What Have I Done

What have I done? She thought helplessly. She glanced down at the man lying beside her, snoring lightly.

Booth rolled over slightly, making her freeze. He didn't wake, however, and she starting breathing again.

What had she begun? A relationship with her partner? A relationship with the man she loved? What right had she to begin a relationship with anyone? She was just the cold, aloof forensic anthropologist. What could she offer him, realistically? Logically?

Temperance Brennan knew she came with baggage. Having recently been informed what that analogy meant by Booth. She was a product of the Foster System, an outsider to most of the population.

How could she give him what he needed?

She knew that she shouldn't be questioning herself like this. That it was stupid, as Booth would have told her. But a part of her wanted to listen to those little voices. Those little voices had protected her from being hurt since she was fifteen. Those voices had protected her more than any person.

Booth had saved her from being killed or injured, sure. But had he shielded her heart? He had merely infiltrated the walls she had built around herself.

Those walls were there for a reason! The last time she left her heart unguarded, she had paid the price. The memory of Sully sailing into the early morning sunlight still pained her. Yet another abandonment to add to her list.

She slipped out of her bed silently, and made her way down her hallway. She reached the dark kitchen, lit only by the faint moonlight coming through the window, and sagged against the wall.

She tried to remember what she had been like before she had met Booth. She thought of lonely all-nighters spent at the lab, Angela's useless attempts to take her out, boyfriends that had been with her for superficial reasons only. She thought of trips to Guatemala and Egypt to help recover identities for nameless corpses.

That was what she had been. A nameless corpse. Waiting for someone to identify her, to bring her back to life. Sure, she had been Dr. Temperance Brennan, Forensic Anthropologist. That was the name she had worked hard to attain, worked hard to uphold. But Booth had come along and made all that seem trivial. He had given her a name she had not had to strive to earn, but a name she had to strive to want.

Bones.

At first she had hated it, and the lack of respect she had thought it implied. But now she knew it was a sign of affection, a sign from Booth that she was more than just a forensic anthropologist. She was a person. Bones felt emotions, and showed emotions. Bones had friends who loved her, who protected her. Bones had a job she loved. Bones had a partner she loved.

But could she be a person without Booth? Could she do all those things without Booth by her side?

She had to try.

As much as she loved him, the part of her that was that abandoned teenage girl told her that love does not keep people together. She had loved her parents, but they had still left. She had loved Russ, and he had left too.

If she was going to love someone, she had to make sure she could survive without them. Then she could permit herself to relax. Maybe even dismantle a few of those walls.

This thought spurring her on, Bones went to the door, pulled on her coat, grabbed her keys, and walked outside.

She glanced back hesitantly, not wishing to wake the man sleeping peacefully upstairs, but not wishing to leave him without a word. She promised herself that she would call him in the morning, when she was far enough away that he couldn't come after her.

Taking a deep breath, Bones closed the door behind her. What have I done?

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