Title: Facing Forward
Author: ZombieJazz
Fandom: SVU
Disclaimer: I don't own them. Law&Order: Special Victims Unit and its characters belong to Dick Wolf. The character of Jack, Benji and Emmy have been created and developed for the sake of this AU series.
Summary: Brian Cassidy and Olivia Benson attempt to cope with his past abuse while trying to maintain their relationship and raise their family. This set of chapters is set in the aftermath of the S20E16 (Facing Demons). The story is also set in the Hello, Goodbye and Welcome Home AU.
Brian rested his elbows on his knees staring through the glass of wall of the waiting room off into the treatment room. Off at Liv and Big Man. They'd gone another route after their first-time disaster and the waiting room meltdown that had ensued because of it that afternoon. So it'd been him in there with Ben while tears streamed down his face – griping his hand while the kid tensed his body so much that the nurse working on him had struggled to get the line into his arm. After they'd finally managed to brutalize his little arms enough that the needle was in and the plastic tubing was all taped down and those bags of poison that was supposed to fix him were hanging above him and starting their slow drip it – him and Liv had switched out.
Ben didn't like his Ma seeing him cry. Brian didn't really know why. He sort of hoped it hadn't been him who'd taught that to the kid in some way. He was thinking it was more an age-and-stage development that likely grew out of some sort of team bench or locker room talk in hockey or basketball. It was a fairly new development – but it'd come into big time play the last couple months with all these doctors appointments and tests and treatments and time in the hospital shit going on. Whole lot of triggers and fear and anxiety in a little boy. Ten wasn't grown up. It wasn't a teen. Brian would argue in his kiddo – their kiddo – it could barely even be defined as a pre-teen. It had maybe been on the cusp of that for Ben. But all this – it'd just brought out the scared little boy. And fucking rightfully so. He was a fucking grown man and he was feeling a little scared and lost in all this. So was Liv.
And maybe that was part of the "Mom can't see me crying" thing. Because if Liv saw one of the kids going through this kind of shit – she welled up. Big Man knew it was upsetting and hurting his mom too. He didn't want that for her. Because he was a good son. A Big Man despite still being a little kid. But the "Mom can't see me cry" policy meant that Big Man was testing Brian's limits too. When your kid's that upset and that scared and you've got doctors and nurses coming at them from all angles like this while shoving shit into their little bodies or shoving them into some other kind of alien imaging machine – it sort of more than upset you too. He'd had his own eyes well up as he tried to calm his kid down and keep him still. To try not to lie to him when he was having to tell Ben it would be OK.
Brian had had other moments – in private – with Liv where he'd just lost it. The timing of all this was bad. But the timing of life was just fucking bad. He was pretty low on his emotional resources as it was. And now this with Ben? He'd had some of his own waterworks.
And Brian reaching tears – that set Liv off. He didn't even have to reach them. Just had to start with the eyes that were watering and then hers would start too. And from there … just eventually reached a fucking waterfall. So there'd been a couple nights where they'd just been a fucking mess.
Nothing makes you feel quite as helpless – in ways you can't even imagine or begin to describe until it happens to you – as your kid being sick with a disease that there's near fuck-all you can do anything about. And the options that exist aren't really options and only do so much. It makes you feel like this failure. As a provider and protector. As a father and man. And it just made him fucking angry. What fucking lot he'd had in life and Liv and now these kids. Their kids. These kids they set out to raise and to give them a better life and an easier life. These kids that had already been through too fucking much before they were able to even call them their kids. And now life had just gone and layered this onto Ben. Onto their family. Onto Liv.
His mom had spouted at him about life hands you what you can handle. Yea, fuck that. Liv had been asked to handle more than her share. She'd taken on more than her share. She had more pain than anyone deserved to carry in one lifetime. It made his own shit feel little. And it made the added shit life had thrown at their little boy that much more un-fucking-fair.
