Thanks to Robyn, again, as usual, who is just being more than fantastic as of late.
October wind on her back but it's March and it smells like summer. Everything, topsy-turvy and there's a part of her that wishes she could retire her winter coat. It'll be back to bite her in the ass though, with a whip and a chill and a "Fuck you, don't you know not to test Mother Nature?"
This hurts, because he was inside of her last night.
It went like this, "Christ Olivia, can't you ever just... not say anything?"
She could ask him that too, she could because he's always got something to say.
His voice could have held more animosity but it didn't. There was something forgiving in it, something surrendering. Her eyes hit hers with a storm, and there wasn't anything to say at all. Why'd they brought up the divorce in the first place? Why'd they even tread that thin ice? It was something that friends did, it was something that friends who had no other friends to turn to would talk about.
And so it was Kathy and the kids, and the last twenty-something years of his existence. It was Desert Storm and the academy and the squad and then the last eleven years of his life. It was the type of raucous that he might have had with Kathy in their second year of marriage, and so he dealt with it the same way. With screaming, with yelling until his throat was so constricted she was afraid he wouldn't be able to breathe. He railed, curled his fists, turned on her.
For no reason.
She didn't oppose.
The shock of her lips on his was almost too much, but he had no time to catch his breath. She was against the wall, and photos were crashing to the ground and his hand was in her pants and her hand was tearing at the hair at the nape of his neck.
It happened this way because it couldn't have happened any other way.
Olivia runs, because it's easy, because there's not a shred of fight left in her, leaving flight inevitable. Jumping at the chance of an undercover out in Missouri, she doesn't bother to clean her desk, instead leaving the clutter for him to sort through.
He will eventually, because he'll need to know, and he'll want to keep something of her. That picture she keeps of them from some gathering years ago, her zipper case of cds, maybe her chap stick, he'll keep something he finds in her desk.
There's a disdain that simmers beneath her skin, for herself, for being weak, for giving in. She knew this would ruin them.
She's at 35,000 feet before she can even begin to process what he'd said to her as he moved inside of her, the one phrase he managed to whisper before he came.
"Jesus, Liv, this is everything."
It's not exactly the type of place you leave everything to get to. But it's quaint and quiet, the type of locale that people write songs about. About loving, losing, living.
Her bags are heavier here, the weight on her shoulders nearly too much to bear. At least she can feel here, at least there's that. They hit the floor with a diplomatic thud, all of her belongings-for the time being-tucked into three large duffles.
The bed is starched and standard issue and the apartment holds nothing more than it has to; it's the federal government, after all, there's really not much to work with. There's no television, but a working stereo system from around the time that compact discs became the rage and she's relieved that at least there'll be the option of classic rock, some npr, static.
She misses him because that's what people do when they leave someone they're around constantly for twelve years. Olivia misses him because she's supposed to, because it makes her feel human because she does miss him.
But she's Julia Haviland for the moment, and to Julia, there's no Elliot and so she reviews the case file again, adapts her story, almost has the hang of going undercover.
There's one pot and one pan and she finds a can of soup in one of the cabinets.
It boils.
She cries.
Back in the day, it had been a shock to him, that such a young, attractive woman would be drawn to the Unit. It had taken two days to get the hang of her, for her to get the swing of things and then she was the one bringing coffee, the one ribbing the guys about, oh, you know, the usual.
Back in the day, they were out on the streets more, and their calls took them to every corner of the city. They spent a lot of time in beat up sedans, tailing people, driving to interviews.
They spent so much time in that confined space that he could tell what the subtle differences her scent meant.
"Oh, I love this song," she would say, reach over and crank the radio. Elliot would grit and teeth and steer, not because he didn't enjoy the music but because he didn't want to know that about her. He didn't want to know what her favorite song was, what her mother's name was, where she lived or what she liked to eat for lunch. He didn't want to know intimate details of her life because he didn't want to get too close.
And then he told her that he had twins, that Maureen was on the field hockey team, that Kathy needed him to clean the gutters, and the distance was shot to shit.
He misses her, there in the seat next to him, telling him to take a right, not a left for christ's sake.
But he hates her too, just enough.
There's one perp, two, a fairly elaborate sting operation that takes four months to prep for. She's glad that there's Star, a familiar face, to work with her through this. Olivia works and works hard and keeps her mind on the task at hand, ponders who she's helping and why she did this in the first place and that bottom line, end game of making a difference.
She feels like a drop in the ocean, so alone, making only the very slightest difference.
But it's something; all of this is for something.
Olivia doesn't think about the righteous anger she's likely to face when she returns because she can't think about what would happen if she were faced with anything else. Olivia doesn't have anyone to watch her as she sleeps, but she'd put even money on saying his name in her sleep.
It makes sense.
In the last moments before she falls asleep on the thin, issued mattress she has, Olivia's last thought is of Elliot and how he must hate her.
Elliot doesn't fight the new trainee he's assigned. She's dedicated and tough, she curses like a sailor, bites her nails and doesn't put up any personal pictures. She's green as hell, but she'll do because she's willing to learn and she's nothing like Olivia. Her name is Tate, which he finds strange, but he deals and they buy each other coffee and they trudge through casefiles and it's pretty copacetic.
His marriage, already on its last legs, falters and cracks and he folds em like it was his plan all along. He and Kathy part amicably, and it's three weeks after he signs the papers that he moves out. And that's fine, because they've been together without it for so long, what's another three weeks simply coexisting alongside one another.
The place he finds to slip into is on the fringe of Manhattan, Washington Heights. His furniture barely fits inside, but it's a nice apartment, has a working fireplace, it's a short walk to the Cloisters.
He won't ever go to the Cloisters.
Liv would have, though.
The way she closes the case is satisfying in a way she hasn't felt in a very long time. Boxes and boxes of evidence are filed away in storage and she signs her name, her real name on every dotted line she comes across. No loose ends.
Star takes her out for a beer, two, and they chat like they're old friends. They chat like they share secrets that no one understands.
Because they do.
"What will you do when you get back?" Star says, one eye on the game, as though she's not really interested, as in no pressure. But Olivia feels it, feels the implications of her words and it's not so much about what she'll do when she gets back, but what he'll do.
Star knows the history.
And Olivia is scared, scared that she doesn't know what he'll do or how he'll react or if she'll even give him the chance. Better to cut ties now than to go back, linger, wait and see.
Olivia drains her beer and questions herself.
"Hide," she says, so unsure, as though this isn't what she's been doing all along.
It's a chilly day for August when she returns to the City and nothing has changed, not really. She's a few months older, a few months more worse for the wear but she's not different. Olivia isn't sure what she expected, there's nothing to expect. It's not as though she believed the world would shift on its axis again.
Olivia doesn't know how to proceed, so she shoots Cragen an email that she's back, let's meet, and sits on the steps outside the precinct and waits for Elliot.
He steps out into the night and sees her immediately. There's a blink, a scowl that morphs for the briefest second into a ghost of a smile, and he nods down at her. Elliot skips briskly down the steps and onto the sidewalk, heads towards the 1.
Olivia unfolds herself, stands, catches up next to him and they walk, stride for stride. She hands him a tepid cup of coffee she'd been nursing.
After a block, he speaks. "I moved."
"Oh yeah?"
"Uptown," is the confirmation.
"Yeah?"
"Washington Heights."
"Been to the Cloisters?"
He pauses, and she too stops, a moment later.
And he kisses her.
Nothing is fixed and nothing is better but everything, for a moment, is far less complicated.