Work Text:
The first time Amy Santiago hears of Jake Peralta she's sitting at the kitchen counter editing her essay for English. Her mom, Elena, is in the midst of baking a cake for her younger brother, Alex, and is also on the phone to one of her older brothers, Manny (only a year older than Amy, and just starting college), holding it precariously between her shoulder and ear. It doesn't take long for the phone to slip and fall, clattering on the kitchen, and bring Amy out of her study trance as Elena swears in Spanish.
"Mijo," her mother says to Manny, picking up the phone, "talk to your sister, I have to finish off Alex's cake,"
Elena hands Amy the phone. "Mom," Amy protests, "I'm studying,"
"Just for two seconds, Amelia. I need to finish off this cake."
Amy sighs and takes the phone. There's no protesting when her mother calls her Amelia, plus, she is semi -curious about how Manny is doing at college.
"Hi Manny," she says, twiddling her pen in her fingers.
"Hey sis!" Manny replies loudly. All her brothers call her 'sis' much to her frustration; she wouldn't be surprised if they'd all forgotten her name.
"How's college?"
"Amazing, so much better than high school!" Manny says enthusiastically. "You're seriously gonna love it."
She smiles to herself. She will love it, and next year it will be her turn to go, finally.
"Yeah, I can't wait. What's your roommate like?"
"Oh, Jake? Jake's awesome," Manny replies, before calling out "Jake! Are you awesome?!"
A guy, presumably Jake, yells back, "Yep! I'm awesome!"
"Wow," Amy says sarcastically, "he sounds awesome."
"Wha'd she say?" Jake calls.
"She said you sound awesome!" Manny yells back at him, and Amy rolls her eyes.
"Tell her she's right! And ask if she looks like a female version of you!"
"Nah," her brother replies, "she looks more like a female version of Luis."
Amy stops listening, and puts the phone down on the counter. "I'm going to study in my room." she says to her mom, gathering her things, and heading up the stairs before Elena can protest.
How her brothers manage to annoy her whilst away at college astounds her.
It's almost a year later that Amy actually meets Jake, despite the fact that she seems to hear about him every other day. Whenever Manny calls or visits there's always another Jake story to tell, most of which are entertaining, but also depict Jake as the sort of person Amy wouldn't want to to be cooped up with all summer. Yet somehow, that's what happens.
Jake's mom is away on an artist retreat all summer, or at least that's what Manny tells Elena and Victor when he asks if Jake can stay for the summer. Amy's sure the fact that half her brothers have officially moved out is one of the factors that lead to them agreeing.
The day Amy meets Jake for the first time, it's hot and sunny, and she uncharacteristically has a stain on her top.
"You must be the famous sister!" is the first thing he says to her after he's greeted her parents, and Manny, at the door.
"And I'm guessing you're Jake?" she jokes, raising her eyebrows at him.
"The one and only!" he announces grandly, doing a mock bow, and her eyebrows rise even further. He offers her his hand, not to shake, like he had with her parents, but to high-five.
She high-fives him hesitantly, eyebrows still raised. He's exactly as goofy as she'd imagined.
"Noice!" he exclaims. "And hey! We're stain buddies!"
Her forehead creases. "What?"
He points at a ketchup stain on his shirt to a jam stain on hers. It must be from her toast earlier.
Amy blushes. "That's not usually there." she mutters defensively.
Jake just grins at her, and heads on inside.
Growing up with seven brothers has given Amy the ability to read and study in any environment, no matter what the disturbance, and Jake is no exception to this rule, at least not at first. Amy spends that first week of summer ploughing through some of the books she didn't have time to read during the school year, and Jake is but a dull buzz in the background.
"Hey Stain Buddy!" Jake calls out to Amy, who's sitting on the porch swing out the back, her nose in a book.
Amy doesn't even realise he's there until he sits down on the edge of the swing and begins rocking it with his feet.
"I'm reading, Jake," she says without looking up.
"You read a lot, huh,"
She turns her page. "Mmm," she responds, not really listening.
"How many books have you read?"
She sighs, and looks up from her book. "Ten," she tells him.
"Ha! I've read fifteen!" He declares proudly.
"Fifty? In your whole life? That's not many."
"Fifteen."
"That's even worse, Jake," but she has to suppress a smile this time.
"It's better than ten," he says with a shrug.
"Ten, this week ,"
"Holy shit, is that even possible?"
This time she really does laugh, and he's struck by just how adorable she is.
She's really adorable.
"Um, anyway, I just came out here to ask if you wanted to play scrabble," Jake says, "cause Manny and I were about to play, and he said you were pretty good,"
"I'm not just very good, I'm amazing , Jake," she says smugly, "but I kinda just wanna finish my book. "
"I bet I'm more amazinger," Jake insists.
"Firstly 'amazinger'? Not a word. Secondly, you could've just said 'more amazing'," she points out.
"You could've just said more amazing," he mutters defensively.
"What?" she gestures at him, bemused.
"Anyway, I bet I can beat you," he says cockily.
