"Why here?"

"You live near here don't you?"

"Close enough but I could've met you anywhere in the city…." said Casey, sitting with Olivia and staring at the imposing frontage of Columbia University standing proud in the low winter sun. "Why here? Why Columbia?"

"The way that you're asking me that question so unsubtly makes me think you already know the answer, councillor."

"What's going on, Liv?" said Casey, turning to her friend with concern.

Olivia looked better than the last time she had seen her, visiting at her apartment. A little of the colour had returned to her cheeks and she seemed a fraction less exhausted. Casey watched as her friend's eyes cast soulfully around the campus, her chin tucked into the material of her thick black scarf.

"I had to come here. I had to see for myself where this all started."

"You remember your mother?"

"There are so many things I wish I could ask her. I guess she never really came to terms with what happened or she wouldn't have drank the way she did. I don't blame her, even with how things turned out. It's strange to think how it was the same for her; one moment sent her down a completely different path from the one she was on. Maybe it was premeditated and she was the target, or maybe she was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Either way her life was forever changed."

"Like yours was?" said Casey after several moments.

"I keep trying to picture what it would've been like if it had played out differently. If I hadn't hit my head. The bullet was in and out my shoulder and its healed fine. I would've been back at work by now. Elliot and I would be together making plans for the future and the baby. It's not so hard to imagine. Especially not around him."

"So you do have feelings for Stabler?" asked Casey, raking a handful of blonde hair from her face as they strolled side by side. She turned to Olivia and thought she caught an almost blush, or the closest Benson would ever come to one.

"There's a spark, an attraction. I felt it the first time I saw him. I knew what we'd been to one another by the way he looked at me and the way it made me feel. The way it still makes me feel."

"Isn't that enough to keep you together until you remember the rest of it?"

"I thought so, really I did. And maybe it would've been if it'd only been a matter of days, weeks even. I see it in his eyes, I see in his face how much history there is between us. He knows me inside out and back to front and how I would react to things, what I'd do or say. It's such an easy, natural dialogue but I've forgotten my lines. The whole time he's looking at me waiting to see me looking back and I can't. She's not in there, that woman he loves. And I don't know how long it'll be until she's back, or if she ever will be. We can't start fresh because he can't forget everything that's happened, and we can't continue as we were because I can't remember it."

"Wow, wow I don't even know what to say."

"Neither do I…." said Olivia quietly, staring into the distance and adding, "… apart from that we can't keep on playing pretend."

"Have you talked to Stabler about this?"

"Not yet."

"Because it'll break his heart, you know that right?"

"I wish I could change things. You have no idea what I'd give to fix this."

"What about the baby?"

"I've been looking into options. I mean it's his child, so obviously if he wants to raise it then that's totally his call. That would be my preference. If not then I've gotten some advice on what the adoption process would be…"

"Olivia no, no…." stopping dead in her tracks Casey reached a hand to her temple, shaking her head in disbelief.

"What? Look I swear if you're about to tell me how much I want this baby, how much I've waited forever to be a mother then I'm not having that conversation. I get that that might have been the case before but things have changed. Like I said, everything has changed."

"I'm assuming you haven't talked to Elliot about this either?"

"Do you want to sound a little more judgemental Casey? Because you're really being no help at all right now. I'm not a defendant. You don't get to put me on the stand."

"I'm just afraid for my friend is all…."

"I get that, and believe me I really am try into see this from Elliot's point of view. It's why I stopped considering a termination. He gets an equal say in what happens to the baby, of course he does he's the father."

"I wasn't talking about him, Liv. It's you I'm scared for. I'm afraid that you're throwing away everything you've waited so long for, everything you've ever wanted. And then one day you'll remember everything. You'll remember who you are and how much all of this means to you and it'll be too late. You won't be able to get any of it back. I'm not judging you, I swear. I'm your friend and I'll support you in whatever you want to do but I won't ever stop being honest with you. And I think you're making a huge mistake."

"Did you manage to sleep at all?"

"Barely, I couldn't switch off. I just keep thinking that we're missing something. Something small, something that seemed insignificant when we were talking to Luis and Carla. Something that would tell us where she is."

"You still favouring the idea that Sara ran?"

"Do you still think she was taken?" said Olivia, answering his question with another question as she gathered herself up from the breakroom cot and twisted her hair into a clip.

