Becs and Booth
A/N: This story idea has been banging around in my head, and won't go away despite some timeline issues, so I'm making some assumptions about Booth's relationship with Rebecca and going ahead with it. If my conclusions about when they met, dates of Booth's military training and service and such seem off-kilter, don't be surprised.
Rebecca had turned down Seeley Booth's marriage proposal when she informed him of their unexpected pregnancy, not because she didn't care deeply for him; but because she had felt their friendship and dating wasn't the firm foundation a marriage needed. She also didn't want to be a woman who needed taking care of, as she told Dr. Brennan years later.
The two had originally met at Penn in a college algebra class when randomly assigned to the same math lab study group. He appreciated her dry sarcastic wit, and noticed her intelligence as well as her beauty. After watching him use a witty comment to dissuade a fellow athlete from harassing one of the geeky students in their group, she realized Seels wasn't as cocky and self-absorbed as she had first assumed, like so many other jocks she'd dated before.
They moved in the same social groups, became good friends, and dated casually for the next year and a half. When Christmas break came, they saw one another in Philadelphia and met each other's families. Grams thought Rebecca was charming; Hank reserved judgement when he learned that her father ran a liquor distributorship his police buddies were investigating.
Early in February, Marie Booth was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and underwent surgery at Temple University Hospital. Despite continuing aggressive treatment at Fox Chase, she declined rapidly and passed away in June. After attending the funeral, Rebecca spent many hours comforting her devastated friend over the loss of his beloved Grams. As September approached, Hank insisted he could handle Jared and sent Shrimp back to the athletic dorm in University City. Booth was much more serious about his studies and football throughout the fall.
When a mid-game shoulder injury placed him on the football injured list in November, it inevitably cost his athletic scholarship. He had just enough money to finish sophomore year before dropping out to work full-time. Rebecca missed seeing him on campus, but wasn't surprised when he enlisted in the Army. Booth was nothing if not practical, and knew his Pops had enough on his financial plate with Jared.
He drove to the Penn campus to tell Becs he was headed off to basic training, at Ft. Sill of all places. Where the heck, she asked him, was that? A world away, he said. Rebecca had gently told Booth she might date other people and he agreed that was for the best. She promised she'd write and hoped he would too.
She sent him short newsy letters of pre-law ethics and rhetoric, campus events, and 'prov witout' to keep in touch. His brief notes back related the culture shock a Philly kid experienced in flat dry western Oklahoma and thanked her for the lifeline she threw him at mail call. He missed his favorite 'Whiz wit' sandwiches more than he could say. Besides regular letters from Pops, her colorful commentaries on classes and games were his only connection to home.
As soon as basic training and AIT ended, Booth deployed to the Middle East, and his communications became more infrequent, but Rebecca wrote when she could amid her classes and legal aide internship, worried about his safety, and called Hank Booth occasionally to ask how he was. His grandfather was similarly concerned, but gruffly reassured the girl that 'Shrimp was fine.' She'd chuckle at the nickname, and tell him to take care.
oooooooooooo
Rebecca never stopped caring for Booth and had an unnerving experience in the middle of January. She awoke with a start in the middle of the night; overwhelmed by a feeling of dread about Seeley. After stewing for a day, distracted from her classes, and more convinced something was wrong, she contacted Hank first thing the next morning, relating her experience and asking if he'd heard anything. He told her what he knew thus far; that Booth was missing and the Army was searching for him, with a promise to keep her informed.
She hung up the phone, noticing for the first time how white her knuckles were from gripping the receiver too tightly. From then on until he was found, Rebecca held a hopeful thought for his rescue, a kind of continuous unconscious prayer below the surface pre-occupation of her brain with pre-law research papers and demanding exams.
Remembering his embarrassment after the shoulder injury, she knew better than to visit him, and left that to his grandfather. But she continued a one-sided correspondence whenever she had a spare moment, keeping him apprised of campus happenings, Philadelphia news, and how her mock court appearances were going.
Fully aware that her letters were probably stacking up unread or unopened; she hoped that eventually, they would distract him from surgeries, external fixation pins, therapy, and the drudgery of a long, painful recovery. Someday perhaps, she and Booth would reconnect and continue their relationship. Until then, she would do what she could to support her friend from afar.