Title: They Want a Reason
Author: Miss Peg/RedFi
Rating: K+
Characters: Lisbon/Red John
Summary: They want a reason, but she can't give them one.
Notes: Written for the Paint It Red ficathon, using the prompt 'Romance: Lisbon/Red John: give me a reason' from tromana.
I wrote this a while ago, it was actually also inspired by Thicker Than Water by lothiriel84. I was reading it so I could make art for the Heroine BB and it seemed to bring something out of me, along with the original prompt. Anyway, I kept meaning to edit it and post, so now I finally have done.
Spoilers: I suppose there are brief spoilers for season 5 episode 5.
They want a reason.
Her brothers need to know what happened, why their father died and what will become of them now. They don't understand that reasons aren't always possible to establish, and now, more than ever, there's no chance of getting the one they desire.
He killed himself.
That was all she could tell them. They were free from the broken life that they'd been leading. A reason barely made a difference to Teresa Lisbon, let alone her three younger brothers. Nothing would bring back the father who died or the father who left a long time ago, replaced by the monster that had caused them such grief for three years.
No amount of reasons would alter their history; the loss of their mother some years before, or the reasons why she herself died.
They want a reason.
Why did she have to leave? Why did she need to move to California when their whole lives were in Chicago? Why couldn't she just get her own place across town?
She couldn't give them a reason. She didn't know herself, just that she had to get away, to start again in a new town a long way from the difficult upbringing she'd had to face. They didn't understand that by living nearby she would still feel responsible for their every movement; she would still feel the desperation she felt every time she considered her future with them.
Her brothers were all older now, big enough to take care of themselves and she wasn't ashamed of letting them do that. She'd sacrificed her childhood to care for them when no one else would and it wasn't fair of them to demand to know why she needed to get away.
The truth was, she loved them so much, but they weren't her children. They were her brothers, but they treated her like a parent, they disrespected her like they would have done their parents had they both still been alive.
But they weren't alive and that was the problem.
They want a reason.
The official question asked why do you wish to hand in your notice? What they really wanted to know was why do you want to leave the SFPD when you have been such a valued member of the team? Where are you going to go next?
She didn't really know. She had a job lined up at a federal agency, but beyond that, she wasn't sure. Perhaps she would make use of the pay rise to fund a home of her own, or go travelling during her leave. Maybe she would send some of it to her brothers, because despite moving across country, she hadn't let go of the fact that she was responsible for them.
Her boss stared at her for ten long minutes because she wouldn't answer his questions. How could she when she didn't know the answers herself? In truth, she didn't want to leave her job at the SFPD, she loved her co-workers as friends. But the challenge went out of the job a long time ago and she needed, desperately desired, the point of being challenged almost every single day.
They want a reason.
What made her say yes to Patrick Jane joining the CBI? Why would she want to become so involved in the personal life of someone so broken as a Red John victim? What was it about the man with the golden curls and the soulful eyes that pushed her instincts and training to one side in favour of nonsensical emotion?
There was no rhyme or reason for her actions; she couldn't tell anyone who asked what it was that made her say yes. Patrick Jane had a look of sadness about him and she resonated with that, she too had lost family. But that wasn't the reason.
When he turned up at her office door looking like a little lost puppy, she had been irritated. More than that, she had seethed at the very idea of a relative of a Red John victim dropping by unannounced like she owed him something.
As the lead agent on the case, that didn't mean she had full control over every little aspect of it. Nor did she want such responsibility. It was hard enough looking after the daily running of the case files and any new developments.
She most definitely didn't say yes to Patrick Jane because of his golden curls or lost puppy dog eyes, because that would be the most ridiculous reason there ever was.
They want a reason.
When she went to see Red John, the man who had evaded arrest for a decade, why did she let him get so far under her skin that she couldn't shake him for a week? Why had she whispered in his ear? What made her fingers trace along the edge of his wrist before she left him alone?
Was it his charisma? Was it the way he spoke of her past like he had been there through every waking moment? Was it his charming ability to persuade her that everything he said made perfect sense?
She didn't want to give a reason. She didn't want to think about her one and only meeting with Red John because to admit to allowing him in close was the same as admitting that she'd betrayed the trust of her closest friend.
To give reason for her unusual actions, for the line she'd crossed, she would have to explain that Red John made her feel more alive in the five minutes they spent together than she had felt in the twenty-five years since her parents' deaths. She couldn't explain it any more than she could explain to her brothers why her father had died, or her boss at SFPD why she had to move on.
Sometimes there was no reason and that always felt scarier than anything that made perfect sense.
End