A/N: I'm always so surprised that people from all around the world are reading this story. It is truly incredible, and I thank you all. Just a reminder that lyrics from the track title are in italics. Enjoy.
Not too long after waking up, Nurse Gillman entered Jane's room to deliver her pain medications and check her vitals. Everything looked fine since she had yet to experience any severe symptoms and was mainly dealing with headaches, nausea, and occasional loss of appetite.
It was Friday, but Jane didn't really look forward to the weekends anymore since they weren't any different than weekdays. There were no restrictions on visiting hours, so her friends and family were free to come and go whenever, which she enjoyed. The food was always delicious thanks to the well trained kitchen staff that Maura hired, and there were always activities going on, though most of them were geared toward the older generation such as bingo, shuffleboard, and book readings. Jane spent most of her time hanging out with Patrick who was there from 10am until 2pm, which was when he had a break between classes in school. They would watch movies, play chess, walk around the garden, occasionally take part in the group activities where Jane would always be as competitive as ever, or they would just sit and talk.
After lunch that day, they headed to the third floor, which had a balcony that overlooked part of the city and comfy recliners to relax on.
"I love the Boston skyline. It is so beautiful, don't you think?" He asked while staring out into the distance.
"Yeah, this is my home. I was born and raised here; I guess, it's fitting that I die here as well."
"Do you wish that there was something you could do?" He turned to face her, unsure how she was going to take this.
"I've been thinking about it a lot, way more than I care to admit, and I still don't know. I mean, it would be great to live, of course, but I just don't want to get my hopes up. I'm going to tell you something but it's kinda a secret okay?"
He nodded, excited to learn more about Jane who was often hesitant to share things about herself.
"Well, Dr. Isles is working on something right now, a cure I guess. We used to be...together in college, and we are sort of together again, but its complicated. I've talked about this a lot with Dr. Cleason, but I am still working it out in my head. I want to be with Maura but its so difficult to talk with her."
"When my mom was sick, like when she first found out, none of my family really knew what to say. She seemed okay like she had already accepted it, but we were all reeling, especially my dad. It was hard for us to figure out how to talk with her without sounding like we were pitying her or talking down to her. Maybe Dr. Isles is going through the same thing. My mom's cancer was like an elephant in the room that nobody wanted to even approach, which made all our conversations seem forced and awkward. I don't know your situation, but maybe think about it like that."
Jane sat quietly, staring out at the city she loved. It was only about three weeks ago that she had found out her diagnosis, yet everything was different. Maura was back in her life, she was living somewhere new, she wasn't working, she had nothing really to look forward to. In fact, she was afraid of the future and perhaps Maura was as well. That could explain the need for a cure and the avoidance; she was afraid. They both were and that was costing them so much. Jane didn't approve of Maura's way of dealing with this fear, but none of this is easy.
"Thanks Patrick. You always give me a new perspective." She smiled at the young man. "I'm glad you are here."
"Not a problem, Jane. I like talking with you."
They sat out there for another hour or so before Jane felt too tired to sit anymore and went in for a quick nap.
Maura was at home. She decided to take the morning off in order to call Dr. Ansel from home, where she felt a bit more comfortable. She dialed the number and waited, fidgeting with her skirt as she sat. After the fourth ring, a voice answered.
"Dr. Ansel's office, how may I help you?"
"This is Dr. Isles. I called yesterday to speak with the doctor and was advised to call back today. Is she available to speak?"
"Oh, yes, Dr. Isles. The doctor is currently in, though she doesn't have much time. I will see if she can take your call, one moment please."
Maura was nervous. She had rehearsed what she was going to say, but now that she was in the moment, everything she rehearsed seemed wrong. This was Jane's life on the line, she had to be perfect.
"Okay, Dr. Ansel is available for a few minutes before her meeting, so I will connect you."
The seconds seemed to stretch on and on, as Maura's heart began to quicken its pace.
"Dr. Isles? This is Tricia Ansel, I heard you were interested in my clinical trial?" A kind, soft voice flowed through the line.
"Yes, I run my own hospice in Boston with the help of a wonderful staff including your old student, Ian Faulkner, and one of my patients has very advanced stomach cancer. She is very young, and her cancer has progressed too far to be treated with chemo or radiation. I read about your clinical trial and was very impressed with the results. I was wondering if there is any possible way to get a sample of the drug you are using?" She kept her 'doctor' voice on in order to sound more put together than she felt.
