More From Brennan's Nonexistent Journal

Rated: M

Disclaimer: I own nothing... Obviously. Just playing in someone else's sandbox for a bit.

Summary: Brennan's secret life as a reporter for the Associated Press catches up to her & threatens her safety in a way she never anticipated. AU.

Chapter 3 – "Benefit Hugely From an Association"

Quote: "It seems to me that someone like you could benefit hugely from an association with someone like me."

-OPEN WORD DOCUMENT-

My morning began ominously when I awoke early with the goal of spending some time in *my* office. It had been almost three years since my last book came out. I had finished writing the last one when I was on bed rest with Chrissy before she was born… and since then… I had been… somewhat distracted, too distracted, really, to be in the right frame of mind to begin a new book. It's not that I didn't have any ideas, it's just that I wasn't really in the mood to want to sit down and write.

Writing a story, any story, can be an extremely daunting task. Most people think they can write, and they can, if they're literate and have access to some type of writing implements. However, telling a story... being a successful writer who tells a story? Now, that's where things get tricky, because, well... everyone who can read has an opinion about what they've read. Good, bad, somewhere in between... the reactions to a person's writing are as infinite as the variation of the color spectrum. As long as your writing isn't eliciting indifference from your readers, you know you're doing something correct.

But, of course, once you written your story, dealing with the fan reaction to it - an entirely separate experience, by the way - can be overwhelming in and of itself. Both good and bad, I get all type of fan responses (via email, the postal mail, and, most ardently, on the so-called 'Brennanite' websites). Usually 1/3 of my readers love what I've written and have no complaints, only glowing and affirming responses. 1/3 of my readers will hate my stories, and for some reason, they will usually chose the most minute and inane aspects of my story to get upset about... okay, Kathy's boss betrayed her after ten years because he was being paid off by the mob? Fine. But, I dare mention the Kathy prefers as PC to a Mac? Hell. Pure hell happens. They won't agree with something I've written, and then complain to me... and I'm not even certain why, except they want to vent maybe? But, some of them do it because... well, it's almost as if they expect me to change things to suit their opinions, which always makes me... hmmm, I'm not sure how to describe my reaction, but it's... amused. maybe? I suppose 'amused' is the closest word to describe my feelings. Then, there are the 1/3 of my readers who, in general, like what I've written, but take issue with the hows, whys, and what-fors of the way in which I wrote the story. They don't disagree with the over all plot, but will argue pacing, characterizations, etc. until I swear I'll never write another story ever again. But, this is where a key aspect of my personality comes in quite handy... I realized a long time ago that the first reason I tell a story is because *I* want to tell it. If other people enjoy it, fine. But, I write for myself alone. That's why I never, ever alter my stories over trivial feedback. It's one thing if a plot point needs to be clarified, a characterization adjusted for consistency, or pacing addressed. But, the biggest thing I always keep to when I write is that I am true to myself... after everyone else is just an afterthought during the creative process.

Honestly, that's one of the reasons why I don't like to let Booth read something before the manuscript goes to the editor. He's the one person that *might* be able to get me to change something based on how *he* would want the story to go because of who he is to me, and that's something I can't do. Writing is usually a solitary endeavor from a process-standpoint. That's why I think I was initially drawn to it. And, if Booth wants to write a story, he can. That's fine. But. I'm not going to let my writing be co-opted by anyone... not even Booth, although I love him more than life itself. So, that's why he doesn't get to read drafts. Not that that's really been a problem recently, but it might be again soon since, as I mentioned, I've been itching to start writing again.

A few months ago, somewhat coincidentally after my birthday, a new idea began to take shape in my mind. It seemed as if inspiration had finally struck… and I was anxious to start writing again now that my inner muse seemed to be focused and cooperating with me. It seemed like a very long time had passed since I just sat down at the keyboard to see where my fingers would be free to take the story… within the confines of my chapter outlines, of course. Now, having informed my agent of the idea, who had, in turn spoken with the publisher, the chapter outline I had just submitted had gotten approval… and last night, my agent had emailed me the preliminary details on the book contract… and the advance. Yes, there was still the advance, the *substantial* advance to consider.

