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Title: Two More Couples "So explain to me, again, why we're having this holiday shindig at our house tonight?" Special Agent Fox Mulder asked his wife as she shimmied into her velvet Christmas dress. "Why not? I thought it would be fun. A chance to get everyone together and let some of our friends meet each other. Besides. . ." "Okay, I distrust the tone of that 'besides', Dana. What have you got up your sleeve?" "Well, Suzanne thought that Jimmy and Kimberly might like each other." "You mean Jimmy as in Jimmy Bond, the Lone Gunmen's newest employee? And Kimberly as in Kimberly Johnson, Skinner's secretary?" "Yes, Fox. As far as I know, they're the only 'Jimmy' and 'Kimberly' coming to the party." "Does Suzanne even *know* Kimberly?" "Let's see. . .in the past two years, they've both been guests at my bridal shower, our wedding, my baby shower, Missy's bridal shower and Missy and Sean's wedding. . .I think that qualifies as at least a passing acquaintance with each other." "Isn't this an awfully elaborate pretense to get Jimmy and Kimberly together? Wouldn't it have been easier just to set them up on a blind date or something?" "Blind dates are awkward and artificial. This way, they simply get to meet each other, at a party with a bunch of other people they mostly already know. If they happen to hit it off, okay. If they don't, there's no embarrassment, because they didn't even know that Suzanne thought they might make a cute couple. Besides that's not the sole reason for the party; like I said, I just thought it would be fun." "I think there's a major flaw in this plan: Jimmy seems to have the hots for Yves." Scully shrugged. "So what? Langley and Frohike *also* seem to have the hots for Yves. I haven't noticed it doing any of them any good. I think part of their problem is that they don't really meet a lot of women; at least not single, attractive women. And Jimmy is the type, physically, who appeals to Kimberly." "How do you know what type appeals to Kimberly?" her husband asked suspiciously. "It happened to come up at Missy's bridal shower. Things got a bit. . bawdy." "Why am I not surprised?" "Mostly it was Monica. That woman has a mouth on her. I wonder if Doggett knows how much of their sex life is common knowledge among other female employees of the bureau?" "If he doesn't, it's not our place to enlighten him. So I'm taking it that Kimberly's type is dumb blonds?" Scully laughed softly. "No, I don't think either hair color or intelligence levels were mentioned in her descriptions. She just likes *big* men; tall, broad shoulders, lots of muscles. . .that sort of stuff. I figured Jimmy qualified in that regard." What Scully didn't share with her husband was the implication both she and Monica had picked up on; that the description Kimberly was giving of her "dream man" could just as easily have been a stat box for her boss, Walter Skinner. Still, if Kimberly had her heart set on Skinner it was probably a lost cause; he'd been divorced for several years and Kimberly had worked for him for almost that entire period. If he hadn't made a move to become more than just a boss to his pretty young secretary in all that time, it was doubtful he ever would. When Mulder remained silent, Scully added, "I'm guessing you don't think the two of them will hit it off?" "Personally, no. But for all my supposedly brilliant profiling skills, I tend to be pretty clueless when it comes to guessing who's going to appeal to whom in a romantic sense. Remember, I'm the man who thought your sister and Pendrell would never make it to a third date. Since they got married last month, I was obviously wrong about *them*. So maybe a year from now, we'll be attending Jimmy and Kimberly's wedding," he said. An hour later, Scully was holding their daughter, Emily, on her hip when she answered the door. Her sister and brother-in-law, Melissa and Sean Pendrell, were the first to arrive. "How's my favorite niece?" Missy asked, snatching the baby greedily away from her sister. "Missy, she's your *only* niece," Mulder pointed out dryly. "Don't bother her with details," suggested Pendrell. The next guests to arrive were John and Suzanne Byers with their daughter, Jill, who was about a year older than Emily. Suzanne had a huge smile on her face which seemed inappropriately exuberant for a mere casual holiday party with friends. Maybe she *really* gets into matchmaking, Mulder thought. "Suzanne, do you have something to tell us?" Scully asked. "I'm pregnant," Suzanne announced. "That's wonderfu!" Dana and Missy said in chorus. "Sweetheart, I thought we agreed we were going to wait and make *one* announcement, once everybody was here," Byers said in mild protest. "I can't help it; I'm excited!" Byers smiled gently. "I know. Me, too." The next guests were the only other "couple" attending the party; Monica and John Doggett and their son, Luke. Just as Jill was about a year older than Emily, Luke was yet another year older than Jill. Luke had his own bit of Christmas news to share with the assembled guests. "I can tee-tee in the potty!" he announced gleefully. "That's great," Mulder