A/N: Surprise drop! Welcome to the last chapter of Trigonometry. Thank you for all your reads and reviews - I truly value all your engagement. Even those of you who incoherently bashed the story stayed to the end and drove up traffic numbers, so thanks for that, too. LOL.
Until next time!
"Get your ass on the couch!" Frankie ordered as soon as Angela closed the door behind them. "Are you fucking crazy?!" he pushed Tommy by the shoulder, and the youngest Rizzoli toppled easily onto the sofa cushions.
Angela had rushed over to the refrigerator to grab the cold pack from the freezer. She threw it at Tommy's chest and then sat across from him on her coffee table. She thought about slapping the back of his head, her go-to punishment impulse, but realized that after he took that blow right to the face, maybe she should lay off. "What the hell is wrong with you? Do you know how embarrassing it is to have my two grown children smacking each other around in front of the woman who was gracious enough to take me in?"
Tommy rolled his eyes. He put the cold pack to his cheek and winced when it hit the bruise forming there. "Ma. You're so dramatic. Neither of us died."
Frankie scoffed loudly. "You gonna have Ma live with you if Maura kicks her out? Or you gonna let me and Janie pick up your mess? Again?"
Tommy was so bewildered that he felt like he'd been hit again. "What? Maura would never do that."
"Keep pushin' her with this stupid shit, and you never know, Tom. She cares about you, but how long until one of her bougie-ass neighbors calls BPD to send me out here?" Frankie said on a sigh.
Tommy shook his head. "No. Maura won't kick Ma out because of Jane. She would never do Jane wrong like that. It don't have much to do with me."
"Well I would really appreciate it if you wouldn't stress that bond, Tommy. I have nowhere else to go," Angela pleaded, and it was interrupted by a hiccup. She tried to cover her mouth with her hand, to catch her tears before they fell onto her work jeans, but Tommy saw it.
He hung his head as he rested his elbows on his thighs. "Ma, please don't cry. It's gonna be fine, alright? It was a mistake. But I would appreciate it if everyone would back off for a second. It's been a weird, rough, twenty-four hours. Just gimme a break."
"Ok," Angela put her hands up, having reined in her emotion. "Ok. You wanna tell us what's goin' on?"
"Maura dropped his ass," Frankie said as he took a seat next to his brother.
"You know about that?" Tommy whipped his head in Frankie's direction.
"I mean it's easy to see. That's why you and Janie were playin' rock-'em-sock-'em robots in the side yard, right? Maura made a choice?" Frankie asked. His raised eyebrow looked exactly like his mother's. Like his sister's.
"Seems like it," Tommy grumbled, and then the cold pack was back on his face.
"Wait a minute," Angela said, "You were dating her? I thought you said you two were just having fun."
"Yeah well, things change, Ma," Tommy said dismissively.
But Angela would not be deterred. "You mean you started going out with her after I told you to back off? After I expressly told you not to? Tommy! This is why!"
"You told me not to because you wanted to make sure that Jane got what she wanted, Ma! Not because you thought it would be a bad idea! But because it put Janie's happiness on the back burner!" He got worked up again, and raised his voice.
His mother met him decibel for decibel. "She got abducted by a serial killer, Tommy! Twice! Let her have some of that goddamn happiness." Angela shouted back, bringing up the one thing as a family they had avoided since it happened. Both Frankie and Tommy felt its weight. "I told you before that if Maura was who you really wanted, you should go after her. Is that what happened? She was who you wanted and you went after her and Jane got angry?"
"No. I went for her because I thought she was who I wanted and she rejected me, Ma. It's clear I wasn't the Rizzoli she was after," Tommy said.
"I'm sorry," Angela said. "I knew as soon as Maura told me she was sleepin' with both of you that things were gonna blow up, but I'm sorry that things didn't work out for you." Even if it was the outcome she predicted, the one she tried to tell him was coming, she felt for him. But his sadness seemed to run beyond someone who had tried to get the girl to get under his sister's skin. She knew her youngest son, and so she knew that his motive was not purely his own love for Maura. And that was another reason she counseled him against it: to protect Jane's heart, and Maura's the same, in case she did fall for him. Luckily for all of them, she did not.
Tommy seemed to realize that too, and he hung his head again. "Not like any of it matters, anyway," he said, "things are totally different now."
Jane fidgeted on the balls of her feet just outside her mother's closed door. She'd given her family about twenty minutes to cool off, and now, she gathered resolve to knock. Luckily, Maura stood right behind her, holding her hand, squeezing it tightly for reassurance.
"He started it," Maura said, harkening back to the melee that had played out in her courtyard not long before, "but you can finish it."
"I did finish it," Jane groused, and it was quiet, but Maura heard the cockiness there.
