#once again. amy santiago jake peralta style | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

amydancepants-peralta · 3 years

Note

mr mendes just released a new song & i was wondering if you could write something inspired by the line: "i wonder what it's like to be loved by you" 😌✨

Ericaaa I loved this prompt! 💕 Of course I had to throw in some Pining because it’s so good ... hope you enjoy! (here it is on AO3)

to be loved by you

It’s a secret to absolutely no-one that Amy Santiago is the kind of woman that likes to excel in any skillset. Unapologetic in her badass-ery, she can (and has) chase a perp through the boroughs of Brooklyn in boots that have a higher heel than three of her male colleagues put together. Her finely tuned memory - the same one that has led Trivia Newton John to seven straight victories - helped solve a series of long-dead case files, and her problem solving skills are the reason that one of the city’s biggest kingpins is currently behind bars.

With this in mind, one could consider it safe to say that Amy regretting her natural ability to ace any situation would be up there with hell freezing over, or for a flock of pigs to soar across the sky.

But tonight, here in Shaw’s bar as she watches Jake have what seems to be a lovely date with Sophia; Amy just might be, if only maybe a little, slightly regretting her highly graded observation skills (yes, the same ones that pushed her into the highest percentile when graduating from the academy - which she very rarely brags about, and she really should - it was mentioned in the commissioners speech and everything).

To be fair, it wasn’t all bad. She could, for example; hear the jukebox in the corner, playing Come on Eileen for the fifth time in a row - unknowingly settling into a duet with squelching sneakers as a bunch of drunken frat guys danced, all of them too far gone to notice any repetition. Plus, she could pick up on the subtle click of the acrylic nails on the woman at a neighbouring table, listening to them tap against a series of her friends’ photographs, rotating between descriptions of priddy and gawgeous.

Mixed with the scent of spilled beer and day-old peanuts, it was exactly the combination that to others may appear seedy, but to Amy and the squad, just seemed … familiar. Shaw’s was their watering hole, the basement bar each could disappear into and drink to forget their days, and despite the five empty glasses on her table and the half-full one in her hand, Amy was finding it incredibly difficult to stop noticing just how sweet Jake was with his girlfriend.

Even more impossible was to stop imagining what it would be like if she were the one standing near the dart board, with Jake’s arm resting comfortably over her shoulders.

It had all started earlier today, when she had glanced over at her partner just in time to pick up on the tiny little smile that grew on his face when he noticed a text from Sophia.

(Okay, it’s possible that it had actually started back at The Maple Drip Inn, with that look he’d given her after maybe, yes, a little. It had definitely led to a series of Thoughts after Teddy’s departure, of which she’d only given herself just that night to think about.)

(Except ‘that night’ then turned into that week, and okay fine then it had turned into ‘just that month'; and now here she is, several weeks later; completely unable of getting Jake Peralta off of her mind, and it’s becoming very likely that this is more than just a little crush.)

It had been so endearing to see, that tiny glimpse of joy and enchantment as he’d read Sophia’s message - just fleeting enough for Amy to wonder if anybody had ever reacted to a message from her with such glee. (Teddy, she remembers, preferred not to text; and would instead express his affections by saving her the last bottle of his favourite pilsner, or brewing a new concoction ‘inspired by her’ … sweet, but somehow didn’t hold the same sentiment.)

So she’d kept her eyes glued to the computer screen in front of her as she listened to Jake pick up the phone and order a bunch of flowers to be delivered to Sophia’s office - using his debit card, and not a combination of the five questionably balanced credit cards under his name - which in itself is huge. Pretended not to notice the multiple kiss emojis in his reply, or the soft tune that he hummed for a few minutes after, focusing intensely on the case file in front of her as she described a recent interrogation in finite detail. Kept up the facade of all that stuff with us is in the past as he recounted a romantic weekend to their squad in the break room - laughing along in all the right places, doing her very best to keep the wistfulness out of her eyes.

And all the while, Amy’s mind had kept contemplating if she would ever get to know what it would be like to date someone like Jake: to have somebody who would take all the black and whites of her life and show her the beautiful greys in-between.

So when he’d shown up at Shaw’s this evening, with Sophia’s hand carefully wrapped around his own and a grin that announced his contentment to anyone who cared to look; Amy had felt her heart squeeze painfully in her chest. Her painted smile had just lasted until the couple retreated to the corner for a crazily competitive game of darts, and Amy had decided tonight would be a great opportunity to drown her sorrows in a few glasses of whiskey, doing her absolute best not to notice all the little things she will never have.

Like the way Jake would punctuate each congratulatory high five with a kiss, even when it meant that his girlfriend had beaten him at a game. The gentle way he steered them away from a rambunctious crowd, keeping an eye on the raised voices as his unaware girlfriend played her shot and came so close to hitting the bullseye. Or the way Sophia’s hand would rest on Jake’s chest as he held her in his arms (just the way that Amy wishes she could do), and the way she would laugh so happily as he commented on the drunk guys dancing near them.

It was all very simple, but undeniably sweet, and Amy doesn’t know how she ever doubted that Jake would be anything but.

“Your covert skills need work, Santiago.”

The chair beside Amy scrapes angrily against the worn floorboards and she turns, startled by the interruption, quietly praying that her face isn’t quite as red as it suddenly feels. Terry, far more interested in taking the last sip of his scotch than commenting on her appearance, settles in to his new location next to her, and his glass hits the soaking cardboard coaster with a slap.

“Wha-huh? Covert skills? You really must be drunk, Sarge. We’re not even on a stakeout right now. Unless you’re talking about us staking out the contents of that fridge behind the bar haha!”

(She’s rambling - she knows she’s rambling; but cannot stop the desperate need to pretend that she hadn’t just been completely busted for spending her entire evening staring at a life she may never know.)

“Ugh. Okay fine.” Her mouth stretches out into a cringe, eyes flickering to the colleagues Terry had just walked away from. “How noticeable are we talking here?”

“Noticeable enough that Charles has spent the last 40 minutes lamenting on ‘the beautiful tragedy of unrequited love’”. Dropping his air quotes, Terry rolls his eyes, one eyebrow lowering as he returns to his drink. “He lost me when he started quoting poetry. Terry loves Shakespeare, but he could do with a little less soliloquies - and a little more spirits - tonight.”

“Oh! You know what, there was just a Shakespeare play in Polonsky that starred - ” Terry overlaps her last words with his own heavy voice, and Amy’s stops in it’s tracks.

“Dianne Wiest. Terry knows. That was his segue, Amy.”

She nods, sensing the need to dig up. “Should have known. Charles loves his Wiest feasts.” Terry grunts his assent, pressing his lips together as he savours another verse-less sip, and Amy seizes the opportunity to cast another furtive glance at the happy couple.

“Seriously, though. Just because Peralta hasn’t noticed, doesn’t mean the rest of us haven’t.”

Amy brushes her hair to the side, swirling the liquid in her glass with her free hand. “Okay, so maybe I haven’t been very subtle tonight, or whatever.” Her gaze returns to Jake, drawn to him like a magnet, and her heart squeezes once more.

To his credit, Terry gives her a moment; waiting for a silence to settle over their table before leaning forward in his chair, ignoring the sticky residue of the tabletop as he rests his arms on either side of his glass.

“Out with it, Santiago.”

She shakes her head, swallowing hard to push down the burgeoning lump in her throat. “They look really happy together, don’t they? He looks … happy.”

Terry shrugs, glancing in the direction of Amy’s eye line. “Yeah, I guess so.”

“He does! All shiny and cheerful and just .. happy.”

“I don’t know. Terry remembers a time when you and Teddy looked just as content.” His look is pointed, and followed by the unsubtle raise of his eyebrows. Amy nods, draining the last of her drink. Somehow, she has a feeling that Sophia’s underwear isn’t lined with mesh like Teddy’s had been (and even if it was, it would be some kind of inexplicably sexy mesh, for sure).

“Sometimes things aren’t what they seem, sarge.”

“You know that works both ways, don’t you?”

Nodding again, Amy wipes her thumb along the smudged lipstick print on her glass, choosing to remain silent. Terry didn’t get it - none of them got it, really. She’d had her chance, the very first time the words romantic styles were uttered, and she’d let it slip away. And now, she has to live with the consequences.

Clearing his throat, Terry continues. “I mean … she is a defence attorney, you know.”

“But see, even that isn’t something that I can fault. Not fairly, anyway.” Clocking the look of disbelief on Terry’s face, Amy shrugs defensively, waving her hand vaguely in Sophia’s direction. “I know we all like to joke and call them evil, but really … all they’re doing is making us prove that our findings are beyond reasonable doubt. If anything, it’s people like her that push us to do better - to work harder to make sure that we’re definitely charging the right person. And as annoying as that can be, it’s definitely not a reason to hate her.”

“Kinda sounds like you do, though.”

She shakes her head, feeling the sense of defeat sink into her bones. “I really don’t. She’s incredibly smart, and funny and beautiful … she honestly looks like she should be in a commercial for shampoo or something. She’s perfect for Jake, and I’m just …”

“You’re just … ?”

Shrugging, Amy slots her thumbnail into the edge of the coaster underneath her glass. It, like her heart, had seen better days, and it was time for her to cut her losses. “I’m just … going home.”

“What? No. Stay! Our squad kicked butt this week, Amy. We all deserve a drink.”

Painting another smile onto her face (she really is getting good at them), Amy pushes her seat away from the table, allowing herself one more glimpse at Jake’s smile before shaking her head at Terry. “Sorry sarge, I just can’t seem to celebrate tonight.”

Heading towards the exit without a second thought, Amy doesn’t see Jake pull away from Sophia, taking a half step in the direction of the door as he watches her leave. She doesn’t notice him pull out his phone, start to type a message before hesitating, pocketing it without hitting send. The night moves on as Amy walks away, and the streets are deafeningly silent as soon as the bar door closes behind her.

The sky seems to feel just as morose as Amy this evening, tiny droplets dropping onto her grey work blazer as she waits for a cab; too lost in her thoughts to take in the frivolity of a parting crowd. As the rain increases and the splotches on her blazer turn into tiny Rorschach Tests she decides to give herself one more night - one last night of wishing for things that will never be.

In the backseat on her ride home Amy twists her hands together, linking her fingers and imagining not for the first time that one hand was Jake’s (she would imagine similar .. later). She thinks of what it could be like to have his warm presence near hers .. to have his hand resting on her leg, not out of possession but just to be near. Watching him get out of the car first, only to turn and offer a helping hand for her exit, every time without fail.

She pictures what it would be like to feel the brick exterior of her apartment against her back as Jake presses his soft lips against hers, kissing the life out of her, making her see stars before pulling her into the apartment for so much more.

He wouldn’t always be the perfect partner - and lord knows, neither would she - but Amy knows that through it all he would remain her best friend, because even through all of this yo-yo pattern of denial and admittance, thats who Jake has been for her. After all these years, he’s become the only one she wants to talk to, at any given moment of the day, who knows her coffee order better than his own and remembers her Abuela’s birthday, even when she hasn’t mentioned it in weeks.

The scent of rain lingers in her apartment as Amy readies herself for bed, casting her pantsuit aside with drunken abandonment and giving her face a half-hearted wash before stumbling towards her bed. She closes her eyes, the thoughts of what could have been still so loud in her quiet apartment, hugging the pillow beside her tightly while her mind begins to wander.

As she finally drifts off to sleep that night, Amy tries not to remember the smile that Jake gave her as they danced so long ago at the community hall - that special kind of smile, that made her think that maybe it was solely for her - and tells herself once. and. for. all. that sometimes, life just doesn’t work out the way you’d hope.

* *

It’s a rush of cool air that alerts Amy to a brand new morning, the drop in temperature squashed as quickly as it arrives by the wrapping of a warm arm around her middle. She smiles into the pillow as it completes its protective loop, letting her body get pulled closer to the human hot water bottle in the middle of her bed, and if there was a better way to wake up on a cold day, Amy is yet to see it.

She lets out a sigh of comfort as the bridge of a prominent nose digs into her shoulder blade, feeling the warmth of his breath through her old academy shirt, nestling closer until her legs are well and truly tangled amongst his. It’s late, later than she would normally allow herself to sleep, but the two of them were far too invested in basking in the afterglow of a rainy Saturday filled with sex and movies to consider leaving the bedroom anytime soon.

Jake’s voice is rough, the remnants of a deep sleep obvious in his throat. “Today’s Sunday, right?”

Amy nods, wriggling herself just free enough to turn within her boyfriend’s embrace. His hair is sticking out on all ends - unaided, she is certain, by her hands the night before - and she runs the tip of her thumb along his right cheekbone. Though his eyes are still closed, he leans into her touch, and she grins. “Definitely Sunday. A rainy Sunday, but part of the weekend all the same.”

He nods, the short and prickly fibres of his morning stubble scratching her palm. “Good. More time for time machine building.”

“… we’re building a time machine?”

“Yeah, one that lets us skip past all the boring work stuff, and leaves us with all the time in the world for more of this. Kinda like that movie Click, but a lot less ‘trying to change the past’ stuff, and a lot more sex.”

She chuckles, and his left foot rubs along the side of her calf under the blanket. “You’re crazy, Peralta.” (Although, she will admit - the ‘a lot more sex’ part did sound kinda great.)

His eyelids flutter open, gaze growing soft as a smile stretches across his face. “You’re beautiful, Santiago.”

Amy feels her cheeks begin to heat up, resisting the urge to cool herself down by tucking her hair away, completely unable to move as long as Jake continues to look at her like that. There’s a pimple growing underneath the surface of her chin that is going to rival Mount Vesuvius, and her morning breath could probably wilt the flower pots living happily on her kitchen’s windowsill. But here, in bed with her boyfriend of almost two years, she feels more beautiful than all of her best days put together.

“I don’t think I’ve told you this today, but I love you, Jake.”

Leaning forwards, Jake’s soft lips press against Amy’s, and he winks as he pulls away. “I mean, we’ve both been awake for a sum total of three minutes, so yeah, you’re pretty late with the love you’s today, babe.”

Her free hand flies out from under the cover, delivering an indignant smack to Jake’s chest, and he grabs it back before she can pull away, linking their fingers together and pressing a kiss to her knuckles. “I love you too, Ames. Even if you don’t want to build a time machine with me, I still love you.”

She laughs - a giggle that starts in her belly and bursts through her lungs, something that she’s been doing a lot more of these days - and pulls Jake in for a longer kiss, morning breath be damned.

One day, in eight or so years time, they’ll have a son - a miniature version of Jake that, much like his father, runs to the beat of his own drum; and answers to the name Mac. Amy will fall pregnant again, and when they explain to their son that he’s going to be a big brother, his response is so perfectly him that it makes Amy’s eyes tear up with laughter.

For they are, by Mac’s decree, now officially a Ninja Turtle family. He is Raphael (or ‘Rafel’), Jake Michelangelo due to his love of nunchaku, and Amy nabs Leonardo purely out of homage to one of her favourite artists. The mini-Peralta still growing in her womb is, by default, Donatello (or Donatella, depending), and even though there was a time when Amy truly felt like she could never be this lucky, she will love their little family with all of her heart.

But for now, she has Jake; and together they have warm bedsheets and no plans for a future that isn’t together - no matter what obstacles may be thrown their way.

And Amy realises, as Jake begins to trace a series of kisses along her side of her neck; truly, being loved by him is better than she could have ever imagined.

#it's all about the yearning #pining!Amy #fic prompts #has the ninja turtle family thing been done? I can't remember #b99 fanfic #peraltiago fanfiction #b99fic

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letsperaltiago · 4 years

Text

one single thread of gold tied me to you

From the very first time Jake mentions her name, Karen sees a thread of gold tying him to Amy. In other words: a series of small moments in which Jake is talking to Karen about Amy.

Jake talking to Karen about Amy throughout their relationship

Read here or on AO3

The new girl

“Anything exciting happening at work?”

“Nah,” Jake halts, pausing to think between bites of the dinner Karen has prepared for the two of them. Because he’s the only child (and the fact that he’s a huge momma’s boy) he tries to stop by Karen’s once a week. Either for a quick chat and a coffee or longer. If the latter includes dinner, which it often does, then it’s always a huge plus. Tonight’s visit is one of the longer ones, much needed, and of course dinner is a must.

“Or,” he takes back his prior dismissal. “Like, this new girl joined the squad last week, so that’s… exciting, I guess?”

Karen’s head perks up letting her son know that she’s indeed listening.

“Well that’s always a good thing. What’s her name?”

By then Jake is already busy chewing on another bite of her mom’s baked potatoes - a personal favorite of his. Then again any food his mom makes is his favorite.

“Amy Santiago. She seems cool enough, I guess. Then again she just arrived so I guess I’ll have to see.”

Although the world, more specifically Jake, isn’t aware of it yet, the spinning of his and Amy’s golden thread commences its journey here. Karen smiles to herself as this, she realises, is the perfect opportunity for her to pick a bit on her son who’s never shy of teasing her. Lovingly, of course.

“Maybe she’s cool enough to date?”

The statement immediately interrupts his before eager chewing, a press on his entire body’s pause button, and earns Karen a deadpan expression as answer to her so-called proposition.

“Mom, please.”

There’s small smile on his face as he knows his mom is out to pester him. “Charles already went all Cupid on us when she arrived, so the last thing she needs is me hitting on her. Plus,” he’s back to being chewing on a mix of potatoes and meat, “I don’t even know her.”

“Well that’s just a matter of time, honey.”

Having nothing else to add he figures a shrug must be answer enough.

“Anyways,” he looks back up from his plate to his mother. “How’s Carla?”

Rivalling close friends

For her son’s birthday Karen has invited the squad over to her place for a celebratory dinner. At this point, since they’re good at dropping by if they’re ever in her neighbourhood or nearby for work, she’s familiar with most of the people Jake spends 95% of his time with - this with an exception of Amy and Holt.

They’re setting the table while Jake gives her one last quick rundown of the 99th precinct’s squad, so Karen is sure of who the different people are.

“… And Amy, besides Holt, is the last one to have joined the squad. She’s that super neat, kinda annoying one, I’ve told you about. You know, the one who tells me that I can’t eat in her car, and constantly corrects my grammar.”

“I thought you liked her?” He can’t see tell, since he’s busy setting the table, but Karen frowns finding it unlikely that her son suddenly has something against a colleague he most of the time spoke so highly of.

“I do, mom and that’s what’s so annoying. She’s the worst and best of all worlds...” He pauses in the middle of putting down a plate giving himself some time to turn over his thoughts. “… I mean, she probably is my best friend at this point, besides Charles, yanno? But please don’t tell him I said that. His little heart can’t take it.”

“Because of jealousy or because he’s dying to see you and Amy together?”

“Both,” Jake chuckles shaking his head in disbelief of the fact that he puts up with this situation daily.

Karen knows Jake’s “brother from another mother”, how the little man had introduced himself the first time she met him, very well and can’t hold back a chuckle at the very vivid mental picture of a both jealous but also over the moon Charles.

“Your secret is safe with me.”

It brings an even wider smile to his face upon seeing his mother pretending to lock her lips and throw away an invisible key. Okay, maybe his mom is his best friend, but Amy and Charles are a close second.

Sadly Amy has fallen sick and never makes it to the birthday dinner, but upon arrival Rosa hands him a pretty gift bag with a tiny card and impeccable handwriting that says: Happy birthday, Pineapples ;) Inside the bag he finds the limited edition Die Hard 2: Die Harder-poster that had smashed his heart to pieces when someone had outbidded him for it on eBay. Little had he known it was Amy, sitting just a few feet away by her desk opposite of him, who’d outdone his bid with a sly smirk on her face. A smile which she could hide behind the big computer screen.

The smile on his face is impossible to hide and he immediately sends her a text:

‘ur gift made me die hard!!! guess ur not so bad after all ;) all kidding aside thank u so much and get well soon <3’

Later that night after everyone has left, he’s helping his mom cleaning the kitchen. Suddenly she hands over a homemade doggy bag with leftovers from the dinner.

“Don’t you think sweet, sick Amy deserves this after the gift she gave you?”

Her smirk doesn’t go unnoticed.

Jake of course agrees and later, on his way home, he drops it off at Amy’s place. It being late and not wanting to wake her up, he leaves it on her doorstep and sends her a text for her to see whenever she wakes up:

‘the bag on ur doorstep is not a bomb but a care package from mother peralta. hope ur feeling better but if u dont can i have your desk at work?’

A few days later Karen texts him a picture of a beautiful thank you card with the infamous, neatly Santiago style-written message thanking her for the thoughtful gesture. Jake smiles to himself and replies with a simple: ‘shes a good 1’

Unconsciously developing feelings

He never explicitly tells her. Still, Karen has her suspicions and they only grow every time her son mentions Amy’s name. Sooner rather than later it becomes very clear to her: her son would go to great lengths for his partner - even though he isn’t ready to acknowledge it yet.

“Mom, there’s no way I’m losing my car to her. I’m gonna take her on a date and she’s going to hate it and i’m going to love it- I mean… love her misery,” he corrects himself.

Karen is leaning against the doorframe to his still unaltered childhood bedroom, where Jake is currently rummaging through boxes containing a mix of childhood memories, dust and worthless nick-nack.

“You don’t happen to still have those old pictures of me and Jenny Gildenhorn, do you? I want to find an exact replica of Jenny’s hideous blue dress to torture Amy with.”

Knowing of Jake’s repressed, yet to be realised feelings, because a mother does know best, Karen rolls her eyes. He doesn’t notice. Probably because he has his head buried under his bed looking for more boxes and childhood treasures. Telling him to look for acknowledgement of his feelings for Amy while he’s down there is almost too tempting, but Karen manages to bite her lip. Hopefully he’ll see it himself one day… Or just keep talking the way he already does about her, even when complaining; it’s always with some kind of admiration. Karen sees the little twinkles in his eyes whenever the raven haired detective is brought up in a conversation.

To Amy’s sheer luck, Karen of course has loads of childhood pictures stored in a box in the garage and she gets to sit by knowingly as Jake searches multiple internet websites for the most horrible, blue, 80s dress possible. “Oh, mom… She’s going to hate this so much. Amazing.”

She doesn’t say anything but smiles knowingly as her son sits on her couch, laptop in his lap, a boyish smile telling her that he is up to no good as he plans the (best) worst date for his “just a good friend”.

Pining

Everything seems harder at the moment. At least harder than what he’d like, Jake thinks to himself as he lies in bed, feeling tipsy from the few beers he had a Shaw’s. He knows he should just sleep but for some reason he can’t. Instead he tortures himself by staring at the ceiling which is definitely spinning - just a tiny bit though, he tries to convince himself.

He’s just come back from being undercover, and although it was kind of fun and definitely exciting in more ways than one, deep down inside he can’t deny that a tiny part of him had hoped Amy by now would give them a chance. It’s not that he’d expected her to break up with Teddy for him - it was her life to control after all. Not his. Although there was no shame in dreaming; dreaming that she’d welcome him back to the 9-9 with a slow motion run and kiss that would blow them both away, telling him that Teddy and his pilsners were out of the picture and that they belonged together; all this time they’d been destined to belong to no one else but each other.

Alas this wasn’t the case and he returned from the mafia to a:

“I’m still with Teddy.”

The short sentence plays over and over in his head like a broken record he can’t turn off. The worst soundtrack of his life - without a doubt. Suddenly his phones rings, interrupting his spiralling thoughts.

“Hi, Mom,” he mumbles not hiding the fact that he’s exhausted, physically as well as mentally, and tipsy.

“Hi, honey. How did your first day back go?”

“It was... fine. Good to see everyone.”

Good to see Amy, Karen thinks before she does a double take when she picks up on her son’s voice clearly representing a moody side of him she, or anyone, rarely gets to see.

“Are you alright?”

“Yeah, it’s nothing, It’s-” he starts out not wanting to get into it, because feelings are messy and he always ends up being the hurt one anyways… But on the other hand, he thinks, his mom will figure out either way - if she hasn’t already. Perhaps his lack of soberness also takes part in his sudden honesty.

“Amy,” he sighs.

“Is everything all right with her?”

“Yeah, she’s fine. I just-” he pauses. “She’s with this guy and-”

“You wish she wasn’t?” Karen beats him to it and finishes the sentence for him.

“Yeah or- I don’t know. I want her to be happy but...” he sounds utterly defeated to a point that hints at teary, she can tell even though she can’t see him. In that moment Karen wants nothing more than hug her little boy. “I really like her, mom.”

His voice never breaks entirely but it’s a fine line he’s walking throughout the entire conversation. Everything pours out of him; he’s a book of sentimental secrets opening up about his Achilles’ heel for the first time and all his mother can do is listen as he describes his favorite parts of Amy (which is pretty much everything): everything from the way her dark ponytail swings back and forth with purpose when she walks to a crime scene to how, when they’re out drinking with the squad, she always get him a beer whenever she gets up to get herself one.

It’s almost as if the spinning of the golden thread, still unknown to the world, between him and Amy is slowly choking him.

“I want her to be happy, mom… I just-” he almost dozes off before finishing the sentence but fights through it and it’s all at once incredibly endearing and heartbreaking to Karen who’s still listening from her end of the line.

“... I just wish she would be happy with me instead.”

New couple

It’s truly unbelievable. Jake can’t believe he’s about call his mom to tell her: tell her that he’s with Amy now.

It’s been a month now; a month of him being with Amy and being so very happy he still can’t believe he’s been spending all this time not feeling like this. However, not wanting to rush things or put any pressure on either of them, simply enjoying being together, no one else but the squad knows about them.

Them. Him and Amy. A thing.

Just thinking about him and Amy that way, it almost makes him dizzy of pure disbelief. There had been so much buildup, such a long history of back and forth, bad timing, but all that aside now here they were. Amy Santiago was his girlfriend. Maybe that is the thought that causes his heart to take on a way too quick beating pattern and the hand holding his phone to become clammy. Now is the time though and he doesn’t hesitate to hit his mom’s contact. It rings. Jake can clearly hear his heart thump loudly against his ribcage. Should he be this nervous?

One time.

Two times.

Thre-

“Hi, honey,” his mom’s warm chipper voice interrupts the monotone ringing instantly making his lips spread into a small smile and heart take a break from the irrational thumping.

“Hey, mom,” he starts pacing around his apartment in attempt of diverting all the energy and emotions rushing through him, unconsciously bringing him everywhere from his bed to his kitchen.

“So it’s actually been a little while now… And I haven’t said anything since I didn’t want to rush anything but,” he cuts the sentence in two with a deep breath. “So, like… Amy and I are dating... together... her and I,” he starts rambling and wow he really should’ve written this down first. Karen doesn’t let it go on for too long though too excited to not say anything.

“Honey, I’m so so happy for you two! And it was about time that you finally told me!”

Jake’s pacing stops on the spot.

“What do you mean “finally”?”

“Oh, Jake... Sometimes I think you forget that mothers know everything. Plus you’re not very good at hiding… bruises,” she clears her throat, emphasizing what she’s really saying while imagining her son blush on his end of the line. “Also you’ve been visiting less and less, which means someone else has to take up your time.Someone who is even cooler than your very own mom, someone who makes you this gitty and nervous to talk about… It had to be her you were calling about.”

The smile in her voice is clear as day, but Jake is still baffled trying to come up with an explanation or the very least a decent answer. There is none, he quickly abandons the plan and instead lets out a happy huff.

“She’s really cool, mom. So cool. The last month has been like… the best. I don’t know how else to describe it. She’s the best.”

Compared to the defeated and heartbroken man she spoke to all those months ago, after his return from being undercover, this is a whole new version of her son that she’s longed to see. Karen can’t physically see him but can still clearly tell he’s flipped the page and is taking on a better chapter of his life.

Early relationship

It’s another night at his mom’s. Although the motivation behind the visit is a tiny bit different than usual this time. Sure, they’re gonna talk and have a nice dinner prepared by Karen as per usual, although tonight the mother has to nurse a whiny Jake who’s missing his dear but very out of town for the week-girlfriend. And the experience feels… mixed.

“Dinner is ready!”

No response.

She looks up from where she’s just carefully put down a sizzling pan to see her son back against the one arm of her armchair with his legs svung over the other. Physically he might be close but mentally he’s so far away, clearly more focused on whatever is going on on his phone’s screen.

“Jake,” she tries again but rather than giving his mother a reply Jake start typing as if nothing or noone was within miles of him. Karen can’t help but feel like she’s raising a teenager all over again, a teenager with the attention span of a goldfish, although this time her son is actually in his late 30s, lives by himself and has a girlfriend. So little yet so much has changed about him.

“Jacob,” she tries with her more more stern voice. She knows what he’s doing, texting Amy, and even though it’s cute he needs to snap out of it. At least for long enough to eat. He finally reacts and looks in her direction. Realization hits him which immediately prompts him to push himself out of the seat.

“If you stop eating you won’t even be alive to see her when she comes back.”

He deserves to be teased, he figures.

“I’m sorry. It was a text from Amy and I just wanted to reply right away. I just really miss her, I guess... and this is the closest we’ll get to talking today since she’s busy with her family, so...”

He leaves his phone behind on the coffee table, implicitly letting his mother know she’s got his (somewhat) full attention from now on.

“It’s so weird. We’ve only been together for like...” he counts in his head. “... 5 months now, but I already can’t stand being away from her for too long. Am I insane?” he drops down into his usual seat by the dinner table, almost in defeat but Karen is quick to rescue him in his moment of overdramatic despair.

“No you’re not, I assure you.”

Karen grabs his hand to stroke it comfortingly. She knows her son didn’t mean to be rude, didn’t mean to ignore her and she loves how much he’s opened up about his emotions since getting together with Amy.