Brian knew it could be worse. It could be so much fucking worse. They were in the fucking children's hospital. They were seeing all kinds of worse around them. But it didn't change the fact their kid was suffering. It didn't change all the question marks around his future now and what that'd look like or how long it'd extend. All the fucking things that could go wrong now. There'd been some real moments – low moments – where it just felt like all these hopes, dreams and possibilities you saw for your kid – your family – kinda disappeared. There was still this struggle to get a grip on it and to keep all of it in perspective. To figure out how to get that perspective.
Some perspective was that in some weird, fucked up way diagnosis happening in his moment had made him and Liv fucking closer. He knew there were all kinds of ways that they could've blown right apart after that trial – after his testimony, after his big reveal. Because he wasn't ready to deal with it in that way. Not with her and within their relationship. But this – Ben – it had just striped a ton of shit away. It'd made them be vulnerable together and ban together in a different way. The level of talk – the fucking physical intimacy in trying to drag each other through this while they got a grip on reality – it was next level shit. It was making them stronger. This was real. This was bonding. If there'd been any question about them or their family – right now – it wasn't there. They were there for each other. There for the kids. Full-stop. Different way than some of the epic bullshit they'd had to wade through before. Could only hide from any of it so much right now – because it wasn't about them. This was about the kids. When the kids were involved – it was different. Him and Liv might all out brawl and emotionally head-fuck each other. Shut each other out, play avoidance and don't ask, don't tell. But neither of them would ever, ever do anything to hurt Ben and Emily. Period. In sync there. So this – all of it - distraction and focus on getting through, it was also spurring these real fucking, bare your soul talks. It was exhausting. But it was like it was the only fucking buoyancy they had right now. Some life ring to cling onto.
But now it was his calm down period now. Here. Only it wasn't really all that calming to be locked out there in the waiting room staring in through the glass. It just made the separation and the isolation all that more real. And you were in this room with other parents who it was either their first time or they just couldn't calm their roll – and they were loitering against the glass windows. Then there were the other ones who seemed so … just fucking engaged in their phones or tablets or laptops or the shitty magazines in the room that you had to wonder why they'd even bothered to be there. What was the point of two of you being there if you were going to be like that during your kid's session?
Brian knew for him it was feeling like a fucking eternity waiting for the drip to finish. Or waiting for Liv to need a bathroom break or for Ben to decide he wanted to switch out. Only he wasn't likely going to. Because Ma was who he cuddled with when he was tired, sick or sucky. Always had been. He was his Mommy's Boy. Full stop. He had a really good – strong – relationship with Ben. But it'd always been clear that Ma came first. And she had. So made sense.
So right now – there Liv was, full-out dressed in the yellow paper robe over her clothes and Big Man, not looking anywhere near big, curled up in her lap in those shitty facsimiles of recliners. She'd mouthed at him earlier that she was going to need a bathroom break. Her and her fucking tea habit – diuretic. Or the caffeine. That went right through her. But whatever it was, Brian was pretty sure her window of opportunity had closed. The urge had passed or she was just holding it. Because he hadn't seen any movement out of Ben for a while. Was pretty sure he was passed out at that point.
"He asleep?" Brian mouthed at her when they caught eyes. Or he thought they had. For a second it seemed like they hadn't. But then hers found his and she smiled. She nodded but then she gestured to look behind him.
Brian glanced over his shoulder – expecting one of the pedi-rheumis or the social workers to be checking in on them. Likely dispensing more useless information in a pep talk that they should really get some training from Liv from on how to dispense. Though, a lot of days he felt like hers could use some work too. At least with the male gender.
He was really going to have to get her to work on that by the time Ben hit his teens or Big Man might start playing as much of a jackass as the Jack Ass could be. Though, if Ben were talking to her like that and Liv wasn't smacking him in his place on her own, Brian wouldn't stand back too long before stepping in and giving the kid a verbal smackdown. He just really hoped that those kinds of confrontations with his kid would end up being one-and-done. Make his point, move on.
He wanted him and Ben to keep on having a good relationship. Wanted to be a good dad. Wanted his boy to want to be his little buddy for … not just as long as possible. Really wanted it for life. That was the goal in all this too.
