A/N: When things around us are in a kinetic state, eventually, they propel us into our own. (TW! Brief mention of "off screen" possible suicide)

DISCLAIMER: I do not own the show or the characters, but, oh, how I wish I did.

March 20th, 11:16 AM

After calming them all down, Olivia brought Elliot and the kids inside and settled them in her living room. She took their coats and backpacks to a hall closet, let them tear apart an entire package of cookies, and then Olivia finally let herself breathe. She kept herself in the corner, a full mug of black coffee in her hand, as Elliot sat between his two youngest kids on her couch.

"So, one more time, why are you all here?" He leaned over and kissed his youngest daughter's cheek. "I mean, I'm thrilled to see you guys, but…" he looked at his oldest child and sighed. "You should all be in school. What happened?"

Maureen reached out to drop her empty glass on Olivia's coffee table. "I didn't have any classes today, so when Dickie called me…"

"I asked you, like, fifty times," the only boy in the brood grumbled with folded arms and a pouting sneer that made him look like his father before his coffee. "Stop calling me that."

Elliot chuckled, shaking his head. He knew his son was at the point in his life where he'd rather be called Rick, and it stung knowing it was just another sign that all of his children weren't children anymore. "Why didn't you call your mother?" he inquired, then looked back up at Maureen.

"I asked him that same question," the blonde quipped. She scooted back in her seat and folded her hands together. "He said that he tried, she didn't answer, and it was an emergency."

"I knew you and Liv were in the field, you texted us when you went out on the call," Dickie piped up, "So I didn't just jump to Mo. Trust me, I didn't have a choice."

"Emergency?" Elliot twisted a brow and then looked around at his kids. "What aren't you telling me? And why are you all here and not at the house?" He noticed how quiet they got, how they looked at each other in a silent game of Who's Gonna Tell Him. "Guys?" He shifted on the sofa, his work pants proving how uncomfortable they truly could be when he was trying to relax.

"One of the teachers…" Kathleen, the middle child, began, her voice gave out a bit and then she cleared her throat. "We didn't see him, we didn't even get the details, they just made an announcement over the PA, told us all to grab our things and head out onto the knoll."

Lizzie looked at her father, knowing what the pallid look on his face meant. "They called the cops. We saw Uncle Fisher. That's when we called Mo."

Olivia stiffened and watched Elliot do the same. She took a long sip of her coffee and then moved closer to the group of people who had, somehow, become her family. "Fish?" she caught Elliot's eyes. Elliot's brother-in-law was an investigator with the homicide division at the Twenty-Fourth precinct. "I'll call," she offered, and she handed her cup to Elliot before heading into the bedroom so the kids wouldn't hear anything they shouldn't.

Elliot swallowed, set the mug on the coffee table, and then let out a shaky breath. Knowing their teacher had been killed somehow, while his kids were in the building, left him shaking and unable to process anything other than that fear. He turned again to his oldest. "Thank you for dropping what you were doing to go get them, honey, but now...why'd you bring them to Liv's?" He looked at each of his children again, shooting up a silent prayer that, as Kathleen had mentioned, they didn't see anything traumatic.

Maureen crossed her legs and rolled her eyes. "Please," she huffed. "We knew Mom wouldn't be home, I was gonna drop them off at the station, but when I called to let them know to have passes ready for us, your boss said you went home. I knew that meant you were coming back here, so I turned around." She looked around and said. "We'd all...rather be here anyway, if I'm being honest." She looked at the still-stunned faces of her brother and sisters. "We needed you, and, um, Liv," her eyes tried to tell something deeper, darker, to her father as she met his stare. "Not Mom."

Kathleen draped her arms over her father's shoulders, unknowingly stopping him from asking any questions, and laid her head on his. "You don't think Liv would mind if we stayed here, just for a little while, do you?"

"Mom said you're not coming home," Dickie broke in, a bitter accusation in his voice. "She told us some lawyer and a judge we've never met are gonna tell us to pick sides, and ya know, Dad, that's not fair."

Elliot's heart shattered. "Dickie, kiddo, I…"

"It's not fair to Mom," the teenager continued, holding up a hand, "Or to you. We don't want either of you to feel like we're choosing the favorite parent, here. That's not what this is." He scratched his head and shrugged once. "We swear, okay? It's not that we love you more than her but...we were all talking in the car, and we just think it's easier for us to stay here. At least until the summer."

"School's here," Lizzie said, "We could sleep an extra two hours if we didn't have to worry about traffic on the bridge, and I can stop trying to do my homework on the freeway. Do you know how many times my English teacher has asked me if I have a permanent hand tremor? Sheesh, she should try writing an essay in the back of a pickup truck doing eighty down the least maintained road on the east coast." She huffed and slumped low, ignoring the laugh from Elliot.

Kathleen, still curled around her father, said, "I need volunteer hours for Honor Society, you know there's nowhere to go in Queens, Dad! I could work in the back office at your department, or at the courthouse. And I could take acting classes at NYU without worrying about how I'm gonna get home."