“It’s a good sign that you care so much, but just remember that distance makes the heart grow fonder and it’ll feel even better when she comes back… and until then you can let your old mom entertain you.”

They share a chuckle because they both know what that means.

“Did you get ice cream?” he asks.

“Strawberry, chocolate chip and cookie dough… and to top it off: Die Hard is ready to play the second we’re done eating and doing the dishes.”

It’s a little tradition of theirs: their shared comfort snack plus movie-combo.

“You know me so well,” Jake smiles almost forgetting about missing Amy.

If not for the rest of the week then at least for a couple of hours.

Going steady

This week is a a lot different from the usual. While it’s not every single week they actually manage to see each other or even get the time to talk, Karen knows for sure that she won’t hear from her son for at least a couple of days. Jake is away on a cruise with Amy, and so besides the few pictures he’s texted her of them eating shrimp in bed (she wonders how he talked Amy into that) and a huge seagull stealing some of Amy’s fries, Karen doesn’t expect a whole lot of her son’s attention that week.

Which is why she is extremely surprised when her phone rings, her son’s picture and name displayed on her phone, in the middle of the night. Yes, the element of surprise is of course due to the fact that she knows he’s busy being away with Amy, but also much due the time at which he calls.

01:21

A mother’s undeniable fear and worry for her child never goes away, no matter how old said child is, and it now creeps in making her fear that the worst has happened. What could possibly lead him to call this late? She frantically grabs her phone from her night stand.

“Jake, it’s in the middle of the night. Is everything okay?” She doesn’t mean to come off as accusing but she’s definitely trying to get to the bottom of the mystery right away.

“I love her.”

It falls from his lips, very out of nowhere, and it’s hard to tell within what context it is to be interpreted. Interlacing with his voice is the sound of crashing waves and a strong breeze making Karen wonder where her son finds himself.

“Honey, what do you mean? Where are you?”

Maybe she should’ve understood right away, it was obvious, but not only was she sleeping just seconds ago but the background noise on his end of the line only makes the whole scene way more confusing than it already is.

He breathes, out of breath almost as if he’s been running. “I’m outside. On the deck. And I love her, mom.”

“The deck?”

“No,” he pauses catching his breath. “Amy. I told her… Or she told me first and then I told her back. Nothing has ever felt more right.”

That makes way more sense, Karen thinks although still quite unsure of exactly why he’s calling her. All that aside her heart is flooded with happiness, when she realises her son is not out of breath from running or crying, but rather all the emotions he must be feeling.

“Aw, Jake. I’m so happy for you. I know how much she means to you.”

“Is it that obvious?”

“Yeah… You’ve changed so much throughout your relationship with Amy and it’s only for the better. You were already wonderful, you’re my son after all, but she brings out so much more good in you. This was only a matter of time. I think you’ve loved her for longer than you think.”

Another silence allows the crashing waves and whistling night wind to make an appearance. Following words almost fall off his lips in a tremble but Karen can tell it’s because he’s moved and is trying to collect himself, his emotions and thoughts. This is a big step for him - she knows.

“I have. And I don’t think I wanna stop again.”

Their talk lasts a few more minutes; just long enough for Jake to explain that he couldn’t sleep, too excited about the fact that he loved Amy Santiago and, even better, she loved him! Instead of staying in bed, restless and thus risking waking up Amy, he’d carefully disentangled himself from his girlfriend’s grip and decided to go for a night stroll. Next thing he knew he was calling his mom’s number.

“I should probably go, mom. I don’t want Amy to wake up alone.”

They say their goodbyes and when Karen finally gets to meet his daughter-in-law a few weeks later, at Jake’s chaotic birthday dinner, she is even more sure: their golden thread is so very strong.

Moving in together

The first time Karen visits Jake and Amy’s apartment (the words still make his stomach twist and turn with excitement every time he says it or even thinks it), Amy is out getting groceries for the dinner they’ll all be preparing together.

Jake proudly gives his mom a full apartment tour explaining where he’s added his Peralta-touch to the household while still praising his girlfriend’s taste in interior design. She has to laugh at the huge Die Hard poster discreetly hung on the inside of their closet door. Framed pictures of the couple together hung and standing around the apartment only makes Karen’s heart melt even more.

“How are you guys liking living together so far?”

They’re in the kitchen, Jake is preparing them both a cup of coffee.

“I mean, we already took constant turns crashing at the other’s place so it doesn’t feel that brand new, but still…” he pauses to smile and pours his mother a hot cup of freshly brewed coffee before continuing. “This is so much better. We share a home now. She is officially my home now, yanno?”

“I’m proud of you, Jakey,” Karen playfully ruffles her son’s curly hair, something she rarely gets to do but still immensely enjoys every time. It reminds her of when he was still a little kid and hits her with just how far he’s become. She’s not just proud: she’s so proud.

“Plus, now I get to annoy her 24/7, which is great,” he laughs and Karen playfully pinches his ear.

“Be nice to her, Jacob,” she’s chuckling too.

“I am! Our relationship is practically built on a foundation of pestering and messing with each other. Trust me; she loves it.”

Prison

“Amy… I miss her so much.”

As if the fact that her son has been wrongly accused and is facing 15 years in prison isn’t agonizing enough, Karen also has to suffer the pain it causes her to hear her son cry out to her over the very rare phone calls they get these days.

“When I say I’m afraid of never getting out of here-” he heaves between fallen, sobbed words; sobbed words which Karen knows he tries to subdue in order to not show the other inmates weakness. But it’s hard; impossible. “It’s mostly because I’m afraid of not seeing her again. Every time she visits-,” a sniffle “I’m always afraid that it’s the last time I see her. And all I wanna do is kiss her and hold her, but i just- I can’t. I miss her so so much, mom.”

Karen’s heart breaks alongside her son’s, even hours and miles between them, tears rolling down her red cheeks. She knows she has to be strong for him, and that it’s harder for him than for herself. Denying the ache and fear in every cell of her body is impossible though… But she has to keep her head up for him.

“It’ll be okay, honey,” Karen forces herself to stop crying when she speaks and will instead let the tears fall freely whenever he can’t hear it. “The squad is doing everything they can to get you out.”

“I know... “ he takes a deep breath and Karen can tell he’s trying to collect himself for good this time. “H-how is she?”

For a split second Karen considers lying, not telling him that she’s spent multiple nights consoling a crying Amy and even sleeping over at their place when the young woman was too tired to take care of herself. She considers telling him she’s fine, but she knows it’s pointless: Jake and Amy are two open books who tell each other everything. Just like Amy knows Jake has never been more afraid and seeks hope in every second he gets to be with or even just talk to her, Jake knows Amy is struggling though she’s a trooper and tries to fight through it as seamlessly as possible.

“I visited her on Wednesday and…” Karen bites her lip but eventually a sigh escapes her. “You know how she feels... It’s hard for both of you. But she’s strong, honey and she manages. And on the days where she can’t, I’m there with her. I promise.”

Silence.

He’s holding back tears again.

“I love you both, mom. So so much. You two are what is going to get me through this.”

“I love you too, Jacob.”

Their golden thread might be strained, but now is time for it to show its strength.

Engaged

He can’t put it into words, at least not properly, because how does one describe how it feels to be the happiest man alive? How does one describe such a wide, complex, incredible range of emotions? It’s impossible.

Instead he settles for a text.

It’s truly comical but also very much them: a picture of Amy in the evidence locker, still partially crying although of course also smiling as she shows off the shiny ring on her finger. It’s followed by the message:

‘MOM, I’M MARRYING HER!!!’

Later that night, tipsy after celebrating at Shaw’s, Jake and Amy facetime Karen. It’s safe to say that she gets a good laugh at 3-drink Amy showing off her new, favorite bling while Jake is all over her, placing small kisses to various parts of her face.

“Okay, you two... I’m going to hang up before this goes beyond a PG-rating. Once again congratulations. I love you both and can’t wait to see you soon.”

Married

Bomb threats, ruined cakes and a lost veil are just a few of the things that go horribly wrong on Jake and Amy’s wedding day.

Now, a few weeks later, all these tiny disasters seem to be long forgotten, almost as if they’d never happened.

“... But in the end we’re married and that’s all that matters,” Jake finishes telling his mother the tale of their chaotic but incredibly beautiful and unique wedding which was followed by a PG-rated version of their trip to Mexico.

The three of them are taking up the space of Karen’s living room as they chat and drink their usual coffee. Jake’s arm is slung around his new wife’s shoulders, fingers interlaced with a happiness and peace that warms the mother’s heart. Compared to the anxiety and sadness they all experienced during Jake’s time in Florida and then later on in prison, this moment in time is a major contrast. It’s a moment which Karen at times had feared she’d never be able to witness ever again. Yet here they were, the three of them together in the same room and Jake looked happier than ever. He was married to the love of his life, showing off a warm glow that he could thank both happiness and the Mexican sun for.

“I’m so happy for you two. It was always meant to be this way.”

Karen beams just as much as the married couple, feeding off the pure bliss they display in each other’s company. Amy perks up at the comment growing curious.

“Always?” she questions with a smile.

“The second he told me that the new girl was “pretty cool”, I knew something was meant to happen.”

Jake feels blood rushing to his cheeks even though said new girl is now his wife.

“Aw, babe,” Amy turns to him flashing a teasing grin. Every opportunity to tease must be put to good use. “I can’t believe you’ve been into me for so long. How embarrassing for you.”

“Hey!” He whines and it’s clear to see that he’s trying to fight the blush and embarrassment alas it’s already way too late. ”Be nice to your husband, Mrs. Peralta.”

“Not my fault that you’re so into me, Mr. Peralta.”

There’s a short pause in the conversation where Jake realises there’s no way out unless he uses her own teasing ways against her.

“I’m a lucky man… I guess,” he counters playfully and it earns him a just as playful slap to the shoulder.

“You guess?”

Amy is quick to pull away although doesn’t allow their fingers to untangle while she sends him a mock-pout.

“Be nice, Jake.”

Karen loves her son but will also, at any given time, take Amy’s side before his. Jake came to learn this the second he introduced the two women and they started gossiping about him. He would care to mind if it wasn’t for the fact that there was nothing better than his two favorite women getting along so well.

“I’m joking, babe,” he loses no time and before Amy can add anything he’s pulled her back into the nook of his arm, adding a kiss the top of her head - just for good measure (and because he’s crazy about her). “I’m the luckiest man alive.”

Their golden thread has tied an everlasting knot.

Trying

Jake and Amy trying for a baby had been such a joyous announcement, and Karen will never forget the proud look on her son’s face the day he told her. Although tonight, said proud and happy expression is long gone, forgotten and dissolved by the many months of planning, trying and holding on to their hope.

Jake is once again, as so many times before, on his mother’s sand-colored couch with warm coffee in hand but this time with a look of despair painted across his pale face. While she’s been getting cookies in the kitchen he’s fallen into deep thought and doesn’t say anything for a while. Even after she comes back and sits down across from him. The silence might be needed, Karen thinks and, of course, respects it. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t shake her to the core when the next thing he says seems to question every ounce of happiness he’s ever lived.

“What if all along I’ve been the wrong choice? A bad choice.”

His eyes doesn’t budge from the same spot, an old coffee stain on the couch, he’s been staring emptily at for the past minutes. Even as he speaks.

“What if she was supposed to be with someone else. Someone who can give her the family she wants… the family she deserves.”

It doesn’t even sound like a question at this point but rather a horrible fact he states in a moment of frustration and agony, and it ignites a fury within the mother because she knows it’s his anxiety and fear of abandonment speaking. She knows that their love is way bigger than that.

Things are far from easy right now. On the other hand Karen hasn’t witnessed them fight and overcome every obstacle imaginable, everything from a stupid mattress to being sent away to both Florida and prison, only to come to this. This isn’t the tip of the thread. A golden thread isn’t spun without reason. It’s spun for the fated.

“Has Amy ever made a bad choice?” she asks.

For the first time in a long time Jake actually looks at his mom. He pauses but she knows he doesn’t have to think. Karen knows that in his eyes Amy can do no wrong.

“No… I just-”

“Okay, so do you honestly think that her wanting and fighting for a baby with you is a bad choice? Even if it doesn’t come easy.”

There’s another silence, longer this time, which hopefully means that something resonates inside his head even though Karen knows it’s a dark and confusing place right now.

“No, I guess…”

“No, don’t say “you guess”. You know, Jake Peralta. You love Amy and she loves you. I know it seems like life keeps on throwing you curveballs and I wish it wasn’t so, but trust me when I say that it’s not because it’s a wrong or bad choice. You being with Amy is the best, most right doing I’ve ever witnessed, and I’m so proud of it. Stop doubting yourself. Your love is too good for that. You’re too good for that, honey.”

Her voice had started out a bit rough, just to make sure to get her point across, but by her the last sentence it has grown soft like butter and Jake can’t help but fall into his mother’s arms. He knows she’s right and it’s in moments like these that, moments where he wants to give up, he’s glad to have her to fight off his demons.

“I just want to give her everything she deserves, mom,” he mumbles into her shoulder, still holding on for dear life; so closely that Karen swears she can feel his heart breaking against her chest. “And I know I’ve been hesitant about it in the past, but now I just-”

Karen feels him let go of her and straighten his back. His eyes are shiny and there’s so much hope but also hurt in them.

“... I really want to be a dad. I really do. And then I wanna do it right.”

Karen knows what he’s hinting at and the sentiment is so valid even though she’s back together with Roger and their father-son relationship has grown stronger.

“You will be, honey. One way or another,” she whispers and reaches out to stroke his cheek. “And you will be the best. I promise you.”

Pregnant

Mother knows best, Jake can’t help but think on the magical evening Amy tells him the best thing he’s ever heard: she’s pregnant. The world seems to flourish around him like never before.

Of course the first person he wants to tell is his mom, but him and Amy quickly agree on keeping the amazing news to themselves, or at least until their baby has hit the safety that the 12-week mark comes along with.

Until then Jake and Amy plan on how to break the news to Karen (and Roger, of course) and Jake almost can’t believe it when the day finally arrives. Their 12-week check was just yesterday, and to everyone’s relief and joy their baby is growing as they should and thriving in their mother’s womb. They both shed a tear and ask for an extra set of ultrasound pictures to give to the future grandparents - both on his and Amy’s side.

During dinner with Karen and Roger the following day, Jake is on the verge of bursting, yelling out the news the very second his parents arrive. Although a humbling squeeze of the hand from his wife keeps him in check until dessert. Here the hand squeeze feels different and Jake knows now is the time.

“By the way,” Jake gets up and heads to the kitchen to get another tub of ice cream. “We have a little extra surprise for dessert…”

Roger and Karen frown in unison as both of them are yet to finish what’s already in their respective bowls. Jake ignores it and comes back with a tub of…

“Lime ice cream?” Roger asks, clearly confused by the very specific flavour.

“I didn’t even know that was a thing,” Karen chuckles, always being the one to lighten the mood.

“Well,” Jake smiles with content as he sits back down. “I promise you: you don’t wanna skip this part. It’s the best.”

And so of course Karen is quickly hands on, pulls off the lid and is ready to dig in with her spoon but halts the second she gets to take a good look at the bucket’s content: a small piece of paper. Neither her or Roger understand a thing, and being too preoccupied by their confusion they fail to notice the wide grins on the other couple’s faces.

Karen takes the leap and digs out the picture quickly noticing something scribbled onto it with neat handwriting - Amy’s, of course.

Hi, grandma and grandpa. I’m now 12 weeks old and the size of a lime! I can’t wait to meet you <3

Karen feels her heart skip a bit, maybe even stop entirely for multiple seconds and looks to Jake and Amy for some kind of approval or… she’s not even sure of what. All she’s sure of is that she’s on the brim of exploding. Her son nods biting down on his bottom lip in excitement, and when she flips the piece of paper she’s met by the most wonderful picture she’s ever seen: their future grandchild, tiny as can be, in black and white, and completely perfect.

Karen tears her eyes away from her grandchild to look at her son to be met by his almost trembling voice and shiny eyes.

“Good thing my mom was right when she told me that I would be a dad some day.”

Jake’s eyes are so sincere with tears threatening to spill as he holds his mother’s gaze talking directly to her, and it’s safe to say there’s waterfall’s worth of happy tears that evening.

Welcoming mac

The day Mac is born Jake feels as if his heart is suddenly beating and living outside of his chest in the shape of his son. There’s so much love even before their son officially arrives, but nothing can possibly top the feeling of holding him in his arms feeling the infant’s hand wraps around Jake’s thumb. Love is shooting through the roof and up to the moon. Never before has Jake felt so much love for someone’s he’s just met before and it’s scary in the best way.

He’s sitting in an armchair by Amy’s hospital bed, his wife fast asleep after the most exhausting hours of her life, when the door to their room pops open. He doesn’t even bother looking up at first as he’s too busy gazing lovingly at the bundle of love in his arms.

“Oh my goodness.”

Jake head perks up immediately recognizing the sound of his mother’s voice. By now she’s closing the door behind her, quietly.

“Hi, mom. Come say hi.”

Karen can hear his smittenness in his voice and sits down on a smaller chair next to him to better see her brand new grandson. It’s immediately clear as day that the newest Peralta is the perfect mix of both parents. Chubby cheeks, dark hair, full lips and a nose she’s gonna want to kiss over and over again.

“Meet McClane. Mac for short,” Jake informs her stroking his son’s chubby cheek.

“It’s perfect,” Karen clucks and follows suit stroking Mac’s other cheek. “He’s beautiful, honey. You must be so proud. I know I am.”

For various obvious reasons Jake has always struggled with acknowledging pride - even when he’s clearly felt it, he’s found it difficult to say it out loud or fully believe it. Today is different though and he wants to scream it from the rooftops: he’s so freaking proud of his beautiful baby son and his incredible wife.

He smiles fondly as he nods in agreement.

“I really am, mom. Proud of myself but especially of Amy. I’ll explain it further later but I Amy went into labor at the precinct, I was out helping with the blackout and almost missed the birth. I just barely got there before Mac was born and Amy managed everything like a pro. I can’t believe I’ve made a human with her. She’s the best… I’m so lucky.”

Jake looks at Karen sensing that she’s going to speak.

“I can’t imagine any other person for you than her, and together you’ve formed a beautiful little family, honey. One to be very proud of, so don’t forget to give in to that feeling, okay?”

Karen hand travels from sleeping Mac’s cheek to her son’s curly hair, on a mission to stroke it like she always would when he was a child and it prompts Jake to lean his head onto her shoulder. From his new vantage point he looks back at Mac, then Amy.

They’re his whole world, his two ends meeting and Karen can only sit by to admire the scene before her. Never has Karen felt more sure of the fact that there was always one single thread of gold tying Jake to Amy.

(And Mac).

#peraltiago #baby peraltiago #mac #fanfic #fanfiction #perlatiago fanfic #oneshot #pining #fluff #angst #happy ending #jake and amy #peralta #santiago #brooklyn nine nine #b99 #brooklyn nine-nine #taylor swift #kinda hahha

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amyscascadingtabs · 4 years

Text

look at where we are, look at where we started

He’s seen Amy sleep before, but never quite this close. She’s never slept on him, and he wonders if they’ve ever been this physically near each other for longer than a few seconds at a time. Her head is a warm weight on his shoulder, heavy without being uncomfortable, and he could probably smell her hair if he just leaned down slightly and it didn’t feel like a creepy thing to do on purpose.

Five times Amy fell asleep on Jake, and one time someone else did.

a.k.a. happy (two days late) birthday @johnny-and-dora! 💛

read on ao3

2014, april.

“This stakeout is a bust,” Amy huffs, throwing her binoculars on the moss-green bedspread that covers the twin-size beds in the cheap motel room. Jake begs they won't actually have to sleep in them later. He tried one out for mattress trampoline and it was rock hard, no bounce at all. His knees are still hurting.

“At this point, I bet there isn't even a drug-smuggling ring and Terry sent us out here to mess with us.”

“Woah, woah. Did I just hear this correctly?” Jake grins, turning his armchair towards her. “Amy Santiago, complaining about an order from a superior? This I gotta get on tape.”

“There's a difference between complaining and disobeying,” she remarks. “Come on, you know you agree with me. Nothing's happening over there!”

“Maybe, but now I have the high ground.” Jake stretches out his legs, putting his feet on the wall below the window. One perk of a gross motel room; no one notices if you make it dirtier. “So I’m going to brag forever.”

“Ugh. I thought this stakeout would be better if you talked so I’d have something to listen to, but it's worse.”

“That's hurtful.”

“Shut up, Peralta.”

“Fine.”

She goes silent. Jake tries to focus on what’s happening through the window they’re watching, but as much as he hates to admit it, Amy’s right. The parking lot they're watching is dead as can be, not as much as a sight of any suspects. He and Amy have spent most of the last hour placing bets on which birds will fly first from the nearby dilapidated tree. Amy won. Jake accused her of cheating, to which she simply responded that there was no possible way she could have been in cahoots with the birds, as he had put it. Jake muttered that he didn't trust her. She rolled her eyes at him. She also gave him a smug smile which, for the record, did not give him butterflies at all. It must have been hunger.

Amy giggles at something on her phone, and the weird probably-hunger-feeling flutters again in his chest as he watches her type a reply. Someone - he guesses Teddy - is making her laugh, and Jake feels the sting of some other gross and ugly emotion next to the non-butterflies. He wishes he was the one making her laugh, but this shift is too boring and they're both too tired and the closest he's come today is the cute snort she did when he used his worst French accent to narrate the process of a pigeon strutting around on top of a car for several minutes. It's not enough. He thinks of digging out the peanuts from his stakeout bag and suggesting another nut-throwing competition like the one they had on that roof two months ago, but as gross as the motel room is, Amy's definitely going to ask him to clean up if he gets peanuts all over the carpet, and that's just not worth it.

“How long until the relief’s team here?” He asks her, trying to hold on to the thought of his bed with its good mattress lump and pillows that at least don't smell vaguely of mold.

“Two hours,” Amy groans. “Ugh. That's an eternity.”

“We could sleep for an hour each?” Jake shrugs. “Nothing's happening anyway, and if it does, we just wake each other up.”

“Only if I get the first hour.”

“But it was my idea!”

“I’ll do your paperwork if I get the first hour.”

“Then sold.”

Amy smirks, looking pleased with herself. Jake feels his cheeks heat. The room’s air-conditioning must be busted, he figures, and hurries to pick up the file with information about their suspects before she can see him blushing.

He keeps his focus on the window, on the view of the desolate parking lot, anywhere that’s not on Amy curling up in the armchair next to his. The streetlights have gone on, lighting up the concrete and old cars and allowing him to see clearly just how depressive a view it is. This stakeout truly couldn’t be over soon enough. Jake turns his head to comment on this to Amy, only to find she’s already asleep.

She has shrugged off her shoes and curled up in the chair, hugging her legs for warmth in a way that makes her look less like an adult and more like an overgrown child looking for safety. She’s resting her head on her own shoulder, her mouth slightly agape, and Jake is gripped by the sudden urge to take a picture of her. He has been running low on new photos to humiliate Amy Santiago with recently, and an embarrassing shot like that would make for excellent leverage at some point. He reaches for his messenger bag on the bed, grabbing his phone from the outer pocket, and is just about to open the camera when Amy leans slightly to the side in her sleep so that her head falls on Jake’s shoulder.

Jake freezes. The camera opens to selfie mode, and he sees his own face staring back at him, paralyzed with surprise. He puts his phone back in his pocket instead.

Amy hums in her sleep, a soft, content noise that shapes the corners of his mouth into a small smile. Part of Jake wants to record this, use it to tease her mercilessly for the rest of their days, but there’s another voice in his head that is quietly whispering about how pleasant it feels. Not just pleasant; it feels natural, somehow, like they’ve done this a hundred times before and have a million more to go. It’s an insane thought, yet it’s persistent.

He wonders if Amy does this with Teddy. Then he scratches the thought, because he’s not supposed to be jealous of Teddy. He’s not supposed to care, or even like Amy at all. Really, he’s furious with her for falling asleep like this, because she’s way too close and way too cute and it’s making the irrational hope in his chest bubble when it should be dormant. If he turned his head right now, he could reach to kiss her forehead. Jake wonders what would happen if he did. Maybe she’d never find out, and it could stay his own secret, but there’s also the overhanging risk that she’d wake up and ask him what the hell he thought he was doing. It’s too big of a risk, especially considering he’s not sure of the answer himself. He doesn’t know what he’s doing a lot of the time, and when it comes to Amy Santiago, he never seems to be able to figure it out.

It doesn’t matter, he reminds himself. Amy’s with Teddy. Jake’s alone. It’s not like he’s in love with her or anything, and he should just move so she’ll have to change her position and he can focus on something else than the way her breathing sounds and how her hair is tickling his neck. If something ever happened between them romantic-styles, this could be his ordinary life, but nothing’s happening and he can’t go around waiting for it to. He shouldn’t be thinking about it. He can’t be thinking about it.

Jake doesn’t know for how long they sit like that, him staring out the window like the firework display of the century was happening outside to keep from glancing back at his sleeping colleague every other second, but it’s both too long and not long enough before Amy yawns and leans to the other side. It’s too long, because he’s hyper-aware of every passing second, and it’s not long enough, because his shoulder feels cold the second her head leaves it.

“Did I miss something exciting?” She asks when the shrill alarm on her phone goes off, waking her from slumber. “Did anything happen?”

“Nope,” he says, keeping his eyes stuck to the still eventless parking lot to avoid meeting her gaze and trying his best to sound nonchalant. “Nothing at all.”

2015, august.

“So tonight’s a big night for you,” Jake states before tossing his girlfriend the plus-sized bag of sour cream and onion chips and the bag of sour candy he bought just for the occasion. “Tonight’s the night you lose your Die Hard-virginity.”

“Gross.”

“What? It’s true! After this, Amy Santiago, you will be a changed woman, never to see the world the same way again. Virginity’s a social construct, but Die Hard-virginities?” Jake waves his index finger at her. “Those are real. I can't believe you haven't seen it!”

“I already told you, I’ve seen parts of it on TV, and I’ve heard you describe the plot at least once a week for the last six years. Feels like that's virtually the same thing.” Amy opens the chips bag, stuffing two into her mouth. She's already changed into the optimal movie night-outfit - pajama pants, black hoodie, and an old NYPD shirt - and is looking unfairly attractive to him right now. Only Amy Santiago could make pajamas look sexy.

“Oh, Ames.” Jake shakes his head. “You're sweet, but sadly wrong. As excellent as my summaries of Die Hard are, you are soon to be made aware of just how much they pale in comparison to the real thing.”

She rolls her eyes, but there's a certain twinkle of excitement there. “Just play the movie, babe.”

The usage of the word babe, like most other parts of their relationship, is still brand new. They've been dating for three months now, which is as long as Jake was with Sophia before they broke up, and he finds himself comparing the two relationships in his head sometimes, terrified this one will suffer the same fate. He's more careful this time, more vigilant to not let an accidental I love you slip out in case Amy doesn't feel the same way, more hesitant to randomly invite himself over in fear of intruding on her privacy. Most of the time, he's letting Amy lead the way, enjoying the steady growth of their relationship one day at a time. Because it is growing; every day it feels safer, more natural, much like the word babe has gone from feeling like a daunting and heartfelt declaration of love to a casual pet name that makes him feel all warm inside when he hears it.

He presses play on the remote and slumps down on the couch next to his girlfriend, grabbing one of his blankets and draping it over both of them. He found out early on in their relationship that Amy refuses to watch TV without a blanket, partly because she gets cold and partly just out of habit, which he finds kind of charming. It's fun to get to learn all these little details about her - he thought he knew so much, but it turns out he’d barely scratched the surface - but it's just as fun to introduce her to his world when she's actually showing enthusiasm about it.

“I'm just watching this movie because you made me,” she mumbles as she moves closer to him under the blanket, throwing an arm around his neck. “And because I'm a great girlfriend.”

“Nah, you're excited,” he grins. “You can try to hide it, but I know the truth.”

“I mean, I am kind of curious to see what it is you've been obsessing over for the last thirty years.”

“Twenty-seven.”

“Whatever,” she sighs, but then she pecks his lips and Jake can't hide the blushing that creeps up his cheeks, distracting him from watching John McClane get off the plane and grab his luggage before going to meet Argyle.

Jake loves Die Hard. He’s loved it since the first time he saw it, at a way younger age than any child should probably have been allowed to, and he can - and often will - quote it by heart. He knows every scene, every line and next to every little mannerism displayed by one of the characters, and yet he’s equally transfixed by it every time. Die Hard, to Jake, is safety. When almost everything else managed to hurt him somehow - when Roger ditched their planned father-and-son days to go have sex with some new woman whose name Jake would never learn, when he and Gina fought over something trivial that would pass in a few days but hurt like a bitch until then, when his mom was forced to work overtime to keep them afloat and he had to make his own dinner for the third time that week - Die Hard never did. Die Hard was Jake’s safety blanket, his escape each time the real world disappointed him, and it remains effective to this day. It cheers him up on a bad day and makes the good ones better. Some would call it hyperfixation; Jake calls it instant life improvement.

It’s kind of like Amy, he supposes as she snuggles into his side, her thighs resting against his and her head leaning on his shoulder the way it always does when they’re watching a movie together. Amy’s an instant life improvement, making bad days easier and the good ones even better. Even Die Hard seems more awesome when he’s watching it with her, which he frankly didn't think was possible, and he turns his head to tell her so when he realizes she's fallen asleep.

At first, Jake’s offended. This was an important night, and he had been looking forward to it for the three days it’s been since she promised him it would happen. You can’t discover the magic of Die Hard if you’re asleep while watching it. Plus, if Amy doesn’t watch this movie, she still won’t be able to understand his dope references, and the confused looks she gives him when he tries one are getting seriously repetitive. He considers waking her up, but then she nuzzles her nose against his neck and lets out a little yawn, and nothing in the universe could make him want to bother her.

