Title: Charlotte's Web (Chapter 37)
Rating: M for graphic violence and language
Fandom: The Mentalist
Summary: Patrick Jane has lived his life obsessed with the capture of Red John ever since finding his beloved wife and daughter slain by the maniac's hand. Now, 10 years to the day after that horrific night, a young woman appears in Patrick's life, someone who threatens to destroy everything his life has become in the interim... if not his sanity, itself.
Author's Note: Thanks for the reviews guys. I am glad you're enjoying the ride. I am writing these chapters faster than I have in the past and often upload them very late at night/early in the morning. I try to go over them and correct spelling, grammar and other errors best as I can, but have decided that getting the chapters out in a timely manner is worth more to most readers than the odd mistake getting through. So please forgive any errors and pretend they aren't there. Reviews are very much appreciated.
I feel like a kitty cat having my ego stroked, reading your comments. Helps my self confidence, which means you get more writing, and faster, too. ;) Btw, fanfiction dot net flags a lot of English words as incorrect if the British spelling is used, so I am starting to ignore the red squiggly underlines more than I maybe should. (Ideally, both American English and UK English spellings for various words would be accepted)
"Masquerading as a man with a reason/My charade is the event of the season/And if I claim to be a wise man/It surely means that I don't know" - Carry on my wayward son by "Kansas"
Lisbon stayed with Charlotte, eyes tracing the girl's face for some sign or hint of Charlie behind those vacant green eyes. Charlotte was scared, that much Lisbon had managed to figure out. Not just scared, really, but terrified on such a profound level that her mind had disconnected her.
If her mind hadn't disconnected her after Jane had dug her up out of the ground, then... well, it spoke to the level of fear the kid had gone through. Possibly a delayed reaction, or possibly something to do with doctors or hospitals.
Jane's words came back to the seasoned CBI agent: Lisbon...Red John had doctors, too.
Of course, there was a chance that Charlotte's current state wasn't related to being in the hospital at all. Felix Morales had seemed more or less normal until he'd attacked the agent interviewing him and bitten out his wrists, bleeding to death in a small FBI room. Elian had probably been more or less "normal", even if he was in shock, until whatever caused him to get that blood all over his hands had happened.
If Red John could "set" people to go off like alarm clocks (the idea was deeply troubling to Lisbon) then could they be timed to go off or go inward, timed down to the very second? Was the subconscious mind so powerful that it could keep track of time down to the second? And if so, what had been the moment the clock had started ticking down for Charlotte? What had been the event that had pushed the "button" in her mind that started the count-down?
So many unknowns.
"I'm going to stay with you until your Dad comes back," Lisbon told the teen gently. "Okay? You're not going to be alone with anyone you don't know."
There was no response, of course.
"He's going to try and take you out of here, this hospital. Jane is. He thinks being here has scared you."
Nothing. Lisbon wasn't sure what she was doing. She was not Jane, but the idea of just sitting here and looking at Charlie and saying nothing seemed somehow wrong, too. Charlotte was so scared that her mind had whisked her away from reality, a level of fear Lisbon was pretty sure she'd never come close to experiencing.
And yet, because of Jane primarily, Lisbon knew that the subconscious mind was always paying attention.
So somewhere inside, Charlotte was aware of what was going on right now, what was happening, what Lisbon was doing and saying... and keeping silent seemed almost like a betrayal when she had the chance to try and make contact.
"I'm sorry you're so scared, kiddo. Jane is going to take you out of here. I am going to stay with you. I won't leave you alone. You don't have to say anything if you don't want to. Nobody is going to force you to speak. You're going to be okay..."
Lisbon thought back suddenly to her teen years, to her little brother Tommy breaking down one day and crying because their father was going on a particularly brutal alcohol binge and had been more abusive than usual. He'd cried, angrily, that he didn't want to be left alone with the man. How did Charlotte cry out to them when she was scared? She wouldn't be able to cry in the usual sense, not any longer, not after so long under Red John's control, not after so many years of having the monster use her "weaknesses" against her. But did Charlotte cry out for comfort in different ways? And if so... what were those ways?
"I won't let anyone hurt you," Lisbon added. "Until you leave here, I am not going to leave you alone. Won't even leave you to go to the bathroom, okay?"
Charlotte blinked quickly at that. Lisbon wasn't sure why, but on an intuitive level, that blink seemed like a good thing. Lisbon hadn't seen the kid blink since she'd entered this state- whatever it was- and it reassured her on some level. The unblinking stare had been troubling her.
"You know Jane, Charlie. He'll get you out of here."
Another blink. So fast that if you weren't paying attention you'd miss it. Lisbon smiled a little. Was this Charlotte's subconscious way of communicating? Of agreeing?
The doctors had been astounded at the very idea that Charlotte be released, especially after Jane began to describe her dissociated state. Jane took no prisoners. Those at the top of the pyramid- so to speak- of Charlotte's medical care knew she had been buried alive and had been attacked before that by Red John. That was what the added police presence in the hospital was all about, lest any of them forget, even for a moment... This was the kid who had been "raised" by Red John. It was all over the news.
Red John was dead but a killer of his notoriety tended to attract crazies, people driven by their own warped psyches to get close to the "survivors". That, and journalists had a habit of sneaking into hospitals and harassing victims in an attempt to secure the all-elusive "scoop". The tension in the place would decrease significantly when Charlotte Ruskin-Jane left the premises.
But they still didn't think she should leave the hospital, on medical grounds.
"This place is nothing but a series of triggers for her. Psychologically, she needs to leave or she is going to deteriorate even more," Jane said simply to the doctor who was in charge of Charlotte's care. The man had kind, tired eyes but was the type to stick to his guns when he thought he was right about something. Jane had him figured out almost immediately.
