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The barista in the Starbucks on Boylston tells Maura that they are out of coffee. She says it with such a straight face that the doctor has begun to turn away before she really registers the words.
“Wait,” she turns back. “Excuse me?”
The girl looks at her with something a little harder than boredom, but not outright anger.
“We’re out of coffee,” she repeats. “Sorry,” she says after a while, though she certainly doesn’t look it. “Try somewhere else.”
Maura hesitates, turning to look at the barista next to hers as he takes a man’s order. He does not tell the customer that they are out of coffee, but taps the custom order into her console and then asks for his name.
The doctor frowns. “That’s not possible,” she says, more to herself than to the cashier.
“Sorry, Doctor,” the barista says. “You can’t always get everything you want!”
This makes Maura take a step back, shocked, and the young woman behind her steps up to the counter, thinking that she has ordered already.
She watches as the barista (her name tag says Hallie), takes the woman’s order - tall black coffee - without issue.
Her frown deepens. She has spent a lifetime of reassuring herself that the actions of others were not done deliberately to hurt her.
In this instance, there can be no other explanation.
The young woman finishes her order and turns to see Maura still standing there.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “Did you finish ordering?”
Maura looks over the woman’s shoulder, meeting the eyes of the barista, Hallie. She is looking back with an expression that can only be classified as a sneer.
“No,” she says slowly. “I’m all set. Thank you.”
That is why she ends up in the break room at the precinct, looking between the coffee carafes, and trying to decide which will taste less like the inside of a shoe.
She’d stayed up late (texting! Of all the activities…), and between getting Mae up and out the door, she hadn’t had the time to make her own cup.
“Oh!” a surprised voice behind her makes her glance over her shoulder.
Two detectives are standing in the doorway, and the shorter of the two is looking at her with obvious shock.
“Hello, Detective Martin,” Maura says politely. “Detective Lind.”
Maura turns back to the coffee as they step level with her, waiting their turns. “Hello, Dr. Isles,” Detective Martin says. “It’s not every day we see you in our humble breakroom!”
Maura smiles, choosing the left coffee pot, because it is fuller, and therefore might be fresher.
“I was running behind this morning,” she answers. “And stopping at Starbucks…did not go as planned.”
“Bit of a late night, huh?” This is Detective Lind, and although Maura can tell from his intonation that this sentence has dual meaning, she cannot begin to decipher what it is.
Should she tell him she was up late texting her detective girlfriend about Mae’s upcoming participation in the soapbox derby?
That hardly seems appropriate.
She opens her mouth, and then closes it again, stuck. It would be impolite not to answer, but she doesn’t know how.
Luckily, Detective Martin clears his throat, gives his partner a significant look, and then smiles at Maura.
“Don’t mind Lindy here,” he says, grinning at her. “He’s not had his coffee yet. His manners is still switched off.”
Maura nods, stepping aside so that they can get their own coffee. She leaves in a hurry, and is almost to the elevator when she realizes she’s left her bag.
She goes back along the corridor, intent on grabbing it and then retreating to the morgue, but she hears Jane’s name, and automatically stops dead, listening.
“I mean, Rizzoli though?” Detective Lind is saying. “It makes no sense that someone like her would be with someone like that.”
“Lesbians make no sense,” Detective Martin replies mildly. “I mean. Whatsitcalled…bisexuals, I understand that alright, but…just girls? Wild.”
“There’s toys,” Detective Martin says, sounding wise, “to simulate men and such. I don’t know. Maybe those two can’t get anyone else. Although I’d give it to Rizzoli if she was a little less…” he trails off here, thinking, and comes up with, “butch.”
“Yeah,” Lind agrees. “But how butch do you have to be to melt the Queen of Cold Storage, hmmm?”
“Shhh!” Martin says harshly. “Not at work, you idiot! If it gets out you said that, it’s a write up. ‘Hostile Work Environment,’ they’re calling it. And Jane’ll put you on your ass.”
“Right,” Lind says, his voice suddenly closer. “Right.”
Maura turns and walks as quickly as she can to the elevator. She makes it to her office without seeing anyone, and has seated herself at her desk and powered her computer on, before realizing that she has once again, left her bag in the breakroom.
……
Susie, her Assistant Medical Examiner, brings her bag by at lunch.
“Someone found this in the break room,” she says, holding it out. “I said I thought it looked like yours, but that there was no way you were in the break room!”
She laughs, and then sees that Maura is frowning, and goes pale.
“I’m sorry,”
Maura shakes her head. “No,” she responds. “I am. I…had several interactions today that have left me unsure.”
“Oh,” Susie says slowly. She bites her lip. “Do…you want to talk?”
Maura opens her mouth to say no, but what comes out is, “are you aware I’m dating Detective Jane Rizzoli?”
