She looked beautiful when she had said it. Come to think of it, she always looked beautiful to him. He was starting to wonder just how many times he thought about it over the span of a single work day.
If there was anyone I'd follow blind, I'd follow you.
Did he think about it when they worked their usual new case alongside the rest of the team and she sat down next to him, her fingers barely skimming his covered shoulder, giving it a light, reassuring squeeze absentmindedly, as her eyes focused on the screen while they analyzed footage?
He would've given everything to have that soulful blue gaze on him, instead. Just for one moment. Drown in it and forget everything that hurt, everything that still tormented him day in and day out, even though he didn't let anyone see it.
Was it on his mind when she hovered on top of him, her eyes brimming with hot tears and desperation, shaking him, trying to breathe life back into him again after he'd been shot, panicked she had lost him for good, giving him a look he hasn't seen anyone throw his way?
Not since Erin, not since a million years ago.
He forgot how it felt to have someone look at him like that.
Hailey.
Did he think of how beautiful she was when she told him about Adam and their relationship, a hint of regret and longing slipping into her voice? Why did she feel like she owed him anything - explanation, justification, reasoning, excuse? Why did she even feel the need to come clean to him about dating somebody else?
They weren't an item. They weren't anything. Just work colleagues. Part of the Intelligence Unit. Maybe Hailey was just becoming part of the family and they were trying their all honesty, no bullshit policy. Right?
His heart never did somersaults around her for reasons he was tired of justifying.
His eyes didn't linger a little too long to be just friendly after a long case, while they both sipped their beers in silence, occasionally chatting but mostly keeping to themselves, each caught up in their own demons.
He never noticed those little things about her that no one else did.
You're never late.
Or did he?
Maybe they weren't just work colleagues. But they also weren't anything more, anything major or significant. They couldn't be. She was with Adam. And whatever they had going on, clearly it was turning into something more, something deeper, something he couldn't give her, never could.
You looked at me. I trusted you.
When she told him about Adam, he reassured her that they were good, that they always would be good. Because he wanted her to know she'd never lose him as a friend, as a partner, that it didn't matter to him if she was dating someone from their unit. Adam Ruzek was a good guy, he could be a player and a jackass half the time but Jay knew he'd never hurt her, he saw it in his eyes. He, too, cared about Hailey.
He's not sure Adam cared in quite the same way he did. Or maybe he was fearful of that possibility and did his best to erase it from his loud mind and even louder heart.
It tore Jay to pieces to let his mind go there but he knew. He'd be good to her. Adam would be better for her than he could ever be.
I'm sorry my heart doesn't bleed like yours.
Whatever daddy issues got YOU so screwed up.
He wasn't good enough for her. He'd never treat her the way she deserved to be treated.
I'm done being your punching bag.
He realized it the moment Adam did. The moment Hailey said that to him. Adam was everything to her that he was too much of a coward to be - partner, supporter, friend, lover..
Jay Halstead was a wounded man. A scarred combatant, on and off field, with a war going on inside his mind and heart, raging like a wild thunderstorm, yet barely allowed to sip through the cracks and reach the surface. He's learned to compartmentalize about the second he saw his first gunshot wound, the second he heard his first anguish filled screams on the battlefield.
I trusted you from the moment I met you.
But he couldn't compartmentalize her.
He couldn't get those words out of his mind, late at night, as he fought his own demons whilst losing the battle for the millionth time. Lately he couldn't get any of her words out of his head.
He's never had anyone say something like that to him, not since Erin. And even though he still missed her like hell, even though he truly thought they'd spend the rest of their lives together, he knew she was never coming back. He had accepted it but he wasn't sure if he had ever allowed himself to move on.
Hailey reminded him of Erin in a lot of ways and he wasn't ready for that, wasn't ready for anyone chipping at his layers again, calling him out on his crap, supporting him, trusting him, looking at him that way again, backing him up in front of Voight with Aiden even though it made no sense to anyone but him, welcoming him when he showed up on her doorstep late at night after a particularly hard case, knowing she needed someone.
