CHAPTER 8
Jane drives home. The images of the crash had left her feeling weak and tired and she needed to think, to understand.
She needed to be alone. She always dealt with these things alone.
She also had to make sure she didn't screw up their friendship anymore than what she had already.
But now, driving away, she felt small again, and alien, like she wasn't truly existing.
She shakes her head trying to understand it all as she pulls up to a red light. It's half three and there isn't another car on the road so she stares at the light waiting for it to change. She waits for the change which seems to be on some sort of holiday. Typically. She could have had a small kip by the time the light changes green.
She is debating whether to just run it anyway when it changes.
"Finally." She growls out loud as she puts her foot on the gas.
Out of nowhere a lady walks in front of the car and Jane scrambles to brake. She is too late and the car stops with the lady halfway through her the front of her car.
The lady turns to look at her and frowns.
Jane's face morphs from one horrified look to a slightly more horrified look. From horror of hitting a pedestrian to horror at the pedestrian unharmed yet standing in her undamaged car and looking back at her.
Yes, in her car. The woman is only visible from her waist up. Her top half seems to be in a white haze. Her legs are somewhere around the cars engine, yet she seems completely unharmed.
Jane doesn't move, she doesn't get out of the car. She wonders if this whitish glowing thing is angry, she can't quite see her features. So she remains still.
The woman shakes her head, "You shouldn't be here" she says as she turns away and walks out of the car and carries on across the road, her legs completely unharmed. She turns the corner out of sight, her glow disappears around the corner.
Jane blinks, a long and slow blink. Her mouth is so dry she can't swallow.
"Ghost." She whispers in a half assured way to herself like that conclusion, of all possibilities, is the safest.
She certainly wasn't tired enough to be hallucinating, and unless she fell asleep at the wheel she wasn't dreaming.
She takes two deep calming breaths, followed by another two, and forces her feet off the brake. She carries on home at half the signposted speed.
Her heart still beats twice as fast.
"You have to go Rizzoli."
Jane shakes her head quickly, "I don't want to. I have plans. Can't you send Korsak?"
"There are only three spots available for the Boston region. Ralph Yoko...and he is a nice chap but lets be real...he is not exactly a shining representative for BPD. And Jonas Edwards. Smart guy but a little bit conceited. We need someone there that can give Boston a good name."
"What about Frankie" Or someone from the drug unit?"
"You're a local hero Rizzoli. Everyone knows you. And you're smart and you stand out in a crowd."
"I stand out because i'm tall...not because of who I am."
Cavanaugh shakes his head in dismay, "You stand out because you are confident, you speak your mind and you don't take shit from anyone."
Jane chews her bottom lip, "You want me there because I'm a girl and it shows how progressive we are over here in Boston?"
Cavanaugh shrug slightly, "That helps. But you're also a hero...they already know you. You're the best person I can think of to be there."
"Its a publicity stunt. And here I was thinking you really thought I was special." Jane turns to leave, "I'm not going."
"Rizzoli." His tone is serious and low.
Jane turns slowly to face him crossing her arms and putting her weight on one leg, her defiant rebellious stance her mother would recognise easily.
"That's not what I mean. We need you there. But...It's not an order. And I won't fire you if you don't go..."
Jane snorts a laugh.
"...but you would be doing the whole department...and me...a massive favor."
Jane sighs heavily letting her arms fall to her sides.
"Please Jane."
Jane shakes her head no in an unconvincing way, her eyes pleading him to let her off the hook.
"It will be good for Frankie to work with Korsak while you're gone...find his own feet."
Jane knows he won't stop until he has guilted her into going so she concedes, "Fine. I'll go."
"Thank you. Orientation is Saturday. You'll be back next Friday night or Saturday depending on which day you drive back. All of your expenses are covered."
"Wonderful" Jane says sarcastically as she heads towards the door feeling like a terrible burden has just descended on her shoulders.
She arrives home, and as tired as she was when she left Maura's, she is as awake now.
She walks up the stairs to her apartment her mind still reeling.
She unlocks her door and deadbolts it behind her.
As she turns she see's a white glowing faintly silhouette in her kitchen.
She almost drops to her knees in panic, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hit you with my car. I didn't even see you...I-"
Her voice is wavering with the terror she feels.
"Jane?"
"Frost." She sighs in relief, "What are you doing here?"
"I came to talk to you."