"I'm not sure what I think anymore. This all seems to be getting greyer by the minute and I'm scared we're running out of time. We're past the 48 hour mark now, right?"

"Almost."

"What'd you want to do?"

"Elliot about last night…."

"Last night?" he asked, almost comical in his attempt to remain nonchalant. He knew exactly what she was referring to, it had been plaguing his every thought too.

"I know I got out the car suddenly and it probably came across as though I was upset or mad at you or something. Which I wasn't, I'm not. So just wanted to clear the air."

"Consider it cleared…." he said, pausing for a moment before adding quietly, "…everything okay?"

"Yeah, yeah fine."

"Sure?"

"I don't know…."

"Talk to me, Liv. What's going on?" he knew exactly what was wrong, and he had a fairly good idea of what was going on. It was more a matter of whether either one of them was finally ready to acknowledge it, to call out its existence: to address the elephant in the room by name.

"I don't know El…." she swallowed slowly, remembering their painfully near miss in the squad car the previous evening, "… you tell me?"

"It was late, or early, depending. We're both over-tired and…." but then he stopped himself and fell quiet. Sighing steadily he wandered over to the break room cot and took a seat beside Olivia. Leaning forward with his elbows against his thighs he sat in silence.

"Elliot?"

"I can't do this anymore, Liv."

"Can't do what?" she asked with a hushed rasp, sliding her hands under her legs to hide the fact they were shaking.

"Last night, last week, the last twelve years….." turning his head sideways he caught her eyes and smiled knowingly, "… the way you're looking at me right now."

"I don't know what you mean."

"I think that you do…." he said almost under his breath, reaching out a hand and tracing her jaw lightly with his fingertips, "…and I'm really hoping that you feel the same way."

"If we do this we can't ever undo it. Once we go there…." tilting her head, feeling the skin of her cheek melt into his warm palm, "… there's no coming back."

"We have to be really sure we want to step over that line."

"Yeah…" she murmured, removing her hands from under her thighs and reaching one to his wrist. Wrapping her fingers around it tightly she held fast. "Do you? Want to?"

"Step over it? Liv I wanna sprint so damn fast over that line there's…." but his sentence was ended by her lips on his, the kiss that followed crushing any doubt in either of their minds that this was not only what they both wanted, but what they needed.

"Liv?"

"Captain!"

"Everything okay?" he asked, worried that he had startled her. "Fin said you were waiting for me in the break room. I didn't mean to give you a start. We were using my office for a little impromptu interview."

She wondered whether he could tell how hot she had flushed, how warm she still felt. He wondered whether he could see in her face that for a few moments previously she had stepped into her old self and lived and breathed memories so real she could still feel them on her skin.

"I just wanted to come in person and say that I've thought about what you said in your e-mail and I'm sure. I want to continue my personal leave for the duration of the pregnancy and leave things as open ended as possible for any return here."

"That can be arranged. I have to ask though, Liv, is everything okay? Only you don't seem yourself…" hearing what he had said play back in his mind Donald Cragen cursed himself under his breath, "… I mean you don't seem, well…."

"It's been a difficult time."

"I can't imagine how hard this is for you. Is there anything I can do?" he asked, knowing Benson well enough to tell when she was upset. Something had rattled her, and he imagined it must be unsettling to be back here after the trauma of the shooting.

"Watch out for Elliot…." she said with a quiet sadness, bringing her hands to a fist as she remembered again the closeness she had experienced in this very room and felt a instinct to protect her partner, "… this is harder for him."

"I've been an ass."

"Yep, yep you have."

"I apologise…." said Elliot, his face held in a completely transparent state of contrition, "….unreservedly."

"Is everything okay?" asked Detective Aubrie Mackenzie, catching him a little off guard. He chose to take her concern as an acceptance of his apology, and that she would therefore not mind his taking a seat beside her at her desk.

"Look, Aubrie, can we just start again? Completely from scratch as though it's your first day and Cragen literally just told us we're gonna be partners."

"Sure, sure we can do that…" she nodded, a warm smile spreading across naturally rosy lips as she folded her arms across her chest, "… good to meet you Detective Stabler."

"So you worked homicide before, huh? That's no cake walk."

"It is compared to SVU."

