Okay, first fic for this fandom. My take on the season five spoilers, which is a little different and probably not the way they do it on the show, but hey. It's starts out in second person, and then ambles over to first, which every composition teacher I've ever had in my life has told me not to do… but hey, shit happens. I don't know if Sweets is still w/ Daisy, but I assumed he was. I also threw a nod to my second fave pair after BB, which is Sweets/Angela. So. I like reviews. A lot.

I'm going to say it one more time before the reading commences… there are spoilers in here. Lots of them. Don't read on if that isn't your thing, even though the only spoilers are the ones from the promos.

***

Awake.

You're awake, and she's here, in a chair beside your bed, typing something up on her laptop and hitting the backspace key. But she's not who you think she is, because she's saying you've been in a coma for four days, and have you?

It's not that you don't know who she is, or how you used to know each other, or any of that. She was Bones, you were partners, you solved crimes. All that is still there, but there are a fresh set of memories on top of that, muddled, mixing in. Because the dream, it can't have been only four days, because it feels like a whole life, as real as anything that came before it, as real as anything that will come after it.

So you say the first thing that comes to mind—"who are you?"—more to yourself than to her, because if she's Bren and you're Seeley, what are you doing in a hospital bed, and why does she look like she's about to cry?

She doesn't say that she's Temperance, or Brennan, or any of those other names you've heard other people call her. She says, "I'm Bones," and for someone who has such issues with the smallest nuances of human connection, she's made a huge intuitive leap—that you're asking who she is to you.

You nod, and place this somewhere in your mind. "Of course you are." Waiting for clarity, waiting for it to make sense, waiting for your mind to be still.

***

But it doesn't go away. That whole feeling that we're supposed to be something different than we actually are — that doesn't go away.

I give it a day, and then another day, and then an entire week, before I start panicking. And at this point, she suddenly decides she's got this burning urge to go on this dig in Guatemala for a month. And I figure that I have that long to figure out what the hell is wrong with me, and fix it. Because following her around crime scenes all love struck and unrequited? So not conducive to our work that it's not even funny.

So, she leaves. Doesn't say good-bye to me in person, but calls me from her plane before it takes off. "I'll see you in a month," she says, and there's this rawness in her voice that I know I'm not imagining. And then the flight attendant comes by and yells at her to turn her cell phone off.

And I'm relieved. I mean, I'm going to miss her. I always miss her, but it's going to give me some necessary time to detox, which I won't be able to do if she's here and I see her everyday.

But after a few days, it becomes clear that it's not going to go away on its own. Electro shock therapy would work. You know, when they shoot all those watts of electricity in you, and you're cured of all those pesky sexual thoughts, they're blasted away? Except it's not 1952 anymore, and I'm pretty sure they've stopped offering that.

Going to Sweets makes me feel like I've lost a good deal of my dignity, but apparently he has a good track record of offering decent advice. (Relatively—he did advise Angela to be celibate, for god's sake.)

I've already told Sweets about the life I experienced during my coma—it was required to get my gun back, but I gave him minimal details. Obviously. Of the whole thing with Bones, I just said, "I was married to Doctor Brennan," and left it at that. He got a look on his face like Freud himself, but he didn't remark on it.

So I'm aware that right now I'm inviting Sweets into my personal life, which is a ridiculously stupid thing to do, but do you see any alternative? Because I swear, if you do, I'm open to it. Exactly.

"You wanted to talk to me, Agent Booth?" Looking all self-important but still shocked that I'm in his office when I don't have to be.

"Listen. I'm having this issue; I need you to help me with it." Better to get this over with.

He motions for me to sit. I don't. Sitting in Sweets' office tends to mean it's more difficult to get out, if I should need to make a quick escape.

"You remember I told you about that life I had in a coma?"

Sweets raises his eyebrows, like he knows. If I wasn't totally desperate, the door would be hitting me in the ass right now.

But then I think about Bones, about this thought I had right before she left, when she and I went to lunch one day and something made her laugh, and her hair swished behind her, and I kept looking at her like I was in love with her. So grateful that it was her, and she wouldn't know what the look meant. I need his help.

I plunge ahead. "Well, it keeps recurring. I mean," I'm trying to gather the words, without giving away too much. It's engrained in me, to keep as much of myself to myself as I possibly can. But that's not going to help me right now. I need to be blunt, direct. I need to be like Bones. I need to channel Bones.

