Disclaimer: I unfortunately do not own Brennan or Booth but I do own the kids though.
"Bridget! Pick up your clothes now! Our living room is not a closet!" Temperance yelled from the bottom of the stairs.
But there was no response. Bridget was consciously ignoring her aunt. Then again Temperance wasn't surprised. For the three months that Bridget had lived with her she had ignored her aunt for the most part. Temperance didn't know what to do with her. All of the other kids simply loved her but Bridget stayed away. Did she blame her aunt for her father's death? Was she simply going through withdrawal because her parents had died? Many times Temperance had tried to get her to open up, talking about she herself had felt after her parents had disappeared but nothing had work. Bridget was simply being passive-agressive.
She heard Booth coming behind her.
"Still no luck?" he asked her even though he knew the answer.
"No. I don't get why she won't at least pick up her clothes. It's not like I'm being unreasonable."
"She's a teenager, Tempe. Of course she thinks you're being unreasonable." Booth replied, grabbing her by the waist and pulling her to him.
"Where are the others?" Brennan asked her boyfriend after kissing for several seconds.
"Elena's in the basement drawing and the boys are out back playing some game. So maybe we could do some playing ourselves too. What do you say?"
Booth leaned in to kiss her again but Brennan pulled away.
"Bridget is upstairs." She stated.
"Are you trying to excuse yourself out of having sex with me?"
"Perhaps." Brennan replied giving him a quick peck.
Booth nodded and let go of his girlfriend.
"You're so mean."
"I know." Brennan replied before walking off to the living room to pick up her niece's clothes.
"Nathan! Get off the coffee table now!" Brennan ordered her nephew for the fifth time in an hour.
"But the carpet is water! If I step in it, I'll drown." Nathan whined also for the fifth time in an hour.
"This is ridiculous, Nate! Come on. Off the coffee table!"
Nathan pouted but nonetheless he obeyed to his aunt.
"You're no fun." He mumbled before stomping away to his bedroom.
Hurt, Brennan listened to the sound of the footsteps above her head and heard the bedroom door slam shut. She stayed a few moments standing alone in the living room, somewhat heartbroken. Could she do this? Was she really made to be a mother? Maybe she could send the kids back to California to live with their other aunt. She knew that the woman would be more than happy to take care of them.
Turning around she noticed Booth standing not too far away. She immediately built her wall back up.
"How hard is it! No standing on the furniture!"
Booth smiled at her sympathetically but Brennan took no notice of it.
"Elena! No jumping on the bed! You'll hurt yourself." Brennan warned her niece as she walked in her room with a basket of clean laundry. "Help me put these away."
"No." Elena replied, jumping up and down on her bed.
"Yes." Brennan added. "Come on. Quit jumping and help me out."
"No. I don't wanna."
Brennan's face turned red and she felt a headache starting.
"Sit!" she barked at her niece.
Elena stopped jumping and sat down on the edge of her bed, feet dangling off of it.
"Thank you." Temperance then said. "Now can you help me put your clothes away?"
She had asked a little nicer this time but Elena simply crossed her arms in front of her and turned her back to her aunt.
"No."
Temperance sighed exasperatedely, took the clean clothes out of the basket and set them on the bed. She then left Elena pouting in her room.
In the hallway she bumped into Booth who was coming out of Nathan's room.
"Did you just snap at your niece?" he asked her, surprised.
"What? She could have gotten hurt." Brennan replied, walking off to her own room.
What was wrong with everybody today? Why was everybody against her?
"Corey I am telling you one last time! Do not talk back to me!"
"I'll talk back to you if I want. I have the freedom of speech." Corey snapped back.
The fight had been going on for a good ten minutes after Brennan had caught Corey stealing some money in his older sister's room.
"Yeah and I have the freedom of grounding you!"
"You wish but you're not going to."
"You think so? Just watch me. Corey, you're grounded for a week. No TV, no video games, no computer."
"YeahOK Aunt Temperance." Corey said, rolling his eyes and walking away from his aunt.
"I'm serious, Corey."
"Whatever!" she heard him reply from the living room.
Seconds later, Corey was turning on the TV and flipping the channels. Tears shot up to Temperance's eyes. She wouldn't be able to do this.
It was a bit past dinner time and Temperance was laying down on her bed. She had a pounding headache and even the three tylenols she had taken had had no effect on her whatsoever.
All day she had fought with the kids, forcing them into doing their homework or cleaning up after themselves or simply not standing on the furniture but they hadn't listened. She didn't know why they had acted like that. Everything had gone great over the summer but ever since school had started things had gone downhill. She found herself missing her old life and even wished she could go back to working twenty hours a day.
