Questions:
"Dr. Isles, I'm afraid I can't release any of that information to you. I'm sure you understand –"
Inside of her room, Jane shifted on the mattress and tilted her head, tucking a lock of dark hair behind her ear and listening intently to the argument happening on the other side of the door. She was supposed to be asleep, which was probably why Maura had decided to question the night shift nurse in the hallway, but the constant soreness that radiated out from the bullet wound in her abdomen kept her from drifting off. She wasn't allowed to use a morphine drip anymore, but Jane preferred the pain. She had seen too many other cops become reliant on painkillers after being injured on the job.
"I simply want to know where the bodies are sent to be autopsied if a person dies under unusual circumstances here," Maura continued. "Surely that information isn't protected by federal and state privacy laws."
The nurse's answer was too low for Jane to make out, but she was almost sure she caught the word "lawsuit" in there somewhere. A familiar, exasperated sigh followed, and Jane could picture Maura tapping the toe of her shoe impatiently.
"Mr. Heissman is the one who wanted me to ask in the first place! Apparently – and I can't imagine why – he is under the impression that a fellow doctor's request for information might carry more weight with the decidedly unhelpful staff.."
Jane smiled when Maura continued after a brief pause, obviously not pleased with whatever the nurse had said. "Well, no wonder you don't advertise where you send your bodies! Dr. White couldn't find his own ass with both hands, let alone identify a cause of death, and I'm sure his students are hardly any better."
Maura's atypical outburst made Jane laugh, but she regretted it when violent streaks of red exploded behind her eyes. Letting out a muffled groan of pain, she tried to ignore the sharp, stabbing sensation in her gut. Unfortunately, Maura heard her from outside the door and abandoned her tirade, hurrying back into the room.
"You're supposed to be asleep!" she scolded, bending over to check on her friend, her brow creased with worry.
Jane tried to bat Maura away with a few weak swings of her hand. "Stop that. I'm fine. Why were you swearing? You don't swear."
Maura sighed. "Well, I certainly won't attempt to do so again any time in the near future if this is the standard result..." she muttered, pushing past Jane's arms and lifting her shirt to check on her bandage, not thinking twice about Jane's modesty. Jane, however, was not so oblivious, and she tried to pull her shirt back down, at least for the sake of the bewildered nurse who was standing in the open doorway. The bandages stopped just beneath her breasts, and she didn't want to give the poor woman, plus anyone else who happened to be strolling through the hallway in the middle of the night, a free show.
"Maur, stop that," she said, managing to preserve some of her dignity while the ME fussed over her. "Who is this Dr. White guy who can't find his ass with both hands?"
Maura sighed. "I use the term Doctor loosely in reference to him. He is a professor at the University, and while Boston sports some of the greatest Academic minds in the United States, his is not one of them. I had the displeasure of sharing my second year residency with him. The man is a complete moron. I'll do poor Rose Heissman's autopsy myself just to prevent him or one of his students from making a butchery of it."
"Is that even allowed?" Jane asked.
"I'll make it allowed." Ignoring the fact that her sentence wasn't grammatically correct – she was two for two today on unusual sentences – Maura turned around to send the attending nurse away with a pointed glare. Wisely, the cowed woman shut the door behind her, leaving the two women in relative privacy.
An uncomfortable silence stretched between them, setting the doctor and the detective on edge as they studied each other. Maura was the first to speak, but she did so reluctantly. "Please don't think that I'm arguing the merits of looking into Rose Heissman's cause of death, but Jane, have you given any thought to your motivations?"
Jane gave the medical examiner a curious look. "My motivations? I never asked you to do anything but talk to her husband. You're the one that's going all body snatcher on the hospital." The way that Jane's dark eyebrows moved as she spoke made Maura's stomach twist itself into slippery, uncomfortable knots.
"I knew you wanted me to look in to it. I know you, Jane. I know how you think. You didn't have to ask."
The detective took an almost defensive posture, not sure she liked what Maura was implying. "You're exaggerating. I'm not that easy to read..."
"You are to me." There was no smug pride in Maura's admission. Like most of her statements, it was simply a fact. "I can tell you want to find out what happened to her. What I would like to know is why."
