Author's Chapter Notes:

Sorry for the wait. Thanks to Jess for her kick-ass beta skills...

Patronus,like the rest of the chapters, is Latin. It refers to a protector or advocate.

Expectations – she's had them.

She'd expected a longer hospital stay.

She'd expected her dreams about her mother to make sense once she was awake.

She'd expected to fit into her pre-maternity jeans; she'd been relatively active during her pregnancy and had heard of a woman in Casey's office who'd been able to slip effortlessly from her hospital gown and into her old pants. Skinny bitch.

She'd expected Simon to return her call; she'd left him a brief message covering the basics of Sophia's entrance into the world but hasn't heard back.

She'd expected some sort of mothering manual from the hospital staff.

She'd expected some sort of parenting pep talk from Elliot.

She'd expected Kurt to stay out of the way and not purchase a brand-new baby carrier.

She'd expected to have some clue about what the fuck she was doing.

Once again, her expectations are off the mark, only instead of highlighting the transcendence of her new situation, they underline the blank spaces – the unknown, the uncertain, and the insecurities that live between her lungs.

Bold and bruising, the weight of a shadow looms over her happiness, threatening to blot out the bright flecks of joy that now color her consciousness.

You're in over your head, the shadow taunts… it sounds suspiciously like Serena.

*

She stares blankly at her own reflection, the city passing by behind the transposition of her face in the passenger side window.

The problem with artists, she muses as they drive by a young man with an easel drawing caricatures on a street corner, is that they can birth beautiful things and then abandon them to the wayside.

Creators are not necessarily caretakers.

"You're quiet," Elliot observes.

Several seconds pass before she remembers his prompt.

"Just thinking," she replies.

They're at a red light three blocks from her apartment when she catches sight of a blond woman and her little girl crossing in front of Elliot's car. The woman's fingers are wrapped securely around the child's wrist and they hurry past, a glimpse of a future and a past.

Olivia frowns. Somewhere within, a proverbial lightbulb begins to flicker, dim and shine.

*

She'd expected everything to be different.

She'd expected the ring of warmth that had been ignited by the sight of her daughter to expand, to automatically color everything around them, to change the way the world looked, but everything looks the same and Elliot doesn't seem to notice. He opens the door to her apartment and strolls in, apparently unaffected by her silence or the melancholy that she feels, clinging to her shoulders and dimming the atmosphere.

Sophia gurgles quietly from her carrier and Olivia marvels at how the sound makes her feel simultaneously lighter and heavier, her body fighting the elation of motherhood and the weight of some dark, nameless guilt pulling her down, down down…

It's the walls, Olivia realizes. The walls are the problem.

They stare back at her, bland and blank, the whiteness a stark contrast to the dark of the furniture. Her apartment is the way she'd left it four days prior, the couch strewn with Elliot's pillows and a Pottery Barn throw, her jacket lying haphazardly across the chair, a browned apple core sitting atop the coffee table. Afternoon sunlight streams in through the windows, highlighting dust particles and her dirty floor.

This place is a mess, she thinks.

"What?"

She's spoken aloud without realizing, her filter is shot to hell and she can see Elliot continuing to operate normally outside of her breakdown, dropping her overnight bag and setting Sophia's carrier on the coffee table next to that rotten apple. Can he do that? she wonders frantically. Can children just be placed somewhere like they're a stack of mail? She doesn't know. She has no concept of the Little Do's and Don'ts of Motherhood, like how to not place your newborn next to a piece of trash in your living room, or how to keep her from toppling out of the carrier and down a floor vent in the event of an earthquake or – God forbid – how to prevent Sophia from falling out the window. Can babies be near windows? Glass can break so easily, she's seen how contractors get around building codes and it's never occurred to her before just how easily some rare baby-eating bird of prey, the kind that nests in the craggy silhouettes of skyscrapers, could easily swoop down into her apartment and now Elliot is looking at her with his eyebrows about an inch higher than they need to be—

"Olivia."

She needs him to shut up, to give her a minute, to give her an hour before he leaves her alone in this filthy apartment with her tiny, perfect, helpless daughter who is, at this very moment, breathing in said dust particles and other molecular menaces that have been living in her bachelorette pad for years and she can't remember what Tia told her about newborns and immune systems and antibodies but surely this, this will prove to be too much and her baby, her perfect baby, is going to have some version of the black lung before she even gets to walk—

"Olivia."

She doesn't realize her eyes are closed until they snap open at the sound of Elliot's voice. His eyebrows are about to climb right off his forehead and he's staring at her like she's crazy, but maybe she is for even daring to think she can do this, this whole being left alone with a small human being whose only means of survival is… her.

"Liv… you're scaring me."