I wanted to take some of the money this time and spend it on something for both of us... maybe a trip...? We hadn't been anywhere outside of work, just us, in a long, long time. Or, maybe I could buy something that I know Booth would never get for himself because it was expensive... but, I have to be careful about that because he's always been so touchy about money. Hell, he didn't even start using the joint account I set up with funds just for food and Chrissy until a couple of months after we had gotten married.

I normally didn't like to talk finances with Booth too often. In the first few months after we decided to acknowledge that the impending birth of our baby meant that we *were* an actual couple, it was a very, very hectic period. I spent a fair amount of time at his place, he spent a fair amount of time at my place… and Parker ended up drifting back and forth once I took my leave of absence from the Jeffersonian. Since people thought I was teaching a course at Northwestern for a semester, so I did have more time to spend with him than even Booth did, he spent a of time with me at my apartment. It was a fractured existence in those first few months. Booth was always leaving stuff he needed at my place at his apartment, Parker even more so, and neither one of them liked my idea of just buying duplicates of necessary items to keep at each place. For some reason, the fact that I had two toothbrushes, two hairbrushes, etc. freaked Booth out. But, I always seemed to have the essentials when they didn't... and gratefully used them, at least until my pregnancy continued to progress.

Yes, I did actually teach that anthropology course at Northwestern… but… it was via the internet. I gave my lectures via a networking platform called Elluminate. Interaction was conducted on discussion boards instead of one-on-one in person. Students submitted the assignments and received them graded via email. I submitted grades that December, a month into the mandated bed rest Macy had ordered me onto because of the partial placental abruption. This was the same partial placental abruption that occurred when Booth tackled me out of the way of an oncoming car one rainy night in November when I decided to go to Woodland to investigate the murder of Dr. Lauren Eames. However, between August when I took my leave of absence, and November when I was put on bed rest, Booth and I spent some time trying to figure out how to make things work… i.e., how to go from being a couple bouncing back and forth between our old apartments - since his forgetting things from one place to the next and my having duplicates wasn't working - and being a family in need of a home with bigger space.

The answer had come somewhat logically from the fact that I own my older apartment – it's really more like a condo, really…- and I still do, actually. I don't like merely getting rid of real estate investments, particularly in this type of economy… and I really, really liked the complex… and location… and several other characteristics. So, when a corner pent house in the building went on the market… bigger… but also *much* more expensive than my old apartment… I snapped it up. It was more the size we needed… four bedrooms (master, nursery, Parker's bedroom, and a guest bedroom that we've been using for storage that I really *do* need to get around to cleaning up and buying some furniture for one of these days), two baths, an office, family room, kitchen, small utility room with a washer and dryer, and a full terrace. It took me a while to ease Booth into the idea… because, well… he didn't react very well when he knew I had just bought it… without asking him, without telling him… and all with my own money. I haven't done that as much in what Booth has taken to calling the post-Quantico phase of our marriage and relationship, but back then I did it fairly frequently. Eventually, Booth finally and grudgingly conceded to the move only because of the baby. He knew I didn't want to furnish one nursery in the old apartment… and then have to do it over again in the new one, and so he finally capitulated… and that's how I spent my free time during the second trimester I was carrying Chrissy.

We chose mostly new furniture… a large majority of which Booth paid for… but occasionally, a piece would make it's way either from his old apartment that began to empty over the weeks, or my old apartment on the other side of the building. As time went by, Booth chastised me for keeping the older apartment, essentially as it always had been, minus the already moved living necessities. However, over the years, I have collected a *lot* of stuff… and I liked the idea of having a baby-free refuge to display my art collection, museum pieces, and what not that didn't need to be baby-proofed. Usually, when I wanted time by myself, the old apartment acted as my refuge. It had transitioned more into an office suite than my actual office in the new apartment… especially as *my* office in the new apartment somehow slowly transitioned into *the* office… which both Booth and I used… and… well… he and I have very different notions of how to keep an office.