"Oh, I always did like Ian. He was one of my favorite students. I'm a little surprised to hear he is working at a hospice, but he always did like helping people. As for your request, doctor, I am sure you are aware of the wait list and how a clinical trial works. I do not just hand out the drug. All patients must be strictly monitored, meet specific requirements, and be constantly tested to see how they are responding to the drug or placebo, depending on which they receive. I am confused as to why you would even ask." Tricia sounded slightly annoyed, which only served to make Maura even more nervous.
"I'm sorry, Dr. Ansel. I would usually never ask this of any professional, but this patient...she is more than just a patient. She is…" Maura didn't even know what to call Jane. They certainly weren't a couple by any standard definition of such, but they weren't just a doctor and a patient. "She is the family that I never had. She is the greatest person I have ever met, and I let her go so many years ago. Now that she is back, I can't let myself do that again. I need to do this, I need to save her."
Her voice was shaking and the 'doctor' facade had cracked. It was liberating to finally speak these words but also terribly frightening.
There was a prolonged pause on the other end of the line.
"Dr. Isles….that was very beautiful and touching really. I wish there was something I could do, but you must know that by giving away my drug, it would ruin the entire clinical trial. It would ensure that nobody else ever gets to use it because the FDA would immediately shut it down. I understand that this patient is special, but there are thousands of patients like her who are just as deserving. Its not fair to deny this potential cure to all of them just for the sake of saving one."
"No. Jane needs this! She still has a full life ahead of her, she is only 39! She is a brilliant detective and a more amazing human being. She is kind and protective, brave and tender. She is everything rolled up into one humble, beautiful woman. You know what's not fair, cancer. Cancer is not fair, but I thought you might be." Now Maura was angry, she could see her resolve slipping away as well as any chance at convincing Dr. Ansel.
"Stomach cancer in someone so young is rare...but my trial is only for people over 50 years old who can come and live in California to be monitored. There is nothing I can do, it would violate all kinds of rules and restrictions. This Jane sounds incredible, so maybe you should just spend as much time with her as you can."
"I'm not giving up, doctor. Please, isn't there anything, anything at all? My family runs the Isles Foundation, which would be more than happy to donate to the Stanford Medical Program or the school in general. Or we could just not tell anyone...nobody would ever have to know that Jane exists!" Her voice rang with desperation.
Tricia sighed into the phone, "I can't agree to either of those as that would be highly unethical. I can see that you are not going to stop though, and your story has touched me in a way. I will see if I can get Jane on the wait list for the trial, but that is really all I can do. I will have to alter her age and location but her response to the drug would be interesting to observe. I can't promise she will even get in though because I am not going to bump anyone who has been waiting. There are over thirty people ahead of her and some of them have been waiting for months. That is all I can do, Dr. Isles. I need to get to my meeting, go spend some time with Jane, it sounds like you need it."
The call ended and Maura was unsure how she felt. She hadn't really expected Dr. Ansel to just hand over the drug at least she got Jane on the wait list, but that might not even work. She needed that drug as soon as possible for any chance of success. But she really should see Jane, it had been….four days!? since they had actually spoken to each other, or their fight to be more specific. She really was wasting their time together, but she rationalized that a lifetime would be much better than 25 weeks.
It was 1pm and Maura was starving so she made herself a small salad and contemplated whether to go into work or stay home all day. She felt exhausted because her nerves kept her up most of the night, but she had been neglecting many of her duties as medical director. She decided to go in after lunch and work in her office. Visiting Jane was still up in the air, they needed to talk but the fear of fighting was holding her back. She put those thoughts on hold and tried to focus on what needed to be done now.
The doctor arrived at work, greeted Elizabeth with a smile, and settled down in her office. Time zoomed by as she diligently went about filing paperwork, signing documents, and going over patient files. Jane stayed mostly dormant in her mind until she looked at the clock and saw that it was thirty minutes to 10pm, which is when the brunette typically went to sleep. Maura hastily shut down her computer, cleaned up her desk, and made the snap decision to head up to the second floor.
Jane was in bed reading a book that her ma brought her. It wasn't half bad, but her head was throbbing which made it hard to concentrate on the words. She wondered when Nurse Gillman was going to come in with her sleeping pills that generally knocked her right out. At that moment, the door opened up.
Jane reached over to the bedside table to put her book down, so she her back was to the door as she spoke, "Right on time, I was just wondering when you were coming. My head is killing me tonight; I could really use some of those little helpers." She chuckled at her joke as she turned but the laugh was cut short as she saw Maura standing in the door frame, looking unsure of herself.
