Home.
Jane stared at the screen of her cell phone while she lay above the covers in bed. Maura usually never added any more nor any less when she were letting the detective know she was home safe, but tonight the single word text message seemed so… Distant.
Jane groaned softly in confusion. One minute they are sharing this moment where Jane just knew Maura had felt… There was something there, physically that just… Cicked finally for what had seemed like years of fumbling around what to do with someone so important. Then the next moment Maura is leaving, and she isn't mad, and she hadn't really run, but she had been emotional….and Jane didn't like feeling so helpless seeing her that way. Especially if she were the reason why she felt she needed to leave.
She was, right? That's why Maura left so suddenly… Because of her. Right?
Jane knew her best friend though. She knew that Maura still had a hard time with certain emotions. She knew that if left alone and upset the ME would slip into a near state of paralyzing compulsion, and she knew that Maura didn't like to talk about that, ever.
What's wrong?"
Jane typed and paused a moment before deleting it and resting her phone on her nightstand. She was an impatient person and Maura was a patient one, that among several other stark differences allowed them to find some kind of middle ground with the other. If she were being true to their friendship, and honest with herself she knew that waiting was the best option.
Her confusion was riddled with a guilt she couldn't understand until her arm brushed against her chest after setting her phone aside. Jane closed her eyes and let out a thin breath. Her mind had suddenly filled with its previous positions: Maura's breasts pressed against her own, her legs snaked within hers, her lips. Jane tried to steady her breath but found just like before she seemed helpless to this urge. It burned her abdomen, singed her lungs, but most dangerously filled her with a criminal feeling Jane had so carefully kept set aside for years now.
Jane Rizzoli's being once conflicted with concern favored non-concern for anything but feeding this
Her hand slipped under the elastic of her shorts and her brows knitted at the tension building in her shoulders.
She were tense all over.
Remembering Maura's fingers sliding up her arms caused the detective to exhale quickly.
This was wrong.
Jane sat up suddenly determined to cast the feeling away. Maura was upset, and she was thinking about getting off? Was that disgusting? She felt sick, feverish even… Jane took a deep breath and ran a hand through her tangled hair. "Maura." She cursed not knowing what to do with herself.
A cold shower and maybe a sleep aide, yes, she'd take two.
Two cold showers and two sleep aides.
Maybe in the morning this all would make more sense.
##
"Are you sure? Korsak asked as he and the rest of the room hurried to slip on their blazers and overcoats.
Jane sat at her desk and waved him off. "Yeah, someone's gotta be here to get the call."
"I think she's catching a cold." Frankie nodded as he adjusted his jacket. "The Jane Rizzoli I know would have been first in line."
Korsak nodded in agreement. "She has been pretty quiet this morning."
"She is also sitting right here." Jane rubbed at her cheek. "I didn't sleep well last night, I think the last thing I should be wielding is a semi-automatic pistol don't you think?" They still had so much work to do.
"It might help." Vince offered.
"Not just any semi automatic pistol, Jane." Nina nodded as she came over with her purse and her overcoat draped over her arm. "THE semi-automatic pistol."
Frankie smiled dreamily. "This is how I knew you and I were meant to be."
"Oh please." Nina rolled her eyes but tossed him a sweet look after.
"You guys go." Jane nodded. She never really liked being the center of attention, and right now with the way her friends crowded her desk it made her feel a little caged in.
Korsak waited a moment more before agreeing. "Alright, Officer McKnight from the clerk's office should be calling soon with that information. Once we get the search warrant we can be out of here and down at the docks in less than a half an hour."
Jane nodded and watched Frankie and Nina hurry to make the front of the mass exodus of detectives running for the stairs and elevator. "Ay ay, sir." Jane saluted. Korsak gave her another fond look but soon moved with a speed Jane could only recall seeing when that taco truck parked itself in front of BPD during the summer months. She shook her head in amusement before returning to her computer screen.
She had been trying to prepare herself for the interview with Turner's ex-husband when a call from one of Korsak's CI's came in tipping them off to some recent suspicious activities at the longshoreman's union meetings. There were a few names attached to prior criminal stints that became quite interesting to the team so Jane volunteered to run them through a few databases. If that search warrant came in before lunch maybe they'd be able to find something worthy of a personal residency warrant, or better yet maybe they'd stumble upon some actual evidence. The fact that this guy was working alone seemed less and less likely to her, this could be a lot bigger than they initially realized.
Jane didn't care much for unions. Her Union Rep Sal D'Alisio was a balding man in his late sixties who she supposed failed the political career track and still wanted to do something where he seemed important yet equally sleezy.
