Title: Lessons VII: Soaring
Author: Jori 
Rating: R for language and suggestive imagery
Summary: It's time to take learning to a new, higher level.
Category: SRH
Keywords: M&S UST
Archive: Yes
Disclaimer: Not mine. They belong to CC, 1013 and FOX.
Author's notes: As with all of MoJo and my Lessons, we are living in a
dream world where Biogenesis doesn't occur until next November.

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

Not even the moderate breeze can cool down this blistering July day.
Today would have been a good day for Scully to consider water polo, but
she is obviously taking us into the great outdoors again. Pool must be
the only indoor 'sport' she knows. At least it isn't figure skating.
I'll take the heat before doing that.

By the time I follow the directions from Scully's hand-written note and
find her in this large clover field, I am covered in sweat. Of course,
I'm not certain if that is from the intense heat or because of the
memory of our last 'game.' I can still feel her mouth come near mine,
our lips touching for such a short time. The thought of her tasting the
salt off lower lip sends my heart racing even after a week.

All week, we acted as if it never happened. We went back to business as
usual. It wasn't mentioned once, but I will admit it was thought of a
million times. At least on my part it was. Maybe Scully hasn't given it
a second thought. Perhaps it was just another part of the game to her.
But damn it, that was supposed to be my game. I invited her there. And
she took over. After that brief, fleeting moment of contact, I could
never get my thoughts collected. She won every match of double down
after that. My concentration was blown for the entire night and for most
of this past week.

Scully has a small kite flying high in the air. It is a traditional
diamond-shaped one with some kind of design on it. She looks incredibly
young doing this. Young and carefree as she concentrates on the kite
flying high above us. Nothing else matters now.

She is wearing shorts and the souvenir t-shirt I bought her from the
Spread Eagle Inn. That was our final bet. If she won, I would buy her
that. Plus I had to face the embarrassment of walking up to the bar and
asking for a domestic beer. She couldn't handle Guinness after just a
few sips.

"Scully, how many years have you wanted to tell me to go fly a kite?" I
ask as I make my way across the clovers to stand next to her. My damn
voice actually cracked when I asked that, as if I'm some teenager asking
her out to the prom.

"You can't even begin to imagine," she says with a smile. She doesn't
look in my direction, instead focusing on her kite. This is a good
thing, because if she did look at me right now, I'm sure she would be
able to see my heart pounding in my chest.

I was alone with her all week. What is different about this that it is
making my heart race and my palms sweat?  Well, we aren't sitting alone
in the basement of the Hoover building working on late expense reports.
No, we are standing alone in a clover field miles away from filing
reports in triplicate. And we are miles away from any other human being.

"So, do I get my own kite, or are we going to share just one?" I ask,
and I can see a slight blush spread across her face. Even with those
sunglasses on, it is there. She most certainly remembers 'sharing' that
chip last weekend.

"I bought a variety of kites for us to try out today. Ed at the kite
shop recommended that we start with this one. He called it a bowed eddy.
He said it is good for beginners," Scully says.

"You haven't done this before?" I ask, surprised.

I was a child the last time I flew a kite. It was summer on the
Vineyard, the perfect time for kite flying. We would run down to the
shore and fly them out over the water. They were cheap plastic kites and
I can remember the sound of them rattling in the wind. Samantha's would
be decorated in butterflies or rainbows. Mine would have dragons or
something equally as menacing on it. She would always lose hers and I
would have to give her mine or else she would cry. I can still see her
standing there, flying my dragon kite, her tiny arms reaching towards
the sky, struggling to hold on. I haven't thought about that in years.

So far Scully has only selected activities she has mastered. She is
always the teacher, the expert. So, the game is changing. From this
point on, we are going to learn together.

"I haven't done this since I was maybe six or seven, so I guess I
technically can't say I have never done it before. But I sure can't
remember the last time I did do it," she says. Every word she chooses is
intentional. I know they have to be. And she is so damn good with those
words. They hit their target every time. "Would you like to relearn how
to do it with me? Fly a kite, that is."

"I, um, would love to do it with you," I say. I see the corners of her
mouth try to form a smile, but she fights it. Scully has had many years
of practice in hiding that smile. Now it is my job to let her set it
free. If  learning to cliff dive is what it takes to get her to smile,
then book us a trip to Acapulco now.

"Then could you hold this one while I get another kite set up?" she
asks, as she starts to hand me the . . .  the thing with the string on
it. She stops before I can take it. "It is important that you have the
proper equipment when flying a kite, especially when handling the reel
and flying line. Wouldn't want those hands to get hurt."