"Jake," she raises her eyebrows at him, and speaks slowly for emphasis, "I really, highly doubt it."
"Really? Because I'm very competitive and very good at scrabble, Amy."
"There is no one more competitive than me."
"Ah, yeah there is: a-me."
"That made no grammatical sense what-so-ever," she tells him.
"Whatever," he says, "I'm better at scrabble and more competitiver ," he stares at her challengingly, a playful spark in his eyes, and she knows he's goading her, but she doesn't care.
She bookmarks her page and slams her book shut. "Fine, let's play." she says, getting off the couch and stalking into the house; Jake follows behind, grinning goofily.
She beats both him and Manny by 300 points.
She starts to like Jake more after that, he's not just a buzz in the background, he's fun, he makes her laugh, and he plays along with her competitive antics. They play scrabble every day (as per Jake's request), and he loses each time, yet insists after every game that he'll win the next win.
It occurs to Amy that if she'd put any money of these games, she'd easily have a thousand dollars by now.
Her Summer Reading List lies practically abandoned on her desk; she only reads three books over those few weeks — something that Jake is quick to point out ("I haven't seen you reading lately, Santiago," "Yeah, because you're taking up all my time!").
She's lying on the couch in the living room, about to start summer book number 14, when Manny and Jake come down the stairs, towels over their shoulders, talking loudly.
"Sis!" Manny says, spotting her on the couch, "I thought you went out with Mom and Alex,"
"No, I decided to stay home, maybe get some reading done."
"Oh well," he looks at Jake, "we're going to the pool, you're welcome to come, if you're not doing anything."
"She's reading!" Jake exclaims awkwardly, and the two stare at him. "That's not nothing!"
She shuts her book, frowning at Jake. "I can read anytime. I'll come." she hops up and passes them on the stairs, giving Jake a confused look.
"I'll be ready in five," she tells them.
"Dude?" Manny gestures questioningly at Jake. "I thought you were fine with Amy hanging out with is."
"I am!" Jake insists, his voice oddly high. "I just thought she wanted to read, that's all."
Manny looks at him suspiciously, but doesn't push it.
The pool is busy, children running in all directions, tired parents lying on chairs, half heartedly telling their kids to stop running.
They find a shady spot under a tree, which is somehow empty, and dump their stuff under it.
"Okay, I'm going to have a shower—" Amy starts, but Jake interrupts.
"You're supposed to shower after, Ames,"
"You're supposed to shower before and after, Jake, everyone knows that,"
"Yeah, but nobody actually does it."
"Which is disgusting, you have no idea where everybody's body has been."
"Life is disgusting, Ames, the pool is no exception. You can't shower everyday!"
"You don't shower everyday?"
"And waste all that water? Do you not care about the environment?"
Amy opens her mouth to reply, an indignant look on her face, before Manny interrupts, looking incredulously between them. "You two are impossible."
Amy rolls her eyes. "Whatever, I'll be back in five minutes, and I'll need one of you to put some sunscreen on my back, so don't get in yet, or your hands will be all wet." she tells them, walking off to the changing room.
"Dibs not!" Manny says to Jake, as Amy leaves.
"What? Dude, I can't sunscreen your sister's back. That's weird." Jake protests.
Manny shrugs. "Not my problem." he takes his shirt off, and runs and jumps into the pool before Jake's shirt is even over his head.
"Not fair, man!" Jake calls down to him, as Manny treads water.
Manny laughs, and swims away.
Amy is back in five minutes (Jake's noticed that she's always scarily punctual), in a sensible looking navy blue bathing suit, and her wet hair done up in a bun; she definitely manages to look better than everybody else at the pool, which was the whole reason he'd been hesitant about wanting her to come. It's so much easier to pretend somebody isn't insanely pretty when then have actual clothes on, and not just a bathing suit.
"Let me guess," Amy says, smiling at him, "Manny jumped in the pool and now you're my designated suncreener?"
Jake nods, hoping he looks less awkward than he feels. "Yeah,"
She laughs, handing him the sunscreen and turning around, so her back is facing him. "He's been doing that since we were kids. Usually Alex is the one who gets stuck, but it looks like it's you today."
Jake begins rubbing in the sunscreen, in methodical circles, trying to ignore how nice her skin feels, and how nice it is just to touch her in general. Amy, much too her annoyance, finds her heart beginning to race at his gentle touch, and she gulps, trying to control it.
A girl from Amy's old book club, Gemma, walks past, and spots her. "Hi, Amy!" she says, enthusiastically, walking over to Amy and Jake.
Jake and Amy are pulled back to reality, jumping away from each other awkwardly.
"Gemma? Gemma, hi! How are you?" Amy says, her face reddening.
"I'm okay, how's your summer going?"
"Uh, yeah, good," Amy nods.
"This must be Teddy," Gemma says, gesturing at Jake, and offering her hand to him before Amy can correct her. "I'm Gemma, Amy and I used to go to the same book club."
"Uh, thanks, but— sunscreen," Jake replies, waving his greasy hands around awkwardly.
