AN: Do not own! Though I do love Hodgela. Enjoy!
It was another tough, bloody, nasty and downright awful case. What else is new? I hated them, hated their deaths. I made a sketch of a grinning little girl, with her front tooth just growing in, out of her smashed skull. She was seven and a half. A redhead. I gave her messy pigtails, because she had brothers, and because I always thought that brothers would yank on your pigtails, just so you could stick your tongue out at them and pretend to hate them. She danced ballet, still in her little sugar plum fairy costume, barely recognizable, when the picnickers found her. Maybe one day she would've been Clara, with her white tutu, center stage. Maybe she would've been, if she hadn't had her skull smashed and her body dumped, all for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I drew her freckles andI gave her her life back, just for a little while.
And then I sat down and cried.
It was Friday night and everybody was working late: Michelle was at a friend's sleepover so Cam, after making her phone call, wasn't in a hurry; Booth was mucking around the platform as usual, so Brennan really had nowhere to go; and Hodgins, well, I didn't know about Hodgins. I tried not to think about him too much, really. Every time his face (or other parts of him) came up in my mind (far too damn often), I would back away. No, scratch that, I would run away. Screaming. That relationship, it was, I don't know, deep, I guess. Artistic. The whole opposites attract thing.
Screw it.
I nearly married the guy. We were at the damn altar once. And now we go to work every day and pretend not to notice that we used to have sex in the darkroom in my office?
Yes. Apparently we do.
Anyways, it was Friday and everybody working overtime except for me, because I had a date with some personal trainer or something that I met at a bar because he ordered the same drink I did. Except I was sobbing in my office and I knew I was going to look awful unless I stopped pretty soon, but honestly at that moment I really didn't care about what some bodybuilder who ordered girl drinks thought about me. Because the little kid that I knew so well now was on the platform as another pile of pale, anonymous bones.
And Hodgins picks that exact moment to walk in.
"Hey, Ange, I got the particulates and--oh." I lift my face up to him, startled, tear-streaked. He looks at me, at the sketch, and then at me again. Then he stands there and the most kind, understanding, dammit, loving look comes across his face. Obviously not of his own accord. Hodgins tries not to look me straight in the eyes nowadays but right then he was staring at me with that look that he used to get all the time when we were together, just understanding. Damn him. I did not need Jack Hodgins and his understanding forty-five minutes before my date with the daiquiri-drinking trainer. The silence stretches awkwardly to the brink before snapping.
"Uh, you all right?" He makes a motion as if to put his hand on my shoulder or pull me into a hug but something seems to draw him back at the last moment and he rubs his eye instead.
"Yeah, yeah," I said. Lying through my teeth. But he knew that. "I'm fine." I pull myself together and give him the sketch. He glances at it again, and goes back to looking at me.
"What am I supposed to do with this?"
"Give it to Brennan," I said, pulling my coat off the back of my chair. I had to get away from those kind blue eyes. "I'm leaving. Sorry. No matches in missing persons. And I've got a date." Alright, I said the last part just to be a little mean to him. Anything that stops him from looking at me like that, from drawing those memories out. It seemed to work. His eyes snapped down to focus on my sketch again, that sarcastic, bitter expression he has these days settling back over his features. And it felt like somebody had taken me from a hot bath and dunked me in ice water.
"Yeah, okay, Angela," he said to my sketch. "Have a good time." Sarcastic. More bitter than expresso shots at midnight. But I still felt his eyes on me as I walked out of the lab.
I spent fifteen minutes at home trying to make my eyes look at least slightly less red, with limited effect; tried on two dresses that made me look okay; and wondered why exactly I was so unenthusiastic about this date. Well, okay, not so much 'wondered' as 'tried not to think about'. Same difference. Girly-drinks guy rings the doorbell ten minutes late with a bouquet of orchids. I don't really like orchids, but I take them into the kitchen anyways, to get a vase and some water for them, trying to forget the fact that these particular orchids are Phalaenopsis cultivars.
"Shit." In my rather rough handling of the bouquet, I knocked over the vase and it smashed on the floor.
"Is everything okay?" called daiquiri dude from where he was examining my paintings.
"Yeah, fine," I called back. I hated people snooping through my stuff. Starting from now. I dropped the bouquet in the sink, figuring he'd never know. He doesn't notice.
We go to some fancy restaurant in town, with y'know, tablecloths and three spoons and the whole shebang. Daiquiri dude--Kevin, his name was (I think), kept up most of the conversation. Apparently he was a surf-boarder or something and he got to D.C. because his brother lives here and he needed a place to stay.
