CHAPTER NINE

"All right, time to get up. Go to the bathroom and do what you normally do." Maura is standing in the middle of the boys' room. It doesn't take a pot of water and a piano to get her up in the morning any more and she thinks she's starting to get used to this life.

"You gonna squirt us with the hose again?" asks Andy, propping himself up on his elbows.

He sighs when she shrugs and says, "That's up to you." Whether in relief or disappointment she's not certain. But either way, she doesn't have the energy today to be playing or scolding. The sooner they get ready and off for school the better.

Charlie jumps out of bed first, rushing straight downstairs in his pajamas. "I gotta feed the turtle."

Her brain tells her to correct him but her mouth doesn't move. She's tired down to her bones, not helped by restless nights on the couch with the dog, and only has the wherewithal to wave an arm in the smallest boy's direction before she trudges back downstairs. "Johnny, come on. Time to get up!"

"I don't want to! The teacher's a big fat tub!"

It's all Maura can do not to stick out her tongue and blow a wet raspberry. She wants to tell them exactly what she thinks of their schoolboy problems, but decides it would be a very immature and inappropriate thing for a sensible and serious parent to do.

The temptation is still very much there all through breakfast though, and even as the boys are climbing the steps of the school bus. One day she might do it, she thinks. To hell with propriety.

oOo

"Rizzoli boys, come up here!" commands Mrs. Burbridge from behind the desk at the front of the class. She holds up a sheaf of student exam papers. "Miss Pitcannon tells me you don't want to take these tests."

Johnny has his little arms tucked inside the sleeves of his t-shirt, scratching at them and his lower back under his clothes. "I'm itchin' and I wanna go home!"

"You may go stand in the corner until you can talk like a little boy!" she points, unimpressed by the repeated use of his Pee Wee voice. "All of you children are new in this school," she says, addressing the three older boys who stand in a row in front of the desk. "These scores will determine your placement in future classes. You must concentrate..." she sighs before barking at one of the twins. "Andy! Stop that!"

He's trying so hard not to wriggle about but chubby fingers claw at his skin as he moans, "I'm in real bad shape!"

"Nonsense!" the teacher dismisses. "Now, if you concentrate, I'm sure you can control those little bodies." She points at the corner again where the youngest boy stands in timeout. "Johnny, sit!" she orders, pointing now to the first small table at the front of the class. "Is anyone at your home?"

Travis is quick to answer, "Yeah. Our mom is."

"Your mother isn't out at work?" the woman replies with barely concealed contempt.

The boy just nods, the twins copying him as he adds, "Oh yeah, she is. But mom is at home."

Now the shock is accompanied by wide eyes and painted on eyebrows that leap upwards, "She remarried?"

"Mm-hmm," Travis murmurs, not sure why that would be so weird. He happens to think his Ma is really great. "We've got another mother now."

"Well, good," she snaps, slapping he palms down on the desk. "Then I'm calling both your parents!"

oOo

The weary blonde shuffles slowly into the classroom. "Mrs. Burbridge, I'm Maura Rizzoli. What happened?" She sounds dog tired, not just tired but totally... done. With all of it.

Before she'd left the house she'd been able to match the pale blue of the bags under her eyes exactly with the color of the light denim jacket she is wearing. Her appearance is one of many things she finds depressing, despite the form-fitting new clothes she has fashioned for herself and, though this morning she felt like she was getting the hang of things, life just keeps throwing curve balls.

Mrs. Burbridge doesn't stand, just slides her glasses down the end of her nose and peers over them at the blonde. "Well, Mrs. Rizzoli, apparently your children consider themselves above taking the placement tests."

Shaking her head, Maura replies, "I'm sorry. Placement tests?" They already have a place at the school so she isn't really following.

"Yes. They are very valuable in measuring intelligence and potential," the teacher sighs, glancing at each boy in turn, judgment seeping from her pores, before landing on Johnny. "Sit still!" She takes a deep, composing inhale and turns back to Maura. "Your children are a discipline problem."

"I know," Maura concedes sheepishly. "I have had difficulties myself." She looks around at them but focuses on Travis, since he's usually the ringleader in her experience. She tries to make it quiet, but regardless of volume her tone is still accusing, "What did you do now?"

"Oh! They decided to play sick!" Mrs. Burbridge waves dismissively, rolling her eyes. "And not very convincingly. Now, I believe their problems exist because of deficient parental guidance. The children are slovenly, incorrigible and being reared by a mother who clearly isn't concerned about their welfare, but is herself just an overgrown child!"

Her negative opinion of the boys' upbringing is thankfully interrupted by a teaching assistant entering the room. "Excuse me, Mrs. Burbridge?"

