Chasing the odds, by chibiness87
Rated T
Spoilers for 5.16.
Summary: When you go all in and lose, what else is left?
A/N: Yes, I'm jumping on the bandwagon. But how can I not, after that episode? And yes, I know I haven't written anything in a donkey's age, but, well, Sweets said something that really irked me in that ep... probably more so than the last few minutes of that episode. (Even though the psychology a-levelist in me can understand Bren's reaction through Maslow's hierarchy of needs, it's currently being beaten down by the crushed fangirl. Thus this angst fest.) Not beta'd.
He is left feeling shaken, appalled at himself. In the name of all that is right and good, what has he done?!
It has been three days since that day.
That day, when Booth... well. That's not the point of this.
Except it is.
Sort of.
But Brennan isn't walking across where it happened because she's on the way to see Booth. No, she's here to see Sweets. Because, well, she finds herself a little (completely) upset with him.
Some would say irked.
Angry even.
After all. This is his fault.
She finds him in his office. Well, no, she asks, and is told he is in his office, so finding isn't that much of a surprise to her. But he is in his office, where it (another it, but an important it nonetheless) happened.
The door to his office slams shut behind her, making him raise his head from whatever report it is he is writing. Jacket slung over the back of his chair, sleeves rolled up, tie loose, he is the picture postcard of "Man hard at paperwork."
Obviously, no one had informed him of her arrival, if his reaction to her appearance in his office is anything to go by (but that has always been Booth's department; he's the people person). She doesn't know if his reaction is because of her sudden unannounced arrival (after all, that was Booth's normal method of approach), or that she is here, actively seeking him out, at all.
She doesn't really care about that.
That doesn't matter.
This.
This matters.
"How could you?" The words are so quiet in after the echoing of the door slamming back into its frame she worries that he has missed them. But then his eyes train on her face, and she knows he has either heard them, or has read something about her posture. And even she can tell he's struggling to understand what he's seeing. Good. That makes two of us.
"I'm sorry?" It comes out as a squeak, the distracted look in his eyes telling her he's still trying to process exactly what it is he has seen. To quantify it. She even understands that part. Mostly. The sudden intake of breath and widening of both his eyes and pupils tell her he's come to some sort of conclusion, but again, she doesn't care for that; she didn't come here for her.
So she continues.
"You. You sit here in this shiny office, you get told people's most secret secrets. You... you... I thought you were meant to help us. You were supposed to... But you don't. You haven't. You just use us. Use us for your experiments, for your research, for you to feel better about yourself. How is that ethical?! I thought psychologists were supposed to help people. But you don't. You're all the same! Why... How could you? Do you even know... How could you?!" She is crying now, fists clenched so tightly with suppressed rage, wanting so desperately to lash out, to hit something. She feels heat in her cheeks, knows they are flushed.
Booth had once told her she looked hot when she was mad, right after punching a judge in the nose.
Twice.
If he were here, he'd know it was nothing on how she looks now, but he is not, so the moment goes by unnoticed.
"I..."
"NO! She doesn't, can't, let him talk right now. He has to know.
He has to know.
"You knew. You knew! The number of times he, we've sat here, and he told you, and you say that to him?!" The tears have gone now, held back by sheer will alone. She will not show weakness. Not now. And tears are a form of weakness, even she knows this. The anger coursing through her helps too. Her fists are still clenched at her side, so tight her knuckles have turned white with the strain, and she can feel them begin to ache with the tension. But she cannot, will not, relax.
It is only when his eyes stay tuned on her right fist she remembers what brought her here in the first place.
She hadn't meant to snoop. Really. She hadn't. But Booth had told her he had left a file on his desk which they needed. She had offered to get it, he had acquiesced. And then she had seen them.
Not it.
Them.
She had grabbed one, counted twenty more, and had fled his office.
It is this she throws to him, let's him know just what he has done.
He stares down at his desk, at the piece of paper that has just landed there. It is a slip.
A betting slip.
A betting slip, made out in Booth's name.
"You were supposed to help us," she says over her shoulder as she pauses in the doorway.
And then she is gone.