With both the kids. Em too. Even though his little worms and snails and puppy dog tails princess would only be "his" for so long. Daddy's little girls grow up – and presumably hate you – too. Hopefully that'd also be a short-lived phase. But if fire trucks, Transformers, Spider Man (and debatably rest of the Avengers) and narwhals were any indication on the length of phases with his kids – he was royally fucked on the likely length of the moody, asshole, hateful teen phase.
Sometimes he wondered if he was doing the whole dad thing too late in life. Because he saw how the dads – the ones that showed up, even the moms that showed up – at the kids' things were. Games and crafts and open house nights at the school. The library and Y and playground. He knew him and Liv weren't the first people to start their families in their forties. But it sure meant that a lot of the time they were interacting with people – and their parenting styles and sensibilities – that were like a decade younger than them. Sometimes it was really apparent that his – and Liv's – parenting sensibilities and opinions and methods didn't exactly match these 30-somethings they were having to mingle with at some of this stuff. They were a different generation and different mould.
Brian couldn't really decide if that was a good thing or a bad thing. It really depended on the day or the issue they were dealing with. He knew that even though he would've figured it out – there was a lot going on with the kids these days, with this shit with Ben – that he wouldn't have wanted to deal with it in his 30s, early-30s. He wasn't sure he would've quite been there yet to be able to really handle it the way any of it needed to be handled. Not in as adult way as he could now – a decade or two later. Even now – looking down the barrel at the 5-0 – there were moments as a grown-ass adult that he struggled to know just how the fuck to deal with any of it. At least him and Liv were in the age-range were the docs they had to deal with mostly treated them like grown-ass adults too. Most of the time. Depended there were different levels – and kinds – of helpful and asshole when dealing with medical professionals. About the same as anything else.
Figured, though, Liv's smile and nod suggested it wasn't one of the assholes that was behind him. But before he even focused his eyes on who was there, a hand smacked down on his shoulder and he looked up at who it belonged too and managed a smile too.
"Cassidy," John said. "What have I told you about the moody leering?"
Brian made a slightly amused noise at that, as John came around and settled into the chair beside him. "You mould your ass in these chairs long enough and your face will look about the same way," he said. "Actually might be an improvement for you, Johnny."
John made a sound and moved his ass around in the thin cushioned seating that was really trying to look as high-end and modern in their brand-spanking new wing. Didn't matter what position you took in them – your ass would still be numb in about twenty minutes and your lower back would be aching. Hence the hunch and the leery – Brian preferred gaze – into the treatment area. John looked in too.
"I can see why you're gawking," he put flatly. "Her outfit is fetching."
Brian allowed a more amused noise at that and cast him a look – a smile – shaking his head. "Careful, Johnny. Jack told her a couple weekends back that her shirt looked like we should be taking her to a nursing home or going to a bad luau. She's still hung up on it."
"Mmm …," he allowed. "But has said shirt since been hung up?"
"I don't know, man," Brian said. "Beyond a couple of the little black dresses, I only pay so much attention to the clothes when they're on her."
Munch gave him a look. "Such language about the patron saint of Manhattan's Special Victims Unit."
Brian allowed him that one too. "Meant when they're in the laundry. You know – because if I fuck up the load and the clothes – that's about the only way I'll see the clothes off her in a while."
"Mmm …," Munch allowed. "Very domestic of you, Brian. I knew you'd eventually get housebroken. But have you heard of dry cleaning?"
"You heard how much savings you've got to have put away for a college education these days, Munchie Munch? I don't got no dolla-bills left for dry cleaning."
"Sure you do," Munch raised his eyebrows, peering at him over the rims of his glasses. "Budget. We all pay for sex, my friend."
Brain shook his head. That was Johnny. He had his bits and he worked them on repeat. They had their set down. Same conversations – little jokes and jibs and jabs over and over – for years. But some of it had taken a whole lot of different meanings and context over the years and years. Time and maturity. Age and stage. There was comfort to it, though. More that changed and all that.
"Not me," he said – feeding the usual line. The expected one. Though, it didn't work quite as well anymore.
