So I randomly found this half-completed Bones fic that I completely forgot about in the recesses of my hardrive. I thought it was very fitting for the season. This is just a fluffy ficlet with some Brennan angst. Set around the beginning of season 5 because that was probably when this was written (I have no idea honestly). And here we go. XD
Brennan always found herself dreading the holidays. This was the one year she decided not to go the far corners of the Earth to dig up the remains of some poor soul from three thousand years ago. She and Booth had gotten together only a few months before and she needed to prove to him that she wasn't going to run anywhere.
That was his biggest fear when he admitted his feelings for her. He didn't vocalize this, though, he didn't have to. Brennan knew the pain of abandonment and rejection better than anybody. It was probably for this fact that she left for Guatemala after he was done with his brain surgery. The pang of those three simple words he'd spoken to her when he came to four days later had left a permanent scar on her heart.
"Who are you?"
It was like someone had crushed her with the heel of their shoe. The action of fleeing to a dig thousands of miles away only served as proof that she fled from situations that forced her to feel with emotions rather than rationalize. The day she was confronted with this fact was still fresh in her mind.
"What is it that you want me to do, Booth? I've done everything I can with this case, but I don't have the skull! Without any other traumas to the body, I have nothing else to give you." she was angry. The case had been especially draining.
"Do you know what I really want, Bones?" his voice was barely above a whisper in the echoing of her office.
"You want me to tell you something I can't confirm with certainty and you know I don't do that." she grumbled.
"That's not what I want."
"What is it that you do want, Booth?" the disgust in her voice was apparent.
"I want you to know something." he looked her straight in the eye.
"What?"
He mulled his word choice before he started. "Every time we hit a rough patch with a case, you get angry. Angry with reason, and I understand that. But then every time I try to explain to you something that pertains to people and relationships, and, hell, love…you say calmly that it's irrational and I get a lecture on why it's irrational. Why is that?"
"Why do I rationalize your misconception of what love is?" she tried to simplify.
"No. Why do you keep telling me the same things over and over about love? I gotta say, Bones, I'm starting to think that you don't even believe what you say."
Silence.
"Is it because it's easier to explain to yourself over and over again that something isn't really real and will fade over time rather than fighting for what you want?"
Eye roll.
"Is it because it's easier to imagine someone's touch on your skin rather than asking them to do it for you?"
Sigh.
"Is it because you're afraid to feel?"
"Stop it!" The tears that had been held back for so long fell forward and meandered down her cheeks.
"I'm going to take that to mean I got it right."
"Several times over, alright? You've made my character flaws perfectly clear!" Her voice traveled throughout the empty lab.
"Do you think that's what I want to do?"
"I don't even know what you want anymore."
"Temperance…" his use of her given name got her full attention, waterworks and all. "I love you. I love you more than I could ever tell you. And it's for those few reasons I already gave you is why I haven't told you. I know that it's hard for you to face facts when it comes to deep emotions that you'd rather avoid. But I've loved you in some way, shape, or form since the moment I met you."
He went on to kiss her after the new, fresh tears followed the tracks of the old ones.
She would later tell him that he'd been right after either the third or fourth bout of love-making. Brennan was using all her excess energy to overcome her immense fear of actual, emotional love. This, however, wasn't the reason she held a distaste for the holidays.
Angela, who was Brennan's closest girl-friend, was nuts about the spirit of the holidays. Especially the ones that demanded giving gifts. It was for this reason that Brennan feared for whatever crazy or otherwise impractical gift that she would receive from friend for the season.
Brennan had to admit when she saw the artist coming towards her office with a cheeky grin on her face, she knew she was in trouble.
"Ange, if that look on your face means what I think it means…" Brennan warned.
"Oh, come on, Brennan! I know you think some of my gifts are useless and weird…" Angela said warily.
"More often than not they're weirder than they are useless, Ange. They have uses, but the uses are weird, even though that makes no sense even as I said it." she went over her statement in her head.
"Brennan, I really think you're going to like this one." Angela pulled the large, brightly wrapped box out from behind her back.
She slouched visibly, but not being able to deny her friend even the most bizarre enjoyment of giving her yet another goofy gift as they seemed to pile up over the years, Brennan ushered her into her office from her desk. Angela beamed and hustled in, closing both the door and the curtain of the glass wall that looked out into the lab.
"Why'd you close the blind?" Brennan hinted at the suspicion that grew inside her.
"No need to worry. Come on over here and open it." the artist returned slyly.
