So, more fluff set in the Crosswords and Coffee verse. It's a fun little thing to write. There is non-C&C fic coming though. Something involving Jane, Maura, and a stripper pole, three more terrible dates for Maura to go on, a fic based upon a pic of Sasha Alexander that is now both mine and my boyfriend's desktop background...
"No." She's standing there, arms crossed on her chest, pouting. She's fairly sure that if she looked at herself in that moment, she would resemble a five year old far more than a thirty-five year old, but she was going to put her foot down. She had agreed to twice as many people on the guest list than she wanted. She had agreed to wear a dress. She had agreed to fancy frilly invitations. She was not going to agree to getting married in a dark, poorly lit, dilapidated church. Even if it had been the one that she'd been forced to go to for the entirety of her childhood.
"But Janey-"
"Ma, no. There's so much wrong with that idea I don't even know where to begin." At her mother's glare she stiffened, listing what was wrong on her fingers. "One, it's a church, I'm marrying another woman." She glared at her mother to silence the rebuttal she knew was coming. Yes Father Roger was an open minded fellow – she and Maura had run into him more than once at ViceVersa – one of the local gay clubs, minus his clerical collar. Yes, she knew the man would be more than willing to officiate over their ceremony. "Two, every time I set foot in that place I'm reminded of school, and there is no way in hell I'm thinking about Sister Winifred on my wedding day. Three, Maura's like, the anti-religion. She'd never agree to it, and this is for her. She's the one that wants to get married, not me. I'm just as content to live in sin for the rest of our lives. But you guys, you're the ones that want the fancy ass wedding, let her pick where it's going to be." She found herself just a little bit breathless at the end of her tirade, and felt slightly bad for the look on her mother's face. It wasn't really sad, or disappointed, but she knew that she'd been harsh to Angela.
"Your father and I got married there." The words are quiet, and she frowns.
"I know, ma. But we're not you and dad. We're – us." She was starting to get fed up with this whole wedding thing. She could still hear Frost's constant suggestion to her playing over and over in her head, and it was sounding like a better and better idea. Run off in the middle of the night with Maura, find some seedy little chapel, and get married there. Even though that was completely defeating the purpose of the wedding that both her y'know – fiancee – whatever she was, and her mother wanted. Her cell phone buzzed on her hip, and she sighed. Murder never waited, and she found herself getting called out to a crime scene.
It was forty six hours later that she finally got a chance to breathe, and it was all thanks to Maura. Of course, Maura would notice that the victim had a severe case of anky-something spondi-backache, of course Maura would notice that their "suicide" was not a suicide at all but a murder. Of course Maura would know it was some genetic back defect. She did have to admit, it was the first time she'd seen someone killed to try and avoid a life insurance payout. Well, it wasn't as though their murderer was going to be getting his disability checks in jail, either.
She relaxed back on the couch, avoiding her mother's calls about finding some sort of florist or something. Right now, she just wanted to have a beer, watch the Sox, work on the crossword puzzle and pretend that the world outside of baseball and The New York Times didn't exist. She was doing a good job too, until Maura came home. "Everything all right?" She sighed, looking up towards the door. Had the tension been so obvious as to be the first thing Maura pointed out?
"Fine, babe." She smiled slightly, as Maura came up behind her, strong thumbs digging into the knotted mess of muscles in her shoulders.
"You're tense." She sighs, tilting her head back, enjoying the brief kiss dropped to her lips.
"Ma's just been bugging me about the wedding. She wants us to get married at St. Agnes', no matter how many times I tell her no." She frowned as Maura pulled away from her, long enough to pour a glass of wine and settle down on the couch next to her. She sighed, kicking her feet over the arm of the couch and resting her head on her fiancee's lap. Fiancee. She was still getting used to that word. It seemed like everything was plowing ahead at a record pace. They'd only been together together for eight months. Only been engaged for three. And now, now she was planning a wedding. Or rather, it seemed like everyone else was planning a wedding with her in it. "What about Vegas?" She suggested. "Just you and me, and none of this big ceremony crap." She sighed, and shifted in Maura's lap, burying her face against Maura's hip.
There was a pause, where she was content just to be there with a calming hand running through her hair and just surrounded by the scent of Maura. Aroma therapy could go hang, this was all she needed to feel calm and contented. "What about a destination wedding?" She looked up, seeing a pensive look on Maura's face, obviously still rolling the idea around. "It would solve most of your objections to this." She tried to glare at Maura's smirk. "It means we can invite everyone we want, but most people won't come. It gives an excuse to not get married at your old church-" She smiled, knowing that this was why she was marrying a genius. And the smile turned into a wolfish grin as Maura's voice dropped an octave into that sexy tone that she loved so much, "we wouldn't have to go anywhere for the honeymoon-" She sat up, capturing Maura's lips with her own.
