Someone Who's Always There: Chapter One: The Domino Effect.
"Ma! I don't want you to keep setting me up on these stupid blind dates!" Jane shouted at Angela, never before had she been so angry at her mother, but this time she'd really pushed her daughter's buttons.
"Well if I don't, who will?! You ignore every opportunity love gives you!" Angela countered, shouting just as loud.
"I don't need love in my life! I am perfectly happy by myself!"
"You don't know what's good for you Janie, and one day I may not be here to be able to comfort you when you realise that it's too late."
"Well your taking your god damn time to get there!" Jane shouted back, grabbing her jacket she slammed the door on her way out, leaving Angela in shock.
Jane dashed down the stairs not bothering to pay attention to Maura who was standing on the stairs in her silk pyjamas.
"Jane-"
"Not now Maura!" Jane shouted, the venom in her voice scaring Maura, like when her mother would curse cruel words at her father.
"Janie wait!" Angela called out as she ran outside into the cold.
"FUCK OFF MA!"
Little did Angela know she had just ran across the street.
SMASH!
The sound of Angela's body hitting the car's body.
CRACK!
The sound of the windscreen breaking,
SCREECH!
The sound of tyres screeching as the breaks were forcefully applied by the owner in attempt to stop the speeding vehicle.
Silence.
Silence seemed to fill all of Jane's universe. The image of her mother being flung onto the car kept replaying in her mind. Her body had shut down the environment around her.
The red and blue lights flashing at her, the loud siren echoed in the distance.
Jane was frozen in place, she could only stand there by her car, watching as the paramedics tried to do everything they could. That's what they always said, "we're doing the best we can." But the 'best' is sometimes not good enough, sure they tried, sometimes it worked and they saved a patient, but sometimes it didn't.
Two days later
"Dear family, friends." The priest said "We are gathered here today, to celebrate the life of Angela Rizzoli. For all the life, gifts and memories she has brought to us…"
Maura, Frankie, Tommy and Frank Senior (who had the balls to show up) were all sitting in the first row. The church was filled with Rizzoli's and friends of Angela, most of them being people who had got to know her after her chatting at the café.
But no one could find Jane.
The big wooden coffin continued to sit in the middle of the church. Maura just stared at it, she couldn't believe it.
Angela had died just two days ago, and Jane wasn't here, what the raven haired woman's reasons were Maura couldn't even guess.
She heard a sniff come from Frankie who was sitting next to her. She gave him a soothing rub on his back.
"It's ok Frankie, she's in a better place now." Maura could only watch as a tear ran down Frankie's face, it was heart breaking.
You would have thought dealing with death on a daily basis would have prepped her up for something like this, but Maura had never been in a room with so much… emotion.
"For Angela was a great woman, and may her journey from this life to the next be smooth and painless. Amen."
Maura walked slowly behind the coffin bearers next to Frankie, as they drove up to the grave, the Boston rain not helping the mood at all.
An old woman approached the freshly dug grave, she was clearly in tears at watching her own daughter be buried.
"Oh Angie." She cried "This wasn't how you were meant to go, we always joked I'd be the first to go. Now look at us." Suddenly the old woman seemed to grow angry. "Unless this is some sort of cycle where your no good daughter has been taken down as well."
"Marie, don't' say that, you don't mean it." One man said to the woman. Maura could only bow her head, sending a little through to Angela as what she hoped would count as a prayer since she hadn't been to a church since the Rizzoli's last Christmas dinner, which Jane had sheepishly asked her to attend as if it were a date.
I wish. Maura thought in her head, looking round as she held the umbrella above her head she noticed a figure far away in the distance, beyond all the other head stones was a tall figure. It had to be Jane, it even had a hoodie and tee shirt combo that Maura remembered.
What was Jane up to? Not attending her own mother's funeral? This was not at all like the woman she knew and secretly loved.
Jane watched from a distance as they buried her mother, she could recognize a few people but despite the umbrella covering three quarters of the body, Jane recognised those style of shoes and legs anywhere.
How on earth could they expect me to show up at my ma's funeral? I'm the reason she's dead! If I hadn't been such an ass hole… I just let her try and make me happy… instead of thinking I was just too good for happiness. She might still be here… no… she would be here.
Jane turned around and went off.
Maura wasn't sure what would happen next, did she invite them to stay at her house? And do what? Watch the game and act like everything's normal? Like the men didn't just lose their mother and ex-wife?
Although things just seemed to pass on by themselves, it turned out the guys wanted to go back to the guest house with Maura, just for… well they had their own reasons.
The four of them were now just in the guest house, looking round for anything. For some reason, Maura was expecting Angela just to come thumping down the stairs with some gossip to tell her, in reality though that wasn't going to happen.
The sound of the front door opening seemed to echo round the house, Jane Rizzoli stepping in. Her clothes were drenched and the smell of alcohol flooded the room.
A tension was building up and Maura was positive something bad was going to happen.
Frank Senior was the first to say anything.
"Well Jane." He started, putting down a picture frame of him, Angela, Jane, Frankie, Tommy and Maura all sitting in the park after their marathon for 'PUKE.'
"You finally got your wish, you mother will stop nagging at you. Was this how you planned it?" He asked,
"Hey Pa." Frankie and Tommy warned.
"Oh no it's ok guys, because Mr Fucking perfect here has got a great point."
"Hey, don't use that language."
"Oh what ya gonna do pa? Get Ma a divorced and go and sleep with someone younger than your own kids?! In fact, if you hadn't divorced her, she'd still have a house! She wouldn't have had to of stayed in Maura's guest house!"
There was a few seconds of silence.
"Why'd you divorce her dad? Why? Why would you want to leave the only happy thing in our lives? Huh?" Jane pestered.
"Hey! Leave your mother out of this, in fact if you had listened to her all those years ago, and been a bit more feminine, perhaps-"
"Oh! So this is about me not having a dick now? Well sorry I got the wrong fucking chromosome!"
"I know she set you up, she tried to make you happy, but you were clearly too good for anyone else's help!"
That's it!
Jane lunged across the table, tackling her father to the ground, she through her left fist at his gut, but he aimed one at her lip.
Her two brothers split her and her father up. Jane's lip bled, and Frank sr. had a dark patch leaking through his shirt.
As Jane and Frank sr. stopped resisting against the Frankie (jr) and Tommy, a silence filled the room as Maura just stood in the corner of the room, unaware of the picture of her and Angela she'd had in her had had dropped
"Don't you ever consider yourself family here again." Her father said in a venom voice.
"Don't you ever consider yourself my father again." Jane replied, as she turned towards the door.