Between her nightmares and the phone calls, it doesn't take much lately to jar her from her light sleep.
Her sheet is twisted around her bare legs and her blankets are askew as she reaches toward the bedside table. Her hand gropes blindly for her ringing cell phone and she is speaking before she has it to her ear.
"Benson." Producing her own name is an effort, a rasp against her sore throat. Her voice is laced with exhaustion.
"Sorry to do this, Olivia. We've got something."
She exhales and nods into the emptiness of her small bedroom. The digital clock's glowing green numbers tell her it is only seven after four.
"It's okay, Capt," she says, though it is the opposite of how she feels. She holds her phone between her shoulder and her ear as she scrawls down the address Cragen gives her, pressing the notepad to her thigh for leverage as she writes.
"You'll call Elliot?" Cragen forms it as an inquiry, but she knows it's more of an order.
"Yes," she replies. The lie comes easily in the dark.
She untangles herself from the winding mess of blankets before she turns on the beside lamp and moves to the very edge of the bed to rest her feet on the floor. She gives herself a moment to get her bearings. Goosebumps form on her thighs beneath the hem of her threadbare t-shirt and she shivers before she wraps one arm around herself and runs her fingers through her short hair, still damp from her shower not three hours ago.
This case.
She eases herself off the bed, her toes catching the strap of her bra that she will put back on momentarily. The bathroom light is too bright, so she leaves it off while she gazes at herself in the mirror by the dim light filtering in from her bedroom.
Standing at the sink, she turns on the faucet, letting the water run until it is warm. The heat of it is comforting against the chilled skin of her fingers. The rest of her body yearns for the warmth of the shower, but she denies herself. She can't waste that kind of time. She leans her hip against the cool marble and shivers again.
She is so tired.
She hopes to God she doesn't have a fever, because she can't afford to be down for the count right now.
None of them can, not with Elliot-
She swallows against the burn of her aching throat and closes her eyes, shaking her head as though the motion will clear her memory.
He threw up seven times last night. Seven. It's a new record, not that she has been keeping count.
This last month he has spent more time in the bathroom than at his desk. She hates that every time she has needed to find him, she has known exactly where to look: the restroom, the crib, the rooftop.
She knows all of his hiding places because they are hers too, where they go when they don't want anyone else to see.
The image of her partner hunched over in a dark alley way throwing up once is enough. But seven times in one night...She draws a steadying breath.
It isn't supposed to be like this. Elliot isn't supposed to be like this. To see the strongest person she knows brought to his knees by something that is trying to save his life is almost too much.
The contradiction doesn't escape her.
He needs the meds, the antiretrovirals just in case. But the very medicine that is supposed to be helping him fight for his life, against a much bigger fish, is making him sick and rendering him unable to keep anything down.
She doesn't know if anyone else sees it or if it is just because she is so hyper-aware of everything about him that she notices that he is visibly shrinking, losing weight fast. The circles under his blue eyes have darkened and he is quieter than usual. He always tells her it is because he is afraid of what will come out if he opens his mouth, but she know better.
When he isn't talking, he is thinking. She knows that he is worried. She sees it in the furrow of his dark brow, the set line of his jaw.
She knows he is making silent contingency plans while sitting beside her in the sedan and nothing has ever shaken her more.
Risk is inherent to the job, volatile situations, hardened criminals, fights, knives, bullets...not HIV. Not AIDS.
None of those things scare her a fraction as much as the thought of losing him and that's why she won't wake him. She won't call him. He needs the rest more than she does and that thought alone spurs her on as she moves through the darkness of her bedroom, dressing quickly in the silence that pervades a quarter after four.
When her mother died last year, he carried her. Now, she carries him. They carry each other. That's what partners do.
As she drives back to the same scene she left only hours ago, she wonders. She wonders what Elliot has told his wife and children, if they have any idea how poorly he feels. She is certain that Kathy understands and for their children's sake, Olivia is sure her partner has told them that Daddy has had the flu for the last twenty-two days.