"Yeah?" asked Elliot, shrugging back into his chair and tossing his leg up, resting his ankle on the opposing knee and stretching his hands up behind his head. "How so?"

"All the victims are already dead…." she said simply, but without a hint of flippancy, "… you don't have to look them in the eye. And they don't cry on you."

"That's fair I guess. How long were you there?" he asked, genuinely interested. She twisted a handful of flame red curls off her face and pinned them at the side of her head.

"Five years give or take, but I was ready for something new. The flip side of how difficult it is here is that you still stand a chance at affecting the outcome. The survivors are still alive to see justice done."

"I guess I hadn't thought about it like that…." smiled Elliot, finding it strangely refreshing and encouraging to see his job through new eyes. He had never doubted himself or his desire to stay in the unit, but it was nice to have an outsider's perspective from the other side of the fence.

"I got tired of feeling like I was always getting there just too late and that whatever we did would never be able to help the victim. It felt like we were a constant disappointment to the next of kin. At least here there's a fighting chance of you catching the perp and that allowing the vic to get some closure and hopefully move on with their life. I needed that hope."

"I guess we all do."

"What about you? You've been here a long time, huh?"

"Too long!" laughed Elliot, slightly evading the question but doing so with a warm enough smile that Mackenzie either didn't notice or didn't mind. "Most importantly – how'd you take your coffee?"

"Oh I don't drink coffee."

"You don't drink coffee?" repeated Elliot with genuine incredulity. "Then I don't think this is gonna work out between us, I don't think we can be partners."

"Don't be such a Judgy Budgie…." scoffed Mackenzie, rising from her desk and attaching her shield and weapon to her belt, "… and this is going to work out just fine."

"You reckon so?" he laughed, slipping on his jacket.

"Come on, I've set up an interview with a woman Afia took pre-natal yoga with. I'll drive."

"I can't get over it. Any of it, all of it. I can't get over it, or around it, or through it. I can't reconcile the person I am, the reality I'm in, with the person they tell me I am. I have horrific, breathtakingly vivid dreams of memories and fragments of my life to the point where I dread falling asleep. The pieces of my life that I've managed to claw together are violent and cruel and lonely and hopeless and the more I remember the less I want to. It's too much, it's too hard. The weight of it all is sitting on my chest and I can barely breathe. I can't handle living day in day out with these people, these wonderful, kind, loving people who are so desperate to have me back. Only I'm not coming back."

"Is that something you've decided in your own mind?"

"I don't have control over my own mind anymore. That's the problem."

"There is no psychological or physiological basis for the assertion that you won't regain full memory over time."

"How much time?"

"That I can't answer."

"And that's why I can't do this anymore. I can't live every day as a total stranger in my own life. I can't continue to be a constant disappointment to everyone."

"Everyone is on your side Olivia and no one is expecting…."

"Yes they are! Constantly! And that expectation is exhausting and want out. I am sick and tired of these people that care so deeply for me being hurt over and over again by the fact that I can't give them what they want, or be who they so desperately need me to be. I've rented a place on Long Island and I'm going away for a while."

"And you've thought about this?"

"Don't patronise me, of course I have. It hasn't been an easy decision, it won't be a popular decision; but it's the only decision. I'm sure of it."

"Will you continue these sessions with me? I prefer to see clients face to face but perhaps we could Skype or I can refer you to…"

"I really just need to stop….." her voice catching Olivia felt tears filling her eyes, as though every emotion she ever had was held so close to the surface it constantly threatened to escape, "… I need this all to stop."

"They're your favourite."

"They are?" said Olivia with an uncreative smile as she took the bouquet of flowers from Elliot. Seeing his face fall, she quickly added, "They are! They're beautiful. Thank you."

"No worries."

"Did you want to come in?" she asked, as Elliot stood in her doorway with his hands thrust into the pockets of his leather jacket. "I've just made soup if you're hungry?"

"You made soup?" he smiled, following her into her apartment and shrugging off his jacket. "What's the occasion?"

"No occasion, just boredom…." she breezed, wandering across to the stove and giving her creation a stir. "I go a little stir crazy and it's been so cold out wandering around the city holds less appeal."

"How're you doing?" he asked, longing for the familiarity between them that seemed to have gradually ebbed away the past few weeks. "Are you feeling okay? How was therapy this week?"

