Hello!
Just a little one-shot I put together after last night's episode. There's some Rizziles in there if you know where to look. And seeing as how you watch this show, it's a pretty safe bet you already know where too look.
I should be updating my other fic, Game, soon. I was working on it when this hit me instead, so at least I was being sort of productive.
Also: I beez on the Twitter (no, I do not talk like that) MyHeadphonesOn I say interesting stuff sometimes, so give me a follow if you're bored. If not, that's cool too.
Alright, I'm done jabbering.
Discliamer: I own nothing but my own ideas. The characters are the property of Janet Tamero and TNT. Not me. Don't sue me. You'll get nothing.
"Hey, Maura." Jane glanced over at her friend who was leaning back against the detective's couch doing her so-called 'meditating.'
They were at Jane's apartment, the only place, Jane argued, that they could have their downtime and 'girltalk' without Jane's mother or some other member of her family dropping in. It didn't bother Maura in the slightest, but she was happy to join Jane at her place anytime, and the only sign that the medical examiner had heard her was the opening of one eye and the slight smile that graced her lips.
Jane placed a bottle of water for Maura on the coffee table (with a coaster, thank you very much) in front of her. "Why do you keep taking in my family?"
"Hmm?" Maura murmured and opened both eyes, her concentration on relaxation officially ruined as she realized this might be a serious conversation.
Jane sat down on the couch, perched on the edge with her elbows on her knees and staring down at the floor. "My family," she repeated. "First you give my ma a place to stay when she needs it and then you think nothing of offering the same to Tommy even though you hardly know him. I guess I'm just curious as to why. Not that I don't think you're just a good person with a whole lot of heart and just as much living space. I just-"
Jane shrugged as a sign of her sentence being as completed as it it was going to be. From the floor, Maura watched her and recognized the sagging humerus and scapular depression. It was often the body language expressed when Jane was in deep thought.
The doctor pushed her self up onto the couch and settled next to her friend, tucking her feet beneath her.
"I don't know what to say. Are you upset that I've offered my guest house?"
"No, of course not. If anything I'm grateful. I just don't know why."
"Well," Maura began, tucking a honey colored strand of hair behind her ear, "I'm grateful too. To Angela," Maura supplied at Jane's confused look. "And to you as well. Before I met you, I was very isolated, as I'm sure you can imagine. I never really had that connected feeling with anyone. When I met you and we became friends, it was amazing. I felt normal, like I wasn't so different from those girls at school who had friends and laughed at each other's jokes. Someone understood me or at least put up with my so-called quirks. I felt the way I imagined other people felt and that has meant the world to me.
"And when you-" Maura faded out and her eyes shone briefly with unshed tears as she thought about that day. "When you hurt yourself and I was afraid I would lose the one person who made me feel like I belonged with everyone else, Angela was there. She was very kind to me and even patient with me when rambled on in medical jargon that I could tell she didn't understand. Even with all the busyness of the hospital and the tensions between your parents, Angela always took the time out to check on me, make sure I was eating, and leaving your bedside for reasons other than going to the restroom. She reminded me of you."
When Jane looked over at Maura, she noticed the doctor had her head bowed and she shook slightly. She was crying. And no doubt trying to hide it since she knew how much Jane hated when she cried, which wasn't exactly true. What Jane hated was the idea of seeing her in pain, especially when she was the one to cause it.
"Oh, Maur." Jane pulled her into her arms and held her Maura tightly, moving them both in a gentle and familiar swaying motion, the same one that Maura used when Jane woke up from a nightmare in tears and inconsolable. "You don't have to explain any more. I understand. I didn't mean to bring it up again."
Jane could Maura's head, buried in her shoulder in a way that Jane couldn't help but find so adorable, shake negatively.
"I'm fine," Maura said, raising her head from it's comforting resting place. A small part of her found it funny that she had begun with the intention of making Jane feel better and now the tables had turned, but that was only a small. The rest of her felt suddenly tired an worn down as she mentally relived the ordeal of Jane's shooting and subsequent hospital stay. She gracefully wiped the tears from her eye before pressing on, eternally grateful for waterproof mascara.