"He's not Teddy," Amy finally corrects her, her face reddening even more. "Teddy's away at his uncle's for the summer. This is Jake, my brother's friend."
"That's me," Jake says, raising his eyebrows.
"Oh sorry, I just assumed..." Gemma trails off, and an awkward silence floats between the three of them, punctured with splashing and children screaming in delight.
"Well I should, um, be getting back," Gemma gestures vaguely behind her. "It was nice to catch up though, Amy," she adds with a false brightness.
"Yeah, you too," Amy replies, as Gemma walks away.
"Ugh, I hate her," Amy mutters to Jake, as soon as she's out of earshot. "She's always so happy and thinks she knows everything, when all she does is steal other people's ideas. It's infuriating."
Jake doesn't reply, and Amy looks up at him. "Who's Teddy?" he asks eventually.
Amy gulps. "Um, my boyfriend," she says quickly, taking the sunscreen from Jake and rubbing some into her arms.
"Oh, okay." Jake replies, and the awkward tension returns. Amy rubs the sunscreen into her arms vigorously.
"Is there, uh, a reason you never mentioned him?" Jake asks after a moment, scratching his neck.
Amy looks up at him, pretending to be surprised by the question. "I haven't mentioned him?" she asks, her voice too high.
Jake shakes his head. "No, not once in the four weeks I've spent with your family."
"Oh, well... that's odd. I'm sure I talk about him all the time."
They stand in silence for a few moments.
"Um, do you want the sunscreen?" Amy asks eventually.
"Uh, nah, I'm just gonna go join Manny," Jake replies. He takes off his shirt (during which Amy is suddenly fascinated by the cloudless sky), and bombs into the pool, swimming over to Manny.
She sits on the edge of the pool, watching Jake with a frown on her face.
"Hey, did you know Amy has a boyfriend?" Jake asks suddenly, as he and Manny walk home from the pool — Amy had gone home earlier.
Manny raises his eyebrow. "Yeah, and why do you care?"
"I don't," Jake lies defensively. "I just thought it was odd that she never mentioned him."
"Huh, yeah, odd," Manny says, in a tone that clearly states he does not care what-so-ever.
"It is a little, you have to admit." Jake persists.
Manny stops in his tracks, and Jake stops, turning back to him.
"Oh my god," Manny says, "you like her."
"What?! No, I don't!" Jake says way too quickly.
"Dude, you can't like my sister!" he starts to walk again, faster this time. Jake has to power walk to keep up.
"Well, it's a good thing I don't then."
"It's weird, Jake."
"I don't like her,"
"She has a boyfriend."
"Like I said, good thing I don't like her!"
Manny looks at him. "Whatever man, just don't do anything weird."
Jake's sitting on the porch swing staring at the setting sun, the sky a deep pink, as Amy comes out, book in hand, hair up in a towel.
She smiles when she sees him, she hoped he'd be there, they haven't talked since the pool earlier and she has no real intention to read her book. "You're in my spot," she says, jerking him out of his trance.
"Oh, right sorry, I— I can go," he says awkwardly.
"Jake," she laughs, sitting down next to him on the swing, "it's fine. Stay."
"You've got your book," he protests, lamely.
" Jake ,"
He suppresses a smile. "Aye-aye, Santiago."
She opens her book and fiddles with the fraying edges of her bookmark, looking at Jake. "Hey, can I, um, ask you something?"
His face blanches at what must be record speed.
"Why did you come to stay with us this summer? Is it really because your mom is on an artist retreat?"
That question, no matter how uncomfortable, is miles better than the other he expected her to ask.
"Kinda." he shrugs, looking away from her, and now it's his turn to fiddle while he works up the courage to say what he wants, picking at a small hole in the wicker swing.
"Kinda?" Amy prompts.
He looks up at her. "Yeah, she and my dad are on holiday, and she wanted me to come, but my dad—" he gives a raw laugh "—he doesn't have the best track record, and... I don't know, I'm just not ready to forgive him, and if Mom is, well then, she is."
Amy nods solemnly and reaches out to squeeze Jake's shoulder consolingly; he smiles his thanks to her.
"She said she wouldn’t go, but then Manny suggested coming here for summer, and— well I always wanted a big family, it just sounded... fun, so I told her to go if she wanted to, and I came here." his eyes don't leave Amy's, and she suddenly finds her throat dry, and her breath caught in it. She lets go of his shoulder and leans back, twisting her hands in her lap.
Jake looks away from her, and gulps, his eyes back on the sunset.
"Well, I'm glad you came," Amy says loudly, after a moment.
He looks back at her, his eyebrows raised and a slight grin on his face. "Yeah?"
She nods firmly. "Yeah, you’re a pain in the ass half the time, but hey, I grew up with seven brothers, and..." she trails off, their eyes locked on each other again, her words momentarily lost. This time Amy gulps, her beating a little too fast. "You're fun," she finishes quickly with a shrug.
Jake can't hide his smile. "Glad to have entertained you, Santiago,"
She rolls her eyes and whacks him with one of the cushions. "Oh, shut up."
