Author's Note: This chapter came out kind of long. Sorry about that. The last one will be shorter.
Once again, I do not own Bones or any of its characters. This is just a hobby, I swear. ;)
And thank you again to everyone who is reading/following/reviewing this.
Stephaniew: Yeah, I like to pull in some insight into Sweets. He's a fascinating character, IMO. ;) Hope you enjoy my other work.
Cobalt6233: Thank you. :D I actually have other "missing scenes" stories in mind. One of which I've just started....
206: And thank you. :) The character of David Sweets was one I created for my THOTF story. After using him so much in that story, he's gotten pretty easy (and fun) for me to write for. Hope you enjoy this chapter. Oh and no problem for the review. I loved your one-shot.
The Doubt in The Doctor—part 3
The next day, Sweets called Booth to let him know that he was coming to work that day. To be honest, Sweets wasn't sure if he was ready, but he knew that he would brood way too much if he stayed at home again.
However, he did decide to cancel his appointments with his patients for the week, and focus more on his profiling assignments. Right now, it seemed easier for him to get inside the head of someone he only saw on paper than to try to help work out the problems of the people he met with face to face.
He finished typing up another report for an agent working on a murder investigation when he heard Booth walking into his office after only the briefest of knocks. 'I really should consider a lock for that door,' Sweets thought a little darkly.
"Sweets, you busy?" Booth asked. Sweets sighed and hit the 'send' button on his screen.
"Why no, Agent Booth, just finishing things up," he said. Sweets turned in his chair to face him. The truth was he was kind of glad to see Booth; he was thinking about asking if he would go to lunch with him. But now it looked like he had some sort of chore for him to do.
"Good. We got those disks that have the backup copies of all the letters Aragon wrote and received," Booth said. "I thought we'd go over them, see if anyone stands out."
"Sure," Sweets nodded, standing up. The corpse he had seen on the subway was turning out to be part an interesting case. The victim, Martin Aragon, had actually been a letter and document writer…despite the fact that he was blind. On the way to the conference room, Booth told Sweets about how the victim had had some kind of surgery to correct his blindness and because of the rarity of said surgery; they were able to identify the body.
'Great, one guy beats cancer and is killed, and another gets his sight back and is killed,' Sweets thought. 'As if there wasn't enough tragedy in the world already.'
As Booth brought up more letters onto the computer screen to scan through, Sweets got up from his chair and leaned against a wall. It had become clear to him that Booth didn't really need him for this. This was a way for Booth to see how he was doing and to keep an eye on him. Sweets appreciated the gesture, but since he wasn't truly engaged in the task at hand, it was easy for his mind to wander back to the subway and to figuring out how to use his father's advice.
"Hey, Sweets, are you sure you should be back to work?"
This broke Sweets out of his reverie, and he shook himself a little.
"Sorry," he mumbled. Booth nodded.
"You know one way you could look at is, he died happy," Booth said. Sweets moved closer as he listened to him reason that at least the man died while ecstatic about his good news. That idea did not comfort Sweets; he was all too familiar with the idea of something wonderful happening in his life followed by something bad.
"You're going to think this is stupid," Sweets sighed as he sat back down next to him. And he certainly felt stupid as he told Booth that the whole thing seemed like a message to him. A message telling him to 'go ye forth and live life to the fullest' and all that. But instead of scoffing at him, Booth just nodded sagely.
"People should do that more often: moment by moment, day by day, but they don't," Booth replied. Sweets swallowed hard at that. 'He's right, they don't,' he thought. 'I haven't been.' A part of him cursed at the way Booth was able to read his doubts so well.
"Look at this," Booth said, gesturing toward the screen. Sweets got up looked over the letter that he was indicating. At first he didn't see anything significant, but then Booth highlighted one line in particular from the letter. 'People have killed for less? That's a strong statement.'
"It's a death threat," Sweets exclaimed. Booth nodded again, smirking a little.
"Sure is," he said. "We need to talk to this guy." Booth shuffled some papers around while Sweets kept staring at the letter on the screen.
"Why didn't I catch that?" he mumbled.
"Don't worry about it Sweets," Booth sighed. Sweets jumped slightly; he didn't realize that he had said that out loud. "You would have caught it too if you had been looking more carefully."
"Sorry," Sweets said, hanging his head a little. "I guess I'm not doing a very good job."
"If you mean that you're not doing a good job at following my advice and taking some time off, then no you aren't," Booth said, getting up to stand next to him. "As for the rest of it…you have a lot on your mind, Sweets. Even the best of us have bad days and miss things sometimes. The important thing is to not let that bother you."
"Ok," Sweets mumbled, hanging his head a little more. Suddenly he felt Booth put an arm around his shoulders and begin to guide him out of the conference room.
"Come on, let's go grab some lunch before I haul that guy in," Booth said as they walked. "You probably didn't eat breakfast today, and I don't need you fainting dead away from hunger."