"She is not medically ready to be released. She is still recovering from her surgeries and-"
"What sort of treatment is she getting here that she couldn't get at home if she was observed closely by a trained nurse?" Jane argued. "Afterall, it's been the nurses who've done the lion's share of the work so far. At least since the surgeries." Jane was pushing buttons, and he knew it. A better approach would have been to appeal to the man's ego and make him think he agreed that Charlotte being discharged was best for everyone. But fatigue and irritation won out. Before the man could speak, though, Jane turned up the heat.
"You and I both know that if you show the same patient to ten shrinks you potentially end up with 10 different diagnoses and opinions about the nature of that patient's problems," Jane said mildly, looking the doctor in the eyes. He nodded, slowly.
"And your point?"
"She stays here anymore than a few hours longer after this little talk of ours, and I hire a private shrink who comes to the decision that Charlotte's fugue state was triggered by being exposed to medical personnel who reminded her of her treatment by Red John. She was triggered by doctors, so to speak. Shrinks have a way of seeing the light when you appeal to their intellectual natures," Jane added, grinning despite himself. In reality, he believed the majority of shrinks to be pretentious quacks with a tendency towards narcissism and a desire to appear smarter than everyone else, and those types of professionals were some of the easiest to manipulate. Their egos left them open targets, as long as one was relatively subtle in their interactions.
"The hospital had a very good legal department," the doctor said doggedly, not backing down. Under different circumstances, Jane would almost like the guy. But right now, only Charlotte mattered.
"Look, doctor, you clearly care about your patients. You have integrity. Both excellent traits in a doctor and traits that are sadly missing from more medical professionals than you'd care to know about. That said, Charlotte is my top priority and I will do anything and everything I can to protect her. Look into my eyes, and you'll see I'm telling the truth," Jane said, dropping his voice slightly.
"Look into my eyes and you'll see I am right. You'll realize that keeping her here is hurting her. There is no treatment she is recieving here at this time that she couldn't recieve at home. Additionally, when she leaves, the police presence in your hospital will disappear. Your other patients will feel calmer. The energy will be better. Your other patients will benefit when she is released. She will benefit."
The doctor nodded solemnly. Blinked. Licked his lips. Jane knew he was hypnotized. But he was a stubborn guy, even in an altered state of consciousness.
"She had serious bleeds. If something develops and she is here we can address the problem. If she is home-"
"But she is doing much better. Your surgeons are highly capable. And she will be monitored closely at home. Realistically, she will be monitored much more closely at home than she is here, in a busy hospital. If she begins to medically deteriorate she will be returned to the hospital," Jane finished, sealing the deal.
"I do have my other patients to think about," the man said in the soft, spaced out cadence of the hypnotized.
"That's right. And Charlotte's mental health also has to be taken into consideration. You don't want to make things harder for her in the long run," Jane reminded the man. He nodded, agreeing with Jane.
"She has already suffered a lot, poor kid. Her mental health is important," the doctor agreed. Jane felt a sudden urge to hug the guy. Unlike so many professionals he'd run into over the years, the man in front of him truly cared about his patients. It was touching, really, when Jane let himself think about it.
"She has suffered a lot. And we don't want her to suffer anymore than she already has, do we?"
"No, of course not. No child should ever suffer so much," the man said woodenly, his own pupils huge. Jane watched him carefully. Came to the confident conclusion that the guy had probably dealt with physical abuse as a kid and that his own early suffering had compelled him to go into medicine to help child victims of violence. It was why he was so driven to do the right thing, and why he was so protective of his patients, why his microfacial expressions had suggested deep pain and grief when Jane had mentioned Charlotte's abuse and her dissociated state.
The man's past was visible in the curve of his shoulders, the slight tightening of his jaw when Jane had become emotionally threatening, in the angle of his head and the spacing of his feet in response to different words and manufactured expressions on Jane's face; his past was evident in the way he shifted when certain words were uttered, in the way his eyes dilated at the moment his jaw tightened and a host of other small visual cues most people were not consciously ever aware of.
It was also why he hadn't been scared off by the implied legal threats Jane had thrown out. He was a man of honour.
"And that is why you're going to sign for her medical release, even if others view it as going against official medical procedure. Official procedures must be ignored if they harm the welfare of a child," Jane murmured sotto voce, pulling strings on his puppet, making it dance. The puppet nodded immediately.
"Yes, of course. The needs of the child always come first," the puppet agreed.
"That is great. I am so glad we agree on this. You're going to go and have a coffee break with me in a moment, and you're going to come back feeling peaceful and confident about your decision to release Charlotte Jane into my custody. It is so good when parents and the doctors of patients get along during trying and difficult times. It leaves you with such a peaceful sense of encouragement about the future."
"Yesss," the puppet agreed whole-heartedly.
"Your actions are helping a deeply traumatized child. Of course, before Charlotte leaves, you will feel compelled to show me, her father, how to put in an intravenous line, won't you? You are a man that goes beyond the call of duty; this is your nature."
"I will certainly show you the proper way to put in an intravenous line," the puppet agreed. Jane smiled at his little puppet-doctor, a dazzling grin.
"That's good, Simon," Jane said softly, soothingly. "You turned out so well. Your brother would be so proud of you."
The puppet whose first name was Simon nodded back at Jane. He was silent and still, deeply entranced.
"I'm going to count backwards from five, now, and when I do you're going to be alert and awake and feeling good but without any conscious memory of our previous conversation of the last five minutes. When I ask you if Charlotte can leave the hospital after you get back from your coffee break, and when I explain the situation to you, you will be in full agreement with me, won't you?"
"I will. I most certainly will. I want the best for Charlotte."
"That's right, you do. Okay, Simon. When we get to one you're going to be refreshed and alert and feeling great; five...four...three...two...and...one," Jane said. He watched the man's eyes as they cleared a bit. The doc blinked hard. Wiped at his eyes. Blinked again. Looked at Jane and smiled uneasily.
