Title: "NO SURPRISES."
Author: Gingfox.
Rating: PG. Contains a couple of naughty words. Angst. POV.
Feedback: Would be appreciated.
Archive: Feel free to archive anywhere, just let me know where. :)
Summary: Spender's thoughts after he delivers some bad news to a close friend.
Disclaimer: Jeffrey Spender (and all other characters associated with The X.Files) is the property of Chris Carter, 1013 Productions and the FOX Network! Lyrics to "Falls Apart" are the property of Sugar Ray. (No copyright infringement intended, so please don't sue me!)


"She falls apart,
By herself.
No-one's there,
To talk or understand.
Feels the sting,
Dries her eyes.
Finds herself,
Opens the door inside.
People see right through you,
Everyone who knew you well.
Falls apart,
Might as well.
Day is long,
And nothing is wasted.
Run away ... run away ... "

"He can't be dead! You're lying! Why are you doing this to me? Shut up! Leave me alone! I don't want to hear any more, you hear me!? Liar! Filthy rotten liar! I hate you! Just fuck off ... please!"

She covers her ears with her hands, and turns her back to me. I just had the unwelcome task of telling a very close friend that her beloved father had been found dead. Murdered. His head and chest pumped full of bullets at close range. My own father is responsible, I know he is. I feel responsible. Now she has no mother or father, and I'm guilty by association.

She's pacing the lounge room now, like a caged tiger. Floods of tears streaming down her cheeks, her skin pale, eyes wide from shock and disbelief. She says she doesn't believe me, but deep down, she knows what I say is true. She knows I could never ... would never ... lie to her.

Slowly I step towards her, and she stops her pacing to stare at me. Then suddenly, unexpectedly, she's in my arms, clinging to me, sobbing her heart out, and it's affecting me to the extent that I too begin to cry.
"Who could have done such a thing?" she asks me through her grief and tears, "My father was a good man! Who could have wanted him dead? He was a good person ... everybody loved him ... " She begins to sob even harder, her heart is beating overtime, I can feel its rapid thumping against my chest.

Not everyone loved her father. I know exactly who wanted him dead ... my father. Her father is, or was, a powerful Senator, who had threatened to expose my father for what he is ... a lying, manipulating, double-crossing, murderous bastard, who seems to take a perverse pleasure out of other peoples' misfortune and suffering. Hell hath no fury like the chain-smoking prick scorned! I wouldn't be surprised if it was he who had pulled the trigger.

Her father was a good man, extremely kind and caring. He treated me like the son he never had. He always showed an interest in me, something my own father never did ... never does. My father is more interested in Fox Mulder, thinks the guy is so damn wonderful! My God, if he loves Mulder so much, then why doesn't he just adopt him!?

Maybe our initial attraction to each other, was the fact she didn't have a mother, and I at the time, didn't have a father. We were kind of the 'freaks' at the Academy. Everyone else had two parents, we only had one each. We were the brunt of so many jokes because of that fact. She was 'daddy's little brat' and I was 'momma's boy.' People can be so cruel ... but we stuck together, and formed a close bond.

Her mother died when she was only six, my father walked out on me when I was eleven. We each had something the other wanted, and our friendship developed from such a need. My mother became something of a substitute parent to her, just as her father was to me. In a way, we were a happy little 'family'. I secretly wanted my mom to marry her dad, but though he was fond of my mother, he'd never fully recovered from the tragic loss of his wife. For a family with no history of cancer, Mrs Lawson died in the worst possible way. It wouldn't surprise me, if my father had had a hand in her death as well. Maybe if our parents had married, my life, our lives, would have taken a different course ...

Now my mother and her father are dead, and where does that leave us? Will she turn her back on me when I tell her the truth about her father's death? God, I hope not. We've been through too much together already, and I don't want to lose her ... she's the only real friend I have.

Maybe the death of her father is my father's way of screwing up my life yet again. That wouldn't surprise me at all!


THE END.