She wonders why it wasn't her. Why she didn't slice her palm open on Sam Winfield's tool box and then reach into the tub to save Gloria Palmera's life. Elliot has everything, everything to live for and she has-
She tells herself that she isn't being morbid, rather realistic. It's just the facts. She isn't married and she doesn't have four children depending on her, day in and day out.
She would trade places with him in a heartbeat if it meant saving his life, preserving his future. Yet, he seems to think that her future is equally important, vital even.
She remembers the day after his visit to the doctor, how he had walked straight into the squad-room first thing in the morning to find her. When he met her gaze, she remembers thinking that surely someone had died.
She had been up and out of her seat in an instant, following him out into the hallway.
She hadn't even been able to whisper a good morning before he was speaking over her. His voice low between them. "Need you to do something for me."
She had braced herself for him to tell her that he was taking a few weeks off, taking some time until he knew how the meds would effect him. She nodded as she listened to his heavy swallow.
"I need you to get tested." The very last thing she thought she would hear.
"What?"
Elliot kept his eyes on the floor and she had watched how he crossed his arms, the way he bit hard into his bottom lip with his teeth. He had shaken his head once, twice before he spoke again. When he met her gaze once more, the rim of red around his blue eyes was more pronounced.
"The other night, I had a sip of your water bottle 'fore we talked to Gloria's doctor." He said it as though he was giving her a death sentence. His voice ached with apology.
"Elliot," she had whispered, shaking her head. "HIV is not- it's not transmitted through-"
"I know that," he told her quickly, nodding as though he had wanted to believe her. "But will you just do it for me?"
"Elliot, you're not-" She started, trying to convince him of something that she wasn't sure about herself. She remembers giving him an exasperated look that she immediately regretted.
"Olivia, If something happens to you..." His tone had been dark.
She hadn't understood the anger that tinted the edge of his voice. He had stepped closer to her in the hallway so that her back had bumped the wall and he had held her there without ever touching her at all. His accent had been thick with anxiety.
"If something happens to you 'cause of me...I-I'll never forgive myself. D'you understand?"
She had nodded then, assuaging him, and spent the rest of the day reminding herself to breathe because of his desperation to protect her. No one had ever told her that she was indispensable before, essential. No one has ever cared about her future as much as Elliot does. She wonders if he knows that the feeling is mutual.
That's why she hasn't gotten tested.
Their welfare is linked. He isn't positive. He won't be and if by some God-forsaken accident he is and some bizarre twist of fate she is too, then she'll take the same sentence. She can't lose him. She can't. He is her best friend in the whole world.
Now her eyes are full, but it's raining hard enough that no one will notice if she starts to cry. She won't though. Not yet.
She bends low over the body of the girl, listening to CSU techs report as they stand above her.
She is bereft without him next to her, without his protective body. He would position himself over her, his broad shoulders keeping the brunt of the rain from hitting her face. She misses him already and he's not even-
She shakes her head to clear it once more. It's not helpful, thinking like that. They're going to be okay. He is going to be okay. She repeats it like a mantra. Please, she whispers for good measure and she wonders if this is how you pray. She will have to ask him to teach her sometime.
The gray morning is just lightening as she makes it into the precinct, soaked to the skin, and wearier now than she was three hours ago.
She needs a quick shower and a change of clothes from upstairs in her locker. She needs warm water against her chilled skin, not the pelting of the cold rain.
She has barely made it to her empty desk when..."Benson, can I see you for a minute?"
She meets Cragen's eyes from across the room and blinks back raindrops from her lashes as she starts her way toward his office. Her boots squeak against the wet tile floor and her captain closes the door behind her.
"Where's Stabler?" He asks, coming around the side of his desk so that he can look at her.
Olivia shakes her head. She is too fatigued to think of an excuse. Exhaustion is keeping her honest.
