Chapter Text
Amanda stared at the test in her hand; the third test of the morning, and no less positive than the last two. She’d make a doctor’s appointment to confirm it, but she already knew, had known for two weeks if she was being honest with herself. She sighed, tossing the test into the trash. She washed her hands and looked at her reflection in the mirror - her face lined with worry and a lack of sleep. She wanted to cry or scream; but Jesse was out in the living room, and she needed to get ready for work. There wasn’t time for a crisis. She splashed cold water on her face, willing her expression into something that didn’t reflect her inner frustrations.
How could they screw up this badly? Five years of friendship, and then one night, months ago, that had almost ruined everything. Now here it was coming back to haunt them.
Work was a distraction, and an effective one - they’d been so busy all day that Amanda probably would have been able to put aside her thoughts and worries for a few hours - if she hadn’t been seeing the source pretty much all day long.
Things between her and Carisi were good now; back to normal. They were back to hanging out, spending time together, and it wasn’t awkward. They’d had an unspoken agreement never to bring up what had happened between them, and she was fine with that - until it wasn’t an option anymore. She pushed it all aside - the conversation she wasn’t ready to have with him - they talked, joked around. There was a moment when he told her he’d never had a massage and she’d wanted to… flirt, maybe, tease him? But she stopped herself because they’d gone down that road and now she was dealing with the consequences.
He didn’t seem to have noticed her mood, or he was doing a good job of hiding it if he did, but there was no such luck with Liv - Liv had known her for too long and she was perceptive.
She clocked the look on Liv’s face before she spoke - the way she glanced back towards the doorway of the break room, seeing Carisi move out of earshot - she knew what was coming before Liv sat down.
She was concerned - Amanda could read that in her face. “Amanda, look, whatever is is going on with you, you're either gonna tell me or you're not gonna tell me, and I don't want to invade your privacy or ask you questions that, you know, as your boss, I shouldn't even be asking you, so-”
Amanda didn’t hesitate. “I'm pregnant.” It was a relief to get the words out, to tell someone else and not bear the weight of the secret alone.
A smile crept onto Liv’s face. “Wow.”
Amanda returned the smile, still a little uncertain - there was a huge part of her that had been panicking for days, and that had been the loudest part. Telling Liv - seeing her friend’s joy, she allowed herself to think for a second about the good parts of this - about giving Jesse a baby brother or sister, growing their family, about the people in her life that would be so happy for them.
“Congratulations,” Liv said, and there was an easing of the tension Amanda felt - ripping off the band-aid by telling Liv, that was step one. Liv eyed Amanda closely, cautiously. “Or-”
Before she could finish her thought, Carisi returned - his footsteps and his voice cutting Liv off before he made it into the room, and giving Amanda time to school her expression into something more neutral. Work called, and the moment was lost.
The case had taken Amanda away from her own troubles, but not entirely; everything that had happened, was going to happen, that was all strung up in her relationship with Carisi. He was taking this case hard and she wanted to reach out to him; she wanted to to be there for him because she couldn’t stand seeing him so cut up. At the juvenile centre, waiting to speak with a psychologist about Sam Conway, they finally got a moment of quiet, a chance to speak.
“You okay?”
“Uh, you know, aside from not sleeping,” his voice was scratchy - the tiredness, the pressure he was putting on himself, it all came through. He wasn’t looking at her - his hands were on the bench, his gaze straight out ahead of him. She wanted to take his hand, to reassure him - and that was why she started speaking, but once the words started coming she lost control of them.
“You worry, you know, you worry about your kid getting sick, or breaking a bone, or God forbid, getting hit by a taxi, and it’s like you’re holding your breath underwater, every day,” her words got caught in her throat, worry about Jesse, about this baby, worry that Carisi wouldn’t be the man - the father - she expected him to be - and then worry about Carisi, about how he was just about holding it together right now. He cared so much about this kid, this case - and he didn’t even know what she was holding back from telling him. “And then you, uh, you get to tuck ’em in and kiss them goodnight, you get to breathe out again, but that’s, you can’t imagine that-” She broke then; she couldn’t hold back the tears, or fight the wave of emotion that was coming over her.
