A/N: Pyrite doesn't need more works in its universe, but I keep adding them LOL. Have some parenting fluff and laryngological theory!
Maura Rizzoli stared through her reading glasses at her iMac screen at 6:45PM on a late September evening. Elena had started school again, and so rather than finishing her report in the lavish confines of her basement crime lab, she worked on it in her home office.
The homicide victim, Mallory Stevens, had died as a result of catastrophic trauma to her trachea. Her hyoid was crushed in what must have been a brutal strangling by someone nearly twice her size. She was 5'2" 105 pounds, and so very young. 25 years old. She was a master's student in the journalism program at Boston Cambridge University, and she should have lived a much longer life than she did.
And Jane Rizzoli was still at BPD Headquarters, trying to figure out who snuffed that life out.
There were parts of Maura that longed for the days before they were parents, and she and Jane could stay at work late into the night together, helping each other on homicides such as this from only a few floors away, not miles. But, with Elena, they took shifts - there were times that Maura would be elbow deep in a chest cavity well into the night, and there were weeks that Jane wouldn't come home for two or three days in a row, except for a shower and quick change of clothes, in order to keep her immaculate close rate. So, during those times, they helped each other, one watching their daughter at home, the other working unbothered, so that all three of them could have as normal of a life as possible.
There were other parts of her that far preferred this life to the one they had before, however. Those parts were the mother, the wife, in her, that made her fiercely protective of their little bubble of normalcy. Somehow, despite their crazy jobs and Elena's chock-full schedule, the Rizzolis made it work - and the chaos was sweet, fulfilling.
Even the suspicion she felt at the suddenly quiet room down the hall filled her with good humor, rather than dread. Elena had been watching highlights, as she often did, but now, the shortage of announcers screaming some variation of "swing and a drive!" signalled that she was up to something. It could be as innocuous as deciding to put in headphones, or as sinister as sneaking down into the kitchen for some of the girl scout cookies she knew she wasn't supposed to have after dinner.
It ended up being neither. "Mom," Elena said, standing in the doorway to the office that had been the guest room once before. She held a giant paperback textbook in her hands and waited for Maura to acknowledge her.
"Yes, my love," Maura answered distractedly, smirking behind the screen of her computer as she typed away about trace evidence found in Mallory's teeth. She sat with one foot tucked under her thigh and the other dangling just above the glass floor protector under her chair. They mirrored each other in a way, Maura barefoot in black yoga pants and a dark gray oversized sweater, Elena in black sweats and a heather-colored Celtics hoodie.
"I know what I want to do next." Elena walked in and sat on the sofa at the far end of the room, a place where both Maura and Jane had napped during particularly strenuous work-from-home experiences.
"Oh yeah? What's that?" Maura was intrigued. She saved her progress and got up to join her daughter on the couch. They sat close, Maura with one arm over the back, and Elena moving in to tuck herself against Maura's now open side.
She placed the book half in her own lap and half in her mother's and pointed to the 804th page. "This."
"Hmm," Maura began, bringing her arm down to wrap around Elena's shoulders. "The larynx. A fascinating structure. May I ask why?"
"It came to me while I was watching Blue Jays highlights," Elena explained, and Maura giggled a little bit at the statement. She sounded more like she was seventeen than seven.
"Is that so?" Maura asked her, all ears.
"Yeah. Ok so, you know how Buck Martinez sounds like there's something bouncing around in his throat?" Elena explained.
"No, but I suppose that's an apt way of putting it," Maura goaded.
"And how Vin Scully kind of sounds like the way peanut butter feels?"
Maura laughed again. "Yes. Very smooth."
"Why do they sound different?" Elena asked, "why does Ma sound like she swallowed rocks when she gets up in the morning?"
Maura bit her lower lip and lowered her head to smell the crown of Elena's head. "You're just like her, you know. Your brain makes connections between seemingly disparate threads at an alarming speed for someone your age. That's all it took? Listening to Buck Martinez wax poetic about home runs?"