"I'm feeling fine, everything with the pregnancy is exactly as it should be."

"Liv I wasn't…." he stepped forward and reached out, she stepped back and held her hands at her side.

"Elliot I can't do this."

"I'm sorry, sorry, I didn't mean to…." his face twisted, his eyes filled with confliction, "…it's just hard to know what to do. How to be. This is getting harder not easier."

"I know."

"I want to help you, I want to be there for you. We were doing okay at first, weren't we? Did I do something? Did I upset you?"

"No! Oh no, no you're great…." sighing heavily she removed the soup from the stove and set it down on a mat. Putting the lid on it she turned off the heat and then turned to him and smiled sadly as she uttered the worst cliché imaginable, "It's not you, Elliot, it's me."

"Are you seriously saying that to me?" he scoffed, the last thread of his patience snapping. "Are you for real right now Olivia?"

"I'm not the person you need me to be and I can't keep trying to pretend. It's exhausting and pointless and it'll only hurt us both in the end. We can't just start over when there's so much water under the bridge, it would never work."

"What happened to us being on the same side? What happened to us being in this together?" he asked, incredulous. "What happened to all the things you said to me when you wanted me to play this your way? Now you're done even trying to meet me halfway?"

"It's not that, it's not as easy as…."

"Easy? Liv none of this is easy. It's damn near impossible from where I'm standing. I've tried everything I can think of to make this work. I've given you space, I've tried to bring you closer. I've held the patience of a saint when my insides were kicking and screaming with frustration and what now you just want to give up?"

"I can't give you want you want right now. Who knows if I'll ever be the person you fell in love with again. You don't think it's going to tear you apart trying to live with the version of me I am now? I see it in your face, in your eyes every minute we're together Elliot. You're hanging off my every word, every movement, waiting for me to remember everything."

"Because you will, any day now, something will trigger and you'll…."

"And what if I don't? Do you have any idea how it feels to be a constant disappointment? To see the look on your face when you bring me flowers that are apparently my favourite but I don't even like how they smell."

"Liv…."

"I need to go away for a while. I need to be somewhere no one knows me."

"And what about me?" he asked with a bleak shake of his head. "I've not said it, I've been so careful not to say it because that would be too much pressure and wouldn't be fair on you but what about being fair on me? I love you Olivia. I love you and I've given up everything to be with you and now you're just gonna walk away?"

"Don't do that! Don't you put that on me!"

"I know, I'm sorry, but it's true and…."

"I didn't ask for any of this! If things were different and the shooting had never happened, if I'd never fallen and hit my head then I'd still remember everything. Everything would have happened just as it was supposed to and we'd be together planning for raising this baby as a couple completely happy. Only it did happen."

"I know that, God I know that."

"I don't feel the way you feel about me. I want you, I'm attracted to you, and it would be so easy to let that be enough but it never would be. It never could. What we've been through together to get to this point is who we are, it's what our relationship is built on and I don't remember it all."

"But you will, in time you will, and…."

"I have pieces, pieces of memories and feelings. It's all confused, it's all a blur of moments and conversations and events. I don't remember the first time I met you. I don't remember how we went from partners to something more. I don't remember conceiving this child. Do you know how frightening that is?"

"I'm so sorry, I hadn't…."

"I know that there's something between us Elliot and I know that it's everything to you. I know it's everything to me too. I can feel it in my gut, I can feel you under my skin. That just isn't enough to carry on as though everything is exactly as it was before. It wouldn't be right, it would be fair to either of us. I have to do this. I'm sorry."

"What about me?" he chocked, echoing his earlier question. "I get it's what you have to do, that it's what you need. But what about me? What do I do?"

"I don't know."

"Do I get to know where you're going? Or for how long? What about our baby? It's my child too."

"Don't be like that…."

"Like what?" he asked, and she shook her head pleadingly to see tears filling his blue eyes.

"I wish that I could give you what you want. I wish that things were different…"

"Yeah…." strained Elliot, as hot devastated tears seared his cheeks but he staunchly refused to acknowledge them, "… yeah me too." Sniffing hard, refusing eye contact to as to not completely dissolve, he grabbed his jacket and walked briskly for the door. As the door slammed and she heard him emit a heart rending, gasping sob from the hallway Olivia sank down into the sofa and buried her head in her hands.