"Jay?.." Hailey questions again, her voice gaining more strength. "What are you doing here?" she closes her eyes in slight pain after taking in her surroundings, only to reopen them in confusion. "What am I doing here?"

He squeezes her good hand a little tighter. "You were shot, Hailey. Will called me because Sylvie brought you in. But don't worry, you'll be alright. It will all be alright. Let me grab the doctor to come check on you and then I can explain some more."

He moves to get up, but she holds his hand to keep him close for a moment. "Are you really here? In Chicago?" she asks so vulnerably that it nearly breaks his heart all over again thinking about how she doesn't think he'd come back for her, especially in this state she's in.

"I am." He assures her. "For good. And I'm not going anywhere!" he gives her forehead another kiss and then runs out to the nurses' station to page the doctor.

It becomes a flurry of activity and people once Jay alerts the hospital that Hailey woke up. A few nurses rush in with the doctor-on-call quickly behind them. They check her sensory skills, ask her basic questions to confirm most of her memory is intact, and put in an order for her to have another CT scan to make sure there's no more swelling and bleeding to be overly concerned about. But so far it seems like she's passing all the doctor's tests with flying colors and progressing well. Which is a major relief to Jay. It seems all Jay may truly have to worry about is her emotional state and how she's going to react to him being back, permanently…

When they're finally left alone again, a little bit of an awkward silence takes hold between them. Which is an odd feeling because they used to be so great sitting together in silence and just enjoying each other's presence. The doctor for the most part filled her in on her injuries and how they came to be, so there's not much for Jay to say there especially since he only knows through Kim.

"How are you feeling?" Jay asks her and then second guesses it. "I'm sorry, that's a dumb question."

"It's not dumb…" she takes a moment's pause, as if reflecting. "I'm alright. Shoulder and head are a little sore, but that's to be expected right? It's just a lot to take in. Especially waking up to see you." She states with no bite, just openly honest.

Jay tries to swallow back the sting of her words. "Did you really think I wouldn't drop everything to be here to make sure you were okay?"

He watches her try to hold in her sigh. "I don't know, Jay… but can you really blame me?"

He lets out his own sigh. "No, I guess not."

"I do appreciate that you did. I don't want you to think I'm ungrateful. But you're not going to get in trouble for dropping everything over there? Is AWOL still a thing for contract hires?" she cracks a small smile.

He chuckles slightly too. "No. I filled the Major in on the way to the airport. He told me I would be relieved of my duties immediately... But even if I wasn't, I need you to know that nothing would have stopped me from getting back here!" he tells her sincerely.

She takes a while to acknowledge his words. As if she's contemplating what they mean and whether to believe them. When she finally does respond it's just simply with "Okay" and the permeating silence takes over again. When they finally break it, they're talking over each other…

"Look, I-" Jay starts

"What's your-" Hailey goes on.

"You first." Jay smiles disarmingly at her.

"What's your plan?.. now that it seems I'll be okay. Will you sign another contract with them? I don't want to keep you here longer than you need to be!"

Jay starts adamantly shaking his head no at her. If he thought he was stubborn, he's reminded that nothing compares to how stubborn the woman in front of him can be, even while laying in a hospital bed. "No! I'm done with that, Hailey. When I told you before I wasn't going anywhere, I meant it! I know that may be hard for you to believe given my history the past 10 months, but it's the truth. Plus, you're literally still in a hospital bed, Hailey… what are you talking about being okay? I would never leave you like this!"

She just slowly nods her head at him, clearly still hesitant to trust his words.

"Look, what I was going to say before is I know I have a long way to go to get you to believe in me again. I know I have a lot to make up for. And I intend to do all of that. But first my main focus is making sure your physical health is up to par. So I'll be with you in this hospital until the doctors kick the both of us out!"

"I never didn't believe in you, Jay. That's the problem. I would have went to hell and back to make you believe in yourself again instead of trying to figure it out 4,000 miles away, but you didn't give me that chance. You didn't give us that chance…"

"Hailey…" he whispers, the emotions deep in his voice.

"I think the pain meds are kicking back in, I'm starting to get drowsy. I'll see you when I wake, yeah?" she interrupts him and he truly can't tell if it's really just her getting tired again or if a part of it is her deflecting, but he doesn't contest her either way.

"Okay." He whispers again, knowing it's pointless to even try right now.

He dims the lighting for her and gets ready to sulk at her words, laying back in the chair and trying to get comfortable while his mind is anything but. Working this out between them may be even harder than he thought it would. As he gets deep in his thoughts and thinks she's almost drifted off again, she surprises him with a whisper of her own.

