And then, from one second to the next, the dirty man is Mulder, and he's not disgusting any more.

that is so fascinating. i love those weird, one-eighty moments, no matter what kind of art i find them in. now i really wish i'd been surprised. all the same, i think the sensation of that moment for me was similar to what you're describing. I was feeling the pain (scully's pain, i guess) at being uncertain of who the man was, so in a way i did feel repulsed by him, or rather, as soon as he walked into the narrator's diner i started trying to ward off the massive rush of feeling i had towards him. what if it wasn't mulder? i'd be crushed. scully would be crushed.

when it turned out to be mulder, all that relief and gladness and fear crashed through. while scully was leaning there against mulder, i suddenly kinda wanted to do the same in a cerebral sense to the story itself. i'd felt so alienated from this story the whole time. now i didn't feel alienated anymore.