“Hey, hey, hey, it’s alright,” his hand was on her back, his voice was soothing and he was so careful, so gentle. She knew she had to tell him, knew that she couldn’t keep it from him any longer. There would never be a perfect moment. She turned to look at him, swiping at the tears under her eyes. “Hey,” he nodded again, reassuring her without knowing what was going on.
She took a breath, building up her courage. “Uh, Carisi, I’m-”
“It’s alright, it’s alright. Tell me, it’s okay-”
Before she could open her mouth they were interrupted - a guard calling for them, letting them know the psychologist was here - and what could she do? She couldn’t tell him like this, here, with everything else going on. He deserved to be able to process it - she had had time - days since she’d confirmed it, but weeks before then of wondering.
Later, as the case wrapped, she found herself opening up to Liv again - saying the thoughts she’d been holding in her head - the thoughts she wanted to get out before she told Carisi and made everything real, and fixed. Liv watched her, letting her speak and gather her thoughts. “I don't know if I need another baby. I don't know if I want another baby. All I know is, if I was back home, the choice would be a lot easier. There'd be no choice.”
It was the truth; she loved Jesse with all of her heart, but a second baby, another kid with a different father, it was a lot to take in. She thought back to Carisi, sitting beside her at the juvenile centre - she knew - knew - what he would want her to do. But she also knew that he would let her make the choice, however he felt about it.
Liv looked Amanda straight in the eye. “Give me your phone.”
“What?”
“Just unlock it and give it to me.”
Amanda did, passing the phone over to Liv, unsure where this was going. She scrolled through the phone for a moment before passing it back to Amanda - a video playing on the screen - Jesse, a year or so ago, her face filling the screen. Amanda loved this video - she’d watched it a thousand times while she was at work, missing Jesse.
“That's playing dirty,” her voice cracked. Her eyes lingered on the screen, on Jesse’s face smiling up at the camera.
“I distinctly remember when you showed that to me. You told me that was the best moment of your life. This is your decision to make alone, and I will defend to the death your right to make it, but regret is an awful thing to live with.”
Liv was right, Amanda knew that too - she had never planned on having kids but now that she had Jesse in her life she could never give her up. And she knew that she had enough love to give to another baby; she knew that Jesse would love being a big sister, and she knew that no matter where it left the two of them, Carisi would love being a father - he was already the closest thing Jesse had - there was no way he wouldn’t embrace every second of fatherhood if she gave him the chance; all the fears she had, they weren’t the kind that came with a guy like Carisi - he wasn’t going to turn and walk away.
Sonny knew there was something up with Amanda; he’d known for a while now, she had been on edge - something was worrying her and she wasn’t ready to share it with him. It had taken weeks for them to get things back on track after the summer and he had tiptoed around her change in mood because he didn’t want to go back to not talking, to awkward silences and raised eyebrows from Fin and Liv. So he waited for her to come to him, to tell him what was bothering her.
The longer it went on, the better an idea he had - the conversations between Amanda and Liv that stopped when he walked into the room; her emotional response to cases involving children, more pronounced than usual - and the physical things, the sudden trips to the bathroom, change in appetite, switching her coffee to decaf. He was fairly certain that she was pregnant, and he was pretty sure he knew who the father was - but she was holding back. He thought she might have told him, a week ago back at the juvenile centre, when she had broken down talking about how parents worry about their kids. She’d looked at him - she’d been about to tell him, he was sure of it. But they had been interrupted and it almost felt like she was avoiding him since.
He was sure, too, that she had confided in Liv. So when the opportunity struck, when he and Liv were sat in the car watching Fin and waiting to move in and arrest Luke, he glanced at her sideways and bit the bullet.
“Let me ask you something, Lieu. What's, what's going on with Rollins?”
Liv didn’t give anything away. “If you have a question about Rollins, why don't you try asking her?”
He almost rolled his eyes. If he thought that outright asking Amanda would get him anything other than the cold shoulder - especially if he was wrong - he’d have done it already. “She's pregnant, isn't she?”
“Really, Carisi?”
“Are you telling me she's not pregnant?”
