It had been 3 years, 3 long, agonizing, torturous years. 3 years since that fateful day in the precinct. She didn't know her life would change that dramatically.

She figured he would take some time off, regroup, and come back. She didn't know he would never come back. She would have never guessed that she wouldn't see or talk to him again. Not so much as an 'I'm sorry', or 'goodbye', he was just gone.

Cragen was the one who had to tell her he wasn't coming back. When she heard those words she tried to keep herself together, but that lasted about all of three minutes. She found an empty interrogation room and cried. Olivia wasn't one to let her emotions out, especially in a place where someone could find her. This had really shaken up her world.

Cragen made her pack up his desk. She guessed Cragen probably thought it was some sort of closure, but it was pure torture. She had so much trouble holding together for a while. Things were so hard for her to handle, cases were not the same. She would bury herself in cases even more than she used to, just to try to keep from thinking about him. After a while Cragen stopped kicking her out; he would just let her stay there. They all hated seeing what this was doing to her. She wasn't the same Bad-Ass Benson everyone knew and loved. She was just a shell of what she used to be.

Eventually two new rookies came to the unit. At first she would do anything not to work with them, but Cragen had set her straight. She eventually tried getting along with her new partner, Nick Amaro. Amaro would never be him though. Nick was young, kind, green at the job; he had been in the military. He was good looking, and Catholic. He was married, with a daughter. His wife was in the military and stationed over in Iraq.

Cragen really knows who to partner her with she thought. She couldn't have been partnered with the other female in the unit now. Nick was like a younger, more open, knock off version of Elliot. She guessed Cragen thought it would bring a lot of familiarity, and she would return to normal.

She eventually learned to trust Nick, and they worked really well together. They would never be as good as her and him, but it would be about as close as they could get.

Her love life is a different story. She knew she loved him, but if anyone would ever ask her she would deny it until the end of time. She had thought he had felt the same way, but it was obvious to her he didn't. She finally thought she had met someone who wouldn't break her heart in David Haden. She was mistaken. He chose the job over her. She was sort of upset, but wasn't entirely heartbroken because, after all, he wasn't the man she truly loved.

Then there was Brian Cassidy. After the undercover stuff and Cragen's issue, he had been there to clear Cragen, and put away Bart Ganzel and Delia Wilson. Things were going great for a while. She had gotten past all the stuff from their one night stand 13 years ago. Things were starting to get serious, and she was feeling comfortable in the relationship like a good pair of jeans. Sadly, she always had one man on her mind when it was inconvenient. She hadn't called out his name in bed or anything yet. She just constantly dreamt about him. When she was at work, she thought about how he would do things. Eventually Brian had caught on and told her he couldn't live in the shadows of a man who wasn't coming back. She told him he wasn't, but it wasn't believable.

So there she was alone, again, sitting in her apartment, with a glass of wine. The girls had been trying to get her to go out but she just wasn't feeling up to it tonight for some reason. Work had been pretty stress free surprisingly, mainly paperwork and Cragen told them to leave and enjoy the evening. She didn't feel like sitting in the precinct, so she went home. She wasn't on call this weekend which was a major shock. She was almost hoping Cragen would call her anyway and tell her someone was sick and she was needed on a case.

It was 8:30 on a Friday night and she decided to curl up on the couch and watch a movie. She needed a comedy so she decided to watch White Chicks. It always kept he mind off of things because she couldn't stop laughing. She was about half an hour into the movie when someone knocked on her apartment door. She was shocked because she hadn't buzzed anyone in and her Chinese food was already there and eaten. She thought maybe she was hearing things so ignored it. A few minutes later she heard it again. She was getting creeped out and went to her bedroom. She grabbed her gun from her dresser and walked to the door. She didn't bother checking her peep hole because she knew whoever it was would leave when she pulled her gun. She carefully opened her door to find him standing there getting ready to knock again. When she saw who it was she didn't know whether to slam the door in his face or hug him. She chose the former and it almost hit him.

"Liv…" she heard from the other side of the door.

She opened up the door; with a fury so deep in her eyes he was truly terrified of her.

"NO! NO! NO! You don't get to call me Liv. You are lucky I am even letting you live to tell you this. You don't get to walk in and out of my life when it is convenient for you. You don't know what you leaving without so much as a goodbye did to me. I don't want anything to do with you." She screamed.

