Maura woke later than she was used to by a half hour. Sunlight already speckled her bedroom, rays settling against her face and the pillow below it, urging her to get up and heed the call of the morning. She reached blindly for the other side of the bed, fingers palpating, but found it empty.

She looked up, squinty and still orienting to the waking world, but there were traces of what had happened all over the room: several tank tops hanging over the top of the chair in the corner of the room, three pairs of New Balances at the foot of it, untied and laces pulled loose. When she glanced down to the end of the bed, there was an old hoodie, pooled as if it were discarded in haste. Jane had gone for a run, and Maura knew because Jane wrestled with morning runs like Jacob wrestled with God - it always involved herculean decisions, a cataloguing of all her exercise tops, at least four switches to find the exact right shoes, a prayer for strength before she finally laced up her chosen pair and decided to bite the bullet. It seemed there had even been a struggle as to whether or not to don outerwear, given the abandoned sweatshirt. Maura hoped that Jane picked a different one for the dropping temperatures of late September, rather than choosing to brave the cold with no sleeves at six in the morning.

But, that was really all that she could do: hope. Hope, and throw on a nightgown in anticipation of some coffee. She grabbed her matching floral robe from behind the door, draping it loosely over her shoulders, letting it flow as she made her way down the stairs, anticipating a quiet kitchen and a possibly very sweaty Jane already with her own mug in hand.

She cinched it tight when she heard voices almost completely foreign to her.

"Oh my god, shut up. Why would you let him do that?" said the one she recognized, Cailin's, to the girl next to her, whisking what looked like pancake batter at the end of the kitchen island. There was another girl sitting on the counter behind them, peeling potatoes.

It looked like they were making breakfast, and Maura could tell because every possible breakfast ingredient, including bombs of flour, littered the island counter. She paled and gulped. "Good- good morning," she said, in a subtle sarcasm that she had learned from Jane.

"Oh hey," Cailin replied, her tone as sunny as the morning pouring in around them, offering her sister a bright smile. The other two girls smiled at her, too.

"You're up early," Maura tried again, smoothing her hands over the tops of her covered thighs and searching for an explanation for the apocalypse in her main room.

"Yeah, we never went to bed," Cailin said, flipping the most recently poured pancake in one of the several pans she had on the stovetop.

Maura bit her lower lip to keep from scoffing. "Right," she said, "why go to bed? You don't need any sleep for rigorous pre-med coursework."

The girl at the end of the island shifted her braids from one shoulder to the other and laughed airily. "I'm sure you didn't need it, either, since you're a genius, like Cailin," she said, and Cailin blushed without acknowledging her. "She aces everything with or without sleep."

"Does she?" Maura asked, looking skeptically at her sister, who was still in the previous day's clothes.

Cailin regarded her just the same, in her rumpled nightgown and sleep-mussed hair. "You uh, you can take a shower, if you want," she said, as delicately as a nineteen year-old could.

Maura looked down at her clothes and narrowed her gaze. "Am I embarrassing you?" she asked.

"I think you look great," called the blonde from by the sink.

Akilah, the one with the braids and pancake batter, agreed. "Yeah, me too. It's great when women your age look good even without makeup."

Maura choked. "My age?"

"It's a compliment, Maura," Cailin said, grinning softly.

Before Maura could respond, the back door opened and Angela swept in, matching the joviality of the teenagers that had descended on her Beacon Hill home. "I almost tripped over this young man! He was laid out right on the walkway," she said, patting the shoulder of the boy with the half-shaved head. He carried a backpack in his arms, along with one of Maura's couch pillows.

Cailin laughed. "Dylan's from Santa Cruz. He misses sleeping outside," she explained, staring at him sweetly.

"Yeah, I love sleeping under the stars. Your brick walkway's not very comfortable, though," he said, taking a seat at the island and tossing his things to the floor next to his feet.

"It's not meant to be comfortable for sleeping," Maura countered, feeling herself drawn into whatever teenage atmosphere had seemed to take over her kitchen.

