Work Text:
“Can I have your number?”
“Wh-what?” Jake looks up from his computer, swivelling a little too quickly in his chair, squinting as his eyes finally adjust to see her standing over him – Amy Santiago, the Nine-Nine’s newest detective and his newest pain-in-the-ass. Like usual, her arms are folded, and her shiny black hair is drawn into the neatest ponytail he’s ever seen - but her natural condescending expression (she’s spent the last few weeks talking down to him like he’s a child because of that one time he got a gummy worm stuck in her hair) is replaced by a half shy one that he doesn’t think he’s seen since the first time they met.
He prays to every imaginable deity out there that she hasn’t noticed how his cheeks have flushed a heavily embarrassing shade of pink as he slowly realises what she said.
He kind of just stares at her for a second, trying to process what she’s asking of him – Amy Santiago wants his number. Amy Santiago, who has spent most of her time at the Nine-Nine so far stressing out over his eating habits (“Peralta, for the last time, fruit flavoured sweets are not part of your five-a-day”), complaining about his barely legible handwriting (“Could you maybe make the case files, I don’t know, not look like they were written by a child?”) and making almost as many felony arrests as him, which he absolutely cannot have.
Amy Santiago, who he has already spurned a stupidly competitive rivalry with in a worryingly short amount of time - and that’s the only reason why he thinks about her a lot when he should be doing paperwork.
And while he’s out in the field. And when he’s lying in bed at night.
Amy Santiago, his new desk mate and new colleague and new pain-in-the-ass, who he absolutely definitely does not have a kinda sorta thing for.
God, he really has to stop using her full name. It’s definitely getting weird.
“Your phone number, weirdo.”
“Why do you – er, why?” She looks at him like he’s an idiot, which has become another frequent occurrence in a remarkably short space of time. Jake has an ominous feeling it’s going to happen a lot in the next few years they’re inevitably going to end up spending together, and he prickles with irritation at the thought of the overwhelming presence of Amy Santiago (seriously, he has a problem with the name thing) in the – in his - near future.
This is why he prefers his life of working alone as much as possible and drinking in silence with Rosa - It’s almost the end of the day and he’d probably already be on his way to Shaw’s right now if he wasn’t constantly being told off by this tiny high maintenance Latina detective that just sort of...never stops.
“For the case, remember?"
"Right. Yeah, of course. The case." He says slowly, firmly pushing down the slight pang of disappointment he gets once his brain finally kicks into gear and realises she only wants his number for work. Obviously.
"McGinley set us both on that double homicide and you’re not getting all the credit like last time. We should be working together, that’s why we’re partners.”
“I got all the credit because I did all the work, Santiago.” He bites back, half joking - but she just folds her arms even tighter, raising an eyebrow, and the second he sees the fire in her eyes he knows he’s made a mistake.
Three of the perps they’ve had the pleasure of interrogating together have confessed pretty soon after getting that look. He’s pretty sure one of them even cried.
(God help him if he ever actually tries to ask her out.)
(Which is never going to happen, because this is all just a stupid crush.)
“I was the one who got all the witness statements and did all the paperwork - all you did catch the guy, and you showed up ten minutes late to the bust with Starbucks!” She says hotly, and he’s almost ready to argue with her for the fifth time this week, a thousand retorts and jokes already in the forefront of his mind that he just knows will make her do that adorable thing where she gets really angry and her face scrunches up and she won’t stop furiously pointing for some reason.
But it’s Friday, and he’s tired, and he’s just closed almost all of his cases and finished up most of the paperwork (no, he hasn’t been making more of an effort to make it neater to impress her), and for some reason he really doesn’t want to argue with Amy Santiago today. Not because he likes her, obviously, but because she’ll probably win and he doesn’t want to ruin his good mood. So he relents, just this once.
“Okay, okay! I’m...sorry.”
“You – wait, you’re what?”
“I’ll... give you my number.”
“Oh. I mean, yes. Good. Thank you.” She says, clearly surprised at the apology, still adorably flustered but with the fierceness of her heat fading.
He can tell, he just knows, that she had a thousand retorts to counter his that she’s now filing away for another day too, and for some reason that makes him smile. A few weeks of working together have proven they both have a talent for driving each other crazy, but they’re definitely equally matched, and he’d be lying if he said he didn’t like a bit of healthy competition.
He’s been getting bored solving all the good cases around here by himself anyway.
“No problem.”
There’s this one second where they’re just half-smiling at each other awkwardly and she’s the only thing that even matters in the room and maybe even in the entire world and it’s, uh, nice, as seconds go. One of the better seconds he’s had, definitely.
“I...uh, I actually don’t know what my number is, but you can give me yours? If you want.” He breaks eye-contact once he realises he’s been staring for way too long and nervously rambles a bit, suddenly feeling intensely awkward, fumbling for his phone and looking like an idiot. The Peralta speciality.
She just nods, and he can tell she’s itching to roll her eyes at him and get critical again, but he’s glad she holds back. He pulls out his phone, presses ‘New Contact’, and hands it to her, trying not to watch as she types her number and name in carefully.
Their fingers touch for half a second when she hands it back - and he hates more than anything in the world that it makes him quietly feel like he’s about to spontaneously combust.
“Okay, great. Thanks, Peralta.” She turns on her heel to walk away, but he clears his throat, because apparently he’s intent on building bridges today. Plus (not that he’d ever tell her) if she stopped talking to him like he’s a child and criticising his perfectly normal eating habits, he thinks they could actually be good friends.
“Uh, Santiago?”
“Yeah?”
“...I’ll text you. If I...figure anything out. About the case. We’ll work it together, I promise.”
“Okay.” She smiles at him, properly this time, which is a nice change - and it doesn’t exactly help the whole overwhelmingly irritating massive huge crush thing that he’s currently dealing with, but he can’t really bring himself to care.
After she’s gone, he stares long and hard at her contact name. ‘Amy Santiago’ - her full name, like she’s somehow worried he’ll forget, like it isn’t currently his favourite phrase in the English language. The capital letters, lack of a nickname and the horrifyingly distinct lack of any emojis make her name stand out a mile against everyone else’s on the list, and he considers changing it for a second until he slides his phone back into his pocket, adrenaline and butterflies and pure energy buzzing in his fingertips.
Sue him – he likes her. As much as he hates to admit it, they do work well together - and he’s pretty sure she’s either going to drive him completely insane or his stupid crush is only going to grow and grow until he does something either very brave or very very stupid. He smiles quietly as he closes up his last case of the week, brainstorming all the ways he can prank text her later.
He can't say he knows where they’re eventually going to end up, of course - but he’s pretty curious to find out.