"Jane...uh, maybe I should go and come back tomorrow. I'm sorry." Maura wanted to do this when they were both feeling okay, though she wasn't sure when that would be. She backed slowly out.
"Wait! I thought you were my nurse! She usually comes around now and I, yeah, thought you were her. If you want to talk now, we can, if you want to…"
"Umm…if you're sure, then okay." Maura came inside and sat down near the foot of Jane's bed. They looked each other over and smiled nervously. "I'm sorry that I haven't been here in so long. Well I was here yesterday but you were sleeping. It's just...you make me so nervous and I'm afraid I'll say the wrong thing. I hate fighting with you, that is not what I want but somehow it always happens. I didn't want to stay away for almost this whole week, and then I did. I'm sorry, you don't deserve that. I'm sorry." She didn't feel like that was enough, she stared down to avoid eye contact.
"I don't like to fight either and I feel like that's always on me. I get so upset and I explode. I think I'm still just dealing with everything and taking it out on you, which you don't deserve either. I hate that you stayed away, I want to see you and be around you. I wish you would stop disappearing. I feel like you are just going to run again as I start to get worse, and I….I don't know if I can trust you. I wish I could, I really do, but you keep proving my point." She felt like she was rambling but the words just kept tumbling out.
Jane stared at the hazel eyes that refused to meet her own and saw the small teardrops run down the pale cheeks of the doctor.
"Maura, I love you and that is scary. I don't think you know how much I was hurting after you left me back in college. I've been talking about this with Dr. Cleason, and she has really shown me how much fear I'm still harboring. I'm scared that you will break me, I'm scared that you don't feel the same, I'm scared that you are using the excuse of curing me to hide."
"It's not an excuse! I really think I can cure you, Jane. I talked with Dr. Ansel today and got you put on the wait list for the clinical trial. That is not what I wanted but its a step, and I think with a little more convincing I could get you the drug itself. I do love you, which is why I'm doing this at all. If I didn't care, this would be so easy but its not. I know this is hard for you, though I really can't even imagine, but this is hard for me too!"
She finally looked up and they faced each other. Their emotions shown bare on each others faces.
"I get it, Maur. You feel like you have to save me, and I know that I would do the same for you if the situation was reversed. Try to think about what this is like for me though. I'm stuck in this place, surrounded by people that are nice and caring but they aren't you. I wish it was you spending the afternoon with me, or watching TV, or playing bingo. I wish I could kiss you goodnight every night and be greeted each morning with that beautiful smile of yours. What if this cure doesn't even work? Have you even considered that? Then what?"
Jane was trying to breathe like Betty suggested, she was trying to keep it under control, but things were escalating faster than she had expected. Maura was raising her voice and really pushing Jane. This conversation needed to happen, so Jane tried to relax but Maura was quickly spiraling.
The doctor almost jumped from the bed and turned away either to hide her tears or her anger. "I don't know! I don't know what will happen if it doesn't work or if I can't even get it! I can't lose you! Why can't you believe that? I love you so much that my brain won't even let me process what will happen if it doesn't work. It's too painful. I'm a doctor, just let me do my job! This cure is something for me to hold onto, something to hope for, why is that so terrible?"
God, this woman was really pushing all of Jane's buttons. Breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, breathe out….nope not working. Screw it.
"I'm something to hold onto! I want you to hold onto me, dammit, not some fantasy drug that you don't even have! Wake up, Maura! I'm dying." She screamed up to the ceiling, "I'M DYING!"
The brunette turned and saw the doctor staring wide-eyed at her, "That shouldn't be surprising because its true, no matter how much you try to deny it. You know, I promised myself and Betty that I wasn't going to fight with you and already I fucked that up. I'm so stupid. I can't even hold a civil conversation with you! You're crying now again and that only makes it worse " She let out a frustrated growl and buried her head under the blankets.
Maura was in tears seeing the broken woman hiding in bed. She had gone from fuming to regretful in two seconds and the doctor didn't know what to do. Jane was crying as well, beating herself up for the words she said. Maura could hear her gasps and whimpering and see the heavy intakes of breath from her chest. Then, it was quiet, eerily so, minus the heart monitor. Jane was still like a mannequin, and Maura slowly approached the bed again.
