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Under the Rain
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Water poured down, slid off buildings, gathered on floors, sloshed onto shoes, and ran down skin and clothing. The night was cold, and the rain was icy, and the wind whipped her clothing as she looked up to the sky, exhaled with a great cloud of gray, and closed her eyes.
Wind boomed against buildings and small plants with a hollow roar. There was no thunder, nor any lightning—at least not yet—but the rain made up for it in its violence. It came down hard and fast, thick. Lights below and around blurred to them, and they flickered in and out of focus, shimmering as water ran down their frames and poured in sheets in front of their beams.
"Bones!" a voice bellowed over the rain, and the wind boomed again in response. She smiled, feeling surprisingly warm under both of her coats and her sweater. "Bones!"
She turned, her hands, almost numb, curled around the railing. "Hey," she said. Her voice was level, and she wondered vaguely if her partner had heard her or if the wind had taken her words and carried them far away from the Jeffersonian's roof.
He moved closer to her, and he was tucked very far into his coat, his hands buried in the folds of the fabric. Light back-lit him, and only one side of his face was even reasonably well lit. A folded umbrella waved about at his side, for it was useless at this juncture, and she smiled in a way that must have looked slightly nutty to him, for he moved even closer until they were both at the railing.
"What are you doing out here?" he said, his voice loud, but not quite a shout.
She shrugged, "Feels good, doesn't it?"
"No. No, it doesn't."
"Haven't you ever just stood and watched the rain, Booth?"
"Yeah, maybe from inside a building or something."
"That doesn't count," she scoffed, but she doubted he heard her. "It feels wonderful."
"You feeling okay?" he eyed her with concern and she crinkled her eyebrows.
"Oh, right, there's that opinion that people who stand out in the middle of the rain are depressed or something to that effect."
"And are you?"
"No." She shook her head. "In fact, I'm a little exhilarated."
A hand slipped from his coat and he pressed it to her forehead.
"No fever," he said.
"I'm not sick!" she protested.
"Jeez, Bones," he said and ignored her, touching her hand. "You're freezing. Come inside already."
"The rest of my body feels quite warm," she said.
In response, he touched her forehead again.
She removed his hand. "I'm fine."
He eyed her. "Then why are you standing out here like a woman possessed?"
She shrugged, "It was hot inside."
"Bones, it's forty degrees outside, and in there it's only about sixty or seventy."
She lifted her shoulders again, feeling water stream down the creases of her clothing.
"Hormonal?"
She scoffed.
"PMSing?"
Her eyebrows knit together.
"What, do you have a space heater stored under that coat?"
"No," she shook her head. "But I am wearing layers."
"Well, I'm freezing, Bones."
"Then go inside."
"I'm larger than you. I should be warmer."
"Well, perhaps you're not wearing as many well-fitted articles of clothing on your person."
"I could be wearing a thousand and still not be warm in this weather."
"Then you would look like a blimp and would have a lot of trouble getting around," she grinned wolfishly at him, knowing he would be irritated by her literal answer.
He exhaled in a cloud of silver.
"Come on, Booth," she said and yanked the cloth covering his arms—for she couldn't find his hands—over to the railing. "Watch the rain with me."
"We're doing more than watching, Bones."
"Fine. Take a shower with me in the rain."
"Why?"
"Why not?"
He shook his head. "Fine. But only for a little while."
"Fair enough."
"And then we go back inside."
"Alright."
Shaking his head, he leaned against the railing as the first crack of thunder lit the sky.
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