It'd been two weeks since I'd joined the Jeffersonian. I never had gotten myself an apartment. Hodgins said that I could rent out the completely finished and furnished attic of his crazy-huge house. I was very glad that I could stay near my new friends. Zach and I spent almost all of our spare time together. We'd go to the diner or watch cheesy horror movies or have an in-depth conversation about anthropology. My life couldn't get much better.

*knock knock knock*

"Alice! Be ready in ten minutes!" Hodgins yelled in my door.

"I'm ready now Hodgepodge!" I trampled down the stairs, grabbing my bag and a piece of toast before going out to get Zach, "Zacharoni! Let's go!"

Zach came down the stairs pretty fast, but neither of us bet on him tripping and falling on the 7th step.

"Whooaah!" Zach tumbled forward and onto me.

"Ooof!" we landed on the hard floor with a thud. Zach was on top of me. We were both a bit dazed and I definitely had the wind knocked out of me. His face was so close to mine. I could feel my pulse quickening. Then I was aware of a sharp pain in the back of my head.

"Oh gosh, I'm so sorry Alice! I completely didn't mean to… Are you ok?"

"Huh?"

"You look a bit pale… Whoa! Your head's bleeding!"

"So that's what that pain was..." I said, slowly drifting out of consciousness as Zach shouted my name.

************************************************

I awoke in the white sterile bed of a hospital. I looked at the window and saw that it was dark out. Was I really out that long? I thought to myself. I looked down to see Zach face-down snoring. Our hands were intertwined. I heard the heart rate monitor pick up my sudden jump in heart rate. I didn't want to wake Zach, so I stroked his hair as he lay there in front of me. I looked at my watch, which read 4:37 AM. He must have been here all night… maybe longer if Dr. Brennan let him off work for the day.

"I knew there was something there!" Angela said as she briskly walked through the door.

"Shhhh! You'll wake Zachie!" I whispered to her, blushing, "So what happened to me anyway?"

"Extremely minor concussion, you were out for a good 20 hours though." She said simply.

"Oh. Okay."

A rather awkward silence ensued.

"So what are you doing here at this hour Ange?"

"I came to make sure that Zach had eaten something while he was waiting for you to wake up."

I smiled knowingly, "I see. If he collapses from malnutrition, we are in a hospital."

"That's true." She giggled, "So… about you and Zacharoni here."

"Well, you know I've known him since high school… and my crush on him started about a month or so before he left for college."

"Ah, I see. So you thought you were never going to see him again. Did you take action?" Angela was on the edge of her seat.

"No, I've always been super shy. I couldn't have! Plus he doesn't exactly pick up on anything…"

"You need to take action! These feelings aren't meant to be bottled up, Alice!"

"Well what do I do then?"

"Ok, the minute he wakes up, I want you to kiss him."

"What?!" I tried hard to keep my voice down.

"You heard me!"

"I could never!"

Zach stirred. My heartbeat quickened again. He groaned as he sat up and stretched. "Mmm… g'morning… Is Alice awake yet?"

"Yup." I said smiling.

"Ohmygoshi'msosorryididn'tmeantotripandthenyouhityourheadand-"

I cut him off with a kiss. Angela gasped and Zach froze, but slowly began to kiss back. Angela awkwardly left the room as Zach's hands slowly crawled up my sides. My hands went to his face and caressed his neck and shoulders.

"Ahem."

We instantly broke apart and looked away from each other. I could feel that my face was a thousand shades of red at one time.

"Sorry to interrupt, but we brought some breakfast. Angela told us you were up." Booth said as he and Dr. Brennan carried in coffee, cocoa, tea and doughnuts. The coffee was for everyone but me and Zach, the cocoa for him, the tea for me. Zach had a very low caffeine tolerance and I just disliked the taste of coffee.

I grabbed a custard-filled doughnut as Angela walked back in. "How do you eat so much without it going to your hips, Al?" She joked.

I smiled but it became quiet once more.

"Did the doctor say when I could be let out?"

"Yeah, in about," Booth looked at his watch, "One hour."