Jane shrugged, even though the motion stretched the bands of muscle across her stomach and made her feel a little sore. "I'm bored. Let's just leave it at that. It'll be weeks before I can get back to work, and I have to see a shrink, re-qualify with my weapon, all that crap. I know finding out how she died is your line of work, not mine, but putting the wheels in motion gives me something to do. God, time just crawls by in this place... and Ma never gives me a moment's peace..."
Although she could tell that Jane was being truthful, Maura suspected there was more that her friend wasn't saying. "So that's it? This is just a distraction for you? There's nothing else on your mind?"
"Yeah." But the blonde didn't miss the slightly startled look in Jane's eyes. Suddenly, it didn't feel like they were talking about Rose's death anymore.
"Well, I've been rather preoccupied lately. In fact, I have a confession to make."
Still a little nervous, Jane tried to tilt the conversation in a more humorous direction. She was too tired and sore for serious discussions. "As long as you aren't going to confess your undying love for Korsak or force me to move back in with my parents once I break out of this joint, I think we'll be okay."
Maura gave Jane a reassuring smile and instinctively placed a hand on her arm. "Actually, I wanted to talk about..." 'Us.' Maura couldn't quite bring herself to define 'them' as an 'us', at least not out loud. Even though she felt ready for that step, she didn't want to pressure Jane in any way. "Over the past few days – no, before that... Recently, I've come to certain realizations about myself..."
Jane sat up straighter against the headboard, making use of the stack of pillows behind her head. She tried not to look as uncomfortable as she felt. For some reason, Maura's touch seemed unbearably warm on the bare skin of her arm. The contact almost burned, but it wasn't unpleasant.
"–I think I'm developing strong feelings for you." Maura barreled on, determined to get the rest of her impromptu speech over with before Jane could stop her. "I don't know how to classify them, since this is a new experience for me, but I felt that, as your friend, I needed to be honest with you."
"What do you mean, feelings?" Jane asked, almost choking on the words. Her mouth suddenly went dry, and she struggled to speak. "Maura, we're friends... good friends... I mean, I know we've, but – do you really want to screw that up?"
Instead of deterring her, Jane's hesitance only emboldened Maura. Obviously, Jane knew what she was getting at, and she didn't seem surprised, just very unsure, testing each step before she took it so that she wouldn't start sinking. That meant there was a chance – a slim chance – that her feelings might be reciprocated. "Nothing's going to change right now. You need to focus on getting better. I just thought you should know."
Instantly, Jane felt a little of her panic subside. A thin layer of sweat spread itself over her palms, and she hurriedly wiped them on her bedsheets, trying not to look as nervous as she felt. Somehow, she had known this conversation would happen between them one day... but she had always tried not to think about it.
"Jane..." The familiar sound of her name on Maura's lips was soothing somehow, and the detective relaxed. She looked up into soft, concerned green eyes. "Jane, you look exhausted. Get some sleep."
"If I had a quarter for every time someone told me that, I'd be richer than Donald Trump," Jane muttered, deciding to fall back on ill humor in order to avoid thinking about all of the things Maura had said.
"We've been friends for a long time now. You know I only tell you the truth, even if you don't want to hear it."
The detective sighed. "Especially when I don't want to hear it." To soften the words, she placed her hand on top of Maura's, giving the medical examiner's hand a friendly squeeze. For just a moment, their eyes met as a brief connection passed between them before both women looked away with identical sheepish expressions.
. . .
"Ma, what did you mean the other day about me and Maura?" Jane asked her mother the next morning as the determined Angela Rizzoli attempted to replace Jane's damp hospital sheets with colorful ones from home. The detective suspected that her mother was deliberately disobeying hospital policies by doing so, but she didn't have it in her to argue or protest. She simply sat in her wheelchair and watched, content to let Angela have her way for the moment.
"Oh, so now you want to talk?" Angela said, pausing in her task to fold her arms over her chest and give her daughter a smug look. "I thought all you've been doin' lately is complaining about me."
For a moment, Jane wondered if Maura had ratted on her, but dismissed the thought immediately. Her mother just knew. "You know I love you, Ma. I just don't like being babied."