"What's disparate?" Elena asked in return, and Maura could only shake her head in disbelief.
Of course raising a tiny version of Jane's mind within the environment of her own academic access and intellectual prowess created a supercomputer of a child. She felt no small amount of smug pride. It made her smile into Elena's hair. "Well, you're on the right track. Anatomically, I mean. The larynx is definitely part of why people's voices are so different from each other."
"So we can do it?" Elena looked up then, catching Maura's eyes with her own, a mischievous glint in both sets.
Maura nodded. "We can. I'll have Nanna bring you to the office tomorrow and then you and I will go to BCU after I finish my workday. There's a new cadaver in the department that I'll be using for my bio 202 class. And I promise to explain the best I can."
"Yes!" exclaimed Elena, shutting her Grant's Atlas of Anatomy with a flourish.
"I'm glad you're excited," Maura said genuinely. "Now, we should call Mamma before bedtime. I don't think she's going to be home for awhile."
Maura smirked at Elena's swinging legs in her rearview mirror. She constantly sought proprioceptive input in this way, especially in cars, but usually whenever, wherever she was seated. Maura steered the Q7 into the staff parking lot closest to the Anatomy and Physiology building at BCU's main campus, fluorescent lights flickering on in the orange glow of early evening, and many of the professors with morning classes pulling their cars out towards the main drag.
Maura was still dressed for work: a sleeveless, crepe couture Valentino dress with a black, heavy lace skirt. The white top of it contrasted starkly with the murky bottom, and when she shrugged on the black blazer she had left hanging in the back seat, needed now for the cool fall sunset, she smoothed her hair in the window. Then, she took regal steps in black Zanotti heels toward the passenger side, and opened the back door for Elena to step out.
Elena was still dressed for school: short brown boots she had already scuffed from rough play on the blacktop, dark jeans, and a flowy navy blouse with some kind of juice stain barely visible on the left shoulder. Maura held out a light coat for her daughter to step into, and then took her hand. Elena trotted to catch up for their first few steps from the asphalt to the concrete of the sidewalk that led to moss-covered, ornate brick buildings, but once they reached the heart of campus, Maura slowed, let her take everything in.
There were young adults sprinkled throughout the quad and common areas, as well as a line nearly out the door in the dining hall closest to them. Elena watched them with rapt interest - in jeans and with piercings and on longboards. Some of them tossed a football around, others sat on stone benches with their legs crossed under them to read textbooks, much like she had the night before.
She and Maura were not to interact with any of them, however. They strode past all of them until they could walk through the glass doors of the Anatomy building. The lobby, with plush seats and low tables, was empty. They stopped there for Maura to open her purse and take out a ring with six or seven brass keys on it. When she found it, she showed it to Elena with a self-satisfied smile, and then they were on their way.
There were more students as they made their way through the maze of hallways. "Dr. Rizzoli," greeted one, who was paired with another, both of them dressed in business casual under their white coats. They straightened up, and the one who had spoken to her had a suspicious blush on his face. Maura smiled at the two students professionally, nodded, but said nothing, which Elena found strange. Even stranger were the whispers she heard once they had passed them, whispers sounding a lot like Queen of the Dead and Professor Hardass.
"Mommy," Elena tugged at the sleeve of Maura's blazer as they walked, intent on asking what exactly all that was about.
Maura sensed it. "Don't worry about it, sweetheart," she said, and it was all that she said about it. "Remember what we're here for. You. And that very plastic brain of yours."
Elena accepted that answer because Maura had clearly communicated that there would be no more said on the subject. They finally reached room 1637, in the bowels of the first floor, and Maura used her keys to open it. There were lockers of all types, as well as cupboards and pristine vinyl counters stacked with all manner of protective equipment. And, Elena knew exactly what to do, where to go. She waited on a bench in front of a locker with M. Rizzoli just above it in label tape, and Maura used another key on her ring to open the padlock that kept the gray-blue cubby closed. She placed her purse on the top shelf, just above her head, after taking out her phone and BCU ID badge.