'Not me' was the naïve comment of a twenty-eight year old kid without a whole lot of experience with women or relationships. 'Not me' wasn't the way it worked after you'd gone through a few more decades. John had a point. Sex – relationships – it's all a negotiation. Agreed on terms and conditions. Sometimes the payout sucked. But usually the investment was worth it. Clung to that. There was a price to it all – but it was worth it. The price and the worth was sitting right there in the treatment room. Not the sex – the rest of it. Having the semi-regular option of Liv rather than his own hand was just a pretty nice fringe benefit at the expense of everything else that he'd invested in here.
John gave him a look. "Still maintaining that twenty years later? A Brooklyn-size mortgage and two little rugrats calling you Daddy?"
See – John knew it was bullshit too. Brian smiled. "Living the dream, Johnny."
But that got a smile – briefly – out of Munch. It got another hand on his shoulder.
And then it got quiet. They stared into that treatment room. Ben's little body looking more like just a lump under the blankets on Liv's lap. The only clue he was there was the way she was tucking her chin down. He'd be against Ben's head, Brian knew. Liv had closed her eyes too at that point, though. She'd just be trying to tick through those endless minutes – hours – too.
"Appreciate you stopping by …," Brian said quiet like.
"Ah, well, you know, was in the area," John said – all casual and dismissive. That was John. Downplay, downplay, downplay. Like he'd just given up – when he hadn't. Clung on through all the hard knocks too. Through practiced – faked – disassociation. And it hung there for a long beat – 'cause they both knew the flippancy and sarcasm and jibs and jabs only betrayed the truths and highlighted the lies.
"How's he doing?" Munch finally asked.
Brian shrugged and forced himself to straighten in the chair. Crossing his arms over his chest. "Sleeping."
"No kidding, Yippie Skippie," Munch said. "How about in his waking hours?"
Brian exhaled a bit and shook his head. "I dunno, John. It sort of feels like he's doing better. Some days. More days I feel like he's just putting on a show – for us or to get us to stop dragging him into the doctors."
"Yeah, well, who can blame him for that," John said but glanced around the room they were in. "Though, they do put a lot of effort into disguising the toxin, torture chamber over here in the kiddie unit."
"Yea, sparkly," Brian said and made his own gesture at the space. All considering, though, it wasn't horrible. This could easily be a whole lot worse experience than it was. They were lucky that way. But he still had mixed feelings about how the Infusion Unit at the kid's hospital was trying to normalize all this shit for kids. He got the why. He understood why they needed to normalize it. But, fuck – it wasn't normal.
"The doctors able to tell you how he's doing yet?" Munch asked.
Brian shook his head and slouched in his chair. "Nah," he muttered. "They check out some of his counts like 10 days after the infusion. Some blood work the day before. But they aren't going to take a look at the disease activity again until we're three months in. Next few days after this will be rough, though. Least it was last time."
Munch made a listening sound and stared in too. "Cases with the kids – always the ones that get to you. Break you."
"Yea …"
Brian felt John's eyes on him and gave him a look. "How you doing?"
Brian made his own sound at that and scrubbed at his face. "I dunno that either, brother."
Munch just kept scanning him. "Life's running a bit of a conspiracy against you these days, Kiddo."
"Yeah, boo-hoo, right? Life's not fair …" Brian said. But it hit him that John was letting him acknowledge that and his eyes sunk to stare at the floor. He didn't want to do the water welling look. And John's hand again gripped at his shoulder. It just stayed there – holding on. And it took a whole lot of fight to steady himself.
"Don't think anyone would hold the self-pity against you at this point," Munch said.
Brian's head bobbed. But he didn't like that dark hole. He had enough dark holes without adding self-pity to it.
"I'm fucking exhausted," he muttered.
"Your choir boy features aren't at their best," Munch agreed and gestured at his jowls. "You might want to work on that. Kitty-corner the dry cleaner there should be this proprietor called a pharmacist. Go in there and ask him about a 'razor'."
Brian made another amused noise and scrubbed a bit at the stubble he'd managed to grow out on his chin. He gave Johnny a look even though he knew he hadn't managed to entirely take the Zamboni across in smoothing out that ice over his eyes.
