Author's Note: The first eight sections are exactly 300 words each, the last four are 500 words, and the coda's 100 words, according to Word's count, anyway. A little bit of an experiment in form, if you will, and it morphed into something completely different than I originally intended. The song lyrics that title each section are credited at the bottom. Enjoy!

(Also, this is probably a hard T/light M, but I erred on the side of safety. If you want to read it without the light M, I'd skip section xii, "don't anyone wake me if it's just a dream.")

i. when you found me, I was feeling like a cloud across the sun

Mother of God, this Olivia Benson was practically perfect in every way. And here she was, being introduced to him as his new partner?

"Stabler," he said, "Elliot Stabler," and shook her hand. A surge of warmth shot through his veins at the brief, momentary contact. She probably wouldn't last; SVU had a high turnover rate for a reason, and he could almost see her getting too attached too quickly to a victim and not being able to shake it.

Pity, really. She seemed to have a good attitude, and he wouldn't be a functioning member of the (straight) male species if he didn't acknowledge that she was extremely easy on the eyes.

Turned out, her having that good attitude around paid off on long stakeouts and sleepless nights spent scrambling over paperwork in the precinct. There was something about her that drew him in and wouldn't let go.

Kathy even remarked on it once or twice, "something's different about you these days," and how could he tell his wife that it was his new partner, and the fact that he wanted nothing more than to reach across the console and taste Olivia's morning coffee on her lips? Press her up against the interrogation room wall and test every whacked-out conspiracy theory Munch had ever told him about the place?

And weeks turned into months, and months into even longer, and there was still a perceptible change in his heartbeat when it came to her being in his close proximity. It was liberating.

He'd have to add in an extra Hail Mary or two if he couldn't get to Confession this week, because being around her all day, every day? Meant he was royally screwed.

(Probably should add them in all the time, just to be on the safe side.)

ii. I never really cared until I met you, and now it chills me to the bone

Olivia had never really had anyone in her life that she could call her own. Her mother was neglectful – something Olivia had innately understood from a far-too-early age – and the less said about the person whose sperm created her, the better.

She'd forced herself to make her way through the Academy, make something of her life, make the world a better place so that there wouldn't be any more broken people like her mother raising any more lonely little girls like her.

Except that was easier said than done.

She tilted her head and looked over at the man sitting next to her in the driver's seat of their squad car.

At first glance, Elliot looked like any one of a thousand cops in the city alone, and she'd rolled her eyes when she saw who she was assigned as partner to. Except, first impressions weren't always accurate, as he'd proven to her time and again. He had a softer side that he sometimes let show, especially if children were around. He had a way about him that took everything seriously, but there was always a moment of levity around the corner to lighten even the darkest of days.

The important thing was that she trusted him, in a way that she'd never allowed herself to trust anyone since her mother, and she knew that her trust was reciprocated. The fluttering feelings she got in the pit of her stomach when she caught him looking at her with those intense ice blue eyes, though? That definitely wasn't reciprocated, not at all.

Her showers at home were now colder than the Arctic, to quell any latent desire that dared to find its way to the surface.

(Probably should add them in all the time, just to be on the safe side.)

iii. my head's spinning around, I can't see clear no more

Somewhere along the way, the word partner stopped feeling sufficient for his feelings about Olivia. There wasn't one simple, concise way to describe her. More than a partner or a coworker, more than a friend, less than a lover or a girlfriend, which was lucky for Kathy and the state of their marriage, he supposed.

He could barely see straight when he'd lean over her desk and pick up on some coconutty tropical smelling body wash. Images of her on a beach somewhere would wash through his head, her in a tiny bikini – always white in his fantasies, for some reason - and then she'd roll her eyes and lob a balled-up post-it note at him across their desks, and he'd be snapped back to the harsh fluorescent light of reality with the gentle thwack and her light giggle.

In another world – one where he hadn't done the honorable thing and married Kathy when he got her pregnant as teenagers – he'd hope that he would still be lucky enough to have met Olivia, and that maybe they'd have a chance to see if they could be something more than partners or friends.

He couldn't allow himself to think about what taking that chance in this reality would do to him. Destroy everything, most likely, and leave him painfully alone.

