a/n - a bit of angst, because thats how my brain likes to work sometimes.
in which amy is left to pick up the pieces
It wasn't supposed to go down like this. This, this wasn't how it was all meant to happen.
It shouldn't be happening like this.
At thirty three years of age, Amy should not be sitting on the floor of her dead boyfriends apartment (her fucking apartment), sobbing her heart out. She felt like someone had pulled her heart out of her chest, set it on fire, and told her to keep breathing without it anyway. She didn't know what to do, where to begin, how she was ever going to pick herself up off the floor and put her life back together.
It wasn't supposed to go down like this.
Jake had been undercover with the FBI for six fucking months, and had come out the other end without a so much as a scratch, and one hell of a successful case under his belt. He walked into the 99 without warning one day, a big grin on his face and a thankful look in his eyes as he took in the 99, and their squad.
And her. He had been thankful to see her.
And she had been thankful to see him. Teddy and her, they hadn't lasted long after Jake went undercover. Amy had broken up with him, giving him a bullshit excuse of 'its not you, its me' because she didn't have the heart to tell him she'd rather spend six months waiting for her partner to come back on duty, instead of spending it dating a perfectly nice guy.
It took a little while to realise, but she didn't want a perfectly nice guy. She wanted Jake, the stupid, annoying, wonderful man she already spent all her working hours with. You know you have it bad when you want to spend all your free time with someone, on top of all your working hours.
He came home a long while after Amy came to the realisation that it was him, and it had probably been him all along, and so when Jake went to go and make a cup of coffee, Amy followed him, and made something happen, romantic styles.
It was perfect.
OK, it wasn't perfect. But, it was as close to perfect as anyone could ever get. They fought, and he pissed her off, and she definitely pissed him off, and they bickered, but when it came down to it, Jake would always bring her coffee before a shift, and he'd always be waiting by his car to collect her if she was working and he wasn't.
When it came down to it, they loved each other, and they loved each other a lot, and nothing else fucking mattered, not even the things Amy thought mattered, because when it comes down to it, having someone love you unconditionally, and loving them back the same way, is all that matters.
All that would ever matter.
It wasn't supposed to go down like this.
They were supposed to be together forever. Six months ago, Amy and Jake had found an apartment and fallen in love, and moved in, dollies and stupid Transformers patterned pillowcases and all.
This was supposed to be it.
They'd been together two months when Jake met her family, charming her mother, and making her father laugh, and winning over the approval of all her brothers (possibly by the grace of God himself). The next week, she had dinner with Jake, and his mom, and finally met the woman who raised him all on her own and made him into the incredible man he was. Amy instantly fell in love with Penny Peralta, and they meet for coffee every week.
They'd been planning their future for weeks now, Amy's focus on getting Captain one day, and Jake's on catching all the bad guys. Their future was always together though, always Jake in the audience when she received her Captains badge, always Amy standing there, giving him a kiss and a high five when he put away another bad guy.
It wasn't supposed to go down like this.
Amy had finally found the love of her life, the person she wanted to be with for the rest of her life. Years of crappy dates had all led her to him, the man she knew she would marry someday, the man she knew she'd have a family with, the man she knew she would grow old with.
That's why it wasn't supposed to go down like this. Because he was her other half, her perfect other half. He balanced her out, his easy going attitude counteracting her obsessive one. He made her laugh every single day, he was kind, and thoughtful, and made her feel safe. Always.
Not everyone saw Jake like she did, apparently. He'd made enemies, sure, but nothing too serious. Nothing ever serious enough to worry about. Or so they all thought. So they all thought until last week, when Jake was shot dead in cold blood on his day off, standing outside a coffee shop with Gina.
Gina had been so hysterical, so upset that she had to be sedated. The closest thing she ever had to a brother was shot in the back of the head mid conversation, dying in her arms a few seconds later. She was on the verge of a breakdown, and Amy didn't blame her. She kind of was too.
They hadn't told Amy at first. Not how bad it was, at least. One of the cops on duty had been told to give her a ride to the hospital, Jake had been in an accident.
Did he try use that kid down the streets skateboard again? was Amy's first thought when she sat into the car, shaking her head. One day, Jake's going to have to realise he wasn't fifteen anymore.
And then she got there, and even Holt couldn't hide the pain he was in. His usually unreadable mask of a face was creased up, Boyle sitting in the waiting room, head in his hands, his shoulders shaking. Even Rosa - emotionless, unfeeling Rosa - was deathly pale, her eyes shining with tears she was refusing to cry.
She doesn't really remember what happened next. Tears, lots of tears. She was probably screaming too, because her voice was hoarse, and broken when she tried to speak to Penny when she arrived to the hospital a half hour later.
It wasn't just her voice that was broken either. Amy felt broken. Shattered into a million pieces. It hurt, it physically hurt to breathe, and move, and even eat. There was a hollow pain in her chest that tightened every time she saw something that reminded her of him.
