I wonder if JTam secretly writes fanfiction. Like, she wants Rizzles to be canon so bad, but the network say no, so she has to resort to fanfic to fulfill her deep, abiding love for shipping Rizzles. Then her biggest problem is that she can't put a disclaimer in her fics saying she doesn't own R&I, because, really, she kind of does. I don't have that problem at all, since I'm not JTam. Or Tess. Or owner of anything R&I.
A/N-Lots of Jane/Maura interaction coming your way. Actually, there's really not too much else...
Maura thoroughly enjoyed her Saturday out on the town with Jane. It seemed to have gone a long way towards easing the tension that so characterized the beginning of their work relationship too; it'd been as if Jane only needed some time to adjust, and the afternoon together had done the trick. For the entire week after their afternoon together, Maura saw Jane fairly often. Sometimes the visits weren't strictly necessary, but Jane came down anyway to discuss the case, and, on few ocassions, things that weren't even related to the case.
It was odd, a radical shift from the strictly coworker relationship she'd cultivated with most of the detectives from both the San Francisco and Boston PD. What made it even stranger was the fact that she couldn't quite understand why Jane was doing it. It was a nice kind of strange, but very unusual nonetheless.
Maura wondered if perhaps that was what it felt like to actually have a good friend, if that was something she could look forward to now that she actually had a person who had, unprompted and without asking for monetary favors, called her a friend and treated her as such.
Of course, Maura understood that platonic friends don't generally enjoy each other's bodies as much as Jane and Maura did. But Maura also knew that Jane would not appreciate any further sexual advances and Maura had to acknowledge that it was for the best.
Still, she wondered if it was unreasonable or inappropriate for her to continue to pick up and, in return, give off flirty signals. Jane was obviously attracted to Maura and, whether intentionally or unintentionally, sent very strong signals on their stroll through the harborwalk. Prolonged eye contact and the occasional arm touches were among the more obvious signals, though there were other, more subtle hints and micro expressions that Maura had trained herself to pick up. Like what Jane might call a 'vibe.' The way that Jane responded to Maura and Maura responded to Jane felt a little more intimate, something a little more than friendly banter.
A perfect case in point regarding Jane's effort to befriend Maura and the flirty nature of their relationship happened a few days after their walk, in the middle of what looked like an open and shut case of domestic violence gone terribly wrong. Maura needed only to finish the autopsy of the woman to confirm that she had, in fact, died of two gunshot wounds to the neck and chest. While she might have called down or sent Detective Frost to check on the earlier in their working relationship, Jane had now taken it upon herself to wait in the morgue for the results.
As much as Maura appreciated the fact that Jane no longer avoided her as if Maura had developed a Hemorrhagic fever, she wasn't sure how she felt about Jane's presence that that particular moment. Jane was pacing off to the side of the autopsy in close enough proximity that she was dangerously close to hovering in Maura's personal space.
"I don't want you to take this the wrong way," Maura said. "But do you realize that pacing in and out of my line of sight is not going to move things along? Studies actually show that movement in the periphery can contribute to decreased efficiency in performing otherwise routine tasks."
"Yeah, but, I'm just," Jane said as she stopped pacing to lean against one of the nearby sinks. "Can't you just declare it now that you have the body open?"
"Not if I'm going to follow procedure," Maura said, only sparing a glance up at Jane as she coninued her work. "And I do intend to follow all protocol."
"That is one thing that I've noticed about you," Jane said. Now she was moving to stand directly across the table from Maura. "You're very...meticulous. Thorough, with an incredible attention to detail."
Maura stopped what she was doing and looked directly at Jane.
Maura couldn't tell if that had been a reference to their time as sexual partners, or simply as a commentary on her skills as a medical examiner. With anyone else, Maura could have determined the motive based on vocal inflection and the two seconds of direct eye contact that they made. No such luck with Jane. Not only was Jane capable of an exceptional 'poker face,' but the naturally seductive timbre of Jane's voice and the elevated hormones levels clouded Maura's judgment.
"You've been watching me, detective?" Maura asked as she turned her attention back to the body, very intentionally making her voice sound as neutral and conversational as possible. "I was almost certain that, up to a few days ago, you were ignoring me."
"You're really hard to ignore," Jane said, with what Maura was now certain was a flirty undertone. There was no way of knowing if it had been intentional or unintentional, but it was most definitely there.
"Am I?" Maura replied, a smile pulling at her lips that she hid by bending even closer to the body.
"Yeah. And, you know, I'm really sorry about all that. I was, just, it's a weird situation, and I was kind of a wimp about it," Jane said.
"It's understandable and predictable to want to avoid potentially difficult or awkward conversations," Maura said. "It wasn't entirely pleasant for me, but, as a whole, an understandable reaction on your part."
"Does that mean I'm forgiven?" Jane asked.
"Yes, I guess it does," Maura said. "I believe your tour of the town went a long way towards achieving that."
