By the end of class, Jane's mood had improved. Restraining laughter would do that for a girl. It wasn't the solution she'd have preferred to the Jorge problem, but maybe it was for the best. At least it was permanent. He wouldn't come to her door, serenading her with some cheesy song in the middle of the night just to get her attention. He was too gentle to turn on her and try to rough her up for spurning him. And it left him with the belief that it wasn't personal, wasn't about him, which was good, because surely someone would want a guy like Jorge. Just not Jane.

Still, as she showered and dressed again for work, the lanky brunette wondered exactly what Maura had said to put the idea that she was gay into Jorge's head. She knew her friend couldn't lie, and in fact found that to be one of her more endearing traits. But apparently she could be quite sneaky. She could leave out information, imply things by using true statements in a deceptive way. Or maybe Maura really did believe Jane was gay, and just said enough to bring Jorge to what she thought was the correct conclusion. As she toweled her hair dry, Jane frowned. Which one of those things had Maura done? Did it matter?

Yes.

So Jane finished dressing, then stood by their lockers to await Maura, who always took for-damn-ever in the showers.

Maura emerged, towel firmly bound around her body, skin pink and a little damp, and smiling. "Jane, I thought you'd be back at the office by now," she said with surprised pleasure in her voice as she plucked from her head the cloth-lined shower cap that had kept her hair dry and therefore presentable. "You waited for me?"

"You could say that," she growled out. "Maura, what did you say to Jorge to make him think I was gay? If he assumed, then you had to say something to lead him in that direction. This is killing me. Come on, tell me what you said."

As Maura shook out her hair and started to brush it and apply her moisturizer, the shorter woman smiled, but not with confidence or bright humor or the glow of good health that had suffused her very being mere moments before.

"I told him that you thought he was cute and very sweet," she began, eyes flicking to Jane often to assess the effects of her words, "and that you hadn't meant to lead him on..." Nearby, other women were getting into or out of their workout gear, some of them trying to eavesdrop, but most not bothering. Maura gave one a pointed look that sent her scurrying, which was a pretty good trick considering that she didn't look any more threatening than a blueberry muffin. "...but that as much as you really wanted to believe that you could be into him in that way, you'd realized that you just couldn't."

Now the cosmetics came out, a little eye shadow and mascara, though no rouge. It was actually quite artful, the way she managed to get her eyes looking wide, contoured just so, adding drama and intrigue with surprisingly little of the stuff in the compact actually winding up on her lids.

"And from the 'she's just not into you speech' he jumped right into 'oh she must be a lesbian?' No way, I'm not buying it. What else did you to two say? Out with it. I need the hear the whole thing." Jane continued to lean on the lockers, not bothering to acknowledge any of the others around her. Her eyes were fixed on Maura, arms crossed, waiting.

Maura picked up her lip gloss tube and had the wand nearly at her mouth before Jane's 'gentle request' came through to her. "Um... Well, there was more," she admitted, then hurried to brighten and moisturize her lips with her favorite color, Tiger Lily. "He asked whether it was him, despite the fact that I'd just assured him that it wasn't. I told him that we'd talked about him a lot, and that we'd agreed that he'd be perfect for most women, but you weren't most women. Then he decided that you must be a lesbian."

The way it sounded, there was nothing there to have given such a cue. But of course, Maura Isles was known to speak with far more than words. Facial expressions, eyebrow lifts, vocal tone, even her posture would add layers of meaning to just about everything that came out of her mouth. There must have been some nonverbal hint that she'd given, either intentionally or purely by accident.

"Yes, because 'she's not into you' totally means I must be gay." Jane rolled her eyes. "Just tell me, honestly, how he really jumped from point A to point D. All I'm asking for is the truth. All of it." Jane sat down next to Maura on the bench. "I don't know why, but this is really bothering me, Maur'. I just want know. I mean," she looked over at her friend, "Do I give off a gay vibe or something?"

"I don't know if I'm the right person to ask about that, but yes, sometimes you do. But Jane, most women give off a gay vibe," Maura replied immediately. "From childhood, we're allowed to hold hands, hug and kiss one another, cuddle. Men can't do that without receiving societal censure." Hazel eyes flicked towards Jane's reflection in her mirror as Maura put away her cosmetic bag and pulled out her clothing bag, slipping the ridiculously impractical panties on beneath her towel in such a discreet way that, had a fourteen-year-old horndog been in the room, he'd have walked away frustrated at getting nothing of value.

She turned back towards the locker to put on her bra, however, pushing her towel down to waist level. "It is possible that a little additional... insinuation might have been in the delivery," admitted the woman as she fastened, adjusted straps, and then turned back around. "Do you really want me to demonstrate?"

She sighed at Jane's nod and in an instant, her entire demeanor altered. She repeated herself almost word for word, but this time included inflections. Her voice would drop in volume and sometimes pitch, then rise again to normal tones; a shoulder would dip; an eyebrow lifted. Along with the extra layers of significance came additional words as well. "...but... well, Jane isn't... most women," she said with chin lowered. Maura didn't quite wink, but had someone been standing right there, holding the second half of that conversation, he or she would have had no doubt what was being implied. "As her... best friend," and sweet Jesus, didn't that contain a world of Sapphic undertone, not to mention the way her eyes were filling in all sorts of blanks, "I've seen her date a few men here and there," was that an emphasis on 'men'? "but I can tell her heart's not really in it. At a certain point, Jane finds herself stopping, and then she balks and comes back to me." She paused then, and delivered the coup de grace for poor not-really-there Jorge. "Not that I mind. At all."

"Wow." Jane stared up at the doctor. "You should have been an actress." She sat there contemplating the little show. "Wait a minute, 'always come back to you'?"

Maura smiled up at Jane, dress in hand, towel still around her waist, as Jane backed right away from the conversation she had started in the first place. "Yes, you do. Every time," she pointed out.

Jane stood up, towering over the smaller woman. "I thought we were pretty clear on who your type is and isn't. Anyway, I got to go. I'll see you at the station." Jane quickly turned on her heels and walked off, her shoulders slightly slumped as she made a hasty exit.

As Jane departed, Maura's smile fell a little bit, facial expression taking on a tinge of guilt, a flavor of sadness. "We were clear," she murmured.

Five minutes later, she remembered to get dressed and head to work.