Tucking the sheets under the mattress in a perfect corner, Angela walked over to Jane's wheelchair and threaded her fingers through her daughter's hair, massaging her scalp and rubbing the back of her neck. "I know, but you'll always be my baby, Janie."
Jane realized that she would have to give in a little, at least for now, if she wanted any useful advice from her mother. "I know," she said, permitting the attention. "So, what did you mean?"
"I told you. That girl's in love with you, and in my opinion, you couldn't do much better." Angela sighed. "But since when do daughters ever want the people their mothers approve of?"
"You approve of Maura?" she asked. Even though the topic was uncomfortable for her, Jane couldn't help being curious. "I mean, we're Catholic..."
"My Maura's a good girl," Angela said, referring to the absent doctor almost like a family member. For some strange reason, it felt right to Jane. "The Pope probably wouldn't approve, but since when is it his business? God saved both of my children, and Maura helped... All I want is for you to be happy and healthy."
"I'm working on the healthy part," Jane said, stretching her arms and doing a few twists to show her mother the results of her PT exercises. Angela seemed pleased with Jane's range of motion, but she shepherded her daughter into the freshly dressed bed anyway and forced her to lie down.
"So isn't it about time to do a little work on the happiness part?"
"I am happy," Jane said, but she knew that she wasn't. Even prior to the shooting, she hadn't been truly happy. Before, she had just assumed it was a rough patch, the kind of tough few months everyone went through at some point, but now, she wondered if there wasn't more to it. Maybe the lingering dissatisfaction that had been plaguing her had something to do with Maura.
'Why do all of my thoughts seem to come back to Maura?' Jane wondered to herself. 'Maura... Maura...'
"Jane!" Her mother's voice jolted Jane out of her entranced state. "Your cell phone?" Now that her mind was focused, she could hear the familiar 'Dun Dun DuDun' that signaled a call from the very woman she had been thinking about. Maura's voice floated in her ears. 'You should really change it to Dies Irae, Jane. The melody is so much more melodic...'
Reaching for the phone, Jane held her breath as she waited to hear Maura's voice. "Hello?"
"Hi there. You'll be pleased to know that my connections have paid off and I can solve your little mystery for you. I'm going to perform Mrs. Heissman's autopsy, with her husband's permission of course. At least I'll have some news to entertain you with tonight when I visit."
"I'm always entertained when you visit," Jane blurted out before realizing how that sounded. Angela winked at her and she let out a frustrated groan.
Recognizing that Jane was irritated rather than in pain, Maura wasn't too concerned. "What's bothering you now?"
"How do you do that, Maur? It's creepy... And nothing's bothering me. "
"Are you sure?"
"You're worse than my mother. I'll see you tonight. Does Rose's husband know you're going to do the autopsy? He was really worried about it yesterday. It might put his mind at ease."
"Yes, I've already spoken with him. It will mostly be standard procedure, and my assistants have been doing a good job lately helping me get through my regular caseload, so I should be able to take her out of the freezer in a day or so."
Jane shuddered. Although her up-close and personal experiences with the dead had increased in recent years thanks to Maura, the thought of human bodies being stored in a freezer still gave her goosebumps. "Eurgh, Maura, that's gross."
The light sound of Maura's laughter put a smile back on her face. "Why do you think I said it? Anyway, I have obtained her medical records, and by all accounts, she was doing much better. Her cancer was responding very effectively to the treatment. Whatever happened to this poor woman, it wasn't the disease that killed her."
"Yeah?" Jane said, feeling slightly guilty for being excited over someone else's death. Of course she didn't like to think of anyone being hurt or killed, but finding the solutions to problems, especially problems that involved dead people... well, that was what she and Maura did best.
"Yes, Jane, not 'yeah'."
"Fine, fine, 'yes'..." Angela nodded her approval at the side of the conversation that she could hear, and then gestured that she was going to leave the room for a little while. Probably to find more food to torture her with, Jane thought glumly. "I'll see you tonight," she said, waving goodbye to her mother as she simultaneously ended her conversation with Maura.