Okay, let me start this A/N with a huge apology. I am so sorry that this is so late you guys, it's just school started and hit me like a freaking 18-wheeler and next thing I know I'm forced to do this thing called NaNoWriMo (if you don't know, it stands for National Novel Writing Month) because of this writing class I started taking and after that I was just so tired of looking at a computer screen and typing and writing and most of December was just so ugh when it came to thinking of ideas and I'm so sorry for that.

Oh, BTW, happy new years, you guys.

Anywho, this chapter took a lot of willpower to actually get out, so I'm sorry (again, I know) if it's a little choppy or incoherent.

As always, I love to hear from you guys in whatever way possible.

Love you guys,

-S

"Wait, so let me get this right," Jane grumbled, sounding frustrated, and I imagined her dexterous, tan fingers rubbing the spot where her nose met the space between her eyebrows. "You've never read any of the Harry Potter books?"

"Nope," I confirmed, fiddling with my left earring, twisting it back and forth.

"Never ever?" she asked with an utterly befuddled tone.

"Never ever. I've never seen the movies either." I smiled as a disbelieving groan/cry rippled out of her throat.

"You need help, Maura Isles." I grinned, knowing that this was a tease, a friendly tease, not something from a pompous, stuck-up, thinks-they-know-it-all-when-they-barely-know-the-quadratic-formula, brat.

"As if," I replied, setting my index finger to my bottom lip and scraping it gently with my nail. "Besides, I barely have time to read. I'm always either talking with you or making up homework that I haven't done yet because I'm too busy talking to you."

"Oh, so you're blaming me for you not reading Harry Potter?"

"No, I'm blaming you for distracting me."

"Well, I'm blaming you for being smart."

"That's not blaming me, that's just pointing something out." My finger scraped the skin of my lip harder, tugging at the little ridges that appeared from my not using chap stick in a while. I felt around my pocket for it while I listened to Jane respond, popping it open and applying it gently.

"Well then, while I'm on the subject of pointing things out," she began, a smile coating her words over the receiver. "Your eyes are the most beautiful things I've ever seen." I chuckled before pulling at my lip, squeezing harder than I normally would.

"Thanks," I whispered softly, my face erupting into flames and fireworks bursting in the pit of my stomach.

"And your hair reminds me of a sunset on the beach," she added, her voice quieter, but the message still containing its previous intensity. I was silent, however, not knowing how to respond and too… what would be the best word for it? Shocked? Taken aback? Either way, I was too busy blushing and attempting to calm my now rapid heartbeat.

"Does it?" I muttered softly, taking a lock in between my fingers and playing with the strands. I heard a small grunt of approval come from the phone before a sniffle. "What's wrong?"

"I have a cold," Jane responded, followed by another sniff.

"Are you drinking enough liquids?"

"Yeah I have—" Suddenly, a horrible rumbling sound followed by the slamming of a door and various amounts of grunting.

"Oh! Jane! Who are you talking to?" a little boys voice pondered.

"I bet it's Riley. How's she doing anyway?" another, more mature, but still boyish sounding voice said.

My intrigued sparked at the name. Riley… her girlfriend perhaps? I stopped myself before the thoughts could get much further. I didn't even know if Jane liked girls, much less if she had a girlfriend, and it was selfish to think that way anyway.

"Shut up, freak sacks," Jane's raspy and deep voice tumbled through the phone. It sounded like she was fighting with something, and it took me a while before I realized it was her brothers.

"Aw, come on, Jane," the seemingly younger one whined and I heard Jane groan in response. "At least let us say hi."

"You say anything stupid, I'll put frosting in your socks and itching powder in your boxers. Tidy whiteys for you, Tommy," a squeal came over the phone before a stout "shut up", followed by the rustling of a phone being moved from one hand to another.

"Hello?" the more mature one asked.

"Hello," I responded as my eyebrows furrowed together and my fingers scratched at my palm. "How are you?"

"I'm good," he whispered into the receiver. "So," he began after an awkward silence, "are you Janie's girlfriend?"

My mouth dropped open at the question, but it wasn't just from shock. So Riley isn't her girlfriend. Good.

