A/N: I want to thank each and every one of you for your support and your kind words. I know it takes long for me to update. I wish I could update every day, but that's just impossible. Please don't think that I'll stop writing, because I won't! I'll always finish my stories, I promise.
Anyway, here's another chapter for you. It's the longest yet, so I hope you enjoy it.
A few days after Jane had been to Maura's house, Maura started asking if she could come over to Jane's place and maybe meet her family. Jane denied her request a couple of times, simply because she was afraid of Maura's reaction when she saw Jane's house. The blonde has probably only visited nice, big houses, and Jane's house surely isn't any of that. The brunette is a little less scared though, when she reminds herself that Maura hasn't brought up the fight with Claire like Jane asked. To her, it means that Maura accepts her the way she is. So when Maura asks to come over on Saturday to practice for their SAT's one last time, Jane says yes. And she thinks she will keep saying yes to everything the blonde wants if that means she can see that smile over and over again.
"Maura is coming over tomorrow," Jane announces on Friday evening, when she's alone in the kitchen with her mother.
"Oh Janie! Is she helping you with all the school work?" her mother says.
"Ma, does it even occur to you that I can have normal friends without them having to help me with something?" Jane says, a little annoyed.
"Of course, honey. I'm would just be happy for you if she could help you a little."
Jane wants to say something, but thinks better of it. She continues setting the table, and her mother continues humming while preparing their dinner.
..
Jane's night is restless, and she's irritated throughout the morning. Her mother only makes it worse by asking her ten thousand questions, and she even snaps at Frankie when he asks her what's wrong. The closer it comes to two o'clock, the more nervous Jane gets. She mentally scolds herself for being so nervous, because after all, it's just Maura. The only thing that calms her nerves is that her father isn't home, so Maura won't have to witness any fights or disagreements.
"Janie!" her mother calls up the stairs. "Maura's here."
Thank God she didn't open the door by herself, Jane thinks, and hurries downstairs. She motions at Tommy and Frankie to go back into the living room, and she waits until they're out of sight until she pulls the front door open.
Maura is wearing a soft, yellow-colored pullover, tucked into the light blue jeans she's wearing. Her hair is up in a casual bun, with some strands of hair falling on the side of her face. Her usual makeup, containing eyeliner, mascara, eyeshadow and foundation, is gone and replaced only by mascara.
Even if she wanted to, Jane cannot look anywhere else.
"Hi," Maura says softly, not missing the way Jane is definitely checking her out.
"Hey yourself," Jane says, quickly composing herself and using her Rizzoli-swagger to cover it up. She dramatically swings the door fully open for Maura to walk in.
Before Jane can say anything, her brothers have come out of the living room to introduce themselves. Tommy pushes Frankie out of his way, and puts his hand out for Maura to shake. "Tommy Rizzoli. Very nice to meet you," he says, and Jane's red cheeks give her embarrassment away.
Jane moves quicker than Maura, and pushes her brother's hand away. "Shut it. Goodbye, guys." She gives Frankie a meaningful look, and he seems to understand because he pulls Tommy with him towards the stairs.
"Welcome to my place," Jane says, "I won't show you around the entire house, because it's a mess everywhere. Anyway,-" She doesn't get further, because her mother calls out from the kitchen.
"Janie! Bring the girl here." The brunette rolls her eyes, and Maura manages to keep herself from laughing out loud. The brunette pulls her, gently, towards the kitchen, where her mother is standing in one of her cooking outfits.
Angela smiles wide when she sees Maura. "Hey hon! So you're Maura? The girl Jane is always talking about?"
"Ma!" Jane hisses, ignoring Maura's look that's directed at her. The blonde looks away from Jane, and meets Angela's eyes again. "Nice to meet you," she says, holding out her hand. Angela drops the towel she's holding and pulls the blonde in for a hug. "Oh, aren't you polite? Nice to meet you too!"
After five agonizing long, awkward minutes of talking, Jane's mother finally lets them go. Jane doesn't know how quickly she should leave the kitchen, taking Maura with her. She leads them upstairs, towards her room. She made sure to clean up her mess this morning, something she usually doesn't do.