I look at the thing in her hands. More reels. More fly line. No rods as
far as I can tell. She digs a pair of fingerless gloves out of her
pocket and hands them to me.

"You steal these from Frohike?" I ask, as I slide one glove onto my
hand.

"No, he was more than willing to give those to me . . ." she says, and I
stop in mid-yank.

"Scully, exactly how many times have you gone to visit the boys without
me?" I ask, and she doesn't give me an answer. She just watches her kite
soar above us.

"Now you can hold this," she says. As soon as it is in my hands, the
kite starts spiraling downwards, as if a damn kamikaze pilot is manning
it, heading towards earth faster than Scully can do anything to readjust
it.

*Schwump!*

"Damn," I say, as I watch the kite tumble across the ground before
coming to a complete stop. The poor thing is my first victim. I wonder
what else Scully has in that bag?

"Mulder, one of the most important things is keeping it up," she says,
as her tongue darts out and rests at the corner of her mouth briefly.
"The next thing of importance is being able to get it back up quickly."

"I'm sure with the proper . . . motivation, I can get it back up faster
than you've ever seen," I say to her. Scully stops reeling in the line
for a moment. "The kite, that is."

"I'm sure you can," she mumbles under her breath as she goes back to
rolling up the line. Or at least that is what I think she said. She
doesn't repeat it when I say I couldn't hear her.

We begin to walk out to where the kite hit the dirt. She rolls the line
up on to the reel as we go, neither of us saying anything right now. As
much fun as I find the banter and the innuendoes, this is nice, too. It
is pleasant to just stand here in this mushroom free field with her and
do something as basic as flying a kite. For just awhile, I don't have to
think about anything else.

As we walk across the field, I remember the one thing I hate about
clover. There are bees. Lots of them. I wonder if she is trying to tell
me something by selecting this location?

"You want to help me get it aloft again?" she asks, as she checks out
the suicidal kite. Her fingers trace over its frame slowly, checking out
every inch with slow, deliberate ease. Those beautiful fingers touch it
so gently, teasingly. I can't help but to stare. "It appears to be
undamaged."

"Just tell me what I have to do," I say, snapping back from my finger
fantasies. I want to add 'to get you to touch me like that' but she
places the reel in my hand before I can say anything.

"I think for two people to do this I have to stand about 100 feet
downwind from you . . ." she starts.

"You think 100 feet is enough?" I ask, catching a whiff of my sweaty
body on a gust of wind.

". . . And I will face you with the kite. You have to tug on the flying
line and kite should rise. I think," she says, looking down at the kite
and playing with the material that makes up its tail.

"You think? Where did you learn how to do this?" I ask. Maybe Ed gave
her some private lessons earlier. For all I know, this is Ed's clover
patch.

"I read it in a kite flying how-to book," she says quietly.

"You have a how-to book about kites?" I ask. Although  I'm sure there
are such a books in existence, I just can't imagine Scully owning one.

"What? I'm sure you have plenty of how-to books around your place," she
says. I can see her eyes narrow through the dark lenses of her
sunglasses.

"Yeah, but none about getting kites up. Now, getting other things . . ."

"One hundred feet, Mulder," she says, poking a finger at the center of
my chest. I begin to walk back toward her equipment.

She shouts 'stop' and I turn around to face her. The line is stretched
from the reel in my hand to the kite in hers and now it is time to see
if I can back my words and get it up quickly. The breeze is blowing
behind me, and when I begin tugging on the flying line, the kite rises
out of Scully's hands and goes aloft, sailing higher than it was when it
came crashing down.

Scully walks to my side and watches me let out more and more line.

"Sometimes that happens on the first try. You just can't keep it up. You
aren't the first. You won't be the last," she says, her voice saucy with
innuendo.

"Never happens to me," I say and give her a wink. She licks her lips
ever so slightly, with just the tip of her tongue brushing across those
beautiful lips, and I swear I can remember the feel of . . .

"Mulder, you have to pay attention to what you are doing. Here, let me
show you," she says, as she ducks between my arms and is standing in
front of me. How does she manage to do that every single time?

I'm only wearing a tank top and shorts. She's only wearing a t-shirt and
shorts. As she leans back into me, I can feel every curve and plane of
her body through my clothing. My gloved hands are over hers on the reel
and with some of the gusts up there, it takes both of us to keep control
of this little kite, forcing her into me.