"I'm gonna hold that over you, now," he teases.
"Shut up ."
"Everyday."
She whacks him with the cushion again. "I'm reading now."
He raises his hands innocently, but there's a smirk on his face. "Don't let me stop you,"
"You are the worst, Peralta," she grumbles, as she opens her book and begins to read.
"I thought I was fun?"
She gives him the lightest of kicks.
"Abuse!" he cries, and she rolls her eyes.
They stay on that porch swing until the sun has well and truly set and sky has moved from deep pink to a velvet blue, the moon hanging above them, smiling; Amy reading, and stealing glances of Jake over her book when he's not listening, and Jake staring at twilight sky, lost in thought, stealing glances of Amy when he can.
Neither of them mention Teddy.
The weeks pass like a dream, filled with day long road trips with Jake and Manny, with laughter and setting suns, with many more games of scrabble and a few games of monopoly that leave the family ties fragile for a few days, with a haze of evening porch swing conversations, and with no mentions of Teddy. The only night they don't have a porch swing conversation is when they set up the projector outside one evening and watch Die Hard, whilst making s'mores on a fire, and whilst Die Hard isn't the best film according to Amy (she and Jake have a whole evening porch swing conversation just about films), it's high up there if you add Jake wearing a tank top and acting out his favourite scenes as they happen.
And okay, she likes hanging out with Jake, she likes talking to him, but she doesn't like him like that, or at least that's what she mentally tells herself whenever Teddy calls and asks her what she's doing.
It's been almost a month since they spoke about Teddy when Jake finally summons the courage to ask about him.
It's not that he's jealous, well, maybe he is a little, but he is genuinely curious.
They're sitting on the porch swing, the sky a yellow melting into a dim blue.
"What's Teddy like?" Jake asks, making sure to get the words out all at once so he wouldn't chicken out half way through.
Amy looks at him, surprised.
"I mean, you don't have to to talk about him if you don't want to," Jake babbles, and Amy watches on, amused, "it's just... I've been trying to picture you with a guy— not that I've been picturing you, wow that... sounded even worse. I just meant—"
Amy finally takes pity on him, and interrupts, laughter in her eyes. "Jake, stop, it's fine, I was just taken by surprise, that's all."
Jake nods, and sighs with relief. "Okay,"
"Teddy's..." she fiddles nervously with the hole in the porch swing, not looking at him, unsure what to say, "nice," she says, finally (and rather pathetically, she thinks to herself).
"Nice? Well that's always a good quality in a guy." Jake teases, and Amy whacks him.
"You know what I mean, he's sweet, and he's into lots of the same stuff as me, I don't know, we just get along, I guess, he doesn't... I don't know," her eyes still don't meet his.
Jake's listening intently. "He doesn't what?"
She looks at him, and he holds her gaze. "He's safe," she says finally, "he doesn't make me do things outside of my comfort zone."
"Is that a good thing?"
"I... I don't know."
They stare at each other for what feels like an eternity, the sound cicadas chirping and the distant arguing of her brothers filling the air.
Amy looks away. "Sometimes I wish I could do something careless, y'know? Something dangerous and reckless,"
Jake laughs. "What's dangerous and reckless in Amy Santiago's book?"
"Hey! I can be dangerous and reckless if I want," she tells him, grinning.
"I wouldn't bet against you," he smiles.
She sighs. "It's tiring being me sometimes, and I just wish... sometimes I could be more carefree, that's all."
She stares at the darkening sky, as the moon rises and the stars start to appear; she can feel Jake's eyes on her.
"Well, it might be tiring being you, but I think you're doing a good job." Jake murmurs, and Amy feels a smile spread across her face.
"That might be the nicest thing you've ever said to me,"
"Shut up." he looks away from her, smiling widely.
Manny, Alex, Amy, and Jake are all sitting on the living room floor, gathered around the coffee table playing monopoly; the fan is on, blowing a cool breeze on them in the hot weather and tickling the worn monopoly money. The doorbell rings and Alex, Amy, and Manny all automatically touch their nose, Jake looks around at them in confusion for a moment before groaning.
"Ugh, not again,"
"No finger on nose means you gotta go do it," Amy says, "thems the rules, Peralta."
"There's no way that was grammatically correct," he says, and she pokes out her tongue.
The doorbell rings again.
"Just go mate," Manny says, giving Jake a light shove.
Reluctantly, Jake gets up and goes over to answer the door, highly aware of Amy's eyes are on him.
He opens the door to a rather average looking guy.
"You must be Jake!" the guy says pompously, and Amy does a double take at the voice.
"Yes... and you must be?" Jake asks, confused and bewildered as the average guy begins to shake his hand vigorously.
"Teddy!" Amy cries in surprise, getting up and rushing over to him.
"Hey, babe!" he says, giving her a hug, and Jake jumps back awkwardly.
"Teddy," he says, "as in Teddy: Amy's boyfriend."
"The very same," Teddy says, an arm around Amy.
Amy grimaces, and glances at Jake, giving him an apologetic look.
