17. Chapter 17

Another Broken Heart You've Left Behind – Chapter 17

A/N: Hey! I tried my hardest to get this update up ASAP, but I actually ended up re-writing the whole chapter because I had a light bulb moment haha so sorry for the delay but I hope you like it! Sorry if it's a bit dialogue-heavy.

Enjoy!

25th December, 2015

"So, you ready for tonight?" Will asks as he sits at the breakfast bar feeding Ben.

"Nope." Jay chuckles "But I might as well bite the bullet right?"

Will smiles as Jay sits down next to him "I know it's not easy, but thank you for trying."

Jay looks up at his brother and smiles as well "Erin's right, Ben should know his grandfather. And maybe it's time we try to put all this drama behind us, for our own sanity."

"Good morning!" Erin exclaims as she walks into the kitchen.

Ben giggles happily as his mother bends down to kiss his cheek, followed by a kiss to Jay's lips.

"Ugh, could you two wait until I finish my breakfast please?" Will says with a smirk.

Erin narrows her eyes at him "Well Merry Christmas to you too Doctor Halstead."

Will stands up and engulfs Erin in a hug, Erin groaning as he purposely squishes her in his arms "Merry Christmas sis."

Jay frowned "Since when did you become sis?"

Erin smirks over at her boyfriend "You don't have to know everything that goes on in my life."

"Well, I am a detective. It's kind of in the job description."

Erin rolls her eyes and sits down next to Jay pinching a piece of toast off his plate and kissing his cheek "Merry Christmas baby."

"Merry Christmas Er." He whispers back.

Their quiet moment is interrupted by Ben's cheers of "da" clapping his hands begging to be released from the confinement of his high chair.

"I'm telling you, the kid's first word's gonna be Dad." Jay states placing his son in his lap and taking over from Will the job of feeding him.

Erin rolled her eyes "Not this again. We've had this same argument for the past two weeks."

Jay just shrugs in response "I'm just stating the facts Erin."

"He says 'Ma' just as much as 'Da' thank you very much. He could say either of our names first." Erin pouts.

Will lets out a short laugh "You two are crazy, arguing over which word he says first. Either way you're both going to melt into a puddle of goo when he says his first word. You two spammed me with videos and texts for a month after Ben started crawling."

Erin smiled sheepishly "Well, we're Ben-obsessed. Can you really blame us?"

"Well I think you should worry less about the kid talking and more about him walking. I mean, I know Nat said he might be a little slow to take to it but come on, It's been three months already and – Hey! Are you two even listening!?" Will exclaimed when he saw Erin and Jay too engrossed in one another to look at him.

Will just shook his head and sighed. Those two were so in love with their kid, but deep down he loved it despite all his teasing of the two parents.

"God you two are so sickeningly in love, you need to just get married already." Will rolled his eyes.

Jay laughed as Erin blushed "Trust me Will, that ain't happening."

Will felt his heart drop as Jay turned away, his little brother oblivious to the heartbroken look that took over Erin's face.

LINEBREAK

Erin sits between Kim and Gabby later on that afternoon at Hank's. The fire and PD teams had decided to have a lunch together at Hank's house, before the Intelligence unit's Christmas dinner while Firehouse 51 was on shift.

Erin was trying her best to pay attention to the conversation, but she couldn't help but think back to Jay's statement this morning. Did he really not want to marry her? She knew they hadn't been together long, but she always thought marriage was an option in the future for them.

"Hey!" Kim exclaimed snapping her fingers in front of Erin's face "Earth to Erin. You with us?"

Erin shook her head, focusing her eyes on her friend's face "I'm sorry." She said sheepishly.

Gabby smirked at the detective "Daydreaming about Halstead?"

"You'd know about that wouldn't you?" Kim joked, the girls' laughter dying short as they saw Erin's sad face.

"Ok, what's going on?" Kim asked.

Erin sighed softly "Jay doesn't want to marry me."

"What!?" Gabby exclaimed. Erin's eyes widened as some of their colleagues looked over at them. Gabby gave an apologetic look, returning her question to Erin softly this time "What do you mean he doesn't want to marry you."