Carefully, just because he gets to do those kinds of things now, he turns his head so he can press a kiss to the top of hers. He runs his hand through her hair, silky and smooth against his skin, and smiles as Amy hums in her sleep when he begins to draw hearts with his fingers against her neck.

He almost loses track of the movie for a while. For once, it doesn't bother him, because Amy Santiago is sleeping on him like he's her own personal safe place and Jake doesn't ever want her to move.

He can't remember if Sophia ever fell asleep on him when they were watching a movie. If she did, he knows it didn't feel like this. This feeling is intimacy and honor, something tender and vulnerable that's new and familiar all at once, and he's still getting used to it but he already knows he never wants it to end.

Amy doesn't blink herself awake until the end of the movie. She keeps her eyes open for the last few scenes, watching John and Holly kiss as the limo drives away from a burning Nakatomi Plaza, and doesn’t acknowledge the fact that she’s been out cold for most of the last two hours. Jake decides to have fun with it.

“So what’d you think of the movie?” He asks as he keeps the credits running, knowing she’ll complain if he turns them off.

“Oh, it was great,” she says, a little too cheery. “Loved it! For sure!”

“Really? What was your favorite scene?”

“When John saves Holly from being shot by Hans Gruber,” she decides, not missing a beat. “I think. I mean, there are lots of great scenes.”

“Mm, right at the end. Classic. So what more scenes did you like?”

“The one where John McClane says Yippee Kiyay, Motherfuckers?”

“Also a classic. Any more scenes?”

“The helicopter explosion?”

“Oh yeah, that one’s dope. But what about the luggage area shoutout?”

“It was great,” Amy says quickly. “Super cool. I get why you love it so much.”

“And when Holly knocks out a reporter’s front teeth?”

“Mm, she’s a total badass.”

“And when it’s revealed that Hans Gruber’s real name is actually Craig?”

“Oh, yeah - no, wait, that doesn’t seem right.” Amy pulls away from him so she can stare him in the eyes. “Jake, are you trying to trick me?”

“Hah! I am trying to trick you! The luggage area shoutout and the front teeth are from Die Hard 2! The second movie! And get this - the Craig thing wasn’t even real!”

“I got that, thanks.” Amy groans. “Sorry for falling asleep. I didn’t mean to.”

“It’s okay. I mean, I’m a little offended you think I’m that boring company, but it’s okay.”

“I don’t think you’re boring company,” she tells him, placing a hand on his shoulder. “I promise. It’s just been a long week, and I was tired, but I didn’t want to cancel on you because I know how much you looked forward to this. It’s not Die Hard’s fault.”

“Ames, it’s okay.” Jake gives her a reassuring smile. “I promise. But you get what this means, right?”

“What does it mean?”

“It means we’re rewatching it again tomorrow. I’m not giving up until you’ve seen the entire movie without falling asleep, and that’s a Peralta guarantee. I’m not letting you remain a Die Hard-virgin.”

She throws a pillow in his face for that comment, but then she laughs, and it’s melodic and contagious and making him even more certain that dating Amy Santiago is the best thing in his life, even when she falls asleep during Die Hard.

2016, october.

Jake’s been on airplanes before, but he doubts he’s ever been this excited about it. Not even the dull pain in his leg that never quite leaves bothers him right now, nor the old lady in front of him talking way too loud about orchids. Even the fact that a kid has the seat behind him and is kicking him repeatedly in the back is okay this flight, because every single thing that could possibly annoy him pales in importance next to the beautiful woman in the seat next to him.

Jake is leaving Florida to go back to New York today, and Amy Santiago is right by his side. It's a wearier, maybe a little skinnier in a bad way, Amy than he's used to, one that's reading the flight security information with her stress-eyes while chewing nervously on her lip, but it's Amy. She insisted on staying by his side for every day he spent recovering at the hospital, sleeping on an uncomfortable foldout couch if not on the chair next to him, and he wonders quietly to himself when she last had a full night's sleep in a bed. The bags under her eyes and the built-up grease in her hair tells him she desperately needs it. He’s tried to tell her so - every night she stayed, he encouraged her to take in on a hotel to get some proper rest - but every night, she refused and said she wouldn't be able to sleep without him there anyway.

(“God, you're cheesy,” he’d told her once, but she had just shrugged.

“I shot you in the leg not even a week ago. Just let me have this.”)

His protests had been half-hearted anyway. Without her there, the pain was all he had to focus on, but as long as she made him company, nothing else mattered. They’d spent a week just talking, her telling him all about life at the precinct and cases she’d worked in the last six months while he tried to share the odd entertaining story from his Florida exile. When they got tired from talking, they snuggled in his hospital bed while trading soft kisses, and despite the pain from his bullet wound, the week had quickly soared to the top of the list of Jake's best weeks in the last six months.

He's had a good week alright, but now he's finally, finally going home with his girlfriend, and he's never been happier. The moment the airplane lifts, Jake's leaving Florida behind, and in just a few hours, he will be back to breathing regular, non-humid Brooklyn air again. He will be back to his tiny, worn-down but charming one-bedroom apartment, to dinners consisting of proper New York pizza instead of Florida’s crappy excuse for it, to real detective work, and, most importantly, to spending every free moment he has with Amy.

“I love you so much,” he whispers to her, tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear and watching her smile as she looks up from the safety instructions.

“I love you so much too. Are you sure your leg is okay?”

“It's fine, Ames.” He’s trying not to think about it. It's easy as long as she's there.

“It's just an hour until you can take more painkillers. Hang in there,” she says, gently patting his non-injured thigh as the aircraft starts moving. “You ready to say goodbye to Florida?”

“I was ready to say goodbye to Florida the second I landed,” Jake says, a little too loud. A blond, middle-aged woman on the aisle across from gives him an angry look. He ignores it.

“I'm ready, too.” Amy takes his hand. “Let's go home, babe.”

They hold hands as they lift, watching through the airplane window as the ground gets farther and farther away, Coral Palms shrinking to a tiny speck. Jake vows to never go back. Everything and everyone he needs is in New York, and he can’t wait to sit at his desk again or see his mom or have a bro’s night with Charles. He’s missed it all, even the overpriced coffee and the crowded subway trains, but he’s already starting to feel like himself again, because the thing he missed most is currently leaning her head on his shoulder as she watches them rise above the clouds.

He presses a kiss to her forehead. She smiles, reaching up to kiss his cheek, and then she closes her eyes as the plane keeps rising. It’s only a minute or two before Jake can hear her breathing slow, and not much longer before she’s fast asleep with her head on his shoulder.

She sleeps for the rest of their three-hour flight, snoozing even through the alarm about his painkillers and every pilot announcement. His shoulder goes numb after a while, and he wonders if she’ll have a crick in her neck tomorrow from the awkward angle, but it’s the most peaceful he’s seen her in days, so he lets her be. He’s missed her falling asleep on him, missed being able to breathe in the scent of her hair and hold her so close while she rests. He’s forever grateful to have gained it back.

Amy flinches awake when the plane hits the tarmac, and Jake thinks to himself that it doesn’t matter how excited he is to be back in New York. In truth, he’s already home. He’s been home since the moment he first laid eyes on her again and she accidentally punched him in the throat, and if he has anything to say about it, he plans on never leaving.

2017, october.

Jake hates the nightmares.

He hates how realistic they are, how even though he should recognize them by now, they make his blood freeze to ice and his heart pound each time they return. He hates how often they appear, that his record without them isn't more than three nights in a row since he came home, and that not even the sleeping medication prescribed to him by the psychiatrist he was forced to visit can seem to prevent them. He hates how vulnerable they make him feel, waking up in a cold sweat trying to catch his breath, feeling like he's having an asthma attack and a bad fever all at once.

He hates every single thing about them, but most of all, he hates how they always seem to wake Amy up.

He just can't seem to learn how to suffer through them silently, or maybe Amy spends the nights guarding him, because he swears she's there every time he wakes up from one. Every time, she's there to stroke his hair and whisper to him that it's all okay; that he's safe, he's home, and he's not going anywhere. He loves her for it, whispers it to her when he calms down enough to speak, but he's ridden with guilt. He can handle his own sleep being ruined - he lost that fight long ago - but he draws the line at Amy having to suffer for it.

This night is no different. The dream seems new at first, hurtling him into a green landscape where he's sitting on a bench waiting to meet up with Charles, but when Charles appears, Melanie Hawkins is with him. Jake tries to protest, tell Charles he dreamed of never seeing Hawkins’ face again and could he please make her leave, only to find Charles has turned into Romero and is angling a sharpened shiv at Jake's neck. He tries to take a step backward, hoping to run away, but he falls and lands on his back in the wet grass. Hawkins and Romero are leaning over him, Romero still holding the weapon. Jake feels Melanie’s hair tickle his cheek, flinching as she seems to hover uncomfortably close to him, and it's first when she speaks that he realizes it's not Melanie, it's Amy.

“Jake? Jake, are you okay?”

The wet grass isn't grass - it's his sheets, damp from sweat and tangled around him. Romero is nowhere to be seen, and the figure he thought was Hawkins is really his girlfriend, leaning over him and repeating his name in an attempt to make contact.

It takes more self-control than he knew he had in him, but he manages a nod.

“Another nightmare?” He manages another, reaching for her hand and squeezing it tight.

“It’s okay,” she whispers, pressing it back. “I’m here. You’re safe. Can you take deep breaths? In for four, out for four,” she coaches him, and he follows her instructions, breathing along with her as he’s pulled back to reality.

“It’s warm,” he mumbles when he thinks his voice won’t falter, but Amy shakes her head.

“I think that’s just the panic making you sweat, babe. I can get you a new shirt -”

“No, it’s… I think I’m going to take a shower,” he decides. He’s been taking a lot of nighttime showers lately, trying to wash away the fear and panic that seems to cling to his skin like a physical sensation after each nightmare. “You can go back to sleep, Ames.”

She nods, but he can see her turning on the nightlight as he leaves for the bathroom.

He stands in the shower for a while, letting the warm water run over him and counting the ways in his head that it’s different from prison. One, he doesn’t have to share this shower with a bunch of strangers staring at him. Two, the water pressure’s good and the temperature doesn’t randomly shift from icy to burning. Three, he’s free to steal Amy’s shower gel that smells like pink grapefruit and doesn’t contain as much as a trace of meth. Four, someone’s laid out a towel and a new t-shirt on the floor for him when he gets out. Five, Amy’s waiting for him in the next room. It’s the fifth point that makes him dry off quickly and throw on the shirt before returning to the bedroom.

He finds her sitting up against the headboard, a book open in her lap that she may or may not actually be reading, and the guilt washes over him another time as he notices her trying to stifle a yawn.

“I told you to go to sleep,” he says, and she gives him a half-hearted smile.

“I know.”

“You don’t have to guard me, Ames. It’s fine.”

She rolls her eyes. “I’m not guarding you. I’m being your partner and making sure you’re okay, and I’m doing it because I love you and I want to.”

“I love you, too.” He sits down on the bed, putting his part of the comforter over his legs and his pillow against the headboard. “And I’m okay. I might be awake for a while, but please, babe - you can go back to sleep.”

Amy watches him closely, giving him the worried look he’s become used to in the last few weeks, but then she nods.

“I’ll try.”

She turns off the nightlight, and Jake settles for playing a mindless game on his phone, letting the repetition of matching colorful figures distract him. Amy rests her head on his shoulder, and it’s almost reflexive when he turns on the yellow light-setting on his phone so it won’t disturb her. The weight of her head grows heavier, and two rounds of Candy Crush Saga later, he can tell she’s asleep.

He helps her lay down, adjusting the pillows so he knows she’ll be comfortable. Then he tries to sit up again, but she reaches out for him in her sleep and frowns, so he puts his phone away and lays down next to her, wrapping his arms around her and smiling as she squishes her nose in the crook of his neck.

They sleep like that for the rest of the night.

2020, april.

There's been a lot of changes in routine in the Santiago-Peralta home since they first found out they were having a baby. Some have been unintentional, such as Amy sleeping in every morning she can and napping at least once per day because pregnancy is exhausting. Some have been planned out in advance, like one night per week being designated to going through a topic from Amy's detailed list of things they need to discuss before they become parents - a list which ranges from nursery themes and sleep training to family holidays and babysitters. Some have been a mix of both, single events becoming patterns, like Jake rubbing the fancy stretchmark-preventing oil on Amy's stomach near every evening or them spending weeknights on the couch drinking tea and reading parenting books together. Their lives are transforming before their kid is even born, after-work drinks at Shaw’s switched for researching the best cribs and strollers online, and Jake is finding that it doesn’t upset him in the slightest. Rather, it’s exciting, and it feels right.

With Amy just having entered her thirteenth week of pregnancy, the arrival of their baby seems far away still, but it’s starting to feel all the more real. Last week’s framed sonogram now takes pride of place on the dresser in their bedroom, put there so they’ll have time to hide it in case Charles decides to stop by on one of his many unannounced visits, and each morning when Jake grabs a new t-shirt he stops and looks at the monochrome picture for a moment.

That’s their child right there, no more than a few centimeters long and only just having gotten all their important organs in place, but somehow already holding so much of his heart.

He’s still nervous about fatherhood. The list of things that could go wrong, unlucky mistakes and faulty decisions he could make, seems endless. He’s scared of not knowing what to do, scared his kid will hate him, and scared he won’t be able to protect them from everything he’s supposed to. He’s scared he won’t feel the instant and overwhelming love that everyone seems to speak of upon seeing their baby for the first time and he’s scared he’ll feel too much of it. The more real it becomes, the more terrifying it gets, and it’s only the excitement that’s stronger. For every tiny onesie he buys, every suggestion they add to the growing list of possible baby names, and every new weekly size comparison to a fruit or vegetable, Jake looks even more forward to meeting this child. He wants to see them, feel them, hold them, and learn everything there is to know about them. He knows they’re the size of a lime this week, that they’re healthy with a nice and strong heartbeat and that they’re wriggling around like crazy inside Amy even though she claims she can’t feel anything yet, but he wants to know more. The 194 days left until their due date seem like an eternity, and at the same time, it’s surreal to think he can count the days until they could be sitting on this couch with their baby.

Tonight, though, it’s still just the two of them. Amy’s parked herself in one corner of the couch and is reading a book on hypnobirthing, while Jake’s at the other end flipping through Bruce Willis’ book on parenthood. He’s not sure if all the advice in it is sound - or in some cases, fully legal - but he figures the more parenting books he reads, the better equipped he’ll be to figure out what’s sane and not. Jake trusts Bruce Willis with his life, but he does have some doubts about whether playing the Die Hard-soundtrack on maximum volume really is the best way to calm down a screaming baby.

He’s watching Amy over the edge of his book, making note of how she’s doing, if it looks like she needs anything. It doesn’t seem like she’s going to be sick, she’s not shivering nor sweating and her lip’s not trembling like it tends to do before she starts crying, but every now and then it seems like her eyes are falling and she has to shake her head to keep from nodding off. He decides to ask.

“Are you doing okay, Ames?”

“I don’t think I like being pregnant yet,” she huffs, closing the book and putting it on the coffee table with a thud. “I’m so tired, I can’t even read. What’s the point of anything if you can’t read, Jake?”

“Sounds rough,” he says, trying not to grin. He probably shouldn’t be making fun of her, but it’s such an Amy thing to be upset with, he can’t help it.

“It is! I’m trying to read up on breathing techniques so I can get this baby out eventually, and that’s what I get in return? It’s like this kid doesn’t want to be born,” she grumbles, touching the top of where her stomach has started to curve ever-so-slightly.

“I’m sure it’s not their fault, babe.”

“I know it’s not their fault, “ she replies, giving him an apologetic smile and a shrug. “It’s okay. I’m just tired of being exhausted, and feeling constantly motion-sick, and I miss being able to have more than one cup of coffee per day. All my clothes are becoming too tight, but I don’t really look pregnant yet, so it just looks like I gained a bit of weight.” She sighs. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be complaining about this.”

Jake frowns. “Why not?”

“Because we tried for so long! I spent ages thinking I’d give anything if we could just get pregnant, and now we are, and I’m whining like some ungrateful toddler who just got told they can’t have ice cream for dinner.” Amy goes silent for a moment, staring longingly at their freezer. “I shouldn’t have said that. Now I want ice cream.”

“Is that code for me to get you ice cream?”

“No. Maybe. Yes. Later. ”

“Just say the word.”

“Do you think I’m being ungrateful, Jake?” She bites her lip the way she does when she’s nervous, twisting her hands in her lap. “Because I feel like I am, and I hate it. I’m so happy about this baby, and I can’t wait to meet them. Pregnancy’s just way more annoying than I thought it’d be.”

“You’re not ungrateful,” he assures her, putting down his book before reaching for her hands and taking them in his. “I promise. I don’t know what it’s like to grow a human with my body, but if it’s as tiring as you describe it - I swear I don’t know how you do it. I’m pretty sure I’d be awful at it if I ever got to try.”

Amy giggles. “Yeah, you would.”

“Thanks for the confidence.”

“Anytime.”

“Point is, babe, you get to complain as much as you want. I know how much you’ll love this child, and that doesn’t disappear because you think pregnancy is hard some days. You’re still doing it. And,” he looks to where he can see her belly beginning to take a rounder shape, the corners of his mouth instinctively turning into a smile. “You look adorable. Full stop.”

She blushes. “I do?”

“You’re the cutest pregnant person I ever saw,” he promises, repeating the same thing he thinks every time he sees her.

“Even when I sweat through my clothes or puke my guts out because I found a new smell I couldn’t stand?”

“Even then.”

“Wow,” Amy laughs. “You really must love me.”

“I really, really do.”

She leans forward, cupping his face the way she likes to do when she kisses him, the way she’s done since the first time she pressed him up against a tree when they were undercover and the way he hopes she’ll do for many years to come. It’s soft without being lazy, firm without being demanding, and his heart flutters as he feels her smile against his lips.

“Do you want me to read aloud to you?” He asks when they separate, Amy leaning her head on his chest. She nods, and he picks up the book where she left it, continuing to read something about the power of wording that doesn’t fully make sense to him while Amy turns around so she’s laying in his arms.

Jake reads until he can hear her breathing slow and even out, telling him she’s fallen asleep. Once he’s certain it won’t wake her up, he lets her hand stray to her stomach, pulling up the tank top slightly and stroking gently over the tiny bump that’s started taking shape.

That’s their child in there, he reminds himself, marveling over the insanity of it all. He still has to pinch himself sometimes to remember that any of this is real, but whatever the future holds, he knows he can’t wait to experience it with them; Amy, and the lime-sized little bean growing inside of her.

2020, november.

Leonel Jacob Peralta isn’t anything like Jake thought he’d be.

He's bigger than he had guessed - Amy won the bet on who could be closest to guessing their son’s birth weight and height - but smaller than he pictured in his head, almost drowning in the newborn-size pajamas with a pattern of grey stars and striped hat. He looks less like the copy of Amy that he’d visualized, but he's not a copy of Jake either, despite Charles’ claims. He's calmer than they expected, having slept through most of his first day aside from the occasional feeding attempt and diaper change, but they know from the moment he took his first breath that he has a powerful voice.

Most strikingly, he is infinitely more perfect than Jake could have ever imagined.

After coming into the world with the sunrise, his son has had a long and eventful first day of life. He’s had visitors, Charles and Holt and Rosa being first in line to meet and hold and fawn over him. He even opened his eyes for a moment while Holt held him, causing Jake to tear up as he dutifully followed Amy’s orders to take a picture. He’s facetimed with his maternal grandparents and several of his uncles, gotten well-wishes on social media from just about every employee of the 99th precinct and has received more gifts than Jake supposes any newborn could really need. Looking at their list of visitors scheduled for tomorrow, he’s come to the conclusion that his and Amy’s son is already way more popular than either of them has ever been.

Leo’s parents have had a long day, too, and a long night before that, but somehow, Jake doesn’t feel tired. Amy’s finally sleeping in the hospital bed next to him, passed out on her side with her mouth open and a little bit of drool on her pillow. Her hair is a mess and her hospital gown has the two top buttons undone, and yet the first word that comes to mind when Jake looks at her is badass. Not a single day goes by that he’s not proud of his wife for everything she does, but after today, that level of pride has skyrocketed past the moon and sun and the entire milky way. His wife is a superhero and their son is magic, pure and undiluted magic that is resting in Jake’s arms.

If this had been an ordinary evening, he might have been focusing on the discomfort of the stiff armchair he’s sitting in, how the temperature of the room is slightly too warm or how he’s getting kind of hungry, but tonight, he’s barely registering anything else. His son is in his arms, opening and closing his fists with full concentration, and he’s watching him with the most focused gaze Jake’s ever seen in a baby. This kid is staring right into his soul like he’s trying to learn every detail and secret about him, and Jake would have been unnerved by it if it hadn’t felt so right.

Jake spent a long time wondering if he was the right person to have kids. He was so scared of being a bad parent, he didn’t dare to dream of what he could have if he were to be a good one. He’s still scared, has accepted he might always be, but he looks into his son’s eyes and knows deep in his bones that he’ll do everything to make sure this child grows up knowing exactly how beloved and important he is.

Jake doesn’t know what fathers and sons do, but he gets to find out, and finding it out with Leo is the only thing he’s ever wanted.

He still doesn’t know a lot about his son, but he’s trying to learn everything. He has his stats memorized, knows he’s six and a half pounds and nineteen inches of absolute perfection. His camera roll is already filled with close-up pictures of his round cheeks, button nose and thick, dark hair that curls a little near his neck. He knows he’s changed their lives forever, and that it’s guaranteed to be for the better.

Leo stretches his legs inside the blanket, trying to wave his arm, and Jake laughs.

“Too excited about the world to sleep, huh? I get you. Sometimes I feel the same way.” Leo gurgles, which Jake decides to interpret as an okay to keep talking.

“I love you so much,” he whispers to his son without breaking their eye contact. “So, so, much. It’s kind of insane. You were so longed for, and so wanted, and it’s crazy that you’re finally here. Especially considering you weren’t supposed to come out for another week,” he jokes, grinning. “I’m just kidding, that was totally expected. It’s your Santiago genes. It’s still crazy, though. I can’t believe you’re here with us.”

He leans down, kissing both of his son’s cheeks for the fiftieth-or-so time that day.

“It’s a scary world out there. I’m sorry about that. But it’s a little less scary when you’re surrounded by the people you love, and your mom and I will do our everything to keep you safe through the scary parts.” Leo yawns, sticking his little tongue out, and Jake can’t help but smile at the overwhelming cuteness.

“We love you. I love you. More than you understand. Honestly, I don’t think I understand it myself yet, but I don’t care. It’s all good, buddy,” he says, nudging Leo’s fist with his index finger until the newborn grips it. “It’s all good, because you’re here with me, and we’re going to be okay.” Leo lets out a tiny squeak. “Yeah, we are. I promise.”

Either Leo’s unconvinced, or something else is bothering him, because the squeaking noises continue. Gently, as if he was handling the finest of porcelain, Jake holds one hand under his son’s head and lifts him so that he’s upright against his chest instead. He’s not entirely sure what he’s doing, but he’s read that babies like to be close, and Leo does seem happier as his nose presses against his neck. Jake strokes the baby’s back through the blue-and-pink hospital blanket, humming the first Taylor Swift song he can think of - Shake it off, always right. It’s only a minute, maybe two, before the newborn stops fussing, and Jake realizes that his son has fallen asleep.

It’s late in the evening of the early November day Jake will forever have written down as their son’s birthday, and he’s sitting in an uncomfortable armchair in a hospital room in Brooklyn, the love of his life still passed out in bed next to him. Their son is sleeping with his head resting on Jake’s shoulder, like Amy has done so many times before, and he can’t remember ever feeling this peaceful in his life. Leonel is warm and soft and smells as if heaven had a scent, and Jake is so in love.

There had been a time, not too many years ago, where Jake had dreamt about dying a heroic death trying to save the city from evil or working himself to the bone trying to become the most successful cop in New York. Now, every single one of his dreams circle back to the same focal point - a boundless, incandescent hope that he gets to keep being a safe place and favorite sleeping spot for the two people who hold his entire heart.

#team leo but make it original!#brooklyn nine-nine #b99 fanfiction #peraltiago fanfiction #b99 #peraltiago #jake x amy fanfiction #my writing

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sambergscott · 4 years

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Lights Out

Summary: The elevator jolts and the lights flicker, before plunging them into total darkness. There's a Brooklyn-wide power outage, they're stuck in the precinct elevator and Amy is claustrophobic AF. Then her water breaks.

Based on this amazing (!!!) s7 finale theory by @luna-minerva. Thank you so much for letting me turn that into this. I really, really hope you love it.

She has a birth plan written out by her sixth month of pregnancy detailing her preferences for labor — dimmed lights, calming music, an epidural, Jake by her side at all times — laminated in the apartment, her go bag (already pre-packed in their family friendly sedan) and her everyday purse. She sent copies to her doctor, both their parents and Captain Holt, printed one for Jake to keep at work and saved a digital copy in the Notes app on both their phones. Just in case.

(“Single spaced, double sided: Santiago Style,” Jake grins when she hands over the final draft.

“Of course. It’s an important document about the most important moment of our lives. I want everything to go smoothly.”)

And for most of her pregnancy, it does. She sends him out for pierogis, potato pancakes and hot chocolate most nights, cries over every car commercial on TV and waddles around the apartment making sure everything is perfect for when the baby arrives. The doctor assures her that they’re both healthy, but she should take an early maternity leave, given the stresses of her job.

She survives for one day before she’s back at the precinct, prompting several raised eyebrows and whispers from around the bullpen. Ignoring all of them, she hitches her purse onto her shoulder, lifts her head, and marches determinately to her old desk.

“FOMOW?” Jake guesses with an amused smile.

“It’s not FOMOW,” she huffs in annoyance. “I just finished organising the nursery and since I was passing the precinct, I figured I’d come visit my husband, if that’s OK with you.”

“Hey, I’m not complaining,” he holds his hands up. “I’ve missed having a beautiful lady to look up at when my paperwork gets boring.” He wiggles his eyebrows playfully. “I suppose you’ll do.”

She rolls her eyes, sitting down and trying to make herself as comfortable as possible, a difficult task when you’re as big as a whale and your back has been aching all day.

“Peralta,” Holt’s new assistant barks as he leaves Holt’s office, “you missed some signatures on this report.” He drops it on top of all the other open case files, candy wrappers and clutter on Jake’s desk, a welcome change from the way Gina would turn their work into paper airplanes and fly them across the bullpen. As Jake starts scribbling his name, Holt’s assistant notices Amy. “Can I help you, ma’am?”

“Oh, I’m OK. I work here. Well, I used to work here. I’m on maternity leave.”

“Of course,” he nods, realisation spreading across his face. “You’re Sergeant Santiago. Captain Holt mentions you constantly.”

“He does?” She clutches her heart. “Jake, did you hear that? Holt mentions me.”

He mouths “dork” and she sticks her tongue out at him.

“So when’s the baby due? You look ready to pop any day now.”

“Two weeks,” Jake answers on her behalf, sensing danger. The ‘ready to pop’ comment has been driving her crazy for weeks. She is well aware of her size and does not need perfect strangers reminding her. She’s pregnant, not a contestant on America’s Next Top Model. She’s supposed to be big. He shoves the signed documents into Holt’s assistant’s hands and glances apprehensively back at his wife. “You OK?”

“Mm-hmm.” She plasters on a brave face. “Can’t believe I’m saying this but I actually miss Gina.”

Jake snorts and presses play on CCTV footage of a robbery.

She twists her engagement ring on her finger, braids the ends of her hair and straightens a pile of folders on the desk. She is something of a workaholic and not being able to do anything is torture. “Any cool cases you’re working on?” She asks Jake, because what else are husbands for if not living vicariously through their work while on maternity leave?

“Hipster coffee shop got broken into last night. The owner was devastated that she had to drink Starbucks this morning like the rest of us instead of her fancy $8 million gold infused coffee blend from Outer Mongolia.”

“At least she gets to drink coffee,” Amy responds snarkily.

“Worth it though,” he grins. “And I’ll be your personal in-home barista once this baby is out.”

“Thanks, babe. You’re the sweetest.” She rounds their desks to give him a chaste kiss (she may not be in work but they are still at work), when something catches her eye on the screen. She instructs him to rewind the video, pointing out that the intruder has the same bone structure and blonde hair as the owner behind the counter.

Jake gasps. “It was an inside job!”

A failing business tries to scam the insurance company; it’s a tale as old as time.

He grabs his phone, gun and jacket in a rush to arrest the owner before they skip town.

“Can I come with you?”

“What?”

“I want to come with you. I’m the one who solved the case.”

“You’re pregnant. You can’t.”

“I’ll walk ahead of you, pretend I’m just a normal customer,” she pleads. “You know I’m good at going undercover. Remember Dora?”

“Of course I remember Dora, Johnny loved Dora, but this is different. It’s too dangerous.”

“They own a hipster coffee shop, Jake,” she deadpans. “They’re not going to hurt a pregnant lady. I’m FOMOWing so bad, I just want to be there.”

“Ames-.”

“Please, Jake,” she kicks her persuasion tactics up a few notches, pulling out the doe eyes and pout that she knows he can’t resist.

“Fine,” he concedes before she starts crying and playing the “I’m having your baby” card. “You can come. But if anything dangerous goes down, you have to get out of there straight away. You can’t get involved.”