That was just her off-the-cuff assessment of him anyway.
Some officers adored him though, would do anything for him, she wondered if murder could be on the list for the longshoreman. With a history of the docks being so colored with organized crime she wouldn't bet on there not being some mob like involvement.
"Start with the obvious track first." Jane reminded herself. The union would be the way to go. They'd need to widen their search to members who maybe paid more than just their dues or even ones who experienced a huge financial crisis recently where the union stepped in and helped them out….
Jane nodded. "Still doesn't explain how personal this all seems…" She mumbled to herself as she worked. The manner in which these women were handled spoke differently to the group theory. Forensically one perpetrator inflicted those wounds…
She became so engulfed with her theories that she hadn't even been alerted by her normal cues that Maura was not very far away. She didn't hear her heels on the marble in the hall before the elevator, didn't smell her perfume, didn't sense her a mere foot away watching her work for a few seconds before placing a coffee cup down at her desk.
Jane only really realized she wasn't alone anymore when the oh-so alluring aroma of freshly ground coffee hit her nostrils. Somewhat startled she examined the coffee cup that had somehow just appeared on her desk. It was from Boston Joe's, a large, and it had the words. "I'm sorry." Written in red Sharpe marker on the side where her name usually hung.
Maura's handwriting.
Jane looked up quickly and there she was, clad in her red coat and leather gloves having just stepped into the office herself, Her hair was up in a professional bun today, and Jane didn't need to know the scientific name for the well foundationed bags under her eyes to know the other woman hadn't slept a wink either.
She was still probably the most beautiful woman in the world…maybe number two in this state of fatigue Jane supposed.
"Hey…" The detective sat back in her chair, she couldn't read the look on her friends face which made her cautious.
"May I sit?" Maura motioned a gloved hand to the chair that often sat beside a detective's desk.
"Yeah, yeah." Jane jumped to move the stacks of envelopes and the coat that she had carelessly tossed there when she got in three hours ago. When it was cleared Maura sat down, placed her own coffee cup beside Jane's and carefully removed her gloves. Jane frowned at how the doctor chose to expend her energy: carefully, methodically, whatever she was going to say she rehearsed over and over.
"Where is everyone?" The ME asked suddenly very aware that they were the single two people in the entire office.
Jane looked around them noticing it too. "Oh that shooting range down the block just got in a couple Desert Eagles…"
Maura seemed confused. "I didn't know Hank's cared much for endangered species."
Jane raised a brow. "It's a gun, Maura."
"Is it?"
"Yes. Big gun."
"Oh…." She nodded acutely as if storing the information away for later reference. "That makes sense."
They smiled gently at one another before Jane rested her left elbow on her desk and leaned forward some. "What's goin' on, Maur?" Her tone was hushed but she couldn't wait anymore. "What happened last night?"
Maura touched her arm and sighed. "I owe you an apology."
Jane glanced at her hand on her forearm before Maura quickly moved it back to her lap. Jane tried to change her expression. She wasn't sure what Maura had seen just then but she knew it wouldn't be productive now. "Alright well… Why don't you tell me about it."
"It's… Hard to explain, Jane and…" Jane waited for her to find her words. "And I'm embarrassed, and upset at myself, enraged at myself actually… " She stopped and exhaled slowly. "I had a wonderful time last night. When we…Kissed I… Realized just how…." She bit her lip. "Frightened I was of us making a mistake because it felt…" She smiled sadly at her friend and touched her own chest where her heart was. Jane's eyes softened. "Lovely." She breathed.
"I felt that too."
"You did?"
Jane smiled a little. "Yeah…" Maura blinked, a moment of relief washing over her. "You know you can tell me anything, Maura." Jane reminded. "I'm still me." She adjusted herself in her seat. "I didn't like seeing you cry…I thought that maybe I did something…y'know, physically wrong."
"No." she quickly shook her head. "Jane everything you did was perfect…"
Jane blushed some but adjusted her features to remain concerned. "You still left."
Maura nodded and nervously fingered the material of her gloves a moment before letting them go with effort. "When I got home I tried to think of how I was feeling, with you, and I tried to manufacture some kind of righteous explanation. I even wanted to blame you for… Making me feel so….Important, and I know that sounds ridiculous, immature even." She shook her head at herself. "…After I meditated… I came to the conclusion, Jane, that I got scared." She waited. "The prospect of true intimacy has.." Maura looked away and began absently playing with her gloves again "Seldom been a theme." She needed Jane to understand her fears, they had promised each other honesty and if she didn't say this now she wasn't sure she ever would. Maura looked back over to her best friend. "I don't know what it looks like, or how it feels and… I got scared that I may not be.. wired properly for it."
