Irrationalities

Summary: If it weren't so irrational, she would laugh. OneShot- Temperance Brennan.

Warning: -

Set: Post Season 5 - Beginning season 6.

Disclaimer: Standards apply.

She has started suspecting she is hiding behind it.

She cannot help it. Cannot help herself. Cannot change, either. Doctor Temperance Brennan believes in rationality like Angela believes in romance and Booth believes in a higher deity – without reservations, without doubt. Which is why she cannot let go of logic and science. She is a scientist. It is not only what she does, but what she is, as well, and no human being can let go of himself easily. It is irrational.

Seven months.

Seven months and a few thousand kilometers she has put between them and still the only thing she wants to do upon seeing him again is look at him. He wraps his arms around her almost carefully and she wants to hug him so hard it hurts, wants to take up his body into hers. As if it were possible. Walls of logic and rationality she has put up, has surrounded herself by them, and yet the only thing she thinks of upon seeing him is that she has been waiting for this day for seven months. But she was the one who decided to leave. She was the one who denied him, left him staring at her with an expression in his eyes that made her tears come even faster, even more painful. When it comes to him, obviously, she possesses no rational thought, isn't capable of applying logic. Why else would all these little things make her smile, make her feel warm and comfortable and happy? The colorful socks he wears. The twinkle in his eyes when he makes fun of her. His annoyed voice when he calls her off – the way he orders her favorite menu when getting Chinese take-out – the way he looks at her strangely and she has no idea why. All these little things add up to a tremendous amount of unanswered questions, of which the greatest is the one that screams in the back of her mind constantly.

How? Why?

Irrational, irrelevant, because how on earth could it be that she loves everything on him, even the way his name is written on the nametag on his FBI jacket? How can she even think she loves him when love is a concept more antiquated than the Roman practice of keeping slaves? And why, why, why does her heart hurt so much when she sees him with Hannah? She has brought oceans and continents between the two of them and still he won't leave her.

My life is exactly as I expected it to be, she told Angela. It is, she was right. She expected her life to be the way it is. Only she never realized how lonely it would be. And her logic deserts her again. As much as she tells herself it is irrational, the feeling remains. However unreasonable, she feels lonely. So damn, damn lonely. So where exactly is the sense in realizing things like that?

She refuses to accept. It was easy, once, before she went to her end of the world and Booth to his. It was one of the last things she thought before he let go of her hand. One year is a long time, she had thought. And suddenly it was impossible to even imagine a week without him. It would stretch out into all eternity, empty and silent and utterly lonely. I need this. And: I don't want this, and What is it that I want? Because she has dumped him, as Ange would say, and there's no way to reverse it. Such a long, long time. Five years haven't seemed as long to her as the prospect of not seeing him for 365 days. She hates it. Hates him. Hates everything, including herself and her hateful emotions. Irrational. Absolutely.

And she hates herself for the tiny speck of a wish that remains inside her heart. No, not her heart, not the muscle that pumps blood and oxygen through her body. Perhaps in the tiny part of her mind, where dreams and whishes reside and which she would have denied having with everything she has if anyone asked her. But it is there, undeniably.

Perhaps, if we wait long enough, our masks will fall away in ashes.

And she walks away and away and away.

After the millionth time, she realizes he won't follow her. He has found a home. He has found his heart. She has found hers, too, but it isn't for her to decide whom to give it. It has developed a life of its own. Stupid Booth, she thinks. Stupid Booth for teaching me the heart is more than a muscle. She could thank him, perhaps she should. But she does not think it would be appropriate. Irrational, too. Her heart isn't his to discover.

Except that it is.