A/N-As you can see, your reviews have convinced me to extend the fic. Now, back to the Rizzles goodness...
I don't own R&I. If I did, there would have been more than handholding in last night's episode (even if it was still delisiously femslashy).
"You know, if you don't agree to dinner," Jane said, taking the collar of the shirt between her fingers, "I have other ways of getting this shirt off you."
Maura swallowed hard, but she didn't dare take her eyes off of Jane. She was sure her facial muscles and eyes must be reacting wildly to Jane's apparent advances, but she could not have cared less.
In that moment, Maura determined that her hypothesis was correct. Dr. Maura Isles was intensely attracted to and incredibly aroused by Detective Jane Rizzoli.
"Tuna," Maura said as she looked back and forth from Jane's fingers on her shirt.
"What?" Jane said, loosening her grip on the t shirt. She so badly wanted to take that shirt off of Maura, and not just so she could wear it to the softball game, but she was caught off guard by Maura's odd word choice when they were about a second from kissing.
"Tuna would be my meal of choice," Maura said, as she took a tiny step backwards so that the fabric slipped out of Jane's hands. "And another shirt that is similarly efficient for relaxation purposes."
Jane sighed and raised her eyebrows at Maura. Jane was aware that Maura had some issues with understanding human interaction, but surely she wasn't an idiot. She must have realized that she started this. Jane never would have dared to be so bold if Maura hadn't been so damn flirty in the bar. Well, it was that and drinking on an empty stomach that had made Jane so ballsy, but mostly it had been Maura's flirting.
"What?" Maura said, as if completely oblivious to the fact that she had killed the mood by talking about fishy cat food. "I was simply articulating my demands, and I think they are quite reasonable."
"Really, Maura, you're actually serious?" Jane said as she folded her arms across her chest and leaned against the counter.
"Yes, I am," Maura said as she tilted her head to the side and squinted in the way that she usually did when trying to understand why it was that Jane was asking such an obvious question.
"Of course you are," Jane said as she rolled her eyes and suppressed a grin despite her annoyance at Maura's insistence on being such a goddamn tease all the goddamn time. She was just so Maura. "Fine, you'll get your tuna tomorrow for lunch and I'll go get you a shirt. I should have an academy shirt that you can have."
"That will be an acceptable trade, so long as there are no holes in the replacement," Maura said.
If Jane didn't know any better she would think that a smile was playing on the corner of Maura's lips. God, was she enjoying this, whatever the hell this game was? Whatever they had going on was confusing as hell for Jane, but Maura was a lot smarter. Maybe the good doctor had things all figured out and was just waiting for Jane to catch on.
"Fine, I'll be right back," Jane muttered as she left the kitchen and made her way to her bedroom.
Just moments earlier, she had been giddy. Yes, Detective Jane Rizzoli had been downright giddy at the prospect of flirting so boldly with her friend. Jane could not pinpoint when it was that she became so enamored by Maura Isles, but the bar flirting had sealed the deal and made Jane brave enough to pursue her friend. Now she just felt an intense desire to get laid.
Jane finally found her old academy shirts at the bottom of the drawer, but both of them had small holes in them. She grabbed the two of them, hoping that two holey shirts might count as one hole-less shirt in Maura's calculations.
"Alright, so I have two of them that you can have," Jane said as she walked out of her room. "They both have tiny holes but—
Jane stopped in her tracks and swallowed hard when she saw what Maura was wearing, or rather what Maura wasn't wearing. She had taken the softball jersey off to expose an elegant lace bra that Jane suspected cost more than an outfit she wore to work on any given day. The bra wasn't Jane's focus though.
Like in the lesbian bar, Jane was almost literally face to face with Maura's perfect, perky breasts. Except on that occasion, she had been able to explain staring at Maura's chest later as part of her cover. To be remotely convincing as a lesbian, Jane had to ogle Maura's very obvious assets. Clearly, it was part of the job.
Now, though, Jane could think of absolutely no work related reason to stare at Maura in all her shirtless glory, and yet, there she was, staring.
Maura, for her part, seemed to see nothing unnatural about her state of undress or about Jane's reaction to it. She smiled brightly at Jane and held out the shirt for her to take. Jane slowly reached out for the shirt, making her best effort to look at Maura's eyes. They were nice eyes, happy eyes even, perky, just like her breasts… no, no, Jane couldn't go there. Just look her in the eyes. That was the only concrete thought Jane could manage as she nodded, took the shirt and handed Maura the two old black t-shirts.
"These should be acceptable," Maura said, as she held them between her fingers and looked closely at the fabric. "It appears to be a cotton blend, similar to the softball jersey. There is significantly more wear, but—
"Maura," Jane said pleadingly, a hand over her eyes. "I can't handle topless talking Google right now. Could you please, please just put it on?"