Scully talks about power lines and trees. She mentions not flying a kite
over an altitude of 500 feet near an airport. Like I'm going to be out
in front of Dulles on Monday flying a kite. And she talks about the
dangers of walking backwards without paying attention. I try to listen.
I really do. But she is pressed against me just right. Oh, man. That is
*too* right.

She is scented slightly of sweat and of newly mown grass. She must have
been sitting in this field before I arrived, getting the kite ready. I
fight the urge to put my hand around her waist like I did when we were
in the river a few weeks ago. I fight the urge to pull her closer to me.

And I must admit it takes every damn ounce of control I have in this
body of mine not let other things go aloft along with this kite. If she
doesn't stop moving back into me like that, she's going to learn a hell
of a lot more about me than the fact that I can't shoot arrows, catch
fish or fly kites.

Mercifully, she slips out of between my arms, giving me control over
this kite and, frankly, myself. Out of the corner of my eye, I see her
setting up another kite. This one is different from the simple one I'm
flying. It is triangular and looks more like a paper airplane. It is
decorated to look like the wings of a Monarch butterfly. What is it with
females and butterflies anyway?

"This one is called a delta, for obvious reasons," she says holding it
up for me to take a quick glance at. "The only thing I remember about
its physical structure is that this is the keel and this is the sail.
Oh, and this is the spreader bar."

I have to laugh. Not at her saying that, but rather at how long it
probably took her to find a kite in her book that had an applicable
sordid term associated with its structure. After we are done I will have
to question where she gained her knowledge of bondage and domination
equipment. I can't remember a case with such things.

"Can you get that in the air by yourself?" I ask, remembering the 100
feet necessary to get this one up and sailing above me.

"I think I can manage," she replies. With her normal grace and ease,
Scully does send that kite soaring. We have to move apart to keep our
lines from tangling, but not so far that I can't hear her talking to me.

"Mulder, if our lines cross, don't pull. That will only snap the lines
and we will lose the kites," she instructs, as we both watch out for
where the other's kite is headed.

I expect that any minute she is going to break out into a lesson on
Bernoulli's Principle or Newton's third law of motion. Maybe she will
even mention updrafts and thermals. Perhaps she will even ask if I
learned about wind in kindergarten again, and I will have to tell her
no. I learned about wind watching Bill Nye the Science Guy early one
Saturday morning.  But she remains silent, only remarking on a few
things here and there.

Of course, I can't help myself. All this crap rattling around in my
brain must come out sooner or later.

"You know, that by flying a kite in 1752, Benjamin Franklin proved that
lightning was a natural phenomenon rather than a supernatural power. Of
course, he never met that kid. What was his name?" I ask.

"I don't remember," she says.

"Anyway, Franklin was even proclaimed as the new Prometheus for reaching
up into the heavens and bringing man an incredible form of fire. And of
course, electricity for our televisions and VCRs," I say with a smile.
"For that, I thank the man every day."

"Did you know that the Polynesians associated kites with deities, the
soul, and as a means of making contact with the gods in heaven? And that
in the Hawaiian Islands, kites were perceived as manifestations of the
gods as well as being celestial objects flown . . ." she starts to ask,
and I guess my face says it all. "Of course you do. If it is in the sky,
you know about it."

"But I'd love to hear your side of it," I say, and with an unexpected
gust of wind, we both nearly get our reels ripped from our hands. My
kite goes into a spiral again, and even with Scully's hints, I can't
save it from taking another nose dive. All I can do is shout, "In
coming!"

"Mulder, I need some help here," Scully says, as she tries to reel her
kite in. The wind is picking up speed very quickly. If she didn't look
like she was struggling so hard I would explain to her the Beaufort's
wind scale. She doesn't look like she would care right now.

"What do you need me to do?" I ask. The kite is pulling so hard it looks
like it could lift her off of her feet and take her up through the
atmosphere . . . up where the air is clear . . .

"I need you to get in front of me and pull it in hand over hand while I
take up the slack flying line," she says.

She is behind me rolling up the line while I pull it down from the sky.
It is heavier than I imagined with the wind trying to keep it up there
with as much effort as I'm using to get it down here. Who said kite
flying was easy?

"Shit!" I say as the kite I left on the ground suddenly dances to life
and tries to do cartwheels across the field. The delta kite is fighting
me every inch of the way. I take one hand off the flying line and reach
for the line on the other kite.

That is all it takes. The lines cross and everything becomes a tangled
mess. And Scully and I get twisted up in it, too. The lines wrap around
us, with one kite going one way and the other pulling in the opposite
direction.

