Title: Sneakers
Author: Gillian Leigh
Disclaimer: I don't own the X-Files characters, SneakerKing, Nike or
Adidas. Please don't sue me. I'm only borrowing Mulder, Scully and
William. I promise to give them back in mint condition...

Summary: Shopping trips. 

Author's Notes: Alright, since I'm BIG on storybook endings, the
episodes, William, Sunshine Days and the Truth never occurred! Yay!
In short, in my world, Mulder and Scully get to live lives as normal
as possible for the two of them. Anyone have a problem with that?
Didn't think so. :oP

~*~*~

*April 23, 2003*

My heart almost stopped when I saw the tiny pink sneakers on the
display. Mulder and I had decided to take advantage of the beautiful
spring weather and go shopping. He carried Will, and they had headed
off to the toy store, and I had planned on sticking to window
shopping, when I saw the shoes on display in SneakerKing. After a
moment, I stepped inside. I walked right to the display and picked up
the pink Nikes. As I held them, in my mind I could imagine a little
girl, with curly hair, brown like Mulder's, fair skinned, with blue
eyes.

The shoes were so tiny. I could scarcely remember when Will's feet
were that tiny. He'd acquired his father's feet, and at age two, they
were enormous and growing quickly. It was silly to spend so much
money on shoes for infants. They grew out of them in less than a
month. I put the shoes down, but before I could convince myself to
walk away, I picked them up again. I knew it was foolish to buy them,
I couldn't even be sure that the baby was a girl, but something
inside compelled me to purchase them. The price was ridiculous,
upwards of thirty dollars, but the moment the saleswoman put them in
the bag, inside their tiny box, I thought that if nothing more, they
would provide a creative way to tell Mulder, something I had been
trying to find the time to do in the past two weeks.

As I walked to the door with the bag in hand, I remembered how he was
oblivious to the morning sickness that had set in, and he failed to
notice that at work I took decaf instead of regular. Of course, it
helped that I was usually the one who got the coffee. I had tried so
many times to tell him, but he was always on his way out, or
preoccupied with something, and this wasn't something that I felt
should be shouted after him as he raced off ahead of me to follow a
lead. I saw them coming in my direction, Mulder with Will on his
shoulders, the two of them laughing. I smiled, and Mulder bent down,
giving me a kiss. He took the bag from me, and I took Will from him.

"SneakerKing, Dana? What did you buy?" he asked, hoping beyond hope
that I'd gotten him the new running shoes he'd been dropping hints
about but was too cheap to buy for himself.

"Nothing for you," I said, blowing a raspberry on Will's tummy. He
giggled and squirmed in my arms, and I smiled down at him. We came to
a bench, and sat down. Mulder looked at me, his curiosity as to what
the bag held was killing him. I took the bag from him, and pulled the
small box out. He immediately assumed the shoes were for Will.

"Ooh, Nikes. You're spoiling him!" he said. Will looked from one of
us to the other, highly confused. I opened the box, but left them
wrapped in the tissue paper, and I said,

"I have to admit that I thought it was foolish to buy them, but I
couldn't resist." As I spoke I slowly moved back the tissue paper.
"After all, I can't even be sure that the baby's a girl yet..." I
lifted both small shoes from the box, and studied them. Mulder gently
placed his finger under my chin, and turned my face toward his.
Wordlessly we leaned into one another, and his hand moved to the
small of my back, drawing me in as closely as possible with Will
between us. I dropped the shoes when his lips covered mine, and my
hands moved to the back of his head when his tongue parted my lips
and began exploring the regions of my mouth. When we parted, I felt
dizzy, but it was a good dizzy. He sat back, but his hand lingered on
my cheek, and he smiled.

~*~*~

*September 19, 2004*

"Will and I will meet you and Melissa back here in say, twenty
minutes?"

"Alright," I said, giving him a kiss. I watched their backs as the
grew farther and farther away, each in his matching navy blue Yankees
sweatshirt and khaki pants. I looked down at my eight-month-old
daughter, and said, "Come on my little Melmo." 

I laughed at myself for using the phrase
Mulder had coined for our daughter after realizing her attachment to
her Sleepy-Time Elmo. My laughter made her look at me with her almost
impossibly-blue eyes. She gave me a silly grin, and I smiled back,
rubbing my nose on hers, our private tradition of Eskimo kisses. As
we walked out of the food court in the mall, she studied me intently.
I kissed the top of her head, which was covered with a layer of
wispy, red curls. She had inherited her father's nose, but she hadn't
gotten his feet, which was a relief. I had dressed her in jeans, a
pink t-shirt and a matching fleece jacket.

Mulder had been, since I found out that I was pregnant for the third
time, just over five months ago, asking me if I thought it was a boy
or girl.

-'I really don't know, Mulder.' He'd lookedd at me as I sat on the
couch, giving Missy her bottle.

'Well, what do you want it to be?' I had thought about this, and
after glancing first at my three year old son, sleeping peacefully on
the couch, and then at my beautiful little girl, I said,
'I don't care either way, as long as it's healthy.'-

I didn't need Mulder to say it, but he was hoping for a son. He joked
with me after I told him the news of pregnancy number three, that
with a few more we could start our own Little League team. As we
walked past the window display of the very same SneakerKing I'd
gotten Missy's pink sneakers from, I stopped when I saw navy blue and
white Adidas Superstars, the smallest ones I'd ever seen. I smiled,
thinking of what the doctor had told me at the visit I'd had
yesterday that Mulder hadn't been able to make. With Missy on my hip
I walked into the store. 

Once again, I walked over to the display and
examined the shoes for a moment before handing one to Missy who
promptly dropped it on the ground and clapped her hands together. She
liked this game. With an aggravated sigh I prepared to bend over and
get the shoe, not such an easy task anymore. A woman who had been
standing nearby picked it up for me. She smiled, handing it back to
me.

"Thank you," I said, putting it back down on the table. "She's very
fond of the 'I-drop-it-Mommy-picks-it-up' game." The woman nodded.

"Ah, I remember that stage. My youngest is three now," she said,
pushing a brown ringlet behind her ear.

"My son is three," I said, smiling. It still felt odd to be linked to
someone else by the common thread of motherhood. "How old are your
children? Oh, I'm Dana by the way," I said, extending my hand. She
smiled, extending hers as well.

"I'm Kate. I've got three, all boys. Eight, five and three."

"I bet they keep you pretty busy," I said, picking up the sneaker
again, fully intending to make a purchase.

"I bet you're pretty busy yourself," Kate laughed.

"And I'll only be getting busier," I said, putting a hand on my
stomach. She smiled, and seemed ready to speak when a child's voice
from across the store called,
"Mom! Mom, I need you!" She sighed.

"Well, it was nice meeting you, Dana, but duty calls," she said,
walking away.

"Nice meeting you too, Kate," I said, waving. She glanced over her
shoulder and waved back. I picked up the sneaker and showed it to
Missy.

"What do you think?" I asked, kissing the top of her head as she
reached for the shoe.

Fifteen minutes later, I walked with Missy on my hip toward my
husband and son. I thought of how odd it was that I broke
baby-related news to him with sneakers. I smiled thinking of the bag
which held two identical pairs of teeny tiny Adidas sneakers.

The End