Seven Year Itch- part 2/3 by Rose Campion Part 2 See part 0 for header information. "Here for the Student's In Criminal Justice convention," Mulder answered. Not sure how this was supposed to go, not even sure what the hell he was doing, he answered with honesty. He wasn't going to make this easy for the alpha, he decided. He certainly wasn't going to humiliate himself by throwing himself at the young man. "I'm a professor, I have students presenting. Just here for the weekend." The alpha glanced at Mulder's left hand and seemed to take offense at what he saw there. He sneered, "I see you must have left wifey at home while you're out looking for weekend fun." "Wifey is a six-feet two, two-hundred and twenty pound ex-Marine who would probably pound you to hamburger if he saw you looking at me that way," Mulder said mildly. Actually, that was probably the last thing Walter would do. Not inclined to violence for the sake of violence to begin with, since leaving the Bureau Walter was downright pacifistic. Actually, Mulder said it more because he hoped the thought of an implied alpha confrontation would increase his desirability. The young alpha would score a point, not just a notch on his bedpost by snatching him away for a while from another alpha. "And if he caught you looking that way at me?" "I don't know. I've never gone looking before. Anyway, I'm here for the meatloaf. That's what I'm looking for." But as he spoke, he kept looking right into the stranger's eyes, body language belying his words, telling the other man with his eyes, yes, let's fuck. A short while later, Debbie brought a plate loaded with meatloaf, mashed potatoes. She nearly dropped it on the table when she saw his company. "Brian Kinney, you leave him alone. He's got someone at home. Someone who sounds really nice." Mulder was about to say something to Debbie, but a complex, unspoken conversation was going on between the two of them with angry flashing eyes. This Brian Kinney finally decided Mulder wasn't worth the wrath he would face from Debbie. Fair enough. Brian was obviously a regular of some kind here, knew Debbie far better than he would ever know Mulder, even if Mulder did end up in Brian's bed. Debbie was a fixture in his life and Brian apparently either respected her or decided a half hour fling wasn't worth the grief she could give him. Brian got up from the booth and said, "Enjoy your visit to town. Tell wifey I said hi." Then Brian retreated to the table where the other three were now seated. They fell immediately in a gossipy, easy conversation. Probably about Mulder. They were far enough away that Mulder couldn't hear. Mulder envied them for a moment, the carefree give and take, their openess. Even envied the screaming queen his laughter. Not that Walter and he were closeted by any means, but it wasn't like this. Their life wasn't centered around being gay, not like all of this. It was just their life. They paid bills. Made dinner and washed dishes. He graded papers; Walter built and installed cabinets. Mulder shook his head, wondered what the hell he'd been thinking and then started on his meatloaf. Not like Walter's at all, this was covered with gravy, not tomato sauce. Confused by his own mental state, wondering how one minute he could be homesick for the man's tomato sauce, the next minute seriously contemplating fucking another man. Cheating on Walter. He'd never said the words, not aloud, but still the standard marriage vows were an unspoken assumption between the two of them. He only managed half the plate, sick to his stomach at himself. He was considering just leaving a twenty on the table, dinner and a more than generous tip and just going. Brian Kinney brushed past him, apparently on the way to the bathroom. A card was clandestinely dropped on the table. Mulder covered it with a hand and swept it to him. He took a look at it still cupped in his hand. It was a business card thick white cardstock, linen press, with raised black letters. Brian Kinney was an advertising account executive with a major firm around here. On the back was hand written an address and '15 minutes.' Mulder left the twenty on the table like he'd been planning, hoping to slip out without catching sight of Debbie, feeling already like a slimy, cheating bastard, knowing what Debbie would think of him if she knew what he was doing. She managed to catch his eye as he left and she didn't say anything. But her face had fallen. She siddled up to him and almost as he expected, she slipped a handful of little square packages to him. He hadn't had to be familiar with them lately, but what they were was unmistakeable. He almost wanted to quipe, `gee, thanks, mom.' to her, but that intimacy wasn't there and probably never would be now. She had seemed happy about him somehow before, in specific that he'd had someone he obviously loved. Now, though, he'd become just another one of the boys who slipped through here every night in search of a short while's company. It had been years since he'd lost someone's respect this quickly. Not sure still what he decision was, he slipped back out into the night, leaving the artificial cheeriness of the Liberty diner behind him. He wandered through the well lit streets of Pittsburgh's small gay district, back towards the hotel, but also, part of him noted, in the direction of the street that Brian Kinney had indicated on the business card. Mulder had, of course, memorized the part of the city map around the hotel. He knew exactly where Brian Kinney's street was and wasn't exactly surprised to find himself turning down it, rather than heading straight on to the hotel. When he arrived at the address, he lurked in the shadows across the street from what had once been an industrial building, warehouse perhaps, but was now a luxury loft conversion. Brian Kinney, from the look of this, did very well by himself as an ad executive. Mulder was, honestly, a little envious. Not that government compensation was exactly generous, but he earned even less now as a college professor than he had as a G13. Between child support and the money trap victorian, it was a struggle sometimes. Kinney was waiting outside, arms crossed, scanning the