Jane and Maura had wanted time to themselves but their friends insisted on going out to dinner followed by a night out at Stuevie's. Maura knew Stuevie's was Jane's favorite place to hang out and Jane would probably have the time of her life with Mark, but Maura could hardly wait to get her new wife alone. They were newlyweds and, under normal circumstances, they would be on their honeymoon. Maura had imagined the two of them making love to each other for hours on end in her dorm room, but instead she found herself in a dark, smoke-filled venue waiting for Snot's band to perform.
For Jane's sake, Maura had promised to make the most of it while she was there. As she surveyed the area, she noticed that nothing about it had changed over the past three months. The music was just as loud, the crowd was just as rowdy, and Mark and Markie were just as eager to get into the mosh pit. The only differences were Jane and Maura. The two of them had grown up so much since their first night together at Stuevie's. They were no longer making awkward conversation with each while leaning against the wall and wondering just how much they could test their limits with each other. That night, Jane and Maura were two inexperienced girls who had never been kissed and, just three months later, they were two married women with adult decisions to make—but that was going to wait until later. For a few hours they were going to put their worries aside and have fun with their friends before everything changed. In just a few days, Maura's friends would be heading home for winter break. Markie would be in Portland, Roxie would be in Santa Monica, and Stash would be in her small town in Alabama. They would be in all four corners of the country and, although she'd have her wife, Maura worried about being away from the rest of her support system for an entire month.
While they were sitting at a table at Stuevie's, Maura caught herself looking at her new wife, the woman she was going to spend the rest of her life with. Jane was sitting next to Mark and the two of them were laughing hysterically about an inside joke. Although Maura wasn't included in the joke, she couldn't help smiling at her wife. Jane was so beautiful and kind-hearted and funny and so completely Maura's. When Jane noticed Maura was looking at her, she reached under the table and held on to Maura's hand. It was a simple gesture but it meant so much to Maura.
"…and then I wrote 'You don't suck as much as everyone else. Love, Jane,'" Maura heard her wife say. She had missed the entire story and when she heard her friends laughing she wished she had caught it.
"That's the worst story ever," Mark said although he had also been laughing. "I have a better one."
"No," Jane pleaded with him.
"I'd love to hear it," Maura insisted.
Mark turned to Jane. "Your wife wants to hear it." Once Maura had said she wanted to hear it, Jane wasn't about to protest. She playfully punched Mark in the arm and told him to continue. "This was two years ago—"
"Two very long years ago," Jane interrupted.
"Two very long years ago," Mark reiterated. "It was the first day of summer vacation and I was excited to take Jane out—not in some romantic way, but more of a 'fuck tenth grade, we're glad it's over' kind of way. When I was almost out the door, my dad stopped me and tossed one of those small boxes of condoms to me, the three-pack ones. I was like, 'Dad, what's this for?' and he said, 'For when you're alone with Jane.' Then he patted me on the back like he was fucking proud of me, man. I flat out said, 'Dad, it's not like that with me and Jane,' but he wasn't buying it no matter how many times I told him so I just took the condoms and kept them in the glove compartment to use on chicks who weren't Jane."
"Other chicks," Jane scoffed. "You were a virgin until a few days before graduation."
"And?" Mark retorted. "You were a virgin until Maura."
"She's my first and my last," Jane said before giving Maura a quick peck on the lips.
"Gross," Mark responded. "As I was saying, I kept them in my glove compartment and when I got home that night, I thought I'd get back at my dad for not listening to me, so I said, 'Dad, tonight I became a man.' Vague fucking statement, right? I wanted to fuck with his head, but instead he tells Mr. and Mrs. Rizzoli."
"And our parents gave us a talk after that," Jane said as she hid her face with her hands.
"It was bad enough that Mr. Rizzoli looked like he wanted to kill me" Mark began. "But then my mom asks Jane about birth control and, keep in mind, Jane is already pissed at me for starting this whole thing, but then I open my fucking mouth and say, 'Ma, Jane's gay. She doesn't need to worry about birth control.'"
"This bastard outed me to my parents and his," Jane added.
"It slipped out," Mark insisted. "But it ended that 'Mark and Jane are sleeping together' mess and gave you an interesting coming out story. You should be thanking me, man."
"You should be grateful I didn't kick your ass," Jane pointed out. "I even thought about how I was going to do it."
"Your parents are cool with it?" Stash asked.
"Yeah and they were relieved that I wasn't dating Mark," Jane responded. "Gay or straight, they know I can do better than him."
"Dick," Mark told her before lightly smacking her upside the head. Before Jane could retaliate, Roxie asked the two of them another question.
"How long have you been friends?" she asked.
"Since we were both in our mothers' wombs," Jane informed her. "Our moms have been best friends since elementary school."
"Yeah, Jane and I would communicate with each other before we were even born," Mark added. "We'd plan our escape together. We both wanted to bust out of the womb and we did so like five days apart."
Markie leaned into him. "No offense, babe, but tonight is supposed to be about Jane and Maura not you and Jane. Let's make a toast."
