Auld Lang Syne

By: dharmamonkey
Rated: T
Disclaimer: I don't own jack. However, I am definitely interested in renting Booth. A five-hour minimum would apply.

A/N: This story is part of the Bones Fanfic Secret Santa and is my top-secret commando gift to my friend jazzyproz who requested a winter/Christmas scene and was okay with "gentle angst" in the context of a run-in with a past relationship. This scene is set during early Season 7.

Happy holidays, everyone!

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
and never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
and auld lang syne?

—Robert Burns, 1788

She heard them before she saw them.

They were in the housewares section, one aisle over from where Tessa Jankow was searching for a set of six bamboo placemats to match the new table and chairs in her dining room.

"I really don't know why you dragged me out for this," the woman in the next aisle said in a reedy voice.

Tessa heard the man snort. "Dragged? We were out anyway. What? You got some kind of hot date tonight you neglected to tell me about?"

She heard the soft sound of skin on skin followed by a quiet ouch and imagined that the woman had just given the man a playful slap.

"The only hot date I have tonight is you," the woman said in a suddenly huskier voice. "Mmm? The same as last night, the night before and the other approximately a hundred and ninety nights before that."

"Mmm-hmm," the man murmured. "You know I love it when you get all mathy on me," he said, his own voice dropping a half octave and taking on a breathiness that made her imagine him leaning in close to the woman's ear.

The woman laughed. "Despite your frequent use of the term, 'mathy' is not, in fact, an actual word."

"Come on—'mathy' is totally a word," the man said. "Just like 'sciency' and 'squinty' are. You just forgot because you're too caught up in your own epic squintyliciousness."

The woman laughed out loud. "While a very creative use of portmanteau, I'm afraid that neither 'squintylicious' nor its noun form 'squintyliciousness' are words, either."

The man made another murmuring sound and the woman squeaked then giggled. "Thank you, Inspector Killjoy of the Washington Word Police's 47th Precinct," he quipped. "Now will you please tell me which of these you like better? My old wreath's falling apart and my front door looks lonely and naked without one this time of year."

A moment of silence passed and Tessa went back to her own browsing, feeling a little (but only a little) guilty for eavesdropping on the couple. Finally settling on a particular placemat, she grabbed six of them and placed them in her basket before realizing that the other things she needed to pick up—interior accent candles—were in the next aisle over.

"I don't really care but I don't know why you're even asking me," the woman said. "It's your apartment."

Tessa was about to walk around the corner when she froze, curious to hear the man's reply and arching an eyebrow when she heard him breathe an exasperated sigh.

"My name's on the lease, okay?" he admitted. "But you're there as much as I am. And until we find a place of our own, my place is your home just as much as it is mine. So, yeah, I want you to be happy with the way it looks. Starting with the front door."

"Christmas is your holiday," the woman told him pointedly. "Not mine. I'm hardly in a position to judge whether something is, in your words, 'Christmasy' enough to furnish your living space."

"Our living space," he corrected her, pausing for a moment before he added in a softer, deeper tone of voice, "Come on, Bones. I just want you to be happy."

Bones?

The word jogged a memory. It had been years since Tessa had seen or even thought about him, but as soon as she heard the man call his companion by that nickname, it all came back to her in a rush: his toothy grin, his throaty laugh, his thick brown hair, his smooth, warm skin, and his big, strong hands. She'd liked him, quite a lot actually, and enjoyed the short time they were together all those years ago, but knew also that their parting had been right. She'd had an inkling early on that there were things in his life he'd always put before her—his son, of course, and his job at the FBI—but it was one night in particular that made her realize that she would never, ever truly have him to herself.

It was a Friday night, and they'd been enjoying a quiet, candlelit dinner at a French-Belgian restaurant on Pennsylvania Avenue called Marcel's. Their appetizer—pan-seared sea scallops in a sage beurre blanc sauce on a bed of sautéed spinach with crumbled pancetta—had just come out of the kitchen when his cell phone buzzed in his coat pocket. He growled and a crestfallen expression washed over him, slumping his shoulders as he reached for his phone and flipped it open.

She knew, not two seconds after he greeted the caller with a softly-grunted, "Booth," that another romantic night out on the town had been ruined. It wasn't the first time that it had happened, and by the end of that week, she was certain it wouldn't be the last. No matter where they were or what they were doing, he could be yanked away on a moment's notice. Of course, she respected the work he did, and she had known early on that the nature of his work dictated that he always be "on call."

When they first started dating, she found Seeley Booth to be a breath of fresh air—funny, clever, self-deprecating and totally unassuming, completely different than the hard-charging junior partner at Hogan Lovells that she'd broken up with a few months before she met Booth. But as the months wore on, it became clear that, while Booth didn't work the same sort of sixty-hour weeks that her last two lawyer boyfriends did, his hours were unpredictable and there was no telling when his phone would ring and his scientist partner would show up, unbidden and unannounced, to wreck whatever plans the two of them had made. Their aborted night out at Marcel's proved to be the last straw. Within a month, they parted ways.

Tessa blinked away the memory and heard Brennan sigh.

"Okay," she said. "If I have to choose one, then I'd opt for this one meant to simulate the blue spruce with its immature cones. It's actually a fairly accurate reproduction of what a picea pungens or Colorado blue spruce looks like, and the red color of the immature cones is evocative of the traditional holiday color scheme."