"I didn't, uh— I thought you weren't coming back for another two weeks," Amy says, unhooking herself from Teddy's arm.
"I wasn't, but then I thought, hey, why not come back to surprise you!" Teddy replies.
"What a, uh, lovely surprise," Amy says, sounding strained.
Teddy, luckily, doesn't notice how uncomfortable Amy seems to be, and goes over to say to Alex and introduce himself to Manny.
Amy glances awkwardly at Jake as Teddy talks loudly, and Jake raises his eyebrows at her, happily bemused at her awkwardness around Teddy.
"Um, Teddy, how about we go for a walk or something?" Amy proposes, rocking back and forth on the balls of her feet. "Let's get some of that air!" she adds loudly when he doesn’t reply, and Jake has to stifle a laugh.
Teddy looks over at her confused. "It's like 100 degrees,"
"And we're right in the middle of a monopoly game," Alex protests.
"Exactly!" she says, still talking too loudly, ignoring Alex. "Nothing like the summer air!"
"Uh, okay," he shrugs, "I'll see you guys later," he adds to Alex, Manny, and Jake, as Amy pulls him quickly out by the wrist.
Alex sighs. "I guess we'll just give her stuff back to the bank." he begins to sort Amy's money and properties (she'd been smashing them all to no one's surprise), as Jake comes at sits back down, a smug look on his face.
Manny frowns at him, suspicious. "What?' he asks Jake.
Jake shakes as head, suppressing a smile. "Nothing,"
Manny look at him disbelievingly. "What?" he asks again, with more insistence.
"Nothing... it's just, that's Teddy? That's Amy's boyfriend?"
"Yeah, so?"
"He just seems so..." Jake trails off, trying to find the right words.
"Boring? Bland?" Alex prompts.
"Yeah," Jake gestures at Alex.
"He is." Alex confirms. "He is mind-blowingly numb. If Amy has to date someone, can't he at least be someone even mildly interesting?"
Teddy comes over for dinner that night, and he's just as dull as Alex said he was. He tells them all about spending the summer at his uncle's beer factory, where he helped bottle exactly 2678 bottles of pilsner.
"So Teddy," Jake says as serious as he can muster, "you seem to really enjoy the beer business."
"Oh yes," Teddy says sincerely, "when I finish college I want to go work there, and then take over when I'm older, make it pilsners exclusively of course."
Jake catches Manny's eye, who fakes a sudden coughing fit to hide his laughter; Amy scowls and pushes her food around her plate with her fork.
"You also seem to really like pilsners,"
"I kills for those pills," Teddy laughs, glancing at Amy, who gives a loud, fake laugh.
Jake raises his eyebrows and Manny really does laugh out loud this time, though he manages to play it off as laughing with Teddy, rather than at him.
After dinner, Jake sits at on the porch swing, staring at the moon, and Amy stays inside with Teddy.
They don't talk on the porch the night after either, or the night after that, and soon it’s been almost a week. Amy watches Jake throughout the day when she gets the chance; sometimes he’ll catch her eye and smile, but there’s something sad about it. He's different, they're different, and she hates it.
"Are you okay, Amy?" Teddy asks, pausing the film they'd been watching. They're sitting in his living room watching a documentary about typewriters, and even though it's the sort of thing Amy would usually enjoy, she couldn't concentrate.
She looks over at him, distracted. "Huh? Yeah, I'm just... I'm a bit distracted today, that's all."
"Yeah, you seem out of it,"
"I'm, um— I think I'll go home actually," Amy tells him, standing up suddenly.
"Amy?"
"I'll see you tomorrow," she says quickly, running out of there before he can stop her.
The evening air is warm and hugs her as she hurries home. She sits out stubbornly on the porch swing, ignoring her mother as she asks Amy why she’s home so early. She sits there and refuses to look at the setting sun as she pushes the swing back and forth angrily with her feet, her arms wrapped around herself.
She was having the perfect summer, quite literally the textbook definition of a perfect summer, and it just suddenly feels so wrong.
"This seat taken?"
She looks up and a smile breaks across her face. "You're here," she breathes happily.
"Well I tried to run away but your mom caught me," Jake jokes, and she smiles again, drawing her knees up to her chest, hugging herself as the sun disappears.
They sit in silence for a few moments, the moon settling in the sky.
"I think I'm a bad person, Jake," Amy murmurs after a moment, and he looks at her, not sure whether to laugh or cry out in horror.
"You're kidding, right?"
She looks over at him, and he can see in her eyes that she's not kidding.
"You're not, Ames, you're the best person," he says sincerely, resting his hand on her arm.
She smiles slyly and raises her eyebrows slightly at that.
"Well, you know, not the best, but not a bad one, an okay one! A good one, even!" he babbles, waving his hands awkwardly in the air, and she laughs, her eyes shining.
"You're a good person," he adds softly.
"Even if I'm not treating someone right, right now?"
"Yeah, you'll do the right thing eventually, I know you,"
She smiles shyly and nods.
She calls Kylie, her best friend since childhood who’d moved to Canada a few years back, the next morning, in desperate need of some clarity that wasn't coming from, well, Jake.