"Man, that looks good," Dylan said, either not hearing her or ignoring her, eyes trained only on the plate in Caitlin's oven mitt. There were eggs, bacon, and two whopping blueberry pancakes.

"Cool. Good thing it's for you then," Cailin said to him, winking and setting his food on the placemat in front of him.

Angela looked impressed. Maura was, albeit begrudgingly, a little impressed, too. Angela, however, was the only one ready to forsake her pride and say it. "Cailin, that looks delicious," she commented.

"Yours is in the oven, Mrs. Rizzoli," Cailin said, pulling one plate out just as Angela's went in.

"Thank you," Angela said sincerely, pursing her lips to hide her smile at Maura's annoyance. "And where's my unruly kid, huh? Still upstairs?" she said more to Maura than anyone else, trying to bring her back into a conversation she had rapidly moved to the background of.

But the front door opened, and then all eyes were on the panting woman standing on the threshold, an answer to the question. "God, Maura, that smells-" Jane started, tugging her sweatshirt off of her sweaty torso, revealing only a sports bra underneath, until she realized they were very much not alone. She froze when she counted the exact number of teenagers she had brought into Maura's home the night before, and saw exactly what they had done to the kitchen.

"She went for a run," answered Cailin, meeting her gaze with warmth, "and this is her plate."

"Shit," Jane, uncharacteristically flustered, walked slowly, looking at Maura as if for permission to take the plate being given to her. Maura offered her no such absolution, only looked her up and down, from her running shoes, to her lithe legs in short shorts, and her completely bare abdomen. "Sorry, babe," she muttered only for Maura to hear, and then she turned to Cailin. "Let me just get a shirt," she said, recalling their conversation about flirtation from the evening before and already on her way toward the stairs.

Maura grabbed her arm instead, apparently taking pity. "Sit, eat," she said. She pointed to the seat next to Dylan where the pancakes steamed seductively. Jane didn't need to be told twice. "Cailin, you are quite the hostess, making breakfast for Dylan, and for Jane… and for Jane's mother," Maura said, turning to her sister, "but can I speak to you upstairs?"

"Sure," Cailin said, one last plate in hand. "You wanna talk now, or eat before your food gets cold?"

With breakfast in her face, smelling so tasty and salty-sweet, Maura sputtered. "I-"

Jane smirked at the interaction and then patted the last seat next to her. "Follow your own advice," she said, her smile brightening from teasing to joy when Maura did so. She chewed without shame on a hefty bite and swiveled around so that her open legs faced Maura's right side.

Maura rolled her eyes, but leaned in to kiss a sweaty temple anyway, just in front of Jane's ear, where she whispered now. "How are you not freaking out about all this?"

Jane returned the favor, leaning in, too. "I grew up in chaos, remember? This is normal to me."

Maura thought that sounded like exhilarating torture. She looked around her, a blend of her family and her sister's friends eating, talking, communing with one another. Jane was right: chaos abounded - mostly in the mess all around, but also in the cacophony of voices and warm laughter. Even Jane, pretty quiet as she wolfed down her food, set Maura's heart to chaotically beating with her sweat and her genuine effort to get to know the kids that had duped her into a place to stay the night before.

Suddenly, Maura wanted it all, every morning. Maybe not the filth… definitely not the filth, but all the rest of it. She could stomach the cortisol that swimmed around her brain because it was completely washed away by all the serotonin flooding the room. Flooding her.

She guessed her talk with Cailin could wait just a few minutes - she needed to finish her breakfast anyway.


"That wasn't so bad, was it?" Jane said to Maura when the undergrads not related to Maura had dispersed and her mother had gone off to work. She rinsed her plate and placed it into the dishwasher exactly the way Maura liked it.

"Do you see the mess in here?" Maura asked incredulously. "You are helping me clean this up. This is your fault."

"My fault?" Jane gasped, standing up as quickly as her spine and her indignation would allow. "When I left this morning there was nary a peep comin' from the kitchen."

"You brought them here!" Maura whispered harshly, even though Cailin was in her room upstairs.

"A'right, a'right," Jane said, hands up. "I did. I did do that. Go upstairs and shower. I'll take care of it."