"Yea, thanks for that PSA, Johnny. But Liv is pretty happy with the state of my face."
"Shocker," John said. "So you aren't just a face only a mother can love?"
Brian allowed a small smile at that zinger.
"Not surprised Liv went and picked the bad boy look," Munch added.
"Yea, that's me …," Brian muttered. So wasn't. They both knew it. Liv more than knew it too. He tried. He'd only ever kept it up so well his entire life. Came out strong but always ended with his arms just flailing around or hauling up the guy he was trying to smack down in the first place. Hand-up, help-out. He was better at that.
So he again slumped back onto his knees to stare inside. He thought Ben had moved a bit. But if he was awake, he still wasn't looking like he was interested in doing anything but stay flaked out on his mom. And the movement must've been only momentary because Liv's eyes just slatted open to gaze down at Ben for only a second and then shut again.
"Always been a sweet guy, Brian," John told him.
He'd been assuring him of that … for a couple decades. Brian was never sure if it was an insult to his ability to be the police or if it was just Munch calling him out on his own bullshit. The facades he put up himself. He wasn't as good at the quick one-liners as Johnny. He went for the macho-fakeness and asshole-ish statements instead.
He sighed a little and sat back, looking at John. "How are you doing? You look like shit."
"Why thank you for noticing," he said. "And we'll just see how you look when you reach your seventh decade on this derelict rock."
Brian only cocked his head on him. "Don't you have some of your own chemo or radiation you're supposed to be at, Johnny?"
Munch only made a sound at that and shifted his eyes to staring in at Liv and Ben again.
"John, don't go making me pick up more pieces of my heart here," Brian said.
Munch gave him a look. "Your efforts to keep abreast of my business and schedule are noted. But confused. My next treatment is tomorrow. I am here in solitary with young Bingo and the shared experience of enduring chemical poison pulsed through our bodies."
Brian shook his head at that and exhaled hard. He'd managed to deal with John's chemo and radiation and big hospital, big medicine, big pharma, big government and all the corruption and conspiracy rants he had around it. Managed – when it came to John and his coping and take on how to deal with the health care system, cancer and his life and choices. But it'd been a bit harder to take now that his family – his kid – was in that system. When his kid was having to come into an infusion clinic once a month. When his kid was having some sort of "immuno-modulator" - that even the doctors admitted they didn't understand exactly how they worked or why they seemed to work – shoved down his throat every day for the rest of his life. Not when he really couldn't deal with the reality that he was likely going to lose Johnny sooner rather than later – his friend, closest thing he'd had to a big brother and father figure. Couldn't really deal with that right now. Not this year. With everything else that was going on. When he – so fucking selfishly – needed John there as a sounding board and a B.S. punter right now. With Benji. With his own shit. With just fucking getting by. He needed him to keep fighting. Needed him to stick around longer. Wasn't ready to add to his losses yet.
And John must've heard that – even though Brian said nothing. "The only reason I am tolerating another cycle of them pumping that crap into my body is because of that one," he said and gestured off to Ben and then off some other way, "and the other one. And her," his finger wagged off at Liv and then pointed right at him, "and you and these pathetic looks you keep giving me."
"Glad to help, Johnny," Brian said. "And the Munchkins are glad you are around and still fucking kicking and screaming and ranting. Expect you to be doing that all the way on the long route out."
"Yeah, yeah," Munch said. "Fashionably late and always the belle of the ball. Even when the Grim Reaper's my big date."
"John ...," Brian sighed just as much as he warned. He couldn't do it. Wouldn't.
Munch shook his head a little. "You realize I never had kids not just to avoid anyone having to take responsibility for me – but to avoid being subjected to those kinds of looks and comments. Guilt trips."
"Well, enjoy the trip, Johnny," Brian said. "Because guess maybe you should've have taken an interest if you didn't want to be stuck with us."
"Isn't that fantastic," Munch mumbled.
"Hey, I think it is," Brian said. "What happened to je regret rein?"
It got another shoulder squeeze. "You've got to get your lady friend and End of the Line to help you with your French."
