Sabbaticals - 28 weeks
Brennan and Booth emerged from customs to see crowds of people waiting to greet friends and family. Booth searched over the heads of the people and spotted Rebecca. "There they are!" Just then, Parker spotted him and started running. "Dad!" Booth ran toward him, scooped him up, and twirled him around. "Hey Parks! Did you grow a few inches?" They hugged each other tightly and then Parker looked over to see Brennan, who had just joined them. "Bones!" He wiggled out of his dad's arms and ran to her. She squatted down to his level and managed to stay upright when he slammed into her. She gave him a big hug and ran her hands through the curls on the top of his head. "Hello Parker. Has your hair gotten even more curly?" He put his hand up to feel the curls. "Mom says it's getting out of control."
By this time, Rebecca had joined them, and all three adults laughed. Booth gave her a brief hug and Brennan stood up and also hugged her. Rebecca looked from Booth to Brennan. "So, how was Paris?" Booth pulled Brennan over to him and wrapped his arm around her shoulder. "It was fantastic." Rebecca laughed and winked at Brennan. "I can tell." Parker chimed in. "So, you can kiss her now?" Booth smiled down at him. "I certainly can Parker. Would it be okay if I did that right now?" Parker thought for a few seconds. "Okay. But just this once." All three adults laughed, and Booth pulled her in for a sweet, but chaste kiss. Parker watched intently. "Okay, that's enough." They all laughed again.
They asked Rebecca to drop them off at Brennan's apartment because it was the only place where they had access to transportation. Because Booth was away from the FBI for a full year, he had been required to turn in his SUV to the Motor Pool. Brennan had put her Prius into storage for the year, but she had emailed the storage company a month ago. She asked them to have the car checked over to make sure it was in good running order, have it detailed, and delivered to her apartment building.
The plan was to have them spend the night at her place, and then, in the morning, Booth would drive the car to his place and Rebecca would bring Parker there. Brennan had insisted that the two Booth boys have Monday and Monday night to themselves to do "boy things". Brennan had lots to do around her apartment. While she was away, she had contracted with her cleaning crew to come in every 8 weeks just to clean and dust the empty apartment. When she knew she would be coming home for Christmas, she had them do a thorough cleaning the week before her arrival.
Booth was reluctant, but she had convinced him to let the cleaning crew clean his place that same week. She reminded him that the apartment had been sitting empty for seven months, and that his time was better spent with Parker than wasting the first day cleaning and dusting. She really needed to spend a day dealing with publishing issues for her books, talking to her accountant, talking to her lawyer. Just a catch up now that she was slightly over halfway through her sabbatical. She assured Booth that she would be fine without her car. Before he left her Monday morning, he ran out and got a big breakfast for both of them. He said it would tide her over until an early dinner, and she planned to have dinner delivered.
He tried to get her to come back to his place Monday night so they could spend the night together, but she insisted that Parker needed his father all to himself for one night. They could watch whatever movies or sporting events they desired, stay up as late as they wanted, and she would be able to get all of her paperwork out of the way to be free for the rest of the trip.
Brennan was glad to finally file away the last of the paperwork late in the evening. As she crawled into her bed alone, she wished she wasn't always so practical. But she knew she had done the right thing letting Parker have his dad all to himself. She and Booth had participated in some pretty rigorous activity last night and early this morning, so she could detect his scent as she settled beneath the sheets. At least she had that.
The Booths enjoyed the boys night, and they watched their action movies until they both fell asleep, curled up together on the sofa well after midnight. He woke up about an hour later and realized where he was as he looked at his watch. He ached to have Bones in his arms, but he looked down at Parker sleeping soundly against his dad's chest, and decided that for one night, this was more important. He thought about waking him up and sending him to his bed, but they were both too comfortable. His boy was growing up and he knew it wouldn't always be like this. He closed his eyes and daydreamed about all of the memories the three of them would make together this Christmas. Next thing he knew, it was morning.
Tuesday was their day to go out to a Christmas Tree Farm and cut down two trees - one for each of their apartments, and Rebecca had offered Brent's pickup truck for the afternoon to haul the trees. Booth and Parker drove the Prius to Brennan's apartment bright and early. Booth was hungry to see her, since it had been almost 24 hours, so he grabbed her and gave her a long kiss. Parker stood by with his arms crossed. "Hey! I thought the one at the airport was the only one!" They still had their arms wrapped around each other and turned to look at him. "Parker. You're going to have to get used to it, because I'm going to kiss Bones a lot. And sometimes Bones is going to kiss me." He looked at her and winked.
