The Snapshot In The Expecting.
A/N: Booth and Brennan discuss their childhoods and their experiences in relation to how exactly this will affect the way they raise their child. Prompted by a session with Sweets. Very dialogue heavy, but it's kinda to be expected when Booth and Brennan are discussing their past. Please stick with me. :D
Chapter Eight:
Brennan sits in her office waiting for something to happen in the lab when Booth knocks on her door.
"Hey, Bones. You ready to see Sweets?"
"Yes. Do you want to leave now?"
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"Thanks for coming guys."
"We didn't have a choice. You said for us to continue working together we had to come see you again on a regular basis."
"Well, either way, the recent changes in your personal relationship need to be addressed before I can let you work together again."
"What exactly do you mean?"
"Come on! You have both said in the past you were interested in a relationship with each other and now you're not only in a relationship but also expecting a baby together. You don't see why you'd have to come see me?"
"Fine. Sweets, say what you want to say."
"I think, to effectively raise a child together and have a stable relationship, you need to address issues to do with the past year and both your childhoods. It is my interpretation that you will both choose to raise the child together in a stable home environment and I think this would be bettered if you were both to address what happened in your childhoods. Both of you suffered traumatic experiences and I think these need to be dealt with before the baby is born."
"Stop. Just stop right there, Sweets. I respect you wanting us to talk about stuff that happened when we were kids, but you need to stop. Bones and I are fine. We'll have no problem raising this baby because, if you're forgetting, I have a son and I have experience in raising a kid."
"Agent Booth, I understand your reluctance to discuss this with me, but I am only suggesting you discuss this. I'm not saying you need to talk to me about it. I am only asking that the both of you sort this stuff out for the sake of your child. A child benefits from a home environment where the parents' issues have been discussed and are on the same page in that matter."
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Booth and Brennan are sitting at home that night, well at Booth's apartment, and both are thinking about what Booth said earlier that day.
"I think we should talk about this year, Booth."
"What?"
"Sweets was right. We need to talk about everything if our child is going to be, as you would put it, somewhat normal."
"Bones, you don't have to worry. I understand. I know what happened and I know we hurt each other, but this is only going to make us upset. It's all okay, Bones."
"No, Booth. I want to talk about it. I find there are still some things I need to say to you."
"You're not having second thoughts, are you?"
"No! No, I'm not. I just… I feel we need to talk about the rhinoceros in the attic."
"Elephant in the room, Bones. Elephant in the room. I know what elephant you're talking about too. You want to discuss… Hannah."
"Yes. I found that while I was happy for you, I was also jealous and angry and upset."
"Angry?"
"Yes, I was angry at myself because seeing you with Hannah and the way you were with her made me look at myself and my actions objectively. I saw what I could have had and it made me realise I made a big mistake by saying no. I knew how I felt about you, but I didn't want to risk loosing you altogether. I don't think I could have survived that. I still don't sometimes." Brennan leans across and takes Booth's hand as she looks into his eyes and says, "You mean so much to me that if you were to suddenly leave me, I don't think I'd be able to face living without you. Especially now."
"Bones", Booth says as he places a hand on her cheek, "I would never leave you. You or the baby. I'm in, Bones. I'm in. For good."
They both lean across and kiss gently as Brennan rests her head against Booth's chest.
"And for the record, I never stopped loving you. I was just trying to deny what I have known for years. I was trying not to hurt anyone, but it seems that a lot of people got hurt. But I will never leave you, Temperance. Never."
"I want to talk about my childhood."
"I know, Bones. And whenever you're ready, I'll be here to listen."
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About a week and a half later, Booth and Brennan sit down to dinner at her apartment and Brennan starts the conversation.
"Booth, I want to talk to you about my childhood. I know we haven't been able to because of this last case, but I'm ready."
"Oh. Okay, Bones. Go ahead. I'm listening. I'm here."
"Well, you know about my parents leaving and me going into foster care, obviously. But, I've never told you about what happened while I was there. I was abused. Verbally and physically. Most of the foster parents had long hours at their work and often didn't have kids of their own. So that left me to do the chores their children would have done. One time, I dropped a dish and it broke. My foster father… he hit me and ended up breaking a few of my ribs." Brennan points to the ribs he broke and Booth's gentle hand follows in the shadow of hers as she continues. "He ended up locking me inside the boot of a car for two days. I stayed with that family for only a matter of 8 months."
"What did he do to you in that time?"
"When I left there, I had sustained a few broken ribs and fractured arms and legs."
"All that in only 8 months?"
(A/N: I'm going on the assumption that Brennan is born late in the year and that she was in foster care from almost 16 to 18. Back to the story!)
"Yes. I turned 16 at that house and 17 at the new house. That family was nice. Mr and Mrs Robbins had a son a few years younger than I, but he would always be hostile towards me. I never understood why. I was there the longest out of all my foster homes."
"How long were you there?"
"About 16 months. I was at the Andrews' for 8 months, the Robbins' for 16 months and then the Waldron's until I went to college when I was 18, so for about 3 months after that. Mr Robbins was a nice man, but he ended up loosing his job about 9 months into me living there and he beat me regularly until I was moved."
"How bad did it get?"
