A/N, I don't really know what brought this on, but enjoy, I guess?

"Carisi knows."

'What? You told him?"

"I didn't tell him, he figured out. Apparently I've been a little off my game, and also I puked at a crime scene. Guess that was dead giveaway. Literally."

"Cute pun. But you've been… feeling unwell?"

She can tell he's struggling, and she waves her hand dismissively and then changes the subject. They've never been close, per say, other than physically being so that one night, and expressing concern for the other's wellbeing felt weirdly out of bounds for them. It's not that they don't give a fuck about each other, it's just that they don't do it out loud. Her and Nick crossed that boundary from time to time, but her and Barba were not her and Nick. Nick is a close friend with whom she shared a volatile yet sincere relationship with, even if it was never clearly defined. Barba (calling him by his first name is foreign to her) is a coworker that pretends to have forgotten that she told him that she had been raped, and that she slept with once on a drunken whim about a month after Nick left.

Would it be better or worse if she had gotten pregnant by Nick instead? She changes her mind on that one about five times a day.

"Amanda."

She quirks her eyebrow. Her first name- he has her attention.

"Yes, Counselor?"

"Well, first of all, you don't have to call me counselor anymore. And secondly, I know that we aren't… we didn't plan this. I know I'm not your boyfriend. But if you need help with anything, or you need to take a step back from work-

"I can still do my job, Barba."

"I know you can. All I am saying is that I am here to help, and if there's anything that I can do for you, please let me know. Okay?

There's a significant pause, and then a half nod of her head, and then a "Liv knows, too."

Another subject change. He fights not to roll his eyes.

"Well, because she hasn't come barging into my office screaming at me and because we both still have our jobs, I'm going to go ahead and assume that you didn't tell her that I'm the one you're having a baby with?"

"Nope. Just told her that it wasn't Nick's."

"Damn it Amanda, that was our out," he half jokes, and it gets a laugh out of the blonde woman sitting in the chair across from him which makes him smile, because she has not been doing too much laughing lately. Not that he had noticed or anything.

"Oh please, Benson loves Amaro. If I hadn't told her that he wasn't the father, you and I both know that she would've called him up and told him to get his ass back to New York, and I know there's no ideal way to tell Olivia, but I don't think that's the way we really want the news to come out. Also, Nick would probably punch you in the face."

"Fair point, but I feel like it's either I get punched by Benson or I get punched by Amaro. And since Amaro doesn't work here anymore, that might make the whole ordeal a little easier on our department."

He's only playing around with the plotline in an attempt to lighten her up a bit, and to keep her receptive to him. They didn't talk about things unrelated to work very often prior to her pregnancy, and Amanda had always been fairly guarded with pretty much everyone, but he could tell that she had been avoiding him in the week or so since she had locked the door to his office and blurted out that they had managed to conceive a child. He understands that they're not dating, but they are having a baby. Why not be friends, or at least try to be?

"How are we going to tell Liv?" she moans, and he internally cringes, because the last think he wants to do is upset her.

"We'll figure it out," he says, with as much soothing power in his voice as he can get away with without it being awkward, even though he's dead certain that no, they will not figure it out, and that the department is going to go up in flames no matter how they go about this. He doesn't want her worry. She's the one carrying the baby, he can do the worrying for the both of them. (And yeah, he knows that it doesn't work like that, but that doesn't mean that he doesn't want to. Maybe he's been harboring a slight crush on Rollins for the past couple of months. So what?)

"No we won't."

"Yeah, you're probably right. We're most likely fucked."

She laughs at first, but then her smile retreats and her eyes start to look a little too wet. She's clearly embarrassed and starts to wipe at her eyes furiously.

"Hey," he says softly, grabbing her hand when she moves to get up from her chair. He gets the feeling that perhaps she's not thinking about them being fucked in the sole context of telling Olivia anymore, and that she's looking at the broader picture of the two of them actually having a child together. And yeah, they're kind of fucked there too, but he still doesn't want her to cry. (It's just a little crush on her, okay? It's no big deal.)

"I'm sorry," she mumbles quietly, and he quickly tells her not to be.

"Rollins, let me buy you lunch," he says, clearly without thinking, because her facial expression tells him that he's crossed one of their unspoken boundaries.

"We're friends," he quickly adds, "And I know that Liv's had you running around all day. You should eat."

"Barba-

"I'm not asking you out. As I said, we're friends. You get lunch with Fin and Carisi all the time."

"Yeah but that's-

"Rollins."

"Fine. Friends. Let go."

He is so, so gloriously screwed.