“Really?”
He took Liv’s protestations as confirmation of what he already suspected, but there wasn’t time to push further - and he knew that Liv would never break a confidence; he had just wanted to know, wanted to be prepared before he tried to talk to Amanda about it.
The whole drive to New Jersey he weighed up his options, debated the best way to approach the subject - he didn’t want to pressure Amanda, he didn’t want to risk her pulling away, but if she was pregnant, if she was having his baby, she had to know that he would be right there with her.
It wasn’t until they got out of the car that he decided to just go for it - to tell her he already knew. They would be at the house in a couple of minutes; there was enough time to say what he had to say and then they’d be busy again, she’d have time to process - and if he was wrong, time to forgive him and his big mouth.
The words didn’t come as easily as he hoped, though, he weaved around the topic, hoping she’d just tell him. “Did I tell you about my cousin Nikki? She’s havin’ another kid, can you believe that?”
“Is that three?”
“Five.”
“Wow,” he could tell from Amanda’s expression that she knew exactly what he was doing and that she wasn’t about to take the bait.
He stopped at the foot of the driveway, turning to look at her. “Hey Rollins, why didn’t you tell me?”
“Tell you what?”
He shrugged. “Alright,” he turned away from her - he was frustrated - he didn’t know what the protocol was for telling your partner - who you had slept with, once, after a difficult week and several whiskeys each - that you thought she was having your kid.
She called out to him as he walked towards the house. “Son- Sonny - listen, hey, I tried to, I just - I didn’t know how.”
He was struck dumb for a second - it was one thing to suspect that she was pregnant, that she was pregnant with his child, and another thing altogether to have it confirmed. “Wh-”
“Don’t start asking me questions right now,” she said, but she was smiling at him - his heart was pounding a mile a minute in his chest - all he had was questions. She met his eye as the Wellbecks emerged from their house. “Later,” she said. “I promise.”
In the car on the way back to New York they had nothing but time and silence. Amanda hadn’t been surprised that Carisi had figured things out - he was a detective, after all - and if he hadn’t suspected before their conversation at the juvenile centre last week, there’s no way the cogs wouldn’t have started turning. She felt guilty that she hadn’t told him sooner - she kept trying to find the right time, and then talking herself out of it. There was a part of her that was still afraid.
“So,” he said as she pulled the car away form the curb. “Were you gonna tell me?”
“We haven’t even left the street yet, Carisi.”
“Amanda,” he said, “We’ve got to talk about this. I mean - I need you to say it out loud so I know we’re both on the same page.”
She sighed, “Yes, I’m pregnant. Yes, it’s your baby... I was going to tell you, I was just afraid about how you’d react.”
He furrowed his brow - he actually looked offended. “What? Why would you be afraid?”
She concentrated on driving for a minute or two before she spoke, and continuing to stare out at the road ahead of her when she did, “Sonny… we… we slept together and we never talked about it afterwards. Not once. Like it never happened.”
He turned in his seat, angling his body toward her. “I didn’t think you wanted to; you couldn’t get me out of the apartment fast enough the next morning.”
She had panicked in the morning, when she woke up next to him - worried that he would open his eyes and realise they’d made a huge mistake. When Jesse had started calling out from her crib she’d gone to get her, and when Carisi appeared in the doorway she made an excuse about Jesse having a play date. She hadn’t been able look him in the eye because she wasn’t sure what she’d find there. “I didn’t want Jesse asking questions, that didn’t mean-”
“I figured you regretted it.” He looked lost. “You never brought it up again, things were… you were weird around me.”
“I didn’t know what we… look, we were drunk. I know we were both more than willing, but we weren’t thinking with our heads either.”
“I didn’t regret it,” he said, staring straight out ahead of him. “At least, not until things got weird.”
Amanda couldn’t keep having this conversation while driving, couldn’t focus on keeping the car steady while her heart was trying to beat out of her chest and there were tears welling up in her eyes because the big mistake she thought she’d made wasn’t the disaster she’d built it up to be in her head - and maybe the bigger mistake was this - was not talking to him afterwards, not letting him know how much that night had meant to her at the time - but she’d begun putting up walls the second he left the apartment; there was a reason she didn’t sleep with guys she could actually have a future with, and she’d broken her own rule when she’d led him to her bedroom that night.