"You had me at honeymoon." She replied, once the kiss was broken, repositioning them so that Maura was pinned beneath her on the couch, slowly running her tongue over Maura's lips, teasing, content to take things slow, gentle, loving.
She'd only just started to trace one hand around the hem of Maura's sweater, enjoying the fact that her fiancee was wearing a shirt and pants and not a dress for once, when the sound of the sliding back door vaguely broke through her consciousness. The sound of her mother standing over them making a various range of throat clearing noises however, there was nothing vague about that break into her consciousness. "Ma!" She shouted, looking up at her mother in abject horror. "The fuck you doing here right now? Can't you ever knock?"
"I did knock. No one answered. I was wondering if you ladies wanted to look at florists -" she groaned, pulling quickly away from Maura, instantly hating the lack of contact.
"Ma, we haven't even figured out where the hell we're getting married, how the hell can we start picking florists?"
"But Janey, sweetie don't you want -" She cut her mother off with a glare, finding herself on her feet before she even knew what she was doing. She was angry, frustrated at the sudden interruption of the first free moment she'd had with Maura that wasn't caught up with work, or wedding plans, where it was just the two of them, without any of the outside world intruding. She was angry, overwhelmed with the way that her life seemed to steaming along full speed ahead with her just along for the ride. She was getting married and it seemed like everything was happening to her rather than with her. She wasn't entirely sure, but she was fairly sure that weddings were supposed to be about the bride.
"What I want is to be content to live the life I want with the woman I want, and not have to deal with any of this." Her hands gesticulated wildly. "I don't want a florist, I don't want to pick out a reception venue, I don't want to worry about a honeymoon, or what color dresses the bridesmaids are going to wear, or how the wedding party is going to work and who's going to be a best man and who's going to be a maid of honor, and who's walking who down the aisle. I don't want a god damned wedding!" There was a moment of stunned silence at her sudden outburst, punctuated by the sudden slam of platinum band against and end table before Jane stormed out, leaving Maura and Angela alone in the living room.
Angela, for her part, looked appropriately contrite. She couldn't, however, figure out what that faint smile on Maura's face was for. "Maura, sweetie, are you all right?" Maura leaned into the comforting arm of the Rizzoli matron, but she didn't really need the comforting. Jane would be back. There was a reason why she had opted for a dozen fourteen-carat gold chains to hold the ring that Jane preferred to wear close to her heart rather than on her hand. A reason why she had chosen platinum over the traditionally much softer gold. Given Jane's propensity for dramatics, they'd already gone through three of the chains in the last six weeks, all yanked off in a moment of anger, only to replaced five minutes, an hour, three hours later. She didn't mind – she had known what she was getting into when she had agreed to this relationship. Besides, the makeup sex lived up to it's name and then some.
"Just fine." She found the faint smile growing, unable to help herself.
"What? You look so happy for someone who just had – I mean, Janey just said she didn't want to marry you."
"No, she said she didn't want a wedding." Maura had, if nothing else, learned long ago to read the subtle differences in language that defined what Jane said. Jane had said nothing about the actual marriage itself. All of Jane's objections were about the actual ceremony, the reception, the planning thereof. Angela looked at her confused, obviously not as adept at reading her daughter's subtleties. "Jane is – stressed about planning things. Overwhelmed. Actually, I was wondering your thoughts about possibly going to Cape Cod? The beach would provide exceptional photographic opportunities, and I have access to a house on Seconsett that would provide for a wonderful reception, and I think it would alleviate some of Jane's tensions about the wedding."
"Cape Cod? But no one's going to want to go out to Cape Cod." Maura's smile remained in place, and the light bulb slowly flicked on above Angela's head. "You mean Janey doesn't want everyone there? But half those people are her family and it's her wedding, and it should be this big, beautiful thing."
"Jane keeps talking about wanting to elope." The smile brightens slightly at Angela's shocked look, and part of her wants to feel bad for it. "I think she feels bad about the imbalance in the size of the guest list as well." It was true, they'd gone all the way out to third cousins, and unless she started inviting Doyles, she could still count everyone on all her fingers and some of her toes. Compare that to Jane's family, who had two dozen by the time they finished with first cousins and their families. "And it would solve some of the logistical issues involved in planning a wedding where there are two brides instead of a bride and a groom." That was a continuing argument. The idea of a traditional wedding party, when most of either of their friends were men. They could count the females in their lives on one hand – certainly not enough to offset the sheer amount of potential ushers. Frankie and Tommy would, of course, have to be in there somewhere, and Korsak and Frost as well, the only woman they could even think of that was even somewhat close to them was Suzie her lab assistant.