"Agent Booth, you don't need to…"
"Besides that, you probably need to talk. Maybe not about what happened in the subway, but about something," Booth continued. "It's never a good sign when you are actually silent. Except of course when you have that creepy stare on your face that you give Bones and me in therapy sessions. So, come on, let's eat." Sweets actually found himself smiling for the first time since yesterday.
"I'll have you know that I'm carefully analyzing the dynamic between you and Doctor Brennan," Sweets protested. "It is not a 'creepy stare.'"
"You should watch yourself in the mirror sometime while you do it. It's creepy."
Sweets snorted a little. Suddenly, lunch seemed like a very good idea.
That night, over cartons of take out Chinese in his apartment, Sweets pondered Booth's words again. After thinking about it, he wasn't that surprised at Booth's response to his 'live life to the fullest' comment. As an agent, he saw firsthand many people who claimed that they were just trying to get more out of life or better their lives by taking someone else's. Booth had a very high regard for life. Much like Doctor Brennan. He would see the hypocritical nature of someone taking a life in order to live theirs more fully.
'Wyatt was right about them not being opposites,' he sighed, impressed again at the former psychiatrist's insight.
Plus, he understood that Booth, himself probably grappled with the feeling that he may not be doing what he truly wanted either at times. This became evident when Booth came to him about his brother, Jared, wanting to run away to India on a motorcycle.
'It would be hard to listen to platitudes like that when you're trying so hard to control everything and everyone around you so that you can protect the people you care about.'
Sweets heard his phone vibrate and picked it up. 'Daisy.' He knew that avoiding her like this would bother her, but he just couldn't work on the questions he was struggling with if she was hovering around him.
Part of that was because he loved her. Daisy seemed to feel everything that he was feeling at times: good or bad. This whole thing was putting him into a dark place, and he really did not want to put her through that.
Especially since he wasn't sure what he wanted to do with his life yet.
After getting some more profiling work done at the office the following morning, Sweets headed over to the Jeffersonian. He was planning to go over those letters Aragon wrote with Angela. There he saw Doctor Brennan standing near her office. She kept turning her head from side to side, like she was looking for someone or something. Sweets walked over to her.
"Doctor Brennan, can I help you find something?" he said. She looked at him, surprised.
"Doctor Sweets? Shouldn't you be taking some time off" she asked. "Booth seemed to think that would be best."
"I'm fine, Doctor Brennan. What about you?" He noticed that she was still looking around him and even over his shoulder.
"I'm looking for Ms. Inagawa," she answered. "I was going to discuss with her the fascinating part of my book where Doctor Reichs was able to identify the victim, but she seems to have run off to gather more meaningless trivia."
Sweets nodded. Booth had told him about the Japanese reporter and about some of her questions. He wished that he could be a fly on the wall during some of her interview sessions, since there were many questions about her book that he would love to ask. Granted, he saw his questions as more intellectually valid; after all he was writing a book about her. But secretly, he wished that he could hear more about the origins of page 187…
"I'm sure she'll find you soon enough," Sweets said, trying to smile. Then he noticed that Brennan was staring at him. Studying him like she was looking over bones.
"Doctor Sweets, did you know that statistically deaths caused by heart disease and malignant neoplasm tend to be more than three times higher than those caused by accidents?" she said.
"Ah…Ok… I didn't know that," Sweets stammered. Brennan nodded, clearly pleased with herself.
"Yes. In fact unintentional injuries tend to be much more frequent than say traffic or transportation accidents," she continued. "So the likelihood of meeting another former cancer patient who dies in an accident right in front of you is infinitesimally small. Plus, since I assume you are healthy, you should have nothing to worry about as far as resuming your normal daily activities."
Sweets stared at her for a moment, but then gave her another smile.
"Thank you Doctor Brennan. It means a lot to me." Brennan raised an eyebrow at him.
"I don't know what you mean," she said. "Are you becoming more interested in death related statistics? While I don't believe in psychology, I know that Booth thinks that an over-fascination with death can indicate…"
"No, just…thank you for telling me that," Sweets said. "Your information was very comforting." Brennan's face lit up.
"You're welcome. Although I'm sure you could have found these statistics yourself if you were to…"
"Doctor Brennan, I was wondering if you could tell me more about Agent Andy's feelings for Doctor Reichs after the scene on page 187."
Both Sweets and Brennan jumped a little at Inagawa's sudden appearance from behind Sweets. Brennan gave a frustrated gust of air.
"Ms. Inagawa, by focusing on these kinds of meaningless details, your article will lack an enlightening discussion of the forensic techniques from my book."
Sweets backed away from the conversation, smiling more than what he had in two days. He would have liked to stay, but he told Angela that he was coming so he walked toward her office.
At first it had gone smoothly as Sweets immersed himself into profiling the victim through his letters. His concentration helped to distract him from what had been troubling him.
As he read the letters something stirred in the back of his mind. 'The wording, the way the phrases flow…I'll bet Aragon wasn't just writing these to fulfill a client's request: he was secretly writing to the person he, himself, was in love with,' he thought. Sweets was telling Angela this as Daisy walked in.