He smiled at that. End of the Line was the Unicorn. Emily. So fucking true in too many ways. End of the Line. The line that officially gave him the title 'father' too all legally. The line he crossed in officially becoming Daddy. All kinds of lines that Em becoming part of his life - his family, his daughter - represented. An End. But more a fucking beginning. A never-ending.
"Always gotten good reviews on my 'French' from the lady friend," was all Brian parlayed back.
Munch made an amused sound. "Making Mother Teresa blush," he said.
"You know it …," Brian said flatly.
And they both stared into the treatment area again. Liv was watching them. Intermittently. She was looking at whatever they had on the screen in there and the IV bag and Ben even more.
"We'll likely be around Sunday," Brian said. "You should call. Come over."
"I only have so much time left to educate you on the intricacies of religion, Brian. But I think I've taught you enough there's no need for you to be confusing Passover with Easter."
"I think you're confusing that we celebrate anything that isn't the miracle of jellybeans growing into a chocolate egg on a stick overnight. And the kids not turning into pre-diabetics over the weekend."
"Well isn't that special," John said. "I thought Pukey anointed you all the Choosey People – Christmas and Easter Christians."
Brian gave him another smile at that. "Yea, that worked until Liv realized she likes brunch is her church of choice. And the kids are a whole lot better behaved while feeding their faces than feeding their souls."
"Cassidy, we're clearly in End Times. That attitude should be concerning you."
"Yea, some how I think I've got other things to worry about."
And they stared again – off at Liv, off at Ben. He was fidgeting a little more. Awake. Maybe screwing around with that plastic thing Liv had got him. More likely screwing around with all the plastic tubing and tape they had taped to him.
"A diabetic coma doesn't sound like such a bad way to go," John said.
Brian cast him a look. "John, I really can't deal with you talking like that. Not today. C'mon, man."
Munch looked away. "I was only inquiring if your mother was marking your people's alleged Messiah's, alleged resurrection with her usual holiday sugar rush."
Brian shrugged. "Yea, that's her standard. But I thought your mom told you to avoid the sweets."
"So what a perfect way to over compensate," John said. "Gross amounts of sugar to mark some Gentile false prophecy that's now soaked in corporate commercialism."
Brian gave him a look. "Yea, real Happy Easter to you too, Johnny. You're welcome to the sweet compensation. But don't come over thinking dessert is your women over-compensation. My Ma's still forever and always off-limits."
John shook his head at him. "If you prick me do I not bleed?"
"Don't want to get pricked – don't be a prick, Munchie Munch."
John just stared at him, though. The jib-and-jab fading from his face. "You know what I was thinking about the other day?"
Brian gave a head shake and went back to staring at his partner, his kid. Even though there wasn't a lot going on there to stare at. He was more fixated on trying to make out how much was left in the bag – judging the number of minutes they'd still likely be sitting there – and straining to see each little drop drip down the line.
"You. Twenty years younger you," Munch said.
"There's a trip down memory lane," Brian allowed.
"It was a case," Munch said. "A kid. Little boy. Nine-year-old. He was raped, strangled by a couple of older boys. Teenagers."
Brian allowed a little sound at that. "Yea. I remember that one." Like John said – the cases with kids, they stay with you. Long, long, long after.
"We talked a lot about kids during that one," Munch said. "I remember thinking here was just this young guy and at the time you were deep into wanting fatherhood. Better life, better school, better grades, better right hook. Just say yes."
Brian gave him a look. "Sounds like we don't have to worry about dementia in you, Johnny, with that eidetic recitation."
John gestured at him and then placed his hand over his heart. "That warms my heart," he said. "My student. Look at you with the vocabulary. Everything I know and yet less than half my good looks."
"There's a real bum rap …," Brian muttered.
"You were worried you wanted kids for selfish reasons," John said – switching out of the tease. "I remember that too."
"Yea, well, guess I still worry about that."
John stared into the treatment room and then at him. "I don't know if I'm sitting next to a selfish man." Brian just exhaled at that. "I'd say fatherhood ended up looking pretty good on you."