"Will made a joke about us getting married and he said, and I quote, that 'trust me, it ain't happening'.

Kim placed her hand on Erin's shoulder gently "Don't take this the wrong way Erin, but I never really pictured you for a marriage kind of girl?"

"I didn't think I was." Erin shrugged "but with Jay … It's different. I see a life with him, one that I didn't think I could have before. And knowing that the idea of marrying me is so ridiculous to him ..."

"He didn't say it was ridiculous Erin, maybe he just doesn't want to get married at all." Kim argued.

"Kim. He's mentioned marriage before. Back when we all had dinner together he mentioned it. But for some reason when you chuck me into the equation it's suddenly a repulsive idea."

"Okay, you're being dramatic." Gabby cut in "You got to calm down Erin, why is this bothering you so much? Matt and I had never planned on getting married either, we never really saw ourselves as the marrying type and now look at us, engaged to be married."

"That's not the point Gabby. It hurts. The way he reacted … It just really hurt me."

"Maybe you should tell him that." Gabby stated.

"The last thing I want to do is cause drama for us. The past few months have been great, and with the exception of my run-in with Bunny and Jay's dad unexpectedly showing up, things have been running smoothly. I don't want to risk rocking the boat."

"Erin, he needs to know." Kim said "You can't just keep going like this, without him knowing what you want or what you're feeling, that's not healthy."

"We've only been together three months Kim, and clearly it's not like marriage is a pressing issue at the moment anyways."

"Okay, you do you Erin. But I'm going on record as saying I don't agree with this. The longer things sit the more it's going to explode in your face.

LINEBREAK

Jay had no idea what had happened. Erin had been so happy this morning. they were both sickeningly lovey-dovey in front of his brother. They they got in the car to head to Voight's and it was like she had done a complete 180 on him.

The entire car ride has been tense, Ben's baby babble filling the silence between them. Jay's attempts to make conversation were denied as Erin simply sat in the passenger seat leaning her head against the window, her normal calm composure was gone, and Jay was very aware of the fact she wasn't usually holding her hand on the console between them while he drove.

"Hey." Will says as he and their father walk up to Jay, passing him a beer "You alright?"

"Erin's been ignoring me the whole lunch. I don't know what the hell happened between this morning and now."

"Women are crazy man, you should've seen the way Laura went off at Sylvie for looking after Diego last week." Antonio says with a roll of his eyes.

"You want to talk crazy? I'm dating Dr Charles daughter. Try being psychoanalysed by your girlfriend's father every time he sees us talking."

"I always knew Erin was crazy." Jay laughed "This is something else." He said with a swig of his beer.

"Maybe the fact that you basically rejected her as your wife this morning." Will said.

Aaron patted Jay on the back as his son choked on the sip of beer he was taking. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"You told Erin you didn't want to marry her this morning. No wonder she was pissed."

"Yeeeeah, that'll do it." Aaron laughed as his son recovered from his shock.

"Why don't you want to marry Erin?" Atwater said from where he'd been standing silently next to Antonio "She's already punching well above her weight dating you, you don't want to rock the boat."

"I never said I didn't want to marry her." Jay said softly, still getting his breath back.

"Bro, think about what you said. Really think about it." Will replied.

Jay's eyes widened in realisation " ... I didn't mean it like that!"

"Well she seems to think you did." Burgess said walking up to the men "And she's pretty damn hurt."

"Dammit." Jay groaned looking at his friends "I fucked up."

Aaron chuckled softly "Well then you better tell her that, and fast. The longer you let it sit, the worse it's going to get."

Jay simply nodding, giving his father an appreciative smile before walking off to find his girl.

A/N: Okay, so this chapter was almost 5000 words so I've decided to spli it into two chapter instead so it doesn't get too boring to read all in one go. I'll have the next chapter up in one or two days.

I hope you guys liked this chapter, it's leading to an important conversation for Linstead that I've had planned since around chapter 3 so hopefully you all enjoy it!

please leave me a review and let me know what you think and if there's anything you'd like to see.

I'll try to have two chapters up by the end of next week as I'll be going to Paris next Sunday for the One Chicago Convention (!) and won't be updating until I get back.

Hope you're all having a good week,

Maddie :)