Snapshots 4.0

Chapter 8 – Ketchikan

The damn alarm went off and Jane shrugged. She hated alarms and figured they wouldn't have to deal with them as they were on vacation but then she thought about it. This was a structured vacation. They had to be certain places at certain times. Dam vacation planning, she was looking forward to when they traveled across the US and didn't have a schedule, just the two of them and the wide-open road. Meanwhile back in their cabin Maura was speaking and Jane hadn't heard a word she had said.

"Jane, are you listening to me?" Maura asked as she sat up in bed and was looking at Jane as she tried to pull the pillow over her head to block the light that Maura had turned on.

"Maur, it's too early. Can't I have five more minutes, please. The light is so bright. Can't we get one of those lights that brightens with time instead of all at once?"

"Jane, love, we are on the ship. We are not at home and yes, I will get you one of those lights when we get home but for now, we have to get up. We have an excursion and I know you are going to want to eat something before we go."

Jane peeked an eye out from under the pillow and asked, "Are you on the menu?"

"Jane!"

"What? It was a legitimate question. We are in Alaska and I have not made love to you in Alaska yet. We have to add this state to our completed list."

Maura just shook her head and said, "Jane, as much as that appeals to me, we can't. Not right now. We have a trip to go on and Ari and Mario will be waiting for us. I am all yours tonight after dinner."

"Promise?"

"I promise, now can you get up or do we have to do this the hard way again."

"I rather like when you are forceful, Dr. Rizzoli-Isles." Jane said as she removed the pillow from her face so she could see her wife.

Maura reached down and pull Jane up to a sitting position. "Did you know that Ketchikan is known as the 'First City' because it was the first major city people came to when they were traveling North."

"No, google, I didn't know that."

"Our excursion leaves at 9 AM and doesn't return until 2 PM. The ship leaves port at 3 PM. So, you can see we don't have long."

"Maur, it is only 6:30 AM, we have time to fool around, we don't have to leave yet."

"Jane, we know you have to eat, and there can be a line to get off of the ship. We are meeting Ari and Mario at 7:15 for breakfast."

"Well, I can text them and tell them we are going to be late, my lady." Jane said as she rose from the bed and curtsied to Maura.

"Oh, please don't start with the Downton Abbey talk again."

"Don't, you like it my lady?" Jane curtsied again.

"Jane, you really are too much sometimes." Maura said as Jane took her into a bear hug.

"I know, but you love me." Jane reminded her.

"I do, I love you very much. Now, let's get ready for breakfast please before your stomach starts talking again."

"Man, my stomach doesn't like when I don't feed it so I guess we better eat. What's our excursion again?"

"A ziplining adventure and lumberjack show." Maura replied.

"Oh ya, ziplining will be so much fun. Do we get to be part of the lumberjack show?"

"No, this is not a volunteer activity. The axe throwing was but you said the ziplining would be a better excursion because we would get to travel and see parts of the surrounding area and that you could always do axe throwing at home."

"Then, that is what we must do. Let's get dressed woman, we are burning daylight and we don't want to hear from the beast."

"Exactly what I have been trying to get you to do, love."

They walked into the designated meeting place at exactly 7:15 and met Ari and Mario, who already had a table for them and had their meal already. Jane and Maura quickly went up and retrieved some food and then went back to the table. They had figured that they needed to start departing the ship before 8:30 so they could be sure to meet their excursion on time.

This gave them plenty of time to eat their breakfast. Jane ended up going back for seconds, she wanted to make sure her stomach wouldn't make any noise. She knew it would be over an hour before they ziplined so her stomach would be settled by then.

It took them twenty minutes to drive via motorcoach to the zipline parking area and then another ten-minute drive via a large four-wheel drive vehicle to reach the chalet. They had to go through a thirty-minute briefing and then they were suited up and ready to begin their adventure.

Jane was the first of the four to go followed closely by Maura. Jane was yelling and screaming with joy. She was having so much fun. She couldn't believe she had never done this before. When their time was up, she told everybody, "we are going to have to find someplace to do this again, I loved it."