"Kylie!"
"Amy! How are you going?" Kylie answers excitedly.
"Good, mostly, I just really need your advice, and even though I would hate for any of our conversations to not pass the Bechdel test—"
"God forbid,"
"God might have to allow,"
"Even us talking about God doesn't pass the Bechdel test," Kylie points out.
"Not true, we don't know God's gender,"
"Good point, Detective Santiago,"
Amy pokes her head outside her bedroom door to check her brothers aren't within earshot; the hallway is empty, and she flops back down onto her bed with a sigh.
"Okay," she starts.
"Go," Kylie commands.
"I think I need to break up with Teddy,"
"Yeah?"
"Yeah."
"Reasons?"
"So many."
"Do any of them begin with 'J' and end in 'ake'?"
"One thing at a time, Kylie,"
She spends the whole of that afternoon drafting the perfect break up speech to Teddy, the mountain of scrunched up paper in her trash can seems to increase with every passing minute; at one point Alex comes in and tries to steal one of them, but she sends him running with just a withering stare.
It's just gone four o'clock when she's satisfied, it's kind but firm, apologetic and thankful, she's happy with it.
"Sis! Where you going?" Manny calls as she comes down the stairs; he and Jake are playing video games in the living room.
"Out, bro ,"
"Ugh, don't call me 'bro'."
"Don't call me 'sis',"
"Where are you going?"
She rolls her eyes. "Out."
"To see Teddy?" he teases.
Her eyes meet Jake's briefly, and she gulps, looking back at Manny. "Just out."
She memorises her speech on the way there, reading it and whispering it.
"Just keep a cool head, Amy," she tells herself, as she knocks on his door.
Teddy answers, luckily, she's not sure she could handle the pressure of talking to his parents right now.
"Amy! I called you earlier but you never answered. Do you wanna go out tonight or something?"
"I need to talk to you!" Amy announces, too loudly.
Teddy frowns, and steps out of the doorway, shutting the door behind him. "Um, okay? Is everything alright?"
"Teddy, you have meant so much to me this past year, and you've been such a wonderful high school boyfriend, but—"
"Whoa," he steps back, "are you breaking up with me?"
"No!" she replies automatically, and his face relaxes almost immediately. "I mean yes!" she corrects herself quickly. "I just wasn't at that part yet, I wrote a speech," she pulls the piece of paper out of her back pocket and waves it in the air pathetically.
Teddy stares at her, dumbfounded.
"Um, can I— can I continue?" she stutters.
When he doesn’t reply she takes that a yes, and continues. "You've been such a wonderful high school boyfriend, but—"
"Can I just ask one thing? Why?" Teddy interrupts rudely.
"That's what the speech is for," she replies, confused.
"Does it have anything to do with Jake?"
She is not ready for that.
"What? Jake... Jake is completely separate from this!" she tells him angrily. "Jake has nothing to do with you and me."
"He sure seems to have a lot to do with you, and you with him!"
"No, okay, no! I wrote a really fucking great breakup speech, that I'm pretty sure would get an A+ if there were grades for this sort of thing!"
"Not everything is about grades, Amy!"
"Not everything is about pilsners, Teddy!" she retorts back.
They glare at each other for a few moments, in which Teddy's younger sister runs towards them, grinning. "Do you guys wanna play chasey?"
"Not right now, Daisy." Teddy says through gritted teeth, and Daisy pouts, slinking off.
Amy passes him the speech. "Just read it if you really think this is about Jake. Jake made me realise I need be supported. You don't give me that."
Teddy takes the speech, and watches Amy walk away.
"I broke up with him," Amy says into the phone, that evening.
"How'd it go?" Kylie asks on the other end.
"Kinda crap,"
"At least you can move onto Jake now!" she teases.
Amy rolls her eyes. "We're failing the Bechdel test, again ."
She’s not really sure what to do now, how to communicate to Jake that things are different. She considers just outright telling him, but decides that would be too weird and abrupt; she tries catching his eye and smiling, hoping her happiness would convey that the awkwardness between them can be over, but he gives her the same sad smile he’d been giving her since Teddy arrived. She’s not asking for anything, she just wants the summer she had before Teddy came back, the Jake she had before Teddy came back.
It’s three days since the break up, and Amy is coming downstairs in her pyjamas to say goodnight to her parents when she spots him. Jake, outside on their porch swing. She smiles, and walks quickly out to him.
The sky is dark, the moon hidden behind the clouds as she goes out to join him. “Hey,” she says cautiously.
He beams up at her, and she feels relief flood her veins. “Hey,” he breathes.
She sits down beside him, smiling back, and the moon emerges from behind the clouds. “Summer’s almost over,” she murmurs.
“Yeah,” Jake says, “just two and a bit weeks.”
She looks up at the moon. “I wish it was longer.”
Jake knocks lightly on Amy’s door, and she looks up from the book she’s reading by her dim bedside lamp.
He opens the door slowly. “Ames?” he whispers, poking his head around her door.
