Title: Confirmation Bias in the Palm of My Hand

Author: Jedi Buttercup

Disclaimer: The words are mine; the world is not. I claim nothing but the plot.

Rating: PG.

Summary: The photo in her hand feels like an inevitability. Like something she should have seen coming. 500 words.

Spoilers: Person of Interest 1.21 "Many Happy Returns"

Notes: Starting to wonder how long this show can circle the trust issue before stepping off the tightrope for good in one direction or the other....

The photo in her hand feels like an inevitability. Like something she should have seen coming.

This woman, this Jessica: John looks happy sitting next to her, ten years before Joss met him. Before the CIA and whatever happened there to shake him. Before he'd somehow got word about Jessica's fate and returned to take it out on her husband. Donnelly's probably right about one thing: he hadn't been expecting what he'd found. But it hadn't been the fight itself that made him sloppy.

How long had John spent on the streets after that before he ended up at Joss's precinct? Three quarters of a year or so? A long time to be soul-searching.

Time enough for his friend to have found him? Yeah; that fits too, another puzzle piece into place. Harold had known what Joss would find in New Rochelle and sent her anyway. What, did he think she'd identify more with John if she discovered his motivation personally?

She fingers the worn edges of the photo, and admits he's partially right. Calculating bastard. She knows who John was now, and what made him who he is, and she can't quite condemn him for it, no matter what he's done with Jennings.

But that's not what made her decide to keep the image when she shredded everything else.

Joss has never seen him smile like that. She'd had Taylor to reach her, after. Who does John have?

She tucks the photo into her pocket, then answers her phone.

Reese stares down at the small rectangle of stiff paper in his hand, turning it over to examine the addresses on both sides.

Harold Wren of Universal Heritage Insurance: that one, he had already plotted on the map from Fusco's research, though he doesn't think Finch knows that. The other... is an address in the neighborhood where Reese meets with Han. Combined with the gift of a key, it's... suggestive.

Is this Finch's idea of reciprocity? Encouraging him to accept a new residence, and forgive his recent omissions, by offering information of similar significance? Not his own home address, but a point of contact-- including his first alias on public record. Reese well remembers how skittish Finch had been about his cover identity when they'd first met.

Is this trust? Is this forming a new connection? Eleven years of defining himself around one loss, in one way or another, have rendered perspective difficult-- even without all his other reasons for wariness.

Finch hasn't said another word about Jennings. No more than he had about Andrew Benton. Is that because he already knows, because it doesn't matter, or because he doesn't want to? Carter had assumed the worst. But she'd also had faith enough not to expose him, and in return he'd made sure Gustavo Peña gave her the truth. Maybe he's waiting for similar certainty with Finch, some clarity of understanding.

And maybe he'll be waiting a long time. But... he thinks he'll go and check out this apartment, regardless.

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© 2012 Jedi Buttercup.