Spend all your time waiting
For that second chance
For a break that would make it okay
Maura had vaguely heard these strains drifting from the nurse's station just down the hall from Jane's room. Dr. Isles had kept vigil at her best friend's bedside each night since the summer evening they rushed her into emergency surgery. The police had come and gone after taking Maura's testimony. Surgeons, doctors, and nurses had been in and out, but Maura knew her own mental assessment of Jane's vitals would serve them better than their clinical charts. Frost had been there and stayed as long as he could; Korsak even longer. And of course, after Frankie had made a full recovery, the Rizzolis had all hung around and stayed many nights with her, just sitting. Waiting. Watching.
Tommy was the first to go. Then Frankie – he had kissed Jane's head on the way out, as if he wasn't entirely sure he'd see her again. Hours later, Frank had insisted on taking Maura and Angela home to rest, but with tears in her eyes, Angela looked up at Frank and shook her head. She knew better than anyone that Maura's eyes would remain fixed on the slender figure in the bed until a miracle could bring her back to life. Angela had kissed Maura at the temple and given her knee a squeeze before slowly rising and taking her husband's hand as they trudged out the door. Maura realized without a doubt that they needed the rest. She could barely recall a nurse saying something about the six days she had been there. Six days just staring at her friend, replaying the fateful day over and over in her mind. She couldn't remember having eaten anything or moving a muscle since Jane had shot that bullet through her own body. Jane Rizzoli would forever be a hero, but Maura knew that wouldn't be enough to save her from the damage she had inflicted upon herself.
I need some distraction,
Oh, beautiful release.
Memories seep from my veins.
Maura couldn't have moved if she wanted to. She had spent far too many hours reflecting on how Jane had protected her. How she laid her hands on Maura's body as if she had planned to catch the threatening bullets. She had stayed by her side until Bobby had wrenched her away and even then, Jane had tried to reassure her. Even though Maura could no longer feel her pulse in time with her own, Jane's outstretched hand and eyes sent a message straight to her heart:
Please don't give up on me.
Heavy tears began to hit Maura's exposed knees before she even realized she was sobbing. Jane had spoken to her without saying anything. A piece of her spirit had inhabited Maura and changed her forever. She and Jane had always been close, but Maura had never needed anyone. But as Bobby dragged Jane out of the morgue and her face disappeared, Maura had grown cold. She needed Jane. She needed Jane alive.
In the arms of the angel,
Fly away from here,
From this dark, cold hotel room,
And the endlessness that you fear
Maura had never been a spiritual person. Her own logic didn't allow her a belief in a supreme being, but as she ran down the steps of BPD that day, she had prayed. She remembered a time in her life when she was very small and she still believed in angels. Just before she rushed through the glass doors and out into the eerie yellow glow of twilight, she had uttered, "Please…please send Jane an Angel."
She tried to shut out the next memory. There had been so much blood. Most of it had belonged to Jane. Korsak had told Maura later that she had gone into autopilot, holding Jane's wound with her own two hands to stop the bleeding, barking orders at others and forcing the EMTs to let her ride along in the ambulance. They had to practically pry her hands away to prepare Jane for the surgery.
Maura had no memory of any of that. Above all the white noise, all she could remember was whispering into Jane's ear, talking to her. Willing her to survive.
"Jane, you're going to be okay. I will never give up on you. I promise."
And now she was here by her side. She had refused to leave save for the actual surgical procedure, and her credentials backed by her stubborn will had been hard for the hospital staff to argue with. But Maura had stayed simply because Jane had asked her to. She knew that her dearest friend would do no less than the same for her. Even now she couldn't help but let a half-smile escape as she imagined Jane threatening to tackle a nurse that may attempt to stand in the way of her seeing Maura in such a state.
Many times Maura's thoughts had drifted to the feeling that Jane's touches had given her in those final moments in the morgue. They had touched many times before throughout their friendship, but this time it had been different. Maura could think of no other way to describe it besides electric. Not a jolt or a shock, but a force; a harmonic pulse that only the two of them shared. For once, Maura didn't attempt to seek an answer from science. She didn't need one to know what it meant.
It's easier to believe in this sweet madness,
Oh, this glorious sadness,
That brings me to my knees.
Maura's heart sank like an elevator plummeting to the ground floor and crashed into a thousand pieces. She was releasing the tension, finally breaking down the barriers between them made up of the lie she told herself every single day. Now Maura's sobs were coming in gasps, and yet no one in the dark hospital stirred.