“Deal.” She shakes his hand firmly (she took a refresher seminar a few months ago) and retrieves her purse from her old desk, following him to the elevator like old times. Peralta and Santiago off to take down bad guys (and look good doin’ it). Of course, there will be no actual taking down of bad guys nine months pregnant, although she could do it if she wanted to, she’s definitely felt the urge to kick Charles in the shin whenever he brings them disgusting foods or tries to kiss her belly.

Just being there is enough for now.

She speeds up, reaching the elevator before him and pressing the down button first. She smirks at him over her shoulder and steps inside when the doors open. Despite being married and expecting a kid together, their competitive edge has never wavered. In the last few months alone, they’ve bet on the sex of the baby, who would cry first when they heard the heartbeat, what fruit or vegetable their baby is that week and who can put a diaper on a football fastest. Bets are the cornerstone of their relationship — the original bet sparking Jake’s realisation that he liked her liked her — and Amy can’t wait for their kids to join in when they’re old enough.

(Kids, plural, because for some reason, even after difficulty conceiving and morning sickness and FOMOW, she would still go through pregnancy all over again. They don’t quite want eight like her parents, but at least one more would be nice).

Rosa’s black boots stop the elevator doors closing and she squeezes through the gap. “Got an early lunch date,” she explains.

“Oh,” Amy says, sharing A Look™️ with Jake. Rosa hasn’t dated anyone since Jocelyn dumped her, choosing to be on her own for a while since she hasn’t really had time alone to process her almost marriage to Pimento, prison and coming out. Repairing her relationship with her parents has been her #1 priority and this is the first Amy’s heard about her seeing someone new. “Is it... serious?” She tries not to push too hard because otherwise Rosa will just close off (it’s pointless asking about names or jobs or appearance), which is hard because she just wants her to be as happy as she is with Jake, but also knows from past experience that Rosa will eventually reveal the information when she’s ready.

“It could be,” she responds vaguely. “I like her, but she’s a doctor so we both work way too much.”

“Well, I hope it works out. You deserve someone really great.”

Rosa pulls her in for a tight, unexpected hug. “Thanks, Santiago,” she murmurs, her voice cracking as if she’s about to cry.

The elevator jolting and lights flickering ruins the moment. After a few terrifying seconds, it stops completely and they are plunged into darkness.

Amy’s blood runs cold, panic filling her lungs. She’s had this nightmare a million times, having suffered with claustrophobia ever since her brothers locked her in a closet as a kid.

She hears Jake’s “cool, cool, cool, cool, cool” and Rosa saying that it’s probably a power cut, but she can’t speak. She can’t do anything but think about how they’re never going to get out and how the squad will have to send them food supplies through the safety hatch in the ceiling and how they’ll have to raise their baby in this tiny metal box, teaching her to count using the buttons to the different precinct floors.

She feels pain, a fun combination of Braxton Hicks that she’s been having for weeks and panic attack. She tries to focus on her breathing and not on the four walls closing in on her. When the breathing techniques fail, she focuses on Jake.

Kind, funny, handsome Jake. Her husband, but more than that, her best friend. She concentrates on the toothpaste stain on the front of his shirt, his unruly curls that she loves so much, the ring on his finger glinting in the light from Rosa’s phone. His own phone is pressed to his ear and she can only hear one side of the conversation but it’s clear that he’s debriefing Holt.

“- Me, Amy, Rosa -"

“- We’re fine, just stuck -"

“- How long? -”

“Shit.” He hangs up, pocketing his phone. “Power’s out everywhere. Our back-up generators haven’t kicked in, something about air in the fuel system. The fire department are busy with the blackout and we’re apparently not an emergency, so. We could be in here a while.”

“Shit,” Rosa echoes his sentiment.

“Yeah. You OK, Ames?” He turns his attention to her.

She shakes her head meekly.

“Claustrophobic?” Rosa guesses, remembering her reaction to being locked in the trunk when she was trying to get her and Gina to face their fears.

She nods.

“We can play Celebrity to distract ourselves. I’ll go first. He’s the greatest actor -.”

“Bruce Willis,” Amy and Rosa say at the same time.

“Thought I’d give you an easy one to start,” he blushes.

Amy almost laughs despite the overwhelming fear. She loves him, Bruce Willis obsession and all. She takes a few seconds to think of someone good. Then, “They’re in - oh - water -.”

“They’re in water?” Rosa repeats, confused. “You mean like Jaws?”

“Or Finding Dory?” Jake adds. He made her watch the movie with him after Pimento’s Memento disease and now wants to buy a fish and call it Dory, even though he famously killed her fish back when they were dating. “Is it Ellen?”

“No, my water.”

Jake and Rosa both look down in horror. She buries her face in her hands. As if this situation could not get any worse.

“At least this classifies us as an emergency now,” Jake quips.

Rosa does Amy a favour and punches him in the arm.

They notify Holt — who in turn notifies the FDNY — and Jake sends a text to both their parents.

Rosa climbs onto Jake’s shoulders and opens the safety hatch so Charles can lower a care package of towels and bottled water into the elevator.

(He also delivers Sour Candies, upon Jake’s request).

Terry tries to pull the doors apart, but even his tree trunk arms are no match for the heavy metal.

Amy breathes through her contractions, stubbornly determined to stick to her birth plan and give birth in the hospital.

Her body, however, has other ideas.

“Four minutes apart now,” Rosa announces. She punches a wall out of frustration. “Where the hell are those firefighters?”

“They’re not going to make it in time,” Jake responds, equally frustrated. “Camila warned me months ago that Santiago babies come early, fast and are always boys.”

“This baby is half-Peralta and a girl. She might be the exception.” Amy takes a sip of water, ignoring the look of disbelief on Jake’s face.

“Diaz, you went to med school, tell my wife that this baby isn’t going to wait.”

Rosa opens her mouth to speak but Amy cuts her off.

“Diaz, tell my husband that the contractions aren’t even that painful and we have time.”

As it turns out, they don’t have time at all.

She’s feels pressure, the urge to push, and not even the glug glug glug of Rosa’s babbling brook sounds can calm her down.

“I do not want to give birth in the precinct elevator,” she cries.

Jake, on back rubbing duty, exchanges nervous glances with Rosa. She’s fully dilated and with the fire department still busy tackling other emergencies, this is happening. Right here. Right now.

“You know, it’s actually kind of perfect, Ames. We first met outside this elevator, right? And I kept the elevator doors open to let you win the Jimmy Jabs because of my massivecrush on you. And then you let me win to save our car. We fell in love in this precinct. It’s where we had our first for realz kiss, where we got engaged, where we got married. It’s kind of fitting that it’s also where our baby is going to be born.”

She tilts her head back to kiss him, ignoring Rosa’s complaints that they’re gross.

She thinks back to her wedding vows. Not everything is in our control, but as long as you’re with the right people you can handle anything. And you, Jake Peralta, are the right person for me. She can handle this with Jake by her side. She can bring their daughter into the world.

“OK... I’m ready.”

“That’s my girl,” Jake says proudly, shuffling into a better position to hold her hand and see the baby when she comes out.

They all disinfect their hands with Purrell from Amy’s purse and Rosa explains what’s going to happen and Jake jokes that he feels like Sandra Oh in Grey’s Anatomy.

Rosa rolls her eyes. “Christina was a heart surgeon, dumb dumb. You’re thinking of Addison. What?” She questions at their surprised expressions. “I like Grey’s Anatomy! It makes me feel things! I’m not totally heartless.”

Amy releases a string of expletives as another contraction starts.

“We’re going to start pushing on the next one,” Rosa instructs, forgetting her favourite medical drama.

Amy nods quickly.

Jake brushes fallen strands of hair away from her sweat-covered skin and takes her hand. “Squeeze as hard as you need to, babe.”

No amount of studying or listening to her mom’s stories could prepare her for the pain of pushing a baby out. It’s worse than the time her brother pushed her off the monkey bars when she was eight and she broke her arm, worse than the time she got shot in the line of duty, worse than the heartbreak of Jake being sentenced to 15 years in prison. It’s worse than anything she’s ever experienced and when it’s over she has so many questions for her mom, including why on Earth did she do this so many times?!

She’s also going to thank Jake for not complaining once and buy Rosa many drinks for her part in all this.

Having her colleague deliver her baby was definitely not part of the birth plan, but out of everyone they work with, she’s glad that it’s Rosa.

Rosa who’s been there for Jake since the Academy.

Rosa who has always had her back, too, who comforted her when Jake was in Florida, helped get her to her Sergeant’s exam on time and encouraged Jake to ask her out.

(And thank God she did).

Labor is exhausting.

It’s painful and emotional and long.

“You’re so close,” Jake cheers her on when she hits a wall.

“He’s right. I can see her head. One more push, Santiago.”

“I can’t-.”

“You can,” Rosa insists. “1,000 push ups.”

“OK,” she whispers. Rosa doesn’t just throw around 1,000 push ups willy nilly. It means something. And if Rosa is so confident that she can do this, then she can do it.

She pushes and pushes and eventually hears a baby’s cry.

It’s the most beautiful sound she’s ever heard.

When Rosa places her in Amy’s arms for immediate skin-to-skin, all four of them are openly weeping.

She’s the most perfect person she’s ever seen.

“I love you both so much,” Jake murmurs, kissing the top of Amy’s head. He leans down to kiss his daughter, too, marvelling over the fact that he gets to say my daughter now.

They cuddle for a while, quietly bickering over who she looks most like. They decide that she has Jake’s hair, nose and mouth and, when she opens her eyes for a second to see what all the fuss is about, he is thrilled to discover that she has the same beautiful eyes as her mom.

They wrap her up in Jake’s favourite blue hoodie to keep her warm and Rosa snaps their first official family portrait and sends it to their parents, Amy’s brothers and the Nine-Nine’s WhatsApp group. She reads out the messages of congratulations that fly in, making Jake and Amy both cry some more.

Finally she interrupts their family time to cut the cord, pulling out her pocket knife and lighter from her leather jacket.

Jake’s eyes go comically wide. “You’re going to use a knife?”

“Do you have any other suggestions?” She snaps.

He falls silent.

“Thought so.” She sterilises the blade (recently sharpened following Brad Leone’s tutorial from the BA Test Kitchen) with her lighter and carefully cuts the umbilical cord.

“Say thank you Tía Rosa,” Amy coos, stroking her daughter’s tiny hand.

“Tía?”

“Mm-hmm,” Amy hums with a tired smile. “We were going to ask you to be her godmother anyway, but I think you have more than earned that role now.”

“I’d be honoured,” she responds.

After another hour and a half stuck in the elevator, the lights come back on, the elevator doors open with a ping and they are suddenly faced with a crowd of concerned police officers, firefighters and paramedics, little Maya Peralta gracing the rest of the world in the most dramatic of fashion.

The firefighters spring into gear, holding the elevator doors shut while others help Amy into an awaiting wheelchair.

Jake hovers next to the paramedics as they check Maya’s vitals. Thankfully, everything is normal, they clean her up and replace Jake’s blood-stained hoodie with a warm blanket.

“She’s perfect,” the female paramedic tells him as she hands Maya back to her dad, confirming what he knew the second he laid eyes on her.

They then turn their attention to Amy, who is fine — more than fine, she’s the happiest she’s ever been — just a little sore. They decide to take them both into hospital as a precautionary measure since Maya is two weeks early (Santiago Style!), packing up their equipment while Jake and Amy introduce the Nine-Nine’s newest recruit to the rest of the squad.

Terry says something about little girls being the best, Hitchcock and Scully claim not to have known Amy was even pregnant and Holt’s stoic façade crumbles when Maya grips his finger with her entire hand.

Charles’ eyes are red and puffy like he’s been crying, but he’s uncharacteristically calm when Jake asks if he wants to hold her. He nods, of course, and is enamoured with her the moment he feels her weight in his arms.

This isn’t how she planned it —none of it is — she wanted the controlled hospital birth and the grandparents to meet the baby first and she really wanted to catch the perp from the coffee shop robbery, but Jake was right. It’s kind of perfect that she was born here, in the Nine-Nine, surrounded by their second family.

She meets her husband’s eye and smiles.

#b99 fics #jake x amy #my writing #I'm really proud of this so I hope you all love it #also the knife thing turned out to.....not be as big of a deal as I expected #but thank you for your advice anyway #let me know what you think!!!!!

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i-love-us-3000 · 4 years

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Peraltiago Relationship Milestones

I’m only including episodes in the first 6 seasons, I’ll update again once season 7 has finished airing

s1e1-Pilot: I’m including the first episode so you can see where there relationship starts and because it is the first time the bet is mentioned

s1e13-The Bet: Jake and Amy go on the fake date and you can tell Jake like likes her

s1e14-Operation: Broken Feather: Jake really doesn’t want Amy to leave the 99

s1e19-Tactical Village: Jake almost asks Amy out

s1e21-Unsolvable: Jake is really upset that he can’t be with Amy

s1e22-Charges and Specs: Jake tells Amy he wishes something had happened between them romantic styles

s2e1-Undercover: Jake comes back and he and Amy talk about what he said

s2e3-The Jimmy Jab Games: Jake can’t stop thinking about Amy, and he lets her win the Jimmy Jabs

s2e9-The Road Trip: This episode isn’t really a Peraltiago milestone, I just included it in the list because this is when Amy and Teddy break up

s2e21-Det. Dave Majors: Amy does the double tuck (she likes Jake)

s2e23-Johnny and Dora: THEY KISSSSSSSSSSSS

s3e1-New Captain: They decide that they are a thing and go on their first date

s3e7-The mattress: Jake buys a new mattress, showing Amy that his butt is serious about their relationship (so serious it should be wearing spectacles)

s3e13-The Cruise: Jake and Amy say I love you for the first time (thank you to @liseyoftheeverlark for pointing out that I missed this one

s3e14-Karen Peralta: Amy meets Jake’s mom

s4e7-Mr. Santiago: Jake meets Amy’s dad

s4e11-Fugitive pt. 1: Jake decides to move in with Amy

s4e15-Moo Moo: I wasn’t sure whether to include this one, but it’s when the two of them babysit Terry’s kids

s4e17-Chasing Amy: Amy is worried that becoming a sergeant will mess up their relationship but Jake tells her that he has always known that she is smarter than him

s5e4-HalloVeen: JAKE PROPOSES

s5e6-The Venue: They pick a venue for the wedding, and it is the first time we hear “Peraltiago”

s5e19- Bachelor/ette Party: The Bachelor/ette parties

s5e19-White Whale: Jake makes important wedding decisions

s5e22-Jake and Amy: THEY GET MARRIED

s6e1-Honeymoon: Honeymoon

s6e9-The Golden Child: This one isn’t necessarily a milestone, I just like the way that Jake supports and comforts Amy

s6e12-Casecation: Their one year anniversary.

Hope this helps, sometimes I just get in that hopeless romantic mood and these are the episodes I want to watch

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staystrange · 4 years

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heart is yours for the taking

Brooklyn Nine-Nine • Jake Peralta / Amy Santiago Rating: T • ~5.2k words • ao3 cw: slight mentions of drugs but no one uses them in the fic

It was officially the first day of summer. But it wasn’t just the first day of any summer, it was the first day of Jake’s first summer as Amy Santiago’s boyfriend, and Jake was determined to make it count.

-or-

Five times Jake's well-intentioned summer date plans end poorly and one time they don't.

This fic was written for @santiagoswagger as part of the @b99fandomevents summer 2020 fic exchange! I had such a blast writing this fic, and I hope that you enjoy it : )

Prompt: Snapshots of Jake and Amy’s first months as a couple through the summer.

I took this prompt and just ran with it and ended up with this! I've always wanted to write a 5+1 style fic but never had the right idea for one, so this was perfect.

Title from Summer Forever by Megan Nicole - one of my favorite summer bops!

011:58, 11:59, midnight.

He looked over at Amy, already asleep in the bed next to him. She’d come over to Jake’s apartment earlier that evening after a long day at the nine-nine (she was so busy that she hadn’t been able to get any extra paperwork done, which to her was an absolute disaster), and they’d eaten takeout pierogies for dinner before getting ready for bed early. Amy fell asleep almost immediately after giving Jake a tender kiss goodnight, but Jake was so excited for the date he’d planned for their upcoming Saturday night off that he couldn’t sleep.

Jake’s train of thought slowed in favor of focusing on Amy and how beautiful she looked, even asleep with drool moving steadily down her chin. No matter how many times he and Amy shared a bed, it never quite felt real to Jake, that he’d finally admitted his feelings for her and that she actually liked him back. Heck, Amy had broken rules for him, and he’d tried to follow some for her in return (though the whole “light and breezy” thing didn’t last long, but the effort still counted). But there she was, lying next to him as she had every night so far that week. It took all of Jake’s self control to not reach over and kiss her (he didn’t want to wake her); instead, he lay back down, facing Amy so that she was the last thing he saw before he fell asleep, a soft smile forming on his face as he drifted off.

“Ready to go, babe?” Jake asked, leaning his hip against Amy’s desk.

“Hold on, let me just finish signing this paperwork,” Amy muttered in reply, the pen in her hand moving at a snail’s pace along the dotted line on the bottom of the page.

“Ames, we’ve been over this. You need to do something about that speed. Not the drug,” Jake added quickly, “I mean how quickly you write your signature. You get what I mean, right?”

“Yes, Jake, I get what you mean.” Amy capped the pen and stood up. “I just have to turn this in to Captain Holt and then we’re good to go.” Jake followed her across the bullpen to Captain Holt’s office door, almost crashing into her when she turned around just in front of it. “You can’t come in with me, babe, I don’t want you ruining this moment between the Captain and me.”

“You mean ‘the Captain and I,’” Jake replied, a smug smile on his face, his determination to catch Amy in a grammar mistake overpowering his offense at her comment.

“No, but good try though.” She patted him on the shoulder before turning and walking through the door, closing it behind her to stop Jake from following her inside.

“Damn it, I thought I had her,” Jake said to himself, but he couldn’t help but smile proudly as he watched Amy hand her paperwork in, Captain Holt nodding with approval in response.

———

When Amy finally emerged from Captain Holt’s office fifteen minutes later, a pleased smile on her face, Jake reached for her hand, tugging her toward the door. “Come on, babe, our shift has been over for almost an hour already. We’re going to be late for our date.”

“Ooh, you’re taking me on a date tonight?” Amy squeezed Jake’s hand.

Jake grinned. “Yep! I actually managed to keep it a surprise for once.” He called the elevator, the doors opening with a ding a few moments later.

“And what are we doing on this spontaneous date that I didn’t get to prepare for?”

Jake winced internally, refusing to let Amy see the doubt that began to permeate his excitement. “You’ll see! The surprise isn’t over just yet.” He opened the passenger side door for Amy with a slightly comical bow before walking around to the driver’s side and sliding into the seat. He started the car and cranked up the radio to his favorite pop hits station, realizing in that moment he should have probably asked Amy to choose the station instead. At a red light, he turned to her to offer to change the station, but then the newest Carly Rae Jepsen single came on and he was too busy singing along, loud enough to drown out his own nerves.

When they pulled into the drive-in movie theater that had just opened right outside the New York City limits, Amy’s face fell when she saw that the night’s showing was of —

“Die Hard?!” Amy asked, incredulous. “Really? We haven’t even been dating for that long and we’ve already watched this movie way too many times. You pick this movie every single time it’s your turn to plan movie night. Why are we paying money to watch this movie again?”

“Because I thought it would be fun and maybe even a little romantic to watch it at a drive-in movie theater on a warm, clear summer night?” Amy raised her eyebrow, her arms crossing over the seatbelt. “I brought snacks, if that helps at all.”

“I’m listening.”

Jake reached into the backseat and handed Amy a plastic shopping bag filled with snacks: greasy potato chips and gummy bears for Jake, chocolate pretzels and salted popcorn for Amy. “Come on, Amy, you didn’t really think I wouldn’t bring snacks to entertain us, did you?”

“I mean yeah, the snacks help, but we could eat snacks and watch Die Hard at home, Jake. Remember when we talked about budgeting and saving your money?”

“Amy —” Jake was about to reply, but then the stadium lights shut off and the screen lit up with the opening shot of the movie. “We’re already here, I already paid for the tickets, and I already bought the snacks. Just try to enjoy this, okay?”

Amy opened the bag of popcorn, putting a couple pieces in her mouth and chewing contentedly. “Fine. But only because this popcorn is really good.”

“You took her to a drive-in showing of Die Hard and called it a romantic date?!”

The second Jake had arrived at the precinct first thing in the morning after his and Amy’s night off, Charles had marched right over to his desk and demanded details. Jake knew better than to deny him, so he told him everything, disagreement and all. Thankfully, Amy had the morning off, and Jake had let her sleep in.

Charles’s response didn’t surprise Jake, and he more than deserved the dig, but he still felt the need to defend himself. “It was romantic! Drive-in movies are totally perfect for early-summer dates, and I brought snacks and everything! And you should have seen the sunset behind the screen!”

“Okay, to be fair, that does sound nice. But still, come on Jakey, this is Amy we’re talking about! You’ve been in love with her for years! And then you get to go out with her, and you take her on a shitty date?”

“Okay, I know it wasn’t great, but I wouldn’t necessarily call it a shitty date,” Jake pointed out.

“Well, whatever, you can do so much better than that, Jake.” Charles’s face lit up with an idea. “I know! You should take her to Bon Appe-tweet, this new restaurant that I just discovered the other night.”

“Bon Appe-tweet?” Jake asked, fighting back the laugh that bubbled up in his chest. “I don’t know, Charles, is this another one of your weird food restaurants?”

“No! Jake, you’ll like it. They only serve bird-based dishes. Chicken, turkey, duck, the works. And it’s pretty fancy, so Amy will swoon, and then you’ll go home and make babies and —”

“Alright, Charles, thank you for the recommendation,” Jake said, cutting him off before he got too far down that rabbit hole. Even though Jake knew from many prior experiences that if it was something Charles recommended, it probably couldn’t be trusted, for some reason he had a good feeling about this one and decided to go with his gut. “I’ll make a reservation for later this week.”

Jake just hoped he wasn’t making a huge mistake.

———

It was absolutely a huge mistake.

Everything was totally fine at first, to Jake’s pleasant surprise. He and Amy had decided to reserve an outdoor table since the weather was supposed to be clear and warm, and to their delight, the outdoor patio was surrounded by colorful sweet-smelling flowers. Jake decided to splurge and order a bottle of rosé for them to share, and they sipped the wine slowly as they perused the menu.

“Ooh, this fancy chicken dish that I don’t know how to pronounce sounds really good. What are you thinking, Ames?” Jake asked, looking up from his menu at his girlfriend across from him. Jake had told her to dress up for this date, and she’d chosen a dark blue dress that she knew Jake liked, her hair pinned up in a classy bun. She was stunningly beautiful; there were simply no other words to describe her.

“I think I’m going to get the orange chicken,” Amy replied, closing the menu and setting it down on the table, her hands folding over her napkin in her lap. “I’m still not totally ready to trust a restaurant recommended by Charles, but you can’t really go wrong with orange chicken.”

“I’ll drink to that,” Jake said, raising his glass with a laugh.

They ordered their respective dishes when the waiter brought over a basket of bread, and they returned to their drinks, content smiles on their faces.

“This is better than the other night, right?” Jake asked

“Yes, definitely.” Amy took another sip of her rosé, her smile widening.

And then it happened.

The squawking coming from behind the restaurant building caught Jake and Amy off guard, and it was a miracle that neither of them sloshed their drinks onto the table or their clothes. Amy looked horrified, and Jake knew his face reflected a similar look back at her.

“Is there like a farm up the road or something?” Amy asked, her palms pressing into her ears.

“I have no idea!” Jake yelled back to be heard over the squawking.

When it finally stopped, Jake exhaled in relief, but there was something uneasy about the silence that followed. No one else dining out at the restaurant that night seemed to notice or care, though, so Jake chose to just shake it off and focus on Amy, whose initially anxious smile had softened as she drank.

Jake had managed to almost forget it until his and Amy’s food arrived and it hit him that the sounds they’d heard were chickens being murdered for their dinner. The thought made him sick.

“Here you go, sir, madam,” the waiter said, setting their dishes down in front of each of them. “Fresh from our in-house farm. Enjoy!”

“We can’t eat this, Jake!” Amy hissed once the waiter was out of earshot. “They murdered these chickens right in front of us.”

“I mean, they didn’t kill them right in front of us —” Jake stopped when the look on Amy’s face made it clear she was in no mood for joking. “Okay yeah, they might as well have. And normally I would support leaving right now and getting dinner somewhere else, but this food is expensive so if I have to pay for it anyway, we might as well eat it, right?”

Amy opened her mouth to argue, but sighed instead, knowing she couldn’t argue with Jake’s logic. “Fine. But please, promise me you will never trust Charles to plan anything for us ever again.”

“I swear on my original copy of Die Hard that I will never trust Charles Boyle’s food recommendations ever again.” Amy nodded her approval, gulping nervously before cutting into her food, Jake following her lead.

The chicken was actually really good when he didn’t think too hard about where it had come from.

———

“Charles, why didn’t you mention that they kill the chickens in front of you?!” Jake asked the next morning, marching up to Charles’s desk.

“Why wouldn’t they kill them in front of you? If your food isn’t being prepared in front of you at a restaurant, then what is the point of going to a restaurant?”

“Okay, Charles,” Jake said, giving up and turning to the pile of paperwork on his desk.

Jake had decided to stop testing his luck with dates for the rest of the week, choosing to plan nights in for him and Amy instead. The next week, though, Jake was feeling brave enough to try again, and this time he sought advice from someone older and wiser.

“Sarge?” Jake approached his desk during an afternoon lull in work. “You’re older and therefore wise and all-knowing. Where should I take Amy on a date this week?”

“You don’t know your girlfriend well enough to know where to take her on a date?!” Terry replied, looking up from his computer.

“No, I do, but I’m worried my ideas aren’t good enough for her. The dates I planned last week were both disasters, and I need a new plan. Where do you take Sharon for date night?”

“Well, we’ve been taking ballroom dancing classes recently and they’ve been pretty fun. They also really add to the romance level of the date, and they’re good exercise too. It’s a win-win-win! Terry loves romance.” Terry puffed up his chest in pride.

“Alright, I get it, you’re the king of dates. How do I sign up, and more importantly, how do I make sure I don’t embarrass myself in front of Amy?”

“I’ll text you the website link in a few, and you won’t embarrass yourself, Jake. It’s a class for beginners. Everyone’s in the same boat. Just let yourself have fun, and Amy will have fun too, okay?”

“If you say so, Sarge,” Jake said. “Thanks. I really appreciate your advice.”

“Anytime, Jake!”

———

“Jake, this is so cheesy,” Amy said a few nights later when they pulled into the parking lot of the dance studio.

“Is it, though? Or is it… romantic?” Jake paused for dramatic effect.

“It’s cheesy,” Amy deadpanned.

“Just trust me, okay? This is going to be fun. We’re going to have fun, I promise.”

“Alright, Jake, whatever you say,” Amy said, following Jake into the building.

After signing in at the front desk, Jake and Amy chose a spot in the back of the room, their eyes wandering around to scope out their classmates. Their instructor walked in a moment later, plugging his phone into the speakers and pressing play on a calming playlist. He led them in a series of stretches, and Jake pretended not to notice the popping sounds his joints made as he followed the instructor’s movements.

What he did notice during a particularly painful stretch, though, was a bag of cocaine peeking out of the pocket of the instructor’s leather jacket that he’d taken off and hung around the back of a chair before the class had begun.

“Ames,” Jake whispered when they’d returned to a standing position. “The teacher guy has cocaine in his jacket pocket.”

“Damn it,” she muttered. “We have to text the squad.”

“Or we could just let this go? For the sake of the date?” Jake asked, hope evident in his voice before he admitted defeat when he saw the look on Amy’s face. “Yeah, no, we have to call this in.” He stepped away from the group during a five minute water break and sent a quick text to Captain Holt.

Just as the instructor began to reorganize the group into lines of partners, the door banged open and Charles and Rosa ran in, Rosa yelling “NYPD, you’re under arrest!” and Charles running up to the guy and handcuffing his hands behind his back.

“What is this about? I didn’t do anything wrong, officers,” he protested.

“Then why do you have a bag of cocaine in your jacket pocket?” Charles asked, holding it up carefully in between two fingers.

“Damn it,” the instructor muttered. “I knew I forgot to do something before I taught this class.”

“Thanks for the tip, Jake!” Rosa said. “Sorry we ruined your date.”

“It’s fine, Rosa,” Jake replied.

Rosa and Charles led him out of the room in handcuffs as the woman working at the front desk ran in to assure everyone that they’d receive a full refund and a discount code for a future class at the studio.

“Why do our jobs have to interfere with our lives so much?” Jake said to himself as he and Amy followed the group out the door.

———

“You arrested the dance instructor?!” Terry asked in shock the next morning. “What the hell, man? I put in a good word for you! You’re going to ruin my reputation over there.”

“You think I wanted to ruin my date, Terry?!” Jake replied, arms flailing. “Now that’s three dates that have been ruined.”

Terry patted Jake’s shoulder gently, or at least what Terry thought was gently. “ There, there. And hey, look on the bright side - at least you didn’t embarrass yourself in front of Amy!”

“Alright, Rosa, you and Boyle interrupted my date last night, and I don’t trust Boyle to recommend dates for Amy and me anymore, so where do you think I should take Amy on a date next?”

“I don’t know, Jake, take her to a binder store or something,” Rosa replied calmly as she sharpened her favorite knife at her desk.

“I can’t take her to a binder store, Rosa, you know that she’s going to want to buy like everything and that’s going to get out of control way too quickly. Something else.” Jake crossed his arms, chewing his lip to use up some of his nervous energy.

“Fine, Jake. Take her to one of those paint your own pottery places. Those are always fun.”