She puts her book down. “Jake? What do you want? It’s past eleven.”
Jake steps into her room, shutting the door behind him, and tiptoes dramatically to sit on her bed (Amy has to stifle a laugh).
“Remember how you said you wanted to be carefree and do something reckless?”
Despite herself she’s intrigued. “Yes,”
“Okay, well come out with me right now,”
“What? It’s past eleven, Jake! We can’t just go out!”
“How old are you? Eight?” he teases.
She rolls her eyes. “Jake.”
“Amy,” he grins.
“Jake, we can’t. I’ve never snuck out before,”
“Neither. There’s a first time for everything right?”
She stares at him, momentarily lost. “Okay, but why?”
‘Why?”
“Yeah, why? I told you that ages ago. Why now?”
Because I like you, he wants to say. Because I want to spend time with you and I want you to be happy.
“We’ve got two weeks of summer left, why not?”
She can’t help herself, a smile spreads across her face. “Okay, fine,” she’s grinning now, and Jake beams back. “But if anything happens,” she adds, mock sternly, pointing a finger at him.
Jake raises his hands. “It’s all on me.”
“You bet it is, Peralta. Now get out, I have to change.”
She shoos him away, and he stands patiently outside her door, rocking back and forth on the balls of feet, not really believing his crazy plan worked.
She emerges a few minutes later in a top and jeans, and, giggling like idiots, they rush quickly out of the quiet house.
“Okay, so where are we going?” Amy asks him as they walk along the street, lit poorly by the orange street lights.
“It’s a surprise!”
“You’re surprises are always terrible, Jake!”
He gasps in mock horror. “How dare you, Amy Santiago!”
She laughs, rolling her eyes.
One bus ride and twenty minutes later they end up outside a club.
“No way, you are not taking me to a club, Jake!” Amy exclaims.
“Carefree, remember, Ames?”
“You need to be twenty one!”
“Ah, come this way, milady!” he takes her by the hand and leads her around the back.
The door at the back is abandoned and Amy stares in horror as Jake begins to expertly pick it.
It swings open and he grins.
“Jake.”
“Your wonderful brother taught me this,”
“Manny?” she asks in disbelief.
“Yep, he’s more of a badass than he would care to admit.”
“This is gonna be the weirdest night of my life,”
“The best night of your life!” Jake corrects.
The club is packed and hot, and Amy holds tightly onto Jake’s hand as they weave through the crowd.
She looks around at all the mostly drunk twenty year olds and their terrible dance moves, and laughs.
Jake smiles at her. “WHAT?!” he yells over the thumping music.
“NOTHING!” Amy yells back. “IT’S JUST… EVERYBODY LOOKS SO RIDICULOUS!”
Jake laughs. “AS RIDICULOUS AS ME?!” he asks as he begins to do a very poor Irish jig.
They emerge an hour later, exhilarated and sweaty, adrenaline running through both of them. Holding hands, they run down the street, laughing; the moon watching them from the midnight black sky.
They stop as they come to the gardens, both out of breath. Amy leans over, catching her breath, and Jake watches her, his eyes shining.
“Okay,” she breathes, beaming at him, “that was fun,”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
They stare at each other for a moment, both breathless and smiling.
“The night is but young, Santiago,” Jake finally says.
She raises an eyebrow. “What does that mean exactly?”
He offers his arm, and she takes it. “You’ll find out soon enough,”
‘Soon enough’ occurs in fifteen minutes when they’re standing outside the closed city Art Museum.
She looks at him, smiling. “It’s shut, Jake, but thank you,” she squeezes his arm gently, and rests her head on his shoulder briefly, looking up at the beautiful building.
But Jake doesn’t look at all disappointed, in fact, he’s grinning again. “Didn’t you once say you wished you could have a whole museum to yourself?”
She lifts her head up and looks at him incredulously. “Jake, we are not about to break into a museum,”
He smirks. “Who ever said anything about breaking in?”
“Jake?”
Five minutes later they’re being let in by the security guard, Jake’s neighbour.
“I’m still pretty sure this is illegal, Jake,” Amy murmurs.
“Not if your uncle is on the board,”
She stops dead in her tracks. “Your uncle is on the board?! Why did you never tell me this?!”
“Ames, hush, we’re in a museum,” he teases.
“Jake!”
He shrugs, “The whole side of my Mom’s family are into art stuff, hence why she’s an art teacher,”
Amy grins. “That is so cool.”
“I’m glad you think so,” he replies, smiling to himself.
They spend a good two hours wandering around the museum; Amy telling him all about the different paintings, and how she wants to study art history at college. He listens attentively, basking in her glowing enthusiasm.
Every now and then she catches him looking at, and she blushes, smiling as she looks away.
“Jake,” Amy says as they walk along the almost deserted street, music coming from a nearby pub, “this was amazing. Best night ever.”
“Really?”
“Oh, a hundred percent,”
It’s Jake’s turn to blush and look away, a smile on his face.
“Can I ask you something?” she murmurs.
“Of course,”
“Why? Why tonight? Why me? Why all of this?”