The answer is plainly written on Dr. Chang’s face, though she looks for a moment like she’s going to lie.
“Yes,” she says finally. “I’d heard a rumor.”
Maura nods. “How?” she aks. “I mean…how does everyone know?” She looks up at Susie’s worried face. “It’s not that I’m upset,” she says quickly. “I would never hide it…It’s only, I hadn’t been broadcasting it either.”
“Oh,” Susie takes a step closer to her desk. “Well…I heard from Dr. Lyons? You know? The Boston proper AME?”
Maura nods.
“I guess…that Detective Rizzoli has a picture of you and her and your daughter, um,”
“Mae,” Maura fills in.
“Right, sorry,” Susie blushes. “There’s a photo of the three of you taped to her monitor now.”
Maura knows which photo it is immediately. They’d taken Mae to the Planetarium, and outside the butterfly garden, Jane had insisted that they all take pictures in a photobooth. It was both Mae and Maura’s first time, and in the first two pictures, they are looking at Jane with twin expressions of confused adoration while she makes a funny face at the camera.
“It’s really small. The picture,” Susie says when Maura looks at her, confused. “And the Administrative assistant, Meg Walsh, heard Detective Rizzoli ask her partner if he thought she should take it down.”
Maura smiles. “I hope she leaves it up,” she says, more to herself than to Susie. “Thank you for telling me,” she says after a moment.
Susie smiles at her and turns to go, but Maura calls her back before she can get to the door.
“Do you think it’s odd, Dr. Chang?” she asks.
“Do I…” Susie frowns at her. “I don’t think anyone’s sexual orientation can be categorized as odd, doctor-”
“No!” Maura says, “Not that.” She blushes a little herself as Susie turns scarlet. “I meant my relationship with Jane. Do you – what I’m asking is – do you think that it’s odd that we’re together?”
Susie frowns at her for a long moment, and then something seems to click in her brain. She smiles warmly at Maura, and shakes her head.
“Don’t worry about what those dweebs from Robbery say. None of them have had a date since Elvis was alive.”
And with that, she turns and heads back into the morgue, leaving he doctor to chuckle at her joke, albeit a bit belatedly.
……
……
She opens the door to her house that evening, to hear the high pitched giggles of her daughter ringing down the entry hall.
“Jane!” Mae is laughing. “You’re gonna make it rip!”
It’s the second time they’d tried this arrangement: Jane picking up Mae when Maura works late, and for a moment, Maura just stands in the hall, thinking about how wonderful it could be to have life be like this for always.
Then Jo Friday trots around the corner and sees the doctor, and her excited bark gives her away.
“Mommy’s home!” Mae comes around the corner at full speed to hug her.
“Hello, darling,” she says. “How was school?”
“It was good,” Mae says, still hugging her. “The teacher was wrong six times, but I didn’t say anything since you said not to. At recess I played with Amanda, and we sat together at lunch. And I got a 104% on my math test. Come see the box Jane got for our car!”
She turns and runs off, and Maura follows her, trying to make sense of what she’s just heard.
“Wait, Mae!” she calls. “Did you just say you…played with someone at Recess?”
She rounds the corner, and the sight in front of her makes her burst into laughter.
There is a huge cardboard box in the middle of the living room, and out of one end, poke the detective’s legs. She is dressed in jeans, and one sock is missing.
“Hello, Detective,” she calls.
Jane shimmies herself from her cardboard prison and sits up to grin at Maura. Her hair is wild, like she’s been rolling around on the carpet for some time.
“Well,” she says, smiling back. “Doctor! Welcome home.”
She stands as Maura returns her focus to Mae, who is consulting her book on soapbox derbies.
“You played with someone at Recess?” she asks again.
“Yes,” Mae says distractedly. “She saw my book and she and her Dad are going to do the derby too. I said me and my Jane were gonna, and then she asked me to play pretend. So I did. At lunch we talked about what colors are the best for the car. Also she has read Artemis Fowl too, Mommy!”
Mae is still engrossed in her book, but Jane struggles to her feet and comes over to put her arms around Maura’s waist.
“It’s a big deal,” she says into Maura’s ear. “But you can’t let her know that.”
Maura twists so she can press her lips to Jane’s.
“Ewww,” Mae says, delighted. “Do it again!”
……
“So, I heard that you have a picture of me and Mae on your desk, Detective.”
Maura is lying on the couch with her head in Jane’s lap, not reading the book propped open on her chest, while Jane runs her fingers through Maura’s hair, and half watches the television. Mae is in her room, finally asleep.
Maura’s statement catches Jane’s attention, however, and she looks down at Maura, smirking.
“Three days,” she says, amused. “If only the BPD could transmit leads and crime scene information as quickly as romance gossip.”
