A/N: I am so sorry I haven't updated in so long! I've just gotten into a rut of some kind, and I couldn't get out, I just never felt like writing. I tried to make up for the time with this chapter; it's about twice as long as my normal chapters are. I hope my readers are still around, and I hope that you enjoy and review so that you can help get me out of this little rut of depression I'm in.
The day after the attempted abduction Booth woke up early to go into work so that he could possibly find out anything about the man who tried to kidnap his son. When he left both Brennan and Parker were fast asleep, so he simply left her a note saying where he went and that he'd be back as soon as possible. Brennan woke up an hour or so later to find this note placed on Booth's pillow. She smiled as she read the note, especially when she reached the bottom and saw his closing, "love, Seeley." She couldn't stop smiling to herself, she thought she would feel fear and the desire to run if the word love ever made its way into a relationship for real, but she felt nothing bad, she just felt happiness and love. At first when she started feeling like she was falling in love she tried to rationalize it as a simple chemical reaction, but now she wasn't sure, she had thought she felt what was called love before, but now, this time, it was completely different then all the other times. Now she was starting to think that love was more then just a chemical reaction, it was something deeper as well.
Brennan remained in bed as long as she could, not wanting to wake Parker up too early, so that they wouldn't have to wait as long for Booth to get back so they could go to the zoo. Soon, however, she started to feel her bladder protest the fact that she hadn't gone to the bathroom yet, so she carefully slipped out of the bed and into the bathroom. When she returned to the room, she found the bed empty and her heart rate sped up. All she could think about was if something had happened to Parker. Before she became irrational though, she forced herself to calm down and think rationally, he could be some where in the house, in fact, he was probably sitting in front of the TV watching morning cartoons. Rational thinking didn't stop her from practically sprinting to the living room, which to her dismay was empty. When she saw this she lost all rationality and started going from room to room, calling Parker's name, and looking for him.
Just when she thought he had really been taken, and that she was going to have to tell Booth his baby boy was gone, Parker came out of his bedroom looking confused. "Mommy, why were you calling me?" Parker asked her, Brennan took one look at him, safe and sound and burst into tears, "Mommy, why are you crying, are you sad?" He asked.
Brennan moved over to him and bent down, sweeping him into a hug, "No Parker, I was just scared, I couldn't find you and I thought something bad had happened. Now I'm crying because I'm so happy you're alright."
"I'm sorry if I scared you, I just wanted to surprise you and Daddy by getting dressed all by myself so we can go to the zoo. Where is Daddy anyway?" Parker asked as Brennan scoped him up and carried him into the kitchen, not wanting to let him go just yet.
"Your father had to go into work for a little bit, but I promise we're still going to the zoo, he said that he's going to be back as soon as possible."
"Oh, okay." Parker seemed disappointed that his father wasn't there and ready to go to the zoo already. "Is it because of the bad man from yesterday?"
"Yes it is, he's going to figure out why he did this, and make it so it never happens again, that way you're safe." Brennan thought that would make him a little bit less disappointed, but it didn't seem to work, so she came up with another way to make the little boy happy. "I'll tell you what, how about you and I go into my work, and see Aunty Angela and Uncle Jack until you dad gets out of work, how's that sound?"
At her suggestion Parker's eyes lit up, "Will Uncle Jack show me bugs? Oh, and experiments, and is Grandpa Max going to be there too, I haven't gotten to see him for a while and I miss him."
"If you ask Uncle Jack nice I'm sure he'll show you some bugs and experiments, as for Grandpa Max, he should be there today, we'll see when we get there," Brennan said, not wanting Parker to be too disappointed if her father wasn't actually there.
"Mommy, you're the best, can we go now? Please?" Parker asked with the charm smile her learned from his father on his face.
"What about breakfast? You have to eat first, that way you don't run out of energy before we get to the zoo." She knew that this would get him to eat at least a little cereal, no matter how excited he was to leave."
"Okay, can I have some lucky charms? Daddy says they're magical and that's why they taste good." Parker said in a mater of fact way, a smile on his face.
Brennan forced herself not to say anything about how magic wasn't real, and how the cereal just tasted good because it was so full of sugar. Instead she just smiled at him and poured some in a bowl before adding the milk to it. She told him to eat and stay at the table while she went to get dressed. Sat at the table with a coffee and waiting for Parker to finish eating.
"Mommy, aren't you going to eat too?" Parker asked as he finished his food and noticed she wasn't eating. "Daddy says that you don't eat enough, and that it's our job as men to make sure you take good care of yourself."
She almost told him that she wasn't hungry, but decided that it was probably going to be easier to just eat a yogurt then argue with him about something his father taught him, so she got up and got a yogurt. "Thank you for reminding me, your dad is correct; sometimes I do forget to eat." She told him with a smile, not wanting him to think his father lied, and so that he would continue to show concern for other people.
