I couldn't resist posting this soon. I hope y'all like! :)
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CHAPTER 10: The Emotional Brain
The afternoon sun was beginning to sink over the horizon, but still the pool was quite crowded. When the woman in the red two-piece shed her towel, every head turned to look, except one.
"Oh honey, y're lookin' fi-ine…" Fred said loudly the moment Brennan was within earshot.
"Thanks, Fred. Looking okay yourself." She smiled, leaving him chortling (I like her, the kid's got spunk!), then went over to where Rob lay reading a magazine with his sunglasses perched on his nose.
"Rob, don't you wanna swim?" she asked, pouting slightly. Booth kept his eyes glued to the page, not wanting to embarrass himself, and spoke without looking up.
"Didn't take my swimsuit, did I? 'Sides, it's almost dark."
"'Kay."
Brennan sauntered off and looked around for Stacy. It was time to find out why the other girl already hated her, as though they were competing for something and Angel was losing.
The redhead was swimming on the shallow end, bright hair a halo around her in the water. She wore a blue two-piece, and she looked like the little mermaid.
"Stacy!" Angel called, waving.
No reaction.
"Stacy, hey!" Brennan was leaning at the very edge of the pool, and she was starting to attract attention. Stacy was either deaf, or ignoring her.
"Get inside, Angel!" Fred called, taking a seat next to Rob in the white lounge chairs by the side of the pool. "We want to see how you look wet!" His tone was commanding, no longer with a pretence of kindness or sweetness: greed and lust, that was all this man really felt.
Brennan realised, for the first time, that she could strangle this man without remorse. In a simple, crude sentence he reminded her of what she hated the most. The thought frightened her, but it was also liberating: because he was the kind of person who was used to degrading women until there was nothing left to take, who promoted the misogynistic, retarded values she despised.
Booth's hands, meanwhile, ripped the magazine clear apart, the sudden rage in him was so great. But just as quickly as it came, he controlled it, and the calm, blank look on his partner's face helped. Fred hadn't noticed, he was looking at Brennan, waiting for his command to be obeyed.
She did as she was told, of course. It was her job. With a light, athletic step, she ran to the deep end and jumped, head-first. There was a little ripple, and then nothing.
"Be careful with her kind, Rob." Fred muttered. "Trust me, you want to keep them docile, or they start thinkin'. Gettin' ideas. You wanna watch out."
"I know, man." Booth managed through clenched teeth. He stuffed the torn paper under the chair, and waited for Brennan to resurface. The sun had almost set.
"Did you hear how she talks back? That ain't never a good sign."
"I'll watch out for that."
"Look at them." Fred said suddenly, eyes glued to the pool, pupils dilated. "Just look at their beauty."
Booth's brain numbly registered that he'd never seen Brennan in a bikini before, but it didn't really sink in until later that day.
Angel was swimming swiftly to Stacy, who sat on the stairs and smiled at the men who gathered courage to talk to her. They did look beautiful, both with hair gleaming in the fading sunlight, shining like diamonds. Angel was a flickering image under the rippling water; to watch her was to try and catch stolen glimpses of white athletic limbs and red cloth. Stacy was serene, smiling, confident. To watch her was to take a breath of fresh air into starving lungs.
When she reached Stacy Angel tried to initiate a conversation, thus dissipating the crowd forming around them.
"To think she's… mine." Fred breathed. Booth tore his eyes away from them and felt sick, he wanted to throw up.
To try and keep the bile down, and feeling that he deserved a small respite, he waved at Brennan, who waved back and once again tried to make Stacy talk to her.
"So how's Fred?" Angel asked, sounding interested.
"The fuck do you care?" Stacy snorted. The coarse words and deeper voice coming from her mouth were like a slap to the face. Obviously she wasn't always simpering and trying to please.
"Hey, you're not the only one in this situation. We're all on the same boat here."
"No, honey, we're not."
"Why not? Look at me! Look at you! We're the same-"
"Stop it." Stacy looked really angry, now. She was almost crying. "Stop saying we're all on the same fucking boat." She splashed into the water and began swimming away, then seemed to reconsider and came back. She spoke looking up at Brennan from the water, her mascara completely ruined.
"The same…? Jesus, Angelina, have you seen the Brad Pitt you're here with?" Brennan couldn't help a glance at Booth, lying on the lounge chair, white shirt open and looking spectacular in the dim light. She wasn't completely certain who Brad Pitt was, but if he looked a little like Booth, he must be attractive. "I'd take a beating from a man and smile after, if he looked like that. Rather than… touch Fred."
