Disclaimer: Not mine. Dick Wolf's. Need I say more?
Pre-Ghost but post-Loss. Implied A/O. Enjoy this little oneshot!
I check the mail every day. Not because I'm under any delusion that something important might arrive, but just in case. I've started a hundred thousand letters to Olivia, but I know I can never send them, nor should I. Sometimes I wonder why I do this to myself, living on false hope, building myself up only to tear myself down again. The pain that comes every time I return to an empty mailbox – not even a bill in sight – is practically unbearable.
And when it gets to be too much, I draw. I used to do that often when I was younger, and now that I have an abundance of time on my hands, I continue to do so. I draw pictures, always of Olivia, but there's always a sadness in her eyes, a melancholy that I imagine she has in the wake of my "death". I'm not good at drawing happy, upbeat pictures of smiling children; I'm better at the vulnerability laced with inner conflict. Nostalgia. Pain. It's what I'm most familiar with, after all.
I hate the feelings I get sometimes. They are blessings and curses at the same time, when I can go to a playground and look at the children and tell right away which ones are happy and which ones are not. And I know I'm right. There's just something in their eyes, a deadness that children should never have. As if they've seen enough to know the world is not a friendly place.
I'm all too aware of that painful fact.
Much as they try to hide it, they are almost transparent to me. I can see the pain they've endured and it hurts me to know that they've endured it. I wish the world was a safer place, a better place, a happier place. I wish I could be with Olivia again, forever and forever and forever. I wish I could go back in time. I would have dropped the case when she told me to, if it would have guaranteed us a future.
You can always tell the girl that's been hurt the most. Look for the briefcase and the broken smile.
I hope you liked it. Please review!