She closed her eyes, thinking that maybe it would help her headache. Everything was quiet. She didn't know what the kids were doing and truthfully she didn't want to know. This was so nice. Maybe she could take a small nap before bath time. She desperately needed the sl...
"GET OUT OF MY ROOM YOU LITTLE BRAT!"
Temperance's open flew open.
What the...? She thought to herself.
"WHAT WE'RE YOU DOING IN MY ROOM? ARGH! YOU'RE THE ONE WHO'S BEEN STEALING MY MONEY, AREN'T YOU?"
"I DIDN'T STEAL ANYTHING FROM YOU!"
"YOU'RE LYING, YOU LITTLE THIEF. NOW GET THE HELL OUT OF MY ROOM!"
"NO!"
"HEY DON'T PUSH ME!" another voice said.
"I'LL PUSH YOU IF I WANT. YOU'RE MY LITTLE BROTHER, THAT'S WHAT YOU'RE FOR!"
"I'M TELLING."
"I'M TELLING." Corey mocked his brother.
"AUNT TEMPERANCE!" cried two voices at the same time.
Temperance groaned loudly before getting up and going out in the hallway to see what all the comottion was about.
As soon as she stepped out of her room, the three kids ran to her and, all at the same time, told her about what had happened. Temperance could hear three different versions of the story and her headache grew worst, if that was even possible. Soon she felt herself being drowned by the all the noise. The kids had stopped talking to her and were now arguing between themselves. She wanted to do something to stop all the madness but she couldn't. She listened to them argue, fighting the tears that were pushing to fall. Her headache grew worse and worse to the point when she thought her head would explode.
Suddenly a cry ripped the already tensed air and reached all of their ears. On cue they all stopped arguing. Seconds later, a very bleeding Elena emerged from her room. Temperance felt panic running through her. What had happened?
"What happened?" she asked her niece as she ran up to her. "Here come with me."
She led the six-year-old in the bathroom, took out a cloth and turned on the water. She tried washing the cut but it just kept on bleeding. Panicking she called Booth. She knew she shouldn't have lost her cool, this would only make the child even more scared, but with everything that had happened that day she just hadn't known what to do anymore.
Booth came running upstairs. He had heard the fighting and the screaming but he had decided to let Brennan take care of it. Hearing her call him in her panicked voice had had him fearing the worst as he climbed the stairs two by two.
"What happened?" he asked the kids in the hallway.
"It's Elena. Her head is bleeding." Corey replied.
Booth then ran to the bathroom. His eyes immediately fell on his girlfriend. She looked completely panicked.
"Lost your cool there Bones?" he asked her.
"It's not the time for this. It won't stop bleeding." She replied, pointing at her niece's forehead.
Booth tried everything he could do to stop bleeding but it was useless.
"Bring her to the hospital. She'll probably need stitches."
Elena let out a frightened cry.
"It's OK Elena. Everything will be just fine." Booth told her. "Just let me put this bandage on so you don't bleed on yourself on your way to the hospital."
Minutes later Brennan was driving off to the hospital.
"I was jumping on my bed." A small voice said from the backseat, filled with remorse. "You told me not to but I did it anyway because I was mad. I hit my head on my bedside table."
"It's OK, Lena. Just don't do it again, promise?"
"Promise."
Brennan looked at the child in her mirror and she felt guilty. Had she handled the situation better maybe Elena wouldn't have gotten hurt. She wouldn't have gotten stitches tonight and wouldn't have to wake up, the next morning, with a monstruous headache.
No, you can't blame yourself, Brennan. It wasn't your fault. A voice said inside of her and deep down she knew that it was right.
The rest of the drive was quiet and when Brennan pulled in the driveway to her new house, Elena was fast asleep on the backseat.
Brennan turned off the ignition, got out and went to the passenger side. She opened the door, unbuckled Elena's seatbelt and picked up the child, careful not to hit the child's head in the process. She then carried her niece to the house, up the stairs and into her bedroom. She laid the child down, tucked her in and left the room.
Everything was quiet. Nathan and Corey were asleep and Bridget was quietly playing a game on the computer. Booth was watching TV and Brennan joined him.
"Rough day huh?" Booth said as Brennan cuddled against him.
"You have no idea."
Booth brushed his lips against her forehead and she sighed happily.
"You know, Bridget is going to go to bed pretty soon. Maybe you and I should..."
Brennan looked up to her boyfriend and smiled mischiveously.
"I don't think I can wait that long. But the basement bedroom looks pretty sound proof."
"That's good enough for me." Booth said as he got up and helped his girlfriend up, scooping her in his arms as he did so.
Rough day for Brennan, huh!