"Well thanks for the drink and the chat but time to go home, I guess."
She was looking at him intently, her captivating ocean blue eyes unable to look away from his concerned green ones. If work had been optional, she would want nothing more than to put the world to rights here and then with him. But with their crazy schedules and the constant reminder of always having to gain in efficiency on the field, rest was mandatory.
He was still wearing that empathic frown that had become his signature expression when affected by various circumstances.
As a matter of fac,t she had just shared a big part of her life with him. That part which had undoubtedly forged the woman she had become today: the defensive and closed off one. The rough edges. The untrusting nature. To this day, it was still hard to believe getting close to anyone did not actually mean getting hurt in the long run. She had been working all her life to be more trusting and animated and not let that tragic, miserable part of her story dictate the course of her future. But despite her determined and persevering nature, the process was requiring a lifelong commitment tough to maintain every now and then.
"Hey hold on a second." He said, his hand tentatively approaching her arm resting on the table but never actually making any physical contact. She gazed furtively at his movement and looked back at him again, asking,
"What's the matter?" She was expecting words of encouragement or even small talk to delay them parting ways, never planning on the seriousness of the conversation that would ensue.
"Do you have any idea what happened to Darius?" Her eyes involuntarily widened, taken aback by his cool demeanor towards such a sneaky inquiry.
Technically, it was a rhetorical question. They both knew why Darius got killed, he had even been waiting for her that night. But she had never once brought it up, in full conscience of - some would say - her reckless conduct and the satisfying consequences that came with it nonetheless.
"What do you want me to say to that?" She tackled honestly.
She had been ready to stand up and leave but reverted back to her previous position as she was under the impression this was going to take more time and energy than expected. What any admission of hers would change regarding what transpired after that night, that was apprently her mystery to solve tonight.
"Just tell me the truth."
"I subtly ratted him out and got him killed. Don't bother asking, I don't regret it for one second. I don't live with it just fine but after what he did to Cameron, the bastard didn't deserve it any other way." She stated coldly, holding his gaze as defiance.
She noticed his expression change from alertness to disappointment. Witnessing his mixed emotions towards her mingle on his face hurt more than she could have ever put into words. She was now only grasping how much she always thrived to never fail him. But this was clearly not the answer he had been hoping for. Resolved to hold her ground anyway, she pursued,
"I never wanted to see one more prick in that precinct take the fall for protecting his side of the neighborhood, his illegal businesses and murders. Can you understand that?" She demanded, dejected that he would make her the bad guy in this.
"At the cost of his life? This is Voight's signature move Hailey, not yours."
How could he get his head around this? He did not have to verbalize it. By bringing up their superior, whom was at the other end of his emotional spectrum, he was affirming that he could never resort to such methods. Even if the person in question was a cold-blooded murderer.
But his real issue emerged as believing that she could end up following in Hank Voight's notorious shady actions.
"Don't forget he has killed countless of people too. And I won't argue with you on this, Voight would have done the same thing. Are you disappointed in me?" She wondered straight-forwardly, awaiting nothing but honesty from his part too.
"Mostly worried Hailey." She didn't doubt his caring nature, he could never fake that part of himself. But this was the second time he was deflecting his response and withholding that for once, they were not seeing eye to eye.
"Worried?" She reiterated.
"Voight does what he does because he has nothing to lose anymore. That's not the case where you are concerned."
He stressed out the same valid point Voight did that night, making her consider he had talked to the man in question about this. If they both were trying to talk some sense into her, they were coming at it the wrong way. This was ardently upsetting her, almost to the point of no return. She was not a fragile, delicate flower that needed supervision. She was a grown ass woman, making her own decisions and dealing with the consequences.
"And if I told you I wanted to be more like him?" Turned off by his lecture and judgmental stand, she relied on provoking him now.
"Be my guest. But I wouldn't be a good partner and friend," When he saw her tilt her head and raising her eyebrows at his choice of words to label their relationship, he naturally but clumsily corrected, "or whatever anyway, I'd tell you that it is not worth it. Which brings me to our coffee room chat from earlier." Presently staring at him with chagrin and exasperation, she was still both disconcerted at where he wanted to go with this and dreading what she subconsciously knew he wanted to clarify.
He was getting his frustration with her off his chest. He was done with the whole Darius thing, it only came down as if he had needed her to voice the fact that she may have played a big part in his downfall to get past it. With the exception there was now that conversation left.