“I can’t tell if you’re being serious or making fun of me.”

Rosa paused, glancing up at Jake for a moment before returning her gaze to her knife. “I’m serious. I take myself out to those places all the time. I like painting the little puppy figurines, they’re so cute,” she replied in a deadpan.

“Rosa, oh my God, who are you? How did I never know that about you?”

She shrugged. “You never asked.”

———

Jake had butterflies in his stomach as they walked up to the doors of Color Me Mine, the late summer afternoon sun warming the pavement. He almost was too afraid to look over at Amy, but since his eyes were almost magnetically drawn to her, not looking at her was not an option. When he finally did turn toward her, she was smiling softly, and Jake’s pre-date nerves gradually eased until he was grinning, too.

“I love Color Me Mine!” Amy said. “I used to come here all the time when I was younger.” She reached for the door handle and opened it, the air conditioning cooling them instantly as they walked inside. “We should paint something for each other, babe.”

“Like what? Dog figurines?”

“No!” Amy said, her eyebrows furrowed. “Something practical that we both use at work every day, like…” She paused, eyes wandering around the room in search of the perfect item. “Like a mug!”

Before Jake could protest that hey, maybe he wanted to paint a dog figurine for his desk, Amy had crossed the room and picked up the display mug. “This is perfect, Jake! This was such a good date idea.”

“Don’t thank me, thank Rosa — I mean, thank me, it was all my idea.” Jake tried to cover up his mistake, but Amy’s smirk told him she saw right through it.

She set the mug back down before standing on her tiptoes and giving Jake a kiss on the cheek. “Come on, let’s go pick out our paints.”

“Okay,” Jake said softly, following her to the paint display.

———

Once Jake and Amy chose paints for each other (purple and blue for Jake; orange, yellow, and pink for Amy), they sat down at a small round table in the back of the room. Amy, ever the perfectionist, insisted they paint in silence for a while to ensure that the mug she painted for Jake turned out exactly the way she wanted it to. Jake was touched, and as he worked just as diligently on his mug for Amy, he found that the silence was a comfortable one, and he was content to just be in Amy’s presence.

Jake was just putting the finishing touches on the mug, trying not to let his hand shake too much as he painted Amy’s name on it in thin dark magenta lettering, when the sound of pottery shattering startled him, completely breaking his concentration. When he looked away from a crying child and his profusely apologetic mother, he noticed that not only had he completely ruined the lettering, he’d also bumped into the table, knocking over the water bowl which had spilled all over Amy’s lap.

Jake’s heart sank, knowing he’d managed to ruin yet another date. “I’m so sorry, Ames, I didn’t mean to ruin… all of this,” he said quietly, afraid to look at her face.

“Jake, it’s fine. These jeans are old anyway, and it didn’t really didn’t do that much to your mug,” Amy said, lifting the mug off of the brown paper tablecloth.

“No, it’s not fine. I had one job, and it was to not to screw up yet another date.” He could feel the volume of his voice rising so he took a deep breath, determined not to make the entire room of painters stare at him and Amy. “I’ll go get you some paper towels.”

Amy insisted that they stay to finish up their mugs, and even though she didn’t stop smiling for the rest of the night, Jake couldn’t help but blame himself.

“Hey, Captain,” Jake began, closing Captain Holt’s office door behind him as he walked in. “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course. Is this about the paperwork that was due on my desk yesterday that you did not finish before leaving to take Amy on another romantic escapade?” Holt asked, folding his hands with his pen still clasped between them.

“Uhhhhh, no?” He smiled sheepishly. “Anyway, since Amy looks up to you more than anyone else and you know her better than anyone else except for me, because, yaknow, we boink, and stuff —” Jake winced at his own awkwardness, but forced himself to continue. “—do you have a good recommendation for somewhere I can take Amy on a date? Preferably something that I can’t possibly screw up somehow.”

“Hm. There’s the new stationery exhibit at the MOMA that she would definitely like. Make sure you budget a lot of time; Kevin and I spent five hours there last week and we still did not manage to see everything.”

“Yikes,” Jake muttered to himself.

“Did you say something, Peralta?” Holt asked.

“Oh, uh, um, why didn’t you and Kevin stay longer?” Jake asked quickly.

“Oh, the security guards kicked us out. Apparently we’d completely missed the announcements and had managed to avoid security for a whole half an hour after the museum closed for the night.”

“Of course you did,” Jake said. “Anyways, thank you so much for your help, sir, I really appreciate it.”

“If you really appreciated it, you would have your paperwork on my desk on time,” Holt replied.

“You know what, fair.”

———

After finishing his overdue paperwork and all of his new paperwork for the day, Jake took Amy to the Museum of Modern Art and led her to the exhibit Captain Holt had told him about. The grin on her face rivaled the brightness of the lights in the building, and Jake was in… well, he had a heck of a lot of mushy feelings about it.

“How did you know I’ve wanted to come here ever since they announced this exhibit a few months ago? I never mentioned it to you,” Amy asked.

“I just know you that well, babe,” Jake replied, only feeling a smidge of guilt for taking credit for Captain Holt’s recommendation.

“Captain Holt told you about it, didn’t he?” Amy said, crossing her arms and turning to Jake.

“Okay, yeah, but still! I know you well enough to ask Captain Holt for recommendations!” Amy’s eyes narrowed, but her smile remained, letting Jake know she was joking. “Come on, let’s look at the fancy paper!”

“Stationery, babe,” Amy corrected.

“Fancy paper!” Amy rolled her eyes as they entered the exhibit.

———

Jake managed to feign enthusiasm for the first hour or so (he even felt it genuinely for a little while because Amy bled excitement as she explained each and every piece of stationery to him), but once he realized how much longer they had to go before finishing the exhibit, he felt his carefully controlled expression start to slip a little bit. He liked Amy a lot, and he wanted to enjoy this for her, but he just couldn’t. Still, he planned on enduring Amy’s long explanations for as long as she wanted to stay, because this date was for her and he was determined not to somehow mess it up.

“You’re bored, aren’t you,” Amy said after a while.

“What? No.”

“You keep staring out into space and saying ‘uh huh’ every three seconds.”

“I was contemplating the beauty of this piece of fancy paper!” Jake insisted, gesturing at the piece that Amy was explaining. Or at least, the one he thought she had been explaining.

“Well, I was talking about this piece,” Amy said, tilting her head toward the one adjacent to the one Jake had been referring to, “so clearly you weren’t listening.”

Jake looked down at the floor, unable to look Amy in the eye. “I’m happy to see that you’re so interested, and I love… listening to you talk for hours on end about whatever you want, I’m just really not that interested in stationery. But really, we can stay as long as you want, I don’t mind. Keep talking to me.”

“No, Jake, I can’t do that to you. You’ve already stuck this out with me long enough. I can just come back another time on my own; you know I have a membership.”

“Ames —”

“Really, Jake, it’s okay,” Amy said, linking her arm with Jake’s. “Let’s go home and watch a movie or something and go to bed early.”

“Okay,” Jake said. “But only if you’re sure.”

“I’m sure.”

Jake had never felt this much guilt in his life.

“Hey, Jake?” Amy said as she slid under the covers of her bed later that night. “I really appreciate what you’ve been trying to do for me by taking me on all of these sweet dates and making our first summer together extra special. But really, babe, I’m just happy being with you. You don’t have to put so much pressure on yourself.”

“But Ames, I managed to ruin every single one of those dates. You deserve better than five disaster dates in a row,” Jake replied, eyes turning down toward his lap in humiliation.

“Jake, I’m serious. Stop doing this to yourself.” Jake looked up at Amy and they locked eyes in silent communication of mutual adoration for a moment before Amy reached over and took Jake’s hand in hers. “You don’t have to prove that you deserve me or anything. I just want to spend time with you and enjoy our first summer as more than coworkers. Can we do that?”

“Yes, Amy, we can do that.” He squeezed her hand, and she squeezed back.

“But hypothetically,” he continued, their hands still intertwined, “if I were to take you on another date to really make up for all of the other ones this time, what would you want to do together?”

Amy smiled. “Thank you for asking, Jake. I was thinking we could plan a beach getaway for next weekend. I already have an itinerary all ready to go in this binder.” She reached into the drawer in the bedside table next to her and pulled out a thick binder titled Jake and Amy’s Beach Getaway, handing it to Jake, who opened it carefully.

“Ames, why didn’t you tell me about this?” He flipped through the pages, smiling at Amy’s thoughtfulness. She’d really thought of everything - boardwalk rides and arcade games for Jake, relaxing and reading on the beach for Amy, and massages for the both of them. Jake’s heart was full.

Amy shrugged. “I was waiting for the right time, I guess. I didn’t want to interfere with the dates you’d already planned.”

“We could have done this ages ago! I’ve been asking the squad for date ideas for weeks because everything that I thought of was along the same lines as the Die Hard drive-in idea.” Amy laughed. “I wish you’d mentioned this earlier, but I’m excited for us to make it happen now.”

“Me too, Jake.”

———

Thankfully, Captain Holt granted Jake and Amy’s request to take the next weekend off, and together they drove to the beach house they’d rented for the weekend. They’d made a playlist before they left, and they’d spent the drive singing along terribly to Carly Rae Jepsen and Sara Bareilles and a bunch of random 80s songs that Jake had added.

After what felt like ages but was really just a few hours, Jake and Amy lay next to each other on the beach, enjoying the warm sun and the clear blue sky. It was surprisingly less crowded than Jake expected it would be on a Friday afternoon, but it gave them plenty of space on the beach, so Jake wasn’t complaining. Later, they planned to walk the boardwalk together and waste some money on the fun but endlessly stupid arcade games, and Jake couldn’t wait to win some giant stuffed animals for Amy.

She’d been right, of course. This was the perfect date, the perfect way to celebrate their first summer together as a couple. Jake should have asked her what she was thinking from the very beginning instead of trying to be romantic and plan everything himself. There were many benefits to dating an extreme planner like Amy, and this was definitely one of them.

Jake leaned over and nudged Amy awake from the half-asleep state she’d fallen into, kissing her softly. “Thank you for planning all of this for us. I’m so happy to be here with you.”

Amy smiled, lowering her sunglasses for a moment. “I’m so happy to be here with you, too.” She reached for the water bottle next to her and handed Jake the bottle of orange soda he’d bought at the vending machine earlier. “Here’s to our first summer together.” She gently tapped Jake’s bottle with her own.

Jake returned the gesture. “Here’s to hopefully the first of many.”

They each took a sip.

#original #fanfiction #b99 summer 2020 fic exchange #b99fandomevents #brooklyn nine nine #peraltiago #jake peralta #amy santiago #charles boyle #terry jeffords #rosa diaz #captain raymond holt #fluff #canon compliant #early relationship #jake loves amy but is too afraid to say it yet!!!#5+1 things #disaster dates #jake loves carly rae jepsen and die hard

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cocastyle · 5 years

Text

Thankful

Pairing- Jake Peralta x reader

Word Count- 4,870

Warning- none

A/N- here’s my first attempt at a Brooklyn 99 one shot! I’ve recently become obsessed with the show and was in the middle of watching season one when I saw the Thanksgiving episode and had this idea. I plan on writing more Brooklyn 99 one shots as I go seeing as each episode makes me fall more and more in love with the show than I already was before. I hope you all like this!

When asked which holiday was someone’s favorite, most people responded with Christmas or Halloween. But for Y/N L/N that holiday was Thanksgiving.

It was the holiday where she could celebrate being thankful for everything good in her life, where she could stuff her face until she fell into a food coma, and the holiday in which she could spend time with the people she loved and cared about, the people she was thankful for.

So Y/N was always excited when it came to Thanksgiving, but this year was different for this was the first year she would be spending the special holiday with her friends of the 99th prescinct in Brooklyn and Y/N was determined to make it perfect especially for Jake Peralta.

Y/N had been working at the precinct for a little under a year and had even been dating Jake for a few months now, so she had heard a lot about how the man hated Thanksgiving and wanted nothing to do with it. He wouldn’t tell her what the reason was, but then again, he wouldn’t give her the chance to even ask, always pushing aside the topic before it had even begun.

But Y/N, being the Thanksgiving loving person that she was, wanted nothing more than to show her boyfriend just how great the holiday was, even if that meant just getting to spend an evening with the man she had grown to love.

Luckily for her, her best friend Amy Santiago wanted to host a small Thanksgiving dinner for the squad, so Y/N had been quick to volunteer to help the girl make all the necessary preparations. Now it was just a matter of getting Jake to come.

Knowing that the man would decline if he knew too far in advance, Y/N waited until Jake entered the precinct on Thanksgiving Day after just getting back from a case to ask him.

“Check it out, chair jockeys!” Jake exclaimed as he walked into the room with a bag of cocaine in hand. “While you were busy tickling the ivories on your computers, I was doing a bust. Cocaine!” Y/N chuckled softly at the voice he made before Jake handed the cocaine over to an officer. “Thanks, Lucius,” he said.

Jake’s eyes then flickered around the office as he looked for someone, finally stopping once he caught sight of Y/N. Jake grinned and walked over to the girl before giving her a quick kiss in greeting and wrapping his arm around her waist.

“He ran, I pursued. Whole thing turned into an awesome car chase,” Jake said, obviously trying to impress his girlfriend. Y/N knew better than to think that was the actual story, but she just entertained the boy by looking impressed.

“Well, at least you’re done early, so you have time to go home and change for Y/N and I’s Thanksgiving dinner,” Amy said.

Jake furrowed his eyebrows and opened his mouth to object to coming, but Y/N was quick to stop him with a kiss. She pulled away and the boy instantly smiled at her with a dreamy expression on his face.

“Please come,” Y/N whispered as she gave him her best puppy-dog eyes. “Please. For me?”

Jake frowned slightly, his eyes flickering over the girl’s face. “I know what you’re trying to do and let me just say that is manipulative,” he said as he pointed a finger at her.

“Please? All you have to do is dress up,” Y/N said as she walked over to her desk and sat down. “Ugh. Why do we have to dress up for Thanksgiving?” Jake asked. “I don’t even celebrate that stuff. The whole holiday is based on overeating. We should be wearing velvet track suits and diapers.”

“Jacket and tie,” Amy insisted. “Rosa’s even wearing her formal leather jacket.” The three looked over to said woman who nodded, “It’s the one without any blood on it.”

“You’re gonna dress up, and you’re gonna give a toast about what you’re thankful for. Start preparing,” Amy told him. “Oh, I prefer not to prepare for my roasts. I just wing ‘em like scat jazz,” Jake said before beginning to imitate jazz. Y/N shook her head, a small smile on her face as she stared at the man who had stolen her heart.

Amy gave the girl a look and Y/N was quick to look away, knowing that Amy (and everyone else in the precinct) just wanted her to tell Jake that she loved him already, the one thing the two hadn’t done since they started dating.

“Are we singing?” Scully asked, breaking Amy’s gaze away from Y/N which the girl was silently thankful for. “No, no, no, no,” Jake said in a rushed voice, but Scully didn’t seem to notice and began to sing some opera.

Realizing there was no stopping the man, Jake looked to Amy and Y/N. “I’m not dressing up for your party,” he whispered.

“But you’ll come?” Y/N asked in a hopeful voice. Jake’s eyes flickered over to the girl before he hesitantly nodded his head. “Fine, I’ll come,” he said. “But I’m not dressing up!”

And with that, the man was rushing off leaving Y/N to do a little happy dance. Part one of her plan was complete.

Jake Peralta was officially coming to the Thanksgiving dinner.

- - -

By the time the Thanksgiving dinner had arrived, Y/N was practically bouncing up and down in excitement. She had arrived early to help Amy set up everything seeing as Amy had been kind enough to make all the food and Y/N had been waiting and watching as their friends began to trickle in.

It was only when she got a text from Jake saying that he was there that Y/N sprinted over to the door and opened it up, coming face to face with her boyfriend.

“Wow,” Jake whispered breathlessly as he stared at the girl in front of him who stood in a black sweater dress that fit her just right and black boots to match. Y/N blushed and tucked a piece of hair behind her ear while Jake looked her up and down. “You look gorgeous, L/N.”

Y/N smiled softly, but it faltered slightly as she took in the man’s appearance. He was really set on not dressing up. Instead of a nice shirt and tie like Y/N and Amy had told him, Jake had gone out of the way to do the exact opposite, wearing one of his usual plaid shirts with a blue jacket over it. Even the tie he wore to work had been purposefully taken off much to Y/N’s dismay.

“Thanks. You look. . .um. . .comfy?” Y/N muttered. Jake smiled, not noticing the small amount of hurt in her eyes. “Thanks, that’s what I was going for. I was being serious when I said I wasn’t going to dress up,” Jake reminded her.

“I can see that. Uh. . .come on in,” Y/N told him. Jake nodded and entered the small apartment before asking, “You sure this is Amy’s place? It looks like my grandma lives here.”

Y/N gently whacked the man who smirked and looked to her. His smirk fell slightly when she noticed how she looked out of it and he frowned before putting a hand on her arm. “Hey, what’s wrong?” Jake asked.

“Oh, my God, Amy, that’s so cool that you still live with your grandmother,” Gina said, interrupting the conversation the two had been having and saving Y/N from Jake’s question. “I live alone. This is my stuff. I like quilts,” Amy told her with a shrug.

“Stop. Each sentence is getting sadder,” Gina said. “It looks like you live on the set of Murder, She Wrote,” Rosa commented.

“Well, I gotta say, it’s not as bad as I thought it would be. I mean, the football game’s not on, so I can still watch it later at home. And it’s kind of cool to visit a time before electricity was invented,” Jake teased.

Amy frowned and reached for a stack of papers with a sigh, “I have to practice my toast.” “Woah, Amy. How long is that?” Y/N asked, her eyes wide. “Eight pages,” Amy responded.

“Single-spaced?” Jake questioned. “Double-sided,” Amy added. “Santiago style,” Y/N and Jake muttered making Amy crack a small smile while the couple chuckled.

Jake wrapped an arm around Y/N waist and was about to question her about earlier when Terry interrupted. “Mm-hmm. Hey, excuse me. Can we please eat? My body is starting to digest itself. Terry needs nutrients,” he said.

“No eating until the Captain gets here,” Amy told him. “Okay? Sorry.” “Don’t apologize. I’d rather spend Thanksgiving at your house than with my sister,” Rosa muttered. “It’s so pleasant and boring. But, Holt, at your house, surrounded by these idiots? Guaranteed train wreck. Thanks for the invite, Amy and Y/N.”

The doorbell rang, breaking the conversation and making Amy tense up. “He’s here! Okay, he’s here, everybody. Be cool. Hitchcock, why do you have your shirt off?” Amy asked and the whole room looked to the man who was sitting shirtless beside Scully.

“Can’t spill food on your shirt if you’re not wearing one,” Hitchcock replied. Amy shook her head slightly and rushed over to the door.

Sensing that Jake wanted to talk, Y/N looked to her boyfriend and said, “I’m gonna go help Amy and make sure she doesn’t ramble too much.” Jake didn’t even get a chance to say anything back before Y/N was rushing after Amy.

The two friends opened the door to see Captain Holt standing there. “Captain Holt,” Amy greeted. “Happy Thanksgiving, Sir,” Y/N said with a smile. “Happy Thanksgiving. Your apartment was very easy to locate,” Holt told Amy.

“Thank you so much. You look beautiful,” Amy said. Y/N facepalmed and looked to Amy who frowned at her word choice. “Weirdest conversation ever,” Jake called out. “Nice work, you three.”

Y/N sent her boyfriend a small glare while he just winked at her. The girl sighed and clapped her hands together. “How about we eat?” Y/N suggested. “Yes, please!” Terry practically yelled.

The group all chuckled and made their way over to their seats. Y/N was still a little upset and hurt by Jake, but it all washed away when he pulled her seat out for her and made sure she was all situated before sitting beside her, taking her hand in his almost immediately.

Y/N smiled lovingly at the boy and kissed his cheek before Amy cleared her throat to gain everyone’s attention. “Before we eat, I’d like everyone to go around and say what they’re thankful for this year,” Amy said.

“I’ll go,” Y/N announced before she stood up, grabbing ahold of her drink. “First of all, I just wanted to thank you all for coming. It really means a lot to me and Amy that you all came. I guess I’ll start by saying that I’m thankful for each of you. The move from my last precinct was pretty hard for me, but with all of your help, you all made it a whole lot easier. I never expected to create so many friendships or to find someone who I am lucky enough to call my boyfriend, let alone find a group of people who would become like a family to me. So I guess I just want you all to know that I’m thankful for everything you all have done and for the family you all have given me. To you all.”

Everyone was smiling by then, even Jake who hadn’t taken his eyes off of the girl since she sat next to him. Y/N held her drink up in the air and the others did as well before everyone took a sip of their drink. Y/N sat down and Amy looked around the table to see if anyone else wanted to go.

Jake let out a sigh and grabbed ahold of his beer bottle. “Fine, I’ll go next. I am thankful that Thanksgiving only comes once a year. People stuff themselves, and then at midnight they run to appliance stores and trample each other to death. It’s a garbage holiday.” Jake sniffled and pretended as if he were about to cry. “I’m sorry. I just get emotional when I talk about how bogus Thanksgiving is.”

Y/N frowned and set her drink down on the table while Amy scoffed and muttered, “I’ll just go. I actually prepared a little something.”

“You did?” Jake asked in fake shock, but Amy ignored him.

“When I was a little girl, playing cops and robbers. . .” Amy began, but was cut off by the sound of someone’s cellphone ringing. That person happened to be Holt who quickly stood up and went to take the call. “Excuse me. Please. Continue, Santiago,” Holt told her.

A panicked look appeared on Amy’s face as she sisd, “Or I could wait.” “No waiting, just toasting. I want you to toast. Now I wanna eat toast. Give me some toast!” Terry exclaimed.

“Okay, I’ll be right there,” Holt muttered before walking into the room. He stuffed his phone in his pocket and looked to the group. “I have to head back to the precinct.”

“No. Why?” Amy asked. “Someone stole ten thousand dollars from the evidence lockup,” Holt explained. “That’s awful,” Y/N said at the same time her boyfriend exclaimed, “Yes! Oh, awesome.”

He stood up while everyone looked to him confused. “Why is that awesome?” Holt asked. “It’s a case,” Jake explained. “You said I could hop on any case that came up. It’s a Thanksgiving miracle!”

“Wait, Jake. Do you really have to go? I actually kind of wanted you to-“ Y/N began, but he was already grabbing his jacket. “I’m sorry, baby. I’ll see you later, okay?” Jake asked as he bent down to peck her cheek. He then stood up and grinned at the whole group. “Have fun, you guys. Let’s roll!”

And with that, Jake and Holt were walking out the door, leaving the rest of the squad watching after them.

A deflated look crossed Y/N’s face and she looked back to see everyone watching her sadly. “What?” Y/N asked. “We’re sorry. We know how much you were trying to get Jake to like Thanksgiving,” Charles said.

Y/N shrugged. “It’s no big deal,” she said as she forced a smile. “He doesn’t like Thanksgiving and that’s that.”

That was a lie and everyone could tell just from the look in her eyes. It was a huge deal for Y/N, even if it was just a stupid holiday and Jake hadn’t even made an effort to enjoy it for her. Y/N let her eyes drop down to her empty plate, ignoring the looks everyone was still giving her.

“Let’s eat.”

- - -

Y/N let out a small sigh as she put her head in her hands. This could not be happening.

After Jake and Holt and left, the squad had discovered that Amy didn’t know how to cook and that all of the food was disgusting, so the dinner had been ruined.

Wanting to fix it, Charles has suggested going to bar, but they had all been kicked out within minutes of being there. Now they were back the precinct, still all dressed up and still all starving, and Terry was trying to get to Scully’s secret food stash that was hidden away in the ceiling.

How it had come to this? Y/N wasn’t sure. But the one thing she was sure about was that this Thanksgiving was the worst one she had ever had. Maybe it was because she had been trying too hard to get Jake to like it. Maybe that had been her first mistake. After all, if she couldn’t even get her boyfriend to want to stay, then how could she expect to be able to host a great Thanksgiving dinner?

“Sarge, am I too heavy?” Charles asked, breaking Y/N away from the wallowing in her own self-pity that she had just been doing. She lifted her head up and let an amused smile break out onto her face once she caught sight of Charles sitting on Terry’s shoulders.

“No,” Terry answered the man. He then looked to Scully, a fire in his eyes. “Where is it?” “There, the one with the water stain,” Scully said. “There’s a lot of food up there?” Terry asked. “Yeah, it’s a smorgasbord,” Scully assured him.

Y/N perked up slightly as she watched Charles reach for the ceiling tile. Maybe Thanksgiving could still be saved?

However, Y/N was proven wrong when the tile slipped from Charles hands and fell to the ground, revealing old wrappers and rats. Everyone let out screams while Y/N groaned, feeling tears begin to prick her eyes. “Of course,” she muttered to herself. “Of freaking course.”

All she had wanted was to spend her favorite holiday with the man she loved and her new family and now not only had their dinner been ruined three times, but Jake had been gone the whole night just so he could skip out on Thanksgiving.

That plan she had? Yeah, that had pretty much gone out the window.

“I think the rats got to it,” Scully said. “You think?” Terry asked. “This is the greatest thing that’s ever happened,” Rosa muttered as she smiled at the rats.

Not being able to take anymore, Y/N shook her head and stood up with a sniffle. She wiped at her nose and quickly picked up what purse. “Okay, it’s over,” she said defeatedly. “I’m sorry everyone’s Thanksgiving was ruined. You all can go home now, that’s what I’m going to do.”

“Y/N, wait,” Amy called out, but the girl shook her head and looked around at her friends with tear filled eyes. “No, it’s fine. Thanksgiving is over. It’s dead. It was a bust. Just. . .I’ll see you all tomorrow,” Y/N muttered before turning on her heels and beginning to walk out.

“Y/N!” Charles called after her, but the girl was already gone.

- - -

“The money was still in the bookie’s safe. All the numbers match. Let’s head back to Santiago and L/N’s party,” Holt announced as he put the money into his jacket.

Jake frowned. He had been able to miss out on the party because of the case, but now that it was solved, what was his excuse?

Thinking for a moment, the man turned to Holt and gave him a small shake of his head. “Ah, no thanks. I think I’m gonna head home and watch the football game, which was ruined for me!” He yelled as he glared at the men they had just arrested.

“What’s your problem with celebrating Thanksgiving?” Holt asked. “It’s a sucky holiday,” Jake replied. “It’s always sucked. My mom worked. My dad was gone. And I sat at home, watching football.”

“Look, Jake. I came from a very formal family. My parents were not especially affectionate,” Holt told him. “Really? ‘Your Honor’ wasn’t a big snuggler?” Jake asked in amusement.

Holt ignored the man and continued, “But the beauty of being an adult is that you can make a new family with new traditions.” “Well, that’s nice, Captain, but I don’t have a new family yet, so I guess I’m stuck with my awesome old traditions,” Jake said as he turned to walk away.

Holt looked at him confused. “Even L/N?” He asked. Jake blinked abefore turning to look at the Captain. “What about her?” Jake questioned.

“She helped plan this whole night just for you and you don’t think she did that because she cares about you? Because she thinks of you as family?” Holt asked.

Jake blinked in surprise. “She what?” He questioned, not believing that Y/N would plan the night just for him.

“Peralta,” Holt sighed. “L/N planned this whole night for you so that she could show you how fun Thanksgiving can be. It’s her favorite holiday and all she wanted to do was share it with you, to show you how much it meant to her and how much it could mean to you if you let it.”

Jake shook his head. “I don’t think you get it, Captain. Y/N wouldn’t do something like that for me,” he told the man. “You sure about that?” Holt asked as he titled his head slightly.

He didn’t give time for Jake to answer before he sighed and turned to walk away. “Okay. I’ll tell the squad you couldn’t make it.” Holt then walked away leaving Jake by himself.

“Thank you,” Jake muttered, but instead of feeling even the tiniest bit grateful, all he felt was guilty for ruining the night that the girl he loved had planned for him.

“There’s no way,” Jake whispered to himself. Why would Y/N do something like that for him? Still. . .Jake let out a sigh of frustration before hurrying out the door and heading towards his apartment.

After all, he had to change into something nice if he wanted to make it up to his girlfriend, right?

- - -

“I’m here! I’m here!” Jake exclaimed as he walked into the meeting room where the group was all about to chow down on their Thanksgiving meal of foreign foods.

The squad all cheered while Jake, now fully dressed in a suit and tie, smiled and walked over to an empty seat. “Finally something to actually be thankful for.”

“What are you wearing?” Rosa asked in amusement. “Y/N and Santiago said to dress up, so. . .” Jake trailed off as he gestured towards his outfit. “Although, I did it mostly for Y/N. Okay, it was one hundred percent for Y/N.”

“I’d expect as much,” Santiago said. “Well, you look beautiful. That’s my thing now. I’m just owning it.” Jake gave her a grateful smile before his eyes flickered around the room, trying to find the eyes of the one person he really needed to apologize for.

A frown formed on his face once he came up empty handed. “Where’s Y/N?” Jake asked.

The whole squad fell silent and looked down at their plates, trying to avoid the man’s gaze. Jake frowned more and looked to his best friend. “Boyle?” He asked.

Charles looked up at his friend as a guilty look flashed across his face. “She went home,” he suddenly blurted out. Jake looked at the man confused before looking at everyone else for confirmation. “She what?” He asked.

Amy sighed. “She was upset about the whole Thanksgiving thing not going the way she had planned and you leaving, so she went home,” Amy explained.

“And you let her? Even when she was upset?” Jake asked as he quickly stood up. “You’re the one who left her!” Amy shouted in defense.

