Little One Shot. I know the scenario has been done to death but this wouldn't leave me alone! Enjoy!
The rubber band bounced off the side of her computer's monitor before landing on the keyboard in front of her. Dark eyes darted up and she could see Korsak looking at his own monitor in forced interest. He was pushing it this afternoon. Five minutes or one more rubber band shot her way and Sergeant Detective Vincent Korsak was going to end up with a lap of day old coffee from the pot in the corner.
Their little group of crime fighters hadn't had a case in days, leaving them stuck at their desks with cold cases and paperwork. Not that Jane was complaining much. She supposed that no one getting killed was a good thing. Even if it did make for long days behind a desk. Leaning back in chair she glared at Korsak for a moment then turned her attention back to the report on her screen. This was her last one and it was finished, and for a moment she let herself relax.
Her eyes roamed her desk, before landing on the red plastic egg resting by her keyboard. Inside it was one ounce of viscoelastic polymer, more commonly known as Silly Putty. Maura had given it to her. There was another plastic egg exactly like it sitting on her bedside table at home, and yet another in the Medical Examiner's purse. Jane's left hand snaked out and grabbed the egg, popping it open and taking out the contents.
It still had black newsprint streaks in it from a recent bout of making mirror image, stretched out copies of a City Councilman who'd refered to Boston PD as a group of brainless thugs. The activity had caused stress relief for her and laughter from her partners. Crushing the image into a ball had been intensely satisfying.
But it wasn't the original intention of the Chief Medical Examiner to give her a toy that caused irrational giggles to echo through the room. Her hands pulled at the putty stretching it out before she rolled it back up into a neat ball.
"What do you mean you don't have the results back?" Jane was standing in the doorway of the ME's office, fists clenched tightly.
"Jane, it will take at least 24 hours, DNA isn't something you can just snap your fingers and have appear in front of you. In fact..."
"I don't need a damn science lesson, I just need those results!" Maura flinched in hurt, and then her eyes narrowed at the way the woman's hands flexed.
"Detective, you'll have your results as soon as the crime lab returns them, not a minute sooner. The work will be done properly or it won't be done at all." Her voice was cold, and internally Jane realized she may have pushed a little too far. She didn't want to take it out on Maura, but the ache in her hands was getting worse the more the weather changed outside.
"Whatever." The detective had walked out then, stalking her way upstairs. She took one look at the bullpen, before grabbing her coat and stomping toward the door. "I'm out for the rest of the day."
It was near dark and she'd been curled up on her sofa for at least an hour, before she'd heard the knock at the door. She wasn't going to answer, it was either her mother, or a neighbor wanting to borrow something and she wasn't in the mood for either. The knock came again, more insistent this time, and Jane was up before she could control the urge. She yanked it open without looking to see who would dare disturb her. "What?!"
"That isn't exactly the most polite way to answer the door." Maura pushed passed her without invitation, hearing the door slam behind her.
"Not now Maura! Just go."
Thinly veiled hurt flashed again across the doctor's face before her jaw clenched, and she sat down on the sofa. "Persistent pain can cause shortened temper."
"Excuse me?" Jane stood in front of the sofa glaring at her friend.
"Your hands." She pointed idly. "They've been hurting for at least two days now, possibly longer."
"How would you know that?"
The doctor raised an eyebrow, "Quite frankly Jane, you've been a bitch for most of the week."
Shock rushed through the detective's system at the doctor's words. "What gives you the right to come into my home and insult me?"
"I'm not trying to insult you. I'm simply pointing out a fact. You've been short with everyone, and you've been down right mean to me. Now are you going to let me help, or are you going to sit here and suffer."
"A team of surgeon's and therapists couldn't help what makes you think you can? You work on dead people Maura."
Another shot, Jane knew how to push her buttons, but tonight she wasn't going to let it get to her.. "I'm going to let that glide, Jane. I should walk out and be done with it, all of it, but I won't. I care about you too much. Sit down, Jane."
'Walk out?' The words sent another shock through the detective's system. What did she mean by all of it? The very thought caused her knees to start shaking. She opened her mouth to offer some apology, or to beg. For what she didn't know. Forgiveness, a bullet to the head, even help if it kept the blonde on her couch. Instead out of pure habit. "It's slide Maura. The phrase is let it slide."
Never the less she followed the Doctor's orders and sat meekly on the couch beside her. "I'm sorry."
A small smile crossed Maura's lips and she held out her hands, waiting for the other woman to reach out her own. Her request was granted carefully. "You're forgiven. You haven't done any of the therapy exercises they gave you to do have you?"
Maura squeezed lightly, and Jane could barely keep the groan from crossing her lips. "I never have time, and I can't do anything like that at work. Not in front of..." Her voice trailed off and the blonde was able to finish the thought in her head. 'In front of anyone.'
Releasing the hands she was cradling the doctor dug in her purse pulling out the red plastic egg. "Your solution to massive trauma to the hands is Silly Putty?"
When Japan took over the Pacific Theater, the U.S. rubber supply was cut off. It took approximately 32 pounds of rubber to put one soilder in combat, and the War Department put out a call to chemists across the country to produce a synthetic rubber that could be mass produced. James Wright, a scientist at General Electric, produced what he called 'Bouncing Putty' in 1943, and while it wouldn't replace rubber, GE thought it might have some potential.
By 1944 the U.S. was producing twice the amount of synthetic rubber than could be produced by the rubber trees of Sri Lanka, and Thailand, but 'Bouncing Putty' lay forgotten. In 1949, at a cocktail party in New York, Peter Hobson saw the party goers around him playing with the substance. A year later and a write up in the New Yorker and Silly Putty was born. Originally sold at Doubleday Books, and Nieman Marcus for $2.00 an ounce, Hobson marketed it as an 'adult novelty.' As advertised it's various uses were stress relief, cleaning typewriter keys, and hand therapy.
Maura had told her all of this, enduring the eye rolls from her brief history lesson, not knowing that Jane was soaking up the information. When Maura listed the last use her eyes went wide. The doctor had handed over the plastic egg, giving her a knowing look, stating simply, "You can still do the therapy, because no one will realize what you're doing."
She stared at the plastic egg, now considered a child's toy, before she'd crushed the doctor in a hug. Though they occasionally still ached, she didn't have many instances of the severe pain she felt at first. Yes, she was still a bitch from time to time, but it usually had nothing to do with her hands. That was just an aspect of her personality. Jane smiled.
With one night of defiance and stubborn determination in the face of her wrath, Maura had given her back some of what she thought she'd lost. In her mind some decision was reached, something that she'd been holding back on acknowledging. A rubber band smacked off her shoulder, and she heard a snicker from Korsak. Smashing the putty in a lump in her left hand she stood slowly. "I'm going down to the morgue. I'm sure there's something more lively down there than what's going on up here."
Walking past Korsak's desk, the lump of Silly Putty in her hand, she reached out and tipped his coffee cup over into his lap. Smirking as the barely controlled curses filled the room, and the elevator doors closed.