"Oh hell no, you moronic mouth-breather!" Jane yelled as rustling came through yet again. A plethora of curses flowed from either Jane's mouth or her brothers', followed by the screaming and laughing of young children and a door slamming. "I am so sorry," she growled softly, silence the only background noise. "They're stupid little rats."

"They're your brothers, Jane," I chuckled, though I still wasn't completely over the fact that one of them asked me such a personal question, no matter how welcome it was. "You're supposed to love them unconditionally, aren't you?"

"That's what parents want you to think, Maura," she whispered conspiratorially. "They're just little monkey men."

"Neanderthals?" I chuckled out and Bass hunkered into my door. He raised his head and looked at me with his beady eyes in greeting.

"No, they're monkey men. Neanderthals were at least a little comprehensive of their environments and actions." A little bit of scratching next to the phone followed by a click and more movement met my ears. "Sorry, I'm laying down for bed. It's getting pretty late, you know."

"Since when has that stopped us?" I purred. Something sounded wrong about the sentence, but it wasn't wrong per say, but it's didn't feel… normal. Not abnormal as in abnormal abnormal, but not normal abnormal. Not to say that any abnormal is normal, nor am I saying that any normal is abnormal. Then again, the fact that I'm classifying this particular abnormality as normal is abnormal itself.

… Did you get all of that?

Either way, the sentence felt flirty, feels predatory, in my mouth. I wondered if Jane heard it in my voice as she laid in her bed, surrounded by the encasing warmth her blankets gave her.

Jane laughs quietly and I feel like we have the greatest secret in the entire world or universe or everything. "That's a good point, Dr. Isles." I can barely restrain my smile at her voice forming those words. I knew that I wasn't a doctor (obviously), but it was so good to hear those words in her Boston-Italian accent mixed with her slightly sleepy, yet still raspy voice. It felt familiar—just like 'Maur Maur'—and it made the area between my stomach and spine feel like it was numb almost.

Ignoring the feeling and passing it off as simple nerves for a nonexistent chemistry test the following day, I got ready for bed myself, putting Jane on speaker while I stripped until I was in my bra and underwear only.

It was getting close to summer, so don't say anything about my being mostly naked.

Once I got under the covers, I took Jane off of speaker and pressed my cell to my ear. Since my mother and I had agreed on expanding my minutes plan to unlimited, I felt a lot less horrible about burning all my minutes and not being able to talk to Jane until we paid off the bill. It was always terrible when I couldn't hear Jane's voice. It was like trying to write with my left hand, or say a word that I hadn't heard in an overly long time, or walking in a pair of shoes a size too small. It was just… off.

"What are you thinking about?" Jane's voice was tired, and I could tell she was half asleep.

I chuckled before answering her. "Shoes, believe it or not," I whispered, licking my lips afterwards.

"Of course you are, Maur Maur," she growled playfully. "Why not think about shoes at…12:30 at night."

"Is it really that late?" I turned over and looked at my bedside clock, noticing that she was right, but subconsciously knowing that, of course, she was right. She wouldn't lie to me. "Hm, well then."

"You're still not going to go to sleep, are you?" It was like she wanted to fall into the hands of her dreams but also like she wanted to stay right where she was, talking to me, laying in her bed (probably half-naked like I was), with the phone pressed to her tanned ear, fiddling with her merciless black curls. My legs crossed at the thigh and clenched.

"Would you like me to?" I rubbed and clasped at the sheets with my toes before laying my palm on my abdomen. Again, the sentence sounded too comfortable, too flirtatious, even if it was with Jane.

"Sleep is important, Doctor," she teased while a slight smacking sound resounded in my ear.

"So is maintaining a healthy and blooming social life." She chuckled and I joined her, subconsciously rubbing the pads of my fingers along my bare skin.

"Yes, what we have if definitely 'blooming'."

When I think back on it, I think that's when it all changed… 0ur conversations, our feelings, our everything, because she was right when she said those words. Everything was slowly 'blooming' into something more, something… spectacularly extravagant. Jane and I had started out dandelions and now we were… tiger lilies or crowned dragons or, perhaps, a gardenia. It was then when I began questioning why it was even a discussion for her to fly to Virginia, for her to visit me for the summer, when my mother was probably going to be stuck in France or Spain or England or something for the duration of the three months leading up to my senior year.

