#anyways i'm supposed to be looking for another fic i wrote 800 years ago but i did this instead whoops

[elsaclack]

Hi em I hope all is well with you!!! I have a fic request for whenever you have time/energy to write. I was watching The Golden Child and I noticed amy wearing a little infinity sign necklace. Could you write about jake giving it to her?? Thank you!!! I love you and your writing soooo much

ahsldkFHASDLFKAJSD this is probably not what u had in mind but!!! this is where my brain went i’m! not even sorry!

and I LOVE U TOO SOSOSOSOSOSOSO MUCH

Holt has been gone for an hour and Amy has been dressed like Holly Gennero for forty-seven minutes and so far, all they’ve done is talk.

It’s not that he minds, exactly. Talking to Amy is probably his favorite thing in the world - tied with making Amy laugh and holding Amy’s hand and cuddling with Amy and boinking Amy and watching TV with Amy and…

It’s Amy, actually, his favorite thing in the world is Amy and she’s his wife and right now she’s sitting with him on a balcony in Mexico gingerly sipping a cocktail through a straw bobbing around in half of a coconut and she’s dressed like Holly Gennero.

For sex reasons.

His wife, Amy freaking Santiago, is dressed like Holly Gennero, specifically for sex reasons.

For forty-seven minutes he’s been sitting next to his craziest, most impossible sex fantasy come to life, and all he’s done is talk to her. About not-sex stuff.

And he’s never been more content in his life.

It’s weird, how not-weird this is.

She’s watching him now, her brown eyes glittering with amusement beneath the fringe of curly Holly hair on her forehead and he’s suddenly aware of the fact that he has no idea what she just said.

The smile blossoming across her face tells him that she already knows.

“Sorry,” he says with a sheepish grin, switching his beer bottle from one hand to the other and wiping the condensation off of his free hand on his shorts.

“It’s the wig, isn’t it? The curls?” She turns her head away just sharply enough that a wave of tight ringlets tumble over one shoulder before turning back to him, her grin much broader and more sly than before.

“They’re nice,” he admits with a laugh, “but I…actually prefer your normal hair. It’s all pretty and soft.”

“Cheeseball,” she mutters, but her eyes are soft with affection.

“I can’t believe he’s actually gone,” he says after a moment of comfortable silence. “I keep expecting him to, like…I don’t know, Spiderman down from the balcony over ours any second now.”

“I know,” Amy laughs as she shakes her head. “I can’t believe we spent our whole honeymoon taking care of our boss.”

“I should have put my foot down,” he says, guilt rising like a tide in his throat. “I shouldn’t have let it go that far. I’m sorry.”

“Never apologize to me for caring about other people,” she says gently. “You have the biggest, kindest heart - if anything, it just reminded me why I love you as much as I do.”

He bridges the gap between their chairs, interlacing their fingers so their hands hang clasped together between their armrests. “Still the right person for you?”

“Just like yesterday, and the day before that, and the day before that.”

“What about tomorrow?”

“Then, too. And next week, and next month, and next year.”

“What about ten years from now?”

“Raise you twenty.”

“The year twenty-forty-three?”

“Let me save you some time - and some math - you’re my person from now until infinity.”

He reflects her smile for a moment, before leaning toward her. They meet in the middle, the brush of their lips tender and chaste, the prickly hairs of her wig tickling his forehead - the sensation, combined with the lightheaded giddiness coursing through his veins, has him grinning like a fool against her.

Her expression is one of combined curiosity and exasperation when she pulls away. “What?”

“‘Til infinity…and beyond?”

“Yeah? That’s the joke you wanna make right now? We’re married, I just told you you’re my person, I’m dressed like Holly Gennero, and you wanna make a Toy Story joke?”

“I mean I’d like to get you inside so I can save you from the German terrorists, Ms. Gennero, I just thought -”

“It’s Mrs. Peralta.”

He blinks. “What?”

“Gennero is my maiden name,” she says slowly, eyes shining with earnestness and mirth and something deeper, something that makes the heat simmering in his belly begin to stir. “It’s Peralta. Mrs. Peralta.”