Jake frowned, knowing that she was right. He was silent for a minute as he tried to think of what to do before he let out a small gasp. Jake then looked to Charles and smiled.

“Boyle, can I borrow some of this food?”

- - -

Y/N stared blankly at the bowl of ice cream that sat in front of her, a million emotions running through her head as she did so.

By now she had ditched her dress for a pair of her comfiest sweatpants and one of Jake’s shirts that she had stolen the last time she was at his place. And as the events of the night continued to haunt her, Y/N began to stuff her face with ice cream, hoping to eat away her feelings and somehow make herself feel better.

Her therapeutic eating didn’t last long before there was a knock on the door. Frowning, Y/N reached over and turned on the TV in an attempt to drown out the knocking and get the person to leave.

However, the knocking only grew louder and more persistent the longer she took and she eventually let out a sigh as she reluctantly turned the TV off and went to the front door.

She threw open the door without a second thought, not caring about her appearance enough to even attempt to look somewhat decent. This was a mistake on her part and Y/N’s eyes widened at the sight of Jake Peralta standing before her dressed up in a nice suit and tie, a strong contrast from the clothes he had been wearing the last time she saw him.

“Jake,” Y/N whispered out in surprise. “What. . .what are you doing here?”

Jake’s eyes scanned over the girl and Y/N started to grow self conscious as she seemed to curl into herself in an attempt to hide how awful she looked. Jake only smiled and let his eyes lock with hers as he stared at her like he always did, like she was the most beautiful thing he had ever had the pleasure of seeing.

He then held up a small paper bag and Y/N was instantly hit with the smell of spices and something that she didn’t recognize but that had her mouth watering. “I brought food,” he said as if it answered everything.

Y/N watched him with weary eyes before smiling softly and taking a step back. “Come on in,” she told him making the boy smile as he did as she said. As he walked in, Y/N took the time to take a good look at Jake. “You’re wearing a suit,” she commented.

“Yeah, someone once told me that you’re supposed to dress up for Thanksgiving meals like this, but it seems I overdressed,” Jake teasingly said as he looked to the girl.

“Damn, I forgot I was wearing this. I. . .I’ll just go change real quick and we-“ Y/N began as she went to walk away, but Jake was quick to grab her wrist and halt her in her tracks.

“You look stunning as always, Y/N,” he assured her. Y/N softened slightly at that and felt herself relax as she looked at the boy. He blushed under her gaze and looked to the floor.

“Listen, I. . .I’m sorry for the way I’ve been acting about this whole Thanksgiving thing. I never really had a family to celebrate with, so it was hard for me to come to terms with the fact that now I do. You put in all this effort to help me have a nice Thanksgiving for once and I was a jerk and I’m sorry. Then there was the whole thing with the toast earlier and how I was rude after you had just said a nice toast. I’m sorry for that too.”

“What I really should’ve said was how thankful I am for you. You’ve made me a better person since the day we met and have given me everything without expecting anything in return. I’m so thankful for you, Y/N, and I’m sorry I don’t tell you that as much as I should. If it’s okay with you, I’d like to have that Thanksgiving dinner with you now. And I promise I won’t be rude or try and leave before it’s over,” Jake said.

He let his eyes flicker back up to her and he frowned slightly once he noticed the tears in her eyes. “You’re crying. Why are you crying? What did I do?” Jake asked, his voice coming out rushed and in a panic.

Y/N just smiled at the boy and shook her head at him before grabbing onto his tie and pulling him forward. Jake blinked in surprise at the sudden proximity and Y/N smiled lovingly at him before whispering, “I love you, Jake Peralta.”

Jake’s mouth fell open in shock before a goofy grin appeared on his face. “I knew it,” he whispered teasingly making the girl give him a look. Jake chuckled and leaned in slightly so that their lips were almost touching. “I love you too, Y/N. Always and forever,” he said.

Y/N smiled before tugging the boy the extra inch closer, resulting in their lips crashing together in a passionate kiss. They kissed for only a moment before Jake was relucnatntly pulling away.

“As much as I would love to keep kissing you and declaring my undying love for you, I just drove fifteen minutes here and the food is already starting to get cold,” Jake pointed out.

Y/N chuckled and leaned forward to peck the boy’s lips. “Then let’s get this food out and start eating! I’m starving!” Y/N exclaimed.

Jake let out a small laugh and pointed at the girl as she began to walk away. “I knew I loved you for a reason,” he muttered.

Y/N just winked at him in response before holding a hand it for him. He quickly took it and smiled in adoration at the girl as she began to walk them towards the dining room.

It was only when they got to the table and Y/N began to put the food out that Jake whispered, “Happy Thanksgiving, Y/N.”

The girl stopped in her tracks and looked back at the boy with a huge grin on her face. She leaned in and gave him a small kiss, a kiss that had him blushing slightly and smiling that goofy and dazed smile of his.

“Happy Thanksgiving, Jake.”

#jake peralta #jake peralta x reader #jake peralta imagine #b99 #b99 x reader #b99 imagine #brooklyn 99 #brooklyn 99 x reader #brooklyn 99 imagine

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lovegetou · 4 years

Text

Pick your top 10 OTPs without reading the questions. (thank you for tagging me @louvegoods had a great time doing it! <3)

harry styles/louis tomlinson (one direction)

remus lupin/sirius black (harry potter)

sherlock holmes/john watson (sherlock BBC)

monica geller/chandler bing (friends)

amy santiago/jake peralta (brooklyn 99)

harry potter/ginny weasley (harry potter)

james potter/lily evans (harry potter)

rich hardbeck/grace blood (skins)

katniss everdeen/peeta mellark (the hunger games)

elio perlman/oliver (call me by your name)

1. Do you remember the episode/scene/chapter that you first started shipping 6? -- i think i ship hinny since... always? But i’m sure i fell completely in love with them in chapter nine of Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince when harry smells ginny perfume in the Amortentia potion.

2. Have you ever read a fanfic about 2? -- yes, all the time actually lol they're my favorite!

3. Has a picture of 4 ever been your screen saver/profile picture/tumblr screen saver? -- no, i never had a blog or any fan account about friends, even though it's my favorite tv series.

4. If 7 were to suddenly break up today, what would your reaction be? -- um, they are dead lol.

5. Why is 1 so important? -- they've been in my life for so long, it means a lot to me. it's part of me nowadays, it's just... who i am, you know.

6. Is 9 a funny ship or a serious ship? -- it's a serious ofc, they're true soulmates. :)

7. Out of all the ships listed, which ship has the most chemistry? -- that's tough, all of them have a lot of chemistry. but i think i'm going to choose amy and jake since they're the most unproblematic couple ever.

8. Out of all your ships listed, which ship has the strongest bond? -- mondler or johnlock, i cannot decide sorry.

9. How many times have you read/watched the 10’s fandom? -- the book only once, but the movie many times.

10. Which ship has lasted the longest? -- mondler or hinny probably, since i believe they're married until this day.

11. How many times, if ever, has 6 broken up? -- once :( but after the war they got together again and then got married! <3

12. If the world was suddenly thrust into a zombie apocalypse, which ship would make it out alive, 2 or 8? -- sirius and remus for sure, they're wizards and already went through a war.

13. Did 7 ever have to hide their relationship for any reason? -- i don't' know, we don't know much about marauders era (sadly).

14. Is 4 still together? -- i believe they're, or at least i wish!

15. Is 10 canon? -- yes :)

16. If all 10 ships were put into a couple’s Hunger Games, which couple would win? -- katniss and peeta ahah, of course!

17. Has anybody ever tried to sabotage 5’s ship? -- i'm not sure, i don't remember lol.

18. Which ship would you defend to the death and beyond? -- larry, johnlock and wolfstar since they aren't ""cannon"".

19. Do you spend hours a day going through 3’s tumblr page? -- not anymore lmao, but i used to do it.

20. If an evil witch descended from the sky and told you that you had to pick one of the ten ships to break up forever or else she’d break them all forever, which ship would you sink? -- elio and oliver, since they're not together anymore lmao.

tagging my newest mutuals + blogs from my activity page: @malvoyy @headfullofnargles @chaos-grrrl @th3mudbloody @malfoy @concussedhufflepuff @lyannastrak @petwrparker + anyone who wanna do it!

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elsaclack · 5 years

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they’re burning all the witches (even if you aren’t one)

read on ao3

“This is a bad idea.”

Despite the roar of the passing trolley and the responding volley of honks from upheld traffic, Jake knows she heard him. Her back is to him and she makes no move to acknowledge him, aside from a slight tilt of her head and a jump of her shoulders in repressed laughter.

“I told you to meet me in the park,” he tries again as he approaches, lowering his voice accordingly. She still hasn’t turned; he’s afforded a rare view of the back of her head, eyes following the waterfall of hair that falls halfway down her back in slow, tantalizing waves. “Why’d you change the location?”

“First of all,” she says coolly, “when have I ever done what you told me to do?”

He barks out a laugh as he drops off the stoop, closing his eyes as the sound echoes back to him off the other side of the underpass. Pedestrians and vehicle traffic intermingle and pass before them; despite his misgivings, he has to admit, this is a much better place to blend in and go unnoticed.

And blending in is the most important thing to Amy Santiago. She’s looking straight ahead but her expression is relaxed, and after a moment of studying her profile, he follows her lead. “Secondly,” she says once he’s focused on the graffiti on the far end of the underpass, “I got a tip that there might be some action here later. I wanted to be early.”

“So punctual,” he says with a smile. “I’m assuming that it’s action we’ll hear about later?”

“Maybe.”

He shakes his head, still smiling, and leans forward to plant his elbows on his knees. “Well, I appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedule to meet with me.”

She snorts. “Your facetiousness is noted,” she says. “And it’s really no trouble - I know it must be bad if you’re asking for my help.”

He bites the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing. As always, she’s startlingly accurate. “Double homicide,” he mutters once his laughter is in check. From the corner of his eye, he sees her lean forward, too - if only slightly. “Both vics died from multiple stab wounds, but they were also shot in the head post-mortem. Execution style. Both bullet wounds had gunpowder burns along the edges, so it was extremely close-range.”

Amy clears her throat. “Any evidence?”

“Nothing substantial yet. Labs are still running tests on the bullets, but there were no casings on site, so it’s not likely to get me very far. Every surface in the house was wiped clean, which makes me think it was professional.”

“And the victims - were they related in any way?”

“Husband and wife, though they were apparently estranged and not on speaking terms, according to the neighbors. None of them heard anything, which again makes me think this was a professional job.” He turns his head slightly, peering at her sideways. “Any of this sound familiar to you?”

She narrows her eyes at him, lips pursed, and he could swear the gears turning in her head are visible even from here. “I know of a few people who might fit the bill,” she finally says, calculating eyes darting back to the opposite side of the underpass. “You got any leads?”

“A vendor who was set up across the street that night has given us a composite sketch, but we’re not sure how accurate it is, since he kept contradicting himself. We questioned him, too, but he checks out -”

“We?” Amy repeats.

He drops his head for a moment. “She’s my partner, Santiago,” he says quietly.

“She doesn’t trust me.”

“Can you blame her? Most cops tend not to trust the badass vigilante types.” Amy scoffs, rolling her eyes and shaking her head. “Diaz has helped me cover for you more times than I can count, you know. She may not trust you, but she does respect you.”

“I’m so honored.”

It’s his turn to roll his eyes. “Your facetiousness is noted,” he says in a high-pitched voice, and Amy’s responding glare could wilt the flowers sprouting up from the concrete beneath his feet. “Anyways, we have a composite sketch, but we haven’t released it yet since we haven’t been able to verify -”

“Let me see it.”

He pulls his phone from his pocket without another word, pulling the image up quickly and passing it off to her.

And the moment she seems to fully take it in, the color drains from her face.

“I don’t know him,” she says, all but shoving his phone back. Suddenly she’s edging away from him, leaning as far to the right as she can, attention darting and unfocused on the traffic around them. “Never seen anyone like that.”

“Hey,” he grabs her wrist and she whips back toward him, wrenching her arm from his grasp so quickly he barely registers the movement. “Wait, what’s going on?”

“I told you,” she snarls, “I don’t know him and I can’t help you.”

“Okay, it’s very obvious that you do know him - or know of him, at least - who is he? And why are you so scared of him?”

She’s panicking, like a rabbit caught in a trap, eyes wide and fists clenching and unclenching rapidly. “It’s not - I’m not - just -” a passing pedestrian trips over her foot and she lurches forward blindly, seizing at her ankle. “Just don’t, okay? Don’t pursue this, don’t - don’t.”

“What? Don’t pursue this? Are you serious?” She looks to be in agony, her expression so bald-faced he feels his own chest tingling with anxiety. “You’re the one who quit the Academy so that you could help people without all the stupid rules -”

“Rules aren’t stupid, it’s the bureaucratic red tape that contradicts and negates the rules that are meant to help people that are stupid, and that isn’t the point, Peralta. Please, just - just trust me. This case is so much bigger than you could ever imagine -”

“Tell me his name, Santiago.” he interrupts firmly. She shakes her head, stubborn, and he inches closer. “Tell me why you’re scared of him.”

Her chest is heaving and she’s blinking rapidly, but she’s no longer scrambling to get away from him. “Look, there - there are bad guys, and there are villains. There’s crime, and then there’s evil. He -” she points to Jake’s phone still clutched in his hand “- is pure, unadulterated evil. Everything he stands for, everything he’s involved in, is evil. You need to let this go.”

“I can’t. Because those victims have families and those families deserve answers. And this guy deserves to be brought to justice. Him being evil is all the more reason for me to keep pursuing this. Someone has to bring him down.”

“Not you, Peralta.” she says firmly. “You’re not gonna be able to do this alone.”

“I won’t be alone, I’ll have -”

“Diaz won’t be enough,” she snaps. “He’s cunning and cruel and if he finds out that you’re pursuing him, neither one of you will stand a chance. Please, Jake,” her voice cracks, and he’s paralyzed by the desperation in her eyes. “Don’t pursue this. Drop it. Forget it ever crossed your desk. Please.”

“Okay,” he hears himself say. The desperation has not diminished. “Okay, I’ll drop it. I promise.”

He offers her his pinky, and she stares down at it for a beat. Her chest is heaving slightly with the intensity of her urging, but after a moment she raises her hand and hooks her own pinky around his, squeezing firmly.

Her touch is far warmer than he was expecting.

And it isn’t until she’s walked away, disappeared into the flow of foot traffic, that he realizes that was the first time she’s ever called him by his first name.

His name is Freddy Maliardi.

It took a while - far longer than Jake was hoping - but after cross-referencing a dozen criminal databases nationwide, they get a hit on a mugshot marked as a close match out of California.

He served twelve years for aggravated assault, but that isn’t what interests him - what does interest him are the twelve counts of alleged first degree murder, all of which were dropped during his trial due to insufficient evidence.

Maliardi is thin and sickly-looking in his mugshots, but his eyes are dark and glassy - almost dead.

And despite the fact that it’s just a grainy picture, Jake shivers, Amy’s words still ringing in his ears.

“So Santiago didn’t recognize him?” Rosa asks from the other side of the briefing room.

Jake grunts, feigning focus on finding a free thumbtack to add Maliardi’s mugshot to their steadily-growing evidence board. “He’s pretty average-looking,” he says evenly, “and the composite wasn’t the most accurate compared to the real thing.”

“True, although that doesn’t answer my question.” Her heavy combat boots scuff along the tile floor as she approaches, but he doesn’t look around; she pulls even with him and stops, surveying their evidence board with her arms crossed loosely over her middle. “It’s not solid enough to hold up in court, yet, but it’s a start,” she finally mutters. “Is Santiago working her magic or should we start canvasing the scene?”

He clenches his jaw at the contempt in her tone, but stays quiet. His relationship with Amy has always been a bit of a thorn between himself and Rosa, though she seems to have less of a problem with it now than she did way back at the beginning, when Amy’s “anonymous tips” lead to him solving five cases in the amount of time it took her to solve one. “Let’s start with calling the vendor and asking him to come down to verify that this is who he saw that day,” he says. “No point in canvasing if we’ve got the wrong guy.”

He sees Rosa nod in his peripheral vision, but she remains rooted to the spot. “I’m sorry,” she finally mutters. “I know she’s...helpful.”

“She is,” Jake confirms quietly.

Again, Rosa nods. “Probably best to keep me in the dark, but is it safe to assume that we’re just getting the evidence trail and she’ll deliver this guy in a few days? Or -”

“She’s not helping this time,” Jake interrupts. “She took one look at the composite and freaked out. Said he’s pure evil. She didn’t want anything to do with him.”

“What, she’s scared of him?” Jake shrugs, eyes glued to the mugshot. “Why?”

“No idea. But I intend to find out.”

Rosa hovers for another moment, before stepping sideways toward the briefing room doors. “I’ll call the vendor and set up a time for him to come in,” she says, subdued.

Jake nods, jaw clenched, waiting until the doors are closed again. He approaches the evidence board slowly, until the mugshot is just inches from the end of his nose. Maliardi’s cold, dead eyes seem to track his every move.

“I’m sorry, Amy,” he whispers.

For all of her hidden depth and range of emotions, Rosa Diaz has never been one to succumb to terror. Fear in general is not an emotion she has to handle with any regularity; beyond her childhood, she’s hard pressed to pinpoint any one time she’s ever truly felt scared.

Until now.

Fear claws rhythmically up her throat, choking off her airway, and no matter how hard she concentrates on the feeling of her lungs expanding and contracting she can’t shake the feeling of suffocation. The shadows she’s currently shrouded in certainly aren’t helping, but she won’t leave them - she can’t leave them.

Someone may recognize her.

The butt of her gun pressing hard against her palms is the one reassuring lifeline keeping her afloat amidst the shuddering darkness around her, and she grips it as hard as she can as voices approach, crest, and fade from the other end of the alley. She’s been waiting all of two minutes but already it feels like a lifetime - two minutes waiting are two minutes wasted, two minutes she’ll never get back, two minutes more of whatever he’s going through wherever he is -

“Diaz?”

Rosa jumps a foot in the air, nearly whipping her gun out despite the voice’s quiet, gentle tone. Amy Santiago stands ten feet away, hands raised in surrender, eyes wide and uncertain as Rosa heaves for breath. “Jesus Christ,” Rosa snarls, flattening her hand over her hammering heart.

“What’s going on?” Santiago asks slowly, hands still raised. “Where’s Jake?”

And even though adrenaline is still coursing through her veins, Rosa feels her heart squeezing mercilessly at the mention of her partner’s name. “I need your help,” she says quietly.

Somehow, Santiago’s alarm seems to double over. “Where’s Jake?” she repeats, stepping toward her carefully.

“Maliardi,” Rosa says, and even in the faint light she can see how quickly Santiago pales. “We were going to interview a witness to confirm the mugshot was who he saw on the scene, but Peralta got ahead of me ‘cause I had to go back to the car to get his stupid notebook, and by the time I caught up, I - I - they were shoving him into the trunk of a car -”

“How long have they had him?” Santiago’s voice has gone ragged, steely, like the sharpened edge of a serrated blade.

“Twelve hours,” Rosa says hoarsely.

Briefly, Santiago squeezes her eyes shut. “He’s still alive,” she finally says.

Something like relief briefly flares to life, like a match in the pit of a pitch-dark cave. “What makes you - how do you know?”

“Because they’re waiting for me.”

Ice floods through her entire body; without a second thought, Rosa rips her gun out of her jacket and points it directly between Santiago’s eyes.

To her credit, Santiago looks little more than annoyed. “Not like that!” she snaps, but Rosa refuses to lower her gun. “They’re using him to draw me out and force me to intervene. They’ve been trying to get a reaction out of me for months now, but I haven’t directly engaged. They must’ve figured out that Jake - that I -” she stops and presses the heels of her hands against her eyes. “He’s still alive because they’re waiting to kill him in front of me. Because they know that he’s - important to me.”

Slowly, Rosa lowers her gun, surprised at the genuine distress rolling off of her in waves. It’s been obvious for months now that Jake has been nursing a secret, hideously inappropriate crush on the morally-grey vigilante superhero-wannabe standing before her now, but never in a million years did she suspect that that superhero-wannabe would actually return those hideously inappropriate feelings.

“We’re doing everything we can on our end,” Rosa says, and Santiago nods, looking like she’s hanging off of Rosa’s every word. “We’ve put out APBs on Maliardi, the witness, and the car they drove off in, but it’s been hours and we’re no closer to finding them than we were at the very beginning. I know we’ll find him eventually, but I’m afraid - I’m afraid we might not be fast enough.”

“So you called me,” Santiago offers quietly when Rosa does not continue.

“I know you don’t really have any allegiance to me. We don’t have a lot of history, and what little we do have has been...complicated.” Santiago clenches her jaw, but says nothing else. “I know that you’re scared of Maliardi. I know there’s a history there that I don’t know about, that Jake doesn’t even know about, and I know that the idea of going after him alone is - is probably terrifying. I don’t have any right to ask for your help and I won’t pretend like I don’t need it. Because I do. I need your help, so badly. I know that I don’t stand a chance at solving this and saving him before something really bad goes down. He needs you, Amy. You’re the only chance he’s got - that any of us has got. Please, please help him.”

She swallows hard, gaze searching Rosa’s face. “You realize that if I get caught, they’ll kill him, right?” she asks, voice low. “I may be his only chance of getting out of this alive, but that’s only if I can get to him before they catch me. I’m his best chance, but I’m also his biggest liability. Are you sure?”

“Never been more positive of anything in my life,” Rosa answers quickly.

A beat passes, and then Amy nods, expression quickly slipping into a steely mask of grim determination. “Keep your phone on.” she mutters before backing into the shadows and disappearing from sight.

Through the haze of blood and agony, Jake tastes salt water.

He’s certain it’s a psychological by-product of the salty air blowing in through the busted window to the right of where he’s bound, whipping off the surface of the churning sea beyond it. It fades in and out of his senses, much like his consciousness, but it’s never stronger than it is when Maliardi is pounding the unyielding curve of his steel-toed boots into Jake’s ribs.

His hands are shaking where they’re bound behind his back and Jake gasps for air, grunts and moans of pain escaping his chest of their own volition. Maliardi paces back and forth before him, watching, those dark eyes all the more dead-looking now that they’re up-close and personal.

He’s been at this for hours, starting from the moment Jake lurched back to consciousness bound and gagged here on the floor. There are a half-dozen other men loitering around them, in varying degrees of engagement; a couple of them jeer and mock his screams, some snort with laughter, one has yet to look up from his phone.

That one’s the leader, Jake’s sure of it.

They haven’t really talked to him, outside of taunts. It’s been clear to him since hour one that they’re waiting for someone - that torturing him is merely a way to pass the time.

He isn’t sure how much more of this he can take.

Maliardi kicks him again - inches from his groin - and Jake screams, biting down on his gag until he’s positive his teeth have cracked. The other men are laughing again, and Maliardi is grinning, and as the tears clear up from Jake’s vision, he registers that the leader has looked up from his phone for the first time all day.

“Enough,” the leader says, and Maliardi backs off at once, retreating to the far wall and leaning back with his hands folded behind him. “We need him alive until she gets here.”

“We’ve been waiting for hours,” one of the others pipes up timidly. “Shouldn’t she be here by now?”

“Maybe she isn’t coming,” another one says.

“She’ll be here,” the leader says calmly, knowingly.

Jake heaves down as much air as he can get through his nose, staring up at the ceiling, trying to make sense of the conversation. It’s hard to track with his own noisy breathing and the pain radiating through his body, but he understands enough to know that he was correct in his suspicion that they’re waiting on someone.

And that the rest of his lifespan can be measured by that mystery woman’s commute to this warehouse.

It does not occur to him that she might just be his saving grace until after the gunfire has already started.

The world is narrow and unforgiving where he’s trapped flailing on his back, but somehow he remains relatively unscathed even as the volley of bullets exploding deeper in the bowels of this room whiz over his head and crack against the wall to his right. Voices, forever ingrained in his memory for all the taunting and jeering and the like, cry out in the kind of finality that sets his teeth on edge, but instinctively he knows that for every heavy thud of a body hitting the floor, he inches closer and closer to freedom.

As quickly as it started, it stops. And once again, he’s left struggling to hear anything over his own noisy breathing.

The footsteps that approach him are quicker and lighter than any other he’s heard all afternoon, and a split-second later his hazy vision is focusing in on Amy Santiago’s desperate, blood-spattered face. “I told you to drop it,” she growls.

Despite her obvious rage, her fingers are exceedingly gentle where they work the gag out of his mouth. He gasps, lungs filling to capacity for the first time in hours, and lets his head fall back, content in knowing that she’s going to keep him safe. “When have I - ever - done what y-you - told me t’do?” he manages to rasp once his jaw has readjusted.

She tries to stay stoic, she really does, but he catches the exasperated smile that cracks through her glare, and it’s like fireflies flickering in the pit of his gut. Briefly, her hands frame his face, and then she’s scanning down the rest of his body, gingerly picking his shirt up away from his torso and examining what bits of skin she can see through the torn material of his jeans. “Nothing fatal,” she murmurs to herself as she gently touches his face again, thumbs stroking his cheekbones. “You definitely need medical attention, but you’re gonna be alright. Your team is on their way right now, they’ll be here so soon.”

He hums out a broken note, eyes closed in relief and at her touch, relishing in the kindness of each gentle caress. “Good,” he mumbles, “I’m really tired.”

“I know you are,” she whispers. “Just rest, Jake. They’ll be here soon.”

Her hands are no longer on his face and he’s panicking, alone, in pain. “Amy!” he yelps, eyes flying open to find his view of the ceiling unobstructed. “Amy!”

She’s there again, face contorted in alarm, hands warm and steady where they press into his chest. “It’s okay, Jake,” she says quickly, “it’s okay, it’s okay, calm down before you hurt yourself -”

“Please,” he gasps, “don’t go, d-don’t leave me -”

She stares, frozen, gaze burning. “I’m sorry, Jake,” she whispers, barely audible over the sirens quickly fading in from somewhere outside. “I have to go, I’m so sorry - I promise I’ll find you, okay? I swear, I will find you.”

He can barely keep his vision focused, so close to the edge of unconsciousness is he; the last thing he sees is her leaning forward, her lips brushing against his forehead, and then -

And then, darkness.

He’s in and out over the next few hours, each foray into consciousness fleeting, but long enough to know that he’s in the hospital under protective custody, both from the officer standing guard outside his closed door and Rosa, who stubbornly refuses to leave his side. Others have filtered in and out, he’s heard their voices distorted through the filter of sleep; he learns from their quiet conversations that every person who was in the warehouse with him earlier is dead.

Including Freddy Maliardi.

And according to Captain Holt, they have absolutely no idea who is responsible. No idea who would mow through a room full of hardened criminals, including the kingpin of the Ianucci crime family, but leave him alive.

Rosa remains a steady fixture at his side even after visiting hours are over, slumped over in sleep when he briefly surfaces around midnight, clearly insistent on keeping vigil.

Which is why it’s so disorienting when she’s suddenly gone around 2 in the morning.

He blinks, trying to make sense of the empty space she seemingly just occupied. His senses are dulled from whatever painkillers are coursing through his veins, but he’s fairly certain he can’t hear any movement in the bathroom; for the first time since he woke up this morning, he’s alone.

At least, he’s alone until he hears the doorknob turning half a moment later.

It’s hard to tell through the darkness, but he’s pretty sure the person easing their way into the room is a woman. Not Rosa, though - her hair seems straight, no errant, wild curls to catch the moonlight spilling through the window on the opposite side of the room. The woman eases her way inside and quietly closes the door, and then pauses. He can feel her gaze on him, even from here.

“Who’s that?” he asks (slurs).

“You’re awake?”

And now that he’s heard his voice, he feels a little silly for asking. “Amy?”

“Hey,” she crosses the distance between them quickly and claims Rosa’s seat, dragging it closer to the edge of the bed. And now that she’s inches away he can see more details through the darkness, like the way her concern seems to be fading with each second that passes or the way she nibbles on her lower lip subconsciously. “Rosa said you’ve been sleeping since you got here yesterday - how d’you feel?”

He hums. “Surprised,” he says after a moment, and her brows raise in an unvoiced question. “Didn’t know I’ve been here a whole day already.”

She nods, gaze drifting down his neck and chest. “You were pretty beat up,” she murmurs. “And you lost a lot of sleep working on the case. You needed it.”

Slowly, he reaches up, catching a lock of her hair between his fingers and gently tugging. “Are you okay?”

He sees her jaw clench as her eyes squeeze shut. “I will be,” she says after a moment, eyes fluttering open again to meet his gaze. “Knowing that you’re okay definitely helps.”

He swallows, letting her hair slip through his fingers, mesmerized at the silky texture. “You saved me,” he says softly.

She bites down on the inside of her cheek, her right hand gently closing over his forearm bent up toward her hair. “You needed me,” she murmurs, and he nods. “I couldn’t just leave you with them.”

He closes his eyes, the memories of the warehouse flashing through his mind, but he quickly banishes them; all that matters is Amy, now, and the slow, steady lines her fingers stroke into the skin of his forearm.

“I can’t stay long,” she whispers, and his eyes pop open again. “Rosa snuck me in, but I only have a few minutes before the other officer comes back -”

“I don’t want you to go,” he says quickly, and she slides her fingers around his forearm again, squeezing in what he thinks might be a reassuring way. “Please, you saved my life, and I - I want you to stay, please stay, please.”

