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Booth knows that if they have to choose, he’s the romantic one. If they have to pick someone in the relationship who believes in true love and destiny and the way their fates have overlapped to bring them to this moment, the choice will inevitably be him. He believes in the higher power and purpose of God, how His providence had brought him the family he’d always desired.
While he’d spent years trying to make a family to replace the one that he’d never had, clinging to his faith in a happy ending as a mechanism to get him through, she’d spent years believing that the easiest path forward was to protect herself from recreating the family that she’d lost; it was easier for her to believe that there was no happy ending waiting for her at the finish line than to open herself up to more hurt and heartache.
It hits him over the head in unexpected moments just how lucky he is.
Like when he comes home late from work on the days when they drive separately, and Christine squeals with delight at his arrival, jumping into his arms and giggling in delight as he gives her sloppy kisses all over her face. Fatherhood is the greatest joy he’s ever known and he’s been blessed multiple times over now.
Or when Parker is home and gets down on the floor to play with his siblings in the living room as Booth cooks dinner, blowing loud raspberries on their stomachs and letting them ride around on his back. Their simultaneous laughter fills the house and it’s all that Booth can do not to get emotional.
Or when Bones gets in that mood where she kisses him soundly at work despite everyone around them and he feels like he’s been hit over the head with something that makes him very stupid very quickly. She looks at him with that mischievous and seductive smile and he can’t help but kiss her one more time, superiors and rules and societal expectations be damned.
He’d built his dream world around Bones all those years ago and it had taken Gordon Gordon to make him realize it, how every fragmented moment of his reality was shaped by his repressed feelings for her.
Despite it all, his happiness is contingent on other people and has been for a long time. It’s tied up in Parker’s laughter, in Christine’s singing, in Bones’ teasing looks over the kitchen table, in Hank’s baby babble filling every corner of the house.
He puts on The Soul Album through the bluetooth speaker as he chops chives on a Saturday morning after a long week, his youngest son toddling around his legs and banging the cabinets open and shut in his usual loud way. Christine is sitting at the bar, loudly reading out of her latest book about earthquakes and tsunamis ( where did Bones find these things? ). The five-year-old was an unsurprisingly voracious reader even before her formal education, consuming chapter books at a rate he just couldn’t relate to.
"It’s early in the morning,” he sings along, the whisk in his hand acting as his microphone, “about a quarter till threeee-”
The eggs crack perfectly and he whoops triumphantly, bringing the bowl down to Hank on the floor to show him how good his daddy did, but the toddler ignores him entirely, his attention completely focused on banging on a pot on the floor, and Booth is left to show Christine instead.
“Daddy,” she says reproachfully, “it’s not like that’s hard.”
“Be easy on your dear old dad, okay Christine?” he laughs. “It’s fun to get excited about little things.”
“Okay,” she says with a shrug, going back to reciting facts about Richter scales.
Otis Redding croons through the speaker and Hank whines at his feet and, ever the doting father, Booth slings the kid up on his hip, bouncing slightly as he pours the eggs into the pan. It’s the perfect moment, food sizzling and music blasting while his kids wreak havoc on his life, the chopped chives and some tomato and other random stuff in the fridge joining it all in the pan soon after.
He’s so involved in his cooking and dancing and singing with Hank, who’s now giggling at the goofy antics and repeated bouncing, that he doesn’t even notice his wife coming into the kitchen, sneaking up behind him.
“Your state of dress when cooking omelets used to be very different,” Bones teases suddenly.
Booth nearly jumps out of his skin but recovers quickly.
“Morning, Bones,” he says, handing her the baby (who actually isn’t so much of a baby anymore) when she reaches her arms out for their youngest.
“Good morning,” she answers back affectionately, dragging his head to hers for a kiss, Hank squished quite between them.
It’s a surprise, how long she lets the kiss persevere, and he hums with satisfaction, dragging her closer with a hand on her hip, perfectly happy to let the food burn if it meant one more moment tasting her.
“Ick, Mommy,” Christine says finally. When he pulls away with half a mind to stick his tongue out at her, she’s making a face that he can’t help but find adorable.
“Hey, none of that,” Booth tries to say sternly but it comes out affectionately. “Mama’s gotta get her lovin’ too, you know.”
“Booth,” Bones laughs, pulling away even as she reminds him of his current task, “the food.”
He rushes back over the stove, pulling the pan off the heat quickly. “Oh, shi- shoot —”
The omelets turn out alright (thankfully) and breakfast continues in its usual form, Hank throwing his eggs on the ground and Christine laughing at his antics as their parents chug coffee and attempt to have some semblance of an adult conversation.
