AN: I was so anxious to post my first story that I forgot the disclaimers. I do not own the Mentalist or the characters. This writing is just for fun, (and there's not much fun in the show at the moment)… "The darkest hour is just before the dawn."
Thank you to:
Rosepeony, you were my first reviewer … ever, so you are special. Don't worry Lisbon is going to start to rationalise her thoughts and follow the evidence with a bit of a nudge.
clairebare and Guest for your reviews and encouragement.
LouiseKurylo; Thank you. I have to say I agree with you. Personally I find Pike's character quite creepy. He is either very needy, even more so than Jane, or something more sinister. I would like to explore that avenue but with the end so near… I fear it will overtake my thought processes.
WHY NOT?
Jane couldn't remember the drive back from the hospital; he was on auto-pilot and didn't really care if he got back to the trailer park or not. He wasn't going to cry like he did when he left her on the Malibu Bluff but he sure felt like it. He was used to panic attacks in the morning when he awoke from his nightmares so he recognized his current symptoms and used as much biofeedback as he could possibly muster to control them. The bottom had fallen out of his world, his heart was truly broken and he found himself gasping for air to fill his empty lungs. Agent Pike had sucked the very life out of him in one brief moment after less than a month.
A few hours later, he knew he was wallowing in self-pity. WHY NOT?
He lay huddled on the couch in his beloved Airstream. Six empty bottles of beer lay in the small sink, a shot glass was on the draining board next to the nearly empty bottle of whiskey and on the table sat a cup of ginger and lemon tea, a pathetic attempt to settle his stomach, along with a bottle of aspirin and a glass of water for the headache that was bound to follow. Forget the biofeedback he would just surrender to it. He had deliberately left the lights off and drawn the curtains, locking the door as well which he didn't normally bother to do. He was truly alone now; perhaps he was better off that way. That way he couldn't hurt anyone, just himself. After the panic attack subsided, the beer and the whiskey finished; he felt cold and shivery so had taken the blanket off the back of the couch to wrap around himself. He'd just spend the night here on his couch. WHY NOT?
"Pancakes" he shouted out to the air around him. Thirteen years ago Teresa Lisbon had taken him in as a broken wreck of a man, watched over him, protected him and helped him recover and repair but now it was over. They had become friends, close friends, partners… She had even helped and supported him in finding and eventually destroying the man who had ruined his life by killing Angela and Charlotte, and in helping him she had destroyed her own career. He had seen a chance, a glimmer of hope that he could put that right and hoping that then they would move on together. He allowed Abbott to bring him back to the US, he had put it right, but she didn't want him anymore and was moving on with someone else to live thousands of miles away. The best human being to come along in the whole of his sorry life since Angela and Charlotte were killed, had met someone else. No! It was worse than that; he had actually introduced her to Pike: and within a month of meeting and flirting with him in that Aladdin's cave of treasures, she was prepared to give up everything for this new man. Agent Pike had taken her out for pancakes and then she'd spent the night with him. PANCAKES! He remembered a long time ago telling her; "I would never seduce you over a meal." Perhaps he should have… and it certainly wouldn't have been pancakes! WHY NOT?
She was hearing what he said but she wasn't listening. For the art scam he'd given her the role of his girlfriend: his partner, keeping her close to him all the time. He told her the story of the secret love behind "Violets". He'd told her she was beautiful, at the men's club he had described her as irreplaceable, and pretended to stumble when making his way to the chair on the stage for the magic act, just so that he could feel her touch warming him. She'd brushed her hand gently against his, her arm lay across his back, as she guided him to the chair and it sent a shiver through his whole body. She'd laughed and giggled and for a moment he thought she understood his messages. "Let your beauty show". Perhaps he should have just acted like caveman Pike because she sure hadn't picked up on his genuine, loving, and thoughtful but obviously too subtle statements? WHY NOT?
It was obvious she didn't trust him personally anymore, had she ever? Heaven knows he'd given her just cause over the years to doubt him and he was truly ashamed of some of the things he had done, but he had changed, he was changing. He was trying so hard to become the man he thought she wanted him to be. Backing off, not making decisions for her, communicating his love for her. Couldn't she see that? WHY NOT?
What hurt more if that was possible was her lack of trust for his judgment. When he'd phoned her to ask for backup she didn't even respond the first time and then accused him of just trying to ruin her evening with Pike. How was he supposed to know what she did outside work hours now? She sure as hell didn't know or even care what he did once he was on his own in the evening. In the Office she didn't talk to him unless she had to, just glared at him from time to time from her desk or in the briefing room. Perhaps he should assume she was with Pike whenever. That was probably a safe bet these days but he had never liked safe bets. WHY NOT?
Now she wasn't the boss she spent what seemed like hours during the work day receiving and sending phone calls and texts from Pike, all of which made her giggle like a school girl. She would leave the office as soon as she could every night, trying to avoid talking to him or anyone else for that matter. In addition to all that; Pike would appear in the office at odd times almost as though he was checking on her. Perhaps he should try and get hold of her phone and read what Pike was saying to her... or perhaps he could get Wiley to put a tracker on her and give Pike the controls so that he could keep a check on her at all times without interrupting their department's work. No, he didn't want to go there, but there was something… creepy about the Art "department" Agent. She had spoken the truth when she said "He makes the time to be there for me" He didn't seem to have anything else to do; Jane had been honest when he had commented on things being slow in the Art "department".
