Forever Onwards and Upwards

Disclaimer: I don't own Mentalist or its characters

"5 minutes left!"

Patrick Jane had been daydreaming yet again, this time thinking about an imaginary life where he was a carny. This daydream had sucked him in a lot more than other dreams because, as a student born into a fairly wealthy family living in a well-off urban city, being a carny in the future was next to impossible. The fact that it was so unlikely to occur, made it even more appealing to Jane. In this particular dream, he was impressing a fairly large crowd by breathing fire out of his mouth, while claiming to the crowd that his father was actually the last living dragon on earth and thus, he was a half-dragon and was able to breathe fire.

"2 minutes left!"

This time, the teacher's announcement managed to snap Jane back into reality. He glanced at his test paper and saw that he still had 6 questions left to answer. Jane had barely studied for the test, like usual, so he wouldn't normally care if questions were left unanswered before the test was over, as he would probably get them wrong anyways. This test, however, was multiple choice, so Jane could still get lucky guessing the correct answers. By now, Jane knew he seemed to always have insanely good luck on his side. In fact, he was rather notorious throughout the school, and town, for it. He thought back to the times where he always beat his friends, and practically almost everyone who when it came to things like rolling die, rock-paper-scissors and coin tosses. He quickly guessed the remaining questions and put his pencil down just as the teacher, Mr. Abel, declared that the test was now over. Abel then walked around the class, collected the papers. As always, students started chattering right away despite being told repeatedly to remain quiet until the tests were collected.

"Quiet down. You may leave and talk once I have collected all the tests" he scowled. Abel practically had to say this after every test ever since he had started teaching.

Once he was done, he dismissed the class. Jane started packing all his things into his bag when a voice behind him asked, "How did you think you did?"

He turned around to see a studious looking female with jet- black hair and green eyes that were quite striking.

"Well Teresa, being Patrick Jane, of course I scored perfect. I'm psychic and I can see all the answers by reading everyone's mind." he joked.

Teresa Lisbon, a friend of Patrick, smiled back at him. Lisbon and Jane had been friends for only a year now, and yet their friendship was quite strong. They were quite different from each other, Jane being fairly lazy and Lisbon being close to a model student, but they somehow managed to make the friendship work. Still, they were only good friends, not best friends, although in this particular math class, they both hardly knew their other classmates, so they interacted with each other quite a lot where they were in Mr. Abel's classroom.

"That explains your C minus on our last test."

"Hey, this time is different, okay? It's all multiple choice this time."

Lisbon looked somewhat disgruntled at this. She, like a lot of people, knew about Jane's good luck. The proof of this was in previous multiple choice tests they both took. Lisbon spent hours and days studying compared to Jane's mere minutes, yet on MC tests, Jane scored nearly as well as Lisbon, and on one occasion, actually scored higher. She remembered how Jane made fun of her for nearly a week when that happened and promised to never let that happen again.

Still, sometimes she wondered if there was more to Jane's good luck than what meets the eye. She thought it wasn't possible that a person could ever be that lucky. Maybe Jane was just smarter than he let on. She remembered when Jane took on the entire school at rock-paper-scissors and won against every student, teacher and faculty member without losing once. When he finally lost, during the repeat round where he played against everyone a second time, he looked incredibly bored, which made Lisbon wonder if he chose to lose due to being tired of playing rock-paper-scissors all day. Afterwards, most people talked about how lucky Jane was, Lisbon wondered if it was actually luck, since she knew that there some amount of skill and thought that were required to win at rock-paper-scissors.

"Your luck will run out soon. Even if it doesn't, it's not like we'll be taking multiple choice tests forever."

Jane noticed how Lisbon turned sour over this topic and decided to change it, for her sake.

"Hey Teresa, what do you think about being a carny? I was thinking about being one while we were taking the test."

Lisbon thought this was completely absurd and scoffed.

"Why would I want to be living like a homeless person, with no prospects and hardly any wages? And for that matter, why would you want that?"

Jane looked offended. "Well, I think it would suit me rather nicely. Can't you imagine me being a carny? Think of all the tricks I can do already. Like the coin trick I just played on you a few days ago. If I was a carny, I could make a fortune showing tricks like those off and even invent some cooler and better ones along the way."

"You'd have to be really good at it to make that much. Enough to not live like a rat, I mean. And while you are good, you're not that good. And what about your parents, Jane? Do you think they'd be proud of you if you became a carny?"

Jane was about to answer back when the bell rang, signalling the next class. They both looked at each other and realized, not only had they spent 10 minutes talking to each other, but all their classmates from Abel's class were gone and replaced with students from the next class.

"Catch you later, Jane. I don't want to be late for geography" as Lisbon ran out the door.

Jane walked at a leisurely pace to his next class, not caring less about his courses. He thought over Lisbon's last question. What would his parents think? He knew they supported and loved him very much, sometimes to the point where it was overbearing, but would they accept him if he chose a carny life, while his parents were both successful doctors?

In the school cafeteria

"Come on, you have to come. It's going to be the best party this year. We don't even have tests coming up."

Wayne Rigsby was sitting next to Kimball Cho in the cafeteria, both talking about the upcoming party at one of their classmate's house.

"Those are the exact same words you said last time" Cho replied while continuing to eat nonchalantly.

"I mean it this time. You know who's hosting the party? Matt Talbot! You know who he is right? Star of the football team! We've got to go."

Cho finished his lunch and tossed the bag in the garbage.

"No", he said deadpan.

"Can you at least say a bit more than that? We talked about how much I hate it when you talk like that."

They both got up and started backing to the back of the school, where they both normally hung out before lunch period was over.