"Like I said," Brian recited, "living the dream."
"In a nightmare," Munch said flatly.
Brian scrubbed his face and stared off at Ben – the heap of him. "You know what I remember?"
"I would hope more than me," Munch said.
Brian allowed a little smile but stared at his kid. "I remember – about seven years ago – coming into the squad with a shitload of take-out to have a pow-wow with you. And you'd bailed on me without even giving me a heads up."
"Yeah, that sounds about right," Munch allowed. "There was likely had some some feng shui going on with a lady friend."
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure that lady friend was your mom in the nursing home," Brian said.
Munch made a listening sound at that.
"What I really remember was – fuck, Liv and I had done another short fling there. The hospital, shooting, escort fallout. Then stopped returning my calls. Stopped showing up. Another royal head fuck. I thought. So there she was. Fucking awkward and I'm again trying to play it cool. Like it was just another hook up, not a big deal. And then there's this little boy peeking at me from under her desk. I hadn't heard. Any of it. The timing. Ben landing on her doorstep. That's why the fucking calls stopped. The hook-up ended. And – that kid looking up at me – ended right there for me too, Johnny. All the … whatever the fuck I'd been doing with the six years of my life before that. Fucking black hole. Just sucked up and shut right there. Done. I was sold. Moment I saw Ben. Just – there – clarity, finally – her, him. It was – is – what I wanted. This nightmare – it's still the dream. You know?"
Brian turned to look at him when he said it and they stared at each other. A long time. It felt like. But Munch gestured off at Liv and Ben.
"You know I was only ribbing you when I said you both could do better," Munch said. "I mean, Olivia could clearly do better. But you …"
Brian shrugged. "Yea, well, same. Like I said, ended up with the best I hoped for there."
"Likely not the best you hoped for," John said. And Brian cast him another look. "You give me that Shakespearean soliloquy and then you're really going to tell me that kid who hadn't even cracked thirty yet but was going on about having kids hoped and dreamed to not be married to their mom?"
Brian made a little sound at that and scrubbed his hand down his face. "You aren't really the go-to for marriage advice or know how."
John shrugged. "You know, despite my collection of ex-wives I am still a hopeless romantic and all for the sanctity of marriage. It's finding a woman who wants to enjoy martial bliss with me that's the problem."
"Sounds like it mustn't be that blissful then, Johnny."
"Well, I'm going to assume that it's not just what you've got growing on your face that's your winning feature in the relationship and there's actually something blissful there for you and Liv," John said. "Because Sugar Daddy and Baby Mama are not roles either of you wear well."
"Liv isn't really the marrying type, John. Not like it hasn't come up in the past twenty-one years."
"What happened to 'just say yes'?" John said.
"Liv more operates on 'don't ask, don't tell.'"
"Mmm …," he allowed. "Funny. I would've always pegged her as the kind of woman who made the leap. Eventually."
"Yea, well, maybe," Brian muttered. "Eventually."
John made a little sound. "You know, I get it. Liv's a fighter, a survivor. Her own woman and all that."
"Yea, she is," Brian said.
"But, you know, there's this other thing my mother used to tell me," John said.
Brian just stared in at Liv and Big Man. "Yea, what's that?"
"That anything worth having takes a lot of hard work, patience and time," he said.
Brian just made a small sound of acknowledgement. "Truth …"
"For a bit of a hot-headed, hot-shot, you're a hard-working, patient man, Brian," John said. "Liv too. And you've both put in a lot of time. When you get to the point I'm at – you start to realize, there's never enough time. So in situations like this – when it seems like the world's taking all kind of possibilities from you - maybe you should be keeping your eyes open to all the other possibilities it might be providing. You know, in the moment." Brian cast him a look. But John only shrugged. "Just saying," he said. "But what do I know. Me dummy, right?"
Brian eyed him. But only for a beat longer. His eyes went back to Liv. And Ben. His life and family. His won't-be-my-wife - who was mouthing at him 'I need the restroom'. And it still made him smile - as much as he wished he could find that little boy or softer man inside him to just do a real big cry.