Chapter Text
“So, I have news.”
Kylie’s usual carefree tone held a little more weight to it than usual, at least enough for Amy to stop flicking through the take-out menus and look up at her best friend.
Kylie is generally loud, brash and spontaneous; the exact opposite of Amy, which she supposes is the reason their friendship and roommate-relationship works. Amy keeps the order, while Kylie brings the chaos. So her tone makes Amy curious, but her expression makes Amy think she’s fucked up.
The smile Kylie gives her is pleased but apprehensive; the same smile Amy recognises from that time Kylie borrowed her favourite trousers for a job interview and then spilled gravy onto the inner thigh area. Fortunately, she got the job and so was able to pay for the dry cleaning expense.
“What?” Amy demands, starting to feel nervous. “Have you borrowed my only pant suit and ripped the seams? Cause I saved up for months to be able to buy that!”
“Yeah, I know,” Kylie tells her. She gives Amy a look. “Probably saved up too much for a pant suit. I mean, a pant suit Amy. You’re barely 21; you should be blowing your pay check on Jimmy Choos or even better, alcohol.”
Amy frowns at Kylie. “I need a good, tailored pant suit. Everyone should have one. I could wear it for a job interview, or meeting clients at the gallery, or even—“
“I swear to God if you say a date, I will punch you in the boob,” Kylie interrupts her with one finger raised. “Girl, I love you, but you need help.”
Amy crosses her arms and doesn’t admit that Kylie is right. “So what’s the news?”
Kylie immediately grins again and claps her hands in front of her mouth. “I got in!”
Amy drops her arms immediately and the take-out menus fall out of her lap when she jumps up to squeeze her arms around her friend.
“Oh my God!” Amy says, unable to put her happiness into words. “Congrats!”
Kylie shrugs as they pull back and smirks. “No biggie, just two grown women moving up in the world. Me going to grad school, you getting into the academy to become a captain.”
Amy’s embarrassed by the enthusiastic smile she knows is spreading across her face and tries to shrug Kylie off casually. “There’s still such a long way to go, but getting into the academy is the next step.”
“We have to celebrate!” Kylie squeezes Amy’s hands and does a little shimmy. “We need to go out.”
Amy groans. “Kylie, no. I’m still hungover from graduation.”
“Screw you,” Kylie scoffs. “I mean like a real fancy, adult dinner at like a five star restaurant.”
Amy looks around their small Manhattan apartment, where the ghastly green wallpaper is slightly peeling around the ceiling and the take-out menus scattered on their scavenged coffee table. They had driven to the richer houses in New York and spent the day gathering as much furniture as they could in the truck they borrowed from one of Amy’s brothers.
“Okay, maybe four star,” Kylie amends.
Amy looks at her again with an eyebrow raised.
Kylie huffs. “I’m sure we can afford at least a three star restaurant. Right? Fuck it, let’s just blow money on a stupidly expensive dinner and dress up fancy for once. We deserve it!”
She kicks the menus near her feet away and grabs Amy’s hand to drag her into her bedroom. “Now come on, we need to find appropriate outfits that are fun but still modest.”
Amy shakes her head and laughs. She drops herself onto Kylie’s bed and watches as Kylie starts to riffle through her closet. It’s half bare, much to Amy’s amusement because most items are scattered all over the bed and chair by the desk.
“Loca chica, me vas a matar,” Amy tells her.
“You know that when you talk Spanish to me it turns me on.” Kylie spins on her heel with a floral dress in her hand to scold her.
Amy can only roll her eyes in response to that. She says instead, “You’re leaving me. Traitor.”
Kylie pouts and drops down onto the bed next to Amy. She lays her head on her shoulder and sighs, a big deep one that Amy can feel in her bones. “I know.”
It’s Amy’s turn to sigh when she says, “Now I have to find a new place and roommate. That’ll be fun.”
Kylie shrugs. “It might not be so bad. Worst case, you can move back home for at least the summer.”
Amy shakes her head. “No way. I’ll do anything else but that.”
Kylie sits up and grins cheekily. “Even be a hooker?”
Amy drags a pillow towards her and smacks Kylie in the face with it. “I’m training to be a police officer!”
Kylie only laughs and falls back onto the bed. Amy follows suit and turns her head to see Kylie watching her.
“I’m going to miss you,” she tells Amy earnestly.