Jane's face fell. "Wired?—Maura…eh—"
"—That's why I left. Do you understand it?"
Jane looked a mixture of emotions. She regarded the floor briefly as she tried to see what Maura saw. The evidence had all been there though, overwhelmingly so. "But…" She looked up at her friend and let up a soft smile. "You held me back."
Maura's face wrinkled. "I beg your pardon?"
"You held me back Maura, and you didn't shut down or your robot batteries didn't surge out or anything." The ME chuckled softly. "You held me back okay? You're more than capable." She nodded. "and if it's something that maybe we figure out together then that's what we do because I'm gonna give you a bit of a shocker, I'm not really good at having people this close to me either—"
"Oh Jane, you hav—"
"Not like you." The detective stopped her firmly. They openly stared at one another for a moment before Maura nodded.
"I hope you'll let me grovel accordingly." She dipped her chin.
Jane smiled softly, a touch of that firmness still in her eyes. "The coffee is good enough."
"There is still so much that I felt that I don't know how to say." The doctor admitted a little frustrated at the whole ordeal as she sat back in her chair. "I've even looked up scientific studies on neglect in children—"
Jane waved a hand out. "Alright you are no longer aloud to own a computer outside of work."
Maura softened. "I despise not understanding something. Especially myself."
Jane nodded sympathetically. "I know."
"Hormonally speaking—"
"Maura."
She smiled apologetically. "Together?"
Jane nodded slowly. "Together."
Just then a call came in that Jane had to grab. Maura watched her professionally take down some information and ask a few follow up questions. She tilted her head at her friend. Just seeing Jane today made her feel happy, more grounded. She was able to think clearly. For a long time it had always been the opposite, where her solitude grounded her. Even now the warmness she felt throughout probably had little do with her body simply metabolizing her well balanced breakfast of macronutrients like she originally imagined. It was Jane. "Unexpected surges in Dopamine and the tapering down of Serotonin, of course.…" She realized with a soft smile. A neurotrophin called Nerve Growth Factor accompanied all this euphoria last night and increased her emotional dependency to a level that Maura was not expecting whatsoever. She'd never been emotionally dependent on anything, not really….
Jane furrowed a brow having just hung up from the call. "What?"
"When I see you." She offered thoughtfully.
Jane touched her knee. "All I'm saying is work on it, I don't think Hallmark is gonna understand that one."
Maura laughed and Jane smiled.
"We okay?" The detective finally asked with raised brows and big soulful brown eyes that Maura couldn't refuse.
"Yes." She reached out for her hand and squeezed it. "Thank you, Jane."
Jane smiled easily. "We'll figure it all out." She reassured softly. "Okay?"
Maura nodded. "Together."
"Without Google." She said slowly as if speaking to a small child.
Maura laughed again. "Yes, yes okay."
Jane squeezed her knee affectionately and was about to say something when her phone rang again. She sighed and went to reach for it. "Rizzoli, Homicide…Officer McKnight…. Fine Sir. Yeah….Mhm…Perfect, yeah, I'll print it now… Hey thanks a bunch alright?" Jane hung up and jumped out of her seat startling Maura.
"What is it?"
"Warrant came through, Gotta go get the guys." Maura stood and they embraced quickly. "But first I'm gonna go shoot a really big gun." Maura only shook her head with a small laugh as Jane hurriedly put on her blazer and grabbed her coat. "I'll call you later." She pointed at Maura with her car keys as she strode out the door.
Maura didn't see Jane again until late evening. It had been a full day for the Chief Medical Examiner once again, she intended to show some budgetary spreadsheets to Kent but there was a small chemical fire started by one of her newest techs and the paper work to match. A young woman passed away waiting for an organ donor, an older man with a failing kidney. A friend of hers from medical school had called during lunch with a challenging case in Denmark where he lived, and Maura had just finished reviewing and signing a stack of death certificates when the lean object of her floating thoughts announced her presence with a small sigh.
Maura looked up from her desk and smiled at Jane's slow movements to the seafoam couch before plopping herself down on it and yawning. "You've been favoring your left knee still." She went back to start an email.
"You should see the other guy." Jane joked in a distracted grumble; Frankie's face had yet to heal back completely from their basketball scuffle. The tall woman slouched deeply into the couch and stared blankly at the masks of death on Maura's walls. The consistent humming from the large refrigeration units and the small yet insistent ticks of Maura typing an email were quite comforting. Jane's eyelids began to grow heavy but she fought them. "Are we going to see any results from that dirt sample Nina brought down on your super-secret ladies lunch?"