He swallows thickly, mouth suddenly dry. “Okay,” he rasps, “Let’s - let’s get you inside - need some medical attention after - after escaping Nakatomi Plaza -”

“The only attention I want is yours, Mr. Peralta,” she interrupts, carefully setting her coconut on the table on her other side. “Hans Gruber wasn’t happy when he realized I’m your wife - thank you for saving me, how can I ever repay you?”

“Oh, it’s about to get real weird in here.” he mutters, and she laughs, stumbling as he yanks her to her feet and leads the way back into their room.

The morning of her birthday - some four months and some-odd days later - starts off far more quietly than he was hoping.

He should count his blessings, of course. He’s actually here for this birthday, for starters - his presence on this day has been a bit of a crapshoot over the last few years. He’s here, and she’s here, too - she may be sound asleep and snoring loud enough to rattle the floorboards, but it counts. They’re both here, they’re both relatively healthy (try as she might, the whole drinking water thing just hasn’t stuck with him yet), there are no impending trials or monster cases or any other scary uncontrollable things looming over their heads.

He should count his blessings, but he can’t.

Because it sounds like Amy is literally sawing logs in their bedroom, and he knows she won’t wake up on her own for hours to come.

“Just a couple of hours,” he mutters to himself as he swipes the spatula through the eggs cooking on the stove top before him, pitching his voice up high, repeating her words still ringing in his head from the night before. “Just a little guidance for the overnight crew, I’ll be home before you finish the Harry Potter marathon on Freeform.”

He scoffs louder than he means to. Amy’s snores continue on.

On a certain level, he knew this would end up happening. The moment her phone rang - which happened to be about half a second after they both settled on the couch to watch said Harry Potter marathon - he knew his plans for her birthday were completely out the window, despite Amy’s exasperated, good-natured assurances that they weren’t.

“Comin’ home at six AM smelling like a whole dog park and sounding like asthmatic Darth Vader,” he mutters, grinning at his own joke in spite of himself as he scrapes the eggs onto the two plates set out on the counter beside the stove. “I’m gonna kill Gary the next time I see him.”

He covers both plates with foil and tucks them into the oven, before snatching the little jewelry box on the counter and tip-toeing out of the kitchen toward their bedroom. He needn’t have bothered - he knows nothing short of a nuclear explosion reaches her when she’s this deeply asleep - but still, he eases the door open and slips inside as soundlessly as possible.

Amy’s star-fished over the bed, torso turned at an angle, head caught in the valley between their pillows. She’s flat on her back - a sign of her increased difficulty breathing - and her mouth is open, drool only just beginning to leak from the corner closer to her pillow. It’s hard to tell with the quilt pulled up as high as it is, but he’s fairly certain she’s still wearing the blouse she left the house in the night before. He stares at her a moment, taking in her awkwardly splayed legs beneath their quilt, her arm bent up under her pillow and the other stretched ram-rod straight across his side of the mattress, curled fingers only just extending past the edge of the bed. Even from here, he can see the dark circles under her eyes, the still red and raw quality of the skin around her nose, her hair uncombed and disheveled on the pillows, the pallor in her forehead and cheeks and neck casting an air of illness about her.

She looks like she’s been dragged through hell and back.

She’s ridiculously, stupidly hot.

She’s his wife.

She’s asleep on her own birthday.

He picks his way across their bedroom floor carefully and sets the jewelry box down on his bedside table before gently moving her arm so that he can perch on the mattress beside her. She snuffles for a moment, pulling her arm out of his grip to cross loosely over her torso, turning just slightly more toward her side of the bed; a moment after she settles, the snoring starts up again.

She’s turned just enough that he has access to a narrow portion of her back, so he slides his hand under her shoulder blade and begins stroking her back with just enough force that it breaks through her subconsciousness. “Babe,” he whispers, and the snoring suddenly cuts off. “Hey, Ames, you awake?”

Her eyes are still closed, but he sees her fingers flex against the quilt; a moment later she turns more earnestly, granting him access to the entire expanse of her back.