"So you talk about me with your mother?" Maura says when they're in Jane's room.
"I knew you wouldn't let that go," Jane replies, cheeks already reddening. "I've only told nice things about you. Anyway, this is my room," she says a little nervously, hoping that Maura will drop the subject. Mercifully, she does, and the tension in the room lessens a bit.
They practice for SAT's the entire afternoon, only interrupted once by Angela who came in to bring some hot chocolate and cookies. When Jane finishes her last assignment at 5:02PM, she happily drops her pen onto her book. "I'm done."
"Did you finish that last equation as well?" Maura asks, closing her book.
"Yup. All done," Jane replies. "Let's go downstairs and see what we're having for dinner. Do you want to stay over?"
Maura looks at her. "Is that okay? Don't you need to ask your mother for permission first?"
Jane shrugs, standing up. "She loves you already, Maura. And by the way, she always makes dinner for about ten people when we're only here with six. Five today, because my dad isn't home. But we can go and ask, if you want."
The girls walk downstairs, and Jane quickly goes into the living room to say hi to her brothers. Tommy and Frankie are sitting on the couch, watching Star Wars. "Hey! Are you joining us?" Tommy asks.
"Uh, I don't think Maura likes these kinds of movies," Jane replies, shooting a quick glance at the blonde who simply shrugs. "Let's ask my mom first if it's okay for you to stay." She motions towards the kitchen, where here mother is still standing, this time preparing dinner instead of cookies.
"Hey girls!" she says, clearly excited.
"Hey Ma," Jane says, "Can Maura stay over?" she steals a piece of ham from the bowl, pulling away in time to avoid her mother's hand swatting hers away. Her mother nods. "Of course, honey. Food is ready in ten."
..
Dinner is loud, but that was to be expected when you're in a house full of Rizzoli's. Jane is always loud during lunch time at school, and Maura should've known that two smaller Rizzoli's and Jane in one house would be even louder.
She's sitting next to Jane, Tommy and Frankie are sitting across of them. Angela is sitting at the head of the table, and Maura thinks Jane's father must usually sit there when she's not here. Jane's brothers are arguing about some kind of game Maura has never played, and Angela is constantly trying to get the boys to lower their voices. Jane interferes and joins the conversation, from time to time looking at the blonde to see if she's alright.
Maura on her part is watching the siblings interact with mixed feelings. She loves the atmosphere in this house, busy, full and loving, but it stings slightly when she remembers all the nights that she's sitting by herself. She takes another bite of her food, and Jane turns around to look at her.
The brunette leans over to softly speak into Maura's ear. "Hey, you okay?" she asks. The blonde has to suppress a shiver when she feels Jane's breath on her ear.
"Yeah, it's just ..." she can't finish her sentence, because she cannot find the right words for what she wants to say.
"Overwhelmingly busy?" Jane fills in, taking another bite.
The blonde nods. "But I love it, Jane, don't get me wrong."
Jane smiles, and Maura loves that appear every time the brunette smiles. Her gaze travels lower until she's staring at Jane's lips, and she momentarily forgets they're in a house full of people. When a tongue darts out to lick those lips, she's pulled out of her trace and meets twinkling brown eyes. She quickly averts her gaze, cheeks slightly reddening. Jane doesn't comment on it, instead kicks Frankie back underneath the table because he almost knocked over a glass of water.
At the end of dinner, everyone stands up at the same time, Tommy and Frankie already running upstairs. Jane wants to leave the kitchen too, expecting Maura to be right behind her, but Angela calls out.
"Can't you three ever help me? I go around cleaning people's houses every day, only to come home to another house that has to be cleaned and dinner that still has to be cooked."
"Can I help you with something Angela?" Maura immediately says. Jane turns around, wanting to say something, but her mother is quicker to answer.
"See, at least she's a decent child," her mother says.
You should know, Ma, the kind of problems I have to solve without you each day.
"Ma, leave it be. I'll help tomorrow. FRANKIE!" she yells into the hallway, waiting until she hears the boy's door open. "Come help."
