#lauren writes rizzoli and isles fanfiction

[anthrofreshtodeath]

Looking forward to this prompt like always.

maybe they get slightly jealous while out, so they grab onto their partner's hand to establish their relationship

here it is! I have no idea what I just wrote but, you know, here we go:

—-

The Childhood Cancer Awareness Gala. If anything in Maura’s life is a black tie affair, it’s this. It comes once a year, in May, just as the spring gives way to summer temperatures, and, unfortunately, when the nascent MLB season really starts to take shape. Which usually means she takes a man, a doctor most times, instead of Jane: the person with whom she much prefers to attend these things. Not only is Jane Maura’s best friend - and thus makes it all genuinely more bearable - Jane has all the social skills Maura wishes she did when it came to fellow donors and hot shots. There are celebrities at this thing, for god’s sake. And that makes Maura nervous, especially since Jane so often has about five to eight games to catch up on by the time late May rolls around and refuses to come. Last time Maura had to bring a surgeon. But this year, by some miracle, the Red Sox have an off day on this Tuesday night, the same that the Gala is on. 

And Maura had known this fact for months. In fact, as soon as the regular season schedule was released. That meant that she started her get-Jane-to-the-Gala campaign while snow still raged outside and the year had barely begun. It culminates in the black, strapless gown she wears now, the one showing off her tanned shoulders and her three hundred dollar haircut complete with layers and highlights and the smell of priceless product. There are heels that highlight her calves and make her ass look fantastic; there is a pendant on her neck that draws attention to her perfectly supported breasts. There’s even a diamond ring on her right ring finger, big and belonging once to her mother, because Jane likes to look at things that remind her of tradition. 

And Maura had promised, not with words per se, but quite forcefully, quite convincingly, that Jane’s attendance would be worthwhile. The promise had consisted of some rather pointed modeling in the guest bedroom while Jane sat in a lounge chair and watched, of even more pointed half-states of undress, including dropping the garment in front of her with her heels still on so that she could bend over in the skimpiest pair of underwear appropriate for a platonic home fashion show that she owned. It also consisted of the subtle increase in hand jewelry, answers to Jane’s questions about it being, “My mother gave it to me. She couldn’t bring herself to wear it anymore; she finds such signs of commitment provincial. I vehemently disagree - especially when the signs are so exquisite. Don’t you think?”

Jane had sniffled. She’d stood, looking stiff and stupid as her mouth gaped at the ring Maura held out, before she finally said, “it’s on the wrong hand.”

Maura had chuckled warmly and replied, “for now.”

The stupidity intensified up until Jane mopped her jaw off the floor and excused herself to return upstairs. Maura then understood that she didn’t even need to invite Jane: she just needed to bring the Gala up. 

That happened about two weeks after the ring incident, which was about two weeks after the dress fitting. Maura stood in front of the vanity in her bedroom’s en suite, rubbing a European moisturizer into the skin just over her cheek bones. “You know, the Childhood Cancer Awareness Gala is on the 28th this year,” she said with the most practiced nonchalance as she frowned to get more of the product into her pores. 

Jane had grunted. She leaned against the threshold to the bathroom and crossed her arms, using tox results for their current case as the excuse to be in Mauara’s inner sanctum. Maura had at least given her the courtesy of relaying those lab results before bringing the fundraiser up. “‘S an off day,” Jane said. 

Maura made a curious sound. “Hmm. Really?”

“Yeah,” Jane confirmed. “Want me to tag along?”

Maura pursed her lips so she didn’t smile. Jane isn’t hers. But she knows a secret: Jane wants to be, and so she admits she played a little dirty to have gotten Jane to accompany her.

Honestly, though, that was the nonverbal content of Maura’s promise: go, and becoming mine is a distinct, dirty possibility for you. “I’d like that,” she told Jane. “Do you need something to wear?”

She knew what Jane would say. Well, she knew the answer. Jane ended up saying, “I”ve seen what you’re wearing; I think I can cobble something together.”

Contrary to what even Jane herself might have believed, Maura hadn’t wanted to go shopping for Jane anyway - she wanted it on the table that Jane would be dressing to compliment her. Because that meant Jane in a suit. And Maura is attracted to the Jane she knows, not the Jane she can conjure by draping her in couture.

And so, Jane is here, at the Childhood Cancer Awareness Gala, in May, instead of in front of a ballgame somewhere. Jane is here in a suit, with a very expensive white silk shirt under the jacket, with a sleeker, more understated boot than the aggressive block heel she often wears to work, her hair wild and beautiful and the perfect compliment to her sharp features.

It is, by all accounts as Maura returns from the restroom, a win. A complete victory on all fronts. Except, that is, Jane stands close to Doctor Melissa Henry - world renowned OBGYN and overall knockout - listening intently enough, leaning in close enough, to hear above the sociable din. 

Jane’s long fingers hold her champagne flute by the rim, the drink Maura had procured for her long before the trip to the restroom, and Jane hasn’t touched it. Hasn’t had a sip. Which, of course not, because Doctor Henry is Puerto Rican and curvaceous and a genius. Why would Jane interrupt her spell to imbibe? 

Doctor Henry leans close and says something into Jane’s ear, Jane who turns into the gesture yet again, and suddenly, they are both chuckling. And by god, it’s Jane’s handsome chuckle - the one that crinkles the corners of her eyes and bestows upon her a crooked little grin.

Normally, Maura respects the hell out of Doctor Henry as a leader in the field of women’s medicine. She’s serious and principled and warm… and that’s the damn problem. Maura did a fucking bend and snap to get Jane here (thank Jane’s modern media bootcamp for that particularly relevant reference); she’s not letting go this easily. 

And again, she intends to fight dirty. 

She marches across the crowded ballroom to where the two women stand, where Doctor Henry places a steadying hand on Jane’s shoulder because her heels are tall and her ankles are crossed. A man bumps into a deadset Maura, by accident, but it only fuels her resolve. She continues, gaze forward, back straight, clutch in front of her hips (the ones that sway as she walks), until she approaches Jane and Doctor Henry. Then she stops.

For all her missing of social mores, Maura can synthesize the details of a situation like no other. So just as she approaches, she comes up to Jane’s left, because Jane’s right is occupied with the champagne. And also, coincidentally, Doctor Henry. All for the better, though, because this means that for her next act, the ring on her hand can do all the heavy lifting, even if it’s a mirror image of where it’s supposed to be. 

Her fingers find the ones at Jane’s side, and they slither between them. Once they’re all but entwined, she drags them up, skin brushing as they curl, just before manicured fingers scratch Jane’s palm one time. Then as she fans them back out, down and united again, she kisses Jane’s covered shoulder. Jane shivers and Maura knows it’s because of the metal rubbing on her ring finger. “My mother’s bete noir is here,” she says into the fabric of Jane’s jacket, relishing the delicate scratch against her gloss-softened lips. “The feud is as alive as ever.”

Boom.

Between the touching and the comment just for her, she’s got Jane. She knows she’s got Jane because instead of a statement about how rude it is not to greet the third party, Jane says in that gravel-rich timbre, “she still telling the story about how her daughter styled… who?”

“The Roman Prince of Cerveteri? At least once a function,” Maura replies quickly, all as she turns her gaze on Doctor Henry. “So sorry, Melissa - family issues. You know how it is.”

Family. Issues.

Jane stiffens further, grows warmer; Maura knows there’s blushing even if she can only see Melissa Henry’s straight-out-of-a-catalog face. 

“That I do,” Doctor Henry says. Gracefully she steps away from Jane. Is that a bit of fear Maura sees, too? “Do uh, do you two need a drink? I think I’m headed to the bar.”

Jane smiles with her lips closed and simply holds up her champagne flute. I’ve got plenty.

“I’ve had enough for the evening, but thank you,” Maura answers with a cordial smile.

When Doctor Henry walks away after a nod and a smirk of her own, Jane snorts. “I don’t think she’s coming back,” she says.

“God, I hope not,” says Maura. When Jane, without letting go of Maura’s hand, downs her entire drink and steps close enough for their fronts to touch, Maura honors the nonverbal request for an embrace by wrapping her free arm around Jane’s shoulders. “When you’re here, when you accompany me to these events, you’re mine,” she asserts with a growl of her own.

“I’m yours all the time,” Jane counters. She rests her head in the crook of Maura’s neck because in heels, Maura is tall enough.

Maura squeezes, and laughs lowly. “I know.”

