Chapter Text
Happiness is relative. It’s not something that is drilled into someone’s skull but it’s known by none and all.
What might appear as the pure definition of happiness to one person can be the equivalent of absolute poison to another. It’s the same way that perfection is relative. Something is not perfect the way something cannot be purely good or evil.
A fairytale ending to one, a cursed tragedy to another.
Or more so, a beginning.
Happiness is a facade. A mere oak door is much like a curtain of secrets. A perfect family from the outside is crackling and breaking on the inside.
Some people just have the plain dumb luck to be trapped behind it.
Hailey Anne Upton was one of these people. Barely a person, barely left her mark on the world, still playing stupid games like hide and seek and singing while she played hopscotch. Still running back home before dinner with scrapes on her knees from biking and a smile plastered between chubby cheeks.
At least a handful of childhood years left. Years filled with first and second kisses, spelling bee trophies, and scrapes on each knee.
But soon they meant nothing anymore. The scrapes turned to bruises, and they wouldn’t be on her knee, but on her ribcage and cheek, and they wouldn’t be from biking up and down the raw pavement, but from the hand that used to tuck her into bed. Her years were littered with marks, like a map on her body that should’ve meant sweet memories but instead cut through her like a knife.
At the ripe age of eleven, Hailey wished for those years to be far behind her.
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Not a day later than when she turned 18, Hailey left.
She hated how much it didn’t hurt to leave. How her memories could be packed in one navy blue suitcase and practically kicked out the door.
Her brothers had left years ago. Each to a different edge of the country to live in an attempt of bliss. They said goodbye, but Hailey knew it wasn’t sincere.
Hailey hugged her mother goodbye, trying hard to ignore the wince from the frail woman in her arms. Hailey couldn’t feel sympathy, sympathy lead to crying, which inevitably came anyway because she had lived through it. She withered away from the embrace and whispered a soft nothing in her mother’s ear.
A last-ditch attempt at begging her mother to leave. She knew it was no use.
Her car was soaked with tears and she wiped them away to read the map that was blank cause where the hell was she even going.
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Family was always an obscurity to Hailey. The definition she read once on Wikipedia didn’t match. ‘a group of one or more parents and their children living together as a unit.’
It was never a unit. She never knew what it meant.
Not until she joined intelligence and was adopted into their unit. A unit. Her unit.
A temporary placement turned to one year turned to two turned to five. Five years that taught her Kevin’s favorite pastry, and that Kim could sing remarkably well but didn’t admit it, that Trudy was a softy at heart. Taught her that Adam loved Kim through the secret stolen glances between them and the ones filled with longing and something else when Kim wasn’t looking. Five years that taught her that Jay would rather take a bullet than get the flu shot and that if he smiled the right way, five of his most prominent freckles would shift to form a star.
Five years that taught her what it meant to be in love, and god how did it take her so long to see it.
But she did see it eventually. Which left her now, with her eyes glued to the little star outlined by freckles cause he was smiling just right.
“Hails?” god, the nickname.
“Yeah,” she answered, a toothy grin on her face because he had just cracked a joke and she was trying so hard not to give him the satisfaction of laughing. “You know you crack a pretty good dad joke.” she deadpanned.
“How dare you.” he gasped in mock resentment, “I crack an excellent dad joke.” he grinned.
“Uh-huh.” Hailey bit back her smirk and turned back to the parking garage in front of them. “Where’s this CI?” she sighed, glancing around at the bare pillars of concrete.
“He’ll be here.” Jay’s fingers tapped along the dashboard.
Right on queue a silver Prius slithered into the nearly empty garage and parked off to the side before a dark brown head of hair pulled out from the window and hopped out from the vehicle.
Jay didn’t even need to signal to Hailey, they were a well-oiled machine by now and had every movement of the other planned out. The clatter of their combat boots could be heard as they trudged down the garage to the CI.
“Hey man.” Jay smiled wide and his palm collided with the back of the man’s shoulder.
“Jay my man, how you been?” A toothy grin escaped and Hailey couldn’t help but grin back. He seemed nice enough.
“Good good.” Jay turned to his partner, “This is Hailey.”