"No. No - I'm not going to make you do it by yourself," Maura shook her head as she spoke.

"Well go up anyway. I'll get a head start," Jane said. She smirked as she watched Maura fiddle with the tie of her robe, a telltale sign of her discomfort. "You can help me when you get back."

"Ok," Maura replied gratefully. Jane was already shaking out a trash bag for food scraps and empty containers. "One of her friends said I looked good without makeup… for my age."

Jane barked with laughter. "They're teenagers, Maura. To them, anybody over thirty might as well be half-dead." Maura only shrugged, clearly still affected. "C'mon - you have to know you look beautiful. All the time."

"A shower will definitely help. Give me ten minutes," Maura said. Jane agreed easily.

Maura reappeared more like twenty minutes later, but her hair was done and she was in a black v-neck tee and jeans. She even wore heels. Jane had cleared most of the counter of clutter, including eggs, milk, and flour canisters. "You smell good, too, for the ripe old age of thirty-seven," Jane said, tying a second trash bag together and setting it at the end of the island.

"That I can do regardless of age. I just need enough money for my favorite perfume," Maura replied, in a considerably better mood than when she had left. "I wanted to scream when I saw my kitchen."

"Yeah, well, Ma says kids push buttons you didn't even know you had," said Jane, pulling cleaning supplies from under the sink. "When I was nineteen, she threatened to kick me out at least once a week."

"But she's not my child. She's an adult… child," Maura argued, putting on an apron and cleaning gloves. "Maybe Hope is right in treating her like a kid."

Jane sighed heavily. "Baby. All she did was have a couple of friends over and make a mess," she reasoned, looking down when she felt flour stick to her bare belly after she leaned over to swipe a sponge across the counter. She tried to wipe the streak away, but it only spread. Ok, so, the mess was pretty annoying.

That incensed Maura further, seeing Jane get dirty with Cailin's carelessness. "Which we are cleaning up!"

"Yeah, but she wasn't tryin' to get under your skin. She just needs to learn. Set some boundaries - somethin' Hope clearly hasn't done," said Jane.

Maura sprayed all-natural cleaning solution liberally on all surfaces, scrubbing vigorously. "You know, I barely know her. I don't want her to hate me."

"Maura, she's a good kid. Set up some rules and stick to 'em. She'll stick to 'em, too. She worships you," Jane said, putting her things down and smiling softly, making Maura look at her.

"No, she doesn't," Maura said, blushing, shaking her head.

Jane closed the distance between them and laid a bunch of loud, wet, kisses on Maura's cheek, her nose, her lips. "Yeah she does. I do, too," she said, wrapping her arms tighter around Maura's waist when she felt forearms pressing against her chest.

"Stop," Maura said weakly, kissing back anyway. "I'm clean and you are not."

"You'll get over it," Jane asserted. Maura's resistance melted when she said, "put ya hands on me." Gloves came off and Jane's embrace was returned. She pinned Maura against the island counter as softly as she could, and stepped in between her widened legs as they kissed.

A cleared throat interrupted them both. "Guys, you have a guest," Cailin said, hustling around the kitchen and dropping a used mug of tea onto the counter.

"Uh-uh. This is my house," Jane dissented by kissing one last time down the side of Maura's face, loud enough to be obnoxious, but she broke them apart just after. "You got class?"

"Yup," Cailin said, sparing Jane a knowing smile before looking at Maura, who crossed her arms in a little bit of embarrassment. Then she looked at her phone. "Crap. And I am so late," she complained, grabbing a bottle of water from the fridge. "Bye! Have a good day! Try to stay out of trouble!"

Jane looked pointedly at Maura until Maura spoke. "Um, Cailin?" she asked, and when Cailin turned around, she said, "I would appreciate it if you cleaned up after yourself."

"Sure, yeah," Cailin replied, looking back at her mug. "I'll do it when I get home for lunch, ok? Bye."

"Bye," Maura said brightly. She turned to Jane for appraisal, who tried not to laugh. "How was that?"

"Good," Jane said, nodding, her voice light and teasing.