Dickie leaned back against the arm of the couch. "I wouldn't have to beg Ray's mom to gimme a ride home after late practices or night games when you get called into work. I could just walk here." He shrugged. "We're not trying to bail on Mom, but this just makes things easier for everyone. Think about it, she can't leave work to drive over a bridge and through two tunnels every time one of us needs something. We're thinking of her, too."

Narrowing his eyes, Elliot raised his hands and held them palms out for a moment. "That's...I mean, you have a point. A lot of...good points." He reached again for Olivia's abandoned coffee. "You all...feel that way?" he searched each face, his heart thumping as they nodded eagerly at him. "Well, yeah, then we can...we can tell that to the lawyers, but I notice you all keep saying here," he sipped from the mug and licked his lips. "Why?" he turned and met Maureen's suspiciously blank stare. "What?" he scoffed.

Maureen dragged her long fingers down the arms of the cushy chair she was sitting in and dropped both feet to the floor. "Well, we assumed you'd be staying here because…" she looked over her shoulder toward Olivia's bedroom door. The astute nearly-twenty-year-old noticed, as her eyes roved over the walls and shelves, that nearly every photograph had her father in it, many had her and her siblings in them, and she wondered if that meant something other than what she'd believed for so long. "Dad, you and Liv…" her head tilted in uncertainty, her eyes flickered with disappointment. "You are staying with Liv, aren't you?"

"Oh, uh, yeah, but..." Elliot cleared his throat again, wiping his now-sweating palms on the thighs of his pants. "I, uh, ya know, on the couch," he shifted his direction and twirled a thumb around the room. "This place is barely big enough for her, where is she supposed to put all of you?" He ruffled his son's hair. "Stick you in the bathtub?"

"Across the hall," Olivia's voice answered. She stepped into the room, twisting her phone in her hands. "My landlord owed me a favor. It's a two-bedroom, fully furnished, but it's just for tonight. Maybe a couple of days, tops. So you can spend some time with your father." She scraped her teeth over her lip. "I have extra sheets and pillows you guys can take over there later. But right now, are any of you hungry?" She smiled when they all nodded emphatically at her, and then she said the only thing that would get them out of earshot. "Why don't you guys go into the kitchen, you know where the takeout menus are. Just...let me and your father know what you want."

"Okay," Maureen smiled, reassured that her inkling had been spot on after all. She was the first to get out of her seat, then goaded her brother and sisters into the other part of the apartment.

Olivia watched them, making sure they were far enough away, then dropped into the seat on the couch beside Elliot. "Fish, um, told me what he knew. And, uh, it was Kat's history teacher, actually…" she paused to take a breath. "I don't think Kat knows that. How am I supposed to tell her that?" Her eyes glazed over as she realized for the first time in her life, she wasn't processing like a cop. She rolled her eyes, then, knowing she had no right to feel what she felt for Elliot's kids. "A student found the body."

Elliot grabbed both of her hands, not noticing or caring that her phone had dropped to the floor when she gripped his wrists. He pulled her closer, eyed the kids for a beat, then searched her eyes. "Where? How? Is he sure the kids…"

"None of them saw anything," she spoke fast, giving him assurance. "He was on the floor of the closet, in his classroom, with a torn rope around his neck. Fish said it broke off from the coat rod he was…" she shook her head again. "They're still investigating, they can't tell if he was strangled by someone else and then made to look like a suicide or if he really did..." She narrowed her eyes and turned to look at the kids behind her. She grinned warmly, watching them pass menus and flyers back and forth as they argued over who made the better pizza. "They came here to be with you, El," she looked back at him and stared up, into his eyes. "They had a terrifying day, and you're the one they ran to. They want you."

"And you, apparently," he yawned and kicked off his shoes, and then looped an arm around Olivia as he pulled his legs up and propped his socked feet on the corner of the coffee table. He pulled her close to him and smiled when she dropped her head to his shoulder. "Maureen actually thought that, uh, I'm staying here because we…"

"We are," she mumbled, her eyes closed, her hand flattened over his heart.

He hummed. "Didn't think my kids should know that, yet," he whispered as his eyes shut. He puckered his lips and moved blindly, finding the crown of her head. He kissed her once, then let his shoulders relax as his pucker faded into a slight content smile.

"Hey, Dad, Liv, we're gonna order…" Maureen stopped when she saw the couple on the couch, sound asleep, wrapped together, smiling. "Guess we'll just save you guys a couple slices." She laughed softly and quietly walked over to the couch, then pulled the throw blanket down from the back and tossed it over her father and Olivia. "Dick-" she cleared her throat and gave her brother a smirk. "Rick," she corrected. "Call Mom, let her know. And please, don't tell her that Dad doesn't know, yet? I'll tell him." She dropped her head toward her father and Olivia again, her heart thunking once at the looks on their faces. She'd never seen her dad smile that way, it made her smile, too. "When he wakes up."

A/N: Next? What is Maureen keeping from her father? And what are they telling Kathy?