"And because of all the hot girls," he says, winking. I laugh, but it really wasn't that funny, and the little girl was still on my mind, and because, honest to God, he just wasn't very sincere, not like some people…
Aghh! This date was supposed to be for forgetting about him! Obviously it wasn't working. I tried to concentrate harder on daiqu--Kevin's good features. Mmm. He had nice muscles, and a very nice ass, but his face was kinda disappointing. What was it that Bren kept telling me about Booth? Symmetrical features? The guy was as symmetrical as a Picasso out of the bar light and beer goggles And his eyes were kinda dun brown, like dirt. Dirt. Hodgins hated the word dirt. And Hodgins had very nice, very blue eyes…I groaned internally and took another sip of my wine. This was bad. Very bad.
"Angela?" Daiquiri-dude was looking at me oddly and I realized my internal groan may not have been as internal as I thought it was. Damn. And I had no idea of what he'd just said.
"Uh, what? Oh, I'm sorry. I was just thinking about something at work…" Great job. Great job. Now he's going to ask me what I do and it's really, really hard to explain.
"So, uh, where do you work at? You said something about being an artist, right?" Kevin didn't look all that interested either. He likes to talk about himself. Figures. Thankfully, our food came at that moment, saving me from having to answer for a moment. I picked at my salad as I try to figure out what to tell him. Confuse him with six-syllable words that he probably wouldn't understand? Give him a flowery description that masked my real job? Lie? I remembered the red-headed little ballerina though, and I knew I couldn't just pretend or cover up my job--it was too important.
"I work at the Jeffersonian," I began carefully. "I reconstruct faces of people from their skulls. We work for the FBI sometimes and I reconstruct faces from murder victims." Kevin looked kind of freaked out. He stopped eating his pork loin and just stared at me, an oh-gross-gotta-run look on his face. I found I didn't really care at all.
"Oh," he said. "Really?" The kind of question people don't actually want you to answer.
"Yeah," I said lightly, taking another sip of wine. "It's a really good job, though. I mean, we work to, y'know, catch murderers." Kevin nodded fervently--itt's kinda in bad taste to disagree with people on this topic--but shifted uncomfortably. Perversely, I found myself enjoying his disconfort. Somewhere along the way, I stopped wanting to talk and flirt and laugh with this guy at all and started wondering when exactly I could get back to the lab and see if the dentals came back. Hmm. Maybe this was what Brennan felt like, all the time.
The rest of the dinner slogged along, as boring and uncomfortable as it had been, as Kevin the Daiquiri Guy treated me to "One Thousand Awesome Surfboard Tricks I Have Done." I, on the other hand, dropped my fork twice, got a wine stain on my dress, and wondered when exactly I would get out of here. I silently cursed all fancy restaurants. Who needed a tiny bit of food that required three spoons anyways? I'd always liked playful dates anyways. It would've been a lot more fun just to play on swings like I did with--damn. Forget him, forget him, forget him. Even as I tried my hardest to compartmentalize (something I'd never been really good at) I couldn't find any enthusiasm for the rest of the meal.
As soon as dinner was through, I begged off to go home to change. "Some other time, maybe," I said to daiquiri guy, but he (thankfully) knew as well as I did that this was a pretty big failure of a first date. He tried to give me a good-bye kiss. I turned my face a little so he kissed me on the cheek instead. When on earth did I stop letting guys with hot asses kiss me on the lips on the first date? When did I start deciding to go to the lab at ten PM on a Friday night rather than go drinking, and then home, with a date? I knew the answer, but I didn't want to acknowledge it. I sighed and stopped my car in the nearly-empty structure, swiping my card to go in the dark building, all shadowed with moonlight from he skylights and always a little too cold. It was really a bit creepy here this late, without any people around. Footsteps sounded around the corner and I couldn't help but jump a little. It was just Cam, though, pulling out her keys as she as she buttoned her coat. She practically stopped in her tracks when she saw me.
"Angela? What are you doing here this late? Dr. Hodgins said you had a date tonight." Hodgins told her? Damn. She must've seen the look on my face though, because she added, "Only to tell me where you were."
I shrugged. "I wanted to see if the dentals had come back yet. I think I'd like to check all the dance studios near where she lived, if you've found the location from the particulates." By you I meant him. But I definitely didn't want to say his name, especially seeing as he ruined my date by being so damn understanding before I left. Bren can be logical. I just need someone to blame.
"O--kay," said Cam, obviously surprised. "The particulates report should be in the server. You'll be alone, though. Dr. Brennan and Seeley left for the diner an hour ago, and I haven't seen Dr. Hodgins since nine-thirty." Oh, good. I definitely could use some alone work time right now, without my best friend, her hot partner, or certainly any far-too-understanding entomologists. I nodded.
