A/N: So I was in the middle of writing the first chapter for my new "Moonlight" fic, and this crazy idea occurred to me. I know there must be other stories out there using the blatant plot device of Angela Jane's ghost, but I purposefully didn't read them, so any similarities between those and mine are purely coincidental.

I know there are those out there who followed me bravely into my other extreme AU fics, so if you liked those, I beg your indulgence once again. I can't promise it will be free of clichés, but I can promise there will be absolutely no use of potter's wheels (except perhaps a humorous allusion or two). Please give this story a try and I'll try to make it fun and amusing, with only a small mixture of angst along the way. So, my loyal, adventurous readers, get ready to suspend your skepticism and join me for a bit of supernatural romance…

The Ghost and Mr. Jane

Chapter 1

The first time Patrick Jane actually saw his dead wife was in the mirror over his left shoulder. He'd been shaving in the bathroom of his cheap extended stay motel, and he'd caught a glimpse of light brown hair, felt the touch of a cold hand on his bare back. He literally jumped, the razor slipping in his hand, blood oozing from the stinging wound on his cream-covered jaw. He let out a strangled bark of surprise.

Heedless of his injury, Jane spun around, only to be faced with the emptiness of the motel's Spartan bathroom. He gulped, pulse racing, and walked on shaking legs out of the bathroom into the bedroom. No one was there either, and one glance at the chain still in place on the door told him he'd had no intruders. He shook his head at himself, managed a light chuckle, though his heart still pounded loudly in his chest.

"No more late-night Mexican food for you, Jane," he said aloud to the empty room.

He returned to the bathroom, looking in disgust at the rivulet of blood that had run down his neck and onto his chest. On closer examination, he saw that the cut was deep enough to suffer the embarrassment of wearing a Band-aid to work. He grabbed some toilet paper and pressed it to his wound with his left hand while awkwardly shaving his other cheek with his right.

His eyes still flew from his task to the reflection of the tile wall behind his back, as if expecting to see the ghostly image again. But Jane didn't believe in ghosts, so of course he attributed this first contact to spicy food and lack of sleep. He rinsed his face and chest of the remaining shaving cream and blood, applied the offending bandage and walked to the closet, a towel wrapped low around his hips. It was then that he heard her voice.

"Patrick," said the ghost of Angela Jane. "You've let yourself go."

He turned abruptly from the closet, and there she was, sitting on the edge of his bed, her head tilted as she evaluated his naked torso. His aching jaw dropped and he stared wide-eyed at the beautiful manifestation of his dead wife. He tried shaking his head again to clear it, then closing and opening his eyes. But she was still there, still talking.

"You used to be up before sunrise, jogging on the beach or swimming in the ocean. Then there were the hundred crunches on the floor beside our bed—my morning wake-up call. But look at you now, Patrick," she said in amusement. "You're starting to look a little soft around the middle."

His hand went involuntarily to his stomach as he finally managed one word: "Angela?"

The ghost nodded. "Of course it's me. It's not as if you were expecting some other woman waiting to ogle you in this cheap dive." She looked around the dingy room in disgust. "Not that you've had any women over the last nine years ogling you in the altogether. What's up with that?"

"I—what?"

Jane's head was spinning. He was obviously having some sort of mental breakdown, perhaps building up since the emotional upheaval he'd felt after he'd kissed Erica Flynn two weeks before. Or maybe it was some residual damage from his recent near-drowning. But Jane had honestly felt like he'd been doing better the past few months, stronger in every way. Why was he hallucinating now? He felt his head with one trembling hand—he didn't feel feverish. When he looked at the specter again, he suddenly became light headed.

"Sit down before you fall down," she advised him wryly, inclining her head toward the couch in the small sitting area.

He took her advice, dropping onto the brown Nogahide with a whoosh of expelled air.

"Deep breaths, Patrick," said the ghost. "You're not going crazy. It's really me."

"But how? There are no such things-"

"As ghosts? Oh, come on. Of course there are. You've been talking to me nearly every day for years."

"It was just a way to comfort myself," he denied. "Even now, you're just a manifestation of my imagination and my—"

"Stop the psychobabble, Patrick. You've always been a sensory sort of guy. What are your senses telling you now?

"That I'm seeing my dead wife and that I've finally gone round the bend."

She laughed, and it was the same tinkling sound that had haunted dreams. "Oh, how I've missed you, my love," she said affectionately. "You could always make me laugh. You're far from insane, though. As a matter of fact, when you actually were slightly insane once upon a time, I made sure to stay away, much as I'd wished I could be there for you. But seeing me then would have definitely pushed you over the edge. These days, you're in a much better place, Patrick, better able to handle a visit from the Great Beyond." She gestured dramatically with her hands, her eyes alight with amusement.

He stared at her, believing now that he must be having one of the best dreams he'd had in years. Angela was as beautiful as the last morning he'd seen her-silky hair, intelligent brown eyes, sensual lips. She was wearing his favorite dress of hers—a simple black sundress with spaghetti straps. It enhanced her delicate décolletage and showed off her shapely, tanned legs. And she was barefoot, as she usually was around the house. He decided then and there to stop fighting it and enjoy this gift his subconscious had bestowed upon him.

