I wasn't planning on posting again until the new year, but I couldn't sleep and I am so, so grateful for how wonderful and supportive this community has been of my writing after the last chapter, so here's a bonus 2020 update! Thank you in particular if you reviewed the last chapter, you guys really reassured me that you're picking up on everything I was hoping would come across to the reader, and I was at a point with this story where I really really needed that. Guest, Mariskadownunder, Ashleyo28, WriterKC, BarbaraSouza, Bethxxx0409, andy1990, Lunacy111 and SpaceKitten2700 you are all wonderful.
I've had quite a few requests for a chapter from Olivia's pregnancy- if you've been paying attention to the timeline, you've probably worked out that Lollie is born in early 2014 while Olivia is undercover... so you might be able to piece the rest of it together from this chapter. There's also an underlying theme that carries through into Olivia's parenting in the last chapter if you look really closely...
As always, your reviews make me so happy, and constructive criticism/suggestions/requests are always appreciated too! :)
-IseultLaBelle x
24 December 2013
"You sure you're alright?"
"Elliot," Olivia sighs, glares at him over her computer screen. "I swear to god, if you ask me that one more time…"
"Are you, though?" He watches her closely, scrutinises, struggling to contain now the concern that's been building within him for months, now, ever since she came back to work after Lewis and somehow managed to persuade Cragen to clear her for full duty- or perhaps it never went away in the first place. "Because you looked like you'd been crying, when you came out of Cragen's office, and you were in the bathroom for…"
"What, you timing my bathroom breaks now?" She snaps at him as though to tell him to back off, pushing him away, but Elliot spots the longing beneath the defensiveness in her eyes.
She wants his reassurance. He's sure of it; he knows her well enough to understand that she'd never ask for it outright, she's so convinced it makes her vulnerable- hell, perhaps not even from Brian, and it worries him.
And so, he shrugs. "I'm your partner. It's my job to notice these things. You never used to take so long in there, and you never used to need this much coffee to get you through, either…"
"You do remember we took a two-year break from this partnership, right?" she points out, and the reminder tugs at his heartstrings. "More like two and a half, really. Your knowledge of my bathroom habits and my coffee intake is two and a half years out of date…"
"Hey, I've been back three months!" Elliot protests. You haven't been in and out the bathroom like this for the last three months, just the last couple of weeks or so…"
"Oh my god, Elliot," Olivia groans, frustrated, perfectly replicates the tone his once-teenage daughters used to take with him at their time of the month. "Way to make me self-conscious. Thanks a lot."
"I'm worried about you…"
"Well, don't worry…"
"You been sick again?"
"No," she insists, though he knows when she's lying. "I'm fine, El. Stop fussing."
Elliot takes a deep breath.
He's been debating this for days.
He's been mulling it all over in his head ever since he started to wonder- even talked it through with Kathy and her nursing expertise the night before last, convinced his suspicions are correct but at a total loss as to the best way to handle it.
("Don't handle it at all, Elliot," Kathy had told him firmly, horrified that he'd even considered bringing it up with Olivia when he'd told her. "It's never going to go down well, believe me. And it's not exactly any of your business anyway, is it? If she is, she'll tell you when she's ready.")
"I'm going to ask you something…" he begins, but she only rolls her eyes at him, presses her fingers to her temple, exasperated.
"God help me," She mutters under her breath, just loud enough for him to hear.
She's refusing to even look up and make eye contact with him now; gaze fixed firmly on the report in front of her, runs her pen along the page with her right hand with the lid still attached as though trying to busy herself, appear as though she's absorbed so the world will leave her in peace even though deep down inside, she's struggling.
"Stop," Elliot tells her gently, fights to get through her, still re-establishing that connection they once had in a life before William Lewis, before Jenna, when he could get through to her in an instant, she trusted him so implicitly. "I'm going to ask you something," he begins, nervous, fights not to show it. "I'm going to ask you something, and I want you to know I'm here for you, alright? You can tell me…"
"Why don't I like where this is going?" Olivia sighs.
"I don't want you to take this the wrong way…" he stammers awkwardly, rather typically only starting to come around to Kathy's way of thinking and her adamant belief that raising this with his partner is only going to cause offence and result in her pushing him away now, when it's far too late to turn back and abort.
"Is this about the St Ksenia case?" she asks him, defensive, affronted. "Because it doesn't matter what you think, Elliot. I'm more than capable of doing this. My shrink's cleared me for undercover, Cragen's signed it off, 1PP have signed it off…"
"Cragen's signed it off?" He's distracted from his mission now, alarmed, protective of her all over again.
"And 1PP," Olivia repeats. "It's the tamest undercover assignment ever, Elliot…"
"Posing as a member of a community we knowis being targeted by a serial rapist on the inside, I don't think so…"
"I can handle myself…"
"I never said you couldn't," Elliot sighs. "I wasn't even going to ask you about the St Ksenia case, as it happens…"
"What, then?"
She's still irritated, Elliot realises.
That much is obvious from her tone, the way she narrows her eyes at him as she waits for his response.
