Notes

Thank you to the helpful reviewer who did some fact checking for me! I am actually from the UK and knew some of these things, but I have to admit I got wrapped up in the story and didn't pay attention to accuracy.

Corrections:

British hospitals don't have residents - according to google Dr Chang would be a higher trainee.

White coats - are an infection control risk and Maura no longer wears one. Except maybe at home, for fun…

What we call surgeons - in the UK surgeons are called Mr/Mrs/Ms. I actually knew this one, but I find it very weird, and now, to make the story accurate, so does Maura. I just can't handle calling her 'Ms Isles' (as in missiles).

Maura placed Agent Provocateur onto the turntable she'd bought to play it in London. She'd justified the purchase with the internal argument that all sophisticated residences had record players, and had further supported this rationale with the acquisition of a vinyl music library that any audiophile would be proud of. Maura had always loved music, and with Jane to expand her horizons, her tastes had evolved throughout her twenties to include everything from Baroque to Drum and Bass.

She'd told Jane that she needed to go to bed. This was true - she was exhausted. But she found herself making another cup of tea and settling on her sofa, listening, remembering.

It was so easy to recall Jane's lips on hers, Jane's body above her, lying back on the pink comforter Jane had never told her mother how much she hated. Maura knew it had been eight years, but it could have been eight minutes. Her skin still tingled as if Jane had just touched it.

Maura had noticed, in the hospital, that Jane smelled exactly the same. She wondered if she would taste the same too…

No good can come of this, she murmured to herself. It was over, it had ended, and while it was lovely to see Jane again, surely, at this point, they could never be more than friends.

Things had changed. They had changed - at least, Maura knew that she had. In Boston, she'd been young, naive, and desperate to be loved. Now she was older, closer to 40 than 30, and she knew much more about the world. She'd seen so much pain, so much suffering, she didn't even know if she believed in love any more.

As Maura thought this, Lou Gramm began to sing 'I wanna know what love is,' and tears began to trickle down Maura's cheeks. She thought back to the very beginning, before Rachmaninov, before Foreigner, to the day she and Jane first met…

"You don't have to come."

Lauren, Maura's roommate, was celebrating her 21st birthday. Maura had turned 21 a month ago, but hadn't had any desire to mark the occasion with inebriation. That being said, she was aware that she had missed out on several rites of passage, and had been thinking of late that perhaps participating in some youthful traditions would be beneficial to her college experience.

"I want to," she said, adjusting the tight black dress Lauren had lent her for the occasion.

Lauren eyed her dubiously. "Do you promise not to lecture me about the risks of excessive alcohol consumption?"

Maura bit back her initial answer, (which was about the risks of excessive alcohol consumption), and nodded.

They were joined in the hallway by a group of Lauren's friends. Maura knew some of them - there was another woman there who was final year pre-med, and Lauren had introduced her to the taller of the two men, though she insisted he was not her boyfriend. Maura tried to be friendly, but she had never been very good at small talk.

At least the bar was loud, so conversation wasn't required. Maura enjoyed dancing, and was learning to enjoy cocktails, and before too long she was fully embedded into the group. The other man, whose name was Ryan, had taken an interest in her, and kept buying her more drinks. Maura could feel the alcohol affecting her, but for once, she liked it. Gradually, she forgot herself, so much so that when Ryan's arms snaked around her waist, she didn't resist.

They moved from the bar to a nightclub, where Lauren screamed, "SHOTS!" with such enthusiasm that it would have been rude not to partake. Maura swayed slightly in her heels.

"You're so hot," Ryan slurred in her ear.

"Actually, my body temperature feels close to normal," Maura replied, before realising that he might have meant something else.

Ryan actually did seem hot, he was sweating through his shirt, and Maura was finding him less and less interesting. She moved to dance with the others in the group, but he always found a way to follow her.

Lauren was occupied with the man who wasn't her boyfriend, the other women were having a deep conversation in the smoking area, and Maura began to feel cornered. She danced with Ryan a little more, trying to establish boundaries, but short of punching him, she wasn't sure how to get the message across.

When stepping with her full weight on his foot didn't work, Maura decided it was time to leave. She wished Lauren a happy birthday, and hurried out into the night, turning a corner before Ryan could follow her.

She was in an unfamiliar part of town, but she had her purse, with enough cash for a taxi. She just needed to find one. She took a steadying breath, telling herself that of course there would be one, it was Saturday night in the centre of Boston, and that as soon as the street stopped spinning so much she would get her bearings and find her way home.

But it really was spinning. Maura wobbled a little and leaned against a wall, and once she was leaning, it didn't take much for her to slide onto the sidewalk, curl up in a ball, and cry.

"I may vomit," she said, to no one in particular, once the tears had subsided.

"If you do, can you try not to get it on my boots? I just polished them."

Maura looked up to see a tall, dark haired police officer shining a flashlight in her direction.

"Officer Jane Rizzoli," Jane said with a smile. "Can I give you a hand?"

"Did I do something wrong?" Maura asked, awash with anxiety.

"Not at all," Jane told her, helping her to her feet. "This is the protect and serve part of the job. You look like you might need some protecting."

Maura wondered if she was leaning on Jane a little too much, but it was such a relief to be supported by someone who felt so strong, so safe, that she couldn't help herself.

"I'm okay," she said, more to herself than to Jane.

"You got a name?" Jane asked.

"Maura Isles. I'm going to be a doctor."

"How did you end up here, Maura Isles who's going to be a doctor?" Jane asked her as she guided her down the street towards her vehicle.

"I walked."

"Right, gotcha. But before you walked, you were..?"

"Oh. I was in a club, there was a man, he was being… Pushy. So I left."

"Good. I mean, not good that he was being pushy. But good that you left."

To signify her wholehearted agreement, Maura ducked into an alleyway and vomited.

"He sounds like an asshole," Jane said when she came back.

"He was," Maura decided. "But I had a nice time, before that."

"Oh yeah? You sure seem like you did," Jane said with a chuckle.

"I was trying to be normal," Maura admitted. "It's practically a social requirement for people my age to go to bars and nightclubs and risk alcohol poisoning and permanent liver damage."

"Sounds like a blast," Jane said.

"I was foolish."

"No one's smart all the time."

They had reached Jane's car.

"Ever been in one of these?" she asked Maura.

Maura shook her head.

"D'you wanna?"

Maura nodded.

"I can give you a ride home," Jane told her. "But if you need to hurl again, give me some warning so I can pull over. This perp puked in the back of Harrington's car a couple of weeks ago, we've tried everything to get rid of the smell but nothing's worked."

"You can use baking soda, then a solution of white vinegar, detergent, and alcohol," Maura suggested.

"That's some thorough training, teaching future doctors to clean up puke," Jane said, opening the passenger door for Maura.

Jane got into the driver's seat and started the engine.

"BCU Campus?" she asked.

"Yes. How did you know?"

"I mean, where else are you gonna learn to be a doctor in Boston?"

Maura leaned back into the seat. "It could have been a purely aspirational comment."

Jane laughed. "You seem like the sort of person who makes their aspirations reality."

Maura smiled. It was nice to have someone think of her like that, and she said so. They reached her dorm, and she moved to get out of the car. Jane reached out, touching her arm.

"Hold on," she said, scribbling her number down on the back of a receipt. "If you want to go out with someone who'll take better care of you than the friends you were with tonight, call me."

"Do you always try to make friends with drunks you pick up off the side of the road?" Maura asked, but she took the number.

"Only the ones who are going to be doctors," Jane said with a grin. "See you, Maura."

"Thanks, Jane."