Author's Note: Lovelies, Bones is on Thursday. I have a shift till eleven. Tell me it ain't so. I may or may not cry :'(. On a brighter note, how cute are those two? I mean, yeah, in my world they're horridly dysfunctional and sad and revenge-y, but in FOX, they're having a baby! Yayy! sldfjkalsdfj IM SO EXCITED. Haha, onwards, less spazz, more fic. Thanks as always to Steph, Candi, Alex, and all my reviewers. Disclaimer: I own none of Bones. All goes to Hart Hanson and FOX. Cheers! xx

Rain by Patty Griffin

It's hard to listen to a hard hard heart
Beating close to mine
Pounding up against the stone and steel
Walls that I won't climb
Sometimes a hurt is so deep deep deep
You think that you're gonna drown
Sometimes all I can do is weep weep weep
With all this rain falling down

Strange how hard it rains now
Rows and rows of big dark clouds
But I'm holding on underneath this shroud
Rain

It's hard to know when to give up the fight
Some things you want will just never be right
It's never rained like it has tonight before
Now I don't wanna beg you baby
For something maybe you could never give
I'm not looking for the rest of your life
I just want another chance to live

Strange how hard it rains now
Rows and rows of big dark clouds
But I'm holding on underneath this shroud
Rain

Chapter Fifteen, Part One: Catharsis

"I'm here, you're here and there are fries. Here's your chance to explain why this isn't working."

Booth knew how women were. They wanted apologies and begging and grovelling and flowers and chocolate and sex. Bones, in these senses, was most certainly not a woman. Booth opened his mouth, closing it before he said something that resulted in, "No, Booth, unhealthy fats and sugars will not solve this problem."

Bones apparentlytook some pity on him, and moved to articulate. When she spoke, her voice was uncharacteristically quiet.

"You know," she said, her voice taking on an eerie, musing, quality, "you died here."

Booth's eyebrows drew together in worry.

"No," he said forcefully. "No, I didn't. Can't you see? What can I do to make you see? It was all just the worst of understandings, and I'll just never be able to do anything like this again. I'll quit homicide if you ask me to, Bones, just say the word."

Bones shook her head, not quite looking at Booth.

"No, no, you're the one who doesn't see, Booth," she corrected hazily, reliving memories. "You died here. And it was shitty timing, you know. Really. You couldn't choose a better time to die?" Booth flinched a little at the unexpected curse, and forced himself not to speak. This was not his time. It wasn't my fault, his psyche wanted to justify. I was being shot at… it worked to the FBI's advantage! But he had dignity enough to abhor speaking out and remained silent.

"You know something? Angela took it terribly. The hormones drove her crazy with misery." Brennan looked at Booth, trying to get him to understand. "Booth, she didn't talk for a month." Booth closed his eyes, forgetting everything for a minute. Just the thought of Angela, usually so chatty, silent for a month…

"And then we were at the hospital…. Parriera was there, said Hannah had gone home… oh." Realization dawned in Brennan's eyes, "Of course. She must've known." Booth didn't even have time to begin apologizing before Brennan moved on.

"Oh poor Jasper, all for nothing, and Sweets was quite endearing about the whole thing…" She looked up sharply. "He didn't know, did he?" Booth shook his head numbly.

"Good, otherwise…" Booth wondered what had transpired between Sweets and Bones while he was gone.

"Then there was the funeral… not too many crying girlfriends Sorry," Brennan said wryly, but her tone sobered to a haunted whisper. "Though Hannah was there. I thought she might have been more sad than me. I was sad." Brennan nodded emphatically at Booth, as if to assert her emotional capacity.

"I checked, you know, to make sure you weren't a soldier this time. they thought I was crazy… I think I may have been a little crazy. Hannah was so nice, and comforting, and distraught… I mean, imagine the self-conflict," Brennan pointed out. Booth couldn't. All he could imagine was a crying Brennan, dressed in black, making sad attempts to find him in a crowd of random people. He thought his visual was worse.

"Hannah took the flag, and I stayed," Brennan remembered. "I didn't cry at the funeral." Booth nodded. To what he didn't know, he just… nodded, to help her.

"You headstone," Brennan commented. "Was completely inadequate. After that-" Brennan paused, deliberating something. Booth didn't want to push her; this was supposed to be cathartic.

"After that, I rang Max, and then I found Harley to exactrevenge." Booth laughed an uncomfortable laugh.

"Bones, it's totally fine if you don't want to share everything."

The look Brennan fixed him with was calculating.

"No, really."