"Yeah?" Maura asked in disbelief.

"Yeah," Jane answered, tamping down on her lips. "It's uh, it's good that we're gonna have like eighteen years of practice before we have a teenager of our own." Maura pouted. "It was good, a'right? A good first start. I really should bathe."


Stuck squarely in the mid-afternoon rush at the cafe, Jane took her chance and waved her mother over between customers in line, pointing to the coffee machine. When Angela did come, she was holding the decaf pot and two mugs, and Jane frowned. "No, Ma, I want regular."

Angela just tossed her head in Maura's direction, who sat across from Jane. "No. You can't drink caffeinated beverages this late in the day, Jane," said Maura, shutting her down.

Jane sighed loudly. "Ok. Maura says I can't drink it so can I have an IV drip, please?" she asked Angela, who set the pot down and smacked Jane's shoulder.

"No. But you can try one of these instead," Angela told her, reaching behind them to a cart with a large homemade sign that said Angela's Pick-Me-Ups. "I tried a new espresso brownie recipe."

Jane's eyes grew and she snatched the brownie from her mother, unwrapping it and breaking off a chunk to try. When she moaned, her voice deep and unguarded, Maura regarded her with a raised eyebrow and an impressed smile.

"I'm glad that you like it so much. Business is booming!" Angela said excitedly.

Maura looked at the amount of desserts on the cart and worried her hands. "Angela, you should really be offering some healthy snacks."

"I do," Angela replied, "but they just don't sell."

"Baby come on. Don't be so virtuous," Jane interrupted, handing Maura a piece of her treat.

Maura took it reluctantly, but hummed as soon as it hit her mouth. "Hmm. Oh, my," was all that she could say. She even brushed away imaginary crumbs from her teal sleeveless blouse, just to gather herself.

Jane, with a self-satisfied grin, offered her more, which she took.

Angela pulled a notebook from her green apron pocket. "See? Look, I sold forty-five brownies yesterday, and I've been averaging an extra hundred dollars a week."

"I'm glad you're savin' for retirement, Ma," Jane said, looking pointedly at Maura as she said it, who widened her eyes back.

Angela huffed. "Yeah, me, too. Excuse me, girls. I got customers." She took the decaf coffee back with her to the counter.

"Did you see her face?" Jane asked Maura as soon as she walked away.

"I think she's hiding something," Maura confirmed. "Those are all the things she was baking last night - but maybe she just doesn't want to burden you."

"There are certain things my mother will not talk about, and money problems is at the top of that list," Jane said. "Speaking of problems, though, have you talked to Cailin in the last five seconds?"

"Well, I told her she has to check in with me every thirty minutes," Maura said matter-of-factly.

"Ok, no. You're the one with the problem, Maura," Jane lamented as she laid her head on the table.

"Me? I'm just trying to create boundaries! Just this morning you were telling me to create boundaries," Maura gasped, hurt.

Jane looked up and sighed. "Give her what she wants - a relationship. Ok? She came to you as a big sister, not as another mother."

"I'm just not sure if I know how to do that," Maura admitted.

"Well," said Jane, thinking for a few moments, "how'd you give me a relationship?"

Maura narrowed her gaze. "I slept with you."

Jane blushed in response. "No, not that kind of relationship. Just our friendship, our relationship outside of that. How'd you do it?"

"Oh. Well, I think I just got to know you. I wanted to spend time with you, and I was willing to do things I wouldn't normally have done in order to be around you," Maura answered honestly.

"There you go. Just let her be herself, and show her you wanna spend time with her. She's gonna have to follow some of your rules since she's in your house. But… and this is a big but, you're gonna have to back off and let her be an adult that makes her own mistakes. And if you do that, maybe next time she's up a creek, she'll call you instead of me," Jane explained.

"I can at least try," Maura said.

Jane nodded, pleased enough by this answer, and stood up from her seat, holding out her right hand for Maura to take. "That's all we can ask for. Now let's go - I'm hopin' those results are back on the sticky stuff in our victim's wound."


