You and I - Upstead

You and I

Notes: Some trigger warnings before we start so please take notice of these

TW: There are mentions of abuse/domestic abuse, trafficking, homophobia in parts of this fic.

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Yeah, grow old with me

Let us share what we see

Oh the best it could be

You and I

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The holiday season wasn't particularly Hailey's favourite time of the year, but she always held a special place for Christmas in her heart but unfortunately most if not all of her happy memories of Christmas as a kid were tainted by her fathers explosive behaviour at some point over the Christmas period, usually Christmas Day.

It was always fun for the beginning, running downstairs with her brothers to find presents under the tree and an empty glass of milk and the crumbs of the cookies and carrots they had left for Santa.

Then their father would get a drink or two in and he would start to change, sometimes he didn't even need to have a drink he would just explode, and they became aware of this so as the years went on the magic of Christmas disappeared, the excitement of running downstairs disappeared, only to be replaced with them walking on eggshells and the fear of how long would it take this year for their dad to explode.

So she didn't do much on Christmas, she would send her brothers cards and their kids some gifts, sometimes she would go to their houses for a little bit either on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day but even though they were her brothers, she felt like she was intruding.

Her brothers, Niko and Elias always tried to make Christmas special for Hailey, ever since they were kids and they did make it special to some extent because there was only so much a ten and eight year old could do for a 4 year old to make it special. But that was Hailey's happiest Christmas memory she had, the first Christmas that she could kind of remember and it was her brothers dressing up in tutus of Hailey's that they had somehow managed to squeeze into, wearing tiaras and letting Hailey use her little kids make up set on them, she remembered dancing with them and Niko letting her jump on his bed, playing music to try and drown out the arguments of their parents downstairs.

She would always be grateful for the way they tried to protect her and tried to make it normal for her, but of course he had to ruin it for them, he would always ruin it for them. All of her happy memories were tainted by something her father did and she would never forgive him for that.

Hailey walked into work at the beginning of December to find Adam, Kevin and Jay already there, Adam standing on a step ladder and Jay and Kev passing him so decorations to hang up, Christmas decorations. Hailey had heard their voices as she had walked up the stairs and she didn't know what she would find but she definitely wasn't expecting this.

It was very different from robbery-homicide, everything was very plain and smart, everyone had small individual items at their desks, usually a small picture but nothing else was personal or unique.

That was one thing she has noticed in the short time she had been at intelligence, there was a hint of everyone everywhere, Jays rangers mug, the chicken they had, the knife wall, Olinskys hat hanging up on the wall, desks neat but also littered with some small trinkets as well as photos, Kevin's desk currently holding an art project Vinessa had sent him.