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Amy was pretty sure she had the best husband in the entire world. For one, he'd been happily at her beck and call ever since she got pregnant. He didn't care what hour of the night (or in some cases, the very early morning) it was; if Amy Santiago was craving that one brand of microwave lasagna, Jake would happily search through 3 different 24-hour convenience stores to find it.
He'd done it more than once. Multiple convenience stores in Brooklyn had started to stock that one brand of microwave lasagna since he'd started coming.
But that wasn't all, Amy never thought she would see the day that Jake Peralta made an effort to be more prepared. She was wrong. They'd bought parenting books together, and he'd actually sat down and read them. He'd even forced her to get one called Cry Hard with a Vengeance, and then- this was the strangest part- willingly admitted that Bruce Willis didn't give good parenting advice.
And it wasn't just parenthood he was trying to be more prepared for. He still didn't show up on time for work, and he rarely had the things he needed to do said work, but he suddenly seemed to always have extra shirts on him that she could borrow when she sweated through her own.
She found that was the case with a lot of things: he neglected to take care of himself, but for her (and their future baby), he would do anything.
Not to mention the sex reveal party, Amy didn't even know where to begin with that. First, he tried to fix things between his dad and his grandpa. Second, he tried to clean the cake they knocked over without finding out the sex of their baby. When that didn't work, he tried to put everything back together so that it could all still be perfect for her. Then, he went to the hospital with his dad to get a second thumb surgically reattached because of another stupid accident involving Roger's irrational competitiveness. To finish it off, he bought another cake just for her. Of course, Scully ate it, but that wasn't the point. The point was that he tried so hard to make it work, and it was still a disaster. It was her perfect disaster.
So when she woke up to an empty bed in the middle of the night, it didn't matter how exhausted she was. Amy was more than willing to return the favor.
She found him on the couch in the living room, poring over one of many parenting books, the rest in a haphazard stack by his side. His head snapped up and he met her gaze.
"Honey, what are you doing?" she whispered.
His answer came tumbling rapidly out of his mouth before he could do anything to stop it.
"I'm gonna be a bad dad."
She watched her husband's eyes grow big and soft, filling slowly with tears. He bit his lip to try and stop them, his eyes still exactly on hers.
(He thought that if he tried to move them they would overflow. They did anyway.)
She rushed over to him, trying to soothe her trembling husband.
"This was a mistake, I'm gonna screw up our kid," he whimpered.
Amy wanted to laugh. Not because Jake was upset, that was physically painful for her to watch, but because it was shocking to her that he couldn't see how wrong he was.
"No honey, you're not. Of course you're not."
"I can't even handle a sex reveal party, how am I supposed to handle a kid?"
"Jake, there was nothing you could've done about the party. You did the right thing at every turn. It's not your fault."
He threw his hands up in exasperation, "You don't understand," he yelled, slumping over, "When my dad and Walter were yelling at each other, I tried to act like a parent. I tried to fix it like a parent would, and I fucked it up! Now, Walter is gone forever and my dad lost an entire thumb. Worst of all, I left the second cake alone with Scully. Any idiot knows not to leave any food item alone with Scully."
"Babe, you were trying to parent two grown men who've had decades to build up a terrible relationship with each other, not two toddlers arguing over something dumb like the last piece of chocolate. How Walter and your dad turned out is not a reflection of you."
"But this was a sign from the universe, the Peralta curse is coming for me. Did you know that my dad hadn't talked to his dad since I was ten? And that his dad abandoned him at the World's fair? And that his dad fled to America after drowning his dad in a well? That's-" he counted on his fingers, "four, no five generations of bad dads!"
Amy blinked slowly, "Wow, that's... wow. But who cares? Jake, did any of them read parenting books? Did any of them try and fix relationships in their family? Did any of them even have a sex reveal party? I'm betting the answer is no. You're going to be the one to break the cycle because you are already better than any of them ever were and your son isn't even born yet. You patched things up with your dad, you forgave him and you continue to forgive him every time he messes up because you want your son to have a granddad. That's amazing." She squeezed his hand, "You're amazing."
He leaned into her, pressing his face into her shirt. "I don't know how to do this. I'm supposed to teach him life skills, Amy, I don't have any freakin' life skills," he mumbled.
"Jake, that's ridiculous. You're calm under pressure, you're compassionate, and you do what needs to be done, even if it hurts you sometimes. Those are life skills. Also, I can't cook for shit so whatever you can teach him in that department will be a blessing from heaven."
He didn't answer, so she went on, "You didn't have a dad when you needed one, but the instinct is still in there," she touched his chest, "You can do this, and you will. If you're half as good a dad as you are a husband, our kid will be the luckiest person alive."
"Really? I have life skills?" he asked, eyes filled with wonder.
"That depends, do you have a life?" They smiled at each other, Jake allowing himself a small chuckle of amusement. His expression became nervous again.
His voice came out barely a whisper, "Are you sure I'm not gonna fail?"
"I'm so sure. You're not alone, babe, we're in this together. We're both going to mess up sometimes and we're both going to learn..." she trailed off, smiling.
"But remember," she started again, "We can get through anything as long as we're with the right people, and you, Jake Peralta, are the right person for me."
"There will never be a righter person for me than you, Ames."
She planted a kiss on his forehead, "Then it's settled. We got this."
"We got this," he repeated, nodding.
They snuggled in closer to each other, cuddling in silence for several minutes. Amy listened to his heart beating against hers, watching the rise and fall of his chest slow until it matched her own. She let his warmth wash over her, feeling him relax as he entangled his hands in her hair. She wondered how it was possible for this man not to understand how incredibly flawless he was. She pressed her lips to his.
She almost didn't hear him whisper into her ear, "God, I love you."
Amy took a deep breath, saving the moment forever in her mind, "Are you feeling better now?"
She watched his face, looking for signs of an answer, and she found one in the form of a small smile.
"Yeah, a little bit." Gently, she took him by the arm and guided him back to their bed. Normally, Jake would be the little spoon, but since her abdominal region had started to swell, the roles had been reversed. She cherished the sensation of his breath hot on the back of her neck, his skin on hers.
When she woke up in the morning, she would find herself still enveloped in his arms.