It's hot. Scorching hot. The annual New York heatwave had struck in full force and chased the city's inhabitants out of their often tiny homes into the outdoors. While most New Yorkers had fled to the coast, school holidays in full swing, some citizens were citybound with nowhere to go.
Amanda and Carisi for example. Sex crimes didn't end when the heat in the city rose to a sweltering 95 degrees. On the contrary even. The SVU squad and A.D.A. office were busier than ever and swamped with a caseload they could barely handle. It was as if people's temper rose with the temperature outside and their behavior worsened in equal measure.
Still, every precious minute of the day Amanda was off work and not sleeping, she tried to spend outside, the air conditioning in her apartment being extremely unreliable and no match for the current New York heatwave.
She'd usually hang out in the park nearby her apartment building, watching the girls as they played in the playground or splashed around in the calf-deep paddling pool. Although the playground was set in the shade underneath some leafy elm trees, she made sure she reapplied sunscreen on the girls every few hours and have them drink enough water so they wouldn't dehydrate during these hot days. While she could barely lift a finger in this heat, her children acted like it was just any other day in the year, running, climbing, and screaming like there was no tomorrow.
'Billie, you dropped your hat… again,' she added quietly as she bent down to pick up the bright blue floral hat for what seemed like the tenth time that afternoon. She sighed and sat back on the wooden bench with the hat on her lap. She wasn't even going to try anymore.
'Who wants ice cream?'
She turned her head at the sound of the familiar voice.
'Uncle Sonny!' the two littlest Rollins' girls called out in unison and ran up to their godfather who was not in his usually three-piece suit but wearing a casual polo shirt and blue dress pants.
Amanda smiled at him and picked up the toys they brought to use in the water and sand. She filled up a toy bucket with plastic scoops, a toy truck, and several sand mold shapes. 'Didn't know you had the day off?' was her way of greeting her friend and former partner.
'You're having a beach day, huh?' he initially ignored her question and opened both his arms so that a sand-and-water-covered Billie and Jesse could give him a big hug. With his face in between his two goddaughers', he looked up at her and gave her a quick wink. 'I don't. Took a longer lunch break to see my favorite girls. It's been a while.'
Amanda wholeheartedly agreed in silence. She hadn't seen him since she'd visited him in the hospital the week before. He'd only replied to her texts in short phrases and hadn't swung by the squad room like he'd usually do.
'Can we get ice cream now?' Jesse asked in a highly demanding tone to which Amanda immediately intervened. 'Jesse, can you come here please?'
The five-year-old knew that she was in trouble and walked up to her mother with a guilt-stricken face.
She lowered herself to come to eye level with her daughter and pressed a finger underneath her chin to make her look at her. 'Baby, remember what we discussed earlier? It's not nice to ask for something in the way that you just did, especially not in that tone. Can you think of another way to ask Uncle Sonny for ice cream?'
Her voice sounded calm and reasonable, and Carisi couldn't be more proud of her. 'You've been the grown-up for a while now,' he'd once told her, and the way she dealt with her girls proved just that.
Jesse nodded and turned back to her godfather, fumbling nervously with her hands. 'Can we please have ice cream, Uncle Sonny?' her voice was barely audible.
She didn't look at him but he smiled at her regardless, wanting her to know that she'd corrected herself beautifully. 'Yes, of course, Jesse-Bessy. You want one too, Billie-Bee?' He rarely used the nicknames he'd chosen for them but today felt like a day that he should.
'Yes, yes. Yes, please!' The toddler chimed in.
Amanda took out the two towels she'd brought with her and wiped their legs and feet dry before she helped them put on their shoes. Once she'd collected everything in the luggage sack of the stroller she'd brought for Billie, they took off - with the littlest Rollins not having the slightest intention of taking a seat in the stroller.
Carisi pushed the stroller and took Billie's sweaty palm in his as he adjusted his usually fast-paced step so her short legs could keep up with him. The two of them started a whole conversation about the travels Billie had seen Dora going on that morning on TV. 'And was the monkey there too?' he asked.
'Yes, of course!' she giggled as if it was the dumbest question in the universe.
Jesse and Amanda walked slightly behind them and were engaged in a conversation of their own, while Amanda couldn't help look over at Sonny and Billie with a warm feeling in the pit of her stomach. The man who gave her stability in her life, the man who loved her children almost as much as she did, the man she could rely on. She'd missed him.
'Momma, you're not even listening to me!' her oldest huffed and she looked down in the eyes of a disappointed five-year-old.
'Sorry baby, I'm now. What is it you wanted to tell me?'
