Page 6 of Booth

After the game was over, they finished hanging the TV.It had been put on a shelf, and they decided, after watching a game with it at that level, that it needed to be just a bit higher.Just over the fireplace was where it ended up, and she thought that it looked lovely there.Along with their new furniture, the living room was finished up.Only about half a dozen more and they’d have the house finished, she thought with a laugh.

When everyone left, she was tired again.This time, she was able to lie on the couch and not have to go to the bedroom.Booth sat down near her feet and talked to her while she rested, and by the time dinner was being called, she felt about as good as she’d felt in the hospital.But less bored.

“Cullen thinks he’s found him a house.He’ll know more about it in a couple of days.Falkner is still debating if he wants one or not while he’s studying for his exams.”She asked how much longer he had to go.“This was his last quarter.I think if he passes his exams, which I don’t see being a big deal for him, he’ll take his boards and be a doctor.It’s something that he’s been working on for a few years now.”

“Good for him.”Booth told her that they were all proud of him.“Of course you are.It’s a big accomplishment for the family for him to be a doctor.I’m proud of him, too.”

“I heard from Bonnie about the boxes in the barn.Everything in it, no matter what we find, is ours.”She told him that was a funny way of saying it.“I thought so as well, but since there isn’t anything in there but large crates or boxes of holiday stuff, we’ll figure it out the closer we get to Thanksgiving.It’s been raining outside since we moved in, so I didn’t want to bother with it right away.It could be stuff that we just take to the end of the street on trash day.I don’t care.Do you?”

“No, not really.Like you said, if it’s junk, we’ll just take it to the end of the road and be done with it.Do you know if they ever decorated around here before we purchased it?”He said if they did, he never remembered.“I’m not from around here, so I wouldn’t know either.I was just thinking that it could be a Christmas tree for the front porch or something like that.”She smiled at him.“Then again, it could be a big blow up Santa, and we’ll be the envy of everyone on our street.”

“Now I want to go out and see.”They were still laughing as they went to bed.Booth was going to sleep with her tonight, and she was glad for it.The bed was certainly big enough for the two of them.But she was worried that there might be too much room between them.She wanted to be held.

He came out of the bathroom with pajama bottoms on.He looked sort of out of place in them, and he told her that he usually sleeps naked.Wondering why he wasn’t, he told her that he didn’t want to wake up hard as stone with her next to him because of what the doctor had said.Gentle and ease into things.

“I don’t know if I could be gentle with you lying next to me.”She felt her face heat up at his comment.But he got into bed with just the bottoms on and held her to his chest.“This is perfect like this.We can get some nice snuggles in and not have to worry about me pouncing on you in the middle of the night.”

She felt comfortable with him and knew that he was right.They’d been flirting all day and even before she got home, touching each other.Now was not the time to have sex where she’d end up back in the hospital in worse shape than she came home.She thought of his claiming her, and before she could ask him about it, she heard him snore softly.Smiling to herself, she laid her head down and closed her eyes.They had the rest of their lives to make love, and they didn’t have to hurry anything along.

Waking in the middle of the night, she was confused again.But as she laid there, letting her mind settle as to where she was, she realized that she was alone in the bed.When the bathroom door opened, then closed, she knew it was Booth, but was still in panic mode when he got in beside her.She smacked at him twice before her head understood that he wasn’t going to hurt her.

“I’m so sorry.I didn’t know…I was in the car again, and I was being crushed.”He said that he had her.“I was tossed all over the place in my little car.I knew I was going to die and didn’t know what to do.I’m so sorry that I hurt you.”

“You’re fine.I should have said something before getting into the bed with you.I knew you were panicking.Are you all right now?”She said that she was, but felt bad because she’d hurt him.“You didn’t hurt me, honey.I’m fine.I’m just worried that I hurt you when I tried to hold you.Please tell me that you’re all right?”

“I promise you that I am.I was just scared.”She thought of the accident and thought about what she’d been told about it.“I was upside down when they got to me.I didn’t know what to think, I couldn’t think, actually.I just remembered that man behind me screaming at me to pull over.Well, I was terrified to do that.I didn’t know who he was or what he wanted in wanting me to pull over.Not to mention, we were on a busy street and there wasn’t any place for me to pull over.Then, when we got to the roundabout, he pushed me into four lanes of traffic.You have no idea how terrifying that was for me.I thought for sure that I was going to die.”

