Bringing this back because I've fallen back in love with these idiots and I want to do everything in my physical capabilities to mash them together and GET MARRIED ALREADY, DAMN IT.
Presence and Well-being: Jane's having a bad day.
Jane Rizzoli leapt up from her desk with a growl, marching out of the bullpen with a determined slam of the door. It was a shitty as fuck day, beginning from the very moment she decided to open her goddamn eyes all the way to her goddamn case. Fuck it all, fuck it all hard. She didn't need it all; she didn't need any of it. She shoved the door off the BPD open, not caring as it banged hard against the wall as she disappeared outside.
Korsak and Frost shared a look. They had been expecting it all day, and they were counting down the seconds before Raging Rizzoli imploded on herself. She had walked into the PD with the darkest look on her face they'd seen since Hoyt. They'd tried everything they could to snap her out of it; jokes, teases, gentle inquiries of why, but all the tan woman had done was glare dangerously at them as soon as they were within range of her.
They decided it was best to let it sit before she decided she needed to shoot something to vent.
It was an accumulation of her week; a progression from bad to worst to why is she even coming in. Her temper was shorter, her eyes dark and clouded with seven devils waiting to be unleashed.
It was, in short, one hell of a fucking bad day for Jane Rizzoli.
"You want to get this, or do I get the honors?" Korsak quipped at the young partner, motioning to the black office phone in his hand.
Frost gave him a dry smile. "I'll get page Dr. Isles."
Jane was huffing and puffing at herself when Maura pushed the BPD doors open, growling and pacing the street like a caged lion. The blonde ME sighed at the sight - Jane was flexing her hands again. It was a psychosomatic reaction to stress; they only ever hurt when Jane was highly strung, and as of late, Jane had been incredibly on edge. It worried her to think of how long Jane had been keeping the pain a secret - she never did like being fussed about.
"Jane," she called to the detective softly.
Instead of replying, the dark haired detective snarled at her, and increased the speed of her pacing. Jane walked up and down the street, stalking the pavement so dangerously that pedestrians crossed the street rather than dare approach her. Maura could see the thunderous look on her best friend's face, like everyone else, but she saw something else there too.
Uncertainty.
"Jane," she tried again, firmer this time. As genteel as people assumed her to be, Maura had a spine of steel when it came to handling Jane Rizzoli where others had no spine at all. She moved down the steps in her Louboutin red bottomed heels, striding carefully over to the silently blustering woman, stopping just short of where Jane seemed to have designated as her pacing space. Maura thought of commenting on how the continuous pattern of her strides would scuff her boots, but decided against it.
She knew Jane hated Googletalk when she was mad.
Instead she waited until Jane gave the air a solid looking punch and slumped against her cruiser, breathing heavily still. She waited another moment before she spoke. "Do you want to talk about it?" she asked the detective gently, watching with her hazel eyes in mild concern when Jane did nothing but sigh heavily. Much like a petulant, but troubled child. She stepped up to the woman, lowering her gaze until she could see Jane gnawing on her lower lip from under her mass of dark curls.
Maura reached out for Jane's anxiously flexing hands, grasping them in her hands gently, thumbs stroking the scars. She offered Jane a warm smile when the detective hazarded a look in her direction, and watched as the woman visibly relaxed. "Are you ready to talk about it yet?" she questioned again, stepping closer to the detective as Jane straightened off the cruiser and leaned down over her.
Jane grumbled something under her breath, but made no move to pull away. When she received the Maura Isles 'and what part of the English language is that actually considered a response' look, Jane looked up at the sky with a huff. "It's stupid," she told the ME, her low voice uncharacteristically hoarse. She hadn't had a good night's sleep in weeks, and the coffee she was downing like air was beginning to take its toll on her throat.
"It must be something if it bothers you this much," Maura countered, staring up at her expectantly, hands still stroking Jane's hands. It was almost a reflex; a built in habit of hers.
The detective frowned. "Everything bothers me, remember? You're the head; I'm the heart." She gave Maura a self-deprecating smile.
Maura scoffed. "That doesn't mean what bothers you doesn't matter," she chided. Shooting Jane a stern look, a look she knew Jane couldn't disobey, she stood straight in her heels and waited for the woman to reluctantly meet her gaze. "Tell me."
Jane made a show of sighing heavily, as if telling her this would somehow burden her for the rest of her life, but mustered a crack of a smile when Maura chuffed at her. She shifted on her feet, suddenly aware of how close Maura was standing to her, and how intimate it must have seemed to people; Maura holding her hands. Once again that feeling of deadweight dropped back on her chest, and Jane shook her curls back as she offered Maura a smile she didn't feel.
"It's nothing, Maur. It's just one of those days," she assured her, giving the ME's soft hands a reassuring pat. She hated 'one of those days'. For Jane, it was worst than the usual bad days - for a woman who wouldn't hesitate to insure her gut for a million dollars, having bad days was like having the world strapped to you like a time bomb. If you so much as breathed wrong, the whole world came tumbling down into dust.
Maura stared up at her face, a dubious frown on her mouth as Jane did her best not to just give in and moan to the woman just how shitty her day had been. Maura didn't need to hear that - she was around dead bodies all day. That alone trumped Jane's worst day.
"I don't believe you." Now it was Maura's turn to sound like a stubborn child.
Jane smiled endearingly at the woman. She wrapped an arm around Maura's shoulders and squeezed her tight, feeling the weight start to lift. "I'm okay, Maur," she whispered down to the woman, smiling earnestly now. She didn't know why it happened, nor did she know how, but Jane's shitty day suddenly began to look brighter. "Come on, let's go see Ma and get some coffee." As she led the woman back up the stairs, she paused at the top when a thought struck her.
"Hey, did you know this is the first time today we've seen each other?"
If you don't remember, Presence and Well-being was my first ever Rizzoli and Isles fic, which I took down a while ago. It's a three/four(?) part fic, which might go a little longer, but it resolves into Rizzles, so anticipate that!
(May or may not indulge into some sexy times to hurhur) Reviews would be lovely, if you have the spare time or if there's something specific you'd want to read!