"Night, Cam." She was still looking at me a bit weirdly, but didn't comment further.
"Night, Angela. Be careful when you go home, alright?"
I slipped into my office a bit after that, turning on the cozy lights and and buttoning my lab coat up over my dress and the stain. This place was a lot nicer than my apartment. More cosy, weirdly enough, especially during the day, with my closest friends. I can see why Bren spends so much time here. It was a bit of a home for all of us, all alone.
I logged in on my computer, found the particulates report and read it twice, the second time because of how preoccupied I'd been by the fact that Hodgins wrote it. Then, pushing the thought down, I threw myself into researching and cataloging every dance studio within twenty miles of the area on Hodgins' report, running every group picture or candid shot against my sketch and all the names the teachers against the criminal database. A thousand photos of recitals later, I was pretty sure I found our victim in a shot of a performance of Swan Lake, within the area of her body's particulates. I sighed. The murderer probably knew her, then, if she'd been murdered so close. All the dance teachers turned up clean, but I knew that Booth and Brennan were going to go and question all of the people involved tomorrow anyways. There's always a first time for a crime. My head ached and I glanced at the clock. Twelve-thirty? No wonder I was sore, I'd been here for two and a half hours. I glanced at the picture again. A redheaded little girl (in pigtails, no less!) dancing in a little pink tutu. So young. So alive. My head pounded and my eyes ached and I realized that I was still wearing my hair up like I had been for my failure of a date. For some reason, it felt like days ago. I reached up and unpinned my hair, letting it hang over the back of my lab coat again. I felt miserable. Working had numbed the pain of the girl's death and the awful date for a bit, but now that I'd stopped, all the gloominess of my day rushed into me and I felt like crying again. Grabbing my keys, I decided to head to the once place where I'd maybe feel better--though I hadn't been there since, well, since Hodgins and I.
Three staircases and a couple of doors later, I swiped my card to get into the experimental garden of the Jeffersonian, pleased that the codes for entrance that Hodgins had gotten me still worked. Unlike the ornamental gardens, this one was up on the roof and open to the stars. The cool breeze sifting through my hair made me feel better already and I stopped, content just to stand with my eyes closed for a few minutes, breathing the scent in. From the rail of the garden the city lay spread out before me, a starmap of human activity. The heady green smell of the gardens, though, was bringing back memories. I sighed. Some days I just can't avoid him. Some days I don't even want to. I leant on the rail, fully intending to have a good cry and go home, when I heard the inner door to the gardens open. Instinctively, I shifted the keys in my pocket so they were pointing out. Anybody who can go through those doors had to be a Jeffersonian worker. Then I remembered that one girl who ended up in the incinerator. That didn't help. What also didn't help was that whoever was going through those doors had to their back to the light, meaning I had no idea who it was.
"Ange?" Oh, damn. Brennan once told me that eighty percent of murder victims knew the killer--wait, hey, that voice was awfully familiar, almost like that one that had been running through my…head…all…night. Damn. I really couldn't get rid of him, could I? There was no mistaking that curly hair, even silhouetted against the light.
"Jack?" That was a slip. It's been a while since I called him that. "What are you doing here?" The door shut. He was wearing his lab coat too. Had he been here the whole time?
He raised his eyebrows and gave me a bit of a grin. I suddenly realized that I haven't seen him really smile in a while.
"I work here. What are you doing here?"
I rolled my eyes but couldn't keep a chuckle from rising in my throat, and watched as he picked his way to my side of the terrace.
"So," he continued, resting his arms on the rail next to me, a little closer than really necessary. "How was your date?" I grimaced, he laughed again, but not mockingly as much as sympathetically.
"I really would rather not talk about it," I said, wrinkling my nose. He snorted. We looked at each other a bit, smiling. I could sense that I was walking into danger again but this time, I didn't really care.
"So why are you still here? Brennan rubbing off on you?" I laughed, but it was true. Work had slowly but surely stolen over the large portion of my life, and I didn't even mind--at least, not when work still meant friends, family and, well, my fiance. Fiance. I never could get used to that word, even when we were engaged. But what we were...well, I guess I did get used to it, because there were days when I missed it like crazy.
"You're still here," I pointed out after a while.
"Mmmhmm," he said, purposefully vague.
"Why are you still here, Hodgins?"
"You know, I liked it better when you called me Jack," he said, grinning. I could feel my heart speeding up, completely against my will, as I tried not to grin back at him. "And maybe I was chatting to people. Girls. You know, on the internet."
Oh. Was he? I was not jealous, not jealous...