Maura said, "You can have fun with that, I have tried it. I'm not a huge fan. Maybe Frankie or Tommy will go with you." Arianna and Mario were with Maura on this one, they tried it and now they don't have to do it again.

Jane couldn't believe that none of them wanted to do it again. Maura was so happy it wasn't a repeat adventure on their trip and she would make sure it didn't appear on any other of their trips unless Jane was going with someone else on the zipline. She knew Jane preferred to go with someone, but she would do it herself if she had to.

They thoroughly enjoyed the lumberjack show. The lumberjacks had performed log rolling and then several different cutting exercises before they competed against each other. Jane thought it would have been cool if they asked for a volunteer from the audience because she so would have volunteered. Her and Maura are so opposite in that way. Maura prefers to sit and watch while Jane prefers to be in the middle of the action. She is an adrenaline junkie. That is one of the things Maura loves and hates about her at the same time. Jane will try anything once and more if she loves it.

After the show Jane tried to get the guys to let her hold the seven-foot blade but for insurance purposes they were not allowed to let her touch it. She was disappointed. She wanted to have her pictures taken holding the blade. They let her take her picture with them as they held the blade but she couldn't touch the blade. Jane was satisfied she at least got a picture with the lumberjacks as they held the blade. Maura, Arianna and Mario joined in a picture also.

Jane and Arianna had a bet on which team would win the lumberjack competition and Jane lost. She thought the team with the bigger guy looked promising, but in the end the team with the little guy won. He was so much more powerful than she had expected.

After the competition ended Arianna was a great sport and didn't say a word, she simply just placed her hand out in front of Jane so she could fork over the fifty dollars. Maura and Mario just smiled, their wives would bet with each other on almost anything. When all was said and done, they normally evened out but they had to be reminded to keep their bets at a maximum of fifty dollars.

Maura could swear that one of the two of them had the original fifty-dollar bill from their first bet in their wallet. It just kept getting switched between the two of them. As they were walking back to the ship, Maura called her parents to check in and found out that Nicky and Giana had just left that morning to take their families to Disney World for a week vacation.

Nicky and Giana had always enjoyed trips like that when they were little and their children all wanted to go to Disney World, so off they went. They figured while their parents were off galivanting they could accomplish Disney World with their children. Arianna and Mario would have enjoyed Disney World but they wanted to do the cruise with Jane and Maura.

Jane had to call her mother because if she didn't, she would never hear the end of it. Arianna and Mario called Mario's sister and checked in with her. They hadn't talked with her since they landed in Boston so it was nice to catch up with her and find out what was going on in Italy.

Arianna missed that she couldn't call her mother. Sophia had passed away last year after living a very long life. She was 92 years old and her heart just gave out. She went quietly in her sleep after saying goodnight to her family and going to bed at 8 PM stating she didn't feel good. Arianna's sister Maria had called her the next day to give her the news of their mother's passing.

A little after 2 PM they arrived back at the ship and of course Jane wanted to eat so they made their way to the buffet after freshening up in their rooms. Maura, Arianna and Mario figured a stop at the buffet was going to be an activity after every excursion. If they didn't feed the beast then it would speak and sometimes it was very loud and spoke at inappropriate times. Jane had eaten all the snacks that Maura had taken with her so she was surprised that Jane was as hungry as she was.

Their rooms were right next door to each other so they didn't have to use the ship's messaging system that often but Jane like to use it when she could because she thought it was cool. She had programmed Arianna and Mario into her phone as soon as they were connected to the ship's Wi-Fi. Because Maura was in the same room as Jane, she was already pre-programmed into the messaging system. Jane loved to send Maura messages while she was sitting on the balcony. Maura just smiled and read the messages of love from Jane. She seldom replied through the system, but rather turned and talked to Jane. Jane would get flustered and say, "Maur, what's the use of having this if we can't use it?"

"Jane, I'm right next to you. you can just talk to me instead of messaging me."

"But I like to use the features. Okay, I will message Ari and Mario." She spent the next ten or fifteen minutes doing that until they stopped responding and just knocked on the door and joined them. Jane got up and opened the door, "Hey, nobody is letting me use this messaging feature."

