Work Text:
“Was it Stacy from narcotics or that new girl down at security?”
Lisbon's eyes remain on her paperwork as she poses her question. Her tone feels carefully sculpted to sound like casual conversation.
Jane hums, already half asleep. He doesn't need to be alert or have his eyes open to know that this whole ordeal is bothering Lisbon far more than she lets on. The thought brings a smile to his face before he replies, low and sleepy, “For the hundredth time, I don't know,” he lies.
The Valentine's Day card Jane found lying on his desk bore a certain Stacy's signature. The card smelled of lavender and was colored pastel yellow, not too flashy or cliché, like red or pink. The note inside the card was clear, to the point- very law enforcement. Stacy expressed her interest, complimenting his appearance and charm, then concluded the message with a question about whether he would be interested.
“Jane,” Lisbon starts sternly, and he can practically feel the weight of her gaze moving over to him just as well as he can hear the scrawling of her pen halt. “I saw you with the flowers earlier, spit it out,” she demands.
Jane's smile widens with her admission. His clasped hands over his steadily rising and falling chest tap a gentle rhythm of excitement. “Ran out of murders to investigate, Lisbon, hm?” He teases.
She huffs. “You know as well as I do that the CBI forbids in-office romances.”
Jane does not bother to contain the chuckle that escapes. It never fails to amuse him, the excuses Lisbon will come up with. “You’ll just have to report me to Hightower then, you don't want a repeat offense of keeping tabs on secret romances.”
She pauses. “So.. you are actually going out with her then?” A mix of curiosity and surprise colors her voice, although Jane suspects an edge of disappointment, perhaps.
He draws in a sharp breath and sits up in one fluid motion. His eyes open and fixate on her features, already trained on him. He wants to observe her reaction to the next question even though he feels he already knows the answer.
“Jealous much, huh?” He smirks briefly before asking in a dead serious tone, “When was the last time you received a Valentine's Day card, Lisbon?”
She blushes and instinctively hides behind the papers on her desk. “None of your business,” she squeaks out, all high-pitched like she tends to get when he is spot on about something.
Jane cocks his head to the side and hums lightly in wonder. It's no secret that Lisbon tends to live solely for the job. Despite that, he still finds it beyond his comprehension how she hasn't received any interest in the slightest. Teresa Lisbon is not only breathtakingly beautiful but also smart, funny, and warm. He chalks it up to the persona she puts on at work. For most acquaintances, he imagines they don't see past her hard shell and into her soft, nurturing core as easily as he does.
“Besides, quit trying to turn this around on me,” she catches on to him quickly. “As your boss, I have to know, so just quit messing around and tell me,” she demands once more with just as much force behind it as the last demand, if not more.
“Ah- to the side. I am to the side, not below, not above,” he corrects with a warning finger in the air. Lisbon rolls her eyes.
Jane bounces up to his feet. “And, no,” he shakes his head, and his eyes involuntarily dart to the floor momentarily, “I'm not dating,” he supplies truthfully this time- having had his fun with teasing her. Once he speaks the sentence out loud, he knows that his tone and expression have once again revealed the depth of the grief that follows him. Knowing Lisbon, he accepts that she catches every nuance of that grief regardless of how well it may be hidden beneath the fake smile he puts on out of habit.
The curve of her eyebrows shifts in a way that confirms how well she sees through him when it matters.
Jane makes a move out of her office, the sudden mood change serving as the motivator. “Oh,” he begins as a second thought, already halfway out the door.
He circles back to approach her desk slowly as if to reveal a secret. “The flowers?” he leans in towards her and asks rhetorically, preparing to answer himself. She watches with a raised eyebrow as his smile turns mischievous and genuine.
“You needn't worry about those, Lisbon. White tulips are apology flowers. I was just trying to let her down gently,” he admits with a charming wink and a matching toothy grin.
And even though he doesn't stick around to see it, Jane knows that Lisbon is blushing once again.