[anthrofreshtodeath]

Send me a prompt number and I’ll write a snippet for it! I’ll leave requests open until Thursday/Friday.

blossoming romance writing prompts:

accidental hand touching

eye contact across a crowded room

exchanging secret smiles

first conversations alone

admiring them from afar

asking them about their family

visiting them at their place of work

discovering common interests

exchanging gifts for the first time

a surprise encounter

picking a leaf/flower petal out of their hair, or brushing dirt off of their face

nervous embarrassment around them (blushing, fidgeting etc)

complimenting their appearance

looking at their lips as they talk

finding excuses to be alone with each other

naturally gravitating closer together

noticing their individual quirks

hello/goodbye hugs that linger

talking late into the night

clumsy attempts at flirting

sharing long term dreams, goals and aspirations with one another

playful teasing

being unable to keep their eyes off of them

attempting to find out if they are single/available

finding comfort in their scent

creating art inspired by them

sharing an umbrella in the rain, or a coat/blanket in the cold

surprising them with their favourite treat

visiting their home for the first time

confiding in them

[dirtyrobber70]

@anthrofreshtodeath Okay I'm sharing with the class lol. My apologies, couldn't figure out how to link the playlist in a comment or reblog of your post 🥴

[anthrofreshtodeath]

Long time no see! 😂

How about "slowly intertwining fingers while the other is driving" ?

It's been awhile! This one is kind of angst-lite.

___

Jane wants only to drive. She wants to rev the engine of her cruiser; she longs for the satisfaction that cutting and weaving through traffic gives her. It’s asshole behavior, she knows - but she’s an asshole. She relishes being an asshole, especially when she’s angry and especially when she’s been handcuffed, when someone bridles her rage and forces her to swallow it down. 

Hope Martin and Paddy Doyle are quite good at that. 

So are the guards at the maximum security prison she’s just left with Hope and Maura in tow, because they quite literally would have cuffed her if she’d leapt over the table to throttle Paddy like she’d wanted to. But Paddy, and Hope, know that fact intimately. And that’s why Hope waited to be forced to talk to Paddy. And why Paddy shut up about Hope. They knew the only safe place for them to see one another and still get Jane and Maura the information they needed was to do it in prison. 

Because, like they surmised, Jane wants to kill the both of them. She wants to kill both of them with her bare hands and she wants to whip through the streets of Boston like a maniac and she can do neither.

Standstill traffic on the bridge back into the city.

It’s a one sentence horror-story to every Bostonian, really. But even more so to Jane today. Hope, coward that she is, has stayed completely silent in the backseat on the way into town, despite all the revelatory, criminal shit she shared in the interrogation room. Maura, saint that she is, also remains quiet, peering out the window of the passenger side while rain starts pelting it, sending periodic glances Jane’s way.

And Jane’s embarrassed by it, though she’d never say so out loud. It’s fucking embarrassing to have all this fire and nowhere to put it. To be so angry and to be so close to two confessed lawbreakers who repeatedly lied to and used their relationship with Maura to manipulate her and do nothing? Jane’s foot might punch a hole through the floor of the Crown Vic. All she can really do is shove her left leg against the driver’s side door, her knee up to the window, and squeeze the wheel until her knuckles blanche. Which means, on top of all the hellish shit she just endured, Maura now has to watch. She’s gotta make room for Jane’s mood. That makes Jane madder, more ashamed.

It reaches an apex when Maura resettles, apparently tired of counting raindrops, and releases a calming breath when her shoulders press against the padding of her seat - she lets the hand that had rested against her own face fall into her lap, and sneaks the other over to Jane’s on the console. 

Jane’s brows furrow and she considers yanking herself away. More than wanting to wound, Maura shouldn’t have to do this. Hold onto her weakness like this, pacify this. But Jane stays, because Maura’s fingers wrap slowly around her own, and the touch is warm and sweet and hot all at once as the cold from the outside threatens to seep in. 

So, Jane accepts the calming of the beast. Until, that is, Maura says something.

“I know you’ll never make me walk through those doors,” she says darkly to Jane, eyes stormy and assured. “You’ll never be the reason I go back.”

And then Jane realizes… their hands. Hope leans, is angled so that her gaze lines up right with their union. Maura speaks, her voice carrying toward the middle of the cab, so that Hope can hear. Jane understands that it isn’t placation at all - it’s a point. My relationship will never be as ugly and twisted as yours. Your relationship is and forever will be beneath mine. Maura has simply used Jane to make it.

Jane finds she likes being used much more than she likes being pitied. Even if she still wants to slap the bubble light on and burn through all the cars in front of them.

[anthrofreshtodeath]

I think the OP just turned on the first two seasons of R&I and jotted down this list of prompts 😂

How about a little " hangouts that start to feel more and more like dates" please and thank you.

I do hope this won't be your last prompt challenge!

Sorry this is so late 🫠 but hey, I wrote something!

___

The first time they’d hung out, Jane had brought a giant bag of peanut m&ms and extra butter popcorn. Maura had called it a movie night, after all. It was early on in their friendship, and Jane had been excited when she trotted up to the front door with her snacks in one hand, and a six pack in the other. She’d hiked up her long leg to press the doorbell with her boot, and was in the middle of putting it down when Maura swung the door open.

“H-hi,” Jane said, cheeks ruddy from sheepishness as much as the crisp fall air. 

Maura had smiled, and then looked down. “Can I help you with something?”

Jane held the grocery bag with the food in it. “Thanks,” she said, “sometimes carrying stuff is still, uh, kinda hard.” She didn’t brandish her scars, but their pointed eye contact told her Maura had understood.

Maura then nodded to the beer. “I have a place in the refrigerator where you can put that,” she told Jane. “Come in.”

Jane had whistled. “Nice place you got here,” she commented as she looked up at the high vaulted ceilings and the gleaming marble countertops.

“I rent,” Maura confessed. “I just moved back to Boston… well, when we met, actually. And I am being judicious about where I would like to own. So most of the decor came with the house.”

“I woulda never guessed,” Jane said. She pointed to the fridge, stainless steel, wide, and clean. Maura affirmed. “No offense, but rich suits you.”

“None taken. I am rich,” said Maura, with palms against the fabric of the jeans on her hip. 

Jane would have spit beer out of her mouth if there’d been any. “And humble, too,” she chuckled. Both at Maura’s comment and at the fact that Maura could no longer resist the bag she brought in. Maura rummaged through it with equal parts fascination and disgust. “You good?”

Maura peered up. “Do you really eat all this during one film?”

Jane curled a brow. “No…” she elongated it. “I got it for us to share.”

“Oh!” said Maura, then her face fell. “Oh, that… that’s very sweet. I…”

“You don’t eat any of this junk, do you?” asked Jane kindly. Her eyes crinkled and her lips pursed like she was trying not to laugh.

“Not at all,” said Maura on a whoosh of relieved air. “The hydrogenated oils are-”

“Don’t.” Jane held up her hand, “ruin it for me. But, that’s good to know. What do you like to eat during… films?” she asked with no small amount of humor. But when Maura opened her mouth to answer, Jane stopped her. “No no. You know what? Don’t tell me. I’m your friend; lemme figure you out.”

Maura had blushed and said nothing. But she’d smiled and showed Jane to the living room where they’d be watching what she’d picked out.

___

Subsequent hangouts got easier. Like this one - a long week called for a late Friday night at home. Maura had purchased the townhouse on Pickney about half a year prior, and since Angela moved in not long after, it was the place Jane thought of when she conjured the word home in her mind. And, yes, it was movie night, but a newer venue also called for newer fare - namely, gourmet charcuterie from the deli a few blocks from Jane’s apartment, and a good wine from the Whole Foods in Beacon Hill. Not, y’know, a six hundred dollar bottle a-la Tommy’s FBI debacle the previous week, but something good. 

Something Jane knew Maura liked. 

Something she and Maura had drunk before. And so, balancing everything in one hand, Jane used her key to open the door, and when she heard the muffled voices of a conference call on the second floor - the governor did tend to call Maura late, much to Jane’s chagrin - she set the items on the counter and went to the cupboards to pull out the decanter. She’d peeled off all the horrid labels her mother placed under each shelf when Ian was here, and it’d felt like something she’d had to do.

Strip Maura of the stinging past, restore the present to as it was before him, so that they could move forward into the future. 

Put off by the taste of that experience, Jane pulled out the candles Maura reserved for those truly trying times: decadent spices and citrus that reminded Jane of herself. And she thought it sounded egotistical but she had enough comfort in Maura’s space to own that - she liked the house to smell like that because she belonged there, not because she wanted to mark her territory. Ian’s mountain of medical supplies had felt like the opposite. Felt like a threat. 

Tommy’s bottle of wine had felt more like fumbling in the dark. Like something he wanted and knew he couldn’t have, but had to take a shot at anyway. 

Jane’s bottle of wine, the one she poured into the decanter, and Jane’s candles, which were really Maura’s, the ones she lit to waft up to Maura, to ease her into relaxation on the way down from her call, felt like what a Friday night should be. 

Felt like a well-worn routine. 

