TITLE: Make Much of Time
AUTHOR: Ambress
EMAIL: ambress27@home.com
CATEGORY: Anything I told you here would be a
deception. Okay, fine then: MSR, UST, S/O, M/O, M/S.
Happy now?
RATING: NC-17
SPOILERS: None that I can think of. Oh wait, a slight
reference to The Ghosts that Stole Christmas, another
to Trevor, Lazarus, and one to, um, E.B.E., I believe,
but they don't have anything to do with the . . .ahem.
. .plot.
SUMMARY: Gather ye rosebuds while ye may.
THANKS: to bugs, alelou, Ropobop, Darla (whose beta-
virginity it was a pleasure to take ;)), Vehemently and
Meghan, for beta and discussion and encouragement.
Thanks also to those on the scullyfic list who answered
my question. It's nobody's fault but my own if it still
doesn't work.
FEEDBACK: I love it.
DISCLAIMER: Everybody has their own Mulder and Scully
doll; this is what I did with mine. Oh, but the
characters themselves all belong to Chris Carter, Ten
Thirteen, and Fox.
SECONDARY DISCLAIMER: I'm not advocating anything.
ARCHIVE: Gossamer okay, Ephemeral okay, Xemplary okay,
Spookies 2000 okay, anywhere else, please ask.

Make Much of Time

Scully had dropped out of sight, again. This time,
right before his eyes.

Her words had gently mocked him, "Another haunted
house, Mulder?" as she picked her way through the
debris in the attic: boxes of various shapes and sizes,
stacks of magazines, chafing dishes, an old dollhouse,
baskets without handles, and other assorted effluvia.
"I can't believe I let you talk me into this."

"Me neither," Mulder replied, pointing his flashlight
at an old-fashioned dressmaker's dummy with suspicion.

"So, the family still owns the house and property?"
Scully felt the layers of dust infiltrating her
nostrils. She tried to wipe her face with a Kleenex,
but only succeeded in moving the dirt around.

"Yes, they've had some offers from developers, but they
want to keep it and retire back to the Ol' Homestead
some day. When they can afford to renovate it, of
course." The attic smelled like a complicated history:
dust, leather, and ancient piles of newspaper, topped
off with eau de bat droppings. The dim light made it
seem like they were appearing in a black and white
movie.

"I hope they're in lucrative professions," commented
Scully as she peered up at the bird's nest in the
rafters.

"So," she went on, "the house is supposedly haunted by
the owner's great-great-great aunt?"

"Yes. Great-great-great aunt Lillian, who died a tragic
death at the age of seventeen. Apparently, she had had
a love affair with a local boy that no one in her
family knew about. When he ran off to sea, she was so
distraught that she hanged herself in the attic."

"Ahh, young love," said Scully sardonically, glancing
up at the rafters again.

"She left a note explaining that as she was ruined and
could bring nothing but disgrace upon her family, she
wanted to end her misery."

"Ruined? What a delightfully old-fashioned term,"
Scully commented, with still more bite in her voice.

"It's not clear," Mulder went on, "whether she actually
thought she was pregnant, or not. Since her death,
various members of the family have reported hearing her
drag that trunk," he pointed at a large steamer trunk
with brass fittings in the corner, "across the floor of
the attic, and then the creaking of the rafters as the
rope sways."

Scully shook off what in a lesser woman might be called
a case of 'the creeps.' "Most likely what they've heard
is the house settling."

She shone her flashlight at the trunk. "That doesn't
look like an easy piece of furniture to kick out from
under you."

"I think she jumped off it." Mulder responded absently.
"Her descendants have also reported hearing her crying
downstairs, from the hallway outside the bedroom that
was hers, but when they enter the bedroom, no one is
there." He wiggled the fingers of his free hand at her
in a gesture meant to express spookiness.

"Hmmph," said Scully. "Probably the windows don't fit
in their frames correctly in a old house like this. The
wind blows, and makes. . .moaning sounds through the
cracks."

Mulder took it in stride. "And several of the women in
the family have reported actually seeing the apparition
of her corpse hanging in the attic."

"Yuck."

"According to these young women, they saw the
apparition during their teenage years or twenties, at a
time when each was contemplating having sexual
intercourse for the first time."

"Oh, there's a convincing argument for waiting until
you're married: Don't even think about having sex or
you'll see the ghost of Great Aunt Lillian creaking in
the wind."

Mulder grinned at her.

"What a waste of a life, Mulder," Scully burst out.

"Thank goodness we don't still place such an
overemphasis on female virginity, huh?" he mused.

"Virginity is still a vastly overrated concept if you
ask me, Mulder."

"Are you trying to tell me something Scully?" He was
smiling slightly as he inspected an enormous old
birdcage. "Your priest would be horrified."

"Don't be ridiculous. I just think that most girls have
such a high expectation of their first-time that they
are doomed to disappointment."

"Well," he huffed.

"Don't get all defensive about your prowess, Mulder.
The simple fact of the matter is that most women go on
to have much better sex than they do when they lose
their virginity, and I just don't see why we make such
a production about that one little first, either by
making it such an intimidating production that it looms
ahead of a young woman as something to be feared, or by
romanticizing it as an earth-shattering event out of
misguided notions of love eternal."

"What a little cynic you are, Scully." The floor
creaked and groaned warningly as they traversed it.

"I just think--" she started, but then there was an
enormous cracking sound, and she disappeared.

Where she had been there was a jagged gaping hole in
the floor. A slow moving cloud of dust arose from it.

"Scully!" cried Mulder, in terror and amazement.

"Mulder . . . " came a low voice out of the hole in the
floor.

Mulder dropped to his knees, and then onto his belly,
and slithered his way over to the edge of the hole.

He looked down and saw his partner hanging onto the
infrastructure of the attic floor with a desperate look
on her face. She was dangling into the room below, her
feet swaying as she struggled to hold onto the
crossbeam.

"Hang on," he said, and anchoring his body to the floor
on his left side with his weight, he reached his other
arm down and grabbed hold of her upper arm.

He grunted as he pulled her back up into the attic, and
falling back, he pulled her on top of him. "I've got
you. I've got you." He didn't know if he was talking to
her, or to himself.

She groaned heavily.

