What Were You Meant For

"Put your helmet on," Jay Halstead instructed his ten year old son.

Liam sighed and fiddled with the straps but still hadn't made a move to put it atop his crown. "I have never fallen off," he said looking down at his scooter.

"That's great. But if you do, your helmet will be on your head." Jay sighed as his son continued to stall. "Put it on or we don't go and if we don't go, you'll spend the morning cleaning the kitchen instead.

"Now it's a beautiful morning, and I'd much rather be out here," he said spreading his arms wide towards the nearly empty streets, "than in the apartment. Besides, you know how cranky I get if I don't get my morning run."

"Fine," Liam huffed slamming the helmet on and clicking the buckle closed. He felt like a little kid when he wore it and he wasn't a little kid, despite what his father thought.

This was their typical morning routine when the weather allowed, and being tough Chicagoan's, only a polar vortex, pouring rain or a blizzard would keep them inside. Jay needed his morning run to calm his mind and rev up his body. His days were long, much longer than he liked, and much, much longer than his son liked. His job and its demands were always a point of contention between father and son. But morning was their time and it had dawned sunny and beautiful on this day. The low clouds and fog that were frequent visitors to the city were nowhere in sight. The pair rolled out of bed, into their clothes and out the door. It was a time dedicated to physical exercise and togetherness; a time each day that was rarely put aside for the needs of anything else. And despite Liam's occasional resistance, Jay had no doubt that his son cherished this time as much as he did.

He took one last look at his watch, nodded at his son who was straddling his scooter and began to jog down the sidewalk of their Bucktown neighborhood. There were very few people out yet. Most were up, preparing for the day ahead, showering, doing yoga, brewing coffee and pouring cereal into bowls. But they weren't outside yet and that left the sidewalks and streets to the pounding feet and spinning wheels of the Halstead men.

They rarely spoke during this time, but found the silence both comfortable and somehow comforting. Liam, would ride his scooter or bike as his father ran. Jay much preferred the scooter as the kid couldn't get up the same speed and stayed much closer than when he was allowed to pedal. This activity seemed to cement them in a way that the rest of the day couldn't promise. Jay had amassed a list of sitters that could step in and swap out when he wasn't available into the evening and occasionally overnight. He hated it as much as Liam did, but he loved his job and he was damn good at it. So he juggled it all as best as he knew how.

The entire intelligence team was a great asset. When work conflicted with a scheduled activity, Hank Voight did his best to accommodate a few minutes where at least one of them could check in and show their support. If it couldn't be Jay, then it would be Adam, Hailey, Kim or Kevin. He knew how hard it was raising kids and how easily it could all slip from your fingers.

Liam or L.J. as he was sometimes called was a good kid. He was charming, charismatic, bright and very headstrong. He was also outspoken, adventurous and had a heart as big as his fathers. There was no doubt Jay had his hands full. Very full.

As Jay's new running shoes slapped at the pavement he looked down the street at his son who was reaching the intersection. "Don't go any further," he yelled as Liam turned around and began to make his way back towards Jay.

He had never thought about having kids. Not that he was particularly opposed to it, but whenever he allowed himself a peek into the future, there were never any children in the pictures of his mind. Now, not only was he a father, but he was a single father. Not a part-time, every other weekend father, but totally one hundred percent on his own, father. It all stemmed from a ten day leave that had him enraptured with an ethereal Irish beauty.

He had been back home in Chicago before his deployment to Afghanistan and they had met at a friends party, spending ten fun-filled days and nights entwined in each others lives before parting. Despite having no specific future plans, and both seemed somewhat content with their brief time together, Jay still made sure to leave his contact information with her. After initially hearing nothing, he assumed she had moved on and forgotten all about him. Then one day an envelope came. The envelope that contained a letter that changed everything. It began with the usual formalities and greetings, weather related sundries, sorry I haven't written etc. But it was the fuzzy black picture that had Jay puzzled. He couldn't tell what it was, until a fellow soldier looked at it and said 'congratulations...boy or girl?' It was then that he realized that he was holding an ultrasound picture and there were two paragraphs yet to be read in the letter.

She assured him the baby was his, that she hadn't been with anyone else. The due date fit their time together and suddenly the world felt very small and very heavy on his shoulders. She wanted nothing from him. But felt that he needed to know, that it was only fair.

It was months later on a dusty, sweat soaking day that the letter came with a picture, giving her new address if he was ever interested in a future visit. He looked at the 4x6 picture which was filled with a little boy, his little boy. Liam James Halstead. She had even given the baby his last name. His heart pounded faster and heavier than it had in the firefight that he had been involved in the day before. He wanted to deny the possibility, but as he looked at the fair skinned, blue eyed infant, all he could see was himself. He returned home, but was nowhere near ready for the responsibility awaiting him. He made several attempts to call, to visit Bridget, the mother of his son, multiple times, but it took six months before he was truly ready and successfully knocked on that door and met his child for the first time.