What kind of woman would honestly say that? Brennan's heart was going to bruise today, after all the hits it had taken.
"Look at my pig."
Next to tall, dark and handsome, Frederick was short, fat and disgusting. Brennan understood what was happening, and her heart felt heavier in her chest than usual, that this woman should lead such a horrible, horrible life.
"I'm sorry." She muttered before she could stop herself. "I'm sorry Stacy."
Stacy clung to the railing on the metal steps so hard her knuckles were white, and didn't answer. "I…" Angel slid down to the water next to her, but now it felt cold. "I know it's not the same. But what chance do we have if we don't stick together?"
The black tears falling down the Stacy's cheeks hurt Brennan more than she dared show. But at least Stacy didn't look angry anymore.
She murmured something Angel didn't catch.
"Sorry?"
"My name's not Stacy."
"Oh." What else could she say?
"It was Hannah. My name is Hannah."
Angel put her hand over Stacy's.
"Thank you for telling me."
Brennan knew this was Hannah's way of apologising, and smiled tentatively at her. "My name isn't Angel either."
"I figured."
Of course she couldn't say her real name. She couldn't say Temperance.
"It's Camille."
Stacy smiled back.
"That's a nice name."
"Yeah." After a small pause, she added. "Would you like to go back?"
"Sure."
Booth and Fred were talking animatedly, and Brennan had to fight the urge to throw herself in Booth's arms and beg him to make her forget the horrible things Stacy had told her, or not told her.
"Rob?" She crooned instead. "I wanna eat."
"We'll ask the food be sent to our room, 'kay?" Rob said, sounding annoyed. "Let's go."
"Bye, doll!" Fred called.
Booth stood swiftly and left without so much as a goodbye to Fred and Stacy. Brennan turned for a last, sad smile at her new friend, and followed him.
*
"I'm not really hungry." She said the moment the door to their room closed behind her. This time, the light inside the room did nothing to ease her mind, even though it came in the beautiful pink hues of sunset.
"Me neither. I feel like throwing up." Booth muttered gruffly.
"It's just so… degrading! So disgusting, I want to… I feel like killing him!" she burst suddenly. "All of them! I understand that it wouldn't help, that it wouldn't really change that much to kill him, or any of them, because another would take their place… but I want to!"
"I know, Bones. I know." He took her hand and his touch soothed her nerves.
There was no long, drawn out struggle as to who would sleep on the bed. Agent Anderson might have been ashamed to hear what was going on inside their heads, but he couldn't have faulted Booth and Brennan's professional behaviour.
"Want to get some sleep, Bones?"
"Yes. I think it will be beneficial." And that was all they said on the subject.
She sat at the edge of the bed tiredly, and began unzipping her boots. Then she took off her fake glasses and undid her ponytail. It was so tight her scalp hurt, but she didn't let her face show her pain.
Her hair, glossy dark and spilling down to her shoulders, stirred something in Booth he couldn't bear. As her deft fingers gently massaged her sore head and she closed her eyes, sighing with relief, he had the desire to comb it himself. To smell it. To kiss her, to breathe her pure, delicious essence until his brain exploded with it, and only his heart, pumping hot blood through his body, kept him alive.
"I'll go change, now." She said softly, and went into the bathroom.
While she was gone, Booth quickly stripped and tugged on his sleeping shorts, just a plain, dark blue pair. Gabrielle had insisted they take special sleeping wardrobe, but as a precaution, not a compulsory fact. They'd both packed their own pyjamas ("Gabi, who'll see us when we're sleeping?"), and Booth felt that the first night would be challenge enough without silk and lace getting involved.
Brennan emerged having removed her make-up, and looking a lot more like herself again. She wore a long black T with a large human skull on the back. Booth laughed, not looking at her long bare legs.
"Wow. That's hardcore, Bones."
"My editor gave it to me when they published my second book. I thought it was rather humorous."
"It is. I love it."
He smiled and she smiled back, feeling a bit less tired than before. Then she noticed that he was already sitting on the bed, the left side, to be precise. Brennan wondered whether he'd known she wanted the side closest to the window, or he wanted to put himself between her and the door.
