"Hi, I'm Temperance Brennan. This is my…uh…boyfriend, Seeley Booth," Brennan introduced them to her new roommate.
"I thought you hated titles?" Booth whispered in her ear. Brennan ignored him and stepped forward and stuck out her hand for a shake.
Instead, Angela pulled her into a hug and then hugged Booth. Brennan and Booth both looked at each other, not quite impressed yet with the touchy-feely art student.
They sat and talked for a while about themselves in order to get to know each other a little better. Angela told them she transferred from the University of Texas. "I love Texas, but my dad scared off all of the boys and some of my girl friends," she told them. She was desperately in love with a curly headed, bearded Biology major named Jack who wasn't sure if he wanted to transfer so she broke it off. She kept telling Brennan how jealous she was of her for having such a good looking boyfriend who was always by her side. Booth blushed.
They helped Angela unpack and get everything settled.
"Now, I don't mind if he's here all the time. I can definitely get used to looking at him. But just let me know if you guys want…some…alone time. I get it. A girl needs to satisfy those urges every once in a while. Just let me know if you want me to make myself scarce," Angela told them, making both Brennan and Booth blush this time.
XXXXXXXXXXX
Classes started up and Booth began struggling as soon as he was assigned homework. Brennan agreed to keep tutoring him though the football team's academic program designed to help struggling players. They were sitting in the library one afternoon, working on one of Booth's new classes, psychology.
"Okay, I'll admit, sometimes, I don't understand these concepts," Brennan said, reading Booth's psychology textbook, "Some of this stuff doesn't make sense. Anthropologically speaking-" Booth cut her off.
"Bren, I don't want to do this, but maybe I should get a tutor who understands psychology."
"No, Booth, I'll figure this out. Just give me a minute." Brennan pushed her own homework aside and delved deep into the psychology lesson. Over an hour later, Brennan slammed the textbook shut.
"What's wrong?" Booth asked.
"Get another tutor. I don't understand it," she said, frustration and disappointment evident in her voice.
"Just for psychology. I still want you to help me with all these math and science classes," he promised.
She smiled at him, hoping whoever would be his psychology tutor was either a guy or an ugly girl. Brennan wasn't normally the jealous type, but then again, she hadn't had a boyfriend before.
XXXXXXXXXXX
A few days later, Brennan and Booth were sitting on the futon in his room, cuddled up and watching TV. It was only mid afternoon but Brennan was fast asleep, curled against Booth's chest. There was a knock on the door. Booth attempted to move Brennan off of him without waking her up.
"What's going on?" She asked, rousing from her sleep.
"My new tutor's here," he said, simultaneously shutting off the TV, "Go take a nap in your room. Once I'm done, I'll come over and we can go catch some dinner."
Brennan nodded and took her time gathering her things. She wanted to see who the new tutor was. Booth opened the door to reveal his new tutor. She was blonde, tall and had the muscular legs of a dancer.
"Rachel?" Booth was stunned to see his ex-girlfriend standing in the door way.
"Hi, Seeley," Rachel smiled at him.
"You're my psych tutor?"
She nodded and brushed past him, inviting herself into his room. "Oh, who's this?" she asked.
"That's Bren, she's my girlfriend," Booth told her, emphasizing the title to show Rachel that he's taken. If he remembered anything about this girl, she had a knack for flirting with guys who were unavailable.
Rachel just nodded and then pretended like Brennan didn't even exist. "Come here, Seeley. Come sit next to me," Rachel said, patting the spot next to her on the futon, "We need to start studying. This is going to take all night." She seductively drew out the last two words despite the fact that Brennan was still in the room.
Brennan looked between Booth and his ex. Without a word, she threw her backpack over her shoulder and walked out of Booth's room.
Defeated, Booth sat on the futon as far from Rachel as he could. She pulled out her textbook and moved closer to him.
"So…You understand psychology?" Booth questioned, not exactly sure what to say to her.