"Jane I, I know I've told you before that I don't need anyone. That I'm used to being alone but…" her tears almost consumed her as she grabbed desperately for her companion's frail hand. It was cold.
"Oh Jane please…don't leave me. I do need you. I don't want anyone else."
As Maura had struggled to stand with quivering knees, she heard the final notes of the song underscoring the tears that fell and landed on Jane's face, drifting down her neck as if she had been crying them with her. Carefully, she knelt down and placed the most tender of kisses on Jane's lips.
"I love you, Jane."
Maura had closed her eyes, but almost instantly she felt something electric course through her hand. Her eyes shot open again to see her friend start to stir. Movement began in her delicate fingers, closely followed by the fluttering of her long, dark eyelashes.
Dr. Isles jumped back in alarm, letting her hands come up to cover her mouth in shock.
It couldn't be possible.
Jane was now attempting to look around and decipher her surroundings through hooded lids and likely glazed eyes. Maura darted out of the room before Jane could notice, her heart pounding in her chest. She had alerted the nurse at the station, who had assembled a team with just the touch of a button. A hoard of people rushed down the once empty hallway toward her, but Maura continued upstream toward the elevator. She was back on autopilot and heading for home. Reaching for her phone, she typed, "She's awake," in a message to Angela just as the doors closed in front of her.
Maura had reluctantly agreed to attend Jane's welcome home "gathering" as Angela had described it to her on the phone. She wouldn't want her still recovering daughter to be partying three days after she came out of a surgically induced coma.
Until tonight, Maura hadn't seen or spoken to Jane since their time in the hospital. No calls. No texts. Nothing.
This was a rare occurrence for them, but Maura simply didn't know how to move forward. She had admitted her intense feelings for the detective to herself for the first time, and she was still coping with them. What's more, she had no way of knowing just how much Jane had been conscious for. Maura must have reached for the phone a thousand times in these past seventy-two hours. What if Jane found her best friend's silence in her time of need hurtful? But Maura knew she lacked the courage to confront her. Jane would have to make the next move.
Jane had spent the majority of the gathering lying on the sofa as her family, friends, and colleagues mingled and came to sit nearby her, swapping stories of the fateful day from their own perspectives. Once, Maura overheard Frost teasing Jane about not being able to get up and get her own beer, calling her an "old lady." That lit a fire under Jane as she tried to pop off the couch and prove herself to him, but luckily Korsak had eased her back down. Maura watched her wince in pain from across the room, and Jane caught her stare. Maura had looked away quickly and down into her fourth glass of wine. When she looked up again, Jane was smiling at Frost as he handed her a beer. Maura nearly leapt ten feet to warn her that she shouldn't be drinking while so heavily medicated, but she knew that it wouldn't do any good. Instead, she spent the remainder of the evening talking to Suzie, Frankie, and other guests here and there, biding her time as the crowd dwindled.
Angela, of course, had been the last to go. Maura had helped her clean up the apartment for at least an hour. Maura was gathering her own things, considering making an escape again when she overheard Angela's conversation with her daughter.
"Don't be ridiculous, Jane! Of course I'm staying here with you. I can't leave my invalid daughter all by herself in her big apartment!"
"It's not that big, Ma…"
"My god, what if… what if that thing ruptures and you can't get to the phone? Then what would you do?"
"Ma! Relax, okay? Thanks for the offer, but Maura's going to stay with me tonight."
Maura perked up in shock, feeling the tension mount between them without even turning around to read her friend's expression.
"Oh," Angela said incredulously. "Well, I suppose that would be all right, considering she is a doctor and all." Angela must have felt the tension as well, because she immediately knelt down to kiss Jane on the forehead, and turned around to rest her hand on Maura's shoulder, and looking straight into the doctor's eyes, she said, "Thank you, Maura." The door clicked shut behind her.
Now they were alone.
Maura remained fixed at the kitchen counter with her back still turned to Jane. Moments had passed, but whether it had been thirty seconds or an hour, neither woman could say. Maura couldn't bear to look at Jane without being reminded of how close she had come to losing her. Even as her familiar image rose to the forefront of her mind, Maura fought her tears. Jane was the first to break the heavy silence.
"Hey Maur."
"Hi Jane," she managed, but realizing how cold she must sound, she added, "How are you feeling?"
"Oh it's great, ya know, having a bullet go through you. You get all the ice cream and beer you want, and your mother never goes away…" she chuckled.