Looking back, he had always wondered what if he hadn't followed up—if he had pretended none of it was true—if he had taken the clemency that she had offered. Where his life would be now, how different would Liam be, how different would he be? But there was no sense in wondering what, why or how, because the love of his life, was a ten year old boy with a stubborn streak and an attitude to match. A boy that he would fight for, cherish and love until his dying day.

He and Bridget instantly agreed that pursuing a relationship was not in the cards and that was okay, though she seemed a little more insistent on staying apart than he did. Jay paid child support, and got Liam every other weekend and every Wednesday night that his job allowed. She never pushed for the money, though he was certain finances were tight, and she never admonished him when he had to cancel because of work. There were times, it even felt that she wasn't even there. Then one day—she wasn't.

Her name was Bridget O'Brien, or at least that's what she had told him. She was from somewhere in Ireland, she never said exactly where. She had come to Chicago for school, fell in love with city and decided to stay, finding a job with an nonprofit agency. She lived simply, even with a child in her care. She never spoke about her family back home or her life as a child. He had seen one picture of her in her youth, she was with a boy, perhaps her brother as there was a clear resemblance between the two. It was tucked partially under a book on the kitchen table where Jay was waiting while she got Liam ready.

Then one day, when Liam was five, Jay was waiting while the boy hunted down his favorite sweatshirt to ward off the upcoming weekend chill, she broke the news.

"I have to go back home," she said barely above a whisper.

"Ireland?" Jay asked, his voice hesitant. His mind was swirling. He and Liam had become so close. He couldn't bear the thought of losing him, even for a brief time. What about Liam's school? His friends? What about Jay's promise to ride the Centennial Wheel at the Navy Pier? What about the promised trip to the book store to pick out, not one or two, but three books since his report card had been so good?

"I'm not asking you to give him up. In fact, I need you take him full time. He can't come with me."

"But—" Jay began, his mind shifting from one extreme to the other. "What? You're going to leave him? Why can't he go with you?" Then he looked at her face, which was an unreadable mask. "I mean, I was preparing to fight to keep him here so—"

"You don't have to. It's just best if he stays here with you."

"But my job has long hours. I'm not sure if I'm ready for this. When will you come back?" He asked as the uncertainty crept into his voice.

"When I'm finished with what I have to do. You'll be fine. It's what you were meant for."

"What?" He asked, confused, though she had used that phrase with him before when he had talked to her after a long and difficult day at work, wondering if police work was truly for him or not. She assured it was exactly what he was meant for.

"We all have our part in the world, what we are meant for. I'm meant for something that will take me away. You are a good man Jay Halstead. And a good father. I have no doubt that this is what you were meant for."

Jay tried to absorb what she was saying. "Does Liam know?"

"I've told him I'm going on a trip."

"What are your plans there? What is going on?"

But before she could answer Liam had come out of his room, sweatshirt and backpack on, ready to go. He ran towards his father, slamming into Jay's legs with full force. The unspoken words remaining unsaid.

She never came back. She never contacted them again. The phone number that she left was a dead end. And then the discovery that Bridget O'Brien hadn't been her real name.

At his father's insistence, one of the many things that drove them apart, he did a DNA test when Liam was eight months old. His mother was disgusted by thought, saying she knew that without a doubt this was their grandson. The spitting image of Jay as an infant. But Pat had insisted and Jay acquiesced. With the sealed results in hand, he couldn't manage to open the envelope as his mother posed the question, what if Liam wasn't his, what then? But Pat took the results from him, ripped them open and the answer was 99.999997% conclusive that they were in fact father and son. His dying mother sobbed; in happiness of the certainty, or out of anger at her husband for his uncertainty, Jay was never sure which.

But not everything could be measured with lab results, most especially who Liam's mother really was, where did she go and why she hadn't come back. Papers had been dated months earlier with Cook county and delivered to Jay six months after her leaving. She had signed over all of her parental rights. There was also an envelope addressed to their son, not to be opened or read by anyone other than him. And to be given to him, when Jay felt the time was right. When that would be, he had no idea.

Telling a family that a loved one has died, is gut wrenching, but telling your only child that his mother had been lost to an unknown abyss was an impossibility.

As Liam rolled by Jay thought about what crap hand the boy was given. A workaholic father who dealt with episodes of PTSD and suffered equally from insomnia and nightmares. Along with a mother who was willingly swept away into an unknown hurricane. The odds were already stacked for the kid to have more abandonment issues than Jay had ever experienced, as well as a general mistrust, of, well—everybody.

He knew Liam was more aware of things that Jay wanted to believe. He had stopped asking about his mother over a year ago. At first it was daily questions of when she was coming back, then weekly, then monthly. Jay admitted he had no answers. But he was certain there was a good reason she had left and that Liam was the reason that she would be back. Except she never had returned.

It left the boy angry and frustrated. It would cause him to occasionally act out, especially when Jay worked long hours. More than once had been met at the door by a tearful child, believing that he had been killed while on duty. It was those nights, neither one of them got any sleep.