"Well, hello to you to you, Jane." Arianna said as they entered Jane and Maura's room. "I thought it would be better to talk in person, sorry if I ruined your plans."

"You didn't ruin my plans, just my fun with technology." Jane said as she smirked at her cousin.

"Ya, ya, well we came to talk to my favorite cousin anyhow. You know my cousin, Maura." Arianna said as Jane smacked her on the arm. Arianna ran out to the balcony and closed the door behind her as soon as Mario joined her. They greeted Maura and then Arianna made funny faces at Jane who was still inside the room.

"Arianna, you realize we are on the wrong side of the sliding glass door. Jane has all the power now. We can't go anywhere or do anything from out here." Maura said as Arianna thought about it.

"Damn, you're right. Let me open the door." Arianna tried to open the door but Jane had locked it. Jane held up her phone and pointed to it. Arianna shook her head saying 'no' and Jane nodded her head saying 'yes' and they stood there looking at each other, both so stubborn. Maura and Mario just sat down in the lounge chairs watching the interaction between the cousins. Maura reached into the little cooler she had beside her and offered Mario a cold bottle of water which he gladly accepted. Who knew how long they would be trapped in this transaction between Jane and Arianna.

After about ten minutes Maura sent a message to Jane through the ship's messaging system, "Love, are you going to punish me, it is almost dinner time? I would love to go with you to dinner."

Jane smiled thinking, 'finally someone is using the system.' She responded back, "No babe, I just want Arianna to respond back to my message through the system but she is just as stubborn as me."

"Yes, she is love. Mario would also like to go to dinner." Maura told her via text message. She figured at some point Jane would let them in so they could go to dinner with her. Although the thought did occur to her that Jane could go to dinner by herself and leave them locked out on the balcony. She thought the probability was low as Jane loved company most of the time.

Jane finally let them in the room and they went to dinner together. Jane wanted to have company for dinner and she missed Maura. She was in a snuggling mood and wanted to have her wife with her. They walked to dinner arm-in-arm. The menu offered a nice stuffed pork chop that Jane just loved. She almost asked for seconds but decided against it. She would just have dessert later.

After dinner, they went to play 80's trivia. They did quite well and came in second place having only missed two out of the twenty-five questions. The team that came in first only missed one question.

After playing trivia, they went to the night club to dance. Jane asked the DJ to play 'Don't Be Cruel' by Billy Swan, as she wanted to slow dance with her wife and she had just found this version of the song. He didn't have the song, she suggested a few others which he didn't have so she handed him her phone that had all the songs on playlist and he hooked it up to this sound system and played her playlist, she was so happy.

The beat picked up a little when 'Just Dance' played by Lady Gaga. Jane closed her eyes and just let the music take her. She was in her groove. Maura danced closely with her, their bodies bumping into each other as they danced together. They were having fun and Arianna couldn't help but pull out her phone and videotaped them. They were in their comfort zone just dancing with each other oblivious to anyone else being in the room. They were having fun. She had the phone propped on her shoulder as she danced with Mario, more liked swayed because she wanted to keep her phone on Jane and Maura.

Jane had fun twirling Maura and around and timed it perfectly that when the song ended to twirled her right into her arms. Jane had a natural rhythm to her and really enjoyed dancing with Maura. They stayed out for a few more songs and after 'Yeah!' by Usher played the DJ switched back to his music and gave Jane her phone back. He noted some of the tracks so he could add them to his playlist.

Maura was ready to go back to their room. They had an event planned that just required the two of them naked in their bed. They needed to add Alaska to their list of states that they had made love in. They said their goodnights to Arianna and Mario and set a time to meet for breakfast in the morning. Then they quickly journeyed to their room. After several hours of enjoying each other bodies they both felt confident that they could cross Alaska off of the to do list. They kept enjoying each other long into the night even after they heard Arianna and Mario enter the room next door to them. They tried to be quiet and after about thirty more minutes they were both exhausted and decided to go to sleep. They needed rest before the next day's activities.