"Finish it the right way," she replied. "Smooth things over, Jane." Jane continued to stare at the door's knocker despite the imperative, and Maura huffed. "If for no other reason than to get us out of this heat, please."
That spurred Jane into action. She banged on the door, hearing the hushed voices of her brothers and Angela on the other side. "Ma open up, it's me!" she called out.
There was a shuffle of footsteps behind the door, and then she heard her mother shushing Frankie and Tommy. "And why should I let you in, huh? You gonna swing at Frankie, too?"
"What? He start-" Jane's temper flared up again in an instant, but she was pulled back to reality by Maura's pinch on her elbow. Maura shook her head forcefully and pursed her lips. No, she whispered. "No, Ma. I'm not gonna punch anybody. Maura's here, too."
Angela pulled the door open just an inch or two. "That didn't stop either of you last time," she whispered, only one eye and her mouth visible.
Maura's lips twitched to hide her laughter at the ridiculous visual. Jane held onto her hand in order to hold her caustic remarks inside. "You're right. But I think we both probably have cooler heads now," Jane said instead. "Can we come inside, please? I think we all need to talk."
"Maybe I should preview what you have to say, in case it's gonna cause World War 3," Angela said.
Jane sighed loudly. "I came to apologize. To Tommy and to you. But it's hot as hell out here."
"Ok," Angela agreed after a second or two of deliberation. She stepped aside, swinging the door open for both of them to step in.
Thank you, Maura mouthed to her as she followed Jane inside. They shared a small smile when Angela shut the door and locked it out of habit.
Jane took Angela's previous spot on the coffee table, and her legs were so long that her knees knocked Tommy's. He turned his body away so that they didn't. Neither he nor Jane said anything, but he felt his sister's eyes on him searching and soft. She took note of all his injuries, even the ones that weren't visible, but made him grunt when he twisted his torso. She leaned into the pain that her own twin bruises caused as she scooted forward.
"You two look like a couple of real knuckleheads," Angela interjected; she couldn't help it.
"Ma!" Frankie scolded from his place on the arm of the chair that Maura occupied nearby. "Give 'em a minute."
But Tommy laughed bitterly. Jane caught it and released a chuckle of her own. "We do," she said. She wore that crooked little half smile and her larynx bobbed up and down. Tommy did the same.
"Sorry I tried to punch your lights out," he said to her. He put his hand on her head, patting the top of it. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail and so she felt the warm pressure of it more clearly that she would have with her hair down, styled.
"Sorry I did punch your lights out," she countered, and they smirked at each other.
"Not the first time, Mike Tyson. Probably won't be the last," Tommy shrugged, putting his hand back on his own knee. "I deserved it, but it was still fucked up, Janie."
"It was. And I'm sorry. It's not ok to choose violence, especially when it comes to family," Jane said seriously.
"Since when?" Tommy joked, and she laughed.
"It's never been ok. I just have a lot of growth to do, I guess," she said.
"If you do, then I definitely do," Tommy conceded. "But you gotta know why I was upset."
It was Jane's turn to hang her head. "Yeah. I shouldn't have said those things about you not bein' enough. They're not true, and they're not barriers to love."
"No, they're not. But the girl you like lovin' someone else is," he said, and Jane blushed when he grinned at her. "And… if I'm bein' honest, I may have tried to get Maura to go out with me because I knew it'd piss you off."
Jane straightened her spine, ready to fight again when Tommy admitted his motivations so shamelessly, but Maura caught it. "Jane," she said in warning, then she turned to Tommy. "Tommy, that was… manipulative. I don't appreciate being manipulated. I told you last night that I was ending things because I didn't see it working out long term between us. I gave you honesty, and I wish you had done the same."
Tommy blushed. "I really do like you, Maura. I swear. I'm… man, ok. I was an asshole. I'm sorry. Buttons I didn't even know I had, remember?" He said, harkening back to their conversation at the carnival. They shared a look, and then both looked Jane's way.
Jane breathed as deeply as she could and shook off the uncanny scruntiny. "It's over," she said to herself as much as to him, to them. "Ok? It's over. That was fucked up of you, but it's all over."
"Yeah it is," Tommy agreed a little too zealously. "Even if I didn't want it to be, that doesn't matter."
Maura perked up. "You said that last night when we were on the phone, too. What do you mean?"
"I mean…" he started, and then leaned back onto the cushions of the couch and groaned. His family sat rapt with attention. "I mean that one of the girls that I have been seeing is pregnant," he finally admitted, and his mother shrieked. He bit his lower lip. "Lydia. Her name is Lydia. And it's probably mine."
Frankie guffawed. "Hey, Tommy's gonna be a baby daddy!" he said, getting up and sitting next to Tommy on the couch, clapping his back.
