The days began to blur together as the month sped on at hyper speed. There were so many cases to solve and not enough time to do so. It bent the 1-6 beneath the crushing weight of a staggering amount of new cases. 1PP watched every day to see to it that Sergeant Benson was capable of running a squad. They kept them all under the microscope, even though no one knew it but Olivia herself.
She sat in her desk on a dim afternoon, rolling her pen between her fingers as she watched her squad at work. The deep sigh she gave alleviated nothing. There was still that discomfort within. It felt as though something in her was off - misplaced, broken even. A large part of her cared not an ounce for doing the work she'd so long lived for.
Her mind tried to fight against it, but she knew it was right. If it didn't get easier, there was no way she'd be able to keep it up.
Nick's eye caught hers as he glanced back into her office.
Her bruise was fading, but it reminded her every time she looked in the mirror of how much she drank every night.
Nick's heart sank when he met her gaze. He could see how exhausted she was, physically and emotionally. Yet there was almost nothing he felt ready to do. He respected her too much to bring Lewis up again - to face her directly in asking her what she needed. But every nerve in him told him to betray those thoughts anyway.
Every day the darkness in her eyes grew. Every day she brought to work with her the evidence of another night gone by with hardly a wink of rest.
Nick made his decision and then took his eyes from hers, returning to his work silently. He had already seen her read him. It was too late to keep her from knowing what his thoughts were.
Olivia watched as her partner tore his gaze from hers. She was so listless. She looked back at her paperwork to find some determination to catch the spark of interest she swore she still had. She felt nothing. The spark was either buried so deeply within her that she couldn't find it, or it was gone forever.
Olivia took a deep breath as the lines of words blurred together. The feeling that she had when she felt she didn't have the fire she used to anymore was the most crushing, and it happened daily. She found her mind wandering as her pen hovered over the blank lines requiring simple markings to finish. Her throat craved the burning of her release as she swallowed air. Her mind wanted to be set free of its burdens again, relieving her body of its aches as she dealt with the stress and exhaustion.
Olivia bit her lip. It had happened. And she knew it. She was hooked. She was addicted.
Her pen fell from her grip. She dropped her eyes to the floor, shaking her head for so many different reasons. Then as she let herself look up again, she caught Nick's eyes in hers again. This time they were locked on one another. Neither looked away. Neither could.
Olivia saw the concern in Nick's eyes - maybe even a little fear. Nick could see her reading his eyes as he saw the darkness and pain that showed her internal struggle. It hadn't been like that since she'd come to work with that horrific injury. She was never openly weighted. Sure - they could tell before that she was under a lot of pressure, but they had no idea. She didn't let on that she was struggling. Even in a room full of officers who know when the slightest dynamic was off, she used her expertise to keep her battles out of everyone's eyes. Until the moment his eyes locked with hers, he had had only the slightest idea of how deep her pain went.
Olivia could tell he was reading deeper than before, but she couldn't will herself to look away. The familiarity and comfort she found in his eyes was unequal to anything she'd had in many weeks. It only lasted a few moments. Nick's gaze moved, carried to the man who entered the squad room. Olivia had seen him.
Tucker entered her office, closing the door behind him. Suddenly Olivia's healing injury felt more noticeable. She stood up and saw his eyes as he saw it.
"The hell happened to you?" He absentmindedly reached out toward the injury before thinking better of it and pulling his hand away.
Olivia shook her head. "Nothing. What brings you here?"
She changed the subject as quickly as she could. It didn't keep Tucker's eyes from catching the bruise occasionally. It took a moment to get his thoughts back in order.
"Just wanted - the suits wanted me to relay a message. The task force that has been examining past cases - the integrity unit - is done. Police commissioner wants the money going somewhere else."
Olivia paused for a moment, trying to wrap her brain around what that meant. Nothing. It meant nothing.
"I thought you were one of those suits." She let only a sliver of playfulness grab hold in her cynical comment.
Tucker could barely hear it. His eyes kept flickering back to the bruise on her forehead.
"Cute, Sergeant." He fired back with narrow eyes, his signature look. But it grew soft soon after he'd made it.
"He just wanted you to know that they didn't find anything else in sex crimes that needed any sort of a double look. Thought it'd lighten your load a little." He shifted his weight, a little thrown by how uneasy he felt. It was something he hadn't felt before.
Looking at that bruise almost made his stomach turn. It didn't make sense. Had she fallen? Had Cassidy - ? No. He wouldn't. Would he?