"Once, he… he… he tried to rape me." Brennan says as she breaks down in tears in Booth;s arms.
"Oh, Bones. It's okay. He didn't, you know?"
"No. I got away before he could. I broke his nose in the process."
"That's my girl."
"Thinking back on it now, he was probably one of the reasons why I forced myself to be so cold and detached for so long. I kept thinking that if I let people see my weakness, they'd hurt me like Mr Robbins did."
"Bones, it's okay. Hey, you're fine. I'm here."
"I know. I know it wasn't my fault but I couldn't help but think that."
"It wasn't. It never was."
"I've never told anyone what I just told you. I… I never trusted anyone enough to let them know."
"Thank you, Bones. It's alright. Thank you for letting me in." Booth takes Brennan's hands and kisses her gently.
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About a week later, Booth and Brennan sit down for dinner and Booth starts a conversation. For the week following Brennan's stories about her childhood, Booth had been thinking about his own experiences and what he went through and decided that because she let him in on such personal details of her life, he would tell her about his father.
"Bones. I want to let you in."
"Let me in how?"
"You told me about your childhood and what happened to you in foster care. I want to tell you about my father. You know he flied fighter jets in Vietnam already and that he was a barber. But you don't know what he did to me, Jared and my mother."
Booth took a deep breath and continued.
"I guess the memories of the war stayed with him. I can understand that. My time in the Rangers sure as hell has stayed with me and I can only imagine how bad Vietnam would have been. But that doesn't excuse what he did. He… he used to hit my mum. And not like a gentle kind of hit like you'd do if you had to punish a kid. He used to beat her. But when she died of breast cancer when I was 10, I guess that sent him over the edge. He'd always been kind of a heavy drinker, but my mother's death sent him into full on alcoholism. He drank almost every night. He'd sometimes come home from work having been at a bar since he left and he would reek of alcohol and he'd lightly hit us around. But as Jared got older and more clumsy, my dad got more violent. Jared had forgotten to put away some of his toys and dad had come home drunk to find them in the living room still and he was about to hit Jared when I got in the way."
"You were trying to protect your brother."
"Yeah. He was only 8. I was 11. I tried to stop dad before he hit Jared and he just hit me. When he realised who he'd hit, he got angry at me and really beat me. I was pretty much covered in bruises for the next few weeks. It didn't help he kept doing it just as they were healing. I was his main punching bag for the next few years as he kept drinking. Just before Pops got me and Jared out of there, dad had been working to clean up his act and had managed to save up enough money to take one of us to the Phillies game. Me and Jared rocked off for it. I won. For the first time in years, I thought everything was going to be good again." Booth stops and swallows a lump as a tear escapes down his cheek. "It was the happiest I'd been since my mum died. But a few days later, dad got back into the drink and it all started again. About a month later, Pops came over and saw my dad hitting me while Jared watched scared from the other room. I didn't see him again after that. I haven't seen my dad since I was 15. That was 1986. Last I heard he was in Ohio trying to get his act together. Frankly, I don't really care what has happened to him. Sure, he's my father, but he wasn't a dad. He didn't care for me or Jared like a father should."
Booth looks up to Brennan with watery eyes and sees hers are watering too.
"Bones. There's something you really need to know about me. Even though I was the star athlete in high school, I didn't get as many girls as you'd think. Sure, they gravitated towards me and I took that as a compliment, but I never let them in really. I… I nearly killed myself when I was about 16. I was still trying to sort out what happened with my father and it was just too much. I was sitting in the bath one night contemplating pulling my grandmother's hair dryer into the bath with me when Pops came in because I'd been in there really long. He saw me holding the hair dryer and pulled it out of my hands. It scares me still to think I came that close to ending my life but I think that I had to get that low to come back up. All the stuff was rising and it was almost over my head that I was almost drowning in it. Bones,", Booth says as he takes Brennan's hand in one of his and places his other hand on her baby bump and looks into her eyes, "I want you to know that I wasn't the player kind of kid in school. I respected the few girls I was with enough to let them control how fast or slow things went. It was because when I was about 9, my father told me about how he met my mother and he described it as his "only girl". I wasn't looking for action in high school and college. I was trying to find that "only girl". And when I walked into that lecture hall and saw you… I knew I'd found her."
Brennan was fully crying now and Booth took her in his arms.
"I know you don't believe in soul mates and two people completing another, but the moment I saw you, I knew you were it for me. And you have been for the past 7 years. I love you, Bones. I love you so much sometimes it scares me. But I wouldn't change anything about you or us."
As Brennan wipes away her tears, she places her hand on Booth's cheek and smiles at him.
"I love you too, Booth. I love you. Thank you for letting me in too."
She then leans across as their lips meet in the middle and as they're kissing, the baby kicks, making it's presence known. The two break apart and laugh.
"Yes, we love you too."
A/N: Whoa. That was a long one. 2300 words. Whoo! Glad I got that out of the way. It was a kinda hard one to write, but I hope you all liked it. Keep the reviews coming! Chapters 9 and 10 being written now, only because I'm off uni, so keep an eye out! :) In chapter 9 someone very familiar returns and in chapter 10 it's time to celebrate Christmas, Bones style! :D