She handed them to Elena, and then removed her blazer. She placed it on a hanger and then into the locker, and made quick work of her dress, which she also hung up. Then, in nothing but her black lace undergarments and heels, she switched her elegant shoes for the more functional clogs at the foot of the locker. She pulled a pair of clean black scrubs from one of the shelves, and pulled the pants on one leg at a time so as not to let her feet touch the ground. She adjusted the thin, plain gold chain around her neck after she pulled on a long sleeve undershirt, and then her scrub top.
Elena watched her mother sit on the bench next to her, arms back behind her neck to reach for the clasp of that chain. "Can I do it?" she asked, knowing exactly what was coming.
"Sure," said Maura, putting her hair up into a loose ponytail and then moving that out of the way for Elena to reach her necklace. Small fingers struggled with the tiny clasp, but eventually it was free, and then she let her hair swish back in its place.
"Ring?" Elena held out the necklace, undone with one side in each hand, and Maura complied by slipping off her wedding and engagement rings, soldered together, and slipping them onto the chain. Then Elena returned the chain to her neck, taking three tries to close it correctly before Maura straightened it and then put it under her top.
"Hand me your coat," Maura demanded. Elena rose and gave it eagerly, because just after she did, the locker would close, Maura would put her phone and the keys into her pants pockets, and then they would walk over to the counter space.
"Do you think they'll have gowns my size this time?" Elena asked, bouncing over to the industrial sink before her mother got there. Maura pulled a small footstool from the corner and beckoned Elena to stand on it.
When she did, Maura stood behind her, and placed a short kiss to the fabric over her shoulder. "Definitely not," she said, and then turned the water on. They washed their hands, scrubbing vigorously, and Maura only let Elena down when she was satisfied with the level of clean. "You're seven. They don't even make surgical gowns that small. Luckily you've got your mother's large hands and we can fit the small size gloves on you."
Maura pulled out a surgical gown and fitted herself with it. Then she pulled out two surgical caps and two sets of gloves, putting hers on first, and then helping Elena. She bit back a laugh at how ridiculous her daughter looked in the oversized cap and barely small enough gloves, knowing she wouldn't be able to keep it in when she fitted Elena with the smallest pair of protective eyewear the university ordered.
Sure enough, she was a sight to see in it all, the goggles slipping off of her nose repeatedly until Maura found a way to stuff them into the surgical cap, just in front of her actual eyeglasses, but Maura felt a surge of emotion, too. Her daughter, so often in dirt-stained uniform pants and cleats, or sweaty basketball jerseys and ankle-protective sneakers, looked like a scientist. "Ok, shall we?" asked Maura, clipping her badge to her gown and motioning toward the door.
"Yeah," said Elena, leading the way. They exited out the side door and into the cadaver room. It smelled like chemicals and it was cold. Elena always caught a shiver when she first stepped in, but Maura fell into it as though it were her natural state.
"Body number 622," Maura said to herself as she walked past several drawers before finding the one she needed, the one with her name listed, that semester's class number printed next to it. She grinned in recognition at it, a fairly fit sixty-five year old male who had died of a heart attack while running a marathon. She ran a gloved finger over his adam's apple, deciding he would be perfect.
Body 622 was now on a table under a bright surgical lamp, exposed from the chest up and with four tracheal retractors holding his skin and other tissues away from the larynx. Maura had found another stepping stool for Elena to use, and she now stood behind her daughter, holding a small hand in her own, guiding the forceps in that hand with precision. "See this?" she asked, using Elena's hand to pull back a lobe of the thyroid gland to reveal a large, now beige from formaldehyde, tube structure running all the way up to the base of the skull. "That is the carotid artery. If we follow its branches to the voice box, here, you can see that it terminates in the superior and inferior laryngeal arteries. This gives the larynx blood, so that the muscles can move. Well, there are several cranial nerves involved in movement, but we won't get into that today. You should just know that this big artery comes all the way from the heart," Maura explained, removing Elena's hand from the throat so that she could flatten against the cadavers chest, "to the brain itself," they palpated toward the head, "and everywhere in between. Remember that everything is connected. Any tiny error can affect everything else around the area you are working on. This is why we cut with precision and care."