night. Mulder's old skills served him in good stead and Kinney didn't catch sight of Mulder, for five, ten minutes. He was still trying to decide just what it was he was going to do when Kinney appeared to give up. The other man shrugged his shoulders, gave the night one final look, then turned to go, not up to his loft, but out to the hunt again. Mulder was obviously just another body to him, another anonymous fuck. Mulder knew Kinney's name, but Kinney, Mulder noted, hadn't asked Mulder's and probably wouldn't. Mulder's feet were moving before he'd made a conscious decision. He stepped out of the shadow and across the street. Walter would never have to know, would he? Mulder's long legs and traitorous body brought him across the street with rapid, easy steps. Inside, part of Mulder watched with mute horror as he approached the other man. Walter wouldn't have to know, but this still would poison the love they had, as far from perfect as it was. Yet it still kept Mulder sane, was still the plug on that gigantic hole where his heart had once been torn out. He knew all this, but couldn't stop himself from walking up to the gorgeous younger man and saying, "Hey. I came. I assume that's what you meant. I've never done this before and I'm unfamiliar with the etiquette." "The etiquette is simple. We go upstairs. I fuck you. You leave and go home to wifey." With that, he put Mulder into a clinch, right there, out on the street. He pushed him against the rough, cold brick wall of the nearest building and out of the light. Mulder almost reacted violently, long dormant instincts peeking their head up as if this were a fight and then add the anger at hearing Walter described again as wifey. Of course, what right did he have to be angry about that? His own sin here, his own betrayal was far greater than any disrespect that Kinney could heap on. Mulder was about to have sex with this strange man. He was erect, breathing heavily, traitorous body wanting even rougher and more familiar touches. The younger man was slightly shorter than Mulder and now that they were close, Mulder could tell that he was more slender than he looked in his clothes. There was something pleasant to this, knowing that he was the stronger one here and almost certainly the more dangerous one. Walter was always slightly taller, much more muscular, stronger. He would never use it against Mulder, there was that implicit trust. But it was always there, an elephant in the living room they didn't talk about. Kinney's hands roved while he planted light kisses on Mulder's neck and jawline, moving closer and closer to Mulder's mouth, as if asking a question. Mulder answered, "Don't kiss me." Somehow, that would be even a greater betrayal than bodies just getting off on each other, as if it would defile that first kiss Mulder had shared with Walter. Kinney removed his lips from Mulder's face, but his hands continued to roam. Kinney found something under Mulder's jacket. Something he didn't like. His hands flew off Mulder as if burnt and he stepped back. Damn. Mulder had forgotten the gun. Well, it wasn't like he'd planned to go out prowling for an anonymous fuck. The holster and the weight of the gun was something so familiar, Mulder didn't think about it most of the time, just another part of the clothes he put on to face the world. "What the fuck?" Kinney was saying. "I thought you said you were a college professor. I may not know anything about guns, but I do know that's big enough to be major firepower. What are you really?" "I am a college professor. Now. Criminal justice. I used to be a cop. A fed. Special Agent with the FBI. There are people out there who still have grudges out there about perps I brought to justice back then, enough that I have legitimate cause to worry. I have all the permits I need to legally carry this thing pretty much anywhere I want. If it makes you feel better, except for target practice, it hasn't been fired in nearly ten years." "Damn. And I thought I had to be worried about wifey, not you." "Oh, I'd still be worried about wifey. He used to be my boss." Kinney seemed to regain courage, perhaps the aphrodesiac of the potential power exchange here was working, the thought of not just stealing this prize from the other alpha, but of topping a man who should in his own right be just as alpha, just as tough. Kinney closed the gap between them again, hands knowing just exactly the responses they wanted from Mulder's traitorous body, nothing overtly sexual was touched just yet, hands nowhere near dick or ass, but still those hands demanded a response and got it. It was nothing like sex with Walter. The touch was rapacious, wanting and taking, hard and unrelenting. Walter could be like that sometimes, but when Walter took like that, every bit of himself was offered back in return. Plunderer gave himself up to being plundered in turn. Brian Kinney just took. And yet, how intoxicating it was to be wanted in just exactly this manner, with no apologies, no mutuality. Mulder was ready to offer himself up, ready to surrender to this. He would have gone through with this, except he felt something tugging at his ring finger. "Take this off and put it in your pocket or something." Kinney said. "I can't do this thinking about your wifey." Mulder was frozen. He'd never, not once, taken off that ring since the night he'd put it on while Walter served meatloaf. It belonged there. Like he belonged in Walter's arms, not in the octopus hands of this total stranger. The part of him that had been watching in mute horror before decided it had taken enough of this crap and found its voice now. He said simply, automatically, "No. Fuck you." and then "I can't." "What, it doesn't come off anymore?" Kinney gave another tug on the ring and Mulder pulled away from the grabbing, invasive hands. He had to slap Kinney's hand off his ring finger. He stepped back three paces giving him over a good clear yard between Kinney and himself and he knew he would never close that distance between them again. "I don't know. I've never tried. But it's not coming off." "What the fuck is your problem here? I'm here to get off. I thought you were too. What are you really here for?" "I