I don't own Bones.
A Year from Today
He had been afraid of what he would be like when he returned. Last time he returned, he had turned to gambling, where the stakes were lower than when he was doing his job, serving his country, saving lives.
...
She had been afraid of what she would be like when she returned. She was afraid she had regressed to cold anthropologist when she wanted to open her heart. She wasn't just a doctorate, a job.
...
Bones had her coffee in her hand.
It had been over a year since she had gone to the reflecting pool.
It had been a year since she had seen Booth.
And here he was now, coming to her, like she knew he would.
Just like he'd promised.
...
Booth observed Bones.
She had a coffee in her hand.
She looked deep in thought, but when she saw him, she smiled.
And he was certain that whatever happened next would change their relationship forever.
...
A perfunctory greeting, a lingering hug and a kiss on the cheek.
Many words to be said, each reluctant to be the one to begin.
But someone had to take that first step.
Someone had to take that gamble.
...
"Rationally, a year isn't that long. But it felt like forever."
"I missed you too."
"Yeah, me too."
"Let's not do that again."
Pause, then,
"Did you find what you were looking for?"
"I've definitely learnt some things while I was away, but what I was looking for wasn't there."
"I know what you mean. I went away with an objective, but my mind always led me somewhere else."
"Officially, we're not partners, or associates, or working together."
"I know. We're just two people, at the reflecting pool, waiting for something, to start, to end, to continue."
Silence.
...
Both wanted to say the same thing, but didn't know how to say it.
It was the elephant in the room which they had thought about for a year.
That had been there for seven years.
...
"I don't want you to think this thing we have, this connection, doesn't mean anything to me."
"I know."
"I'm just afraid of change."
"Don't think that I'm not either."
"It's just that if I say what I think, I can't take it back, and it becomes real."
"I know."
A pregnant pause, then:
"Bones, do you know why I started gambling after my first deployment?"
"I have some idea. But I don't know why you specifically started gambling."
"Civilian life didn't seem real after being deployed. What we had seen, what we had done, what we had been told was incongruent to life at home. Nightmares every night, flashbacks triggered by just about anything, being on my guard all the time, being emotionally unavailable. Post traumatic stress disorder, I was told. I stayed the required time at the vet facility, but then they left me on my own... And all the way through that I was gambling, because nothing felt real. Then I joined the FBI, and I kept gambling, because winning meant I was still here in the world, living."
"And how do you feel now that you're back?"
"I'm at a better place now than I was last time. I have a life here, I have Parker, I have... I have a life outside the military for me to return to."
"I'm glad. I'm glad you're back, and have people... a life here to return to."
Another pause.
"The dig was actually extended for another three months."
"Then why are you back? You could have told me in one of your emails."
"I wanted to come back."
Then,
"I wanted to come back because I had made an important promise..."
"To meet me here in a year's time. Thank you Bones."
Then,
"Will you be going back?"
"Well, the progress we've made in the last twelve months have already shed a lot of light on the evolutionary process, but the facilities available to us in Maluku aren't at all comparable to what is available to us at the Jeffersonian, so there's a lot more work that has be done back here."
"So no?"
"It depends if there's a reason for me to stay or go."
"But were do you want to be?"
...
Is this a test?
What is the right answer?
What will happen if she answers incorrectly?
...
She obfuscates.
"Well, Angela and Jack, and you are back. I haven't seen Dad or Russ and the girls for over a year. I want to sleep on a real mattress. I want to have a hot shower without worrying about how full the tank is. I want to eat and have the organic, vegetarian option. "
"Well, you can do all that and then go back."
...
The truth.
That's what is required.
Are they brave enough to say what they feel?
One takes a gamble.
...
"I want to stay. I don't want to be the leader. I don't want to be the bureaucrat doing paperwork, being in charge of every little problem. I want to be myself. I want to be with my friends, my equals, people who know my limitations and don't expect more than I can give. People who don't look up to me as being the standard as an anthropologist. People who aren't consumed by their career."
"I remember when I first met you, and you were your career. You think you can't change, but you have, Temperance."
"Do you think I should go?"
"I want you to stay. I'm being totally selfish. I want to keep you to myself. I want lots of things from you. I want you. I want your heart. I want you to know that I'll never abandon you and that I'll love you and hold you for as long as I live."
...
There, he had said it.
They were now at the point of no return.
Absolute recklessness.
All heart, thought in neutral.
It's her turn.
...
"Then I'll stay. Because you want me to stay. Because I spent a year looking at my heart, and all I could find was you. I don't understand love like you do. Love to me is a chemical response, but that doesn't make your understanding any less valid."
"What do you see for us, Temperance?"
"I see unconditional friendship. I see physical desire. I see mutual respect. I see a family. I see companionship in thirty, forty, fifty years time. I want these things with you, Booth."
"That's love."
"Then if that's love, then I love you, Seeley, and I want to love you forever."
A long hug.
"You see, you do have an open heart," Booth says into her ear as she feels tears running down her face.
A kiss.
Everything had changed.
.
A/N: Big thank yous to the people who reviewed the first chapter, I'm glad you enjoyed my style of writing.