AN: Another post-Red John tag. I'm clearly not over the disbandment of the CBI still, so I'm trying to cope with that! But really this was a way to pass the time before the PCAs.. fingers crossed for a win! I hope you enjoy this, please review!
Clare can't believe it's been almost ten months since she started working here. Since they all started working here. Clare has been with the company almost from the start, has seen it through from its very foundation.
She'd joined the company straight out of college, where she'd been an English Major. The minor in Creative Writing had been an indulgence, something she'd adored but knew nothing would come of. She'd been working hard for years, so the opportunity to do something solely for her had been something she'd cherished. Armed with her new degree and fresh into the real world, Clare knew she'd landed on her feet with securing a junior position in a small publishing company which was still just finding its roots. After many childhood and youthful attempts at writing fiction herself, Clare relished the opportunity to work with the publication of new books, even if for now she knew she'd be mostly making tea and coffee for the others. Her team was small, and it meant they were a close-knit bunch, a workforce of just seven, and she'd made eight.
Ten months ago, they'd upgraded from the cramped, shoddy office where Clare had had her interview to a new premises across town. Sacramento was a beautiful town, Clare knew, and she was glad to have such a gorgeous location in which she could begin the rest of her life. The new office was a very nice place to go to work in, if a bit intimidating at first. Clare had been told what had been there before the building's conversion into various sized office units on several different floors. This whole building, up until nearly two years ago had been home to the state-run California Bureau of Investigation, or so she'd been told. Apparently there'd been a massive conspiracy though, and in a dramatic turn of events, the FBI had disbanded the CBI and taken over the whole thing. According to Rob, the company accountant, many of the CBI agents had been arrested, with lots of them being charged with a thousand different crimes. Clare remembered a whisper of something to do with the poetry of William Blake, and the English student heart in her had swelled with the drama of it all. The final events in this building had led to the takedown of the serial killer Red John. Rob promised her that the actual main people working that case had been in their very office, but Clare was almost sure he was messing her around. Almost sure.
Anyway, the whole building had lain empty for almost a year before it had been sold to a private buyer who was now renting out units to small companies of Sacramento. So for their rent each month, Clare and her colleagues had the comfort of an open-plan space with a desk each, and a separate office for their boss, Marguerite, and a kitchenette for their use.
Clare's first days with the company had coincided with their move into their new building, and so her first efforts on the team had consisted of sweeping up the floor, washing the windows, and making their eerily quiet portion of this building , which had been untouched for a year liveable in once more. Half of her new colleagues were across town, packing up their old office, and the ones that were here were busy setting up whatever things they had already moved over from their old workplace. So, Clare, with no previous belongings or commitments, was left to the more mundane tasks of cleaning out the cupboards. There'd been a few items whose presence had surprised her. There'd been a collection of teacups, including one with the message "World's Greatest Boss" painted on it. The idea didn't really go with the whole idea of the previous inhabitants of this office being a gang of murdering conspirers as her new colleague Rob would have her believe. It made Clare wonder, but she didn't spend too long thinking about these people she'd never known. She needed to make a good impression with her own new boss.
There'd also been a sad little turquoise saucer sitting in the cupboard, beside the "Greatest Boss" mug. Clare wondered where its partner was. The image of a saucer without its teacup made her feel strangely lonely.
Clare shut the cupboard door and looked round her new workplace. She thought she'd like it here. The kitchen was done now, still mostly empty, but clean. It was all she could really do; the floors had been swept and she'd given the windows a quick rub with a cloth.
Looking round the room, Clare's eyes had caught Marguerite's new office. She hadn't moved in yet, and according to the letters on the glass of the door, the office still belonged to one "Teresa Lisbon", described underneath as "Senior Agent." Clare was sure Marguerite wouldn't appreciate finding some corrupt agent's name on her new door, so she'd went over to it and had scratched round the name till she had found the sticker's edge. The letters were stuck fast to the door, almost as though they hadn't wanted to be removed, and Clare had wondered just how long they were there.
"Sorry, Teresa," Clare had murmured quietly as the sticker finally gave, and she pulled it finally away from the door. The sticker had crumpled up into itself in Clare's hand, and she'd been aware of Rob watching over her shoulder.
"Teresa Lisbon, huh?" Rob had asked.
"Mmm," Clare had replied.