"I didn't call him, Capt," she confesses, watching as Don's furrowed brow raises.
"Why not?" He asks, lowering himself into his chair and resting his hands on his desk. Olivia bites the inside of her cheek and tilts her head before she answers again.
"He needs to rest."
Don gives her an appraising look before he speaks again. "So do you." She almost feels her mouth quirk upward because she knows that she must look a mess. Wet, worn, worried. All of the above.
He can't send her home. He can't.
"Elliot needs it more than I do," she reasons. Her voice is stronger now. When she defends him, it always is.
Cragen leans back in his chair and gives a heavy sigh. She knows that he has had just about as much sleep as she has over the last few days. He stands and leans against his desk, so that they are eye-level before addressing her once more.
"Olivia, if you're concerned about your partner being compromised-" Don's voice is gentle, but Olivia holds up her hands before he can finish. She can't let him finish.
"No Capt," she replies, shaking her head vehemently. "This was all me. This is all my fault."
Cragen nods slowly. "I know that you're worried about Elliot," he starts quietly. "I am too, but you don't get to make those kinds of calls, understand?"
Olivia nods, feeling the familiar prickle of emotion creep across her nose.
"Elliot's a big boy, Olivia. I know he's your partner and you two are thick as thieves, but we have to trust him to come to us if he needs us."
Cragen's office blurs before her as Olivia's eyes well from emotion or exhaustion or a combination of both, and she can't help the clogging of her throat, the way she can't vocalize a coherent answer for her captain. She cheeks burn with embarrassment, but Don seems to know that she is in no position to speak right now and he is lenient with her once more.
"Go get cleaned up and grab a couple hours. We'll wake you if something happens."
Olivia nods slowly, biting into her bottom lip mercilessly to keep herself from crying. She wants to get back to her desk, to check her messages, to wait for Elliot. As she turns to open the door, Cragen seems to read her mind. "Olivia," He says her name softly and she glances back at him over her shoulder. "That's an order."
He knows her too well.
The squad room is filling slowly from the morning commute, but Elliot's desk remains empty before her and that sight is just enough to set her off.
She presses her palm to her lips in an effort to keep herself silent and then she is moving quickly through the room, up the stairs and toward the locker room and the crib.
The showers are blessedly empty, so no one hears the way her sob resounds against the tile before she turns the spray on and wills the water to wash all of this away.
Her locker holds an extra pair of jeans and a sweater, but she can't sleep in those. She hasn't done laundry in days, so she has to search Elliot's locker for his sweats.
She hopes he won't mind her pilfering.
She can barely keep her eyes open as she slips the heavy cotton material of his sweatshirt over her head, his sweatpants up over her legs. If she had the strength, she thinks that she just might laugh because she can't imagine how she looks in his clothes. They swallow her whole and they hold onto enough of the smell of him that she thinks she just might be able to sleep without dreaming of having to let him go.
"'Livia."
"Hmmm?"
She hears the softest chuckle and feels the warm press of his palm against her knee. "You gotta wake up, Sleeping Beauty."
She peeks up at him through her lashes. Her eyes are still swollen from sleep and the way that she cried. Elliot sits on the bunk across from her, his elbows pressed to his thighs. His lips quirk upward in a smile when she meets his gaze and she thinks he looks good, better than yesterday. His eyes aren't as glassy and he isn't quite as pale.
"What time is it?" She whispers, watching as he glances at his left wrist.
"Eleven seventeen."
Olivia rolls onto her back, exhaling as she moves. She has been out for hours, dead to the world, and though she knows that she needed the sleep, it doesn't stop her from feeling guilty for not being across from him at their desks.
"You okay?" He whispers. She tilts her head to look at him and she nods against the pillow, mussing her hair.
"You?" She breathes in reply and he nods, too. She fishes her hands out of the long sleeves of his sweatshirt and rubs her eyes.
"I can't believe Cragen let me sleep this long."
