Chapter Nine - Shower

Dana unlocked the door and helped Liv into the apartment. It was sparsely decorated, but it was better than a hotel room. Dana led her down the hall to the second bedroom.

"Someone else staying here?" Olivia asked.

"Yeah, in the front bedroom," Dana stated.

"A recruit?"

"After a fashion," Dana replied, "Look. Don't worry about your roommate. You need to worry about you. Huang called and he called the 'red-eye.' He'll be in the morning. You won't have to see him until the afternoon. Get some rest. Relax. We'll get through this."

"I just want to take a shower."

"Bathroom is that way. Be careful, though. It has been a week since you stood on your own. I don't want you back into the hospital because you fell in the shower. Take it easy."

"I will. I'll be okay. Leave me some take out menus in the kitchen. I'm sure that I'll be starving after I take my shower."

"Liv, take it easy. I'll come get you in the morning. Your wallet, credit cards and some cash are in your room. I've gotten UC to bring all of your stuff that we had in storage here. Mischa will be down in the morning to get your sizing for your cloths. Just let her know what you want and she'll send them back down for you. That woman is amazing."

"Dana?"

"Yeah?"

"Shut up and get out. I'll see you in the morning. Now, I'm going to take my shower."

Dana laughed. She smiled and left Olivia standing in her bedroom. She made sure to pull out the delivery menus in the kitchen and dump them on the table. She put the Wong Fong's on top, knowing that Liv preferred Chinese take-out.

Liv opened the closet. She noticed her jeans hanging next to some blouses. They were her clothes. She knew that the FBI would take care of her apartment in New York. She just wasn't prepared for her stuff to be in Virginia for her. She shook her head, grabbed some clothes and made her way down the hall to the bathroom.

She slowly, methodically, undressed. She turned the water on and then tested the temperature. She looked at herself in the mirror and sighed. She would check out the wounds and new scars when she done. Right now, all she wanted was to wash away…everything.

She stepped into the spray and let the warm water rush over her. She ran her hands through her short hair and grimaced as pain shot up her right arm. She leaned forward, against the tile and propped herself up with her left arm, as the memories came flooding through her mind.

Olivia was washing her hair after her haircut. She ran her hands through her shorn dark hair. It would take time for her to get used to it. She knew that she had to go see the tattooist later in the day. She was mentally preparing herself. She was trying to become Julie. She got out of the shower and dried off.

She walked into the room she would have until she went to Atlanta. The file for her undercover profile was laid out across the bed. She studied it as she dressed.

"Julie Seabrook," Olivia told the closet mirror. "I am Julie Seabrook."

Olivia studied the paperwork some more.

"I'm working for…Russell doing paperwork and paying invoices. Great, it's a desk job."

She shifted through the file and found a picture of Russell. She studied it, memorizing his face and features. Dana was good at placement. They favored each other enough to pass as siblings. The doctored family photos were in there, too. They looked like a normal happy family.

"Who are you, Julie?" Olivia asked herself as she began to formulate a cover story.

Olivia stood in front of the mirror, hanging on the inside of the closet door.

"Who are you? Julie? Olivia? Who are you, now?" Liv asked her reflection.

She reached up and traced the bruises on her face. She turned left and then right, noting that her skull hadn't been fractured. It wasn't for lack of trying. The yellowing bruises covered her eyes, cheeks and lips. There were still cuts, long clotted over, on her left eyebrow, the right side of her mouth and ears.

She touched the faded, thin scar on her neck from knife wound she'd sustained while on duty in New York. It was the smallest reminder of who she really was, deep down. She didn't have to see the scars on her back to know they were still there.

As Olivia, noted each new scar, each new wound that she had suffered, she concluded that her face had taken the brunt of the attack. She couldn't remember clearly who started it, but she knew that D. J. and Robin were the ones that beat her. Her legs weren't their normal tan, but more a sick yellow color from the bruises fading. The cuts there were mostly healed.

It had only been a week since extraction and she was already returning to normal. She stared at the face in the mirror again and laughed. Normal, she thought to herself, what the hell is that? She had forgotten what normal was for her the day that Alex went into Wit Sec.

"Why does everything always go back to Alex?" she chided herself, as she dressed.

She pulled on a pair of dark navy jeans and t-shirt. It was a gray Marines PT shirt. She laughed because she Elliot would rag her about it. She smiled. It was a good memory. One she wouldn't mind remembering and thinking about. Elliot…he had helped her, helped define who Olivia had become as an officer and a detective, he had been a good friend.

"Well, hello there, Olivia. Nice to see you, again. Are you ready to be you, again?" she asked herself.

She was fighting the tears that had begun to form. Everything was coming back to her. There were flashes and tidbits, real as to her mind as if she was back in the moment. The sight of her with her hair short and her face beaten to a bloody pulp dressed in a relaxed outfit didn't stop the flood. It was all finally coming back to her.

She found the corner in her room. She didn't remember sliding down the wall. She didn't remember curling into a ball. She didn't remember burying her head in her knees and hands. She didn't remember when she started crying, but she could feel the tears streaming down her face and hands. She went back to the day she met Ike Bellinger, then day that Olivia died for her and Julie was officially born.

Olivia stood under the spray of the warm water. She ran her hands through her now short dark hair. All of the highlights had been cut out. She let out a sigh she didn't know that she was holding. She stood there, washing the past away, knowing that in a few minutes Olivia Benson would longer exist. She got out of the shower, dried off and stood before the mirror.

The fluorescent lights did nothing for her natural beauty. She looked at her reflection. She watched her body move as she once again took stock of her short cropped hair. Her swagger would help her get through this she told herself. She stared at the person loking back from her in the mirror, again. Admittedly, it was Olivia, clad only with a towel around her waist, but then again, it wasn't Olivia. Olivia didn't have a tattoo. Julie did, no matter that it was only ten days old.