Sweets immediately felt guilty. She had been calling him regularly for the past couple of days, and he hadn't returned any of her phone calls. He hated himself a bit for treating her this way, especially since she was being so patient with him.
"I've been doing a lot of thinking," he told her. Angela started to leave, but Sweets didn't want her to go. That would just allow the conversation with Daisy to continue, which wasn't what he wanted. He meant it when he told Daisy that he would talk to her later.
Sweets was pretty sure that when he figured things out, it would involve her in a big way.
"What's going on Sweets?" Angela asked after Daisy left. Sweets crossed his arms across his chest, as if to close himself off from her question.
"I have one life, I don't want to play it safe," he said. "So for now I want to work."
Angela nodded and dropped it at first as she explained how she was going to track the IP addresses to see if anything came up. After the startling revelation that the subway manager, Colin Casey, who was at the scene of the accident was involved, Sweets felt a hand on his shoulder.
"You know Sweets; if you want to talk you should…"
"But I don't," Sweets snapped. "I just want to work." He shrugged off Angela's hand and walked closer to the screen. But then he felt Angela move close to him again.
"Sweets, don't feel you have to have all the answers all the time," she said. "We all get a little lost sometimes. What's important is that we try to find our way back." Sweets turned to her, and she put her hand back on his shoulder.
"Don't worry. I think you'll find your way soon enough," she said gently. Sweets sighed and looked down, nodding his head.
"Thanks Angela," he said as he turned back around. Happily for him, they did not discuss it further.
The next day, Sweets decided to visit the Jeffersonian before getting lunch so that he could see how the case was going. As it turned out, Brennan had already left for the FBI building to interview the subway security guard, McKenna Grant. It had turned out that Casey had hired Aragon to write those letters for for Grant causing her to break up with her boyfriend, Eddie, a pawnshop owner. Sweets discussed it with Cam in her office.
"She apparently used her former boyfriend's gun to shoot Aragon," Cam said.
"A symbolic gesture," Sweets said. "In her mind, Aragon was directly responsible for her breaking up with Eddie. I'm sure she feels betrayed or misled somehow by the fact that Casey did not live up to the promise of his letters."
"I bet you're right," Cam said rising from her chair. "And speaking of betrayed, you need to speak with Miss Wick. She is driving us crazy."
"Doctor Saroyan, I know Daisy is a bit trying for all of you sometimes, but she is working very hard to learn to control her hyper-emotions."
"No, you don't understand Sweets," she said. "I actually had to have Angela take her out for a drive at one point. Do you know why? Because she keeps walking around here, sighing and moaning. She's scared about how you feel about her."
"I know that I've been avoiding her recently," Sweets sighed. "I just…I…"
"Look Sweets, I won't pretend to understand your relationship with her," Cam said. "But it's clear that she cares for you. Just like the rest of us, she's worried about how you are holding up."
"I'm fine, Doctor Saroyan." Cam held her hand up.
"I'm sure you are, Doctor Sweets," she said. "None of us doubted your ability to handle this. But like it or not, you're part of our team, and it's our responsibility to make sure that everyone on the team is all right. Including you." She took a deep breath and looked down for a moment before returning her gaze to him.
"You should talk to Daisy," she said. "Not just so she'll leave us alone, but because I think she could help you."
Sweets looked away from Cam for a moment, but soon looked back at her again. While he did have a somber expression on his face, his eyes were warm, appreciative.
"Thank you Doctor Saroyan," he said. Cam smiled at him.
"No problem Doctor Sweets. Now, go…stop Miss Wick before Angela finally snaps and has to hurt her."
Before meeting with Daisy, Sweets decided to get a little more work done in his office. Sitting at his desk, he typed furiously at yet another report. After finishing it and saving it, he pushed his chair away from his desk and started to think.
He thought about these last few days. Before now, he had focused only on that moment in the subway when he saw a life fade away in front of him. But now he started to think about the aftermath of all that. He thought of Booth's protectiveness, Brennan's reassurance, Angela's encouragement, Hodgins' sympathy and Cam's empathy. As he contemplated the support he had received from them, his father's advice came back to him.
'Just ask yourself: is this where my heart is? Then you'll know the answer.'
He smiled to himself. He understood now that the reason he had decided to immerse himself in work was because this is where his heart was. At least partially. He loved his job. 'No not job, vocation.' His father was right when he said it was a good fit for him, and Doctor (well Chef) Wyatt had been more accurate than he could have ever guessed when he said that Sweets was following 'a deeper calling.'
He also knew that even though his parents were gone, he belonged to a family again: the family at the Jeffersonian. It was a rather odd and dysfunctional family at times, but it was his family now. David and Carolyn Sweets would always have the first place in his heart as his original family, but now his heart was also with his Jeffersonian family.
He was leading a life of purpose with people who cared about him. Surely that was the best definition of 'living life to the fullest'.
'Still….' Sweets frowned. Something was missing, and he needed to figure out what that was.