Disclaimer:I don't own them, I didn't create them, and I certainly don't profit from them.
Author's Note: This idea came to me during that conversation Sweets' girlfriend had with Brennan about blue fish. Somehow I made the leap to Dr. Seuss, and while it turned out far more serious than I'd first intended and with no actual rhyming, I hope you enjoy it.
One Fish
That's what Temperance Brennan felt like in this world. She was alone and she had made friends with that a long time ago. Alone was good; alone was safe. And even though it was very lonely, she could count on it being consistent. She was in control of her destiny. If she didn't let anyone in, they couldn't abandon her the way her family had. She had made sure that she carved out a world for herself that didn't depend on needing to be liked or even wanted by other people. The world of forensic anthropology wasn't exactly a field many chose and it gave her purpose. Certainly she'd had a connection here and there; a tenuous link to the living, breathing part of the human race. And there were those that she considered friends, but she wasn't sure that she was the kind of person that anyone really considered a true friend. But what she might want or need deep down inside she had shoved so far down so many years ago that it was nearly unrecognizable.
So she flitted here and there; doing what she did best, giving a voice to the dead and bringing peace to those left behind; a peace that she herself seemed to find so illusive. But still it was something in this solitary life and she was good at it.
Two Fish
Special Agent Seeley Booth knew that he could be as irritating as hell and yet he was sure he'd met his match in that department when he was assigned as the FBI liaison to the Jeffersonian. How one woman could be so incredibly brilliant and infuriating and beautiful all at the same time he wasn't sure. And how he let her bribe him into letting her go out in the field with him he also wasn't sure. He should have turned her in, or arrested her, or any number of things, but he sure as hell shouldn't have taken her out in the field. Taking her in the field made her his responsibility; a fact that she didn't seem to grasp on any level. Of course, the more cases that he worked with her, the more cases they solved together, he found that all of her squinty-speak became a little bit more understandable and he started looking forward to seeing her. Not that that he would ever tell her that. They were professionals after all who just happened to work together.
Of course that hadn't stopped him from flying down to New Orleans to bail her out, or bring in a US Attorney or pilfer evidence from a crime scene to protect her from a bogus murder charge. He knew that she was innocent, so he hadn't thought twice about it. When had his gut ever let him down? Well with regards to her anyway.
It's strange though, somewhere along the line she'd stopped telling him to stop calling her Bones. Maybe it was about the time they stopped being just partners and became friends too. That had to be it; it couldn't be anything else. Could it?
Red Fish
If Brennan didn't know any better she would have sworn that she was jealous, but that was completely impossible because to be jealous of the relationship Booth had with Cam would be to admit that perhaps she had feelings for him that were romantic in nature and that was simply impossible.
They were partners. They were friends. That was all.
Perhaps she was just concerned about his well being. Or maybe she was concerned that his focus wouldn't be devoted to the case they were working on the way it always had been before because he'd be distracted by Cam. Or maybe she was concerned that it put her in an awkward position because he was dating her boss. Couldn't he appreciate that it was a bad idea? Or maybe it was simply a case that she knew that he'd have less time for their friendship. But jealousy, there was no way that what she felt seething through her veins when she'd learned about their relationship was jealousy. It was probably just a spoiled batch of Mee Krab that made her feel as if her blood was boiling. Of course if it had actually been boiling, she would have been dead, so clearly it wasn't jealousy.
Booth was spending a lot of time counting to ten. He'd shot a clown. He'd been forced to go talk to a shrink before he could return to duty and somewhere in the middle of it all another agent who he had considered a friend had made a move on his partner.
None of it made sense; what did Bones see in Sully anyway?
Of course the fact that Sully was one of the good guys made the whole thing that much harder. He'd even had enough honor to ask Booth if he had a thing for Bones himself.
A thing for Bones? He didn't have a thing for Bones.
Ok, maybe he had a lot of things for Bones, lots of little reasons that added up to something so monumental that to call it a thing was to reduce it to something that Sully just couldn't understand. Of course denial seemed to be the best course of action because to acknowledge what it was between him and Bones was to risk that maybe she didn't see things the way he did. Especially when it seemed that Sully made her happy. At least he thought maybe he did; not that he wanted to leave them alone long enough to find out. She was after all his Bones and he really didn't feel like sharing.
He shouldn't have worried about Sully; he sailed off into the sunset on a boat called Temperance with its namesake standing on the dock waving goodbye. It had been only a matter of time.
Everything happens eventually and he knew that he'd eventually get around to admitting to himself, and maybe her, that the damn line he'd drawn in the proverbial sand was long gone deep down in his heart.
Blue Fish
Cobalt blue; it was the color that drew those tropical fish together to signify they were meant to be together. All Brennan could think about was that despite her denial to Dr. Sweets' girlfriend that she and Booth weren't blue fish, she knew that they really were. She knew that it had probably been happening for quite a while, but that impulsive kiss she pressed against his cheek when he'd given in to her and allowed Russ to see Amy's daughter Hailey at the hospital before arresting him had been the first real sign to her that something had shifted.
And then a few weeks later, when Caroline Julian had bribed her into kissing Booth under mistletoe in exchange for arranging Christmas for her family, somehow she'd agreed to it. She knew that there was probably another way; Booth had even offered to intervene and talk to Caroline. Her forceful 'no' surprised even her. Booth had looked shocked.
But the kiss had surpassed her expectations. Booth was an excellent kisser and after the fact, after her brain had once again been able to string together words into a coherent thought, she realized that he'd walked away with her gum.
But it had been the double date that had made her realize that all of her denial that they were simply partners and nothing more was to put it simply, a load of crap. They had been something far more than that for a very long time. And if she had bothered to take the time to notice before now, she would have seen all of the earmarks of two people who quite simply belonged together.
Deep down they were just two blue fish.
Two Blue Fish
Booth had never realized just how happy taking the most terrifying step of his entire life could make him.
Bones had shown up at his door with a very purposeful expression on her face before walking right past him into the apartment as she launched into some dissertation about fish colors and how the color of blue was important to it all. It left him looking at her quizzically because he felt at that moment as if he needed a translator. What did she want him to do? Was he supposed to run to a pet store and buy her a couple of tropical fish? Was there even a pet store open at this hour?
Maybe it was the odd expression on his face that had made her take pity on him because he had no idea what she was talking about.
That is until he saw the look in her deep blue eyes and felt his heart start to race about a gazillion miles an hour and then the sweet press of her lips against his as his fingers seemed to thread themselves into her hair all of their own accord.
He felt as if his heart was going to explode.
It was quite a while later after they'd come down from orbit, tangled up in his sheets that he finally understood what she'd meant about those fish and he had to agree.
They were two blue fish. It was obvious, because everything happens eventually.
The End