Brennan interjected. "But Parker, don't your mom and Brent kiss sometimes?" He looked caught out. "Yeah. I guess." She continued gently. "You know that your dad and I love, love each other, right?" He nodded his head. "Well, that's what people who love, love each other do. You should be happy every time you see us kiss because that means we are both happy. If we ever started fighting a lot, you wouldn't see us kissing a lot. And you wouldn't want that, would you?" His eyes got big. "No! I don't want you to fight!" Booth looked over at him and gave him an exaggerated wink. "Watch this pal." He grabbed Brennan by the waist and dipped her low, giving her a long kiss that ended with an audible smack.
Parker laughed and clapped his hands. "Dad, that's like the cartoon characters we saw in that movie last night!" Brennan gave him a puzzled look and he whispered in her ear. "Just roll with it Bones." He looked back at his son. "So, Parker. Bones and I are really, really happy. So we just can't stop ourselves from kissing sometimes." Parker nodded. "Okay. I can deal with that." Booth went over, picked him up and started tickling him. "Deal with this bud!" And they ended up rolling around on the floor in a five minute tickle fest while Brennan stood back and enjoyed watching her boys have so much fun.
Once the roughhousing was over, Booth laid out the plans for the day. "Okay, family." He looked around and both Brennan and Parker had smiles on their faces over the designation. "First, we look at what Bones has in the way of Christmas decorations. Did you pull out the boxes yesterday?" She assured him she did, and he continued, looking over at Parker. "Now, I'm guessing that there's not much there because Bones always went away for Christmas in the past." He smiled over at Brennan. "But no more. Were a family now." She had tears in her eyes and he reached out and took her hand.
He looked back to Parker. "So we're going to assess what she has, and then we are going out for breakfast. After breakfast - shopping! We need decorations. We need lights and ornaments for the tree. We're gonna find a Christmas store and clear out the shelves!" Parker jumped up and down clapping his hands and Brennan had to fight to keep the tears from falling.
"Then we're going to get Brent's truck and head out to the Christmas Tree Farm. Parker, I'm going to need your help to saw the trees down." He looked at him with eyebrows raised and Parker very seriously nodded his head. "Then we'll come back here and get the tree in the stand, I'll deliver the other tree to my apartment while you two start decorating the tree here, and then I'll return the truck. Once we have this place all Christmasafied, we'll all head to my apartment and do the same." Brennan screwed up her nose. "Booth - I don't think that's a word." He scoffed. "'Christmasafied'? Of course it's a word. Silly Bones." Parker chimed in. "Yeah. Silly Bones!"
The trio had a hearty breakfast at the diner, and found the perfect shop filled with Christmas decor. Walking out of the shop, all three had their arms filled with bags and boxes. The three of them had found two ornaments that felt special to them, and they decided to buy them to commemorate their first Christmas as a family. One would go on Brennan's tree and the other on Booth's. As Parker went skipping over to another display, Booth whispered in her ear. "Hopefully, next year there will be one tree." She smiled and nodded.
As they loaded their purchases into the trunk, Booth grabbed the bag that held the five Christmas CDs he had picked out. As he settled into the driver's seat, he opened one and slid it into the car's CD player. "It's Christmas!" He shouted. The sounds of "Sleigh Ride" filled the car and Parker started seat dancing to it in the back seat. Booth began singing along with Johnny Mathis, and Brennan couldn't contain her smile.
It was a joy filled car all the way to Brennan's apartment with the whole family in mega Christmas spirit. Brennan couldn't believe how much she was enjoying it all, and knew it was never like this before Booth. The three of them schlepped everything up to the apartment and went back down to the car for the drive to Rebecca's house. They left the car there and took off with the truck for the Christmas Tree Farm. Booth had checked the truck when they got there and was happy to see it had a CD player, so he brought another one of the CDs he had purchased. So they had Christmas music all the way to the farm and back.
On the drive to the farm, it started snowing and Parker just about lost his mind. "It's SNOWING dad! It's SNOWING!" The two adults chuckled at his glee. Neither said anything, but they were both delighted at the serendipity of the snow to add to their Christmas spirit.
As the three of them walked between the rows of trees, the snow was falling pretty heavily and it was turning into a fairyland. There were quite a few other families there and everyone was having a blast looking for their trees while the snow fell all around them. Booth and Parker surveyed quite a few trees looking for two perfect specimens. Brennan observed. "It looks like you two have done this before." Parker jumped over to her. "We come here every year Bones! We look at all the trees because we always have to get the perfect one!" Booth came up behind him, put his hands on Parker shoulders, and winked at her. "It's a very important decision, Bones."
