Disclaimer: All characters own in complicated ways by Hart Hanson, Kathy Reichs, and Fox.

Time line: Let's say this is set sometime in the near future, though it really could be any time post-season 2.

Note: I seem to be on a grammar kick, title-wise. This isn't actually related to "The It without an Antecedent" except that I wrote them both. Also, toss e-tomatoes at me if you like but preferably not for the end of this part which is not the end of the story.

The Question Without a Mark

(1)

He's been waiting for this for weeks now.

Ever since she'd announced from the passenger seat that she'd be taking some time off. (They'll sail his boat to a cluster of islands somewhere and she'll come back tan and rested. Like she should have done the first time. But this time he won't try to take her away for a year. Just a few weeks.)

Ever since he'd gotten the Save the Date magnet in the mail. (He hadn't put it up on the fridge. It wasn't like he was going to forget what day it would be. But then there it was one day, holding up Parker's latest spelling test. When his son saw him looking at it, he said, "I found it in the drawer with the silverware." Parker scuffed his shoe nervously against the floor. "You're not mad at me for cutting off the part with that guy, are you? It was just … Bones looks really pretty but I didn't like him smiling at her.")

Ever since the air in the Jeffersonian had gotten thick with strain, since the squints started going quietly about their business with the look of the children of warring parents. (Cam had accepted by default, she said. She hadn't really believed she was hearing the question before she said "yes." "I almost turned her down, Booth," Angela said over sandwiches at the diner. "Why would you do that?" He'd asked in horror. "She's your best friend." Angela shook her head sadly and gave him a good, long stare. "No woman wants to be part of the wrong wedding. Especially if it's her best friend's.")

She'd been putting it off, stepping carefully around it, for weeks now. She had to ask. They all knew there was something wrong behind it all. (Knew because of Parker's mangled magnet that kept falling off the fridge because he'd stuffed too many papers under it by now. Knew by the way Angela frowned at the dress, hating it because it was too beautiful. Knew by the way Sully didn't want to take her away for a year this time. Just a few weeks. Just the rest of her life.)

So he expected it. Because he was the last piece in the wrong puzzle. But she could make a pretty picture out if it anyway if she forced him to fit.

She stands in front of him now, compulsively straightening the dog-eared edge of some report or other.

"Spit it out, Bones," he says more harshly than he means to.

"I've been meaning to ask...."

"So ask."

"...If you'll give me away." She'd been looking down but now she looks up almost defiantly. She knows it's wrong, at least, but he stills feels like he's been sucker-punched.

He'd expected her to ask him to be a part of the wedding party, to stand on Sully's side since Sully didn't give a damn who was standing next to him as long as he got to stand across from her. He'd expected to watch her walk toward him only to turn to someone else at the last minute. He'd expected her to ask him to sit in a front row seat at his own execution. He didn't expect her to ask him to flip the switch.