Booth held her while she cried.It was still fresh in her mind, and she would remember that feeling of not being able to move her legs when she was first out of surgery.So many things could have gone wrong, but here she was lying with her best friend and mate, and she couldn’t have been happier.

Dee must have dozed off at some point because when she woke again, the room was bright with light and Booth was still beside her.Holding onto him as he held her was something that she’d never thought would happen to her in all her life.When he turned and looked at her, his smile was about as bright as the sun, and she kissed him.

“This is what I needed.Everything in life is just time spent waiting for you to come along and be with me.”He grinned with such boyish charm.“I love you, Booth Dixon.So very much.”

“And I love you, Dee Dixon.With all that I am.And as my mate, I claim you to be my other half, my only one true love for now and forever.I claim you as my bride.”She felt her body warm up, her body sizzle with something powerful.

~*~

Booth pulled the box down off the shelf and waited for the dust to settle.He’d been pulling down boxes for the last two hours and hadn’t opened any of them.He was waiting for Dee to get finished with her PT so that she could come outdoors with him.She’d been in her therapy for the last two hours, which was why he was out here going through box after box.Just waiting on her.

He pulled the box down that was marked one of two and had Thanksgiving written on it.Once he had it out of the shelves, he pulled the second box down, two of two down, and put them together.There were similar boxes like this one.Christmas, Halloween, and more Thanksgiving.He didn’t know what they were, but they were certainly heavy.

“I’m finished.”He asked her how it had gone.“She can’t believe the progress I’m making already.She said that being home has done me more than all the time in the hospital.”She waved her hand over the clothing that she had on, and was now dressed warmer.“This has got to be the most wonderful bit of magic you have given me.I love being able to just change my clothing at a whim.I just have to be careful and not do it in front of someone.”

“Yes, me too.I’ve been able to do it longer than you, and it’s saved me tons of money on clothing, too.She asked him if he could name them.“Outfits with names?It never occurred to me to try that.I’m sure someone has looked into it before.I just think of what I want to have on, and it’s on me.Even if it’s the same shirt, it’s clean, so I don’t worry about that either.”

“It was just a thought.What’s in the boxes?”He said that he’d been waiting for her so she could be surprised as well.“Good.Let’s open the Halloween one and see what we have.”

It took them twenty minutes to get the box open.There weren’t any locks or anything on them, but the lids were down on them tightly.Once they got the first box open, they were delighted to find pumpkins, big bats, and ghosts to hang in the trees and other yard décor in the large box.She was excited, she told him to open the next one.

“It’s a giant blow-up.Look, it’s a ghoul.I wonder how tall he is.”Since it was still a couple of weeks away for the holiday, they decided to open it in the barn.Once they got all the parts out and started it to be blown up, they were so happy that it seemed to be about nine feet tall and about as wide, with not just a ghoul monster but bats and pumpkins as well.He couldn’t believe their luck in finding not one but two of the blow-ups in the same box.The second monster was a tall vampire that looked funny rather than scary.“You think that the other boxes have them in them as well?”

Just pulling the tops off the boxes, they could see that it was the same heavy-duty plastic.While they couldn’t tell what was in them, they knew that they were going to be the hit of the neighborhood.He was so excited to get them out and up that he wanted to push the limits of the time and put them all up now.But Dee told him he had to wait, and so he put the lids back on the boxes and put them back up on the shelves.

“I was struggling to get them down.I’m betting that Mr.Milner didn’t want to fuss with them anymore and left them behind.I don’t know that I’ve ever seen them up, as I said before, but they’re not easy to move around.And with him being an elderly man, I’m betting he just said fuck it and left them for us.I would have, too.”Dee squeaked when she found a larger-than-life tree to put up in the yard with lots of lights on it.

“There is a sled back here, Booth.How much you want to bet that it goes in the yard with the big Santa?I’m so excited.We have to get them out the day after the previous holiday.That way we can enjoy them more.”She clapped her hands, acting childlike more than ever.“I can’t wait to have kids now.We’ll have so much fun with them putting these up for them.It’s going to be epic.”

“I’m betting that my parents will love these up too.They love the holidays more than we did as kids.Mom especially loves Christmas.Did I tell you about the ornaments that we’d all get when we traveled?She would put us up a tree so that we could decorate it with the things that we’d gotten over the years.Jayden is going to take pictures of them when he gets some for his own tree and catalog what he gets and where he got it.”She asked if they could do that too.“Of course.I think that it would be fun to give the ornaments and the book that we put together for our children when they move out.”

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