Secrets
Summary: A man will go to extremes to protect his secrets. Drabble- Jane, Lisbon, post ep to s05ep21.
Set: Post-episode drabble to s05ep21.
Warning: -
Disclaimer: Standards apply.
I know a secret you don't know.
Lisbon still feels shaky when she drives back to the headquarters half an hour later. The house – the darkness, the dust and shadows, the shrill voice of the woman and the man who tried to tell her something and could not talk – those are images she wishes to forget as soon as possible. As usual, these also are images she knows will haunt her for quite some time. The case was barely trivial and yet not half as ugly as they usually got and still there is something in its afterglow that tastes stale and bitter in her mouth, like ashes, dust and earth.
A man will go to extreme measures to protect his secret.
Not only men, she thinks. And then: Jane, damn you, and she knows he really did not look into the Tupperware box of LaRoche's. She has known him for such a long time she is pretty sure she would have detected a lie in his eyes, or his voice, had he lied to her. No, Patrick Jane has not checked the box, just as he said, and the fact that he did not lie to her makes her a tiny little bit happy. Just a tiny bit.
"Jane?" The knock on the iron door is too loud in the silence of a Friday evening. Silence answers her first, then:
"I told you, Lisbon, I need to be alone."
"I know."
She leans her head against the door. It is like being a little bit closer to him, a tiny little bit. She feels ashamed to think she could be able to lessen the distance between them by sulking in front of his door.
"I just… Can you come out one last time? It will not take long."
"Why?"
He sounds cranky. Granted, he has every reason.
"Just once."
And, because she feels like it, because the darkness of the stairwell and the man without tongue and the pictures inside her head are just the littelest bit too overwhelming, just a tiny bit too gruesome, and because she wants to see him the tiny bit too much that might just as well be her downfall:
"Please."
She can almost hear him sighting. The lock rattles, the iron door creaks open a bit and Jane's head appears. He sees her standing there and opens the door wide enough to lean against the frame. Mind you, he does not let her in, but she does not want in right now. Inside his lair is a secret she cannot bear to confront now, especially since she has enough to think about as it is tonight. It is enough, just seeing him standing there.
"This better be good."
"I know what's in the box," she tells him. Jane, calm as you please and sometimes she could kiss him for it, merely cocks a brow.
"So?"
"Don't you want to know?"
"I explained it to you, didn't I?"
"You did."
She sighs, too, looks down: her hands are locked. She unlocks them, gazes at her fingers.
"Do you sometimes have the feeling you have known a person for a long, long time and still don't know her at all?"
"Oh, Lisbon, don't we all have this feeling now and then," he says dramatically and rolls his eyes. He makes her want to smack him and it feels surprisingly good. Normal. Still, she sighs again. "Listen, Teresa," he continues and she looks up at him quickly. "I told you. Some things should just remain secrets, okay? I can't tell you to forget what you saw or whatever you just learned. I can't tell you not to worry about it. But believe me: sometimes it is better not to let yourself dwell on such secrets."
He looks so serious she opens her mouth to ask him something and then he continues.
"It will make you worry, and you'll get bad skin and bags under your eyes. So don't worry off your pretty little head."
Teresa stares at him and then starts laughing. It is something in the way he says pretty little head that makes her want to burst into laughter before she tries to figure out whether it was a blatant lie, an insult, an intentionally misdirected compliment or a badly concealed attempt to get her out of his hair again. Patrick glares at her, mock-hurt.
"I was being serious."
"Of course," she echoes, tension trailing away with the last pearls of laughter. She catches herself, takes a deep breath
"Thanks, Jane. I won't come back until you leave your room again."
She turns to leave.
"Hey, Lisbon."
He calls her name with a sudden seriousness that makes her turn around slowly, suspiciously, Jane is always trying things on her. But he just leans in the door, his eyes searching for her gaze and finding it, and she stands there, transfixed. There seems to be something he is telling her but she cannot find anything in his eyes. And she cannot look away, either.
"I'll tell you a secret, Lisbon," Jane says and wriggles his right hand in a come closer gesture. Teresa hesitates a second, then follows his gesture until she stands directly in front of him. His blue eyes look at her with the odd mixture she still hasn't learned to decode completely: there is humor in there, irony and sarcasm, hurt and laughter, and tonight, there is something more in there, as well. Or she is imagining it.
"Thank you," he whispers when she is close enough, and his breath tickles her ear. "For letting me do this."
And then he leans forward and kisses her.
It lasts a second, then the door slams shut. Lisbon is left on the corridor, rooted to the spot, one hand on the door frame, one on her lips. Blinking, she tries to orient herself. Get a grip, Teresa. He's messing with you. Again. But she cannot stop the tiny voice in her head that says that perhaps he has not been playing her. Not this time. The voice is just tiny enough to be heard, just so.
She wonders how long she'll be able to keep her secret.