AN: Hello, surprisingly good episode! After last week, I was expecting to be let down, but I honestly wasn't. Good things, all around.
Pasts and Palaces
He spent longer than he really needed to with Pete, but he kept finding himself unable to walk away. There was something so intrinsically horrible about not being able to remember that it broke his heart.
That was what he did - he remembered. Everything.
His past had effectively made him who he was every second of every day. His distant past, his recent past, all of it. To not be able to remember...there were few things more horrible.
He also felt a strange sort of companionship with Pete. Pete, too, he found a woman he cared about with her throat slit, felt himself responsible for the deaths of people he cared about. When he had forced the younger man to relive finding Lucy, he understood the feeling of utter horror all too well.
Perhaps that was what caused him to take extra time in the creation of Pete's memory palace. Jane was sure he had enough of a grasp on the concept to continue perfectly well on his own. He himself had other things he could be doing - drinking tea on Lisbon's couch and trying to coax her into singing again, for one - but he found he just wanted to make sure.
Not for the first time, he wondered what he he had been thinking during his fugue state the year before. Lisbon had told him in great (and annoyed) detail about his actions, which hadn't been particularly surprising, but that didn't answer the question of what had been going through his mind.
Intrinsically, he didn't think he was a bad person. Too much had happened to him for that. But a Patrick Jane without those defining events would be formidable indeed.
Pete left eventually, Jane tossing out advice even as the elevator door closed behind the young solider.
He stared at the sealed doors for a few minutes, smiling a touch wistfully, then made his way to Lisbon's office, stopping to brew a cup of tea before appearing in her doorway.
She looked up almost immediately, which told him that she had been waiting for him.
"What was that about?" she asked without preamble.
He crossed the room to take up his usual spot on her couch. "I helped Pete build a memory palace. I think it'll fix his problem, at least partly."
Lisbon stared at him for a moment, apparently surprised. "That was...very decent of you," she finally said.
He frowned at her choice of words, leaning back into the cushions. "I can't imagine it...not being able to remember what you had for breakfast, who you spoke to an hour ago."
"Not being able to remember the two thousand people you've shaken hands with in the past ten years?" she added, and there was a touch of humor in her voice.
"That, too," he conceded. "My job would certainly be much more difficult."
"Well, hopefully you don't take any severe blows to the head in the near future." She took a sip of coffee, eyebrows raised. "Oh, and I didn't play the clarinet. I think I already told you that once. Maybe your memory is already going."
She had, in fact, told him that, years ago, the same day he had managed to convince her to dance with him. Of course, she had definitely given away the fact that she had played a woodwind of some sort - he smiled at the memory of her fingers pressing invisible keys. Oboe? Saxophone?
One of these days, he was going to weasel it out of her. And then he might have to get a hold of Annie and have her hunt down some pictures of Aunt Reese in her band uniform.
"My memory is as sharp as it ever was, Lisbon. I just felt like annoying you." That was certainly true. She hadn't even bothered to contradict him when he'd deliberately said the wrong instrument - she'd just given him a look before studying the music notes tattooed around their victim's ankle. "And, incidentally, you have a lovely singing voice."
Her cheeks colored slightly, just like he knew they would. "You're lying, but thank you anyway."
He wasn't, not really. Granted, she wasn't going to win any Grammy's, but she could carry a tune without causing small children and animals to scream in agony.
Their little duet at the crime scene had definitely caused the local PD (and the military) to wonder if the CBI was slightly insane, but that just meant there was more pleasure in showing off. He didn't care about the implied insults they were throwing his way, but he wouldn't stand for anyone questioning Lisbon's team.
Of which he was still a part, he supposed, despite her threats from earlier.
They had called a truce regarding Lorelei and Red John, at least for the moment. He had given in to her requests, and she had stopped looking at him like he was breaking her heart. He supposed he probably was - it wasn't the first time he had done so, and, unfortunately, it wasn't likely it wouldn't be the last time, either.
It would be better for her if she walked out the door tonight and met someone who could make her happy - truly happy, without strings and without enough emotional baggage to sink the Titanic. He would be violently jealous, and more than a little heartbroken, that much was certain, but it truly would be the best thing for her. He was unselfish enough to want that.
But he was also selfish enough to be grateful every day that it didn't happen.
That meant he got to continue doing what he enjoyed - being near her, close enough to touch, flirting and tricking suspects into giving themselves away. This case had been a wonderful example of how he wanted every case to play out.
Sitting with their elbows touching, the lingering eye contact...
Yes. Definitely not a bad way to solve a case.
He stretched his legs out in front of him, putting his cup and saucer on the table at his elbow.
Their silence was comfortable, that of two people who knew each other very well, knew that conversations didn't need to be forced.
"Chess?" he asked once, motioning to the board he had left set up. He had taken to teaching Lisbon the game recently, and though it wasn't much of a challenge to beat her, he very much enjoyed watching her face as she concentrated, her unconcealed glee when she managed to take one of his pieces.
She flicked her eyes over at him before turning back to the work on her desk. "Sorry," she said, a note of sarcasm in her voice. "Some of us have jobs that don't just require us to hypnotize people."
He pretended to look wounded. "Be nice, Lisbon. I even told you what I was doing."
She conceded his point with a negligent flip of her wrist, then signed something with a flourish. He could tell she was tempted by his offer.
"Please?" he cajoled. "The way you play, you'll be back to paperwork in no time anyway."
As he had predicted, she was unable to resist the challenge.
"One game," she told him. "Just so you stop smirking like an arrogant jackass."
Triumphantly, he moved the board to her table, then waited for her to join him. She made a great show of putting her paperwork aside before standing, and he hid his smile.
If only life could always be this easy.
She stretched her legs out under the table, and he mirrored the gesture, careful to not actually touch her, but rather to make sure that she touched him every time she fidgeted. Lisbon didn't acknowledge the gesture, but he was quite certain she didn't move that much normally.
He prolonged the match as much as he could, losing both knights and a bishop before he decided to actually start thinking about where the pieces were going.
Lisbon's expression of disappointment was adorable.
"You son of a bitch," she said, frowning. "I really thought I had a shot at winning this one."
He smiled as he re-set the board. "All in time, grasshopper."
She made a face that looked like she wanted to flick him in the nose, but instead, she pushed her chair back and re-settled herself at her desk.
Jane put the board in its usual spot above her shelves, then sprawled on the couch, tucking a pillow under his head.
His earlier nap had been interrupted, and he intended to make up for it.
"Night, Lisbon," he said, "don't work too loudly."
Without looking, he held up a hand to deflect the box of tissues she threw at him.
Smiling to himself, he turned slightly onto his side, lost in pleasant thoughts and the wistful notion that if life could always be this simple, he would be happy.
Well, he admitted, perhaps not completely happy. There was going to need to be another warm body on this couch with him for that to happen.
But it would be a good first step.
And, well, you had to start somewhere.