my cousin's keeper

chapter 10: ready to go back into the world

hailey's alarm buzzed loudly on the nightstand. awaking her and jay from their sleep. she rolled over and turned it off, but before she could get up and out of bed jay pulled her close to him "stay here" he mumbled sleepily. hailey laughed, turning in his arms to face him. "i have to get ready for work" she said. jay finally opened his eyes to look at her, "you don't have to" he countered.

"i do have to," hailey said softly before giving jay a kiss "intelligence would be lost without at least one of their best detectives" she continued. jay chuckled, placing a kiss on hailey's forehead before letting her go to get ready for the day. "you're going to stop by today, right?" hailey asked from the bathroom. "yes, i am." jay responded with a small smile. 

it had been almost three weeks since the break in, and the halsteads had slowly began to pick up the pieces. 

a few days after the suspects were arrested, they held services for cate and mateo. mateo served in the army for six years after he graduated from college so the arrangements were traditional military services. jay wore his military blues for the first time in a long time, since the services for his friend terry egan. as hailey pinned on his honorary medals and badges, all jay could think about was the tragedies that brought him to adorn this uniform. 

everyone jay and will knew from the 21st district, gaffney medical center, and firehouse 51 came and some of mariana's friends and their family members attended. jay, will, and mariana all spoke. the reception was held at molly's. cindy and christopher hermann had reached out to offer the venue and helped jay and will organize everything. there was food and music and those who knew cate and mateo shared stories and memories. jay, will and mariana wanted to make sure it was a celebration of life. there had been enough sadness that day. after the services, the four of them came home and shared stories about cate and mateo. for the first time, mariana talked about them with a smile instead of sobs.

will and jay both took two weeks off from work following the services to be home and with mariana. hailey returned to intelligence, but spent as much time as she could with them when she didn't have to be at work. tomorrow, jay and will would both be going back to work while mariana resumed her classes online. they had decided for at least the first three months out from the break in she wouldn't be home alone. it presented a bit of difficulty since will, jay, and hailey had somewhat unpredictable work schedules, but they would make it work. if she needed to spend a day with trudy at the 21st or doing homework in doctor charles' office at med she could. even chief boden had reached out to the brothers and told them mariana was welcome at firehouse 51 whenever. that was an offer the brothers would be taking him up on tomorrow as jay and hailey had to be at work by 6:30 am and will had to be at med by 7:00 am. mariana was a little bit intimidated by the thought of going to the firehouse, but will and jay assured her that it would be good for her and hailey promised that she and jay would try to stop by if they could. 

jay got up out of bed and followed hailey into the bathroom. he brushed his teeth as hailey got ready, stealing glances of his wife out of the corner of his eye. she was beautiful to him always, but especially in the small moments. "i'm gonna make some coffee and see if will and mariana are up" he said. hailey nodded, patting her freshly washed face dry. she was excited that she would soon have her partner back with her. 

jay headed into the living room to find will and mariana both sleeping soundly. mariana wasn't ready to sleep in the guest room yet, so she slept on the couch while will graciously took the floor. hailey and jay had an air mattress from before they set up the guest bedroom, so will was using it as his bed.

jay made his way into the kitchen and started to make a pot of coffee. the two weeks off of work had gone by rather quickly for jay, which surprised him. for the first few days he just wanted to get back to intelligence to distract himself from everything that had happened, but he knew that mariana needed him. it also presented him with the time to work through his own grief before returning back to work.