"Great! Seeing as its five in the morning, how about we head off to the Jeffersonian!" Dr. Brennan said, gathering up the empty doughnut container and leaving with Booth.

"Zach, you stay here with Alice, ok? Bye!" Angela walked out quickly.

"Um- Oh, you can- eh…" we both said at the same time.

I giggled and he smiled warmly. I took his hand and intertwined it with mine.

"I'm going to go change into some regular clothes. You can go back to the lab if you like." I said getting up, grabbing a pile of my clothes from yesterday and kissing him on the lips before walking off to the bathroom, surely leaving him stunned in his seat.

I walked into the bathroom and all but jumped for joy at what I'd finally done. Walking back out of the bathroom, I noticed that Zach hadn't moved from his seat and was smiling whilst staring blankly into space.

"Zach! Let's go!"

He quickly jumped up and walked with me to a cab and we drove off to the Jeffersonian in silence.

************************************************

Zach and I buzzed about the Lab as happy as clams, whatever the heck that means. He and I were cataloguing bones when Cam walked in.
"Ok, we've got a case, Brennan and Booth are getting the body, so I need you two to put away all these bones before they get here ok?"

"Ok!" Zach and I said brightly.

"Is there something I'm missing here?" She asked looking between the two of us.

"Yes-" Zach started.

"But we're not going to tell you until an appropriate time." I said gathering up the bones from the table.

"Fine, just stay out of the supply closet, lovebirds, that's Hodgins and Angela's spot." She said laughing as she walked off the platform. Zach and I blushed as we picked up the boxes to bring back down to Limbo.

"Hey, there aren't any cameras down in Limbo, correct?"

"I think you're right…" Zach said smiling.

We put the boxes in their places and walked off to one of the corners.

"Zach, before we start… you know… we need to discuss this. We need to let each other know what this means to us."

"I agree. Care to start?"

"Ok, I have loved you since high school and I was a total idiot to give up on you when you left for college, but seeing you when I got to the job of my dreams just… because you are the man of my dreams. You're everything to me. You share my level of intelligence and my passion for knowledge and my love of anthropology. I love you Zach Addy."

"Can I make mine short? Exactly what you said. Only what I mean is-"

Cutting him off for the second time today, I began our full make out session. Our lips moved in tandem as my hands massaged his back and his caressed my hips. His lips moved down to my neck as I gasped in pleasure. My cell phone rang. Most likely Cam calling us up to examine the new body. We regretfully separated as I answered my phone.

"Cam? Yes. Yes, I realize that. Yes, we'll be up in a minute." I shut my phone.

"I take it we have to go up now?" he asked with sadness in his voice.

"Yes, Addybear, but I promise we'll continue this after work okay?" I said, straightening my shirt and hair as we walked up to the main floor. I swiped my card and walked up to the platform to look at the body. It was almost completely bone, which I was a little glad for since I wasn't in the mood for rotting flesh today.

"Alice, stats please."

I looked carefully, "Male, 70ish… looks like he had a limp and one of his legs is about an inch shorter than the other."

"Possible cause of death?"

"There's a gunshot wound to the head for starters, but it looks like-"

"Is that a hickey?!" Angela almost shouted.

"I have a hickey?" I asked rather clueless.

"Uh, yeah. And it's purple as a plum!" Angela chirped as Zach blushed.

"Alice, please continue your thought as you were saying before Angela interrupted." Dr. Brennan said sternly.

"Yes, of course. There appears to be strange ridges along both sets of ulna bones. They look almost like they were sawed at or something."

"That's very interesting… I didn't see that before. Great work Alice. Let's get an identity on this guy and then we can go home for the night"

"Where was he found?" I asked.

"In an Iron ore processing plant, why?"

"These ridges might have been made by a machine there, they're all perfectly spaced and the lines on the two arms line up with each other perfectly."

"Wonderful work Alice!" Dr. Brennan smiled.

I smiled back. Zach came up and discreetly kissed my forehead.

I whispered to him, "The faster we work to find this guy's identity, the sooner we can go home."

He seemed to get the message.