I mean, just compare his office at the Hoover with mine at the Jeffersonian. I like mine appropriately decorated – when someone walks in, they definitely know that a forensic anthropologist works there. I also think the office should be (and actually is, by the way) relatively free of distracting play things. On the other hand, Booth likes to personalize his office. He feels more comfortable surrounded by lots of pictures, lots of sports paraphernalia, lots of gadgets and toys… footballs, globes, and who knows what else. I like my desk relatively uncluttered… I don't like to leave stacks of file folders and piles of paper on it if I'm not actively working through them… Booth does. So, it's somewhat clear that slowly, as his style began to encroach on my space in the new office, it really wasn't *my* office anymore. It felt like somewhere where, yes, we could check emails, surf the web, print things, fax things, even pay bills… but I couldn't write in there… either my scholarly writing or my fiction writing. It was difficult for me to grade there, go through student drafts and complete evaluations, and write up reports… and, so, I had the money, I wanted to keep the old apartment so that I had a place *just* for me, and that's where I normally went to do my writing.

However, on the particular morning I woke up, before I left to go to *my* office, I knew I had left my laptop in *the* office because Booth's desktop has been acting up and neither one of us has had time to debug it to find out what virus or malware has corrupted the system this time. He had asked to use the laptop last night to pay a few bills, and I knew he had probably left it there before he came to bed, so it wasn't a big deal. What *was* a big deal… as I walked into the office, and saw the laptop sitting open on the desk… was the random purple, red, and green crayon markings that littered the laptop screen in wobbly lines.

Sighing heavily, I clinched my fists and pursed my lips in frustration. Shaking my head, I counted to ten and then spun on my heels. Booth apparently caught the look on my face when I unexpectedly marched out of the office towards our daughter's room. He didn't call out, but I could sense his presence fall in line softly behind me as I marched forward.

Walking up to the room, I purposely threw open the partially-cracked door. Arms on my hips, a cold mask of displeasure hiding my anger, I stood in the door way and scanned the room as I spoke forcefully.

"Christine Joy Booth!"

A head of brown curls snapped up, a toothy smile - *Booth's* smile - grinned at me… and my own eyes innocently greeted me.

"Morning, Mommy!"

She's not even three yet… not even three… but over the past year… over the past year… she has been getting *more* stubborn, *more* defiant, and *more* infuriating. And, she's not even three yet!

I've spent my life facing down some of the worst, most violent, most manipulative and controlling members of society… Ecuadorian death squads, gang leaders, rapists, crooked cops, serial killers, my father… on a very bad day, I might even put Booth on that list, too… I've handled Presidents, four- and five-star military generals, Prime Ministers, religious leaders, socialites, actors and actresses, members of every US government organization from the National Park Service to the Secret Service, Homeland Security, the CIA and, obviously, the FBI... and I have *yet* to be bested by any of them. However, over the past year, it seemed as if the one person who finally might get me to crack… finally might get the better of me… was approximately 40 inches (about three and 1/3 feet) tall, not quite 36 pounds in weight, had an extremely high IQ level - although I had not yet had her formally tested - knew the entire alphabet… and, because of that last goal, apparently was going to be the one who *finally* did in Dr. Temperance Brennan. *That* person happened to be none other than my very own daughter.

When I found her, Chrissy was standing in front of this easel that we had bought for her. It had a dry erase board on one side and a chalk board on the other with adjustable legs so that it could continue to be used as she grew. It was currently turned so that the chalkboard side faced her

Chrissy, well, I'm not sure how long she had been up. It was a little after 7:15am. Booth… it was unusual for him to be up this early… but, our schedules had been a little off since we got back from San Diego. Normally, he'd still be asleep for another half hour or so… then I'd fix us breakfast, feed Chrissy, and get her ready to go while he dressed. We'd quickly eat… then he'd leave first with the baby to drop her off for her morning enrichment lessons before heading into the Hoover. In the meantime, I'd get changed and ready for the day so that I'd be leaving for the Jeffersonian and get into the lab by about 9:30am. However, as I said, today our normal schedule was a bit off because we had just gotten back… so I was going to spend a couple of hours writing… but, no matter how early I had awoken (followed shortly thereafter by Booth), apparently Chrissy had beaten us both by some time.