To further the routine, she pulled a board out from a cabinet next to the oven, and arranged meats, cheeses, and dried fruits in the pattern Maura liked, the one that seemed most calming. Before Maura, Jane didn’t even know that meat could be arranged in a calming way. After Maura, Jane learned that most perceivable things could bring calm, or bring stress. She’d adapted well, considering. Went for easily identifiable, separate food groups. 

“You’re early,” Maura’s voice roused Jane from her contemplation. She was barefoot, and had changed into yoga pants and an oversized sweater, with her hair pinned up. “Oooh - figs.” She reached over as Jane worked, and their fingers brushed on her way to the fruit. “Thank god autumn is here.”

“Those are all you,” Jane teased, “I’m all about the prashut’ right here.” She lifted the paper thin meat to her mouth and dropped it in. “Things, uh, things go well on your call?” 

Maura shrugged. “The governor is an obstinate man,” she began, “but I know how to bring him down. And explain artfully that Popov is not really my problem, but his.”

“That guy is everybody’s problem,” Jane commented when she pulled a beer from the new, glass-door fridge. “If you need me to forcefully suggest retirement to him, just let me know.”

Maura laughed, bubbly and bright. When Jane returned, Maura placed a hand on her shoulder. “I trust he’d take the hint,” she said.

“I’m good at givin’ hints,” Jane joked. She caught the blush with which Maura stared down again at the spread, and it confused her. She caught the wistful glance toward the wine, aerating in the fanciful glass Jane’d poured it into, and maybe Maura was just hungry. Just tired after a long day and needing a drink to take the edge off. 

“Hmm,” was all that Maura offered in response, like an agreement but about something else.

The something else itched at Jane. “I’ll take this over to the couch,” she said, moving slow, balancing the board in her left hand and nodding toward the living area.

“I’ll bring the wine and start a fire,” said Maura. When she looked up, she smiled softly at Jane, as she often did.

This time, Jane shuddered just before she headed toward the coffee table. 

___

“I heard,” Maura breathed out when she answered the door. 

Jane stood there, still dressed for the work day, just like Maura. This was what hangouts between them sometimes devolved into now - Jane felt worn out, and felt like she looked it, too. Maura looked just as perfect as when she’d started the day, when Jane had waltzed into the foyer a much happier woman in search of her morning coffee. 

Maura had handed it to her, like Maura handed her a beer now. The clock on the microwave read 11:12 PM and she had work the next morning, but Jane wanted to get drunk. She scrunched her face in displeasure, crossed her eyes to be silly and to note her frustration. “Honestly surprised it took this long for Tommy to knock someone up,” she said. When she walked in, Maura hovered close behind. Jane felt Maura-ness all along her back. 

Maura caught Jane’s hand just as Jane went to pop the top of her beer off on the granite. “Don’t ruin my counters,” Maura warned. She took the beer back, twisted the cap, and waited. 

Jane knew what she waited for, too, so she turned around with haste, between Maura’s front and the lip of the countertop. “It’ll give ‘em character,” Jane teased.

Maura rolled her eyes. “And you don’t know that Tommy… knocked someone up,” she continued, the colloquialism familiar to her brain but foreign on her tongue. “It’s just a possibility.”

“I think it’s more likely than my pop doin’ it, at his age,” Jane grumbled. She lifted the bottle to her lips and let the Blue Moon rush down. Cold, bubbly, tangy. Perfect. 

“Well, I know nothing about your father’s sexual health, but given that we can assume he slept with Lydia multiple-”

Jane’s hand flew to Maura’s soft, soft lips. Had they always been this soft? It made Jane’s fingers jittery with the need to move, to touch. She pulled her hand down when Maura stopped talking. “Please, please don’t. Don’t go there.”

Maura put up her hands in surrender. “I ordered a pizza,” she offered a branch of reconciliation. 

Jane sighed. Pizza? Beer? The night, all because of Maura, seemed to be turning around. “Sounds perfect. You know, why can’t Tommy find something like-”

Uh oh. 

This time she stopped herself, not Maura. Something like this? Something easy, something heady, something in a nice home with a beautiful woman who… Jane needed to run. She’d already said too much. But, Jane was trapped.

“Like this,” Maura chanced. She moved closer. Jane’s anxiety wafted toward Maura on a noxious wave of fear and need, but, Jane watched Maura persist. She watched conviction literally light up Maura’s eyes. Increased moisture catching the light over the kitchen island, Maura would have said, but still. Maura unclasped her own hands and opened her arms, not wide out at her sides like a barrier, but palms out, close to her sides like an invitation. “Like you. And me.”

Jane nodded, and then her face crumpled. What in the hell, besides this very reason, was she doing at her friend’s house at 11 at night, drinking beer and sulking because her brother just made all of their lives so much more complicated? Didn’t women call their girlfriends to vent all about life problems as they had a nice night in at their own places, watching shitty reality tv and drinking? Didn’t they send a text saying something along the lines of “OMG my brother’s an asshole and I’m struggling and really need to talk to you about it over coffee tomorrow?” 

They certainly didn’t show up at their friend’s place close to midnight to stand in front of them, soul bare, and blurt out… feelings.

But Maura didn’t really seem interested in what women usually do with their friends either. She knew what they did. So, Jane slumped forward, into the invitation, and Maura caught her.

“I don’t think many people get to find something like this,” Maura began, wrapping her arms around Jane’s tired shoulders and pulling her even closer when Jane sighed. “Do you?”

Jane still held her beer in one hand between them, with the other clutching at the fabric of Maura’s dress between her shoulder blades. “Nah,” she answered. “I guess not.”

[anthrofreshtodeath]

Wow remember this one? Can’t believe it’s been two years!

Trigonometry by DanteBeatrice77

#anthrofreshtodeath

[anthrofreshtodeath]

ohh man these prompts are perfect and so rizzles coded already lmao but i would like to request lap sitting please ☺️

Wow this is so late - and I have one more! But lap sitting it is for this evening.

—-

Jane pushes through the crowd of Italian bodies on her way to her aunt Anna Maria’s kitchen because her glass is empty. Normally, it’d be a bottle of beer, and normally, she wouldn’t be so jittery, so distracted as she smiles and nods at her cousins, but it’s Christmas - so she’s sipping her aunt’s signature spiked egg nog. The jitteriness, however, the nervousness, has more to do with the fact that Maura’s here, too.

And you know, things are good. Ish.

They just got done fighting over Paddy Doyle like a week ago. They’ve seen each other outside of work twice in that time. Jane hates it, honestly, the here-and-there kind of love she’s been forced to give her best friend lately. And in the deepest recesses of her heart, Jane will admit that she’s probably more than half to blame for that awkwardness. Maura may have started the yelling, but boy, does Jane know how to escalate.

It took a near-death experience to bring them back together.

And isn’t that just like Jane? But the half-hearted coffee runs and mild attempts at conversation aren’t - not loving hard is, well, hard. It is better than fighting, almost, Jane thinks as she slides between cousin Danny and the new girl he’s seeing. Maura is being… sweet. Bashful and timid, and sweet. But, well, back at square one. Almost. Square one would be Jane chewing out the new medical examiner in the cafe line, but Maura is here at her aunt Anna Maria’s house. For Christmas. Swallowed up by the throngs of Sicilians and Neapolitans as she smiles politely and sips on red wine just to listen to the deluge of Rizzoli and Mazzone stories Aunt Anna Maria regales her with. That’s something.

So, once Jane fills up on some more super sugary liquid courage, She heads over to the barstools that her mother’s sister and her best friend occupy, and takes the one next to Maura. “Know where all the bodies are buried now?” Jane snarks. It feels homey and she smiles.

Maura rubs her lips together and blushes. “You didn’t tell me your aunt also married into the Rizzoli family,” she says, having just heard of Anna Maria’s ex-husband, Frank’s cousin Ray.

“And I divorced right out, honey,” Anna Maria tells her, face soft and lips pursed, mischievous like Angela. “They make it easy to do.”

Maura only sips mulled wine and avoids Jane’s eyes at all costs. Jane dips her head and turns her glass on the subway tile counter. “We’re not all so bad, aunt Anna,” she says, this time with a smile so small it’s more noticeable in the change of her voice than the tightening of her face.

Does Maura read her contrition? Her guilt? Because Maura touches Jane’s wrist, patting it with an open palm.

“Oh I know,” Anna Maria gets up and rubs Jane’s shoulders until she can embrace her from behind. Maura snatches her hand away as soon as she thinks Anna Maria can see it. Jane sighs, and her aunt squeezes her tightly. “It’s the men, baby. I was talkin’ about the men. Who could leave you?”

“You’d be surprised!” Jane yelps, secretly pleased to be swallowed up in the embrace, to be smashed into a body that’s loved on hers as long as she’s been alive. “You’d be surprised.”

