Title: Miss You Most at Christmas Time
Author: Emily Miller
Archive: Anywhere, but ask first.
Disclaimer: ...
Spoilers: Christmas Carol/ Emily (maybe, depends on what happens- this is written on Friday)
Classification: VA
Rating: PG

Summary: Christmas comes again...

She was alone in the graveyard- not counting, of course, the ones buried there. She was actually surprised that she was alone. It was Christmas Day. Wasn't there anybody else like her mother, who every year spent most of the day at her father's grave.

She didn't really stop to think about. She just did what she'd come to do.

The grave was small, and seemed lost with all the others around it. All the adults, those who had died after a long life.

She sat in front of it, read the stone like she did every time she came to visit.

Her name, the date of birth and death. The last was the worst. She was so young.

It had been a whole year, but still it hurt to see it. She held back tears as she began softly to sing-

"The fire is burning,
the room's all aglow,
outside the December wind blows,
away in the distance carolers sing in the snow. Everybody's laughing,
the world is celebrating,
and everyone's so happy
except for me tonight."

She lay the gift she'd brought with her, a stuffed bear that she had been given on her fourth Christmas. Then continued.

"Because I miss you most at Christmas time.
And I can't get you
get you off my mind.
Every other season comes along
and I'm all right
but then I miss you most at Christmas time.
I gaze out the window
this cold winter's night
at all of the twinkling lights
alone in the darkness,
remembering when you were mine."

She adjusted the bear, propping it against the stone so that it covered the date of death and the small rose carved into the bottom. Took a deep breath.

"Everybody's smiling
the whold world is rejoicing
and everyone's embracing.
Except for you and I.
Baby I miss you most at Christmas time
and I can't get you
get you off my mind.
Every other season comes along
and I'm all right.
But then I miss you most at Christmas time."

She was crying, the tears running down her face and falling into the layer of snow.

"In the springtime these memories start to fade
with the April rain.
Through the summer days
till Autumn's leaves are gone
I get by without you
till the snow begins to fall.
And I miss you most at Christmas time.
And I can't get you
get you off my mind.
Every other season comes along
and I'm all right.
But then I miss you most at Christmas time."

She put her head against the dirt for a moment, as though she would hear one last time the voice she had only known so briefly.

"I love you, Em," she whispered into the ground. Then, she stood and left the cemetery.

She never saw the girl watching her. Nobody saw her. Emily had been dead for almost a year now. She was almost used to being ignored. Her mother didn't believe in ghosts, anyway.

She followed her mother away, followed her car and then went with her back to the apartment, felt whatever heart she had left breaking as she watched her only parent cry, alone.

"It's okay, Mommy. It's all gonna be okay," she said.

Her mother looked up, and four eyes widened. Had she been heard?

"I imagined it," her mother said, but couldn't help including, "I do love you, Emily. And I miss you."

"I love you, too. But I'm with you," Emily said, and Dana Scully, although she didn't hear it, seemed to know.

She smiled.

The End

"It's just so arrogant... to think this little backwater planet is it... that all that was put there as nothing more than our own personal light show." Ellie Arroway CONTACT