A/N: Okay, so I'd like to thank all my reviewers. I really appreciate it when people take the time to review. I thank all the people who sign in individually, but thanks to my non-signed in reviewers. I'm not sure if there's been a little bit of confusion, I could be misunderstanding my reviews, and if that's the case, then sorry, the upcoming explanation is going to be redundant. All of my AU stories (including all the S2 oneshots listed in the A/N in the first chapter of this fic) are part of the same series. This fic is a continuation of them. I would consider this fic an AU, even if it is not a major one, in that Jane and Lisbon were sleeping together for well, really most of S2, even if they weren't in an actual romantic relationship and everything was all kinds of messed up. And then that arrangement dissolved after the S2 finale. Just wanted to reiterate that to make sure we're all on the same page. Alrighty then.
On to the fic! Hope you enjoy! I claim no responsibility for some of the middle section. No idea where that came from. It just happened, I swear. And please keep up the lovely, lovely reviews; they honestly make my day.
xxxxx
Post 3.11: Undisclosed Romantics
xxxxx
"Meh, he lost a life of getting hit in the head but he got his marriage back. Seems like a fair trade to me."
"Aren't you the romantic?"
"Makes the world go round."
xxxxx
Teresa Lisbon shook her head as she walked back into her office with yet another cup of coffee. She didn't even want to think about how many she consumed in a day.
Jane could probably tell her.
That man noticed more things than he admitted to, more things than she wanted to know about Lisbon was sure.
And he had an uncanny ability to know when she needed a re-fill. They crossed paths in the break room too many times for it to be random. She wasn't intentionally seeking him out (most of the time), so that only left Jane looking for her…
Not that she minded if that was the case.
Sometimes Jane was the little bright spot in her day.
Okay, most of the time he was nothing but trouble, and extra work, not to mention a never-ending source of worry and confusion.
(Lisbon didn't like being confused.)
But when he wasn't being all that, Jane was also the man (her colleague) who made her smile. The one who came up with the insane schemes to help her solve her cases. The one who distracted her from her often-otherwise crappy day.
(Patrick Jane had always been good at distraction where she was concerned. But she didn't think about that anymore.)
Now he knew just when to pop up, stirring a cup of tea, and making her laugh.
Their case even had a happy ending, of sorts, this time. Well, not for the victim's father, but the killer'd been caught, and, according to Jane at least, they'd saved a marriage.
Apparently, and by his own admission, Patrick Jane was a romantic.
Something that didn't surprise Teresa Lisbon in the least.
She'd actually known that. Quite well. Had a little bit of first -hand experience with romance and Patrick Jane. Which, speaking of distracting…
Not that they'd been really romantic. They'd both known it. She always reminded herself of that.
But sometimes, when a handsome man was smiling at you like you were the only person in the room you forgot.
(Especially if he was telling you that romance made the world go round.)
She half-wondered how romantic he could be. Except that she didn't.
(She couldn't.)
Because she was sensible. Always sensible.
(Never that reckless. Not even with herself.)
She did her paperwork and made sure that her unit wasn't about to collapse about her.
She dotted the i's and crossed the t's.
Nodding to herself, Lisbon took a sip of her coffee, and opened her file, thankful that the case hadn't ended in disaster.
Then she frowned.
Because while it may not have ended that way…
xxxxxx
Jane was lying on his couch in the attic when his phone rang. He fished it out of his pocket with a smile, knowing who was calling without even having to check the display.
"Wouldn't be the end of a case without a phone call from the boss," he said airily. "Always takes you a few hours to remember there was something you wanted to scold me about earlier, but were too distracted to remember at the time."
Lisbon smirked. "Trying causing fewer problems and maybe we'd be able to get through a case without one of these conversations."
Jane smiled affectionately, "Now why would I want to do that?"
He heard her sigh.
Jane decided to take pity on her, "What can I help you with today, Teresa?"
Lisbon allowed herself to spin slightly in her chair, "Can we have a conversation about you starting a riot in the middle of a hallway in the CBI?"
"I don't know, can we?" Jane asked, deciding he was in too good a mood not to tease her at least a little.
Lisbon's irritation rose to the bait, as it almost always did. "Seriously? You're going with that?"
"Maybe," he replied with a shrug.
"Fine," she snapped, not in the mood for his childishness (wishing that just once they could have an actual conversation). "Call me back when you've decided to act at least half your age."