The figure fades in and out a little between glowing like a ghost and looking fully human.
"You are glowing Frost."
"Occupational hazard." He chuckles but Jane doesn't smile at the joke.
He fades even more, just like the other time before he disappeared.
"Don't go Frost. Wait."
"I wasn't going."
Jane takes a step closer.
"Can you...come clear? It doesn't feel right talking to you when you aren't..."
"Human."
"No...not that..."
"When I seem more dead than alive?"
Jane nods. She needs tangible right now. Nothing feels right most of the time.
"I can't see you properly. Can't you be...like less ghosty?"
"Maybe the physical version is merely what you wanted to see last time. I am a spirit, Jane."
"This is like that movie with the kid that see's dead people?"
Frost chuckles, "Just relax Jane."
"Will that help?"
"Yes."
Jane sits down on her couch and tries to relax her fingers tapping each other and her foot tapping the ground.
"Be calm Jane."
"I can't Frost. I can't see you and I'm not sure I should be trying too. You're dead and I'm going crazy. I'm seeing ghosts."
"You're not crazy Jane. I am dead. But...you're not exactly 'alive' either."
Jane bites her lip, "What does that mean?"
"Think of something calming, Jane."
Jane rubs her palms together slowing and thinks of all the things that help calm her.
"Maura."
"Why Maura?"
"Because...I think I'm better when she is close. I feel calmer. She makes me...well...feel."
"Feel what Jane?"
Frosts figure, now looking more like frost, sits beside Jane.
"Feel...I don't know...just feel. I don't feel so out of place when she's around. I can feel my hands when she touches them. I'm going crazy aren't I."
Frost shakes his head and lifts his hat off his head placing across his knees, "No Jane. She is your link. She is the thread that holds you there...or here rather...in the physical realm."
Jane frowns and chews her lip.
"I'm getting worse though. Everyday. I feel like i'm getting further away from what I was. But I can't stay with her twenty-four seven just to be ok right? But I think I might be disappearing when I'm not with her."
"I was sent to help you stop you leaving just yet."
"Leaving?"
"Not existing in this realm."
"Who sent you?"
"It doesn't matter. I am here to help you stop this happening."
"Great...make it stop Frost, please."
"Did you figure out what had changed, Jane?"
"I...no. I don't know. But I don't think I was meant to survive that crash. I saw the pictures. No one should have survived that...But I did. Maybe that changed something."
"It was before that."
"How do you know?" Jane asks, her voice laden with desperation and she turns to face him.
"I was there."
"What? You...I..."
Jane studies his face, and he looks at her...then through her, then he turns away.
Frost is sitting in her car beside her, looking at her. He looks at her like he is looking right through her. And then he turns to look in the direction they are traveling and he points in that same direction. She turns to look where he points...up ahead there is chaos...the crash.
"The crash. You were there. In my car. I thought it was a dream. I thought I imagined it...you...every flashback after that you weren't there."
"You weren't supposed to remember that at all."
"Why were you in the car Frost?"
"To stop you crashing."
"I did crash."
"You were so focused on your phone, Jane, but you shouldn't have been, you shouldn't have been waiting for a call. You weren't even meant to have been on that road. If you had looked up a few seconds later than you had...it would have been too late."
"I...thank you..."
Frost smiles at her, his eye's softer than she has ever seen them.
"I still don't understand...If I wasn't on that road then I wouldn't have been rushing back to stop Tony..." Her voice chokes up in her throat at the thought of what that asshole could have done to Maura, "I had to stop him."
"Think back further."
"Futher? well...I wasn't meant to be on that road...I wasn't meant to go to that conference?"
"Are you asking? You're a detective Jane. Only you can put the pieces together."
"I don't know Frost. I don't understand. Help me."
"Think Jane...what stands out?"
"I wasn't supposed to leave the conference? But Maura...that guy..."
"Think back Jane."
"To where?"
"To when."
Jane closes her eyes. "You're being so frustrating Frost."
"You came back for Maura?"
"Of course."
"But...You left her."
"I had to. It felt wrong though...driving away. From when I left Boston...from when I left her house."
"Then why did you leave?"
"Because of him...because she was with 'him'...she didn't want me." A tear trickles out of her eye and down her cheek, but she doesn't care.
Frost edges slightly closer and speaks gently, his voice soft, "Did she know she could have you, if she wanted?"