When Jay was shot while pursuing the arsonist responsible for the fire that killed his father, Liam came into his room every night, and slept on the floor or the foot of the bed as if he feared his father would disappear in the middle of the night. He hadn't been truthful with the boy, telling him he had fallen down the stairs while chasing an offender and that's what was responsible for his injuries. But Liam had clearly sensed it had been more.

"Which way? Left or right?" Liam asked snapping him out of his memories.

"Left," Jay answered as Liam scooted ahead.

Back home, Jay shooed Liam into the shower while he got the coffee going and got out a box of cereal and a bowl for breakfast. He downed a protein shake, as Liam came out, trying to tug his shirt down over his still wet torso.

"Did you even try to dry off?"

"I did. Just some of the water stuck to me."

Jay, couldn't even come close to quashing the smile that came to his lips. "Come and eat while I shower."

Liam tried to pat down his wet hair with one hand as he picked up the box of Cheerios with his other hand and got most of the little O's into the bowl. As he got the milk from the fridge he could hear his dad call out to be careful with it. "I'm not a little kid," he replied. Using both hands he steadied the half gallon and carefully poured the milk and took pride in his complete success. "I did it great!" He yelled out in an I-told-you-so tone.

"Good job!" Jay yelled out from the shower. "Is your backpack ready to go?" The list of things to do was endless and there were some days that he was exhausted before he even walked out the door.

"I think so. You have to sign my permission slip for the Field Museum or I can't go!"

"Where is it?"

"The Field Museum?" Liam questioned.

"No. The slip, smart ass," Jay yelled.

"I don't know."

"Well how am I going to sign it then?"

"I don't know that either."

Jay finished his shower, got dressed, put on his badge and retrieved his gun and ammo from the lock box in his closet and came back the kitchen to find the entire contents of his son's backpack on the vinyl floor. "Find it?" He asked as he looked at the clock and noticed they were going to be late.

He squatted down and started picking up the random papers that littered the floor. "Dude you really need to get organized."

"It's not here. The trip is next week and I have to turn it in today."

"You've been to the museum several times already. We can always go again."

"No! I want to go with my friends."

"Well, then you should have kept better track of it."

Jay stood up and grabbed the refuse from breakfast and put it away as Liam slung his folder across the floor. "Uh uh. Not how to handle it. Look, I'll write a note stating you can go to the museum. I'll contact your teacher and she can email me the permission slip if necessary. But, in the future, you need to be more responsible. It would seem that I recall you just told me that you weren't a little kid. So this would be a great time to show it. Get your stuff, we're going to be late."

"You have to write the note," Liam reminded.

Jay opened his eyes wide in exasperation. The streets often seemed calm after dealing with a ten year old in the morning rush to get to school. "I'll write while you clean up."

Liam gathered up papers and stuffed half in a blue folder and the other in a red folder. "I found it! It was folded up in here." He said excitedly, waving it in the air.

"Well give it here," Jay said setting aside the note he had been working on. "You are spending nearly the entire day there I see."

"Yep. But we have to be quiet and we will have to write a report on our favorite part. I like the dinosaurs. SUE is my favorite."

"Yes, I know you do and I know she is. Here, put it in your pocket or somewhere you'll find it. Now lets go."

"They don't know that it's a girl. It's just named after the person who found the bones." Liam explained concerning the skeleton of the Tyrannosaurus Rex that was one of the highlights of the museum. "Are you picking me up today?"

"I'm going to try."

"You always try."

"And sometimes I actually do it." Jay said with a tight smile.

A half hour later with his child dropped off, Jay made his way upstairs and collapsed in his chair at his desk at the district.

"Rough morning?" Hailey asked.

"Every morning is rough. It's like this mindless spinning energy."

"A lot like the streets."

"Yeah, I guess. This mornings big trauma was a lost permission slip."

"Oh the horrors of fifth grade. Hey, does he ever ask about his mother anymore?" She asked as she picked up a picture on Jay's desk of him holding a cherubic two year old Liam, the camera capturing his loving gaze perfectly. She set it down and picked up the other framed photo, taken last year at the Christmas parade, both of them bundled up, with Micky Mouse waltzing around behind them.

Jay blinked back his surprise. "Not really. I think he's given up."

"Have you? Given up?"

"I don't know. Why the lies? A pseudonym, no background information at all? How could I not see how secretive she was?"

"Because you weren't interested in her for his familial history. Then, it was all about Liam. I might have someone who can help and not leave a trail."

"Help with what? I discovered there was no one by her name that left Ireland and lived in Chicago. I have nothing to go on other than Ireland. I've got no direction. I'm not even sure when she came over here. She never said. Hell, she may not even be Irish."

"Why would she leave her son behind? I mean by accounts she seemed like a good mother."

"She was a great mother. But something always seemed off about her. I mean not that Liam was ever in any danger, but she just seemed so content to fade into the background. No social media, no parent groups, nothing outside of what she absolutely needed. How did this get past me? Some detective I am."

"We often miss what is right in front of us. And it may mean nothing."

"If it meant nothing, then she'd be here." Jay replied.

Soundtrack:

The Decemberists ~ Rox in the Box