She hung up with a click.
Jane stared at his phone in surprise. He hadn't been expecting that reaction.
All told he lasted nearly three minutes before calling her back.
"Lisbon?" he heard her answer on the other end, as if she didn't know who was calling.
"You wanted to speak to me?" Jane asked in his politest (and he hoped, least confrontational) tone of voice.
"Only if you're going to be the smallest bit sensible," Lisbon grumbled, feeling a little bit silly for her earlier burst of temper.
"Sensible's no fun," Jane replied, his tone almost whimsical.
"No, in your world, fun is starting a potentially dangerous riot in the middle of my hallway," Lisbon said dryly, attempting to let go of her frustrations where her consultant was concerned.
"Your hallway?" Jane asked, raising his eyebrows.
"My office is on that hallway," Lisbon justified. "So is the bullpen my team sits in."
"So are about a dozen other things," Jane reminded her. "Including the interrogation rooms. Does that make it the suspects' hallway too?"
"Shut up. Stop trying to change the subject. Why?" she asked again.
"I can't just start a little riot for fun?" Jane asked innocently.
Lisbon nearly choked on her coffee, whether in laughter or in irritation she wasn't quite sure. Conversations with Jane tended to flip from one to the other with surprising speed. "Oh, and what's on your schedule for next week then? A little bit of jokey bribery? Maybe grand theft auto for a laugh?" she asked scathingly.
"It was a bit funny," Jane defended with a grin. She couldn't see him, so she couldn't punch him for it.
"What if people had gotten hurt?" Lisbon asked, with as much authority as she could muster (quite a bit really, when dealing with anyone but Jane).
"Meh."
"Jane."
"Don't scold, Teresa," the consultant all but ordered her. After all, she didn't know the whole story. "That guy, one of the fighters, Merriman? He deserved it."
"Oh did he?" Lisbon asked, leaning back in her chair figuring this should be good.
"Yes."
"Jane, just because you don't like someone…" Lisbon started to explain what should have been a simple concept.
"You don't like him either," Jane interjected.
She paused. "I don't know him," she said finally.
"You don't like him," Jane repeated. "And he disrespected the victim."
"What?" Lisbon asked, surprised by the apparent non sequitur.
"Idiot me if Charlotte Mitchell was raped when I first interviewed him, seeing as she was attractive, though attractive wasn't the word he used," Jane explained, his tone deceptively light.
Lisbon let her chin fall against her chest. She should have known. She should have known that even Jane wouldn't start a riot in a hallway for no reason. Not that having a reason made it okay but… Of course this was what it was. Patrick Jane, the man who couldn't follow any rules, but also couldn't let a wrong go unanswered. "Jane…"
"So no Lisbon, I didn't like him," Jane continued, cutting her off in that same false voice.
Lisbon shut her eyes for a half a second.
"No one should treat women that way," Jane added. "Charlotte Mitchell didn't deserve that."
"You'll excuse me for saying it, but you're a bit of an unexpected avenger," Lisbon said with a gentleness that surprised both of them. Though she knew her statement wasn't exactly true. Rigsby may have been the team's most obvious defender of women under threat, but then, for obvious reasons, sometimes that was also one of Jane's particular buttons. His methods, however, couldn't have been more different than Rigsby's (no six-foot-plus frame and gun to intimidate the jerks with in Jane's case).
"Plus Merriman's such a cliché, the fighter who's little more than a caveman, and it's so much fun to watch the wheels in his head try to turn," Jane added, sounding more like himself.
"Well," Lisbon said, trying to bring the conversation back on track. "In future, if you want to 'teach someone a lesson', I'd appreciate it if you didn't involve half the people on the floor in a brawl with people trained in any number of martial arts."
"Feeling a little threatened, Teresa?" he teased. "You shouldn't be. I was sure you'd be able to get things back under control."
"Yeah, luckily before someone ended up seriously hurt!" she snapped. "Seriously Jane? A brawl? Again? This is your second one in as many years! And if I recall you weren't the one standing right in the middle of the two guys intent on ripping each other apart."
Jane felt a twinge of guilt at that. He had basically forced her to break up a fight between people at least twice her size. "I'll try to limit any physical altercations in the future. And like I said, I really didn't think that brawl at the high school reunion would happen. That one really was an accident Lisbon."