How someone hadn't already made her realize how uniquely special and loved she was, was well beyond him. She deserved it more than anyone he knew, and some buried part of him yearned to be the one who would show it to her – in as many ways as he could think of.

He was in over his head and there was no way out of this entanglement that didn't end with a lineup of shattered hearts.

Oh man, was he fucked.

iv. I'm not going to pretend I'm the type of girl you call more than a friend

He had a wife, she reminded herself constantly.

Her partner had a wife. And four children, that despite how much time he spent on the job, she knew he adored each of them more than life itself.

He had a family, damnit. If she did this job for her mother and people like her, Elliot did it to preserve families like his.

And Olivia never, ever wanted to be the other party to a disintegrating marriage, which was giving herself a lot of credit that she wasn't sure if she deserved. One, she wasn't actually sure how bad the Stabler marriage was, but from the outside in, it didn't look like any Norman Rockwell painting she'd ever seen. Two, even if the marriage was bad, she had no way of knowing if she was at all a factor. She hoped not. Kathy was always cordial and nice to her, the times they'd met. And three, even if their marriage was disintegrating beneath their feet, who's to say that she'd be the shoulders Elliot chose to cry on and the arms he'd embrace?

She'd never be the one to deny him the happiness he so richly deserved, and she'd never be the one to take it from another woman.

So, as she went on dates with guys her friends knew – dates that rarely became anything more than second or third, her chosen career was intimidating and she knew it – she'd picture someone else sitting across the table from her, or riding in the taxi next to her, or kissing her goodbye instead. And every man, whether she realized it or not, was measured up to the Stabler standard.

Only one man could ever meet that standard, and he was the only one she could never have.

Oh man, was she fucked.

v. you can't be everything you want to be before your time

It would be so damn easy. The papers were all but signed. His divorce was all but final.

And then, he'd be a free man, free to pursue whatever – or whoever – he wanted. Olivia. Her name was the first on his mind when he awoke and the last when he went to sleep at night, and most of the time in-between, considering they spent most of their time together while at work. Her name was a mantra, a salvation on the days when it seemed like everything else conspired against him.

But it'd almost be too easy to run to her. Kathy probably half expected it, based on some of the arguments they'd had. In his worst nightmares, she heard him mumble Olivia's name in the foggy stupor of sleep, but she'd never confirmed nor denied it when they were awake. He could live in that land of ignorant bliss, he supposed, but it didn't prevent him from analyzing every side-eye she gave him when the subject of his job came up. He knew she didn't like his job, probably didn't understand it or why it consumed him whole the way it could. Not like Olivia. She'd been baptized in the fire and knew it intimately.

He wanted to be the kind of man that deserved to love a woman like Olivia, and he wanted to be the man that Kathy thought she'd married and raised a family with. He wanted to be the kind of father to his children that he never had, and if repaying the world for his father's multitude of sins meant he was doomed to never knowing true satisfaction, it would be a small sacrifice.

He had to do the right thing, no matter how much it killed him inside. Honor above all.

Sorry, Liv.

vi. we've come too far to leave it all behind

The world had two Elliot Stablers in it now, and Olivia wasn't sure how to feel about it. Her stomach was a tangled ball of emotion – she was responsible for the second one making his way safely into the world, and any day that ended up with a plus tally in the alive column had to be considered a win in their line of work.

But it meant another connection between Kathy and her Elliot, and she wondered when she'd actually become that possessive. She'd always sworn that she'd never let bitterness paint how she felt, but she couldn't help but feel a small twinge of jealousy. He'd never abandon his family, especially not with a new baby to bind them closer together.

She was a terrible person for falling in love with her married partner, and he was terrible for enabling it, but he had absolutely no control over how she felt. If he knew how she felt, he'd probably be ashamed of her for the sheer audacity of it all. If she could back off – put the screeching brakes on everything that she felt for him inside – she'd be able to preserve both his precious family and their prized partnership. If this newest Elliot grew up knowing the kind of man his father really was, beneath the surface, he'd be so incredibly lucky, and she couldn't rob an innocent child of a parent's loving devotion.

Not when that had been the exact thing she'd always craved more than anything else, until the day her mother died, and even to some extent after. But she was a big girl now, and she didn't need to rely on anyone else.

She had to do the right thing, no matter how much it killed her inside. Honor above all.

