Chapter 1: Blank Slate of Mistakes

She knew this was completely illogical but the smile raging through her body was much more than she could contain. For years she had dreaded this date. The day that had sent her life into a downward spiral of self-doubt and heartbreak; but exactly ten months and four days ago that same day had a radical new meaning. The shadow of doubt that once covered her ever waking second finally broke, revealing a sunset of perfection and unshakable love.

Even as pragmatic and determined that this woman had become, determined that love did not exist, well, for her anyway; the facts were as plain as the air she breathed. She was not his perfect match, to any significant degree anyway. But as the smile on his face breathed new life into her hallow shell of a being, she knew one thing was true.

This was love and he was it.

"I know I'm late but…" A man with gray hair and a briefcase came barreling through the doors, "you'd never believe the day I've had."

She just smiled as the man rushed around the apartment. Without missing a beat the man shuffled the contents of his briefcase across the coffee table with a disgruntled sigh. The woman could see the weight of the day way heavy on his mind but the smile twinkling in his tired eyes set her heart a flutter. As much as she tried to deny it, there was something real in the way he could turn even the darkest of nights into a brightest of sunrises.

"Baby, today was just..." Was all the man could muster before sweeping his loving wife into his arms. "All this tedious paperwork was all I could do to not kill all those stupid, stupid reporters. Couldn't they see I had somewhere more important to be then some stupid meet and greet? But, man, if one more of them shoved another recorder in my face, I was going to..." The man trailed off as the scent of the woman he adored filled his every movement. Even at his worst, she still brought out the best in him.

"We don't want that." The blushing bride couldn't contain her excitement of the evening's activities that she was sure was going to end only one way, "I don't think I can live without you anymore; especially after last time. When we... well, you know." The woman spoke flustered and in pure disbelief of what had actually unfolded before her eyes. A woman who knew without a deniable doubt that love, life and a family was not in the cards for her was standing in the kitchen of the apartment she shared with her husband, about to bust at the seams with news that was going to sure to rock him to the core.

"After all it took to get here," The man smiled, trying to catch the frown that had fallen from her angelic lips, "they couldn't make me leave you even if they had a gun to my head. You're mine and always will be."

"Always." The woman smiled, trying to fathom how she could be here again with him and finally, honestly, more than she even could to admit to herself, in love.

Five years earlier…

Watching the streets flood below, Brennan couldn't help but let the silent tears flow. As they tracked down her checks onto the puddle on her floor, she knew it was the end. The end of something that had defied all odds and sent a once rational, pragmatic woman into the downward spiral of her demise. The end of her own personal love story. They had all told her to just give it a shot, forcing her to contemplate emotions she had pushed so deep down inside she wasn't even sure if they were real anymore. But as she watched she her life unfold before her there was one undeniable truth. They were wrong, all wrong. And the price she would have to pay would be her life as she knew it.

'I love you; Bones… I do… please… please just stay…' The words reverberated over and over in her mind, unable to just let her heart die in peace. 'Bones… please…'

But words were not enough salvage the perfection that they had created. The light flickers of what they once had spoke of a truth neither could deny. They had lost their spark, their fatal connection that forever brought them back together. The once in a lifetime shot they had to let things unfold in pure perfection. And as that flicker faded into the darkness of the night, Brennan knew the choice was already made.

Six months were all it took for her heart to shatter into a thousand unrecognizable pieces. It had taken her six years to give him her heart but a second for him to shatter it. Couldn't he see it was killing her to just be his best friend? She had given him her heart but as he paraded woman after woman in front of her wavering devotion she knew it was the end.

The end of all that she had tried to savor. He was the heart and she was the brain, didn't he know she would need time? Yet, at the first chance to run he let her flee as quickly as her feet could take her. Running off to the farthest lands, just so she didn't have to face all that she had meant to him. He had given her his heart on a silver platter and ever since that day, she knew the truth: she had his heart all along.

He had told her he loved her once before but as she lay broken on the bedroom floor they had once shared; she knew the truth. The undeniable, earth shattering truth.

She was damaged goods.

An apartment once full with the pitter patter of small feet now lay bare and vacant. All the memories of what she once believed was hers for the taking now lay neatly in a tower of boxes.

A new city, that is what she needed to escape the overbearing heartbreak he alone had caused. A new city, name and love. That is what it would take for her heart to finally learn to soar again. That was all she needed to shake the death that followed her day and night. The death of the only thing she had ever begged for, the only thing she had ever truly wanted. His love.

"Goodbye." She whispered against the void she now resided in, "Goodbye my love, my life, my all."