“Nonsense,” says Anna Maria just before she lets go. She uses a Bluetooth remote to turn up the Dean Martin holiday tune in the background. “Now get your ass in gear because it’s time to open presents and you know seats are limited.”

The rest of the family take the music as a cue and migrate the way her aunt is headed. Jane looks at Maura, who looks even more unsure than before.

Jane uses that and the emptiness of the kitchen as an excuse to return Maura’s affection. She swipes an open palm between Maura’s shoulder blades, the cashmere sweater creating a pleasant swish as she goes back and forth. “You ready to go out there? It’s gonna be total chaos, but a little birdie may have told me you’ve got somethin’ under the tree. Maybe a couple somethings.”

Maura’s face dances - she grins, the water in her eyes moves as a trick of the light. The green shines and Jane wants somehow to swallow it. “I do?”

“Guess you’ll have to come and see,” Jane calls from behind her shoulder. She’s left her mostly full egg nog on the counter and opened the fridge. She pulls out a beer and twists the cap off, tipping the bottle in Maura’s direction. “C’mon, doctor.”

When Maura answers, her voice is wet. Jane gets it. Her family is a lot. Jane is a lot. And crying just sort of comes with the Rizzoli territory. “I’ll be in in a bit,” Maura says. Her hands go to her lap and she clasps them together. Jane looks down at them because she always does. It’s like a homing beacon when Maura does it. “I just need…”

“A moment, I got you,” says Jane. “Well, you’ve got time, because the kids always go first. But I’ll be waitin’. Come find me.”

“I will,” Maura promises.

It’s the most freely they’ve spoken to each other in weeks.

—-

A whole ten minutes later, Maura shuffles out of the kitchen and into the filled living room. Jane notices only because cousin Danny, on the floor with the children, says pretty loudly, “hey Maura, you made it!”

And when Jane turns, she sees the realization in Maura’s dropped open lips - slight but obvious to her. And in her gaze, which scans the entire room to see that the seats are all taken - both furniture and floor. And in the way she twists the ring on her right hand, because she would be the only one standing.

Jane nods her head so that Maura will come close, intent on giving up her chair. But Danny cuts in again. “Sit with Janie! She’s too skinny for that damn chair anyway.”

Jane gulps. The armchair is big. She’s tall but it eats up her frame. She’d snatched it when she could just so she’d have a place to watch the cousins’ kids rip open wrapping paper, not because it was the most prudent for her size. She’s about to stand up anyway, but, well, Maura shrugs.

Her cute shoulders do this cute upward tilt and Jane can’t help but shrug back. No one else has noticed them. Not even cousin Danny is looking anymore, because his nephew Rudy just got a giant Transformers play set, to the excitement of the rest of the people in the room.

While the Rizzolis and Mazzones whoop and holler, Maura stands in front of Jane.

They lock eyes. Maura brings her hands up to the collar of her oversized captain’s sweater and runs her teeth over her lower lip. Jane rubs one hand down the length of the jeans on her thigh and moves the other to her side, the beer still in it. Maura’s sweater is cream, and hers is navy, but otherwise they’re kind of matching.

Jane takes it as a sign and nods.

Maura visibly softens; her shoulders round and all rigidity leaves her body. She doesn’t even contemplate making Jane move over so that they both uncomfortably share the cushion, but instead she crawls into Jane’s lap and uses the armrest as support for her back.

No more distance, cordiality. Jane wants to cry. Instead, she just leans forward until her head knocks against Maura’s chest, and the softness there supports her. She sighs, closes her eyes, and Maura snakes an arm behind Jane’s back to hold her head close. “Hi,” Maura whispers into the top of Jane’s head, into the crown of her hair.

“Hngh,” groans Jane in reply, gulping in breaths of air tinged with Maura’s perfume. Formalities can fly out the window. Formalities can go fuck themselves. She’s waited days, weeks for this. For Maura, as Jane knew her before Paddy got shot.

Jane knows that’s not quite right, that this is still the Maura of after, but it’s ok because Maura loves her again. In the right way. The good way. In a way Jane refuses to fuck up again. And if they blur the lines of friendship, if they blow them up, so what?

“You’re missing the overstimulating robot toys,” Maura says against Jane’s hair. She chuckles when Jane shakes her head like an obstinate child. “They very much seem like something you’d like.”

“I got everything I need, right here,” Jane asserts. She thanks the universe that Maura is content to stay and hold her, to do all the watching for the both of them

[anthrofreshtodeath]

Prompt: telling them they deserve better (and silently wanting to be the one who gives it to them)

Thank you !!! 💛

Please don’t give up doing prompt snippets 🙏 yours are always so good 😊

Let's do it! Life got in the way, but this prompt is complete. I ignored the "silently" part, though, whoops.

___

Maura walked down the hall of the fourth floor of BPD, where the staff gym was housed. Sometimes, different departments ran training from the main area, using the padded flooring for de-escalation and self-defense. The rest of the time, employees were free to use the weights and the machines as they pleased. 

Maura arrived at the heavy double doors all the way at the end of the hall, and breathed a sobering breath. There was no slip of paper on it to denote any trainings, and she’d suspected as much. 

This increased the chances that Jane was on the other side of the doors exponentially. 

Maura couldn’t, however, bring herself to open them just yet. Because opening them would mean confronting Jane, precisely what she came to do, but confrontation required guts Maura was unsure she had. 

Tap. Tap. Thump. Tap. Tap. Thump.

Sounds Maura expected to hear. Sounds that signaled that Jane really did exist on the other side, and that Maura had no time to wring her hands over this face to face she’d planned.

Things were dire.

Maura pulled the right door open, and inhaled until her posture turned regal, icy. She needed the Queen of the Dead. Her heels clacked when she marched toward the punching bags. One bag sang against the stale air, air that smelled vaguely like sweat and something sweet, some kind of cleaning supply.

Jane punched it. Repeatedly.

Maura took a moment to study the hits themselves - it wasn’t that it was wild, but she saw rage in Jane’s method. Each third hit in the sequence was her deadliest, the punch she never used when teaching Maura self-defense, or sparring with her. 

Jane meant to be alone, with the demons she battled when she thought no one watched her. Maura thought about clearing her throat, but Jane either wouldn’t hear, or would ignore.

But Jane would never ignore her voice. “Jane,” she said. Firm. Measured. With a not unnoticeable amount of displeasure.

Jane’s next jab thundered into leather, sputtering and corrective. She’d heard, alright. She stopped. “Hey, Maura.” 

Maura studied Jane’s broad, shining shoulders, exposed by her tank top - white and blotched with sweat. When Jane breathed, winded from exertion, Maura stepped closer - learned Jane’s pulse until her own matched it. And that riled her. “I’m here to scold you.”

Jane raised one eyebrow and bared her pretty white teeth when she smirked. “Oh yeah? For what? Tellin’ Frankie not to kiss you? Beatin’ Tommy’s ass outside that bar? Any aspect of the shit storm that has landed on Rizzoli island lately?”

Now, or never, despite Jane’s handsomeness. “None of that. This is about your… your piss poor romantic decisions.”

This time, Jane wavered between pride in Maura’s colloquialism and indignance. “Excuse me?” She said, lips now turned down in a tight frown. 

Maura gulped down some confidence, hoping that when it reached her belly it would eventually metabolize into her bloodstream. She needed it fast. “You heard me. You spent the entire weekend in my home, lamenting that the man who once told you he’d settle down if you married him decided that you were no longer worth it.”

Jane, still taller despite Maura’s footwear, inched closer with a finger in the air. “Hey, you know he-”

Maura stamped one of those feet. “Don’t defend him,” she ordered. Jane froze, finger suspended between them. “Don’t give him any more rope to hang himself. He’s already done it. But here’s what I do not understand, Jane, despite having known you for years now - why would you consent to being treated that way?”

“That’s my business,” Jane replied lamely, dropping her taped hand to her side. “What say do you have in my romantic life?”

“You can claim your independence, your privacy, when you don’t fall apart with me every time he wavers. When you don’t crawl into my bed on the late nights he’s rescinded all his promises. When I don’t even stir because you do it so often now,” Maura hadn’t planned this part of the tirade, but she couldn’t stop. She stood toe-to-toe with Jane, who looked down on her defiant look upwards; she placed her entire right hand on Jane’s shoulder, palm flat. 

When Jane steeled for confrontation, Maura’s hand slipped closer to her clavicle. “You better watch what you say next,” said Jane. The tenor was that of a threat, but there was no bite to it. 

Maura spread her fingers. “Your heart,” she began, and they both looked to where she would be able to feel the roar of the subclavian artery. “It’s crying out for me right now. And it’s crying out for me every time you seek me out. So why? Why accept less than what you deserve? You deserve better.”

Jane deflated. But a small smile accompanied it. “You’re better?”

