He pulls at the collar of his hoodie as he waits for her to say something - for her to explain why she's here. But instead she just looks around - taking in what was once supposed to be their livingroom. Newly printed and framed pictures of the twins are placed sporadically about the space, from the walls to couple of the tables. Those are what she seems to focus on the most and it has him wondering what she's thinking as she looks at their little, adorable faces.
After another couple minutes, with her still distracted his eyes look her over. The dark circles beneath her beautifully blue eyes, make him think she hasn't slept in weeks and it causes his heart to clench with the thought. But what's even more worrisome is the fact that she's almost drowning in her clothes - ones he remembers her wearing before, which rules out that she just bought them in the wrong size or that they're supposed to fit that loosely. So he concludes that she's lost weight in the time since he's seen her last - since he left Chicago. He steps towards her - the urge to hold her before she withers away in front of his eyes becoming too hard to resist. But then she's speaking - stopping him in his tracks.
"Do the kids spend a lot of time here?" Her eyes still focused on one of the framed photos, her voice is quiet and sad.
"No, tonight was actually the first time they were here. We were just about to go shopping for their rooms so they can start staying over." He tells her and she nods.
"So you've been spending a lot of time at Erin's house with all of them?" She asks next, her jealously evident in her words.
"Yeah Hailey, it's kind of where the twins live - it's their home and she's their mother." He quips and she seems to accept that before posing her next question.
"And you're sure you're their-"
"Hailey, did you see them?...They're mine." He tells her before she can even finish her question - as if she hadn't seen the twins or notice Alex's resemblance to him or Ava's shared features with her brother and subsequently Jay.
"So you could be co-parenting someone else's children just because they look like you?" She argues and he sighs.
"Did you just come here to question the paternity of my kids? Or is there a real reason for your sudden appearance?" He defends and she sighs but her shoulders tense.
"When you told the department about Voight, did you tell them everything?" She finally looks up at him with that.
"Yeah, why?" His eyebrows furrow with curiosity and worry.
"He asked me to visit him." She throws out and he pinches the bridges of his nose for a moment before letting his hand return to his side and he looks back at her.
"So you did?" He narrows his eyes at her - his blood boiling with his sudden anger.
"Jay, he's told the department and lawyers that we didn't tell them everything. He's threatening to tell them what we didn't. They'd have to let him walk and maybe even arrest us instead." She babbles and he huffs - throwing his head back with the absurdity.
"Well I told them everything I knew about, so if there is something they don't know it's something that I wasn't told about or-" He shrugs and she nods as she breaks eye contact with him this time - letting him know that he just hit the nail on the head.
"Hailey?"
"Do you remember the Peters case?" She asks and he nods - recalling one of the first cases they worked after they got married and wanting her to tell him how it could quite possibly tarnish their credibility and put them at risk of being targeted themselves. But then he reminds himself that Voight is undoubtedly a crook whose credibility is long gone so Jay reasons that they're not really at risk of suffering any blowback but he still doesn't want to test the theory.
"Yeah, case went cold because the perp vanished right before we could bring him in." Jay adds when she doesn't say anything else at first - instead looking at her hands as they begin to shake and then she's clenching them to try and stop the trembling.
"It was an accident, I - I thought he-"
"Stop." He shakes his head and they both grow quiet as he begins to pace. He thought he wanted to know but now he realizes that he can't - he shouldn't hear the rest because then he won't be able to claim ignorance on the matter if he were to be approached about it.
"I didn't know about that because you didn't tell me about it. And I don't need to know now because I'm not going down for this Hailey - I can't. Not now." He tells her and she lets out a defeated sigh.
"Why are coming to me about this now?" He asks instead and she blinks back her tears.
"I'm pregnant Jay." She blurts out and his head snaps up to look at her - to see if she's telling the truth.
"And you've been my rock for the last four years. I can't go through this without you." She murmurs and he shakes his head again, this time in confusion.