She lowers her hands in time to catch the shake of Elliot's head.
"Capt. had nothin' to do with it," he tells her unabashedly, as she starts to sit up. "It's only fair. Figured you let me sleep in this morning."
She opens her mouth to reply, but he is speaking again before she can.
"How come you didn't call me, Liv?" He asks, his voice low. There is a hint of hurt that she sees stirring in the blue of his eyes and she can tell that he is genuinely asking her for an explanation because he doesn't understand.
Olivia shakes her head, drawing her knees up closer to her chest and resting her elbows upon them.
"I wanted you to get some rest. You need it more than I do," she tells him. She repeats the same lines that she gave to Cragen hours ago, futilely hoping they will work on him, too.
"By the looks of you, that may not be true," he tells her lightly, reaching across the space between them and brushing what she is sure is a messy wave of her hair behind her ear. "You need your rest, too."
He is quiet now and he simply sits with her here in the silence of the crib. Having him close would be comforting, if she didn't know that he is waiting for her to tell him the truth. She knows that he is just as stubborn as she is, if not more so. She loves him for it, and she hates him for it, and right now she doesn't trust herself fully, so she is counting on the fact that he won't push her, not just yet.
"I'm sorry 'bout last night," he says. His voice rasps ever so slightly and she looks up at him.
"What do you mean?"
Elliot shakes his head. "I should've called off. You shouldn't have had to see me like that...that bad."
Olivia takes a breath before she answers. She won't lie to him.
"I scared you, didn't I?" He asks so openly, so honestly that the sound of his voice alone could make her cry. His tone is nothing compared to the expression on his face, the pain in his ocean eyes.
"No," Olivia says fiercely, shaking her head. She has to make him see, make him understand. "The only thing that scares me-" She takes a breath and focuses on the ripples of the sheet beneath her thigh. Her fingernails bite hard into the skin of her palm. She has to do this, she has to tell him.
"The only thing that scares me is the thought of losing you."
The truth tumbles from her lips on a hushed breath that turns into a sob. Before she knows it, Elliot is moving across the chasm between them, settling next to her on the edge of the bed, and reaching for her.
"Olivia," he breathes her name. He slips his arm around her shoulders and ducks his head to try to get her to look at him. "Hey, it's gonna be okay." She knows that the roles should be reversed, that she should be comforting him, and yet here they are.
"I would trade places with you in a heartbeat," She tells him, wiping her cheek against her sleeve.
"Don't say that." He reprimands, shaking his head.
"I don't have kids, Elliot," she reasons, her voice raising uncontrollably. She twists out of his reach, pushing his arm from around her shoulders with her hand. "I'm not married-"
"Don't," Elliot starts, as he rises to stand before her. "Don't you dare make your life any less important than mine. You think this would be any easier on me if this was reversed? You think I'm not scared to death of losing you?"
Olivia shakes her head in exasperation and she realizes too late that he doesn't realize that the movement isn't in answer to his question.
"You didn't get tested, did you?" Elliot's voice is deathly quiet and in her silence he gleans her answer.
"Damn it, Olivia!" He growls, hitting the frame of the bunk bed with his palm. "What are you gonna do?"
"You don't have HIV," she tells him, keeping her voice down even as she glares up at him.
"And what if I do?" Elliot asks, glaring right back. "And I gave it to you by some fucking fluke?"
Olivia shrugs. "We'll figure it out. You just said it yourself, it's gonna be okay."
"God," Elliot rasps and she isn't sure if he is praying, or cursing, or a little bit of both.
They are silent for more than a minute and she knows full well that neither one of them are going to back down and that is why he surprises her when he sits down on the bunk across from her and rests his head in his hands.
"Olivia."
She listens as he rumbles her name softly, almost as though he hasn't realized that he has spoken it aloud. She watches him and the way that he drops his shoulders in defeat rattles her. She has the childish urge to reach for him, to touch him, to hug him.