"You okay?" he asked, puffing with exertion and post-
fright adrenaline. He wanted to run his hands over her
frantically, checking for breakage, but he stopped
himself.

"I'm fine," she said.

She was silent for a moment, aside from the sound of
her overtaxed breath, then admitted: "Actually, I think
I need to go to the hospital. I think I cracked a rib."

"Okay," he said. "Okay. Let's crawl out of here." He
paused. "So what were you saying?"

Norton Hospital
Route Nineteen
Forty-five minutes later.

Actually, she had fractured two ribs.

They were in an examining room of the small local
hospital's emergency room. Mulder was sitting in a
chair to the side, and Scully was up on the examining
table. She held her arm protectively in front of her as
she sat. The little white room smelled of disinfectant,
and the fake leather of the chair Mulder was sitting in
made obscene noises when he fidgeted. Scully looked
down at him loftily.

"I've been thinking about what you said, Scully."

"That's a change of pace," she shot back.

He grinned. "Maybe," Mulder's voice was speculative,
"the problem is not that we place too much importance
on the loss of virginity, but that we place too little.
It's just about inevitable that adolescents have sex.
They've been doing it since the dawn of time. Trying to
stop young people whose bodies are telling them to
copulate, with the same instinctive force that those
bodies are telling them when it's time to eat, is
futile, in my opinion."

She gave him a kind of diagonal nod to indicate that
she was listening, even if she didn't entirely agree,
and then hissed in her breath as even that small
movement jarred her ribs.

He waited for a moment, asking her if she was okay
without speaking, but she gestured to him to go on.

"But young men and women are left to their own devices
in these matters, without any direction, or validation.
Their parents simply say, 'don't do it,' instead of
acknowledging that they *will* do it, and preparing
them to make good decisions. The loss of virginity is
an important personal landmark in anyone's life, but
it's an event we undergo essentially alone."

Scully gave him an eyebrow look.

He tilted his head in acknowledgment of her silent
correction. "Okay, well, not alone, but without any
community support, or outside acknowledgment."

"So what are you suggesting?" She grimaced as she
shifted on the table. "A kind of virginity bar
mitzvah?"

"That's not a bad idea--"

The doctor came in then, with a nurse right behind him.
"Agents Scully, Mulder." He nodded at each of them.
"I'm Dr. Bollier. What seems to be the problem?" He
looked like an addled Ralph Fiennes, as though a giant
had picked him up and played accordion with him, and
then slapped him back down. Tall and rickety, he looked
down at Scully.

Scully explained, briefly. She did not mention their
ghost hunting, merely referring to a "case." He looked
as though he knew anyway, but was too polite to say.

The nurse helped her off with her jacket, while Dr.
Bollier examined her chart.

Mulder realized too late that he should have left
already. Maybe he shouldn't even have come in the
examining room with Scully at all, but he knew how
boring it was to sit around waiting for a doctor to
show up, and they were having an interesting
discussion. The doctor must have assumed that Scully
wanted him to be there, and so had not asked him to
leave.

The nurse helped Scully take off her blouse as well,
leaving her only in her white satin bra. She didn't
look at Mulder at all, and he politely looked at the
CPR chart on the wall--mostly. She answered the
doctor's questions, and flinched when he touched her
rib cage.

He taped up Scully's ribs, and told her that he wanted
to keep her in the hospital overnight. Scully objected.

"Why do you need to go back tonight, Scully?" Mulder
was curious. "Hot date?"

"Shut up, Mulder." She said it matter-of-factly,
without hostility. "I'm meeting a college friend of
mine for breakfast in the morning. She's only in town
tomorrow, and I haven't seen her in three years."

"But Dr. Scully, a four hour drive would be very
uncomfortable for you." Doctors never use the word
pain, thought Mulder, they only talk about discomfort
and being uncomfortable.

"Just give me a prescription for Lorcet and I'll be
fine." Dr. Bollier looked like he thought that
'discomfort' was the worst thing that could ever happen
to a person. Obviously Dr. Scully needed to be
medicated for more than her broken ribs.

"Maybe you should stay overnight, Scully." Mulder
thought that Scully often pushed herself too hard.

"This is your fault, Mulder." Scully fixed him with a
glare that had the same effect on Mulder as headlights
did on a deer. "You better get me back to D. C.
tonight, or you'll regret it."

Mulder turned to the doctor, sticking his lower lip
out, turning the corners of his mouth down, and pulling
his eyebrows up in face of mock fear. "She's right,
Doctor. She's fine. Painkiller prescription?"

Dr. Bollier agreed, with some token objection. Unlike
Mulder, he seemed genuinely intimidated by Agent
Scully.

They filled the prescription at the hospital pharmacy.
Mulder borrowed some pillows from the hospital. Scully
suspected that he had sweet-talked a nurse in order to
do so. "I'm fine, Mulder," she insisted.

"Yeah-Yeah. I just don't want to listen to your moaning
and groaning. It interferes with my singing along with
the radio. Here, take the Lorcet." He held the pill out
to her in one hand, and after she popped it in her
mouth he handed her the Snapple peach iced tea he was
holding in the other.

"You want to wait and make sure it takes effect?" he
asked her.

"No. Let's get going."

He helped Scully back into the car. He put her feet up
on one pillow folded over, put the car seat back, and
put another pillow under the small of her back. "Okay?"

"Yeah." She adjusted the pillow behind her back a
little. "Thanks."

Mulder took his jacket off and laid it over the back of
the seat. Mulder headed the car back towards D.C. "So
you think that sex is overrated?" he asked her once
they were on their way.

"I didn't say that." She shook her head at him, and
pursed her lips to indicate how ridiculous he was. "I
said that virginity was overrated, which, in case you
unaware of the fact, Mulder, is not the same thing as
saying that sex is overrated."

"Oh, okay. It just sounded a little like you had some
issues." He was grinning, aware that he was riding the
ragged edge of disaster.

"I do. I have issues with the mythology that surrounds
the loss of a woman's virginity, with the idea that it
must be a frightening and sexually unfulfilling
experience, and yet one that is expected to be the
summit of all her tenderest dreams, and somehow magical
proof of love. Why should we assume that entrance into
adulthood for girls is always marked by pain, and
surrender?