"Hold still. Stop backing up," Scully tells me as she tries to figure
out the entangled lines.

The wind picks up once again, taking the airborne kite even higher,
yanking the flying lines wrapped around us even tighter. Scully tries to
say something, but before she can finish we both go down with a *thwump*
like something straight out of Charlie Brown, all wrapped up in the
line. At least we aren't hanging upside down from a tree.

Then I do notice where we are. By some miracle found in the laws of
gravity and a few principles of physics, she is under me and I am over
her. Her sunglasses fell off as we hit the ground, allowing me to see
into those perfect eyes. And now her mouth is just inches away from
mine. I am damn glad I landed in such a way as to make up for the height
difference between us. Do you believe in miracles? Yes!

I can feel her breathing under me, but I can hear nothing but the sound
of my heart lub dubbing away as fast as it can in my chest. Well, that
and the sound of bees. Not a lot of bees - no swarm this time - but just
one can sometimes be worse. Her eyes flicker and she smiles at me.

There is no thought behind it this time. No reasoning. No long pauses,
giving either of us time for reconsideration. I cannot say whether she
moved toward me or I moved toward her. We both moved toward each other
at the same time, our mouths now meeting in the middle.

And it is more than just her stealing a taste of salt off of my bottom
lip. Even though it is less, it is so much more. Our lips barely brush.
The slightest contact is made and then is broken. But neither of us
moves to get up. I swear I can feel her heart beating against my chest.

Before I know what is happening, before I can even start thinking again,
her tongue is back on my bottom lip, and then further into my mouth,
searching and probing ever deeper. Years and years of wanting *this* are
at this moment wrapped up in mouths and lips and tongues. And flying
line.

She tastes better than I ever imagined. She does this better than I ever
imagined. I knew she would be so damn good at this. She is so good at
everything she does. All my what-if questions I've had for the past year
have just been answered. And the answer is wonderful. It was well worth
the wait. This only feeds my vivid imagination as to what else she is
good at.

Scully's hands somehow go up and under the front of my shirt with
hesitation, as if she has to steal this touch. They move around to my
back, and she vacillates about moving any lower than the waistband of my
pants. I can feel that she wants to let her hands explore to places we
just haven't allowed ourselves to let the other touch all these years. I
can feel her need is as strong as any of my urges to touch her. Dammit,
Scully, touch anything you want. Let your hands wander where they may.
You don't need my spoken permission.

I'd tell her that, too, except it would mean I'd have to break this
kiss. No way in hell I'm doing that. The only thing that will make me
stop is when one of us has to come up for air or . . . her body starts
to tense up and she pushes me away. Just like she is doing now.

Her eyes look startled as I pull away from her and her mouth is trying
to form words that just aren't coming to her. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. I just
blew six fucking years of *us* for just this one kiss.

"Scully, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry . . ."

She doesn't say anything. Rather, she pushes at my chest harder.
"Mulder?"

"Yeah?"

"Move!"

Tangled in the lines, the best I can do is to roll over with her on top
of me. Now she is straddling my hips and right at this very moment, that
isn't such a good idea.

*Schwump!*

With a clatter and a rip, the delta kite hits the ground in the exact
spot we were in just a second ago. It looks like a big broken butterfly.
Scully lets out a little sigh of relief and tries to untangle us from
this mess we've gotten into. Hell, it is a bigger mess than just flying
lines and kites now. If she doesn't stop wiggling like that, it's going
to be an even bigger mess.

The lines are finally off of us and her hands are back on my chest. Mine
are wrapped around her slender waist, not moving any higher or lower.
The two of us look like a playful couple out for a day at the park. And
I'm undecided whether I want her to get up or whether it is just better
for her to stay like that. Both have their intrinsic problems. She has
got to feel that by now. Hell, for all I know, maybe she is enjoying
what she is doing to me.

"Do you think we will be able to get it up?" she asks, looking at her
broken kite and then at me. That elusive smile of hers is now playing
across her face and her eyes are lit up.

"It's already . . ."

"The kite, Mulder. The kite."

The End

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

So, MoJo, have you got the next lesson revved up to go?

Feedback is graciously accepted at:
MoJo: mojober@aol.com
Jori: damienma@bellsouth.net

Author's Notes: All kite flying information was taken from a kite flying
how-to book called: The Magnificent Book of Kites by Maxwell Eden.

All knowledge of wind was acquired by watching Bill Nye the Science Guy,
Beakman's World and The Magic Schoolbus.