[A/N: I remain astounded by your generous comments and very grateful for them!

Now I remember why I usually write stories in their entirety before posting them. This is still on track, but I may be wandering a bit more than I would if I had written the whole story already. Hopefully the story isn't suffering for it.

I know that I lean way too heavily on Booth's POV because it's easier for me to understand and write, but I have made a commitment to give Bones the consideration she deserves in coming chapters.

This chapter directly answers one wonderful reader's thoughtful request. Please let me know what you think or leave a question if you have one. The next chapter is mostly written, and I find that reviews are just the fuel I need to find the time and energy write more quickly!]

Chapter Seven: States of Matter

Booth and Charlie spent the afternoon interviewing neighbors and friends about the Forsters' disappearance seven years earlier. After exhausting all of those leads and not coming up with much, they had gone to the sheriff's office to kick around the guys who'd originally investigated Lieutenant Forster's disappearance. Booth figured that poking holes in the efforts of local law enforcement had been just the thing he had needed today. Making them squirm had felt good. One of the officers had been a bit smug, and Booth had enjoyed breaking the man down bit by bit to humble him. He hadn't found the person who'd killed one of his own. In Booth's book, nobody in that situation should feel smug about his job.

With a few potential leads, Booth and Charlie headed back to the office. Booth left Bones a message asking for an update on the case. When she called him back later, Bones suggested that she and Booth meet for dinner at the diner to discuss what both teams had found so far. Surprised by her suggestion, Booth swallowed hard—he really hadn't been prepared to see her again yet. What if the interview had made her upset or vulnerable? He wasn't sure he was solid enough yet to be there for her. But sensing the tension in her voice, Booth relented and agreed to meet her. He was unable to resist helping her or trying to be there for her whenever she needed him.

Exceptionally wary about what the evening might bring, Booth dialed a familiar number and set up an escape plan in case he needed to extract himself from the situation at the diner. He felt guilty doing so—this was Bones he was planning to hide from, after all. But the man had strong self-preservation skills to accompany his white knight tendencies. If he'd taken much time to think about it, he'd have realized that calling for backup had been as much a move designed to protect Bones as it had been to protect him. His caller had been surprised to hear from him and confused by his request. He asked her to meet him at the diner an hour after he'd been scheduled to meet Bones. She asked why, and he had been skillfully evasive; he just told her that it was important. She knew him well enough to take him at his word.

When Booth arrived at the diner, Bones had been sitting nervously sipping her tea as she waited for him. He had been pleased to see that their favorite waitress had just placed their food down on the table. Bones had ordered for him. He sighed and strode in confidently. Bones had ordered for him like always. That felt good.

"Hey, Bones," he said, slipping into his seat and smiling at her. She returned the smile and asked how his afternoon had been. Gesturing as if to offer her free access to his fries, he explained what he and Charlie had learned that afternoon, sidestepping his browbeating of the officers but not leaving out any essential details. Nodding her acceptance of the results of his inquiries and eating more than her fair share of his fries, Brennan shared the lab's latest news with him. As she explained to her partner that the team had made remarkable progress, she watched his approval of their quick work register slowly on his face as she filled him in on the details. The third body had been mutilated, but they'd determined that most of the damage had occurred after the teenaged boy's death. Hodgins had found particulates and carpet fibers adhering to the garbage bag that suggested that the victim had been killed elsewhere and transported to the burial site. The boy had not been shot like the other two victims. Instead, he'd been beaten with a metal object—most likely a common pipe. While none of those details had been enough to give them strong leads about the person's identity, Angela was now working with Wendell to identify a pattern in the bruising—the evidence suggested that the boy had been beaten in a pattern—it had been some sort of defined shape or symbol. Booth's heart clenched as he listened to his partner's explanation of the torture and pain inflicted on the young boy before his death.

Morbid though the subject matter had been, the partners lost themselves in their desire to piece the evidence together in order to catch the criminal who'd inflicted so much pain on the people they'd found buried together and who'd damaged so many other people's lives. In an intricate dance more intimate than either of them would want to consider, they matched wits and tested one another's theories and ruled scenarios in and out of the list of possibilities. She questioned his reasoning and he pushed her to step a bit past her pure science. This was Bones and Booth at their best state—open, honest, smart, capable, focused and absolutely brilliant. They worked together so seamlessly and so well that even they didn't appreciate the sheer genius that their huddling together over a table at the diner produced.