(Or maybe it’s so that he can’t see her face anymore.)

“Amy,” he says a little louder, and she hums, legs shifting restlessly beneath the quilt. “C’mon, Ames, wake up.”

“M’tired,” she mumbles hoarsely, and his desire to kill Gary for unknowingly leading her into a dog fighting den crime scene the night before is renewed. “Wanna sleep.”

“I promise you can sleep for the rest of the day if you wake up and have breakfast with me right now.”

She groans - pitiful and reminiscent of a cranky toddler - and he bites the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing. “No breakfast,” she mumbles, “jus’ napping. Join me.”

“I wanna give you your birthday present now, though.”

He feels the muscles in her back stiffen; after a moment he draws his hand back and she rolls just far enough to peer up at him through bleary, blood-shot eyes. “Present?” she repeats.

He nods, hoping his smile looks more suggestive than it feels.

“Do I have to get out of bed?”

He considers her a moment. “I mean...I guess we could do breakfast in bed. I just thought, y’know, crumbs -”

“I’ll get up,” she interrupts, voice deadpan.

“You could open your present in bed, though,” he offers as she throws the quilt off, crumpling it down by her feet.

(He was right, she is still wearing the blouse she left the house in last night - but not her pants. And somehow the sight of his wife in a rumpled, wrinkled work shirt and underwear is almost as hot as it is unbearably endearing.)

She props herself up on an elbow, somehow managing to look interested despite vigorously rubbing the sleep out of her eye with her other hand. “It’s not a sex thing, is it? ‘Cause I love you, and everything, but I can barely keep my eyes open -”

“It’s not a sex thing,” he laughs. Her eyes follow the movement of his hand as he leans forward; they seem to light up significantly when she recognizes the shape of the object in his hand. “Sorry I didn’t have time to wrap it.” She takes the box when he offers it to her, eyes darting up to his face as she pries the lid up. “I couldn’t find any non-Christmassy wrapping paper.”

She appears not to hear him - all of her attention is fixated on the contents of the box. He smiles at the emotions flicking across her face as she processes it - the delicate chain, the tiny metal pendant, the way it all seems to catch every modicum of light in the room. He remembers the moment he spotted it - scouring the jewelry section of the department store at the mall near his mom’s house. The little infinity symbol seemed to scream his name, glowing beneath it’s own invisible spotlight until the saleswoman pulled it from the case and handed it to him over the counter.

“Jake,” Amy breathes - and a lump rises up in his throat at the realization that her voice is warbling as she fights off tears. “It’s - it’s -”

“You said on our honeymoon that I’m your person until infinity,” he says softly once he’s sure she won’t finish her sentence. “I hope you already know that you’re mine, too, but in case you didn’t, or you forget...” he gestures to the box, to the necklace whose chain is hooked around Amy’s fingers. “Happy birthday, Amy.”

Tears are brimming in her eyes when he meets her gaze again. “It’s beautiful,” she whispers, letting the chain slip from her fingers so she can touch his face. He leans down and kisses her - and lifts his hands to cup her face when he feels her smile against him.

Her forehead lingers against his when they break apart, tears only just beginning to fall down her still-sallow face. “Here,” he murmurs, leaning back just far enough to pull the necklace out of the box. She reaches around to pull her hair away as he moves to work the clasp. He plants another kiss on her cheek once the necklace is in place, and then another on her lips when she loosely grips his shirt over his chest to hold him in place.

“I love it,” she whispers when they break apart again. “And I love you. So much.”

“I love you so much, too, and I have breakfast made if you’re awake enough for that now, but I’m also beyond happy to join you for a nap if you’re too tired.”

“Breakfast sounds good,” she murmurs, hands sliding down his chest to land loosely in his on his lap. “I do have one question,” she whispers.

“What’s that?”

“Is this an infinity necklace or an infinity-and-beyond necklace?”

“You are so lucky that it’s your birthday and we’re married and legally share all of our jokes, because otherwise I’d totally sue you for that.”