"I think there is a need to be at least curious. Over the years, your gifts have vibrated, smelled awkward, and things have flown out at me. I still haven't really gotten over that snake trick you pulled with Booth."
Angela smirked inside her mind. Seeing a spring-loaded rubber snake fly into the face of her friend with her F.B.I. agent as a partner in crime had been too much and both had broken down in a fit of laughter. Needless to say, Brennan didn't speak to either of them for a week.
"Okay, Bren, I get it. I'll tell you that what is in this box doesn't vibrate, smell weird, or is meant to be a joke. I promise." Angela made an X motion with fingers over her heart.
Brennan reluctantly rose from her desk and came over to sit next to her friend. Unfolding one of the ends of the gift carefully, she slipped a long, black box out of the wrapping. Realizing there was no trademark insignia adorning it, she assumed it wasn't the original box her present came in. Lifting the lid and pushing back the layers of wax paper, Brennan's jaw would've hit the floor if the muscles connecting it to her face would've allowed it.
"You don't have to say anything right, but just know I want details later. See you later." Angela was giddy as she fled from the office.
Brennan tried to call after her, "Angel-" but it was too late. Her friend was long gone and would probably opt for the smart decision by retreating home. She looked back at the coffee table where the box rested, more than not challenging her to put it to use. Picking it up and holding it away from her, she examined it and thought about the possibilities.
"Maybe not useless…" she said to no one.
Booth drove up to his parking spot in the lot in a daze. He'd been loaded with meetings all day with dumb rookie cops that had next to no idea what they were supposed to be doing. He was disappointed when he tried to call Bones on the drive home, but was only greeted with her voicemail.
As he dragged himself through the front door of his building, he thought about going over to Bones place and surprising her, but he hardly had the energy to notice that there was a strange flickering light coming from the window of his apartment.
Curious, he went and got his mail and went up to Steve, the cashier at the convenience store that sat underneath his apartment.
"Steve, did you see anyone go up to my place?" Booth asked nonchalantly. Maybe his eyes were getting old and playing tricks on him.
"Oh, yeah. You're lady scientist went up about an hour ago. She had an overnight bag. Killer red pumps, too."
Booth was now suddenly relieved that Steve was gay and only noticed out of pure admiration of the shoes and not the woman in them. "Thanks." he said and went to begin assent to his apartment.
A million different thoughts were swirling around in Booth's head as he reached for the keys in his pocket. In the few months they'd been together, she'd surprised more than she had in five years of partnership. Booth had a premonition that this was going to surpass all the other times he thought he'd been shocked.
He walked into his average, dark apartment with a newfound vigor that he didn't possess downstairs. Both his kitchen and living room appeared to be untouched by his uninvited but welcome visitor. He had a pretty definite hunch that was confirmed the second he'd turned around. The crack under his bedroom door had a flickering illumination that was taking place behind it. Booth also saw a shadow move, along with the clicking that could only be caused by high heels against hardwood floors.
He smiled to himself and approached his own bedroom door cautiously. Three casual knocks on the door later, he called inside, jokingly. "Are you decent?"
There was a short pause inside before the reply came. "More or less."
That was the phrase that made him lose his cool pretty quickly as to the fact he practically tore the door off the hinges getting into the room.
What he found, to say the least, was mind-blowing. The entirety of his bedroom had been bathed in candlelight from the candles on every elevated surface of his room except for the bed. On the bed, there was something even better.
Temperance Brennan had never really been one for beautifying herself for a man when no one else was in the vicinity to see her. If a man couldn't take her as she was, he wouldn't really be worth sticking around for. Booth, however, was a different story. She knew he cared about her immensely and didn't even mind that long car ride home with her covered in yellow-dyed Crisco and paper feathers. He respected her for more than her looks. It's why she more often than not went out of her way to make herself look nice to him.
The way his jaw had dropped several inches must've been what she looked like when she'd first saw what she was wearing also. The blood-red silk had been molded to be seductive, while at the same time leaving enough to the imagination. It was trimmed with a white feathery material that tickled her chest in time with her breathing. Candy-cane striped stockings ran up to under the frilly hem while the culprits of noise, three inch stiletto heels, adorned her feet.
Speech was beyond the poor F.B.I agent as he watched his lover adjust the Santa hat on top of her head and rise off the bed to stand a mere two to three inches from him.
"What do you think?" her fingers laced together behind her back as she met his eyes.
Booth couldn't find the words to describe her even if there was a gun placed at his head. "Breathtaking." was the only word that seemed appropriate.
