He had learned a few things about blue lines over the years.
The first lesson had come right before graduating from high school, in 1984. Two blue lines meant that in nine months, there would be a little one in the picture. One meant that you were fine, that you had screwed up, sure, but there wasn't anything to worry about, other than figuring out what you were going to do next.
That had been the defining lesson.
He'd fallen into the role of playing the father from a distance, having joined the Marines right before he got married. They had decided, for that time being, that she would stay in New York, where she and the child they would have could be near family. He, on the other hand, would go wherever he was sent. And there would be letters, and maybe a visit here and there, but other than that, not much, until Maureen was born, and he'd been there for that. Then it was off again, and it would continue on this way until he left the service.
The lesson on waiting came after that.
February of 1987 found him with a child that was just barely a month away from reaching two, and another one on the way. It also found him not working and therefore taking care of Maureen while Kathy went off with her friends, because he'd told her she might as well get away while she had the chance. It found a cup of spilled grape juice, a moment of scaring the hell out of himself because of his reaction to said spilled cup, and an hour straight of reading bedtime stories to get Maureen to calm down again. And then it found, after she had fallen asleep, Kathy coming home and announcing that she was pregnant, again.
Two children in as many years, he'd thought. We've definitely done it this time.
The funny thing about that was that where they'd thought they weren't ready for it when they'd had Maureen, somehow, they had managed to balance work and home and kids and everything in between. They were more ready than they had been before, but it didn't change the fact that they were still kids in more ways than one. Being forced to grow up too fast was something they hadn't thought would ever happen to them, but it had, and they were dealing with it. He slid into the hospital five months later, two months early, just in time to help deliver Kathleen.
The third lesson was that the blue lines sometimes threw the unexpected.
September of 1992 found the two of them, him and Kathy, sitting in some doctor's office being told that the reason why there had been more noted changes than usual was because she was carrying twins. And there he was, barely a detective in the NYPD, and it was definitely unexpected. Kathy was due in March, said the doctor, according to the fact that she was already quite well along. But February came, and there were the twins; a son they named Richard and another daughter that they named Elizabeth. Another lesson learned, and as far as they were concerned, the last one.
Blue lines and cops, Elliot thought, were a lot different than blue lines on a test.
It is May of 2007, and the unit's caught up in the middle of a trial that's supposed to be concerning one Darius Parker, but is instead concerning the four of them. Olivia's issues with her brother. Fin's family issues. His own family issues. No one's bothered to poke at Munch yet, because he came up from Baltimore, and anything he did down there isn't really going to count up here.
And then this. She shows up right when he thinks that he and Munch are about to come to blows, because Munch is pissed at the way the press is crucifying Fin, and honestly, so is he, but there's nothing they can do about it. They are a unit, he thinks, and the blue lines are as strong with them as they are with any other unit. But she tells him that they need to talk, and so he follows her, asks what's changed when she tells him that she needs him to come home, not for the kids, or any other reasons (though she knows and he knows that she knows that the kids are one of the reasons why he wants to come home in the first place), but for her.
So he asks what's changed, and it doesn't hit him until after she's announced that once again, she's pregnant.
Fourth time's the charm, he thinks, and says nothing. It is May of 2007, and the last time either one of them were with anyone, it was with each other.
Another lesson about blue lines, he muses, later on, when everything is over. Sometimes they can make things worse…and sometimes, they give a chance to make something better.