Maura scoffed. “You don’t think so?” she asserted, however, when she saw Jane’s lips quirk.

“I don’t think there’s anybody better than you,” admitted Jane. “But I also don’t think there’s anyone more scared than me.”

“I can be brave enough for the both of us,” Maura told her. Her hand slipped from Jane’s chest until it fell and caught one of Jane’s fingers. Maura refused to let it go.

[anthrofreshtodeath]

25 if you’re still taking prompts! Thanks :)

Sure! 25 is "finding comfort in their scent" - here we go!

___

Jane smells gunpowder in the cab of her unmarked when she turns off the ignition. It’s peppery on her tongue and it pricks her nostrils long after her gun had been fired. She’s lucky enough to have found a parking spot just a few feet from Maura’s home, especially because it’s late, after midnight. 

It’s late, and she’s just had to kill the main suspect in her double homicide. He had ambushed her and Frost at the warehouse where the bodies had been dumped, led them there in the dark, and caught Jane’s eye as he turned the corner towards them. She got her shot off just before he aimed to put his slug in Frost’s chest, and that’s how it usually worked - people often wanted to take her partners, the men, out first, because they saw Jane as the lesser threat. She, nine times out of ten, killed those people, and that happened tonight. She hit him, center mass, and he crumpled to the wet, sticky, filthy ground. Which was a damn shame: she wanted the families of his two victims to watch him stand trial for his crimes; that was the outcome she always hoped for. 

She smacks her lips because the scent lingers and to her it tastes like failure. 

She’s done enough wallowing in here, however, where the late fall chill starts to settle in and  it tightens up her hands - she can at least go into the house where it’s warm and where Maura waits for her. So, she heaves herself out of the car, engages the lock, and trots up through Maura’s courtyard to the front door. Jane fishes in her pockets for her keys with one pronounced sniff against the cold, and then she pushes her way into the entry. 

It’s almost completely dark, save for the light over Maura’s sink. Maura hates to leave lights on at night, so Jane knows it’s been done just for her. Christ.

Jane’s chest cracks open, flowering her insides with gratitude, and she pulls at the crotch of her slacks because she’s a little wet. Maura’s kindness always inspires these twin reactions. And Jane knows that if she goes up the stairs, even takes them two at a time, Maura will be there. It would take seconds. But even that is too long, so Jane turns to the coat rack just to her left, the one with Maura’s fall coat hanging ready for tomorrow, and she leans into it. She teeters like she might fall, but her feet catch her and she is face-first in the soft back of it. 

Her brain erupts into a burst of southern Italian citrus - she sees oranges and their blossoms, the fat lemons she and her brothers would cut and bite into when her mother returned from a trip to the island to visit family. Maura had smelled like this when they met, and Jane counts it as fate.

She had smelled like home from day one.

The thought, tangled up in the images of the man she killed falling to the ground, screws Jane’s eyes shut. She tries not to cry, and she succeeds when she inhales a big, ballooning lungful. That it had taken Jane so long to love Maura the way she deserved after that initial meeting is a travesty, one she spends each day attempting to rectify. 

All of the sudden, like a lightning bolt down her spine, the coat is not enough. Jane needs Maura now. But, she’s still got some self-preservation instincts, some pride, so she kicks off her boots near the bench towards the front of the hall. She pulls her empty holster and her badge, keeping them in her hands when she marches up the stairs toward the main bedroom.

She knows the way in the dark. 

She takes her things, opens the nightstand drawer on her side of the bed, and shoves them in. Then, she can get a good look at Maura as her eyes focus around the dim streetlight out the bedroom window. Maura sleeps soundly, and sleeps naked - always naked - her eyelids fluttering when Jane stands to her full height. They open when Jane’s left hand goes to her belt buckle. Her right stays down by her side while she uses deft fingers to yank the strap first from the belt loop, then from the prong, and finally through the frame, perhaps simply to prove to herself that her left hand is good for more than killing.

Maura writhes under the covers as she wakes, takes a big nasal breath in, and tugs the covers closer to her nude chest. Her blonde hair covers the pillow beneath her like a wreath, and Jane wants to bury her face in it. “Rough night?” Maura, voice usually so velvety and clear, croaks with sleep. She stares pointedly at Jane’s undone belt, and then her gaze climbs to Jane’s face.

Jane follows it, inch by inch, until they meet. Brown on green. Sleepy on sleepy. “Yeah,” she replies, and then she groans when Maura pulls the covers up to reveal both her body and the warm, inviting space next to it. Maura smirks when Jane pulls off the rest of her clothes - this time with both hands - and gets into bed on her hands and knees. Jane ignores the smirk for the paradise of pulling Maura close. Every inch of her skin finds an inch of Maura’s, who luxuriates in a stretch when Jane inhales deeply at the crook of Maura’s neck - that same ancient citrus smell from downstairs, but intensified by Maura herself. By the taste of Maura’s throat when Jane presses her lips there three times: loud, clumsy smooches that break up the sound of even the white noise machine. 

No pepper, no bang, no flash.

“Hmm,” Maura considers Jane’s answer, and Jane briefly wonders if she should have elaborated. “Come get some love then,” Maura says, banishing those thoughts immediately. She rolls onto her back, pulling Jane who is helpless to follow on top, wrapping all of her limbs around Jane. “Good love,” Maura accentuates.

Jane just nods, and accepts Maura’s leading hand on her own. Their snaked fingers find their way between Maura’s legs, and Maura is already wet. Jane is too tired, too elated to ask why. She just kisses. Maura’s lips specifically, kisses them sloppy and sweet as she melts into the body below hers. Her shoulders drop; Maura holds them. Her hips settle; Maura’s leg tightens around them. Jane envisions the pulpy flesh of an orange as her fingers find rhythm. “Is it good for me or for you?” she finally teases, the words mushy because of their entwined lips and tongues.

It’s a wonder that Maura understands her, but she does. “For the both of us, I hope.”

That’s the right answer, and Jane celebrates by flattening her nose against Maura’s chest, breathing in the scent of home. It is so, so good.

[anthrofreshtodeath]

I do write one! Sort of - it’s written in snippets as a thought exercise for when I eventually flesh it out. You can find it here

Does anyone know of any Rizzoli & Isles and Bones crossovers bc i know Dr. Temperance Brennan and Dr. Maura Isles would get along so well

[anthrofreshtodeath]

— hugging and absentmindedly kissing their neck, resulting in mortification for one of them

Again, several people asked for this prompt, but I am placing it here! I saw each request, thank you.

___

“Don’t approach, I smell like sewer water,” Jane said as she walked through Maura’s door, finally, after eleven pm. She held up her hands when makeupless, robe-wearing Maura shut the refrigerator door and squealed at the sight of her. The hands stopped Maura midstride, but only because Jane appeared both serious and forlorn.

“I don’t care,” Maura replied honestly, impatient fingers drumming against her own hips. “I haven’t seen you in days.”

Jane dropped a spackle- and plumber’s putty-covered bag to the foyer floor, and trudged toward that closed fridge door. “Trust me, you’ll care when you get close,” she sighed. Maura watched her stare at the contents of the beer shelf for long seconds, more from exhaustion than from indecision. “A pipe burst and after we got the water turned off I almost killed Tommy,” said Jane. She grabbed a Peroni and dropped her shoulders with a huff. “This is the last job I help him with.”

“Is that what the stains are?” Maura asked, and when Jane turned around, lip of the bottle to her mouth, Maura arched her brow. “They look like salt.”

Jane held her arms out and looked down. “That would be a terribly unfortunate wrong guess,” she said, but the opening was all Maura needed to swoop in.

She hugged long, and firm, and deep - the way she’d intended since Jane first walked in. Hugs had become this way between them, more boundaryless, less friendly. More satisfying. And Jane was right, the smell of old standing water and all manner of waste lingered as they embraced. 

And Maura was right, too: she didn’t care. 

Her toes, bare and clean from her evening shower, the one that stripped her of the deco smell, wiggled against the thick soles of Jane’s workboots, just as spotted with gray as her toolbag. 

Jane fell forward into the hug like she always did. Right after stiffening, she melted into a puddle around Maura, arms tight, shoulders slumped, head bending like the rest of her into the crook of Maura’s neck.

Maura’s little secret for the previous few months was that she turned her head to allow Jane more space, because when she did, every time she did…

Jane grasped against the small of her back and inhaled with gusto against Maura’s thumping jugular. Maura even wore the French perfume Jane liked, that she knew Jane liked because of moments like the one they shared now. 

But this time, one tiny thing changed, and before Maura could hide her second squeal of the evening, Jane kissed Maura’s neck when she turned to get a better whiff. 

“Oh!” Maura yipped in surprise; though, when she thought about it, hadn’t she been preparing the both of them for it since they shifted into these types of hugs? Hadn’t she intended to draw Jane out?

