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She knows her limits. Four beers, three vodka drinks — unless the bartender is Tim, he makes them strong — and subtract one for each shot.
That’s why she knows that at three shots and two strong whiskey cocktails she’s blown right past every limit she’s ever set.
But Jake’s back. After six long months of a rotating cast of useless fill-ins and newly-minted rookie detectives, his desk is full of terrible, tooth-rotting candy and actual police work. He stood up and apologized to the entire 99 squad for the lie of his quitting. Gina threw her phone at him, then said she’d always known. Scully cried.
Happy hour hasn’t been this happy in god knows how long. Boyle is beside himself — Sarge has actually had to pick him up off the floor twice. Rosa’s been spotted smiling by no fewer than seven people.
And Amy Santiago is getting rip-roaring drunk.
Because it’s been six months of thinking about what he said. Six months of missing his stupid face and his constant competitiveness. Rosa’s the second-ranked detective in the precinct with him gone, but she has ignored any challenge with her usual leather-jacket-clad shrug.
"Why would I care who’s winning?" she’d asked with a withering look. "We’re cops. And I’m not Peralta."
Amy winces at the memory and reaches for her drink. Her third? Maybe? It sloshes a bit as she works it up to her mouth.
"Saaaaaantiago!" He slides onto the barstool next to her, giving it a full spin that leaves her blinking to regain her own balance. "You are drunk."
She very carefully enunciates. “I’mmfn. Immean… I’m fine.” Oh. Shit.
He grins. “You are not. Is that your third Whiskey Sour? You’re just asking for trouble. Gimme.”
Her hand tightens around her drink until his fingers slide in next to hers. Then she lets it go so fast it tips onto her crisp pink button-down.
"Whoa there!" Jake does what he can to contain the damage, putting the mostly-empty glass behind him on the bar and grabbing a stack of cocktail napkins. "Time to call Teddy?"
She swipes them from him and glares as she dabs — you always dab, never wipe — at a spot somewhere by her knee that has no liquid whatsoever.
“Teddy.” The word has as much disdain as she can work into it. Teddy is probably somewhere in his nice apartment, having a nice evening in with his code book and his unwillingness to bend the rules, even when they’re stupid rules like who is supposed to pick up the groceries or how many times they can reschedule a date for work reasons. “No more Teddy.”
He looks away for a minute, fiddles with her glass on the bar before downing it in one gulp. “I’m sorry,” he says, turning back to her and wiping his face with the back of his hand. “I didn’t know.”
Of course not. He was undercover with the FBI, doing amazing police work and earning Captain Holt’s unwavering trust and….
"Are you crying?" He sounds panicked, and grabs the cocktail napkins from her hand to push them at her face. "Shit. You really are drunk."
"Ohhhh god," she wails into her papery mask. "I have to go. Before Holt seesh me.”
"Right. Hang on." He turns her to face the bar and then gets up, clearing his throat loudly.
"Well thank you all for the welcome home party! I gotta say, though, I’m on FBI time, and I get tired really early now, so maybe we can pick this up again tomorrow."
The rest of the squad laughs and pats him on the back. She hears Holt give him a very pointed “Nice to have you back” but doesn’t turn to look because the napkins feel nice on her face and it’s dark in here and maybe if she can’t see them, they can’t see her.
"Santiago?" Sarge taps her on the shoulder. "What are you doing?"
What does he think she’s doing? “Hiding.”
"Whaaat she means to say," Jake jumps in and grabs the cocktail napkins away so Amy can see Sarge has his daddy face on, all concern and confusion, "is that she just got a huge zit and she didn’t want the captain to see it so she was hiding. But now it’s time to go home, right Santiago?"
She opens her mouth to answer and gets a wide-eyed, crazy smile-glare from him. So she nods instead, and crosses her arms over her smelly, whiskey-stained shirt.
"Well, my wife’s already in the car, but if you need a ride home…"
This time the wide-eyed panic is her own, aimed at Jake. She loves the Sarge, but she doesn’t want him to know how drunk she let herself get at an office happy hour. What if he told Holt?
