Author's notes:

Thank you to two great writers, Sue Shay and make-mine-a-kiaora, for their beta-reads and analysis of this chapter! Being able to work with, learn from, and laugh with these fine friends is a priceless treat. Be sure to check out Sue's latest updates to her story, "Ready or Not."

I do not own the TV show The Mentalist and get no compensation from it. This story is written purely for entertainment purposes only.

Notes on the chapter title follow the end of the chapter.

Chapter 20: How High The Moon

Darkness. Patrick Jane sensed the total darkness around him. Really it wasn't darkness, it wasn't anything. Just a void. He longed for something else, anything that he could feel.

He heard voices. Where? He couldn't make out their words other than his name, but he sensed excitement and anxiety in their tone. Why were they so strident? He felt at peace. He wished they would go away, leave him alone. As if in answer to his desire, the voices dwindled while the void returned.

Now he felt warmth, a warmth that cheered him. Absent everything else, he seized on that warmth. It was something. He reached out to touch it, to savor it.

Patrick found himself walking along a trail in a forest. Where he had started from he couldn't remember, and where the trail was leading he couldn't discern. But again it was something. Now he was somewhere so he kept walking as the trail twisted and turned. Birds chirped in the trees, small animals scurried across the ground. The temperature was so perfect he didn't really even feel it.

As he walked, he began to notice things. Things that he wouldn't expect to see in a forest. To the left was a crib, to the right a set of building blocks lay scattered across the ground. Further along a suit sized for a young boy hung down from a tree limb. Was a child missing in the woods?

Something seems familiar about these things.

When he rounded a bend, he saw a yellow toy truck sitting just off the trail. Then it dawned on him. It was the truck he had as a child, the first toy he remembered.

These are all my things from my childhood!

Picking up the truck, he ran his fingers across its edges. It hadn't changed a bit. Setting it back down, he resumed his walk.

He came to a bridge. On the other side he spied another memory from his past. He had to see it again! Breaking into a run across the bridge, the wood slats beneath his feet rumbled under his weight.

Once across, he smiled. It was the carousel where he had courted Angela when they lived with the carnival. His thoughts drifted to happy times that he spent riding around and around on the carousel with Angela, the two of them laughing as they bobbed up and down on their favorite wooden horses. She always rode the Appaloosa; he would take the Arabian next to her. As they spun around he would say something outlandish; she would answer with a mock-scold as her eyes danced with delight.

Patrick looked further up the trail. In the distance he saw something atop a hill gleaming in the sunlight. Again he ran, not letting the slope slow him down. When he scrambled to the crest of the hill, he beheld his beloved Blue Turtle. The polish on its smooth surface was so perfect beams of light reflected off the metal. Funny that he couldn't think of it as the Citroen anymore; Teresa had changed that. What made him smile now was his memory of Teresa riding in the Blue Turtle with him. On their way somewhere, anywhere. They were laughing, talking, smiling - enjoying each other's company. He closed his eyes to let all the pleasant memories wash over him.

When he opened his eyes he was on the trail again. How long had he been walking? He felt the need to rest. Ahead was a park bench, so he walked over to it.

As Patrick sat on the end of the bench, he gazed at a glorious spring day around him. Birds chirped as they flitted through the air, he felt a gentle breeze lift stray strands of hair off his forehead, and sunlight danced through the rustling leaves around him. The warmth of the sun seemed to focus on him as he rested his hands in his lap.

"Beautiful, isn't it, Patrick?"

He turned. Angela was on the bench next to him.

"It is," he replied.

"So pleasant, so calm, so peaceful." She waved her hand at the scene before them.

"I didn't expect to see you, Angela."

"You surprised me too."

"Where am I?"

"Along the trail. You've just made a brief stop."

The sunlight that filtered through the breeze-blown leaves on the trees moved back and forth across her body. He saw no tension, no stress, only peace in her eyes. She was exactly the way he remembered her, except she was dressed in white. Looking at himself, Patrick saw he wore white as well, but blood-red patches stained his clothes. He recalled what happened.

"I remember," he whispered, more to himself than Angela.

"You had a big day, Patrick." When he looked up at her, she smiled.

"This time I made a difference. I changed the outcome."

"You did, Patrick."

He noticed the warmth again.

"It's hurt so much over the years."

"What?"

"Being alone has hurt."

"But you haven't been alone, have you?"

Patrick pondered for a moment.

"No…I wasn't alone."

"You started out on a quest, but you found a new life along the way."

"I did."

"Your quest is over now. It's time for you to move along."

"But it's so peaceful here."

"Patrick." Angela's voice tensed, and she nodded to the right from where they were sitting.

He followed her line of sight to see a winding trail leading away from the bench back into the forest. In the distance a lake glittered in the sun. That lake. The one where two lives changed with the skip of a heartbeat.

"Don't you see, Patrick? This is just a stop along the way. It's not your destination." She nodded again toward the trail. "You need to move along."

A warmth filled him all over. Angela smiled as she motioned for him to stand.

"There's more you seek. Find it. Find what's beyond the curve of the trail."

Patrick looked again at the path ahead. When he turned back to Angela, she was gone. In fact the bench was gone. All that remained was what spread out before him - the forest, the lake, the trail. A chill crossed his body that made him shudder, but just as quickly the warmth he had enjoyed before returned. Something called to him from further down the trail, and it gladdened his heart. He took a tentative step, and the warmth grew. With a second step the warmth increased again. No longer troubled, he began to walk forward. As his pace increased so did the intensity of his desire to reach what waited just beyond the curve of the trail. He shouted out as he moved forward.

Jane walked around that curve into the bright sunlight.

To be continued.

Author's notes:

Nancy Hamilton and Morgan Lewis wrote "How High the Moon" in 1940. My favorite recording is Ella Fitzgerald's version on her album Hello Dolly. Ella most often performed and recorded the song as an up-tempo swing number; however, on the Hello Dolly album she turned it into a ballad - a haunting, achingly beautiful version with an entirely different tone and meaning.