Jane stood ramrod straight as soon as she heard it, and the color drained from her face. “Oh, my god,” she said, mouth agape. “Maura, I am so sor-”

Maura yanked Jane closer when she tried to pull away. “No!” she shouted, then quieted when Jane’s eyes blew open. “No. I don’t care.”

“You don’t-”

“Stop, that’s not right, either,” Maura revised her echo, “I care. What I mean to say is… this is a development that pleases me.”

This time, Jane’s brow arched upward. “Is that right, Sherlock?”

Maura pursed her lips in confusion at Jane and her barely-there smile. “I think out of the two of us, you’d be Sherlock, and I’d be Doctor Watson. But yes, it is right. I’m tired of you not kissing me.”

“Tired?” Jane asked, like she still could not believe Maura’s mortification didn’t match her own. “Wait. Is this… is this what the perfume is about right before bed? You’ve been doin’ it all the time.”

Maura blushed. “Did it work?”

Jane lurched forward, leaning into their embrace again, this time pulling Maura off the ground before sniffing the side of her neck with gusto. “Oh it worked, alright. I am going to scrub all this grime offa me, and then show you how much it worked.”

Maura’s third squeal fluttered through the living area as Jane carried her past the kitchen and to the bottom of the staircase.

[anthrofreshtodeath]

#10 sounds like a good one

#10 is "Surprise Encounter" - I dig it! Here we go.

___

Jane doesn’t love going to the doctor. She tends not to show up unless something’s wrong, or if it’s a checkup she guilts herself into attending. She gets her teeth cleaned religiously every four to six months because she’s never forgotten the horror stories of teeth falling out that her mother threatened her with when she was a kid. She’s barely got a general practitioner and she should have regular check-ins with her physical therapist she hasn’t seen in like three years.

She really doesn’t love it. 

Especially this kind of doctor - the lady doctor. That’s what her catholic ass calls it, because for some reason the catholicism makes her unable to say the word gynecologist? She doesn’t question the logic because it guards her against the anxiety that is always there. And you know? She’s here, she thinks when the elevator in the parking garage dings her to the third floor, and that’s what matters. 

Maura had told her about Doctor Hillenbrand, a Harvard-educated OBGYN who specializes in fertility, but sees patients for all their gynecology needs. Maura had quite kindly intimated that Doctor Hillenbrand also is very good with patients who have experienced trauma, which makes Jane want the ground to swallow her up, even now. But, it’s been awhile since her last pap smear, and… sigh. She needs to go. Might as well go to the woman Maura raves about, Maura herself sees, and get it over with. 

So Jane ambles down the hall of the ritziest medical building she’s ever been in, and looks for suite 321. She finds it, and grips the golden doorknob, pushing in with a fortifying exhale. The waiting room boasts buffed, ridiculously shiny tile, thriving plants in each corner, and no television in sight. Fancy. It’s pretty empty, too, at two in the afternoon; there’s no one here, except for one woman filling out paperwork over by the -

Oh. Nope. Nope, nope, nope. “Nope, nope,” Jane says it out loud as she backs toward the door.

It’s Maura. Maura, of fucking course, is the only other patient in the waiting room. She glanced up as soon as Jane spoke, and now she’s on her feet. “Jane! Jane, wait!”

And now Jane freezes, because no way in hell is she seeing the doctor at the same time as Maura, but she also can’t refuse anything Maura asks. So she stands there. “Really? Of all days? Today - really?”

“Would you please sit down?” Maura asks, motioning toward herself in the middle of the room. The receptionist looks up, but decides she is uninterested when Jane trudges slowly forward.

“I should go,” she grumbles despite letting Maura lead her by the wrist back toward the leather-padded chairs. “This was-”

“Don’t say it was a mistake,” Maura admonishes. “Doctor Hillenbrand is excellent. Why are you here?”

Jane heaves herself into the seat next to Maura, who adjusts her own blazer and crosses her legs under the skirt of her yellow dress. She half faces Jane, and it compels Jane’s body to relax. Jane sinks into the knees-spread, feet-planted, hands folded in her lap while her elbows sit on the arm rest type of posture she often adopts. She sucks her teeth. “Check-up,” she answers. “I’m a half hour early. You?” Maura blushes instead of replying, and immediately Jane brings herself to attention. She shoots up, hunches her back so she can turn towards Maura, who looks away. Jane busts out the big guns, and puts her hand on Maura’s knee. “Maura? What’s up?”

At first her palms sweat and her stomach drops - is something wrong? But then Maura licks her lips in thought, and a sigh brings her back to Jane. “I… I am here for an ultrasound,” Maura confesses. 

Jane’s left eyebrow climbs up as her stomach plummets again. “Are you, uh… are you pregnant?” Maura isn’t seeing anyone. Not that Jane knows of. But Jane’s not a dummy, either - she knows Maura scratches an itch when she needs to. This could be that.

Until it’s not. “No! No,” Maura says. She waves her hand for extra emphasis. “I’m not. But…” her eyes well up, and Jane rushes her other hand to Maura’s back, running wide, slow swaths across it. She can’t help it. She doesn’t want to help it, because the affection calms Maura down enough to continue. “But I’ve been keeping something from you,” Maura tells her. 

“A secret man?” Jane guesses, with hurt written all across her pursed, upturned lips. A mockery of a smile. 

Maura breathes out a mockery of a laugh. “No. There is no man. Not even the prospect of one, which is why I’m here,” she says. Then she pokes her head around toward the front of the room. “Shouldn’t you get your paperwork? If it’s your first time, there will be a lot of it.”

“Nice try, but no. You’re not wigglin’ outta this one so easy,” Jane says. This time her smile is a little more real. “They can wait. So, will you just tell me what the hell’s goin’ on?”

“I’m scheduled for a retrieval,” says Maura, the words whooshing out over a near whisper. “I’ve found a donor and I’m going to freeze my fertilized eggs, if this ultrasound bodes well.”

Jane gapes, her jaw opening then closing a few times before she shakes her head. “You were serious about that? I always thought… well I don’t know what I thought. I guess I didn’t have to think about it.”

“I was serious about it. And as my window closes, I want to be able to retain all options. I want to do this, Jane. I, I want to be a parent. And soon,” Maura tells Jane.

Jane scrunches her face in thought. Maura’s eyebrows upturn in open confusion in response. “Can I make a comment? Or, maybe, uh, ask a question?” asks Jane.

Maura is extra confused, but she puts her hand over Jane’s on her knee. The middle finger of her left hand has a chunky ring on it that scrapes Jane’s knuckle. It’s pleasant because it’s Maura. “Y-yes. Yes of course you can. I think you’ve earned the right.”

“Well, it’s just… babymakin’ is a touchy subject. I don’t wanna hurt you,” Jane starts.

Maura is so moved that a few tears fall and she grasps Jane’s face in both her hands. “You’re not going to hurt me. What do you want to know?”

Maura’s breath flows and ebbs so close to Jane’s nose and it is somehow sweet and minty at the same time. Jane wants to taste it? The thought rattles around in her head, and it’s not the first time, Jane will admit to herself. She wants to taste it, but she puts that on the shelf for another, less vulnerable time. Gone is her embarrassment when Maura bites her own lower lip, replaced by surety. By a need to keep Maura safe, even if it's from some nebulous feeling like sadness. “Well… you’re an established, wealthy professional,” Jane begins, and Maura’s brow goes up again. This time it’s accompanied by a hopeful smile, small and timid. Jane continues. “And I know you don’t… there isn’t a guy. But there’s me, and my family. We’d love the hell out of a tiny you. If you really wanna do it, why wait?”

Maura did not expect this question: her mouth drops open like Jane’s did just a few minutes ago, and Jane feels that hand clench around her own. “You… why wait to have a baby?”

“Yeah,” Jane answers, wondering if she’s said something monumentally stupid. It’s been known to happen. “Maybe it wouldn’t look conventional, but I don’t see the point in waiting around for some guy who might be Mr. Right, or who might not.”

“You mean that,” Maura asks though there’s no question mark at the end of it. 

“Yeah I mean it,” Jane asserts. The more time goes on, she realizes that she’s said something kind of smart. Or at least right. She puts her hand by one side of her mouth and adopts a stage whisper. “And to be honest, what good are men with babies anyway?”

Maura laughs, hiccupping and wet. Eyes crinkled, genuine. Her thumbs, when they rub back and forth, feel amazing under Jane’s perpetually tired eyes. “Not half as good as you’d be, I imagine,” says Maura. Her voice is low and intimate. 

“Oh hell no. Couldn’t touch me,” Jane brags, only half-kidding. For Maura’s kid, she’d be Super Mom. Or, shit - not mom. Super Aunt. Super Somebody. She’d show up like she’s never shown up before, and that’s saying something.

