AU One-shot inspired by a comment from sodapop99! I hope y'all enjoy! :)

Will is twentyish and Jay is almost seventeen. This takes place in 1994. And since we do not know the name of their mother, I named her Melanie in this fic.

"Mom! I'm going over to Haylee's for a while, be back for supper." Will yelled as he headed towards the front door.

"Ok, just be careful the weather man on the T.V said it's supposed to get pretty nasty out there in a little while." Melanie said as she stuck her head out into the living room.

"Yeah mom, will do."

"Oh! And grab me some bread and milk before you head back!" she yelled from the kitchen.

"Why do people always think that bread and milk are a necessity when it comes a blizzard? I mean what about actual things we need such as meat."

"William."

"Fine. Later." Will said as he walked out the door, grabbing his coat and car keys from the nearby coatrack and table.

"Jay! Why don't you go outside and get some fresh air?" Melanie yelled towards the living room.

"But mooommm, I just got to level five on Donkey Kong Country!" Jay whined as he felt his mom's eyes burning a hole into his backside.

"Honey, you are almost seventeen years old, isn't it time for you to stop playing video games and I don't know, get a girlfriend?"

"And isn't it time for you to call Camille and begin gossiping about Ms. Fogerty's latest boy-toy?" Jay countered, not removing his eyes from the screen of the television.

"Jay Halstead! Why don't you go and get the bar of soap from the bathroom and wash your mouth out!"

"Mom, please. We all know that Ms. Fogerty's is anything but the religious church going woman she claims to be." Jay said as he rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, you're right. And that new wardrobe with the plastic surgery is most certainly not doing her any justice." She laughed.

"See? Now, if you will excuse me I am about to defeat King Rool here and get back my bananas."

Melanie had seen enough, she would be damned if she was going to let her baby grow up to be one of those people they talked about on late night talk shows. She walked over towards the gaming system, unplugging it from the wall.

"MOM! I only had one more punch to give Rool!"

"Rool, drool, who cares whatever the apes name is. I am not letting your brain turn to mush, you can have this back tomorrow." She said as she picked up the gaming system and carried it off down the hall.

"Now what…" Jay sighed under his breath.

He looked around the room, looking for something else to do 'Too wet to skateboard, can't play ball cause Will hasn't shoved the drive way, hmmmm maybe Mouse is free to hang out…' he thought.

He picked up the phone off the wall, punching in the numbers that had been forever etched into his brain.

"Gerwitz residence, this is Bo speaking." He heard someone greet on the receiving end.

"Hey, Mr. G it's Jay, is Mouse home?"

"GREG! TELEPHONE!" Jay heard as he remembered to pull back the speaker from his ear, Bo has a tendency to forget to move the phone away from his mouth before yelling. "He will be down in a second."

"Thanks." Jay said as he heard the phone being placed onto a hard surface.

Jay waited, hearing a pair of footsteps walk by the open phone, before they stopped at the table, he heard a female voice asking who it was.

"It's for me mom! It's Jay. Hey Halstead." said Mouse as he catched his breath.

"Hey Mouse, you wanna go throw some passes down at the field? Mom is burning my ass for me to get out."

"Sorry man, I have been told I am pulling a shift down at the community building, something about teaching old people how to use computers.." Mouse grumbled.

"Good luck with that one."

"Thanks, say… If you are that bored you could always-"

"Never. All this technology crap and me do not get along."

"Fine. I gotta go. See you Monday." Mouse said as he hung up the phone.

'Well, so much for my afternoon…' Jay thought to himself once again. He walked back over to the couch, falling down onto the soft cushion, he looked out the bay window and seen that the snow seemed to have let up for a few minutes and decided to take his mom's advice and go outside. He quickly ran up the steps to his room, throwing on an extra pair of pants, light jacket, and a heavy jacket, before walking back down, grabbing his beanie and gloves off the side table.

"Moomm! I'm going outside!"

"Don't stay out their too long, I don't want you getting sick."

'Make up your mind woman, do you want me outside and sick or do you want me inside and dry...'

Jay walks out onto the front patio, the cold Chicago air hitting him in the face. He takes a deep breath in, the cold air burning his lungs. He walks down the steps and towards the garage, grabbing the shovel off the wall and begins scrapping the inches of fresh snow off the concrete.

He was about halfway through when he caught glimpse of something in the tall oak tree off to right of the driveway. He couldn't help but smile and shake his head as he dropped the shovel off onto the bank of snow and walked over to the tree. He sighed, looking up the trunk of the old tree, before he rolled up the sleeves on his jacket the best he could and grabbed onto the highest board he could reach. He climbed to the top, pushing the wooden door up and pulled the rest of himself in.

'Well at least the sperm donor did one thing right during my childhood..' Jay thought as he reminisced on one of the few things his father ever did for him and Will.