"Uh, I'm sorry. Can I help you?" The doc said to Jane, looking a bit disoriented. Jane grinned at him, the dazzling TV smile that most people fell for, which made most people feel important.
"In a little bit. You look tired. I could use some coffee, myself. Want to get a cup with me?" Jane asked calmly, still smiling at the doc.
"Yeah, I think so," the pediatrician known as Simon Cole told the mentalist known as Patrick Jane, nodding his head. "It's been a long day and I like to be a little more alert before answering parents' questions anyway."
"Highly responsible," Jane said pleasantly, as they walked to the cafeteria for some pick-me-up caffeine.
Monday, November 6th, 2013 11:58 pm PST
"Okay, Lisbon, we're good to go," Jane said as he re-entered Charlotte's hospital room, grinning knew that look all too well. Jane had been using his mentalist abilities recently, and despite his skill at manipulating people in general even he was pleased with himself and what he'd managed to pull off this time.
He'd also been gone an hour and a half. Lisbon had started to run various scenarios through her mind involving Jane flipping out and hitting someone and being kicked out of the hospital.
But no.
Judging from his 100 watt smile, he'd been playing the part of puppet master better than ever for the last 90+ minutes.
"Already?" Lisbon asked him warily. Something was up.
"Already," Jane confirmed. He was pushing a wheelchair.
"You're car is not here and-"
"Ah ah ah," Jane said, effectively shushing Lisbon."I phoned the car rental place, and they're driving one over for us. It's all good."
"And my clothing and stuff is back at the motel-"
"We'll stop by there and check you out, of course, pick up all your stuff. We can even stop by your apartment, too. Don't worry, Lisbon, I have it all figured out."
"My apartment? You mean... we're going to Malibu tonight?" Malibu was six hours away by car. Jane tilted his head, considering Charlotte. Then looked back at Lisbon, steadily.
"I know it's a lot to ask of you, Lisbon," he said seriously, eyes looking somewhat guilty now. He was asking her to grab her stuff and follow him, follow him into the dark again.
And he hated doing it, he really did, but he couldn't take care of Charlotte on his own and he didn't trust anyone but Lisbon to be around her. Of that Lisbon knew all too well. And he had every reason for his paranoia, after what both he and Charlie had been through. After what all three of them had been though, really.
"You don't have any power at the Malibu place, do you?" Lisbon asked doubtfully, sliding out of her chair. She went over to the little roll-in couch and began to pack up the case files. Jane went over to her, helped her organize and repack the paper work into the box it had come out of.
"I'll phone the power guys tomorrow. That one is easy."
"And water?"
"Will phone the water guys tomorrow too," Jane admitted, grinning. "If you have to, um... use the restroom, though, I'd advise using it right now," Jane commented mildly. Lisbon handed him the box of paperwork. He put it back on the roll-away couch.
"I'll be back in five," she said, opening the door.
"We're going down to the main floor to wait for the rental car," Jane said, gesturing with his head towards Charlotte, still lying motionless in her bed. Jane was wasting no time getting her out of here.
"You know the non-ER entrance on this side of the hospital, looking out onto the patient parking? We'll be there, outside near the taxi pick up lot. Don't forget the files," Jane said, nodding back to the box. Lisbon nodded. Jane would, of course, have his hands full with Charlotte.
"I know where it is," Lisbon said, heading off to use the facilities. Jane grinned at her as she left, expression full of exhausted delight and appreciation. He knew what he was asking of her, again. He was asking her to put her life on hold, her job on hold. He was asking her to back his plans, trusting that he knew what he was doing and that everything would be okay. Lisbon was the naturally argumentative type. She didn't take orders well or submit to authority blindly. That she was so willing to follow Jane's lead at this time in his life and after all she had recently been through touched him deeply.
"Okay, Charlotte," Jane said then, going over to his daughter. "I'm going to take you out of this yucky hospital, okay? We're going to go home."
There was no real response from Charlotte, but Jane pretended there had been one.
"Yeah, I know you're happy about that. I don't like hospitals either."
Again no response.
Jane gently folded down the thin hospital blanket his daughter had pulled up to her neck. She was dressed in loose fitting hospital pants decorated with little teddy bears and a matching short-sleeved shirt which closed in front and was tied shut. Given her tiny size (what Jane was pretty sure was years of malnutrition and excessive stress which had stunted her physical development) and youthful features, the pajamas didn't look particularly out of place on her. The ties on the front though were undone, easy access to surgical sutures, there. The shirt was untied over the abdomen, the shirt fabric pulling up slightly.
The flash of bright red got Jane's instant attention. Charlotte had a gauze dressing taped over the surgical sutures on her abdomen but above that, drawn in red sharpie marker...
Jane forced himself to take a deep, steadying breath. The hearing in one of his ears cut out, and a high-pitched tinnitus took over as his blood pressure rose in accordance with what he was seeing.
Someone had drawn one of Red John's smiley faces on Charlotte's pale abdomen with indelible ink.
The only people who had had enough access to Charlotte to draw that... Jane forced himself to remain calm and think rationally. The surgeons, possibly, but the idea that multiple surgeons were all "agents" of Red John's was unlikely. The doctor in charge of her care hadn't seemed to be under Red John's control. And the ink looked relatively fresh, which meant it had probably been put on in the last 10 hours or so, shortly before the time when Charlotte had gone inward and stopped responding to the outside world.
Jane ran the day's events back in his mind. He or Lisbon had been with Charlotte the entire time, except for a short period of time when a woman nurse had come in to check Charlotte's incisions for signs of infection and take out her foley catheter. Having such an intimate procedure performed had been a possible catalyst for Charlie's behaviour, and that had been Jane's tentative theory, until now...