It was then that I realized that I wouldn't let her go back if she flew down here.

It was then that I realized that I would hurt too much to watch her board a plane that would take her far, far away from me.

It was then that I realized that I wanted Jane next to me more than a friend should.

It was awkward on my line after I had the major self-evaluation. I don't think Jane noticed it—a great thing, obviously—but I felt it in every whispered word, either from her or I, every text message sent in the middle of a required course, every friendly compliment, every minute spent in a comfortable silence. It was there, and it took a hell of a lot more strength to restrain to keep from saying something that showed my…affection? Overly-maybe-like-her-more-as-a-friend? Maybe-I-really-do-like-her-more-than-a-friend-and-I'm-a-freak-for-thinking-that-way-about-her? Whatever it was, I was getting better and better at hiding it, and it was a blessing that hives weren't springing up all over my body.

Though the feelings for Jane that I had recently acquired were… exuberant to say the least, that didn't stop me from wanting her to visit (from a friendly standpoint, mind you.) We talked about it almost nonstop; how her mother would handle everything, payment plans (which we still hadn't agreed on), what we would even do considering there was nothing to do here anyway, but we would never really put it to the test. Jane never asked her mom, neither of us looked up any flight plans or prices on the internet, nothing. In reality, I suppose it was just a silly dream for the two of us, though one we wanted terribly. It was like a child wanting to aspire to become an astronaut, not knowing that NASA's Space Exploration branch had been put on the back burner and didn't need any astronauts as of yet.

Still, we spoke about it hour after hour, day after day, slowly sipped coffee after needlessly turned off lamps. We talked about it through whispered words and clumsily typed texts during math and English. We talked about it until it became a fathomable thought and tangible idea. I had come unbelievably close to calling my mother, on a business trip of course, and asking her if Jane could stay over for summer break. I "wimped out", as Jane would put it, and made it to the last digit of her number before I deleted them all and locked the screen on my phone.

It was difficult to talk to Jane about my hesitance, considering the main part of it was my feelings for her and what would happen if she did stay over. Questions like 'Would I start to really, really like her?', 'Would I finally understand it was stupid to like her in the first place?' would constantly tumble around the deepest corners of my mind. Yet again, I was alone, but this time it wasn't because people were putting me into the position.

It was me forcing myself into the corner.

A lot of the late night calls between Jane and I blended together into giggle fits, wonderfully silent moments and simple catching up between two friends, but the night before my English Writing final exam stood out predominantly. Jane hadn't called me all that day, only sending me the occasional text saying 'Hi' or asking me about my day and the like. After school, however, my phone was dead silent. It was worrying, of course, the silence, since I had lived with Jane's voice or texts constantly over the past few months. I was pacing slightly across my room, one hand in my pocket, the other poised near my mouth as I chewed gently on my fingernail. Strange how a virtual stranger could become such an intimate part of my schedule and life, to the point where I couldn't go to sleep without at least getting a text from her saying good night.

It was at around 12:10 when she finally decided to call, but something was strange, off about her words. They were too slurred, too drawn out. My hand subconsciously clenched the phone tighter, pressing it harder to my ear as she spoke.

"Hey, Maur Maur, what's up sweetheart?" her voice was low, raspy like always, but the heaviness to it was what threw my off.

"Um, nothing, just waiting for your usual text or call," I muttered, feeling my eyebrows furrow and rise in curiosity at what was wrong with her. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine, love." Oh, that's new. I bit my lip as the words hit my ears. "I'm more than fine, actually. I'm damn fine. How're you?"

"I was fine until you called. What's wrong? Why do you sound so…"I couldn't think of the right word, but I was sure that even if I could, it still wouldn't be able to describe her tone correctly.

"Tipsy?" she chuckled out. That explains it, I thought stupidly. Of course she was tipsy. Why wouldn't she be drinking?

…

Actually, why would she be drinking in the first place? Underage drinking is detrimental to the primary development of the neurons in the brain and causes a higher risk of being dependent to alcohol when older and the activity in the brain—

"Our last final was today. We're just celebrating, Maura." She still sounded too elated, too laid back for the seriousness of the situation.

