The Broken Toe
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Booth paced the ER waiting room. It felt like he spent too much time in hospitals lately. Brain surgery and follow up appointments and brain scans...he unconsciously reached one hand up to his head to feel the scar that was hidden by his dark hair. He shook his head. No. He was fine now.
Tonight he wasn't here for himself. He was here for his partner.
Which was far, far worse, in his opinion .
"Booth!"
"Sweets. Finally!" Booth stopped his mad pacing, and greeted his psychologist.
"What happened?" Sweets asked, as he approached. "I got your text. 'Emergency Room. Now.' Very vague...and a little threatening. Is your tumor back?"
"Bones broke her toe-" Booth began.
"Dr. Brennan broke her toe?" Sweets looked confused. "You called me all the way down here in the middle of the night for a broken toe?"
"No, wait, there is more-" Booth tried to begin again
"How did she break her toe?" Sweets asked curiously.
"Tripped getting out of the bath tub." Booth said, his jaw clenched tightly. He was getting impatient with the young psychologist. "Getting back to-"
"Which toe?"
"Who cares?! Forget about the toe! I need you to talk to her doctor's...find out about her head injury. She hit her head, okay? That's why I called you down here."
"Head injury?" Sweets said his expression growing serious. "Right. Of course. I'll see what I can do." He awkwardly patted Booth's shoulder and left him in the waiting area to make his way towards the nurses desk.
"Thank you...finally!" Booth exhaled loudly. He sank heavily into a chair, rubbing at his eyes.
"Any news?" Angela asked, approaching him holding two cups of coffee. She sat beside him and handed him his cup and sipped from her own.
"Thanks. No...nothing yet. I sent Sweets over to see if he could find anything out." Booth said, pointing towards Sweets. He turned back to Angela. "So she was...confused?" he asked in a small voice. "Tell me again what happened?"
Angela took another sip of coffee. "Bren called me saying she was running late and told me to let myself in, she was going to take a quick bath....anyway...like I told you, I got there and found her on the bathroom floor...she was barely conscious...freaked me the hell out. She could barely string two words together. She'd lost a lot of blood..." Angela broke off teary eyed.
Booth reached out and reassuringly rubbed Angela's shoulder.
"There was so much blood." Angela sniffed.
Booth flashed back in his mind to a few weeks earlier when he had been covered in his partners blood after she had been stabbed with a scalpel.
"She was lucky you were there, Angela." He managed to say after a moment.
"Yeah." Angela nodded.
Sweets approached them clearing his throat.
"So?" Booth prompted.
"So...they wouldn't tell me much, they have stitched her up and she is having a PET scan...they're worried about swelling...and she hasn't regained full consciousness yet." Sweets said grimly.
"Oh man." Angela murmered.
"Can I see her? I-I need to see-" Booth stood up, his concern for his partner growing..
"You will have to wait till after the scan." Sweets told him. "She...she did ask for you...when she had a lucid moment."
"I should be with her. I should be..." Booth broke off in frustration.
"Booth, it's okay, she will be fine." Angela said soothingly. "You know Brennan, bump on the head won't stop her. She got stabbed two weeks ago and after they stitched her up all she asked for was a band aid." She smiled.
"Right...I know...she will be fine. But I am her husband! I should be by her side. That's my-"
"What did you say?" Sweets asked, his eyebrow raised.
"I should be with her...I'm her hus--partner." Booth said, realizing his mistake. " I meant partner." He emphasized. "Partner."
"Booth, honey--" Angela started.
"No. It's fine. I am fine." Booth said firmly. He glanced briefly at Sweets, then looked away, knowing instantly what the psychologist was thinking.
"You're still experiencing delusions from your coma." Sweets stated.
"No! I just...forgot. Just for a moment." Booth protested, shooting the young doctor a menacing glare.
"Agent Booth, if you are--"
"Give him a break, Sweets." Angela shot the psychologist a glare. "He had a momentary relapse...this is a stressful situation, he's been up all night." She gave Booth a sympathetic look, patting his arm, urging him to sit back down.
"Why am I the bad guy? I am only concerned for his well being--"
"Angela Montenegro!" A loud female voice boomed across the waiting room.
"Me! That's me." Angela stood quickly, holding her hand up for the person who called her name to see. Booth stood close at her side as a doctor approached them.
"I'm Dr. Scanlon, are you the one that bought in Miss Brennan?" The doctor inquired briskly.
"Yes." Angela nodded vigorously. "How is she?" She asked anxiously.
"It's Dr. Brennan." Booth added in a small voice. He wasn't sure why he had the compulsive need to correct the doctor, but he did.
"And you are?" Dr. Scanlon raised a questioning eyebrow.
"Special Agent Seeley Booth."
"And what is your relationship to Dr. Brennan?"
"She is my partner."
"They are very close." Angela added with a suggestive wink.
"How is she?" Booth pressed ignoring Angela's insinuation.
"She's resting. Still a bit hazy, but she has regained consciousness. We're just waiting on the results from her scan. If everything is fine with her scan, we will keep her overnight for observation but other than that, she is fine, aside from the broken toe of course." The doctor smiled.
"Great. So I can see her? She was asking for me right? Her partner Booth?"