"In reality, Mulder, we are biological organisms that
are driven to reproduce, and sexual intercourse is the
means by which we most frequently do so. Sex is
natural. It should be neither terrifying, nor
glamorous."

"Glamorous? My, my." Mulder mocked her gently.

"I mean in the old fashioned sense of the word, to mean
characterized by illusion. You disagree?"

"No, not entirely. You're right that sex alternately
horrifies and enchants us. I think the loss of
virginity is given an aura of mystery, but I don't
think that's entirely a bad thing. Shouldn't it be a
little magical, a little enchanted?"

She made an ambiguous grunt in answer.

After about half an hour he looked over at her. The
light had faded into early evening. He was hoping that
she was asleep, but her eyes were wide open.

"Does it hurt?" he asked her.

"Yeah." Her voice was soft and a little dreamy. He
guessed that the Lorcet was taking effect. "But I don't
care." She huffed a little laugh. Since she couldn't
have even managed a chuckle an hour ago without crying
out, Mulder was more certain than ever that the drug
was taking effect.

There was a long silence in the car. Mulder had the
window open, and they were driving in the cooling
evening air through the blue-green mountains of
Virginia. The air smelled sweet, and Mulder could see
the sparkle of fireflies up on the hills that rose
around them. He wondered why they congregated higher
up.

"Tell me about your first time, Mulder."

Mulder was startled, to say the least.

"My first time?" he repeated, not sure that he'd heard
what he'd heard. He could feel a prickly heat moving up
from his chest, to the back of his neck, to his face.

"Yeah."

"Well, let's see--uh, hmm, I was, um, twenty, and uh,
well--"

"Twenty?" She sounded amazed.

"You got a problem with that?" He put on his best
haughty voice.

"No, no, go on." She was smiling. Let her smile. It
happened infrequently enough that he was willing to
give up his image as a Don Juan in order to see it.

In a few, halting sentences he told her about the girl-
-the woman--he'd met in London the summer before he
started at Oxford. He was living there, just enjoying
himself, and one evening he'd gotten off the Tube at
South Kensington Station and started walking to the
flat he'd let in Chelsea. Halfway down the block, the
sky had opened up. It was pouring cold London rain. He
looked up, started laughing, and this young woman,
walking the same way, laughed with him, and offered to
share her umbrella with him.

He took her up on the offer, then in return, asked her
to go to the pub near his flat, The King's Head and
Eight Bells, and let him buy her a pint. They drank
several together.

Then . . .

"Then?" prompted Scully, her eyes now closed and her
voice a lullaby.

Well, then--they had gone back to his flat. . .They'd
talked. . .and he'd spent the rest of his summer in
London with her, until he'd gone to Oxford and met
Phoebe.

"What was her name?" asked Scully.

Her name. Jane.

"You Tarzan, Mulder?" She had a goofy sly smile on her
face when he glanced over at her, amused. "Was it
good the first time?"

Was it good? A rush of memory, piercing and sweet, came
over Mulder.

"Yeah," he said, a little huskily.

"What was she like, with you?"

The image of Jane, holding his hands in hers, and
moving them over her body, showing him how she wanted
him to touch her, made him feel a small lump in his
throat. "Tender," he said briefly, barely able to get
the word out around it. "Kind--sweet--generous."

"Umm. That's good. I'm glad." He could tell that she
was completely sincere, and it warmed and reassured him
that she didn't begrudge him that. "What did she look
like?"

He hesitated. "She was, let's see, she was very pretty.
She had brown eyes, and she was medium height, and she
had freckles across her nose. She was older than me.
About twenty-five."

"Brunette." Scully's voice was matter of fact.

No, actually she was a redhead. Mulder wasn't sure why
he didn't want to tell Scully that. To change the
subject, he asked banteringly, not expecting her to
even answer, "So Scully, tell me about your first
time."

"I can't tell you that," she said in a sleepy voice.
"It's a secret."

Mulder's stomach dropped. He felt a sudden chill sweep
over his entire body. What did that mean? Had Scully
been sexually abused? Before he let the rage that was
still a little flame in his belly ignite into a brush
fire he asked her:

"Why is it a secret?"

"Ummm," she said. "Bill would be mad."

Bill?

That bastard. He knew there was a reason he didn't like
him, other than the fact that Bill hated him.

"You can tell me." If something bad had happened to her
she needed to be able to tell someone. She needed to
get it off her chest.

"You can't tell anyone, Mulder. Nobody knows."

Who am I going to tell? he thought.

"I won't, Scully. Cross my heart." He made the
obligatory third-grade gesture.

"Hmmph," she said. "Okay, I'll tell you.

"Marcus and I were going to do it the night of the
prom, remember I told you? But the fire got out of
control--"

Was that some kind of euphemism?

"--and we had to ride home on the pumper truck."

Evidently not. "No, Scully," he said. "I don't remember
you telling me that."

"Oh that's right, I was telling it to *Eddie Van
Blundht*, who looked like you at the time." Her voice
had become outraged for the last part of that sentence.
When she resumed her story, however, she let go of it.

There was a sound like bones being put through a wood
chipper as Mulder ground his teeth at the mention of
Eddie Van Blundht. What had she told him that she
hadn't told Mulder? Oddly, Scully didn't seem to notice
the sound.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .She and Marcus, her high school boyfriend, had
done just about everything else. Well, she supposed not
*everything* else, but still, she wasn't a total
innocent. Well, anyway. . .they hadn't had sex that
night, and then they didn't get another chance. Between
school and end of the year social events, they had no
time alone. Her family, his family, their friends,
everyone wanted their attention. Marcus would have been
willing to snatch any stray fifteen minutes, but Scully
didn't want to rush it. She wanted the first time to be
private, at least, and preferably in a bed. . .Then at
the end of the year, she went away to spend the weekend
at the University.

