#grandma gertie and her gift
The fourth series reads as follows:
Apple Balancing…Potential…The Newbies…The Dessert…Dinosaurs and Cannibalism…Sassy Sprinklepants…The Secret Vault of Mudlerness…Taco Night…Neckhole Wrestling…The Onesie…Multiplication…Catching On…Thanksgiving…The Funeral…Midnight Libations …Stockings were Hung
To catch up: First series…Second series … Third series
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Mama Walter arrived a few days before Veronica and was standing at the stove when Mulder and Scully walked in for Thursday night cards and Will bragging. The carrier swung from Mulder’s arm while Scully set the diaper bag by the couch. It was awfully quiet for having at minimum five people already in the house. Heading suspiciously into the kitchen, ears tuned, eyes alert, they stopped dead when they saw Walter, Maggie, Ellie, and Ruth watching wide-eyed as someone, presumably Mama Walter, moved a baking dish carefully from the oven to the counter.
With a whisper, Mama Walter greeted the new arrivals, “I will give you a proper ‘hello’ in a moment, right after this souffle settles down and we can talk in a right proper voice.”
Whatever type of souffle that was, Mulder’s nose told him he loved the baker of it already. Even Will knew to be quiet, sucking on his fingers in rapt anticipation of meeting this short, round woman who might prove to be a very good cuddler. Once the souffle was down, the woman took off her oven mitts and held out her hand to Scully, “you must be Dana. Walter has been talking about you,” then nodding toward Mulder, “and you for years. Glad you finally got your ducks in a row.”
Scully gave her the biggest smile she could produce without cracking her face in half, “nice to meet you … Walter’s mom?”
The woman turned to lightly smack her son on the chest, “have you not told them my name? I ought to take you over my knee, young man.”
Skinner, towering Marine with the ‘don’t mess with me’ countenance, turned back into a seven-year old boy for half-a-second, then rebounded with a smile, looking from his mother to the pair of them, “excuse me. Mom, meet Dana and Fox. Dana and Fox, may I introduce my mother, Gertrude.”
She hugged them both immediately, “please, call me Gertie. I haven’t been called Gertrude since I was 13 years old.” Finishing that introduction, Gertie turned to Will, “and you, my dear boy, must be the great-grandson.”
Will blew raspberries at her in approval.
She blew them back in response, then tickled the bottoms of his stocking feet, “we will have to figure out just what you’ll call me.”
Mulder and Scully, being Mulder and Scully, looked at each other, and in unison, because they were Mulder and Scully, “Grandma Gertie,” then, “G.G.,” followed by both nodding, “G.G.”
Grandma Gertie watched them in amusement, then looked at Skinner once again, “they really are exactly how you described.”
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Grandma Gertie fit in well, holding her own in the baking, travel, reading, yoga discussions but when it came to family, she offered up, “Walter and his first wife didn’t any children and my second son Michael didn’t live long enough to get married so when I first heard about Maggie and the brood,” smiling at Maggie, “I couldn’t wait to meet y’all.”
Neither Mulder nor Scully had ever heard of Michael but knowing now was not the time to ask, they recovered quickly, Mulder taking over, “I don’t know about Walter but I will say from personal experience, that the family, while huge and loud, is wonderful and they’ll like you, trust me.”
“That’s good to hear, Fox, thank you.”
Her slight southern accent amused them all and as the evening progressed, and as the stories emerged, the accent became stronger. There wasn’t any drinking that night, given their guest and the fact that, as Skinner had shared quietly sometime in the past, “my father had a drinking problem. Mom stayed with him until he died, but she does not like to be around people when they drink.”
They still had a whopping good time, Gertie losing every hand and loving it, laughing in glee until her face turned red, and spooning up souffle every time Mulder held out his empty plate. Soon, Will began fussing, tired of being passed around the kitchen table, ready for bed. Gertie stood, extending hesitant arms out to the baby, “may I? I’ll take him in the other room and get him to sleep. Let y’all continue playing.”
Scully agreed before anyone could offer an alternative, “of course. He would love that. His stroller is open and flat so he can just go in there whenever you feel like putting him down.”
Gertie gave her a soft smile, “I don’t think I’ll ever feel like putting him down but we’ll see where the night takes us.”
Gertie indeed did not put him down, still quietly holding him an hour later when the pair decided it was time to head home with the little for a good night’s sleep. Finding Gertie in the squashy chair, Will snoring in his place in her arms, Mulder whispered to Gertie, “how is your arm not asleep?”
“Oh, it is, dear, been dead for most half an hour now.” Running a light finger over Will’s nose and cheeks, “but he’s perfect so I’ll forgive him the pins and needles that’ll be happening in a few minutes.”
Mulder hated to take him from her but take him he did, “we may have to hire you permanently once the twins get here.”
“I heard about the pair of them. Congratulations.”
Scully tucked Will’s empty bottle and clothes back in the diaper bag, “thank you. I think the family is starting to take bets on just how big I’m going to get.”
Mulder touched her arm, “I’ve got $20 riding on you being roughly the size of a small, one room Ikea apartment. Don’t disappoint me.”
Gertie gave Scully an appraising look, staring first at belly, then at face, “I would like to wager $10 on one twin being 5lb. 8 oz. and the second being 5 lb. 12 oz.”
With an admiring look, “that’s very specific, G.G.”
She looked at Mulder, having heard enough about their work history to know he’d appreciate her next statement, “I have a gift.”
She had him hook, line, and sinker, but he also knew Scully was exhausted and wanted to get home, so he left it with, “you and I … we should talk,” before scooting his wife and son out the door.
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“She’s got a gift, Scully.”
Scully, being halfway to dreamland and not wanting to have this conversation which could very well end up with Mulder going over to the house and waking the older woman up to demand details about the aforementioned ‘gift’, “go to sleep.”
He was curled behind her, his hand on her warm, rounding stomach, voice soft in her ear, “do you think she can see the future? Is it just random things? Is it specifically only about babies? How can you not be intrigued by this?”
Praying, pleading, with the God and the gods, for him to shut it, “I need you to go to sleep. Will is going to be awake in six hours and I’d like to have had more than an hour’s worth of sleep by then.”
Mulder never heard her, “in the old days, I would have shown up at your door and you would have wanted me so badly you would have grabbed your little blue suitcase and hopped in the car.”
Okay, “wanted you so badly?” Now she turned her head, running into his nose, wide awake and paying rapt attention in anticipation of his future response, “that’s why I went to the ends of the Earth, as well as Kroner, Kansas, with you? Because I think it was my job and I do my job and I do my job fucking well, thank you very much.”
He nibbled her cheek, “but you admit, you did want me, just a little bit.”
Her smile creased her cheek, “even if she were to answer the door and tell you hours upon hours of tales of her ‘gift’, Skinner would hear you, and kill you.”
“Maybe she already knows I’m coming over.”
“You’re not going over.”
“What if she’s already making tea for me and another souffle?”
“She is asleep, like we should be.”
Mulder grumbled into her cheek, “if she calls me tomorrow and asks why I didn’t come over, you owe me big time.”
Turning a little more, she kissed the corner of his mouth, “I’ll take my chances.”