Maura looks at her questioningly, wondering what's going on. Jane ignores her look, and walks into the hallway to meet Frankie. Maura hears the brunette ask him if he can help their mother with cleaning up. He shrugs, and walks into the kitchen, picking up some plates.
"Let's go, Maura," Jane's voice is clear. The brunette waits until Maura's right behind her, and wants to walk up the stairs. Maura grabs her arm, and pulls her back before the brunette can set foot on the first step.
"What's going on?" she asks gently. Her hand moves up towards Jane's shoulder, but the brunette shakes it off. "Don't," Jane says, maybe a little too harshly.
They stand like that for a few seconds, face to face in the hallway, not saying anything. Maura is studying Jane's expression, and she wishes for one time that she could read somebody's mind. Although that's scientifically impossible, of course, but she'd like it.
"Please talk to me," she tries again. Where Jane is a girl of actions, she's a girl of words, and she desperately wants to know what's going on.
The brunette meets her eyes, looking a little nervous. "Okay," she says. "Outside? I know a place."
..
..
They reach the top of Mission Hill not many minutes after that, and Jane points out a bench on the right to sit down. It's only a Saturday night in October, but the wind is so cold that it feels like December. Maura cups her hands and blows into them, trying to warm them up a little.
They sit in silence for a while, enjoying the view. Maura has never been here, and she's sure that without Jane she would have never come here.
"Why do we need to talk?" Jane asks, looking at the lights of the city. They are almost as beautiful as the girl who's now sitting next to her. Almost.
"You're angry towards your mother, even though she hasn't done anything to hurt you. It's not fair," Maura says directly.
Jane scoffs. "Talk about fair. You don't know anything."
"Tell me then, Jane," the blonde says, studying Jane's side profile. Her cheek bone is prominent, her hair a little wild. A strong gust of wind makes brown curls move slightly up and down, and Maura's heart flutters quickly. Jane is so beautiful, and she probably doesn't even know it.
She waits for a response from the brunette, but it doesn't come. The only think she notices is a small crease in dark eyebrows.
"Jane, can I point something out to you?" Maura asks, hoping that Jane will look at her.
"Since when do you ask for permission to do that?" Jane says teasingly. "Sure Maur, go ahead."
"Look at the way you're sitting. Don't change it, just look," Maura says.
Jane looks at herself, but doesn't notice anything out of the ordinary. She looks at her friend, questioningly. "What's wrong with the way I sit?" she asks.
She feels Maura's eyes scan her body again and she looks away again, feeling uncomfortable.
"Do you notice the way you're holding yourself? Your arms wrapped around you, as if you're trying to protect yourself from something. And you're constantly taking short breaths with the top of your lungs instead of slow, controlled breaths coming from your stomach. You're tense and cautious. Constantly."
It wouldn't be a Maura sentence if there wasn't some kind of biology or science thrown into it. But when Jane really looks, she notices that Maura is right. She doesn't admit it though, because for some reason it feels like she'd be admitting that she's weak.
"You're not in danger right now, so why are you so tense?"
Really smart, Maur, trying to talk your way in via this way.
"Okay, fine," Jane says, and Maura immediately falls silent.
"My parents, they ... they don't really get along anymore. And we don't have much money at home, something you probably noticed, and ..." Jane falls silent for a second, and Maura waits patiently for the brunette to continue. "Ma has to work so much to pay the bills, because all my dad does when he's not on the job is buy more alcohol. And Tommy, he's .. changing."
Maura works hard to take in all this new information about Jane, and notices Jane has fallen silent again.
"Changing how?" she probes gently.
"He always needs money. I asked him a few times, but he keeps saying he needs to pay people back for things he bought. And I'm not talking about ten dollars, Maura, I'm talking about hundreds. And I don't have that kind of money," Jane's voice has a rough edge to it now. "I'm so afraid he's going to get into the kind of trouble I can't get him out of. That's the thing that scares me the most. Not my drunk father, or my mother who's angry because I didn't do something. She only sees those kinds of things Maur, she doesn't know what I have to do and take care of every day."