"Why now, then, if I'm doing so much better? Don't you think that seeing you just might set me back a few steps?"

She shrugged her slim shoulders. "I'm here because you need a little nudge in the right direction on some things, if you're ever going to be happy again."

He felt his eyes watering as the shock began to wear off. It was slowly sinking in that Angela, no matter how or why, was sitting right in front of him, gently prodding him and telling him the unvarnished truth, just like she used to.

"How can I be happy?" he said brokenly. "You're dead. Charlotte's—"

At that moment Jane's cell phone rang from its place on the small dining table in the kitchenette. He jumped a little at the harsh interruption.

"You gonna get that?" Angela asked. "It's Teresa."

It rang a couple more times before he gathered his wits about him and rose to answer his phone. It was Lisbon, just like she'd said.

"Hello, " he said absently.

"Jane. Where the hell are you? CSU is about done with the body—"

"Sorry, Lisbon, I—" His gaze went back to the bed, but the ghost was gone. He paused in surprise, then tried to refocus on Lisbon's voice in his ear.

"Jane?"

"I'm on my way," he said, disconnecting. He walked over to the bed, felt the place where Angela had sat. It was cold, and there wasn't even an indentation in the bedspread. No one had been there, just like he'd known all along.

"Okay, Subconscious," he said. "I want to wake up now."

But nothing changed. He didn't wake up.

"Angela?" he tentatively asked the empty room. But she didn't reappear.

Jane gave a shuddering sigh and returned to his closet.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Jane sat at the stoplight, preoccupied with thoughts of his unearthly visitor, or more accurately, the figment of his imagination. Dream or no dream, hallucination or not, it had been so good to see Angela again. Over the years he'd been dismayed to note that his memory of her had faded, that he'd forgotten the little things about her features that he had once known so intimately. In a way he was grateful that his brain had so beautifully reconstructed her in his mind's eye, down to the small laugh lines on her cheeks and the way her eyes crinkled when she smiled. Still, hadn't he tortured himself enough already without so vividly bringing her back to life?

The tears he'd been holding in check threatened again, and he blinked rapidly against them. It wouldn't do for Lisbon to see that he'd been crying.

From the corner of his eye he saw his wife, sitting comfortably in the seat beside him where a second before it had been empty.

"Shit!" he exclaimed, one hand going to his chest. "Are you trying to give me a heart attack?"

Angela chuckled at his discomfiture. "The light's green; people are going to start honking at you." Sure enough, the car behind him gave a warning toot of his horn, and Jane floored it, driving quickly across the intersection toward the freeway entrance. She grasped the door's armrest for dear life. "Still driving like a maniac, I see."

"What do you care?" he asked in annoyance. "You're already dead."

"Well, that's not a very nice thing to say, Patrick."

"Look, it's wonderful to see you again, Angela, but you and I both know there's no way I'm really talking to your ghost right now. Any minute I'm going to wake up in my bed and reality will hit me like a sledgehammer. In some ways, seeing you like this, so animated, so full of life, is going to be worse that the endless nightmares I've had over the years. To be honest, it hurts to see you like this, so I wish you'd just leave me alone and let me try to deal with the pain of losing you again once you disappear."

"What can I do to make you believe that I'm really here with you, that you're not dreaming. You want me to ask God to make it rain inside the car?"

"I thought only George Burns could do that."

She grinned. "It's sad to see you so pessimistic; you didn't used to be. I guess all I can do is hang out with you until you believe in miracles again."

"You'll be wasting both our times," Jane said wearily, merging now into morning traffic.

"I can't believe you're driving the Citroen," she said, ignoring his sour mood. "Out of all your expensive collection of classic cars, you chose this piece of crap."

"You sound like Lisbon," he said numbly.

"Well, maybe you should listen to her more. The woman knows what she's talking about."

Jane didn't reply, so they sat in silence awhile, Jane trying to avoid looking to his right. Just when he thought she might have gone, she spoke again, pointing out the passenger side window.

"It's just up here," she told him. They went over a rise, and, just as she'd said, Jane spied the highway patrol cars and the familiar CBI SUV parked on the side of the road. He pulled in behind it, his eyes involuntarily going to his passenger.

"No one else can see me," she told him, reading his mind.

"If I slip and talk to you, they'll think I'm nuts."

"So don't slip. Besides, they already think you're nuts," she said, grinning mischievously.

He couldn't help smiling a little at that; she was probably right. When Jane got out of his car, Cho was the first to greet him-well, if you could call it a greeting. No pointless small talk for Kimball Cho.

"Victim's a woman, early twenties, stabbed in another location and likely thrown out of a vehicle," he informed Jane in his typical monotone. "No sign of sexual assault."

"Not another one," commented Jane under his breath, tired suddenly of crimes against young girls.