Elena nodded. "So why do people sound different?" She was singularly focused. A dog with a bone. Maura appreciated this. Liked it.
"This is an unremarkable sixty-five year old man," said Maura.
"Unremarkable?" Elena asked.
"Meaning nothing is out of the ordinary with his larynx. It looks healthy, normal," Maura explained. "Feel the notch of his laryngeal prominence," she instructed, then guided Elena to the front of his thyroid cartilage. "And the cartilage itself. Is it bigger than yours or smaller than yours?"
Elena swallowed thickly as if testing it. "Bigger. He's a grown up."
"That's right. And his voice was very likely much deeper than yours. Look at the two strips of muscle inside," Maura directed. She severed the larynx between the thyroid cartilage and the hyoid bone so that Elena could look inside, her scalpel skills unrivaled still. "What do those look like to you?"
"Um," Elena thought, bending down low to get a good look at the vocal cords. "Like rubber bands?"
"That's a good way of putting it. When they move, they get tight like rubber bands, and vibrate very fast. And the heavier they are, the slower they vibrate. This can be why some people have deeper voices."
"Just some?" Elena said as she touched the larynx, still attached inferiorly to the trachea.
"Well, arguably the more important factor is resonance. When we talk, we breathe air into our lungs and then push it out through those vocal cords. They vibrate, and make a sound. But the sound really only sounds like a buzz. We use our throat and our mouth to shape the sounds. Look at me," Maura pulled her head back from Elena's shoulder so that Elena could. They were nearly nose to nose. "Say aah." Elena did, and then she did, too. "What's my mouth doing when I do that?"
"Opening wide."
"Yes. And when I say oooh?" Maura asked, holding the vowel for long enough for Elena to scrutinize it.
"Your lips got all squished."
"Yes. I rounded them. And because I rounded them, and changed my tongue a little bit, the sound changed. Even though the buzzing at the level of the vocal cords sounds the same for both."
"You're saying they're the same sound?" Elena was confused, but trying.
Maura was just elated she was mostly following. She kissed the tip of her nose. "No, they're not. Because I changed my mouth. So we can sound different based on the shape we make our mouth, and we can also sound different if our throats are different sizes. Longer throats mean sound has to travel more, which results in a lower sounding voice. Basically. There is a lot more acoustic theory behind it, but you get the idea, my love."
"So you're saying Ma has a longer throat than you," Elena said, back to her question of the previous night.
"Yes! Wow," Maura said, raising her eyebrows. "You are… you are very smart. What else?"
"This… thingy," Elena replied, blushing and pointing to body 622's adam's apple, "Ma's is bigger than yours. It pokes out. And sometimes when I touch it she gets mad."
Maura grinned. "It's probably not pleasant. Makes her feel like she's trapped, or choking. But yes, her laryngeal prominence is very… prominent. What does it mean?"
"Her rubber bands are bigger," Elena said matter-of-factly, thinking back on the comparison between herself and the dead man on the table. "The cords."
"Excellent. That is probably true. And when she talks she tends to resonate more from her chest than her mouth. That means that she lets the air vibrate more here," Maura put the back of her wrist to Elena's chest, "than here," and then to her chin, "Where I talk from. Is this making sense to you?"
"Kinda," Elena said honestly. "So Buck Martinez has a different throat than Vin Scully. That's why they sound different."
"Yes. Among other social factors, but ultimately, yes."
Before Maura could continue her lesson, one of the medical students from her biology class entered the room. Both she and Elena turned to see a young woman in her early twenties, with work attire under her white coat. "Dr. Rizzoli?"
"Yes?" Maura said, keeping Elena in front of her, shielded. The woman, Natalie, was kind. Sweet. But even with her demeanor and her open professional relationship with Maura, Elena wasn't really supposed to be in the cadaver room.
"Uh, Jane… Detective Rizzoli is here to see you. Should I print her a visitor badge and send her in?"