"Only you could accidentally start a brawl," she grumbled.
"Guess I'm just one of a kind," he replied easily, grinning when he heard her sigh.
"Merriman really asked if Charlotte had been raped?" Lisbon asked.
"As casually as if he'd been asking about the weather," Jane confirmed.
"Ass," was Lisbon's succinct response. "Between him and Manny's wife, who blamed her husband's infidelity on the women in his life…"
"Ultimate fighting does attract a certain clientele," Jane replied. "From what I hear, Rigsby got a taste of that firsthand from his date to the event."
Lisbon's ears pricked up. "Really?"
Jane chuckled. "Why Lisbon, indulging in a little gossip are you? I'm shocked."
"Shut up and tell me what you heard," she ordered.
Jane paused, "You know that technically…"
Lisbon made a sound of exasperation. "You really are twelve today aren't you?"
"According to you I'm twelve most days," Jane reminded her.
"Come on Jane," she all but pleaded.
He grinned. "I don't know, you've been a bit cranky with me this fine evening."
"And what better way to get back on my good side?" Lisbon asked.
"I wasn't aware I was ever on your good side," he grinned.
"It's rare," she admitted dryly.
Jane smiled and settled further into his couch. "Well," he drawled. "From what I managed to glean, when I overheard Rigsby talking about it with Cho, his lady-friend would have been more than happy to see our friendly teammate punch someone. Repeatedly."
"Oh lord," Lisbon said with a laugh.
"Yes," Jane continued. "Rigsby gathered that if he knocked someone to the ground she might be even more… enthusiastic where he was concerned."
"Poor Rigsby," Lisbon said, though her tone wasn't exactly sympathetic.
"Heaven only knows what she'd have done if he got his gun involved," Jane added.
Lisbon let out an undignified snort, before collapsing into muffled giggles.
"I gather he was far too afraid to ask her if she wanted to see his handcuffs though," her consultant continued. "Shame. Could have been a missed opportunity, that."
"Maybe you should suggest it to him," Lisbon smirked.
"I don't think he plans on seeing her again," Jane replied. "Sounded a bit scared, really."
"Oh, Rigsby…" Lisbon murmured. "Though that could hardly have been the first time Wayne's gone out with a woman attracted to the whole big bad cop image."
"What?" Jane asked, confused.
"We've all had it happen," Lisbon explained. "Not realized that the person we're out to dinner with has a bit of a thing for authority until it's far, far too late."
Jane sat up abruptly. "What?" he repeated, a touch of excitement seeping into his voice at that idea.
Lisbon felt her grin turn mischievous. "Yeah, part of the price of being a cop," she explained. "Personally, whenever it happens I've found the best thing is to politely refuse to handcuff the guy to his headboard and cut the evening short. Unless he's really hot of course."
"Of course," Jane repeated, discombobulated and distracted (really distracted).
"Course, the kind who are all excited to be handcuffed usually aren't the ones who are really hot," Lisbon added as mournfully as she could manage.
"Right," Jane coughed, still sounding a bit lost.
"Still," Lisbon continued suddenly cheerful. "It's too bad that Rigsby's date didn't work out. Might help him get his mind off of Van Pelt."
"I think it'll take more than an overly enthusiastic woman with a fetish for physical violence to do that," Jane observed.
"Sounds like it," Lisbon replied.
"But the course of true love never did run smooth," Jane observed. "Guess he just needs to meet the right girl."
"Alright, what's gotten into you lately?" Lisbon asked. "All this sudden support of romance."
"When have I not supported romance?" Jane asked curiously.
Lisbon paused. She supposed he had a point; maybe I wasn't so much that Jane didn't support romance as that he didn't mention it. When it did come up, Jane did tend to be on the side of love and its trappings (except perhaps when I came to himself). And her consultant did love a good story, a happy ending. He was never shy about stating when a relationship was doomed, but then a bad relationship wasn't exactly romantic.
The ideal, he fun, the joy, the magic of romance, she supposed that sort of thing would be right up Jane's alley.
"Lisbon?" Jane asked softly.
She shook herself out of her reverie. "Maybe It just feels like it's just been coming up more often than usual lately," she admitted.
He paused. "Has it?"