She pulled over, parking on the corner of a side street, and finally turning to look at him, “You never said that.”
He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and dropping his head to his hands. “I didn’t wanna be that guy, you know?”
“What does that mean?”
He turned to look up at her. “Look, I’d been, uh, attracted to you for a long time, and I guess I always figured it was one-sided. So, I thought if you just wanted a one night stand I didn’t want to be the creepy guy who won’t let it be.”
Amanda’s voice was small when she finally spoke again, telling him something she’d barely admitted to herself. “I thought you weren’t interested anymore.”
He sat up fully then, turning his body back towards her. “What? Why would you think that?”
“Sonny, we slept together - we had a great night and then I didn’t hear from you until work on Monday - and you gave me the cold shoulder for weeks. I thought that was you telling me you got what you wanted and we were done.”
The look on his face startled her - he was almost horrified. “That’s not… I thought you knew me better than that.”
“I was scared, scared that I’d lose you,” she bit her lip. “I thought if we were back to being just friends then I’d have you in my life, and we’d be partners again, like before.”
Carisi dropped his head back, leaning against the headrest. He let out a frustrated groan.
“Sonny-”
“I’m sorry.” He opened his eyes, looking over at her from the passenger seat. “I never wanted you to think I didn’t-”
“Hey,” she smiled over at him, reaching to rest a hand on on his leg. “This is on me as much as it is you. Look, I don’t know what we do now - I’m not sure what the playbook is - but I’m keeping this baby, Dominick, and you can be involved or not - that’s your call, but you’re my partner, and my best friend, and I don’t want to lose you.”
“Hey, hey, you’re not gonna lose me,” he put a hand on top of hers, and after a moment of silence, he grinned at her, “I’m really gonna be a dad?”
“Yeah,” she laughed, “You really are.”
Despite a trying few days, Sonny was still in a pretty good mood - although Gabriela’s case had been tough on all of them, and the overriding mood in the precinct was one of defeat, there was still a voice in the back of his head reminding him that he was going to be a father and there was nothing that could shake that - he knew that the rest of the squad were in the mood more for commiseration than celebration, so he kept his tone light when he closed his laptop and began packing up for the night.
“Anybody want to get a beer?”
Fin shook his head. “Oh man, I promised Ken and Alejandro I’d babysit tonight.”
Sonny walked over to Amanda’s desk, shrugging on his jacket as he approached her. “What about you? Non-alcoholic?”
“What’s the point? Besides, after this Gabriela thing I’d need something a lot stiffer than a beer.”
“Alright,” Carisi held up his hands in surrender. “I’ll see you both tomorrow.”
He turned back towards his desk, ready to grab his phone and keys, but Amanda called out to him. “You could come over?” she said, “No beer in the house but Jesse might share her chocolate milk.”
He laughed, glancing at Fin to see his reaction, but Fin had barely reacted at all; while Sonny knew that going to Amanda’s meant that he would be spending time with the mother of his child, to Fin this was just a normal night, where Sonny went to hang out with Amanda and her kid because he didn’t have anything better to do - which was true, but Fin’s definition of 'nothing better to do' was quite different from Sonny’s.
“Sure,” he said, “I haven’t had chocolate milk in about thirty years but-”
“That’s a lie,” Amanda said as she pulled on her own jacket. “An’ you’re driving, I’m beat.”
At Amanda’s place, Jesse had declined to share her chocolate milk but Amanda had supplied him with a cup of coffee - he lay on the floor with Jesse, helping her build a tower out of Lego bricks; Amanda had gone for a shower once he was situated, and he was content to play with Jesse - he couldn’t help but see this is as a window into what their future could look like - in a few months’ time he could be here again, but with a baby nearby - they could be a family, maybe.
