Author's Note: This literally just got stuck in my head at about 1 AM and I had to type this out so here it is. I wish with all my heart they'd delve into Jay dealing with his PTSD but I'm not holding out much hope so I hope this gives you guys something and hurts your heart like it does mine. Let me know if you like it or if you have any ideas you'd like to see- I'd definitely be down for writing them. Thank you for stopping by!

[11:42 pm] 2102 W. Ogden Avenue.

[11:46 pm] Please.

The first ping of a message coming through her phone woke her from a daze; one of those foggy, brief lapses of a few moments that was more of a zoning out than a dozing off though her hazel eyes had somehow flickered closed. The second came as she began to fidget, trying to course a sense of feeling back into her knees, her ankles, her toes. Trying to get a sense of her surroundings, of the now single-occupant apartment that had seemed to grow immensely in his absence.

She shifted again, this time getting her legs out from underneath her tiny frame, planting her bare feet on the scratchy carpet of her- as in no longer their- living room, while the fingers of her right hand grasped blindly for the coffee table in front of her where she was almost completely certain she'd tossed her phone after the long shift at the district. Squinting at the sudden brightness of the screen, she held the device at a significant distance from her hazel orbs, giving them a moment to adjust before her heart plummeted at the sight and registering of his name in tiny black letters on her screen.

Erin was up in less than an instant, diving for her boots that she'd yanked off and flung somewhere near the loveseat, her mind latching on to the brief twinge of a memory where Jay had reprimanded her for the habit only a few weeks prior. Her coat came next as she was able to form the coherent recollection that it was begrudgingly frigid outside in the city of Chicago, slipping it hastily over her loose-fitting maroon sweater before making a last second snatch for her keys and dashing out the door, already halfway down the hallway to the staircase before she heard it thud shut.

With trembling fingers, Erin opened up the messages from her partner, half of her mind focused on jogging down the staircase of her building and the whole 'one foot in front of the other' process while the other managed to copy and paste the address into Google maps, the monotone voice of a guide already barking directions before she'd even slid behind the wheel, slammed the door, and gunned the car into reverse.

The monotone voice repeated back that she'd make it there in thirteen minutes. She made it there in six.

Erin managed to calm herself enough to slow the vehicle to a crawl, her knuckles white against the steering wheel as she entered the empty parking lot of the Veteran's Resource Center of Chicago. Well, nearly empty. A single car remained- two spots to the right of the handicapped stall and one spot over from the 'visitor's only' signs. Funny how her brain latched on to those minuscule details when all she really cared about was the dark outline of a man sitting on the curb, his head in his hands, his left foot tapping in a sporadic rhythm on the cracked concrete, not even bothering to look up at the headlights or the sound of her tires rolling closer. Almost like he had known she would come. Because they swore they'd have each other's backs. Because even though his side of the bed remained cold and bare and empty, even though she'd kept a fair amount of distance with her tip-toeing around him, she was in love with him and even her stubbornness and her pride couldn't keep her from launching herself out of her vehicle and quickening her pace until she was kneeling right in front of him, the coolness of the cement seeping through the fabric of her jeans, sending a shiver down her spine.

Erin's fingers found his bare arms first, trying to rub a sense of warmth into Jay's trembling body, her brain finally getting over its initial shock of seeing him and registering that the temperature was well below freezing and he was sitting outside, alone, with no jacket and he was shivering and damn it she just wanted to scream and yell and ask what in the hell was the matter with him because she was pretty damn sure he had more sense than this and how could he be this stupid.

But she ferociously bit her bottom lip to keep from erupting, shrugging out of her own jacket and draping it over his shoulders, ignoring his mumbles of discontent though his head and his gaze remained firmly in his hands. Almost as if he was ashamed to look at her. Almost as if he was afraid of what she would see, what she would think of him.

Erin let her body slump all the way down to the cement, content with the fact that he had at least had an ounce of fabric guarding his skin from the harsh wind, though she kept her hands on his knees, hating the way she could feel his body shake softly with sobs, hating the way she couldn't find the words to give Jay the comfort he so desperately needed in that moment, that as his partner, as someone who loved him so completely, she didn't know how to reach him.

And so she sat, her thumbs trailing useless and pointless patterns on the seams of his pants, over and over and over again, hoping that there was a piece of him that could still be consoled by her touch. That somewhere in the depths of his mind where he was currently lost in, that he felt her.