"Oh, the test results. Thank you," she replies, standing to meet the other woman at the doorway. With her back to Maura, who is currently distracted by the boys' itchy condition, she doesn't even try to be discreet as she speaks about the blonde behind her back. "I'll look these over as soon as I'm finished with this... woman."

She doesn't see Maura switch into protective mommy mode - rolling up the boys' sleeves, checking their chests and cupping their little rosy cheeks lovingly, her own face one of unprecedented sympathy. "Oh, my God." All four of them are covered in a horrible red rash and though it's still developing in the older boys, little Johnny has the beginnings of oozing yellow blisters on his arms.

She hears Mrs. Burbridge finishing up with her colleague just as righteous indignation gives her the boost of adrenaline she desperately needs.

Jane is on her way up the corridor as the teaching assistant leaves the room. She intends to walk right in, find out what the big deal is, but stops dead when she hears Maura's voice. The deal sounds kinda big if she's honest, but not in the way she was expecting before she got here. Maura's tone is harsh, very Mrs. Fairfield, and the brunette presses herself against the wall just outside the door for a spot of eavesdropping.

"Mrs. Burbridge, would you come over here for a moment?" The blonde has a hand on her hip, patience quickly waning as the teacher plods across the room. "Has it escaped your attention that these – m- my children have head-to-toe poison oak?!"

"Well, no... Yes, but..." she stutters, searching everywhere for an excuse.

"But what?" Maura barks, as she backs the much taller teacher up in her own classroom. "My children are in need of medical assistance! And you can sit here and smugly lecture me on the importance of tests?! Tests which label children's potential - a thing which cannot possibly be measured! Least of all by anally compulsive huns like you!"

She imagines beet red is probably not a good look, but she's on a roll and this is turning out to be an effective form of stress relief, so she takes a breath and keeps going as the teacher falls back into her desk chair. "And my wife may be a large child, but that's none of your business. And my children may be rotten, but they're mine! They're bright and sensitive and creative and kind. So I have no doubts whatsoever about their intelligence! I do, however, have serious doubts about yours!"

The teacher doesn't respond, just opens and closes her mouth like a gawping fish, but Maura's not waiting around for any further discussion.

Jane's grin is luminous as her heart beats double time. She ducks away from the room and out of sight when she hears mad momma Maura bark her final orders like a general.

"Get in the car, boys. Let's go. MOVE!"

They march their little butts one after the other and the blonde catches Andy whispering to Charlie. "She told her off. Ma never did that."

Throwing the woman a look so fierce that less experienced teachers might have spontaneously combusted, Maura stalks out of the room, feeling and walking taller than ever before. "Discipline problem? I don't think so. Good day."

oOo

Maura has taken the boys upstairs in order to treat their condition in relative comfort. Each boy occupies his own bed, now that they've all been bathed or showered. She has another huge laundry pile to get through but it's a small price to pay for making sure the irritating plant oil isn't on their clothes or bedding where it can continue to cause harm.

But she'll deal with that later. Her children are her first concern.

Something about her confrontation with Mrs. Burbridge has changed her, rocked her, made her stronger and softer all at the same time. She swears to herself that if her beautiful boys are scarred as a result of their teacher's willful irresponsibility and neglect there will be hell to pay.

She wonders if this is the first time they've ever had poison oak, wonders how she dealt with it and if she felt this bad for them. It tears her up a little inside that she doesn't remember.

"I can't stop itching!" cries Andy, overacting in his usual style, trying to rub every limb all at once, hopping across his mattress like a jumping bean.

"Well, what do you expect when you roll around in poison oak?" She sits down on the edge of his bed and passes him a new tube of cream. "I want you to do what the doctor said and put it right on the red parts. Okay?" He nods and she sweeps her gaze around the attic space. "Then later we're going to clean up this room because it's a disgrace."

"We like it like a disgrace," Travis snarks, sounding very much like his other mother.

Maura lets it go, but raises an eyebrow when Charlie adds, "Ma lets us do whatever we want!"

"Yeah, well, it's trickling down the stairway." They can argue all they want; she is determined to instill some discipline. She's following her gut mostly, which feels silly, she'd much rather a parenting textbook to tell her what to do and what not to do. But she doesn't have that luxury, and worse she fears this isn't particularly an exact science, and so she wings it, doing what feels right.

