Chapter Text
Jay and Hailey are face to face in the kitchen, separated only by the island, where a black box from LEGO Pixar rests: a lamp and a ball from the movie Toy Story, along with several white bags full of pieces numbered from 1 to 4.
Next to Jay, on the table, there is a white notebook with instructions that his wife, Hailey Halstead, is clearly not following.
It is not the first LEGO they assemble together, but it is the first since they bought the house and moved. The first time they saw the place, they noticed a wall with glass paintings. Once installed, they thought of many things they could place there, but nothing fit... until one day, while Hailey was cleaning and accommodating some fake plants, she came up with the idea of buying small LEGO sets.
Tonight is the first one they're assembling.
"Come, let me help you."
She shakes her head and pulls the toy away from him, preventing him from touching it.
"Hailey, you're not assembling it well."
"No, I don't," Hailey replies. "You just want to do it yourself."
"That's not..." Jay observes how Hailey disassembles the LEGO that is supposed to take the shape of a sphere, as indicated by the image of the box.
"I just want to help you put it together. I'm not going to touch him, I swear," he adds, noticing Hailey's look, who makes it clear that she doesn't believe him and suspects that he simply wants to do it alone.
Hailey sighs, looks at the mess of pieces in front of her and then looks back at it.
“It's okay.”
Hailey gives in, but squeezes the pieces hard and surrounds the island. He stands next to him and drops them on the counter, as a joke. Jay receives them all, laughing.
"Jay!"
She glares at him, crosses her arms and turns around with a small snort, moving away to the other side of the island as if she had finished with him.
He lets out a funny laugh, earning a couple more boos, but he doesn't even try to hide it while following her with his eyes.
"You're so adorable when you pout," Jay says, leaning a little towards her, amused.
"And you are my husband... the idiot" Hailey replies, rolling her eyes, although she can't help but smile.
"Hey, I called you adorable" he complains, pretending to be offended by his wife's insult while returning the pieces he had taken away from her.
"And you're still an idiot," Hailey repeats, without giving in.
"At this point you can't keep calling me an idiot... I'm your idiot and..." he points to Hailey's hand, stopping at the black ring that matches hers, the same one they placed on her wedding day "I'm sorry to say, but you're already very stuck with me."
"God help me deal with you for the rest of my life, then."
"Ouch." He takes a hand to his chest.
Hailey approaches him, tiptoing and rotating her arms around his neck, and brushes her lips with Jay's.
"But I wouldn't want to deal with the rest of my life with anyone else."
Jay puts his hands on his waist when Hailey kisses him. "Good to know," he says.
"So you put up with my idiocies and I put up with your tantrums for the rest of our lives?" He says, smiling. “It's a great plan... and I wouldn't change it.”
Hailey squints her eyes, as if she were evaluating him, but the smile betrays her.
"And the romantic Jay is back, ladies and gentlemen."
She leans just towards him, crossing her arms with a theatrical air.
"Only when it comes to you."
Jay gives her that half smile that she knows so well.
"Now what were we on?" Hailey says, returning to the pieces in front of them and placing herself next to them again, this time looking for the instructions.
Otherwise, they wouldn't end this.
The following minutes pass in silence, side by side, between instructions and pieces fitting little by little. At some point, Jay helps Hailey with some parts, and she also does the same with him.
Until, again, Hailey places an incorrect piece, causing the yellow sphere not to fit as it should.
Jay offers to help her, but she, as before, shakes her head. He decides to let it go.
He finishes his and stands there, with his arms crossed, watching her. Hailey sticks out her tongue in concentration, and he can't help but smile... until she gets frustrated when the piece she's been in for a while doesn't fit.
Hailey looks at Jay's LEGO, perfectly assembled, as it appears on the box and in the instructions.
Jay observes Hailey's, completely different from what the steps indicate, forming a figure that he can't even identify.
They both look at each other...
And they ballot in laughter.
"I think you just need a little help and it will be ready," says Jay, putting his thumb and index finger together to indicate "a little."
Then take Hailey's LEGO, remove some pieces that shaped it in the shape of a ball and review the pages of the manual, one by one, placing each piece until it is completed correctly.
Jay leaves the finished LEGO on the counter, right next to his.
"Ready."
"Yayyy!" She says, jumping like a little girl.
Jay can't help laughing at her.
He would buy her all the LEGO sets and they would put them together if that means seeing her happy, jumping like a little girl.
"Come on, let's put it there."
They walk together towards the room, with one hand intertwined and the other holding the LEGO figures. Jay first places the lamp on one side, and Hailey leaves the figure (still ball-shaped) in the empty space, forming the image of a lamp illuminating.
Hailey watches him for a few seconds, then looks at his and once again intertwines her fingers with Jay's.
"I guess we make a good team... even when I don't follow the instructions."
Jay smiles, leaning over to kiss his temn.
"Especially when you don't follow them."