She was still wearing her nightgown from last night… but, over her night gown, Chrissy had pulled on the blue lab coat that I had gotten made for her about a year ago. It was very similar to my lab coat that I wore at the Jeffersonian… and, in an unusually sentimental moment, I had splurged and even gotten her name embroidered on the coat pocket… it said 'Future Dr. C. Booth' in simple white script. Chrissy went through a period of time, right after I gave it to her, where she insisted that she wear it over all her outfits (morning, noon, and night) each day for about three or four months. It got to the point where Booth and I were washing it every night - with him scowling at me each time he pulled it from the washer and tossed it into the dryer - and I had seriously considered just ordering a half dozen for her, when her obsession with it started to fade, soon to be replaced by the multi-colored sock obsession that, in turn, was something for which I got to blame Booth.

However, whenever she 'taught school like Mommy' Chrissy still insisted she wear the lab coat, even though she had already started to outgrow it as I looked at her that morning. The arms were a bit tight, and she had clearly grown about two or three inches since I bought it. But, she had still managed to get it on over her nightgown somehow… then pulled her hair into a messy ponytail. It was eerie staring at a miniature version of myself. I've never taken her to American or the lab for obvious reasons, but she's seen pictures. And, we've talked about what Booth and I do at work in terms a three-year old could understand. Apparently, this had resulted in her lining up about a dozen of her stuffed animals in front of the board as her 'students'. I had apparently interrupted her lecture, as she had a piece of white chalk in hand and was gesturing at her stuffed dolphin when I arrived. Her chalk board was covered in abstract lines and squiggles and didn't make much coherent sense except for the very crooked letter F which she had drawn in the middle of the board.

My displeasure still evident on my face, I looked at her and said, "What are you doing, Christine?"

"Teaching," she said. "Mr. Dolphin doesn't get it."

I couldn't help myself. I admit it, she wasn't quite three, and I should have known better than to ask… but my intellectual curiosity wanted to know what my daughter was trying to teach a stuffed dolphin at 7:15am in the morning. "What doesn't he understand?" I asked.

Yeah, that was so not a good thing to do.

She smiled. "I'm teaching him about the fee-or."

I winced. God, she *wasn't* still hung up on that… there are 206 bones in the human body. I'll admit, I may have been a bit over enthusiastic about teaching Chrissy about the human skeleton since she had been born… but, at three… all she seemed to retain about *all* the long winded rants I've chanted at her… was the name of a single bone… the femur. This is yet another example, I honestly believe, of Brennan intelligence mixing with Booth one-tracked stubborn single-mindedness. 206 bones… and the only one she can remember, or, more likely chooses to remember, is the femur.

Yes… like I said… she was going to finally do it… a toddler was finally going to crack me.

"'Femur'," I corrected. "It is pronounced 'femur', Christine."

She nodded. "That's what I said, 'fee-or'."

Stubborn… she was being stubborn… and trying to distract me. But, that wasn't going to happen. If the source of the original grin couldn't charm me when I didn't want to be charmed, there was no way in hell the mini-version would succeed. Chrissy was only 40 inches tall… I was not going to let someone who barely weighed as many pounds as she was inches tall do me in… it *wasn't* going to happen.

"Christine," I said.

"Yes, Mommy?"

"Before you started 'teaching', did you leave your room this morning?"

"Yes, Mommy."

"And, where did you go?"

She looked at me and smiled shyly. "Office," came her clear response.

Hmmmph. Well, at least we had gotten past the part where she thought she could get past me by evasion. I swear, my interrogation skills have improved by 1000% percent since she learned to walk and talk. If I had to go through the behavioral sciences portion of the damn training at Quantico *now*… P-CB (post-Chrissy Booth) I know I would receive perfect scores on the entire damn unit because you haven't truly broken a tough nut until you've learned how to deal with a smart toddler like Chrissy on a consistent basis.

"Christine, what have Mommy and Daddy told you about going into the office?"

"Not allowed," she parroted back to me, using the exact words that I knew Booth and I had conveyed to her about the issue of the office on multiple occasions.

Suddenly, my instinctual feeling that she was deliberately baiting me was confirmed by her word choice. Deciding I had had enough of the conversation being controlled by my offspring, I move to take the alpha-female position due me as her father's mate and as her mother.

