Changed in me
Little oneshot that popped into my head while I was supposed to be doing other, much more important, things. I haven't done an oneshot in a while, so I hope you guys like it.
Disclaimer: Nope, I still own nothing.
I've never really liked cops, you know.
Growing up in the carnival circuit, when I wasn't performing my Boy Wonder act I was always out and about in whichever little town with the crew. A lot of the time someone would set up a card game-con or something like that and they'd always take me along as look out. Usually Petie, a fellow carnie with buckteeth and terrible bad breath, who had a talent for hiding cards up his sleeves. From a young age, you see, they knew I was an asset in all things sneaky. I was always vigilant when they put me on such little missions – little jobs like that make an eight-year-old feel very important – and I'll always spot a passing cop long before he's even within distance to see the stand. I even picked a few plain clothed cops out of crowds before.
And when I caught sight of a uniform, or recognized that signature walk all cops have out of the crowd, I'd subtly signal to Petie and he'd pack up and run off in record time.
When you grow up in a setting like that, cops become the enemy. They're not to be trusted and never to be liked.
Years later, after eloping with Angela and making it semi-big with my brilliant con and shiny suits, I started doing the unthinkable. I worked with the enemy.
Somehow someone in a uniform had heard about me and my act and had believed it enough to ask me to come help out with some cases. And, because somewhere along the line money had become everything and even the meager salary of consulting for law enforcement made dollar signs pop up in my eyes, I agreed. I let myself be bought over.
Not that I was suddenly all buddy-buddy with them. I still rolled my eyes at the strange ways of cops. How many arrogant, coffee-guzzling cowboys I had to deal with on a day made rather depressed.
Angie had a problem with it. Old carnie instincts told her it was a bad idea. Cons shouldn't go playing around with badge-yielding fire, she had said. But I ignored her. They had offered me something I couldn't refuse: a challenge. The Red John case. It was bloody and mysterious and intriguing beyond words. Once they waved that little manila folder in front of me and told me what it was all about, there was no turning back. It had become my newest game.
That's when I met her. A lot of people – the team included, I know – kind of assumed we met when I joined her team. But I saw her once before that.
She was still very young then, working as a fellow detective. Just shy of the big break that would truly put her on the map in law enforcement. I remember her hair was a little shorter than she wears it now and she had a coffee stain on her collar. At first meeting I saw something different in her. For one, when I greeted her and smiled she didn't swoon and giggle like most young women would've. She extended her hand, expecting a handshake, with an unimpressed expression. I was taken aback then – I wasn't exactly used the getting resistance from the ladies – and I awkwardly shook her hand. She had – has – a really firm handshake. She's a cop; she has to. It's part of the job, I guess.
I had worked hard that day to win her over; she was a challenge, a game I needed to win. But she didn't buckle under my shameless pursuits and charms. She just blushed attractively and walked away awkwardly. And stared at my wedding ring; a lot.
Back then I wasn't the best husband imaginable. The spotlight comes with many perks; one of them is loose women hanging on your every word. I didn't exactly cheat on Angela, but I bordered dangerously close to it on many more than one occasion. Flirting shamelessly with an intriguing young police officer didn't seem like much.
But then I went on that show. And I said a lot of things I've regretted saying ever since.
And when I went home that night, there was a note on my bedroom door and inside...
I didn't see her for more than two years after that, I think. It took some time for me to... heal. To get back into a state of mind where I could pursue my new life mission. Vengeance.
I wasn't happy on going back to the place that, essentially, lead me to ruin my own life. I wasn't happy with working with cops again, either. But I knew it had to be done; there was a bigger picture, a greater mission in the horizon.
When I saw her again, she had just been promoted to Senior agent. She was the youngest ever, if I remember correctly. She deserved it. I wasn't put on her team immediately, in fact I worked through most of the other teams in the CBI for a bit longer than a year before I finally ended up with her. Virgil Minelli swore it would be my last shot. He also mumbled that if anyone could handle me and my behavior, it was her.
He was right, but I didn't know just how yet.
Years and years passed and she never gave me up. She never asked that I get transferred, even after countless complaints and legal situations, hundreds of screaming fights and flying staplers. She always stuck by me. Even when it came to Red John cases and I got as dark and broken as I did.
I sometimes wonder now how I didn't see it.
How the little lady cop with the fierce attitude and the prettiest green eyes I've ever seen had been everything I had wanted. She had seen my darkest, lowest moments and still she promised to stay and help me. She still smiled that dimpled half-smile of hers at me whenever I felt low, and it always cheered me up. She still made my tea perfectly – well, not the way I like it, the water is never quite perfectly boiling and she always puts in just a bit too little sugar. But it somehow tasted more endearing that way. Lisbon-tea.
We had a lot of intense moments together; how many times I've heard her get shot at (or almost get blown up) over phones; I shot a Red John lead for her; Hightower; Mashburn; she punched a suspect through the face and endured anger management classes for me.
Despite the fact that she guzzled bad coffee down like a Hummer, despite the fact that she was so extremely trigger-happy and waved a gun around like nothing, despite the fact that she walked that signature cop-walk that I could spot out of a crowd since the age of eight... Despite all of the things I used to think I hated, I had grown to love her.
Apparently it wasn't enough.
X
"Wow. That's pretty intense, man."
I sigh. Nod slowly. "Yup. Intense."
"You should tell her how you feel."
"It's not that simple."
I'm lying on the narrow and hideously uncomfortable bed on the bottom bunk in my prison cell. Telling my new cell mate, Mike, about her.
"Has she come to visit you?"
Another sigh; heavy this time, because my heart feels like solid lead, like it could sink out of my chest cavity and tears through my flesh and fall right down to the ground. "No. No, she hasn't. Not once."
He makes a little grunting noise of understanding and I can tell he's nodding too.
"Mike?" I ask. "Do you think she'll forgive me?"
"I don't know, man. Whatever."
And he rolls over and falls asleep. A few moments later I hear the terribly annoying, but now familiar, sound of his snoring.
I turn on my side and stare at the picture stuck to the wall with sticky tape. The team had brought it over when they had come to visit, along with a blueberry muffin. Of course, she wasn't with them, but I knew the muffin was from her. Like I asked for the last time she came to visit me in a similar setting.
It's a picture that was taken some time or other during a case closed pizza dinner. We're all looking at the camera, smiling.
Rigsby and Van Pelt are scooted close, telling the story on how they're not-so-secretly together at the time.
Cho's face doesn't have a hint of a smile; classic Cho.
And we're sitting together, bantering. We're smiling at the camera, but I can see from the annoyance in her eyes and the way she's slightly turned to me that she's about to turn back and counter whatever I just said with a witty comment. We're sitting very closely together; almost intimately.
I wish I had the courage back then to reach out and hold her hand.
Now I'll never get that chance again.
I'll never be able to tell my beautiful lady cop how much she has changed in me.
I'll never be able to tell her that I love her after all.
Okay... DEPRO! But I'd love some reviews! They are awesome and if you send one, then by definition: you are awesome! So go ahead... Press that little button there... You know you want to!
Much love, Zanny