He had always wanted kids - and that wasn’t a secret, he was good with kids, people trusted him to take care of their kids. His mom had always had a busy house; there’d be siblings and cousins and nephews and nieces everywhere, and he couldn’t remember a time there wasn’t a Carisi kid being dropped into his lap after dinner. The thought that one day soon he’d have his own kid - it was the most excited he’d ever been about anything, and he was trying to hold it in, keep it contained so that he wouldn’t overwhelm Amanda - he knew she was concerned about raising a second child, unhappy about having to ride a desk for months - she’d already jumped down Fin’s throat when he suggested she maybe should take it easy - and he knew she was worried about them, too, about how they were going to make this work - all he could do right now was be present, and maybe try to get her to take the prenatal vitamins his sisters had sworn by.
When she returned to the living room she smiled at him before taking a seat on the couch. “That’s a great tower, Jesse.”
“Uncle Sonny helped a bit,” Jesse said, “I can only reach this high,” she held out her hand, indicating the point two thirds of the way up the tower which she could no longer stretch past.
“Well,” Amanda said, “You’ll grow.”
Jesse didn’t look convinced.
“Hey,” Sonny said, “Once you were a tiny baby.” Amanda gave him a look, but he just smiled up at her.
“When I lived in Momma’s tummy I was little,” Jesse said knowingly. “But now I’m big.” She studied Sonny carefully for a moment. “When were you a baby Uncle Sonny?”
“Long time ago,” he said, “Before even Momma was.”
Jesse laughed, shaking her head. “No, Momma was a baby forever ago.”
Sonny laughed too, Amanda shaking her head and resisting the urge to join them.
Later, once Jesse was tucked up in bed and Sonny had cleared away their dinner dishes, Amanda put a hand on his arm as he made to leave. “Dominick.”
“You okay?”
She nodded. “Thank you for tonight, you’re so good with Jesse,” she put a hand to the bump that was just beginning to show. “I know you’re going to be an amazing father to this baby too.” She reached up and pressed a kiss against his cheek before bidding him goodnight, and he left with a spring in his step.
It had been a day. A week. Amanda had been feeling especially on edge - she hadn’t been sleeping all that well, her back was aching and the baby seemed to be taking up permanent residence on her bladder. She knew that Liv was cutting her some slack at work, letting things slide she should’ve been written up for - and she knew that Carisi had noticed because he kept throwing concerned glances her way when he thought she wasn’t looking.
He’d been amazing up until now - patient, more patient that she’d been herself, and he’d been on board with keeping things quiet until she was ready, even though she could tell he was bursting at the seams to tell people - he even looked happy when Amanda filled him on Noah’s video call tantrum - but his hovering was probably going to drive her mad before long. He hadn’t come out and said he thought she should be on desk duty, but she had seen him hold back the thought more than once. She was starting to show, anyway, so there was only going to be so much longer she could get away with hiding it.
By the time they’d wrapped things up at the airport, Amanda was tired - tired enough to reluctantly admit defeat. As uniformed officers took Beck and his ex into custody, she walked with Liv towards their own cars, and made a decision.
“So I'm gonna notify 1PP that I'm pregnant, and I'm gonna tell them that you didn't know.”
“Amanda, you don't have to do that.”
She stopped beside Liv’s car, turning to look at her as they talked. “No, I'm - yeah, I do,” she sighed, “And it is going to kill me to have to sit behind a desk, but it's only a few months, right?”
“I'm really happy for you, Amanda. If I haven't said that before.” Liv reached out to place a hand on Amanda’s arm, and they shared a smile.
“I know. There’s… there’s something else I should tell you.” She had to start somewhere - there were some things it wasn’t fair to keep a secret, and this was one of them.
“Oh?”
Amanda glanced up to make sure there was no one else in earshot before she spoke. “I’m telling this to Olivia my friend, not Olivia my boss.”
Liv nodded. “Okay.”
“Uh, the father, I wanted you to know… it’s… it’s Carisi.” Liv raised an eyebrow, but Amanda continued talking before she could interject. “And I don’t know what happens next, but I’m gonna leave that out of my conversation with 1PP.”
“I take it you’ve told Carisi this?”
“Yeah, I have.”
Liv nodded again, the smile returning to her face. “Well, when the baby’s here and you’re out from behind the desk we’ll talk about you and Fin partnering up again. For now, I haven’t asked.”