It's kind of scary how easily Christine works her ways into their conversation now and Booth realizes more than every that he's going to have a tough time with keeping anything from her in a few years.
Then it’s dishes and cleaning up the kids messy faces and pouring another cup of coffee for both himself and Bones because they’re going to the park to meet the Hodgins-Montenegro clan this afternoon and he knows he’ll need his strength up to throw all three boys around and on top of it all, Bones, who’s busy with the dishes while he clears the table, has been working extra long hours this month after a dig turned up some set of remains that she claims to be extra interesting and—
The music changes, a melody of horns coming out over the sound of the sink and the kids.
I don’t know what you got, baby, but you’re so good to me…
Bones is standing in front of the sink, dishes piled in front of her as she rinses them and he knows they’ll have to get to eventually just like he’s sure that Hank probably needs a change. And despite all that… this song comes on and everything falls away and all he wants is his lady in his arms, swaying gently to the music around them.
He comes up behind her, kissing her neck softly. She chuckles affectionately, turning over her shoulder to look at him as he pulls back, reaching his hand out to her.
“Dance with me, Bones,” he says.
She looks at him skeptically, wringing her hands off on a dishtowel, her gaze softening when she realizes he’s completely serious.
“Here?” she says. “Now?”
He takes her hand, catching how she’s trying to hide her smile, twisting her body into a small spin as he pulls her into him.
“Here,” he repeats, dragging her ever closer, one hand around her waist. “Now.”
She seems to melt a little, leaning her head against his shoulder and moving with his guidance as he sways them back and forth.
How different would life have been if she hadn’t wormed her way into that first case, blackmailing him in the very place they’d get married years later? If he hadn’t been at that lecture the first time he laid eyes on her? If grief hadn’t brought them together, if she hadn’t had a positive pregnancy test a few weeks later?
God had known what He was doing when He brought Bones into Booth’s life and he sent up a millionth silent thanks to the big man upstairs for knowing just what he needed.
How could he not be thankful? Three beautiful, healthy children. Relative safety at the end of all the awful things they’d dealt with for so long. A wife, beautiful and intelligent and way too good for him. A family, all his own to love and protect and take care of forever.
“I’ve been loving you, honey, for a long time,” he sings softly, just a little off pitch but something tells him that she doesn’t care, especially as he spins her out and back in gently, her eyes meeting his the whole time, “and you’re still good to me.”
She tucks her head under his chin, a little hard with only a few inches of height difference between them but he can’t find it in himself to care, tilting his head back to make room for her.
“I find this to be very romantic,” she says finally.
The statement warms something inside him, the part of his heart where her happiness is most important. “Yeah?”
She kisses his neck softly, innocently. “Yes.”
“Good,” he says finally and that makes her chuckle against him.
The song continues and he lets himself stay in the moment. Not the dishes or the kids or the plans of the day, but that exact moment, with the woman he’d been in love with for a decade in his arms as his favorite music played in the background. They've danced together a thousand times and it hasn't lost its appeal; she's still his all time favorite dance partner.
“Did you ever think we’d get here?” she asks, tilting her head back to meet his eyes again.
“Here?” he asks, looking around them at the chaos, the egg on the floor and the dusty shelves and the general mayhem. Hank has found the pots again and is banging on them with renewed vigor at a tempo that completely does not match the music.
“Us,” she clarifies.
Did he ever think they’d ever get where they finally were?
“Oh yeah,” he says, nodding seriously despite his smile, feeling a little emotional at the immensity of it all. “I knew. The guy always knows.”
He looks back to her, her blue eyes bright and slightly teary.
Oh, how those looks from her absolutely ruled him.
"You taught me to have faith, Booth,” she says, her gaze as affectionate as it had ever been.
He can’t help but kiss her, pull her fully against him as the song comes to a close, the two of them swaying in the kitchen.
“I just love, love, love ya, baby,” he half-says, half-sings softly.
“I love you too,” she says finally and her voice is as choked and emotional as he feels. “Very much, Booth.”
He grins as the moment is finally ruined by their kids make their desires to be included known in a very loud way as the next song on the album comes on, swaggering and fast.
Bones grabs Hank and hugs him close to her while Booth picks up Christine, and their romantic moment has passed but it's okay because this one is great too, just as good, just as perfect, dancing goofy with their kids in the kitchen. Another moment of bliss in his life.
Man, God really was good to him.