Maura hit send and looked around her laptop at Jane and her legs sprawled out from underneath her. "You should wear a compression brace, so the tissue heals properly." Jane nodded. "The results should be in over the weekend."
"Hm, oh right, it's Friday night."
Maura stood and organized the death certificates on her desk into a envelope and then into a delivery parceled package. "Do you have any plans?"
Jane sat up some in her seat and pressed her palms along her lap, letting them run to her knees. "Was going to ask you the same thing." Maura looked at her. "Wanna get a drink?"
"At The Dirty Robber?"
Jane hesitated. "Um… No." It was Friday night and her mother was surely working. "I was thinking more like Dailey's…or somewhere, y'know…not The Robber." She sat up even straighter now.
Maura only blinked. "Okay."
"Yeah?" Jane hurried to stand as if slouching much longer would change Maura's mind.
"Sure." She smiled.
Dailey's Pub was the highest of high class pubs in the area. Cop bar nor Fire hide out, the bar itself had remained neutral ground for generations of emergency response teams. Rumor had it that Timothy Dailey himself had had a few run ins with the Irish mob and that's why the establishment never really gained a more… uniformed following but who ever knew if that were the case or not. Regardless the place was pretty nice: original tall and round leather booths hugged the perimeter allowing for the feel of seclusion, menus though garnished with pub staples were bound on an impressive slab of leather. Nothing was served in its bottle, and their napkins were actually some (albeit starchy) sort of cloth.
It was the nicest place Jane could think of that wouldn't break the bank before an expensive trip like New York. Hell at one point it was the nicest place Jane could think of at all.
They sat in one of the smaller booths elevated by a small step and tucked away into a corner of the dining room. It was busy and that was good because as Maura sipped her wine and people watched Jane was able to think of what she wanted to say next. They were both tired, that she knew, and the idea of them sitting out on a Friday night not talking to one another and tired almost made her want to laugh.
"It's nice here." Maura turned back to Jane to rest her Cabernet down.
"You like it?" Jane asked motioning to the polished wooden tables and dim-ish lighting. "Not exactly Per Se."
"I'm glad you mentioned it."
Jane reached for her tall glass of amber colored beer. "It's a nice spot to um…y'know hear someone." She rolled her eyes at herself and Maura smiled fondly.
"You're gwtting old, are you?"
Jane smiled back. "These kids these days, y'know?" She leaned forward some. "Frankie and I had a witness we needed to follow up on a few weeks back—you were in France still—and he's in this new bar with a live DJ and seasonal cocktails—" Maura was laughing. "The place could have easily been misplaced for a strip club, Maur, and we couldn't hear a damn thing he was saying. Good thing Frankie was able to read lips, I walked out of there with zero statement and a headache to match." She took a sip of her beer and looked around as Maura had just been. "It is kinda nice…" Maybe they could come here again.
"Do you know that I have never been to a strip club."
Jane stared at her for a second. "What?"
"Nope, never."
"What about that body we found a year ago behind Mermaids?"
"Well Jane I never went inside, it was also four in the afternoon when the victim was discovered." She reached for her water glass suddenly surprised by the wine that wasn't in her glass anymore.
The detective rolled her eyes and reached for her beer again. "That doesn't mean a thing, you have your early girls—"
"Oh you know a lot about this topic?"
Jane shrugged. "I worked Vice before Homicide, Maura, I've seen some things."
Amused by the turn in conversation Maura leaned forward dramatically. "Tell me about the early woman."
"Girls." Jane corrected.
"I don't see how making them prepubescent makes it any better."
"It's just what they're call—never mind." Jane shook her head with a small laugh. "How about this, I'll do you one better. Put it on the list, I'll take you to one in New York."
"Oh we shouldn—"
"Why not?" Jane grinned loving the way Maura's brows knitted in both intrigue and worry. "No one knows us there, it'll be fun."
"….I have always wondered how the process works."
Jane's grin fell. "The process, Maura? Really?"
"Of being discovered." She explained factually.
Jane rolled her eyes. "Take it easy. I'm not bringing you to get a job."
Maura waved her off. "Trust me I have my hands full with my current state of employment. I've just always been curious of the breakdown of society in an environment where usually taboo lifestyles are celebrated. From an anthropological stand point gender and sex are policed heavily, where the patriarchal male is both the victim and the savior." She took another sip of water. "I'd love to be a fly on the wall. Unequivocally th—"
"So it's settled." Jane interrupted. "We put Tasha to bed, and then we check one out." Jane raised her glass. "An hour tops though, those places are really…rough. Even for you Dr. Goodall."