She nodded seriously and asked Parker to show her how to identify a perfect tree. After about 30 minutes, they had found their two trees. They were fairly close together, so Brennan was stationed at one of them, while Booth and Parker sawed the trunk on the other. They dragged it over to Brennan and went to work on the second tree. They only had to wait about ten minutes for the tractor pulling the large wagon to pick up the trees and people for the ride back to the farm entrance.
As they pulled away from the farm it was still snowing with several inches on the ground already and just starting to get dark. The snow, the Christmas music, and the two trees in the truck bed had them all feeling the spirit. When they got to Brennan's apartment, Booth put the tree in the stand and Parker helped make sure it was straight. As he was leaving, his heart skipped a beat as he heard his son, very seriously, explaining to Bones how to best string the lights on the tree.
He dropped the other tree off at his apartment and drove to Rebecca's to thank them for the use of the truck and retrieve the Prius. Because they hadn't eaten since their large breakfast, he stopped and picked up some sandwiches for them. He drove back to Brennan's apartment and was impressed at the progress they had made. While he was gone, she had put on the Christmas music and they were both dancing to the music as they added ornaments to the tree. He had quietly unlocked and opened the door so he could watch them, unnoticed, for a few moments. He was overcome with love watching the two people he loved so much working so joyfully together.
Brennan noticed him by the door and smiled as she walked over to him with an ornament in her hand. She put her arms around his neck and gave him a long kiss. "We've missed you. Come and help us finish." He convinced them both to stop for a few minutes and eat the food he brought. They quickly scarfed down the sandwiches so they could get back to work.
He joined in the revelry and added his own twist by loudly singing along with the music. There were a few good natured disagreements over ornament placement, and they finally had all but one of the ornaments on the tree. They had held back the special one they all chose and placed it right at the front. Booth went around and turned off all the lights so that only the tree lit the room. They all had a seat on the sofa, with Parker in the middle. Behind the tree, the falling snow was visible through the balcony doors and they decided it was perfect.
They spent a few minutes admiring their handiwork and then Booth slapped the sofa cushion. "Okay - on to the next tree!" Parker groaned, but he was smiling, so Booth knew he was excited about continuing the decorating spree. When they got to Booth's place, they had the Christmas music, the snow falling outside the windows, and another perfect tree. Again, the last ornament placed was the other special one they chose, and once again, it went right in front. They all plopped on Booth's sofa and decided this one was also perfect. Booth slapped the sofa and got up. "Stay there and enjoy the tree. I'll be back in a few minutes."
About ten minutes later, he came from the kitchen with hot chocolates with whipped cream, candy canes sticking out of the mugs, and an assortment of Christmas cookies he had purchased from a bakery as he was returning the truck. They all sat on the floor in front of the tree and enjoyed their treats. The two adults were cuddled up together and Parker was sitting between his dad's legs. After finishing his drink and a few cookies, he started to get sleepy and eventually leaned back against his dad's chest and quickly fell asleep.
Booth's right arm held his sleeping son, and his left arm was around Bones' shoulders. The two lovers took the opportunity to have a little make out session, and then Bones dropped her head on Booth's shoulder. Booth dropped his head against hers and he ran his fingers over and over through her hair. It had been an incredibly emotional day, but this, right here, far exceeded every dream he had ever had of a life together with her and Parker. He wondered if it would continue to get even better. He had faith that it would.
They stayed that way, listening to the music, gazing at the tree, watching the snow fall, for a long while. Booth's arm around Parker started falling asleep, so he kissed her on the cheek and whispered. "I'm going to put him to bed." He got up and carried his sleeping son into his room and tucked him in without waking him. He decided that he would just have to sleep in his clothes and he left his socks on his feet to keep him warm.
He came back into the living room and put out his arms to pull her to her feet and they walked to his bedroom. "I missed being with you last night. I think we can do it quietly, don't you?" She smiled. "I'm sure we can manage that. It's something we'll have to get used to, eh?" He nodded. "And another thing. Before we fall asleep on nights that Parker is here, we have to wear some kind of nightclothes. One of my t-shirts for you would work, and I just need to pull on my boxers. Occasionally - thunderstorms, nightmares - Parker will come in and want to climb in my bed." She smiled back at him. "I'm good with that. We're family, after all." He pulled her into his arms and thanked God for the day he met her. Their coming together that night may have been quiet, but it was no less passionate.