I'm taking a break from revision. I'll go back- I swear. I'll also post the next chapter of Partner in the Pond when it's done.
This wouldn't leave me alone. I'm not too happy about the title, or even the end, but heigh-ho. I did my best without throwing the laptop out the window.
Disclaimer- I own nothing I used. Even the inspiration.
His feet pounded against the wet pavement, watered down mud splattering his bare calves. Beads of sweat began to dot his forehead, cooled by the bitter cold. He fought to control his ragged breathing as he sped past row after row of apartment buildings. He knew he had ran too far already, and he hadn't even started on his journey back. Glancing quickly across the street, he darted, unnecessarily, across, as the roads were dead.
He always used to enjoy early morning runs. The quiet tranquillity made a great contrast to his everyday life.
Midnight was no different. The city began to slow down, the rush and push over for another night. He laughed internally at a friend's comment of him being nocturnal. They weren't far off, he had to admit.
Reaching a street lamp, he supported himself, while doubling over, coughing and spluttering. His lungs burned with the exertion.
His mind and body screamed at him;
Too fast. Too far.
He pushed it away.
His heart felt as if it would burst out of his chest, breaking every rib, tearing every muscle.
Back against the street lamp- he slid down slowly, hitting the pavement with a thud.
His breathing began to slow, and he closed his eyes, revelling in the pain that threatened to rip his limbs apart.
He needed it. It was his drug. His own personal high.
In his pocket, a cellphone rang. Shrilly, while buzzing around.
Groggily reaching in- he flipped it open without even looking at caller ID.
"Booth." He coughed, wiping his mouth and forehead with the back of his hand.
He heard a sigh, or a gasp, he wasn't sure.
"Hello?"
She was tired. Exhausted. Her chest hurt, and her palms throbbed from the antiseptic that the nurses had used to take out every single last piece of grit embedded in her hand from the fall. She lost count.
Now she lay, in a dark, cramped hospital room, surrounded by machines, and wired into God knows how many of them. She sniffed, and had fingered her cellphone nervously before dialling.
It hadn't taken long. By announcing who she was, anyone would have given her his number. She had recognised the voice. Charlie perhaps.
Tugging the sheets close to her body, she burrowed herself in, slotting the phone into the small space between the pillow and her ear.
It had rang four times before he picked up, and when he did, she was taken aback by his voice.
Rough, gravelly, and ragged. But- it was undeniably him.
"Booth."
She released a breath she didn't even realise she was holding, and bit her lip expectantly.
"Hello?"
"I'm sorry to call so late. But I didn't expect you to be sleeping."
"I wasn't." His eyebrows drew together in confusion.
"You don't know how nice it is to hear you voice." She bit back a sob.
"Who are you?" He said quietly. She was distraught, he could tell, but the faint resignation in her voice made him all the more curious. Pulling the phone from his ear only for a moment, he noticed that it was a private number.
She purposely avoided his question.
"I got your number from your old office. When I told them who I was, they handed it over without question." She laughed lightly.
He stayed silent.
"I'm so sorry." She sobbed openly, sniffing. There was a pause, before she continued.
"You don't even know who I am- do you?"
He opened his mouth, to say 'No'.
But the word caught in his throat.
Something inside told him, that he knew the voice.
That sweet, smooth voice that was buried deep beneath all that emotion. The logical, powerful and independent voice.
"Of course I do."
He could have sworn he could feel the heat radiate from her smile through the earpiece.
"Say it." She said.
"Temperance Brennan." He said with a grim smile. "Bones- I always thought I would be one calling you."
"I'm still a surprise then." She chuckled.
"Why are you calling?" He said solemnly. Rubbing his eyes roughly with one hand, he leant his head back against the cool metal of the street lamp, and a solitary car rolled past.
She stayed silent for a moment, and he wondered if she had hung up. But the faint sound of her breathing told him she might have fallen asleep.
"Temperance?" He asked softly.
"I'm here."
"Why are you calling?"
"I wanted to speak to you." She ran the light sheet between her fingers, wincing when it caught her bandages.
"What's wrong?" He asked, after hearing her small exclamation of pain.
She grinned at the evident amount of worry in his voice.
"I fell." She stated truthfully.
"Where? How far?" He asked quickly.
"Outside my front door. About 3 feet." She laughed.
"Are you alright?"
"Oh. Tough question." She joked.