"To Jane and Maura," Stash said as they all clinked their glasses of soda together.
"You're not getting out of it that easily," Mark told Maura. "I have a few words to say in honor of you confining my best friend to the same vagina for the rest of her life."
"No," Jane groaned.
"Yes!" Mark insisted. "Maura, our dear Maura. When I first saw you at The Basement, I wasn't really paying all that much attention to you because I was trying to arrange an opportunity to get into Markie's pants, but you were pretty so I thought I'd pawn you off on my best friend. You seemed easy and Jane needed to get laid, so I figured what the hell. Even though you didn't put out that night and you two didn't even kiss, you were still all Jane talked about. That's when I teased her about falling in love and she pushed me off of my skateboard. And then she ended up falling in love with you and the more time I spent with you the more I realized how perfect you are for her. I've never seen Jane this happy before and I know it's because of you. Jane is like the Butt-Head to my Beavis and when you came along I thought I was losing my Butt-Head, but I was wrong. I'm not losing her. Instead, I'm gaining another Butt-Head and, well, I'll drink to that."
"Thank you," Maura said with a confused look on her face.
"No prob," Mark responded.
"Okay, my turn," Markie announced. "Jane. Jane fucking Rizzoli. My opinion on you has changed so much over the past three months. When I first saw you, I assumed you were an arrogant asshole, but all of that changed when I talked to you. That's when I realized you were a sarcastic asshole, but not an arrogant one, which is better. Maura fell for you so quickly and I worried about you using her, but the more she talked about you and the more time I spent with you made me realize how much you love Maura and you'd never break her heart. With that being said, if you ever break her heart, I will hire someone bigger than you to kick your ass."
"I'll keep that in mind," Jane said nervously.
Roxie rolled her eyes at them. "Wedding toasts are supposed to be sweet."
"Yeah, we don't do that," Mark told her. "If this were fifteen years from now and we had champagne and shit and weeks to prepare, my speech might have been a little more heartfelt, but we're eighteen, chillin' at Stuevie's, and drinking Coke with way too much grenadine in it. You make due with what you have, man."
Another fifteen minutes had passed before Snot's band started to play and Maura noticed how nervous her wife was becoming. Not wanting to bring attention to it in front of their friends, Maura leaned in and kiss Jane on the cheek.
"I love you," she whispered into Jane's ear. Instead of a verbal response, Jane wrapped her arms around Maura and held her tightly. She was able to fully take in her wife's scent—the combination of her shampoo, perfume, and lotion. That scent usually served as a source of comfort but, in that moment, it was like an aphrodisiac for Maura. They had already been married for twelve hours and she had yet to spend time alone with her wife.
"I met this chick named Jane a few weeks ago," Snot said as he took the stage. "She married her girlfriend this morning and it's badass because they eloped. Jane's chick is something else, man, and like no girl you've ever met before, but Jane loves her. I mean, she really loves her so I thought I'd help her out. She wrote a song for her, but since she can't sing for shit, she gave it to me to sing for her. Maura Rizzoli, stand up."
Maura was flabbergasted. Jane had always told her she couldn't write lyrics, so she knew this song must have taken so much time and effort on her wife's part. To top it off, she was allowing it to be performed in public just hours after they had gotten married. With some help from her wife, Maura had finally overcome the initial shock and stood up. "Queen of the Dead," Snot announced. "This is for you."
"It's called 'Queen of the Dead'?" Roxie asked.
"Yeah," Jane said proudly. "Would you expect anything less from a grunge love song?"
A grunge love song is exactly what it was and Maura listened intently to the lyrics. Her wife had written about the flavored condom incident, kissing on the bridge, and an entire chorus about how much she loved her and what it was that she loved about Maura. When Snot sang the verse about spending their life together, Maura was moved to tears.
"You did this for me?" Maura asked in disbelief.
"You're my wife," Jane reminded her. "There's nothing I wouldn't do for you."
They were at a crowded venue, but Maura wasn't paying attention to who might have been looking at them. She wrapped her arms around Jane's and pressed her lips to hers. When she felt Jane slip her tongue into her mouth, she knew she wouldn't be able to hold back any longer.
"Let's get out of here," Jane suggested once the song was over.
Maura needed no further convincing. She grabbed her purse and stood up near the table as she waited for Jane.
"Where are you going?" Mark asked.
"To the room," Jane responded. "Thanks for everything tonight, but we really need to leave."
"We want to consummate our marriage," Maura announced.
"And we have some things to discuss," Jane said to save face.
"But we mostly want to consummate our marriage," Maura added.
The drive home took longer that Maura had hoped and the anticipation was becoming too much for her. To put her at ease, Jane gave her quick pecks at every red light and stop sign, but Maura was filled with so much need for Jane that she felt tempted to pull over in a secluded area. It would have been a quick release of the tension that had been building up for over thirty days and Maura would have been fine with that, but not on that night. It was going to be their first time making love to each other as a married couple and Maura wanted it to be memorable, not just for her but for Jane—especially for Jane.