A Boy from Philly

Part XXXVI

He stretched and switched positions on the mattress, draping his arms over what he thought would be Brennan. Instead, he found an empty bed and slightly warm sheets.

He turned his head, "Bones?" He scanned the room, then put his feet to the carpet. His toes sunk into the thick carpeting and he walked toward the bedroom door and looked out into the living room. Nothing.

He walked into the nursery and pushed the door open slowly.

And there she was. She sat in the rocking chair and pushed off on her right foot, rocking the chair slowly. A creaking noise brought her eyes to Booth's. She stood and put Caleb in his crib and walked out of the room.

"I... I heard Tanya getting up to nurse Caleb. After she finished, I offered to take him to the nursery." She leaned against the wall and looked down at the floor, then she looked back up and crossed her arms. "She's still in a lot of pain, so--" She opened her mouth to continue the sentence, but instead, she closed it once again. "Why are you up, Booth?"

Booth knew her better than that. He took a few more steps and drew her into his arms. She rest her cheek on his bare chest, closed her eyes, and breathed in his familiar scent. "Are you OK, Bones?"

She nodded. "I think... that we should talk."

The seriousness in her voice made him pull back and look into her eyes. "What's wrong?"

She shook her head wordlessly. "Perhaps you should sit for this."

The words sunk deep into his stomach. "No," he whispered. "I'm OK."

She put her fingers, cold from anxiety, to her neck, then crossed her arms again, an unconscious defense mechanism. "I'm not who I seem to be, Booth. I've always had this shield and I have secrets--" She breathed deeply. "Things that Angela doesn't even know."

"Bones, I will love you no matter what."

"I have a feeling that this won't change the way you see me, but it might change your--your ideals--or it may threaten to change your definition of Happily Ever After... And for that I'm sorry." She measured his reaction to this for a second, then said, "I don't know why, but some people believe that sitting when you are given bad news is the best way to receive it. My assumption is that it may have to do with fainting spells, but I'm terrible at interpreting such things sometimes, so you may still want to sit."

Booth took a seat on the arm of the couch, "Is this the surprise you were wanting to give me?"

She smiled weakly, "Somewhat. The truth is, there is good news and there is bad news as well, which must go hand-in-hand with it. It's a convoluted surprise, I realize, but-- I never thought I would have to share this with someone, so I never imagined myself in this position." The tension in her body was causing her to shake ever so slightly.

Booth reached out for her, but she stepped back.

"You may not be so sympathetic when I'm done--I don't know, may be, but it could go either way... Do you want the good news first or the bad news first? If I give you the good news first, then that could lighten the blow of the bad news. However, if I give you the bad news first, then the good news might cushion the blow. Well, which is it?"

Booth crossed his arms and stretched his bare feet out in front of him, crossing his ankles. "You aren't cheating on me, are you?" He laughed nervously.

"Of course not. I haven't gotten bored of you in five years, that should mean something as far as our sustaining power goes."

"OK, Bones. How about... good news first."

"OK," she nodded. "Although now I wish you'd chosen the other."

"Bones--"

"I'm sorry, I'm just nervous."

"It's OK. Just--lay it on me."

"Good news... OK..." Suddenly she was wishing for a glass of water. Visions of her first lecture at Northwestern University slid through her mind. Cotton mouth. "I'm ready. I'm ready to begin--" the words were harder to get out than she had imagined, "to begin--" She looked Booth seriously in the eye, hoping he would see through her scientific shell and read the undercurrent of truth, "procreating, reproduction--with you."

Booth grinned, "You wanna have a baby with me? Bones, I don't see any bad news in there."

"Yet," she cut him off. "I'm not even finished, Booth. And this is the worst part." She closed her eyes, "I think that I may have raised your hopes--I should have given you the bad news first..." She reopened them and the hope and joy in his eyes made this althemore terrible and difficult. She took a seat on the couch and put her hands defeatedly over her face. Booth slid down and sat beside her. Finally, she looked over at him. "When I was nineteen, I started to have a lot of pain. I didn't have any money. No family. No contacts, so I just took a lot of Ibuprofen and that hardly dulled the pain..." Her face cracked and she hid the pain, tucked it away once again. Then she looked back at Booth. "I couldn't see a doctor and I didn't have time, anyhow. I was a full time student--going to school on scholarships and thousands in loans. When I got my first job in a lab, I was twenty-six and I finally saw a doctor--I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner." He reached over and rubbed her back. "They discovered it was endometriosis--something I had suspected by way of independent research. What I'm trying to say is--It may not be possible to have a child, to become pregnant and carry out a pregnancy. It's true that it's possible to become pregnant, but it's also true that I may not--" She made a frustrated gesture with her hand, recrossed her arms and took a few steps away from the couch. She looked back at Booth who was now chuckling a little sardonically and shaking his head. In her defense, she said, "I suppose it was just easier to convince myself that I didn't want something that I knew I couldn't have."

Booth stood up from the couch. He was now smiling and he took her hands in his and kissed her. "I don't care about all of that--"

"Yes you do."

She saw through him just as much as he saw through her, "Yeah... I do," he admitted. "But if that's not in the cards, Bones, then... it's not in the cards. I'm just really glad that we're together... I couldn't ask for more. Nothing more than your company, your friendship, your love. I'm already luckier than most men."

"You know how I feel about luck." She looked down at his hands.