She's staring at him now, and blink dammit, she commands her eyelids, do something other than freak Elliot out because he hates it when you stare like this, when you get inside your head and start watching the world burn but he shouldn't freak out because she's fine, she's fine she's fine she's fineshe'sfineshe'sfine—

"Elliot," she croaks, and her eyes widen at a familiar clenching in her torso.

He's across the room in four long steps, arms out like he's ready to catch her if she falls but falling isn't the problem, nothing is falling and everything is rising, lifting and flying, ascending from her middle and into her throat and she tries to talk to him with various coded blinks and if she could just move her lips to tell him she's fine, it's all fine—

"What's wrong?"

Her heartbeat goes the way of the hummingbird, thrumming and flying as Elliot pulls her to the couch, rubbing her arms and shushing her with calm, warm words. He sits on the coffee table, and the combined presence of his ass and the baby carrier cause magazines, baby books and a newspaper to crash onto the floor.

The panic attack assumes full control, and she can't stop thinking of the books on the floor, of how they've made yet another mess in an apartment as unfit for a child as she is.

*

She remembers the swell of the ocean, its waves cajoling and caressing skinny legs, knobby knees and a chest too flat for a bra. Saltwater soaked her hair, slid into her eyes and mouth, droplets dripping and dodging into the crevices of her face. The sun beat down, streaming and shining, and she could feel the telltale tenderness of sunburn creep across her nose.

The world seemed inconceivably huge as she kicked and pumped her arms in a steady, treading motion, a speck of flesh in a vast sea. Squinting against the sunshine, she gazed out over the Lower Bay, trying to spot a visible marker that could tell her where New York and New Jersey waters met.

Push and pull, and push again. The water pulsed softly around her and she was no longer Olivia Benson, soon-to-be eighth grader at P.S. 265; she was myth, she was mermaid, she was something aquatically inclined, enchanting and weightless. Worry-free.

She could hear Serena's voice in her head as it softly recited "The Great Selkie o' Suleskerry," her normal Yankee twang softened with the lilt of the Orkey Islands.

The silkie be a creature strange

He rises from the sea to change

Into a man, a weird one he,

When home it is in Skule Skerrie.

She wondered what it would be like to escape into the boundless depths of the Atlantic, to leave behind the broken smirk of her mother and just… be.

But the tide had other ideas, and she soon found herself carried toward the shoreline by a sneaker wave before reluctantly conceding to reality and swimming the rest of the way.

She's never forgotten the feeling of the push, the pull, the swell underneath as a larger force carries and crashes. She remembers feeling untenably small, deposited against her will in the shallows of the sea. She used to dream of disappearing in a swirl of saltwater.

Now she desperately grasps for the shallows.

*

To calm her, Elliot has resorted to dredging up universally soothing feminine clichés; sounds of Oprah wash over her from the living room as she stares at Sophia's cupid-bow lips.

After reminding her how to breathe, Elliot has been showcasing his domestic skills by depositing her onto her bed with cool rag on her forehead, a bottle of water on her left and Sophia to her right. The ceiling fan whirs quietly on low as she folds her arm underneath her head and contemplates her homecoming.

I can't do this, she whimpers mentally.

Enough of this, her inner lioness argues. You're pussying out. Stop it.

Sophia is helpless. She has nobody to look out for her if I fuck this up—

You're looking out for her, Lioness growls.

And that, she reflects with a frown, is the problem.

"Feeling better?"

She looks up to see Elliot leaning in the doorway, his lips curved into a small, tired smirk.

"I feel great," she says weakly.

"You need some Tylenol or anything? You know, for the…" he gestures awkwardly around his lower body. "…discomfort?"

"No."

The ceiling fan continues its cycle, the quiet hum soothing her nerves. In the living room, Oprah declares something to be fabulous.

"I'm gonna get something for us to eat," Elliot says after a moment. "You hungry?"

Her stomach bunches at the thought of food and she shakes her head, tracing Sophia's forearm with her index finger. "I'm good."

She watches Elliot's eyes follow her hand, sees as they soften almost imperceptibly as he watches Sophie sleep. A whisper of Emily Dickinson's words in her mother's voice tickle the base of her skull and she scowls. Hope with feathers has never made sense to her.

"How's she doing?" he asks quietly.

Sophie's sleeping, and Olivia figures that probably means that everything's fine. So she shrugs. Elliot smiles again, only this time he looks mildly amused by something. Olivia almost asks him what's so funny – she could use the laugh.

"You know, you're doing great."

Her eyes snap up to meet his, looking for signs of jest or sarcasm. She finds none. "Right," she snorts. "That panic attack really showcased my maternal instincts."