Rachel just nodded and leaned closer. She could smell him now and he smelled better than he did in high school. He was hotter too. Booth looked Rachel over. She was taller and blonder than she had been the last time he saw her.
"Look, are you going to help me study or not?" Booth asked her, snapping out of Rachel's spell. He wasn't one of those guys who had a relationship behind his girlfriend's back. Booth would never do that to Bren. He was desperately in love with her.
"I've missed you, Seeley," Rachel whispered, "No one ever treated me better than you did."
She lunged at him, attempting to plant her lips on his. She missed. Booth stood up and Rachel followed suit.
"You need to leave," Booth said loudly while he walked to open the door. He stood there with one hand on the handle.
She glared at him, grabbed her bag and textbook and stormed out the door. Realizing that Brennan had left in a somewhat similar manner, Booth slipped on a pair of shoes, pocketed his wallet, and ran to Brennan's room.
XXXXXXXXXX
Brennan walked into her room, slammed the door and climbed up into her lofted bed.
"Sweetie?" Her new roommate called out, "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine," she said, muffled by her pillow.
"Hon, I know fine. You are not fine right now. You wanna talk it out or are you just gonna cry into your pillow all afternoon?"
Brennan sat straight up, knocking her head on the ceiling. She winced but ignored the new scrape on her forehead from the textured ceiling. "I am not crying. I am…" She searched for the right word for what she was feeling but failed to produce.
"Wanna tell me what's wrong?" Angela offered.
Brennan slowly made her way down from her bed and sat at her desk. Angela pulled her desk chair over and sat close to her new friend.
"Booth's exgirlfriend is his new tutor," Brennan announced.
Angela smiled. "You…are jealous," she informed Brennan.
"What? No, I'm not."
Angela nodded. "So you're not his tutor anymore?"
Brennan shook her head. "She's just his psychology tutor. I fail to see the importance of such a trivial subject. There is no anthropological importance for mind reading."
"Sweetie, psychology is more than just mind reading."
Brennan ignored Angela's statement but rebutted with, "I am not jealous."
"Whoa, we got off that train, Bren."
Brennan looked confused. "We've been in here this whole time. We were never on a train."
"It's a figure of speech, sweetie. I think you need to talk to Booth about why you don't want his ex to be his tutor."
"Neither one of us get to pick who his tutor is. The tutoring program the athletic department has set up picks for him," she informed Angela.
"Well maybe both of his tutors help him at the same time. That way, you can make sure this chick doesn't make a move on your man," Angela suggested.
Brennan shrugged. "I'm just going to take a nap. I don't want to talk about this anymore."
Angela rolled her eyes and stood up. "Alright, sweetie, if you wanna chat, I'm just gonna paint so I'm not going anywhere."
Brennan noticed that Angela had practically turned their room into an art studio. There was a dirty sheet covering the floor under her easel, paint cans and brushes taking up every nook that Brennan hadn't previously occupied. Brennan didn't mind. As she lay in her bed, Brennan listened to Angela's brush strokes on the canvas and found the noise to be soothing. She fell asleep rather quickly but was woken up not long after by someone pounding on the door.
"Bren!" Booth yelled, bursting into Angela and Brennan's room, "Let's go to dinner."
"Whoa there, cowboy," Angela came to Brennan's defense, "She's not too happy with you right now. Maybe you should come back later."
Booth became defensive right back. "I didn't do a damn thing. I didn't even know Rachel went to school here," Booth turned away from Angela and pulled himself up onto Brennan's bed, "Come on, love, we'll talk about this over dinner."
Brennan sat up in bed again, this time slower than the first to avoid what happened to her head. She looked between Angela and Booth in order to decide what to do. Angela had a look on her face that said 'talk to him, but make sure he knows who he belongs to' and Booth's face said 'I'm sorry, let's work on this'.
"Diner or Thai food?" she asked Booth. Booth perked up at her response.
Giving her a lopsided smile, he said, "Thai, but the diner for dessert."
