A/N: Just something that came to me while watching the final scene of "The Twisted Bones in the Melted Truck." I really dislike writing in the present-tense like this, but I've been experimenting with it more lately, and it's what works for Parker in this. Oh well.
I couldn't find a version of the episode online that my ancient computer would let me watch, so I probably messed up the dialogue from the episode in this story. I own nothing from Bones—that honor belongs to the awesome and hilarious-on-Twitter Hart Hanson. However, if someone were to give me Seeley Booth for Christmas, I would certainly accept. ;)
I can't keep the smile off my face as I tell Dad and Bones about my day with Hannah. It's enough to almost make me feel bad for telling Dad I hated her earlier, but one look from him and I know that he forgives me for it. The laugh when I talk about the lion, and Bones corrects me like she always does. I don't mind though. Bones is nice about it when she corrects someone, not like Mom when she's proving that I've done something wrong or that know-it-all girl in my class who acts all snobby, like she's better than the rest of us just because she can read at a high school level and has the table of elements memorized. No, Bones doesn't act that way. She's cool.
"She says stuff like that all the time," I tell Hannah, in case she doesn't know. "It's really weird." And it is, even though it's one of the things I like most about her. I think I remember my dad saying once that he thinks so too, but I'm not sure—he talks about Bones so much that it's hard to keep track of it all.
"I know," Hannah says, smiling at me. "We're friends."
"She knows everything," I tell her, looking at Bones proudly. "Watch this. What animal farts the most?"
Luckily, Dad doesn't get mad at me for saying that in public—usually he'd start talking to me about how that's not "appropriate dinner conversation," especially since there are girls around. Dad's always saying how I have to act like a gentleman and be polite and respectful to girls, even though I would probably do that anyway if he didn't tell me and, besides, I still don't get how girls are that different from boys in the way they act. But whatever. Bones knows the answer, just like I knew she would. "The termite, because of their diet," she says right away, without even having to think about it. "They can generate more methane gas than human industry does. But, you can't hear them."
We all laugh at that, and they talk some more, but I don't really start paying attention until I see Dad smile and reach across the table to take Hannah's hand. It's his special smile, one that I don't get to see very often anymore, and the two of them are looking at each other like they've never seen anything more interesting than the other person's eyes in their life. Grown-ups are so weird. I mean, what's so special about my dad's eyes? They're just brown. Or Hannah's, for that matter. I wrinkle my nose in disgust at their sappy looks and turn back to Bones, knowing that she'll probably be as grossed out as I am and we can share a look of our own, except ours will be making fun of Dad and Hannah without ever having to open our mouths, instead of being some weird, lovey-dovey staring contest.
Except when I look at Bones, she's still watching Dad and Hannah. Her eyes move from their hands together on the table, to Dad's face, to her lap, and then back to my dad, finally settling somewhere on the table as a strange look comes over her face. Her mouth turns down in some combination of a frown and a very straight line, and her eyebrows sort of scrunch together weirdly, and even the way she's sitting changes—it's like she just wants to sink down into the table or something. I bite my lip, still tasting the chocolate ice cream there as I stare at her thoughtfully. I've seen that look before. It's the look Mom had on her face when Dad told her he was going back to Afghanistan—she still gets it sometimes after they talk on the phone. It's the look my teammates had when I missed the very last basket and the championship game, and they didn't talk to me the whole ride home. And it's the look that Dad had on his face when he came home one night after a meeting with Bones and Dr. Sweets about some book, and he'd hugged me for the longest time without saying anything. Yeah, I know that look.
I don't know why, but Bones looks like she's lost something.