"Why wouldn't you have started with that?" He has his suspicions as to why she didn't tell him that right away but he wants to hear it from her.
"I just want you to come home." She avoids answering his question and he can feel his heart begin to pound even harder in his chest.
"Hailey." He says sternly as he comes to stand in front of her and she looks up at him with red rimmed, teary eyes.
"I'm only two months along." Her bottom lip quivers with the sentence.
It's what he immediately suspected - figuring she couldn't be far along. And they hadn't been intimate for at least a month before he left Chicago three months ago. Two months, he repeats in his head. Two months ago they decided to get divorced, it was around the same time he found out about the twins.
"The baby's not mine?" He doesn't mean for it to come off as a question because he obviously knows the answer - one that he's quite honestly relieved by.
"We didn't mean for it to happen." She claims and he bites his tongue to stop himself from saying the snarky remark that came to his mind - knowing now is not the time.
"At first he would come over to be my sounding board, someone for me to talk to but the night we decided to get an annulment he was there and it was a moment of weakness - something to distract me from you leaving me behind-"
"I wasn't leaving you behind Hailey, you were supposed to be coming with me." He argues - not being able to hold back his anger anymore and she looks down again.
"I felt like we weren't us anymore - even before you decided to take the job here." She murmurs and he shakes his head for what must be the tenth time since she got here.
"So you slept with another guy?" Gone is the gentleness he held for her before. Part of him wants to know who the guy is but the other part tells him it's not really important - that he doesn't really care.
"He and I met when I worked overtime that one night. And after that he ended up being there for me when you weren't Jay. There were nights you were coming home hours after me - a couple nights you didn't come home at all." She tries to defend and it only seems to agitate him even more.
"So he's why you decided not to move here." He states and she doesn't deny it. She reaches forward and takes his hands in hers.
"Yes, but he's a little younger than me and he's not ready for this - for a baby. Which is why I came here to ask you to come home." She admits and he pulls his hands away from her and takes a few steps back.
"I need your help with this Voight thing and then I figured we could work through our issues and have a family." Her teary eyes are practically pleading with him - begging for him to give in.
"You want me to leave my kids to go back with you and raise someone else's?" His voice is louder than before - his anger making itself known.
"They may not even be yours either Jay." She counters and he huffs at that because he's never had any doubt that the twins were his children.
"If that's what you need to tell yourself to make you feel better about the fact that you cheated on your husband and are pregnant with your lover's baby, have at it. I'm sorry that you felt like you were abandoned by me but that doesn't make what you did right. I wish you the best with this Voight thing and your baby because I do love you." He stops as he walks to the door and he smiles sadly at the picture near the entryway - one that Erin sent him in one of the letters a couple years ago. He doesn't think she meant to be in it but she is, with one side of her face at the top of the frame as she smiles down at the babies in her lap.
And he thinks of them - the twins and Erin before he continues. "But I love them too - I love them more than life itself and I'm not leaving them or moving back to Chicago."
He doesn't leave any room for further argument and by the way she nods her head, he thinks she gets that there's no changing his mind.
"Here." She says after pulling two envelopes out of her backpack. She steps forward and hands him one that's a bit weathered and open but she holds onto the other one. She pulls out a pen from her bag too and then unfolds what was in the envelope still in her hand. He watches as she signs and initials a few places before returning the pen to her pack. She refolds the papers and tucks them back into the envelope before giving that to him too.
Then he's opening the door, telling her that she can stay the night if she needs - knowing that she's not the type to mess with his house or his things. But then again, he wouldn't have thought of her to be the type to cheat either but here they are. Regardless he thinks if she does try anything, he doesn't have much - if anything of significance or high value other than a few materialistic things held within the house. So with that he leaves with no real destination in mind - at least he doesn't think he does until he's turning on the newly familiar street.