"M-hm," she said slowly. "Though I suppose you've always been giving Rigsby romantic advice. But I don' know, between him and our married couple earlier today, who I wouldn't have thought stood much of a chance by the way, I guess it's seemed like a lot."
Jane wondered briefly if she could be right. Especially as she didn't even know about his attempts to set up her former boss with a woman who might be able to help him through a tough time. "Is that a problem?" the consultant asked curiously.
"No," Lisbon admitted. "Just… unexpected maybe. Or not unexpected but, well, I don't know actually. Maybe just different somehow."
"There are worse things than romance," Jane said lightly. "I could be channeling my considerable abilities into something else entirely."
"Like starting fights in the CBI building?" Lisbon asked.
"Hush."
"I definitely prefer matchmaking to that," Lisbon admitted. "As long as you don't make me your target."
He felt his heart skitter ever so slightly. Did that mean Lisbon wasn't looking for love? Because that was very sad, but he couldn't say he was all that eager to help her find a nice guy and settle into a stable relationship. Or did Lisbon mean that she was looking for love, but she simply didn't want him interfering? He really wasn't all that fond of that option either.
Or was he over-thinking this, and this was just another attempt by his friend to keep him at a distance?
"Where's your sense of romance, Lisbon?" he asked, trying to keep the conversation light.
"Buried in paperwork," she replied quickly.
"Come on."
She paused. "Jane, I've seen a lot. With this job, and well…" she trailed off.
"Teresa," he whispered suddenly sad for her.
She pasted on a smile and a cheerful tone of voice, "Anyway, I'm too much of a workaholic for romance."
"But that's one of the most romantic stories of all," Jane reminded her. "A person who's all but given up on finding love discovering it in the most unexpected of places."
"Been reading a lot of Nora Roberts recently, have you?" Lisbon asked, deflecting with a joke.
"Nothing wrong with Nora Roberts," Jane replied gently.
"I didn't say there was," she replied.
"You should know," Jane said, pleased by a sudden memory. "I've seen those novels hidden in the corner of your bookshelf."
"I would expect nothing less given your tendency to snoop," she shot back, well aware that she was blushing, and pleased he was currently in another part of the building.
"A little more romantic than you like people to think, Teresa?" he asked playfully. Of course she was. How could he have forgotten? He'd seen her smile when she'd accused him of being romantic earlier. Of course Teresa Lisbon was a closet romantic. The woman dedicated herself to making things turn out the way they should, to solving the tragedies of life. She lived in a world of faith and idealism; it was directed towards the legal system, but still, what could be more romantic than that?
"Maybe I let myself believe sometimes," she replied curtly without thinking.
Jane paused, feeling his heart go out to her, she whom life had not certainly not treated fairly. And he wished that they weren't having this conversation on the phone. So that he could at least… take her arm maybe. He wasn't quite sure. "Don't give up so easily Teresa," he said gently. "If a serial philanderer can get a happy ending, things can't be as terrible as you think. Besides, romance is a good look on you."
"Is it?" she asked, bemused.
"Sure," he admitted.
"So I should take a page out of your book?" she asked. "Follow your example."
"Well, I was trying to be modest…" he said with a smirk.
She laughed. "Yeah, you're known for that."
"Hey!"
She laughed again. "Well, as fun as this has been, I should finish the rest of these reports."
"Now that you've administered my weekly scolding," Jane surmised.
"Weekly?" she asked.
"I was being generous," he explained.
"Ah. Anyway, I've got to work," she told him.
"Practicality always wins out again," Jane said philosophically.
"You be the romantic for the evening," Lisbon replied.
"Fine."
"Bye Jane," she said with a laugh.
She heard a soft "Goodbye Teresa," just before she hung up her phone.
Lisbon stared at her phone for a second, shaking her head slightly. It figured Jane was encouraging romance, even if it was… odd.
On the other hand he was always trying to convince her to see things form his point of view. And he believed in romance.
"Makes the world go round."
Her hand shook suddenly as she reached for her file.
But how much did he believe in romance?
She'd thought he believed in it when it came to everyone but himself. But…
But he had asked Kristina Frye out to dinner.
And before that he'd sought out her own company (not that they'd been romantic; the phrase played in her brain like a broken record). That was done now, but…
But maybe Jane hadn't quite given up hope.
(Regardless of what he might think.)
She set her pen down on her desk gently and tried very hard to regulate her breathing.