"Please," Maura said in relief. Even as a faculty member, that age-old fear of getting her hand slapped for breaking the rules was hard to dispel.
The next time the door to the cadaver room opened, Jane stepped inside. She wore purple nitrile exam gloves, identical to the ones she used at crime scenes. "Hey Rizzolis," she said tiredly, voice all scratchy and dark, but she smiled, too.
Elena turned in her mother's half-embrace and smiled back. "Why are you wearing gloves?" she asked breathlessly, hoping against hope.
Jane pulled up close behind them, peering over both of their shoulders. "Because they made me," she said. "I will definitely NOT be puttin' hands on that guy. This is your thing, anyway."
"But I'm learning about why you sound like that," Elena replied.
Jane scoffed. "Excuse me? Sound like what?"
"Like that," Maura said, laughing. "What brings you here?"
"To BCU?" Jane asked.
"To the cadaver room of the anatomy and physiology building of BCU."
"You," Jane answered simply. "I need to know if the results came back on the fibers you found in, uh, the Stevens case," she stumbled, not willing to say more in front of Elena. Even if she was touching a dead man's trachea, she didn't need to hear the particulars of murder. "I also need a decent night's sleep. Nina dropped me off because she didn't trust me to drive myself home."
"She's a keeper," Maura said. "Come with us to the changing room. Your evidence is on our list, but you can't skip the mass spectrometer line just because you're married to me."
"Sure I can," Jane argued back, helping Elena down from her stool. "Do it all the time. Now come on, doctors. I don't have all day."
"You are so impatient. Let me put this body back in its drawer and then we'll be off," said Maura.
Maura nodded toward her locker with the tiniest flicks of her vertebrae - the movement was the equivalent of a corporeal syllable, but to Jane it spoke sentences. She removed her disposable gear and licked her lips.
"Hey Elena," said Jane, "go wash your hands, would you?" She used her left hand to pluck the surgical cap off of her daughter's head before tossing her own gloves in the trash with it. Elena did the same, and then wordlessly walked to the sink.
Jane followed Maura left when Elena went right, stalking through each row of lockers until she found her, already out of her scrubs and seated on the bench. "You were supposed to let me help with that," she complained, stepping forward to rub Maura's shoulders.
It was not the light caress one would expect from a lover, or a wife, or a mother. It was deep, tissue-busting, nearly-painful, and it was exactly what Maura needed. "How long do you think it takes her to wash her hands? It was either do it myself and give you a few seconds of uninterrupted staring, or let you touch with an audience. You could quit your job and I would pay you to do this full-time, you know," Maura groaned at the end, hands gripping the lip of the wood below her.
Jane laughed, and then peered around the corner, afraid that the sound would send her daughter running. "I'll think about it," she said, taking a seat next to Maura. She used her considerably longer arms to reach forward and pull out black heels, bending forward to place them at Maura's feet. "Now up."
They both stood, Maura now nearly as tall as Jane in her Zanotti's, and Jane took the Valentino dress off of its hanger. She plopped back down, holding it open at just the right angle, for Maura to step in without catching her heels in the lace. It went on easily enough, and then Jane was up again, zipper between her fingers as Maura turned around. "She must be up to no good," said Maura.
"Or she's a germaphobe, like you," Jane teased. She kissed the skin stretched over the base of Maura's neck again and again until Maura reached for her blazer.
"I am not a germaphobe! I am… dedicated to cleanliness," Maura replied, and even though Jane couldn't see her face, she could hear the pout.
It swam around in her heart, warmed it. "I heard some knuckleheads talkin' about you in the hall on the way here," she said quietly, lowly.
"Oh?" Maura feigned mild surprise, careful not to turn around as she motioned for Jane to unclasp her chain.
"That same old 'Queen of the Dead' shit," Jane growled. She slipped the two rings from the necklace and held them out for Maura on the end of her index finger. "They said you're frigid. They said you don't give out As to boys on principle."