The nurse had been one of Red John's "eyes", and he had left his daughter alone with her. Not for long. Only about five minutes, really. But long enough...
If Charlotte hadn't gone inward, Jane probably would never have seen the mark. Charlie was intensely private. She wouldn't have been comfortable showing her father even her abdomen. Jane knew that. She would have washed it off and pretended it never happened.
But her subconscious mind knew better, knew that Jane had to see this mark. It had taken over and shut her down, so that he would respond and so that he would remove her from the hospital, so that he would see this.
Jane was certain of it. The subconscious mind was much smarter, in many ways, than the conscious mind.
"I'm so sorry, Charlie," Jane said softly, finger gently touching the smiley face on her upper abdomen. "Thank you for showing this to me."
No response from Charlotte, but Jane thought he saw the muscles around her eyes tense just a little. It was quick, though, and he couldn't be certain.
"I will wash this mark off you later, okay, Charlie? But right now," Jane began, tying Charlotte's pajama top closed, "-we have to leave the hospital. So I am going to put you in that wheelchair, there, and we're going to go down to the first floor in a few minutes and get into a car, and go back to Malibu. Lisbon is coming with us, and everything is going to be okay."
Jane had taken her IV bag off the IV hook and positioned it on top of her belly. He moved her hospital pillow to the chair for added support, then gently lifted her up and placed her into the wheelchair. Her small feet were bare, positioned in the foot rests.
"We'll get you some socks at the drugstore," Jane murmured to her, looking into her vacant face, smiling despite the extreme gravity of the situation. She no longer had her thumb in her mouth, and somehow looked even more forlorn and lost without it. .
Jane re-positioned the IV bag in her lap, careful of the IV taped in her hand and the line in general. Even though her doctor had shown Jane how to put in an IV (and he had the bandages on his inner arms to prove it) and administer injections, Jane still didn't want to have to cause her anymore pain than was absolutely necessary. Jane surveyed the room, making a mental note to memorize everything he could. He then pulled the hospital blanket off Charlotte's bed and wrapped it around her thin shoulders, around her small form, covering her chest and lap.
"Okay, that's good enough. You ready to get out of here, Charlie? I am. Let's go home, kiddo."
He pushed the brake off and wheeled her out of the room, trying to act as nonchalant as possible, eyes scanning the hallway for the nurse he had seen in his daughter's room earlier. He didn't see that nurse, but he still felt uneasy being in the same general area. Jane reached the elevators and hit the elevator button pointing towards the floor.
"Jane, hold the elevator," Lisbon said, coming up behind him. Jane tensed just a bit at her words. When she saw his face, she knew something was up.
"Jane?" Lisbon prodded in a low voice.
"Go get the files, Lisbon. Right now. Hurry back," he told her softly, eyes tracking back to the room. He had been so desperate to get out of the room that he hadn't even considered the possibility that the files could go missing. Lisbon knew Jane well enough to know that something very big- and almost certainly unpleasant- had been discovered.
"Don't run, but walk quickly. Get the files and come back here as fast as you can," Jane whispered to his partner. Then, quietly. "We'll be waiting in the taxi pick up zone."
Lisbon nodded and went to get the files. Jane caught her eye.
"Be careful Lisbon," Jane said darkly, pushing Charlotte into the elevator when the doors finally opened. Lisbon nodded and walked towards the now-vacant room. She felt paranoid, felt her arms prickle with goose flesh. Hospitals had always freaked her out, a little.
They housed dead bodies and contained a morgue where recently living individuals were cut up and dissected like lab animals. People endured some of the most invasive and painful experiences of their lives in hospitals. They were presented with news that shattered their sense of hope and fairness in the world. They prayed and cried. And if there was any place likely to be inhabited by ghosts or earthbound spirits, hospitals ranked right up there with cemeteries in Lisbon's mind.
She'd never felt easy in hospitals but had managed to push most of her uneasiness away as she'd grown up and forced herself to view them clinically. Hospitals were places people came to get well. They were clean, efficient, sterile. Not pleasant, but definitely not places to be feared... until now.
Lisbon entered Charlotte's room, saw the box of files. She pried the lid of the box. Everything appeared to be in order. Jane's eyes had been uniquely haunted, though, his eyes full of meaning and urgency. Lisbon grabbed the box of files and left the room, carried them back to the elevator.
"Agent Lisbon? Taking a break for the night?"
It was the nurse who had been in Charlotte's room earlier that day. Lisbon nodded at her, forced a tired smile, but the woman made her skin crawl now. Her voice was too chipper and something about it rubbed Lisbon the wrong way.
Lisbon still wasn't sure what had spooked Jane, but something had, and until she knew what it was everyone here was a potential... what? Lisbon didn't even know.
"Yeah," Lisbon said, answering the nurse's question. "Only so much of this stuff I can process in a day."
"I completely understand," the nurse said, nodding her head. "I can't imagine dealing with that sort of thing all the time. You've got more guts than I do."
Lisbon wasn't a mentalist. She didn't have Jane's insight into human behaviour. But she was intuitive, and she knew when someone was "off". And this nurse was off. She couldn't say why, exactly. But she knew that her skin was crawling, knew that her shoulders and back were suddenly chilled.
"I wouldn't say that. I imagine nursing has it's fair share of..." Lisbon stopped, not sure what she wanted to say. Forced herself to smile. "Well, kids I guess. Not really my area."
"Kids can definitely cause messes," the nurse said, and Lisbon nodded again, hit the elevator button for the ground floor again. Come on. Hurry up.
"Mr. Jane must be with her then?" The nurse prodded.
"Pardon?" Lisbon said, stalling.
"With Charlotte. After what the poor dear has been through, I can understand his protectiveness."
"Of course," Lisbon agreed, her smile a little too strained now.
"How is she doing, do you know?"
"In what way?" Lisbon prodded. Come on, you damned elevator. Hurry up!
