Ok so I haven't written anything here (or anywhere for that matter) for a disgracefully long period of time and this has been on my to-do list for an equally long period of time so I'm using it as a tool to get myself writing again before I tackle the completion of my multi-chap fic What a Difference a Year Makes (I will finish it I promise). So, since its been a while reviews would be greatly appreciated.

Disclaimer: I may have been gone a year but I still dont own them

Longing

She was not the first woman he fell in love with by a long shot but that didn't matter anymore. 1314 days ago he fell in love with her. As of today he's officially loved her the longest.

Mere minutes, that first friendly love...

Seeley Booth first fell in love when he had just turned six and it was a short lived affair. Her name was Jenny Forbes and she lived next door. She was five and three quarters, had shiny blonde hair and was the prettiest girl he'd ever seen, even more so than his momma. They bonded one afternoon across the garden fence over a mutual love of red jelly beans.

His father, in a rare display of sobriety had handed a paper bag of scarlet candy to his eldest son that morning and he'd happily shared half with Jenny. At precisely 12:45 his mother had called him in for lunch and he'd temporarily bid farewell to his new favourite person and happily rushed indoors for his snack and mandatory juice box. He emerged back into the garden twenty nine minutes later to find that in his absence Jenny's mother had returned from the store and gifted her daughter with a bright yellow gobstopper the size of her young daughters fist. Jenny proclaimed this to be far cooler than any old jelly bean and skipped off to the other end of the garden to play with her dolls.

She didn't share.

He decided girls were mean.

And their love was short lived at just 87 minutes in total.

Weeks of adoration, that misplaced infatuation...

The next time Booth fell in love was with young Miss Laura Gibbs. She was smart and happy and pretty. She was also his fourth grade teacher. After three weeks of doe-eyed looks and strategically placed cards made from brightly coloured construction paper he found himself being sat down and told in a soft almost joking tone that 'perhaps it would be better for him to focus on girls his own age'. He sulked for two whole days.

Then, four months later, he transferred schools and he never saw her again.

He had learnt that love didn't always go both ways.

Seconds, young lust...

When Booth was twelve he walked in on his best friends older sister and caught a glimpse of her wearing nothing but her underwear. Her name was Kelly Sanders, the panties were pink, the bra didn't match.

He loved her for the period of time between his hand pushing open the door and her hand connecting with his face.

It was then he learnt that love hurt.

Months, a friendly sort of love

Helena Jacobs caught his heart when he was fifteen. They'd been 'going steady' for two months before it happened and he already knew she was one of the coolest people he knew and that she kissed like she was born to do it. However, he decided he loved her when she skipped her grandmothers 90th birthday party to watch him in his first 'big game'. She also told him she'd wore her blue sweater because she knew it was his favourite colour. He lost the game but somehow it hadn't mattered.

They parted amicably six weeks later, just as school ended for the summer. 'A spring romance' she had called it with a wistful smile beyond her years and he had smiled back, thinking how odd it was that he wasn't sad. She ended up married to another one of their class mates, a boy who by chance she had been sat next to and met at that ill fated 'big game'.

It was funny how things turned out sometimes but if the fifteen weeks they had spent together had taught Booth anything it was that just because you stop loving someone doesn't mean you have to stop liking them.

Forever and yet no time at all, a passionate affair...

Booth learnt his next big lesson in love courtesy of a temptress of a girl who insisted on being called Alexa Blue (despite the fact her real name was Amy Clark). Booth was a young man now, full of dreams and hopes for his future, and he was completely and hopelessly in love with her. She was everything he wanted and within two weeks of meeting they were practically living together. She was an artist and wanted to travel the world. When he first joined the army he wrote long letters back to her, vividly describing the places he'd been, the wonders he'd witnessed (more the good than the bad), wishing she was there to share it with him. He'd talk of how he loved her passion for life, her vivid imagination, her free spirit and how he couldn't wait to spend the rest of his life with her.

In the end however Booth found out the hard way that it was possible to be too free-sprited when he returned home on leave after six months away only to find her in bed with a man he'd never even met. He'd simply turned around, walked out the door and had never seen her again.

Love, it seemed, could end just as quickly and as passionately as it started.

Years, the steady romance you're sure will last...

For a long time Seeley Booth thought Rebecca Stinson had been the love of his life and could count the length of time he had loved her down to the day. It started with an impromptu coffee date and ended with blue lines on white plastic and a rejected proposal. Rebecca was wonderful. She was smart and funny and beautiful. When she spoke people listened. She spoke her mind and shared his values. She was calm and dependable and in the end had given him the most precious entity in his life, his son. She was perfect...and she was all wrong for him, they were all wrong for each other. The time they shared was magical but it was over almost as soon as it began. Sad but true they just weren't meant to be.

They weren't the people they were meant to spend the rest of their lives with.

Three years, seven months and four days.

It was a long time to spend in love with the wrong person.

Eternal, the love you know is worth waiting for...

He can't be sure she even believes in love, despite what she says, but when she tips her head at him and smiles the smile he knows is reserved only for him as she invites him to lunch he realises it doesn't matter. They'll argue over lunch but she's no Jenny Forbes, she isn't going to leave when something shiny catches her fancy. It might not be easy but unlike with Laura Gibbs there's nothing inappropriate or misplaced about the way he feels about her. He thinks she's the most beautiful creature he's ever seen but unlike with Kelly Sanders he wants her for more than her body. She's his best friend but unlike with Helena Jacobs they have the potential to be so much more.

Just like with Alexa he doesn't call her by the name she was born with but unlike with Alexa he knows the thinly veiled passion they share wont fizzle and die but rather will burn deep wthin them, nurturing but not consuming. He had been wrong about love before, wrong about what was right and wrong for him. Unlike with Rebecca he knew this time, he was sure, not a doubt in his mind. She was forever. Her beliefs were almost irrelevant, she had his heart whether she wanted it or not and as of today she's been its custodian longer than anyone else ever has.

Three years, seven months and five days ago Seeley Booth fell in love with Temperance Brennan.

One day he just might tell her.