“Thanks, Liv.”
“Congratulations, again. To the both of you.”
Sonny was doing his best to take care of Amanda without making it too obvious - luckily, making sure Amanda ate regularly was already part of his daily routine, so ordering her favourite pizza wasn’t going to get the department rumour mill churning. He brought the pizza into the squad room, opening it in front of her, but she just shook her head at him.
“I’m good.”
“What d’you mean you’re good? It’s your favourite.”
“That was last week.” Last week it had been - she’d made a comment under her breath about Italian babies and he’d had to leave the room before Fin asked him what he was laughing at.
He frowned, but he knew better than to argue with her - instead relocating to the break room to share the pizza with Fin, who was full of questions - mostly about Amanda. Which made sense, everyone knew the two of them were close, if she was going to confide in anyone it would be him. Still, Sonny tried to deflect them as best he could. They hadn’t exactly had a conversation about when and how to tell people - he knew that Amanda had told Liv, but that was it. Sonny’s own family didn’t even know - partly because he wasn’t ready to inflict that particular headache on Amanda just yet, especially when his mother found out they weren’t getting married.
“Not that it’s any of my business, but she tell you who the father is?”
“No,” Sonny shook his head.
Fin raised an eyebrow; he didn’t look convinced. “She didn’t tell you?”
Sonny dropped his pizza back onto his plate, “I- she, uh, she didn’t have to.”
“You know something I don’t?”
“It’s, uh,” he swallowed, his eyes darting to the door. No one was close by. “The baby, it’s mine.”
Fin laughed. “That’s a good one.”
“Really, Fin.”
“You’re not kidding?”
Before he could respond Amanda walked into the break room unannounced, reaching over him to take a slice of the pizza - hunger probably winning out over whatever reason she’d rejected it initially.
“Kidding about what?”
He glanced at her, probably looking about as innocent as he actually was, “Nothin’”
Amanda sighed. “You told him.”
“You told Liv.”
Fin’s eyes darted from Sonny to Amanda and back again. “Wait, you’re serious?”
“One of you two bring me a seltzer, please,” Amanda said, backing out of the room without answering Fin’s question.
Fin dropped his own pizza onto his plate, turning in his seat to face Sonny head on. “Damn, Carisi.”
Sonny wasn’t ready to answer more of Fin’s questions - and he was only half certain he wasn’t going to be getting an earful from Amanda the second they were alone; he stood up, not meeting Fin’s eye. “I’m gonna take her that seltzer.”
“I can’t believe you two finally got your shit together and didn’t even tell me.”
As he got Amanda’s drink from the vending machine he turned back to look at Fin. “It’s not like that.”
“Wait, what?”
“We’re not - we’re havin’ this kid together, that’s it,” he left the room, but he didn’t miss Fin’s disbelieving response.
“Okay, sure.”
Amanda hadn’t said anything when he handed her the drink, and he spent the rest of the afternoon stealing glances over to her desk. It had felt good to tell Fin about the baby - good that somebody else knew and that it wasn’t something they were hiding, or that Amanda was ashamed of. At least, he hoped it wasn’t something she was ashamed of. He was thrilled that he was going to be a father - that he was going to have a baby that was half him, half Amanda - he wanted to tell everyone in his life, he wanted to brag to strangers on the subway, but he was holding back because he knew that this wasn’t as easy for her as it was for him - he knew that trusting him, letting him in, was a big deal, and he didn’t want to make her regret it.
He closed his laptop at the end of their shift, but when he glanced over to her desk she was already gone. He had been hoping they could at least walk out together, talk briefly before saying goodnight.
He was just shrugging on his coat when she reappeared beside him. “You got plans tonight?”
“Me?” he shrugged. “Nah, I’m all yours,” he hesitated. “If, uh, that’s why you were askin’”
“Good,” she smiled up at him. “I was thinking, since you told Fin-”
“I’m sorry.”
She shook her head. “You’re right, I told Liv, it’s fine. But I think before we tell anyone else we need to sit down with Jesse and explain.”
“And you want me there for that?”
“Oh yeah. This is half your doing too.”