"That's right," I confirmed, moving to scoop her up in a swift and fluid gesture. Chrissy immediately began to yell at the movement as I swept out of her room, past a very amused looking Booth, who had remained out of sight in the hallway, and back we went into the office. Holding her tightly, I stopped in front of the desk and pointed at the laptop. "Now, Christine, explain to Mommy why, if you know you are not allowed to go into the office, how did your crayons end up writing *all* over Mommy's computer screen?"

Chrissy turned to look at me and said, as if it were the most logical thing in the world, "'Cause, Mommy. I needed to practice my writing like you do."

In purple, red, and green crayons… yup, she was going to make me crack.

And, suddenly, a random thought occurred to me…how wise was I really being if, terrifying to my sanity as *one* Booth-Brennan DNA mixing produced offspring was… how smart was I to be to want to double the opposition? Obviously, it wasn't Booth's genetics, separate and by themselves, that was the issue. I've seen Parker… Parker is never this bad. Parker is a normal child. At times, he was precocious. But, he never, *ever* bypassed precocious for deviousness as Chrissy had done - and continued to do. No, apparently, it was something unique to the combination of his genes and mine that had produced this frighteningly brilliant child… who was also going to be the end of me. And, here I was… actively working to add a duplicate to the equation? Maybe it had finally happened… maybe she finally had caused me to crack, and I just hadn't noticed it until now….

Sighing, I said, "Christine, you were very, very bad to do this. You know you are not allowed in the office without your father or I here to accompanying you… and,yet, you did it anyway, and have caused an extensive amount of damage to my computer. You were very, very bad."

"No, Mommy!"

"Yes," I repeated. "And, you are going to be punished for this, Christine. You know such deliberate and flagrant misbehavior is unacceptable."

"No!" she shrieked again, starting to twist in my arms.

Booth often says that Chrissy doesn't know what I'm saying half the time I use my normal vocabulary around her. I disagree, and my opinion is usually confirmed by her reaction. She may not know the exact meaning of all the words I use, but she gets the general idea. Otherwise, she wouldn't start throwing a temper tantrum like these early rumblings seemed to indicate loomed on the horizon.

Turning her around, I brought her to face me as I looked directly into her eyes. "Yes, Christine. You misbehaved and such an action has punitive consequences." I stopped for a moment, looked at the crayons, and then decided. "You may not have access to either your crayons or your markers or your chalk for one week."

"No!" she screamed again. This time, she twisted harder, and began the first jag of what I knew would be a full blown temper tantrum. "No, no, no!" Chrissy yelled.

I pulled her tighter, struggling to control her tantrum.

"Yes," I repeated for emphasis.

Looking up, I saw Booth watching us from the doorway. I sighed at him and said, "A little help here, Booth?"

He nodded wordlessly, and came forward to grab Christine. She immediately stopped struggling when she was in Booth's arms. She looked at him, red-faced and teary-eyed, and buried her head in his shoulder. "Mommy's mean!"

Saying nothing, he looked to me. I shrugged and then moved past him. He followed me back to Chrissy's room. I immediately bent down and began to scoop up her boxes of markers, crayons, and chalk. When she lifted her head from Booth's shoulder to see what I was doing, she immediately started to scream again.

"No, no, no!" she yelled. Chrissy began to squirm, but Booth held her tight as her cries intensified. "NOOOOOO!" she screamed. "Those are mine! No, Mommy, nooooo!"

I hastily made a scan of the room, and believing I had collected them all, I disappeared into our bedroom and hid them in on a tall shelf in the closet. Chrissy's screams had intensified by the time I had reappeared. She had apparently been crying so hard that she was now alternating between hiccuping and occasionally hitting Booth's shoulder.

He still said nothing as I came back in and took her. Sitting down on her bed, most of the fight gone out of her, she turned her head from me as I said, "Christine, look at me, please."

"No!"

"Christine—" I warned.

Slowly, she turned her head and glared at me.

"Do you understand what you did that was wrong, and why you are being punished?"

Silence.

"Christine—"

"...Yes."

"Why?"

"'Cause I went in the office without you or Daddy."

"And?"

"And I wrote on your con'puter."