Jane felt a pang of guilt when she saw Maura's face fall almost imperceptibly. Jane always did that to Maura without ever meaning to. It never ever felt good to see her stop smiling, even if Maura was annoying the hell out of Jane at the moment with her bipolar 'now I'm flirting, now I'm not' routine.
"Hey, it looks better on you than it does on me," Jane said putting a hand on Maura's shoulder and smiling in an attempt to perk the blonde up. It worked and Maura continued smiling like a kid on Christmas morning.
Jane hadn't been lying either. The shirt did look infinitely better on Maura, mostly because it was a bit tighter in just the right places. Jane admired the fit longer than she had intended, settling her eyes on the Boston PD logo scrawled across the chest. Goddamn it, Jane really, really needed to get laid. At this point, she thought even Korsak might do the trick.
"Jane?" Maura said, as if to gently stir her, not wanting to startle her friend.
"Huh, what, yeah," Jane said, looking around the room for something to stare at that wasn't Maura's breasts. She failed miserably and settled on looking at her cell phone to check the time. "I should really get dressed, you know, for the game."
"Oh, yes, of course," Maura said, as if startled out of her own reveries. "I need to go too. I'm on call tonight anyway so I should get home."
"See you tomorrow though?" Jane asked.
Wow, Jane thought, eager much? Such an awkward almost kiss was usually enough to make Jane want to put a few states between herself and that person. But no, now she was eager to see Maura again even when she didn't want to be eager. Must be the beer and wine. Yep, that was definitely what was causing the involuntary eagerness.
"I'd hope so, you owe me lunch," Maura said as she slung her Louis or Louise one of those two, over her shoulder.
It made for quite a picture, seeing Maura Isles in a black Boston PD shirt and Jane's old jeans with a designer bag on her shoulder and expensive light purple heels on her feet. Jane found it unusual that Maura hadn't noticed her own rather odd appearance when Maura was the one who would pester Jane because the blazer that she wore went out of style a year ago.
"Oh yeah, I'll see you then," Jane said, rubbing the scar on the side of her neck. Maura simply smiled and nodded. She was about to open the door when Jane spoke again. "Um, Maura?"
"Yes?" Maura said, turning around and smiling at Jane as if she was expecting something, hoping for something.
"I, um," Jane said, wondering exactly what it was she wanted to say to Maura. Jane Rizzoli never had a problem finding something to say, but here she was floundering for a reason to talk to Maura Isles. "Call me if you get a case."
"But you have tonight off, don't you?" Maura asked.
"Yes, Maura, I have tonight off," Jane said, making her best effort to be patient with Maura's inability to read social situations. "Just call me, ok?"
Maura looked at Jane in that adorable way she did when something didn't quite make sense to her, her eyes squinting in concentration and her lips pursed, before she finally gave up.
"Alright," Maura said with brevity that startled Jane. "I'll see you at work."
"Yup, see you there," Jane said as she watched Maura leave the apartment. Maura seemed to take forever to open the door, which gave Jane plenty of time to shamelessly stare at Maura's fantastic ass. Maura smiled over her shoulder at Jane one more time before shutting the door behind her.
God, Jane so needed to get laid right then and there, preferably, she found herself thinking, by Dr. Maura Isles.
Maura arrived at the morgue at around 6 a.m. the next morning. She hadn't been called in, and statistically speaking this time of day would not likely yield many case, but she hadn't been able to sleep well. Maura thought she might as well be productive if she was already awake. She set to meticulously scrubbing the sinks and slabs. Maura found the routine soothing, even if Jane could never understand why she cleaned everything more frequently than was necessary.
Oh, Jane.
What was she ever going to do about Jane? Maura had set something into motion that she wasn't sure she understood and that scared her like nothing else. It had been very obvious based upon Jane's body language that she was going to kiss Maura, that she wanted Maura in a sexual way. Maura had wanted the same thing too.
She simply didn't know how to go about something like that, not in the sense that she didn't know how to have sex with a woman. Maura couldn't see any logical reason to abstain from relations with a woman if they both found each other sexually attractive, so she didn't find her attraction to Jane particularly shocking or new.
It was the fact that she and Jane were friends, not just friends, but best friends. Maura's romantic relationships never started out as friendship, ever. It was always a very simple mating ritual that she went through with each of her ex's. They would meet, express mutual interest, start a romantic relationship, and the relationship would eventually end. It was simple. There were no external, confounding variables to be concerned with.