"Oh Tommy, really?" Angela gasped, tears switching from stressed and sad to happy.
"Seems that way," he said as if suddenly weightless after carrying a heavy load for a long while.
"Congratulations," Maura said earnestly, her smile wide for him. "You're going to be a good father, Tommy. And you've already got the best support system."
Jane was a little more suspicious. "What do you mean you're probably the father? How many other guys could it be?"
Angela finally got to dole out her smack on the head, but this time it was to her daughter. "I think you of all people should keep your mouth shut when it comes to judging people for having sex," she said harshly. "Be happy for your brother."
"Ow! Alright, alright," Jane said, "I am. I'm happy if you are, Tommy."
Tommy took the cold pack off his face. "I don't really know what I feel yet. All I know is life as I know it is over, and a new life is about to come barreling in."
"Well, after you get a paternity test, and it turns out this baby is yours, you know we got you, right?" Jane asked him.
"Yeah I know. If you didn't tell me, I'd know by how you just sweated your ass off for me all week at the 6th street place," Tommy said. He made sure that Jane was looking into his eyes, feeling all the gratitude that he felt. "Still scary."
"Scary as hell," Jane acknowledged. "But hey. It's not like we haven't dealt with scarier shit. And at least you'll get Ma off my back about kids for awhile," she added, looking back pointedly at her mother and smirking.
"Don't think you get off that easy," Angela retorted, "I saw you walkin' in here real cozy." She wagged her finger between Maura and Jane and pursed her lips.
Jane turned beet red. Maura laughed out of sheer appreciation of Angela's audacity, of her ability to render Jane speechless.
"Please don't," Jane finally said, fear in her voice. Angela took pity and came over to wrap an arm around her daughter, kissing her temple.
"You're safe," Angela said, chuckling. "For now. I love you."
"Love you, too," Jane said. "And I'm sorry that I embarrassed you, Ma. I'm sorry I let it go as far as it did."
"I forgive you. Let's just forget about it, ok? You kids still need to drive those boxes over to the house and then we can go out to dinner to celebrate this baby!"
Jane rolled her eyes in good humor. She hadn't expected… whatever the hell that just was, but when she looked at Maura, Maura who had just told her that she was madly in love with her, she supposed she could handle it.
Jane closed the door to the guest house behind her only after copious promises that she'd return: she just needed some sturdier moving shoes and the truck keys that were hanging out on Maura's counter.
In reality, she needed a moment, one she couldn't wait for: she snatched Maura's wrist, effectively stopping Maura's stride in front of her and spinning her around. Jane crashed their lips together, hugged Maura to her like she was trying to take Maura inside her.
Maura clawed at Jane's back during the pleasurable invasion, stepping up on her toes to drink in all of it that she could. When they broke apart, heaving for breath they'd forsaken to be together, she smiled, close enough for Jane to feel it on her own lips. "What was that for?" Maura asked. Jane just hugged her closer. Maura hugged her back, but turned her face in to try and see what Jane was thinking. "Are you alright?"
"Fuck," Jane breathed out into Maura's hair. She took another deep breath in. "Fuck, I love you."
Maura didn't realize just how tightly Jane had been holding on until she was let go and then her heels hit the ground. The tap of her runners against the brick woke her up. "I love you, too. What's wrong? Why do you look like you've seen a ghost?"
"Agh," Jane shook her head to shake her overall discomfort. "That could have been you, Maura. You coulda been the girl that Tommy knocked up. And then where would that leave me, huh? I was almost too late."
Maura smiled at Jane in pity and touched the cut on the left side of her lower lip before kissing it. "Your sentiment is sweet, and understandable, but misplaced."
"You didn't hear him in there? One of the girls he was sleepin' with got pregnant. You also fall into that category," said Jane. She was insistent, and confused by Maura's lack of… well, relief.
"I do, that's true, but that never really was a concern. I'm a doctor - I know how to make sure I don't get pregnant, Jane," Maura assured her.
"I guess that's true," Jane said. "You're right. It's just, Jesus. I would've had to have been your kid's aunt all because I couldn't get my head out of my ass."
Maura laughed. "To be fair, my head was pretty far up my own ass, too. It was a mistake to think that I could sleep with you and not reach this point."
Jane squeezed her tightly again, this time enough to lift her entirely off the ground. "Still, it's fun, isn't? Sleepin' with someone who knows you?"
Maura tapped her own chin while Jane held her up by the waist. "Hmm," she said theatrically.
"Maura!" Jane griped, but then Maura wrapped her arms around her shoulders.
"I think it's more fun falling in love with someone who knows you," she countered, and kissed Jane all the way into the main house, quite liking the feeling of being swept off her feet.