"OK, what did you want to talk about?"
Jane had posed that question to Maura over the internet chat-room. From the response that she received, she knew never to pose such an open ended question to Maura Isles ever again. She looked at her laptop screen incredulously;
"Actually, I'm glad you asked! I watched a very stimulating documentary centred on the ecology of carrion decomposition, last night. Maybe you also watched it. I mean, carrion decomposition is slightly off-track of my career field, but not totally unrelated, so I thought I'd give it a look in". Jane could safely say that she did not fully understand this woman. She decided to try and solicit some form of familiar conversation from this bizarre response.
"Right. And, what career field would that be?" Jane asked, fully expecting some form of outlandish occupation that she would have never heard of.
"I actually returned home from a job interview a little over an hour ago" Maura informed her vaguely. Ever-curious to find out what this 'enigmatic-would-be-an-understatement' woman did for a living, she decided to press and see what the job interview was for;
"What was the interview for?" Jane asked inquisitively.
"It was for the position of Medical Examiner, so I would be based in the morgue of the Boston Police Department. I noticed that you're a detective, so where exactly in Boston would you be based?" Jane was filled with shock at Maura's revelation. The job title wasn't too surprising, since Maura came across as having an enthusiastic and scientifically oriented mind, however, Jane also worked at the Boston Police Department, meaning that Jane and Maura would be working in the same building, given Maura got the job! Jane didn't know how to feel about this.
"What a co-incidence, I work on the homicide department of the Boston Police Department" Jane told Maura, taking care to remove any traces of sarcasm from what she said.
"Wow, no kidding?! Well, it looks like I've already made a friend!" Jane was about to argue and tell her that their conversation did not constitute a friendship, but upon reflection, she saw no point in dashing Maura's happiness. She also thought that having another friend couldn't really go amiss, seeing as she did not make them all too easily.
"Yeah, sure, of course!" Jane said, not really knowing how to respond to that.
"Actually, Jane, ever since I applied for the position as Medical Examiner, there's been something bugging me that I just cannot get off of my mind! Could I possibly ask you something?"
"Go ahead" Jane typed to her, wondering how serious Maura's doubts were.
"Tell me, in the Police Department café, do they serve coffee made from the ground coffee beans or will I be required to bring in my own coffee machine and make it myself?" Jane was starting to wonder whether Maura was serious now, due to the bizarre things that she seemed to be coming out with. Whether it was a legitimate fear of Maura's or not, she gave her a response;
"Don't worry, the coffee isn't instant. My mom works in the café!" Jane informed Maura.
"Oh really? Well, you'll have to introduce me to her!"
"Don't you think it's a bit early on for that?"
"Now, early on in what exactly?" Jane felt like she had been lead into a trap here, just the selection of her words had landed her into the perilous situation where Maura was asking her to label the relationship between the two of them! Jane initially had thought there would be zero existence of any relationship whatsoever, and she didn't feel that 'talking online for less than two hours' constituted one either.
"Acquainting ourselves" Jane responded with, and immediately after sending it the suggestive connotations had sunk in. It also seemed that Maura hadn't failed to pick up on it either.
"Well, in that case, let us continue to acquaint" she had sent to Jane with a somewhat redolent overtone.
Jane was about to type out a response to Maura's message, but her phone rang before she had the chance. Her mobile phone was on the kitchen counter and she was on the sofa, and she had to swiftly move over to the kitchen counter to silence the high pitch whine of the phone's ringer. She glanced at the caller ID before answering and saw that the call was coming from her partner, Detective Frost, who worked with her on homicide at the Boston Police Department.
"Rizzoli?" She said by way of greeting and as a question as to what warranted the call.
"Jane, there's been a body found, you'll need to get here as soon as possible" Frost informed her, his voice tinted with the slightest hallmarks of revulsion. He felt uneasy around the dead and the decaying, therefore this aspect of the job of homicide he went about with a palatable amount of disgust.
"Yeah? Well, it'd be good of you to tell me where about's it's been found, body dumps aren't scavenger hunts. Well, not most of the time, anyway" Jane replied, impatient for Frost to tell her where there had been a body found.
"Just get to Dorchester Shores as soon, as possible okay?"
"Yeah, sure, thanks Frost" Jane told him before putting the phone down. This meant that she would have to cut short her conversation with Maura. She quickly typed out a response;
"Sorry Maura but I just got a call from my partner and I have to go work on a case. I think it's urgent. Talk to you later". The latter part of that sentence Jane had written out of instinct, though she thought that she'd be happier to stay home and talk to Maura than go out on a cold September evening to pick up a dead body.
"Ooh, how exciting! Yes, we shall speak sometime else, maybe I'll see you at work?" Maura replied back to Jane. Jane had intended on leaving before Maura had a chance to send her response through, but she kept finding something to do until Maura's response had popped up on the computer. Resisting her urge to type anything else, she grabbed her car keys, said goodbye to Jo Friday after making sure her food and water bowls were full, and ran out to her car.