This thing with Jane, though, was different. She had a good friend, a best friend, for the first time in as long as she could remember. That could completely confound things, and irreversibly damage any relationship she would ever have with Jane, platonic or romantic. At least that was based upon psychological studies regarding changes in relationship dynamics. Maura couldn't say for sure if that would be the case in her circumstance. She would have to find some way to further investigate.
Maura sighed and gave up on scrubbing to sit down and think. Maybe if she meditated, Maura might be able to think more clearly and find a solution to the problem, or at least a way to go about researching it. She settled into her usual pose and soon enough found her eye grow heavy until she fell into a deep sleep.
She only woke when the phone rang.
"Medical Examiner's Office, Doctor Maura Isles speaking," Maura said as she rubbed her eye and tried to suppressed a yawn.
"Hey, doc," Korsak said, much more energized than usual for this early in the morning. "You got the autopsy report on the Callahan case? I was thinking of taking another look at it."
"Yes, I have it right here," Maura said as she shuffled a few folders on her desk before finding the autopsy report on Timothy Callahan, the suspected victim of a bad drug deal, though there was no physical evidence. "I'll bring it up to you."
"You sure? I've got nothing going on here, mostly just cold case stuff," Korsak said.
"I think I can spare a few minutes," Maura said as she looked around the empty room.
She hung up the phone and grabbed the file to head upstairs and deliver it. She was actually quite grateful that Korsak's phone call had roused her, because she imagined it would look very unprofessional to be seen sleeping on the job should the Lieutenant stop by to check up on her.
When she reached the homicide division, Maura's eyes immediately went to Jane's desk, but Jane wasn't there so she continued on to Detective Korsak.
"Here it is. Timothy Mark Callahan, age forty eight. Caucasian male. Fractures on his left and right patella. There is a gunshot wound to the right temple that was determined to be cause of death," Maura rattled off as she put the file on the detective's desk.
"Thanks doc," Korsak said as he took the file and flipped it open and looked through Maura's extensive notes.
"You're welcome," Maura said. Glancing over at Jane's empty desk, she added, "Jane hasn't come in today?"
"Yeah, she's been in for a few hours now," Korsak said without looking up from his report. "She and Frost are in a meeting with brass now, something about a joint taskforce with narcotics."
A few hours ago? Jane never arrived quite that early. What time was it, anyway? Maura glanced at the clock on the wall and was startled to see that it was about quarter past 11.
Maura occasionally fell asleep during her meditation, but rarely did she ever fall asleep sitting upright for an extended period of time, as she had apparently just done. Only when she was absolutely exhausted both physically and mentally did Maura's circadian rhythm deviate that much from her normal patterns of behavior.
"Do you know when she'll be back?" Maura asked. She must have sound too eager for the social circumstances because she suddenly had Detective Korsak's full attention.
"Why? You guys have a hot date or something?" he said as he raised his eyebrows.
Maura hesitated. She did not know with certainty if this was in fact a date, or simply payment for the safe return of Jane's shirt. She had suggested the meal at the moment when pheromone levels appeared to be most elevated, but Jane had given no outward indication that she considered the meal a romantic rendezvous.
"No, we don't. We are simply eating lunch together, as we have on a number of occasions as strictly platonic friends," Maura said and nodded her head at the end for emphasis.
"Whatever you say, doc," the detective said as he smiled knowingly.
Maura squinted her eye, at first confused by the detective's seemingly gleeful reaction to her lunch with Jane, then she finally understood. Maura did the one thing she knew how to do when at a loss for what else to say. Talking Google, it was then.
"Did you know your physical reaction to the assumption that Jane and I are in a sexual relationship is likely the result of a male fetishization of lesbianism?" Maura responded, ignoring Korsak's horrified face and the intense blush rising in his cheeks. "It began in the early to mid twentieth century with what are popularly called sexploitatation novels and carried over into the pornography industry. That, in turn, created a larger cultural phenomenon. It can be seen in any number of mainstream films, television shows, songs and other media."
"Um, yeah," Korsak said once he managed to recover from the barrage of information. "You know what, I'll tell Janie that you were looking for her when she gets back."
"Thank you," Maura said, smiling and nodding politely as if they had just had a conversation about any number of everyday matters. "I'll be in the morgue when she's ready for lunch."
Maura turned and left Korsak to ponder things much more interesting than the Callahan file. After all, she had a maybe-date to prepare for.
A/N-What do you think of Jane's POV? Should I have them take turns, or do you prefer just Maura's POV? This chapter isn't my favorite and I can't say exactly why, so I'd appreciate the feedback.
Reviews will make me love ya'll, and not in a creepy, stalkerish way like Maura's sperm donor daddy. Reviews please? :)