"Jane? get your head out of the covers. Go back to screaming or cursing. Please, please calm down. Steady out, I'm terrified. Jane? Please...talk to me." She stood right next to the bed, staring down, waiting. She glanced at Jane's heart monitor and saw that her blood pressure was running quite high. She shouldn't have egged her on like that, this was not healthy both physically and emotionally for her. Maura mentally kicked herself for letting it escalate like this, she should know better.
"Jane? Please, let me take your temperature, you can throw the thermometer right back at me, if thats what you want to do, okay? I just really need to check your vitals. Your blood pressure is high, so I need to see if you are running a fever, which would be really bad. This is my fault."
The covers of the bed slowly peeled down, revealing the red, puffy brown eyes and mess of curls.
"I won't throw anything at you, Maura, jeez. I'm not that cruel. Just take my temp and then maybe you should go. Things keep getting worse between us and it takes two to tango, this is not on you."
Maura put the thermometer in Jane's mouth, "I'm not sure what a South American dance has to do with this conversation, but I don't want to go. This needs to be sorted out now that's the only way we can move forward. We are stuck in a wheel right now, going round and around but not getting anywhere. Please, we can't do this again. It is dangerous for you and for our relationship itself. Please…"
The door opened and Nurse Gillman entered and took in the scene before her. Both women looked like disheveled messes with their tear streaked faces, bloodshot eyes and flushed complexions.
"Hi..Dr. Isles, um is something wrong? Jane, are you alright? I heard yelling and crying and...what's going on?"
The two females looked at each other and then at the nurse in unison. They weren't about to explain everything, but something needed to be said, as the small woman standing in the door looked completely shocked.
"Oh, Nurse Gillman, I was just checking in on Ms. Rizzoli and noticed her blood pressure was high, so I am taking her temperature to check for a fever, and it's a little elevated but nothing to worry about." Maura tried to sound okay.
Diane furrowed her brow and looked skeptically at them, "And the screaming and crying…?"
Maura turned bright red and looked to Jane for some much needed assistance.
"Well, that was my fault. See, I was watching the Red Sox game and they made a huge error so I was really upset. Then I turned the channel because I was so frustrated and ended up watching...The Notebook which is just really sad, you know? Maura..or..errr… Dr. Isles heard me and came in to see what was wrong."
The nurse was obviously not buying any of this, but she was not about to get involved in the medical director's business. "Right….well I have your sleeping pills here and I was going to check your vitals but it looks like Dr. Isles has that under control. Here you go, Jane, and here is some water. I'll be back in the morning." She handed over two pills and a small glass of water before exiting the room, glad to be out of that awkward situation.
After the door closed and they were alone again, Maura sat down in the chair by the bed. "Jane, don't take those yet. They put you right to sleep, but I don't think we are done talking. I am much calmer now, really, I'm ready."
Jane looked at the pills in her hand and then back up at the hazel eyes of the doctor before popping the capsules into her mouth and swallowing with some water.
"I'm sorry. My head is about to explode from pain and from all the thoughts kicking in my brain. This wasn't how I expected things to go, in fact this was what I feared. If this is how its going to be now, maybe you shouldn't come back. Maybe its not you that I love, maybe its just my idea of you. I have built you up in my mind for twenty years, but I really don't even know who you are anymore. That doesn't mean I don't want to, but I think we both need more time." Her words started to slur and her eyes began to droop. "This isn't gonna be easy, but I hope...that...we..can.."
She was out like a light and Maura let out a deep sob and wrapped her arms around herself for support. She sat crying for several minutes as the woman next to her didn't move a muscle. Eventually, she stood and lowered the bed into a horizontal position and then tucked in the brunette. She wiped her own tears so they wouldn't fall onto the sleeping body. She knew she should leave, but she sat back down next to the bed and held Jane's limp hand in her own.
"Jane, can't you see what you are doing? Can't you see I'm scared to speak, and I hate my voice cause it only makes you angry. It seems like I only talk when you are sleeping. That's when I tell you everything that I'm afraid to say, and imagine that somehow you're going to hear me. I'll be here when you wake up to kiss you good morning. No matter what you say or what I say or how you try to break me, I know that I love you and this isn't going away. This is not just a desperate attempt to relive the past or fulfill some fantasy. I'm in this, though my actions might say otherwise, my heart belongs to you. Please believe that."
She stood and placed a gentle kiss on Jane's cheek before walking over the couch and collapsing on the cushions. Within minutes, she was fast asleep.
