A/N: The prompt I responded to was the following
"Today I begin to understand what love must be, if it exists...When we are parted, we each feel the lack of the other half of ourselves. We are incomplete like a book in two volumes of which the first has been lost. That is what I imagine love to be: incompleteness in absence."
/
He slowly walks into her apartment. How many hours have passed? Only three? It feels like it's been ages.
He can't believe he still has the courage to walk, but his legs seem to be still holding, unlike his brain, his heart, his aching throat, his barely not trembling hands. They seem to have found a will of their own as well, since instead of taking him to the car, they lead him to her place (the irony of her home being so close to the hospital goes lost on him).
He had called her this morning to tell her about the set of remains found on the highway, just a few miles out of the city. He couldn't leave the office; the last case he had been working on with Charlie and the other guys had just got an unexpected turn when a new and important eye-witness had come to testify, finding the courage to tell them what he knew after all this time.
"It's ok, Booth. I have no problem driving there myself. Just tell me the name of the officer that is going to be there."
"You are not going to harass the guy too much about how they've treated the remains while waiting for you now, are you, Bones? He's a good guy, one of the best I've worked with."
"Booth! Just because we're more than just partners now doesn't mean you have the right to boss me around!" Her voice is playful, though.
"Hey, I let you boss me around all the time!" She tries to suppress a chuckle. "Are we having dinner together later? It's Special Pie Day at the diner"
"I don't see how this is supposed to convince me to say yes, since I don't eat pie..."
"Bones…"
"But I guess I could eat you up, later."
He laughs out loud. "I love you Bones. See you later."
She still hasn't said these three words back at him. He doesn't mind - for the most part. Her actions tell him most of the things he wants to know, day by day, as they explore this new side of their relationship together. He can wait...
"See you later. And, Booth..."
"Yes."
"There's something I want to tell you tonight."
He will never find out what that was, now. The drunk truck driver that went straight at her at full speed on her way back made sure of that.
He realizes he's been standing with his back on her door all this time. He takes a few steps inside, the familiarity of everything (the furniture, the half-full coffee mug on her desk, the shirt thrown haphazardly on the back of the chair - Bones had moments of untidiness?) assaulting his senses, scraping the fresh wound. He goes to her bedroom, the door open, the bed carefully made. There's a notebook on the bedside table, open, its cover facing the ceiling.
"Temperance Brennan, 2010-present". She was keeping a diary? She had never told him that. Well, she is – was – an author after all (and a really good one at that), but...
Can he turn the notebook upside down? Should he? These are her most personal thoughts, things she wanted to keep to herself. Surely she would have told him about this if she...
He takes it and turns it around anyway. The page on the left is half filled, yesterday's date on the top, the hour written one of late, late night (that's his Bones, always methodical).His eyes drop to the last three lines.
"Today I begin to understand what love must be, if it exists...When we are parted, we each feel the lack of the other half of ourselves. We are incomplete like a book in two volumes of which the first has been lost. That is what I imagine love to be: incompleteness in absence."
They say big boys don't cry. But his Bones never believed in such restricting, sexist societal norms, anyway...