Jane jerkily rubs the back of her hand across her cheek in a move that looks defiant, but really she is kicking herself. She kicks herself for a few minutes before she is able to talk again.
"I should have given her a choice before I accused her of making one."
Frost nods slowly, his eyes distant like he is watching something take place somewhere far away.
"I shouldn't have run away that night. I should have talk-...I was meant to talk to her. But I ran away. I never ran away before."
"You always faced your fears before."
"Shit. I was meant to tell her the truth."
"You surprised us all by going off your usual path."
"I was meant to stay in Boston."
"You walked up the path to her house."
"I ran away. Why would I run?"
"You knocked on the door and you waited, you were so so happy Jane."
"No Frost, I was so angry. Because I saw her through the window...with him..."
"She opened the door and she smiled at you."
"Yeah...And then I yelled at her."
"You smiled back at her Jane...you smiled at her...because what you saw didn't matter...you were going to tell her everything...and you were so happy, so sure, so brave..."
Jane sucks her lip between her teeth and holds her breath.
Maura smiled back at Jane, her face lighting up ever so slightly and then her face dropped in realization, "Shit, I'm so sorry Jane. I forgot. I-"
Jane laughs softly, "Wow. You swore. It's fine Maura."
"It's not fine. I am sorry."
"Maura...I um, I need to...uh...talk...uh...to you about...well...something..."
"What is it? Is something wrong?" Maura reaches out to touch Jane's shoulder her face full of concern.
Jane shakes her head, "No. Nothings wrong. I...well...I want to take you...um...somewhere."
"Where Jane?"
"I mean. Well...I would like to take you out."
"Unfortunately I have company right now. And it would be rude for me to leave..."
"Not right this second Maur." Jane says with a half smile her eyes looking over Maura's shoulder, but the company is not immediately visible.
Maura squints her eyes, questioning, "Well, then when Jane?"
Jane clenches her fists to control the frustration inside her, that she can't even ask a simple question in a simple way that could be understood for what it meant, "Maura...Out out. Like...on a...date. I'm asking you to go on a date with me."
"A date?" Maura says pausing cautiously between the two words.
"Yeah." Jane says rubbing the back of her neck nervously, "I...I kinda like you...so...do you...uh...do you think that would be ok?"
Maura raises her hand to her neckline and grasps the material her eye's blinking rapidly, "You and...me?"
"Uh...yeah."
"You and me - on a date?"
"Yeah...A real, romantic..." Jane waves her hand around trying to find the right words, "more than friends sort of date, Maur."
"L-l-b-f-f." Maura says each letter slowly, her eyes wide like a possum in headlights.
"Jeez Maur. YES. A real date date."
"A...date."
Jane had to force her hands to stay by her sides because her instinct is to literally facepalm.
"Yeah. Gosh. Is it really that silly? I don't know."
Maura shakes her head slowly side to side, still registering the request.
Jane continues to talk despite the unresponsiveness, "I thought we could try, because, well...I like you a whole lot Maura Isles, and when I think about going away for even a week it just doesn't feel right...at all. I sort of feels...wrong...like something necessary is missing. I think I might need to be close to you. I think I might...I don't know...I maybe even...love you."
Maura covers her mouth with both hands and Jane can't see the smile forming behind her fingers.
Jane's face tries to hold firm and brave, but the edges of her lips twitch downwards in uncertainty while she waits for a reply, "You're really killing me here Maura."
Maura drops her hands, so Jane can see her beaming ear to ear smile. She leaps into Jane's arms throwing her arms around her neck and hugging her tightly, so tightly Jane is sure she will bruise, but she doesn't care, she hugs Maura back with a grin of her own.
"I can't wait." Maura whispers in Jane's ear.
"Excuse me," Tony says from behind Maura. Both girls, still in the doorway, turn to face him, arms still around each other, Maura still smiling, Jane looking annoyed at the interruption, "I believe I am already on a date with Maura."
He clicks his tongue on the word on, like it meant he had some sort of entitlement, some ownership. Like it was a dude fight for the chick and he had the bigger gun. Like a western stand-off before the quick draw and he was the sheriff. But if confidence is key...Jane has it in spades. Maura gently squeezes her arm, an assurance that Jane knows means she can go ahead and evict current company, that Jane is her choice.
"Oh yeah?" Jane asks darkly like she would in an interrogation. Her voice so cool that Maura shudders.