"I remember that name, I think," Rob had started. "She was caught up in it all, I think she was the one who led the team at the heart of the whole thing." He'd wandered off then, and Clare had put the sticker in the bin. This was their office now. She remembered thinking that hopefully they'd have more luck here than Teresa Lisbon and her team had had.
Rob had returned a few minutes later, beckoning Clare over to his new desk where he was sitting over his mobile phone, connected to its mobile browser.
Clare had approached him. "Huh," he'd said.
"This Lisbon woman was actually one of the good ones. It says here her and her agents were one of the only units in the CBI that didn't have charges pressed against them." Clare had smirked. Rob had sounded almost disappointed.
" –Oh wait...," he'd said then, excitement building in his voice again: "Patrick Jane, it says here – Clare, come here! He was the one that killed the Red John killer! And this was their office. Wow!" Clare had smiled. His excitement was cute, she'd thought.
Clare had taken an interest in the CBI then. She'd went home that night and researched the case. It turned out Teresa Lisbon was one of the good ones, despite the apparent loose canon she'd been in charge of, the now infamous Patrick Jane. Clare wondered where she was now. She felt a strange affinity for this woman she'd never met.
It was hard to believe that had all been ten months ago. Clare is glad to have settled into her new job well, has made good friends and good connections she knows will serve her well. She sits at her desk, across from Rob's, and doesn't make coffee and tea as much as she did in her first few weeks. She's enjoying her work immensely, even thought it can be harder than she ever imagined. But there's a great spirit in this office, and she is happy.
This morning, Marguerite has left some boxes out for Clare to take up to their storeroom upstairs. It's a dingy, dim, lonely room, but there's a door there that leads to a small balcony of sorts, and Clare takes refuge in it when things are getting too much.
She goes up there now. Rob offers to help her with the boxes with a wide smile, but she declines his help. She likes Rob, probably a little too much if the truuth be told, but she prefers being up there alone. Having gone up the stairs, she slides the door back and crosses the room. This room is a funny little space. The windows are filthy and let little light through. There's wooden boxes galore, scattered across the floor, mostly empty and old. There's random bits of furniture. Clare supposes the FBI didn't think it was worth taking all this rubbish away.
Clare goes to set the heavy box on the wooden table, but she finds it was never really a proper table after all, just a few weak pieces of wood, for the whole thing collapses under the weight of Marguerite's precious box. The 'table' is in pieces on the floor, but the box has miraculously retained its lid. Clare looks down in frustration at the panels of wood, and props them up against the window. Clare stands up straight again, and places her hands on her back, stretching. It is then she sees the envelope taped to the back side of one of the panels of wood. Immediately intrigued, Clare pulls the tape from the envelope and takes it in her hands. Clare pulls her cardigan round her and goes out onto the balcony. There's a bench beside the window she's taken to sitting on to admire the view of her new town. She sits there now, looking out, in the spot she's sat so many times before. She then looks at the envelope in her hands. Lisbon is scrawled on the envelope's front. Clare hesitates for a moment, but she knows this letter will never make it into Teresa Lisbon's hands. She's not coming back. Clare turns the envelope over in her hands, and she opens it easily. She doesn't know these people, so she doesn't feel too bad about reading someone else's letter.
It's hardly even a letter, she sees as she glances over it. It's barely even a note, just a few simple words written in haste.
Lisbon,
Sorry doesn't seem enough for what I've put you through.
I wish it could be different. I've only ever wanted the best for you, though I know it hasn't seemed so.
All my love,
Jane.
Clare's young heart is taken by it all. It suddenly all seems so romantic. Perhaps Jane wasn't what he once seemed, though she has never known him. And all of a sudden, Clare, sitting alone on the balcony once shared by these two strangers, knows finally, after years of wanting, what she wants to do. The Creative Writing minor might not have been such a waste after all. She's in the right place now to follow her dreams of writing, and surely this story needs told. This Patrick, and his Teresa, stealing away to this balcony looking over Sacramento, now torn apart and leaving hidden love letters for one another. The whispers of their shared past here are all around, and she is taken by the notion. Clare hopes she will be as happy here as they once were. She hopes they get their happy ending, the kind she'd like to give them in writing, and yet she knows life isn't a manuscript like the books she reads through every day. But she hopes they are happy now, wherever they are. She hopes that life is kind to them, despite all the odds. She chooses to believe it will.