“Ditch your appointment?” Maura asks. Jane smirks in conspiracy. She knows what she’s being asked and yet she waits for Maura to elaborate anyway. Of course Maura does. “Come to mine? It’s scheduled for, well five minutes ago, and I have some important questions to ask, apparently. And I might need you to hold my hand.”

“You got it,” says Jane. She leans in and hugs Maura with the arm near her back, stopping before the embrace to kiss her on the temple. “I didn’t wanna come anyway.”

[anthrofreshtodeath]

P FKN R Intro

I'm at work, sort of working, sort of tinkering with some writing stuff at lunch, especially the beginning of P FKN R in hopes that I might manufacture some inspiration. Too soon to tell, but maybe if I share it here that will spur me on some more. Here we go!

___

Jamaica Plain’s cars were jammed onto its narrow streets, effectuating a one-way rule by default; those that did crawl through broadcasted an amalgam of sounds into the Latin Quarter: Spanish talk radio, classic rock, and of course, full and knocking reggaetón beats.

Jamaica Plain’s three-story homes groaned as they expanded at high noon, stacked and running from one end of Chestnut Avenue to the other, one of those narrow streets in the time-honored New England style. In another facet of that tradition, its air rippled in a summer scorcher, wafting smells over from La Isla café on the corner: the strong oil-sweet of fried plantains and roasted pork, the kind Jane Rizzoli liked to order with a side of rice when she sat down at one of their vinyl-topped, worn-in, peach-colored tables. 

JP pulsated at lunch time. 

Jane’s stomach gurgled when she remembered her last meal: a chugged cup of coffee at the marble counter in the Beacon Hill home of the woman kneeling over the body they’d been called to investigate. The image of it was made more grotesque by the contrast of her Aeron skirt and Bottega Veneta heels with the contorted limbs of the man on the walkup in broad daylight. 

Jane still liked it, Maura Isles’ high-class wardrobe and the attitude it brought to neighborhoods like this, neighborhoods like her own. That attitude, the I’m the hottest in the room chest-beating, shoulder-brushing mindset, matched what Jane always knew about Boston’s real cultural pockets. The ones with subsidized housing and community gardens and spots like La Isla. “Watcha got for me?” Jane said by way of greeting.

Maura looked up, her long, highlighted hair swishing to the other shoulder when she shook it out. Her green eyes shimmered and she smirked when Jane winked. “It’s nice to see you, too.”

“Saw ya like thirty minutes ago,” said Jane. “And if we hurry this up, cut the pleasantries, I can take you right on over to that restaurant and introduce you to the best lunch you’ll ever eat in JP.” She pointed to the wide-open window view of the restaurant just a football field away.

“Hmm,” Maura replied, “I could be persuaded, I suppose. Penetrating wounds to the chest and abdomen, surrounding shell casings would indicate he was shot.”

Jane pursed her lips and smiled at the same time. She crossed her nitrile-gloved hands over her hips and shrugged under her blazer for some relief from the beads of sweat rolling down her back. She should not have worn black in late June. “You don’t say,” she teased. But then, quickly back to business, she pointed to the decedent’s broken ankle, distorted and impossibly angled toward midline. “That from this fall?” She asked.

Maura stood, narrowed her brows at Jane’s narrowed brow. “Can’t say right now,” she answered. “But these steps are narrow and uneven. It’s possible.”

“Even if it isn’t, he wa’n’t goin’ very far,” Jane commented. She clenched her jaw, and her masseter muscle clicked in investigatory concentration. “What’s on his hand?”

“Burns,” Maura said. They shared a look, one that only experience, only dozens and dozens of murders, could engender. A car door slammed and footsteps approached as they communicated about the man on the ground without words.

Maura never went to JP unless there was work to be done, and Jane? Jane really only traveled out this way for murder anymore, which was a damn shame because the food was good, and so was the company - even if that company happened to be related to the asshole walking up to them now. “Hey oh - the hell are you doin’ at my crime scene?” barked Jane.

Rafael Martinez, lieutenant of the Drug Control Unit.

Tall, dark-skinned, in a baby blue v-neck stretched against his defined chest, with a Boricua jawline that showcased his trimmed beard like art. He ran his hand over his shaved head once, and licked his lips on his way to the woman shouting at him. “I could ask you the same thing, Rizzoli,” he said through a wicked smile, all white teeth and innate pride. Just as he held out his arms to really rub in his obtusity, a lowered, electric green and black Impreza roared past them, changing Martinez’s mirth to ire, now directed entirely to the street. “Ey!” he shouted, the car already long gone. Then he stepped onto the sidewalk and dusted his dark, slim fit jeans. “Swear to god if one more lowrider tries to run me off the road, I’m outta this city.”

Jane scoffed. “You already were outta this city, remember? Almost a decade. They ain’t got those in New York, Mr. Hot Shot?”

Martinez stared at her, awed by both her attitude and her mouth, until he shook his head of its disbelief. Maura smiled at him as if to commiserate, and held her medical bag in front of her as she faced him. “Not that we’re not happy to have you-”

“We’re not,” Jane interrupted.

Maura glared with a good-natured, nonverbal shut up that worked, at least for the moment. “Like I said - not that we’re not happy to have you, but a federal task force in New York City with the chance for so much more? What brings you back to Boston?”

“Homesick, I guess, doc,” Martinez replied with a cheeky grin. Maura nodded and out of habit, tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

Jane was unmoved by his obfuscation and his easy Boston-Latin accent. “Bullshit,” she said, “you live for that. You live for the thrill. And the juice.”

Rafael shrugged. “Whatchu want me to say, Rizzoli?” he overtrilled the r of her surname on purpose, in the way that both Italians and Puerto Ricans do. “Me voy a caballo y vengo a pie, eh? Didn’t turn out, no matter how bad I wanted it. When you come from the neighborhoods that Paddy Doyle runs, the Bureau gets certain ideas about where your loyalties are. Especially if you BPD.”

Maura bowed her head in embarrassment, and Jane actually twitched her nose at that one. A droplet of perspiration ran down it, a sign that she’d been in the sun too long. “Well that sucks. Sorry. Still don’t answer why you’re here, steppin’ all over my toes.”

“That,” he started again, pointing to the victim sprawled on the porch of the house they surrounded, “is one of the main earners of the Kill Shot Gang. New crew muscling their way into JP. And I…” he drew out the pronoun for emphasis, “needa find out who did it. I already got your bro out there runnin’ ops for me.” He threw his head in the direction of the strip mall at the intersection of Chestnut and Weaver, a block that saw a lot of traffic. Literal and metaphorical.

“You got an Italian infiltrating the Latin drug trade? Sounds like all you’re doin’ is lookin’ for ways to get him killed,” growled Jane. She marched her long body toward him, her posture designed for intimidation. 

Martinez laughed. “Would you calm down? I know what I’m doing,” he told her, stepping into her aggression, opening his chest to it, bringing his face close to her hers. He smiled when she glared. “And other Rizzoli’s a grown man. Despite you and your ma’s best efforts.”

Just as Jane initiated her lunge, Maura caught it, her fingers wrapped firmly around Jane’s bicep. “Jane-”

“And what’s that supposed to mean?” Jane, body bridled for the moment, unfurled some biting words, “don’t think I don’t remember your mommy comin’ down the station with sack lunches for all of us.”

“Alright, alright, listen,” Martinez put up his hands when he acquiesced, because she had a point. “One: I don’t remember you complaining about all that food when it was put in front of you. Two: I will personally make sure that he stays safe. You got my word.”

Jane pulled out of Maura’s grip and sighed. Rafael’s deep and steady voice, when divorced from deceptive intent and real life experiences at his side, inspired faith. It made people want to believe. But Jane had been his partner for too long. She had been in his bed for too long. “Yeah, that’s my worry,” she grumbled quietly. She took stock of his eyes one last time, brown and expressive and alive, and let them give her that little jolt they had before all the history came seeping in. 

He took stock right back, and the passion that had always burned in him shook her, passion for her that she could never reciprocate. She broke first, turning her head to Maura at her side - Maura, who had a pretty indulgent grin on her face. “It seems you have business,” Maura said, hand on Jane’s back. “I can take a rain check for lunch. Meet me for the autopsy?” 

“Y-yeah,” Jane stuttered. 

“But don’t wait up for her too long,” Martinez butted in. He winked at Maura, in a way that reminded her of Jane. “Because I’ve got a task force on KSG that I have a feeling Detective Rizzoli here is gonna want in on.”

Maura regarded him for a long time, without regard for the social rules on how long a person should stare, before she decided on a smile of her own. “I’m the Chief ME, lieutenant. I’ll wait for whomever I want, however long I want.” She winked back, clearly in mockery of his previous display, and then bid them her goodbyes.