Every inch of the apartment was covered in him, his memory. A pair of his sneakers were still by the floor door, kicked off in a haste the week previously when he had arrived in from a ten hour shift, hungrily devouring Amy's lips.
His laptop was discarded on the coffee table, still plugged in to the TV after their Netflix binge a few nights previously. The scent of his cologne lingered, his handwriting on the post-it notes stuck to the fridge reminding her of all the times she'd made fun of his horrendous handwriting, the two of them crying tears of laughter for no real reason in the middle of their kitchen.
Amy hadn't touched any of his stuff. The only thing she could bring herself to grab was a flannel shirt of his, a slightly grubby one that had been discarded on the laundry pile. It still smelled like him, still felt like him. Reminded her of him.
It wasn't supposed to go down like this.
He was thirty four, a star detective, with his whole life ahead of him. He had his mom, his friends, everyone. Everything going for him. And in a spilt second, some fucking mobster shot him in the back of the head and ended everything.
They didn't even give him a chance to fight back. Stomach, back, leg… They could have shot him anywhere, but they didn't. They shot him execution style and never gave him a fucking chance to try and fight back.
It wasn't fair. It wasn't fucking fair, because she didn't get to say goodbye. She didn't get to thank him for making her feel like the most loved girl in the world for the two wonderful, blessed years they had been together.
She never got to fucking say goodbye.
He had left early that morning, heading out to meet Gina for breakfast. He had kissed her goodbye, his parting words a joke about her morning breath, and a bright 'I love you.'
Amy couldn't even remember if she had said 'I love you back.' Knowing he would be back before lunch, she had sleepily turned over, her eyes shutting with the promise of a few extra hours sleep.
He wasn't back before lunchtime.
He was dead before noon, his body lying in the hospital morgue.
He had looked so perfect, so Jake when she had seen him. His skin still soft to touch, dressed in a slouchy hoodie and a pair of jeans. She could almost pretend he was sleeping, if it wasn't for the bullet hole in the back of his head. If it wasn't for the fact the rapidly beating heart that had been filled with so much love, for so many people, was now completely still.
It wasn't supposed to go down like this.
They were meant to be happy. This was their happy ever after, two detectives in Brooklyn, living the dream. Ten years down the road, two detectives with a nice apartment and two kids (three, if Amy got her way) and hopefully, one of those detectives would be a Captain with a unit of her own.
It was supposed to be like in the movies. The boy and the girl fall in love, and ride off into the sunset.
Amy felt like she was in a horror movie. Her life felt like a nightmare, but there was no waking up.
Her life was a nightmare now, plain and simple. It felt like everything had lost its meaning.
The love of her life was dead. No fucking magical 'we saved him', she didn't get a visit from beyond the grave where she got to thank Jake for everything, tell him how much she loved him once more. Fucking nothing.
It was just over. Like that, it was just fucking over.
Amy wasn't back at square one. She was negative one million now, her heart heavy and head fully knowing that she could never, ever be happy without him. Knowing she could never feel as loved as she did when she was with Jake, never again.
He was dead, and she could sit on the floor for the rest of her life if she wanted to, clinging to his old shirts and his fading memory, but it was still over. The rug had been well and truly yanked from under her, and she couldn't breathe, she couldn't think, she couldn't move.
"Amy."
Amy felt someone sit down beside her. Looking up, she saw Terry looking at her, the sergeants expression heartbroken. "I don't know what to do." She said. "Sarge, I don't know if I can do this. I don't know if I can do this without him."
"Me neither." Terry admitted. "He's sat at the desk across from mine nearly everyday for six years. My two baby girls know Jake better than they know their own uncles. He was family. I don't know if I can do it without him either. But we have to."
"I don't want to." Amy admitted. "This isn't how our life was supposed to turn out Sarge. I just feel empty. There's no point anymore."
"There is a point. There's always a point Amy." Terry said. "Jake only got thirty four years. So you need to go live all those other years he never got for him, because if you don't, well, you're going to see him again one day and he won't be happy."
"I can't do it without him Sarge. He was the love of my life. I know he was." Amy said, her eyes welling up with tears. "I c-can't."
"I promise you Amy, you can. It hurts now, and its probably going to hurt forever - but you are not alone. We're going to miss him forever, but he'll always, always be with us. We always know how Jake Peralta helped New York become a better place - we'll always know how he changed people's lives." Terry said. "You're not alone because Jake's with you, but you also have us. You'll always have us. Come rain, hail or shine, no matter what time of the day or night, I am always only going to be a phone call away. The 99 is a family, and we're not going to give up because some bastard took one of our best. We're just going to fight harder."
"I don't think I can even get up off this floor."
"Then we'll stay here." Terry said simply. "And when you feel like you can stand up again, we will. And one day, you're going to feel like you can walk out that front door again. But until then, we're just going to sit here."
"Its not fair." Amy said quietly, tears beginning to stream from her eyes.
"No." Terry said with a heavy sigh. "Its not."
It wasn't supposed to go down like this.