“Because I… I wanted you to have a good memory of this summer,” he replies truthfully.
“This whole summer’s been a good memory,”
“You do know how to flatter a man,”
Amy opens her mouth to reply, when Jake stops in his tracks, outside of the pub, which is almost empty.
“What?” Amy asks, looking at him confused.
“Listen,”
She pauses, listening, recognising the start of ‘Dancing in the Moonlight’. She looks up at the silver moon overhead, and then back to Jake, who is offering his hand. “May I have this dance, milady?”
Smiling, she takes his hand, and they dance slowly on the spot, underneath the light of the moon, and it’s the most cliché, romantic, magical thing that’s ever happened to either of them.
“You’re a really good dancer,” Amy murmurs letting him take the lead.
He smiles. “I did ballroom dancing from the ages of six to fourteen,”
She gapes, laughing. “No way!”
She smiles at him, her breath caught as she looks into his eyes; they’re so close, their hearts are beating against each other, and never before has she wanted to kiss him this badly. The world is just them, the music, and the night sky above them, the moon smiling, electricity coming down from the stars and crackling around them.
She stares at him. “I— I broke up with Teddy,” she finally whispers.
He stops dancing. “What?”
“A week ago,”
“Amy,” his voice his hoarse, “what… what does that mean?”
She can feel her heart racing as she looks into his eyes, trying to find the words.
She can’t, so she kisses him.
And it’s beautiful and profound, they’re lost in each other. Her hands are on his face and neck, and his are on her back, pulling her into him. It’s the perfect kiss, in the middle of the night, under the moon and starts, a kiss that’s been the whole summer in the making.
When they finally stop, Jake’s hands slide down her back, linger at her waist, and hers rest on his chest, where she can feel his hammering heart.
He smiles softly. “I’ve, uh, wanted you to do that for a long time,”
She lets a small laugh. “I’ve wanted to do that for a long time.”
They walk home hand in hand, whispering and laughing together; it’s almost sunrise by the time they get home, and Amy presses her lips to Jake’s one last time, before going back to bed. She flops down onto her bed, a smile on her face that can’t come off.
“Manny? Can I ask you something?”
It’s early afternoon, and Manny and Jake are on the couch in the garage playing video games.
Manny raises an eyebrow. “Yeah, shoot,”
“It’s about Amy,”
Manny sighs, and pauses the game, putting down his controller. “You wanna ask her out,”
Jake winces. “Maybe? Would that be totally weird?”
“I mean, yeah, it would be a bit, but— I mean, you’re a good guy, and I think she likes you, so sure,” he says, trying to not sound as awkward as he feels.
“Really?” Jake grins.
“Yeah, of course,” Manny replies, unpausing the game.
They play for a few moments, but Manny can see Jake acting restless out of the corner of his eye, and pauses it again.
“You wanna go ask her right now, don’t you?”
“Can I? I just really li—“
“Rules: no talking about her much you like her or how great she is, or any, y’know, stuff,”
“Aye aye cap’n!” Jake says gleefully, before running out of the garage.
Amy, to no surprise, is out on the porch swing, book in hand.
“Hey,” Jake says, as he sits down next to her.
Amy looks up, smiling, and shuts her book. “Hey,”
They both sit there in silence for a moment, before Jake clears his throat. “So, um, I was thinking that, maybe, we should go on a date sometime.”
“Wasn’t that what last night was?” Amy asks, smiling slyly.
Jake reddens. “Not officially,”
“Well, I highly doubt any date could top last night,”
“Oh trust me, I’ll find a way,” he assures her, and she giggles, kissing him gently.
“Get some, sis!” comes Alex’s voice.
The two pull away, horrified, to see Alex watching them through the kitchen window.
“Go away!” Amy yells at him, annoyed.
He grins cheekily, and prances off, singing, “Amy and Jake, sittin’ in a tree: K, I, S, S, I, N G!”
“Well for starters we’re sitting on a porch swing,” Amy grumbles.
Jake laughs, beaming at her.
The last two weeks of summer past much like the rest of the did, in a haze of happiness, except this time with kissing and handholding thrown in, which both Amy and Jake deeply appreciate (though Manny seems to be less enthusiastic about it).
“It’s only a half an hour drive between colleges,” Jake is saying, holding Amy’s hands, as they stand out the front, to see him and Manny.
“I know, Jake,” Amy smiles.
“Okay, well, I’ll see you in a couple of days then,” he smiles back at her, giving her a quick kiss. He thanks her parents for having him, and gives some of her brothers a hug, before hopping in the car with Manny.
“Wait!” Amy calls out, and runs down to the car. She sticks her head through Jake’s open window and gives him one last kiss. Manny makes a noise of disgust, whilst Alex cheers behind them.
“Um, okay,” she says embarrassed, her ears red, “I’ll see you guys soon.”
She joins her brothers again, giving Alex a slap, waving as Manny and Jake drive away.
“That’s the last time I ever invite you over for summer,” Manny says to him.
Jake grins, putting his feet up on the dashboard. “Your mom already invited me.”