"Do you have a designated driver? How much did you even have? God, please tell me you didn't drive yourself home. Please tell me your parents and brothers are out and you just decided to drink in your own home instead of risking your damn life on freaking alcohol. Please tell me you're safe. Damn it, Jane, why would you do that?"

"Whoa, Maura—"

"And just to celebrate the last freaking final of the year, what the hell? Why the hell couldn't you just buy a cake or something? Go out to the movies or a restaurant?"

"Maura, it's totally fine—"

"The consequences of drinking and driving are permanent, Jane, I can't believe you would even risk your life like that—"

"Damn it, Maura, if you don't stop ranting I won't explain to you that I'm at Riley's and her parents aren't home and I'm not going to go home because, hell yeah, drinking and driving is freaking stupid as hell and even drunk I'm not that dumb." She virtually snarled out the words, and even slurred, they sounded angry. "I just wanted to call you and hear your voice. I always love listening to your voice, you should know that."

I felt bad about my implications, especially when I should've known better. This was Jane.

There was no way she was going to risk ruining her flawless face and, in turn, perfect ego.

"I'm sorry," I muttered. My pacing slowly until it was just a few steps in a miniature circle.

"It's fine, babe," Jane uttered the words so casually, the exact opposite of what they did to my still quick-beating heart (from the small panic attack I had at the beginning of the conversation).

"'Babe'," I mimicked.

"Is it too intimate?" It sounded as if she was sobering up a little bit, but the slurred tone of her voice was still prominent.

"It's… different, but not a bad different, I guess." I didn't want to say 'Actually, Jane, it's perfectly intimate and I'd rather like it if you continued with this whole 'Babe' and 'Love' thing you've decided to adopt and, I don't know, maybe whisper it a couple of times with something a little bit more intimate if you'd like' because that would obviously cause a few questions to arise that I wouldn't want to answer.

"That's great. I've wanted to say it for a while, actually. It just seems… comfortable, ya know? Like I can say it around you because we're already so close, but we're also getting closer, you get it?" A swishing sound followed by a soft gulp and the closing of a door followed her statement. "Like, I dunno, we could be more than just friends I guess."

I laughed awkwardly but felt a sense of elation in the depths between my small intestine and my stomach, around my colon region. It was soon followed by a logical remembrance of the fact that Jane was, in fact, very drunk, and was simply spewing nonsense at this point. "Perhaps you should go to bed, Jane." I tried to make it so I didn't sound as… sad as I was, but sometimes, my vocal chords just betrayed me.

"No, no yet, I don't think," she groaned before sighing. "Ya know, you're really beautiful, Maura."

"Thank you, Jane. I hope you know you are too." I pressed my cold fingers against my suddenly warm face.

"Yeah, yeah, but really, has anyone ever told you how stunning you are? Even just from, like, talking and such, you're just so smart and you're just a genius." I laughed as I stretched and got comfortable in my bed, deciding to humor Jane even if I did have a final the next day.

"Okay. Thanks again," my smile didn't fall even as I turned off the light and closed my eyes.

"But I feel like I want more too." The corners of my lips fell, but only slightly. "That sounds weird, huh?" We shared a giggle (how girly) before she continued. "It's true though. I want more than just the occasional 'selfie' and texts and late night chats and all that."

"What do you mean?"

"I want, like, to see your face actually move." An actual laugh escaped my mouth, filling the dark and lonely house. Jane chuckled deep in her throat. "And, ya know, actually feel you."

I don't have to explain that one, right?

"Really?" slipped out of my mouth unintentionally, coming out with more of a teasing tone that I originally wanted it to.

"Really," she echoed, just as sure, but just as teasing as well. "And actually lie down with you and actually talk to you and actually go with you to a Starbucks or a Dunkin Donuts or Seven-Eleven or wherever the hell you get your coffee and but your coffee for you and actually stir in two, maybe three sugars—depending on how late we stay up—instead of just knowing it and actually hold you and hear you and laugh with you and talk with you and joke with you and cuddle with you or whatever the hell else we want because I'd actually be there to do those things." The seriousness of her mini-monologue weighed down on my shoulders in the most wonderful and glorious way and I hated it and loved it at the same time.

Damn it, Jane Rizzoli, for making me feel the way you make me feel.