replied, since the little boy seemed so proud of his accomplishment. "I thought you were having problems trying to sell him on the concept of giving up diapers," Scully murmured quietly to Moncia. "I was," Monica admittedly ruefully. "Then he followed John into the bathroom one day last week and once he realized that *DADDY* goes tee-tee in the potty and that if he stopped using diapers he would be just like Daddy -- which is the goal of his entire existence -- he immediately started using the toilet. Except for a couple of accidents at naptime or bedtime, he's been keeping dry ever since." The next two people to arrive could have been tagged "the odd couple". Melvyn Frohike and Ringo Langley were good friends as well as co-workers. Neither seemed to have much luck with women. As was true of their younger colleague Jimmy, they both seemed slightly enamored of Yves Harlow, a freelance writer who sometimes worked with them and sometimes competed against them in their quest for uncovering conspiracy theories. Jimmy himself showed up next. He came alone, but was greeted enthusiastically by everyone present. He was like a gentle giant; among the adults present, he was the youngest by several years. "I'm always glad when Jimmy shows up at a party," Missy murmured in her husband's ear. "Should I be jealous?" Pendrell inquired. But it was more in the nature of teasing than actual worry. Miraculous though he still felt it to be, his gorgeous wife was as crazy about him as he was about her. "No, of course not, silly; it's just that when Jimmy's around, I know I'm no longer the dumbest person in the room." "You're not dumb, Missy," Pendrell protested. It had been a shock to him when he first realized that a woman as beautiful and outgoing as she was could have insecurities. But in a family full of people with master's degrees and medical licenses, Missy -- who'd only completed three semesters of college before dropping out -- sometimes felt like she didn't quite measure up. The next two people to show up were Walter Skinner and his secretary, Kimberly Johnson. It was unclear whether they'd arrived "together" or had just happened to both pull up at the same time and accompanied each other to the door. Dana made a special point of immediately introducing Kimberly -- and Skinner, too, since he happened to be standing right next to her -- to Jimmy. They greeted each other politely enough, but there didn't seem to be any initial spark. "They don't look too interested," Scully murmured to Suzanne. "For heaven's sake, Dana, what did you expect? For them to immediately rip each other's clothes off? Give it time. After all, you and Mulder knew each other for an entire year before you gave up on the whole 'we're just partners in a professional sense' business and started dating. And, quite frankly, I'm not sure things would have progressed even *that* quickly if the X-Files hadn't been shut down and both of you reassigned," Suzanne said. "Okay, okay," Dana replied softly with a small smile. The last person to arrive was Yves Harlow who did seem to make somewhat of an "entrance". She was wearing a black velvet dress that hugged her curvaceous figure and black high heels that boosted her already above-average height to the point where she was nearly on eye level with Mulder and Doggett and just a few inches shorter than Skinner and Jimmy. She towered over poor Frohike. However, she didn't really cause as much of a stir as she might have hoped. The married men gave her the sorts of smiles which basically said, 'Yes, you're attractive. I'm not blind; I'll acknowledge that. But I'm also not interested." Frohike and Langley, as usual, did fall all over themselves asking if she wanted a drink or something to eat. On the other hand, Walter Skinner -- the only man at the party Yves had never met before -- gave her the same sort of bland smile the married men had. Granted, he was old enough to be her father, and she wasn't really interested in him, but she was used to having more of an effect than that on all but the most happily married -- or flagrantly gay -- of men. Most disturbing of all, Jimmy Bond didn't join his co-workers in swarming around her. He acknowledged her presence with a casual "Hi, Yves. You look nice tonight," then turned back to the conversation he was having with Mulder and a redheaded woman. Yves at first thought the woman was either Dana or her sister, then realized the two of them were carrying on an antimated conversation with Suzanne Byers and the two little girls in another part of the room. "Who is that?" she asked Frohike, inclining her head toward the woman who seemed to be holding the attention of both Mulder and Jimmy. "Her name's Kimberly Johnson. She works at the bureau," Frohike answered. The party was progressing nicely. Emily had fallen asleep but Dana, loathe to take her away from all the festivities, had simply tucked her into her cloth infant seat with a blanket around her and settled her into a dimly lit corner of the living room. Luke and Jill were playing some sort of game which seemed to involve chasing each other around the dining room table at top speed, then ducking underneath