Author's Note: Just a short vignette about Aldo Clemens. Set in Season 9, Episode 1, The Secrets in the Proposal. Just because I love the guy. (Will try to update either Watching or BAMN soon…the muse is all over the freaking place right now.) Borrowed one line in this from the movie Casablanca...you'll see it. It's not mine, just like Aldo, Booth, and Brennan.
He recognized it in her eyes, the moment she walked into his bar.
Long before he knew her name. Long before she smiled a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes as she ordered the ladies' special. Long before he knew anything else about her.
He already knew that look. Because it was the same one he saw in the mirror every damn day.
This was a woman who'd lost her faith. Just like him.
He'd been a priest, after all, and now he was a bartender. Figuring out people was sort of his specialty.
She hadn't worn that look as long as he had. He could tell. Acceptance and resignation hadn't come yet…the hurt was too fresh. She was still in the shell-shocked phase. That gut-punched, legs kicked out from underneath you, and the whole damn world turns upside down because everything you thought you ever knew was a lie and why am I walking into this bar, kind of phase.
Yeah. He knew exactly what that was like. Could still taste it some mornings when he woke up.
Paradise Lost. The name was wasted on most people. He had a feeling she could relate.
He almost asked her what God had done to her. That's how sure he was.
And then he peeked at her name in her wallet.
Temperance Brennan. Booth's girl.
He didn't believe in blinding flashes anymore, but the answer hit him like one. It wasn't God she'd lost faith in. He figured that much out even before she had time to tell him she didn't believe.
He had a pretty good idea what - or who - this woman had rested all of her faith upon. And he also knew it wasn't misplaced, whether she thought so right then or not.
He knew for certain what had shaken it, too.
If somebody had told him that morning that there was a single soul left in the world whose faith he could actually heal - that he would even want to - he'd have suggested they order something a little stronger to drink.
For just one second there, he thought that maybe just maybe God was doing him a solid, just for old time's sake.
'Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world…'
Of course, then he realized it wasn't him that was catching a break here. Nope. If this was a divine favor for anybody, it was for Seeley Booth….the only solidly Catholic guy on the face of the planet who truly thought it was a great idea to knock back a few drinks with his former priest, obliviously certain that the poor soul-sick bastard who couldn't find redemption or absolution anymore even if Booth got him an FBI search warrant for it, could nonetheless provide it for him.
Seeley Booth. There was a guy who never lost faith, even if he went about it in the most back-asswards way possible sometimes.
"Booth loves you."
He almost felt guilty, putting that spark of hope back in her eyes. Because whether he'd admit it or not, he'd felt that little spark of almost-rekindled faith a time or two over the years. It was a lot easier just to stay dead inside, than to let a little life back in just so you could die all over again.
Somehow, he didn't think Booth would let that happen to her.
"You want me to have faith in him?"
The irony wasn't lost on him. Not even a little.
As he watched her go, fairly certain that the little spark of hope in her eyes no longer mirrored the bitter deadness in his own, he poured himself a drink and tried to ignore the tiny spark of warmth in his own chest.
Sometimes, when you least expected it, a little redemption came your way while you were busy giving it to someone else.
Paradise unlost.
Author's Note: I'm like any other writer here...I live for reviews. Well, good ones, anyway. :)