"Elliot," she whispers his name and then he is moving again, closer, kneeling down on the floor before her bunk. She still has her knees tucked to the side up on the bed, so he presses his palms to the mattress on either side of her legs.
When he looks up at her, his blue eyes are churning like the sea during a winter gale.
"Listen," he says quietly, tilting his head and watching her just as closely as she watches him. "I'm in this for the long haul with you, but if we're gonna be partners for life, you gotta do something for me."
Partners for life. She would nod if she could breathe. She listens to him swallow before he speaks again.
"You gotta develop a sense of self-preservation. If you won't do it for yourself, do it for me, okay?"
Olivia sinks in her stance and Elliot blurs before her. "Sure," she replies, sarcasm tinting her tone. Her first line of defense. "Says the man who reached into that bathtub with-"
"This is not the same thing and you know it, Olivia," he says gravely. "I didn't have a choice. I just acted."
She can feel his gaze on her face and so she nods, in agreement, or acquiescence, or understanding; she isn't sure.
Elliot takes a deep breath before he speaks again. He seems to be choosing his words carefully because he worries the inside of his cheek for a moment.
"Don't slap me, okay?" He starts and she feels the corners of her mouth lift in surprise at his words. "You matter to me, Olivia. I don't care what anybody else has ever told you."
He is merciful in that he doesn't mention her mother by name, but she is aware that he knows. He reads her the same way that she reads him. She keeps her hands that are tucked into the long sleeves of his sweatshirt, securely in her lap, so that she doesn't reach for his.
"You're important to me. More 'portant than you know. I can't do this without you. I can't do anything without-" Elliot falters as his voice fades. He seems to sink before her with exhaustion and he surprises her as he leans in closer, crowding her in the most pleasant way, and bows so that he can rest his head against her thighs.
He doesn't hold onto her, doesn't close his arms around her back. He simply leans against her, a safe port in the storm. His warm weight, an anchor.
"Tell me we're gonna be okay, 'Livia." He murmurs so quietly that she thinks if she didn't know the prosody of his voice better than her own that she wouldn't have heard him at all.
She moves slowly then, to rest her hand against the nape of his neck, right above the collar of his sky blue dress shirt. She doesn't withdraw her palm completely from the cuff of the sweatshirt, because she doesn't trust herself to touch him like that, her lifeline against his bare skin.
"We are," she whispers because when he is beside her she believes it. All the fight drains out of her because in moments like this she doesn't have to do anything other than be. Be with him, for him, for herself.
Elliot nods ever so slightly and his jaw bumps against her knee. He reaches for her hand that covers his nape and squeezes her fingers tenderly. He pulls himself away from her, pressing against the mattress for leverage to stand and he stifles a low groan.
"Are you-?" Olivia starts. She can't help the immediate concern she knows he hears in her voice.
"I'm not going anywhere," he reassures her. "'Cept to go puke right now." He motions toward the bathroom to explain his abrupt departure from her side.
Olivia leans back against her pillow and closes her eyes for a moment, steeling herself to listen to his awful retching, but it doesn't come. All she hears is the rapid rushing of water and by that sound alone, she knows he has turned on the faucet to drown out everything else.
He protects her, even in this.
"That's only the second time today. Maybe I'm on the up and up," he calls from the bathroom. He almost makes her smile at his attempt at optimism.
"There's a pack of gum in my locker," Olivia informs him at the same second that she hears the clink of the metal door. She does smile this time, because he knows where she keeps it and he is already helping himself. What's hers is his and vice versa.
"Got it," he replies. "Thanks."
She sits up on the side of the bunk as he rounds the corner and makes his way back toward her. His tie is askew - she'll have to fix it for him - and he is a touch paler than he was a few minutes ago, but he gives her half of a grin when he meets her eyes.
He nods his silent confirmation to the question she doesn't ask, their unspoken shorthand, telling her that he is all right.
