Story 199: "Dance Card" by Sab (Sabine)

[wendelah1]

After reading "Five Things That Never Happened to Dana Scully" last week, it seems appropriate that this week's offering is also about a "road not taken." Since three members separately expressed some interest in reading it, and because Sabine is an accomplished and entertaining writer, "Dance Card" is now on our dance card.

SUMMARY: The road not taken.
NOTE: This is a true story, sorta. I mean, it happened to me, not Scully, but I figured I'd plug her in to the game and see how she played it out. So that's where it stops being a true story, but those little snowy highways and dogwoods and mistakes do exist, ten, fifteen years later. Oh, and in answer to your question, yes, I did write another story with another guy Scully meets named Paul. It's a good all-purpose name; whatcha gonna do? Album and book publication dates verified with Borders.com, Amazon.com, and Cdnow.com, so they should all be correct. German translations c/o Altavista's Babelfish; let me know if they got it wrong. All "chalking" quotes copyright J. Wilson Kello, with whom I spent four years of college chalking. He is not Paul.

That will all make sense after you read the story, I promise. "Dance Card" has two sequels: "What Happened After That" and "Moonshine," which could be subtitled "What Happened After What Happened After That." The links are all to Gossamer under "Sabine" if the links get broken; the first and third are also at Fugues Fiction Archive. Discussion on any and all of the three is welcome. Sab is iamsab here and Sab at AO3, but alas, these stories have never been re-posted to either location.

Leave feedback, leave suggestions, and come back for discussion, which is still ongoing for the last two fics we read, by the way. You guys are awesome.

Read "Dance Card".

Read "What Happened After That".

Read "Moonshine".

Comments

I know this comment wasn't addressed to me, but oh well

[wendelah1]

Nor is it a story like Iolokus, where the characterization is skewed to fit the plot.

That's an excellent point. Yet haven't some people suggested that Iolokus is about what Mulder and Scully would be like if the events depicted in the series as happening to them had actually happened? They would say the characterization came first, then the plot, rather than the other way around. But it is an extreme case, and plenty of people disliked that story for those extremes. (For the record, I finally reread it last fall and still found it as enthralling the second time through as the first.)

It's a story about the author, wherein the author has called herself "Dana Scully". I was told that by the author's note, and way the story was written bore this belief out.

We don't get Mulder's POV at all on these events until "Moonshine," when he does two uncharacteristic things: he gets drunk and then he talks to someone about his feelings for Scully. In "Dance Card," he's only there for real at the end when Scully looks up and sees him for who he is in her life. I like the ending to the story, I just don't see why it would lead to sex. In the followup story, he's only there to look great, wear a plaid scarf (does Mulder even own a scarf?) and have sex with her. Great sex, from the sound of it, but still. I liked the sex scene for the most part, I just didn't find it believable.

I love "all things". We're destined to disagree.

This may seem strange but my feelings about "All Things" vary from rewatch to rewatch. I can't seem to get a handle on that episode, but what I do know is that I don't believe it's the first time they slept together. If it was, I don't believe she'd have left before he was awake, just slip away without saying a word, which I think is strongly implied by how the scene is structured. I do remember the first time I saw it gasping in surprise at the sight of an unclothed Mulder, sprawled on his bed asleep. I don't think I've ever seen an icon of that scene, but someone should make one.