When she came back, Marcus, the bastard, got drunk,
came over to her house late one night, and after luring
her down into the yard with pebbles against her window,
(a cliche which she had once found endearing, but now
repellent), confessed in a maudlin self pitying fashion
that he'd screwed Meg Tyson at a party while she was
away. . .She was so hurt, so angry, so humiliated, to
discover that he wasn't the person she'd thought he was
all this time. If he couldn't wait for her, if it was
more important to have sex than it was that she was the
one . . .She broke up with him. She couldn't even look
at him, much less continue to be his girlfriend. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Mulder knew he should stop her. She was not herself.
The pain and shock of her fall, and the influence of
the painkiller, was causing her to talk in a way that
she would find extremely embarrassing even to hear
someone else speak, much less talk herself, if she were
in her normal state of mind.

He couldn't bear to, though. He wasn't sure he wanted
to hear what she was going to say, but then again--he
did, he wanted to know, no matter how awful, he wanted
to know the truth.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .So, she went to the University the next fall, and
she had a lot of fun her freshman year. She enjoyed her
classes. Feeling her intellect stimulated and having
her assumptions challenged was exciting. She made new
friends. She discovered that her professors liked and
respected her for herself, not just as Bill and
Melissa's smart and straight arrow little sister.

She wanted to get rid of her virginity, really she did.
It was like a winter coat that had grown too small for
her, but she didn't just want to toss it out. Something
that has fit you for a long time is hard to discard.
She wanted to show it some respect, not just toss it
away. She did some dating, but she didn't meet anybody
that she wanted to make love to. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Mulder practically jumped out of his skin when she said
"make love." He didn't think he'd ever heard Scully use
that phrase before. Usually he thought it sounded
ridiculous, but now it ricocheted around his head:
"wanted to make love to--wanted to make love to--wanted
to make love to." Scully didn't find anyone that she
wanted to make love to. Good God almighty.

Astounding thought. Not that she didn't find anyone--
for who could have deserved her? But to think of Scully
wanting to make love to anyone at all sent a little
frisson up Mulder's spine.

He was gripping the steering wheel tightly now. The
back of his neck still felt anxious and hot, but
excitement was also beginning to tease him. Scully was
telling him a new truth, and it made his blood thump in
his veins.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .She went home to her parents' house in Annapolis
after the year was over. It was good to be home. .
.Marcus still wanted to get back together, but she
didn't think she could ever trust him again.

It had been a good year. She felt good. She had done
well in her classes. She had made new friends. Her
professors liked her, and other men had shown decided
interest in her. Actually, one of her professors had
also expressed a more than professional interest in her
after the semester ended. Although she found it
flattering, she didn't find him appealing.

She didn't feel like she needed Marcus back, or even
wanted him back. . .Maybe there was a little tickle of
wanting to punish him for his unfaithfulness, but
mostly she just wasn't interested in walking back into
a relationship that had become so painful for her. She
couldn't feel good about herself if she did, and she
needed to feel good about herself.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

She paused for a moment that seemed interminable to
Mulder. She wouldn't stop there, would she? She
wouldn't realize that this was too personal, too
intimate, too much information?

He held his breath with the suspense of her silence.
When she finally opened her mouth again to speak, he
released it in a long puff of relief.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . . There was this guy. . .He'd been a friend of
Bill's when they'd lived in San Diego. His name was
Nick. She'd had a crush on him when she was younger.
She had been very shy around him back then, awkward,
which was unusual for her, tongue-tied. He had been
sweet to her, but she was Bill's little sister. Cute,
and sweet, but definitely not interesting from a
romantic point of view.

She had done things that her older self would now find
laughable, and touchingly naive. She would make a point
of being around whenever he came over. She would dress,
oh so consciously, to attract his attention. She didn't
think he knew how she felt, but then--There were these
pictures her mother had taken, at a cookout they'd had
before they moved back east, and there she was at one
end of the picnic table. . .looking at Nick as he sat
laughing with her father, like he was an oasis in the
desert. She realized, with a sense of humiliation and
horror, that she must have looked like that around him
all the time. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

She laughed, a little self-deprecating chuckle. "I had
to steal that picture out of the stack and hide it
before my brothers could see it, or I would never have
heard the end of it. I still have it somewhere."

Mulder was tantalized. Not only a Scully with a crush,
but a Scully willing to steal in order to cover it up.
Oh, the hidden depths!

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .He had graduated from school in California, but
the summer after her freshman year in college, he was
living in Maryland. Training for the Peace Corps, he
would go to Sierra Leone in the fall. They were giving
him intensive language instruction, for one thing. They
didn't pay him anything, of course, so he came over to
eat her mother's cooking with the Scullys a lot, even
when Bill wasn't around. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Mulder no longer suspected that she was going to tell
him a horrific story of rape and abuse. She was too
relaxed. Her voice was gentle, and she was a soft mass
that he could barely see when he flicked his eyes over
at her in the growing dark. When a car or truck passed
them on the other side of the two lane highway its
headlights would illuminate her face, serene and
sharpened by blue shadows.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .She had thought that she was over him. She had
been crazy about Marcus, after all. She'd been so sure
that he was the one. She'd thought she was in love with
Marcus. But when Nicholas showed up on the Scully
doorstep in Annapolis, all those old feelings bubbled
to the surface. . .She felt like she was in a permanent
state of flush whenever he was around, as though every
little capillary under the surface of her skin was
swollen with desire.

Sometimes she thought nobody ever really gets over
another person that she's cared about, she just
assimilates them into her being. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"What do you think, Mulder?"

He was momentarily surprised that she had addressed him
directly. "I think you could be right, Scully."

She was quiet for a long moment. He glanced over at
her, trying to read her expression in the gloom. After
a minute, she resumed her story.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .He wasn't even gorgeous, or anything. There was
just something about him. When they'd lived in
California, he'd had this dark brown cloud of curly
hair on his head. It *was* the seventies. By the time
he came to Washington, he'd cut it shorter, but it was
still a crop of wayward, boyish curls. . .His eyes were
blue, like that cloudy dusty color on blueberries in
the center, with the darker blue they have underneath
outlining the circles of his irises.

She was really crazy about his hands, though. They were
knobby. You could see every joint and tendon in them,
but they were very nimble. . .She loved to watch him
take things apart with a few deft gestures. He fixed
her mother's sewing machine once, while Bill watched
and made smart remarks. He was lean, not muscular, but
she liked the way his muscles were stretched over his
bones so sparely. He was a little bowlegged. Just a
little, but you knew it was going to get worse as he
got older.

