A Broken Fox

7) Cleaning

Clean.
That's what he needs to do.
He needs to clean.
His whole apartment is a mess. How has he gone for this long without cleaning it? He has a vacuum, why hasn't he used it? It doesn't matter why, he just needs to clean.
And he needs to clear off that coffee table.
And he needs to rearrange everything in his cabinets.
He just needs to clean everything.
This has been the main thought on Mulder's mind ever since Scully left six hours before. He's washed all of his dishes, even the ones already up in the cabinet, he's organized his coffee table three times over until it's perfect, he's vacuumed his whole apartment, including his couch, and now he's reorganizing everything in his desk. Or, more accurately, the last remaining drawer in his desk.
He pulls out stacks of papers, files, and several small containers of paperclips that he doesn't quite remember putting in there. Heck, he doesn't remember half of that stuff.
He stares down at the remaining papers in the drawer, then looks at the thick piles on the floor he's made.
All of them are X-File related. All of them. Every stupid scrap of paper.
He releases a small snort of laughter, shaking his head. What is he even doing? Cleaning? What does it even matter? He yanks out the whole drawer and, standing up, tosses it across the room, sending it crashing to the floor. Staring at the mess, a half-smile forms on his face.
He turns around and pulls out another drawer, then takes the items out, one by one, hurling them every which way in the room. He doesn't care anymore. What is the point of this? Of his work? Of these papers? Of living? What is the point if he's just going to die without making a single difference in life? If he's going to die with "Spooky Mulder" being his only legacy? What's the point?
His hand freezes as it reaches down into the drawer, hovering above a photo of a young girl, a boy several years older than her, and a grown man. Samantha.
He slowly reaches down and carefully picks up the photo, staring at it. This was taken about a year before she...went missing. That's so much easier to say. To think. That she went missing. Who would believe him if he said that she was abducted? Who has ever believed him? Scully herself wouldn't even say that she believes Mulder. But she would willingly admit that she believes his sister went missing.
That's all that happened.
The government never took his sister, aliens never abducted her, and she was never cloned. She just went missing one day, and she was never seen again.
"She just went missing," he mutters quietly to himself.
He sets the photo on top of the desk and slowly lowers himself onto his couch. He looks over at the huge mess he's made, then over at his desk, where a gaping square hole and a clutter of papers stare back at him. He gets back up, picks up the basketball he set on top of his desk earlier, and goes into another room. In a matter of moments, the apartment is filled with the sound of the basketball hitting the floor, the mess in the other room ignored.
The sound not only fills the apartment, but it also fills Mulder's head, blocking out the silence of the apartment, the mess in the other room, and the memories that fight to come up in Mulder's bored mind.