Page 20 of Booth

He must have dozed off at some point because he woke up to a darkened room and a blanket pulled over him.Getting up, he stretched and nearly screamed like a little girl when someone knocked on his patio door.It was his brother Dallas.

“Wanna go on a run?”He asked him what time it was.“Not late.About nine thirty.I just need to get out of the house for a little while.The baby is going to hate me because I can’t stand to let her cry, and Amy cries too.It’s too much.They’re both asleep, and I left a note telling Amy that I was going to hang out with you since you can stay up late.So do you wanna go on a run with me?”

“Of course.”He decided to leave a note for Dee, too, and was out the door before he changed his mind about the hour.It was nearly ten when the two of them shifted and ran through the trees like their other halves.

When Dallas said he’d had enough, the two of them laid in his backyard and rested.It was a beautiful night for being out, and they’d worn each other out.It was just something else that he missed having to work early in the morning.

“I’m loving being a dad.But there is so much I don’t know about being one.I’m striving to be just like our dad.”Booth told him that was the best way to go.“When are you and Dee going to have a baby?I don’t mean to pry, but I was just curious.”

“Soon.When she ovulates again.”He wasn’t embarrassed talking to his brother about Dee and her cycle, they’d been raised not to be that way when it came to sex.“Right now, we’re getting used to me being home all the time.I find myself outside a great deal more than I’ve ever been, and I’m loving it.Dee said it’s nice to have me around, too, when she needs to talk to me.She’s not keen on the mind-speak thing yet.I think she’s just nervous.”

“So was Amy at first.She didn’t know who could hear us.It took her a while to get used to justbeing able to reach out and talk to me.Now she does it all the time.It’s nice having someone so close that you can talk to them.”He asked about Cullen and Faulkner.“I’ve heard from Faulkner but not so much Cullen.I think he’s still getting used to not working too.But his stress levels were way up there.”

“I understand that.I’m beginning to realize how much pressure I was putting on myself, teaching all the time.Having this summer off from school really made me realize how much I was missing by going to bed early all the time.I know that I did the school dirty by just up and quitting like I did, but I feel better than I have in a decade.And tonight, I got to talk to you and have some fun.I wouldn’t have done that before.Not with having to get up early to be to class on time.”He asked if he thought that he’d miss it.“Dee asked me something like that tonight.Would I miss working?She said that I didn’t strike her as a leisure kind of person.I have stuff to do right now, so no, I don’t miss it, but I’m sure that once the newness wears off, I’ll have to find myself something to do.”

“Yes, I understand that.When Amy was around the house more, it was driving me crazy that we couldn’t just pick up and go places.She had to stay close to home in the event that the baby came early.But she calmed me down by telling me that once she was born, we’d have lots to do with her.And while so far that hasn’t happened, I can see where we’ll travel more and be out of the house a great deal.I’m looking forward to her first holidays.She’s too young to understand what’s going on, but I’m not.Then next year she’ll be one and that will be so wonderful with her.”Dallas laughed.“We’ve been told that the years would go fast now that we have a baby in the house.In no time at all, she’ll be going off to college.I don’t want to think that far ahead, but the past month has really flown by.”

“It’s hard to believe that she’s going to be a month old in a couple of days.”Dallas said he couldn’t believe it either.“Dee and I are going to watch the two of you with Anna and see how you screw up.Because grandma told me that you always screw up your first kid.You’re over everything.Overprotective and so on.”

“Thanks.But with having all the elders around, mom and the grandmas I don’t think we’ll screw up too much.Dad told me to get this through my head.‘Amy is always right.’ Dad said it took him one or two of us being born before he understood that was true.Mom was always right when it came to us boys about anything.”

The sun was coming up when they decided to go to their homes.Dee was just getting up when he got into bed, and she was glad that he’d been out with Dallas.The women were going to get together today and have lunch.Booth said that he had some more inventory to take and he’d be done with the barn.They were finding all kinds of things in the barn that had been left behind for them to use.

In addition to the blow-ups, there was an old lawn tractor.Also, a small tractor that looked like it would have been used for gardens.He thought that he’d enjoy that, having his own garden when the summer rolled around.It would keep him out of doors, and he thought that he’d share his crops, if he had any, with his family.Shaking his head, he wondered when he’d become such a sap about things and decided that he’d worked hard enough to be sappy about whatever he wanted.

