Good For You

Part I

Pairing: Jane/Maura
Rating: T
Disclaimer: Jane Rizzoli and Maura Isles do not belong to me.

A/N: A pretty bare bones post-Season 7 story. I've been thinking about this scenario for a while. Based on the time in the story, you can probably guess I had initially planned to post this a few months ago. I'm expecting one more chapter.

Jane was barely three steps inside Maura's house when her mother's arms were wrapped around her tightly. Over her mother's shoulder she saw Tommy getting up from the couch to come give her a hug as well. Maura was sitting on a chair with TJ in her lap. It looked like they had been reading a book. Maura bent down and said something into TJ's ear that caused him to get up and run over to Jane as well.

After hugging Tommy, Jane knelt to capture the running TJ in a hug. "Hey little buddy. What are you up to?"

"Reading a book with Aunt Maura."

"Yeah? Who's doing the reading?"

"Aunt Maura. She's real smart."

"She's the smartest person I know," Jane responded.

Tommy said, "We wanted to wait for you and welcome you home, but I gotta get the little guy to bed. Say goodnight to Jane, TJ."

TJ gave Jane another hug and said, "Goodnight, Aunt Jane." Then he ran over to Maura to give her a hug and say goodbye to her.

"We'll see you tomorrow, Jane," Tommy said before heading out the door.

Maura finally stepped forward to give Jane a tight hug and whisper, "Welcome home," against her ear.

Jane swallowed, momentarily unable to respond, while trying to ignore the warmth that spread through her body at Maura's touch. Once Maura pulled away she said, "I'm sorry I'm late. All flights out of DC were delayed. Did I miss dinner?"

"Yes," her mother answered from the kitchen, "but I kept a plate warm for you. Come sit and eat. Tell me everything."

Jane rolled her eyes at Maura. "Ma, we talk like twenty times a week. You know everything that's going on with me."

"We only talk once a week, but fine, I'll go and let you girls catch up. You'll help me in the kitchen tomorrow morning."

"Love you, Ma," Jane called to Angela's retreating back. Once she was gone, she turned to Maura and said, "That was weirdly easy."

Maura grinned. "I asked her to give us some time tonight to catch up."

"Ah, and yet she still managed to play me."

Maura laughed. "You're out of practice."

Jane sat down at the island and started eating while Maura poured a glass of wine for herself and pulled a beer out of the fridge for Jane, setting it down in front of her with a smile.

Picking at her food, Jane couldn't stop herself from saying, "So, Tommy and TJ looked awfully at home in your house. Are they over here a lot?"

"Your mother watches TJ some afternoons and usually Tommy stays for dinner when he picks him up. I'm not always here because of work, but sometimes we all have dinner together."

Jane made a noncommittal grunt. "They're not imposing on you too much are they? I can tell Tommy to back off."

"Of course not. I like getting to spend time with TJ. My house would be empty without them here."

Jane frowned but turned back to eating.

Maura rubbed a hand down Jane's back and said, "I'm going to shower and change, you do the same if you want when you finish eating, and then I'll meet you on the couch and we can catch up. Okay?"

"Okay, that sounds nice."

Half an hour later Jane sat down on the opposite end of the couch from Maura and pulled one end of the blanket over her legs. "So who will be here for Thanksgiving tomorrow?"

"Just Angela and Ron, Tommy and TJ, and Frankie and Nina."

"What about Korsak?"

"Vince and Kiki are traveling in Europe."

"Seriously? For how long?"

"They left about two weeks ago. They're traveling through Europe and then to India and China."

"Damn, I would never have guessed that's how Korsak would spend his retirement." Jane sighed. "I guess it really has been a while since I talked to him though. I know I've been terrible at calling people, even you. It's…I have been busy with work, you know that right?"

Maura nodded.

"But it turns out I really hate trying to keep in touch with everyone by phone. It makes me feel farther away from everyone."

"I think I can understand that," Maura said softly.

"But I'm here, and we have all kinds of things to talk about, so tell me everything. How's the book?"

Maura shrugged. "I worked on it the rest of the time I was in Paris after you left, but I lost some steam once I got home. Between work and volunteering at Hope's clinic I haven't had a lot of time to work on it."

"But I thought you had it all written and were editing. It must be in pretty good shape already. Are you going to let me read it yet?"

"I don't know. I think the editor I showed it to was just humoring me as a favor to my friend. It's probably not any good. I don't know if you should even bother reading it."

"Maur. I'm sure it's amazing."

Maura blushed and covered her face. "Ugh. I'll think about it, but I'm not making any promises. Enough about me. I want to hear about you. How is the job going? Are you settling in yet? Is it getting easier?"

"A little. It was a ton of work at first putting together lesson plans for each class. I don't know how you did it when you were teaching. Your classes were about a thousand times harder then mine. They gave me a curriculum to follow but I still needed to figure out how I wanted to teach each topic I have to cover. I think it's going well though."

"I'm not surprised. The students are lucky to have you. How is living in Virginia?"

"It isn't Boston," Jane said with a laugh. "It's alright. It's warmer, but humid all the time. I don't know. I haven't had much time to explore things, other than finding the best Chinese and Pizza places with delivery. I figured you would have visited by now, though. You want to come down in December?"