"Calm down your neighbors are going to come out and complain. If you will let me come in and tell you what happened then we can go from there." He calmly suggested.

"Not happening, you can march your ass right back to where you came from and leave me and my life alone." She gritted through her teeth. She went to slam the door in his face for the second time that night, but his reflexes were still sharp and he stopped the door with his foot before she got the chance. She turned around to see him hot on her heels. She slapped him causing him to stumble backwards and almost fall to the ground. She walked back to the couch and sat down staring at him with a look that would have killed him.

He walked towards her, but she got up and came towards him as though to attack him again. She raised her arm to strike him again, but this time he anticipated it and grabbed her arm. She tried fighting him off, but his grip wasn't loose enough. He then pulled her in for a hug she didn't fight it anymore. She enjoyed being in his embrace, but she was still pissed beyond hell with him. After standing there for a few moments in silence, Elliot spoke up first.

"We need to talk…" He spoke softly into her hair, and then proceeded to lead her to her couch.

They sat there in silence for a few minutes, trying to figure out what exactly to say and who was going to speak first. Finally, after the silence became too much Olivia talked.

"Why did you leave without a goodbye? Was I not good enough to say goodbye to? Did 12 years of partnership mean nothing to you? Because I will tell you something Elliot, it meant a whole helluva lot to me, and I thought it meant something to you too. You don't know how many times I cried myself to sleep, thinking I did something for you to never say goodbye to me. I thought I could have done more, or it should have been me who took that shot, that way you would have still been around." At this point she was pacing around the couch.

"I completely broke down in one of the interrogation rooms after finding out you turned in your papers. I understand why you left the force. It is no surprise after that. What really got me was the fact that you never took the time to call me, text me, or reply to anything I said. I have always been there for you. I have always backed your play and had your six. When Kathy left you, it might not have been unicorns and butterflies between us but I was still there. When you signed the papers, when you found out Kathy was pregnant with Eli, when Kathleen was busted and diagnosed with bi-polar disorder, when Dickie ran away and beat up the hobo with that two by four. I was there for it all." She had stopped pacing, and was just staring at him

"You knew you were right when you said you were the longest relationship I had ever had with a man. You know everything about my past, you have helped me through that crap with Simon, you were the one there for me when they took Calvin away, you saved me so many times. You were my best friend, the only man who had never disappointed me, who had hurt me like the rest had." By this point, Olivia was furious and almost in tears at the same time. Elliot saw this and was heartbroken. He had never seen Olivia this vulnerable.

Elliot pulled Olivia back to the couch so she was sitting with him.

"Liv, you have to understand that I never meant to hurt you. After I shot Jenna I was such a mess. I couldn't get the images of her lying in my arms not moving out of my head. That image along with the images of you with Sister Peg, and the look on your face when it all happened. I couldn't stand to think you saw me as a child killer. I thought that what I was doing was for the best. Olivia, I was no good the person I had become after that. I couldn't let you see me that way. I began to drink heavily; I was an even angrier person. Kathy finally got tired of putting up with it and kicked me out, took Eli away, and that just made things worse. For a while I wouldn't even get up out of bed. I seriously considered ending it, and you know my views on suicide." Elliot was in tears now, voice weakening

"I had lost everything I had: my job, my loveless marriage, my kids, and you. After I realized my life was nothing, I was determined to get better. I promised myself as soon as I was back to the Elliot I use to be, if not better, I would come see you. Kathy eventually talked to me again and we worked out a custody agreement with Eli. I get him every other weekend, and my other kids visit when they can. Olivia… Liv, I know it is going to take a lot for me to even begin to make up for being a bastard, but I hope you can see past all of that and let me back into your life, even as a friend, because frankly I know I don't deserve to be your best friend again. Just being in your life at all is something I would be forever grateful for."

Olivia was shocked with how open Elliot had been. The Elliot she had known never showed vulnerability, yet here he was spilling his guys out to her.

"I will be willing to let you back into my life Elliot, but you have to earn my trust back. I can't just lay everything out for it to be shattered again. I couldn't handle it again," she whispered.

"I am willing to do that. Whatever it takes I will do it."