Olivia nodded slowly. "And he couldn't have picked up the phone to tell me that? He had to send you."
She continued to challenge as she crossed her arms, leaning back on her desk.
"A phone call to your office has a 20 percent chance of getting answered. If that. It was the best bet we had to just let you know. I'm not enjoying this either, Sergeant." Tucker couldn't cross his arms. It felt like they were frozen.
Olivia nodded slowly, feeling her blood run cold as soon as she remembered why it sounded so familiar. David Haden. David Haden had walked out of her life - they'd chosen the road they were on - so that he could accept the promotion and keep his job as the head of the crime integrity unit.
"Thanks." She spoke softly, making it clear that it was time for Tucker to let himself out.
As the man reached for the door, he cursed under his breath, almost hating what he already knew was coming out of his mouth next. He turned toward her again.
"You get that checked out by a doctor?" He pointed to her forehead.
Olivia pressed her teeth together. "No. It's nothing big."
Tucker paused for a long moment. "How 'big' was it when you did it?"
He didn't give her a chance to answer. He knew more than he cared to talk about.
Olivia was left speechless. She touched her tender bruise. He was right.
David moved the last of his boxes back into his old office, a comfortable feeling after three years of 1PP's work. He wiped the slight evidence of his effort from his forehead.
He examined the work to be done. There was so much of it. But he felt right again.
He sighed as he moved a box from his desk chair to the bookshelf behind it. The night was quiet. The night was lonely.
Olivia couldn't get past Nick, who was the last of the team still seated in the squad room when she left, without a look of question. She stopped briefly, her bag dangling from her arm.
"He just came in to tell me the crime integrity unit was disbanded. It's nothing big." She gave him a small smile, reassuring him that she was actually telling him everything.
It felt like he'd been doubting that, and she knew that's because it was true. She'd been telling him hardly anything. But he still knew something was going on. He simply respected her too much to ask. She knew that.
He nodded as he leaned back. "Need a lift home?" He asked quietly. He already knew what the answer would be.
Olivia wanted to tell him. She wanted to tell him everything. But she knew she couldn't. Riding home with him would only be silence that she couldn't break. Still, she found herself sick of the looks she got on the subway with the healing bruise on her forehead.
"Sure."
Nick had to pause to make sure he'd heard right. But he stood up cautiously, gathering his things as Olivia stood there. They were silent on the way to the parking space. It was almost five minutes into the drive when Olivia got the courage to speak.
"Nick I know I haven't been - I haven't been much of myself lately." She sighed deeply.
Nick said nothing. He didn't feel he could, and he knew Olivia didn't expect him to. She looked down at her hands. Never before had she felt so unsure of herself.
"I'm just - I'm getting there." She said even quieter.
Nick swallowed hard, preparing himself for the backlash he felt he might get when he asked.
"Is there something going on - with you?"
He had to put it that way. He had no idea what was going on. But it wasn't just Olivia "not feeling like herself." It was more. He knew that bruise hadn't resulted from a clumsy fall. Olivia didn't do that.
She shot him a face of anger, feeling boxed into a corner, exposed. "
If you know, would you tell me?" She threw knives into her sarcastic response.
Nick felt them ricochet away from him before they had a chance to sink their blades into his skin. He knew the pressure she was under, and her answer simply made it easier for him to understand something was happening.
Olivia shifted uneasily, calming herself. She realized what she'd just done.
"I'm sorry." She almost whispered.
Nick's car rolled to a stop at the curb of her building just in time to save her from explaining. It felt like she was always running, and as strange as it seemed, she didn't have the energy to stop. Olivia let her gaze settle on her partner again.
"Thanks, Nick."
"Anytime. Listen, Liv - if there's anything you need -"
She cut him off. "I know. Thanks."
Her feet took the stairs in stride up to her lonely, empty apartment. She knew her good friend was waiting. Her door closed behind her, and her legs took her to the cupboard. It yielded warmth in her throat, the comfort of burning in her stomach. The first glass, second and third were gone within five minutes. The fourth went down no problem, the fifth following easily.
Olivia leaned against the cupboard as she felt the liquid working. She hated herself for doing it, and she knew exactly what it was she was doing. But she could not stop. Even her self-disappointment as she sipped the wine disappeared when it took affect, and that was why she did it.
Lewis disappeared, her mother, her job, her loneliness.
She'd hardly made it to bed when she collapsed into darkness, the calm trap within her mind. The world let her go, and she did. She went. She left her problems, creating another one - a bigger one.