After they both finished eating Brennan helped Parker get his shoes on, gave Booth a call to tell him to meet them at the Jeffersonian instead of at home, and then they left the house. Upon arriving at the lab they were enthusiastically greeted by Angela, who was happy to see her friend and the boy she was now aloud to call her nephew.
"Sweetie, what are you doing here, I though you had the week off?" She asked while giving both Brennan and Parker hugs. "Not that I'm not glad to see you or anything, just surprised."
"Well, Seeley had to go into work to check in on a few things, and so I decided we'd stop by while he was at work so that Parker wouldn't be too disappointed about getting a late start on the zoo." Angela was surprised at her friend's sudden ability to think of the little boy she was now responsible for while planning her day. She realized he was disappointed and came up with a way to make him feel better, it was a big deal. "Do you know if my father is here? Parker wants to see him and Hodgins and see if they'll do experiments with him for a little bit."
"Yea your father was heading back to his desk when I last saw him, and I'll go get Hodgins and bring him over, then while they do their experiments we can have a little girl time," Angela said with a smile before hurrying off to find Hodgins.
"Come on Parker, lets go find Grandpa Max, okay?" Brennan asked, taking Parker's hand and leading him in the direction of her father's desk. When they arrived she found her father sitting behind his desk filling out something. "Hey dad, Parker and I decided to stop by for a visit; Parker would really like it if you and Hodgins had some time to do some experiments with him."
"Of course I have time for my favorite grandson," Max said with a large smile on his face. This was the first time he was able to see his daughter interact with Parker, and he was very happy with what he saw, his daughter looked like a mother. She looked completely comfortable standing there, holding Parker's hand; it looked so natural to Max. He was even happier when he was able to see her interact directly with Parker.
"Okay Parker, you be good for Grandpa Max and Uncle Jack. I don't want to hear that you didn't listen to them, and I defiantly don't want you to get hurt. So promise you'll be good?" She asked after bending down to Parker's level when she saw Hodgins coming their way. All three adults looked on in awe at what was transpiring, Dr. Brennan, notoriously cold and emotionless, was kneeling in front of a child that called her mommy, talking like a mother does to a child. It was an amazing sight.
"I promise Mommy, Daddy says that I should always behave when he leaves me somewhere, he says that misbehaving isn't how big boys act, and I want to be a big boy like my daddy." Parker said with a smile. He gave Brennan a quick hug before fallowing Hodgins and Max to do experiments, leaving Brennan and Angela alone.
"You know, he really looks up to Booth, most of what he says is 'Daddy says' it makes me even more glad that he's with us and not with Rebecca." Brennan said as the two women walked towards Angela's office. They sat and talked for a while, Brennan telling her what happened the day before, and also telling her about how things were going at the house. They had just started talking about the latest lab gossip when Booth came into the office.
"It was Rebecca," he said, anger clear on his face as he paced back and forth in the room.
"What do you mean, what was Rebecca?" Brennan asked, concerned.
"Rebecca was the one who tried to have Parker kidnapped, apparently yesterday they were able to get the guy to talk, and he told them some lady contacted him, asked him to grab a kid. She paid him half in advance through money order; they have her on camera filling the money order. They picked her up yesterday, along with Brent, but neither would talk until today. Rebecca said she just wanted what was best for Parker, how would kidnapping him be what's best, scaring him is defiantly not what's best for him. I can't believe she would sink this low." Booth kept pacing as he explained what had happened. He was beyond angry at Rebecca for trying to kidnap Parker.
"Seeley, calm down, you're not going to be any good like this. If Parker sees you like this he's going to be scared," Brennan said, moving from her seat to his side. She placed a gentle hand on his arm, to try and get him to stop pacing, and just calm down and explain what was going to happen before Parker saw him freaking out.
"I'm sorry, I just never thought that this would happen, how am I going to tell Parker that he can't see his mother anymore because she's in jail for trying to kidnap him?"
"So she's going to jail then?"
"Damn strait she is, there's no way I'm going to let her get away with this, even if I have to go to every court date, and when she gets out I'm getting a restraining order on her so she can't bother us."
"Okay, so we just tell Parker the truth right?"
"Not exactly the truth, I don't want him to hate his mom, even if she is crazy, I don't want him to be afraid of her for the rest of his life. Because chances are she's going to get at least supervised visits with him eventually." Booth ran a hand through his hair, normally he knew what to say to people when something happened, and he could tell people that their family members were dead, but this was different, this was his son.
"Just tell him that his mother did something really bad, and that she's going to be gone for a while so he won't be seeing her." Angela said, speaking up for the first time. Both Brennan and Booth seemed a little surprised to see her sitting there, but they quickly brushed it off. "Hey, it's not a lie, but you're also not telling him that his mom tried to kidnap him. It's the best you can do for now, when he's older you'll be able to tell him and not have to worry about scaring him quite as much."
