Carisi arrived at Lola Rodriguez's building as the EMTs were bringing her down the front stairs in a stretcher. How they'd managed to get it up the steps and around the tight corners, he had no idea, but that's why he didn't envy them their job. "Her grandson Jacob, where is he?" he demanded.
One of the EMTs nodded down to the fire truck that had arrived shortly before the ambulance. Carisi spotted Jacob sitting in the cab with one of the firefighters. He breathed a sigh of relief. "Jacob!" he called, threading his way through the bystanders that had gathered on the sidewalk. His Little Brother looked up from under the brim of a fireman's helmet. "Sonny!"
Carisi picked him up, and Jacob buried his head in Carisi's neck. "Is Grandma okay?" Jacob asked him.
"She's gonna be fine. Hey, you did so good," he praised the boy. "You did great, buddy." He nodded to the firefighter. "ADA Dominick Carisi," he introduced himself. "I'm Jacob's Big Brother. He called me before he called you guys. How's Lola?"
"Me and my guys got her comfortable. From what it looked like, she slipped in the bathroom. Broken hip, maybe a concussion. She was unconscious but breathing when we got there. They're taking her to Columbia Presbyterian."
"We'll follow. Thanks. Come on, kiddo." Carisi set Jacob down and the two set off at a clipped pace to Carisi's car to follow the ambulance as it pulled out. Carisi made sure Jacob was buckled in the backseat and prayed he didn't get pulled over-Jacob still needed a booster seat because of his height and weight, but Carisi didn't have one. He drove as carefully as he could and found them a place to park not too far from the ER entrance.
"Sonny?" Jacob's voice was quiet in the backseat.
Carisi turned. "Yeah, Jacob?"
"Is Grandma gonna be okay?"
He gave him a reassuring smile. "She's gonna be just fine. Let's go talk to the doctors, okay?"
"Who's got her power of attorney?"
"I don't think anybody does. Jacob's parents are both gone, and Lola's husband's been dead for a few years." Carisi leaned against the wall and watched Jacob staring idly at the news scrolling across the television. "I left a message for Alyssa at Big Brother to call me, see if there's anythin' she knows."
"I can get Sienna to come watch the girls, we could go knock on doors in her building, see if the neighbors know anything?"
Thank God for Amanda Rollins. "Nah, it's okay. Lola's in surgery yet. We'll see what they say. Thanks, though." Carisi pushed off the wall and walked over to the chairs, smoothing Jacob's hair as he sat beside him. Jacob crawled over the arm of the chair and squirmed into Carisi's lap. "Hey, I gotta go."
"Keep me posted."
"Yeah, definitely." Carisi hung up and tucked his phone into the pocket of his dress shirt. Then, he adjusted his legs and put his arms around Jacob so he could hold him better. "You hungry, buddy? We could go look for somethin' to eat?"
"No. I just wanna see Grandma."
"I know." Carisi rubbed circles on the small of Jacob's back like he used to do with Billie when she was teething, or when Jesse had a bad dream.
"I'm scared."
Carisi swallowed. Keep it together, Sonny. "It's okay to be scared," he told him. "I would be too. But you and me, we're gonna stick together, a'ight?"
"…Okay."
Carisi leaned back as much as he could, propping his feet on the coffee table in front of them. It wasn't polite, but he didn't really care if an issue or two of National Geographic got his sneaker prints on them. Jacob dropped his head to Carisi's shoulder, his fingers gripping Carisi's tie. He fell asleep a few minutes later, exhausted from the adrenaline wearing off.
"Mr. Carisi?" someone called his name what seemed like hours later.
Carisi opened his eyes, not realizing he'd also fallen asleep. His neck and back were killing him. Jacob was still crashed on his chest. He recognized the doctor they'd seen earlier standing above him. He blinked, trying to wake up. "Uh. Yeah. Yeah, that's me."
"Mrs. Rodriguez made it through surgery," the doctor told him. Carisi let out the breath he'd been holding. "She's in recovery right now."
"How soon until she can be released?"
"Recovery can take anywhere from 2-8 weeks," the doctor explained. "She wouldn't need to be in the hospital much longer, we want to keep her under observation because of her age and the severity of the injury. We had to replace her hip. She's still sedated."
"She lives in a two-floor walkup," Carisi said. He nodded to the sleeping child on his chest. "This is her grandson, Jacob."
"Does she have any adult relatives that you know of?"
Carisi shook his head. "We've got some feelers out."
The doctor nodded. "We could find her a place in an assisted living facility to help with recovery…"
She looked at Jacob, and Carisi understood. "Not really a place for an eight-year-old though."
"No."
He shifted, trying to unearth his phone from under Jacob. "Okay. Lemme make some calls." The doctor nodded, leaving them alone in the waiting room again. Carisi punched in a number. "Hey. Sorry for the late hour. You got a sec?"
"…This better be good."
"How fast can I get a temporary guardianship?"