"We both know you only want to go because Grace van Pelt is going too."

Rigsby's face blushed. "That's not true."

Cho only had to look at him for one second before Rigsby admitted, "Okay, that's one reason. But it will still be a fun party even if I don't get to see her. Besides, why would she want to hang out with me anyways?"

Cho looked at him again, with a rare look of compassion in his eyes. "Why would you say that?"

Rigsby looked disbelieved upon hearing this. "You mean aside from the fact that she's seen Forster and his gang give me wedgies, flush my books down the toilet, give me a swirly and throw food at my face about a hundred times?"

"You know the reason why that's a problem?"

"Aside from the pain and humiliation?" Rigsby said in a sarcastic tone that Cho would have been proud of.

"Because you don't stand up for yourself."

"When I'm 5'9 and Forster and his pals are all taller than 6 feet? What a great idea." Rigsby continued in his perfect sarcastic voice.

"Can you stop talking like that?" Cho asked.

They both then realized the irony of the situation and laughed.

"OOF!" Wayne suddenly crashed into a hulk of a student who knocked Rigsby to the ground.

"What's so funny, Rigs?" said the student.

"Nothing, James. We were just heading back inside."

James Forster grinned and turned around to face his friends, who were almost as violent and scary as he was.

"Whaddya guys wanna do with our pal Rigs here?"

Various suggestions to torment Rigsby came up almost all at once.

"Let's take away his pants!"

"Give him another swirlie!"

Meanwhile Cho helped Rigsby to his feet, who muttered a quiet thanks.

Suddenly, Forster walked over and picked up Rigsby's backpack, which had fallen off when Rigsby fell over.

"Hey!" Rigsby cried out.

"Just looking," Forster said as he searched the contents of Rigsby's bag. "Man, just a load of worthless shit inside."

"Then give him his bag back." Cho suddenly said.

Forster looked at Cho this time, menacingly. This was not the first time Cho had stood up for Rigsby like this. The first time he did, Forster was surprised. He knew Cho and Rigsby were childhood friends, but Cho didn't seem like the type of person to intervene in situations like this. Forster thought Cho was more like the guy who ran off to the teacher to call for help. Even so, Forster continued to torment Rigsby throughout his high school years, even when Cho was right there beside him. It was just too fun, after all. Still, Forster never picked on Cho directly, as something about him made Forster nervous. There was a saying that said you should always beware of the quiet ones, and Forster thought this applied perfectly to Cho.

"Better leave now, Cho. What would a teacher think if a straight A, model nerd like you was messing around with a guy like me?"

"Give it back," Cho repeated.

"Well, this is all worthless junk anyways. I think I'll do Wayne a favor and help him throw this trash away."

He looked up to the rooftop and drew back his arm as he prepared to toss the bag onto the roof. Out of the corner of his eyes, he noticed Cho move. He looked back at him to see Cho draw back his fist and assume a fighting stance. Forster normally didn't get intimidated easily but seeing Cho like this made him doubtful of continuing.

"If you throw it, I'll make sure that you never want to come back to this school ever again", Cho warned.

Forster sneered and his friends laughed, albeit rather nervously. Risgby and Cho heard a stampede of students walking over and talking amongst themselves rather excitedly and looked behind Forster and his gang. It seemed that, like most other situations where a fight was going to break out, a large crowd had gathered nearby to watch. Some even took out their phones so that they could record this.

"You think you're tough? Bring it on then" Forster made up his mind. While Cho looked quite threatening, he wasn't going to let his reputation of being the biggest and strongest student go to waste.

"That's enough!"

Suddenly, a teacher, Ms. Brighton, started walking towards the crowd of people who had gathered.

"What's going on, here?"

The crowd started walking away in disappointment, as the fight they all anticipated wasn't going to happen after all.

Forster replied meekly, "Nothing. Rigsby here tripped and I got his bag for him."

He shoved Rigsby's backpack into Rigsby and walked off, his friends following him.

Brighton turned to Rigsby and Cho. "Is this true?"

Cho was about to answer when Risgby quickly said, "Yes!" before he could say anything.

Brighton looked doubtful, as if she didn't really believe Rigsby, but she left, as she had no other choice. After Brighton was out of earshot, Cho asked, "Why did you lie?"

"I don't want any more trouble as it is, okay. Don't you think I've had enough of that?"

The bell rang and they started to walk back to the front of their school, Bloompool High. As they reached the front and were about to part ways, Wayne turned to Cho.

"Thanks for helping me by the way. Even though you didn't have to. You nearly got into trouble and that would have screwed over your perfect record."

"Someone had to stand up for you when you weren't going to."

Rigsby knew there was truth in Cho's words but he didn't want to talk about it any further.

"I'm just glad someone called the teacher before things got out of hand. Any idea who it was?"

"No and it doesn't matter. I've got to get to class."

Cho gave Rigsby a small wave and headed off.

Rigsby was about to turn around and head to his class when he saw a pretty, red-haired girl in the distance. He thought back to just a few minutes ago and realized that he had seen the same person standing next to Ms. Brighton and talking to her. After Brighton had walked over to the crowd, she vanished. He now knew who had called the teacher over.

The girl turned around and saw Rigsby. She, of course, was Grace van Pelt. She gave Rigsby a small, comforting smile which made him blush. He tried to return the smile but she already walked off, chattering with her friends.

"She's so...beautiful" he thought. "How pathetic is it that she has to save me by calling the teacher over because I was getting the shit kicked out of me for the hundredth time?"

He walked off to class, van Pelt's smile still in his mind, like a rainbow after a storm.