"I heard the poor lamb had stopped talking? I can only imagine the horrors she's endured to bring her to that point." Another faux-concerned smile. Lisbon's skin was crawling.
"I think she's sleeping right now," Lisbon lied, silently thanking God as the elevator doors slid open.
"Well then, agent Lisbon. I'll see you later." And the nurse walked away, a cardigan over top of her Winnie the Pooh scrubs, her shoes squeaking garishly on the linoleum floor.
Lisbon shivered as the doors slid shut.
Charlotte looked even paler than usual under the sputtering fluorescent tube lights lining the area near the taxi-pick up lot. Jane kept his hands on the handles of her chair. Talked to her softly. Kept his voice confident and soothing.
"Lisbon is coming down and meeting us. Everything is going to be okay. We're leaving the hospital, Charlie. See? We're outside now. Can you feel the night air on your skin? We're outside."
Sodium arc lamps shone down on the cars of parents who were staying overnight at the hospital. The sky was a dark gray instead of black, dulled by Sacramento's light pollution. The lights of traffic were visible in the distance, cars on the highway speeding into the night and the future.
"See those cars out there, Charlie?" Jane said, trying to get through to her scared mind. "Those cars are on the highway. We're going to be in a car on the highway soon, too. We're going to be very far away from this hospital soon. Very soon."
Jane came around and bent down so he could see his daughter's face. During the trip down to the ground level and the parking lot, she had put her thumb back in her mouth. Other than that, there was no indication she had relaxed at all. Jane waved a hand in front of her face. This time there was a slight blink of her eyes. He smiled at her.
"That's good, Charlie. You don't have to talk if that feels too hard right now. Nobody is going to make you say anything. Not me. Not Lisbon. We both love you. We are both going to protect you. Can you feel how the air is cooler right now Charlie? That's because we're outside. Feels fresh, doesn't it? What does it smell like to you?"
There was no response. He hadn't really expected one. He continued to talk, anyway.
"I can almost smell cement, can't you? Brick, maybe. And can you smell the highway? The cars? I can sort of smell them too. Can you hear them, Charlie? The sound of them out there in the night on the highway? All these people, going to different places. Safe in their cars. It is a nice sound, isn't it?"
Charlotte's eyes seemed to droop a bit with fatigue, but the dazed, robotic stare was less intense. She still wasn't talking, but was no longer quite so out of it. She had a long way to go but now looked more shell-shocked than "gone". Jane could work with "shell-shocked". Who wouldn't be "shell-shocked" at this point?
"When the car comes and Lisbon comes, I am going to go back in the hospital for a bit. I will come right back, though. I just have to get some things and then I will be back. And then we will drive away from here."
"Jane," Lisbon said softly and Jane looked up. Smiled at her. She was holding the box of files.
"Lisbon, stay with her, okay? I need to get some stuff, I'll be right back-" Jane didn't even finish his sentence. He just turned around and ran back into the hospital. He came out 7 minutes later wheeling an IV pole in one hand, holding a plastic bag full of... Lisbon wasn't sure... in the other hand.
Lisbon raised her eyebrows at him.
"I didn't know medicare covered that stuff-" Lisbon said eyeing the medical equipment.
"Her doctor agreed that some of this stuff will be hard to get in most drug stores this time of night," Jane said, not explaining anymore. Lisbon nodded. Of course Jane would have worked out a deal where the doctor in charge of Charlotte's care sent him off with a medical care package.
The rental car pulled up then, the driver rolling down the window. There was another car right behind it.
"Patrick Jane?" The driver asked, eyeing Lisbon before looking back at Jane.
Jane nodded. The man nodded, got out of the car with the keys and handed them to Jane.
"How do you guys get back to the office?" Jane asked by way of chit chat as he loaded the IV pole and the bag of medical gear into the trunk of the car.
"Oh, I get a ride back with him," the driver said, pointing to the other car. Jane nodded and grinned at the man. Lisbon put the files in the backseat and Jane moved the pillow the back, the blanket. Laid it out on the seat. gently picked Charlotte up and positioned her in the back seat. Covered her back up with the blanket and closed the door.
Lisbon got in the passenger seat and Jane got in the driver's and they pulled out of the parking lot, out of the hospital grounds.
Lisbon was silent a moment.
"The nurse?" She asked softly, looking over at Jane. He tensed just a little and she saw his eyes flicker up to the rear-view mirror to look at Charlotte.
"Yeah, I think so," Jane said back to her after a moment. "Why?"
"She came up to me when I was waiting for the elevator," Lisbon said in the same, soft tone of voice. "Something was definitely off." Lisbon looked over and Jane, expression full of meaning and Jane nodded. They'd talk about this more when Charlotte wasn't within earshot.
"How about some music?" Jane said then, raising his voice just a little, suffusing it with manufactured ease. Lisbon nodded. Silence right now was too much. But talking was out. They couldn't talk about the hospital and the danger they both felt Charlotte may have been in, but they also couldn't do chit chat right now, not without both feeling considerably more creeped out. Lisbon leaned forward and turned the radio on, scanned through the stations until she came to some modern pop station. It was a station she knew Rigsby liked the listen to when they were on stake outs. Cho didn't care for it.
They'd had arguments over it more than a few times now...
Jane drove to Lisbon's motel, so she could return her room key and check out. She came back with her bags and loaded them into the trunk while Jane stayed in the driver's seat with the car running and the radio on making the occasional comment to Charlotte about a song on the radio, the talent of any given performer, the possible meanings of various lyrics.
"Do you need anything from your apartment?" Jane asked then, pulling the car out of the motel's parking area when Lisbon was once again in the passenger seat.
"I don't think so," Lisbon said, looking over at Jane. Jane nodded. Whatever she needed they could buy in Malibu anyway.