"She's been home for three whole hours without incident," he shrugs, grinning. "That's three-for-three, far as I'm concerned."

"Glad you think all this is funny," she mutters crankily. "I'll remember your vote of confidence when I'm trying to remember how to keep her alive."

"Relax. Kids are way more durable than you think."

Why is it, she wonders, that Dad Elliot is either overwhelmingly endearing or super-annoying? He's such a know-it-all. "Right," she says again.

"I'm serious."

She rolls her eyes.

"Olivia, you're great with kids and you know it."

"Yeah, other's people's kids. Older kids." She sighs. "This is different."

"She's yours," he nods. "It's different."

"It's just… I just can't think," she confesses, cringing at the whiny inflection in her voice. "I can't… I don't know if I can do this alone."

"Camping out on your bed and trying to figure out ways to keep her in a bubble her whole life isn't going to make you a better mother."

"It couldn't make me a worse one."

"Bullshit. Your mom did it by herself."

His casual mention of Serena strikes a nerve; she flinches. "I'm not my mother."

"Didn't say you were," he says easily, crossing the room and kneeling at the side of her bed. She watches as he caresses the curve of Sophie's cheek with a long, callused finger. "She wasn't perfect, but your mother could have done a lot worse. Look how you turned out."

"My mother wasn't well, Elliot," she murmurs. "I don't… I don't really have any kind of example to follow."

"Yeah? Who does?" he asks dryly. "You know, one time, when Maureen was about ten months, I set her on her bed while I grabbed some clothes out of the dresser for her. She wasn't a big mover at the time, but…" he shakes his head, his eyes fixed on Sophie. "I turned my back for one second – just a second – and I turn around just in time to see her fall off the bed and crack her head on the floor." Olivia can feel her eyes widen in horror as he chuckles. "I bet I called ten different pediatricians to see what I was supposed to do."

"What did Kathy say?"

"We were pretty shaken up. But Maureen—she's always had a head like a rock. She was fine. And if this one's anything like her mother," he smirks, nodding at Sophie, "I think we can cross 'head trauma' off the list of concerns."

"Funny."

He nods, and his small grin makes her feel almost normal. "I do what I can. You hungry yet?"

She nods thoughtfully and Elliot stands; her eyes leave Sophie's sleeping form long enough to watch the strong, straight lines of his back as he leaves her bedroom.

*

She dreams, but not of water.

The sights and sounds and smells of Manhattan on a Saturday assault her senses and she looks up and to both sides, her five-year-old eyes straining to take it all in. Everything is bigger, brighter, louder as she hurries along on her chubby childhood legs. A hot dog vendor smiles at her and she slows, only to feel the warmth of slim, smooth fingers tighten around her hand.

"Keep up, Olivia," Serena commands.

"Mommy, I want a hot dog."

"You just ate."

"I'm hungry."

"You're not hungry. Hunger is the absence of food in your stomach, and you ate pizza not an hour ago."

"I want a hot dog."

"Don't whine."

Serena's grip is relentless, as is the pace of her heels as the clack along the sidewalk. Her trench coat floats slightly behind her, brushing Olivia's knees as she double-times her stride to keep up. The hot dogs smell too good to be true and she feels herself pouting with disappointment.

"I want a hot dog."

Her mother ignores her, her face stoically blank as they come to a stop at the crosswalk. Olivia swings her mother's arm, pulling, pulling, pulling…

"Olivia," her mother hisses. "Hold still."

"I want a hot dog," she whines.

"Oh dear god," Serena breathes. "I just fucking fed you."

"Is she your daughter?" a heavy-set woman to the right of them asks. Olivia is just cognizant enough of life beyond the hot dog stand to see Serena's eyes narrow at the intrusion.

"I'm her mother," she says stiffly. "Mind your own business."

"Mommy," Olivia whines.

"I don't think it's appropriate to speak to a child that way," the woman continues. "Especially your—"

"Mind your own fucking business!" Serena yells.

"Easy, lady," someone else says. Olivia can't see him.

The crosswalk light turns.

The masses push forward.

Olivia pulls back, feeling a rush of excitement as her small, sweaty hand slips from her mother's. Her hot dog is yards away and she makes a dash for it, small legs pumping her closer and closer to the man with the smile and heaven in a bun.

Almost…

She is feet away from the vendor, her getaway made to the cacophony of honking horns and squealing brakes, to the deafening sounds of the city… but none of them drown out the shrill panic of her mother's voice.

"Olivia!"

Olivia freezes and turns in time to see Serena bearing down on her, eyes wide and sharp and gleaming with something frantic, something familiar. Her manicured hand stretches forward, reaching and open, seeking purchase and finding it as she grabs Olivia's wrist.