Maura clinked their glasses together. "How exciting!"
Jane laughed. "What the hell am I getting myself into?"
"Jane I can't go alone, would you rather me go alone?"
Jane shook her head as she sipped her beer. "Yeah no, you can't go in there by yourself." She snorted. "You'd either wind up running the place or get stolen or something."
"What do you think my stripper name would be?"
Jane sighed and took a moment to think. "What's this called?" She pointed to the flat area just above her nose between her eyes.
Maura tilted her head. "Your glabella." Obviously.
"That." Jane grinned and began to chuckle as Maura seemed disappointed in her selection. "It's either that or Poindexter."
"I don't care for either."
Jane shrugged. "Well let's talk about something else." Maura laughed and agreed. For about a half hour they talked about their days. Maura noted that Jane took particular interest in her conversations with others today, usually it remained solely on the police work and the forensics, but the detective asked questions about her thoughts on interactions, if she thought she were understood, if the other person were in a good mood. It wasn't unlike her to fall into the nature of her work while living her everyday life. Still the ME always found it interesting where Jane's line of questioning would end, maybe even a little revealing. A small lull hit them when they both ordered a second drink and some more water.
Jane cleared her throat carefully as she looked at the menu before her she had grabbed when their glasses were taken away. "You hungry?" Maura shook her head in the negative. Jane tossed her a warning look. "If I order fries you can't have any."
"What kind of thing is that to say to your best friend?"
The raven haired woman continued to read the menu. "I don't even know why I bother, you always take some anyway." Jane decided she'd order the nachos. They sounded really good and The Robber didn't have nachos. Another small quiet hit the table then. Maura watched Jane thoughtfully and the detective raised a soft brow in silent question when she decided to notice it.
"Why didn't you want to go to The Dirty Robber?" Maura finally asked.
Jane shrugged softly and looked around at their new surroundings before looking back at her. "Wanted to make a little time… y'know away from everything." She knew that her immediate future would probably be filled with a lot of late nights at the precinct and secretly hoped the private setting would give them an opportunity to talk about last night, really talk... "We got some good leads but y'know the longer this unsub or group of unsubs goes un-arrested the colder the case gets."
"You've always been anxious over that." Maura pointed out.
"What?"
"The notion of a case growing cold."
Jane nodded thoughtfully. "Time really screws with evidence, people get comfortable in their lies, they protect them…" She rolled her shoulders. "Three is enough for me."
Maura sat back into the booth gently and regarded Jane then, she really was beautiful, but at moments like this, when her thoughts ran down a path of case related possibilities her face almost seemed vexed handsome, fierce and powerful all in one. "Only three?"
Jane nodded. "You know them."
"I do." They almost felt like hers too. A near decade of professional collaboration would forever link them, at least to the Medical Examiner's Office and the BPD Homicide Unit. At that moment the waitress arrived to place their drinks down. Jane ordered the platter of nachos and Maura took a sip of her wine and waited as the rich flavors of organic earth and spice blended together and the tannin gripped her gums tightly before letting them loose. "Jane?"
Jane was wiping the beer foam from her mouth with the back of her palm. Her face still vexed in thought. "Yeah, Maur?"
"Last night…"
Jane nodded. "…Yeah."
"I liked it." She waited for Jane to fully look at her. "A lot."
Jane let out a small breath of air as a corner of her mouth twitching upward in what eventually would be a smirk or a smile but the detective stopped it before it got any bigger. "I did too." She rested her beer down on the table. "A lot."
Maura could feel her ears burn, but there was a seriousness to their tones that she couldn't let lie for the flighty feeling of such an intimate confession. The two stared at one another a moment more before Maura tilted her head slightly. "You aren't mad that I left." She read.
Jane shook her head. "I could never be mad at you for that, Maura."
"Where do I categorize this look then?" She motioned to Jane's face.
"I'm just thinking of how it would have been if you stayed, we could have talked…" She shook her head and cupped the base of her beer with both hands as if to anchor herself. "I didn't like feeling worried like that."
Maura looked momentarily distressed but then just plain old sad. She reached for Jane's hands cupping her beer. "I am sorry."
Jane knew it. She knew it from the moment she saw Maura's face this morning. This wasn't about getting an apology, she didn't need one, she understood her best friend more than the other woman probably gave her credit for. This was about sharing how she felt. "If you want your space then I get it, but you gotta tell me that." She smiled a little to ease the lines of worry Maura wore. "I'm not a mind reader… and I was kinda…y'know thinking about other things at the time."
Maura let out a small breath of air but smiled back at her. "Of course." She nodded. "I can do that." The blonde took her hands away but was surprised when Jane caught one.