Looking around to see how the youngest boy is getting on, she finds him rubbing cream on his face with both hands. She's sat on the edge of his bed in a flash, gently taking his wrists and pulling white caked hands away. "Johnny, don't do that. Don't get that near your eyes, sweetheart." He's surprisingly patient as she wipes his hands clean on his used bath towel. Picking up the tube, she follows the printed instruction with her index finger. "Look, I want you to read this. See what it says? 'Don't get near your eyes.' Read on."

He takes the tube from her and stares at it for several seconds. It's a total surprise when he launches it across the room angrily and promptly dives under the comforter, hiding from view.

"What's this all about?" She looks around to the other boys wide eyed when he doesn't move or give a response.

"He's embarrassed 'cos he can't read," Travis explains simply.

"Well, he's a small child," she replies, as if it's the most obvious thing in the world.

"He can't read for a small child either," he clarifies. "The teacher makes fun of him!"

It's the most caring thing she's heard one sibling say in defense of another. As much as they bicker and tease on a daily basis, he sounds genuinely offended on Johnny's behalf. It makes her heart swell painfully in her chest.

The lump under the covers is still unmoving but she rubs tenderly at what she thinks feels like a leg or an arm anyway. There's a lump in her throat, too, as her heart breaks silently for him. She wills it away, chasing its retreat with a firm swallow, all the while wondering to do next.

She stands as the other three boys finish rubbing in cream and start to settle. "Okay, we'll talk about this later. Try to go to sleep."

oOo

The blonde is slow to arrive downstairs, her mind swirling from the day's events. "Jane!" She finds the brunette in the lounge, rifling through the sideboard drawers.

"Yeah! What is it?"

The brunette was relaxing on the couch last time she checked, having taken a back seat to the poison oak neutralization and after care, but now she has on her jacket as if preparing to leave. "Where are you going?"

"Out. If I could ever find my... Oh, wait." She pats her jacket pocket, finding a bunch of keys buried in the bottom.

"Wait!" Maura grasps her forearm gently. "Not tonight! We have to talk." The word please sticks at the back of her throat, too proud to beg.

Jane isn't subtle when she brushes her off, avoiding eye contact and pulling away briskly. "When I get home. I'm in a hurry."

"Now!" the blonde shouts, earning a look and a sharply arched eyebrow that screams 'excuse me?!'

Jane steps closer, wagging her index finger near Maura's chest, "You know, I let the water routine slide the other day, but let's not push it, okay?"

"I got a little carried away with the hose," she concedes with her palms out. "But this is important."

With a physical change of stance, Jane softens, but only slightly. She's clearly impatient and itching to leave. "Okay, fine. What's on your mind, sugarlips?"

Somehow Jane pushes every one of her buttons without making much effort and her irritation rises by the second. "Stop calling me sugarlips! I have a name. Call me Maura."

Sighing loudly, Jane urges and shucks a thumb over her shoulder, "Get to the point, Maura. I'm busy. The guys are waitin' for me."

"You can't run out every time things get complicated here. The kids are sick!"

Jane throws up her hands, "They got medicated lotion. What do you want me to do?"

"Take on some grown-up responsibility!" Maura snaps.

Stomping a foot, Jane wants to tell the woman to mind her own damn business. "I earn the money. That's a responsibility."

"Are you aware that Johnny can't read?" she continues, pushing the issue further. "That Travis only reads smut magazines? I can't get him out of the bathroom."

"He's thirteen!" Jane yells in response. "I'll build you another bathroom!"

She jabs a finger into Jane's chest, unwilling to permit the woman to make empty, superficial promises that she can neither afford nor find time to keep. "They don't need that! They need guidance from you!"

"Oh-oh-oh! Now, don't you worry about me and my boys, okay? We're pals."

"They have enough pals," Maura jabs again. "They need a parent."

"Hey, hey, hey, look. I decided a long time before you... you and me... We..." Jane clears her throat, covering her faux pas. "We decided a long time ago, before we started this family, we'd raise these kids naturally, not force bullshit rules..." It was mostly true, which made a nice change for the sake of Jane's guilty conscience; it just wasn't Maura who had partaken in that particular agreement.

"I'm not talking about discipline. I'm talking..."

"Stuff you shouldn't be talking about! It's none of your business anyway." Dammit, there it was. She'd already bitten her tongue once but it found its way out.

"My children are none of my business?!" Maura shrieks, shaking her head in disbelief.

Jane sees no option but to run from the disaster that is her home life. But then it is something she is used to and has perfected over the years. She looks at her watch before waving it in Maura's face and rushing out the door. "Look... I have... Now I'm late! Thanks a lot! Appreciate it."

oOo

Creeping in to the house in the early hours, Jane tiptoes through the lounge. She crouches by the sofa and lays a gentle hand on the back of the blonde's shoulder. "Hey, Maura. Are you asleep?"

