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They don’t define this thing between them - it just is.
After a week, Sonny thinks maybe they should - but he’s so happy, and he doesn’t want to break this calm comfort they’ve found in each other by putting labels on things that have never needed to be labelled before.
Everyone around them is so curious though; other people want it defined. And it shouldn’t matter - shouldn’t be anyone’s business but their own. But it isn’t that simple. Their friends and family make no secret of the fact that they've been waiting for this almost as long as he has.
He skipped out on most of Memorial Day weekend with his family for the first time in his life - only putting in an appearance in his parents’ backyard late on Monday afternoon, a white lie on his lips; that he’s been stuck at work - a lie his mother sees through in an instant.
He can’t stop checking his phone; types and deletes a message to Amanda - an I miss you that he can’t bring himself to send, because it’s so ridiculous. He sends her a photo of the backyard filled with family instead, and smiles down at his phone when she sends him a photo back - the girls at the park, ice cream cones in their hands, sprinkles and chocolate sauce already trailing down Billie’s arm.
He tries to duck out of sight to call her a little later, but his mother catches him as he creeps up the stairs to his childhood bedroom; she stands at the foot of the stairs, hands on her hips, a scolding frown on her face - he hears the Dominick before she says it, and slinks back down to the hallway without a word, thinking about how he’s a prosecutor and he faces tougher opponents than his mother on a daily basis, but no one can reduce him to his thirteen year old self like she can.
His mom doesn’t let him slip back out to the party, her grip on his arm is firm as she tugs him into the kitchen, “Alright, out with it,” she says and he feigns confusion.
“I don’t-”
“It’s either a girl, or it’s something bad,” she says, arms crossed over her chest, a shadow of worry on her face. “And your sister told me you broke up with-”
Sonny sighs, resisting the urge to fold his own arms. He hadn’t actually told Bella that at all, just relayed one of the many arguments he and Nicole had had before they’d called it quits, but he wasn’t surprised that she’d drawn her own conclusions. “Bella needs to stop gossipin’ about me.”
“Tell me.”
“There’s nothin’ to-” His mother fixes him with a look that would have had him running to his bedroom as a kid; he resists the urge to bolt now. “It’s new,” he says, and because his mom doesn’t so much as blink, he adds. “Rollins.”
There’s a part of him that’s almost giddy at the way she reacts - the way her posture softens and she smiles up at him. He enjoys it for half a second before the questions start coming in thick and fast - he deflects, but she ploughs on.
“So the two of you are-”
“Figuring that out,” he says. He listens to her as she talks about not wasting time, tells him he’s not getting any younger, reminds him his grandmother’s engagement ring is still sitting in her jewellery box upstairs just waiting for him to need it.
“Way too far ahead of yourself, Ma,” he says - too far ahead but still visible there on the horizon.
The closest they come to having the what is this? conversation in those early days is the is this a secret? conversation.
“I don’t want it to be,” Sonny admits, “But if you wanna wait until-”
“Until what?” Amanda asks him, “I’m sure,” she says. “If you are.”
They’re on the couch, the girls fast asleep down the hall and her feet resting in his lap; it’s casual and domestic and not really all that different from the way things have always been, but he lets himself take it in, appreciate the way his world is changing. He rests his hands on her shins as he smiles over at her, “I’m sure,” he says. And that’s it.
Everything left unsaid passes between them in looks, kisses, and touches. They don’t need more.
They don’t advertise it; there’s a time when they’ll have to - disclosure paperwork and conversations about professionalism and objectivity as though they haven’t been managing just fine up until now. But Sonny’s diligent - he’s checked the paperwork - he might have checked the paperwork over a year ago, when she’d left him at his desk with a sad smile and he’d spent the next forty-eight hours kicking himself, only for a global pandemic to stop him calling in that rain check - and he knows they have time.
They do arrive at the precinct together one Tuesday morning a couple of weeks in; he has a meeting scheduled with Liv first thing and he hasn’t been back to his own apartment in three days. They’re not so blatant as to hold hands, but they do work with some of the best detectives in the city, so it isn’t a surprise that they’re caught out within minutes.
Fin gives them look, but he doesn’t say anything. Sonny’s sure he’ll get a comment in at some point, but while everyone knows Fin enjoys a gossip way more than he lets on, he’s good at keeping his questions to himself until the moment that best suits him.
Kat doesn’t follow suit. She’s nothing but questions and Sonny tries to escape under the guise of waiting for the captain in her office, but Amanda grips his jacket sleeve, silently telling him not leave her.
“How long?” Kat asks, “And what exactly-”
“Our business,” Amanda says; she’s smiling at Kat, no malice in her tone, but no room for argument either.
Jesse get a pass. Because she’s Jesse. And because this affects her just as much as it does Sonny and Amanda. For the first two weeks of waking up to Uncle Sonny sleeping in Mommy’s bed she doesn’t ask any questions - it surprises him, because that first morning waking up beside Amanda his second thought had been that they would have to figure out how to explain his presence there to Jesse and Billie. When Jesse had raced into Amanda's bedroom, though, she had just greeted him like she was used to him being there, and he’d wondered if they’d ever actually need to sit them down and explain.