"Yeah, that's good. I was kind of hoping so," Jane said. "And, um, Maura?"
Maura looked up at Jane, who had her arms folded across her chest as she looked directly at the body.
"It doesn't have to be a one time thing," Jane said as if it were difficult for her to say, like the words were somehow leaving her a little vulnerable. "The hanging out. I wouldn't mind it if we did something like that again sometime. Or, you know, made it a regular thing. Like the shopping. If you really want to take me shopping for the clothes. I, I'll do that. We can do that sometime if you want to."
"I'd love that," Maura said, grinning brightly at Jane.
Jane grinned back for a second before suddenly looking back down at the body, as if overcome by an uncharacteristic fit of shyness.
"Good, glad that's settled then," Jane said. "Hey, isn't that a bullet fragment?"
It was, in fact, a bullet fragment, a development that effectively ended their flirty bonding moment and moved it back to the investigation at hand. The fragment also kept Maura from thinking too much at length about that apology, the way it had developed, the way that it sounded almost like Jane asking Maura on a date when clearly the content of the conversation was aimed at developing a friendship.
Recalling the conversation in hindsight, a few days after the husband had been booked on murder charges and with only some extraneous paperwork to do, Maura couldn't help but notice how radically denotation and connotation differed in her conversations with Jane. How much the intended meaning was clouded, shifted, even distorted by the context of the conversation. Jane and Maura's relationship, even just that conversation within their relationship seemed worthy of a struturalist linguistic analysis. Maura wondered if there was such a thing, a structural linguistic/psychological case study.
Maura had just set aside her painfully dull paper work to search for such an article in one of Harvard's internet databases when she heard someone knock on the half open door. She looked up to see Jane standing in the doorway.
"Hey, Maura, you got a sec?"
Before Maura had a chance to say anything, Jane entered her office and made herself comfortable in one of the office chairs that the previous ME had left for visitors.
There was something so comfortable, so familiar and easy in the way that Jane sat there, as if she belonged in the office, as if that chair was hers. Maura thought perhaps it was her chair, that Jane always made a regular habit of visiting the ME's office when things were slow. Maura doubted that though, because, as good as Jane was at her job, she did not have a reputation as a people person around the precinct. She rarely socialized with officers and employees that were not or had not been her partner.
If one broadly applied the term 'partner', Maura had been Jane's partner for that week on vacation, so maybe that was the reason for this impromptu social call. But there were an awful lot of maybes floating around, and that did not set well with Maura.
"How can I help you?"
Jane shrugged and looked around the office, which Maura still had not finished putting together.
"I'm bored," Jane said. "You have an autopsy or something I could watch?"
"No, but you are welcome to sit here and watch me do paperwork," Maura said.
"C'mon, I mean, you must have something to do," Jane said, gesturing to the unopened boxes left in the corner of Maura's office. "What about them? You need some help sorting through, putting away your stuff? You don't really seem like the type to not unpack for months at a time."
Maura glanced over at the boxes. She had put off that particular task for some time, and the paperwork was primarily beauracratic busywork. Besides, this was clearly an effort on Jane's part to either bond with Maura or hide out, because, based on the state of Jane's desk, the detective definitely was the type to leave boxes packed for months.
"I see no reason that I should put it off any longer, and I do have space left in my bookshelves," Maura said as she spun around in her chair to take a look at the half empty shelves set up behind and to the right of her desk.
Jane clapped her hands together once and got up from her chair to kneel in front of the largest box.
"Alrighty then, let's get started," Jane said.
Jane actually enjoyed her time unpacking Maura's books. She usually hated moving and packing things, so it wasn't a regular Six Flags adventure or anything, but the company was good. And it had given Jane the opportunity to just chill with Maura without it having to do in some way with sex, murder, alcohol or a combination of the three. Despite their unconventional start and awkward first week working together, Maura was one of the few people that Jane actually got along with at work, and being friendly with the M.E. might help to make Jane's life a little more pleasant. Maybe working on the friend thing would also help relieve some of the lingering tension from the sex thing.
They were halfway through Maura's, well, rather eclectic selection of books when Jane came across a very interesting selection that she could not help but comment on, despite the potentially awkward conversation it might inspire.
"Do you really think you need The History of Sexuality in your ME library?" Jane asked, holding up the slim volume for Maura to see.
"Yes, I do," Maura said. She placed a book on animal remains in its proper place on the shelf and turned back to Jane. "Sex is an incredibly powerful motivator. In order to be a competent medical examiner, I like to understand how such dynamics affect a person's life and death. Besides, understanding the development of societal discourse on sexuality helps in forming and informing my own social interactions."
"Ok, let's see what pearls of wisdom we have in here then," Jane said. She flipped open to a random page towards the beginning and happened upon a convoluted sentence that began with the phrase 'In short' and ended about half a page later after all sorts of philosophical jargon.
