Disclaimer: I do not own or lay claim to anything even tenuously associated with Bones; it belongs to various individuals and corporations who are considerably more talented and well-off than myself. I am only playing with the aforesaid characters, situations, settings, etc. for my own amusement and am making no profit whatsoever from this (other than the bettering of my writing skills and my own amusement). No copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
A/N: So this is an exorcism of my worst fears about the next season. I doubt they'll fully go this route, but B/B are definitely going to have some issues to work through.
Entropy is the natural order of things. He promised once that 'not everything' changes – and she's sure that he believed it – but he was wrong. They are changing; spiraling downwards, being torn apart. Of course, he'd also said that things had to change. And while she had clung to the feeble hope that nothing important would change during that year apart, she'd known better. She'd always known.
She'd known that this would happen eventually, but bracing herself for the pain did not fully prepare her for the full force of its impact.
When they eat together – which is becoming rarer and rarer – they do not eat at either of their apartments, sticking instead to brightly-lit diners. That they do this by a mutual, tacit agreement is one of the last surviving proofs of their bond.
Because she no longer knows him, really; no more than he knows her. A year without communication has done that to them. They are too careful around one another these days, too stiffly polite.
He is moving on (has moved on) and she is staying in place. She is a scientist who cannot change; though she vehemently pushes aside her emotions during the day (she has always been excellent at compartmentalization), they are still there. He can move on from the two of them.
Much though she would deny it, she can't.