Booth looked at the small pile of clothes laying on the cold tile floor of his partner's spare bathroom. He wasn't prepared for the onslaught of emotions he felt in seeing the only pieces of clothing - of anything - he now owned. He could effectively put his life in a Wal-Mart sack. She had been mostly right, all the suites, ties, stripy socks and 'cocky' belt buckles could be replaced. It wasn't that. It was the memories those items held.
Before, her 'for company' bathroom was just that; a home away from home. Two years ago, before everything turned to shit he supposed and all his belongings went into the garbage, he had kept a spare toothbrush there, a shave kit, even extra socks. Now it felt a little more sterile; generic. All the brands where mirror images of everything she kept for her own personal use down to the triple ply toilet paper. But the towels were soft and the water warm and he remembered this wasn't an un-named hotel, this was Bones' place and she did want him here.
He found her in the kitchen later redressed in a pair of linen pants and tee. He almost hated it when she dressed down. The clothes fit her better than any thousand dollar gown ever thought of doing.
"Hey," she greeted him as he approached. "Feeling a bit better?"
"Yeah I suppose," he replied. He pulled open the refridgerator door and eyed the carton of orange juice sitting on the top shelf. "Mind if I get a drink?"
"Of course not. Help yourself."
"Thanks." He poured himself a healthy glass as he offered her one then put it back and joined her at the bar.
"What's all this?" he asked looking over her shoulder.
"I wasn't sure what kind of help you wanted," she told him. "But I felt the need to offer something-"
"-Bones you opened your home, that's enough," he assured her.
"Besides that." She slid a list in front of him. "A rundown of all the people you're going to need to contact. Insurance agencies - you possessed renter's insurance?"
"Of course."
"Right. Well, insurance agencies, credit card companies, your bank, etc." She hung her hands cutely. "I wasn't sure if you would remember all of them."
"No, thanks." He scanned the list. Some of them he wouldn't have remembered. The credit cards were a given but his life insurance, he hadn't given it a second thought.
"You'll need copies to have for your records," he explained seeing where his eyes were lingering. "Bank statements, policies, tax forms."
"Fuck," he sighed under his breath. "Sorry Bones," he quickly apologized for his harsh language.
"No I think that definitely describes it," she laughed softly. "But none of that has to be done now, well except for the credit cards. Someone might find them and try to use them. None of the rest of the businesses will be open on a Saturday."
"Right," he sighed again. "There's only three, including my debit card. Visa's." He took the handset on the counter and dialed the number on the top of the yellow legal pad written in her neat hand writing. "Where'd you get these numbers?" he asked listening to the ring then the automated system come on.
"The backs of my own cards. I knew you had a Visa card and we bank at the same location, plus you don't want to keep a lot of open credit in case for felt the overwhelming need to…"
"Gamble," he filled in. She nodded slightly diverting her eyes to the tiled countertop. He hated that she knew him so damn well.
.
.
Three cancelled cards later Booth was exhausted. The shower and, as Brennan pointed out, the adrenalin of the morning had finally wore off he was barely able to keep his eyes open.
"Booth, there's nothing pressing that needs done now." She refilled his orange juice as she helped herself to a yogurt in the fridge. "You should try and get some rest."
"Yeah I know. I don't know if I can sleep though," he admitted. "It's when I close my eyes and try to relax my mind I hear the alarms again and smell the smoke. Then I start to think about if I hadn't made it."
She nodded in understanding. Scooping some soft pink yogurt into her mouth she swallowed before speaking. "But you did make it, that is what's important."
"Yes. Thank God for that." He waited for her to say something more along the lines of thank evolution for the ability to walk upright and get his ass down the stairs but it never came. She only dropped her cup into the trash then went to her bedroom coming back a minute later with a prescription bottle in her hand.
"Normally I wouldn't do this," she explained opening up the bottle and dropping a small, round pill in her hand. "It's to help you sleep."
"What is it?" he asked examining it when she placed it in his open palm.
"Ambien."
"Where did you get them?"
"The pharmacy but I'm assuming your question was meant to be who prescribed them?"
"Sure. Yeah." He turned the pill over in his hand.
"Sweets."
He looked at her. "Sweets wrote you a script for Ambien? Why?"
"I have occasional insomnia. It stems from a lot of things, mostly nightmares, but that's not the point. The point is I'm certain this one time sharing my medicine with you will not bring you harm." She watched him study the pill in his hand thoughtfully. "You don't want to take it?"
"No it's not that. Why didn't you tell me you were still having nightmares?"