"That shit helps you get laid?" Jane said incredulously.
Maura narrowed her eyes and snatched the book away from Jane.
"My methods worked on you," Maura said, a mischevious smile on her lips.
And there was the very topic Jane feared might come up if she mentioned the book. She couldn't really blame anyone but herself for having set her own trap, walking into it and waiting until Maura sprung it.
Jane smiled and nearly laughed out loud at how proud Maura seemed at having made Jane speechless, even for a moment.
"Alright, fair enough. It can stay," Jane said, turning to kneel back down to take another stack of books from the box.
Maura knelt down too. Her pace seemed to slow gradually, and Jane noticed after a few minutes that Maura sifted aimlessly through her box, making no effort to get a stack together. The whole time, the usually efficient, precise woman had been taking her sweet time. Not that Jane minded; she had nothing else to do, but, from what Jane knew of the doctor, it seemed kind of out of character.
Jane managed to place the remaining contents of her box on the shelf in the time Maura had only managed to get through half of her own box. There were no more boxes to unpack, so Jane reached for a stack of books to help Maura out.
"Here, I'll help you with these," said Jane. She took about four or five books, and was about to stand up when Maura turned abruptly and spoke.
"Why do you like me?" Maura asked. "I mean, why do you want to be my friend?"
The way that Maura asked the question, moreso than the question itself, broke Jane's heart. Maura asked as if she sincerely could not understand why someone would want to just hang out with her, like she didn't understand how she could be worth it. Jane had never expected to sense such insecurity in the normally composed, self-assured woman.
"Because," Jane said, stalling for time to answer the unexpected question. "Um, I don't know. You're a cool person."
"Jane, I may be intelligent, but I am not a cool person in any sense of the colloquial use of the word. Although my average body temperature is a bit low," Maura said matter of factly.
"I don't know. I can't really explain it," Jane said, and that was the God's honest truth. Jane could not understand, or at least could not put into words why she was making a special effort to befriend Maura. If she were to be completely honest with herself, it've been whole lot easier and less complicated had they just remained work aquaintances, but Jane, for some strange reason, didn't want that kind of distance from Maura.
"Like what you just said there. You're cool in a kind of different way. Not like anyone else. And we seem to get along well. Just kind of a good vibe, don't you think?"
Maura seemed to at least partially grasp Jane's convoluted explanation. She grinned like the time at the Robber when Jane had called Maura a friend, and Jane knew that she had said the right thing even if it sounded pretty lame and inarticulate.
"We do get along well, don't we?" Maura said.
"Yeah," Jane said.
Jane rested her stack of books in her lap and just looked at Maura. They really did have a good energy, vibe, whatever you want to call it. Chemistry. That's not what Jane wanted to call it, but that's what it was, plain and simple. Jane had crazy intense chemistry with the woman, and she knew that Maura picked up on it too, based on her responses to Jane and her own flirty behavior. Even that teasing, mischevious smile a few minutes before was something more than the teasing grin they had both treated it as.
It felt as though they could not help the flirty vibe, even in platonic situations. Yet, they had to help it. Jane could not be in a relationship or even have casual sex with a coworker. She'd seen it before and it had ended horribly for everyone involved; people had been reassigned, friends had been forced to take sides against coworkers. It'd been a mess, and Jane vowed she'd never, ever do something like that.
Besides, the fact that Maura and Jane were both woman, in a male dominated field no less, would have made them both subject of rumor, teasing, even ridicule from a few old school cops.
As hard as she would try to hide it, Jane knew that any sexual or romantic relationship with Maura would get out. Maura didn't need that harassment and Jane didn't need that distraction. She was at work to catch bad guys, not sleep with the hot ME, goddamnit.
"Jane? Jane?"
"Yeah, yeah, you need help?" Jane asked.
"No, it appears we are all done," Maura said, standing to inspect her work. "Thank you so much for the help. It was definitely much more enjoyable this way."
There it was. That could have been said without connotation or innuendo. Maybe it had been said with that intention, but it sounded like something else entirely.
"Yeah, better than watching an autopsy," Jane said. She stood up and stretched her arms above her head, and when she did, Jane noticed it was already almost 6 pm. "I'm exhausted. I think I'll hit the road now."
"Alright. I should finish signing off on some paperwork anyway," Maura said, then added hopefully, "but I'll see you tomorrow?"
"Definitely," Jane said, grinning at Maura to reassure the doctor that she was sincere. "See you then. I'll be looking forward to it."
A/N-See what I mean about there not being much besides the Rizzles conversation? But I'd like to think, despite the lack of movement, this chapter served a purpose...It's really kind of an odd chapter for me, but it's not like I hate it or anything. It just feels different than other chapters that I've posted so far. Anyone else getting that feel from this chapter?
Thanks for the lovely reviews, both anonymous and signed. I love all of them, and they trul motivate me to continue work on this fic :) Ya'll have any more of those reviews in you?