Take two. "I told you, she and I were married in the dream. And I was in love with her." I say this as matter-of-factly as I can manage. "And I keep thinking I still am." There. It's out there. The fact that I feel like I can't breathe will pass. I think.

Sweets looks like he's hit the jackpot. Like he's been trying to get me to ask for his advice for two years now, and I've finally come around. Well, he's hit the mother lode. But this is not the time to think about the battle of wills I've been waging with the shrink. I need his help, as horrible as that is.

"You're in love with Doctor Brennan?"

"No," I say. "Weren't you listening? My brain just keeps telling me I am. That's all. And I need it to stop before she comes back, because that will make it hard to work together."

"So, your brain thinks you're in love with Doctor Brennan?" He corrects himself, in what I consider an overly patronizing tone of voice.

"Exactly that."

"Hm," he says. "And what exactly would you like from me, Agent Booth?"

I frown at him. Maybe this was a bad idea. I take that back. This was definitely a bad idea. "I need you to fix me."

He laughs. "I'm not a mechanic, Agent Booth. I can't just pop open the hood and do some rewiring to fix you."

"Then what does the department pay you for, if you don't have any real skill?" Jesus Christ. That sounded like Bones if I ever heard it. The woman even has me talking like her.

"I'm going to ask you to consider something." Sweets folds his hands, and looks up at me. "You're not going to like it," he warns.

I nod for him to go ahead.

"I wonder if, in your weakened state, something under the surface came up for you that you didn't want to acknowledge before your coma?" The kid is walking on egg shells.

"Are you saying… you're saying I was in love with Bones before two weeks ago?" I shake my head. "Don't think so, Doc. I would have noticed. You're forgetting, I'm the only person around here that isn't socially stunted."

Sweets bites back a grin. He's enjoying himself. This is not making me feel better. "Then I would ask you to consider, if you had a similar dream about Dr. Saroyan, or Angela, do you think you would wake up feeling that you were in love with one of them?"

I hadn't thought about that, but I can't see that happening. Angie and Cam are both amazing, beautiful women, but I can't imagine that, not at all.

He takes my silence in, lets it linger. "As it is, Agent Booth, I don't have any ready cure to blast those thoughts out of your head. Unless you'd be willing to try electro shock," he deadpans.

Oh, Buddy, you have no idea.

"I can tell you this. If these newfound feelings are merely a product of your coma, then they will run their course in a reasonable amount of time."

"Define reasonable."

"Over the next several weeks. If they don't, however, you'll have another answer." He grins at me. "And then you should come to me for advice on how to proceed." Another grin. "I hear Doctor Brennan likes tulips."

"I don't want you to take this the wrong way, Sweets, but if I ever come to you for romantic advice, I really hope you'll take my gun and put me out of my misery."

"That's… nice." He looks vaguely crestfallen.

"And another thing, this conversation, it's just between us. I know you have that hypomatic oath, or whatever it is, and if I find out you said anything about this to anyone…" I pause, thinking of a threat. "I'll sue you for everything you've got."

He laughs. "Agent Booth, I'm a twenty-four year old psychologist drowning in student loans. How about I give you my thirty-eight cents now, and save us both some time?"

"Okay. So I won't sue you. I'll just tell Daisy about that big crush you've got on Angela." And it's Agent Booth for the win.

His eyes get wider. "I don't know where you're getting that." Right. If I wasn't entirely sure before, I definitely know now.

I turn and leave the room.

***

So Sweets wasn't any help.

Which shouldn't be a surprise, considering the whole fact that he hasn't gone through puberty yet. But I have to admit that I'm even more horrified leaving his office than when I walked in it.

Next plan of attack.

Well, who else is there to talk to? I'm realizing quickly that for a social guy, I don't have any friends. Well, I take that back. Bones and I are friends. And I have co-worker friends. But no friends outside the office.

I could call Wyatt. He's off in cooking school now, wherever that is, and I have his phone number. He's the only psychologist who's ever made any sense to me besides Sweets. Except one psychologist is plenty.

There are interns around. I could ask Clark, if only to see the horrified expression on his face before he bolted out. Fisher, who has no soul. Wendell, who is a good guy, but that would be too weird for words.

And then there's Cam. There's always Cam. There's always been Cam since we were just out of college, when we were practically kids.

So I ask her to come out for drinks with me.

She gives me this look, knowing, responds, "You're really lonely without Doctor Brennan, huh?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You'd be asking her, if she were here." Coming from most women that would absolutely be a dig, but not Camille. A smile in her eyes, shaking her head at me.

