Stay
They stood in front of each other, unshed tears in their eyes. Each wanted to say something, to stop the other, but the words were stuck in their throats. They wanted so badly to pull the other into their arms and never let go. But they couldn't. The words simply wouldn't come out and their arms wouldn't move.
To all outside observers, this scene seemed so odd. It was obvious those two loved each other. Their bodies spoke of endless love; from his clenched fists to her shimmering eyes. And yet, even though it was so clear they loved each other, they didn't kiss or even hug.
Both reached out at the same time and held hands tightly, trying desperately to convey all they felt by that simple touch. But they couldn't. They simply couldn't say the words and risk their already wounded hearts. It was hard, too hard, to lay all their cards on the table and risk being rejected and have their hearts completely broken, or more correctly, crushed.
And then their hands parted and each of them turned away, feeling the cruel reality settle upon them. The brutal truth of not being able to see each other for an entire year; 365 days apart.
It took exactly six seconds for them to realize what was about to happen and together, in their usual uncanny unison, they turned around and crushed into each other, wrapping their arms around one another, trying to get as close as possible.
"Don't leave." Brennan whispered in his ear, metaphorically wearing her heart on her sleeve, breaking in and letting her tears finally fall. "Stay, don't let me go. Please Booth, I promise I won't leave. I'm here as long as you want to have me. For the next thirty or forty or fifty years. Please don't let go." She spoke with a broken voice, bringing her hands to softly tangle in his freshly cut hair.
"Bones," He started, his voice a hoarse whisper "if you run away again-"
"I won't Booth. I'm done running." She said firmly.
"If you run away again," He took her face in his hands "I'm coming after you. You got a free pass this time but there won't be a second. Because if I have you, I'm not letting go and I will chase you down to the ends of this world, even the Malooloo Islands."
"Maluku"
"But I need you to know that if you go running again… You'll be ripping my fucking heart out Bones. So I need your promise to try as hard as you can to stay, even when you get scared and are overwhelmed by your feelings. I won't hesitate to hunt you down and drag your beautiful ass back home but you gotta promise to talk to me first and try to work things out."
"Booth, I'm so tired. So tired of running and so tired of hiding. I want to have you, I want to be with you, I want to tell you… I want to tell you that I love you every day and tell you how happy you make me every day and I'm so done with being scared by my own feelings and-"
But she didn't get to finish, because he crushed his lips to hers in a soul searing kiss, using her gasp to slip his tongue into her mouth and entangle it with hers, pouring years of denied love into that one perfect moment. But as all perfect moments, it had to come to an end.
"Umm… Dr. Brennan, I'm really terribly sorry to interrupt but we have to get on the plane." Daisy said, looking anywhere but at Brennan's eyes.
"Sweetie, it's not too late to change your mind and decide not to go!" Angela said, a wide smile spread on her face.
Brennan turned back to look at Booth. "What do we do now?"
"You're gonna call the Maluku people and say you're sorry, but you can't go because there's a guy who loves you more than anything in this world and he's simply not going to let you get up on that plane. Then, you're going to pull some government strings and get me off duty because there is no way I'm going back to Afghanistan when my beautiful partner is here in DC."
"Sounds reasonable." She smiled. "Change of plans, Daisy, you're going away by yourself." She yelled and grabbed Booth's hand as they ran away from the airport, laughing all the way.