With her back to her wife, the blonde whines into a pillow, "No. Go away."

"Uh... listen. I'm... I'm sorry," Jane breathes quietly. She keeps rubbing her hand on the blonde's blanket covered body, as if her voice alone isn't enough keep Maura's attention. And why should it? After the horrible things she said. "I'm sorry I came down on you so hard before."

"It's okay." It's not, but Jane's not about to leave her alone to sulk and suffer in peace.

"Just... I don't want you to think I don't appreciate all the work you're doin' in the house and how you're handling the kids and all that, uh... You know, I think you're doin' great. I mean, what you said about me and the boys tonight, uh... I guess you probably... You know, maybe you got a small point there, and I just..." Sighing loudly, she perches on the edge of the couch in the only space available behind Maura's knees.

She's thought about it a lot, thought of nothing else all evening even though it's painful, and decided maybe now's the time to shed more light on their - her - life before the move back to Swampscott. She tugs at the blanket, uncovering Maura's back, but the woman's front is still buried, hidden from view and even though the light is low she needs to do this face to face. "I can't... I can't talk to you while you're turned away. Will you just please lift your head out?"

The woman wriggles, "No. No!"

"Why?" Jane pleads, surprised when Maura does finally sit up in the dim light.

"Because I'm so ugly," she cries, sniffling. Her hair is wild and she's got white creamy patches all over her face. "I got poison oak, too!" she bawls.

Jane turns and kneels on the floor, arms stretching out to take Maura's face in her hands. She strokes a cheek before smoothing down her hair. "Come on, now. Nobody cares what you look like. I mean, I - we - we like the way you look." More serious with every word, she means it when she says, "You're beautiful."

Too close all of a sudden, Jane drops her hands. Changing her mind about their important talk, she gets up to move away. "All right, forget it."

"I don't even have a wedding ring!" Maura continues to cry behind Jane, forcing the woman to spin around.

"What?"

Dropping the blanket, she holds up her empty left hand. It is adorned by nothing but red blotches and white patches. "I must have lost my wedding ring in the sea."

It might be time for Jane to get a checkup given the recent frequency of the chest pains she keeps having. Trust Maura to think of something that tiny and insignificant. She bends, strong arms finding the woman's back and legs. "Okay, come on. Let's go."

Maura flails wildly, "Oh, no. I don't want the hose again!"

Standing back up, Jane explains defensively, "I'm puttin' you in the bedroom. I'll take the couch." Lifting Maura's back and legs again, she continues, "Oh, hey, listen. I've had poison oak a million times. Come on. Up! Up!"

Being lifted so easily makes Maura a little light headed. It's comforting. With an arm around Jane's shoulders, she buries her face into a long neck. Jane's grip might be strong but the blonde clings on the same way Johnny might, like a spider monkey. Her hand finds a straining bicep and she runs her palm over it, thankful for Jane's years of manual work.

Inside the bedroom she thinks the brunette might just throw her across the room, she has little evidence to the contrary, but then Jane places her so gently on the bed it takes her breath away.

The brunette tucks her in, smoothing out the comforter and fluffing the pillows as if she were as precious as one of her children. "You know, I once got poison oak on my bu... back. And, uh... Well, don't you worry. It'll be gone in no time. Lift your head up. That's it. Is that better?"

Jane's voice is the softest Maura has ever heard and the blonde can't tear her eyes away. "Yeah," she whispers.

Jane sits on the bed, one hand resting on Maura's covered knee. "All right?"

"Yes." But then the blonde asks, "Tell me something about my life, about my past. Please. Something not… horrible."

"Uh, okay. Yeah." There's a pause while she chews on her lip, before she curls, leaning on the bed by an elbow. "Well, there was that time, uh... ...when you were, uh... You were working at... yeah, Burger Boy over in Lewisville. And, uh, this kid started choking. Everybody there panicked except for you. You ran over to him and you gave him that Heimlich maneuver, where you... Y'know, and poof! The kid puked up a fry and they named you Burger Boy employee of the month. It was great. I was really proud of you."

Eyes closed and humming low, her head pushing further into the pillow, Maura smiles, "You can be quite charming when you want to be."

Jane shuts her eyes for a moment. There's that pain again. She hates being mean, isn't mean to anyone deliberately under normal circumstances. There's a tiny sliver of something suddenly floating around her bloodstream. Wanting. She wants to be more charming more often. She swallows and ignores it before getting up to leave. "Ah. You just caught me on a bad day. Good night, Maura."

"Good night," the blonde mumbles as Jane looks on from the darkness of the open doorway.