Title: 37 Days

Author: Drovar

Email address: Drovar@ix.netcom.com

Rating: PG

Date: 2/14/99

Other website/archive: The Ferret Cage

URL: http://www.geocities.com/area51/hollow3190/ferret.htm

Summary: It's been 37 days . . . Post 'One Son'

Category: V, A

Disclaimers: CC, Fox & 1013 can keep all the rest, Spender belongs to me.

Notes: Not beta'd, a short something that came to me just now.





It's cold. I've let the fire burn down again . . .



I should get up and stoke it, but the wood bin is empty and the cold outside 

makes the ache even worse.



I think I was delirious again last night. I remember blood; he wanted blood, 

there had to be blood.



I ache, and I'm cold.



There's no snow on the ground; not yet, even here, but it's so cold.



The blankets are damp with my sweat, clammy and dank. I stink, but there's no 

one here to notice, not since he dumped me here, roughly sutured and alone.



Thankfully the night terrors, sweats, and dreams are becoming less severe as 

time goes by.



Time, I once thought I had none, now I have nothing else. 



I gingerly burrow back beneath the blankets and search for my usual uneasy 

sleep.



I never used to dream. I'd wake up each morning a blank slate, swept clean by 

the night. Now I sometimes can't tell where the dreaming stops and the reality 

of my life begins.



I hear my mother calling for me in my dreams sometimes. She's so far away. I run 

for her, following her echoing voice, uncertain, unclear which way to go. 

Sometimes I catch a glimpse, a soft face in the distance, serene, at peace. 

Sometimes I envy her death.



But I'm still among the living; still trapped in machinations I don't 

understand, by forces I'm unable to fight. I turn slowly onto my uninjured side, 

chasing the oblivion of sleep. 



I wonder how Mulder ever managed it without going completely insane. I know 

things I never imagined could be true, things I've denied the reality of all my 

life. I've been a fool, easily manipulated, a child caught in a game where I 

hadn't a clue about the rules.



Now I know, now I understand; now, when it's far too late.



I don't know what's going on in the world around me. I don't know what's 

happening at the bureau. There's no phone here, no radio, no television, not 

even electricity. I rise with the sun, and sleep when it sets.



I tried to walk out once, but these woods seem to go on forever. I spent one 

night alone in the dark, huddled beside a fallen tree. That was my last 

excursion. There's food at least, and medicine. I won't starve or die of 

infection. Though I wonder how many painkillers it would take to join my mother.



I managed to scrape together some old pencils and paper. Enough to keep this 

journal. But I have so little to write about, other than my random thoughts, sad 

little poems for my mother, and letters of sincere apology to the people I 

betrayed in my ignorance.



I have no idea what he plans to do with me. I'm not certain I even care. But I 

do know this. I've lived a large part of my life as a fool. But now I can 

finally sign my name . . .



Jeffrey Frank Spender

An honest man



[END]