"You wearin' my sweats?" Elliot asks suddenly, his voice lilts with amusement and something else that Olivia can't quite categorize so easily, but she knows it makes her stomach somersault. She looks up to find his gaze skimming her body, hidden beneath the bulk of gray material. She nods and feels her cheeks flush ever so slightly, but his expression is so disarmingly gentle that she can't find the will to mind her embarrassment.
"Yes," she answers, "Mine are due to be washed." She says it simply as though she borrows his clothes all the time, but there is an undercurrent that she can't ignore.
A little daring.
He tilts his head as he surveys her. She can smell the spearmint gum.
A little heady.
"They look good on you," he says earnestly. "Little big, but comfy."
"They are," she says. "You should wear them more often."
"You gotta get out of 'em first," he teases with a grin, but his voice is too low.
A little reckless.
"In your dreams, Stabler," she tosses back mildly, before she realizes what she has said.
"You-" Elliot starts to reply, but he stops himself. He rubs his jaw with his hand and when he meets her gaze again he seems to fighting the urge to smile. He shakes his head at her affectionately as though he thinks she is a piece of work, but she swears his cheeks have more color than they did only a minute ago.
"I'll meet you downstairs," he tells her softly and she nods in confirmation.
Elliot closes the door and she is alone once more. She takes a breath and then a second one for good measure. She runs her fingers through the messy wave of her hair. Sometimes she forgets that they are at work, that they are partners, that he is thoroughly, happily married.
When he looks at her like that, he makes her forget that he is her best friend in the whole world and she can't help but wonder what he left unsaid on the tip of his tongue. The way that he pushed himself out the door makes her think that sometimes he forgets, too. It scares her that sometimes they pretend that they are just people. Right now, she is wearing his sweats against her bare skin and moments ago he was looking at her as though the clothes were not the only thing that belonged to him.
She gives a soft laugh as she shakes her head, because she is being ridiculous and she knows it. Her inhale is shaky and she knows that she has to get a grip on herself before she goes back to work. Elliot is still sick and he needs her to be on her game for both of their sake. She pushes herself up off the bed, stripping his sweats as she goes. She figures her head won't be so cloudy in her own sweater and slacks and she will march right down to start the day beside him, good as new.
A week later on Tuesday morning, she finds him at their usual breakfast spot. He faces away from her as she enters and she doesn't have time to figure out why that bothers her, but she thinks it has something to do with the fact that no one is watching his back. But she's here now and when she brushes his shoulder with her hand he looks up immediately and grins at her. "Hey, you following me now?" He jokes.
"A cop should know where his partner has breakfast," she replies, keeping up the shtick.
She sits quietly for a moment as she watches him eat. Eggs and toast and she knows exactly how long it has been since he has been hungry enough for a breakfast like this. She contemplates reaching for a slice of his toast and while she knows that he would generously oblige, she would rather let him eat.
"Listen, you took a chance going through that radio car. Thanks," she tells him. This last case had shaken her, turned things upside down for a little while, but now...
Elliot grins at her from across the table and it's the kind of grin that reaches the perfect blue of his eyes. "Praise makes me hungry."
Olivia nods. "Got your appetite back."
"Feels good to eat like a human being again," he replies honestly.
"You got your test results?" She asks as a formality because she can already see the answer in the lightness in him.
"Clean bill of health," he tells her quietly. "Negative for HIV, hepatitis..."
"Congratulations," she smiles. She feels his foot brush her ankle lightly beneath the table and his expression turns serious for a moment. He swallows a mouthful of orange juice before he says her name softly.
"Olivia."
She crosses her arms and leans in against the surface of the table for effect, biting her lip to fight her growing smile.
"Elliot," she says his name right back.
"Thank you," he whispers. His blue eyes are crystal clear. He grins at her, that secret smile of theirs and she falls for him for the thousandth time, knowing that he will catch her in whatever way he can.
Author's note: An exercise in the art of Olivia. Thank you.