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Hailey woke up to her phone buzzing away on her bedside table, drifting closer and closer to the edge with each incoming message.
She reached out to grab it, praying to every deity that there was, is, or ever might be, that this wasn't about another case. Peering at the messages with bleary eyes, Hailey saw that they were all from Jay. And they all said the same thing.
*Tap-tap*
*Tap-tap*
*Tap-tap*
*Tap-tap*
*Tap-tap*
Hailey sat up and propped herself against the headboard as a few more tap-taps came in. *What are you doing?* She replied. * It's 1:30 in the morning.*
*Throwing rocks at your window. Open up?* His message came across the screen, followed within a second by a picture of the man himself waiting just outside her door.
Hailey swung herself out of bed with a groan and staggered out of her bedroom. She opened the door and barely had time to step out of the way before Jay rushed past her. He started pacing the living room, running his fingers over the stubble on his jaw, still in his clothes from work that day. "Are you okay?" she asked. "I thought you wanted to take the night?"
Jay had pulled her aside in the locker room as they were packing up. He claimed he was tired and didn't think he'd be much company. So he was going to go back to his place for the night. Hailey didn't really like the idea; they always decompressed together after rough cases. But she also understood, sometimes you just need to stew on things yourself for a while until you were ready to talk. Apparently, for Jay, that time was now.
"Hailey, my head has been spinning all night," Jay paused in his steps to look at her. She could see it in his eyes.
"Okay," she took a seat at her kitchen counter. "Spinning on what?"
"I thought I got it, y'know," he resumed his pacing. "Our conversation in the wire room, I thought I understood. I mean, the fruit of the poisonous tree sucks."
"It does," she nodded.
"But then there was Kenny's, and what Voight was going to do."
"Whoa," Hailey held up a hand to stop him. "Whoa, just back up and freeze for a second. Kenny the tweaker?"
Jay nodded.
"What exactly was I fine with, Jay?" she asked, her brain still lagging with sleep.
"Leaving Voight and Adam there to work that guy over."
Hailey sat up straight, slumping against the island. Now she was awake. And now she was pissed.
"And I just don't get it, Hailey," he continued, rubbing hands over his face. "How you just leave like that, know-how times are, how Voight is."
"Wow," she glared at him. "Really? That's your take? We were given an order, Jay. It wasn't one I liked, but it's one I understood."
"You could have at least-"
"What?" she cut across, standing from the stool but rooted to the spot. "Wasted time arguing with him like you? Given Hoff more time to hunt his next victim while we stood there debating? Watch you get fired for insubordination?"
Jay sneered. "Voight wasn't gonna fire me."
"He might have," Hailey shot back. "And let's be clear here, Jay, you didn't know what Voight was going to do."
"Oh, come on, Hailey."
"No," she insisted. "You thought you knew what he was gonna do, but he didn't. They didn't."
Jay turned heel and started on a new path to the balcony and back, letting out a groan of frustration on his way. "You gonna have this conversation with Kim and Kevin too," Hailey asked. "They left too."
"Maybe I should," he spat.
"And you'd be a hypocrite if you did," she barked.
"Excuse me?"
Hailey took a harsh breath; she could feel the heat in her cheeks, the too-familiar prickles of anger in every part of her body. It would be so easy, she thought, to throw it all back in his face. To remind Jay of all the times that he crossed the lines. Times he seemed to conveniently be forgetting as he hurled his accusations at the rest of them. She took another breath and clenched her fists. She didn't want to do that. Inhale, Jay had worked hard on himself since those dark days. Exhale. They could get through this. They just needed to do what they always did, talk it through.
"You seem to forget," Hailey started, her words maybe a little sharper than she wanted them to be, so she took another breath. "That none of us are innocent of it, Jay. Not one member of the unit. Not even you. We have all stepped over that line."
She watched as Jay deflated at her words and dropped into her armchair, his head in his hands. Hailey walked the short steps into the living room and sat on the edge of her coffee table. "Talk to me, Jay," she insisted.
"The last time you got okay with crossing lines, Voight sent to the FBI," he said, his eyes hollow. "I almost lost you."
"Okay," she nodded for him to keep going.
"I'm worried that this is the start of that all over again."
"Jay, I don't ever want to cross that line again," Hailey assured. "I don't. That's not what this is. I was just ranting, giving voice to some frustration, and maybe some of it came out badly. But someone like Hoff never should have been released like he was; I don't think you'll ever be able to convince me otherwise."
"So what?" Jay asked. "We should just go back to the old ways? Become those old school Chicago cops again?"
"No, that's not at all," Hailey shook her head. "But I do think there needs to be more of a middle ground than just letting some of these guys go. The law was followed to the letter after Martinez was suspended, but justice was cast aside to do it."