Jane followed his colleague to the location of the victim, where Rigsby and Lisbon stood talking to the Crime Scene Unit.

"There you are," said Lisbon, excusing herself and joining Jane as he squatted beside the body where it lay in the brown grass ten feet from the pavement.

"What took you so long?" Lisbon asked, her concern more personal than a boss's should be.

She must be able to see how off balance I seem.

"You're right," said Angela, and a startled Jane squinted up to see his wife's ghost standing there, the morning sun behind her, watching them with keen interest. "Snap out of it."

He made himself return Lisbon's gaze with his usual mild grin. "Perfection like this takes time, Lisbon," he told her. Of course he was only wearing his usual uniform of expensive ten-year-old suit and slightly wrinkled dress shirt. He flushed a little when Lisbon's eyes zeroed in on the Band-aid on his face.

"Plus, I had a bit of an accident with the razor," he confessed, trying to focus now on doing his job and not on the spectral image of his dead wife.

Lisbon's expression remained wary, but the faster Jane finished his examination of the victim, the faster they could get on with the investigation and find her killer.

"So, what do you think?" she prompted. Jane forced himself to sniff, to look at the body from all available angles. She'd been stabbed several times with something small and imprecise—a screw driver perhaps—and her formal gown was soaked in blood.

"She's a Jane Doe for the moment," Lisbon was saying. "No purse, no phone, no ID of any kind."

"It's like I'm looking at Cinderella right after the clock struck twelve," he mused. "She wasn't used to going to a fancy ball like she'd attended. Her nails are newly manicured, but not expertly so; she probably did them herself. Her makeup is too heavy, her perfume too cloying. And look—Cinderella is missing a shoe. The one she has on is a cheap designer knock-off. Any sign of her carriage? No old pumpkins lying around?"

"She was dumped here, but there are new tire marks on the freeway shoulder nearby. Forensics took some pictures and hopefully we'll have a lead on what vehicle might have made them. Rigsby thinks it was a high dollar sports car—maybe a Ferrari."

"Aw, no doubt her Prince Charming's conveyance." Jane stood, dusting his hands off. "I'd say her killer was her date, some guy way above her station that she was trying to impress without the means to do so." He nodded morosely at the woman. "Obviously her plan didn't work. Find her missing shoe, Lisbon, and you'll have your suspect."

"I'm sure he's disposed of her shoe by now," Lisbon said, enjoying his fairy tale allusions in spite of herself.

A noncommittal noise arose from his throat. "Only time will tell," he said.

"Excellent job, Patrick," Angela said proudly.

"Thanks," replied Jane without thinking.

"Thanks for what?" asked Lisbon. She followed his gaze to the emptiness behind them.

"Oh, uh, for listening to my nonsense."

He was saved from explaining himself further when the rest of the team joined them.

"What happened to you?" Rigsby asked, noting his bandaged jaw.

"Nothing much. You should see the other guy," Jane said dryly.

The coroner's van arrived and the team stood back as the dead woman's body was zipped into its black bag. Angela stood close beside him, and Jane looked away as the victim's face disappeared behind the zipper. Whenever he saw this achingly familiar sight, he always flashed back to the night of his family's murders, how the police had had to hold him back as their bodies were loaded into just such a van. Usually he was long gone from the crime scene when the coroner took away the body.

"Don't think about it," said Angela softly.

He looked at her like she was the crazy one.

Lisbon noticed his distraction, the strange expressions shadowing his handsome features, and came to stand beside him, her forehead wrinkled with worry.

"Are you okay?" she asked discreetly, lightly touching his forearm.

Maybe he was having one of his bad days. Was it some significant anniversary she was missing?

He smiled by way of reassurance. "I'm fine, Lisbon. Just having an off day, I guess. No need for the mother hen treatment, I assure you."

She frowned, not taking the bait. She knew he sometimes got her riled up to distract her from the real issue at hand. "Let me know if you need to talk," she told him sincerely, dropping her hand. "I'll see you back at HQ."

"Sure thing."

Jane waved to Cho and Rigsby and headed back to the shoulder where his Citroen was parked.

"She's in love with you, you know," said his wife, and he stopped short, his head whipping around to stare at her in amazement. She continued, undaunted. "She's only recently come to realize it, although she's felt that way about you from almost the beginning."

"What the hell are you talking about?" he demanded tightly. "We're just friends."

She smiled at his defensive tone. "Oh, Patrick, you know it's true. The signs are all there; you've just been ignoring them because it's safer that way."

He continued walking now, his pace quickening, as if he could outrun a ghost. He got into the car and started the engine, signaling to merge back into traffic. He felt Angela's presence beside him although the passenger side door had neither opened nor closed.

"You want to know why I'm really here?" asked the ghost. "It's so you don't screw this up with her."

"I thought I was the one imagining things," he told her, his eyes remaining resolutely on the road.

She smiled enigmatically. "To quote a wise man I once knew: 'Only time will tell.'"

A/N: Are you still with me? Well, thanks for taking the chance! Is it too off-the-wall to continue? I really want to know what you think.