Two months ago

"Bren..."started Angela as she walked into her office, "what's wrong?"

She noticed that Brennan had been at work when she got there, and by the looks of her office and bones on the examining table she had been there for a while. Angela knew that something had happened between her and Booth, something major...something that broke them up. Not that they were dating in the first place. Not that they would admit that they had feelings for one another.

When Brennan didn't answer her, Angela moved closer to her desk to get her attention. That was something else that she and others had noticed in the past few weeks, she was always somewhere else. She was never really 'there' with them. She came into work every day, did her job examining the bones Cam brought her from Limbo and she went home every night. She stopped working on cases for the FBI too. She was there, every day. First one in, and last one to leave.

"Brennan!"

Jumping slightly she looked at Angela. When did Angela come into my office? she wondered to herself.

She was getting fed up with herself. Now she wasn't even paying attention at work. How is it that she, Dr. Bernnan world renowned anthropologist, was letting a man get in the way of her work. A man that she never wanted to see again. Never wanted to talk to again. The one person that had been there for her these past few years, was the same person that tore apart her world with a mere two sentences.

"Yes, Angela. What can I do for you?" she realized that came out stronger than she intended to.

Taking a deep breath, Angela started talking again...but she was only catching bits and pieces of it. "We've been....about you. Haven't seen....ooth around....wondering....something...two?" She could see that Brennan wasn't really paying attention to her. She was staring at something across her office, and when she turned to see what it was she was not really expecting.

On a bookshelf, among artifacts that she had collected from her trips to far way places sat a picture. A picture that, surprisingly she had never noticed before. It was a picture of Brennan and Booth when they had gone to Las Vegas and ended up going undercover. She noticed that they looked so happy in that photo, and they had been in love...even then...even if they didn't want to admit it.

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She knew that Angela was still in her office, talking about something. Probably talking about how she was worried about her. But she couldn't take her eyes off that picture of her and Booth. They had had a fun time in Vegas, even though at the time she wouldn't admit it. She had gone undercover with him, pretending to be his girlfriend. She was wearing this black dress that he had picked out for her, and she still thought that it was too skimpy for her, but he seemed to have liked it.

She kept remembering some of the good times that they had together, but then stopped. She knew that they weren't partners anymore...hell, they weren't even friends anymore. In a matter of minutes she had lost her best friend. She felt like she had lost half of her heart or soul, even though she knew that scientifically she couldn't do that. Because if that were to happen, she would no longer be alive.

Taking her eyes off the picture, she turned and looked at Angela and smiled a half smile.

"Ange, I'm fine. I have just had a long day. I just want to go home and forget. Forget everything." Angela could barely hear the words coming out of her mouth. She knew then that something bad had happened.

When she first noticed that Booth wasn't coming around anymore she decided that she was going to give them their space. She wanted to give them time to figure out things on their own. But this crap had been going on long enough, and she was tired to ignoring the looks that floated across Brennan's face. Shock. Sadness. Anger. Guilt. She was tired of seeing her eyes shoot to the doors every time she heard them opening, knowing that the person she most wanted to see wasn't coming through them.

"Okay. For now. We ARE going to talk soon. I want to know what has happened to you and Booth..." and that's when it was confirmed that something was wrong. The look that shot across her face when she mentioned his name.

"Nothing happened. Nothing is going to happen. We just parted ways. He went back to the FBI where he belonged and I am here. I belong here with the bones, doing what I do best."

And with that, she got up from behind her desk and walked out of her office. Even when she heard Angela and Cam calling her name, she just kept walking. She kept telling herself that she needed to get out of there. She just walked and walked for hours. How long had it been since she had just taken a walk for fun? Months? Years?

Even after the sun had gone down, and the wind had picked up she just kept walking. She wanted to walk until the hurt was gone. Until the words were erased from her memory. She wasn't really noticing where she was walking either, until she looked up surprised. She had ended up in front of Booth's apartment. She didn't know what to do, she just stood there for a while.