Hailey ran a hand through her hair. "He was guilty, fruit of the poisonous tree or not, Hoff was guilty. They knew that. They knew his criminal history that he'd already been acquitted for a similar crime because the victim was too scared to testify. That he escalated after that. And they still just let him go."
"But what were they supposed to do, Hailey?"
"I don't know," she shrugged. "Have some stipulations on his release at the very least. Mandatory check-ins, curfew, anything. Just something more than the nothing that they did. I'm not saying that it's all on the prosecutors either, okay? Martinez screwed up, I realize that, but in the end, she wasn't the one who paid for that mistake. Not really, not like Renee and Jessica did."
"Yeah," Jay whispered. If he closed his eyes for longer than it took to in the end blink, he could still see their eyes, wide open and still somehow terrified. He was sure Hailey did too. "Yeah, I get that. I do."
"Okay," she leaned back.
"So what about us?" He asked.
"What about us?"
"Where do we go from here," Jay picked at some invisible lint on his jeans, trying to hide the tight set of his shoulders. "You wanna call this off?"
Hailey pushed herself off the table and slid into his lap, her arms coming up to wrap around his neck and pulled him into a kiss. She felt the tension leave his body as she gently worked her lips over his. When they broke apart, Hailey rested her forehead against his. "Jay, I don't want to break up," she breathed and felt him fully relax under her. "We have a difference of opinion. Are you telling me you need a girl who agrees with you on anything and everything?"
"No," he shook his head. "I don't want that."
"Good," Hailey pressed a kiss to his temple. "I don't want that either. How can we learn and grow as cops, as people, if we agree all the time? I think that's what I like best about us, about you. You make me look at things all sorts of new ways, Halstead."
Jay looked at her and smiled for the first time in what felt like days. He reached up and brushed some of her hair out of her face. "I'm sorry," he said. "I shouldn't have jumped all over you like that."
"You didn't. You were worried," Hailey waved it away. "Given my history, our team's history, I don't blame you for it. It's a part of the man you are, the cop you are. And I'm kinda in love with that guy."
Jay looked up at her and beamed. Hailey had gotten a lot more comfortable and free with the whole 'I love you' thing. But he wouldn't lie; he was surprised to hear it now. "Even though I'm a hypocrite?"
"Jay," Hailey raked her fingers through the fine hairs on his neck. "If you can go out there and find one person who has never said or done something hypocritical. Then I'll eat whatever gross mouldy old food we pull outta Adam's locker on the next cleanout day."
A slow grin spread across his face. "Yeah, you do that, and I'm not kissing you. Like ever again." He pressed a kiss to her forehead. "But I will hold your hair back when you puke up your stomach."
Hailey laughed and tucked her head into the crook of Jay's neck. They sat there in silence, just holding one another, Jay's fingers smoothing along Hailey's hip, while she fiddled with the collar of his jacket. "You feeling better?" she asked a couple of minutes later. "Your head spinning a little less?"
"Yeah," Jay nodded. "But, is this something we can keep talking about?"
"It is," Hailey nodded.
"Okay," he craned his neck to look at the clock on her stove. It was almost two in the morning. "Come on, let's get you back to bed."
"You still need the night?" she asked, not moving from her spot on his lap.
Jay shook his head. "The only way I'm leaving is if you tell me to get out."
"Well, that's not happening," Hailey groaned as she forced herself to stand. "That bed is way more comfortable with you in it."
Jay stood up and took off his jacket, dumping it onto the chair as Hailey started towards the bedroom. He came up behind her and scooped her up into his arms, carrying her the rest of the short distance. Jay dumped her, laughing, onto the mattress, and stripped out of his clothes as she got under the covers. He climbed in after her a minute later and tucked himself up against Hailey's back. She reached back and grabbed his hand, wrapping his arm around her as she settled deeper into the mattress. Jay dropped a kiss on her shoulder and listened as her breathing evened out as sleep pulled her back under its spell. Jay, however, stayed awake for a while longer, thinking. Things were just so different with Hailey, in a good way. In most of his past relationships, differences of opinions, even small ones, usually led to a massive blow out. They'd argue about it until they were out of breath until they agreed to just let it go. But really, it only festered until whatever it was they had disagreed about reared its head again and led to an even bigger fight which then led to a breakup. Honestly, that's what he'd been ready for when he came by that night, for him and Hailey to scream and shout at each other until she told him to get out, that she didn't want to see him anymore.
"Sleep Jay," Hailey's groggy voice cut through the air.
He chuckled gently and pressed a kiss to her neck this time, and settled against the pillows. He listened to Hailey's deep breaths until his eyelids started to grow heavier and heavier. Waffles, he decided as he lost his battle with sleep, when they woke up in the morning, he was going to make her waffles.