In his alcoholic induced haze he had to admit that he found the high voice she used when talking to and about Pike irritating, no… infuriating, along with her constant hair tossing. He had always loved the look and feel of her hair when he had been able to sneak a touch of it; its scent was cinnamon and orange blossom, but now she smelt of Pike's shampoo and it just made him feel nauseous. She had changed and to him her behaviour seemed … strangely out of character and after all he had known her for nearly thirteen years. It was even a little unprofessional to be honest and that was a charge he would never have laid at her door. She could quite correctly lay it at his and often had, along with others, but she was behaving like a teenager with her beau; texting him at the dining table; "Meh!"
A picture of her and Pike sitting at either end of a sofa texting each other instead of talking came into his mind … but he quickly pushed it away as he knew they certainly shared a bed and the activities associated with that particular item of furniture. Did she call Pike's name out loud in the throes of her passion, did Pike murmur her name in his waking moments like Jane did every single day. WHY NOT?
Through blurry vision, Jane picked up the dictionary he always kept near; "Pike: fish; a respected freshwater predator," he read. "It has a strong, streamlined, camouflaged body, combined with a veritable arsenal of teeth within its elongated jaws." Jane read and smiled again. Predator was a good word to describe the agent who'd pounced within just days of meeting her, his camouflage had been perfect and Patrick Jane had not seen him coming. WHY NOT?
She had given him a hard time about having to wear those dresses and the heels he had bought for her for the con. He didn't know where she had got them from but now she wore much more revealing dresses; tighter, shorter, brighter colours and higher heels without complaining; but not for him. WHY NOT?
On the plane from New York she had made her feelings quite clear and he had tried his best to respect those wishes. "You don't know me anymore." Her words had deeply scarred him but he acknowledged the truth of them; after all the first rule as a conman was to be honest about yourself to yourself and he truly thought she would see him in a new light as he gave her space to make her own decisions. His heart actually skipped a beat when she came to see him in the detention suite, sat on the edge of his bed and told him she had decided to work with the FBI;
"I was bored. It's my choice."
He remembered the feel of the socks against his cheek. He hadn't been given a present for…years; since…no one had bought him socks for a present since Angela and he first married and they had very little money. Teresa handed him the brown paper bag, had smiled at him and he felt sure he saw a light in her eyes that was more than friendship. She looked proud of him as she found out how he'd pulled a fast one on the whole FBI with the encrypted list. Then when they started to work for Abbott and his team she had avoided him as much as possible, often obviously and the coldness and glaring started. He seemed unable to do anything that made his presence within her orbit anything more than just tolerated. WHY NOT?
And tonight… the bombshell… and her blatant lie. He really hadn't seen it coming, rather like Fischer's little subterfuge on the island. He was slipping. She'd even told him at the hospital, with Pike waiting outside the room. The case they were working on was still open; the whole team had been moved by the level of the abuse. Why was Pike there; he wasn't part of their team. There was no art fraud involved in this shabby, seedy world of human trafficking, they weren't short of agents in Abbott's team so why was Pike even there? Lisbon knew how much Jane hated hospitals; how he would want to get out of there as quickly as possible and obviously she'd asked Pike for some time alone with him in the visitors' room. How Pike must have enjoyed that. He imagined the scene;
"Marcus, darling…Do you mind if I just have a few moments alone with Jane, after all he was my partner for a long time. He probably knows already but I suppose I should really tell him about us? After all, if it wasn't for him we wouldn't have met." Teresa tossed her hair and giggled at Pike.
"No of course not Teresa, I have a phone call to make. Don't worry I'll come and rescue you from him in two or three minutes. Then we can decide what we're going to do this evening before we go back to my place for …" Pike leered at her and placed his hands on Lisbon's arms, bending to kiss her forehead. "I'll only be two minutes, probably quicker than that. Are you sure you don't need me to come in with you."
"No it'll be fine. He'll be fine about it. He probably already knows anyway."
"Oh, of course he reads minds doesn't he?"
Lisbon giggled as she walked into the Visitors' room where Jane was waiting.
Jane shook his head to rid himself of the image. What depressed him deeply was that after all these years she didn't love him as he had thought she did or as he loved her. She could only spare him two minutes from her busy social schedule, couldn't bear to give him enough time to talk alone; at the office after work or even over a drink. WHY NOT?
He didn't need to be a mentalist to know that she didn't love Agent Pike. Even Rigsby would have spotted that and that was saying something. He wasn't even sure that Pike loved her, he certainly seemed to want sole possession of her, but … she had lied and said she was happy and he had always told her that she deserved to be happy, so what else could he do but tell her he was happy too. A lie on a lie. She did deserve a good man and he, Patrick Jane was certainly not a good man. He was trying so hard to be better, to be the man she could love and want to share her life with; but was Pike a good man either?
Then Pike had interrupted them with his; "I've managed to get tickets for… "whatever it was and "have you finished" They hadn't even started and then Pike had called him "Patrick" in that condescending tone, showing his arsenal of teeth. He was Jane. Only Hightower and LaRoche had regularly called him Patrick. Teresa didn't.. WHY NOT?
He realized that he loved his Teresa when he shot the deputy; his only link to Red John, but falling in love with her had crept up on him slowly but inexorably. Lorelei and Sean Barlow noticed it and by the time Red John painted her face with Partridge's blood, Jane was helplessly, hopelessly, irrevocably in love with her but she was still in danger and he had no choice but to hide his feelings and leave her behind. When he pulled the car up beside the bluff and held her close, her heart was beating even faster than his but words failed him. He was sure that this would be his last sunset, the last he would ever see and he couldn't burden her with his declaration of love and then die. He knew how it felt to have someone tell you how much they love you and then abandon you. The best he'd been able to say was; "You have no idea how much you mean to me." Why hadn't he had the courage to shout out; "TERESA LISBON: I LOVE YOU WITH EVERY OUNCE OF MY BEING, NOW AND FOREVER!" But he hadn't; WHY ON EARTH NOT?