Jane drove the car to the little motel he rented by the month and came back with his bags. Lisbon realized at that moment just how rootless Jane had been, and for so many years. He could pick up his stuff in a moment's notice and relocate. He was in and out in less than 5 minutes. Ridiculous, in a way.
"Just going to stop at the drug store before we get on the highway," Jane told Lisbon when he got back in the driver's seat, as much for Charlotte as for Lisbon. "Got to pick up some stuff. Won't be long. I think there is a 7-11 right by the CVS. You want anything?"
Lisbon shook her head. She wanted to sleep. And she wanted her fear of Red John- and by extension, the people he had programmed and turned into psychos- to go away. She no longer felt safe, ever. Is this how Jane had felt for the last decade? This treading water sensation, this sense of itchiness in the blood, the sense of internal agitation and unease? Lisbon knew Jane had suffered terribly over the years, but it was another thing actually feeling on edge and watched.
And she still had no idea just what sort of guilt he experienced. No wonder he'd ended up on a locked ward. Humans weren't psychologically adapted to deal with such severe stress and unease for any length of time. If Jane hadn't already been a mentalist and skilled at hypnotism, Lisbon thought, he might never have gotten out of that locked ward.
She had a new-found appreciation for that insouciant grin he'd sported so often, for so long. She'd found it mildly irritating on occasion. Was beginning to realize, now, just how much that grinning and showmanship had kept him sane.
"Lisbon?" Jane said softly, and she turned and saw that he was watching her closely. She nodded, cleared her throat, but he talked before she could answer.
"It's going to be okay, you know. Everything is going to be okay." His eyes were concerned and gentle. His carnival barker grin was nowhere to be seen.
"Jane-" Lisbon began, wanting suddenly to tell him just how much she appreciated him, how proud she was of him for his inner strength, for all he had been through and managed to overcome. He watched her carefully, silent, waiting for her words but she didn't know how to say what she wanted to say. She sighed.
"I... I'm proud of you, Jane." She said, simply, almost uncomfortably. She looked down at her lap, feeling awkward. She'd never felt at ease being emotionally open with anyone, not even in her childhood. It was too intimate and too... naked, somehow.
Jane was silent. Lisbon blinked. "I am proud of who you are," she tried again, words full of barely repressed emotion. Jane nodded at that finally. She could see in his eyes when she looked back at him how touched he was.
He didn't say anything for a long while. She wasn't sure what she was expecting, some glib acknowledgement, some self-deprecating grin. What she got was much more subdued.
"Thank you," Jane said softly, eyes scanning Lisbon's face intently. Lisbon nodded, feeling somewhat exposed now. She looked towards the brightly lit-up CVS. Open 24 hours.
"Lisbon..." Jane started, obviously touched by her openness. Lisbon held her breath. Emotional intimacy scared her, if she was honest with herself. Jane seemed more fearless in that regard- sometimes- despite all his scar tissue. "I never really got a chance to ask you if you were..." he trailed off, eyes darting over to the rear-view mirror again, once again all too aware of Charlotte in the back seat, out of her head from stress. He sighed.
"What you went through in the Mexico..." Jane tried again, eyes intently locked on Lisbon's. "That sort of thing changes a person." He wasn't going to ask her something trite and well-meaning but ultimately empty like "are you okay?" Lisbon would just nod and claim she was, even if she wasn't, and they both knew it.
Lisbon had a sudden sinking feeling in her stomach. The fear she had woken up with when she'd roused from the blow on the head Red John had given her, that fear was suddenly back. The terror that had built as he unbuttoned her blouse, after she was tied to that damned lawn chair, powerless to fight back, that terror was trying to break through her current iron grip on it.
The terror had swelled considerably when he'd applied the EKG pads. Lisbon shivered, felt tears flood her eyes, hated herself for it. Jane was watching her so tenderly, and yet he looked so much like Red John that she suddenly felt an even greater urge to cry. But she would not cry.
She would not cry. Jane would read her mind somehow and know why she was crying. And he would be horrified. He would hate himself more than he already seemed to sometimes.
"Oh, Lisbon," Jane said mournfully, letting out a shaky sigh, and Lisbon rubbed at her eyes furiously. Sniffed.
"I'm okay Jane. I'm fine," Lisbon said lightly, trying on a smile. Jane didn't buy it for a second. He kept staring at her silently, waiting. She dropped her gaze. His eyes were too intense. They were like looking at the sun.
"I am tired, Jane, and... I will be okay." I will be okay, not I am okay. Jane caught it immediately. Lisbon suddenly felt intense annoyance with herself. Charlotte had been buried alive. She had been sexually assaulted by the beast sporting her father's face for years. Lisbon ran Charlotte's past through her mind, saw a stream of gory images play in front of her mind's eye. And here she was crying for herself because Red John had put EKG pads on her chest and hit her on the head with the back of his gun? What sort of pity party was this?
"You going to be okay while I am gone?" Jane asked gently, knowing the question would bug her, unable not to ask it. Lisbon shot him a smile that held irritation and fear. Irritation, because she hated him fussing over her like this. It embarrassed her. It made her feel weak and girly and less competent, even if Jane didn't view her as weak or girly or less competent...
She felt fear because she wasn't certain if the answer to that question was "yes". Suddenly, Jane being out of her view at all seemed insanely dangerous. The walls of the world were closing in.
Red John had stripped the safety out of the world. How had he done that? 1-2-3 presto! Now you're in Hell... Anyone in the audience want to volunteer for the buried alive trick? What it does to your sanity will simple a-maze you!
"I'll be back in... let's make it 10," Jane said, opening his door, knowing Lisbon was battling with fears she wouldn't let herself express. He smiled at her reassuringly, nodded towards the radio.
"That's Rigsby's station, isn't it?"