"Well, hello there. You must be Julie Seabrook. Aren't you something?"

Olivia stared at the face trying to become her new identity. She kept staring at the face of Julie, the reflection in the mirror, the same face that resembled hers so much. Somewhere in her mind she knew that the reflection was her own, but she couldn't make her mind believe it. The face staring back at her was Julie's, not Olivia's. She rubbed her face and smiled, again, at the mirror.

"JULIE, YOU READY?"

"Yeah, Ike, let me get dressed and I'll be right out."

"Well, hurry up. We've got a time table to keep. Things to do and all, you know?" he replied, now, closer to the bathroom door.

"Yeah, I know."

Olivia looked deeply at her reflection one more time, noting the she was not longer Olivia Benson. She had to continue to tell herself that to believe that she was now Julie Seabrook. And, she did it.

Julie grabbed a pair of jeans and put them on. She glanced over the rest of the clothes. She didn't know what to wear as a "butch dyke," because the few times she cruised it was in a classy, high end, very hush-hush club. She finally decided on a black sports bra and black wife-beater. Once she was completely dressed, she exited the bathroom to find Ike waiting on her.

"You ready, Julie?" he asked her, emphasizing the "Julie."

"Yeah, where's the briefing today?"

"Don't worry about that right now. I need you to do something. I have some questions for you to answer. Standard protocol and all," he told her.

"Okay," Julie answered, arching her eyebrows at Ike.

"What's your birthday?"

"December 13th," she replied without thinking.

"Julie, what is your birthday?" Ike asked her again.

"Oh, sorry, May 15th."

"Julie, you don't have time for sorry."

"I know."

"When is your birthday?" he asked.

"May 15th."

"Good, do you have any siblings?"

"Yeah, one brother, Russell. I am going to work for him in Atlanta. Virginia is getting too crowded for me now," Julie told him.

"And, what is that?" he asked, actually curious.

"I just got into a bad break up with Sally Watkins. Russell is going to let me stay with him for a while until I decide what I want to do with my life. Besides, I hear that Atlanta has a nice lesbian scene for me deal with," she said, getting cocky about her cover story.

"And, Sally isn't going to follow you is she? Won't create a problem for you, now that you are moving on, will she? We needed to be prepared for anything," Ike told her.

"Sally is fictional, Ike. I made her up. There is no Sally. Hell, I'm straight."

"Well, this is going to be a load of fun," he murmured.

"You have no idea."

"No, my dear, I don't think you do."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"You do realize that your cover is gay. You will have to act like a lesbian. You will be inserted into the bar where the gang frequents to see if they'll bite and try to recruit you."

"Yeah, I got that part."

"And, you don't care about that, even though you are straight?"

"I'm as straight as I need to be."

"Well, okay then. Moving on. You'll need to frequent a bar called-"

"Dominique's on Piedmont. I know that. Just tell me who the marks are. I'll figure out the rest."

"The owners of the bar are Dominique and Robin Golding. They are sisters-in-law. D. J. is Robin's brother and Dominique's husband. We need you to find a way to get close to them."

"That shouldn't be hard. I can be very personable when I need to be. Anything else?"

"Yeah, try not to get too close," Ike told her, "They are exceptional liars. They'll convince you that they aren't doing anything wrong."

"Huh?"

"You are going to be fourth UC we've sent."

"Fourth?"

"Yeah, had to forcibly extract the others for getting too close. Whatever angle you use to get into their organization, be careful. They're good. Stay away from D. J. and Robin, find another way in," Ike warned her.

"Gotcha."

Olivia stared at the closet door. She had found another way in. It had been Frankie, Robin's ex. She started crying all over again. She blamed herself for Frankie's death.

"If I hadn't of been there…" she sobbed.

Alex had just returned from meeting with Dana and Ike. The more she talked to them, the more she disliked them for what happened to Olivia. She went to her room and changed into a pair of light blue jeans and a form fitting Yankees shirt. She walked into the kitchen, selected a bottle of wine from the rack she'd personally filled yesterday, and poured a glass. She walked over to the kitchen table and found the take out menus. She selected Wong Fong's and began to select something to eat.

She made her way in the living room area and turned on the TV. She sat down on the couch with remote and menu in one hand and her glass of wine in the other. She glanced around the room and then she saw the familiar leather jacket lying across the EZ chair. She'd recognize that jacket anywhere. It had been months, years maybe, since she'd seen it, but she knew it belonged to Olivia Benson. She knew then that Liv was there.

She decided that she would ask Liv what she wanted to eat, too. She made her way down the hall to find Olivia. When she got to Liv's door it was shut, but she could hear her crying.

"Liv?" she questioned, as she tried the door knob.

She heard the sobs getting stronger. Olivia didn't answer her. Alex was worried. She didn't know how Liv would be able to handle it all on her own. It didn't matter how she felt about it at the moment. Liv needed her more.

"Liv, honey, open the door," she told her, gently hoping Liv would comply.

She didn't hear any movement. She didn't see the door open. She could still hear Liv crying.

"Liv, open the door or I will," Alex told the closed door.

She waited. She stared at her watch. She didn't hear anything by Liv crying. She tried the door knob again. It was still locked. Alex knew what she was about to do was going to hurt. She didn't care. She had to get to Liv and help her. She backed up and then dropped her shoulder into the door, busting it open.

"Oww, that hurts a lot more than I thought it would," Alex stated as she burst into Olivia's room.

She rubbed her shoulder for a second. She cleared the room and got to Liv, quickly. She gathered Liv up into her arms and just let her cry. Dinner could wait. Liv needed her, now.