TITLE: Twinkle
AUTHOR: Liv
RATING: PG
FEEDBACK: Please?
CLASSIFICATION: Olivia/Elliot friendship UST
SPOILERS: "Popular" Season 3...see it first, or you won't know what the hell I'm talking about
DISTRUBUTION STATEMENT: If anyone is so inclined to post this anywhere, let me know about it first...I promise you'll get the green light...and I'll be flattered
AUTHOR'S NOTES: My first attempt at channeling Kathy...please let me know what you think. Also, I think the title really sucks, but I'm horrible at coming up with stuff like that. If there are any suggestions, please let me know.
DISCLAIMER: I don't own any of the characters on SVU, I'm only playing with them for the time being and will return them in one piece...I promise.
Thanks to myrth for beta-ing!
There's a damn good reason I don't visit my husband at work very often; her name is Olivia Benson. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that my husband is a cheating low life—at least not in the physical sense. I honestly think I could get over it if I knew he saw her as nothing more than a good lay, but with them, it goes so much deeper than that and that's what kills me the most.
You watch the two of them together for about a minute, and you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. There's a twinkle in both of their eyes that appears only when the other is around. Before today, I told myself I was crazy; that there was nothing to worry about; that he couldn't possibly be in love with her, that he genuinely cared about her well-being because that's just the kind of guy he is, but God was I wrong. I made the mistake of going to the station today—I invaded their sacred turf—and yes, I paid dearly for it. When I first arrived, I was told they were in the field, following up a lead and should be back any moment. They strolled in about fifteen minutes later, eyes twinkling, soft banter being murmured between them—the whole nauseating bit. They were completely relaxed in one another's company, well, that is until they saw me. Both of them tensed up as soon as they saw me patiently awaiting their arrival, Olivia more so than Elliot. At least she had the decency to give us a few minutes alone after forcing out a quick, "Hey Kath."
Kath? That was kind of baffling to me. When the hell did we become friends and how come I never got the memo? The moment she left the room, his eyes lost that twinkle they'd had when he'd walked through the door with her. Now, he was looking at me and there was nothing left to look that way about.
After she told us that she was going to talk to the captain, I proceeded to rip into my husband. I of course had to be more restrained than I really would have liked, but the station was really not the place to get into a screaming match with him, for a variety of reasons. Particularly, the brunette one that would come to his assistance, pretty much immediately, I'm guessing. I suppose I'm pretty dumb to have not realized that my husband was playing me like a witness the night I told him about the girl from the hospital, but call me crazy, I really wasn't expecting him to practice his interrogation techniques on me. Now his zeal to do the right thing has cost me a friend and Carol the trust of any future patients and very possibly, her job. That's not a price that either of us were willing to pay and I'm damn sure it would have been nice if we'd been had the chance to vocalize that before this whole mess continued to snowball. I really wish I would have gotten the chance to tell him that, but of course, before I could even spit out the words, she was interrupting our conversation, eyes twinkling the moment she caught him in her line of vision.
"El, Cynthia Wilmont was just admitted to the hospital. Somebody tossed her down a flight of stairs," she said quasi out of breath to make it seem more dramatic than it actually was. I actually did a double take as I replayed her words in my mind, where the hell does she get off calling my husband, 'El'? He absolutely cannot stand it when I call him that, but it's A-okay when she does it? Wow. I've certainly had enough of this crap for one day. By the look in his eyes, I can tell this conversation is over, whether or not I want it to be, because as usual, 'duty calls'. I accept it and move over, allowing him to go back to her, not because I want to, but because I have to. I'm relatively certain that he'd cut off his right arm before letting her follow up a lead on her own.
Nothing I say or do will change the way the he feels about her and I'm sure as shit not going to say anything to her about her feelings for him. Hearing her admit to loving my husband as much as I know he loves her would be the ultimate masochistic move, and I'm not one for that sort of thing, which is precisely why I don't come to the station all that often. As long as I don't have to see it, I can pretend it's not happening, even though I know very well that's not the truth. You would think by now that I'd pretty much be numb to the pain that this causes, but every time I see them together, it's like someone just sliced open an old wound that just finished healing. I never thought I'd be one to admit it, but my husband is in love with another woman and I willingly turn a blind eye. It's not worth fighting with him about it anymore; he doesn't even realize how much in love with her he is, and honestly, I'm tired of yelling at him and crying about them. It's just not worth it. There's nothing that I can do to change what has happened throughout the course of their seven year partnership and I want to believe that it's something that neither one of them intended to happen. Sometimes it just seems like they should really be trying harder to hide their obvious feelings for one another because someday, the wrong person is going to pick up on it and the shit is really going to hit the fan.