Amy closes her eyes and smiles. “I’ll miss you too.”
--
“So you and Kylie will look for another place?” Her mom inquires, spooning more rice onto her dad’s plate. He grunts in acknowledgement and continues to chew vigorously on a mouthful of chicken.
Amy reaches for more broccoli—her dad’s doctor highlighted that his cholesterol is a problem, which he’s currently not doing much to improve despite her mom’s attempt to increase his green vegetable intake—only to give herself an excuse to busy her hands, her eyes while she thinks of a way to tell them that Kylie is moving interstate for grad school.
“Kylie got a grad offer,” she begins slowly. Neither of her parents is looking in her direction, but she can feel a heaviness in her shoulders that makes it feel like they’re glaring daggers at her. “She’s moving interstate.”
“What will you do, niña?” Her father asks genuinely, but Amy knows he’s worried she doesn’t have a plan.
But she’s Amy, of course she has a plan.
“I’ve been asking around and looking at ads for rooms,” she tells them. She winces internally; it sounds like she hasn’t got it figured out. But she does, she knows what kind of place she’s looking for, how much and how far she’s willing to commute to the academy. A two bedroom apartment, with or without a current occupant, who is neat, organised and could possibly cook; no more than $500 a month including bills; no more than 50 minutes.
Except, what she wants and what’s out there are mutually exclusive.
So she has a plan. It’s just taking longer than usual.
Her mom immediately turns to her dad, a worried crease between her dark eyebrows and rests her arm on Victor Santiago’s arm. “Do we know anyone who is renting?”
Victor pauses in his meal to think deeply on this question, but his wife beats him to it, straightening up in her seat and slamming her palms on the gingham covered table.
“I know,” she tells them. “I bumped into Karen the other day at the bodega—she was looking for a good salsa—and she was saying how her son, what’s his name, I forget it now, has a spare room. He’s in Queens, which is near the academy?”
Karen, Karen, Karen. The name spins around Amy’s head trying to place it. She’s about to ask her mom if she knows her last name but then a name flashes in her mind and it immediately causes her to sour. Hopefully she’s not right. Except that she’s always right, but she hopes she’s wrong on this.
“Ah!” Her mom cries out in recognition. “I remember it now, Jacob!”
Amy wills her face to stay neutral. “Oh? Jake? Jake Peralta?”
Her mom is nodding enthusiastically now. “Yes, yes! That young Jewish boy.”
Amy doesn’t point out that he’s no longer a young boy and that mentioning that he’s Jewish is an unnecessary detail, but she has no doubt now that her mom is talking about the boy whose grandmother lived down the street.
“I don’t think—“ She begins to protest, but her mom interrupts her as if she hadn’t stopped.
“I told Karen that if I knew someone I would tell her.” She’s still busying herself with loading her plate with moros. “And now I can let her know!”
“I never really like that boy,” her dad supplies. “He was always too sticky. Niña always hated that.”
Amy almost hugs her dad in joy relief. He’ll talk sense into her mom.
“But,” he continues and she stares at her dad in horror, “he’s a grown man now, so probably not sticky. You should contact him, it will be cheaper and he’s a cop.”
“Si, si,” her mom chants. “He can help with training, niña.”
Amy wants to drop her head into her moros. Her parents could not possibly be suggesting she move in with Jake Peralta. As a child he was messy, loud and inconsiderate with her organised markers—you just don’t use yellow on top of black, even if you are drawing a bee. He was the reason she would bring her spare set to school and keep her good markers at home.
“But, mamá, papi,” she begins, but she doesn’t know how to finish her sentence. He’s sticky; he’s loud; he ruined her markers. “He’s Jake Peralta.”
Her mom just smiles at her. “He’s grown now, I’m sure he’s fine. He was a good kid; all the boys got along with him.”
“That’s true,” her dad agrees.
Amy doesn’t bother explain that her brothers were nightmares to live with and even as adults are hopeless. It’s a wonder how one of them has a child.
Amy sighs and decides to let her mom have this one; it’s not as if she’ll actually tell Karen she’s interested and even if that happens she doesn’t think that Jake would want to room with her. They haven’t seen each other since high school and it would just be . . . awkward.
So she just smiles at her mom and says, “I guess.”
She mom smiles at that and the matter is dropped as Amy had hoped and dinner continues on with no mention of Jake Peralta or his stickiness.