Please enjoy.

TW- mentions of sexual abuse.

Two hours had passed since Lily and Matt had left and Kelly was still staring numbly at the kitchen table, he hadn't said a word since they'd returned home twenty minutes before Lily arrived. Instead choosing to send his fist hurdling into the photo frame. Over the years he'd learnt how to manage his feelings instead of resorting to drink and violence but the events of the day had made him snap. Stella didn't know how to comfort her husband, she didn't think there was anything she could say to make things better . She was still trying to process everything herself, it wasn't that it didn't make sense it was that she didn't want it to. It couldn't be true. She didn't want to believe that the boy who desperately wanted to eat pancakes for every meal had been in so much pain.

The day had started off bleak but somehow they had been functioning as normal. Four years of enduring emotional torture while caring for Lily had taught them how to keep going even on their darkest days. But the day had gotten even worse when they received a phone call from Voight . A call from the sergeant wasn't unusual, he'd become an unlikely friend over the years. He'd been a shoulder to cry on, someone who understood how it felt to loose a child. As soon as he asked them to come down the station a had shiver ran down Stella's spine. Normally Voight visited the apartment whenever he had something to say regarding Bailey's disappearance. Which was how Stella knew that whatever the sergeant had to say it wasn't good. But she hadn't allowed her mind to wander, she hadn't been ready to entertain the idea that maybe Bailey's body had been found. The sympathetic looks of the detectives they passed on their way in did nothing to settle her nerves. Before she entered Voight's office she hadn't thought it was possible for their workd to darken even more. But as she listened to Voight's words she'd felt all the light and hope vanish from her heart. The person Bailey idolised had abused him. A man they had trusted had caused Bailey immense pain. Even now Stella's heart was still beating rapidly in her throat. The things they were told would haunt them forever. She'd never forget the images they'd seen, she would never forget how badly Bailey had been hurt. Because Bailey was her son too; it wasn't Lily who made her a mother. It was their job to protect the boy and they failed. How did they not notice what was going on? If the monster hadn't filmed it they would never have found out. They'd been completely oblivious to the pain Bailey had been suffering.

After an evening spent in silence the two distraught parents found themselves lying wide awake in bed staring up at the ceiling. Stella had been focusing on the steady sound of her husband breathing for a few hours, it was the only thing that drowned out her thoughts. They'd originally tried watching tv but everything had reminded them of Bailey in some way, whether it was a young boy in CSI or a documentary about Bailey's favourite animal -sloths- on the discovery channel. Going to bed seemed better than sitting in the couch in silence, but after lying awake for hours Stella was starting to doubt their decision.

All of the sudden she was pulled out of her thoughts by Kelly jumping out of the bed,

"I can't do this" the dark haired man muttered before rushing out of the room. Stella followed close behind her heart racing as she contemplated the meaning of the man's words. When she reached the kitchen Kelly was already searching through the cupboards underneath the sink. Confusion washed over Stella when Kelly pulled out a trash bag. She watched numbly as the firefighter marched towards Bailey's room tearing the boy's old baseball photos off the wall on his way.

"Kelly!" Called Kidd desperately but the man ignored her and proceeded into the teens old room. She was afraid he would do something irreversible that he would regret when he calmed down. But Kelly was too caught up in his anger to listen. Severide wasted no time in searching through Bailey's stuff and disposing of anything baseball related, which Stella now realised was most of the boys belongings. Awkwardly she stood in the doorway with tears streaming down her face as she watched Bailey's old things being shoved unceremoniously into the black bag. For so long the room had remained virtually untouched at Kelly's insistence , the space had been treated like sacred ground but now Kelly was ripping it to pieces. Despite her initial shock Stella understood her partners actions. He was cleansing the room of any trace of the sport that had taken their son from them.

By the time Kelly was finished the only personal items left were a few family photos and Bailey's school stuff, baseball really had been the teens entire life. It was the one thing he'd loved and it had destroyed him. The devastated man took a step back and looked around the empty room.

"Shit!" Gasped Kelly as he took in his destruction. Stella watched through tears as Kelly dropped the bag before collapsing down in a heap on the floor next to it. This was the worst she'd ever seen him ; her heart ached as she realised there was nothing she could do or say to take away her husbands pain. Delicately Stella pulled the broken man into a hug,

"I'm his father, I was supposed to keep him safe", Kelly's cries sliced through the cold air like a knife. Stella felt completely helpless as she felt Kelly's body shaking with heart wrenching sobs. She gently shushed him while rubbing circles on his back in a desperate attempt to soothe him, she knew it wouldn't ease his agony but at least it would remind him he wasn't alone. She listened with a broken heart as the man sobbed,

"I failed him, I failed my boy".