She slumped her shoulders as she sighed. "Booth it is not a big deal. And besides, I haven't had one in a long time."
"Well that can't be entirely true because the bottle has a lot in it so the script has to be fairly new. So you're either having nightmares or you aren't, which is it?"
She slid his juice glass in front of him with more force than necessary. "Will you just take the damn pill?"
"Why won't you just tell me," he insisted.
"No. I'm not having nightmares. There. Now take the pill and go lie down."
"I'll take it when you tell me why you went to Sweets in the first place. It must have been bad enough for you to worry if you went to him instead of your normal doctor. And I know him well enough he wouldn't give them to you unless he really thought you needed them. Believe me, I know he doesn't just sign his name to anything."
"You asked him to write you a prescription for something?"
"What? No. That's not the point I'm just saying he doesn't just whip out the ol' prescription pad for nothing. Is there something wrong with you?" He heard how it sounded as the words left his mouth. "And I mean that in the nicest way possible."
"There are plenty of things wrong with me," she answered sarcastically.
"Will you just answer me?"
She stood firm. "Did you ask him to write you a prescription for Viagra?"
"What? Are you nuts?" He stood up from the counter and took his glass to the sink. "Where the hell did you come up with that?"
"Statistically speaking, Viagra is the number one drug for men your age. Are you suffering from erectile dysfuntion?"
Again with the penises.
"Men my age? Just how old do you think I am?" he nearly shouted from across the kitchen. He definitely needed some space for this conversation. "I did not ask Sweets for anything, okay? Let's just drop it." He tossed the Ambien in his mouth and dry swallowed it. "See I took it." He yawned widely. "I think I am tired, I'll go lay down now." He quickly walked past her and down the hall.
"Booth if you think you need-"
"-Night Bones!" He effectively cut off the conversation with the bedroom door.
.
.
"I guess I'm confused," she told Angela. "Smell these." She held out some strawberries from her.
Angela inhaled them closing her eyes to the sweet fresh smell of the fruit in front of her. "Hmm, yummy. Grab me some too." She took the small basket from her friend and put them in her bag. "What are you confused about? It's obvious he can't raise the flag pole." She sighed sadly," which really is very depressing. Do you think it's always been like that?"
"I know for a fact it hasn't," Brennan confirmed moving down to the next vendor. The farmer's market wasn't crowded yet and the women had choice of the vast variety of fresh fruits, vegetables and flowers in front of them. "Maybe something happened in the desert."
"Or Hannah made it receed," Angela offered.
"Angela be nice," Brennan chastised with a feminine giggle. "You think?"
"Who knows," she shrugged. "So how's he doing?"
"When I left he was snoring loud enough to break glass." She dropped several large lemons into a plastic sack then onto a scale. "He's upset which is to be suspected."
"Oh course he is Bren, his home burned down," Angela pointed out. "I'd be devastated. He's lost everything. I got these." She handed the vendor the money for their purchases. "He's going to have to start over from scratch. Think about that for a second. Not just buying new shoes, but everything. Shoes, socks, shampoo, silverware, potholders, razors, moth balls. It's exhausting just thinking about it. Not to mention that fact that we are very fortunate Bren that if something like that were to happen to us we'd just go and replace everything. Does Booth have that ability? I know he makes good money but he did just buy an engagement ring plus he pays child support. Can he afford to start over?" She stopped and looked back when she noticed Brennan wasn't beside her anymore. "What's wrong sweetie?"
"Those things didn't occur to me. I feel I've behaved like such a bitch."
"Well I wouldn't go that far Bren," Angela soothed with a gentle shoulder squeeze.
"Seriously Angela, I showed up after he called me and I made fun of his things. I said I would buy him new stuff, better stuff. I basically told him that it didn't matter because they were just material items. I feel horrible."
Angela frowned. "I'm sure Booth didn't take it that way."
"Yes he did."
"Oh…well I'm sure he forgives you."
"That makes me feel worse," she admitted. "I didn't even think about him not being able to replace everything all at once. I told him I would give him the money…I didn't even think about him paying me back."
"Booth isn't like that sweetie. You know he hates debt of any kind."
"I know. I've been very foolish. I've been so consumed by my anger and fear that I forgot that this must be very hard for him." She gathered all her bags together quickly. "Angela I hate to leave after I promised the afternoon but I feel I need to go back and make things right with him."
"Of course sweetie, go." She gave her friend a quick hug. "But wait, didn't you give him something to sleep?"