It almost scared her how much she hoped that was true, how much she wanted it to be true.
She always told herself that Jane wasn't as far gone as he always claimed to be. That he had something to live for, that he wouldn't just throw everything away to get Red John.
She told herself that because she had to.
But confronting the idea that Jane himself was romantic enough to think that, even without knowing it…
After all, maybe the right person simply hadn't come along yet, for him either.
For the second time obviously.
But there was no rule that everyone only got one person. Some people must get lucky, and Jane did seem to have an odd sort of luck sometimes.
And if Jane did believe in romance…
She on the other hand, had never really had much hope of epic romance to begin with.
Sure, she'd had a couple of brief romances in her college years. Even had a steady boyfriend for year or so in San Francisco. And since she'd come to Sacramento she'd tried the dating thing sporadically, but none of it had ever stuck. She wasn't good at letting people in. Even if she had been, the hours she worked weren't exactly conducive to a long term relationship.
Lisbon had figured out a while ago that she was best at casual.
Not strangers. She'd never really been all that comfortable with going home with a complete stranger, but a relationship with someone she liked well enough to spend a couple of nights with, no commitments, that she could do. Like Mike Nicholls, formerly of the Fraud division before he'd transferred upstate, or Walter Mashburn, everyone's favourite fun-loving billionaire, or even Jane himself for a while.
She could deal with that sort of thing.
It worked for her, though even she realized it wasn't always ideal.
The most serious she'd gotten in a while had been with Jane, and look how that had ended.
Things were probably better between the two of them now than they'd ever been when they were sleeping together. She was more comfortable in her consultant's company. She might even trust him some of the time, at least on the job. Or maybe she was just getting used to him. After all, she hadn't even batted an eye when Jane started going on about a message written in shorthand that she'd known herself hadn't existed hours earlier. But then, he was also including her a little more in his cons than he had been, so maybe that was it.
Or maybe she was just beginning to recognize the signs of a Jane-plan.
It was becoming old hat, just as running after an angry witness chasing after Jane was becoming the norm too.
They were becoming almost partners, or partner-adjacent, as Jane would say.
She kinda liked it.
Just as she was beginning to like the idea of spending time with him after-hours. Friendly time.
She'd known him for years after all.
They'd gotten close. It was normal.
Hell, Jane was the longest relationship she'd had in a long time.
She wasn't sure what their relationship was all the time, but it worked. Or rather it was a work in progress.
Today they were friends.
Tomorrow…
Well, tomorrow hopefully they'll still be friends.
Anything else with Patrick Jane was impossible. Even if she wanted things to change.
Even if relationships did evolve.
Even if he was a romantic a heart.
Paperwork. She needed to focus on paperwork.
Practical paperwork.
xxxxx
An hour or so later Lisbon heard a knock on her office door.
She looked up with a half-smile, knowing the knock was mainly for show. She wasn't upset that he'd decided to pop in, though she hadn't really expected to see him again that evening. She'd figured he was settled in the attic for the evening.
"Hello," Jane said, setting a plastic back down on her coffee table.
"Hello," she replied, as she watched him curiously. "What's that?"
He shrugged. "I assumed that, as usual, you'd probably forgotten to feed yourself."
"You got me food?" she asked softly.
"Dinner, Lisbon," he corrected. "It's called dinner. We really need to talk about your eating habits if you don't even know that much."
She would have yelled at him for that comment, but he was handing her Pad Thai and spring rolls from her favourite Thai place, so she decided to be the bigger person and bite her tongue (though she did send him a warning glare).
"I didn't know the Thai place delivered this late," she remarked.
"I picked it up," Jane explained. "Had another errand to do on that side of town, thought I'd kill two birds with one stone."
"Ah."
"Still burning the midnight oil?" he asked.
"It's not that late," she defended, shutting her files.
"It's an expression, Lisbon," Jane said indulgently. "No need to be so literal."
She glared at him. She almost threw her spring roll at him, but she was hungry, so she substituted a pair of complimentary chopsticks.
"Coulda taken my eye out with that," Jane muttered.
She smirked. "Thanks for dinner, Jane."
"You're welcome," he replied.
"So," Lisbon said after a minute. "Anything new with you?"
Jane stared at her, "Since what, two hours ago?"
"Maybe," she said. "Or just in general."
Jane considered that. "Nope," he said after a minute. "And before you ask, I haven't seen any good movies lately either."