Moments passed by in tense silence before Jay's trembling ceased, his hands slowly falling from his face and finding Erin's. He looked up at her then, this tiny but fierce woman before him, his piercing blue eyes noticing the adorable crease of concern on her forehead, the way she was crouched so uncomfortably in front of his knees though she hadn't made any effort to shift away. He was positive her steady inspection of his features had picked up on the tear streaks dribbling down his cheeks, the remnants of a terror he had just managed to escape from in plain sight. Gently, he began to intertwine their fingers, inhaling sharply at her warm grasp compared to his cold, numb hands, desperately wishing he could pull her closer and steal all her body heat and maybe create even more between the both of them.

But that would be selfish of him as he had been the one to walk out and leave all of the comforts she was able to provide behind; and she'd already driven all the way here. All the way here when he was certain she'd have to be up by four-thirty the next morning to have the time to roll over all of her six pillows and out of bed, to leisurely wander into a scalding hot shower because she couldn't stand anything less than scorching water on her smooth skin to wake her up completely. She'd have to be up that early to have time to throw on a pair of his favorite waist hugging black jeans of hers and some sort of v-neck sweater that made his blue eyes shift out of focus and in her direction whenever she leaned over a desk in the bullpen. Then came the pot of coffee which she always poured into a travel mug along with a dash of skim and two sugars, never having the few minutes to spare to go for a mug and a nice few moments of solitude and silence, leaning up against the counter or perhaps catching a snippet of the morning news. Erin Lindsay had always hated the news. Hated seeing the faces of the fallen, reliving a case she'd witnessed first-hand all wrapped up neatly into a few sentences and grim camera angles. No, she could never stomach sitting through one of those programs. And so she always tended to snatch a banana, or an apple or if she was lucky and had remembered to stop at the store within the past week a container of Greek yogurt before she grabbed the essentials and dashed out the door, the drive to the district taking her a mere eight minutes and fifty-two seconds. He had that stretch of time ingrained in his head, having spent a copious amount of late nights and early mornings curled up in the warmth of her bed sheets, spreading kisses up and down her neck and further to her collarbone when they had far less than eight minutes and fifty-two seconds to get into work. It'd been worth it. Those extra minutes. Every damn time.

"Jay, hey- baby, look at me."

Shit. It fell off her tongue far easier than she'd meant for it to, his perfect blue eyes welling with tears again forcing the words out of her before she truly had time to process or to think or to comprehend any of what was really happening.

But he had brought her here, out into the cold of Chicago and out of the warmth of her apartment and the annoyingly delightful pile of her pillows on her bed and he suddenly felt so guilty that he couldn't even stomach it, the fact they'd been tip-toeing for weeks around and away from each other and she still came in an instant, still was right here and clutching his hands and kissing his knuckles and looking at him with those damn hazel eyes that he could get lost in if only they could go back to that. Back to the days of his forehead kisses and her tiny frame pressed up against him in the middle of the night, an anchor for when his reality became distorted with a past he still wasn't able to get away from.

"Erin, I can't make it stop," he finally croaked, his gaze finally meeting hers and not wavering. She nearly crumbled at the fear she saw there- at the agony, the torment, the torture. Acting on instinct she placed both of her hands on the sides of his face, guiding him forward and closer until their foreheads were touching and their tears were both landing in his lap, darkening his jeans.

"Tell me what I can do, Jay. Tell me how I can help you, I need you to tell me," Erin whispered fiercely, her voice shaky and hesitant and she cursed herself for not being able to hold it together when he needed her to the most.

"I need you to stay here with me. Please. Just stay."

As if she was going anywhere. They sat until neither one of them could feel their fingers though the tears had finally stopped, Jay's eyes having flickered closed and breaths having evened out. It was then she had the idea to move him, to coax him towards her car and into the passenger seat, his head resting against the cool glass of the window as she traveled the twelve minutes back to her- as in, no longer their- apartment.

He knew where they were headed the second she got him off the ground, her small frame providing quite the stable support as his body leaned closer to hers in an attempt to find his footing. He didn't argue when the car sputtered off and the heat stopped blowing on his cheeks and she nudged the driver's door open off to his left, a sharp burst of air coming from his lungs which almost resembled a laugh because somehow Erin Lindsay always ended up behind the wheel. Without a hint of protest, he found the handle and followed after her, trying to stop himself from noticing the swing of her hips as she stepped one foot after the other in front of him, or the way she raked her fingers through her hair which he knew meant she was holding back the words she wanted to spew out. He'd spent months memorizing her ticks, just as he'd spent even longer memorizing the patterns of her skin underneath the rough pads of his fingers and the flecks of lighter shades of green in her eyes because somehow he'd been lucky enough to end up sleeping next to her and he never got tired of looking at this woman.

She made sure he was following her by listening to his footsteps, steady and solid and sure as they went up the stairs and down the hallway and around the corner until they were at her- as in, no longer their- place, feeling a lurch in her stomach as she listened to his footsteps stop and then the door latch shut, suddenly grateful she'd left some pointless sports program on in the living room so she didn't have to listen to a deafening silence of uncertainty that rested between them.

