Air, she thinks. I need air.
What she really needs is a cigarette and a day off, but she'll take what she can get these days.
Barba is probably following her downstairs and the logical part of her brain doesn't blame him, but the emotional part? The raw, exhausted part of her that just exposed a gaping wound that she had been trying to cover up for years? That part of her wants to ring his fucking neck.
He raped me.
There. She'd said it. She'd said it on paper and behind the witness stand, in front of strangers and friends, behind closed doors and in empty courtrooms. She's even said it to herself a few times.
Barba is helping her go over her testimony, and it's strange to be the subject of each question. She did not recount how a victim described their attack; she described her own attack, in sharp, excruciating detail. When she looked up afterward, Barba held her gaze with such obvious difficulty that every fiber of her being told her to bolt. So she did.
Now here she is at the back entrance of the courthouse, where attorneys and high-profile defendants alike sneak in and out unbothered every day. She wishes she had thought to grab her purse on the way out because damnit she could really use a cigarette right now.
She contemplates hailing a cab and just disappearing for a few hours, but she knows that Fin would find her anyway; she's already learned that the hard way this week. She could walk back in there and tell Barba that she'll finish up tomorrow, but that would be an admission that she can't handle this. She had promised them- Barba, Sergeant Benson, everyone- that she could. It's becoming more and more obvious that she can't handle this, but she doesn't have the energy for more painful truths today.
She starts to pace- never a good sign- mentally berating herself for leaving in the first place. No matter how I play this, she thinks, Benson's gonna find out and I'll get another lecture and a mandatory appointment with her therapist. Fucking great.
A slammed car door muffles her thoughts for a moment, and a defense attorney she doesn't recognize steps out of a BMW into the biting January cold. He makes his way inside without acknowledging her, which is perfectly fine. I just want to be alone, she thinks.
"Well then you came to the wrong city."
She turns around to find Barba outside, closing the door behind him. Great, she thinks, I was thinking out loud. Another good sign.
"Couldn't exactly stay in Atlanta now could I?" Her tone is as cold as the air she's breathing. He lowers his eyes and digs his heels into the ground.
They stare at each other for a moment before she starts again.
"I-I'm sorry. I just needed a minute."
He looks up with those damn eyes again, that kicked puppy look.
"It's ok, just um- maybe next time tell me where you're going because uh, I don't wanna have to call Benson every time you go AWOL." She sees his apologetic smirk and concedes that that's probably for the best, but she doesn't move.
"God it's freezing out here. Do you want to come in?" Because she can see that he's trying his best, she agrees. They make it back to the courtroom before she finally has the balls to stop him.
"Wait. I just," she starts, "can we do this tomorrow? I just, um, it's been a long day and, uh, I'm...tired."
He's surprised she admitted it at all, let alone asked him to help her. But it's getting later and he's gotten more out of her than he'd hoped for today so he might as well give the woman a break.
"Sure. Same time tomorrow?"
"Yeah," and she turns to grab her purse.
She doesn't feel much like going home and she's not allowed anywhere near the precinct, so she finds herself wandering the streets of New York, taking in the atmosphere of a city that was supposed to give her a fresh start, a new life. Fuck that, she thinks. She could've gone anywhere. Boston, D.C., Chicago, fuckin' Seattle, it didn't matter. She picked the biggest city in the country and hoped that she'd never run into him at a conference or a visit back home.
Him. What a fuckin' cliché, that her mind can't even say his name. How fucking pathetic. How dare she call herself a cop. How dare she even exist in the same universe as the Great Olivia Benson, a cop who'd built her career on getting too close to victims and never ever backing down. No matter what Benson did, she came out on top.
And who am I? she thinks. What have I done to deserve any of this? A good job, a decent life, rape, a gambling addiction. None of it made any fucking sense to her. She didn't deserve the good parts of her life, but she sure as hell didn't deserve the shitty parts either.
What a fucking mess, she thinks.
She checks the time while she's waiting in front of a shitty street vendor for her probably-burnt coffee. She realizes that she's been wandering for hours, which wouldn't matter except for the fact that she needs to get Frannie from the dog sitter before she ends up paying extra for being late again. She hails a cab and makes it home just in time to stare aimlessly at the 6 o'clock news.
Maybe I'll figure it out tomorrow, she thinks.