“I can’t,” she breathes. “I’m so sorry, Jake, but I - I can’t. They might figure out it was me, and if I’m here with you when they figure it out then you’ll be in trouble, too -”

“It was self defense,” he argues, aware of the fact that his voice is rising in pitch and cracking from his own desperation. “You didn’t do it for fun, or because it felt good, you did it to protect yourself and to save me -”

“You’re right,” she says quickly, her voice low and soothing. “You’re right, you’re absolutely right. I didn’t do it because it felt good. But, Jake, the thing is...I’d do it over and over and over again if it meant keeping you safe. I’d do whatever it takes to keep you safe. And right now, the best thing I can do for you to keep you safe is to get as far away from you as possible. Right or wrong, I’m responsible for what happened in that warehouse, and I - I refuse to let you and your career be collateral damage for my actions.”

“But I don’t want you to leave,” he all but whimpers.

“It won’t be forever,” she says softly, free hand reaching to gently card through the curls that have fallen against his forehead. “I just need to lay low for a while, until all of this blows over. I promise you, it won’t be for long. And you have my number - if you ever need anything, I’m just a call or a text away. No matter what.”

He bites his tongue, trying and failing to distract himself from the sharp emotions jutting up his throat and welling in his eyes. “This isn’t fair,” he mutters as the first tears fall.

Her smile is melancholic, and it makes his heart ache. “You’re starting to sound like me, now,” she murmurs, thumb brushing over his forehead. “Don’t pull too hard at that thread - they need good cops like you on the force.”

He swallows thickly, fingers still tugging on her hair. Slowly, he increases the pressure, until she acquiesces and bends her spine a little more. She pauses with less than three inches between the ends of their noses, searching, waiting.

He lifts his hand up through her hair to the back of her head, pulling her down to close the distance, meeting her lips in a slow, sweet kiss. The fireflies that ignited in the pit of his gut before are spreading quickly, bursting through every inch of his body, buzzing with excitement and tenderness and affection as her fingers slowly curve around the back of his neck.

She pulls away much too soon, leaving him aching for more. She looks winded when he manages to pry his own eyes open; winded and vulnerable, and maybe, just a little bit hopeful.

“I’ll be back before you know it,” she murmurs, fingers tangling with his as she stands beside his bed.

“Promise?”

A shy smile spreads across her face as her pinky hooks through his and squeezes. “I promise,” she echoes with a nod. “I’ll see you soon.”

He resists the urge to reach for her as she retreats back toward the door, holding his breath until she’s out of the room and the door has clicked shut behind her. He releases it in a long, loud exhale, vision blurry as he stares up at the ceiling.

Rosa makes her way inside a few minutes later, the whites of her eyes visible with the steadily increasing light coming in through the window. “You alright?” she asks, paused at the foot of his bed.

“Yeah,” he grunts, still staring at the ceiling. “Kinda screwed up that she has to go into hiding, now. But I’ll be fine.”

“It’s not fair,” Rosa agrees as she drops into her seat. “She risked a lot to save you, and now it’s like she’s being punished for that. It’s fucked up.”

He turns his head to look at her head-on. “It is fucked up,” he murmurs softly.

She flashes him a half-smile that almost touches her eyes. “So what’re you gonna do now?”

He inhales through his nose, gaze flicking back up to the ceiling. “I’m gonna wait for her,” he says steadily.

Rosa’s quiet for a beat. “It could take years,” she says quietly.

“I know. I don’t care, though. She’s worth the wait.”

“She won’t expect you to wait. Sacrificial lamb complex and all that.”

“I know that, too. That’s part of why I - y’know.” He clears his throat, and Rosa offers him a plastic cup full of half-melted ice chips. “I don’t care how long it takes,” he says, waving his hand in refusal. “She’s worth it. All of it.”

Rosa seems to contemplate it in silence for a while. “I’m starting to agree,” she finally murmurs.

He doesn’t see her again for eight months.

When he does finally spot her, she’s alone, standing still in the midst of a sea of pedestrians, her face like a beacon in the night despite everything that stands between them.

He forgets what he’s doing, why he’s there, who he’s with. His entire world narrows down to her, standing on the sidewalk, less than a block between them.

A slow, hesitant smile begins to spread across her face.

It grows to blinding proportions by the time he actually reaches her.

He wastes no time once his arms are around her, kissing her thoroughly, momentarily forgetting they’re on a sidewalk surrounded by people. She doesn’t seem to care, either - she kisses back enthusiastically, hands curling along the back of his head and neck, respectively, anchoring him to her.

And in an instant, every last ounce of heartache from the last eight months is eradicated.

“Please tell me you’re staying,” he gasps when their lips finally part. “Please say you’re staying.”

“I’m staying,” she breathes, fingers squeezing tighter. “I’m not going anywhere.”

And just like every other promise she’s made to him, she keeps this one, too.

#brooklyn nine nine #brooklyn 99 fanfiction #peraltiago fanfiction #peraltiago #jake x amy #my b99 fics #this wiped me out y'all i hope you enjoy it #THREE FICS IN ONE DAY!!!! NEW RECORD!!!!!!#apparently the secret ingredient for me is sleep deprivation and a LOT of old criminal minds clips #anyways

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peraltasames · 5 years

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if the stars don’t align, if it doesn’t stop time

Pairing: Jake Peralta/Amy Santiago

Desc: Amy doesn't realize what was missing in her relationship with Teddy...until Jake.

Notes: here's some fluff bc my last post was so angsty. from tumblr request: "Can i request a fic with parallels between Amy's relationship with Teddy and with Jake and how much happier Jake makes her? Thank you, love your writing!" title from not like the movies - katy perry but it's also heavily inspired by begin again - taylor swift which happened to come on while i was writing this and the chorus is so them it hurts

Read on AO3

Two months into Jake’s time undercover, Amy arrests a perp named Joe Uterus.

The first time she hears Rosa say his name, before they’ve caught him killing a stray dog - he’s a complete psychopath - she looks up to meet the eyes of the person that should be sitting across the desk from her, laughing and making immature jokes. But he’s not there, and the room is silent.

That evening, she goes to dinner with Teddy. The restaurant is nice, the food is good, the company is…well, it’s Teddy. He’s her boyfriend. Her responsible, mature, intelligent boyfriend who she really, truly likes most of the time.

Surely it doesn’t make her that bad of a person that she’s planning in her head a way to get out of going back to his place after dinner so she can go home and watch Law and Order. Nobody wants to be with their significant other all the time (even if she’s only slept over there once this month and she left at six the next morning).

“Amy? Did you hear what I was saying?”

Amy snaps out of her thoughts, nodding her head with a fake smile. “Yeah, pilsners,” she guesses, hoping it’s correct. She’s like, ninety-nine percent sure it is.

Teddy nods, taking a sip of the boring drink that her brothers joked was the personification of Teddy himself if he were a type of alcohol (Tony confidently declared that he would be tequila) after he came to her parents’ place for dinner one time because he saw the text on her phone from her mother inviting him and there was no way she could get out of it.

“So, um, I arrested a perp named Joe Uterus today,” Amy says with a sip of her wine, a small grin on her face at the ridiculous name.

“What did you get him for?” Teddy asks, expression still blank.

Amy shakes her head, laughing. “His name was Joe Uterus. It doesn’t matter what he did, that name is hilarious.”

Teddy shrugs. “Nothing funny about crime. Anyways, as I was saying, that pilsner convention in Jersey next month might be a fun weekend getaway, we can…”

Amy slips back into her own thoughts as Teddy rambles on for what will likely be the rest of their meal. She thinks about what she needs to buy at the grocery store and what she should wear to work tomorrow and, in the back of her mind, of messy brown hair and leather jackets and I kinda wish something could happen between us…romantic-styles, potentially the last words he will ever say to her.

She really hopes they’re not.

Two months into Jake and Amy’s relationship, they go to a restaurant that Amy faintly recognizes but can’t quite remember why or when she came here.

Jake pulls out the chair for her to sit down, his hand barely skimming the side of her tight black dress as she sits down, making her body tingle with the best kind of nervous anticipation. She still, without fail, always feels like a sixteen year-old girl before every time she gets to see him. She’s grateful for the comfortable chair supporting her; she’s been weak in the knees since he helped her out of the car and placed a hand on her lower back.

“Sorry I’ve been talking about myself all night,” Amy apologizes, realizing he spent the entire car ride here listening to her rant about this annoying beat cop that always gives his unsanctioned advice on how she should solve her cases.

“It’s okay,” Jake says, sliding into the chair across from her. “I like listening to you rant, it’s cute when your face gets all red.”

She can’t help the blush creeping onto her cheeks, tucking her hair behind both of her ears absent-mindedly. Jake always smiles when she does that, and she can’t figure out why for the life of her.

“Oh, I forgot to tell you something! You’re gonna love this,” she says excitedly. “One of my brothers picked Die Hard at our family movie night last week and they’re all, like, obsessed with it now. We’re gonna be watching Bruce Willis movies every time until it’s my turn again, I swear.”

Jake laughs, throwing his head back. “That’s so awesome. If I ever meet them, remind me to give them my recommendations. Santiago movie night will never be the same.”

“When Anthony comes to Brooklyn next week, I definitely will,” Amy says, noting that his smile grows a little bit at her casual shift from if to when. “Seriously though, I know you love them, but does every Bruce Willis movie have to be an action movie? There’s only so much I can take.”

“Hey! It’s what he does, he’s basically the king of action movies.”

“Well,” Amy says with a small smirk, a joke forming in her brain. “I guess it goes to show what they say about old habits…”

As her joke lands on him, Jake’s eyes light up and he looks at her like she hung the moon. She’s a little shocked when he leans across the table and takes her lips in his. The kiss is chaste, but still manages to make her feel dizzy the second he pulls away from her.

“Babe, you just - a Die Hard reference and a pun, you’re…” he gives a small shake of his head, his face softening as he meets her gaze. “You’re amazing.”

She grabs his hand over the table, the contact enough to sustain her while they continue to talk and laugh and eat and drink things other than pilsners. Eventually, it’s not enough and she’s dragging him into a cab headed for his apartment. Jake tips the driver generously for not making any comments about them making out for the entire ten-minute drive.

She doesn’t wish even once that night that she were back at home watching Law and Order. She doesn’t leave early the next morning before he wakes up - she wakes after he does, with her head still on his chest as he presses kisses to her hair.

There’s no point in compromising when it comes to love, Amy realizes. With Jake Peralta, she never has to.

#otp: you're not allowed to fall in love with me #b99 fic #b99 #fic request #hello i am back but with fluff this time #yay for fluff #myfics

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urwarriorangel · 6 years

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<3 urwarriorangel’s writing challenge <3

hello my darling angels! i have started a writing challenge because i want to read more of what you write. i’m calling this a challenge because that’s what i’ve read others call it? rules are listed below! all submissions will be read by yours truly and (if they follow the p basic rules) i will post them all on a masterlist! i will reblog them and give you feedback because that’s what should happen regardless and also i love you guys! (gif not mine!)

rules

*no rape/incest/underage sex/etc.

*if you choose to write smut, you must be 18+!!! the characters you’re writing for must be 18+!!

*must be character x reader! you can write for multiple characters, but it still must be a reader insert!

*it’s first come first serve for characters, meaning there are character limits. multiple people can write for the same character, but they are capped. so please message me as soon as you see a character you want to write for!

*only one prompt per fic! (bonus points if you use any of my original prompts lol!) (also prompts can only be used once)

*triggers must be tagged. if there are any triggers in your fic, you must have a trigger warning. i cannot emphasize this enough.

*fic should be at least 500 words, if it’s longer (which please make it as long as you’d like!) you have to add a ‘read more’

*must tag me in the fic and use # urwarriorangelwritingchallenge <3

*fic should be a new original, not an old piece being resubmitted or a part of an already existing series. (you can write a series for this challenge if you’d like!)

*bonus points if you’re a poc!writer with a poc!reader <3 <3 <3

*you must respect the sexuality of the character! if you would like for an lgbtq+ character, their sexuality should not change in the fic. thank you!

*please send me a message with the character(s) you’d like to write for and the prompt!

example: damon salvatore + “i don’t know how much longer i can go on”

~the masterlist will be posted on august 13th! (if this goes well aka if people participate i would love to do this more often!)~

categories allowed:

anything your heart desires. if you’re going to write fluff please keep it compelling! add a few different styles together! give me some angst, some smut. make it a mystery! i mean absolutely no disrespect to those who write/read only fluff, but personally i find fluff a little more fun when it’s got multiple components! (if you write only fluff, please go ahead and write fluff! i will read it and i’m sure i’ll love it! these are just my personal preferences!)

i love aus very much, so please don’t shy away from them!

characters & prompts under the cut!

characters (five slots for each character)

agents of shield

al mackenzie antoine “trip” triplett daisy “skye” johnson grant ward jemma simmons lance hunter leopold fitz lincoln campbell

brooklyn 99

amy santiago charles boyle gina linetti jake peralta raymond holt rosa diaz terrence jeffords

buffy the vampire slayer

angel buffy summers cordelia chase rupert giles william the bloody aka spike

criminal minds

aaron hotchner david rossi derek morgan elle greenaway emily prentiss jennifer jareau luke alvez penelope garcia spencer reid

defenders-ish

billy russo frank castle jessica jones luke cage matt murdock

friends

chandler bing joey tribbiani monica geller phoebe buffay rachel green ross geller

game of thrones

arya stark benjen stark daenerys targaryen eddard stark jaime lannister jon snow khal drogo robb stark samwell tarly sansa stark tyrion lannister

gossip girl

blair waldorf carter baizen chuck bass dan humphrey nate archibald serena van der woodsen vanessa abrams

harry potter

draco malfoy fred weasley george weasley harry potter hermione granger remus lupin ronald weasley sirius black (young) tom riddle

hawaii five-0

adam noshimuri chin ho kelly daniel williams kono kalakaua michael noshimuri steve mcgarrett

jane the virgin

adam alvaro jane gloriana villanueva petra solano rafael solano

lucky number slevin

slevin kelevra

mcu

bruce banner aka hulk brunnhilde aka my valkyrie queen bucky barnes aka winter soldier clint barton aka hawkeye drax aka the destroyer erik stevens aka killmonger gamora aka um need we say more? janet van dyne aka wasp loki aka loki m’baku aka you already know mantis aka mantis aka a fucking cutie may parker aka ailf nakia aka loml okoye aka incredible badass peggy carter aka kickass peter parker aka spider-man peter quill aka star-lord pietro maximoff aka quicksilver sam wilson aka falcon scott lang aka antman shuri aka an angel stephen strange aka dr. strange steve rogers aka captain america t’challa aka black panther thor aka thor tony stark aka iron-man wanda maximoff aka scarlet witch

new girl

coach nick miller

pretty little liars

aria montgomery caleb rivers emily fields ezra fitz hanna marin jason dilaurentis mona vanderwaal noel kahn spencer hastings wren kingston

reign

francis mary stuart nostradamus sebastian

riverdale

archie andrews betty cooper cheryl blossom fangs fogarty fp jones fred andrews jason blossom josie mccoy jughead jones kevin keller malachai charles!reggie mantle ross!reggie mantle sweet pea toni topaz valerie brown veronica lodge

shadowhunters

alec lightwood clary fray isabelle lightwood jace herondale lucian grey magnus bane simon lewis

teen wolf

allison argent chris argent cora hale derek hale isaac lahey jackson whittermore jordan parrish kira yukimura liam dunbar lydia martin malia tate peter hale scott mccall stiles stilinski theo raeken

the 100

bellamy blake clarke griffin echo finn collins jasper jordan john murphy king roan lexa lincoln monty green nathan miller octavia blake ontari raven reyes wells jaha

the originals

davina claire elijah mikaelson freya mikaelson hayley marshall kol mikaelson lucian castle niklaus mikaelson marcel gerard rebekah mikaelson

the vampire diaries

bonnie bennett caroline forbes damon salvatore elena gilbert jeremy gilbert katherine pierce malachi parker mary louise matt donovan nora hildegard olivia parker tyler lockwood stefan salvatore sybil

x-men

alex summers aka havok charles xavier aka young!professor x erik lehnsherr aka magneto hank mccoy aka beast jean grey aka phoenix logan aka wolverine peter maximoff aka quiksilver ororo monroe aka storm raven darkholme aka mystique

prompts (once someone requests a prompt, i will update the list! list will be updated once a day, if multiple people ask for a prompt in between updates, i will give it to the first person who sent me an ask. i realize that there are more character options than there are prompts, i did this because i don’t think too many people will participate. if we ever run out, i will add more prompts! example of request: klaus mikaelson + “give me a chance”)

(rfaimagining)

angst

1: “ give me a chance. ”

2: “ not you again.. ”

3: “ leave me alone. ”

4: “ i don’t love you anymore. ”

5: “ why do you hate me? ”

6: “ i lost the baby. ”

7: “ i thought you loved me. ”

8: “ i don’t need you anymore. ”

9:“ i can’t believe you! ”

10: “ we can't keep this up forever. ”

11: “ you’re a monster. ”

12: “ i hate you. ”

13: “ don’t leave me… ”

14: “ you’re a disappointment. ”

15: “ don’t die on me– please. ”

16: “ i never meant to hurt you. ”

17: “ are you upset with me? ”

18: “ i wish i’d never met you. ”

19: “ i’m going to kill you! ”

20: “ please don’t hurt me like this. ”

21: “ thanks for nothing. ”

22: “ dont call this number again. “

23: “ why did you spare me? ”

24: “ you need to leave. ”

25: “ i’m sick. ”

26: “ i’m dying. ”

27: “ i wish i’d never met you. ”

28: “ i thought we were family!”

29: “ there was never an us. ”

30: “ so that’s it? it’s over? ”

31: “ i fucked up. ”

32: “ i came to say goodbye. ”

33:“ he’s dead because of you. ”

34: “ i don’t deserve to be loved. ”

35: “ about the baby… its yours. ”

love

36: “ i’m so in love with you. ”

37: “ dance with me! ”

38: “ isn’t this amazing? ”

39: “ i wish we could stay like this forever. ”

40: “ will you marry me? ”

41: “ i’m pregnant. ”

42: “ i need a hug. ”

43: “ you’re special to me. ”

44: “ i’m going to keep you safe. ”

45: “ do you trust me? ”

46: “ can i kiss you right now? ”

47: “ you’re cute when you’re angry. ”

48: “ i’ve liked you for awhile now. ”

49: “ let’s have a baby. ”

50: “ we’d make such a cute couple. ”

51: “ i want to take care of you. ”

52: “ can we cuddle? ”

53: “ it’s lonely here without you. ”

54: “ i can’t stand the thought of losing you. ”

55: “ shut up and kiss me already. ”

56: “ are you flirting with me? ”

57: “ is that my shirt? ”

58: “ how did we get here? ”

59: “ you own my heart. ”

60: “ you’d be a great dad. ”

61: “ you’d be a great mom. ”

62: “ i want to protect you. ”

63: “ what's the matter? ”

64: “ you’re so beautiful. ”

65: “ did you do something different with your hair? ”

66: “ is that a new perfume? ”

67: “ stop being so cute. ”

68: “ you’re making me blush! ”

69: “ you’re teasing me again… ”

70: “ this is why i fell in love with you. ”

71: “ you’re the best! ”

72: “ they’re going to love you, don’t worry! ”

73: “ oh, are you ticklish? ”

74: “ of course i remembered! ”

75: “ you’re one hell of a girl. ”

76: “ you’re one hell of a guy. ”

77: “ are you jealous? ”

78: “ hold me and never let me go. ”

79: “ stop hogging all the blankets! ”

80: “ lets run away together. ”

misc

90: “ catch me if you can! ”

91: “ i’m fine. ”

92: “ are you drunk? ”

93: “ are you high? ”

94: “ we can't go in there… ”

95: “ give it back! ”

96: “ well this is just great. ”

97: “ don’t touch me. ”

98: “ not sure if you could tell, but i’m not exactly a people person. ”

99: “ this was fun— let's do it again sometime!”

100: “ i didn’t do it! ”

101: “ i did it… ”

102: “ i don’t remember that! ”

103: “ well that’s pretty rude of you to say. ”

104: “ get that thing away from me! ”

105: “ you owe me. ”

106: “ do you believe in aliens? ”

107: “ do you believe in ghosts? ”

108: “ are you hitting on me? ”

109: “ why are you naked? ”

110: “ you did what?! ”

111: “ you have… superpowers? ”

112: “ why are you bleeding? ”

113: “ where did all these puppies come from?”

114: “ don’t make me come over there myself! ”

115: “ that wasn’t funny. ”

116: “ this tastes horrible. ”

117: “ this is delicious! ”

118: “ are you mad at me? ”

119: “ stop ignoring me… ”

120: “ i love that show too! ”

121: “ can i borrow that book of yours?”

122: “ let's blow this joint. ”

123: “ let me help you with that. ”

124: “ take that back! ”

125: “ wanna go see a movie with me? ”

126: “ no way, that’s so lame. ”

127: “ what are you listening to? ”

128: “ i brought you your coffee. ”

129: “ don’t fuck this up. ”

130: “ run! ”

131: “ lets run away together. ”

132: “ i haven’t slept in four days… ”

133: “ your turn to do the dishes. ”

134: “ was i really that drunk? ”

135: “ was i really that stoned? ”

136: “give me back my phone! ”

137: “ you’re an asshole. ”

138: “ are you cold? ”

139: “ this place gives me the creeps. ”

140: “ i swear my house is haunted. ”

141: “ did you hear that? ”

142: “ it’s just your imagination. ”

143: “ just how stupid do you think i am? ”

144: “ stop being such a baby. ”

145: “ go back to bed. ”

146: “ are you okay? ”

147: “ i can take care of myself just fine.”

148: “ thanks for helping me back there. ”

149: “ since when have we ever been friends? ”

150: “ what on earth are you wearing? ”

151: “ i can’t feel my legs! ”

152: “ stop texting me weird stuff so late at night. ”

153: “ put me down! ”

154: “ there’s only one bed… ”

155: “ it isn’t what it looks like! okay.. maybe it is… ”

156: “ how did i lose it? ”

157: “ i read your diary. ”

158: “ this is awkward. ”

159: “ didn’t you read the sign? ”

160: “ do you think you can teach me that? ”

nsfw

161: “ bite me. ”

162: “ make me. ”

163: “ fuck me. ”

164: “ stop teasing me so much… ”

165: “ do you like it when i touch you like that?”

166: “ okay.. this is new. ”

167: “ want to head back to my place and have a little fun? ”

168: “ you’re in trouble now. ”

169: “ what a pretty sight. ”

170: “ bend over. ”

171: “ on your knees. ”

172: “ the food looks great but.. there’s something much more delicious i’d like to eat right now. ”

173: “ lay back. ”

174: “ take off your clothes. ”

175: “ well, fine; just this once. ”

176: “ i’m waiting. ”

177: “ you’re so beautiful. ”

178:“ as you wish. ”

179: “ first one to make a noise loses.”

180: “ you have no idea what you do to me. ”

181: “ if you’re bored; wanna have sex? ”

182: “ i've wanted this for so long. ”

183: “ car sex looks so much more easier in the movies. ”

184: “ can i touch you? ”

185: “ open up. ”

186: “ no strings attached. ”

187: “ already? do i really have that much of an effect on you? ”

188: “ mine. ”

189: “ the nights still young. ”

190: “ we can't do that here! ”

191: “ behave. ”

192:“ what did you just say? ”

193: “ good girl. ”

194: “ good boy. ”

195: “ come here. ”

continued nsfw from misc sources

196: “are you going to come here, or are you going to make me come get you myself?”

197: “don’t look at me like that, you brought this on yourself.”

198: “stay still, squirming will make it worse.”

199: “keep count. if you lose it, we’re starting over. understand?”

200: “go get me the cane.”

201: “take your shirt off and put your hands up against the wall.”

202: “open your mouth. i’m putting the gag in so your screaming won’t alarm someone.”

203: “did you disobey my orders?”

204: “i thought i told you not to touch that?”

205: “have you finished everything i told you to do?”

206: “if you don’t stop acting like this, i’ll be forced to use different tactics.”

207: “your skin turns so red under my palm.”

208: “bend over the back of the couch.”

209: “you might want to bite something, the whip has a bite to it.”

210: “come here and bend over my lap.”

211: “i’m tired of your smart mouth.”

212: “you’re really hot.”

213: “oh, don’t mind me. just enjoying the view.”

214: “you know, those/that ______ of yours are/is pretty distracting.”

215: “hot damn.”

216: “so, you come here often?”

217: “well, well. my night just got better.”

218: “is that a gun in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?”

219: “you have got a great ass.”

220: “hey, i’m open minded.”

221: “you enjoying the view over there?”

222: “keep sweet-talking and this could go a whole new direction.”

223: “don’t be bashful. you know you want to.”

224: “you can have me any way you’d like, baby.”

225: “you wanna move this conversation someplace more private?”

226: “i’m off in a few minutes, you know.”

227:“it’s been a long day. why don’t we help each other unwind?”

228: “i think it’s about time we stop avoiding the obvious.”

229: “i’m gonna be honest with you. i’m really horny, and you’re really hot. can we fuck? like, now?”

230: “i wanna see you get naked.”

231: “you like how i bend over for you, huh?”

232: “you’re getting me all worked up.”

233: “what do we have here?”

234: "i see someone’s happy to see me.”

235: “play your cards right, and i just might have to put you on speed dial.”

236: “you like that, don’t you?”

237: “how do you want me?”

238: “i’m sure we can put those lips to better use.”

239: “i want you. right here. right now.”

240: “god, you’re perfect.”

241: “i really like a man who’s good with his hands.”

242: “i’d be more than happy to show you a good time, if you’re looking for one.”

243: “i saw that. you just checked me out.”

244: “you look real good in that suit/dress/skirt/outfit.”

245: “you wanna help me out of this ___?” (insert article clothing here.)

246: “can i keep you?”

247: “you’re such a tease.”

248: “oh my, looks like i/you dropped something.”

249: “i love it when you talk dirty.”

250: “i can’t stop thinking about your hands on me.”

251: “i think you’ll be happy to know that i’m not wearing any underwear.”

252: “i really want to take you home and get you out of all those clothes.”

253: “it’s like you want to ruin men/women for me.”

#urwarriorangelswritingchallenge

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amydancepants-peralta · 4 years

Note

prompt: jake being the sweet and caring husband he is when amy gets her period, sometime during trying/before ding dong

The first thing Jake notices is the empty tampon packaging in the trash can in their bathroom, the blue cardboard sticking out amongst the tissues as he discards the last of his contact solution.

It’s presence doesn’t surprise him - it’s the same brand that Amy’s been using for years. Cross referenced with the other brands with her typical Type-A regularity for value, availability and reliability; she will often conclude her findings with a satisfied grin, pleased with the knowledge that she is in fact still using the best available option on the market. It’s packaging is a sight that’s as normal as all the rest, and having grown up with his mother and occasionally getting to the stage of regular stay-overs with various girlfriends over the years, Jake is no stranger to finding such things in the trash.

He’s been expecting it for days actually, which probably sounds odd but he’s known Amy for so long that he knows how to read the signs. Breast tenderness was one - and she’d pulled away slightly from the hug he’d given her a couple of days ago, eyebrows knitting in silent discomfort as she’d readjusted her position in his arms before tucking her face into his neck, and it made him realise that a few weeks had (somehow) already passed.

(It had been a hug of commiseration, the latest negative test in what felt like an endless tally of negatives still clutched in her left hand as she wound her arms around his waist, and he knew that she’d been hoping that all the signs her body had been sending her way would be related to a brand new life growing inside her, instead of an indicator for the opposite.)

Another sign (and admittedly, the more obvious one) was the tiny red dot that Amy marks on their calendar each month - in the same location as the ones she marks on her planner - and in true Santiago style, it was right on time. So the empty carton comes as no surprise - but if he was to be completely honest, there was still a tiny part of him that had held onto a sliver of hope that maybe, after they’d given up the rigid scheduling and just started trying to try, that maybe this time the test would be wrong, and they’d have finally gotten it right.

But they hadn’t, and now her body has the receipts.

He knows that Amy thinks it’s her that is failing them, and even though he makes the joke, he wishes that she’d acknowledge the likelihood of it being his. After all, you only need to compare the difference between their genes to know which one of their bodies is way more likely to turn up for their duty on time and ready to go, and which is likely to be a few minutes (too) late. Whether she can’t see it or simply doesn’t want to, Jake isn’t sure. But he’d give anything to be able to make it easier.

Amy’s already in the process of swallowing two Advil at their kitchen sink when he walks in, and as she stretches forward to wash out her glass Jake wraps his left arm around her middle, pressing his chest against her back as he squeezes. Letting out a soft hey, she leans into his touch, and even though Jake can feel the smile on her face when he presses a kiss to her cheek, he can hear the resignation in her voice. He lowers his head to leave another kiss along the side of her neck, wrapping both arms around her middle and resting his forehead against her shoulder when her hands move to cover his. She sighs, and slowly he nods.

“You smell good,” she whispers to break the silence, and eventually Jake shifts his hands from her middle to their kitchen counter, giving her room to turn in place. He catches her gaze when they’re finally face to face, finding all of the sadness that she’s trying so valiantly to mask, mirroring her response when she shrugs in a total loss for words. Her hand moves to rest against his cheek, a touch that is so familiar but still feels so perfect every time she does it, and when he leans in for proper kiss all he can think is how he’d give her the world, if he only knew how.

“I’m just about to call my mom,” Amy mumbles, resting her hands on Jake’s waist and letting them linger as he begins to step back. “I’ve been putting it off for days.” It was something that used to be a lot more regular - until the conversation began to turn towards ovulation schedules and conception suggestions - and as the months went by it just became too difficult for Amy to hear how easy it was for others to do the one thing she was struggling so hard to get right.

Jake nods, deciding in the interim to do a run to the nearest corner store and grab a few necessities. (This phone call, he knew, was going to need space - and he rather give it to Amy before she needed to ask.)