"'Computer'," I corrected. "But, yes, that's correct. And, because of those actions, as your punishment, you will be without your crayons, markers, and chalk for a week. They will be returned to you at that time, provided that you don't misbehave again. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"Good," I said, as I leaned down and gave her a kiss on the head. She turned away and scowled.

"Bad Mommy. I'll hate you forever."

I sighed as I stood. I gestured to Booth and said, "She's all yours."

Moving past him and back down the hallway into the office, I contemplated how best to remove the wax of the crayons from the computer screen without scratching it. I sat in the chair for a minute, so, so *not* in the mood for how Brennan vs. Chrissy Battle of the Wills Round 354 had turned out. Again, I sensed more than saw that Booth was there when he came back to lean against the door frame.

"I'll help you clean it," he said softly.

I waved him off. "Don't worry about it." Looking at him with a nod, I said, "Where is the little calligrapher?"

"Curled on her bed, clutching her dolphin, and cursing you with scathing epithets of 'Bad Mommy'," Booth said.

Nodding, I said, "Well, we both know I've certainly be called worse."

"Yeah," Booth said. "By me," he laughed. He then stopped and nodded. "She's… is it just me or is she getting worse lately?"

I looked up at him in disbelief. "Seriously?"

"What?" he asked in innocence.

"Really? Booth, I've been telling you that for a year!" I exclaimed.

"Well, yeah," he admitted. "But… now… it's like… it's not just you she's doing it with…."

I shook my head. "I don't know… maybe… I mean, I was planning on bringing it up with you soon anyway since the new year starts in August, but I think it's time we considered enrolling her in some preschool classes."

"She's only three, Bones… not even…."

"Yes, I know… but… she has never spent a lot of time in daycare because she's either with my dad or with Jared and Padme… and I'm concerned that her ability to socialize with children her own age may have been a skill that is underdeveloped because of that… she has trouble relating to children her own age… and I suspect if she were exposed to them on a more consistent basis, her mood might improve… and perhaps her defiance might lessen," I said.

"It was your idea to enroll her in the enrichment lessons with the individual tutors instead of the Gymboree class I wanted to put her in," Booth said.

I scowled slightly at that. "Yes, well, perhaps it's time to reassess my decision on that particular issue."

Looking back at the computer screen, I sighed… and he noticed. Softly, a hint of truth, a hint of amusement in his tone, Booth read me like a book as indicated by his next comment. "You aren't thinking it's a mistake to have another one, are you?"

I turned to meet his gaze and said firmly, "No… if anything… it is blatantly clear that Chrissy needs to have someone around on a regular basis that isn't spoiling her or bending to her every will… A little competition for her might be just what she needs, so I think it's a better idea now than I did before—"

"Even if it's another girl?"

My eyebrow arched at him, as I said, "I prefer not to answer that question, Booth. I don't think I can possibly say anything that won't be able to be used by you at a latter date to recriminate and chide me."

He laughed with a nod, and then turned back from the office leaving me with the crayon-covered laptop screen.

A couple of hours later, Brennan was in a highly irritable mood when she arrived at the lab. After her impromptu battle with Chrissy, she was no longer in the mood to write. And, so, she decided to go in early and see what the San Diego field office had been able to process and ship to the Jeffersonian in the three weeks that had transpired since her initial consultation.

Upon her arrival on the platform, Brennan was surprised to see that a slab of concrete was in the center of the work space. Cam, Hodgins, and Angela were staring at it in disbelief.

Frowning, Brennan said, "Is that from the case in San Diego?"

"Sure is," Hodgins said.

"Why wasn't I notified the remains had arrived?" Brennan asked, looking to Cam.

Cam waved her hands in supplication as she said, a bit more testily than usual, "It just arrived an hour ago. Facilities just unpacked the damn thing. I swear I was getting ready to call you when you came in the door. We haven't had unfettered access to it for more than about ten minutes."

Brennan frowned, but nodded, "Very well."

Angela walked around the slab of concrete and said, "This is certainly… exactly like you described it, Bren."

Brennan nodded. "I… I couldn't tell Booth much at the scene… the construction permits indicate the foundation for the original Starbucks' expansion were laid approximately two years ago. They found this when they went to carry out maintenance work on the foundation that was necessary after the last earthquake San Diego had two months ago… but the trauma to the bones is such, I can't even make a guess at race, sex, and approximate age, let alone cause of death."