Booth chuckled. "It's Christmasy," he told her, setting the other wreath back on the shelf as Tessa rounded the corner. "I think it's perfect," he said, gently placing the spruce wreath in their cart as he leaned forward and dropped a soft kiss on Brennan's jaw, just in front of her ear. Tessa watched as her ex-boyfriend nuzzled his nose into Brennan's hair and whispered something in her ear. She felt a dim flash of something—jealousy, perhaps, or, more likely, nostalgia—as she saw his arm snake around Brennan's waist. He muttered something else in her ear that Tessa couldn't quite hear from where she was standing, quietly observing as they stood a few feet away with their backs turned. "Come on," he said more loudly. "I love elves. They're very Christmasy."

"I am not an elf," Brennan told him, the faint snicker on the edge of her voice belying her annoyance.

"Mmm-hmmm," he murmured as he placed a wet, sucking kiss on the side of her neck. "So you say…"

"Booth, I am not going to wear one of those holiday elf sweaters!" she protested, turning her head away from his plucking lips as she wriggled out of his one-armed embrace. "Okay? I'm not—"

Brennan fell suddenly silent as she turned around and saw Tessa standing there with a shopping basket dangling from her hand and a faint smile on her lips. The scientist's eyes narrowed as Booth himself turned around and stared in surprise at the sight of the slender, long-limbed blonde before them.

"Tessa?" he whispered, his dark eyes fluttering as if trying to blink away the haze left by years of separation. "I...wow, umm..."

"Seeley," she said, the word falling from her lips less as a question and more as an acknowledgment. Her eyes locked with his for a moment as the vague, enigmatic curve of her lips broadened into a smile. She noted the happy glimmer in his chocolate brown eyes as he took a small step forward, tucking himself behind Brennan as his broad, smooth forearm snaked once more around his partner's waist, holding her snugly against him as his long, thick fingers settled over the round swell of Brennan's belly. "Dr. Brennan," Tessa said, her eyes swiveling up to meet Brennan's as she greeted her with a nod.

"Bones," he said, nudging Brennan from behind with his hip. "You remember Tessa, right?"

Brennan's pale, gray-green eyes sparkled as she remembered the night she met the tall corporate attorney, who emerged from Booth's bedroom clad in nothing but a black bra and panties with one of his white dress shirts hanging from her by a single, hastily-fastened button. She remembered feeling a strange swirl of amusement and envy as she exchanged banal chit-chat with Tessa while Booth sheepishly dressed in the foyer.

"Of course," Brennan said huskily, reaching around to place her hand over Booth's own as it palmed the curve of her pregnant belly. "Nice to see you again."

Tessa watched Brennan's fingers skim over Booth's, smiling at the way his splayed fingers narrowed, catching hers between them as a breathy laugh passed from the scientist's glossy pink lips. "When are you due?" she asked with a warm smile as Booth finally let go of the breath he'd been unknowingly holding.

"February 17th," Brennan answered, a proud lilt in her voice.

"Well, congratulations," Tessa said, her gaze sweeping up once more to meet Booth's. "On everything," she added obliquely.

"Thanks," Booth said as he gave Brennan's fingers a light squeeze. Glancing over his shoulder at the cart, he shrugged and said, "We've got to, uhh..."

Tessa smiled and waved off his awkward apology. "Me, too," she said. "I just...well, it was nice seeing you both again."

She watched as the two turned away and made their way down the aisle, noting that Booth's arm never left Brennan's waist as he kept one protective, loving hand on her six-months' pregnant belly and the other on the cart. For a few long moments, she didn't move or turn to browse the accent candles she came into the aisle to see, but rather recalled the way her ex's eyes would flicker every time Brennan came into a room. That flicker—which had once annoyed her and which had been, in a way, the writing on the wall that signaled that she and the hunky, sweet FBI agent were not meant for one another—had settled into a steady gleam that brightened his warm brown eyes and left little doubt in Tessa's mind that all had turned out as it should. Good for him, she thought as she heard their voices again, bantering just out of sight on the other side of the aisle's endcap.

"No, Booth, I am not an elf," Brennan squawked. "Those sweaters are absolutely stupid. And in any event, I'm too huge to wear one at this point. Even if I could get it on, it'd cling to me in all of the most unflattering places, and—"

"You're not huge," he told her. "You're a beautiful, gorgeous, sexy pregnant elf and you'd look great in one of those sweaters. We can even get you a matching green elf's hat, and—"

"Forget it, Booth," she said, the scowl almost audible in her voice. "Now," she said, her tone shifting to one a bit deeper and decidedly more wicked. "If you want to get yourself one of those cute little hats, I'm happy to let you be my elf."

"Hmmm," he murmured. "I dunno. Does it pay well? Being your elf, I mean."

A moment of silence hung between them as she considered his question. "No," Brennan deadpanned. "But the fringe benefits are excellent."

A/N: Soooo...

I hope you all (especially holiday giftee jazzyproz) enjoyed that one. It's definitely not my usual, but pushing one's own limits and writing to someone else's prompt is half the fun of Secret Santa.

Did you like it? Since I'm not a psychic like Avalon, I'd love to know what you all thought. Please, please, please leave a review. Pretty please? *works the puppy dog eyes*

Thanks!