She'd thought it would make for good photographs to have them set three and three – Jane with her brothers, and Maura with Frost and Korsak – their almost-family. Jane, like most things involved with the wedding plans, had been indifferent. She knew that Jane loved her, and wanted to do this for her, but even she was starting to get fed up with the planning involved, especially when she saw the toll it was taking on Jane. She wanted a wedding, yes, but she didn't want one if it meant putting her wife through hell to have one. "Well, it is your wedding, you two should be the ones to decide where to have it." She smiled faintly at Angela's secession, watching the other woman retreat back to the guest house.
She paused for a moment, before walking to the garage. "You can come out now, your mother's gone." Jane looked surprised that she had been found so easily, listening to the Sox game on the car radio, a beer pulled from the extra fridge that sat in the corner of the garage in hand. But Maura had developed a good intuition as to where Jane would go – she hadn't heard the car leave, and she had known that Jane's storming out had been entirely out of frustration and not at all in anger, and that a few moments alone would have worked wonders to calm the detective down. Jane turned off the car, glad that the prius' battery was great for things like sitting and listening to a game without having to worry about running the battery completely flat.
"Really?" Jane looked around, skittish to come out if there was the risk of being kidnapped to go stare at more things that she really didn't care about.
"What do you think of Cape Cod? It's close enough to not be too far away, but far enough that most people won't want to drive. You, me, your family, Korsak, Frost – the beach." Jane smiled and wrapped her arms around her love, burying a nose in blonde hair.
"Mmm, sounds wonderful. No florists?"
"Well, flowers would enhance the ambiance of the ceremony and the reception-"
"No worrying about a venue?"
"That would be taken care of."
"Open bar?" She grinned and spun in Jane's arms, laying a gentle kiss to her love's lips.
"Of course."
"I can't believe we're actually – y'know – doing this."
"What, getting married?" Jane nodded, and Maura could see the underlying fear that resulted in the frustration. This was Jane Rizzoli, fearless detective who made murderers cringe and cave, who threw herself in the line of danger every single day, who hadn't been afraid to shoot through herself to get the bad guy, who had faced the same serial killer twice, and walked away from it scarred, but living. And fearless Jane Rizzoli had one fear – commitment.
"It's just – everything's moving so fast. It's like, one morning I wake up, and I'm just a single, unloved cop who has ruined every relationship I've been a part of, and then all of sudden I blink, and I'm picking out bridesmaids dresses, and trying to decide if I want to hyphenate my name, and trying to figure out the differences between eggshell and ecru, and who the fuck cares it's just some piece of paper that people are going to throw away as soon as they RSVP. The whole thing's like a year away, why do we need to do all this stuff now?" She scowled at Maura's smile.
"Because a wedding isn't something you can just throw together at the last minute and hope it comes out right." the But why? in response was a question that didn't even need to be asked. "We could move the date." Jane shook her head. It was one of the few things that she was steadfast on. Whenever she had – and she would never admit she had, but every little girl considers it – fantasized and daydreamt about a wedding it had always been in early fall. That perfect time between seasons, when the leaves were still mostly green, and the air was just starting to have a crisp edge in the morning.
"No, I just-" There was a pause, and Maura stood there, arms wrapped around Jane. "I love you, but this- I just –" She didn't even know what she wanted to say. She just knew that the very idea of getting married seemed to shake something inside of her. A relationship – that was malleable. But a wedding? What if they didn't like each other after twenty years? What if Maura decided she liked Tommy better and married the wrong Rizzoli, what if Maura got sick of the way that she left her dirty laundry lying around, or her propensity for dramatics, and storming out, or how damned thick she was and how long it took her to realize things.
Maura, on the other hand, Maura understood. Maura was the smart one, who knew that right now what she needed more than anything was a set of reassuring lips being applied to her own. "I love you, and that won't change if we get married in front of sixteen thousand people or six. It won't change if we have a wedding in a church, or on the beach, or jumping out of an airplane. It won't change if the invitations are on eggshell, or ecru, or My Little Pony stationary. It won't change if you wear a dress, or a tee shirt, or if all your cousins are bridesmaids or if we elope. I love you and if planning a wedding is more than you can handle, I'd rather not go through with it." She couldn't help the thick feeling in her throat that made it decidedly hard to smile, and harder still to see.
"You're amazing, you know that?" There was a long pause, where they were content to just stand there, holding each other. "A skydiving wedding sounds kinda fun though-" And Maura couldn't help but laugh.