Perhaps Kathy was right and this is a truly terrible idea, but it's too late to turn back now.
And besides, Elliot tries to reassure himself, he's right.
He knows he's right.
He's either right, and she knows but she just hasn't told him, or he's right and he's realised before even she has worked out the explanation for her symptoms over the last few weeks- but either way, he's right, and she needs to be put safely back on desk duty for the time being.
She can't be mad at him if he's right, surely?
"Are you pregnant?" Elliot blurts out, losing his nerve and all-too conscious that if he leaves it much longer, he'll never muster the courage to go through with it.
"What?"
She's staring at him now, genuine surprise in her features, caught off-guard and she's not hiding it from him, Elliot realises, a huge part of him suddenly relieved.
He shouldn't be.
He's selfish.
His partner clearly hadn'tworked it out for herself, and now he's forced her to confront it, possibly before she's ready and god, he'd rather she didn't have to come to such a life-changing realisation like this.
But selfishly, a huge part of Elliot is relieved that she's not been keeping it from him.
Does that make him a terrible person?
He wants so badly for things to go back to how they were between them, to heal the wounds he left behind when he walked away.
He wants to fix her.
That's what it comes down to.
He wants to fix the damage Lewis has done to her, but he knows he can't if she doesn't let him in.
But she hasn't shut him out.
She hasn't shut him out, thank god; she's learning how to trust him again.
But that presents him with a whole different dilemma.
"Are you…" he begins to repeat, stops himself, realises she heard him perfectly clearly the first time and he's only going to irritate the hell out of her. "Is it possible you might be pregnant?" he asks gently, carefully, lowers his voice to grant her some privacy.
"No!" Olivia shakes her head, laughs quietly, calm, apparently taken aback and unsure how to respond to his question. "No. Absolutely not…"
"You sure about that? I just… I'm pretty familiar with the signs," Elliot points out dumbly, before he can stop himself. "I've watched Kathy go through it four times…"
"I'm not pregnant, El." She turns back to her paperwork, shutting him down, tucks her hair behind her ear.
"But are you absolutely certain? Have you taken a test?" he presses. "Because…"
"I don't need to." She presses her lips together, tenses, eyes roam the report in front of her so erratically that she can't possibly be concentrating on it.
"I think you do," Elliot argues with her, gentle as he can manage. "You've been throwing up for, what, three weeks, now…"
"It's the PTSD, El." She rolls her eyes. "My shrink says it's not uncommon. I'm definitely not pregnant, believe me…"
"Every time I see you, you look more exhausted…"
"I haven't had a good night's sleep since May, do I really need to spell it out to you…"
"You keep complaining you're sweltering in here when everyone else is praying maintenance does something about the broken heating before we all freeze to death."
"It's called menopause, Elliot. Ask your wife about it." Olivia doesn't even look up.
He sighs, holds his breath, knows he should back down before it's too late but he's so goddamned worried about her, so convinced that she shouldn't be doing anything more haphazard than desk duty and certainly not preparing for undercover work, and he needsher to see, sooner rather than later, for both their sakes. "You realise… I know this is an awkward subject..."
"Probably best to just drop it, then…" Olivia advises, sarcastic, unimpressed.
"You're my partner, I notice things…"
"Now you're starting to sound creepy…"
"I couldn't help but notice, in the last month or so you've put on a few…"
"If you finish that sentence with what I think you're about to, I'll never speak to you again," Olivia threatens. Her lower lip trembles with hurt and embarrassment and too-late, Elliot realises he's only adding to her crippling post-Lewis self-consciousness, recalls Kathy's warning never to comment on a woman's weight that he foolishly dismissed, naively convincing himself that those rules don't apply to him and Olivia, surely not after all these years.
He forgets that she's a woman, sometimes.
Sometimes, it's impossible to forget.
Sometimes he looks at her and she's everything he's ever wanted and everything he can't allow himself to have, and sometimes, she's fighting so hard to hold her own in this misogynistic world their partnership inhabits that he hardly notices her femininity at all- and right here, right now, is the latter.
Except he's messed up, Elliot curses himself.
He's messed up hugely.
That much is clear from the way it's that comment, not his first few presentations of her symptoms to reinforce his assertion that she's pregnant, but that, that causes her face to fall.
Apologise, Elliot. Apologise, and fast, before she…
But she beats him to it, there before he's quite managed to find the words.
"I'm not pregnant, Elliot," she snaps, voice quiet as though she's terrified of them being overheard, and yet not so quiet that the hurt in her tone isn't horribly evident- and Kathy was right, fuck, she was absolutely right, when it comes to comments on her weight fluctuation his partner wants him to treat her like a woman. "I'm menopausal, not that it's any of your business. It's menopause. It happens. I would say ask your wife about that part, too, only she wouldn't know about that part." She spits out those last few words laced with the bitterest resentment he's ever heard her use in reference to Kathy- she's usually so utterly respectful of his wife and kids, so accepting of them as an extension of him she cares about deeply by association, and so he lets it go, watches her guiltily as she fidgets self-consciously, now, adjusts her shirt around her abdomen.