"Don't you ever," she hisses. "Don't you ever do that to me again! Do you understand me?"

Olivia's limbs are frozen still, but something changes anyway and her mother's face shifts, or maybe Olivia's shifting, she can't tell, but then all of a sudden she stands tall, showing off the five inches she'd gained on Serena through adulthood.

"Do you understand me?"

Adult Olivia nods dumbly as Serena pants with fury. "Please let go of my wrist," she whispers.

Serena opens her mouth to answer, but the only sound that emerges is the shrill wail of a crying newborn.

*

"You okay?" Elliot asks groggily, his frame crowding the doorway. She glances at him with bleary eyes and shifts on the bed, cringing as Sophia's toothless gums clamp onto her a bit tighter than before.

"Go back to sleep, El. We're fine."

A mumble, a shuffling of feet, and Elliot's snoring resumes. Sophie drinks her fill and Olivia desperately tries to remember the word that eludes her fuzzy consciousness, the name of the emotion that had filled Serena's eyes that day on the sidewalk. She feels a small tug at her synapses and she frowns thoughtfully, attempting to capture the thought in the back of her mind—

Minutes later, she lays Sophie down in her bassinet and collapses back into her own bed. She's wavering between waking and dreaming when Serena's voice whispers something into her brain.

Fear.

Days pass.

Elliot comes. Elliot goes.

Sophia sleeps. Sophia cries.

Olivia remembers coming home at night and prying boots off swollen feet. Those same boots – her pavement pounders – have been sitting by the door for almost three months, long since abandoned for shoes that were friendlier to tired, pregnant feet.

She was a force to be reckoned with. A girl with a gun, a bitch with a badge. She could stare down a monster without wavering, without blinking. She's made rapists cry uncle.

The apartment is cleaner than it's ever been, thanks to the nervous energy that takes over her body while the baby sleeps. Cleaning cleanses more than her surroundings; it's one of the few tasks she can complete at home without feeling criminally inadequate.

She thinks of Serena, of raising a child with foreign eyes and coloring, a child with her father's face. She thinks of Kurt, how he must have put an alert on his phone to call her; he leaves a voicemail twice a day.

She thinks of John and Fin, of what they're working on, and pathetically wondering if they've ever talked about visiting her. It would be awkward and inconvenient, but it would be something.

She thinks of Elliot, of his rushed goodbyes in the morning and the way he eases the front door shut late at night when he thinks she's sleeping. She thinks of how he looks at Sophia with unbridled affection, of how his large hands can cradle her daughter with infinite care. She thinks of how those same hands have touched her in the past. She thinks of those hands rolling up his sleeves in the interrogation room, of his fingers henpecking at the keyboard for his reports. She thinks of how those hands see the city every day, while she sits in her apartment, charged solely with the care of another human being.

She thinks of loneliness, wondering why it's at its worst when she cooks for two.

It happens on a sunny Friday morning.

Breastfeeding is never extremely comfortable, although she's become accustomed to the abrupt tugging on her nipple; Sophia is a feeder, and today is no exception. Olivia absently watches Wendy Williams interview another D-list celebrity, unconsciously listening to the soft sucking sounds from her daughter.

Wendy's laugh brays from the television… and the nursing sounds stop.

Olivia glances down, freezing in horror as Sophie's tiny body jerks with the force of her coughing. The tiny face is crimson and purple after a few seconds–

Time stops.

And then she is in slow motion, her brain kicking into overdrive as her synapses fire, the information for infant CPR shooting through her neural pathways as her arms flex and prepare to flip Sophie onto her arm–

And then, as soon as it began, it's over. Sophie breathes for a few seconds before her rosebud mouth opens and closes, seeking Olivia's breast.

The whole ordeal takes less than fifteen seconds.

Sophie continues to nurse as Olivia sits, stunned and resplendent in the newfound realization that maybe, just maybe, this mothering thing isn't wholly beyond her.

Elliot comes back Saturday morning, his face streaked with the pale skin and purple shadows of fatigue. He needs to shave.

"Rough night?" she asks from her place on the couch, the baby in her arms. Sophie's face has begun to crinkle in what Olivia suspects are the early stages of a smile.

"The worst," he mutters, flopping down beside her.

"You wanna talk about it?"

He sighs. "Not really. You good?"

She smiles – really smiles – for the first time in what feels like years. In her lap, Sophie's open, gaping grin stretches across her face. "We're great," she replies quietly.

Elliot is asleep in seconds.

We're great, echo the words in her head. We're great.

She means it.

Chapter End Notes:

Reviews make this train go... I would have given up long ago had it not been for your support and encouragement. Thank you!

Check out the poem quoted in this chapter... it's a neat little ballad.