As they had sat there eating and hypothesizing, Brennan had watched her partner relax. Booth wore his intensity and stress like a mantle clearly recognizable by those who knew him well. She'd seen how tense he'd been when he arrived, but she had relished the fact that—this deep into their lively discussion of the case and potential scenarios—he looked entirely like the man she'd spent most of her time with for the last five years. She observed carefully that Booth had started smiling at her more often, and his eyes were doing that dance in the light that filled them when he got excited about something. He was cracking jokes at inappropriate times and goading her about her misuse of some phrase she had never understood. He'd even tried to strong-arm her into eating some of his pie. He'd contorted his face into that conspiratorial look with raised eyebrows and a cocked eye a time or two when he suggested that he'd shot down a few of her ideas, bragging about his superior FBI powers of observation or some such nonsense. She'd watched him grin when she had corrected his purposeful butchering of a scientific term or two and felt comfortable at rest with him for the first time in ages. They'd both enjoyed the peace of settling back in to a routine that had grounded both of them for so long they'd grown to depend upon it as much as they needed water and air... and one another.

By the time they'd finished eating, it was as if the last few weeks had never happened. They were Bones and Booth, and they were relaxed and enjoying one another's company. But when she refused his latest offer of pie, Brennan had felt unexpected tears spring to her eyes. The restoration of the balance of things between them now struck her so strongly. They were still the same people—with the same ideas and habits and issues. She was never going to eat any of his pie, and he was never going to stop offering it to her. They were defined beings with immovable properties. Brennan drank some water and swallowed hard to tamp down the emotion that had rushed at her from out of nowhere. Ever observant, Booth had recognized her withdrawal from the conversation. He'd smiled at her—trying to camouflage the concern for her in his expression—and made some lame joke about it "only being a tiny bite of pie" to try to make her laugh her worries away. She hadn't laughed with him.

Despite his weak attempt at humor, the comfort of their togetherness already melted into the recently familiar angsty awkwardness. Brennan blurted out an apology for ruining their delightful evening and then sat momentarily confused by the facts about each of them individually and together that flooded through her oversized brain. She hated that her emotions had become so embedded in her connection to Booth. It would have been so much simpler to put him in a metaphorical box so that she could limit his ability to stir her emotions, but she couldn't. And this time, she realized that he had not been trying to do anything other than spend time with her. It had been her gut that had been wreaking havoc on what had been an otherwise positive evening. Unable to stand the tension any longer, she immediately stated that she wanted to ask Booth "one question."

Booth groaned inwardly thinking this would likely be far worse than being trapped in the restroom with Sweets for his "one question," but he had nodded his assent. He'd known he would agree to whatever she asked from the first moment she looked worried. Staring at him for a moment but then shifting her gaze downward to a random spot on the tabletop keeping them at a safe distance from one another, Brennan told Booth that the evidence suggested that he'd always been decisive about women and relationships. Then, rushing as if to bring on the pain of the answer as much as anything, she asked him why--why, if he really had feelings for her all those years, why he had waited to say anything.

Shocked by her question, all he could say had been a wistful "Bones...." Sadly, she took his slow response as a sign that she had been right. She tried to answer for him. The pain of his response couldn't hurt as deeply if she were the one to provide it, could it? "It was because of me, wasn't it? I'm too... distant, difficult, stunted..., stubborn...," she continued to rattle off a short list of what she deemed her many considerable faults. "You needed that much time to even consider a relationship with me. Anyone would."

The look on her face hurt him so badly that he felt it could have caused him to bleed until he died from it. He'd had the answer to her question immediately; however, he had taken the time to formulate a way to say it that he hoped wouldn't send her running away. But at that very moment, Cam showed up at the time he'd requested and sat down beside Booth at the table without being asked.