He should stop.
He should stop, Elliot knows he should, but he's still utterly convinced he's right, and even more so of the need to make her see, start taking care of herself properly and pull herself out of that goddamned undercover operation.
"I think you need to do a test," he tries nervously. "Menopause isn't… just because it's started doesn't mean you can't…"
"I think I know a little more about it than you do…"
"Well, you're the one telling me to ask Kathy about it! You do realise I talk to my wife…"
"Oh my god, this is ridiculous…"
"I'm serious, Liv. You've got all the symptoms, it fits…"
"I have all the symptoms of fucking menopause…"
"You need to be sure," Elliot protests, a little more forcefully than perhaps he should have. "If you're really doing the St Ksenia's operation, you need to be sure…"
"For god's sake, Elliot, I haven't had sex in seven months," she blurts out, seems to startle even herself with the brutal honesty of her revelation- but the floodgates have opened now, Finn and Rollins just departed the squad room car keys in hand and she's apparently decided that if he can reel off the list of her symptoms he's decided can only point to pregnancy, he can damned well hear about her sex life. "Alright? Not since Lewis." Her eyes cloud over, dark, haunted, and for one horrible moment, Elliot is afraid he's losing her to yet another flashback. "I… I can't. God help me, I think Brian's starting to get tired of waiting for me to sort my head out, but I can't. I just can't. So unless you're suggesting I look seven months gone…"
"You know you don't…"
"Well, Brian said I didn't look fat at all, and you can't both be right…"
"Oh, so you havehad this conversation before?"
Why the hell does he say it?
She's already told him it's impossible, for god's sake, why does he still push it?
"Stop making it worse, Elliot!" Olivia snaps. "About feeling like a fat, damaged mess, not about being pregnant. There's no chance of that happening. Alright? No fucking chance. I've left it too late. And I really, really need to pee. Yes, again. You can ask your wife about that one, too." And with that, she climbs gingerly to her feet, storms out the squad room before he has chance to intervene.
"Elliot!" Cragen calls. "Elliot, my office. Now!"
Hands up in surrender, he stands, follows his commanding officer through, shuts the door behind him.
"I don't know what you heard," Elliot begins, defensive, begins his efforts to dig himself out of the hole he should have known better than to create. "But I didn't mean…"
"Save it for your partner, I'm not interested," Cragen dismisses. "That's not why I called you in here."
He frowns in confusion, caught off-guard. "It's not?"
"No. It's about the St Ksenia case."
"That you cleared her for. What were you thinking?" Elliot demands. "Have you seen her lately? I know she wants us to think she's coping, but… she's struggling," he whispers. "She's struggling, have you spoken to Cassidy lately?"
"You know I have…"
"Why authorise it, then? I know you want to help her feel she's strong, and everything, but you can't just give her what she wants right now, she's…"
Cragen sighs. "I'm not doing it to give her what she wants, Elliot. I'm doing it to protect her."
He frowns. "From what?"
There's a long silence.
"You didn't hear this from me…"
"I got it."
More silence.
"Lewis's trial has been brought forward," Cragen tells him at last. "December twenty-seventh…"
"You're kidding."
"I wish I was. 1PP have pulled her lieutenant ceremony," his boss admits. "I think she was more cut up about that than she wanted me to see. They're worried about the media backlash, they want to get the trial over with before they promote her officially…"
"Could they not even let her relax and enjoy Christmas? I know she's spending it pulling a double in this place, but that's not the point…"
"I know," Cragen agrees quietly. "I know. It wasn't my call."
"But she was upset, when you told her?"
"Understandably. She's… it's a lot, Elliot. She thought she had another month to get her head together…"
"That what you told her earlier?"
His boss nods.
"Three days?" Elliot rants. "They brought the trial forward and they gave her three days' notice, three days…"
"Lewis's lawyer requested it on medical grounds. Something about a waiting list for a knee replacement- a surgery slot came up for next month, she argued given the circumstances of his injury, the trial should be rescheduled to give him the opportunity to…"
Elliot slams his fist into the wall.
"I should have killed him," he curses. "I should have killed the bastard when I had the chance…"
"We can't think like that," Cragen tells him firmly. "That's not helping anyone, least of all Liv…"
"And clearing her to throw herself into an undercover operation living alongside an unknown serial rapist is?"
"Yes. Yes, it is actually." Cragen sighs heavily. "Condition of consenting to the trial being brought forward at such short notice. It was Barba's idea, actually. We told them we were preparing to place Olivia undercover, that we're willing to hold off until the trial's over, try again at persuading the Russian community to work with the police…"
"So?"
"Will you let me finish? We've managed to strike a deal with the media…"
"They won't publish her photo because you're deploying her undercover after the trial," Elliot realises at last. "You're doing it to protect her privacy."
"Exactly. Assuming…" Cragen glances down, can't meet Elliot's eyes. "Assuming she makes it through the trial with her shield intact."