Jane held in her laughter as Martinez withered under both the midday sun and Maura’s retort. “Man it’s hot. Let’s get this processed so we can get back to the ranch.”

[anthrofreshtodeath]

I'll do a snippet if you give me one of these prompts and a fic universe you want me to write it in.

Example: #1, The Hub of the Universe.

No limit on how many.

January OTP Prompts

Sparkle

New beginnings

“I love you, but that’s a terrible idea”

Bright red

Shooting star

Lonely

“I wish everyday could be like this”

Diamond ring

Slippers

Bundled up

Warm soup and fresh bread

New paint

Secret

Old bookstore on a cold day

Snowball fight

Forbidden love AU

Slippery

Wind

Surprise hug

Teapot

“You’re up early”

Walking through the park

Snow angels

Honey

Café on a snowy day

Broken

Ringing bells

All night movie marathon

Peaceful kiss

Catching snowflakes on tongue

“The safest place is in your arms”

✨❄️🥂🧣✨

[anthrofreshtodeath]

So many good prompts for rizzoli and isles and I know you'll do 'em good.

12. nervous embarrassment around them (blushing, fidgeting etc)

16. naturally gravitating closer together

Thank you for the request! I put these two together. It takes place in a gay bar because, you know, happy pride!

___

Eight minutes.

Eight minutes and fifteen seconds since, for a sting operation, Maura had kissed Jane for the first time.

Well, that wasn’t entirely true. Jane had definitely just kissed Maura first. Another gay bar - there are a lot of those in Boston - another ladies’ night, another spouse as a possible murder suspect. This time, it had been one of the very attractive go-go dancers, all oiled up and well-muscled with a way of moving his hips that Maura, once upon a time, would have drooled over. 

But he hadn’t believed the cover, that Jane and Maura were a couple, and, well, Jane never liked to be challenged. Called a liar. Even if, this time, it was a very calculated, elaborate, intentional lie.

So, eight minutes ago, Jane had scoffed at him, looked Maura in the eye, and said low enough for the music to drown out her words for everyone but Maura, “I’m gonna kiss you now, ok? And it’s gonna be good.”

Oh Jane and her infuriating arrogance. Because it was good. She issued that warning more with her breath than her voice, each word a fog settling over the wet want on Maura’s lips - Maura’d licked them in anticipation. When Maura thought about it further, she realized that she may even have licked Jane’s, too. Just an incidental little swipe, but the taste of vodka she never drank went up to her brain just before Jane short-circuited it. 

And Maura did try to curl her upper lip in a smirk, to raise an eyebrow in a sexy question, to wrap her arms around Jane’s broad shoulders, but she was unsure if any of it stuck when Jane finally pressed her mouth into Maura’s and lingered. 

It wouldn’t have altered her life so much if, when they met, let their lips slide and suck, Jane hadn’t sagged like she was home. But Maura knew the sag - saw it every time she followed Jane into her apartment and Jane finally kicked off her boots or set down the bag of groceries. The home sag. 

Maybe that was why the suspect believed it, too. “Well, fuck,” he said, all breathless laughter when it ended, and she wished he was giving them an order, rather than expressing his approval. “I can admit when I’m wrong.”

Jane had turned, looked at him, and shrugged.

That was eight minutes prior.

Now they waited by the bar, with the pretense of watching some of the dancers, slipping dollars into their g strings as they made their way around, and Jane had work on the mind. “Gotta lay low for a bit,” she said, leaning in close. She wrapped her big right hand over Maura’s left knee, in a more intimate gesture than she’d ever shown before - especially when, covered by the bar itself, no one could see it. “That was a bold move, and I don’t want him gettin’ spooked. We’re this close.”

Maura looked at the earpiece in Jane’s ear, and then down at her own hands. Was Jane talking to Sargeant Korsak, or her? She twirled the ring on her middle finger, and the leg under Jane’s fingers danced on the stool below. This was for show, right? Because Jane was inches from her and shucking off any decorum, undercover or not. “I…”

“Hey, you a’right?” Jane interrupted. 

“Wha-?” Maura asked, jostled out of her own thoughts. The bar pulsated in the darkness, occasional flashes of light coming down from above. House music vibrated the bones of her chest and it contributed to her confusion. Jane’s eyes searched only Maura.

“Now I know the answer is no,” laughed Jane. “Leave the half words to me.”

“I’m sorry,” Maura said, a little more like herself. She tugged on the hem of her dress, down out of habit and then up out of hope. Jane’s thumb slipped into the space between her legs. Maura wiggled her knee in overdrive. 

“No it’s uh, you’re fidgeting. You never fidget,” said Jane. “You afraid we’re gonna get hurt?”

“Are you being obtuse?” Maura asked in reply.

“Wha-?” It was Jane’s turn.

“No. I mean yes, of course, but that’s a worry of mine with every case. I mean… that, the kiss. It changed something, didn’t it? Isn’t it obvious that that’s why I’m-”

“Hey, hey oh,” Jane put her hand out, a signal for Maura to pause. She stuffed a hand into the front of her button-up shirt, and Maura assumed she’d just shut off her microphone. “This is a conversation all of BPD shouldn’t be privy to, ok?”

Maura conceded that. How embarrassing. “Yes,” she answered. “But I’m fidgeting because I’m still thinking about…”

“The kiss,” Jane finished.

Maura fingered the lapel of Jane’s fanciest blazer. One that enhanced her handsomeness and the sense of danger she carried with her everywhere, the one drawing the eyes of so many women even as they talked to one another. “The kiss,” Maura confirmed.

“I told ya it was gonna be good,” Jane replied like that might solve or nullify Maura’s current predicament.

“Does… did that mean it was also fake?” Maura chanced. Jane leaned in, unable to resist. Maura blushed immediately at the implication. She busied her fingers with the task of straightening Jane’s collar.

“Do you want it to be fake?” Jane hedged.

“Jane,” admonished Maura. 

“It was for the job,” Jane rallied. Maura watched Jane gain that metaphorical footing and shuffle away from the edge. Towards Maura. “It… I started it for the job. But when we were in it, y’know, really in it, I felt…”

“Home?” Maura supplied.

Jane blanched. Her mouth dropped open just enough to show some teeth, her upper lip rose in a wave of fear and vulnerability. Her pupils closed in tight and Maura knew the terror of having been seen. She felt that terror every day with Jane. But too much more and Jane might run. “How’d-”

“I know you,” Maura said. “I’m with you so much that I know what home feels like to you. Because it’s what it feels like to me.” Then, so as not to send Jane for the nearest exit, Maura took her trembling hand and slipped into the front of Jane’s shirt, and switched the mic dial back on. “But we’ve got a job to do, and I don’t want to jeopardize that. So maybe this is a home discussion?”

“Y-yeah,” Jane stuttered. “We’ll pick things up at home.” And then, her concentration appeared back on the murderous dancer - alleged murderous dancer - of their case. But, when she sipped her drink, knocking back most of the vodka at the bottom, she kept her hand close to the heat of Maura’s bare thighs.

[anthrofreshtodeath]

Hey, I really hope this is your Tumblr because otherwise it'd be an awkward coincidence lol.

Just wanted to drop in and let you know that I read both Coronita Heights and You Only Live Twice and I can't put into words how brilliant it was. Lemme preface this by saying I know absolutely nothing about baseball and found myself googling terms, players and even searching for videos to get a visual of the movements described.

And I cried. Your writing was so vivid in my mind and especially in the sequel during the WBC I was up outta my seat and cheering as if I was actually in the stadium. I was tearing up when Jane was talking to those little girls, full on sobbing when the Giants made that montage for her during the final. I felt the passion from each Rizzoli sibling on-pitch moment.

I was looking a fucking Rizzles fanfic like I do every couple years because I miss the ship an unhealthy amount. Instead...I think I'm gonna get into baseball now? I'm mainly into football (soccer?), I rep Chelsea FC and one of our owners also own the Dodgers so I already knew about Ohtani after news of his insane contract dropped but with the interest on that side and now with you roping me into all the baseball nerd analogies, I'll try to learn the game. If your writing can bring out that kind of exhilaration in someone who's never cared for the sport, actually watching a game might give me a heart attack.

TLDR; I loved the series and it's gonna be hard coming to terms with finishing it, but I'm definitely giving it a few months before I reread. I feel like it'd be weird to thank you for your talent but I'm doing it anyway because you're literally insane. Much love, hope life is treating you well.

Hey there! This is my tumblr; you’re in the right place. I haven’t been very active because I am in an extreme book reading hyperfixation that has caused me to forsake the internet and consume The Written Word ™️.

thank you so much for your kindness - it warms my cold heart to hear that my work has brought another spectator to the grand game. That’s all I want, really. More people walking around with a love for baseball. If I never write another fic again, messages like this are enough to convince me the work I’ve done so far meant something.

Go Knights!