"Don’t worry," Jake scrambles to fill in the silence. "She’s on my way home, we’ll walk it off."
"The pimple?" Sergeant Jeffords squints at her face and Amy flushes bright red. "Does that work?"
"Oh yeah." Jake pushes at him to try and steer him toward the door. It doesn’t do much. "Like a charm. Have a good night, Sarge!"
Once he’s finally gone, she lets out the breath she’s been holding. “Yeesshhh.”
Jake blinks at her. “Wow. I feel like I should be recording this. For posterity. Or blackmail. Or both.” She slides off the stool in a huff and almost misses planting her feet. Jake slides an arm under her and laughs. “Right, so we’re going now?”
**
The walk does a lot to sober her up. She’s back in the realm of drunk but in control of her limbs and tongue by the time they reach her apartment building.
"I just… thanks." It feels inadequate. After all, she was the one who got too drunk and ruined his welcome back happy hour.
"What? No big deal. This is practically on the way to my apartment anyway."
"Jake, you live in Gina’s old place, which is the exact opposite direction."
"I said practically." His wink is over the top, like the rest of him.
She laughs despite herself, and turns the key in the front door lock. He’s leaning against the door, clearly planning on walking her up to the apartment itself to make sure that key turns as well.
It’s sweet. And she’s missed him. She really has. So when she drops the key and reaches for the belt loops of his jeans to tug him closer, she’s not thinking about how mad she was that he wasn’t around when she broke up with Teddy two months ago, or how jealous she’s been of his assignment, or how weird this could make work.
She’s thinking that he’s back, and she’s missed him. And then she’s tugging his head down to hers and kissing him like it’s been six months since he told her he liked her and then left to do something stupidly brave and actually dangerous. He freezes for a minute, so she pulls again at his waist, and then his hand is on her back and the other’s in her hair and shit she didn’t think he’d be quite that good at kissing.
He’s the one who pulls away, a smile on his face but worry in his eyes. “Ok, Romeo, inside with you.”
Amy blinks slowly. “So you’ve never read any Shakespeare?”
"You’re stalling, detective." He reaches around her to unlock the door himself, and she’s still drunk enough to lean into his arm and pretend, for a minute, that it’s there on purpose.
He propels her through the door, to the elevator, and hits her floor without saying anything else. When the metal doors slide shut she turns to him.
"Jake."
"Amy." He tilts his head. "No more taking advantage of me tonight."
"Taking adv-" she sputters to a halt. "I did no such thing."
"You did. You probably engineered this entire night as a test, just to see if I could resist after six months of wondering." His tone is light, but his face is far too serious.
"I got drunk. There was no plan.”
"And that’s almost more frightening," he mutters as the doors open again. "I will be lodging a formal complaint in the morning. Come on."
They walk in silence to her door, and neither one is smiling, and she’s so confused because that was a great kiss and she missed him and what exactly has she done wrong?
"Why did you get drunk?"
"I…" she stares up at him and considers just skipping the answer and going for more kissing. But he’s so serious. "Frowny face."
His eyes slide shut and he grins in despair. “This is so unfair. Why am I not recording this?”
"Because I don’t know what to do." Her quiet words get him to open his eyes again. "You’re back and I’m so glad and I don’t know… It’s a little scary."
He just looks at her for a minute, and it’s strange after six months of wondering where he is and what he’s thinking to see his relief and understanding spelled out so clearly on his face. He nods. “Ok. We’ll talk it out over pancakes tomorrow. Bed, drunken Santiago.”
Her door swings open — he is still holding her keys, which is something she really should have noticed — and he nudges her inside.
"Jake." She’s not sure what she wants to say. She’s not even sure she wants to say anything. But she isn’t ready for him to leave.
He leans in and pulls her into a hug. Both arms, her head on his shoulder, the real deal. She sighs in happiness. He drops a kiss on her head and then steps away.
"Tomorrow. Pancakes. I hope you have a smoke detector."
The door closes behind him, and her smile drops as she realizes what he’s just said.
She’s so happy to have him back. But if he burns down her kitchen she will have to kill him.