Why did he hope and pray that she needed him, specifically, no one else? Why didn't he let Adam take that role that night or any other night? Why did he feel it was his right to be her savior, her knight in shinning CPD vest? He could feel the awkwardness the moment their eyes met and then again, when he caught Adam and Hailey at work.
It was the same look Kim had on her face when witnessing the same scene. The same look he was sure he wore more and more each day too, one he didn't want to admit was present on his face. He didn't want to think that, like Kim, he had too pushed the person he cared about into the awaiting arms of someone else, someone capable of actually doing it openly, showing it because he was too scared to do it himself.
What he didn't know was that Adam was the one who had to pull her together because of him, because of his stupid decisions that almost got him killed.
I thought he was dead.
Adam has stepped up and been the man he should've been for Hailey all along, the partner she deserved.
I get it. We're good. We're always going to be good.
It's what he had told her when she came clean about Adam. He doesn't know who he was trying to convince more – Hailey or himself.
It's part of the thing. The thing that works between us. One of us doesn't want the other around, the other one stays anyway. We talk. We feel better, we're able to come to work the next day.
She had said that. She had described their relationship in simple, yet rather poetic terms but they seemed so complicated now. It was that thought which plagued his mind as he sipped on the last few drops of his beer and sighed in the monumental silence of his apartment, the space suddenly too big and too small at the same time, the walls closing in on him, but the distance still vast, suffocating and deafening.
They weren't just that. Each other's emotional support or even punching bag to lay out frustrations and anger on from time to time, one verbal hit at a time. They're not just each other's safe space to come home to when they feel most vulnerable, broken or wrecked.
They are more and the weight of that knowledge is suddenly too hard to bear tonight.
So he smiles the very next day yet again, as he sees and hears her angelic laugh at something dumb Ruzek had just said, her smile never quite reaching her eyes.
He lets out the smallest nod of acknowledgement when they both enter the room at the same time, their gazes lingering a little too much on each other to be just friendly.
He tries to stop the bleeding in his heart and the chaos in his mind when she looks at him that way, again. He's pretty sure she doesn't even know she's doing it.
She's done it when she thought he was dead.
She's done it when she told him she always trusted him.
She's done it when his comforting presence and a bunch of beers drunk in the quiet, yet serene nightly atmosphere was enough to pull her back together after a particularly tough case.
He can't remember one time she looked at Ruzek the same. Or maybe it's just wishful thinking, coming out to play . Or maybe it's just the 6th beer he's had tonight.
He'd do just about anything for his 7th to be with Hailey.
But he can't call her. Because he knows she's busy. Because he knows she's probably enjoying someone else's touch, someone else's presence tonight.
What he doesn't know is that she's lying awake too, a chest too broad and a breathing too heavy next to her, as a protective arm is slowly draped around her waist.
She suddenly feels suffocated, like she can't breathe, lying awake in the quiet of the room, only the sound of Adam's steady breathing filling the air.
The chaos in her heart is louder though, louder than anything else. She's drowning and no one else can hear it.
Just like him.
She'd do anything to get out of that room and see Jay.
But she let him go before even having the chance to pull him towards her, tell him how she felt, everything she felt. She never even allowed it to start and now she was mourning the end.
What she doesn't know is that she's not the only one anymore.
She'd do anything for a drink with Jay, just one. She'd do anything to see his face tonight. Her fingers are twitching on the phone's surface as she reaches his contact number, but she can't do it.
So she reluctantly puts the phone down and turns around, facing the owner of a scruffy beard and a golden heart, one she never deserved. Not even once.
Adam Ruzek was a kind, soulful and loyal man. Everything she wasn't right now.
What she didn't know was that Ruzek had seen and heard everything. Her conflicted, shimmering eyes, her thumb scrolling over Jay's contact name, her sharp intake of breath. He had been awake the whole time but he played the part to perfection. For her. Maybe for him. Maybe for everyone.
He knew. Of course he knew.
But for the time being, he said nothing. He just pulled Hailey closer, trying to mend his own shattered heart.
That night, three hearts had broken.