"If we each don't freak out at least three more times I'd be worried." They laughed lightly about it, their fingers lacing above the table. "Plus Maura…" Jane's features softened "I-I like the way you're wired."
"—Alright we've got some nachos." The two were interrupted by their waitress coming over and waiting for them to unlink their hands before placing a large platter of sizzling nachos down in between them.. "Here you go."
Jane was already reaching for the nachos and Maura smiled for her and thanked the waitress before looking back at the woman who had just made her heart enter a momentary bout of premature ventricular contractions. "Jane use a napkin at least." The ME smiled lovingly at her because how could you not?
Maura found that the woman groaning happily across from her as she fought with a string of melted cheese was a woman she felt most exposed with, a woman who currently could give a damn about her accolades and all the tools Maura strategically set up to essentially isolate herself in the past, a woman who made her body hum with this sort of revival, and who made her orderly and easily discernable world now seem a kaleidoscope of colors and shapes.
Simply put, Jane thrilled her.
In ways Maura supposed she never imagined she'd even appreciate.
It scared her something awful, but the pathologist couldn't retreat like she had Thursday night. There was no reason to when you had the foundation they had. She saw that now.
"Maura these are so good, you gotta try 'em."
Maura smiled at her in a way that exposed her dimples before leaning forward and searching for a manageable piece among the glops of melted cheese and beans. "Perhaps we need a fork?" She looked up at Jane.
"A fork? C'mon Maura, you don't eat nachos with a fork!" They indulged happily in the booth; ordering a small side of greens and one more round of drinks before deciding to call it a night and head out.
Jane smiled to herself at how Maura linked their arms together shortly after exiting Dailey's for the cold nights air. "Shit it's cold." She chuckled as she pulled Maura little closer before rubbing her own exposed hands together. "What is this?"
Maura nodded, her cheeks flush from the wine and sudden chill. "Tasha mentioned it may in fact snow when we get in."
Jane dipped the hand that wasn't linked with Maura's into her coat pocket and located her keys. "Let me drive you home."
The shorter woman smiled with her eyes before reaching forward to grab Jane's car keys. "As long as you let me open the door for you."
Jane let out a small laugh before letting go of the keys. "Alright, you remember where I parked?"
Maura's smile dropped as she looked around cutely. "No."
"Guess we have to walk…" She joked.
Maura motioned to her heels incredulously. "Jane."
"I didn't tell you to wear—" There was a strong vibrating sensation coming from her pocket. "—Hold on." Maura scanned the street as Jane pulled out her cell phone and frowned. "It's Frankie."
"Answer it."
Jane nodded before hitting a button and bringing the phone to her ear. The unmistakable sound of Friday night at the The Dirty Robber filled the background. Jane smiled fondly at the familiar hooting and hollering, someone had put on Danny Boy in the background… With a glance at Maura on her arm Jane wondered what it would be like to be there together, like this.
"Hey Frankie."
"Hey Janie!" He had already had a couple beers. "You coming by or what?"
Jane chuckled. "Nah, I um," She glanced at Maura again. "Maura and I went somewhere else."
"You better not let Korsak hear that." He warned.
Jane motioned Maura with her chin up the block to signal that she had parked not too far away. The two began to walk. "I won't say anything if you don't."
"What are brother's for?"
"Blaming things on when you break something?" Frankie laughed with his gut. It made Jane smile. "You call me just to update your GPS or something?" She teased.
"Nah listen look, Ma lost her phone—"
Jane stopped walking and glanced at Maura."—How'd she lose her phone?"
"I dunno, I keep asking her and she says she just lost it."
"Where?"
"I dunno!"
"Well what? Was she trying to call me or something?"
"She needs a ride home, she's all done for the night here and uh.. I can't give her a ride."
Jane shook her head. "and why not?"
"Because Nina and I are heading the other way back home, and nothing kills the mood more than your mother reminding you to floss and pick up after yourself."
"Gross."
"You gotta do me this favor."
"All I do is do you favors."
Frankie laughed. "C'mon Janie please, with this case y'know we haven't really had much time away to y'know—"
"Double gross, Frankie geez, fine just stop talking alright?"
"So you'll come pick her up?" He frowned. "Were you and Maura—"
"We're just leaving, yeah it's no problem, just tell her to be ready outside."
"You know you're the best right?"
Jane nodded. "Yeah I know." She shook her head as she hung up and looked to her side at Maura who was waiting patiently for an explanation. "We gotta pick Ma up."
"Oh, Angela, is she okay?"