Booth's eyes went wide—dammit, he'd forgotten all about calling Cam, and the timing of her arrival had been so bad it defied descriptions that weren't strings of curse words. His mind raced. He'd have to rely on Cam's connection with him to get her to give them just a few more minutes alone. Bones had opened a powder keg, thrown in the match, and shoved herself down into the chamber with it. He had only moments to say something—anything--to keep her from obliterating the years he'd spent trying to get her to trust herself and to trust him.

Unfortunately for Booth, the ever-decisive anthropologist immediately put up a defensive wall. After greeting Cam as calmly as circumstances would allow, she leveled a gaze at Booth and spoke to him in an eerily distant voice that stabbed at him painfully, "I believe that we have exhausted this topic of conversation, Booth. There is no need for any further discussion. If you opt to be rational, you will agree that we should just drop the subject entirely. I prefer that we not discuss it again."

"Bones," Booth started tentatively now that Cam was there taking all of this in, but she cut him off.

"Really, Booth. I insist." As she sat there watching Dr. Saroyan try to understand what was going on and watching Booth squirm in his discomfort, Brennan had another jarring realization. Not only did Booth have a history of being decisive about his relationships, he also had—on more than one occasion—revitalized the relationships for sex with his former lovers. He'd jumped back into bed with Rebecca for a period of time and hinted that it had not just been that one time, and he'd also become romantically re-involved with Cam after she moved to Washington. The evidence seemed to indicate clearly that, once Booth connected deeply with a woman—he had been the one who'd told her that two people couldn't just have sex, that it had to be more than that—he seemed vulnerable to that connection even after the relationship had run its course. Perhaps that is why Cam had come there. Perhaps Booth would be turning to her now to... meet his needs. As much as that thought pained her, her fear that Booth might make another overture to her at some future date terrified her even more. This current trauma between them had been too difficult for her. She could not... would not risk enduring this type of pain and guilt again. Not even for Booth. She had to put an end to this and help them get back to being what she needed them to be--just partners and friends.

Without warning, Brennan jumped up and reported that she had to leave. She rattled off a list of scientific tests she and Hodgins had to begin early in the morning and, without another word, fled from the diner. Booth sat there stunned for a moment and then leapt up to follow her, ignoring Cam's questions and yelling, "I'll be back."

Bones had sped halfway down the block when he caught up with her. She'd climbed into her car and closed the door. As she'd seen Booth approaching, she had tried to pull out into the light traffic, but he had jumped into her path and walked over to the window slowly, knocking and asking her to listen to him.

"Bones...," he said tenderly, hating the fact that she wasn't even trying to hide her tears as she hit the button to lower the window and waited as if having that barrier removed was going to bring her pain instead of comfort.

"I need to go. I told you that I have to be at the lab early in the morning," she said in a truly defeated voice. She hoped that he would understand her need for escape and take pity on her. Not for the first time, she had been wrong.

"Not yet. Look, your question surprised me, that's all. It was a good question. It made me think. You're right. I am decisive about relationships."

She sniffled and composed her face into a mask of indifference. She knew that it would hold only moments, but she had been determined to keep it in place long enough to get away from Booth, "Thanks for letting me know that I was correct in my assumption. I really must go now."

"No! Wait a minute. Bones, listen to me! I took a long time—probably too long—to say anything to you, but you have to believe me. I did a lot of thinking about it, but it wasn't that it took me years to decide. I decided that I wanted you that first day I met you. I decided just like I always do—quickly, without regret, decisively. I just didn't let you know about that until later."

"Oh," she said with a sniffle, hating the way that her heart felt lighter just hearing those words. But why did the words she had so longer to hear bring along with them a torrent of painful regret and frustration she hadn't expected.

"Bones?"

She looked up at him slowly and didn't trust herself to speak.

"It wasn't that you weren't worth the chance... It was that you were worth waiting for. I was just trying to give you time to come around to the idea. I'd made up my mind a long time ago."

He watched as tears fell freely down her face as his confession registered first in her brain and then in her heart. Without considering the consequences, he reached in and opened her door, stepping around it and reaching in to pull her up to him so that he could hug her. She gripped him tightly and held on as if for dear life.