"What about it?"
"Someone inadvertently told me you weren't really truthful to what you said to me in there." She laughed at his attempt to throw her off, shaking her head in disapproval.
This was a blatant lie. He was trying to manipulate her, using the same detective skills she possessed to have her confess something she had not shared with anybody. Was he truly insulting her by questioning how smart she was and how well she knew him?
"Meaning?" Two could play this game. She was testing where he was willing to push this lie.
"You'd have done things differently." He wasn't. He unambiguously expressed what she had internally battled to confess in that moment. Therefore she sighed, quietly conceding he was right as there was no turning back from this. Indeed, she would have done things differently but not for the reasons he was undoubtedly envisioning this instant.
"You're lying to me now?" She flinched at the accusation and pondered how things could have taken such a wrong turn after their meaningful conversation from a few minutes prior.
"I wasn't lying. I was being supportive, seeing things through your lens." She explicated calmly. She had never lied to him before and his doubts were genuinely offensive.
"So you would have done things differently. After what you just told me about your mom and dad, would you have really waited for something terrible to happen to Michelle in order for us to catch the guy?" Once again, she winced at his brutal approach. He was turning her confession into a bargaining chip and she found his attitude really low and distressing.
"Wow. This isn't judgmental or resentful at all!" She was making every effort not to get caught in her rage and in the violence inflicted by his words but if he kept pushing, she would not be accountable for what might happen next.
"I'm just disappointed you weren't being honest in that moment, that's it." He reemphasized, deliberately occulting her side of the story.
"You were already beating yourself up for screwing the operation. I just didn't want to add to your plate." One more truth that by the look of disdain on his face, he took for one more excuse.
"Why do you always follow me blind then? Why? If most of the time you aren't in sync with my way of operating things!" He threw his hands in the air out of irritation, a testament to his incapacity of figuring out why not having her on his side in that moment was bothering him so much.
"Most of the time, we are in sync! I told you, I trust you! Even when the outcome doesn't match our plan. You always lead with the best intentions and that's good enough for me."
"I just thought we were seeing eye to eye on the job you know, being on the same wavelength and everything. But you were just going to do it Voight's way."
"I would have done it my way, Jay. And what's with all the shit you're giving me right now anyway?" She was more worked up now than she had ever been and he was keeping her up in that frame of mind she hated the most: where she could not see past low-blows and having the last word. Tension had been filling up the atmosphere, she could see he was adopting a calm exterior but his eyes had darkened and narrowed, blazing with indignation.
"I just don't want you to end up losing your heart and humanity in this job."
The mere fact that he thought that this could be a possible outcome broke her heart. She wasn't asserting that what she did to Darius was right but she had followed her raw instinct. For Cameron. And all the other Camerons out there. This was a one-time choice she had to live with for the rest of her life, on top of every other horrible things happening daily on the job. She was never planning on turning into Voight and if he ever cast doubt upon that, he did not know her very well then.
"Your heart is the reason why you got shot a few weeks ago and why we let Shane get away with homicide."
He had hit a raw nerve with his accusations and passing judgements. Yet the second those words escaped her, she had wished for nothing more than to reclaim them all promptly. Even more so when she noticed his fuming expression contort into shock and disbelief.
"I'm sorry, this was uncalled for." She immediately apologized, losing her aggressiveness. Things had escalated quickly and nothing good was going to come out of this heated war of words. She ran her hands through her hair, looking down and letting cooler heads prevail. After a few needed seconds of silence, she let a weary sigh escape her.
"No you're right." She detected his voice slightly breaking which doubled up her guilt, "But this is how I roll. And I won't change who I am." His tone had softened too.
"And I would never ask you that!" She exclaimed, looking up at him again. "Is it that bad that I am still figuring out how I want to roll?"
"No because you have so many options to choose from. But if you go Voight's way every time, you won't last trust me." She never thought she would one day be tired of hearing the Sergeant's name. But she was. And he might have been targeting the wrong person right now.
"Copy you but I'm not Erin. There are a lot of things I'm not proud of and maybe I let the Darius situation get out of hand but it's done. We can either disagree on this forever or move on."
