It was six AM of his third day off suspension, and Jamie was thoroughly done with desk duty. He'd always hated it before when he'd had to do it during the day, but at night it was so much worse. The only people calling the precinct were either doing so as a prank or very drunk – or both. So he was glad to be finished with his shift and headed home, and if he was walking through the precinct a little more quickly and determinedly than was strictly necessary, well, who could blame him.
"Wait up!"
He heard the shout, but didn't turn around. The first shift officers were straggling in for roll call, and he chose to believe that the call was directed at one of them.
"Hey, Reagan! Wait!"
Damn. Jamie turned around when he heard his name called to see one of his colleagues, Sarah Knight, jogging up behind him. Sarah had gone through the Academy with Eddie before being placed at the 35th, which had ended with her marrying her TO and transferring out. Jamie'd only met her a few months before and frankly found her a bit too much, but she and Eddie got along well. He didn't really have a problem with her per se, but she wasn't someone he wanted to talk to on three hours of sleep and an almost-worn-off caffeine buzz. But his unrelenting politeness made him stop and plaster on a grin. "Hey, Sarah. How's it going?"
She stopped about two feet away from him and grinned back. "Great! How about yourself?"
"I'm – "
"How's Eddie? Because you know, I talked to her last night and she said she got cleared to come back on modified starting next Monday. Did you hear?"
He hadn't heard, and was frankly a little miffed that she hadn't called him before realizing that he'd probably been on shift already. Damn night shifts. "No, that's great. She's been dying to come back."
Sarah nodded. "I know! That's why I had this idea."
She seemed entirely too chipper for six in the morning, almost reminding him of Eddie except that Eddie was decidedly not a morning person. Jamie was a little hesitant to ask her what the idea was, as Sarah was sort of infamous for her surprise parties and random pranks in the precinct. But as it turned out he didn't need to ask.
"I was thinking. What if we – like you, me, some of the others – just threw a little party for Eddie on Monday night?"
He furrowed his brow. "I don't know. I mean, it'll be her first day back at work in like, three weeks. Maybe we should try to keep it low-key."
"I know! I said a little party, nothing crazy. Just a few of us from the twelfth. We could get that back room at McCready's – you know, that old sergeant with a bar on Mercer? I bet he'd give us a discount. Ooh, and we could get a cake!"
Jamie snorted. "A cake? Like, 'congrats on not dying, here's some dessert'?"
Sarah narrowed her eyes at him. "Ohh-kay. I guess I caught you on the wrong end of a midnight. We'll talk later. Just think about it!" With that, she jogged past him and down the hall to the women's locker room. Jamie watched her go with a chuckle, knowing that whatever his objections might be, there would be a party next Monday night. And a cake. He guessed that was why Eddie and Sarah got along so well – they both had this ability to just announce their ideas as fact and make things happen. Honestly, though, it was probably a good idea, as long as he could convince Sarah to keep it sufficiently low-key. He would've hated something like this, but he knew Eddie would probably love it. And frankly, he was going to be glad to have her back at work. Unfortunately, their desk time wouldn't overlap, as by next week his punishment would be over and he'd be restored to full duty, but he missed seeing her around the precinct every day. So celebrating her return might not be the worst thing in the world.
That Monday morning was probably the first time ever that Eddie had welcomed the sound of her five AM alarm. More than just welcomed it, actually – she'd gotten out of bed without hitting snooze even once, which was practically unheard of. Sure, she was going to be playing desk jockey for the next couple of weeks, answering phones and trying not to curse out any civilians, but somehow she was aching just to walk back into the precinct. These past few weeks had felt like a vacation from her life – one that had she been asked before she might have thought she'd appreciate, but now that she'd lived it she was dying to go back to the grind.
Since getting out of the hospital, she'd had a lot of time to think about the risks she was taking on the job. What she'd told Jamie had been true – they were all supposed to be willing to die for this job, but lying there in that alley she'd had a moment of doubt, or regret, or something that had made her wish for a second that she'd gone into freaking finance or real estate. Something where the days were long and hellish and boring and safe. To be honest, the doubts still lingered, to some extent. She figured they probably would for a while. But she did love the job, which made it easier for her to push her fears to the side for now and just be happy that she was able to go back at all.
Besides, her physical therapist had told her that she would probably be on modified for around six weeks, which was probably going to drive her insane anyway before she ever had the chance to return to full duty, or so she grumbled good-naturedly to Sarah in the locker room as she wrestled her uniform top on over her injured shoulder.
Her colleague laughed. "Oh, it's not so bad! At least you're not freezing your ass off on foot patrol while your misogynist partner rants to you about how he can't get a Tinder date."
Eddie winced sympathetically. "That is a problem I don't have with Reagan."
Sarah narrowed her eyes. "You lucked out pretty well with Reagan. He's cute and doesn't eat tuna in the patrol car."
Eddie laughed. "Damn, Jacobs really sounds like the full package."
"Girl, you don't even know."
They were interrupted by a tapping on the door of the locker room. Eddie looked over at Sarah questioningly, then walked over and swung the door open. She was met by her partner leaning against the doorframe.
"Déjà vu, Reagan."
He chuckled. "Hey, partner."
Sarah came up from behind Eddie. "I'll give you two a minute. Good to see you, Jamie." She winked at him before stepping between the partners and out into the hallway, a gesture that was not lost on Eddie.
She turned back to Jamie with an eyebrow quirked. "Wow, I must've missed a lot if you two are buddies now."
He snorted. "I wouldn't say that. More like…we found common ground."
She knocked him on the arm playfully. "Oh, you're sweet." She laughed as a blush started to creep up his face.
"Shut up, Janko."
"You're just too fun to mess with."
He sighed and rolled his eyes exaggeratedly. "And here I was about to say it was good to have you back."
She grinned at him before gently pushing him out of the doorway and into the hallway. "Get outta here. You don't want to be late for roll call on your first day back out of the doghouse."
He chuckled and shook his head at her as he strode away down the hallway.
A/N: So this is not the last chapter after all! The ending of this story is taking longer than I expected, but I think the next chapter will be the last (for real this time). Sorry that this one is sort of filler, the next one will be much more interesting. Thanks for reading!