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Amy had been dating Jake for a week. She still couldn’t believe that she was dating Jake. Jake Peralta. Peralta, her goofy partner who ate fruit roll-ups for breakfast and had a mail tub. What was more surprising was how happy she was to be dating Jake.
She was really unnecessarily happy. She was constantly sporting a huge grin, and all of her thoughts revolved around what she and Jake had done the night before, or what they would be doing that day. He was a surprisingly good boyfriend, attentive, sweet, and my god was he a good kisser.
The only difficult part about dating Jake was that they were keeping their relationship a secret. It wasn’t that they were ashamed of their relationship; it was just that they weren’t ready for the peanut gallery to chime in just yet. They had, of course, filed the appropriate paperwork with the new captain, but since their new captain didn’t know their history, she was more than happy to keep their secret.
It was 10am and Amy was sitting at her desk working on paperwork for a case she just closed. She looks up quickly, and sees Jake beyond her computer. He is smiling at her with that smile he reserves for her alone. She immediately blushes and smiles back.
“What are you two weirdoes smiling about?” Rosa juts in, quickly removing Amy from her reverie.
“Uhhhh…” Jake begins. “We were just remembering that perp you brought in yesterday, Pat Magroin. Grade A perp name”.
“Yeah!” Amy pipes in a bit too enthusiastically, “so funny!” “Ok…” Rosa continues as she grows bored and turns back to her own paperwork. Jake and Amy exchange a quick “that was close” look before returning to their own work.
The next time they almost get caught is when they close a big case 3 days later. Amy was in the evidence lock-up putting away the evidence bags from the case when Jake came in with some paperwork. Being back where their relationship had begun gave Amy a rush she couldn’t deny. As much as she knew it was a bad idea, she pushed Jake up against the shelves and kissed him. After a moment of surprise, Jake kissed her back with vigor and soon they were full-on making out. They were so involved in their kiss that they didn’t hear the door open.
“What in the HELL is going on in here” Terry boomed as he caught them red handed (or red-lipped as it were… not the time for puns Amy!).
“I was just having trouble reaching a file” Amy tried to explain, her face as flushed as the red folder Jake was holding.
“Right, and I was just being my usual self and trying to keep her from getting it… obviously,” Jake interjected.
“Ok, sure,” Sarge said before swiftly leaving the room.
“Well that was close!” Jake said with a wide grin on his face.
“Yeah, new rule… no more touching at work,” Amy sighed.
“Nooooooooooo,” Jake started before Amy punched him in the arm to make him stop. That was too close. Amy wasn’t ready for the precinct to know yet.
When Jake and Amy had been dating for a month, Jake pulled her into evidence lock-up after lunch.
“So can we finally start telling people now?” Jake asked, a look of vulnerability Amy had only seen a handful of times before on his face.
“Don’t you think it’s too soon?” She wondered.
“No. I don’t. I really want everyone to know about us. I mean, I’m really happy and excited to be with you, so I sort of want everyone else to be happy and excited about it too. We’ve been together a month, that’s gotta mean something for our longevity, right?”
“I… I just… ugh. I don’t know. I do like being with you, please don’t think I don’t, but I’m just scared of what all those opinions will do to us, you know?”
“I really don’t Amy,” Jake sighed as he walked out of evidence lock-up and slammed the door behind him. Shit, Amy thought… Did I just mess this up?
Amy went back to her desk only to find that Jake wasn’t at his. Trying not to sound too panicked, Amy asked Rosa where he was. Rosa said he was out on a case with Boyle, so Amy took a deep breath and decided to calm down. It was fine. He was mad at her, but she would apologize and everything would go back to normal. When Amy’s shift ended, Jake still hadn’t returned, so she reluctantly gathered her belongings and started to head home, quickly sending Jake a text before she got on the subway.
Hey, hope the case is going well… meet at my place when you’re done? I’ll get Chinese :)
As she exited the subway, she checked her phone for a response… nothing. He’s probably just working and not checking his phone, she thought to herself, trying to dampen down the panic rising within her. At 10:30 that night, Amy still hadn’t heard back from Jake. She was about to get ready for bed when she heard her phone buzz. Walking over to it (or possibly full-out running) she picked it up and was excited to see a new message from Jake.
2 tired going home
Any other time, Amy would have been ok with this message. However, after their fight, she was starting to become concerned. Especially because Jake would always finish his texts with a smile or a sorry or at least a goodnight. Amy needed to make a big decision.
The next day, Amy came in, not surprised to find that Jake hadn’t arrived yet. When he finally arrived, he avoided eye contact, and Amy knew that she definitely had to go through with her plan. She waited for Jake to walk towards the evidence lock-up and followed him, not caring if the precinct full of detectives found it suspicious. As soon as she got into the room she pushed Jake up against the shelves and kissed him. He pulled back quickly and quietly said,“someone is definitely going to catch us”.
“I know,” Amy stated, “I want them to”.
She looked up into Jake’s eyes expectantly, knowing he would finally stop being upset with her, but instead his eyes were cold.
“But that’s not really what you want, Ames. You told me that yesterday. You aren’t ready for anyone to know about us. I thought that I was fine with sneaking around, but honestly, I’m not. I am so excited to be with you, but I don’t want to be with someone who isn’t excited to be with me…. So, maybe we should just stop this before anyone gets hurt.”