He laughed again at my expression. "And maybe I fell asleep on the couch in the lounge."
I rolled my eyes and smacked him on the arm, pretending I didn't feel warm relief coil in my stomach. We stared at the silent gardens for a few more moments, at ease. It's been a while since I've felt that way with Hodgins.
"So," I copied, breaking the silence. "How was your night at the lab?" He glanced at me, chuckling, before, pulling from the rail and facing me.
"I," he said, in that stupid, idiotic, theatrical and endearing way he has. "Wrote an entire particulates report, that targeted the approximate home of the victim to within a five-mile radius using only the combination of angiosperm pollen and graminoid rhizomes on her slippers and costume. And I found microscopic steel particulates in the bone wounds, a combination that is only used by one company, based in Japan. And that, Ange, that makes me King of the Lab."
I rolled my eyes, looking at him with amusement. "You know the whole King of the Lab business is really kind of childish alone, right?"
"Maybe you should compete with me, then," he said, smiling. But now he was looking down, touched with sadness. I brought up Zack again, even if I never mentioned his name, like summoning an invisible elephant onto the garden. But instead of pushing us apart, the elephant squeezed us into the corner, together.
"Hey," I said, putting a hand on his arm. "I miss him too." Hodgins looked down at my hand on his arm, before looking up at me, his sad look now joined by mischievousness. I was confused, but only for a second.
"Oh, no," I said. "You still have that tattoo?"
He grinned at me. "Aren't you even a bit afraid that if I laser it off I might end up with your face, all splotchy and mangled, scarring my arm?" I laughed. He looked at me seriously. "Aren't you afraid that I miss you, Ange?"
I swallowed. I couldn't break his gaze. His voice was soft. Too soft.
"Why'd we break up, Ange? It wasn't trust issues, that was the crappiest excuse I've ever heard. Your ex-husband was in town and I didn't trust you because I wanted him out of town?" The words were just spilling out of his mouth. I didn't think he could control it. But he was staring at me, beseeching, because the worst thing to Hodgins is a lack of explanation. He was staring at me, and the little girl in my mind's eye laughed as she danced and Zack yelled "King of the Lab!" and it was all too much and all of a sudden I was in Hodgins' arms, crying my eyes out. Damn. I hoped this wasn't going to become a habit, or anything.
"He didn't understand at all. My date, Kevin, he was grossed out by this job, and I can't stop, I can't stop thinking about that little girl, Jack. She was so tiny, with these little freckles and pigtails." I felt him nod, against my hair, smoothing it back. He understood. I choked back a watery laugh. "God, Jack, why can't I connect with people not in this lab anymore? I don't think any of us can, actually. Once you start being a squint, you stop being anything else."
He laughed, and we pulled back a bit, just staring at each other. He started to speak again, but I shushed him. If I didn't say this now, I probably never will.
"Jack, I…I don't know why we broke up. I have no clue. None. It wasn't trust. I mean, you're human, you have jealousies, but I trust you. I just…I don't know." I turned my head against his shoulder. "I'm scared. Of relationships. Maybe that's why Brennan and I are best friends. But you, y'know, you're the marrying kind. And I'm a free spirit." It was all a lie, and I knew it. Free spirit my ass, if I couldn't go one date without daydreaming about going on swing sets with this guy. Swing sets!
"Ange..." He made to pull back. I grabbed him. Anything to get him to stay.
"At least, I thought I was. I miss you, Jack. I can't stop..." I closed my eyes, steeling my nerves. "I can't stop thinking about you."
"But do you want this?" He was looking at me again. He's gotta cut that out, cos that is a definitely a Class One security threat for me. One look and I'm agreeing with him.
"Yeah," I said. Just like he kept agreeing with me when we were together, just to have me around. Just like how he kept agreeing with me, even when I wanted to break us up, because I couldn't handle the forever part of marriage. But I think I learned a bit about forever. Like anything else, it's one day at a time.
And then I couldn't think anymore because we're kissing now and damn that is something I definitely missed. Oh. God. He has great lips. And when he whispers "I love you," against my mouth, I didn't know whether to laugh, or cry, or just try to stay up here, forever. We pull back and grin at each other and suddenly I felt lighter than I had in months. There's a future for us, but...
"One day at a time, okay?" I said to him. Me. Angela 'Jump-in-feet-first' Montenegro. Going slow. Savoring the ride. And then he smiles, that slow, sexy, confident smile of his.
"There's a huge swing set at Newcombe Park, a few miles from here," he says, wrapping an arm around my shoulders."Tire swings!" And then there it is. Understanding.
Reviews? Please? I mean the button is right there! And it's green. Man, what's not to love?