"Yeah," Lisbon said, face splitting into a garish grin. Any chance to escape her thoughts, even for a moment, held an overwhelming appeal.
Rigsby. Poor, silly, goofy, two-left-feet, well-meaning, head-over-heels-in-love-with-Van-Pelt Rigsby.
Mariah Carey was playing on the radio. The previous song had been by Beyonce. Lisbon wasn't sure, but thought maybe the song before had been something by N'Sync.
"And Cho's station? Classic rock?" Jane queried, grinning.
"Rock Steady L.A. 99.2," Lisbon told Jane, voice holding a touch of irritation. "Home of the Classics."
She'd actually had to intervene before, because they'd been arguing about the damn radio station like little kids. Cho had been more or less stoic about it, but had obviously been annoyed about something. Rigsby had been sulking sadly, ignoring Cho. Lisbon had demanded answers. And gotten them.
And the answer had come out, eventually. They were feuding over the damn radio.
"Poor Cho," Jane said, nodding towards the radio station, still standing outside the open car door. "This Beyonce?"
"Mariah Carey," Lisbon said, meeting Jane's eyes.
"Jane, I'll be fine. Go shop."
Jane nodded down at Lisbon and gently shut the driver's side door. He pulled on the door handle, just to make sure it wouldn't open, that it was really locked, and waved at Lisbon protectively. Lisbon smiled at him as he grinned at her and walked his way into the pharmacy.
She still had the sense of being watched and on edge, but that sense was much less acute than it had been when they'd been back at the hospital waiting for the rental car. Realistically, Red John couldn't have eyes everywhere. The problem was, his "eyes" did not wear signs.
He came back pushing a little cart. Lisbon saw toilet paper and bottled water. Some bags of unknowns. He came back and held a bag out to Lisbon. She looked through it. Power bars and cans of "iced" coffee. Bottles of Starbucks frappucinnos. Assorted medications for kids, over the counter liquid painkillers. Fruit-flavoured liquid iron that looked like it was marketed towards babies and toddlers.
Lisbon held up the box of liquid iron as Jane started the car.
"Iron?"
"According to her doctor, Charlotte is moderately-to-severely anemic. Makes sense if you consider the kid's diet."
Lisbon nodded. Charlotte was very pale and she didn't eat meat. She survived off junk food and simply being a female raised her chances of anemia.
"Remember I told you about when Charlotte vomited blood?"
Lisbon nodded. Jane sat pulled out the parking lot, pulled back into traffic.
"Apparently that might be a bleeding ulcer, but we should follow up on it eventually."
"I thought bleeding ulcers were... like black coffee grinds?"
"That's what I thought, too," Jane said, eyes on traffic. He stopped the car at a stop light and looked over at Lisbon. "That's why we should follow up on it."
"The medical supplies from earlier?" Lisbon asked after a moment. Jane was nodding to himself, probably already knowing what she was going to ask.
"Saline. IV needles. IV tubing. Some syringes and some pain medication and antibiotics."
"He taught you how to put IVs in?" Lisbon asked, eyebrows raising. Jane grinned at her, expression a little too dazed suddenly.
"He sure did," Jane said, still grinning, eyes flickering between the road and Lisbon's face. Some idiot ahead was switching lanes without signalling with his front headlights off...
"And he let you practice on him?" Lisbon nudged. Jane nodded back at her and grinned a little wider. In a second the corners of his mouth were gonna' crack if he kept this up.
"He needed a little subconscious encouragement, but he eventually saw the light."
"You hypnotized him," Lisbon stated flatly.
"I practiced on him first and then myself twice," Jane responded. It was not a completely ineffective dodge.
Lisbon winced at the admission. Jane wasn't exactly a fan of blood or needles. If anything, he seemed a little squeamish.
She could think of numerous times when he had backed off from dealing with a suspect who was developing sudden medical problems, when he'd seen a gun and lost his dazzling bravado or seen blood and winced in disgust. A few times, he'd even paled a bit, physically blanched. Lisbon wasn't sure, but thought Jane maybe had a mild phobia of needles.
He could deal with embezzlers and prostitutes and murderers and rapists and all manner of human indecency, but needles made him squirm like a worm doused in salt.
He hid it well, but his composure broke up around syringes and tourniquets. He looked a bit vacant when the rubbing alcohol and cotton balls came out in hospitals.
She'd seen him go so far as to hypnotize doctors out of performing blood tests on him during medical crises, much to Lisbon's chagrin. His response when she'd snapped at him for putting his health in danger?
He'd said something idiotic like: As long as I am conscious and talking, nothing that dangerous is going on with my blood, Lisbon... they can drain me if I lose consciousness. Until then, I plan to keep my blood inside my body.
Utterly idiotic.
It had been hard to get angry at him for that comment, though, because he'd had the wide-eyed scared look of a little boy trying to talk his way out of something the evil grownups were getting a kick out of.
"You had no intention of hiring a nurse for Charlotte, did you?" Lisbon pressed.
Jane looked over at her for a minute before looking back at the traffic. The idiot with the hatred for his signal lights was gone, but California was full of idiot drivers...
"I don't know," Jane admitted, finally. "Finding it a little hard to trust people other than you and the team these days, Lisbon."
That made perfect sense. Lisbon could hardly fault him for that. She felt the same way.
"At any rate, I thought it was a good idea if I learned how to do the basics... just in case."
"You really... put an IV in yourself?" Lisbon pressed.
"In the crook of both arms," Jane said, jaw tightening a bit at the admission. "So two. Not one. Two. Two IVs, Lisbon." There was the squeamishness, again, written all over Jane's blanching Adonis face.
Lisbon decided to have pity on him and changed the subject. The man was driving and the last thing they needed was for him to pass out thinking about needles and crash the car.