It's so much to take in that Maura needs a few seconds to regroup herself.
"I can't say I know what it feels like, Jane, because I haven't been in a situation like that. I just want you to know that I'm here for you, and that you can talk to me whenever something's wrong or you're worried. I don't want you to deal with everything on your own, even though that's what you most likely want to do. Not bother people with your problems. Right?"
Jane is in awe of the girl who's sitting next to her. She expected pity, not understanding. Maura says the right things, and she knows what Jane feels.
"Yeah," she replies. "And that's probably why I'm always tense. I'm constantly worrying about things."
"I think I understand now," Maura says gently, not pushing any further. She knows how hard it is for Jane to talk about things.
The brunette has slightly turned away, and is looking out over the city again. Lost in her thoughts, just like Maura, they sit in silence for a while.
Very slowly but surely, Jane feels a soft hand slip into hers. Her first instinct is to pull away, because she's not used to the feeling. She thinks better of it though, and an unfamiliar warmth spreads all throughout her body. Long, bony fingers meet soft ones, and their fingers entwine. Jane tries very hard to not look at Maura, because she is sure that she will kiss her if she does so.
It doesn't take long for Maura to shift a little closer to Jane, and she eventually puts her head on the brunette's shoulder.
Jane tries to keep breathing regularly, but that's hard when the most beautiful girl in the universe is laying on your shoulder and holding your hand. Maura, on her part, wills her hand not to tremble. A wave of uncertainty ripples through her, and she questions whether she should do this or not. But on the other hand, if Jane doesn't want this, she'll say so. And it seems that Jane is perfectly content like this.
And anyway, just friends hold hands like this, right?
It happens on a Friday.
They are standing by their lockers, and Jane had asked Maura to hold her bag for a second so she could grab a few books.
"Jane, what's this?" Maura holds up a small bag with white powder in it, and it takes a while for Jane to realize that Maura just pulled that from her school bag. Her eyes go wide, because she immediately recognizes the substance. "Put that back!" she hisses, taking it from Maura and putting it at the bottom of her bag. "Did you just put that in my bag, or something? I don't have anything to do with it," Jane says, looking into Maura's shocked eyes.
"Is that drugs, Jane?" the blonde asks, and Jane can feel her pulling away.
"It's not mine!" Jane immediately yells, loud enough for a few people to turn around and look at them. "I don't know how it got there. I promise, Maura, please," she says, desperately trying to defend herself.
"You're impossible," Maura says angrily, and nothing but dumps Jane's jacket she'd been holding onto the floor. She ignores the few people gathering around them, because students somehow always seem to know when there's a fight about to happen.
Jane then realizes that Ryleigh hasn't spoken to her about the drugs once since the day she told her, and although she was glad about it, she now hates herself for not talking about it with her friend.
Ryleigh. It must be hers. She must have put it in my bag when I wasn't looking, but why? And when-
"Are you going to say anything or are you just going to stand there?" Maura says.
A few students yell at Jane to fight, but the brunette would never physically hurt Maura, and both girls know that despite the situation. A boy to whom Jane always says hi in the hallways tells her to man up and fight "the fuck" back.
"The fact that you come from a blue collar family and don't have a rich background doesn't mean you should become a drug dealer," the crowd whoops, and Maura is taken aback by the support her answer gets. But at what cost? Jane looks straight into her eyes, expressing what others might see as hatred and anger, but what Maura sees as paralyzing fear.
"It's. not. mine," Jane repeats. "I know what it looks like, but you have to believe me."
"I'd hoped that last weekend proved that you could trust me. I thought I could trust you too, Jane," Maura says.
"I would never, ever, lie to you about these kinds of things, Maura. You should know that by now." Jane is careful to not use the word 'drugs' in the middle of the hallway, and she prays that Maura is smart enough to do so too.
"No, these just 'happen' to be in your bag. What, lifeless objects can fly now?" the blonde says harshly, also expertly avoiding the word. "You're stupid if you think that I'm going to believe you on that one."