She grins down at Maura. “Don’t worry. It’s just the bottom square of that photo strip. The one where we all look normal.”
“I’m not worried,” Maura answers. “I…It makes me feel wonderful that you’d put that up for your colleagues to see.”
Jane’s smile fades a little. “But?”
“There is no but,” Maura says. “I…well…”
“Ooh,” Jane says, her smile disappearing. “There’s an ‘ooh, well.’ I’d rather take the but.”
“I heard some of the Detectives talking in the break room today.”
Jane rolls her eyes. “Like hands wrists through the handcuffs, so go the days of our precinct.”
Maura blinks at her. “Is that a reference I don’t understand?”
Jane smiles affectionately. “Yeah. I’ll make you watch the show, and then I’ll repeat it, because that was one of my better ones.”
Maura doesn’t smile back. “That reminds me,” she says. “Can you explain this to me?”
She recounts her brief conversation with the detectives, watching as Jane’s expression turns dark.
“I’d rather not,” she says, when Maura is finished.
“Why?” Maura asks, sitting up so that they can look at each other properly.
Jane sighs. “He was insinuating that you had a late night because we were having…” she raises her eyebrows suggestively.
“Intercourse,” Maura says. “Oh!”
“Sex,” Jane says, and her eyes linger on the neckline of Maura’s scoop-neck blouse. “Yeah.”
“But we haven’t had inter-” Maura cuts herself off with a glare from Jane. “Sex yet.” She amends.
“The rumor mill is fast,” Jane says with a snort. “Not reliable.”
Maura considers this, and she must look worried, because Jane leans forward to put her hand against the doctor’s cheek.
“Hey,” she says softly. “Maura. I’m sorry. The guys I work with can be, really crass. Whatever you heard them say. I-”
“Have you had many sexual partners?”
Jane pulls back abruptly. “No,” she answers. “Why?”
“I…” Maura feels instantly regretful. “One of the detectives said something that I didn’t fully understand, about how someone like you could be with someone like me.” She takes care to stress the words in the same manner.
Jane frowns deeply. “That’s not an insult to you,” she growls.
“Well, I think it was meant as an insult to both of us actually.” She leans forward into Jane’s arms, missing the contact. “Please,” she says against Jane’s throat. “I’m sorry.”
Jane pulls her closer. “There’s nothing to be sorry for. Look,” she sighs heavily. “No one at work sees me as someone who would,” she pauses. “Take the time to date a woman with a kid.” She sighs as Maura tenses. “Not to mention most of the gossip I’ve overheard lists you way out of my league in every category.”
Maura pulls back, surprised. “It does not.”
“It does,” Jane insists. “You’re smarter, more attractive. You’ve got much more money than I do. I almost broke Finnegan’s nose boxing yesterday, because he insinuated I was a gold-digger.”
Maura opens her mouth, but Jane cuts her off. “It means I only like you for your money.”
Maura frowns. “You pay for most of our outings.”
Jane kisses the side of her head, and then her ear. “Yeah,” she murmurs.
Maura’s whole body feels hot and tingly. “I’m sorry,” she breathes, as Jane kisses the column of her throat. “I just…this is new to me.”
Jane looks up into her eyes. “The way I feel about you is new for me too,” she says. “I never thought anyone would…see me the way you do.”
Maura kisses Jane again, so she doesn’t tear up.
But Jane pulls away almost immediately. “Wait!” she says. “What were you doing in the breakroom?”
“Getting coffee,” Maura says.
Jane’s eyebrows shoot up. “I’m sorry…what? You have a coffee machine that costs more than my salary right over there,” Jane points. “Why would you want coffee that tastes like the inside of a shoe?”
Maura smiles. “I love you,” she says, unable to help it.
“I love you too,” Jane answers. “Now spill.”
Maura recounts her odd interaction at Starbucks, but Jane interrupts her halfway through.
“This Barista,” she says with narrowed eyes. “Was her name…Hallie?”
Maura stares at her. “How could you possibly?” she begins.
Jane groans. “Oh, my God!” she says. “I thought she got transferred out of the city. How long can she hold a grudge anyway?”
“Who is she?” Maura asks. “Did you date her?”
Jane makes a face. “Date her? No. I busted her selling Coke on the DL at the Starbucks on Boylston. Ordered the wrong custom drink, and got an extra bag of ‘sugar,’ if you know what I mean.”
Maura almost laughs. “Why isn’t she in prison?”
“She wiggled out of the intent to sell charge. Got probation and community service. It really burned me.” She looks at Maura, smirking. “Dated her, Maura? Really?”
Maura chuckles, leaning down to kiss Jane again. “Hush,” she says. “The rumor mill made me crazy.”