He wore the flashiest tie in his wardrobe and paired them with a wild pair of socks. If his Cocky belt buckle could have been any cockier, he would have given it a transformation too. After spending the night tossing and turning despite knocking back a few shots of his good Scotch to dull the ache in his heart, Booth was determined the solve the Santa case today. Hannah was gone and he needed to come to grips with the fact that she wasn't coming back. And while he had to admit that he felt some measure of relief that the decision had been made for him, he really wasn't ready to lay his cards out in front of Bones yet either. Like any self respecting manly man, he need some time to lick his wounds and cry in his beer in the privacy of his own living room before taking any kind of action. Besides, he didn't want Bones thinking that she was his rebound girl, if she even knew what that was. What he had with Bones went far deeper than that and after basically pissing on whatever concept of true love that he'd preached to her for years by coming back from Afghanistan with Hannah, he needed to spend a little time earning her trust back and reaffirming what he believed about love himself.
If he was planning on solving the case, then he reasoned that pancakes and coffee were a good way to get started. The bell on the diner's door jingled when he pushed it open and he almost turned around and walked right back out when he spotted Sweets sitting at the counter eating his own breakfast. Of course since he was an FBI Special Agent, he wasn't going to let a juvenile shrink scare him away. He puffed his chest out just a little bit and sidled up to the counter. He had his best 'I don't have a care in the world' smile on as he greeted the younger man and took a seat. "Morning, Sweets."
If Sweets noticed anything amiss he didn't comment, he simply nodded. "Agent Booth." A quick inventory had him raising his brows just a bit. Either whatever had been bothering the agent the previous day had dissipated or he was overcompensating.
"A little early for you, isn't it?" Booth gestured to the waitress who already knew what his usual was and then turned his attention back to Sweets.
"Daisy had an early start at the lab." Sweets inwardly cursed for slipping. He and Daisy were taking things slow. Technically, they weren't a couple again. Well yet. It was his call really. It wasn't like they weren't spending most of their off work hours together. It occurred to him that he was a freaking idiot. What the hell was he waiting for? His expression soured.
"Okay." Booth wasn't sure what to make of the personal silent soap opera going on next to him and so he took a nice long sip of his coffee that the waitress had brought over to him.
"She's perfect for me really." He even felt like a wimp for feeling like crying in his coffee when it should have been something a bit stiffer like a rum and coke. "Do you know how hard it is to find the woman who is perfect for you? I'm an idiot. I should just tell her how I feel and realize that just because she left me to go to Maluku once doesn't mean she'll do it again." He had clearly over spoken when he glanced up and noticed Booth looking at him as if he'd just turned into an alien.
"Hey, I'm just here for breakfast. You're the one who's the shrink." Clearly the man needed a shrink given the little confession he'd made. Of course it also could have been some elaborate shrinky-dink scheme directed at him for not running right back to Bones after being dumped by Hannah. Of course the fact that he'd been dumped wasn't public knowledge and quite frankly, the last person that he wanted to share that nugget with first was Sweets.
"Sorry." Sweets shoveled a forkful of eggs into his mouth and chewed silently, swallowed and then turned to Booth again as if he just couldn't help himself. "I wanted to take things slow, learn to trust her again, but what's the point if we're together all the time as it is. Clearly she wants this relationship as much as I do. I mean it isn't as if I found a meaningful relationship while she was gone."
Booth leveled one of his best glares at Sweets and then let his expression soften. As much as he liked giving the guy a hard time, he'd come to regard him as a friend most of the time. "You've got to use your head to follow your heart. She hurt you. You don't recover from that overnight. Just let things unfold the way they're going to unfold and when the time is right to make things more solid, you'll know."
Sweets smiled at the unexpected advice. "You're right."
"Look, the last thing you want is to make a move before either of you is ready." He had learned that the hard way and now he was reaping the benefits of bad timing and a broken heart that was trying to learn to trust in true love again.
"Sounds like you speak from personal experience." Perhaps this was a little insight into whatever had caused the outburst near the elevator yesterday.
Booth glared. "We aren't talking about me, got it?" He did not want to talk about what happened with Hannah. He didn't want to talk about his lingering feelings for Bones. All he wanted to do was eat his breakfast and figure out who the Hell had blown up Santa.
"Sure." Sweets knew he had towed a little too close to the line and felt like he'd been slammed up against the wall that reinforced it. Of course they had a session tomorrow, mandated by the Deputy Director that was scheduled just to recertify the partners as partners after their long absence to make sure that things were going alright. Perhaps then there would be an opportunity to delve into things a little deeper.
Suddenly, words from Gordon Gordon filtered through Booth's mind and he directed his attention back to Sweets. "Man up and grow a pair. If you want Daisy don't piss around and mope because you feel like you need to punish yourself or her for what happened. You might end up losing her in the long run if you do." Maybe it was the liquor from the night before starting to remind him that he was going to need a little bit more coffee and an aspirin or maybe it was the sense of clarity that he was coming to about his own situation, but either way, the air of confidence he'd forced this morning was starting to feel a little bit more natural as he considered what he needed to do about Bones.
The truth of Booth's statement hit Sweets right between the eyes. "You're right. I've just been acting like a jerk trying to keep her guessing, when all I want is my Pookie Bear back." Without another word, Sweets dumped his napkin on top of his plate and made his way out of the diner.
Just when Booth though he was going to have a few quiet moments to himself to collect his thoughts, the waitress brought his food, refilled his coffee, handed him his bill and then gestured towards the empty place next to him with a raised eyebrow as she held up Sweets' bill. He waved it over and grumbled under his breath about how Sweets was going to pay for more than just the breakfast bill later as he pulled out a twenty to cover both meals.