Erin ties her robe shut to cover the camisole and shorts she wearing beneath it just before opening the door - a heartbroken expression on her face that he recognizes is a good representation of how he's feeling inside. He can tell she's trying to figure out why he's here - why he's not with his wife back at his house. But he doesn't answer her silent question - instead he poses one of his own. "Are they in bed already?"
She shakes her head as she looks back over her shoulder and up the stairs.
"They just got done with their baths and are getting their pj's on. We're about to eat dinner and watch a movie." She turns her head back to face him, not even thinking about reminding him that the twin's bedtime isn't for another two and a half hours.
"Are you ok?" She questions as she looks him over again and it's his turn to shake his head.
"Do you want to come in?" She opens the door a little wider with her offer and he doesn't say anything as he steps in beside her. After closing the door, she places one of her hands on his tense back and then he's turning into her and practically collapses against her. And she leans her head against his and rests her chin on his shoulder as she rubs a few soothing circles into his back muscles. They stay like that for a little while and he even seems to relax before breaking the embrace and walking into the livingroom. The dog who's sitting on his bed in the corner starts growling at Jay as soon as he sees him but stops quickly and obediently lays down as soon as Erin tells him to.
Then the twins are making their way down the stairs and of course, they run straight to their dad who falls to his knees to wrap them up in his arms. Everything from the last hour is temporarily erased from his mind as he hugs his kids - the smell of their lavender shampoo wafting his nostrils and calming his racing heart. He thinks of how he could never leave them - how he never wants to be away from them again.
"Daddy can we go shopping now?" Ava asks and Jay chuckles sadly at her persistence.
"Not tonight Peanut, it's getting late but we'll go soon." He murmurs before placing a kiss to her forehead and then moving to place one to her brother's head.
"Mommy, can Daddy watch the movie with us?" Alex questions just as Erin gets done taking a picture of the three of them and goes to sit on the couch.
"I don't know Bub, maybe Daddy will want to go home?" Erin words it as a question to give Jay an out if he does need to get back home to Hailey.
Erin smiles sadly as she looks at the three of them, the twins both staring at Jay with their arms draped loosely around his shoulders and neck.
"Daddy, can you stay and watch the movie wit us, please?" Ava begs and even if Jay could deny them anything, he wouldn't be able to resist the way they're looking at him right now.
"Please Daddy?" Alex adds and Jay glances over at Erin to make sure she's ok with him staying - at least until the twins go to bed. She gives him a nod and he lets out a sigh of relief.
"It depends..." He pretends to think about it and they just continue giving him their best puppy dog eyes. "Ok, what movie are we watching?"
"Alex picked Toy Story again." Ava dramatically tells him and Alex gives her such an offended look - his little face scrunched up and his eyebrows furrowed. It causes Jay to chuckle lightly at the adorable expression.
"It's better than Frozen 2." Alex shoots back and Ava narrows her eyes at her brother - a look that again mimicks one Jay's seen from their mother before.
"Alright monkeys, let's watch the movie." He stands with them in his arms and starts to walk them to the little table where their dinner is all ready for them. Once they're situated, he goes and has a seat on the couch as Erin curls into the arm at the other end and presses play on the remote.
He looks down at his phone and sees a couple of texts and missed calls - having silenced it at some point during his walk around the block that lead him here. His thumb swipes the notifications off his lock screen and then returns the phone to his pocket. He can feel her gaze on him as he pulls his hands down his face and sighs.
"Jay." She murmurs and he looks over at her slowly, his eyes locking on hers instantly.
He shakes his head at her silent question of if he's sure he doesn't want or need to go back to his house. And when she doesn't push him, he mouths an almost inaudible 'thank you' just as Alex walks over and climbs up onto the couch next to him.
By the end of the movie both kids are asleep and Erin can't help taking another picture of her babies. She has to hold her phone up high in order to get both of them in frame but she manages - looking at the shot before setting her phone down on the end table next to her. Then she looks down at her chest where their daughter is sleeping, she rubs her back as her gaze moves over to Alex who's cuddled up to Jay's side. Another sad smile comes to her face as her eyes land on Jay. He seems to be in a daze as he too looks at the twins.
