It's okay to need me

Morning

Jake walked into the bullpen right on time Friday morning. As shocked as everyone was that Jake was on time, what shocked everyone even more was that Charles was not yet at his desk. Charles may not be as punctual and rule-abiding as Amy but he liked making a good impression and was rarely late to work. Jake noticed his friend's absence almost immediately.

"Have any of you seen Charles? He's not late unless traffic is bad and it was considerably good today. I mean, guys, I was actually ON TIME." 

"I haven't seen him at all." Rosa replied glancing around as if to check if he was there. 

"Me either. It's weird for him. I hope he's okay." Amy concluded. Jake nodded his head in agreement. It was then that Captain Holt opened his office door.

"Detectives, I couldn't help but overhear your conversation about Detective Boyle and his lack of punctuality this morning. He has recently informed me that he is sorry and running late because as he said, he "overslept". He will be here shortly. Since Detective Boyle is safe I would like you all to stop dwelling and get to work." Captain holt then promptly turned around and headed into his office, shutting the door behind him. 

Before Jake was even able to sit down, the elevator dinged and the doors opened to reveal a Charles Boyle that looked as though he rushed his entire morning routine. 

"Dude your hair is a mess." Rosa proclaimed bluntly. Charles merely provided a half smile with sad undertones and ran his hand through it in an attempt to fix it. His attempt was however, not successful. Charles quickly put his stuff on his desk and walked over to Jake's desk to ask him about the case. 

"Jake- I'm so sorry I'm late. I overslept and I had to rush to get dressed and everything. I didn't mean to be an inconvenience and-" Boyle was interrupted when Jake put a hand on his shoulder and said,

"Hey, bud, it's okay. S'not a big deal. I'm late all the time. I'm very inconvenient. You're good, Charles." Charles looked relieved but he still said,

"You aren't an inconvenience Jake."

"Well.. that's good." As much as Jake disagreed he didn't want to argue over something stupid and self negative when Charles was already clearly on edge. "Hey bud, you didn't quite fix your hair there. I mean you look great either way but if you care it isn't the same as it usually is." Jake treaded carefully.

"Oh, whatever. I'll fix it eventually. Don't wanna waste any work time going to look in the mirror."

"You aren't being wasteful of time by fixing your hair." Jake replied, concern evident in every aspect of his tone. Despite Jake's efforts, Charles still looked uncertain. "If you don't want to go to a mirror, I can help you bud. Do you want help?" Charles took a second to consider before giving in and letting himself be taken care of a bit.

"Yeah. That'd be great. Thanks Jake."

"Mhmm, no problem." Jake said as he reached towards Charles' hair and attempted to flatten the bed head. When Jake was satisfied with his attempt he spared a glance at his best friend's face. He had to suppress a look of surprise when he saw how sad Charles looked up close. His eyes were slightly red as though he had been crying and he looked as though he barely slept. As Jake was processing what to do Charles asked,

"Am I good now? Does it look any better?" Jake snapped out of his trance.

"Oh! Yeah, you're good. It's fine I think. It was fine before anyway. You know how dramatic Rosa can get." This gained an exasperated look from Rosa. However, Charles merely smiled.

"Thanks Jakey." Jake smiled back but all he could think about was how Charles' smile didn't reach his eyes. His tired, tired eyes. Before Jake could say anything, Charles must have read his mind or at least saw the worry underlying in Jake's smile because he mouthed silently,

'I really don't want to talk about it right now. Please.'  Jake took his cue, and pushed down his worry temporarily.

"We should probably relook over our evidence and try to see if we missed anything yesterday. If we don't see anything new, we should probably do.. door duty." Jake's face scrunched up in disgust at the prospect of boring door duty. His exasperation caused Charles to shake his head and smile at Jake before agreeing with him. They walked to the evidence room to get their files.