"Then, I'm blessed. You can't measure blessings in a beaker, Bones... but I'm pretty sure that my beaker overfloweth and maketh the teacher pissed."

She rolled her eyes and gave him a bit of a shove. He stumbled back a bit, then grabbed her and spun her back onto the couch and began to kiss her ear lobe. He made it down her neck and half way across her chin before she pushed him off again, "Jared's going to be back from work soon."

"Yeah... that would suck if he caught us--you naked and straddling me... Awkwaaaaaaaaaaaard." He got up from the couch and picked her up, lifting her from where she lay. He carried her to the bedroom where he practically threw her onto the bed.

She grabbed a pillow and chucked it at him. He dodged it. "This isn't the Paleolith, Booth! You can't just throw me over your shoulder whenever you want to assert your dominance. We're not Neanderthals."

Booth made a few monkey-like grunts as he shed his boxers and jumped onto the bed. "I don't know about that, Bones."

He kissed her, then let his tongue trail along her neck and then down... He pulled her shirt off, then continued to her breasts. She pushed him off a bit, "Wait, didn't you have a surprise?"

"That's for later, Bones." He began to kiss her again, this time working toward her navel.

She pushed him off again, "Are you upset with me?"

He shook his head, "You can't be that bad at reading signals, Bones. Do I look upset?"

"Of course not."

"OK, then. Now be quiet so I can make love to you."

She shrugged, "You make such a good argument."

"Just what I thought." He kissed her lips. "I love you, Bones. Nothing can change that."

She wrapped her arms around his neck. "I love you, too."

He grinned, "Enough talk."

He disappeared beneath the sheets and did something that created a shriek of laughter from Brennan. He quickly reappeared and put his hand to her mouth, "Shhh... Damn you're noisy during sex, Bones." He kissed her deeply, letting his hands slide along her body and between her thighs, then behind her back. He pulled her tightly against him. She let out a small gasp as she felt him enter.

"...OK?"

She nodded. She was more than just OK.

He kissed her, "Love you."

When the sun began to break through the curtains, Booth was sound asleep and didn't feel Brennan get out of bed and take a shower.

He walked through the Medico-Legal lab. He walked onto the platform where Brennan was nowhere to be seen. He then began to walk to her office and it seemed that no matter where he went, he was felt like he was being watched.

He spun around on his heels and nearly walked straight into a little girl. Eight. Blue-green eyes. Dark hair.

"Uh... have you seen Dr. Brennan?" The presence of a child in the lab was not as odd as it ought to have been.

The little girl grabbed Booth's forefinger and began to lead him in another direction, up the staircase. "She's upstairs," the child stated.

At the top of the steps, Booth knelt. It had occurred to him in that two-second window that this little girl must belong to someone. "What's your name?"

"Mmmmumanum," the little girl muttered almost inaudibly.

Booth ran his hand over his jaw, "And who's your mom? Or your dad?"

The little girl rolled her eyes, climbed onto the railing and began to balance on it, walking slowly across it like a highwire. "Did you know that the physics of highwire balancing requires an even and low center of gravity combined with the ability to move forward at a constant speed--I'm not sure what the whole wordage of the stuff is, but that's what I've heard..."

Booth reached up his hand to help the girl balance. She let her hand hover just millimeters from his. "Your mom. Who is she?"

The little girl sat on the rail. "My mom wanted to name me after a scientist and my dad wanted to name me after a Flyers goalie. So they combined it. The result is atrocious, but I suppose that's what nicknames are for."

The little girl stood once again.

"Who are your parents?"

"Booth!" She spread her arms. "Booth! Booth!" And with that, she fell backward toward the platform. Booth swiped at her and tried to grab her.

"Booth!"

He opened his eyes, his heart was still beating in his ears.

Brennan walked over, drying her hair with a towel. "What were you dreaming about?"

He shook his head, "Nothing."

A knock at the door echoed to which Brennan said, "Come in."

Jared poked his head in, "Hey, guys..."

"Someone remembered to knock," Booth said.

Jared just laughed and entered the room with Caleb on his shoulder, "Tanya and the baby have appointments today, so we'll be gone most of the day. Then we're swinging by the Lopez's... they have this big Mexican celebration thingy... so..."

Booth nodded. "Go. I think Bones and I can take care of each other."

Jared winked and smiled exaggeratedly, "Of course you can."

Brennan threw her towel at Jared's feet. He shielded the baby, although he was obviously too far from the towel to be hurt, "There's a baby present, Auntie Tempe! You're sick.... just sick. You disgust me." Then he laughed. "Oh, here's the key," he tossed it at Booth who caught it and slapped it to the night stand. "I'll just leave you two to your premarital sex."

Booth rolled his eyes, then got out of bed and put on his boxers. "What time is it?"

"Eleven-thirty. Why?"

"Shit," he cursed as he ran into the bathroom and started the shower. "We've gotta get out of here in the next ten minutes."

She walked into the bathroom and pulled back the curtain, "Where are we going?"

He smiled at her, "Perv."

"I'm not being perverted. You don't think that I can look on your body without being sexually stimulated? You have quite the ego."

He grabbed her arm and looped his fingers under the belt of her robe. It slid to the tile. "Nope. As anthropological as you are, Bones, you're still a woman." Then he kissed her and pulled her into the shower.

Sorry for the wait! Thanks again for all of your reviews! There's a bit of a surprise in the next chapter...