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Chapter 3.
"What d'you need all this money for anyway?" Booth complained as they sat at his kitchen table the next evening with his Algebra books spread between them.
His parents had gone out to dinner, and his brother was on a date, so it was just the two of them alone in the house.
If he was someone that she was actually interested in, Tempe might have been nervous, but as it was she just wanted to get their first session over with so that she could pocket her money and go home.
"New car?" He grinned, lowering his voice as he leaned towards her. "Boob job?"
Her eyes went down to her chest, inspecting it critically, afraid that his words had some hidden meaning, until she realised that he was just teasing her. "My breasts are just fine, thank you," she retorted, glaring at him, to keep him from noticing on how hot her face was all of a sudden when she caught him looking at them too.
"And that is none of your business," she finished before he could press the issue about what she intended to do with the money. He wouldn't understand, not with his perfect house and his perfect parents and his perfect life. "Now can we please just get back to work? I'd like to be home before midnight."
He chuckled, and she could feel herself growing even more flustered as he said, "You are such a square."
"I am not!" To prove him wrong, she racked her brains for an instance when she'd taken a risk and done something that could be considered impulsive, lighting up with excitement as she hit on a memory. "There was this one time in Chicago that I cut gym because the Field Museum of Natural History had this fascinating display on the basketry of the Baniwa Indian tribe of South America—"
His brows lifted, the corners of his lips quirking into an incredulous smile. "You skipped school to go look at baskets? Like I said, square."
He was making fun of her. She should have known better than to try to reach out to someone like him. "Fine," she insisted, shooting him a wounded glance as she returned to the task of setting problems for him. "Next time I won't share my story with you."
After that, she didn't speak to him again except to direct him, until he dropped with pen with an exasperated sigh.
"Okay, I'm sorry, Temperance," he said, and she could tell that he wasn't quite being sincere. It wasn't that he really cared about having her forgiveness: he just didn't like knowing that she wasn't under his spell, like all of the other girls that they went to school with. "Is it okay if I call you that?" he checked, still trying to cover his smirk. "What kind of name is that anyway?"
"It means 'moderation'," she told him without glancing up as she went over his answers, taking an inordinate amount of glee out filling the page with red crosses. At least there was one thing that he wasn't good at.
And he could talk. What kind of name was 'Seeley'?
"Is that why you're such a killjoy?" he teased her, frowning, when he saw this, rocking back in his chair with his hands behind his head. "You know, your parents must have had quite a sense of humour."
She felt her whole body stiffen at the mention of her parents. Why did he have to go there? "My parents are dead," she told him, setting her jaw, keeping her expression blank. The truth was that she would probably never know what happened to them. "Thank you for reminding me."
He fell silent, returning the legs of his chair to the ground, averting his eyes to the page to avoid looking at her.
The next time he spoke, his voice was soft, apologetic. "I really put my foot in it back there, didn't I?" he said.
She could feel tears burning her eyes. She turned her head, willing herself not to cry in front of him. The last thing she wanted was his sympathy, to be known as the poor, lonely orphan girl at school. "Can we please not talk about this?"
He seemed to understand this, because he nodded. "Okay," he agreed.
She took a deep breath to compose herself, then closed his Algebra book and opened a new one instead. "Why don't we work on biology?" she told him, deciding that this might be easier for him to grasp, since it wasn't all math.
"So these Benniwah Indians—" he began, and she looked up, surprised. He hadn't seemed that interested before.
"Baniwa, and would it be correct to assume that you're not actually interested in learning this stuff since you keep changing the subject?" she asked, fixing him with a no nonsense look.
If he wasn't serious, then there was no sense in her trying to teach him. He might as well just keep his money.
He shifted uncomfortably, fidgeting with his pen. "I just thought we could have a conversation, you know, like… people."
She searched his expression for any indication that this was another joke at her expense, but when she didn't find any, she allowed him a tiny smile.
"Okay," she agreed, relaxing as she set her down pen down. She missed having someone to talk to, family… a friend… "What about?"
"So these… Indians," he repeated. "Are they just a hobby of yours?"
"No, if you must know, that's what I intend to study at college," she confessed, folding her arms in what was a defensive posture, reluctant to volunteer any more personal information than she already had. He knew more than he should about her, more than she'd wanted him to. "I'm going to be a forensic anthropologist."
She could see by his blank look that he had no idea what she was talking about.
"You lost me," he admitted, his brow furrowing in concentration as he considered this, making him look like a little boy. "So they, like, dig things up?"
"That's archaeologists," she corrected him with a wry grin. He was kind of cute when he wasn't trying to show off. "Forensic anthropologists are scientists who are called in to identify remains if they're burnt or badly decomposed, or otherwise unrecognisable," she explained.
"Bones," she finished when his confused expression changed only slightly.
"Bones, huh?" he echoed, latching onto this detail.
She smiled, pleased to see that he was finally catching on. "Exactly."
He smiled in return, turning the book so that he could read it. "So, Bones, how do we do this…?"
Chapter 4: What does Booth think of this new information? ;)