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After Brennan left, Angela was thinking that she would be back. Knowing that she needed some time to herself, away from the lab and the reminders of Booth. She kept thinking that she was going to return. She knew that Brennan was coming to terms with whatever had been said between the two of them. Something that she hadn't dealt with yet.

After about four hours, Angela started to get worried. She tried calling her cell phone, but stopped when she heard it ringing from her office. Since when did she not take her phone with her. She always seemed to have it right next to her, especially recently. Every time it would ring she would check it before she answered it, and more times than not she would just let it go to voice mail.

She sent Hodgins down to see if her car was still in the parking lot. She called Sweets to see if maybe he had heard from her recently.

"No, Angela, I haven't heard from Dr. Brennan. For that matter, I haven't heard from Agent Booth either. I assumed that everything was still going okay, even though I hadn't seen them in about a month."

"They are fine Sweets. I was just wondering if you had seen her. She left the lab earlier today, and no one seems to know where she went."

"Well, haven't you tried calling Agent Booth? Itsn't it likely that she is with him?"

Here he goes again, she thought. He was trying to get into why we were calling him and not Booth. He was starting to sense that something had happened between them, and she needed to get him off their tracks soon. He didn't need to know that Booth and Brennan were no longer working together, but it was kind of strange that he didn't know that already.

"That is a good idea. I will call him, because he probably picked her up earlier without letting us know." She hung up the phone before he could say anything else.

Looking up, she saw Jack running across the floor with a worried look on his face.

"Her car is here. It hasn't even been moved from where it was parked this morning."

She knew that Brennan was able to protect herself from basically anything, except for a natural disaster really. She wanted to know where her best friend was...she wanted to make sure that she was okay. She didn't know what else to do, except.....she did.

Picking up the phone, she dialed the one person who might have known where to find her.

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Sitting in his apartment, Booth was staring at his tv. The pictures that he saw were not from the tv, however, they were the pictures that had been playing over and over in his mind for the past month. No matter what he tried, he couldn't get that look of sadness that had washed over Bones' face, out of his mind.

He had been sitting there since he had been sent home by Cullen for being very short-tempered with a new agent. He cracked a smile remembering what had taken place earlier that day.

"What do you mean you can't find the file? I gave you that file the day before yesterday and I told you to be VERY CAREFUL with it because it pertained to very specific cases. I told you that we did NOT want to lose this specific file, because it can not be replaced."

The young agent sitting across from Booth looked like he wanted to disappear into the chair that he sat in. He had heard that Special Agent Booth was one of the best agents that worked out of D.C. and that he was teamed up with some scientist lady who helped them solve what seemed like unsolveable cases. He had also heard that until recently they were still partners, but now many were wondering what had happened.

"Sir, I know what you told me. I did not misplace the file..."

Booth took a deep breath, looked at the ceiling before returning his gaze to the agent. "Okay. So if you heard me, then WHERE IS THE DAMN FILE???"

"Agent Booth!!"

We both jumped up when we saw who walked into the room. It was Cullen, and he was not looking too pleased at the moment.

"I have heard from no less than six agents that you have been very short tempered...and that was this week alone." He shook his head because he knew that only one person could rattle his best agent this much. "I heard you yelling at Agent Jones all the way from the elevator. And those doors were closed." He kept a sour look on his face, even though he wanted to smile. "Maybe you should go home for a while. Take a few days."

"Take a few days....and do what exactly??"

"I don't really care," said Cullen, and he continued "I just want you to go home before you happen to piss off any more agents."

He was thinking about how he really shouldn't have gone off on that new agent, what was his name again? Oh yeah, Agent Jones. He was thinking that maybe he should partner up with him on a few cases. Let him know that he really isn't a bad guy, he has just had a really crappy month.

While he was sitting there, pondering what he should do for dinner, his phone rang. Reaching for it, he checked the number and did a double take. It had been a while since anyone from the Jeffersonian had called him. For a second, he hoped and wondered if it might have been Bones. But he knew that more than likely it was Cam checking up on him.

"Hey, Cam. What's up?"

He then heard a voice that he was not expecting to hear, and then knew that something was wrong.

"Booth....it's Angela."