When she wakes up, Lisbon feels relieved to have left another Valentine's Day behind. It would take a whole new trip around the sun before she would have to deal with the admittedly pointless feelings of loneliness it tends to bring along.
Lisbon drags her tired body out of bed, and by the time she is in the bathroom, she feels as if she is on autopilot; half asleep and lost in thought, yet still functioning perfectly to get ready for work. She reasons that the murder her team solved was far more rewarding than any flowers or chocolate from a possible suitor could ever be. For the most part, she normally copes better with the day than she did the day before, she thinks as she puts on her jacket.
She tries to push the thoughts aside as she drives into work, though her own self-reflection insistently drifts towards a certain consultant.
Their conversation in her office the day before had struck her more than she is willing to admit. Lisbon knows that her personal life desperately needs a push. However, the same sentiment coming from Jane had somehow hurt worse when he, no doubt, deduced that her own loneliness made her bitter. Lisbon kills the engine of her car and decides to take the stairs to give herself time to properly shake off the foul mood and never-ending train of thought.
The clicking of her heels echoing in the stairwell does enough to pull her back in the moment, and she takes a deep, grounding breath before she pushes the door to her floor open. She walks through the bullpen with the practiced ease of putting her feelings away.
She steps through to her office, dropping her bag in her chair without even looking and stripping off her jacket to hang in the corner. As soon as she turns around and really takes her desk in, she stops in her tracks. The papers she had left sprawled all over have been neatly organized and put to the side- someone straightened her things the way she tends to do herself when stressed. On the clean wooden surface, there lies a single flower along with a card. The flower is lonely, appearing wild and picked rather than bought, while the card looks simple- white with a gold trim and her name written in handwriting over the front. She picks up the card first to find that it simply reads:
Dear Teresa,
Happy belated Valentine's Day.
“Secret admirer, huh?” Lisbon nearly jumps out of her skin. She was too engrossed in attempting to analyze the handwriting on the unsigned card and mulling over every word that she hadn't heard Jane sneaking up to her door. “Bunch of those going around this year it seems,” he adds with a small smile, referring to the card he had received the day before.
“Right,” she says, sounding as unsure as she looks. Part of her wonders if someone- namely, Patrick Jane- is playing some kind of cruel prank on her. Although if she is honest with herself, she can't even be sure that this was Jane to begin with. Because here he stands watching her now, looking innocent as ever.
Next, she picks up the lonely little flower, raising it to her nose and humming at the impressively strong fragrance it emits. It's delicate and beautiful. The wheels start turning, and she decides to take a page out of Jane's book and use it against him. She suppresses the smile that threatens to break the illusion, to no avail.
“Well, since you seem to be the expert at flowers,” she begins, recalling his analysis from the day before. Lisbon then holds out the flower towards him, fully intending to observe the way he reacts, before asking, “What does this one mean?”
“Eh,” he shuffles forward half-heartedly, appearing to inspect the item. “Blue violets,” he concludes. His gaze meets hers, now closer. Lisbon raises an expectant eyebrow, encouraging him to continue. “Hmm… I'd say blue violets are usually for loyalty,” he shrugs and shoves his hands in his pockets.
Lisbon eyes over it once more. A single, thin stem with exactly two purple-blue violets flowering. She smiles down at it, gently touching the colorful petals. The meaning only makes them prettier to look at, not to mention now knowing exactly who placed them on her desk- Lisbon may not be a mind reader, though she doesn't just lead an investigation team with nothing to show for it.
“That’s one lucky guy,” she hears him comment softly. Lisbon finds it both amusing and endearing that he keeps trying to pretend he doesn't know who did this.
“Thank you, Jane. I-” she lifts her gaze from the mesmerizing indigo with a gentle smile to find that she is now standing alone in her office. “Love them,” she finishes her sentence, tone and smile dropping upon finding herself alone.
The violets live the rest of their short lives propped up in a makeshift vase- a glass jar Lisbon finds in the breakroom. The card stays propped up against the jar for as long as the flowers live, and gets safely tucked into her handbag to display at home after.