The doctor hesitated. "Sure...Agent Booth, follow me."
"Ange...you don't mind do you?" Booth asked the artist.
"No." Angela shook her head. "You go. Give her a kiss from me." She winked.
Booth smiled weakly and turned to follow the doctor.
*
"Bones, hey, how you feeling?" Booth quietly entering his partners' cubicle in emergency.
"I feel like I have been hit by a large motor vehicle." Brennan replied in a small voice. She looked small and pale laying in the hospital bed.
"Kinda look like it too...that looks sore." He pointed to the wad of gauze on her forehead.
"I don't know what happened. They said...I tripped getting out of my bath tub?" She sounded confused. "I don't understand, I have gotten out of the bath tub hundreds of times and never tripped." She pouted.
"It's okay, Bones." Booth soothed.
"I broke my toe," she moaned.
"Just one of 'em." he countered.
"I'm not clumsy." she said firmly as if she was being accused of being otherwise.
"Of course you're not." Booth hid a smile. "It was just an accident."
"My head hurts."
"It's gonna hurt for a bit." Booth said sympathetically.
"You didn't have to come."
"Yeah, I did."
"The painkillers are starting to make me drowsy." Brennan said sounding sleepy, her eyes drifting shut, then open again to watch Booth curiously.
"Close your eyes." Booth said, taking her hand.
"You can stay...now that you are here...you can stay?" She sleepily tried to turn her statement into a question.
"Of course, I'll be right here. Now rest." He gently reached for her forehead and swept her hair back.
"Night, Booth."
"Night, honey."
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Booth had started to feel tired himself when Sweets appeared pulling the cubicle curtain back and gestured for Booth to follow him.
"What is it? I promised her I wouldn't leave." Booth greeted Sweets curtly.
"I managed to get copies of her PET scan results." Sweets said simply, a folder under one arm.
"Oh? And?"
"Well....they were quite interesting." Sweets said, sounding mysterious.
"Interesting? What the hell does that mean?"
"Here. I will show you." He pulled out some print outs from the folder he was holding. "This is her brain." He gestured to the page he was holding out.
"Yeah, I can see that. Recently had brain surgery, remember?" Booth said, growing more impatient. If something was wrong with Bones brain he wanted to know now.
"Then you should remember what I told you about the ventral tegmental area and the dorsal-"
Booth held up his hand and interupted him. "The area of the brain that shows romantic love and sexual desire.." Booth blushed slightly as he remembered the conversation he had with Sweets several weeks ago. The conversation that kept him from telling his partner how he felt about her.
"So, take a closer look at this." Sweets said pointedly, holding out the print out for Booth to take.
Booth focused on the piece of paper, then his eyes widened.. "Hey! Look...Bones brain is....like mine!" He snatched the paper from Sweets hand to take an even closer look.
"It appears that way."
"So...Bones is in love?" Booth concluded.
"Well...according to her brain she is. Possibly. Or she could have been having a vivid sexual dream while she was unconscious."
"I knew it!" Booth thrust the paper back at Sweets. He grinned broadly. "Bones loves me!"
"Now, that is a giant leap, Agent Booth."
Booth wasn't listening. "It's like I've been saying Sweets, something changed between Bones and I when I came out of that coma. That place that I went to...that dream I had....Bones was there...don't look at me like that, I know I sound like a wackjob but it's true." Booth stopped to take a breath, still grinning. "I love Bones and she loves me. This proves that!"
"Even if Dr. Brennan does have feelings for you, we still can't determine definitively if your feelings are real."
"My feelings are real." Booth argued. "It may have taken the coma to realise it, but I know they are real, okay? I love Bones. Whatever my brain is saying is true!" he said. "More importantly," he continued, "I know how I feel here." His hand came up to cover his heart.
"You called yourself her husband half an hour ago." Sweets reminded him.
Booth shook his head. "That was...nothing...I just....slipped."
"You haven't considered she may be in love with someone else."
"Come on! Who else? She spent the last six weeks digging up Aztecs! She's not dating anyone, I would know. It's me! It has to be me!"
"Okay..."
"Why aren't you convinced? Bones spent four days at my bedside while I was in the coma. She wanted me to be the father of her baby. That's gotta mean something, even to someone as rational as Bones. Look, I may have had the dream, but she wrote the book." Booth said. "And the book was about us." He added smugly.
"I'm well aware of Dr. Brennan's devotion to you and yes - she may well love you, but I still advise-"
"I know, I know, tread carefully...I know, okay? Geez, you really know how to rain on a guy's parade. Now, if there is nothing else, I'd like...?" He motioned towards his sleeping partner.
"Go." Sweets nodded.
"Thank you." With one final grin, Booth left Sweets and moved back to sit besides his partners bed.
He watched her sleeping form for several minutes. He finally leaned in and kissed the gauze free spot on her forehead.
"No more secrets, Bones."
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Thanks for reading. This fanfic is dedicated to Emily Deschanel who really did break her toe stepping out of her bath tub (but luckily avoided a head injury)...hey, I needed an excuse for Brennan to get her brain scanned..hope the technical mumbo jumbo is accurate enough....Should I continue or leave it where it is?
Thanks Slovesemmet for beta-ing!