She chuckled. "I wasn't gonna ask," she assured him as she dug into her noodles.
Jane waited until she'd eaten a few bites before asking her his question. "So how many times have men asked you to handcuff them?" he wondered.
Lisbon nearly choked on her Pad Thai. "Jane!"
"What?" he asked innocently. "I'm an investigator Lisbon, inquiring minds and all that."
"Oh, yeah, like I'm going to answer that question," she said sarcastically.
"Aww…" he said crouching so he was directly opposite her and staring right into her eyes. "Come on Teresa."
"Why do you care?" she asked.
"Why did you want to hear about Rigsby's bad date?" Jane shot back.
"Interested curiosity," she replied quickly.
"That plus mocking purposes," he supplied.
"So now I should tell you so you can mock me?" she checked.
"Of course not. But maybe I'm curious," he said playfully, though Lisbon thought she could hear a hint of something else underneath his tone.
"Far more than I wanted," she said eventually, knowing he wouldn't let it go until she gave him some sort of an answer.
"Implying that you did want to handcuff some of them," Jane said thoughtfully.
"Oh for crying out…"
"No, that's interesting, Lisbon," Jane continued. "The desire I mean. I'm not going to pry and ask you whether you ever actually went through with it. Even I have some boundaries," he assured her. "And it's not that surprising, given your issues with control, that you'd have considered it. Healthy even…" he trailed off with a grin.
"Great," Lisbon growled into her Pad Thai, sure her face was bright red. "Well now that you've had your fun…"
Jane reached and tilted her chin back up towards him. "It's not just fun, Lisbon," he assured her.
She froze, eyes wide as she stared at the man sitting opposite her, looking endearingly sincere.
When he saw her expression Jane finally seemed to realize what he was doing, and snatched his hand away from her face like it'd been burned.
"What is it then?" she asked after a second.
"I can't just be interested?" he asked softly.
"You can…" she admitted, not breaking eye contact.
"Just because you had a few bad experiences doesn't mean you should abandon love altogether," he said softly.
She stared at him. It was really all that she could manage.
"Don't give up on romance completely, Teresa," Jane pleaded in a near whisper. "I know you haven't, whatever you might say."
"Have you?" she asked feeling slightly breathless.
"I hope not," he replied before he could stop himself.
She swallowed, her throat suddenly tight. "Food's getting cold," she said hoarsely.
"Yeah," he replied, sitting back and sending her a more normal smile. "And my attempts to make sure you eat at regular intervals will hardly be successful if I keep you from eating it."
"I can feed myself," Lisbon insisted, summoning a smile of her own from somewhere.
"You can," Jane agreed. "I'm just not sure that you always do."
Lisbon stared at him in disbelief. "I'm sorry, I don't eat according to a regular schedule? That's a little rich coming from you wouldn't you say? How many days have you spent up in that attic, foraging from the various caches of snacks you have hidden up there?"
Jane's eyes twinkled at her from over his Pad Thai. "And usually," he reminded her. "When that happens, I can usually count on my boss dropping by unexpectedly with dinner of some kind."
Lisbon rolled her eyes at him, though she figured the effect was ruined by her smile.
This. This was why she liked him. "Yeah, well, someone has to watch you."
"Guess we'll have to watch out for each other," he corrected gently.
"Oh eat your dinner, Patrick," she ordered indulgently.
"Yes ma'am." He said, saluting with his chopsticks.
Lisbon shook her head with a grin. Yup. Her longest relationship may have been some sort of strange, friendship with her unbalanced consultant, but hey, at least she got dinner out of the deal.
She stole another glance at him, lounging in her office, eating Pad Thai like he belonged there.
(Maybe because he did.)
Maybe it didn't matter that she wasn't always sure what the hell she was doing.
Because whatever it was, it somehow felt okay.
And because whatever else she could say about it, Jane was still a relationship, and damn it, so was she.
xxxxx
The End
Again, post-ep not quite what I was intending it to be when I started out, but I don't so much mind. I swear this series has a mind of its own though.
Also, this chapter now has a very short tag (really, I wrote it, and it's actually short). It was actually originally the last scene of this chapter, but I'm not sure I like it that much. So I'm still considering on it. I may change my mind and cut it entirely. Besides, I wanted to get this up since I actually like how it turned out.
