Introspection Chapter 10: Fugue in Red, a mentalist fanfic

4.10 Fugue in Red

She hasn't done that in a while, not for the reason she is doing it right now, actually.

This night, Teresa Lisbon knees inside the small church in her neighborhood, holding her cross like for dear life while crying and praying, praying for her immortal soul, that she could be purged from her sins, spared Hell in the afterlife for what she has just done today, for the horrid and terrible thought that had crossed her mind today.

"The Jane we know, he has always been there. The murder just forced him out" she doesn't know if it's true, if Jane has ever been a good man or not, but she just… she met them all, all the sides of Jane. She met the fake psych, when he still pretended to be one, years and years prior, the kind of man you couldn't help but lusting after, sexy, sure of himself and of his charm, who knew what you needed and what you needed to be told; she met the widower, former con artist who regretted his previous life, a man you couldn't help but feel like hugging, trying to bring comfort to, a lonely, broken soul looking for something, what, exactly, probably he didn't know as well. But they had all one thing in common: both men, they were all post-marriage Jane, and, as much as teased and flirted, and he still does, she knows he had never… delivered. He was a man in love, he still is a man in love (and still mourning, as well), and he was a man that, whatever he did, he did for them. Success and fame were an added bonus, but at the end of the day, knowing Jane, she suspects it was all a matter of giving her what he never had, giving her the chances he hasn't been allowed to take, and not forcing her to be what he has been forced to be as a child.

Losing them, though, molted him into who he is right now. Their loss gave him a new prospective, that despite money and fame, he was nothing without them, and that he didn't care about getting richer and richer and more and more famous. She doesn't think he turned to the CBI to help them out because he felt like helping people out, allowing them the comfort of a justice long denied to his own soul. She is not naïve, nor stupid. Jane joined the CBI because of Red John- and he is still with them just because Red John is still alive, and is still out there, taunting them, him-, that he closes cases is just an added bonus, for him.
For her, it's just troubles. Because, sometimes, she forgets who he is, what he went through. Sometimes, she forgets he us wearing a mask for their benefits, and looks at him with longing: longing to hold him, once or twice, to love him, body and soul (mostly body), and, yes, she thought, even for the man she thought he had been without, before Red John.
Now, she had met him. Jane before Red John. Jane before (without) Angela. A man trying to get into women's pants (hers included, more than once), conning his way into money, fame and everything else. Woman's pants included.

She didn't like that Jane.

She didn't like that Jane, but, as much as she cares about him, as much as she always told herself that if she could safe their life she would…. It's easy with words. Actions are another pair of sleeves, and it's just better that she can't actually find out by herself what she would do, given the circumstances… because he would be someone else. He wouldn't be "her" Jane- their Jane, she tries to correct herself – he would be… someone else. A terrible con man, evil, easy on grabbing money that doesn't belong to him and sleeping around like a man-whore., and not the consultant, troublemaker, who always naps on her couch in her office whenever he can.