Amy’s stomach dropped. This wasn’t what she wanted.
“Jake! No, please, I am so excited to be with you. I was just nervous and being stupid and I was afraid of what people would think. I—“
“That’s the problem Amy. You care more about everyone out there. I could give a shit what they think. All I wanted was you, but you don’t feel the same way, which is fine. You said you didn’t want to date cops because it would get to complicated, and I should have listened. I’m sorry.”
And with that he walked out of the room. She wasn’t sure how long it took for her to take a breath. It felt as though her heart had stopped beating. The moment she was able to finally suck sharp air into her lungs, the floodgates opened and she slid down to the floor and bawled her eyes out. Jake was more important to her than even she had realized, and now she had ruined everything. What felt like hours (but was probably only a few minutes) later, she started to calm her breathing, but the tears kept falling when suddenly the door opened.
“Are you having some sort of nerd-con in here by yourself? You’ve been in here for forever--- oh!”
Gina started when she saw Amy on the floor. Great, Amy thought, Gina is exactly the last person I want to see right now. But instead of saying anything more, Gina sat down next to Amy and put an arm around her shoulders. Immediately Amy laid her head on Gina’s shoulder and began to sob again. They sat there until Amy was able to stop crying, and then Gina handed her a tube of concealer as she left the evidence lock-up.
Once Amy had cleaned her face and applied Gina’s concealer, she returned to the bullpen. Thankfully, Jake had gone back out with Boyle to finish their case, so Amy didn’t have to spend the rest of the day looking at him. Amy made it through the day, only needing to go cry in the bathroom once, and she was starting to pack up and go home when she heard a commotion coming from the captain’s office. Sarge and the captain entered the bull pen, and the new captain quickly stated, “there was an incident with Boyle and Peralta’s case, we need to go to St. Joseph’s Hospital and will report back as soon as we know more.”
“No!” Amy yelled. Recovering, she said, “Captain, Peralta is my partner. I need to be there!”
“Alright Detective Santiago, you may join if you feel it’s necessary,” the captain said with a knowing look.
“I do, sir.”
The entire ride to the hospital filled Amy with dread. She had messed up, and now she might never be able to tell Jake how much he meant to her. She tried her hardest not to cry, since she was with the captain and Terry, but stubborn tears continued to fall from the corners of her eyes with impressive speed.
“Santiago, I’m sure Peralta is fine. He’s been in difficult situations before, he even went undercover. You’ve never been this upset before,” Terry noted with concern in his eyes. Amy said nothing, just nodded her head and wiped her tears on her sleeve. As soon as they pulled up to the hospital, Amy ran in straight to the nurses’ station.
“Peralta! Detective Jake Peralta!”
“Ma’am, I’m not allowed to give out information to non-family members.”
“Fine, I’m his wife, just please tell me where he is!” Though the nurse looked skeptical, she looked at her computer and stated,
“There is no Peralta on my patient list ma’am.”
“What!? This makes no sense…” Amy started to spiral. She started darting her eyes around the Emergency Department, looking for anyone she recognized. Terry was behind her and grabbed her shoulders as she started to fall to the ground.
“Amy!” she heard a distant voice as she started to black out from panic and fear and whatever else she was feeling right now. She felt warm hands start to shake her and soon she was able to draw breath and open her eyes. In front of her, she saw Jake, looking extremely worried, his eyes wide and watery.
“Jake?” Amy whispered, worried that this was her mind playing tricks on her.
“Ames, are you alright? You fainted.” Jake stuttered out quickly. Amy went to stand and Terry and Jake helped her up as the nurse from the desk came around to check on her. Amy started repeating, “I’m fine, I’m fine” as a sort of mantra and tried to push everyone off of her.
“Jake, I thought you were hurt!” Amy said louder than she had planned.
“No, the perp and a civilian were hit, but both are stable and expected to make a full recovery. Nothing happened to me.” Jake said while keeping eye contact with Amy, willing her not to faint again.
“I want to be with you Jake!” Amy said forcefully. “I don’t care who knows, I just need to be with you. You mean more to me than you’ll ever know and I need you in my life. Please, please take me back.”
“Wait, when did you guys break up?” Terry asked plainly.
Both Amy and Jake whipped their heads to stare at Terry.
“Terry knew you two were dating…. Actually everyone knows.” Terry intoned.
“What?!” Jake declared. “How? We didn’t tell anyone.”
“Well, first of all, you are surrounded by trained detectives who notice behavioral changes. And secondly, I caught you making out in the evidence lock-up!”
Jake and Amy blushed, and Jake turned to her and declared,
“Amy. I want to be with you too. I’m sorry I got so weird about taking this public, but I just keep feeling like I don’t deserve you and the more you didn’t want to tell people, the more I was afraid you realized I didn’t deserve you either.”
Amy didn’t hesitate to think of a response; instead, she jumped into Jake’s arms and kissed him with more passion than she had ever kissed anyone.
“AWWWWWWWWWWWWWW” they heard as they broke apart, and found the source of the high-pitched squeal was Charles, who had reentered the ER after speaking with the other cops on the case.
“Yeah, buddy,” Jake cooed with a sly grin, “we are pretty damn cute”.