"You'll be back here again soon at Christmas," Maura deflected.

Jane grimaced. "That's a whole month from now. If you don't want to visit me, just say so."

"I want to visit you. I'm-" Maura sighed. "Honestly, I'm afraid that visiting will make it more real that you are actually gone. I know that this isn't very fair or healthy, but right now I can pretend it's only temporary. If I see you in your new home, that will be more difficult."

"I see."

"It's late," Maura said quickly while standing up. "We should probably go to bed."

"Yeah, okay, but do you know anything about our plans for Friday and Saturday?"

"I'm working Friday."

"Oh. So, Saturday?"

"I volunteer at the clinic on Saturdays. You know that."

"Even Thanksgiving weekend?"

"Yes, even on Thanksgiving weekend. But I told everyone else that Saturday evening is for just the two of us to spend time together."

"Okay."

"I know Angela and your brothers have plans for you the rest of the time you're home anyway."

"Great," Jane deadpanned.

"Everyone is happy to have you home, Jane."

"I know, and I'm happy to be here. I'm gonna stay up a little longer. Go ahead to bed. I'll see you in the morning."

"Okay. Goodnight."

"'Night, Maura."

The next few days went quickly. Jane had plenty of time to catch up with her mother and brothers. She heard all about Frankie and Nina's wedding plans, more than she really needed to hear; Tommy's plans for staying in Boston long-term and having TJ be both a super genius and baseball star, both of which Maura were somehow a key part of; and her mother and Ron's future plans.

It was all fairly normal Rizzoli chaos. Sometimes it felt totally normal to Jane and other times she felt acutely aware of the distance she had created between herself and her family in just a short period of time.

Saturday evening, Jane lay on the bed in Maura's guest room, staring at the ceiling and trying to piece together everything she was feeling.

When Maura came home that was where she found Jane. She sat down on the bed next to her and said, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," Jane answered unconvincingly.

"I don't believe you."

Jane smiled meekly. "I guess this weekend has been a little different than I expected."

"I'm sorry. I should have taken more time off."

"No, no, it's not that. I guess…I guess I'm surprised at how different things seem here."

"What do you mean?" Maura asked gently.

"Frankie and Nina have their own life now. Tommy has his shit together. Ma and Ron seem really happy together. Korsak is traveling the world. You're working with Hope all the time. We don't even really talk that much anymore."

"Jane, you left. What did you think would happen?"

Jane sat up on the bed and ran her hands over her face and through her hair before answering. "I don't know. I didn't really think about it at all, I guess. I didn't know how this would all feel. Do you think I made a mistake taking the job at Quantico?"

"I don't think I can answer that, Jane. I don't think I understand why you took the job. You didn't really say much about it."

"You didn't say much about it or say anything to discourage me when I was offered the job."

"And you never asked for my opinion. You seemed excited about the opportunity. I would never have stood in the way of that." Maura sighed and looked away. "I wouldn't have been able to give you an objective opinion anyway. My opinion would have been selfishly wanting you to stay here with me." When Jane didn't respond and their silence stretched on, Maura finally said, "Did you think about me at all before deciding to leave Boston?"

"Yeah, I did," Jane said softly. "I thought about you having to get brain surgery when you got hurt because a crazy person was after me. I thought about you almost dying—more than once—because of me."

"I didn't ask you to do that. I didn't ask you to change or leave or do anything differently. I don't need you to make decisions for me, Jane. I don't need you to protect me."

After a long moment, Jane said, "You're right. I made the decision to leave. I'm not going to put that on you. Whether the reasons were good or bad, it was my choice. But I don't want you to hide things from me either. I need my best friend. Please tell me when I'm being stupid."

"I'll try," Maura agreed.

"Can we still have a nice evening together?"

"Yes. I wanted to take you out. I was thinking we could go over to the Dirty Robber."

"I don't want to go anywhere we'll run into a bunch of people who are going to interrupt us. I just want to spend tonight with you. Let's just walk down to Charles Street and find someplace to eat."

Walking back up the hill to Maura's house after dinner, Maura leaned into Jane and linked their arms together. It was colder now, but she was warm from the bottle of wine they shared. Although now she wondered if she hadn't had more than her fair share. Dinner had been too lovely to pay close attention to how much wine she was consuming.

Jane had led them to a small bistro with candlelit tables, where they talked and laughed and shared a great meal. It was intimate and, if she was totally honest with herself, the whole dinner felt romantic. For the first time in months, it felt like they were connecting the way they used to. The warmth, Maura realized, wasn't from the wine. It was because she was happy.

At the door to the house, before Maura had a chance to unlock her door, Jane stopped her and took Maura's hands in her own.

"Listen, I left because I thought I needed to make a change. It seemed like everyone else was moving on, doing new things, and I felt stuck. Things just didn't seem to be working out right here. I thought a big change would help. But I was looking for the wrong type of change, and I was looking in the wrong place. I've thought about you and us all weekend and I think I figured out my mistake." She put a hand against Maura's cheek and leaned closer, their breathes mingling. But Maura turned her head away and stepped back.

"Maur?"

"I can't-"

"But-"

"No, I can't. I can't bear the thought of you finally kissing me and then leaving me again. I'm sorry, but I can't do it, Jane."