Brennan allowed herself the indulgence of letting him comfort her silently for a long moment. His arms around her had felt so good... so right. She tried to memorize the feeling—knowing that someone loved and cared for her, allowing the simple touch of a hug to lower her blood pressure and calm her wildly beating heart. Being encircled by his arms and held flush against his body triggered other physiological reactions, but she ignored them for more urgent matters. In this very brief moment, she just allowed herself to be comforted. Well, her heart and her body were comforted while her mind continued cataloguing evidence. She had been amazed how very much the physical contact helped ease her tension and worry. She suspected that the emotional attachment must have magnified the impact of his physical touch. Having never felt this degree of comfort from a loved one's embrace, her mind worked furiously to identify the neurological reactions that were required to translate a physical touch into such emotionally stabilizing effects. Anything else felt safer than allowing herself to feel such a strong attachment to anyone without holding part of her soul back.

Suddenly, her scientific analysis of the situation had been drawn to a halt. She realized that she had been being selfish again. She had to stop dragging Booth back down into this quagmire of emotions and problems. She had to let him heal. While he appeared to be handling this—whatever you called what had happened to them—better than she at the moment, she knew that most of his behavior had been contrived either to hide his pain or to relieve her guilt. Brennan knew that he would never be able to move past this if she were continually falling apart on him. She'd made her decision, and it was her responsibility to make certain that her partner moved past it and recovered so that they could remain friends. Pushing him away and only succeeding in moving him as far away as he'd release her, she looked up into his eyes, "Why are you doing this? Why are you telling me this? Why are you comforting me when I'm the one who hurt you?"

He sighed and hugged her tightly again, his heart panging when she finally stopped struggling to keep distance between them. He whispered into her hair words that shot directly into her heart, "Because you matter to me, Bones. You think that nobody's ever cared enough about you to stay. Well, you're wrong. You're worth it. I'm still here. And I'm not leaving. You have to believe me." He pushed her back at arm's length, knowing that she needed to see the truth in his eyes even if watching her listen to him were going to break him in half, "Just because... just because things between us aren't going any farther... that doesn't mean I'm going to stop caring about you."

"I don't deserve you," she confessed, pulling him back into a hug she hoped would comfort rather than torture him.

"Well, you're stuck with me, Bones. Man hugs are just part of the deal," he lied for both of them.

"This is so hard. I never dreamed this would be so difficult," she said, sniffling and pulling away. This time he allowed her to move farther away from him.

"It's like anything else, Bones," he said tenderly. "You'll use your head, and I'll use my gut. We'll figure out how to fix this. We just need a little more time."

She smiled up at him and was relieved to see some semblance of a smile on his face as well, "We were close tonight. It was almost like the good olden days."

"Old days, Bones. The good old days. But yeah."

There was then a brief lull in the conversation. Both of them used that pause to calm themselves down. Booth smiled at his partner and hoped that she'd reward him with one of those dazzling smiles of her own. Not for the first time, he had been mistaken.

"Wait a minute! You called Dr. Saroyan and asked her to come tonight, didn't you? You were afraid to be there with me!"

Crap.

"I... um... well, Bones, it had been a really long day."

Closing the distance between them this time out of anger instead of more tender emotions, Brennan pointed her finger at his chest as she spoke loudly, "Do you really need protection from me, Booth? Am I that painful and horrible to deal with?"

Booth grabbed her wrist and held it in place, squeezing it tightly to hold her attention and threatening her so that she'd stop advancing on him, "Stop being a drama queen, Bones. It doesn't suit you."

"I don't know what that means."

"I called Cam hoping that her coming into the diner would help either one of us who needed rescuing. But I shouldn't have done that. We're partners. We can trust each other. I won't do that again. I'm sorry, Bones." She considered arguing with him further, but he looked sincere in his apology and she had been too exhausted to put up a fight.

"Apology accepted. Now release my wrist or I'll be forced to use my martial arts training to extract it."

Booth chuckled and released her wrist. She smiled back at him in spite of herself.

"See you at the lab tomorrow?" she asked as she climbed back into the car. He nodded and closed the door behind her and backed far enough away so that she'd be able to pull out.