honestly don't know. I'm going now. This was a mistake." He pulled Kinney's business card out of his pocket, dropped it on the ground and just walked away, not waiting for Kinney's response, not caring what it was. He made his way back to the hotel. He had a momentary fear that Lyddie would be waiting up for him, wanting to tell her how it went, but she was nowhere to be seen, hopefully sleeping. He let himself into the anonymous hotel room with the key card. He shut the door behind him and then leaned against it, head back, one hand over his eyes as if fending off a headache. In a moment, he cautiously took his hand away, as if it wasn't doing any good. The hotel room was warm, almost hot. He shucked off his jacket and dropped it on the floor near the door. "Oh, fuck! What did I just do?" he muttered to himself. Then it was there, knocking at his consciousness, the stirrings of a full blown panic attack, familiar and hated, perhaps the same one he'd fended off earlier this morning. Breathe, he told himself. He looked around the room for something, anything to take himself out of himself. He felt his pocket, the cell phone that was in there. He could call someone. He could call Walter and Walter would talk him through this. But Mulder couldn't do that, could he, not with the grimy feeling of his infidelity clinging to him like dirt. That more than anything was the cause of this panic attack and he wasn't ready to have that conversation with Walter yet, not over the phone. He'd screwed up, royally. Not that Walter wouldn't forgive him, but he'd changed everything between them. As he felt the first clutching pain in his chest and the unthinking need to flee mounted, he muttered to himself, trying to reason himself through this, like he had learned over the years. "No point in running. This is internal. I can't out run myself. Just myself here to get me through this. No, myself and God. We can deal with this." His prayer was silent, not even verbalized in his mind, just a sense of needing help. He forced himself to breathe slowly and deeply. Mulder looked around the room again and this time, his eye rested on his briefcase. Plenty of student papers to grade, plenty of work to do. Yes, he could focus on that. He breathed deeply and dragged the briefcase to bed with him. He took the holster off, tucked that into the briefcase and put the gun out of sight under the bed, but within easy reach. He pulled out a stack of papers. He grabbed a red pen and almost started. He was still shaking. This work was not comforting, not in the slightest. It was, he decided, too much like going over case files in a lonely hotel room, in his former life. He looked around the room for something else to occupy himself. There was the small amber bottle of medication in his garment bag, just one and he'd find himself quite able to cope. But the next day, he'd feel stupid and slow. Mulder knew that the only reason his doctor was so free with her prescription pad was that she knew he hated the drugged feeling and most of the pills would be tossed out once the expiration date rolled by. But keeping that prescription current was still a necessary security blanket, just one that he didn't think he should invoke tonight. The television sat on the dresser opposite the bed, a big black unblinking eye. Once his constant companion, now it was a stranger. He'd gotten rid of his television because something in him recognized it as a block to his healing. It replaced thought, was a substitute for feeling. Something that he could hide behind and not really deal with his issues. He had recognized that he couldn't do the healing he needed to do with it as a possible escape; that if he was going to allow the silence of his refuge to heal him, he had to listen to the silence. So he had left it in DC. He was past that point now, but Walter hadn't brought his television either and they'd just never brought up getting another. In any case, it held no appeal for him now. Mulder rummaged in the briefcase, wondering if maybe he had a novel he'd tucked in and forgotten. No luck. Only student papers to grade and the laptop. The laptop, of course. There was other work he had to get to, not school related. He opened it up, propped it on his lap and waited for the logon script to finish. He was already breathing more slowly as he opened up the games folder. By the time he had finished his three ritual games of freecell, he was ready for work. He pulled up the folder for his writing and selected the file titled, "Double your folly, double your fun." He was, under the pseudonym of William Hobb, the author of a series of mildly successful young-adult mystery novels. Not big time, nowhere near approaching the success of Stine's Goosebumps, but very strong mid-listers that got the occasional favorable review from places like Booklist and Kirkus Reviews. Most writers didn't make the big bucks people thought they did and he was no exception. He wasn't successful enough to make it a sole income and he wouldn't have wanted to, but it was a very important suppliment to his income, the thing that paid the child support. He'd started writing them seven years ago, as a way of talking about the things that he could never talk to with a therapist because some of them were classified, some of them would just get him labelled crazy, but not in a way that would help a therapist heal him. Part of it was wish fulfillment too. The books were about the adventures of Marty and his pal Walt, no little redhead in sight. Part of it was how easily he could lose himself in the writing, without feeling like he was lost. Mulder had written the first couple without showing anyone, but had eventually shown Walter who had been impressed. Walter still had occasional contact with his old friend in Hollywood. That friend had contacts that gotten Mulder an agent. Mulder quickly skimmed through the last few chapters to remember where he was in the story and then was quickly absorbed in the adventures of his two intrepid boy investigators, imminent panic attack averted and nearly forgotten in the easy flow of words. It left him feeling merely weak and slightly shaky by the time he fell asleep. ### The End ###