"Until the doctors kick us out? Usually you're trying to bribe them to let you out, you hate hospitals."

He can tell her teasing tone even while she's half asleep. He's missed it. So much.

"Yeah, well, you're not the only one willing to go to hell and back for the other…"

He catches her soft smile at his words before she officially drifts off. It proves to him that there are parts of them that are still them. Maybe it won't be so hard after all…

Waking up in a hospital bed had been quite the shock for Hailey, but not nearly as shocking as finding her almost ex-husband sitting there with her. She hadn't physically spoken to him since that day in May when he called her frantic after finding out she had been kidnapped. Something in her had broke even more that week. The whole time while she was captured all she could think about was how she couldn't die like this because she'd never get to see Jay again, and she also knew the guilt would destroy him. Imagine that? She was being beaten and near tortured, thinking this was finally her end, and her main concerns were what that would do to her husband's mental state… When she finally did manage to free and save herself, her joy was short-lived because she knew the person she most needed comfort from was 4,000 miles away. Which is why she didn't even feel it necessary to call him, well, his voicemail because let's face it- Jay's auto message was answering well more than he ever did those days, and let him know what happened. Then she had that conversation with Voight and while it didn't resonate in the moment, when she came home to their empty house, fragments of material memories of Jay around her everywhere, but no physical presence of her husband that she desperately needed, that's when it hit her that maybe her boss was right and she had to protect herself. She had seemed to be the only one fighting for their marriage for far too long, and she just couldn't continue to do it if she ever hoped to put herself first again.

After much contemplating, reflecting, and crying alone all night, when the first rises of light from the new day reflected off their balcony door and into her eyes, she took her ring off. Jay called her two days later after who she can only imagine was Trudy, informed him of what happened. He sounded sincere about flying home and she let herself get excited for a brief moment until the part where he mentioned 'leave of absence'… She didn't want her husband home temporarily; she needed him permanently. And not just distance-wise, she just needed the man she knew back. She loved him for and despite all of his flaws, and she wished that would have been enough… but he seemed so adamant to think she needed this perfect version of him, that he became the identity of an absentee husband. So she didn't want his week-of-leave Band-Aid fix. Which is why she told him not to bother and she tried her hardest not to cry when she heard the disappointment in his voice. He placated her though, like the Jay she used to know, and didn't push the issue. She told him she loved him before ending the call, but sadly life had proven that sometimes maybe love isn't enough. Not when you're the only one fighting for it… so she did her best to distance herself from all of his calls and messages over the next few weeks, which ironically he suddenly knew how to do again, and she made the hardest decision of her life. She walked into a divorce attorney's office on the First of June and he worked up the papers for her. They had been mailed out to Bolivia within that next week or so, thus marking a new chapter in Hailey's life that she wasn't sure she wanted, but maybe it was what she needed.

Now, here she woke a little over a month later to see the husband she wasn't sure she'd ever physically see again sleeping on her arm. It was surreal. And if she's being honest with herself, she's not sure how to feel. There's joy, there's wonder, there's fear, there's definitely still some resentment, but not anger… she realized she could never be angry at him for this because he did lose himself and he just needed the time to get back, but in the same regard she couldn't lose all her time and herself waiting for a potential never… there's also hope, there's sorrow, but most of all, there's love. There's still a whole lot of love. She wants to believe him as he assures her he's not going anywhere, that he's really staying for her, but she's believed in that promise before, and it didn't work out so well for her the last time. So she chooses to ignore it all for now and just focus on the tests for the doctor and getting the answers to what happened, since it was a little hazy to her. She made a mental note to get the full story from Kevin whenever he comes to visit. But truthfully, the synopsis of how she came to be like this physically isn't that imperative for her… it's the sea green-eyed man watching her carefully and looking at her like the man she fell in love with used to. She hasn't experienced that in so long. It has to be since at least last August. Nearly a year since she felt like she was something Jay thought was worth fighting for. And she's not ready to think about what that means. Not when she signed those papers weeks ago. Not when she gave her notice and was walking away from this part of her life. Not when she was supposed to be moving on. So it's a lot to take in. It's something that will certainly cause more haze to her brain than the swelling ever did. But as the pain meds make her wind down again, she holds onto Jay's words of going to hell and back for her… and the deepest buried hopeful part of her wants to believe that maybe it will be less hazy than she thinks, maybe it's a sign as clear as day…

[A/N: An Upstead reunion! Something I can only pray actual canon gives us too! Hope you've enjoyed this chapter & thank you for reading thus far!]