"Well," Cam said. "I think it's a safe bet to make that at least we know foul play is involved."

"Without cause of death, how can you say that, Dr. Saroyan?" Brennan asked annoyed.

"Because, honey," Angela said. "When you were on scene, how many pieces of bone did you estimate to be visible?"

"Once I had determined that the remains were human… an estimate based on what was visually accessible… including chips and fragments? I would guess the skeleton had been smashed into at least… somewhere between two thousand and three thousand pieces. However, unless we can get a series of x-rays done and begin to remove the bones from the concrete, it will be impossible to determine an accurate count," Brennan said.

"Well, there you go," Angela said. "If a skeleton that's been smashed into a number between 2000 and 3000 pieces doesn't foul play, I don't know what does."

"2000 to 3000 pieces of skeleton buried in a block of concrete?" Hodgins offered gleefully.

Brennan considered the words of both of her friends, before she finally nodded.

"If you let me at what's visible, I can start to take samples for particulates," Hodgins said eagerly.

Brennan looked at him with a sigh. It was going to be a long day.

"Fuck," Brennan's voice muttered from the bathroom.

Booth looked up in the direction of her voice from where he sat on the bed with her laptop in front of him and a pile of cotton balls and Q-tips and a bowl of some baking soda and toothpaste concoction he was using to remove Chrissy's crayon markings from the screen.

Brennan shut the light off and came trudging out of the bathroom with a huff.

"What's wrong?" Booth asked. "Don't tell me that Chrissy got into something in the bathroom, too?"

Throwing herself on the bed, Brennan shook her head as she sighed. "No."

"Then what?"

"It's nothing."

"Bones—"

"I…" her head spun to look at him. He could see the frown on her face and the furrowing of her brow as she said, "I… I got my period."

Realizing the cause of her ire, Booth said gently, "Hey… that's not that big a deal, Bones."

"Yes, it is!" she said. "I…"

Setting down the laptop and his cleaning materials on the nightstand, Booth then reached over and pulled her to him. She reluctantly allowed herself to be seat between his open legs, leaning back against his chest. It was a position they had often found themselves in, somewhat ironically, during Brennan's pregnancy with Chrissy… and, even after the baby had been born, it was one they often fell back into when things of a serious nature needed to be discussed and they hadn't just had sex.

"It's not that big a deal," Booth said. He then nuzzled her neck. "You said it yourself… you only stopped taking the pill a few weeks ago… your system just needs time to flush the drugs out."

"But… I thought…"

"What?" Booth chuckled lightly. "You thought that because it happened so easily with Chrissy, if we did the same thing again, you'd get the same results?"

Brennan stared away from him for a moment, pouting somewhat as she said, "Yes."

"It's just a month, Bones…."

"But—"

"No, 'buts'," he said with a kiss. "Now, stop beating yourself up about this and look on the bright side."

Spinning her head to him, she said with a frown, "And ,what's that?"

"If you didn't get pregnant last month… we're just going to have to double our efforts in that goal this month…." Booth murmured into her ear.

Sighing, Brennan said, "I suppose that's a valid point."

"You bet your cute little ass it is," Booth said with a grin.

"And, and I weren't so crampy and feeling so totally unsexy right now, I would like to begin implementing that plan, but right now… all I really want is some ibuprofen and some of that cookies and cream ice cream that's in the freezer," Brennan said.

"So, that would make you feel better?" he asked.

Brennan nodded weakly.

Booth smiled as he moved to get out of bed. "You happen to be in luck, tonight, Bones… because… it just happens to be that for tonight only… I can make those two wishes come true… pretty quickly."

Brennan looked at him with a weak smile. "Oh, really?"

With a wink, Booth nodded. "Yup. Hold that thought, and I'll be right back."

And, later, when Booth came back…and, I took the medicine, had eaten the ice cream, and was cuddling in bed while Booth held me in his arms, and we watched the news… it turned out, as usual, he was right. I actually did start to feel just a little bit better.

-DELETE-

-TBC-