"Bones! I swear, if you don't put that bone down and come eat something in the next five minutes, I will make Angela take you shopping every weekend until kingdom come!" Booth shouted across the room to her.
She didn't even look up from the bone that she was investigating. "Fallacious threat. You can't make Angela do anything that she doesn't want to. She's a grown woman, and I doubt that she would want to go shopping every weekend." With a sigh, she looked over at her partner. She knew that he wouldn't leave her alone until she went with him to eat lunch. "And it's not just any bone, it's a hamate bone." She could see him rolling his eyes.
"Those bones have been sitting in limbo for years, I don't think a few more hours would hurt them any." He saw her glare at him, he knew that she hated the bone storage being called limbo, but he knew that if he annoyed her long enough, she would come to lunch with him, even if it was only to get a little bit of peace. He watched as she realized that he was right, she did need to eat and that the bones would still be there when they got back.
She walked over to him and he held out her jacket and helped her put it on. "How many times do I have to tell you that I am capable of putting on my own coat and opening my own door? I am not a cripple."
"I know, but just let me do it for you."
She ignored him and hurried down the steps, headed for the front door.
"Brennan!" Angela's voice came from somewhere behind her, and it sounded like she had some important news that she couldn't wait to tell the doctor.
"Ange," Booth's voice came from somewhere behind Angela. "I'm trying to get Bones some lunch."
"Agent Studly, will you please be quiet? I am about to blow Bren's mind and rock her world. Now-" she said, turning to Brennan and getting ready to say something but was cut off.
"Ange, how are you going to 'rock my world' and 'blow my mind'? Both of those are physically impossible." Instead of responding, the artist just gave her a look. "Oh, you were being metaphorical."
"Sweetie, I id'd your victim. Her name is Sabina Jamison, and she went missing four weeks ago from her school." Angela handed her the sketch, and a young girl no older than twelve looked up at her, and then the file. "Bren, this one may be tough."
"Any case involving young children is tough, Ang. You know that."
"I know, but she was a foster child." Brennan visibly faltered. "Bren?"
"I'm fine," She said, but the slight tremble in her voice said otherwise. Booth was at her side in an instant.
"Bones? Let's go, okay?" Wordlessly, she nodded and allowed him to lead her out of the Jeffersonian and out to his car. He knew something was bothering her, because she didn't even protest that he opened her door for her, which was defiantly unlike her.
She broke the tense silence once they were both inside the car. " That girl- Sabina- could have easily been me."
He reached over and took her hand in his. "But it wasn't, Bones, and we will catch whoever did this to her, okay?" She nodded, and tried to hide the sniffle, but he heard it. This was his Bones in pain, and there was nothing he could do about it. "What do you want for lunch?" he asked, trying to regain some semblance of normalcy. "Thai? The diner?"
"You choose." Okay, that was weird. The only time she let him choose was when he brought her dinner, if she could choose, she always did, she hated not being in control.
"The diner it is." The ride to the diner passed in silence until he heard her muttering something under her breath. "Bones? What are you saying?" She turned to him and quickly wiped at a tear that was threating to slide down her cheek.
"If tears could build a stairway, and memories a lane. I would walk right up to Heaven and bring you back again. No farewell words were spoken, No time to say "Goodbye". You were gone before I knew it, and only God knows why. My heart still aches with sadness and secret tears still flow. What it meant to love you - No one can ever know." She muttered so quietly that he could barely hear her. "But now I know you want me to mourn for you no more; To remember all the happy times life still has much in store. Since you'll never be forgotten, I pledge to you today~ A hollowed place within my heart is where you'll always stay. It's the last thing my last foster mother ever said to me before I left, it's the poem 'If tears-"
"-could build a stairway," they finished together. "Yeah, my mom read it once or twice," he said and the smiled at each other. He reached for her hand, the one that was resting on the console and gently wrapped his fingers around hers. "I will never let anything ever happen to you, Bones," he said fiercely.