Brennan blushed a beautiful pink shade that didn't quite match the nightgown. "Thanks. That's really sweet. Probably why the he put you on the nice list this year."
It only took Booth a second to pick up on her little game. "Really? So you're an early Christmas present."
She bit her bottom lip and brought her right knee into make contact with the left and traced circles on the floor with the toe of her shoe. "He said you have a thing for your partner."
He wondered what the hell had happened in the last ten minutes that made him go from exhausted to anxious to completely turned on. But then again, it just added to the mystery that was his Bones. Her innocent act was enough to send him reeling in the snap of her fingers. The candlelit ambiance about the room only served to make her skin glow and her eyes become even more intense than they already were, if it were possible.
"I sort of have a thing for strikingly-beautiful genius women who like to break into my house." he smiled.
Brennan's first instinct was to fight the fact that he gave her a key to get in, but remained in character with wide eyes. "I think I'm all those things."
Now he knew what this was. Bones was never unsure of herself in anything. He reached a delicate hand out to trail his thumb along her cheekbone. The reaction was more adorable than anything he'd ever seen in his life. She withdrew at first, then eased into his touch and hid her eyes behind closed lids. Her soft gasp only furthered the wonderful feeling that was making all of the blood in his body run south. "You have no idea." was the last thing he said before he bridged the distance.
The kiss was so gentle and feather-light they could barely feel the other's lips on them. Her fingers deftly slid his jacket down his shoulders. Brennan tried to step in closer to him, but took a wrong step in her heels that sent her toppling into him with a sharp gasp. Booth was happy he was alert enough to catch her.
"Are you alright?" Booth sat her down on the bed to prevent anymore slips.
"Yeah, that just caught me off guard." She replied lightly. "I'm sorry. I know a lot of guys think these are attractive, but…"
"Hey," he lifted her chin up to meet his eyes. "If I don't wear them, I don't expect you to." Booth kneeled down in front of her and lifted the shoe off her candy-cane patterned foot. He did the same to it's mate, chancing glances to see more of her incredible skin. He decided on a whim to peel the leggings down each long, creamy limb.
They stared each other down for a long moment before he came up to join her on the bed, laying them out so her head was on the pillows. She reached curiously for the top button of his shirt before jerking away. "May I?"
"Be my guest." he invited. Brennan smiled coyly as her fingers innocently undid the trail of shirt buttons down to where it disappeared into his jeans. She pulled at the hem of his shirt, slid it off of his shoulders, and tossed it with her shoes down to the floor.
Clothes disappeared in a whirlwind after that as the candles burned down to stubs. Brennan rested her head against Booth's chest and felt so calm at hearing his even breathing along with his steady heartbeat. One of his hands ran absently through her hair, twirling the ends.
"Penny for your thoughts?" he said. She'd been quiet for a long time now. He knew she wasn't sleeping with the way her eyelashes were tickling his skin with all of her blinking.
Brennan's arm wrapped instinctively tighter around his waist as she nuzzled him. "I…I think I love you."
Booth's hand stopped on her shoulder. He wasn't surprised by any stretch. He'd been waiting to hear those words from her for some weeks now. But he did smile when she looked up at him with those big baby-blues. "I love you, too, Bones."
Silence came again for a short while. There wasn't a need to communicate anymore. Four years of partnership had gotten them to the point where words weren't mandatory. But there was one thing that he needed to know. "Booth?"
"Yeah Bones?" he replied.
"Can I ask a favor?" she asked quietly.
"Of course."
Brennan thought of all the different ways she could say it to get her point across. The last thing she wanted right now was to not make sense. Those few mono-syllable words had scared the hell out of her, but she had managed to say them. Crawling up alongside him, she met his eyes as they laid on their sides not touching one another.
She went rigid as she spoke. "You've opened the door….Don't let it close."
Booth swallowed and nodded. He'd managed to break down the final barrier between them. There was no doubt in his mind that if he screwed this up, she would never open up like this to anyone ever again. He would carry on with that thought permanently etched into his mind for all time.
Brennan rolled onto her other side facing the wall and settled down to go to sleep. She was happily surprised when two strong arms came around her waist to cocoon her. A chaste kiss pressed to the back other neck and Booth snuggled down into the same pillow, her hair splayed haphazardly across his face.
She never felt so safe in her life.
Please review. I know you guys here on the Bones community haven't heard from me in a while, and if anyone still has me on their read list I'd love to hear from you. :) Happy Holidays!