Jay wandered towards the screen, having shed his boots and her jacket near the door, settling on the edge of the cushions but fighting the urge to sink completely into the pillows. Erin moved towards the kitchen and brewed a new pot of coffee, pouring a mug for him with a dash of skim and far more sugar than she preferred before heading back out to where he was seated looking oh-so-uncomfortable in a place they'd made love more times than she could ever be able to count. She handed him the cup without a word, simply a nod of acknowledgement, ignoring the brush of their fingers and the jolt she felt at his slight touch. She settled beside him then, careful to leave just enough space between their thighs though she longed to run her fingers through his hair and down his cheek and maybe to his lips because feeling Jay Halstead's lips on any part of her body made her feel as if she was floating straight to heaven and was never coming back down.

Jay sipped the coffee quietly, a corner of his mouth lifting as the warm liquid hit his tastebuds, her having made it just the way he liked it which shouldn't have come as a surprise considering she'd studied him just as he'd studied her. She knew he hated lasagna because of Will force-feeding it to him one night when his dad wasn't home because he was probably bitter and drowning in hard liquor and the babysitter was far too concerned with talking on the phone with her boyfriend to pay attention to the rowdy brothers. She knew he couldn't stand to leave dirty dishes in the sink, or on the counter or frankly have clutter anywhere because he had been in the service and maybe the one piece of it that hadn't shattered him to pieces had been the disciplinary standards in place when it came to a clean bunk and living quarters. She knew when he got frustrated his fingers dug into the palm of his hands until they left tiny indentations and that the feeling of her tongue and then the grazing of her teeth below his earlobe sent delicious moans reverberating all throughout his body. She also knew he had a worn picture of his mother folded up in his wallet, a beautiful woman with his same striking blue orbs, a picture that he never went anywhere without and that had gotten him through all his tours and all the times he came home when the men he had befriended and had come to know and look up to and care for had not.

Maybe that's why the words finally fell past his lips- because she knew him and he knew her and he had this thought somewhere in the back of his mind that he had royally screwed things up in packing a duffel bag and walking out of their- no, wait- her- apartment but she would still listen because she still had to feel something for him, because he couldn't bear the thought that he'd lost her forever when he needed her even though he was nowhere near the man he wanted to be for her.

"Every single night, right when I close my eyes, I go back there. I go back to Afghanistan and all I hear is gunshots. I hear guns, I see the men in front of me fall, I hear the men beside me call out. That knot of panic rises in my throat, Er, and I lose it. I can't separate here from there anymore and it's fucking terrifying," Jay spits out. She sits and listens, her eyes on him. Her fingers find his again and she squeezes. She's here. She's here and he's not there- that dark place of gunfire and screams of pain and torment and far too many dead bodies and glazed over eyes of men that should have made it back and into the arms of the people they loved. "Then I see the wives and those kids that don't get to see their husbands or their dad and somehow I'm the one that made it back and then I get that feeling in my throat again, the one where I can't breathe- only this time it's worse because they're crying and they're hurting and I know what it feels like to lose someone and know they aren't coming back and if I could have done something to save those men their families wouldn't have that pain."

She shakes her head in a feeble attempt to show him that damn it it's not his fault, but let him finish, relieved he finally found the words but heartbroken at what came out. "Come here."

That's all she has to murmur before he's leaning into her, his head falling against her chest and her scent of lavender with a hint of coconut wafting to his nose and suddenly the world doesn't seem like such an unbearable place for him to be. He welcomes the gentle touch of her fingers on his back and then his neck, holding him to her though they both know he's not going anywhere. She kisses the top of his head and he can feel her breathing along with the thrumming of her heartbeat, realizing it had sped up the instant she was touching him, the instant his hands fell to her waist and the sliver of her stomach his fingers found and trailed softly against out of habit. "Erin, you need to go to sleep," he whispers weakly, hoping she'll argue and stay right here with him and entangled in his arms because he doesn't think he'll be able to handle it if she wanders down the hall to a bedroom he's not sure he's ever going to be allowed back into. He looks up at her then, her hands falling to her lap as she gets a glimpse of his puffy red eyes and the nervous clenching of his jaw.

"Jay, I'm not going anywhere. Go to sleep." She sprawls out then, tugging him with her, and then he's spooning her from behind, their bodies pressed together as he's burying his face into the crook of her neck and inhaling her familiar scent and though he's well aware of the fact she needs to be up at four-thirty in the morning he couldn't help but wish she would turn around and kiss him so they could get lost in the feeling of each other for hours, and forget all of the tiptoeing.