A/N: This one is basically a tag for EitB. I've written a fair amount of these, and I try to stay away from them, but the ideas just keep me up all night.

Thanks for all the reviews, by the way. If I haven't replied to you, I'm sorry, but I figured you would rather read more of this than just me rampling about how awesome you all are.

A/N2: Also, if anyone wants something written specifically, feel free to ask. I love a challenge, and the feeling that comes from writing something for someone else.

It will teach you to love what you're afraid of
After it takes away all that
You learn to love
But you don't always
Have to hold your head
Higher than your heart

-Hope, Jack Johnson

She was just sitting on your couch. She wasn't speaking -- she didn't do much of that with anyone any more.

You felt sorry for her.

That was one of the first things you learn when you study in psycology; don't be sympathetic, but have empathy. Empathy, what an idiotic idea. How could anyone understand what it was like to be her in a time like this? How were you supossed to put yourself in her shoes?

You knew that she loved him. Hell, even the nurses knew that she loved him. You had known -- it was your job to know -- but you had no idea as to how in the hell she was dealing with this.

You had told her that the session was mandatory. You had told her that you didn't give two shits if she was working Limbo cases, if she didn't make her own way to your office, you would go to the Jeffersonian and piss her of until she agreed to cooperate.

Here she was. One point for you, zero for her.

When she has come into the office, you told her to sit.

"How're you feeling, Dr. Brennan?" you'd asked.

"You told me I had to be here, you never said I had to talk about anything while I was here."

Tie game, one-one.

So, you had both spent the past thirty seven minutes starring at each other. You only had twenty three minutes left to convince her that she missed him.

You let the silence rest for another minute, then you leaned forward, resting your elbows on your knees, "You know Dr. Brennan," you started. "Agent Booth hated when we sat here in silence."

She inhaled deeply. "He can't hate it anymore," she replied bitterly. "He doesn't hate it anymore. He can't." She quickly wiped her eyes with her sleeve, trying to stop her tears. "He wouldn't know why he hated it."

You were finally getting somewhere. You just had to keep her talking. You had to make her realize that she was aloud to be hurt.

"But wouldn't you like to honour that part of him? Just because he doesn't know that part of him, doesn't mean that you don't. You know him." She wiped her eyes again. "You," you repeated, "know him."

She bit her lip as if she was trying to hold herself together in the simple act.

"Dr. Brennan, your bestfriend is essentially gone. Sure, he will eventually get better, at least that's what the doctors have told you, but right now, in this dire moment, when you need him the most, he's not here.

"I've worked with the both of you for long enough to know that he cared about you. A lot. And you care about him. You still do. He does still care. I saw it in his face when I went to talk to him. He didn't know that he knew me -- he just thought I was some young kid who had just graduated. He kept asking if you were okay, although he didn't know why he was so worried. He just said he had to make sure.

"Dr. Brennan, you're aloud to be upset. The person that you love--" She interrupted you.

"I don't love hi--" Two could play at that game.

"Don't lie to me Dr. Brennan. Do you really think that I care that much? Everyone knows. Everyone can see it. Even Booth saw it, even now he knew. You've denied it for long enough, don't you think?"

She ran her hand through her hair, the wiped her eyes again.

"Sweets, stop it." You were really getting to her. She hated it. Two-one for the psycologist.

"No, Dr. Brennan. You need to hear it. Angela won't say anything to you, because she doesn't want you to hurt more than you already do. She won't let Hodgins say anything to you either. Cam won't say anything because she doesn't knwo how to approach you. I don't want you to hurt either, but I want you to help him. You owe him that much. You owe it to yourself."

She took a deep breath. "Don't you think I know that, Sweets? Don't you think that I realize that he's not here anymore? Don't you think that I wish that I could make it better, but I know deep down that there is little that I can do? I know, Sweets! I really do. I know that the chances of him coming out of this are close to none."

You really had set her off. She was crying more freely now, her hands shaking slightly. "I know that I let him convince me that there was more to life than the moment. He let me hope that one day, maybe, we could have something more. Then I was taught something new; that no matter how easy it for you to give yourself to someone, no matter how much you love them or how much they promise to never leave you, it's never true. You can learn to love someone, and then real life comes back and takes it all away. It can be taken away so quickly that you might not even believe that it happend.

"I thought that maybe it was all a bad dream. He couldn't have brain cancer, he's Booth, that doesn't happen to him. He couldn't suffer from amnesia, it just couldn't happen to him. But you know what, Sweets? I woke up, day after day for the past three weeks, and every day I hoped that maybe today he would remember that he doesn't call me Dr. Brennan, and day after day, I had that hope taken away a little more. Just like how every morning, I've been losing a little more of him."

She looked at her watch. "I'm leaving." She said nothing more and left your office.

You learn to never feel bad for anyone -- that they need to be strong and rise above their problems with fists, and fight through it. But her, well, for her you could never feel empathy.

You could never walk a day in her shoes.

It would be far too painful.