Written for endlessvoidofrandomness on Tumblr, a little OS I wrote for Halloween, set some time in the future.
Some days, Amy misses the time when she was just another Detective at Brooklyn's ninety-ninth precinct, and spent her Halloween nights planning a stupid heist against her boss and coworkers.
Especially when it's almost 8p.m. on the 31st of October and she's stuck in her office, sitting at her desk doing what seems to be never-ending paperwork from all the crimes committed during the last eighteen hours instead of spending a quiet evening with her husband and daughter carving pumpkins and watching movies at home while eating candies as she promised them they would do, their new Halloween tradition as a family.
Don't take her wrong, though – she loves her job. She truly does. She loves being the youngest Captain in the history of the NYPD, and she loves having her own squad to take care of, now.
But tonight's a special night, and not only because it's the night everyone seems to agree on not being either kind, sober nor fully-dressed (title of her sextape). Tonight marks the twelfth anniversary of Jake and her engagement, one of the memories she holds the dearest, tight up close with the actual wedding and their child's birth (her graduation as a Captain, too, if she has to be completely honest).
So of course she'd rather be with them than here, working. They even took a carving pumpkins seminar, this year, to make it even more perfect than the previous ones.
She manages to do it, usually – to make it home in time, despite it being the day crime rates go above average.
It seems the whole world is against her and her family plans tonight, though, because soon she's interrupted in her thoughts by one of her Detectives, the good but still too-doubtful Sarah Jones. "Captain," she hails her timidly as she enters her room. "Someone's here to see you," she informs her of the news.
She doesn't even try to retain the annoyed sigh that escapes her throat as she answers her subordinate, "please, make they come."
She takes a quick glance at the clock above the door the other woman is currently leaving through, obeying her command, and feels even more desperate when she sees the time: 8:02. She'll never make it.
Pumpkins will have to get carved without her and the skills she got from her seminar.
Waiting for her guest to come in, praying for whatever they want from her doesn't take too long, she starts busying herself again in what she was doing before her Detective interrupted her in her task, so much that she doesn't hear the steps of people entering the office without even bothering to knock on the door first.
"Special delivery for the most special Captain!" a voice exclaims, and she looks up with a start. She could recognise that voice between thousands of others – her husband's voice.
And there she sees him indeed, standing right in front of her with what seems to be a huge cardboard box in his arms that he soon puts on her desk without further warning. A grin is lighting his features, never leaving his face, and only growing even wider when their eyes finally meet.
Their daughter is there too, she spots her afterwards, smiling playfully as much as he is – which usually means they both have something in mind.
(Not necessarily something good, she's come to learn with the years passing by by their side.)
"Wh– what are you guys doing here?" she asks then, suspicious. "Is everything alright?!"
"Yes, everything is now," Jake says as he starts opening the box between them (she hasn't moved from her chair from the beginning). "Since you didn't seem to be able to come to our Halloween night, we figured our Halloween night had to come to you," he proudly tells her, and a rush of tenderness comes coursing through her veins at his words and their sweet attention.
A break will be more than welcomed, after all, even if she still has a lot to do. She did so much already during the day, never taking a real one for hours, so she at least deserves that.
"Plus," he goes on with his explanation, putting out of the box one big, carved pumpkin, "we wanted to show you we did listen to the seminar you forced us to go to last week. Look," he hands her the fruit for her to see more clearly.
"It's you," their daughter, Ana, speaks for the first time since they arrived as she approaches her parents and points to the figure with a grin, proud of what they spent their afternoon doing (what her uncle Terry didn't hesitate to come help them doing, mostly, because everyone knows that 'Terry loves art' and is a real artist at heart.) "And Dad," she takes out another pumpkin as she goes on, then another, and another.
"And me. We even did Simba. All of us – pumpkin-stylez!" she exclaims, all enthusiastic.
Amy lets out a wholehearted giggle as she watches the carved faces of the more or less recognisable little family and their ginger cat, Simba, whom they adopted a couple of years ago already, when they found him alone and hurt in the woods during one of their Sunday walks.
(Back then, Jake and Ana insisted on doing a remake of the whole 'Timon-and-Pumbaa-find-Simba' scene in the Lion King movie when they first saw him before taking him home – hence the name given to him.)
"That's… super cute," she acknowledges after awhile spent carefully watching the works of the two loves of her life. "Thank you, honey," she looks up at them, and offers them both a tender smile that replicates itself upon their own lips immediately, until it fades a little away as she shamefully adds, "I'm sorry I couldn't make it tonight."
"I'm Sorry I Couldn't Make it Tonight – title of your sextape," Jake only replies, though, amused, which gets him a glare from his wife at his comment.
"Jake!" she reprimands him, pointing out at the girl next to him.
"Sorry. I mean, title of your love story," he quickly corrects himself, and Amy can't help but laugh again at this censored substitution he's come up with on his running-joke towards her ever since their daughter was born. It seems like old habits die hard, though, because it's not the first time she has to warn him about his language in front of their child.
(It's not his fault he got so used to this banter that has been lasting for years now, the words go out of his mouth without even thinking them anymore, sometimes in conversations that doesn't even ask for it.)
"Don't worry, we kept one at home for us to carve together later," Ana lets her know about, taking her parents back to what's important here, not really interested in their weird exchanges (according to her, anyway). "And we brought candies! Dad said we can't really watch movies in here, so we'll have to do without this year."
To mark her words, she shows her mother the candy bags she had hidden in her pockets until now, and offers her one, before taking a seat in front of her just as Jake takes one next to his wife, making themselves comfortable in her office. The woman's about to argue, though – as much as she loves having them here with her, she'll have to go back to her paperwork soon, and she unfortunately can't be distracted too long.
"Don't worry," Jake seems to read her thoughts. "We won't prevent you from doing whatever you have to. We just wanted to be with you."
She looks at him then, with pure bliss in her eyes as a warm and overwhelming feeling takes over her heart – he knows perfectly how to reassure her.
It's so beautiful, how their relationship didn't change that much throughout the years, and if it did, only for the better. They're still so madly in love with each other, and it doesn't seem to fade away with time.
Only appear to grow wider, if it's even something possible.
"I love you," she's only able to answer then, taking one of his hands in hers, then does the same with her daughter's hand across the desk as she turns towards her. "Both of you. So much."
"We love you too," Jake is the one who says it back, before pulling her closer to him with his free arm around her shoulder so that he can put a sweet kiss on her mouth. "And also," he adds when they part, a bit of amusement going through his orbs. "Happy engagement day," he caresses the rings on their intertwined fingers, the memory of that day they officially swore to love each other for the rest of their shared lives.
"Happy engagement day," Amy repeats his words, the same big smile than he wears forming on her own features.
"Gross," Ana breaks this cheesy moment as she watches her parents with a fake-disgusted face, which makes them turn around suddenly in her direction, and break into a burst of laughter.
Finally, this Halloween is turning out pretty good as well, Captain Santiago-Peralta has to admit as she washes off a happy tear from her face.