Title: Female Spiders
Author: Insane Elven Pirate
Rating: T- for suggestive themes. Nothing too bad, though. Mostly just to be safe.
Genre: Humor
Summary: Booth is having girl problems and ends up receiving advice from three very unhelpful squints.
Author's Note: An idea I've had in my head. It's kinda goofy, but I think it's funny. I hope you enjoy it!
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Agent Seeley Booth ascended the stairs of the lab platform with less than his usual gusto. He trudged across the platform and leaned against the metal rail near where his team of 'squints' as he liked to call them, was examining the set of human skeletal remains that belonged to the victim of their latest case.
Dr. Jack Hodgins, the teams entomologist, or 'bug and slime guy' as he preferred to be called, and Dr. Zack Addy, forensic anthropologist, were bent over the bones, both of them leaning in so close that Booth wondered how they weren't gagging from the smell of decomposing flesh. Dr. Camille Saroyan, head of the Jeffersonian forensic devision, stood at the head of the examining table, overseeing the work of the squints while jotting notes about the body on a legal-pad of yellow paper. Angela Montenegro, the team's forensic artist, was sitting on a tall stool. She had one of her legs propped up at a sharp angle so that she could rest a 9'x11' sketch pad on it while the other leg dangled freely.
Booth glanced around the group, realizing that the key squint, the one he had come here to see, was missing. "Where's Bones?" he asked.
Angela glanced up at him before returning her attention to the sketch. "She's in her office. Her publisher called and insisted that they discuss some urgent matter."
"Oh. I guess I'll, uh, just wait here then," Agent Booth said, grabbing a chair and flipping it around so he could sit on it backwards. He began drumming his fingers absentmindedly on the back of the chair. Then, growing bored, he crossed his arms over the back and leaned his head on them before heaving a heavy sigh.
Angela stopped sketching and turned to face Booth. "Are you okay?" she asked, concern evident in her tone.
"Hmm?" Booth raised his eyebrows at the question. "Oh, it's nothing. It's not important." He shook his head, as if trying to shake away some thought in his mind.
"Mmm." Angela nodded sagely. "I see."
Booth furrowed his brow in confusion. "See what?"
"You've got girl problems," Angela replied.
"What? What gives you that idea?" Booth asked, looking incredulous.
"Dude, it's written all over you." Hodgins joined in on the conversation. "Zack looks the same way whenever Naomi from paleontology breaks up with him."
The younger doctor looked up from the remains to stare at Hodgins in surprise. "I do not!"
Hodgins gave Zack a pitiful look. "You so do," he said nodding. "What happened, did you get couched?"
"'Couched?' What is 'couched?'" Zack asked before Booth could respond.
"You know..." Hodgins said. "Couched. 'Dude, you've been couched!'"
Zack gave Hodgins an uncomprehending stare. "Couch is noun," he stated. "You cannot be couched."
Hodgins sighed. "Okay, when a man does something to upset a woman, she makes him sleep on the couch because she is so mad at him she can't stand to share a bed with him. Then all his friends will make fun of him saying 'Dude, you've been couched!'"
Zack nodded slowly. "I see."
"So what's the problem?" Angela asked, directing the conversation back towards Booth's problem.
Booth groaned as the squints looked up at him, waiting expectantly. He glanced in the direction of Brennan's office, hoping that she would come and rescue him from this interrogation, but he could see that she was still on the phone and it didn't look like she'd be hanging up soon enough to help him. He looked up at the ceiling and slowly let out a deep breath. He knew that they probably wouldn't just let this go. "Alright," he began, "This girl I've been dating... She, well, she broke up with me. And, I don't know, we'd only been on three dates, but I thought things were going really well, ya know?" He sighed bitterly. "I mean, I let her choose the fancy wine, I bought her a fancy dinner, and when she was done drinking the wine, and eating the dinner, she decided to rip out my heart for desert."
"Oh, Booth.." Angela reached out and patted his arm sympathetically.
Booth threw his hands into the air. "I just don't know what I did wrong."
"It is said that in some species of spiders, the female will sometimes eat the male after they mate." Hodgins stated in a matter-of-fact tone. "The belief behind it is that the female will mistake the male for prey. So instead of getting eaten, the male spider will bring her a gift, such as a dead beetle or a fly."
Booth gave Hodgins a deadpan stare. "...So you're saying I should have tried given her a dead bug so she wouldn't eat my heart out."
"Yeah." Hodgins shrugged. "Or, you know, jewelry might have gone over better."
"No." Angela shook her head. "A woman doesn't need a gift to know she's important. What kind of things did you two talk about?"
"Well, you know... Work, our lives, what kind of movies we like..."
"You see, there's your problem!" Angela exclaimed, pointing at Booth. "You need to tell her how you feel. Open up to her. Tell her about your hopes, your dreams, your desires. Make a personal connection."
"The drosophila melanogaster, more commonly known as the fruit fly, has a five-step mating ritual, but even if the male does everything perfectly, the female can still reject him," Hodgins stated. "Life's tough, man. That's just the way it is."
"In ancient times it wasn't uncommon for men to kidnap wives when the female population in their own village was low," Zack said, looking up from the body. "They would raid another village and capture women to make them their wives. Then they would go into hiding so that the village the bride was kidnapped from could not find her. It is believed that that is where our modern tradition of the honey moon comes from."
Angela turned to Zack. "Are you suggesting that Booth should club her on the head?"
Zack looked confused. "What? No. I was merely stating a fact on courtship. Is that not what we're doing?"
Angela rolled her eyes. "You need to pay better attention, Zack."
"I was paying attention," Zack protested feebly as Angela turned back to Booth.
"Anyways, Booth, just be in touch with you're feelings, you know? Don't be afraid to cry every now and then. A woman loves a man who can cry." Angela said helpfully.
"It's true," Hodgins nodded enthusiastically. "Hey, and if you need help with the crying thing, try saline solution eye drops. They work wonders, I've used them a lot myself. But-but never with you, Angela!" he hurriedly added when Angela spun around to look at him, "Those tears were all real!"
"Okay, okay!" Booth said, waving his hands back and forth as Angela opened her mouth to yell at Hodgins. "Look, first of all," he pointed his finger at Hodgins, "I'm not a bug," he moved the finger to Zack, "I'm not a caveman," the finger moved to Angela, "And I'm not a woman! And second of all, thanks for the help, really," he continued, not sounding as if he actually meant it, "But I don't need your advice, I can figure it out myself."
Before anyone could reply, Dr. Brennan climbed the stairs to the platform. "Sorry about that," she said. "It was some kind of printing emergency, but we've got everything worked out now."
"Bones!" Booth cried, jumping up from his chair. "I am so glad to see you!" He said, running up to her and giving her a big hug. "Listen, we've got a lead on the case, I'll be waiting for you out front in the car." He explained, as he began climbing down the stairs. "Ten minutes!" He called over his shoulder as he eagerly left the lab.
Dr. Brennan looked around with a bewildered expression on her face. "What did I just miss?"
"Nothing," Cam replied, trying and failing to hold back a smile. "Don't worry about it."
"Okay..." Brennan said slowly. "Well, I guess I'll be going then." She still looked confused as she took off her lab coat and headed down the stairs.
With the distractions of Agent Booth and Dr. Brennan gone, Angela had time to give Hodgins an angry glare before angrily gathering her materials and heading toward her office.
"Angela!" Hodgins called desperately after her. He was ignored, however, and with a heavy sigh he turned back to the body to resume his work.
Zack leaned towards Hodgins. "Would now be an appropriate time to say 'Dude, you've been couched?'"
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