She thought, now, in retrospect, that it was his
passion that appealed to her. She'd always been a
sucker for a man who could be passionate about
something he believed in. Jack. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

She let the last part of her sentence trail away.

Mulder thought about that for a moment. He remembered
something she had said to him over her kitchen table
and a doctored photograph long ago: "I've never known
anyone to be as passionate about a belief as you. It's
so intense, sometimes, it's blinding." He didn't know
what to do with that memory, but there it was.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .It was on a Saturday at the end of the summer. Her
parents were out playing tennis with their friends,
Melissa was at work, and Bill and Charlie were both
gone on a camping trip. She took a book out in the
backyard and stretched out on a beach towel to read it.
It was Mary Stewart's *Touch Not the Cat*. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Mulder had never heard of it.

"You'd like it," Scully told him, smiling to herself
again.

"Do you think it's possibly to be in love for twenty-
four hours, Mulder?"

He had to think about that for a minute. Was there a
right answer? Was it a trick question? Would she think
he was shallow and unable to make a commitment if he
said yes? Harsh and judgmental if he said no? "I think
so, Scully. I think that's what love is: a series of
twenty four hour affairs of the heart."

She seemed content with that answer.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .It was hot, though. So she went back inside and
put on her bathing suit . . .She loved that suit. It
was turquoise, and it was two-piece. It had a kind of
jacquard triangle pattern on it. She hadn't worn a two
piece bathing suit since she was about four. She'd been
as sleek as a seal puppy until she'd broken up with
Marcus and gone away from her mother's cooking, but
unlike most freshman, she'd lost fifteen pounds instead
of gaining them. The only decent food in the cafeteria
was the salad bar. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Her eyes were still closed, and her intonation was what
a purring cat would sound like if it suddenly slipped
into speech. Mulder could feel it zinging along his
bones. Her soft voice could take chips out of him.

Every neuron in his body was on alert. He could sense
the impending revelation, and he wavered between
jealous horror, and what he had to acknowledge to
himself was prurient excitement.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .She didn't tan. She burned. That kid in the
commercial-- remember it?--who says 'Mommy, I feel like
a French Fry?' That was Scully throughout her
childhood. But sometimes she would lie out just to
enjoy the sunshine. She slathered herself with sun
screen first, though. Even though her brown-haired,
brown-eyed friends in the early eighties all doused
themselves in olive oil before they lay out, her
childhood had already taught her that severe sunburn
wasn't pleasant, and it didn't look particularly
attractive either.

She lay on her stomach to read the book, but after
awhile she undid the top of her suit and took it off.
Then, she guessed, she fell asleep.

The next thing she knew was a thump as a large mass
landed on the towel next to her, and heard it saying,
'Hey Missy.' She was startled, and sat up suddenly,
forgetting that she'd undone her top.

It was Nick, and he stared at her in shock.

She wasn't quite with it, bumped abruptly out of her
doze like that, but she realized that it wasn't just
the fact that she wasn't Melissa when the warm summer
air brushed across her bare breasts.

They just stared at each other for she didn't know how
long. She could feel her nipples tighten until they
seemed like they were pointing at him. She could see
his Adam's apple bob as he gulped, and the sheen of
sweat on his throat. . .She wanted to cover her chest
with her hands, or her top, but she was paralyzed. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Mulder wondered if she was even conscious of his
presence anymore, or if she had plunged into the past
as surely as she had plunged through the floorboards in
the attic earlier in the day.

He was undoubtedly a terrible pervert. He'd known it
for awhile, but this brought it home to him. He
shouldn't be turned on by Scully telling him about
herself and another man.

Scully's eighteen-year-old breasts exposed to the air
in her backyard. He couldn't help calling them to his
imagination. White and smooth as fresh cream,
translucent, with a lacy network of delicate blue veins
visible. Her heart pounding with adrenaline, so that he
could almost see it throbbing beneath her chest. Her
nipples, like two pieces of watermelon candy, like
those Jolly Ranchers that hit your salivary glands with
the force of a hammer. . .Christ.

In his imagination he pushed the frozen Nick out of the
way, and knelt before her to slide his tongue
underneath her nipple and suck it into his mouth. He
saw himself in a white dress shirt with the sleeves
rolled up, and suit pants, with his tie loosened,
kneeling in front of her in reverence. He could smell
her skin, coconut from the sunscreen, and sweat from
the sun. He could almost feel the slick warm curve
cupped in his hand. If this callow youth didn't know
what to do when serendipitously blessed with a vision
of Scully's breasts, then he didn't deserve to see
them.

In the light of the headlights of a truck passing them
he could see Scully slide her tongue slowly across her
top lip before she resumed her story:

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .'Sorry Dana,' he said finally. He picked up her
top, and held it out to her. 'I didn't mean to scare
you.' He tried to look at her face, and not at her
breasts, but he couldn't stop the quick flickering
glances down.

'Thanks.' She squeaked. She wanted to jump up and run
in the house in humiliation, but she couldn't move.
Getting up would mean exposing more nakedness to his
gaze.

He said, 'I thought you were Melissa.' She guessed he
didn't notice that Melissa was a good four inches
taller than she.

'Melissa's at work,' she told him. 'There's nobody here
but me.' Then she thought about how that sounded, and
turned brighter red than even a sunburn could make her.

'Oh,' he said, still looking determinedly at her face.
She turned around and re-secured her top, fumbling with
the neck fastening.

She expected him to flee, but he stayed, making
conversation, telling her about his work, and asking
her about what she was going to take in the fall. He
was leaving for Sierra Leone in three days.

He kept watching her face, and she realized that he was
almost as embarrassed as she was, but didn't want her
to feel any worse than she did already.

He would stare at her, though, with this strange,
intent look on his face. She couldn't quite read it,
but then it came to her that he was finally seeing her
the way she had always wanted him to see her, as
desirable, as someone he wanted. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

She chuckled. "And all it took was flashing my tits at
him."

Mulder jumped again. That was more shocking, if not as
profoundly erotic as, "make love."

"Oh well, if I'd tried it when I was twelve I don't
think it would have made the same impression. They were
pretty nonexistent then." She smiled to herself again.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .He had this look on his face that was so struck,
so befuddled, that the embarrassment she felt was
quickly replaced by a little smoke signal of
excitement.