"I meant what I said, Jane. I'm grateful to you for making my life what it is now. Honestly, having your family staying in the guest house feels like the childhood I missed out on, with siblings everywhere, joking and teasing, and parents who actually sit at the table with you and make sure you eat your vegetables."
"You didn't eat your vegetables?" Jane suddenly broke in. She hadn't meant to, but the idea of Maura as a kid who had to be told to eat her veggies just seemed too... cute, and slightly disruptive.
"Of course I did," Maura said indignantly. "It just would have been nice to be told do so by someone other than a governess or nanny. Now, are you done interrupting?" Maura asked, leaning back from Jane just enough so that she could look her in the eye.
"Yes, ma'am," the detective nodded, only partly joking.
"Good," Maura said, tucking her head back beneath Jane's chin and making herself comfortable in the detective's embrace once again. "Now, as I was saying, I like having your family around. I like the whole feeling of being an actual family, even if I'm not a part of it and merely housing it instead."
"Bullshit," Jane interrupting again, looking down at the woman whose head now rested on her chest. "You are a part of the family. Ma loves you already. I'm sure if you give a little time, she'll be setting you up on terrible blind dates too. Frankie and even Tommy already trust you, they know you're dependable. I already know I wouldn't be the same without you. We've got you watching sports on a regular and drinking an occasional beer. Hell, we'll make a Rizzoli out of you yet. You're not just housing my family. You're part of our rag-tag family and you've given them a home when they needed one."
Jane could hear Maura sniffling and feel the wetness through her own shirt signaling Maura's tears, but they didn't seem so heartbreaking this time, for a reason Jane couldn't put her finger on.
"Hey," she said calmly, running her fingers through shiny, honey-colored locks. "Why are you crying?"
"I love... your family." She had chickened out (to use a phrase of Jane's) at the last second. "I'm happy and I'm honored to be considered apart of it."
Jane showed no signs of noticing Maura's slip-up, but she did notice the slowing rhythm of Maura's breathing and the child-like clutching of her t-shirt in Maura's fist.
"We're honored to have you too," Jane said softly. "You getting sleepy?"
Maura, with her eyes closed, responded: "I'd honestly prefer not to answer that," which was the Maura Isles version of a child's petulant 'no.'
"Yeah, well, you don't have to," Jane said, leaning forward and forcing Maura to move with me.
"Noo, I'm comfy," the usually proper doctor whined. All that emotion had taken quite a bit out of her, and now she was just ready to sleep.
"You can lie on me all you want, Maur," she said, pulling her friend up on her feet and helping her stand. "I'd just prefer if we could not fall asleep on the couch this time. Otherwise, I'll have a crick in my back in the morning and be grumpy and you'll be grumpy because you slept in your clothes and have wrinkles, and only one of us can be grumpy at a time."
"Which I presume means I'm never allowed to be grumpy?" Maura murmured sleepily as she was guided down the hallway.
Jane cut her eyes at the ambling doctor. "I'm gonna let the one go and assume it's you being tired and delirious."
After giving Maura the pair of pajamas she kept at Jane's house for unplanned sleepovers and changing into her own tank top and sleep shorts, Jane and Maura met up in bed. Maura quickly resumed her position of lying flush against Jane with her head on the taller woman's chest. As an afterthought, she reached for Jane's hand and placed it upon her head, obviously wanting her to resume her earlier stroking.
"Comfy?" Jane asked sarcastically.
"Very," Maura said and was quickly out like a light.
Jane looked down at the peacefully sleeping doctor and smiled. On a whim she kissed her on the forehead. "I love you, too," she aloud, trying the words out in her mouth and liking how it felt. How right it sounded.
She smiled to herself and closed her own eyes, ready for sleep to take her. Yes, she'd make a Rizzoli out of Maura Isles yet.