Eventually she does ask, one night after he’s tucked Billie into bed with a kiss so it’s just the three of them awake. He leans in the bathroom doorway while Amanda gives Jesse her bath. She’s been unusually quiet, and there’s a thoughtful look on her face, “Mommy,” she says after a while, blinking water out of her eyes as Amanda washes her hair, “Is Uncle Sonny your husband now?”
Amanda coughs as though she’s the one with a face full of water, turning to look at Sonny with a startled expression. He gives her a soft smile, but he doesn’t have the answers either.
“Not yet, baby,” she says, and Sonny can’t help the grin that comes over his face, however wide Amanda’s eyes go at her own words.
“You’ve gotta have a weddin’ first,” Sonny adds, and Jesse beams over at him; he sees a dozen questions forming, but Amanda pours more water over her head, rinsing out the shampoo and buying them more time in the same moment.
Once she’s out of the bath, dressed in her pyjamas and ready for bed, Jesse throws her arms around his legs, hugging him tightly, “I’m glad you’re gonna have a wedding with Mommy,” she says, and tips her head back for a goodnight kiss before skipping to her bedroom as though she hadn’t essentially just told him to get on with proposing to her mother.
Amanda’s mother shows up unannounced at her apartment one Sunday morning, and it’s Sonny who answers the door - not expecting Beth Anne Rollins to be standing in the hallway, an impatient look on her face. “Oh,” is all she says when she clocks sight of him, her gaze travelling down the worn t-shirt and pyjama pants he’s wearing, his bare feet on the wooden floor. She pushes past him into the apartment, not greeting him or stopping for breath, “What are you doing here? Amanda finally admit she’s got a thing for you?”
He closes the door behind her and follows, not answering her questions. Billie scrambles down from the dining table to run and hug her grandmother, abandoning the cereal he’s spent the last ten minutes trying to coax her into eating, while she’d stubbornly refused and told him she wanted garlic bread for breakfast.
“Where is Amanda anyway?” Beth Anne asks, turning to look at him again. He feels self-conscious with her gaze on him, the soft clothes, untamed hair, shoeless Sonny Carisi was reserved for Amanda - and by extension the girls - certainly not for his possible future mother-in-law.
“Takin’ Frannie for a walk,” he says, “Jesse’s gone too,” he adds unnecessarily.
Beth Anne nods, still eyeing him with suspicion as she reaches into her handbag and pulls out a lollipop for Billie, who grabs at it gleefully.
“No-” he starts, but Beth Anne is already unwrapping the treat, and he sighs as Billie puts it in her mouth. “She hasn’t finished her breakfast,” he sighs.
“And who says you get to tell me what my granddaughter can eat?” Beth Anne says, smiling indulgently at Billie.
Sonny shakes his head, “I’m gonna… if you’re here I’m gonna get dressed,” he slips away to the bedroom, taking jeans and a shirt from the drawer he now has in Amanda’s dresser. While he changes he hears the sounds of Amanda’s return - Frannie barking, Jesse yelling a greeting to her grandmother. He hears murmuring as Amanda questions Beth Anne’s impromptu visit, and when he returns Amanda and her mother are at opposite ends of the kitchen, Amanda leaning back against the counter with an unimpressed look on her face.
“And then he tries to tell me not to give Billie candy-”
Amanda shakes her head, “He's right. It’s barely 9am, Momma.”
“Well, is he your boyfriend now or not?”
“Momma,” Amanda starts, but cuts herself off when she spots him hovering just beyond the kitchen, she gives him a warm smile, “We’re together, that’s all that matters,” she says, meeting his eye - all she feels and all that goes unsaid held in her gaze for him to see.
They fill in the disclosure paperwork that evening; they don’t have to just yet; they’ve still got time, Sonny’s been keeping the deadline in his head, but Amanda leaves him on the couch and goes out into the entryway where her work bag is; she returns a moment later, a manila folder in her hands that she passes over to him as she sits down. The form inside is mostly filled out - all their basic information already there in Amanda’s handwriting, the only empty boxes are Date of Disclosure, and Nature of Relationship.
“Time to make it official?” he asks, and she pokes his arm gently.
“It’s already official, Carisi,” she says, “Unless you’re thinking otherwise.”
“No,” he says, shaking his head at her, “You got a pen?”
“We’ve got to decide what to write in that box,” she tells him tapping the Nature of Relationship box with the pen she’s just grabbed. “Whatever we’re calling this,” she gestures between the two of them.
“According to Jesse, I’m your future husband,” he says, only half-joking.
Amanda just laughs at him, “I think you’d need to write fiancé,” she says, “But you’re not getting off that lightly - you need to propose to me yourself,” she tells him; she glances away as she adds, “Not yet, though.”
Someday, he thinks, leaning over, a hand reaching for her face, turning her back towards him so that he can kiss her; she lets him, kissing him right back for a minute or so before she puts one palm to his chest, pushing him back from her, “Carisi, let’s finish this first.”
He sighs as he pulls away, but it’s worth it not to have missed the impatient smirk on her face.
“I got it,” he tells her, resting the sheet of paper on his knee as he adds one word to the empty box. Partners.