Booth looked relieved, "Thanks Angela, I knew you squints were good for something," he said, flashing her a charm smile. "Now, enough of this depressing talk, where's my son, if I remember correctly, we have a date with the zoo."
"How exactly does one have a date with a zoo? It's a place, not a person." Brennan asked, confused.
"It's a figure of speech Bones, it means we're meant to be there, and hopefully as soon as possible. I want to see everything." Booth said, placing his arm over her shoulders and steering her out of the office while talking.
"Well, considering the size of the zoo, it's highly unlikely we're going to be able to see everything, especially not with a young child with us." Brennan said as their walked out leaving Angela behind.
After gathering Parker from Brennan's father and Hodgins the three made their way out of the lab and to Booth's SUV, having already asked Max to see that Brennan's car made it back to the house later. By the time they arrived at the zoo Parker was absolutely beyond excited to be there. "Come on mommy, daddy is getting ahead of us." Parker said after they were out of the car. Parker was walking holding Brennan's hand since she had gotten out him out of his car seat.
"That's because your father forgot to wait for us to get out of the car, I think he's a little excited himself." Brennan said as she smiled down at him, and walked a little faster to try and catch up with Booth. Finally she was sick of trying to catch up with a five year old holding onto her hand and decided to bring it to his attention that he was a little be ahead. "Seeley, can you wait just a second?" She called out to him, a smile on her face.
Booth turned around when he heard his name behind him, and was shocked to see Brennan and his son farther behind him then he thought they were. He quickly apologized when they caught up, and then he took Brennan's hand so that they wouldn't get separated again.
After paying admittance, they started to plan their trip while looking at the map. "I wanna see the tigers, and the lions, and the giraffes, and the penguins, and the polar bears!" Parker said with excitement, "Oh and I wanna see the snakes too. And I wanna see the elephants, because they're really fat."
"Okay buddy, I promise we'll do our best to see everything you want, but how about we just start here and walk down that path leading to the tigers, and then we can go from there. I think it leads to the food court anyway." Booth said and he excitedly pulled Brennan's hand in the direction he wanted to go in.
Together they walked looking at the animals, Parker and Booth both with large excited smiles on their faces, Parker asking Brennan as many questions as he could think off. "Mommy, why do the giraffes have funny patterns on them?"
"That's so that they can hide." She said from behind him, he was standing on a bench so he could see over the barrier, and she was holding him so he wouldn't fall.
"That's silly, they're so big, how would they hide?" Parker asked turning to look at her.
"Their spots help them blend in with the stuff around them," Brennan said, trying to think of way to explain it to him.
"So is it like magic?" Parker asked excitedly.
At first she wanted to explain to him it wasn't magic, but a quick look from Booth stopped her, and made her answer in a way she never thought she would. "Yes Parker, it's just like magic." She said with a big smile.
They continued looking at the animals until they couldn't wait any longer to get something to eat for lunch. After buying food, they sat down together to eat it, Parker talking excitedly the whole time about the animals. When they were done they continued on to look at more animals. Eventually it was clear that Parker was getting tired so they started on their way to the exit, Booth carrying Parker. As they left Booth spotted an ice cream stand and decided that they all deserved ice cream, much to Parker's joy.
Booth finished his ice cream first and headed off to the bathroom, leaving Brennan to make sure Parker didn't make a mess with his ice cream. As she was wiping off Parker's face a woman approached her. "Excuse me, are you Dr. Temperance Brennan? I've read all your books, and I just wanted to tell you I'm a really big fan."
"Um, thanks, do you want an autograph?" She asked, a little awkward, she would never get used to random people approaching her in public. Now she was even a little irritated, because she was trying to spend time alone with Parker and Booth.
"No, I just wanted to tell you that your son is very adorable. My kids are all grown now, I'm here with my daughter and granddaughter, but I remember when my kids were at that age, cherish it while you can, it will seem to fly by." The woman said with a smile.
"Thank you, let me give you an autograph, you're probably the nicest fan I've ever had approach me." Brennan was honestly surprised, normally fans were very annoying to her, but this lady seemed to just want to give her some advice.
"No, no, don't let me bother you, I just wanted to pass on some words of wisdom, I don't want to take away from your time, I know how precious that little bit of free time can be. I just wanted to tell you to enjoy the time you do have as much as you can." With that the woman left her and Parker alone, and left Brennan with her thoughts. The woman was right, the time she had with Parker wasn't going to last forever, and she was glad she was able to enjoy it. It also made her think about other things, like what it would be like to become pregnant, and give birth, and all the things she never allowed herself to think about before. She pushed these thoughts quickly out of her mind though, when Booth returned from the bathroom, signaling that their time at the zoo was over.