And is that true? I consider Cam one of my best friends in the world, and it seems kind of sad that she thinks I don't have time for her. Mental note: ask Cam out for drinks more often.

She's grabbing her purse and shutting down her computer. She motions for me to lead the way. We go to this little bar a few blocks from the office, where I take Bones on those nights when a slice of pie just won't do it.

She settles in next to me. Small talk would ensue now, if I were with someone I was less comfortable with, but I'm with Cam, which means I can cut to the chase.

"I'm having this problem; I need to bounce it off someone."

She nods like she was expecting that.

"It's about Bones."

She nods again, like she was expecting that too.

"Since my coma--" I stop. "I had this dream, Cam. Me and Bones were married, we owned this club. I loved her, in this dream."

She waits.

"Really, really loved her. And my brain—since I woke up, it keeps telling me I'm in love with her."

A pause. "You're in love with Doctor Brennan," she says, just like Sweets.

"No, Cam. My brain, it just keeps telling me that I am." A subtle difference, but an important one.

She waves me off. "Don't think you're getting off this on a technicality." She shakes her head, more sure this time. "You're in love with Doctor Brennan." As if trying the idea in her mind, and finding that it fits.

She gives me a wry look, shaking her head. Puts a comforting arm on my shoulder. "Well, I owe Angela twenty bucks."

Smiles at me, and something in me seems to relax.

***

So, what other options are there?

There's Hodgins, which is ridiculous to the point that it's actually laughable. There's Angela, who I wouldn't hesitate to go to with something like this if Brennan weren't her best friend. But I'm smart enough to know that Angie's first allegiance is to Bones and not to me, and she would give me up in a heart beat.

And then Bones comes back, a week early. I get a text message from Cam while I'm out in the field, that reads simply, "Dr. Bren is back," and one of those little smiley emoticons that she's just discovered recently.

So I'm lingering in her doorway when she sees me, jumps up, and literally launches herself into my arms. Almost rough, and I'm closing my eyes to take it all in—she smells like cocoa butter, and a little bit of some natural scent, something floral but not flowery, if that makes sense.

I don't remember how Bren smelled in my dream, it didn't go into that detail, but I definitely remember this smell—it is familiar, intimate, all her. No confusion, now. It's her, it's Bones, and I don't want to let go.

"How was Guatemala?" Still hugging her.

She pulls back a little. "Okay," she says.

"Must have been awful," I joke. "I've never known you to come back from a dig early." A pause. "So how about I take you out for pie?"

She rolls her eyes, and we go. Talk about this case I'm working, the first one since the Department cleared me to come back, which is much more boring when she's not here. She listens, sprinkles in some stories of her own about Guatemala, even sticks her fork into my apple pie, which never happens. Me hardly listening to her because I'm so distracted by the way her eyes light up, the way she moves her hands to illustrate a point. Did she always do that?

So Brennan is back, and there's no cure for this queer thing that's gotten a hold of me since my surgery. The only difference is that it's not surreal now—it's grounded, concrete, right here in front of me. God help me.

There's only one person left to tell, I think, walking her to her car outside the diner, after we're done eating.

I've told Cam and Sweets, to no real avail. Ange and Hodgins wouldn't be able to help me, and calling Jared in India is not an option. There's only one person to tell. Her.

I phrase it in my head—you see, Bones, this weird thing's been happening since I woke up. I had this dream that we were married, and I keep waking up thinking I love you.

Except… that's not what comes out. This is:

"There's been something I've been wanting to tell you, since I woke up." A pause, a swallow. "I love you."

The stricken look on her face is not the reason I'm panicking. I know better than anyone that she has issues processing things like that, and she's nothing if not horrible at covering her steps socially.

No, that's not the reason I'm freaking out. I'm freaking out because that was not what I was planning to say, and whenever I go off script, very bad things happen.

So I seek to fix it: "You know, in a professional, 'atta girl' kind of way." And punch her on the arm. Did I seriously just do that? Did that really just happen? Jesus Christ. Take me back to the tenth grade.

She nods, and regains herself. She punches me back. "Back at you," she says, and even though I told her that the love was professional and atta girl in nature, that is absolutely the wrong answer.

And I'm sulking at that for a little while, before we get to her car. She looks up at me before she puts her key in the driver's side door.

"You know, I didn't come back early because I hated Guatemala." Her voice getting higher on the last word.

"No?"

"No."

"Then why?"

She grins. A beautiful, almost unfairly dazzling grin.

"I had this really bad craving for pie."

And I think there might be some hope for me after all.