"Do you want to talk about it?" She finally voices and it seems he didn't hear her as he doesn't move or acknowledge her words in any way.
"Jay?" She murmurs a little louder.
"She wants me to move back." Is his response, his eyes still on the kids.
"How far along is she?" Her voice is hushed as if saying it too loud would trigger him.
"How could you possibly know that?" He actually smirks with her ability to figure that out.
"I've kind of been where she is Jay." She says as she once again looks at the twins.
"And my mind hasn't stopped since we left your house earlier." She picks up Ava and he does the same with Alex before they take them upstairs. She places a kiss to Alex's head and then they go into the separate rooms to lay them down.
"When I first got to Connecticut, her telling me she was pregnant was actually exactly what I thought I wanted - a new beginning and life with my wife. I had hoped it'd be the start of our future and that we'd have kids soon after getting here." He continues once he's back downstairs and she hands him a beer as she walks from the kitchen into the livingroom.
"It was the way it was supposed to be. For her - my wife - to have my kids. But-." He pauses for a moment and those words send a ping of pain through her heart.
"But then you found out about the twins." Her heart sinks as his words replay over and over in her head. She takes a long pull from her own beer - not wanting to make this about the twins or herself but she can't help it the more she thinks about that sentence.
"Yeah. And I-"
"I think you should go." She cuts him off and he's taken aback.
"What?" He shakes his head in confusion.
"You should go back to Chicago with your wife." She mumbles into the top of her beer bottle, trying to clear her throat of the lump that's forming there while blinking back her tears.
"Erin?" He tries to pull her into him but she pushes him away.
"I need you to go, please." She begs, her voice is both sad and angry. That's when he realizes the mistake in his words.
"I'm sorry I didn't-"
"I wanted you to be able to vent and talk through it. And for you to realize what you wanted on your own terms. Whether it was to stay here with her or maybe ask for the twins and I to move to Chicago. But I guess that's not how it's supposed to be because my children weren't apart of what you saw or wanted in your future, right?" There's another shift in her tone - leaning more towards her anger.
"That's not what I meant." Now he's angry at how she's misconstrued his words.
"No you're right Jay, you're supposed to have kids with your wife and you should. It'll be your fresh start and you'll get to be there from the beginning - from the moment your baby is born - like it's supposed to be." It hurts her to say, he can tell just by the way her chest quakes with her statement.
"Damn it Erin stop." He slams his beer bottle down on the coffee table with so much force that the brown glass shatters. She jumps with the outburst and her angry tears fall. Zeke gets up and walks over to his owner while once again growling at Jay.
"I'm sorry." He calms seeing the mess he's made both literally and figuratively. He hates seeing that she's hurting.
"You need to leave." She tells him again but he shakes his head. "Please leave."
"I can't just leave them or you." He sighs and she shakes her head.
"You have a wife Jay. You have a wife that's pregnant. One that wants you to be with her. The twins were born to a woman who never was and never will be your wife or anything close to it. They were born out of wedlock and without your knowledge. They were conceived from something that resembled love but wasn't." She doesn't believe the last sentence - knows that what they had was and is love. Her voice is raspier than usual from the hurt the situation and her own words are causing her. Her chest is still heaving from the pain but she continues with her angry rant.
"But they are the best thing to ever happen to me and I resent the insinuation that they weren't supposed to be born because you and I didn't exchange vows or a set of matching rings or sign a fucking marriage license. They were supposed to be a part of my life - they are my life. And I thought you felt the same since finding out about them...but I guess I was wrong." She finishes as she gets up and he thinks she's going to the door to let him out but she turns to the left towards the kitchen instead of to the right. It seems like she's gone for a while and he thinks about going over to the laundry room that she ducked into but she comes back before he has the chance. She sweeps up the broken glass with a sad expression on her face.
