#seasonsix

[...]

"Do you want me to, uh, call someone to be with you or...? Booth asked, risking a glance to the passenger side.

-No, I'm fine...alone." Quiet sobs raked through her body and tears kept coming. She had known that this could not end well; them, together. It could never work, she had told him that much last year but here she was, crying in his car after foolishly acting on impulse...and yet, it had not felt foolish -it had felt right.

The car had come to a halt and Booth cleared his throat not knowing what to do. He was always the one making things easy between them but after her declaration he found himself at his wits' end. He could only hope that just like him she would find a way to keep going in a world where her love was unrequited and that eventually she, too, would find someone to share her life with. Just not him. He could not bring himself to look her in the eyes so he got out of the car and rounded it to open her door. Looking anywhere but at Booth, Temperance slowly slid out of her seat. And here they were; standing face to face on the curb in front of Brennan's house, neither one of them daring to look the other in the eyes. She was the first to interrupt the laden silence.

"I guess I should go. Thank you Booth -for believing me...about Lauren's death.

-Bones..." he muttered although he had no idea what he was going to say next. She had started making her way to her building but at the sound of her nickname she turned around and finally their eyes met. They both stared, lost in thought. Booth could still see the sheen of unhushed tears in her eyes, he could tell she was fighting a new onslaught of tears and he felt strangely untethered. It was not right, it was not fair. A year ago he would have been the man she needed, he had begged her to let him be that man! They would have been good together, more than good.

For years he had believed that them meeting had to be fate, the miracle that put love on his path -now he saw that this was fate, two souls never getting to each other at the right time, bound to miss each other. He loved Hannah, he could see himself having a future with her, here in D.C -her with her work at the White House and him at the FBI working with Bones and the squints... That's the life he wanted.

"I'm sorry, I really am, he trailed off.

-Goodbye Booth..."

She turned her back to him and willed her feet to keep moving. The rain had not let up and she was now soaked to the bone. She did not turn around and he did not stop her. This was really it. She had tried, it would appear she had read the signals all wrong.

Once she crossed the threshold of her house the enormity of it all finally hit her. She expected more tears because surely this meant that their partnership was compromised but nothing came and she was surrounded by the silence of her home. Her gaze trailed over the many artifacts littered all over her apartment, the hundreds and hundreds of books. This was her house; the museum of an impersonal life. She had always been alone so why did it feel different now? It was absurd to think that one could be alone in different ways, either you are alone or you are not and Temperance Brennan was definitely alone, that much had been true before this case, before Booth. She wished she could just go back in time to the days of oblivious loneliness, when she had no real inkling as to what she was missing out on. Damn Booth! Damn him for making her world so messy, so irrational!

Suddenly sadness made way for anger. She had been a fool and now she was paying the price, no doubt she would do so for a long time. What had she expected? For him to leave Hannah and take a chance on a relationship with a woman who had to be faced with the image of an empty life which led to a silent death to finally come to grips with feelings she had harbored for years? He was too fluent in the elusive language of emotions to belong with her in any way.

Even in the sadness induced haziness she could feel that there was something wrong with that statement but she simply did not have the heart to think about it.

She sluggishly got ready for what was undoubtedly about to be a restless night and somewhere between the moment she had removed her shoes and the process of drying of her hair the tears had started back. She did no try to stop them. She would let it all out tonight and then... Well, there was no way for her to infer what Booth would do after the debacle of this night but as far as she was concerned nothing really had to change. She would adapt, she believed there was such a thing as evolution so she would give herself time to evolve, to become a version of herself that did not yearn for the love of her partner, a woman who lived for her job and did not let herself get sidetracked by fragile ties to others. Or maybe she could go back to the Maluku Islands... Angela would be upset, Cam as well no doubt and Booth...evidently she could not trust her intuitions when it came to him so perhaps he would be relieved to see her go; that way they had no reason to face this head on day after day, case after case. And so the hours passed and she kept oscillating between those two options. By the time the sun had risen she was no closer to a decision, her eyes felt swollen from all the crying and her chest felt raw although she knew that it could not possibly from a broken heart, simply a mental state making itself known physically and tiredness getting to her body.

She could not stay in place anymore so she got ready and took off for the lab where she would work, hopefully dulling the ache of Booth's rejection.

The simple act of being in the lab, a place where she knew she belonged seemed to alleviate some of the anguish she felt. This had been an excellent idea. Before she reached the platform Micah appeared out of nowhere -as was his habit.

"How'd it work out? he asked, his trademark benevolent smile fixed on his face.

- I listened to the universe... I felt something. she chuckled, I feel sad.

- That's so much better than dead, or even dead inside."

This made her smile slightly; he was right, at least she had not been run over by that car last night, that had to count for something.

"You heard that in a lecture? she asked somehow soothed by their conversation.

- I got my own story Dr. Brennan. Just like you, just like everybody else... I got my own sad story."

She pondered over this for a while and when she came back to her senses Micah was gone, no doubt she would see him again later in the day. She made a beeline for her office intending to put the Lauren Eams case to rest and find some other task to throw herself into head first. The file was strewn open on her desk, she took a deep breath, bracing herself. Temperance picked up the photograph that had knocked her world off its axis and saw things clearly for the first time since the beginning of this whole ordeal.

"Three days, she whispered to herself. Three days for the world to turn right side up again."

Everything was supposed to be back to normal now but she was still sad and painfully aware of how alone she was. So this was the new normal huh? She hated that just like she could now see Lauren's face for what it truly was she could not make herself forget about the feelings she had excavated from the depth of herself last night. Perhaps such was the price of a renewed life in the world right side up: clarity. Her life had not changed, not in its core but now her eyes saw more clearly what it had chosen to ignore up until then. She was not Dr. Lauren Eams, she was alive, she loved Booth,he loved Hannah. Those were the facts. She could live with those facts and soon she would get over it -he had gotten over her. She would give herself seven months and then...well, she would cross that bridge when she came to it.