A month after Booth comes back from the dead, she tells him about the Titanic.
(The night security guard nods at them as they enter the Jeffersonian, laden with paperwork and takeout bags. Nothing about their current case demands action tonight, but neither of them suggests going home. In an empty building, they sit close enough to bump elbows as they eat.)
"There were compartments," she says soberly, watching as he tosses food wrappers into the wastebasket and flips open the case folder. "They were designed to contain the water if she sustained damage to the hull."
If his eyes flicker at her use of the correct pronoun, he covers it before she has cause to remind him who taught her about seamanship. Instead he grins at her, tapping out a tuneless medley on the tabletop. "You do know the Titanic sank, though, right?"
(The three-inch stack of printouts on her desk consists of schematics, meteorological data, and first-hand accounts. She tells anyone who asks that she is doing research for her new book; privately, she pores over the data late into the night, scrutinizing every detail, painfully aware that she should formulate a question before searching for the answer.)
"Multiple factors contributed to the loss, including design flaws, human error, and adverse weather conditions. But the compartments were supposed to save her - and they didn't." She sees his eyes start to glaze over. "They may have slowed the water intake at first, but ultimately it wasn't enough."
"I'll remember that if I ever decide to build an ocean liner."
"It's important to understand how disasters of this magnitude happen, Booth. Just because the findings are theoretical doesn't mean they lack value." She means to infuse her voice with enough this is how those of us with doctorates think condescension to annoy him into ending the conversation. (She is abruptly, uncomfortably aware of the possibility of Booth understanding her obsession before she understands it herself.)
She must miss the mark, though, because instead of complaining, he goes quiet and still. Only his pulse jumps against her fingertips, startling her.
(She has no memory of moving her hand, but the evidence is clear: the fingers locked around his wrist are unequivocally hers. She sees her fingertips pressed across his tattoo; she notes his thigh muscles tensing, knocking his knee against hers under the table.)
"Bones," he says.
(Blood roaring in her ears and seeping through her fingers. Come on, come on, Booth, come on!) She shakes her head against the memory and talks over him. "What I'm trying to say is that her initial resilience was not an accurate indicator of the severity of the damage - "
"I know that," he says, quick and sure. He leans forward until she meets his gaze. "Hey. Don't you think I know that?"
The pieces click together in her head; in any other circumstance she'd blush at having missed something so obvious. Yet understanding the metaphor doesn't alleviate her guilt. "I didn't cry."
He shakes his head. "Doesn't matter."
She watches for the lie, but his gaze is steady. There are other things she's tempted to confess, a litany of actions she didn't take and words she left unsaid, but she thinks he would have the same answer for all of them. He's a step ahead of her, and for once she doesn't mind at all.
Still: "You specifically mentioned it," she says, aggrieved, and he laughs.