Disclaimer: The usual.
This just popped into my head and wouldn't let me go to sleep until I wrote it, so here it is. Sorry if there are any spelling errors...I tried to proof read but me proof reading my own works does not always mean the errors are caught, afterall, I managed to write it the first time....but enough rambling...enjoy!
Patrick stared out the window at the swiftly passing scenery while Lisbon drove them back to CBI headquarters. After the bantering that started the trip died they fell into a comfortable silence, each buried in their own thoughts. Seeing Sophie again brought up memories Patrick found himself often locking away for those first few years. As much as that breakdown was an integral part of him, he wished it could be deleted from his memory; from his very life.
Slowly Patrick drifted into those unwanted memories, but for the first time since his release he didn't fight it; instead wondering if he could ever be strong enough to wander the paths of these memories without being overwhelmed. Yet even as he wondered, he knew that no matter how many years passed he would never remember without pain, but if he stayed afraid the memories would never hurt any less. Then there was that whisper in the back of his mind, a small voice telling him that there was something he missed, something he was still missing.
* * * *
He'd known he was breaking almost as soon as he opened the door and saw the face. Even as he called the police a haze started to fill his mind, a fog of whispers. Not that it was really an accomplishment or anything but he hadn't fully broken until a few days later when the gravity of the situation finally sank all the way in. Patrick didn't really remember how he'd ended up in his own securely locked room, but by then the whispers in the fog had become shouts and all he saw were their bodies.
"Your fault, it's all your fault! I never should have married you!"
"Why Daddy? Why? Why Mommy? Why me?"
"Piss off a killer. Call him names. Insult his intelligence. Smooth. You know you deserve this. You deserve this room. You deserve this pain. You deserve a life of suffering."
"You're finally where you belong. You'll never get out. And why should you? You'd only get anyone near you killed by your arrogance!"
"You might as well have stabbed them yourself. What part of him being a killer escaped your pea sized brain?! You were just so caught up with your own fame you never bothered to think of them did you? Did you?!"
"Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!"
"Coward. Bastard. Killer."
"Their blood is on your hands and you can never get it off. You can never make it up to them."
"Live in suffering and die a painful death."
Patrick only saw flashes of reality in those times, only small moments where the fog rolled back long enough for him to discern the excessively white room, and an occasional person. He was never sure what he got to draw on the wall, nor did he remember doing it, but he did remember standing there afterwards, staring at the red face which stared back at him, it fitting so well with the gruesome memories always floating through his mind. In fact he remembered that moment with such clarity he could still feel the prick of the needle and the way the blackness had crawled across his vision slowly blotting out the face. Sophie made them leave it for a long time, using it to reach through the fog, to reach to him even as he sat in the shattered vessel of his own mind.
Every day was filled with a cacophany of voices, yelling at him, making sure that every second of every day he remembered that it was all his fault; filled with the memory of their bodies, them standing before him, dead, always asking why.
* * * *
Even now Patrick often had to work to banish the thoughts, those sneaking whispers that tried to snake their way into his everyday. But even as he sat in the SUV, one memory kept floating to the surface with the soft whisper, telling him that, even now, he was missing the most important piece. Closing his eyes, Patrick focused on that one moment.
It had been one of his worst days while in that overly white room. So much guilt, shame, agony, misery, and depression filled his consciousness there was nothing else. Sophie's firm voice barely penetrated the wall of self loathing but yet he knew that was not it. She wasn't what he was missing, he'd known she was there, he'd heard her. Patrick focused on the memory even more, trying to separate the voices, the feelings, and the images. His dead wife had stood in front of him, blaming, screaming, asking why.
Patrick fought against the tightening in his chest, trying desperately to keep his distress from Lisbon. The last thing he needed was her questioning his mental stability. The job often provided his only anchor and he couldn't lose that now. The memory floated through his mind once more, demanding his attention, demanding he look, listen, and see what he missed.
Once again his wife was in front of him, naked, dead, and crying. Unconsciously he traced her face with his eyes, agony tearing at his heart as he looked into her eyes, traced her jawline and lingered on her soft lips. Then he finally caught it. Her lips were moving softly, a movement that didn't match the screams in the background. Patrick focused, strained, and then he finally heard it. A solitary tear made its way down his face as he finally heard it, he finally heard that still small voice that was always echoing in the back of his mind.
"I love you."
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