She decided to pretend she didn't notice his shirtless state, and gingerly walked to the other side of the bed. It didn't seem as huge as it had before, now that they were both about to lie in it.
"Would you like to read before going to sleep?" She asked, sliding under the blankets.
"Yeah, I always do." He grinned, and copied her movement. Then he reached to the suitcase by his side of the bed, and took out his book: Guns, Germs and Steel, by Jared Diamond.
"Oh!" she started, looking delighted. "It's fascinating, isn't it? Obviously it's all being treated as hypothesis still, but I find his facts very accurate, and fitting with the evolution of anthropological findings. That our cultural development could be so determined by crops and environmental conditions, in other words, the geographical location of each populace!" Her eyes glowed in the dim light, her face was framed by the starred sky behind her, and Booth couldn't help but smiled warmly back.
"Yeah, I like it too. Lots of chapters sound very familiar though." The smile turned devilish. "You quote him very often, don't you?"
"I'm surprised you noticed." She said honestly. "Are you reading that for… work?" She'd wanted to say me and they both knew it.
"Yeah. Helps me keep up with you a little, and it's very interesting."
Brennan realised with a jolt that they'd moved closer and closer to each other, until their faces were inches apart, and she hastily scooted to her right.
"So what are you reading, Bones?"
He barked a laugh when he saw the title. "The Emotional Brain, by Joseph LeDoux?"
Her guard was up and defensive immediately. "I realise it's very outdated, considering that the field of neuroscience expands every year, or even every month, with new discoveries. But I find it… comforting."
"Comforting?"
"Yes. To learn that there are neurobiological supports for emotion… to know that it's all really based on science… I like that. That not even our hormone production, neural pathways… I like that not even our emotions can escape science."
Booth liked the way she said "escape" and Brennan wondered at her choice of words.
"Do you understand what I mean?" She asked.
"Of course. Makes perfect sense. But does this mean you're opening yourself a bit more to psychology?"
"No!" she said loudly. He laughed. "Emotional neuroscience is an accepted branch of neurobiology and is based on an objective study and interpretation of scientific fact. It has nothing to do with guessing what a person is feeling through murky subjective questions, or using your gut. I feel content right now even after the terrible day we've had because my frontal lobe has been flooded with dopamine, the production of which was triggered by the large bed, your comforting presence and exhaustion."
A tense silence followed these words, until:
"You left something out of that pretty speech, Dr Brennan." He said, voice low and rough.
"Did I? I thought I was quite clear."
"Well, you weren't."
"So… what did I lie about?"
Booth didn't point out the leap from 'leaving something out' to 'lying'.
"Dopamine doesn't make you… content."
Brennan cursed her body for responding so obviously to her partner's voice, and once again remembered the move away from him.
"It makes you happy, euphoric, ecstatic. And anyway, a real flood of dopamine, Dr Brennan, is usually triggered by sex, not just a bed and me."
In their minds, the three concepts blended into one.
"Sex." Brennan repeated. Booth tugged the blanket up to his chest, glaring at the ceiling for being so cruel.
"Yeah."
The silence was so charged, neither would have been surprised if lightning had suddenly struck their hotel room.
"Why didn't we just bring novels?" Booth groaned finally, and the tension broke, and Brennan giggled.
"I think I'll sleep now, Booth."
"Okay. Yeah, me too."
"Night."
"Sweet dreams, Bones."
She smiled into her pillow. "You too."
After a few minutes of silence, she turned and saw his large outline against the dark shadows in the room. He wasn't breathing very evenly, but his eyes were closed. Brennan saw that his arm was stretched out toward her, as though calling her to him, hand almost brushing her hair. She had to stop herself from licking his finger or putting it in her mouth, and instead just looked at him, at his chest rising and falling, muscles gleaming in the moonlight.
It was like this that she fell asleep.
Booth, who wasn't sleeping at all, felt her hot, even breath against his palm and had to stop himself from shifting toward her and touching her lips with hesitant fingers.
It was like this that he fell asleep.
*
They both woke later in the night when they felt their hands touch. Neither spoke, but Brennan curled her fingers around his instinctively, hoping he wouldn't notice or wake up. Booth held tighter in response, telling himself she must be asleep.
That morning, they would have given anything to stay in this position, sweet and innocent, just two children holding hands.
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I've actually read both books mentioned in this chapter!
Anyway, more BED stuff in the next chapter. Feel free to reread the last sentence and imagine what I'm talking about ;)