"Thank you, Booth," she said, waving and pulling her car out into traffic. He stood there for a long time after she drove away. Then he dragged his weary body back into the diner hoping that Cam wouldn't ask him too many questions.

Knowing Seeley the way she did, Cam had already paid the bill. She met him at the door to the diner and took him to the bar instead. Saying few words but allowing his posture and his mental state say everything important about what he'd been through, Booth drank entirely too much. Cam sat there with him as he thought about things too painful to discuss and tried to numb his pain.

At some point before the drunken man became too heavy and leaden for her to manage, Cam folded him into her car and drove him to her apartment. She had sensed intuitively that Booth wouldn't want to stay alone that night. As they stumbled into her apartment with him leaning far too heavily upon her, Booth asked Cam if she were dating anyone. After shooting him a look to make it clear that she would certainly not be dating him again, she explained that she did indeed have a "special someone." With a goofy drunken grin, Booth showed his surprise, "You do? How long?"

"Six months."

"Really? That long? How come I don't know that?"

"Because it's not your business."

"Awww.... C'mon, Cam. We're... we're friends, right?"

"Yes, Seeley, we're friends."

"So is.... What's his name?" Booth asked quite loudly.

"Be quiet, Seeley. Michelle is sleeping. His name is Robert. No running background checks on him or spying on him, okay?"

With an expression that made no promises that he wouldn't pry to protect her, Booth asked, "So this Robert… is he a big, strong guy like me?"

"Stop fishing for compliments, Seeley. I wouldn't have dated you if I hadn't thought you were sexy."

"You think I'm sexy!" he pondered with a goofy grin that annoyed his friend, "I'm not fishing. I'm just askin'. I mighta had-d-d too much to drink to fight with a big guy."

"He's not here tonight, and there will be no fighting. You're sleeping—on the sofa."

"You don't think he'll come by? He's here some nights, right? Good for you, Cam. And he's a lucky man... very lucky if I remember...."

"Shut up or I will hurt you."

"Promise?" he asked, waggling his eyebrows at her. She shoved him lightly, surprised how easily she had been able to cause him to fall off balance onto the couch. In his drunken confusion and lost in old memories, Booth looked a bit hopeful for a moment that she'd be joining him on the sofa, but Cam turned quickly and walked away leaving him mired in his lonely reality.

Shrugging, Booth relaxed into the sofa and fell asleep instantly. He had already been snoring by the time she brought sheets and a blanket over for him. Smiling at him, Cam covered him up and tucked the blanket in around him. She swore that he mumbled something like "worth it, Bones" as he turned and pulled the blanket up under his chin.

Camille smiled down at him sadly. Seeley hadn't said much about the reason for his drinking, but she knew him well enough that his current state of inebriation had to do with his partner. She'd never seen him this much in love with any woman. Years ago, she'd hoped for so long that he'd have fallen that hard for her. If he had, she'd been certain that she'd have fallen right in along with him. Their relationship had a good rhythm and they were compatible in many ways, but they were always too stubbornly independent to meet one another close enough to the center. Both of them had held back a bit too much of themselves. At that distance, true love couldn't begin to form or take hold. They never made it past the hot sex and the strong friendship. She sighed as she looked down at the man she still adored as a friend.

Sometime over the last five years, her former lover had finally found the ability to give up that part of him that made it possible to love someone deeply. But she wasn't convinced that he'd end up happy or in a relationship. Dr. Brennan had clearly become attached to him and relied upon him and trusted him implicitly, but she might not ever be capable of trusting anyone enough to love him back the way that Seeley deserved. He was obviously stuck—unwilling to walk away and yet unable to get past the enormous brick wall that lie between them. Cam wondered that he hadn't shown up on her doorstep drunk about this before now. Something had clearly happened to change the dynamic between the partners, and Seeley was looking the worse for it. Grateful that she'd been able to be there for him and to get him home safely, Cam turned and headed to her room to catch a few hours of sleep.

[A/N: Don't worry, Booth's not headed toward alcoholism... he'd just had a really long day. I'll share something with you that he doesn't yet know. The next day may be even rougher, but it might make for a lighter reading....]