Brennan thought she had evolved.

She had been captured before. Completely locked away, left for dead, raped, brutally attacked.

Countless times as a teenager, and once a couple of years ago, she was captured physically, stuck. Mentally torn apart, she forced to think of reasons to cope with the inevitable outcome of life- her life, in particular.

Her reasoning was if she was going to die, then why would it matter when?

Temperance thought she had evolved, grown, from her experiences. From the weak, vulnerable, scrawny, teenager she was. The scared, lost girl, that didn't know why her parents were gone.

Never before had she felt so disturbed, depressed, with no reason to live, and no one to miss her, but now. Yes, taking in to consideration the duration of her life.

Never but now.

Now. As her partnership was becoming more and more professional. Now as she was left behind, left to her expectations, to the darkness that was resurfacing, constantly, persistently.

Left to fall.

She realized why she couldn't love- why she couldn't truly, utterly, completely trust anyone with her metaphorical heart.

She had accepted death in that trunk. The one she was locked in for three days, because she had let a plate slip from her fingers. The trunk that she had almost died in- she relived the three days every night, in her dreams. And each time was the small, but heart clenching detail, that she had accepted death.

In fact, she had welcomed it. She couldn't trust him with that knowledge- not anyone. It would reveal her true colors, her reality. The way she tortures herself everyday, would break him, if that were the only excuse.

There was so much more, that she shrived to hide.

They would be too alike, too together. He would never leave. And if he never left, he would prove rational thinking wrong. He would prove insanity right. And without science, without fact, who was she? What could she possibly stand for?

Knowing what she knows about life and death? Knowing what she knows about personal hell, self inflicted mental and physical pain?

She was that scared, lost, girl. The awkward, clumsy, child, that had no control, no independence. She would need him to survive.

If he knew her, every aspect of her, not one detail forgotten?

Who was she without him?

You might argue it was already broken, but it wasn't. No, it was merely crushed. Repeatedly. Perhaps slapped, and sliced.

But it still worked. She could still care, she could still know why she couldn't tell him. She still felt it beating, screaming, for him.

But then she had gotten herself stuck in a car again.

With Hodgins, another life, that wasn't doomed, like hers. Underground, with limited air supply.

And then there was Booth, who Brennan felt was in the car with them the whole way, guiding their genus minds to air, to survival.

And she had relived her experience in the Trunk, again. Expect this time she knew, that Booth would save her. Save her from losing more of her self in this car, save her from suffocating.

And he had, just like she knew he would. She believed in him- in his tendencies.

He was consistent.

Once upon a time, he was her constant.

Not now, not after she pushed him away, ran away.

Not now, as he gets more lost in Hannah, not now, as Brennan can't tell the difference between Booth and Hannah- where one ends, and the other starts.

They seem completely in sync- completely together. Like without the other, they would be lost.

Dear Newton, how Temperance knew the feeling of being lost.

Not knowing who you are? Where you stand? It was practically her life-story.

And now.

Now as Booth loses himself more and more in Hannah, vice versa.

Now as Temperance's soul wishes someone would save her. Save her from her self.

Now as a metallic, rusty, salt smell fills the air around her for the second that week. She closes her eyes, that are red-rimmed, filled with unshed tears.

Now as she's falling back in to old habits, she's losing her self. She's losing what she stands for.

She's losing why, and she hasn't questioned why is a damn while.