Jane lets go of Maura and steps into the foyer, placing herself between Maura and Tony. She looks at him in a sly yet menacing way, like she had the upper hand, like it really was the wild west and she had secretly stolen all his bullets.
"Uh..." He stumbles uncertainly. He makes the slightest movement backwards and Jane glowers at him like a wolf ready to pounce. She goes for the jugular.
"You look shady to me. What's your name?"
"I..I...I..."
"What's the problem?" Jane says moving closer
He begins to feel anger, his gorgeous lay was right there for the taking, and this tramp has just stepped on his parade, "You're my problem." He says under his breath as he glaring at her.
She hears him and scoffs, "I outta run a background check on your smart-arse." She pulls her badge out of her back pocket and waves it around in a casual way.
His eyes widen and his mouth opens, "I...I'll just be on my way." He turns and walks briskly past them both and out the still open door.
Jane turns to Maura and smiles, her eye's carrying a deep happiness and caring, brown pools of sparkling joy.
"I'm glad you came over Jane. I'm sorry I forgot about our night."
Jane shakes her head and smiles at her friend, "I was coming over to tell you I have to go to that stupid police conference, Cavanaugh picked me to go."
"You deserve it Jane, you're the best detective in Boston, you'll have a great time."
Jane shakes her head, "Only while I was driving here I decided I will miss you too much."
"Really?" Maura steps every so slightly closer.
"Really. Really."
"Then don't go Jane."
"I won't go. I just got here." Jane closes the distance pulling Maura into a tight hug.
"I mean the conference Jane. Don't go. Just stay. I have a charity banquet on Wednesday and I require you to come with me. As my plus one."
"Can I just not show up?"
Maura chuckles softly "Let Cavanaugh know that you aren't going. He will fill your spot."
"I'll call him in the morning."
"Perfect."
Jane glances down a Maura's lips, wondering if their first kiss will happen on their first date. Wondering if she can resist for that long.
"Jane. You can stay with me."
"Tonight?"
Maura sighs and smiles, resting her head against Jane's shoulder and burying her face between Jane's shirt and soft locks of hair, "For as long as you like."
Jane looks up at Frost, brown sad eyes, glassy and distant, "Thats what would have happened? That would have been the outcome?" She asks sadly rubbing her hands together.
"No one can know the future for sure...but It might have been." Frost says lowering his head.
Jane plays with her lip between her teeth, "I screwed up so bad. I don't know to fix this Frost."
"In case it mattered, I would have been rooting for ya. Could always tell there was something between you two. Something special."
Jane smiles at him, "Thanks. That means a lot."
"Good to know the opinions of the dead are still valued."
Jane chuckles softly, she missed his jokes. He smiles back at her.
Her smile drops as she realizes how far off track she currently is.
"What am I going to do Frost? How can I fix it?"
Frost shrugs gently, "You have to figure that out yourself Jane."
"What if I can't? What will happen to me?"
Frost frowns in thought, he makes sure to not look at Jane, to keep looking anywhere but at her, "Well, If I had to guess, I would say that you might be stuck where you are, or perhaps drift further and further from where you were meant to be."
Jane runs her hand through her hair, trying desperately not to panic.
"I'm trapped. This is a some sort of alternate reality...or something."
She looks at Frost and notices he is slowly fading away, disappearing in front of her eyes.
"Don't go yet...I need answers."
"I don't have them Jane. I have to go now."
"No...Frost...you are Doc and I'm Marty McFly and you've come from the past in a time machine to help me. Take me back...please." She pleads trying to grab him and hold him there, but she can't touch him.
Frost puts his hat on, the brim partially hiding his eyes as they look at the ground.
"Am I going to die then?...because I won't even exist anymore? Because this isn't how it was meant to be?"
Almost completely gone, Frost lifts his head, his eye's lock on Jane's and he holds her there, her expression matching his.
"You can fix this." He says, then he is completely gone.
...to be continued...
Thank you for your wonderful reviews...I hope this chapter puts the pieces together (or at least I tried to - let me know if I missed any). This wasn't how I planned the story at all when I wrote the beginning chapters.
Can Jane fix it? Is it even possible to fix it now? Or will Jane disappear?
Blessings and thanks to all my fantastic readers. Much love. Jam xxx
p.s Sorry about all the wild west and guns stuff...I wrote that in the middle of the night a little tiny bit under the influence. :/