There's something very wrong when Rafael is being called to baby-sit, but he knows it's a last ditch attempt before Liv just gives up and takes the kid to work so he clears his calendar and smiles awkwardly at the boy. "So, uh, what do you want to do, kiddo?"
He eyes up the child, taking in the jumper that is a little too small and the minute stain on the cuff of the boys pants before smiling encouragingly at the colourful socks. Decision made, he plants the kid on his hip and heads across to SOHO.
When Olivia rushes back into his office at the end of the day she finds her son and the ADA hidden behind a large pile of shopping bags and packing paper. Rafael has a sheepish smile but his eyes are beaming and Liv finds her face instantly lifting to match his expression, though she schools her features quickly to display a vague disapproval.
There are moments when she worries that bringing a child into this world, her world – a world full of rape and murder and pain – was a mistake, that he will grow up somehow damaged by the darkness they find themselves in. But she watches Noah giggling as he plucks his new suspenders and she knows they are going to be just fine.
"Barba, this is way too much. I really can't accept all these." She's juggling her son and her case files as Rafael packs bag after bag into her boot with a dismissive quirk of the brow. She puffs out a small laugh as he pokes a tongue out at her sleepy son before catching himself and straightening up with a tiny lopsided grin. He's lifting her son from her hip and securely strapping him into the car as she stands watching, struck by just how easy this is, before his hand finds her arm to gently point her towards the car.
It's two weeks later when she walks into the DA's office to find Rafael spread out pouring over the case, legs kicked up on the desk. That in itself is not unusual, but there's an orange peaking out from under the leg of his pants, and she knows those socks. She'd pulled the smaller version of them from the washing machine just this morning. He must catch her looking because he stretches just a little more to clearly display the purple dots and smirks openly at her.