Angsty. One shot at this point. I just don't have the inspiration for a make up scene or hot monkey make up sex or apologetic lovemaking that isn't cliched. If you've an idea, though... please let me know!


Pushing Buttons

He didn't know what came over him. One minute, they were having a fight, a fight he'd picked after a case when apprehending the murderer failed to elicit a confession, when discovering the whodunit had no satisfaction, where their victim, the abusive husband killed by the wife's sister, had arguably deserved it, and solving the case provided neither of them with any solace-- and now this.

They'd had to go to therapy with Sweets right afterward, and at least had managed to double team him in telling him he had no clue what it felt like, especially knowing they were going to have to go through it all over again, when the trial came around, and there was a real risk a jury might sympathize more with the killer than the victim and let her walk. Justice might actually be on her side, given the facts of the case.

But they'd gone back to his place after picking up takeout, and he'd been furious all over again, slamming things on counters and tables, ripping his tie off and tossing his jacket carelessly over a lamp, and quickly downing two shots of whiskey as Bones watched him cautiously, serving herself some fried rice and a beer. He grudgingly served himself some, and then a third shot of whiskey, the fire burning through him almost as hot as his anger, but failing to quench it.

She'd remained silent as he ranted and raved, slowly eating her food and sipping her beer as he paced and shouted. She was more than patient with these temper tantrums of his, once he really got started, and more than once woke up to find she'd helped him to bed, or draped a throw over him on his couch when he'd finally passed out from too much whiskey, or fell asleep after dragging her into his lap and holding her, breathing raggedly into her hair in an attempt to calm himself down.

Why she put up with such possessive, needy behavior, he never knew, but she indulged him-- which tonight somehow made him even angrier. He would lose control in this small way, and she'd be quiet and sympathetic and pretend like it never happened the next time she'd see or talk to him. He hated how she could be both so perceptive and sympathetic, and yet so oblivious. Four years they'd been working together, and she still seemed to have no clue that he was not only in lust and in love with her, but so far over-the-edge jealous when she went on dates these days that he honestly worried that one day he'd snap. Of course, it was hardly fair to expect her to clue in to something he'd never told her-- at least his anger and anguish and rage at the outcome of these less-than-clear cases was clear, something she could easily decide how to deal with.

So he picked a fight, shoving her food aside on the coffee table and sitting down right in front of her where she sat on the sofa. These cases pushed all of his buttons, and here she was acting unfazed.

"You're awfully calm for someone who just helped arrest someone with every possible justification for doing what she did." He didn't know why, but he poked her in the shoulder.

She looked at him quietly, then said "The justification doesn't excuse the fact that she still should have stopped short of murder."

"And you would?"

She thought for a moment. "I don't know. I've never been in that situation."

"Well, well, well. So nice to hear Saint Temperance come down off her high horse and admit she has feelings like the rest of us humans," he sneered, leaning in so she was almost backed into the sofa.

She literally flinched like she'd been slapped. "Don't take it out on me, Booth," she warned, voice still quiet like she was trying to calm him. She was trying to calm him. Goddamnit, he was sick of being managed-- why did she have to be so fucking patient with him when all he wanted was to rip her clothes off right here and fuck her until she screamed for him, drawing the rage out of him with each shrieking climax he knew he could give her. Why couldn't she just punch him, or slap him, or claw him with those nails she kept short but which would still be long enough to inflict enough pain to distract him from how much this case hurt him?

"Why not?" he hissed, leaning forward even further, until she was actually backed into his sofa in order to avoid touching him, he was so close.

"You're the one who figured out it was her, did that kinesthetics thing that you do, and now her two kids are going to finish growing up knowing that their mother's a criminal. Doesn't that bother you at all, Temperance? She was a good mother, no matter what else happened when she lost it and killed that sick fuck. Don't you think that's enough offset? Did you ever think for once about what it might mean if you managed, somehow, not to figure it out just for once? Let two kids who were well-taken care of, well-loved have their mother. You know damned well she wouldn't have ever done it again."

She didn't let this case push her buttons? He'd damned well do it, then. He was tired of her indulging him. He wanted her to be as outwardly angry as he was—be so enraged that she'd kiss and claw and fuck him as insistently as he wanted to fuck her right then and there.

Instead, she looked back at him, eyes wide at the verbal assault, and spoke, this time less calmly. "Are you suggesting I should have thrown the case, fixed the evidence?"

He sat back and looked her over, appraisingly. "Maybe I am."

She flushed suddenly, angry, then stood and looked at him. "Then you shouldn't have arrested her. Told her that I was right. Confronted her with the mechanism of injury. You disbelieved me once before. If you wanted to throw it, it's on your head, Booth. Don't ask me to compromise the facts, the truth that they yield, because you can't bear the idea of doing your job every time it's a tough one."

He stood and got into her face. "It's a good thing, then, that you weren't working those robbery cases when your own parents were still working that gang, hunh? You'd have put your own mother away."

She didn't flinch this time. She jerked, like she'd come into contact with a live wire. Rather than yelling or punching him, though, she stepped to the side of him and silently gathered her things, heading for the door.

He stopped her by the sheer expedient of grabbing her by the shoulders and pushing her up against the back of his door, his own body leaning into hers so she didn't have time to kick him in the nuts or otherwise try to get free.

"Booth, stop it," she said, eyes welling with tears. "Just... stop it. I understand that you'd upset, but just... don't take it out on me."

"Why shouldn't I?" he demanded roughly. "You gave me no choice but to take that woman away from her kids. I couldn't toss that evidence once you were done with it any more than I could pick up the truck. It's your fault that she abandoned her kids. How does that feel, Bones? Her kids are going to go through the same thing you did. Feel better about truth and justice now?"

"You're drunk," she said, "and you're being an unwarranted asshole. Let me go. I'll think about forgiving you when you're sober."

"How about I'll think about forgiving you when I'm sober, Bones," he growled. "Maybe you're the one who's done the inexcusable."

He didn't mean any it of course, he was just so angry at the facts of the case that he had to lash out at someone, and she was there. He wanted her to scream back at him, punch him, show she was as angry as he was, but no-- she just internalized everything and once again showed that calm front to the world. He was so tired of it. He wanted an honest reaction from her. This flinching and self-denial were driving him crazy.

"Maybe, Bones, just maybe, you should think about the fact that I'm tired of having a robot for a partner."

Her face turned utterly still, and drained so white he could see through her. "Well, then," she said, her voice totally strangled as tears slipped unheeded down her cheeks, "you should let go of me so I can go, and not inflict myself on you any longer."

That was it? She was going to put up with him severing their partnership just like that? What the fuck was wrong with her? Why wouldn't she fight him? Didn't she care? It was too much.

"Goddamnit, Bones," he said, leaning even further into her, "what the fuck is wrong with you? Where the hell is the spitfire I started working with? When did you become so meek and mild?"

She just looked at him, eyes wide and her breathing becoming increasingly shallow.

"Well? Answer me." he demanded, tightening his grip on her shoulders. "Answer me, goddamnit," he ordered, his hands flexing on her.

She started to speak, but nothing came out of her mouth.

"Answer me!" he shouted, letting go of her shoulder and blasting his fist into the wall next to her head in his frustration.

And then, something he never thought he'd see happened. She gasped, her eyes rolling back in her head, and she fainted. And now he was sitting here on his floor, with her head in his lap, all the anger and liquor burned off as soon as she slipped out of his grip and started to collapse to the floor. She'd been out for five minutes already, her breathing still shallow, and a cold sweat breaking out on her. Him, too.

What the fuck had he done?