THE GHOST OF YOU

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'You can stop now, Jane.' Her ghost said. Jane looked at her from the other side of the veranda. The ice in his glass clinked lightly; the ocean lapped with a whisper on the shore. He said nothing.

Her expression was clear of everything. No fear, no anxiety, no pain. Only tranquillity. He wished he could let himself go in that serenity on her face, the smoothness of her brow and the cloudlessness of her eye.

But she was dead. She was no longer living, and that was his fault, and so the tranquillity meant nothing.

'I can't.' He said. 'I'm not done yet.'

'He's dead, Jane. You did what you said you would - you avenged the lives of your daughter, your wife, and me. You can let go of him.'

Jane shook his head. There was no trace of the mischievous smirk now, not here in his imagination, here on this veranda by the sea, here with the Lisbon in his mind. He could let this imaginary Teresa see what was really happening.

He had no choice.

'If I stop now,' he said slowly, turning his eyes from hers and staring instead at his glass. It perspired gently; tiny dots of light glimmered in the sun. 'If I stop now there will be nothing left of me.'

'You haven't let Red John consume you.' Lisbon said. Her face was still beatific, lips smiling loosely, no worry line between her dark brows. 'I know that. There is still something left of you; take it now, and walk away.'

'I don't know how.'

'Sure you do. You know everything.'

'I know nothing. I didn't know how to save you.'

'No one did.' Her eyes, blank, her expression, void. Jane stood, hands shaking suddenly; the ice clinked more urgently. 'You couldn't have saved me.'

'I could have. It was so obvious, I should have - I…' Jane set down the glass with a clatter, stood, turned his back and stared out at the sea. Its whispers accused. The sun was too bright.

'I gave him the gun, Teresa. I put it in his hand and watched him run.'

'Look at me, Patrick Jane.'

He couldn't. He was afraid. She talked anyway.

'You can blame yourself all you want, but there's nothing you can do now. It's done. And you killed him for what he did. He's paid his debt. You can let go.'

'I don't want to.' He said, jerking around to face her. He focused on her lapel. 'If I let go of him, I let go of you. I let go of half of my adult life. He's been my reason for living for so long, and if I…'

He stopped again. Looked at his chair, couldn't find it in him to sit. Stared at his hands. He'd left the glass on the balcony.

'Look at me, Patrick Jane.' She said again, and again he disobeyed. 'You can start over.'

'I was going to. With you.' He said it out loud for the first time, and his throat closed up around the words. 'I wanted to love you.'

'You still can. Grieve for me if it helps you, Jane, but move on. Start a new life.'

'Not again. First Vivian and Jamie, then you - I can't - I won't love someone again. I'm not strong enough.'

'Look at me, Patrick Jane.' He shook his head. 'You're free.'

He looked up. Her face was alien to him, the familiar features too flat and passionless, too dead; Jane stumbled back, knocking over the chair.

'You're free.'

His fault.

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Right then, there's my little oneshot. Backstory: Red John somehow got close enough to our favourite CBI agents for Jane to give him a gun - I'm thinking Jane got the gun from Lsibon for some very good reason I can't fathom just now and handed it off to Red John, probably for protection as he goes to (Jane thinks) rescue Lisbon from some terrible fate. Jane probably collected the rest of the crew and followed close behind (against his better judgement - he's the one that's supposed to walk into dangerous situations without back-up, isn't he?), got there just in time to catch Red John shooting Lisbon, and shot him back.

Jeez, there might be something to this. Nobody write that story, I call it.

Oh, and also, I couldn't find anything on the identities of Jane's wife and daughter, so I made up their names.

Reviews fuel my muse - any takers?