10

The meeting continued in an order she was familiar with. It felt strange to hear Elliot introduce himself as an alcoholic, but the words rolled of of his tongue as familiar as his middle name. Soon it was Olivia's turn to introduce herself and her ears burned. Every pair of eyes were on her.

"My name's Olivia and I'm..." she felt Elliot's thumb run slow circles across her hand and she swallowed. "I'm a friend of Elliot's."

"Welcome, Olivia."

Soon the introductions were over and volunteers were reading the Twelve Steps of AA aloud. Old news was summarized and new news was introduced. Soon the topic of the night was announced (Letting go of old habits) and the group was taking turns sharing stories and advice. Olivia leaned back in her chair, never letting go of Elliot's hand.

The hour rolled by quickly and before she knew it the meeting was coming to a close. The group stood once again, joined hands, and in sync recited the closing prayer. Olivia felt a pang of disappointment when she realized that Elliot never shared with the group. Maybe he wasn't very talkative at meetings, or maybe he wasn't ready to talk with her there. She reminded herself that he asked her to be here and let it go.

Back outside the group split into smaller circles. In one area gathered the smoking crowd, another the younger crowd, while some people headed straight for their vehicles. Elliot motioned with his hand as they passed through the front area of the church and towards a small cove where four people were chatting loudly. Olivia assumed he knew the group considering he was steering them in that direction.

This must be some of Elliot's crowd.

As they approached, the older woman with the bright colored hair immediately stuck her hand out. "Olivia, I'm Janet. We've heard quite a bit about you."

Olivia managed a small laugh while a blush creeped across her face. "Nice to meet you Janet."

"And Liv," he motioned to the other two people, who appeared to be a couple. "This is Ryan and Shelby Wrighter. They joined the same week I did."

"You have a pretty good sized crowd for the time of this meeting, Janet." Olivia thought it was safe to assume that she was lead runner for this location.

"We try and have a larger meeting to accommodate for the shift workers. This one is perfect for those just getting off work in the later evening hours."

"I don't know as many folks here," Elliot added. "I'm a regular at the evening meetings."

They talked for another fifteen minutes or so, pointing out stories from the meeting they particularly enjoyed and spreading some gossip that Olivia was obviously unfamiliar with. She noticed once again that Elliot was rather quiet, but didn't allow herself to think too much about it.

Soon they were saying their goodbyes and heading back to his house in a comfortable silence. As they were pulling onto his street she fought back a large yawn, but Elliot had noticed.

"Sorry to keep you out so late."

She gave him a sideways glance as they pulled into his driveway. "I was happy to be there tonight."

"It was a good topic," he added.

"Mmm." Olivia had shut the car off but they made no effort to get out of the vehicle. "You ready for tomorrow?"

"Absolutely. I don't know what I was thinking earlier today. Sometimes I let myself get down for no reason..." he sighed softly and turned towards her. "I'm really glad you went looking for me."

She smiled and met his eyes. He had a hard expression on his face, but his eyes shined back at her and she noticed how, while his body language told her he was fine, his eyes seemed to have a sadness within them.

Out of the corner of her eye he noticed his hand hesitantly move forward before dropping back down.

"This would have been so much easier two years ago."

"Yeah," she agreed.

SATURDAY 05:36 AM

Olivia was never one to cancel plans unless work came up. And as the circumstances fell, it always seemed that the plans she wasn't actually interested in were never interrupted, where as the ones she was looking forward to, caught the rain check of a case. Olivia wasn't one to be resentful towards the job, because she knows the victims can't decide when to be targeted, but today Olivia wanted to say "No!" when her phone rang.

Because today is Saturday and she was supposed to be going out to lunch with El and Eli.

Cragen gave her the address over the phone and reluctantly Olivia was dressed, out the door, and at the crime scene in less than twenty minutes. She met her partner, Amaro, outside of the house and he put a hand up, signaling for her to stop. His eyes darted between herself and the uniforms in the front yard. She followed his eyes and frowned as she noticed the grief stricken, sickly facial expressions on most of the uniforms.

"This one won't be easy, Liv."

They never are.

He handed her a small white hand towel and stepped aside. "They've been here a few weeks," he added.
Olivia's plans had definitely changed.

SATURDAY 5:00 PM

Olivia kept telling herself she would call him. Each time it crossed her mind to pick up her phone, something else came up and she was swept back into the case. It was a nasty situation all around. Her team cleared up from the scene about an hour ago and were conducting their follow ups back at the station.

Two of the open missing children cases were solved in a way; the children were found. But the two young boys were found not only deceased, but dismembered. Remains were scattered throughout the small trailer home, which according to local residents, had been abandoned for over a year. In the back bedroom was an unidentifiable deceased adult male, who according to the initial report, had died of a self inflected gunshot wound to the head. That wasn't the worst part, though. Olivia's team was called out because the deceased suspect left video tapes that documented the months worth of sexual assaults he had committed against the two boys.

To say it was horrific was an understatement.

And while all Olivia wanted to do was curl up at home with a bottle of wine, she sat at her desk with the rest of her team while they scanned through the disturbing video tapes trying to find identifiers for the suspect.

Finally Olivia accepted defeat. She wasn't going to get a chance to call Elliot right now. So she settled for a quick, apologetic text message, before brushing the guilt off her shoulders and burying herself back into the case at hand.

He will understand.

SUNDAY 2:00 PM

They were no closer to identifying him. The bastard may have left his body for dead, but he took extra caution in hiding any identifying features from the cameras as he video tapes his sexual assaults. The body's were so badly decayed that there was nothing left but liquid and putrid odors.

The squad room had remained silent for the last two days. All she heard was the sound of papers rustling, pens dropping, tapes rewinding, and the occasional movement when somebody needed to step outside for air. Olivia didn't believe she had a breaking point, but if she didn't get away from this case soon, she was going to snap on somebody. They were all frustrated, tired, and sick to their stomachs.

Elliot had sent her a few messages but she read them without replying. She wasn't in s good place right now.

SUNDAY 8:06 PM

Craven finally sent the team home at eight. He notified the Queens SVU to pick up any on-calls and she told the group to take a few days.

"There's nothing else we can do," he told her. "Let's wait for the dental records to come back and then start with fresh eyes. "

Fresh eyes.

As if she could erase what had already been seen.

SUNDAY 10:46 PM

She should have called Elliot. She should have left the squad, pulled out her phone, and dialed her former partners number. He could have taken her mind off of the case. He could have saved her from herself. He could have helped her forget.

But instead, here she is.

The bottle of wine lies empty on the table in front of her and she shifts the glass delicately between her fingers. She held a firm grip as she sipped at the last remaining drips of liquid torture, swallowing slowly and savoring the taste of her freedom.

Forgetting. That's what the wine was doing for her. Just as it helped her forget her mother, her lost opportunity with Calvin, her ex-lover David, and her former partner Elliot. She would forgot the images of Eddie McNeer and Junior Severide, two eight year old boys who had been missing for seven months. Freedom from the memories that kept her awake each night.

At least for tonight.

She was supposed to go on a lunch date with Elliot and his son. She was supposed to do laundry on Sunday. She was supposed to call Casey and tell her about Elliot.

She should have called him.

To the reviewer that asked about Lewis. I haven't watched the new seasons religiously, and all I know about Lewis is what I've read in other fics. So unfortunately that part of Olivia's life is not in this story.

To the readers, the next chapter can be up in a day or so if you'd like that. I know I wouldn't be too pleased with that ending, myself.