"Yeah she lost her phone or something. I guess Ron is working and Frankie is well… Trying to get laid." Jane said distractedly as she slipped her phone back into her coat. "You don't mind right?"
Maura smiled. "Absolutely not." She patted Jane's arm, the one she had her own arm wrapped around. "I wonder if she would like to go with me tomorrow morning to look at spring potentials for the garden." They continued walking. "I would ask you if you'd like to accompany me but—"
"You know better?"
"Yes well I'd rather not have to deal with you complaining the whole time."
Jane grinned. "Why don't you just date my mother?" She tossed.
Maura made an amused noise. "I don't think she'd have much patience for my closet organization."
"And I would?"
"Well you'd never go in it seeing as how you keep your clothes in garbage bags."
Jane only smirked. "Point taken."
When they got to Jane's car the detective laughed and then smiled sweetly at Maura as the ME made a grand show of opening the driver's side door for her before closing it and then running around to the passenger's seat so she could give Jane the keys to actually start the vehicle.
The trip to The Robber wasn't a long one by distance but the area had hipped up quite a bit over the past few years, and it was after all Friday night. Every other block Jane was stopping for droves of twenty somethings dashing in groups across the street in articles of clothing way to revealing or tight to be helpful in this weather. By the time they rounded the corner and Jane spotted her mother on the corner outside of The Robber talking to a group of younger off-duty cops who were smoking cigarettes: Jane's patience for driving had worn thin.
"C'mon Ma." Jane looked over at Maura, "Does she have to talk to everyone she sees?"
"Your mother is outgoing, jane."
"Yeah well she needs to be outgoing to get a cab, or outlooking for her cell phone—"
"The first one was funnier."
Jane stared at the soft smirk on Maura's relaxed features. "Oh yeah? You're criticizing my jokes while you fall asleep?" It was cute.
Maura readjusted herself and blinked rapidly a few times. "I'm not falling asleep."
Jane only smiled. She so was. Maura didn't even realize how she was leaning against the passenger side door and taking even longer more steadied breaths did she? The ME had also stopped talking about the weather and her metrology suspicions on global warming five minutes ago. "You are." There was no way she could fight this.
"I am not."
"What's the square root of seven hundred thirty-three?"
The ME blinked once before locking her jaw in an effort to concentrate. "…Twenty seven." She decided.
"You're lucky I can't check that." Jane unbuckled her seat belt and lowered her window before sticking her head out. "Ma!" Angela spotted them for the second time and waved before taking the cigarette out from between a younger officer's fingers and stamping it to the concrete. She pointed at the other two smoking officers and Jane watched only mildly impressed as they stamped theirs out soon after. Her mother could get a grizzly bear to consider becoming vegan in a salmon drought.
It was her gift.
"Hi honey!" Angela waved again as she started toward the car.
Jane lifted a hand limply in a small wave back. "Hi Ma, yes I see you." She smiled then. Her mother looked nice in her grey button-down shirt and simple black jeans, there was this little twinkle in her eyes Jane could always remember feeling special under that particular gaze as a kid. The small white strips above her eye from the car accident had been removed but when the other woman stepped under a bright street lamp Jane could just make out the scar that had settled there. With a small sigh at herself and a handful of guilt Jane glanced at a dozed off Maura before getting out of the car to help her mother with the small paper take-out bag in her hand.
"Hi, Ma."
"Oh thank you." Angela smiled as her daughter took the doggie bag away from her. "That's for you, we had all these onions rings left over after my shift." She explained as she went to the back seat of the car and opened the door.
Jane grinned. "Nice." She got back into the driver's seat and put the bag on Maura's lap who jumped a little out of her half sleep.
"Oh." The blonde wrinkled her nose at the smell of fried onion and grease already clinging to her clothes. She moved it to her floor of the car beside her purse before turning and smiling sleepily. "Hello Angela."
Angela buckled her seatbelt and rested a motherly hand on jane's shoulder as she sat up in the back seat. "Maura honey, were you just sleeping?"
"I'm afraid I—"
"No."
Maura cut a look at Jane who had interrupted her. "I was resting." The ME clarified before looking back to Angela. "Frankie tells us you lost your phone. I have some lovely memory recovery exercises we can look into when we get home, you know it's imperative to have a bit of cognitive relapse as close to the initial realization of missing the lost artifact as possible. Where did you last see it?"
Angela removed her hand from Jane's shoulder and motioned to her stitches. "I think I may have lost a few marbles with this thing too." She joked.
Maura examined her face. "All your scans came back clean."
"It's a figure of speech, honey." Angela waved her off. "One minute I have it and I'm texting Ron—Have you kids heard of sexting?"
