Chapter 1- It's Been A While

It was a sunny, crisp afternoon at the SVU precinct. There were no new cases and Olivia and Elliot were stuck at their desks doing paperwork. Elliot glanced at his watch and saw that it read 5:00pm. His gaze shifted to look at Olivia, who was sitting directly across from him. He took a moment to admire his partner, who today had chosen a dark, wine red shirt and jeans that hugged her in all the right places.

"Hey," he said, causing Olivia to look up. "You want to get out of here and go grab a bite to eat?"

Olivia was surprised. They hadn't spent much time together outside of work recently since Kathy had become rather possessive of her husband. Olivia had been sad by the change, but understood that Elliot needed to be with his family. But, not willing to give up an evening with Elliot, Olivia replied, "Sure, but why don't we just get some take-out and hang out at my place? I don't feel like going out anywhere tonight."

"Sure, no problem. Let me just finish up this report and we can head out."

Half an hour later, Elliot and Olivia had picked up some Chinese food, and were headed back to her apartment. Their conversation was easy and light-hearted. They were even laughing more than they used to. The heavy topics from work had fallen away, and all was left were two best friends enjoying each other's company. When they arrived, Elliot grabbed the bags and followed Olivia up to her apartment. As they entered, Elliot glanced around.

"It's been a while since I've been here." He noticed not much had changed. There were a couple new pictures sprinkled around the room. None of them showed a new guy or boyfriend. Good, he thought, breathing an internal sigh of relief. As he looked closer, he saw that a lot of the pictures were of Olivia and himself.

"I like this one." He said, picking up a picture of the two of them at last year's Christmas party. They were both looking at each other, his arms wrapped around her and hers pushing gently against his chest. She was laughing as he smeared icing on the tip of her nose.

Olivia walked over to look at the picture. Seeing it, she smiled, "Yeah, Cragen gave it to me as a Christmas gift. He said he thought I might like it."

"Good times," said Elliot, "You know you looked beautiful that night."

Olivia quickly blushed and looked away. "Umm, thanks El." She changed the subject, "Come on, let's eat before the food gets cold."

Elliot let the topic drop for the time being and walked over to the table to make himself a plate. They both plopped down on the couch to watch TV as they ate. They were sitting much closer than they usually did, almost touching at the hips. Olivia had her feet curled up under her and Elliot's were stretched leisurely out onto the coffee table in front of him. His arm rested on the back of the couch, behind her shoulders. They watched nothing in particular, instead enjoying the same easy conversation they'd had in the car.

When they had finished, Olivia got up, and took Elliot's plate. She walked them over to the kitchen calling over shoulder, "I'm making coffee, you want some?"

"Yeah" he called back, watching her as she walked away. "You need any help?"

"No, I'm good," he heard her reply from the kitchen as he turned his attention back to the TV. A minute later, realizing sitting on the couch watching TV without her was no fun, he decided to join Olivia in the kitchen. He found her with her back to him, in front of an open freezer.

Hearing him enter, she turned with two carton of ice cream in her hands. "Look what I found," she said smiling, "Chocolate or strawberry?"

"How about both?"

"Just what I was thinking," she shot back with a quick smile. They scooped the ice cream, electing to eat at the kitchen counter while they waited for the coffee to finish brewing. When that was done, they took their cups back to the couch where they resumed their previous, comfortable positions next to each other. They drank their coffee leisurely, both relishing the time they were spending together. Olivia was the first to move. She let her head fall back, and found herself resting against Elliot's arm. When he didn't move, she decided to let her head stay there.

"You know I've missed this," she said suddenly.

"Missed what?" he asked, turning his head to look at her.

"You know, just us hanging out. We hardly see each other outside of work anymore. It's nice to be able to relax a bit, and not have to worry about a case, or paperwork or whatever."

"Yeah, it is," he replied quietly. He thought back to the last time they'd spent time together like this. It had been months ago. He hadn't realized how much he'd missed seeing her like this, outside the worries and stresses of the office. Kathy had been insistent that they spend every minute he had outside of work together. But that was different now.

"I'm sorry about Kathy," he continued, "she was really jealous about all the time we were spending together at work." Olivia picked up on his use of was instead of is, but decided not to comment on it.

"Well, I'm glad she decided to let you go for tonight, El." Olivia said, not venturing to ask about the sudden change of heart.

"Yeah, me too" he replied honestly, though he quickly dropped his gaze afterward. He wanted to tell her something, but still felt that this wasn't the right time. In fact, the whole reason he'd asked to her to dinner was to tell her something important. But, he was still working up the courage to say it.