When Dee left with all the others, he decided that he was going to clean out his office.It was raining right now, and he couldn’t do too much in the yard, so the office it was.Some of the things that he’d brought from his apartment were school things, and he set them aside to deal with later.But as he dug into the rest of the stuff, he realized that he still had all his notes from college and decided that he wanted to see about going back to school to get another job.He didn’t know what he wanted to do, but teaching wasn’t one of them.Piling stuff up by the door that needed to be shredded, he got sidetracked with trying to find his shredder so that he could take care of the mess he had.

When Dee got home, the office was a mess.Not only had he gotten sidetracked a couple of times and left messes in piles, but he’d never found the shredder.Also, he had a list of things that he needed to make his office complete.In addition to the shredder, he needed a stapler—he had no idea where his had gotten to and a new chair.The one he had was as old as the paperwork that he’d found in his desk drawers.

He thought about getting a filing cabinet, but he knew he’d be storing paperwork that should have been thrown out years ago.Everything that he had was backed up on his computer so keepinghard copies of things was doubling the amount of crap he had.He also thought that he should get himself a new computer, as the one he had now was from his senior year in high school and had to be babied along to turn on when he needed it.He was sort of ashamed of his mess when he realized that his brothers were coming over to watch the game with them.

“Just shut the door.No one will know anything about it.”He said that he’d do that, but would know it was a mess.“So?You’ve only just moved into the house.If they complain about a little mess, then tell them to go home.I’ll eat all the wings that were made myself.I love the hot and spicy ones.”

“You would too, wouldn’t you?”She nodded at him and then laughed.“All right.But I’m ordering a couple of things that will come tomorrow if I can order them soon enough.Are you going to be home?”

“I don’t know.I can be here in the morning, but in the afternoon I have to go over to Amy’s home and sit with the baby while she takes a shower.She said that Dallas freaks out when the baby cries, and she’d rather he didn’t have to watch her.Do you really think he freaks out?”He told her what they’d talked about last night.“Oh.I guess I can see him doing that.Holding her all the time isn’t good for either of them.But then I’d probably be the same way.”

“Nah, you’d be a pro at it.I have a feeling that our kid is going to be much smarter than Dallas simply because we both are.”She asked him if he was calling his brother stupid, or, for that matter, calling Amy stupid.“I’d never say that to their faces, but they have been known to freak out with the baby.”

They both laughed, and she helped him move the papers from in front of the door to the middle of the room.Once the door was closed, they weren’t going to bother with it for the rest of the night.But he did get some things ordered and got himself a new laptop that he could use when he got his mess cleaned up.

The game was fantastic.Their team, the Browns, had won the game by a narrow margin.The food was a huge hit as well, and they were all now ready for dinner.Ordering pizzas and inviting the women over seemed like a wonderful end to their day.Even Mom and Dad came over to eat with them.

When everyone left after dinner, he realized how exhausted he was.Not getting any sleep the night before, he was willing to bet that he’d go to bed and crash tonight.Dragging his ass up the stairs after everything was locked up he brushed this teeth and got into bed.He was happy to have Dee curl around him, but that was all he remembered.He really was out before the lights went out in the room.

~*~

Dee had a million and one things going on in her head when the front doorbell rang.Going to see who could be bothering her at eight in the morning, she was ready to blast whoever it was for disrupting her morning.She was both surprised and nervous when a stranger was there.

“I want to talk to your husband.”She said she did as well, but he wasn’t home at the moment.“Where is he?I want those test papers that he gave my son at the beginning of the school year.And don’t think I didn’t notice that he quit the school when I wanted those papers.”

“Mr.Sawyer, right?”He seemed startled that she knew his name.“Yes, well, you’ve been causing trouble since Booth quit.Speaking of which, thank you for that.”

“What do you mean, to thank me for him quitting.He was lazy, that’s why he quit.It had nothing to do with me.”She just stared at him until he had to look away.“Look.I want those tests.I’ve had the teacher at the school looking around for them, and they must be here.”

“If they were here, they’d be shredded, like he told you that he’d done with them.”He said that he didn’t believe her.“Then by all means come into his office and find them if you’re so hyped up on finding them.However, you’re not going to find them here any more than they were at the school.He shredded them.Just like he told you he’d done.”

She knew for a fact that they’d been shredded and were in the bags of shredded papers that he’d taken to be dumped off at the warehouse.They used the shredded papers for packing material, and that was where he was right now.Stepping back so that Mr.Sawyer could enter, he just stood on the steps without coming in.She asked him what he wanted now.

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