Summary: Olivia comes across an obituary in the newspaper and struggles with the decision on whether to reach out to the Stablers.
Versify Me
1.
"Nice to hear from you, Don," she mumbles with a smirk as she tears open the back of the small envelope in her hands.
She immediately furrows her brows.
It's not quite what she was expecting. A postcard would have been nice.
Instead, the newspaper clipping from inside rests gingerly between her thumb and index finger as her brown eyes glide down the Times New Roman font while her other hand lightly grasps the small white envelope, with her former captain's name on it, that had arrived on her desk this morning.
She doesn't dwell on why her former captain sent this to her because she knows it'll only drive her crazy over all the what ifs. But it doesn't keep her from feeling the flip flopping in her chest with a cloud of uncertainty seemingly forming over her head, and most importantly… worry pooling in her gut.
She lets her eyes skim the text and as she reaches the conclusion, her eyes rapidly flutter back up and they wash over the image peering back at her, trying to piece together what she's observing.
Soon it dawns on her.
There's a soft glean in the eyes of the subject with paper thin skin which envelopes, entices, enchants her to inquire more about the soul that leaves behind just a grainy image.
Olivia licks her lips and tries to push down the swell of emotion that pushes against her diaphragm, daring to rupture her lungs as they burst out of her ribs.
That is actually an understatement to the true feeling ruminating in her veins, and she's not exactly sure why.
A surge of emotion threatens to spill out of her then , but she siphons the bleed with a quick sniff and a deep breath.
She barely knows the name, or the person who brought it to life. She'd like to think she did in a previous lifetime.
She sits in silent awe at the sincere fact that a simple name can conjure up so many possibilities again.
With the simmer of a burnt out candle comes the flicker of something new and she remembers the details of a day nearly a decade ago that revealed nothing, and yet, so much after just one conversation, one trip, one discovery.
Olivia saw his life. She saw his eyes. She saw his soul. She saw his beginning.
With the waft of her parfum and the flibbertigibbet staccato she proudly accepted, Olivia knew him more in that moment, sitting in that little cafe in a far away, sandy, open seascape with freshly salted air than she had ever before.
And it stunned her.
But now it's too late to search those eyes for truths, for history, for purpose, for answers, ever again.
The paper slips through her fingers onto the slick surface of her desk and glides across the metal surface, slowing to a halt next to her keyboard.
"Liv?"
Rollins's southern drawl creeps into her subconscious and draws her attention from the information before her.
Clearing her throat, Olivia pushes back slightly in her office chair before looking up, "Ahem, uh, yeah? Did you hear back from the guys?"
Shaking her head, and maneuvering her pregnant frame through the doorway, Rollins stops just shy of Olivia's desk.
"No. And, I wasn't prying, but I was skimming over files at my desk and I heard your phone chirp a few times. Loudly. I thought maybe you…. I thought maybe they texted you the information. Maybe, you and I could run the next lead they send back," she offers, and Olivia knows she's itching to get from out behind her desk. However, the other woman is very pregnant and Olivia has been trying to keep the squad room in check.
"You know Amanda, I think you can handle a little interrogation. When they bring in the girlfriend, I'll give you point. She seems loyal, though I think we can get her to crack 2 on 1," she trails off.
Not entirely out of the haze of the previous moment, she then glances down again and the small newspaper clipping stares back at her.
The heading of the obituary is bold and final.
It serves as an invitation and a final testament to a void all around her.
Bernadette Stabler, 88, Beach Haven
One day. One conversation. A lifetime of history.
A history that the younger woman standing before her is entirely oblivious to.
She snaps out of her reverie when her cellphone chimes again on the corner of her desk.
Rollins's eyebrow tips up with a "that's what I thought" expression but Olivia brushes it off and picks it up.
She punches in her security code, and anticipates a text from Carisi or Fin to pop up with information on their suspected rapist plastic surgeon and his lover.
However, when her notifications pop up, it's not a call or text from her team, rather a handful of text messages from an unknown number.
After opening the text, she can't help but drop the phone on her desk as the message peers at her from the glowing screen.
It's a short, to the point slew of words that shouldn't mean as much as they do.
plese help us
"Is it them Lieu?" Amanda inquires curiously.
Olivia swallows and rereads the short text message, before closing it and opening the next one in a hurried secession.
Plas help him
Shaking her head, she peers up from her phone and pushes her black framed glasses atop her head while looking at Amanda.
"No. It's not them."
….
tbc.