"Maybe I don't," Maura quipped. "Boys do tend to do mediocre work," she laughed, but her eyes weren't in it.
"I told them I could get them kicked out. They were too scared to work out that that was a big fat lie," Jane whispered.
Maura turned around just in time for Elena to join them. "You should not have done that. But I appreciate the gesture. And maybe I could test your fibers as soon as I get into work tomorrow morning, since you went through all the trouble." Elena straddled the wooden bench just a few feet away from them, showing that she had in fact been up to no good with the doctor's office lollipop in her mouth. "Elena Giulliana, those are for patients," scolded Maura, but she paired her narrowed eyes with a smirk.
"They won't notice if one's missin'," Elena said, shrugging. She twirled the cherry-flavored candy around her lips before sticking it back in.
Jane guffawed and it echoed throughout the otherwise empty storage room. "She's got you there, baby," she said to Maura, but with her eyes on Elena. She mirrored Elena's position, one long leg swinging over the seat so that they were face-to-face. She leaned in, her face scrunched in an affectionate, close-mouthed grin, until she kissed Elena's nose. Elena frowned and wiped her nose with her wrist. Then Jane looked back over her shoulder to the woman still standing behind them. "You know it's all bullshit, right?"
"Jane," Maura scolded her next, this time for her language.
"It is," Jane reiterated. "You're a great teacher."
Maura tucked a strand of hair behind her ear before sitting down and rubbing wide swaths over the expanse of Jane's back. "That's sweet. But you've never been in one of my classes."
"So? I've seen you teach her a million things," Jane said. She threw her thumb in Elena's direction. "I watched you today. From the viewing room. If you're half as patient, half as expressive, with these assholes as you are with her, then you're the best professor they've got. And maybe you are Queen of the Dead, with the way that you work with corpses better than anyone on the Eastern Seaboard. But you're our Queen. So they can piss off."
In this moment, Elena gathered that Jane somehow had heard what those boys were saying about Maura. Either Maura told her about the first time, or they had been dumb enough to say it again with Jane stalking the halls. And judging by the way Maura only smiled softly and dabbed at her eyes, Jane must have said the right thing back, just now. Elena wanted in. "We love you, Mommy. Even if you are really good at cutting up dead people."
Jane held a finger in the air. "Especially since you're really good at cutting up dead people."
Maura slumped forward with a huge sigh and squeezed Jane's midsection tight. The polyester cotton blend of Jane's blazer, smashed against her cheek, felt like home. "You're my favorite, you know. The both of you," she said through the distortion of her scrunched face.
Jane hummed in approval. "And you, Doogie Howser!" she shouted, turning back to Elena, "who knew you'd be such a natural?! C'mon. Let's go home. I'm hungry."
"Who's Doogie Howser?" Elena asked as the three of them got up from their seats. Maura handed her her coat, and then they were off toward the door.
"Don't worry about it," said Jane.
"Ok," Elena agreed. "When we get home, can I touch your voice box?"
Maura snorted and Jane huffed. "Hell no," she said, "but I'll let you tell me all about the gross stuff you learned today… if Mom lets me drive us home. Deal?"
"Deal!" Elena shouted, just as the three of them exited into the hall.
"Absolutely not!" Maura exclaimed, laughing more out of disbelief than humor. "You haven't slept in days."
"I haven't slept at home in days. There's a… slight difference. But, I promise I can drive!" Jane reasoned. When Maura stood firm, only a manicured eyebrow in motion, on its way up to her hairline, she stamped her foot. "Not even for defending your honor back there?"
"We already decided that your reward would be a breach of crime lab protocol. Don't press your luck," Maura said.
"Alright, alright. At least let me pick where we order from," Jane tried anyway.
"That can be arranged." Surprisingly, Maura assented. She led them out of the building and into the quad. "As long as it's at least somewhat healthy." She held out her hand, and Jane, who had been trudging behind, keeping an eye on both wife and daughter, took it.
"Of course, Your Majesty," Jane teased, and they walked hand in hand, Elena just ahead, all the way to the car.