This isn't how she imagined her life.
She thought she would be married. Established. A mother.
She thought she would have a white picket fence and a handful of proper, polite children. She'd work part-time and write for medical journals and be a wife, an 'other half.' A 'better half.'
Things would be simple. Easy.
Black and white.
Instead, hers is a world of gray.
She hasn't been in a successful relationship in months. There is no thought of bringing a child into her life. And her home, while quite nice, does not have a fence (let alone a white picket one).
Sometimes she's happy with that. Or… ok with it, at least.
Because she has Jane.
Jane.
Tumultuous, brilliant, energetic, confounding, bold, brash, Jane.
Her best friend. Her colleague. Her confidant.
Jane fills voids Maura didn't even know existed. She shines light on things in a way that sometimes threatens to blind Maura. But still she doesn't look away.
Sometimes when she falls asleep next to Jane, she thinks she's happy with her life. She has something, someone, that most people can only dream of.
Only… she doesn't have Jane. Not really.
Because some day, some man will stroll into Jane's life and replace Maura. Overshadow her.
And she'll be back to square one. No children, no picket fence, no spouse.
It will be worse though, because she'll know what she is missing out on.
Ignorance was bliss.
It was.
Now Maura knows.
She knows what it's like to have someone who loves and supports you unconditionally. Someone who will lie, cheat, kill- do literally anything for you.
To have a person who can make you feel safe in the midst of the chaos that sometimes threatens to consume you.
It will all be taken away, when that man finally materializes.
Jane will date him, marry him, sleep beside him.
Maura will go back to sleeping alone.
But unlike before, when she was ignorant, she won't just be alone.
She'll be lonely.
Lonely.
She can feel it now, that ache that her brain can't reconcile with her body. That blooming pain in her chest that feels like her heart is hurting, even though she knows it's not possible.
She will slip back into the shadows, unnoticed.
She will disappear, little by little.
Over time, she will disintegrate.
And the Maura she is now, the person Jane has allowed her to become, will vanish.