Disclaimer – I don't own Law and Order: Special Victims Unit or any of the characters.
Author Note – I'm sorry…
Last Rites
'Everyone who says hello
Will one day say goodbye
Sometimes without warning
Or giving a reason why.'
VK
She's numb.
Has been for a month.
Olivia rifles through her bag, searching for the pacifier Noah dropped while they were out. The envelope brushes her hand but she ignores it. It's been in there for a month and it will stay there until she's ready to open it. She's not sure whether she'll ever be ready.
Days pass and she goes through the motions not really paying attention. The rest of the team give her space, time. Fin hovers sometimes but at a distance. Nick does too, and he's more obvious than Fin but he doesn't know as much as Fin, doesn't understand. They're waiting for a reaction.
She's numb.
That's her reaction.
And it doesn't satisfy them.
They're waiting for her to break.
Olivia blocks it all out.
Part of her wants to shout out and cry, she doesn't because she knows when she does she won't be able to stop. It's bubbling under the surface, and Olivia knows that it could spill over at any moment. The tiniest thing could make her snap. She keeps a tight grip on her emotions, detaching herself emotionally from almost everything around her.
Noah's the only who can elicit a real smile from her now. He's her reason for getting through the day. He plays happily in his high chair, waiting for her to make his dinner. He babbles to his toys excitedly and Olivia is grateful for the noise. The back of her hand touches the envelope again as she withdraws it from the bag.
It's been in there a month.
Olivia had been too late.
She and Nick had been in New Jersey chasing a lead when she got the call from Fin. He refused to tell her over the phone but as soon as she heard Fin's voice, she knew. The car ride had taken too long. Nick navigated traffic as quickly as he could but the second accident in two days had jammed the roads. Her knee bounced nervously as she sat in the passenger seat, her anxiety growing by the minute.
By the time they reached the squad room, Olivia tried to steel herself for the worst but nothing could have prepared her for what waited for her.
Olivia burst through the entrance and stopped short when Fin turned to her, he looked exhausted, scared. He had been coming out of the conference room in the corner. He pulled it closed, the lock clicking too loudly. Through the blinds she could see two figures huddled together on the sofa.
"Liv…" he started walking towards her. He gestured to her office but she brushed past him to get to the conference room.
Fin turned with her and tried to stop her before she reached the conference room. Her hand was on the handle, hesitating briefly when his hand closed around hers. He leant in close and she realised she was shaking.
"Liv," he warned.
She blinked, the unshed tears catching on her lashes. There was remorse in his voice, an apology, consolation.
Her hand turned and his fell away as she pushed the door open.
It was sudden.
The truck ran a red light and he died on impact.
It's been three weeks since she stood between Munch and Fin in the cemetery, both of them flanking her as if she was about to crumble. She hadn't. Not even to shed a tear. It had been a blur, and Olivia hadn't been able to take it all in. She remembered Kathleen falling into her arms and hugging her. The rest of the Stabler clan, including Kathy, smiled at her sadly, almost apologetically and she couldn't fathom why. As if they felt guilty about what was left unsaid.
They knew what was in the envelope.
Olivia didn't say anything to Kathy; it would have been too awkward. Even if it hadn't been and Elliot had been any other colleague, she had no idea what to say to his widow. It didn't matter that Kathy no longer wore a wedding ring.
The envelope is taunting her constantly, irresistible and terrifying all at the same time. She's never going to be able to reply to whatever is in there. In the back of her head Olivia can hear his voice, the one he used when he was teasing, telling her to open it, telling her that sooner or later curiosity will get the better of her. That she wants to know what he's got to say.
"We found it in his pocket," Kathleen said, her voice cracking as she was overcome with another wave of sobs. Dickie wrapped an arm around his sister and pulled her close as he looked like he was going to burst into tears.
It wasn't just a letter. There was a bulge and Olivia had run her fingers across the small bump a thousand times, trying to figure out what he wanted to give her. She had no clue. Olivia was careful enough not the press the paper too hard, she didn't want to imprint the object onto the paper and find out what it was before she was ready. She wanted to know when he intended to give it to her, how long he had carried it around with him. There was a fold down the middle where it had been in his pocket for a while, the crease wearing the paper so it was almost torn.
Cragen came to see her the day after the funeral. He'd been on stand by for a flight home when Elliot had been laid to rest. He sat with her and Noah that afternoon. Noah was enthralled by the older man who played with him all afternoon, and Olivia forced a bittersweet smile onto her face at their interaction. They didn't mention Elliot till after Noah was tucked into bed, even then there words were few and far between.