He sat back and closed the hatch of the small building, taking in his surroundings. He looked around as memories began to flood his mind. The hundreds of times they played Pirates in search of the chest of treasure, Cowboys versus Indians, the time that Will convinced Jay he had superpowers and told Jay to go head first out the small window resulting in a concussion, a laceration to his jaw and a broken arm. Jay laughed as he begin to notice the pile of toys that had been left, covered with an inch of dust was his favorite bouncy ball and bag of jacks, Will's bag of marbles he begged their mom to buy when he was eight, the variety of Hot Wheel cars and trucks that had long since been abandoned on the racetrack in the corner, along with a variety of odds and ends. He never realized just how small this space was, or maybe it wasn't small, maybe he had just out grown it. He noticed the pile of snow that had made its way into the small building through a hole in the roof. He scooted over from the wall he was against to inspect when something began poking him the back, he reached back and grabbed the obstruction with his hand, pulling his hand back so he could inspect whatever he had in his hand.

'Slingshot.' He smiled as he grabbed one of Will's marbles, and placed in the leather that swallowed it whole, he pulled back and aimed at the poster of some eighties movie that was hanging on the wall, before he released it from his hold. 'Bullseye.' He smiled and grabbed another marble, but then another idea struck him. He made his way over towards the pile of snow in the corner, grabbing a handful and shaping it into a ball, he placed it in the leather of the wooden slingshot and crawled his way over towards the window that over looked the street and sidewalk below. He found another target, the metal garbage can on the street corner and took aim, releasing the snowball and watching it hit the metal.

"Ahhhh! What the hell!?" Jay heard a female voice shriek below.

"Sorry! I didn't see you there!" Jay said as he stuck his head out the small window before he seen who it was. "Sorry Lindsay!"

"It's fine, just don't scare me like that again Halstead." Erin glared towards Jay. "What are you doing up there anyways?"

"I was scrapping the driveway and kinda got distracted." Jay swallowed hard and ran a hand through his hair, he and Erin had only met about three months ago, and he already had the hots for her.

"I see that," Erin laughed as she walked closer towards the tree "I've never been in a tree house before."

"Really? My father built ours, I actually haven't been up here in years.. What are you doing out anyways? You're gonna get sick."

"You sound just like Camille.. Like I told her and Hank, I just needed some fresh air, needed to clear my head." Erin said as she spoke about the people who rescued her, at least Jay was assuming that's what happened, whenever he asked he always got shut down or they avoided the questions. All Jay knew was that Hank is a detective with the Chicago Police Department and he suddenly showed up with Erin three months ago, Jay would ask his mom what the situation was considering she was best friends with Hank's wife Camille, but she would always tell him the same thing, "You have to ask her that, otherwise it's none of your business." But there was no way in hell that Jay would ever ask Erin about her past, not now anyways.

"Well, if you ever need to talk, you know where to find me."

"In a treehouse?" Erin laughed.

"Well, no, but if that works for you then that's fine." Jay smiled, he was glad he was partially sitting because her laugh could make him fall to the ground, flat on his face.

"I might just take you up on that offer one day Halstead. I gotta go before Hank sends out the whole department searching for me." Erin smiled as she headed back towards the sidewalk.

Jay was about to tell her bye when he noticed a familiar car making its way down the street. He quickly ducked back into the shelter of the small building and over to the snow pile, quickly making snowballs in a variety of sizes. Jay slowly moved towards the window that overlooks the driveway, seeing that the car was now pulling into the drive, he loaded the slingshot with the biggest snowball he had made and waited for the engine of the car to shut off. The engine turned off and he heard the car door open, the occupant stepping out before turning back around and shutting the door before slowly walking up the drive.

'Now's my chance.' Jay thought as he pulled the leather back and aimed it out the window at his target.

The frozen ball went gliding through the air, hitting the target directly in the back.

"What the Hell?!" Will yelped as he turned around, looking for whatever had hit him.

Jay quickly ducked and grabbed another snowball, loading it into the leather before he slyly looked out the window. Will had turned back around, heading towards the house. Jay quickly rose the leather out the window and took aim at his older brother once again. He released his finger and watched as the ball hit Will directly in the neck.

"Alright! Where are you Jay? I know you are out here and don't be a little pussy." Will voiced as he walked back towards his car, still oblivious to Jay's hiding spot.

Jay loaded another snowball into the leather of the slingshot, taking aim at the side of his brother's face as Will began to look around for his pest of a younger brother.

Jay released the snow, hitting Will square in the face, knocking the glasses off his face.

"You little prick! I am going to kill you when I find you!" Will yelled as he dropped the grocery bags in his hands to the ground and picked up his glasses.

"Yeah? You and what army?" Jay said as he stuck his head out the window, only to get blasted with a snowball to the face.

"This. Means. War." Will glared as he made his way over towards the base of the tree.

"Shit! Shit! Shit!" Jay cursed as he heard boards on the tree squeak as Will climbed the tree. Jay scurried over to the biggest window, debating on whether this was a bright idea. He heard the wood of the floorboard squeak as the door was pushed open. 'Now or never.' Jay thought as he jumped out the window.