Finally, he asked her, 'So, are you going to get back
together with the ex-boyfriend?'

She smiled at him, and was happy to be able to tell him
decisively: 'No way.'

'Good,' he said. Emphatically. She thought he realized
a half a second after he said it how it sounded,
because he flushed a little. He didn't take it back
though. In fact, he went on, 'He doesn't deserve you.'

Of course, Nick knew what had happened. Everybody in
her family had known--it was hard to miss her hard set
face at the dinner table the preceding spring--and of
course Bill had explained to Nick. She could just
imagine what he had said. She felt the embarrassment
start to return, but she squelched it.

'No, he doesn't.'

He grinned at her then. His smile was a cool blue
splash on that hot day. She watched his eyes crinkle up
at the corners, mesmerized. Someday he would have real
laugh lines around his eyes, but for now there was just
the promise of them. After a moment of shared
amusement, they lapsed into silence. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"You know how it is when you know that a man wants to
kiss you?"

Mulder had a brief flashback to a very awkward moment
during his second year at Oxford. He suppressed it, and
made a noncommittal sound. Scully wasn't listening for
his response though. She was continuing on.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .The air between them was electrified and yet
Scully felt the heaviness of a down comforter weighing
upon her. She knew--she could just feel it--that all
she had to do was look at him, be open to it, arch her
back a little, and tilt her chin, and he wouldn't be
able to stop himself. He would move closer, and his
face would come close to hers. She focused on his mouth
as he moved toward her--the shape of his lips, the
color, the tension of his desire in the small muscles
around it. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"When he leaned over and kissed me--Oh Mulder, do you
know what it's like to get just what you've wanted, so
badly, for so long?"

"No." He sounded as though he was strangling on the
night air. He didn't know yet, but he would soon.

He hoped.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .It was the shocking thrill of triumph that went
through her as much as anything else in his kiss. Not
that it wasn't sweet and passionate. It was. She felt
something falling open in her, like a book to her
favorite scene. His face was a little stubbly. The
smell of him, slightly sweaty, and laundry detergent,
and Ivory soap, went straight to the pleasure center in
her brain. It was too good, and when he pressed her
mouth open with his lips, and slipped his tongue in to
find hers, she thought her heart would pound so hard
that it would fly out of her chest, like a bird
released from a cage.

She let her own tongue slide against his, and savored
the low groan he made.

They must have sat out there in her yard, necking, for
a long time. She didn't know how long.

She was kissing his neck, massaging the muscles of his
throat with her tongue, making him groan. 'Salty,' she
said, humming it against his neck.

'You thirsty?' she continued.

'Thirsty?' He sounded completely bewildered.

'Want a glass of lemonade?'

'Lemonade?' he repeated. He was normally very
articulate. He and Bill would argue about politics for
hours. It was thrilling to be able to turn him into a
parrot this way.

'Come in the house, Nick.'

'I probably shouldn't.'

'Don't you want to?'

'You know I do.'

'Well, come on, then.' She stood up and held her hand
out to him. He took it and pretended he was letting her
pull him to his feet. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

In his rapidly overheating imagination, Mulder snatched
her up off the lawn and dragged her away from Nick. He
fantasized that he pushed Scully behind him, and
shutting the door quickly, locked Nick out in the yard.
Looking at him from the inside of the sliding glass
door, he bared his teeth at him. He pulled Scully by
the hand upstairs to her bedroom.

Here it was.

He could see the picture of Marie Curie on the wall
above the one of Roger Daltrey, the big stuffed bear in
the corner, the copies of *Anne of Green Gables* and
Frances Hodgson Burnett's *A Little Princess* on the
shelf side by side with her freshman biology textbook.
There was a picture of her family on her bureau,
apparently at the Grand Canyon. So that was what
Charlie looked like. Everything was neat and tidy and
in its place.

No canopy over the bed, thank god, but a flowered
bedspread, with big blue and white roses. He would lay
her down across it and then himself down beside her. He
would run his fingertips lightly over her arm, and then
her belly. He would lean over to kiss her beautiful
mouth.

He would kiss her and kiss her, searching her mouth
with his for the answers, until she moaned underneath
him and said, "Oh, Mulder."

He was so hard that he could have used his cock as a
baton to beat time on the steering wheel. He shifted
uncomfortably in his seat.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .Their house slanted away down a hill in the back,
and the downstairs was cool, shaded by the trees. The
Scullys couldn't see any of the neighbors from that
direction. She and Nick went in through the sliding
glass door, and she went to get him a glass of
lemonade, her brain ticking away with excitement. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

They were still downstairs in the family room? God,
this kid didn't have the sense God gave a biscuit. What
was wrong with him? If it had been Mulder, he would
have that cute little turquoise bathing suit bottom off
her lickety split. He would hook his fingers in the
edge of her suit bottom above the curve of her ass, and
pull it down her lovely lovely lovely legs. He'd push
her back gently so that she landed on the couch. He
would fall to his knees, and pull her legs over his
shoulders.

He'd kneel before her, holding her to his mouth, as he
ate her like a ripe, juicy, sweet pear, meltingly soft
and delectable. She would be gripping the arms of the
couch tightly, as tightly as she did in Dr. Werber's
office. He would see the tension in the muscles of her
arm out of the corner of his eye. She would be holding
onto the arm of the sofa for dear life as he licked
her, and tasted her, and stroked her with his tongue,
plunging himself into the heady smell, the taste, the
gorgeous feel of her. He would be listening to her
saying "oh god, oh god, oh GOD," above him. She would
be praying to the ceiling, the slope of her throat
taut, so that every muscle in it was clearly defined,
the roll and ripple of white sand dunes.

Mulder was abruptly bumped out of his fantasy by
Scully's voice:

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .He sat down on the couch, and she handed him the
lemonade. He took a long swallow, looking like he
needed the action to give him time to think. She
couldn't have that. If he stopped to think he might
stop entirely. So when he put the glass down on the end
table, she moved closer, and throwing her leg over him,
she sat down astride his lap. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"He looked as though--well, he looked like you did when
I said spontaneous human combustion during that case in
Louisiana. You remember?"

