How can I make an http request from node to a local file?

I am working on a node.js script to read from an API. I have a mockup file that will be the end result of the API on my filesystem.

without spinning up a web server to serve the mockup on my local machine, is there a way I can request the file with node's http.js component?

I want to be able to write

request('file:///home/me/work/apimockup.xml', {
    complete: function(err, body){

/etc