At the mention of her name on his lips, Hailey’s grin grew as her eyes danced around. “Nice to meet you..”
“Donny.” he extended his hand out to the blonde, to which she wrapped hers in and shook it in a friendly manner. “Alright well, what do you got for me?” Donny turned back to Jay.
“We got a dealer named Emmet Levy, likes to keep a low profile which is why we’re hoping you can go in and set up a buy.”
“Levy? Yeah, I think I’ve heard of him.” Donny spoke sternly and Hailey couldn’t help but think that he sounded just like a cop.
“So you’ll do it?” Jay asked, a hopeful smile hinting at his lips.
“Hell yeah, anything for you my man.” he smiled charmingly and turned to wink at Hailey quickly.
She felt her skin flush ever so slightly as Jay’s gaze flickered over. “Hey man, come on now.” he joked but a hint of real annoyance leaked from his voice.
Donny rolled his eyes dramatically and stepped back towards his car, “Alright well call me when you need me to go in. I’m ready anytime.” he called to the two detectives.
“Will do,” Jay called back.
“Nice to meet you, Hailey.” Donny disappeared into the car.
Hailey threw a small wave at him before he drove off.
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The click of the phone sounded through the bullpen when Jay pushed his chair from his desk and turned to Voight.
“Good news. Donny was able to set up a meeting with Emmett, this time tomorrow we’ve got a deal on track.” Jay flashed a smile, sweet enough to melt Hailey’s soul through and through, but professional enough to remind her they were on the job. And remind her that he’s not hers.
“Alright, head home we’ll pick up tomorrow.” Voight rounded off the day and swiftly shut the door to his office. Did the guy even sleep? It seemed like he lived in his office.
Hailey grabbed her jacket from the back of her desk chair, her eyes sliding over to the pens scattered across her desk. She smiled and walked from the bullpen.
Her evening plan consisted of her bed, a good book, and maybe one or two beers, up until she felt a light tug on her jacket as she was walking through the parking lot.
“Hey, Hailey.” Kim’s bright smile and equally bright eyes met Haileys. “We’re going to Molly’s, want to join?”
Kevin, Adam, and Jay’s smiling figures stood behind Kim, pleading glances on their faces. How could she say no?
“Yeah, sounds good.” Good book and bed forgotten. At least she still had the beers. “I’ll shower and meet you guys there soon.” she grinned and turned away from them all.
Hailey would never say the real reason she agreed, but in her defense, Jay’s toothy smile and dancing freckles were enough to persuade anyone.
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Walking into Molly’s shouldn’t have been weird. Hailey had taken the exact same route every time, her hands always hovering right by the splintered wood on the door. She remembered the time the string of her sweater snagged on it and she almost fell to the ground walking in.
She wore the same sweater, but this time she walked in with ease.
She spotted the table they were all huddled around almost instantly. Jay’s smile lit up the whole damn bar.
She walked over quickly and effortlessly, her loose wavy hair floating behind her. When she arrived she slid into the booth with ease, taking her normal place beside Jay.
His breath was on her neck and his knee touching hers. Chills ran down her body and right out the open back of her knit sweater. Dear god.
“Hey,” his whisper filled her ears. “You need a drink?”
“Yeah, thanks.” Hailey’s smile was soft and normal, so why did it feel so different?
“Alright, scoot out.”
Hailey’s jeans slid across the leather of the booth and she watched as Jay walked towards the bar.
An hour in, Hailey’s phone lit up. It displayed an array of messages and when she excused herself, she slid out of the bar, clutching it.
It was the same message she had gotten every night for a week. Another useless brochure of opportunities from the FBI filled to the brim with amazing chances and perks. Things like leading her own team, things she hadn’t dreamt of for years.
So why didn’t they feel like dreams anymore? Why did she shut them down along with her phone that was blinking brightly with messages?
She hadn’t felt this way before. Every opportunity out of state meant an opportunity to leave. It was her idea of happiness.
Well, it was. After all, happiness is relative.
It was different this time. This time she was leaving something, someone.
She had never imagined herself as the person who would turn down something for a someone. But before she was even thinking too deeply, she was sliding the phone down into her jean pocket and turning back to the bar door.
The FBI could wait. This, whatever this was, could not.