Tommy Rizzoli, youngest of the three Rizzoli kids, and usually the most wayward of them, carried three trash bags full of bottles and cans up Maura's walkway. He stopped at the mailbox just before the courtyard entrance and pulled the various envelopes out, thinking on what life events had brought him to this very specific moment in time - TJ's birth, the Storrow Center collapse, Lydia's inability to see him as an adequate provider, his own inability to hold down (or even find) a stable job, and finally, his father's unending letdowns.

This time, luckily, the cans and bottles weren't for him. He had been painting houses on a crew for the past few months, and had been doing well at it, even if it was a day-by-day kind of job, and he didn't need the extra money. At least, not recycling money. But his mother? His mother did. And so, for the way she stuck by him when he was in prison, when he had no place to go and no money, and when his son came along, he would stick by her now, not question her. He'd bring her what she needed whenever she asked. And right now, she asked for recycling. So, he had it for her.

When he dropped the bags at her doorstep, he rang the guest house doorbell once even though he knew that she wouldn't be home. As he turned, he saw a young girl, who couldn't have been more than twenty, with her keys threaded through her knuckles at the sight of him. "Oh, hey, whoa," he said, hands up, smiling nervously. "Easy."

"Who are you?" she asked, staring him down like he wasn't half a foot taller than her and at least fifty pounds heavier.

"Tommy Rizzoli," he said, "Jane's brother. Just droppin' off some stuff for my Ma. Who're you?"

She sighed, immediately putting her hand down. "Oh. Hi - I'm Cailin, Maura's sister. Nice to meet you," she said, bright and bubbly again, offering him a handshake.

He wiped his palm sweat onto his jeans before obliging. "Nice to meet you, too. You just moved to Boston, right?"

Cailin smiled. Rizzolis knew more about her than she thought. "I am."

"How do you like it?" Tommy asked, "Don't say anything unless you think it's the greatest place on Earth."

"Ok, I won't," Cailin said, laughing. "I love it here. There's definitely an energy that I haven't experienced anywhere else."

"Damn right," Tommy said. "Well, Cailin, should we go in? I got Maura's mail and it seems dumb to keep standing out here in the cold."

"Sure," Cailin said. She opened the door for him and they both ambled into the kitchen to see Jane and Maura enjoying a glass of wine at the kitchen island as dinner cooked.

"You know, you could be one of the most impatient human beings I know," Maura said, obviously mid-conversation, swiping a hand over Jane's midsection in affection as she took plates from the cupboard behind them, despite her annoyance.

"Hmm, but you're not sure. Maybe you should test it," Jane teased. She turned at the intrusion and then smiled at the two people walking in. "Hey," she said to both of them.

"Hey sis. Got your mail," Tommy replied, holding it up to her.

"Oh, thanks, Tommy. Do you mind putting it on the desk?" Maura asked, grabbing two more plates to set out at the sight of them.

"Sure," he said, doing so. "Can you let Ma know I left somethin' for her?"

Jane frowned. "She's not home?"

"Nah. Cavanaugh took her out to dinner," Tommy said.

Jane wondered how it was that Tommy knew that before she did, and when her mother had gotten so secretive. "What did you leave her?"

"Cans and bottles for recycling," he replied, stuffing his hands in his pocket.

Maura could sense the tension simmering between the two of them, and she motioned Cailin toward the kitchen, away from their discussion by the dining table, to avoid any possible collateral damage. Cailin widened her eyes and followed wordlessly.

"Why are you bringin' garbage to Ma?" Jane asked harshly. "And what's this I hear about you usin' some TV lawyer to settle your suit with the Storrow Center?"

Tommy bristled. "Because she needs my help, Jane. She asked for my help. And I'm not discussin' that with you. It's my business," he said, his voice rising with his agitation.

"What about TJ, huh?" Jane asked, not backing down.

"What about him?" Tommy asked back. "Look, I hired Mark because he said he can get me the money now. Who cares if he's on TV? Frost's guy says it's gonna be at least another year and I need it now. I need to show Lydia that I can provide for her and TJ."