Mulder did indeed, though he didn't have any idea what
his face had looked like. He suspected he could imagine
the expression on whatshisname's face was, though. He
must have looked like he'd just gotten the Red Ryder BB
gun for Christmas, and wasn't sure that he deserved it.
Of course, he didn't, the sanctimonious little prick.
Mulder liked to consider himself above such petty
emotions as jealousy, but there were limits to his self
righteousness, after all. The thought of Scully
straddling the lap of some youth barely out of his
teens himself was stretching his generosity pretty far.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .'Do you want to see them again?' She looked him
solemnly in the eye. He looked confused, in an adorable
sort of way, for a moment, and then comprehension
spread over his face, his blue eyes clearing away the
clouds and shining with an intense, hot light.

'Yes or No?' She wanted a clear answer.

'N--Yes.' She knew part of him wanted to say no, to be
the good boy, the respectful friend, but she could feel
his hard cock pressing against her, and it was saying,
yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

She reached up to the back of her neck with both hands,
and leisurely untied the knot. She let it slide through
her fingers and thumb, so slowly, and let the halter
drop down against her belly.

He was swallowing hard, over and over, watching her
hands. She reached back behind her, her elbows turning
out and her breasts thrusting forward towards his face
as she did. She moved deliberately, drawing out the
moment. She could hear him release a little 'ah' sound
as they bounced nearer to him, but he made no attempt
to touch them. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Dumbass, thought Mulder. He had just realized that he
had always wanted to fuck Scully on his couch. Not her
couch. That was Eddie Van Blundht's fantasy,
apparently.

No, he wanted to fuck her on his couch, to hear the
creak of the leather as he thrust into her, and the
small gasps that would be flung out of her soft,
relaxed mouth as she balanced herself on his lap by
pressing her hands into the wall behind his head.
That's what he'd wanted to happen before that bee had
stung her. He'd wanted to kiss her, and stroke her
tears away with his thumbs. Then they would have kissed
again, and it would have been hot and passionate, and
he'd have said, "come back inside" in a low voice, and
she would have let him guide her back into his
apartment, and they would have kissed on the couch
until they couldn't stand it anymore, and then he
would--

He would have fucked her on his couch, and she would
have left, and gone to Salt Lake City in the morning,
or wherever she'd wanted to go, anywhere to get away
from him. He knew her. She was tough. It would take
more than getting inside her to get inside her.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .She unhooked the back of her swimsuit top, and let
it fall forward, catching it in her hands, and pulling
it out of her lap to drop it to the side. She looked at
his face to watch his reaction.

He was staring at her breasts now, in the way he hadn't
allowed himself to do earlier. The look on his face was
ravenous, an oddly erotic contrast to his normal
friendly countenance.

'Nicholas,' she said softly. He looked back up at her
face.

'Do you want to touch them?'

He gulped . . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"I don't know what possessed me. I was much less
cautious then, when I was younger, but still, he was
older than I was, and I was acting like I knew exactly
what I was doing, like I had no doubts about anything,
particularly not about how sexy I was."

How could she ever doubt that, wondered Mulder. That
was like doubting that the stars were made of fire.

Mulder was excruciatingly envious of this kid, who had
seen Scully the Siren. He'd swum in her sexual river
before she dammed it up in favor of reasonable
behavior. Just the thought of all the raw power that
must have accumulated behind the barrier she'd erected
made his ears ring. If it were to come down now, would
he be swept away by the roar? Oh god, let him please be
knocked down by it.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .It was wonderful. It was thrilling. It was the
whoosh of breath from your lungs when the fast Tilt-a-
Whirl ride at the carnival starts.

'Do you want to suck them?' she asked him.

'Yes,' he said, and leaned forward. But instead of
zeroing in on her nipples, he kissed the slope where
chest just begins to turn to breast, three inches below
her clavicle. It felt good. It was good. Marcus had
always gone right for the bull's-eye, no wasting time
with any unnecessary sidelines, however erotic she
might find them.

She loved this. His mouth felt so good on those muscles
and skin, so wet and hot and alive, moving downwards
toward her breast. By the time his mouth reached her
nipple it was agony. She pulled his head closer to her
as his stubble scraped across her skin, and touched his
soft curls--soft, not coarse--wonderingly. She could
feel the soft wet texture of his tongue against her
nipple as he sucked hard and slowly.

She couldn't repress a gasp.

'Dana, you know,' he said breathlessly, as he turned
his face up to her, letting her wet nipple slide out
his mouth, 'if he catches us, it's me your father is
gonna kill.'

'I'll protect you,' she promised, kissing his neck some
more, and nipping at his chin.

'Just distract him while I make a break for it, okay?'

'Don't worry. They're playing in a tournament. There's
a dinner, afterwards. They won't be back til late.'

'Bill and Charlie?'

'Shenandoah. Camping. No chance.'

'What time is Melissa getting off work?'

'Not until seven. Then she's meeting some friends for
margaritas.'

'Jesus, Dana. Bill would kill me.'

'I'm not gonna tell him. Are you gonna tell him? It's
none of his business.' She reached for his belt buckle,
and started to undo it.

'Oh, Christ,' he said, but he didn't stop her. . .Even
that simple movement, working the leather of his belt
through the buckle, gave her a intoxicating feeling of
power, of accomplishment.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

If it were Mulder who had Scully straddling his lap, he
would already be searching for her clitoris with his
fingers. It would be like trying to catch an iridescent
minnow in hot mud. Soon he would feel her vagina
clenching tightly about his fingers. He would groan
with the sensation, which would send sharp signals of
pleasure up his arm, and banging into the tops of his
ears before shooting back down to his cock.

He stifled an actual groan. He fervently hoped that she
didn't hear him.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .She had to rise up off his lap to work his shorts
off. He raised himself off the couch to let her. 'I
don't have a condom with me.'

'It's okay. I'm on the pill.' She had gone on it when
she had thought that she and Marcus would do it, and
never saw a reason to go off of it. It made her periods
more bearable. She shucked her bathing suit bottom as
well, watching his eyes flash as she did it.