Maura felt a small smile creep up on her before she used her cautionary tone to fight it. "Jane, you really shouldn't be drinking alcohol until you're off your pain meds. It could be potentially very damaging to your-"
"Maura, I know, okay? It just…helps me keep my mind off of things is all."
Maura could feel herself starting to shake.
"Uhm…what exactly have you been thinking about, Jane?"
The detective scoffed a little before replying, "Oh, well I don't know. How about how I trusted Bobby and he was actually a dirty cop? Or how I don't know if they'll ever let me go back to work, or…or maybe the fact that my little brother almost died?"
Maura's tears were welling up again.
"You uh…you saved his life, Maura. You know that, right?"
The doctor's only response was the tears that now came in streams.
"Maura, look at me. My little brother Frankie is alive because of you. And you know what else? So am I."
Maura swallowed hard, still unable to look Jane in the eye. "I…did what I could Jane. I should have done more. I never…I never would have had the courage without you."
"Sure you would, Maur. You're the bravest person I know.
Maura pursed her lips and shook her head furiously and her auburn locks clung to her damp cheeks.
Jane continued, "Korsak told me what you did. How you almost beat those guys up to sit in the ambulance with me. Rode all the way to the hospital and just sat there. Ma told me you never left my side."
Maura was breathing faster, feeling trapped and seconds away from breaking down.
"Maura…why did you leave when I woke up?"
The doctor went rigid.
"Wha…What?" she stammered.
Jane's voice dropped into a lower register, and she rasped, "I saw you above my bed. At first I thought you were an angel…the one that I felt with me all along, even when I was unconscious. I didn't think I still believed in that stuff anymore. But then Korsak told me…about you, and the ambulance – all that."
Maura was trembling furiously now, using the counter to hold herself up.
"Maura, when I realized that they weren't going to shoot Bobby…when I knew that I was alone out there, you were the only person I thought of."
Jane's voice was somehow closer, but Maura's ears were ringing now and she couldn't be sure of anything.
"And I found myself praying for you. I asked God to help me make it out of this so that I could see your face again. That's what gave me the courage to pull the trigger."
Maura jumped as she heard the first piano note of that familiar song again – the one from the hospital. In her peripheral vision, she saw a slender hand place the remote back down on the counter.
"The next thing I remember is this music, a faint touch…"
Maura gasped breathlessly as she felt Jane's warm hands come to wrap around her waist from behind.
"…a soft kiss…"
Jane nestled into the smooth hair covering Maura's neck and found a patch of skin to place her lips as her arms held her tighter. Jane uttered the last words directly in her ear, "…and your beautiful face."
Maura couldn't take it anymore. She turned around to face Jane, and found that her eyes brimmed with tears even bigger than her own.
Let me be empty,
Oh, and weightless,
And maybe I'll find some peace tonight.
Maura felt her chest rise and fall drastically against Jane's tall and strong frame. Even in her condition, Maura felt safe in her arms.
"You were the answer to my prayer…you always were. You're my angel…and I love you, Maura."
She dipped her head down as she tipped Maura's chin up and kissed her tenderly for the first time.
Seconds later, she pulled away only to whisper, "I love you too, Jane."
Maura couldn't feel her body except where the electric pulse of Jane's touch met her skin. Suddenly she was aware of the distant rumble of thunder beneath the strains of the music. Lightening flashed with a ghostly glow through the open windows as their kiss deepened. Maura let her hands drift up Jane's chest and wrapped them around her neck. Jane's own hands came up to tangle in Maura's auburn tresses, pulling the dampened pieces away from her face and drying her tears. Maura sucked gently on Jane's lower lip, and the wounded detective groaned. She pulled away briefly only to kiss down the doctor's soft face, past her chin and down her neck. But just as she began to suck just below her jaw, Maura felt Jane wince in pain. She opened her eyes to see Jane clenching her side in extreme pain.
"Oh my god, Jane! You shouldn't even be standing. Let's get you back to the couch…"
"No! Please…I want to sleep in my bed…with you."
A crack of thunder erupted and the two of them locked eyes. There was nothing left to be said. They needed each other, and they knew that now. As they lay cuddled together through the storm, Maura held on to her angel, and she drifted to sleep as she heard the music through the rain and knew she'd never have to feel alone again.
You are pulled from the wreckage
Of your silent reverie.
You're in the arms of the angel,
May you find some comfort here.