that there are days I'm so tired I can't get out of bed. I simply lie in my room and watch the sun make its way across the sky. When it's dark, I shut my eyes, but I don't go to sleep. I needed two hours today to shower and put my clothes on. My thoughts never leave me alone. As I look at my son, so young and already so haunted, I know that telling him would be the most selfish thing I could do. I've been a selfish mother. I've wronged my son in so many ways. But this last, I cannot do. I try to smile again and I must do something right because Fox relaxes slightly. He's still young enough to want to believe in his mother when she lies. "I just wasn't sleeping very well, Fox, and I thought that maybe I would be able to fall asleep faster if I took an extra dosage. It was a stupid thing to do." He pulls me into a fierce embrace. "I was so scared, Mom," he says into my shoulder. "I was so scared." I stroke his hair and his back. "I know, Fox. I know. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry." xxxxxxxxxxxxxx I wake up in the morning and see Fox asleep in the armchair by my bedroom window. He helped me up last night and hovered over me as I walked to my room, knock-kneed and wobbly as a newborn foal. He insisted on staying with me until I went to sleep, but I was awake long enough to watch his head droop and his eyes drift shut. Looking at him in the early morning-sun, I realize anew that he really has grown into a startlingly beautiful man. A boastful mother's pride surges through me and I laugh. Fox opens his eyes and for a moment he looks wild and confused. Then he sees me and smiles. "I haven't fallen asleep sitting up since Medieval History with Professor Leslie." He stretches luxuriously. "How are you feeling this morning?" he asks. "I'm fine, Fox," I tell him. "Go get some real sleep in your bed. I'll have breakfast ready when you wake up." He 's still groggy enough that he shuffles off to his room obediently. As I get ready to go downstairs, I almost look directly at my own reflection in the mirror. xxxxxxxxxxxxxx Fox stands on the porch holding a brown paper bag full of French toast and sausages. "Here's lunch and dinner for today," he teases and smiles when I look vaguely scandalized. "Let me drive you over to the Gruders'," I say. "I'm perfectly fine." "Mom," he says in a mock-haughty voice. "I run farther than that everyday." We both stand in front of the house trying to think of something else to say. Fox shifts from one foot to the other and then hugs me again. "I'll call you as soon as I get back to Washington," he says against my ear. "I'll be waiting," I tell him. I take his face between my hands and kiss him on the forehead. "Don't worry about me, Fox. Just come see me more frequently." He blinks back tears and gives me a quick, abashed kiss on the cheek. "I will." I watch my son until he becomes a tiny figure in the distance. I should sit on a rock in Cornwall and comb my hair. I should wear tiger pants. I am rare. xxxxxxxxxxxxxx Author's notes: Sylvia Plath hovers over this story in ways both explicit and unobtrusive. I basically stole wholesale from Plath's poem "Lady Lazarus" in the Mrs. Mulder hallucination scenes. The lines "I should sit on a rock in Cornwall and comb my hair/ I should wear tiger pants/ I should have an affair" and "Gee, baby you're rare" come from the poem "Lesbos." I thought about working in a few references to The Bell Jar, but that seemed like overkill.