"I'm sorry." She murmurs after she dumps the glass in the garbage can in the kitchen. He takes her hand and gently pulls her down to sit next to him on the couch. Then he's cupping her cheeks and wiping away her tears.
"I guess I let my fear of you leaving them manifest into all that. And I overreacted." She tells him and she feels guilty for how she turned this around so it wasn't about him. She wanted him to talk if he wanted, so he'd hopefully feel better and she could be his shoulder to cry on be it figuratively or literally. But now he's comforting her and it makes her feel disgusted with herself.
"No I worded that wrong and I understand your reaction. But I need you to know that I'm not leaving them Erin. I'm never going to leave them." He tells her first and she releases a shuttering breath.
"But what about your-?"
"The baby's not mine, she's only two months along. She came here to see if she could convince me to go back - to be with her? Yes, but she also wanted me to help her with something Voight is trying to pull." He admits and she just gives him a questioning look and he wipes the newest batch of tears off her cheeks with the back of one of his index fingers. Then he goes over the whole conversation he and Hailey had.
"But you don't want to go back?" She asks once he's done relaying everything to her.
"My brother asked me if I thought you'd be willing to move back to Chicago the night Voight was arrested." He admits and she nods while looking down at her lap, one of his hands covering both of hers.
"And I told him no - that I wouldn't ask you to. Because we left Chicago for a reason and even though the twins are still young, you've made a life for them in there." He adds and she sighs.
"My answer is still no because I don't want to move back or to uproot you and the twins. And that's what I told Hailey." He gives her hands a squeeze when he feels her tense ever-so-slightly.
"Then she signed the annulment papers she brought with her and she handed me this along with them." He pulls the folded and opened letter from his back pocket - the last letter Erin sent him about the twins two years ago.
"Why did she have it?" She asks, her eyes narrowing at the letter ever-so-slightly.
"I didn't ask. But I thought about it on the walk here." He looks down at the letter - smiling at the pictures that are new to him as they poke out the top of the envelope.
"By the time Hailey and I started dating, Voight had taken her under his wing - they had built a relationship similar to what you and Voight had. So I figured he asked her to keep an eye for anything from you and to take it if she saw it." He shrugs because he didn't think to ask Hailey before he left the house.
"I'm so sorry Jay." She whispers again as she leans forward to place a kiss his forehead. And when she pulls back, he shakes his head as he brings her even closer to him, so their legs are pressed against each other.
"What are you apologizing for?" He questions and she shrugs which confuses him even more.
"For everything you've had to go through."
"Well don't be, it's lead me here." He murmurs to her.
"And here is exactly where I want to be." He tells her while looking into her eyes - both of them lean in until their lips are ghosting over each other's. But then she moves to press a kiss to the corner of his mouth instead and then pulls back a little.
"I'm sorry. I hate how everything has played out for you Jay but we can't."
He looks at her with so much confusion but nods anyway.
"I can't take advantage of you, not now - not ever." She adds and his eyebrows furrow.
"You can't take advantage- "
She raises one of her eyebrows at him.
"You and I both know that a woman can take advantage of a man, Jay." She interrupts him and he nods because she's right about that.
"This is a vulnerable and emotional time. And I meant what I said the other day about what's best for the twins. So while I want this-" She gestures between them.
"I want to do this right. We have to do everything right for them and for ourselves. So that means it has to be the right time." The words of how pursuing or progressing things the same night his marriage ends isn't exactly right in any way, is left unsaid but he knows what she means. So she places a hand on his arm - giving it a gentle squeeze as he lays his hand on her thigh closest to him.
"Ok." He whispers in understanding - knowing she's right as his thumb runs back and forth over the skin of just above her knee.
"One day." He adds, still in a hushed tone and she smirks with a sad chuckle falling from her lips at that.
"Definitely." She agrees and then he leans in to place a lingering kiss to her head and she closes her eyes, pushing a few tears to fall down her cheeks.