"The nurse?" Lisbon asked, throwing a glance back at Charlotte protectively before continuing. The teen's eyes were closed, the eyelids bruised. She seemed to be asleep. Her thumb was no longer in her mouth. Her pale face looked hollow and wasted, the bruising on it garish in the low light.
The bruising was the least of her problems, of course, but as a symbol for what she had been through it was incredibly poignant.
Poor kid. Poor, poor kiddo. Lisbon turned back to Jane.
Jane didn't really need to say it, but he mouthed the word "Red John" anyway. Lisbon shuddered despite herself. Glanced back at Charlotte again.
"How... how did you know?"
"She left his... mark," Jane said softly, voice little more than a whisper. Lisbon stared at him in horror.
"On the abdomen," Jane said soberly. Lisbon nodded. Had visions of the bitch cutting it into Charlotte's pale, naked flesh. No... she wouldn't have done that... even Red John himself didn't usually go that far.
"When did you see it?"
"When I picked her up," Jane confessed. That meant he wanted to get Charlotte out of the hospital before he saw the mark. But he'd probably intuitively known what was going on. Jane was incredibly perceptive, even when he couldn't consciously figure out what was going on (which was rare, indeed), even then, his subconscious usually knew what was up.
Charlotte's catatonic state alone had prompted his desire to remove her, but if one of Red John's "eyes" had been in the hospital, then, what had transpired between her and Charlotte to send the teen into such a state in the first place?
"She... left the mark," Jane said quietly, eyes locking on Lisbon's for a moment. Lisbon eyes bulged slightly. If Charlotte had been injured physically, she didn't know if she wanted to hear it...
"In ink," Jane added, sensing the unspoken question. Lisbon nodded, feeling almost grateful for small mercies.
It was nearing 1:30 in the morning, but Lisbon pulled her cell out. Dialed a number.
"Who you phoning?" Jane asked.
"Van Pelt. I am going to get her to dig up whatever she can on that nurse," Lisbon said. Someone on the opposite end of the line picked up. Lisbon's attention shifted focus.
"Van Pelt, hi, it's Lisbon. I'm with Jane. Yeah, we're okay. Jane got Charlotte discharged and we're heading upstate. Can't say much right now, will explain everything later. Listen, one of the nurses at the hospital worked for..." Lisbon dropped her voice a bit. "... you know who, and I need you to dig up whatever you can on her. Look through her financials, make a list of every close person in her life, look her over with a fine tooth comb. Name? Just a second, Jane might know..."
Jane was already shaking his head, no. He hadn't bothered to ask her name. Not that he would have received an honest reply even if he had thought to ask.
"Jane doesn't know, but she tended to Charlotte today, around noon... sometime around then. Description? Yeah. Um, about 28... slim build. Caucasian, dark brown hair. Yeah, both Jane and I could visually identify her if you send pics. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Okay, that's great, thanks. You too."
Lisbon disconnected the phone.
"She is going to send pictures of all caucasian female nurses working in that ward between the ages of 20 and 40 with brown hair." Lisbon told Jane. He nodded. His expression was unreadable.
"Jane? What is it?"
"You know, Lisbon... that will only help us if she is actually a nurse."
Lisbon felt a rush of adrenaline when her tired brain finally connected the dots on that one.
Jane nodded when he saw her response. Knew she understood; it was possible the woman who had come in to "change Charlotte's bandages" wasn't a nurse at all, but was merely dressed like one.
If that were the case, there would be no way to track her down through hospital employee files.
Something about that possibility made more sense to Lisbon.
Red John couldn't possibly have so many moles in the world that they popped up all over the radar, wherever they went. It was more likely that he had recruited people to do his bidding who were then sent to various locations to carry out orders.
The question now was, if the woman didn't work within the hospital system to begin with, how did she even know where Charlotte was being treated?
If she worked in the health care industry it might have been possible to narrow down the possible places by elimination, guesswork and gossip, but if she wasn't even a nurse? If she wasn't a nurse, if she had merely been acting the part, then someone would have had to tell her where Charlotte was.
The only people who knew that were the medical professionals who had treated her (although she had been registered at the hospital under a different name to keep her status on the down-low), some FBI agents, Jane, herself, Cho, Rigsby, Van Pelt... Jane must have been going through the list too, when he looked over at her.
"Lisbon, I have an idea..."
"Hmm?"
"Phone Van Pelt back and get someone over to the hospital. If that woman- whoever she is- doesn't know that Charlotte was released already, she might try to re-enter her room. Get Cho or Rigsby or someone to stake out the room. She comes back in, and boom, they have her-"
It was a completely hair-brained scheme. There were so many things in that "plan" that could go wrong, but Lisbon had nothing better herself.
"And if she knows Charlotte has already been discharged or someone else is already in that room?"
"Charlotte's doctor was a bit, um... I don't think he will even remember he signed her out of the hospital, to be honest. So he probably won't discuss the fact that she was signed out with anyone. That means that there won't be another kid in that room in all certainty, at least not yet. If she hasn't figured it out already, we may still have a chance. Worth a shot, anyway."
Lisbon nodded, and redialed Van Pelt's number again. Told her the idea and asked her to send either Cho or Rigsby or both over to stake the room out. Both, ideally, so they'd have each others' backs.
"Lisbon, tell Van Pelt that they'll know they have the right woman if she tries to run when she enters the room and sees them. A regular nurse will just be confused and ask what's going on. Our lady will run, because she'll know we're onto her. If it turns out to be the same woman, than under no conditions can she be left alone, unrestrained."
Jane didn't have to explain why leaving a Red John "eye" alone, unrestrained, was asking for trouble. Van Pelt had worked the RJ case long enough to know that people under RJ's control ended up offing themselves when authority figures closed in on them.
Lisbon relayed the message.
"Think she'll fall for it?"
Jane shrugged.
"Maybe. We can hope."
He didn't sound altogether too confident, though.