He can hear the hey, mom from their bedroom as he peels the list from it’s magnetic pad on the fridge, and blowing Amy a kiss even though he knows she’ll never see it from the kitchen he heads out, closing the door just loudly enough for her to know that he’s definitely gone.

The Sampson’s Grocers is a relatively new addition to their neighbourhood, a family owned business that sits five and half blocks away from their apartment but always has the best produce. The aisles are familiar to Jake, the layout remaining unchanged each time he comes here with Amy, and he grabs a basket from the door and begins filling it up as he moves through the store.

Because it was written by his wife, the list in his hand has been itemised according to aisle, and it takes him no time at all to gather all of the items, deciding to do a second lap just in case there’s something they’ve both forgotten to put down (and perhaps also to buy Amy and Camila just a little more time).

Because he loves his wife, he stops past the sanitary products in aisle seven, grabbing a twin pack of each level of absorbency and making a mental note to collect the chocolate she likes on the way back to the register.

Because he believes in their future, he gathers another three packets of Amy’s favoured pregnancy test - the ones with the 99.9% certified accuracy - and places them in the basket next to the tampons.

(And because they’re on sale, he grabs an extra packet of sour gummy worms that may or may not end up making it all the way home.)

Normally, for the first few days of her period Amy would be seeking all of her favourites - warm blankets, hot chocolate, takeout and a marathon run of old Jeopardy episodes, all in no particular order. Long since mastering the art of filing up water bottles with one hand while ordering takeout online with the other, Jake hesitates outside their favourite Thai restaurant before deciding to forgo.

(These past few months have been different, and he has the strongest instinct that today is going to be the same.)

She’s on the couch with a blanket covering her feet by the time he walks in the door, eco-friendly bags hanging in his left hand as he closes the door with his right, and gives him a soft smile as he heads towards the kitchen to put everything away. Her positioning leads Jake to think that the pain relief has kicked in but he still moves quickly, eager to return to Amy (it is their day off together, after all), and as he’s finishing up he calls out if she needs anything.

“No. Just you.” Comes her reply, and maybe there’s still a couple of items left on the counter, but clearly out of the two options (out of ANY two options, really), Amy is going to be his priority, and he makes a beeline straight to the living room, capturing her smile and storing it away in his heart with all of the others when he gets there. Grabbing his left hand, Amy pulls it towards her and leaves a kiss against his palm, and when Jake shuffles along the couch to move closer she snuggles into his side, resting her head against his shoulder like that is it’s second home (which, to be fair, it kind of is).

Amy’s hand slides around his waist, toying with the belt loops of his jeans, and after a pause she glances up. “My mom suggested a hormonal assistance program I could start taking that .. actually sounds kinda promising. I’m going to call my doctor tomorrow and see what she thinks.”

He nods, running his right hand along her forearm. “That sounds like a great idea, babe.” She nods into his hoodie, and when the silence stretches out he continues. “Do you want me to get you a hot water bottle or anything?”

Her grip around his waist tightens, as though Jake’s sentence alone was enough of a threat for her, and shakes her head before tucking her nose into his neck. “No. Just you.”

He nods again, resting his head against hers as she takes in a deep breath. This has been the change in recent months, now that the beginning of her period doesn’t just mean persistent aches from all the cramping and no chance of sex for five to seven days. Now, it told her that even though they’d tried their hardest - and then for a little while, didn’t officially ‘try’ at all - that despite her best efforts, nothing had worked, and they (she) had failed again. Now, the pain wasn’t just from the contracting muscles in her uterine walls (he’s read a lot about conception and biology in the last six months); now, the pain is compounded by the confirmation that once again, there would be no mini Peralta-Santiago arriving in nine months time.

She asks him if he thinks everything is going to work out; her voice so soft you almost wouldn’t hear it (but he hears her, even when she thinks he doesn’t), and he nods, shifting to press a kiss to her forehead to seal the promise. There’s no way for him to know for sure - and he’s well aware that as time presses on things will only get harder - but he believes in them with every fibre of his being, and if there was anybody that could come out of this battle a winner, it is Amy Santiago.

So he tells her yes, tells her that he loves her and that everything will be okay, and because she loves him her body relaxes against his, knees curling up until they’re resting just along the outside of his thigh.

“You know, I could actually kinda go for some chocolate,” she mumbles, twisting her neck until her cheek is resting against his chest, and Jake smiles in victory because he knew this was coming.

“Ask and you shall receive, my darling wife.” His left hand disappears from her thigh, reaching into the pocket of his hoodie and grinning brightly as he reveals a family sized block of her favourite - thankfully unmelted due to the slightly cooler weather outside - and her eyes light up in glee. She gives him a chocolate flavoured kiss a few minutes later, telling her she loves him with her actions just as much as her words, and honestly, all of world’s problems could probably be solved by a little chocolate.

It will only be a few more weeks before there will be no need for the recently purchased packets of tampons, and they will get stashed away to the back of the cupboard for their eventual need in nine or ten months time, but for now the day passes with the two of them stretched out on the couch.

There is so much proof of their love within these four walls, and the greatest proof of all is yet to come, but for now all they need is a couple of Advil, a block of chocolate, and the arms of the one you love.

#we stan one supportive husband #anon prompt #thank you for this!#I don't know if this is what you were looking for #but this is where my mind went so ...#catch me getting distracted from my other fic by writing this #if you’ve sent me a promot pls know that i’m working on it!#b99 prompts #b99fanfic #b99fic #jake x amy fic #peraltiago fic #my writing

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letsperaltiago · 5 years

Text

and if we give a little of our love away; maybe meet in the middle every night and day | Jake x Amy|

I Love You-prompt request #91: I hope you like it.

Requested by anonymous

Again and as always, because I’m excited to share: this isn’t proof read yet, so sorry in advance for typos and other mishaps! But omg, guys... I’m actually (for once lol) so proud of this. I really poured every damn thing into it, so I’d really love love love if you’d give me some response! Enjoyyyy and merry early Christmas!

Also this title is lyrics from a celine dion song don’t look at me

Word count: 2.4k

Heavy chunks of ice, which the weather lady on TV dared to call ‘beautiful snowflakes’, drizzled down on the district of Brooklyn. Its habitants had naturally chosen to stay inside in order to escape from the cold, but also because it was indeed Christmas Eve. The streets were clear from people - not snow - and the only life to be seen was the flickering street lights and occasional birds as they searched for a hiding place themselves.

Inside what used to be Amy Santiago’s apartment, two anxious individuals were running around the house in preparation for tomorrow’s festivities. Actually, the truth of the matter was that Jake Santiago Peralta was hopelessly stadning by the kitchen sink, feeling anxious for Amy Santiago Peralta, as he watched her anxiously run around the house. Luckily - Jake was starting to realise it was quite rather the opposite - Amy had been given the day off, since her entire family plus the Peralta-parents would be coming over for Christmas morning celebrations.

He hadn’t been around for the entirety of the day, since he still had to go to work, but his wife had been up and running around even before he had. In retrospective it was hardly surprising, but it had definitely caught him off guard at 5 AM, when her alarm had ripped them both out of a deep slumber. Within seconds the alarm was cut off, Amy was out of bed and he was left with the remaining warmth that her body had left on the mattress beside him. For a second he thought he was dreaming, but upon noticing the bathroom light being turned on, he’d lazily boosted himself into a half-risen position, resting on his forearm and elbow. After quickly checking the clock on his bedside table, he’d redirected his exhausted and disoriented gaze towards the bathroom.

“Ames?” His voice was groggy, and he had to squint; even the slightest light coming from the bathroom was burning his eyes. “What are you doing?”

A couple of seconds went by in silence, before she rushed out of the neighbouring room in what would be her grey, ‘down for business’-set of sweats and a high ponytail. Even through the darkness, he could tell that her facial expression showed no mercy and she was determinate as ever - Santiago style.

“Ames?” He tried to reach her again.

“Our families will be here in,” she swiftly glanced at her wristwatch, “T minus 29 hours and this place is a mess!”

“Wha-“ he frowned, even more profoundly than before, as his wife basically bolted out of the room with a huge binder with the title: ‘Santiago-Peralta Christmas 2020’, that she (apparently?) had stored in their closet for God knows how long. A deep sigh escaped his exhausted body, internally debating whether or not he was going to be a good or bad husband today. Even though he was lowkey exhausted by just the thought of his wife’s monstrous ambitions, he still still respected her enough to choose the latter and force himself out of bed. Within the timeframe of 5 minutes, he managed to get up and pull a signature hoodie over his pyjamas (aka. his boxers and a random t-shirt), allowing him to leave the coziness of the dark bedroom behind for the livingroom and whatever ‘mess’ his wife was talking about.

She was already running around the room and picking up clothes (mostly his - and yes, he did feel bad). With this tempo, she was going to exhaust herself in a matter of no time and just the thought pained him. Amy would have to slow down in orde to survive today, Jake knew, and as her husband it was his job to trick her into it since she’d never explicitly want to.

“Babe, calm down,” his voice was still tired, but he made sure it was still kind since the last thing she needed was to feel critiqued. “Let yourself sleep for once. It’s your day off.”

She froze on the spot, whipping her head in direction and letting him know that he’d stepped onto dangerous territory. “I will not allow our families to be disappointed by their first Christmas at our place, Jake. Everything needs to be in order, and sleeping won’t obtain that!”

“Okay…” It’s not like he didn’t know that telling her to calm down wouldn’t make her calm down, but it seamed like an obvious first try. Instead of giving up, like one maybe should at this point, he took a deep breath as he walked over to the opened binder on the dinner table. “But then at least let me help.” His eyes quickly skimmed over the visible pages, taking in all the sections, sub-sections and even sub-sub-sections.

By then she no longer looked mad, but now rather discouraged upon hearing him offer his help. “That’s very sweet of you,” she tugged the dirty laundry into the basket she’d brought along for the ride around the entire apartment. “But there’s so much to do and it needs to be done after the book. Just go back to sleep. I’ll be okay.”

“Ames,” he grabbed her wrist as she rushed past him, gently removing the laundry basket from her other hand and putting it down besides them. Before she could object to it, he was holding onto both of her hands in order to make sure she that he had her full attention. It was obvious, from the look in her dark eyes, that she was anxious, stressed and tired. Christmas was supposed to be the exact opposite. “There’s no way you can do this all by yourself. Let’s sit down for a minute, at least have a cup of coffee, and you can instruct me on what to do. Okay?” He looked straight into her eyes, sincerely hoping that she’d accept his offer and take some of the burden off her shoulders. As the cherry on top, he soothingly drew circles on the inside of her palms with his thumbs, hopefully working away some nerves.

Oddly enough, hearing her sigh and seeing her shoulders drop in defeat was indeed more than a simple victory for Jake. It meant that he, to some extent, had fought off the stressed beast inside his wife’s gut. “I guess you’re right… Sorry.”

“Don’t apologise,” he sent her a tired smile, before pressing his lips to her forehead for a tender moment, before mumbling against it. “Sit down and I’ll brew us some coffee. Then we can go through your binder together.”

A lot had happened since T minus 29 hours. Even though the entire apartment was now spotless, decorated to pure perfection (precisely like Amy’s binder had predicted: colour-coordinated, well-balanced and including both small catholic and jewish touches) and most of the food was prepped for tomorrow morning, they’d hit the ’T minus 13’-mark. Just when he thought he’d seen his wife at her worst, she absolutely crumbled in front of him.

“No no no no!” She almost screamed at the oven, squatting in front of it and desperately pressing all of its buttons. “Why. Won’t. You. Work!” With every word, the poor, defenceless oven received a punch from the agitated woman. That’s when Jake decided that enough was enough. He wanted to be the last person to tell a woman what to do, but there had to be limits. Beating up an oven was now one.

“Woah woah woah!” He jogged over to gently pull her to her feet and back to a distance, where the oven wouldn’t suffer further abuse. “Alright, babe… Time out.” He grabbed her shoulders to spin her 180 degrees and restrain her from turning away.

“But the turkey needs to slow roast!” She whined and Jake could swear that he could spot tears forming in his eyes. “It needs 12 hours and 45 minutes in the oven like Boyle showed me, and if everyone arrives at 10 AM tomorrow, then it needs to get in within the next 5 minutes!”

“Babe,” he tried to get through to her - again - slightly tightening his soft grip on her shoulder, just to get her attention as he had rarely seen her spiral like this. “You don’t get it! If it doesn’t go in NOW, then it’ll be way too pink for anyone to eat-“

“Ames!” He snapped, not angrily bit firmly enough to get her attention for a second. “Breathe with me, okay?” He started taking deep breaths - inhaling through his nose and exhaling through his mouth - never letting his eyes leave hers. Seconds later she was quietly breathing with him, and he allowed himself to gently rub her shoulders. The worst was over.

A calm smile spread across his face, hoping that she’d soon mirror it. “Amy… Everything looks perfect and it’ll still look that way tomorrow.”

“But the turkey-,” she whimpered quietly.

“The turkey will be fine as well. Yes, people will arrive at 10, but we’re not gonna serve the turkey until lunch, which means we have an extra couple of hours for it to cook. Everything is done and going accordingly to the binder. There’s nothing else you can do now. Please stop?” It was now his turn to look desperate, sincerely hoping that this would be enough to convince her. A silence washed over them, like the quiet after a massive storm, and it allowed Jake to hear his wife’s finally even breaths. Thank God.

He felt her exhale deeply under his soft touch on her arms. “O-okay. You’re right…” A tiny smile finally broke out on her face.

It was now Jake’s turn to let out a heavy breath, relieved from the bottom of his hear, which also showed when a adoring smile followed behind. “Good. Now I’ll take care of the bird, while you go take a nice shower.”

“You’re the best,” she gently placed her hand where his heart hid behind his firm chest, and quietly took soaked the soothing beat. “Meet me out here afterwards? I have… an early Christmas present for you.”

This immediately caught Jake’s attention, obviously showing as his brows rose in curiosity. “Ooooh, is it something sexy?” He teased, only earning a pair of rolling eyes and a soft punch to where her hand had previously rested.

“Jake… Turkey,” and with that his Amy was back on earth and walking towards the bathroom.

Later that evening, after respectively showering and putting the huge bird in the oven (and also making sure that the timer was set correctly), the couple settled down on the couch together. In the background, soft Christmas music and dimmed fairy lights were finally allowed to give the room its destined cozy and relaxed atmosphere. To Jake’s relief, Amy looked much healthier and happier. And if that was all he’d get for Christmas that year, then he’d be more than okay with it. Yet the small package in her lap told him that it wasn’t.

“Ames, I thought we were going to open presents tomorrow?”

A soft, yet somewhat nervous, smile was plastered to her glowing face as she nervously fidgeted with the green, flawless curled ribbon. “I know,” she allowed herself to glance up at him through her dark eyelashes. “But I waned to give you this without everyone else around. Merry Christmas, Jake.” She carefully placed the red and green package in his hands, chewing on her bottom lip as he carefully unwrapped it.

To both her delight and fear, Jake quickly finished the unwrapping process, pushing the paper aside to reveal a little white, knitted cloth. His eyes rose to meet hers. Confused but not disappointed; Questioning but pleasantly curious.

“I-I hope you like it,” she stuttered nervously, still smiling, as he pulled the cloth completely out of the packaging.

“You know I love everything you make, but what-,” his sentence was cut short, when he held up the cloth and two additional, seemingly smaller pieces cloths emerged from either side of the bigger piece. For a second, he seemed even more confused before until a realisation hit him like lighting and caused the man to freeze.

“A cardigan?”

She nodded, telling him he was indeed headed in the right direction with this guessing game. Another realisation hit him.

“A tiny cardigan?”

She once more, just like before, nodded in approval. A few seconds of silence allowed the other shoe to drop and never before had Amy Santiago Peralta seen her husband’s wider. Not even the first time she kissed him against that tree; not even the first time she said “I love you”; not even on their wedding day.

“A tiny cardigan,” he repeated, this time a statement instead of a question. After taking a second to look at the fabric in his hands like he was in deep thought, he glanced back at his wife with stars in his eyes. “A tiny cardigan. For a tiny human.”

Her previously nervous smile was immediately replaced by a wide, toothy smile and crystal clear tears forming in her eyes. A final approving nod from her sent him over the edge. Completely forgetting about it in the moment, he dropped the fabric in his lap and immediately lurched forward to cup her rosy cheeks in his hands. Within seconds, before she had the time to blink or understand what was going on, his lips were and hers. The world around them disappeared as he carefully stroked her now damp cheeks, while he poured all of his love and joy into a soft yet passionate kiss.

“Is this real?” He pulled back a bit, just barely enough to speak; almost too excited and out of breath for it to be coherent. His forehead was still resting against hers. He kissed her again before she had the time to answer properly, limiting her to a nod and a smushed hum. After another few tender moments of just soaking in their mutual joy and love, he broke the kiss again, still leaving their foreheads touching.

“I’m going to be a dad,” a single tear rolled down his cheek in overwhelming disbelief. This was definitely too much for his own good, but he didn’t care.

“Yes,” she sniffled, definitely crying more than him, but also not really caring. This was their Christmas miracle. Not anyone else’s. Just theirs for now. “You’re going to be dad.”

#I love you x Peraltiago #peraltiago #jake and amy #jake x amy #fanfiction #fanfic #jake peralta #amy santiago #fluff #prompt #pregnant #pregnancy

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amyscascadingtabs · 6 years

Text

this night is sparkling, don’t you let it go

She doesn’t fully comprehend how he gathers the energy for his signature boyish, goofy grin at one in the morning, but he does anyway and waves his phone at her. “I was going to play you my list of Taylor Swift favorites.”

“Ugh.”

“You said I could”, he reminds her with an accusatory expression that works all too well on her. “‘Sure, whatever.’ Those were your exact words.”

“Just keep it at a low volume. ”

Three times - all under wildly different circumstances - Jake plays Amy the same Taylor Swift song.

read on ao3

The first time Amy Santiago hears it is at the precinct.

She’s landed Jake Peralta as her partner for the money laundering case she’s currently working, and while he’s been peculiarly nice to her since he won their bet - even came to admit he enjoys working with her when she came close to taking a job at Major Crimes - he’s not the most efficient when it comes to going through pages and pages of income and transaction records. The fact that it’s currently one o’clock at night and Boyle broke the coffee machine trying to make chai latte in it aren’t helping their focus much either. She’s sticking with water as coffee-replacement, trying to attentively work through the records with her highlighter while Jake’s drinking something blue that can’t possibly be good for his heart, humming away on some upbeat melody and tapping his pen to the table in a drumming, repetitive manner. It would be a lie to say it doesn’t bother her, but she’s learnt from experience it’s a habit too ingrained in him for it to matter if she told him to stop.

He’s actually pretty charming like this, Amy notes. When he’s hard at work on a case without the pathological need to deliver a humorous line every other second, he suddenly becomes a lot more tolerable. She can even admit the messy, sleep-deprived look of his wrinkled flannel and tousled curls has a certain attractivity to it, especially in combination with the peering brown eyes flicking around the room whenever he gets distracted.

(It’s just the sleep-deprivation talking, though.)

(She doesn’t find Jake cute.)

(Really, she doesn’t.)

“Santia- gooo”, she hears just as she’s finished highlighting another dubious transaction in hot pink, the sudden noise causing her to flinch and her hand to slip, making an unintentional pink dot at the side of the paper.

“What do you want, Peralta?” She holds up the document in demonstration. “You’re ruining my notes.”

“Oh, come on, see it as a piece of art. Now your notes are just more unique.” She snorts at his creative attempt at avoiding an apology. “Anyway - you mind if I play some tunes? Helps me focus better.”

“Sure. Whatever.” She shrugs. “But no High School Musical soundtrack. Not again.”

“Pfft, you loved it when Boyle and I sang along to I Don’t Dance.”

“Absolutely didn’t.”

“And no, I won’t play High School Musical, even though it’s arguably the best Disney movie and musical of all time.“

“Absolutely isn’t.”

“Oh my god, Santiago, just let me finish.” She doesn’t fully comprehend how he gathers the energy for his signature boyish, goofy grin at one in the morning, but he does anyway and waves his phone at her. “I was going to play you my list of Taylor Swift favorites.”

“Ugh.”

“You said I could”, he reminds her with an accusatory expression that works all too well on her. “‘Sure, whatever.’ Those were your exact words.”

“Just keep it at a low volume.” She stifles a smile at the way his face lights up, jubilant over having convinced her.

Seconds later a slow ballad is playing in the bullpen. It’s softer, more tranquil than the music he usually plays until it picks up pace in the first chorus. Even then it doesn’t bother her much. She honestly truly enjoys the song, and because it’s late and she knows it’ll make him happy, she tells him so.

“It’s Enchanted”, he informs her, beaming with excitement. “It’s called that, I mean. It’s one of my favorites. I’ve always pictured this song playing at my wedding.” She raises a questioning eyebrow.

“You already have a song for that?”

“You don’t?”

“No?” This is brand new information to her, and she’s frankly finding it shocking. He never seemed the type who has a song picked out for their wedding even though they’re single to her - and she quite doubts he’ll ever be mature enough to want to get married. “I want something nice, instrumental. Live music.”

“Never said I didn’t want live music”, he retorts, pouting.

“I know for a fact you’re not allowed within five hundred feet of Taylor Swift, Peralta.”

“That was a misunderstanding!”

“Whatever you say”, she mumbles, returning to her documents and highlighter. Jake continues passionately singing along to the chorus, about a sparkling night and being enchanted to meet someone, and even though she’d deny it should anyone ask, she’s instantaneously grateful it’s him she’s working this late night with.

(He makes her laugh.)

She loses track of how many more times she hears the song after her and Jake become a couple. Truth be told, she loses track of how many times she hears any Taylor Swift song, because he plays them so often there's no use in keeping count. Amy's fully willing to admit some of the tunes are pretty catchy, and after a while she even begins to associate them with cherished memories from their relationship. Jake played Shake It Off on repeat to calm his nerves during their road trip to his first official Santiago Family Gathering, they've danced around the living room like fools to the soundtrack of both Blank Space and Style more than once and she beat him in memorizing all the lyrics to All Too Well when he bet her she couldn’t.

Enchanted still remains her favorite. It's the one song she can’t hear without remembering the time they were merely two competitive detectives, deadbeat on proving their skilfulness in whatever way possible, and how even when it feels like the universe has turned itself inside out since then and they’re oceans away from the people they used to be, they’re also in some ways entirely the same.

She whispers this, albeit in a much less coherent way than the thought appeared in her head, to Jake when they’re perched on Shaw’s bar stools after their unconventional precinct-curbside wedding, going through their shared Spotify library. They’re still giddy from the champagne and the exuberant joy of finally being married, and she has her doubts about whether they will be able to survive their first dance without unintentionally maiming each other, but Terry insisted on it being a crucial part of any wedding reception and so here they are.

“I think we’ve find our song”, Jake tells the bartender, handing him the phone so it can be plugged into the speaker system. “Ready, Mrs. Santiago-Peralta?” He says his own name after hers with unrelenting pride, and although they’ve agreed many times she is in no way his property for having married him, it's flattering.

“Ready.”

They make their way to what will serve as their dancefloor under close observation from their friends and the sound of Charles sobbing with happiness, hand in hand still trying to grasp the fact that they got here, they did it, they’re married.

The soft guitar of the melody she’d recognize anywhere starts playing, and she shifts focus from Rosa’s wolf-whistling and Holt’s modest smile to her husband.

“You know how terrible I am at dancing. It’s not going to be easier in this dress. You’ve been warned”, she advises him quietly.

“It doesn’t bother me”, he promises, and Amy knows it’s true.

This night is sparkling, don’t you let it go

I’m wonderstruck, blushing all the way home

I’ll spend forever wondering if you knew

I was enchanted to meet you

They’re mostly swaying back and forth, too enervated from their day of bomb threats and jealous exes and too aware of their limited skills in ballroom dancing to dare try something more advanced, but she likes it. It’s sweet and effortless, an harmonious oasis in the midst of Shaw’s buzzing atmosphere. He meets her eyes with an adoring smile as the tempo of the song slows down again, nearing the end.

Please don’t be in love with someone else, please don’t have somebody waiting on you, the lyrics repeat.

With what just having promised him the rest of their lives, matching silver rings on their left fourth fingers to demonstrate so, she knows there is no further need for her to prove she’s not in love with someone else. She kisses him anyway, the cheers and standing ovations from their friends fading to white noise with his lips under hers and his hands on her waist.

“I would marry you again any time, any place”, he says when they part. “I love you.”

She takes the chance to press another quick peck to his lips, grinning at the way she hears Charles squeal with euphoria from the couple’s uncharacteristic amount of PDA this evening. “I love you too.”

“Thank you for saying yes”, he whispers. “When I asked you to marry me.”

“Thank you for asking.”

Although several of the books on parenting Amy made sure to consume during the almost nine month eternity her pregnancy felt like said the same thing - that babies can recognize music played to them in utero after they’re born - it's still a partial shock to her when their daughter shows a certain affinity for Taylor Swift ballads early on. With the singer’s albums definitely playing throughout their apartment more often than Amy would like and Jake literally holding the phone to her bump while it plays his favorite Taylor hits at more than one instance, it really shouldn't have surprised her; but it does.

As with so many other lessons the couple learn on parenting, they discover it entirely by chance and in the middle of the night.

They’ve been parents for a long, exhilarating and exhausting week when they learn. In this week-long trial of parenthood, neither of them has had more than three consecutive hours of sleep or the opportunity to take a shower longer than five minutes, and it’s somehow all still been worth it. It’s only a little less worth it, possibly, when their daughter’s face is deep red and crumpled from exertion and she’s crying without stop, unflagging and indefatigable even though Amy has nursed her, burped her, checked her diaper a dozen times and walked at least forty laps around the living room in the middle of the night trying to bounce a screaming newborn to sleep.

“No success?” Jake stumbles into the living room just as she’s finishing lap forty-one. He looks disorientated either from the few minutes of sleep she told him to get or from lack of it; with the noise their progeny is making, she suspects the latter. She shakes her head in response, continuing the bouncing. “Did you try the pacifier?”

“Spits it out.”

“Want me to take over?”

“Please.” The smile she tries her best to give him comes out more an exhausted grimace, plagued by the soul-crushing sound of a panicked infant. Their daughter does go silent for a millisecond as Amy transfers her to Jake’s arms, a glimmer of hope burning before her parents eyes, but then the crying simply picks up where it left off.

“Man, you’re persistent”, he tells the infant before giving Amy a meaning look. “Much like someone else I know.”

“You’re not funny”, she mumbles and takes a swig from her water bottle on the dining room table otherwise covered in flowers and cards sent from family and friends.

“No, I guess that’s fair. She doesn’t seem to think so either. What’s bothering you, little Holly?” The sight of him talking to their baby in a soft voice and equally tender expression on his face is disarmingly sweet, and she wishes it wasn’t disrupted by the shrill soundtrack.

“I’ve vetoed Holly”, Amy reminds him warningly, laying down on the couch for at least a moment of physical rest. “And I don’t know what’s bothering her. I’ve tried everything. I think she’s just overtired and can’t figure out how to go to sleep.”

“Maybe we’re just trying too hard? Because she sure slept fine before she was born - she could be missing the environment. Must’ve been nice and comfortable in there.”

“Yeah, but I’ve held her so she can hear my heartbeat, and the bouncing should remind her of me moving around. I don’t get what else I can do.”

“Noise”, he states confidently. “I think she’s a little calmer when we’re speaking. Marginally, but still. And there must’ve been constant noise inside you, right? So this is way too silent for Johanna McClane.”

“I vetoed all Die Hard names, Jake. You give birth if you want to name a kid after those movies.” She hands him a lime green pacifier left on the couch table, but their daughter promptly spits it out again. “What are you suggesting in terms of noise then, baby-genius?”

Jake shines up at the nickname. “Ooh, nice title! And we haven’t tried music before, have we? Could be worth a shot.”

“Anything is worth a shot right now”, she agrees, stifling a yawn. “Hand me your phone. What should I play?”

“Just put on whatever I was listening to before.”

“I’m not playing her The Lonely Island.”

“Taylor Swift, then”, he says matter-of-factly. She scrolls down to the ‘t-swift favez’ playlist on Spotify and presses shuffle.

The first tones to Enchanted begin to play, and as if by magic, the crying lessens moderately. Amy hands Jake the phone so it’s closer to the baby, and by the time the first refrain ends their daughter is silent save the sound of her breathing.

They’re staring at each other in pure unadulterated shock as the newborn simply yawns her adorable yawn and closes her eyes against her father’s t-shirt.

“Put it on repeat”, Amy wheezes - a sentence she’s never said regarding any Taylor Swift song before. “Quick.”

Three plays later has a baby still fast asleep and two parents looking from her to each other to the phone in utter disbelief.

“So clearly my daughter.” Jake’s glowing from pride watching the sleeping copy of him continue her sleep, and Amy’s fighting both hormones and sleep-deprivation in order not to shed a tear of relief.

(She loses.)

She grows just a little bit tired of the song when their daughter is nearing one and still refuses to fall asleep through any other method than by being carried around the apartment as someone rocks her and plays the very same Taylor Swift ballad.

She also loves it more than ever, because now she’s learnt to associate it with the heartwarming sensation of a growing baby nestling her face into the crook of Amy’s neck, falling asleep before the end of the six minute track.

“I was really enchanted to meet you, Miss Leah”, she whispers a few nights later when the (non-Die Hard) name is finally settled on. “Always will be.”

#my writing #b99 fanfiction #b99 fic #brooklyn 99 fanfiction #brooklyn 99 fic #jake x amy fanfiction #peraltiago fanfiction #jake x amy fic #peraltiago fic

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