"Ma!" Jane all but shouted from the front seat as she maneuvered the car back through the crowds of Friday night thrill seekers.
Angela waved her off too. "Anyway I had it, then poof! Gone, nowhere to be found."
"Where did you…sext last?"
"Maura." Jane growled.
Maura's smile was teasing. "If it helps to jog her memory Jane—"
"Okay new rule. While I'm driving, no one talks about sexting." Jane kept her eyes on the road while her mother and Maura grinned at one another. "At all, in any language." She glanced at Maura. "That includes nerdling."
Maura looked back over her seat. "Where did you have it last?"
"At the hospital."
"What were you doing at the hospital, Ma?"
Angela rolled her eyes. "My boyfriend is a doctor, Jane."
"Wait a minute you were sexting him while he was at work?" Jane furrowed her brows. "Isn't that like… not okay?"
Angela threw her hands up. "When else I supposed to do it!?"
"He's a doctor Ma, not an accountant."
"I thought you didn't want to talk about sexting, although I don't know why, you've been all bent out of shape lately, it may do you some good. To find someone to sext." She looked back at Maura. "What was it? chronic agitation?"
Maura nodded. "Hardly depression."
Jane sighed heavily. "…Forget I said anything."
"We can swing by tomorrow morning." Maura nodded. "Although I do admit my accompaniment comes at a price."
Angela nodded. "Name it, Doc. I had pictures of baby TJ on there, or in the cloud, or wherever."
"I want to think of some new inspirations for the garden, it's still a little too cold, but there must be some lovely arrangements at the nursery now."
"Perfect, I was wondering when we would tackle it."
Maura nodded. "How is your fern doing?"
"The ice cubes helped, you were right."
Jane drove on tuning the other women out and focusing on the road. It was a lovely night despite the almost sinister chill in the air. There wasn't really a cloud in the sky, and the moon shown down on the city with an amazingly pale guidance. When she finally pulled up to the Maura's front door she turned to look at probably the two most important women in her life and smiled some. Maura had yet to turn in her seat to face forward and they were debating the rationality behind daises.
"Alright ladies, this is your stop." She announced in fear that they wouldn't even notice the car was stopped and she'd be required to sit here all night.
Angela jumped at this. "Oh good, I've got to pee so bad." She leaned forward and placed a motherly kiss on Jane's cheek
"Agh, Ma, c'mon."
"I made you, I can kiss you." She reasoned before ruffling her hair some too. "Thanks for the lift, Hon'."
Jane swatted her away. "Thanks for the onion rings."
Angela turned to begin getting out of the car leaving Jane and Maura to look at one another.
"You won't come in?" Maura asked.
Jane shrugged once. "I'm tired, Maura."
Maura nodded quickly. "Of course."
"I'll see you tomorrow though? For baseball?"
Maura blinked. Right, that thing they did together most Saturdays. She'd need to find a good book… "Right."
Jane leaned forward some with her left hand on the steering wheel for support. "Ma's waiting for you." She murmured with a small smirk when Maura leaned forward a little too.
Maura looked over her shoulder and chuckled at Angela standing under the front door light searching her bag vigorously for her keys while jigging from foot to foot. "I'd better go then." She leaned forward some more and surprised Jane with a soft kiss on the cheek, it was the kind that lingered and borderlined a nuzzle. It was a sweet gesture that left Jane smiling stupidly as she watched Maura reach down and grab her purse and the take-out bag.
"Whoa whoa whoa, hold up, those are mine." She had alsmot missed it.
"It's far too late to be eating these, Jane." Maura dismissed as she got out of the car.
Jane frowned. "I'm hungry though." She looked through the passenger side window which had been rolled down with a pout.
"Impossible, you just had nachos."
Jane's pout toppled over to one side of her face. "I'm still growing?"
Maura shook her head. "Your autopsy is going to be extremely long, and tedious." She tossed the bag back into the passenger seat of the car.
Jane chuckled. "Because of all the deliciousness I eat?"
Maura leaned against the window some. "One could put it that way." Jane chuckled and moved the bag of onion rings to her lap in fear that Maura would try and take them away again through the window. Instead the pathologist smiled. "Goodnight, Jane."
Jane wanted to find a reason to stay all of a sudden but knew Maura would see right through it. "Night, Maur…" She took her hands off the wheel. "You should call me… y'know if you can't sleep."
"May I?"
Jane nodded quickly. "Yeah. Of course." They exchanged shy little waves and Jane waited to ensure everyone was inside the house safely before reaching one hand into the greasy bag of onion rings and steering the car back onto the street with the other.