I don't own Bones...but this shouldn't surprise anyone.

Thanks once again to AvaniHeath for checking this out and giving me feedback!

He doesn't know how long he is standing in the nursery, holding Christine, but he notices at some point that his tears have been replaced with sheer exhaustion. Not wanting to be parted from her for even one night, he gathers up Christine and her blankets and takes her to the guest room. Pausing in the doorway, he contemplates if he will sleep in his makeshift room, or if tonight is the night he returns to their room. To him, the guest room represents where his life is now, but he doesn't know if he can bring himself to sleep in their bed without her resting in his arms. Looking down at his daughter-this little person who almost completes him. This little person who is equal parts him and her mother. He decides he's going back to their room tonight. As he readies for bed, he can't help but stare at his daughter, who lies peacefully in the middle of her parent's bed in a nest of blankets and pillows. He isn't quite sure how she got to him, but he's happy just the same. Once he's brushed his teeth, he climbs into bed, staring at his daughter, wishing and praying that her mother was there with them. Before he realizes it, he drifts into a peaceful sleep himself, dreaming of a time when father, daughter and mother can be together again.

Somewhere not quite so far away, there is another father keeping watch over his sleeping daughter. This daughter is not sleeping peacefully; in fact she is barely sleeping at all. She is in her bed, under her blankets, trying in vain to keep her tears at bay. Finally, Max can take no more and goes to her. Without words, he gathers her into his arms and just holds her as she cries. Even if he wanted to, what would he say to her? Brennan takes comfort in the fact that her father has been here before. He's comforted another mother when she had to leave her daughter. And while he knows both women did what they did out of love for their daughters, that doesn't make the pain they feel any better. And so, he holds her until eventually her sobs reduce to quiet whimpering, and her breaths even out and slow down, and he hopes that she can find some measure of peace in her dreams tonight. Though she would tell him he had no way of knowing this, he assumes she's dreaming of a time when she is once again under the same roof as her daughter; only instead of sleeping alone, she'll find herself wrapped in the arms of the man who knows her best, misses her best, and loves her best of all.