"Yes," Brennan called back over her shoulder as she hurried to her car. "But I have a couple stops to make first!"
"Bye then!" Angela waved as Brennan drove away. "Good luck!"
.
Brennan made three stops in all before she got back to her apartment. She had to make two trips with all her bags but she felt confident she had made the right decision when she began unloading her purchases on the kitchen counters.
.
Booth lay awake for along time listening to the sounds of the apartment around him. He could hear neighbors above and below him going about their days; their lives. Irrationally, it made him angry. He felt anger that they had Tvs to watch, food to prepare, laundry to fold and air conditioning to control. He felt anger that these people hadn't stopped their lives because that's what had happened to his. His life had stopped in a spark of a fire. But he knew these feelings would pass and he would have to adjust to fact he was starting over, yet again. He started over when Bones rejected him. He started over with Hannah. He started over without Hannah. And now he was just plain starting over.
He padded softly down the hall and into the living room where his partner was sorting laundry out on the couch and coffee table.
Couldn't she do that somewhere else?
"Hey," he greeted her in passing to the kitchen. He needed something loaded with sugar.
"Hi," she replied leaving her pile and joining him in the kitchen. "Did you sleep well?"
"Yeah, surprisingly. I'm gonna have to get me some of that Ambien." He opened up another cabinet. "Don't you have anything in here with no nutritional value?"
"Sorry, no."
"Figures," he huffed shutting the cabinet and going to the fridge. "What have you been doing?" He spotted a root beer in the back. Damn. Diet.
"Bones I have got to teach you about junk food. There's nothing in here even capable of getting fat on." He compromised on a peanut butter and banana sandwich. She watched him smear a thick line of peanut butter on both slices of bread then cut the banana into chunks then push it into the bread.
"Want a bite?" he offered before digging in.
"No thank you," she said quickly with a head shake. "I was thinking maybe we could go to the supermarket later and purchase some groceries. I know food is an important part of feeling at home. I want you to have that."
"Agreed," he said with his mouth full. "This place needs some Oreos."
"Angela prefers the Double Stuf."
"Definitely."
His eyes finally able to see anything other than sustenance he noticed the entire men's line from Wal-greens lining her countertops.
"What's," swallow," all this?"
"Well," she passed her hand over the items," I thought you might want some of these items seeing as yours are gone."
"You think I use that much stuff?"
He could have swore he saw her blush before she spoke. "I wasn't sure what scent you wanted." He tilted his head to the side slightly and she continued. "Pre and post Hannah that is. Less…cologney, although that's not a word."
He shouldn't have been surprised she noticed things like that. "I guess it really doesn't matter Bones. Whatever is fine."
"Well I liked this one." She slid a silver and blue plastic bottle in front of him for inspection. "But you should choose whatever you want. I also purchased several razors, reasoning Hannah wouldn't have a problem with razor selection." She held one up. "Are you aware this vibrates?"
He chuckled at her obvious giddiness in choosing his razor selection. "No Bones, I didn't know that."
"Also I purchased deoderant, shampoo - I know how you get itchy scalp - toothpaste with a bubble gum flavor, do you know how hard it is to find that? Hair gel, q-tips with the cotton stick and not the plastic, after shave and mouth wash. Did I forget anything?"
"Bones there's like," he quickly counted and calculated," two hundred dollars worth of crap here. I don't need all this, I won't use it all in a lifetime. You should have just gotten whatever was cheapest."
"No," she said crinkling her nose. "The cheap stuff is just that, cheap and it's nothing but water and dyes. Look at this." She opened a can of shave cream. "It comes out a gel but when you rub it between your fingers it's a foam."
"It's a miracle," he told her with a heavy eye roll.
Her face fell and she put distance between the two of them. He hadn't meant to hurt her feelings but all of this was a little overwhelming.
"I'm sorry Bones," he said rubbing his hands over his face and hair. "I shouldn't be like this. Thank you, really, for going and getting this stuff. It's just hard to believe I have to buy all this over again. And I know you are just trying to help me. It's going to take me time to adjust to the new setting and the fact I'm homeless and without anything."
"But you aren't homeless," she corrected quietly.
"Sure I am Bones. It burned down."
"No I mean this can be your home. Here. I know it doesn't feel like that now but I'm willing to do whatever you need to make it feel that way."
Her generosity overwhelmed him. Obviously she was still hurting, but so was he. Maybe together they could heal. Maybe together, this time, things could be different for them.
"Thank you," he told her.
"You're welcome," she replied shyly.
"Show me that miracle foam again."