She'd handled a penis before, of course. She wasn't
totally inexperienced. She was maliciously pleased to
note that Nick's was thicker than Marcus's. Still, she
had never handled one before in this particular
context, and trying to guide him into her was awkward
and fumbling. 'I can't. . .I can't' she said finally,
unable to determine the proper angle to accomplish what
she wanted to do. 'It's okay,' He reassured her.
'You're just not ready.'

'I am ready!' She was defiant.

He chuckled a little. 'I just meant your body's not
ready. Relax, just let it happen.'

'I hate it when a guy tells me to relax.'

They shifted, and his thick cock nudged mercilessly at
her tight little opening. She was hovering above him,
holding onto his shoulders. She could feel how close
they were, and she knew that she had to make it happen
quickly. She pulled her feet up flat onto the couch.
Her pelvic floor was relaxed and open in this position,
with her knees spread wide open on either side of his
thighs. She was afraid that it must have looked
ridiculous, but it felt good, so good. His hands, those
knobby hands she loved, were on the soft skin of her
inner thighs. She linked her arms around his neck, and
pressing her torso to his, lowered herself down over
his cock, as steadily and forcefully as she could bear
to. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Oh god. He was inside of her. Here she was, giving him
something she had never given anyone else. She was
telling him a story she had never told anyone before.
He knew her. He was learning to know her. He would
penetrate her to her innermost part. It was agony, but
it was so, so, sweet.

He let out a thought he didn't know he'd been thinking:
"Tell me how it felt, Scully."

"Strange. Oh, it felt strange. It didn't hurt like I'd
expected. It just felt like pressure inside me.
Different than anything else, ever--"

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

. . .Like when she closed her thumb within her fist. It
was all her. Fingers and thumb inside one another,
where flesh is against flesh. It was like being turned
inside out, existing on two planes at once, so half her
awareness was turned inward, and yet she existed
outside of it. It felt shocking, real. When he pushed
into her, it was like the plunger of a hypodermic,
pushing a high pitched moan out through her.

A look of realization flooded his face. 'Jesus, Dana,'
he said, horrified. 'Why didn't you tell me?'

'Then you would have stopped,' she gasped. 'Don't stop
now, Nick.'

She was alternating between clutching the back of the
couch and his shoulders.

His hands were on her hips, gripping her so tightly
that a little tighter would have been pain. She could
feel his thumbs on her hip bones, which in later years
she would discover were an incredible erogenous zone
for her. He was bringing her down over his cock, and
then letting her rise back up, running his hands up and
down her back, and pulling her down again. It wasn't
the easiest position they could have chosen, but Scully
quickly discovered she like being on top, oh she liked
it, it was good, good, good, good.

There was a picture window behind the couch. She could
see the trees beyond his head as she fucked him and he
fucked her. Each individual leaf of oak, and maple, and
even the tulip tree in their backyard was outlined with
a surreal clarity. She closed her eyes, and opened
them, and closed them, and looked up at the sky. She
looked down at his face, the stubble of his beard, into
his eyes, hazel-green like the leaves. She could feel
her heart--hear it--pounding in her ears, filling her
brain, as though that trapped bird were going to beat
its way out, its wings beating hard and frantically,
pinions tensed, and then, and then, she just. . .oh. .
.flew. . .away. . .

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

A strange sharp moan emerged from her throat, and when
Mulder glanced over at her, his own heart pounding too,
even in the dark he could see the tremor that rippled
through her.

Had she come?

He couldn't be sure, which didn't really surprise him.
It wasn't the first time he'd been unsure whether or
not a woman had come in his presence. He suspected that
it wouldn't be the last. At least, he hoped not.
Dammit, he wasn't sure what he should hope for. It
wasn't exactly the pinnacle of his fantasies for Scully
to have an orgasm in the car seat next to him, as she
remembered a sexual encounter with another man, while
on painkillers. Still, it was much closer than he
sometimes had thought he would ever get.

Wait, something sounded wrong. What was it? When he
realized, he was stunned. She had definitely described
this Nick character before as having blue eyes. Blue,
like the color of blueberries, she'd said. But just
before she, uh, did whatever she had done, she'd said--

"Scully. Scully?"

She seemed to rouse herself. "I went to his wedding
last year. I almost didn't go. . .I didn't want to see
what time had done to him. I thought about just sending
a place setting, and a nice card, but I couldn't
resist. He looked just the same--only older of course.
It hurt only the tiniest little bit. I still loved him,
but it was. . .cumulative. You just pile more love on
top." She sighed a little, and her shoulders slumped,
as she drifted a little further away from him, into
sleep.

What happened? What had happened with her and Nick
after that? Did her parents come home? Had he just left
for the Peace Corps, and never looked back? Did they
date after that? If they had, then Bill surely would
have known about it, and it wouldn't be a secret. He
wondered if he would ever have the nerve to ask her.

She was still asleep when he pulled up in front of her
building. He started to wake her, and then thought
better of it. Holding his keys, with her apartment key
between his thumb and forefinger, he went around to her
side of the car, he slipped his arm under her knees,
and very gently, so as not to hurt her ribs, he slipped
his other arm under her back across her shoulder
blades.

Maneuvering her out of the car, he carried her up to
her apartment. She was sleeping the sleep of the
drugged; otherwise she would surely have woken up when
he awkwardly balanced the weight of her body on his
knee as he put her key in the lock and opened her door.

He carried her to her bedroom, stopping several times
to maintain his stability. Her head fell against his
shoulder. Her hair was soft and tickled his neck.

He carefully laid her down on the bed and slipped off
her shoes. Standing a moment in her bedroom, he
couldn't resist the opportunity to look his fill at
her.

He wrote her a note, and finding some Scotch tape in
the catch-all drawer in her kitchen, taped it to the
bathroom mirror, so that she would see it when she woke
up in the morning.

It said: Your secret's safe with me.
--M

The End.

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old time is still a-flying;
And this same flower that smiles today
Tomorrow will be dying.

The glorious lamp of heaven, the sun,
The higher he's a-getting,
The sooner will his race be run,
And nearer he's to setting.

That age is best which is the first,
When youth and blood are warmer;
But being spent, the worse, and worst
Times still succeed the former.

Then be not coy, but use your time,
And, while ye may, go marry;
For, having lost but once your prime,
You may forever tarry.

Robert Herrick "To the Virgins, To Make Much of Time"

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