Jane put her thumbs in her belt in a show of aggression and big-sisterly superiority. "I think it's short-sighted and stupid," she growled.

Tommy looked truly flummoxed, with open eyes and a slack jaw. "You can't see me as anything other than a stupid screw-up, can you?" He said quietly, backing out towards the door.

Maura hated to see this whenever it happened. "Wait, Tommy, stay and have some dinner," she offered, despite all of the grief Jane had just given him.

"No, I can't. I just came by to drop off the cans and bottles for Ma," Tommy said as he opened the door and stepped out into the evening air. "It was nice meetin' you, Cailin."

"Nice to meet you, too," Cailin called out, hoping that he heard her before he slammed the door shut.

Jane stood, fuming, at the writing desk for several minutes. She remained silent, tall and dark, brooding until something in her seemed to slide into place and she took the mail from the desk to the island. She set it in front of Maura and sucked her teeth. "I'm sorry. Both of you. I really shouldn't be that hard on him, and definitely not in front of you."

"Sibling relationships can be complicated, my love," Maura said softly, with a warm smile and a wink for her own sister. Then she slid Jane's still half-full glass of wine across the island to her. "That should help."

Jane took it and sipped. "You're the expert now, huh?" she asked, drumming her fingers against the granite.

Cailin watched them. "I'm guessing you're not gonna offer me a glass of wine," she said, in typical teenager fashion.

Jane chuckled, and deferred to Maura, who said, "We could pretend it's France."

"It's ok. I got a guy who can buy me a six-pack," Cailin teased, pulling out her iPhone. Jane laughed openly, and Maura looked at her in horror. "I'm kidding," she said.

Maura finally, finally, let herself laugh, too. She started to sort the mail as she waited for dinner to finish. "Sit with us. Have dinner."

"Ok, cool," Cailin agreed, setting her bag down by an armchair in the living room and making her way back to a stool by the island.

Jane grinned at them both, at their rickety progress, until Maura gasped and dropped a large envelope to the counter. "Maura? What's up?"

"It's from the IRS. I think it's an audit," Maura said, regaining some composure and picking it up again. She handled it as if it were poisoned.

"Good thing we're not married yet," kidded Jane, smirking until she realized Maura's face wasn't changing. "What're you worried about? You break out into hives if you lie. I mean, if you cheat on your taxes, you're probably gonna get leprosy."

"It's not for me; it's for your mother," Maura said simply, looking up to meet Jane's gaze. Jane was next to her in an instant. She took the envelope from Maura's hand and held it over a steaming pot of sauce on the stove. "What are you doing? Mail tampering is a crime."

Jane, the officer of the law, sworn to protect and uphold, removed the paperwork as quickly as she could. "Fuck," she said tersely, angrily. "She owes 27K in back taxes," she explained, eyes still scanning the letter.

Cailin tried to melt into the background, and Maura was shocked. "What? How is that possible? She doesn't even make that in a year!"

"My father," Jane answered with disdain. "He probably cheated on their taxes. No wonder she's been tryin' to make extra money."

"Tommy probably knows," said Maura, "that's why he's recycling for her."

Jane groaned. "Well, why does she tell Tommy and not me and Frankie?" Maura scrunched up her face, but said nothing. Jane pulled back from the half-hug they had found themselves in. "What? What's that face, Maura?"

"Well… Tommy doesn't judge," Maura replied.

"I don't judge!" Jane said quickly and indignantly, and Maura only raised her eyebrows, looking between Jane and Cailin.

"And what was that with Tommy just now?" she asked. "I'm just saying, maybe he sat down and listened to her, without imposing his own opinions about it."

Jane threw her head back and swallowed thickly. "A'right, a'right. Point taken. How am I gonna pay off twenty-seven thousand dollars? The condo just sold, but I can't get my hands on that much cash for at least a couple weeks," she asked timidly, after a few moments of pregnant pause.

"I don't think you do, Jane. She hasn't asked you to. She hasn't asked us to," Maura said simply.

Jane just nodded. She looked suddenly resigned. "I'm gonna kill my Pop. He better not show his face around here, because I'm gonna kill him."