She was bringing this to an end, their argument having drained her. He contemplated her in silence, nodding to let her know after putting everything out in the open as well as in perspective, he too wanted to put this behind them, choosing to trust her. But he felt compelled to add,
"I guess I wanted you to admire my gesture, you know. With Michelle. It was instinctive but in some way it was my misguided attempt at bringing you some sort of comfort after everything you've been through."
His confession tug at her heartstrings and caused her to realize the matter of contention might not have been Darius or inaudibly disagreeing with him on how to handle Shane and Michelle. The problem was that he thought he had somehow let her down. He had been taking his self-inflicted frustration out on her and she looked to be caught off guard by the abrupt 180 turn of events, the rollercoaster of emotions he could lead her through. As daunting as it was, it also signified that each time they might potentially quarrel, he could also be the one to bring her to the other side: where trust, honesty and respect could solve anything.
"I do and I am. Always. I stand by what I said earlier Jay. You did a good thing." He took his time to look at her with puppy-dog eyes, soundlessly thanking her for her reassurance and anticipating there was still a hitch,
"But what you got wrong is that my childhood misery is exactly why I would have waited. My gut told me he was just yelling to scare her. He had to get out of the house for this meeting and even if by stealing his car keys she was pissing him off, in his twisted mind he would have waited until closing the deal before making her pay for it." Attentive to her own evaluation of the situation, his wandering and contemplative eyes corroborated he was analyzing her solid and rational elements which produced her point.
"You've experienced violence in a lot of ways too. We can't predict what form or consequences it might take on the job. Our guts just told us different things in that moment. It's bound to happen again. That doesn't mean I want to be more like Voight and less like you. I just want to do me. And we'd live in an utopian world if thinking we're always going to get it right together." She sensed he had taken a breather as he appeared more relaxed and dared taking her hand in his while gluing his eyes to hers,
"Always be straight with me Hailey." He pleaded, losing her hand to cup her cheek briefly and delicately, "That's how I want us to roll." He affirmed, his pointer finger pacing back and forth between them.
"I'm sorry I sugarcoated things with Michelle. You have to look at my best intentions too." He cracked a smile shrugged her off playfully with his hand, assuring her everything was okay again.
"I'm sorry for that stupid argument over my frustration of feeling like I disappointed you." Taking into account his full disclosure on picking up a fight with her, just like that, every infuriated fiber left in her being vanished completely. Their miscommunication was already where it belonged: in the past. She was truly dazzled by how their relationship - whatever it was now - had healthily and sustainably progressed over the years. Even if they both found themselves still guarded sometimes, mostly because of their pasts, when it came to the other person they always managed to push through.
Voight says I'm wired through the heart. When it comes to you, definitely." There he was again with those eyes, that smirk and that confidence he exuded when trying to make his non-verbal feelings for her come across.
"Meaning?" She raised one eyebrow, matching his smirk with a heartfelt smile only he could paint on her face.
"We are dancing around something we both know the meaning of Hailey." He declared, currently and unconsciously drawing on the table with his hand, averting her eyes.
"We both have to figure out so much shit before we can entertain the idea of making this work." He looked up to her, as if this wasn't what he had wanted her to reveal.
"It's already working Hailey. You make me better. On or off the field. I can only hope I am doing the same for you." His voice was non-surprisingly soothing, his eyes beaming and candid, a look she had never seen him throw at anyone else but her.
"Of course! Why are we unable to move forward then?"
"With the kind of lives we're leading, we'd better be careful." He warned her half-jokingly.
"What are we then?" She pushed carefully, seizing this opportunity to open the never-ending postponed discussion that could make everything too real.
"Soulmates in waiting." He retorted, as if he had practiced his words a thousand times before. Perturbed by his confession, she had not even caught sight of him leaning his head towards her.
"What the hell does that mean?" She blurted out, punching his shoulder playfully with indignation, forcing him to retreat back to find his balance again.
"Our time is coming. In the meantime, you hang on to the idea you are my soulmate." He took her hand in his once again as she squeezed it tight repeatedly, letting him know his promise was good enough for now, meaning the world to her at the same time. He grinned from ear-to-ear and kissed her hand gently before winking at her and taking off.
She leaned back on her chair, her heart racing, as she watched him walk away. He stopped by the door, wearing a puzzled look on his adorable face as to why she was not following on his heels. She came back to her senses, stood up to march towards what looked like a bright future.
Jut in time for One Chicago day! Hope you liked this one. I also hope everyone is safe and doing okay in these unprecedented times.