She doesn't get a response from Jane, who has now lowered her eyes. This is something that scares Maura even more than a fight with Jane. The brunette looks completely defeated, and doesn't say a word.
When the crowd around them feels that the fight won't be escalating, some of them already start to leave. Maura doesn't care, and Jane puts her middle finger up to a guy who yells 'Come on, Jane! Don't get walked over by a girl'.
Jane picks up her coat from the floor, and takes a step towards the blonde. "Maura," her voice trembles, something the blonde hasn't heard before. "Give me ten minutes. I need to talk to someone. Please."
The blonde doesn't exactly agree, but she doesn't reject it either. Jane takes that as a yes, and quickly walks towards the cafeteria, pushing some people away who keep walking after her. She sees Ryleigh sitting at their table with Frost and Audrey, and she motions to her friend to come to her.
"Hey, Jane," Ryleigh says, smacking her shoulder friendly. "What's up? Where were you?"
The brunette doesn't respond and pulls her friend with her, towards a few bathroom stalls in a hallway that no one ever uses. She closes the door behind them, and turns around to face her friend.
"What the fuck were you thinking?" she shouts at Ryleigh, giving her a hard push against her shoulder. "I'm just going to hide some of my shit in Jane's bag? She won't notice it anyway?" Ryleigh's expression was blank at first, but realization now dawns on her. "Oh shit, Jane. I was just-"
"You were just what? Messing around?" If possible, Jane yells even louder.
"I just needed a place to hide it!" Ryleigh counters. "We were in the hallway this morning, and I was just pulling the stuff out of my pocket and a teacher came by. Your bag was the closest, so I dumped it in there. I meant to take it out right after lunch! What the fuck happened?"
I knew it was her. I knew I should have told someone the second Ryleigh told me, Jane thinks.
"Maura found it," Jane's voice is soft now, almost emotionless.
Ryleigh falls silent too, her eyebrows wrinkling in desperation. "Fuck, Jane. I'm sorry, I-" She doesn't even get the chance to finish her sentence, because Jane starts yelling again. "You messed it all up! One girl I really fucking like, and now she hates me and thinks I'm a drug dealer. I fucking TOLD you to not get me involved. It's not even been two weeks since I told you that and look at you! Already using me as a cover up, nice going!"
"I never meant for you to get in trouble like this, Jane. You have to believe me," Ryleigh pleads.
Jane takes a step forward, pointing a finger at Ryleigh's face. She looks furious. "It's all YOUR fault, and I don't want anything to do with you anymore."
The door flies open and Ms. Brown, one of their teachers, is standing in the hallway. "What's going on here? I can hear you yelling all the way down my office!" She steps in, and pulls the brunette away from Ryleigh. Jane struggles against her teacher's hold, but can't pull herself free.
"Fuck you, Ryleigh. FUCK YOU!"
"Enough!" Her teacher yells, and pushes Jane into the hallway. "Go somewhere to cool off, Rizzoli. Don't let me see you fighting again today."
Jane immediately pulls her cell phone out to call Maura, because she has no idea where the blonde is right now.
*phone ringing*
"Yes," the voice that answers the phone is nothing like the one Jane knows.
"Maura. Listen to me. It was Ryleigh. She put it in my bag, and I-" Jane doesn't get any further, because Maura interrupts her.
"Really, Jane? You're going to blame it on somebody else? I thought you'd be responsible enough to clean up your own mess."
"If you could just give me some time to talk! I can't even finish my sentence," Jane says, a little annoyed.
"So now it's my fault?"
This is going the wrong way. She won't listen to me, anything I say only makes it worse.
"That's not what I'm saying, Maur. I just .." The brunette doesn't know how to explain what just happened. She feels her insides clench with fear at the thought of not being with Maura. Like friends, or whatever they are. The blonde's voice pulls her from her thoughts, saying something Jane desperately tried to avoid.
"I think it's best if we don't spend our time together anymore."
That's how it all falls apart.
A/N: I'm sorry! I just gave you guys the 'hand holding' and now I'm already tearing everything apart. It'll be okay, I promise. That's all I'm saying for now.