the long tablecloth and hiding. Various adults kept coming up to the table and "finding" them, which led to the whole game starting over again. Mulder and Scully's main Christmas gift to each other had been a state-of-the-art sound system, so they were putting various CDs in and some of the adults -- those who weren't busy eating from the buffet or "discovering" the toddlers hidden beneath it -- were dancing. There was a sprig of mistletoe hung in the archway between the living and dining rooms and all the men who were dancing with their wives managed to swing beneath it and steal a kiss. Pendrell spent so long beneath it with Missy that Mulder muttered "Why don't they just get a room?" to Scully. "Hush, Fox. They're newlyweds. Let them be," she replied. Yves had danced with both Jimmy and Frohike -- Langley refused to dance, even if it would provide a chance to hold Yves in his arms -- and Kimberly had danced with Skinner and Frohike, finding Frohike to be a surprisingly good dancer. Finally, the event that Scully and Suzanne had been hoping for happened. . .Jimmy asked Kimberly to dance. Jimmy wasn't deliberately trying to make Yves jealous; he didn't have the guile for that. He was, actually, trying to follow the rules of etiquette his mother had taught him as a teen, which he seemed to recall included a caveat that an unmarried male guest at a party should ask each of the unmarried female guests for at least one dance. He presumed the rule didn't apply to females in diapers hiding under tables, but it would certainly apply to Kimberly. Kimberly moved gracefully into Jimmy's arms and Scully grabbed the remote to the CD player and flipped the song selection to "Love Me Tender". Mulder rolled his eyes slightly, but didn't comment. Jimmy and Yves weren't the only ones on the floor; both the Doggetts and the Pendrells were dancing. Skinner was watching the scene in front of him with ill-concealed impatience. He was vaguely aware that he really ought to ask Yves to dance -- his mother had taught him the same rule that Jimmy's had -- but he was too disgusted to do so. He hadn't minded Kimberly dancing with Frohike; that man was even older than *he* was and, in any case, was too busy flirting with Yves to be more than a vaguely attentive partner to Kimberly. But having her dance with this good-looking blond giant was irking him. Although he didn't make use of the ability often, Skinner had grown accustomed to being able to intimidate virtually any man he came in contact with. Those who weren't cowered by his sheer physical size were usually wary of his position as Assistant Director of the FBI, as his workaholic lifestyle led to him associate mostly with other agents. Jimmy, however, was every bit as big as he was and 20 years younger, too. And, as he wasn't an FBI employee, there was no threat -- not even a veiled, implied one -- that Skinner could make in regard to hampering the man's career. Jimmy was dancing easily with Kimberly. He was less attracted to her than he was to Yves which meant, ironically, that he danced better with her as he could concentrate on the music rather than her proximity. Yves noticed the grace with which the two of them moved and was not amused. Jimmy's final step before the dance ended involved dodging the two toddlers and placed him and Kimberly squarely beneath the mistletoe. Langley noticed and said, "Hey, Jimmy. Look up!" Jimmy glanced up, saw the mistletoe, and grinned. Still striving to be polite, more than for any other reason, he quickly dropped a tiny, closed-mouth kiss on Kimberly's equally closed lips. "What the *HELL* do you think you're doing?" Skinner roared. "Jimmy!" Yves screamed at the same time. There was stunned silence for a moment. The few adults in the room who hadn't been paying attention to the drama beneath the mistletoe were at least aware that *something* had just happened, even if they weren't quite sure what. Surprisingly, it was Kimberly who took charge of the situation. "He kissed me; that's what people do when they find themselves underneath the mistletoe at a Christmas party. I'd thank you to remember, Walter, that I'm your secretary; not your wife or even your girlfriend. Who I do and don't kiss, even if it happens right in front of your face, isn't any of your business," she paused for a moment than continued, "Thank you for the dance, Jimmy. I enjoyed it. Now I think I'll step outside for a bit of fresh air." Mulder mouthed the word "Walter?" at his wife in the silence that followed, but nobody actually said anything for several seconds. Then Yves said, her voice tight, "Jimmy, may I speak to you for a moment, please? Outside." She turned and walked in the opposite direction, through the back door. Jimmy said, "Uh, sure," and followed Yves. Skinner, who hadn't moved a muscle or said a word since Kimberly's speech, now said, "I'm going outside to talk to her," and walked out onto the front porch in search of his secretary. "What just happened?" Pendrell asked. He'd been so busy concentrating on Missy that he hadn't paid attention to what the other guests at the party were doing.
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