Jesse fired off a story about what had happened at the playground the day before when they were there with the sitter. Something about an argument she'd had with an older boy when he'd pushed her off the swing, and Amanda realized to her dismay how much her oldest was like her. She could imagine how her oldest would've stood there, hands on her hips, telling the boy off for taking what was hers. The feistiness and determinedness of a true Rollins came to light in Jesse more and more. She wasn't sure if she had to sit down to have another talk with her daughter or cover her in praise for the fact that she'd dared to speak up to a boy almost twice her age. She chose the latter but added a warning about being careful and how not every kid would take it like this one.
As soon as the ice cream truck came into view, both girls ran off to be there first and to pick their flavor.
The adults followed them and when Amanda tried to catch up, Sonny took in the sight of her. She looked beautiful in the dress she was wearing, the yellow fabric accentuating her sunkissed hair and the shape of the item of clothing showing off her perfect waist. He loved how she smiled at him when she noticed him staring at her, and how patiently she helped her daughters pick an ice cream flavor. He'd missed her.
'I want strawberry,' Jesse yelled over her shoulder and Billie echoed her sister. 'Me too, Slawberry'!
'Alright, alright. Here I am with the money. Let's get you both a scoop of strawberry. Sprinkles too?' to which both girls nodded heavily. 'Perfect. What are you having 'Manda?'
She opted for one scoop of mango and one scoop of yogurt-flavored ice cream, while he went with a classic chocolate version.
As the ice cream truck was right next to another playground, the girls hurried to finish their ice cream and went on to explore the playground equipment. Carisi and Amanda took a seat overlooking the scene.
Her eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly when she took him in. He seemed tired, exhausted even. He looked even thinner than she remembered and his skin seemed pale, despite the weather. She looked at his ear last, a fresh bandage a macabre memory of the Mesner attack the week before. She let out a sigh. 'How're you doing?'
He didn't meet her eyes, kept his gaze locked on her daughters in the playground.
'Hey.' She put a hand on his arm, desperate for him to look at her. He'd been there for her when she needed him. Returning the favor was something that came naturally to her. Their bond was based on mutual trust and had resulted in certain unspoken rules. Being there for each other being one of them.
'I'm okay Rollins, really.' His gaze now turned to her, communicated the complete opposite of that statement, his pupils wide, and red veins meandering the whites of his eyes from the lack of sleep he'd obviously been suffering from.
The finger of her right hand trailed the edges of the bandage. 'It's okay to not be okay, you know,' she said. He'd been through a lot this year, they all had.
A silence fell upon them, only broken by the giggles and screams of Jesse and Billie who were busy taking turns on the slide.
His fingertips grazed the top of her hand which she turned and opened for him to take. She let their hands drop to her knee.
The words felt hot on his tongue, fighting their way out but he didn't think he would be able to form appropriate sentences with them. His mind was a big jumble of thoughts, memories, and emotions. The squeeze he felt in his hand kind of grounded him as a gentle reminder that she was there. That he wasn't alone with the thoughts that had haunted him for the past week. Thoughts that had kept him up at night.
'Mommy, Uncle Sonny, look I'm hanging upside down!' Jesse had found the jungle gym and was showing off the skills she'd been practicing at school.
He smiled and even his eyes started to sparkle with pride. 'Wow, Jess, that's amazing. Maybe you can join the circus when you get older?'
Amanda grinned at the suggestion and looked down at their joined hands which rested on her knee. Her smile dropped as silence stretched between them. 'I went to see him. Mesner. I went to see him in jail.'
Her confession came as a full surprise to him and he didn't know how to react. A shiver ran down his spine thinking about Amanda coming eye to eye once again with the psychopath that had blazed a trail of destruction in its wake. 'Why?' was all his mouth allowed him to utter.
'It was in a playground just like this where he threatened Jesse. It was in a courtroom, your domain, where he hurt you. I couldn't let it go. Couldn't let him threaten my family without further consequences.'
His heart fluttered when she suggested he was part of her family and he pressed a kiss on top of her head. Over the past few days, he'd tried to hide in work as the solution to his anxiety, making distraction his key priority. Being here with the Rollins' girls made him aware of the trivial mistake of his judgment. Instead of work, it were these girls and Amanda in particular that could heal his wounds and even out his scars.
'Why don't you come over for dinner? You can stay over if you want. I have a spare fan we can set up in the living room.'
He could've come up with several excuses. That he had court in the morning, that he had to prepare for a key witness prep or something else work-related but instead he nodded. 'Yes, that sounds nice.'
A smile of relief brightened her face. 'I've missed you.'
'I've missed you too.'