It was Saturday - the official last day of this unjust punishment that had been thrown on Alex. She'd officially suffered for a full two weeks. To not repeat last Saturday's events, she decided to get up on time and get ready without complaint. She'd go through the damn motions of today and then she'd be a free girl!

Jay holstered his gun and clipped on his badge in the kitchen after polishing off his breakfast. "Ready to go?" he called out.

Alex grumbled something and stood up from the couch, heading toward the door with just herself and her cell phone to keep her entertained today.

"Aren't you forgetting something?" He raised an eyebrow.

His sister tiredly looked herself up and down. She had a shirt, pants, socks, and shoes on. Sure she could have spent more than five seconds on the messy bun, but there was no way he was calling her out on that. "What?"

Jay took a deep breath. "Your homework."

"What homework?"

"Don't you have any to do?"

"But it's fall break," she explained matter of factly.

Jay crossed his arms. "So they don't give homework over fall break?"

She felt like he was trying to trap her in a lie. "Not what I said."

He felt himself losing patience by the second with this teen. "Then explain," he said flatly.

With a dramatic sigh, she explained, "I have all week to do homework. No need to do it the first day."

"Why not get it done now and out of the way?" he countered.

To which, Alex just shrugged. "I don't wanna."

"It's not a suggestion," Jay said firmly, showing he wasn't budging on this.

Alex opened her mouth to retort something else, but she immediately snapped it shut, reminding herself that today she was just going to roll with it and get this damn punishment over with. The last thing she needed was to give him a reason to extend it into her fall break.

Pleased that she didn't have a sarcastic comeback, he nodded in approval. "Good. Now grab your bag and let's get moving."

The district was quiet with little to no commotion all morning. The team trickled in and out all morning - some choosing to come in late on this rare occasion.

After about an hour and a half, Jay reached a good point where he could stop the endless paperwork he was working on at his desk. Luckily they were between cases right now, so the next few days would just be catching up on notes if all went well. The stars were aligning for a successful move tomorrow to their new apartment. Jay had been looking forward to it all week, and was eternally thankful that Adam and Kevin had agreed to help him move everything. Finally, the siblings would have additional space for them both.

Jay glanced over to his right to check in on Alex. She was clearly daydreaming with her head resting on a propped up fist as she stared blankly at her computer screen. Not that he could blame her - doing homework on a Saturday morning did sound pretty awful, but he wasn't about to admit that to her.

He thought it over for a moment, and he decided that now was a good time to follow through on his plan. He opened his bottom desk drawer and grabbed something that he'd purchased recently. The idea had occurred to him when he went for a snack yesterday afternoon, and he secretly hoped that it would go over well.

After Jay gave a light tap on the break room door to pull her from the daydream, he went inside. "Whatcha working on?" he asked casually.

Alex abruptly closed the laptop and protectively put her arms on top of it. Her cheeks flushed a deep red. "Nothing." She wasn't about to tell him she had been researching certain locations she'd seen in a case file yesterday.

Deciding not to press it more after seeing her strong reaction, he walked over and held out a small bag of mini Oreos. "I got this for you," he said with a proud grin.

"What is it?" she snapped, clearly able to see what it was.

"Come on, it's Oreos. Your favorite."

"Maybe my favorite when I was like 10," she retorted without thinking it through. The warm smile he had on his face instantly faded as he was hit with yet another reminder that he didn't know his sister and had missed out on a lot of her life.

"Oh, uh, sorry." He shifted his weight, uncomfortable that his plan had failed miserably and so quickly. Trying not to show his disappointment, he quickly changed the subject. "I should wrap up in the next two hours, so we can go grab lunch." When she didn't say anything, he continued, "You finish your homework?"

"Yes, Detective, sir," she sassed with a salute. And it was the truth - she had finished everything this time. Whether or not she had put full effort into the work was something up for debate. She put forth the best a teen could at 10:00am on the weekend.

Letting the sass roll right off him, he fished her phone out of his pocket and put it on the table. "You sure?"

"Want me to show you?" she quipped, making no movement to actually show him the homework. She regretted the words as soon as they'd left her mouth because if he did ask to see it, she'd be forced to open up her computer to a google location page that would be hard to lie her way out of.

"I'm trusting that you truly did it all." He said with a raised eyebrow, making a point to let her know that he was trying to trust her again, even if it was just a small step.

In true teenage fashion, she replied with a classic, "Whatever." It didn't click that he was really trusting her with this - she was just relieved that he hadn't asked to see it.

Jay turned to leave and was almost out the door before he heard Alex call out. "Jay?"

"Yeah?" he replied, turning back to her.

"I said Oreos aren't my favorite anymore. That doesn't mean that I don't want them." She motioned with her hand for him to fork over the small bag.

The older Halstead couldn't help but chuckle, secretly grateful that she'd accepted the treat. It was tiny, and some might say insignificant, but he had hoped it could be a small bonding moment between them - something to show her that he cared.

He handed over the bag and they shared a brief smile before hers was quickly replaced with her standard scowl. Taking advantage of the lighthearted moment, he asked, "So what's your favorite now?"

Alex gave it a moment of thought. "If I had to pick one, then Milky Way."

Jay nodded, committing the new information to memory. "Noted." He offered a quick wave and turned to leave, but was cut off.

"What's your favorite?" Alex asked with genuine curiosity as she tossed some mini Oreos into her mouth. She even surprised herself by asking.

The question caught Jay off guard - it was the first time she'd asked him something that showed an interest in bonding. He couldn't help the grin that formed, soaking up a moment of positivity. "Probably Almond Joy."

Alex made a gagging noise and shook her head - who even ate those? "Gross - that's the candy nobody wants at Halloween."

Now it was Jay's turn to chuckle. "Why do you think you never had any? Mom let me pick them all out when you'd get back home from Trick or Treating." His grin widened at recalling the cherished family memories from a decade ago. Their mom would let Jay go through Alex's candy bucket when they got home so he could pick out some for himself, and he'd go straight for the Almond Joys.

Her mouth gaped open in slight shock that he'd gone through her candy and she'd never known. "Crazy world we live in." She shook her head. "The thief becomes the cop."

"Detective actually," Jay retorted playfully.

"Okay, loser," she quipped.

Well, loser was better than being called a prick, dick, or asshole. So this was a total win in his book.

More importantly, a small step in the right direction.

At least…that was what Jay thought.

After he was out of sight, Alex erased all evidence from her laptop and zoned in on her phone. With careful consideration, she planned out how she'd get to one of the specific street corners on Monday to purchase the pills - take the train to a rough part of Chicago and walk three blocks. She was nervous beyond belief, but in her mind, there wasn't any other choice. She had to do this for her friends.

She couldn't lose them.

…she'd already lost too much.