"We never slept together."
"I know."
Olivia stirred through Noah's dinner, the heat rising off of it. She took the pan off the hob and poured the stew into Noah's bowl to let it cool enough for him to eat it. Olivia turned to find him holding his bear close as he played with the blocks on his tray.
The sight of her son playing happily created another pang of heart ache. Elliot would never meet him. Two of the most important people in her life would never know one another. She didn't know if Elliot knew about Noah coming into her life, and that felt wrong. Olivia wondered if she would ever tell Noah about the man who understood her better than anyone, what she would say if she did. Olivia wondered if Noah would be the one to open the envelope after she died. She didn't want to pass the burden on to him.
The crumpled paper is always in the back of her head, mocking her. Of course she was tempted to open it, almost had a few times when she woke in the middle of the night, the image of his dead body ingrained in her mind.
She shouldn't have gone to the hospital to see him.
Fin drove her and waited protectively in the hallway with Melinda as she stood at the window of the relative's room. She refused to go into the room. Her hand curled around the string on the curtain as she tried to grasp the courage to pull it open. The courage hadn't come and she strode out past Fin and Melinda, leaving Fin struggling to catch up with her. She was nearing the car when he did, opening the door for her to slide into the passenger seat. He didn't say anything when she asked him to take her home.
She'd seen enough dead bodies to know what waited for her behind that curtain.
She didn't sleep that night, just watched Noah as he slept.
Elliot was haunting her.
She welcomes his ghostly presence in her head, craving some sort of connection.
His absence from the squad room had never been more poignant to her than it was in the last four weeks. She could hear him in her head as she interrogated a suspect, telling her how to play it; hear his consoling words as she digested the statement of a victim.
Olivia missed him.
Olivia checked Noah's food on the tip of her tongue. Happy with the temperature she moved to the stool and fed him, encouraging him to eat it when he frowned at the initial taste but he dutifully chewed, eventually deciding he liked his dinner and eagerly leaning forward to accept it.
She had to find a better way of coping because it wouldn't be fair to Noah for her to feel empty inside for the rest of her life. She thought about going to Lindstrom, but she thought better of it. While it was evident to those around her how much Elliot meant to her, it was private, precious, and something she wanted to deal with on her own.
She wanted to protect it. Hold it close.
Just like the envelope.
There was only one person she wanted to talk to and he was dead.
One conversation that was all she wanted.
A week later Olivia pushed open the gate to the cemetery. The hinges creaked loudly, making her jump. Her eyes scanned the headstones, taking in the surroundings, the mourners. She followed the path, passing rows of headstones. Gravel crunched beneath her feet.
People said this worked but Olivia wondered what good it would do to talk to a headstone which couldn't talk back. She can hear his laugh at the thought, deep and rumbling in his chest. She wonders if he would visit her if it was the other way round.
If her prayers for death had been answered while Lewis had her…
Would Elliot have come to her?
She turns on her heel and makes her way along the row. Her eyes are trained on the new headstone amongst the aged ones. She reaches the grave, the earth has settled and the flower arrangements are long gone.
Elliot Stabler, beloved father
She stands there for a long moment. She loses track of time as she stares blankly at the slab of stone. She feels numb again, nothing apart from words linking her with the grave. His body may lie six feet under her but she can't feel him here, or their connection. She wonders if this would have been easier on the roof of the precinct, just talking to the sky.
"I want to hate you right now," Olivia says to the grey stone. "Four years ago, all I wanted was to see you one more time. To say goodbye at least." She scoffs. She would always wonder what had happened to him in the four years since he left the force. "Now I can't think of anything worse."
She swallows the lump that forms in her throat. The tears build but they don't fall. "I have a son and you'll never meet him." Her voice cracks and she clears her throat. Her eyes close but the tears start to flow anyway. "I wanted him to know you, to help him know me."
Olivia reaches into her pocket and grasps the tattered envelope, pulling it out. She breaths in deeply and blows it out slowly, trying to control the panic rising in her chest. She was not going to have a panic attack here.
"I miss you," she hisses. She swipes her hand across her cheek to brush the tears away. Her lip trembles and her body shakes. "I…I hope you're at peace, I hope you know how much you were loved." A sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob escapes her. "How much I loved you."
She wipes away a new tear. "I'm not going to read it Elliot," she says holding the envelope up to his headstone. "I can't. Because when I do, there's going to be nothing else for us to say to each other, nothing else for you to give me."
Because she's not ready to say goodbye.
Not ready to lay him to rest.