He sighed with a straight face, but as her laughter rang through him, he found himself joining in.
Laughter dying down, Brennan wiped a stray tear from her cheek, before whispering.
"You broke my heart."
Booth found himself in awe, propped up against a street lamp, on an empty, wet street. He found his eyes quickly full of unshed tears, mouth agape.
"Literally."
He took a breath. For a brief moment, he believed that she had perhaps felt something. The hope escaped him like air from a balloon.
"That bullet I took." He could hear her beg to maintain her composure. "It sent a shock wave up my spine and it ruptured a vein. They fixed it- but I now have a weak heart."
"It was meant for me." The tears fell silently, rolling down flushed cheeks.
"I know." She took a small breath, and jumped slightly when a nurse popped her small head around the door to check on her. She buried her head into the pillow, pretending to be asleep. She heard light footsteps, as the middle-aged woman entered to take her vitals, and read her chart one last time.
Booth waited, she was still there- he could hear he breathing. Instinctively- he held his breath as well.
"Are you still there?" He whispered gently, after a few moments.
"Yeah. I'm so tired." She yawned.
"Go to sleep Temperance."
"But I like to hear your voice." She sighed.
"How 'bout I'll keep talking, and when you fall asleep, I'll hang up."
"Okay." She murmured.
She closed her eyes, and a deep blanket fell over her. Drug induced, she guessed. The nurse must have upped her morphine.
After what felt like hours, Booth hauled himself up off the pavement, and began his long walk home. He still held the phone to his ear, but kept quiet, listening to her relaxing breathing. He found one corner of his mouth twitching up ever so slightly.
From what he knew- she hadn't moved since the 'accident '. So, a logical step would be for her to be at the local hospital. Smiling to himself, he knew he had no other choice.
"I'm not gonna let you drive."
"Please Booth! I thought you said I did a good job today." She pouted, and, being Booth, he couldn't resist that Temperance Brennan pout. When he pulled over at the nearest spot, that pout grew into an ear to ear grin, when she jumped out of her seat, and bounded into Booth's place.
"Don't get used to it." He warned lightly, clipping in his seat belt.
"Oh I won't." She smiled, and clipped herself in.
"You did do a good job today." He smiled after a moment. She turned to face him slightly.
"Thanks." She grinned once again.
He crept, his sneakers making little noise against the polished floor. He'd managed to dodge a few nurses, making midnight rounds, but other than that- the hospital was empty.
He scanned the room numbers, after checking a large whiteboard, and found she was in Room 18.
He peered around a corner, checking for doctors or nurses, before slipping slyly into the room.
The cramped room was in darkness except the eerie glow of a couple of screens and LCD displays. The steady, rhythmic beat of her heart monitor echoed around the bare walls. Against the pillow, her messy hair was splayed out and Booth noticed the cellphone tucked between her ear and pillow. Her chest moved with every breath, the assurance of life that Booth really needed. He took the cell phone carefully, and flinched when his cooled skin swept past the her delicate, soft shoulder, bared ever so slightly by the blue robe. She turned in her sleep, subconsciously moving closer to him. Her chin lifted, and he couldn't fight the urge to reach out and stroke her cheek. The smooth velvet of her skin caressed his rough thumb, but he quickly moved back into the shadows after she sighed in her sleep.
"It's a gorgeous day." Booth grinned out the window, taking in the bright scene of daffodils, tulips and crocuses blanketing each garden.
"It really is." She smiled.
"What the hell is going on?" Booth complained, gesturing to a speeding black car approaching them in the opposite lane. It slowed as it reached them- and a window rolled down.
Dawn broke painstakingly quickly. He could have watched her sleep forever, her pains and burdens temporarily lifted for a few hours of bliss.
When she didn't have nightmares.
He took a deep breath.
He broke her. More than he ever realised.
After the 'accident', they mutually broke off the partnership, and moved apart. He took a job up in New York, but often travelled down to see Jared, Parker, and everyone else he worked with. He even paid Zach a visit. Nothing could compare to the aching, gaping hole that Brennan's absence had left in his life. And his heart.
Every torment, comment, joke, shooting. They had gotten through together. He needed her, and he longed for her to need him.
He had to fix everything. That's what he did.
Closing his eyes, he smiled. When she woke up, her azure eyes taking in his appearance, he would give her his heart all over again.
Forever.
So? Please review, they always make me smile. :)