Sorry, El.

vii. who would have known how bittersweet this would taste?

Hearing her voice would break him now.

Facing her would be the death of him entirely.

Of all the cases, all the victims, every inch of heinous darkness that they'd uncovered together over the years of their partnership, Jenna's was the one that broke him. IAB would have had his neck – and probably found a way to get Liv's too, where one went, the other followed – but this was one place he couldn't allow her to follow. The synchronicity between them has been what kept their partnership thriving even when times were tense, and now it was his greatest hinderance as he tried to leave.

She had so much more she could give. She'd give until she was empty and find ways to give even more.

He doesn't. He can't do it. Not anymore.

Maybe he was tired of lying to himself every day about how he felt about Olivia. Over twelve years of being beside her day in and day out, through the ups and downs, the hard losses and the hard-fought victories, the good days and the bad, the countless hospital visits for both of them, and he'd managed to restrain himself the entire time. And for what? The occasional tantalizing glimpse of what he could have had years ago if he'd taken the chances God had taunted him with? That wasn't enough.

He had to be a ghost in the night, vanishing without a trace, or he'd never be able to leave. She'd understand the why of it all, one day. Maybe. He left his papers on Cragen's desk, walked through the squad room one last time, and placed his hand on the back of her chair. The faintest lingering smell of coconut wafted from somewhere nearby.

"Goodbye, Liv."

Something told him it wasn't goodbye forever, though.

viii. oh, darling, I set you free

Eventually, even the hardest-fought of battles had to come to an end, and for Olivia, it came with one line from Cragen. Elliot had put in his papers. He couldn't even face her before he did it, come up with some explanation – and God, she would have understood a lot of reasons, even if it was as simple as the straw that broke the camel's back.

She couldn't take the step of deleting him from her phone contacts – that seemed like a bridge too far, and some small part of her would always hold out perverse hope he'd reach out one day. But she'd managed to remove the slight reminders of him from around her desk – the scrawled post-it notes in his familiar scratchy handwriting went to the trash can, a small Polaroid of the two of them and Fin from some captain's retirement party got tucked in her bag to take home. Soon enough, the small visible traces of "the time before" were obliterated, and she threw herself headlong into her work with Amaro.

He'd changed her on the inside, though, and those traces would be harder to get rid of. There was no amount of scrubbing in the shower or tossing things in a trash can that would remove them.

Time would be her only eraser.

She sorted through the few pictures she had of the two of them together, and her smile was watery. There were too many memories attached, and she'd always been determined not to rely on any one person. If she was to do her best work, she had to let him go.

She tucked the precious photos into an envelope, put it in the back of her nightstand, and willed herself to forget.

"Goodbye, El."

Something told her it wasn't goodbye forever, though.

ix. the world was on fire and no one could save me but you

Elliot had never been very good at being alone.

He'd gone from living at home straight to living with Kathy and then baby Maureen – followed in short order by the rest of the Stabler clan. At work, he had the squad – Cragen, Munch, Fin, and of course, Olivia – and they were like a family away from his family, squabbling and all. Hell, he used to see them more than his flesh and blood sometimes. And after he'd left, he'd reconnected with the kids some, taken Eli and Kathy to live in Rome with him – his anchors in a foreign country.

Now, Kathy was ripped away from him – for good – and the kids were scared of him – unfortunately rightfully so, especially after the mishap with Eli and the car. And for once in his life, he was well and truly alone and it scared the shit out of him.

He tapped at Olivia's name on his phone and started a call. "C'mon, pick up, Liv," he said, as he listened – ring, ring – and then, blessedly, after the third ring, he heard the click of the phone and her soft exhale of breath.

"What's wrong?"

"I see we're long on skipping formalities now and short on everything else."

"Look, Elliot, it's 11:30 on a school night, Noah's fast asleep and I have to remember to sign his virtual field trip form before I turn in, and there's a real creep with no leads who I'm just waiting to get the call they found another victim. And frankly, after what happened the last time we talked, I didn't – "

"You didn't what?"

"I didn't think you'd want to talk to me again anytime soon."

Right. Because the last time they'd talked – actually talked, not communicated by voicemail – was at his kids' well-meaning but ill-fated attempt at an "intervention." Things were said then that couldn't be taken back now.

Like "I love you."

He could have kicked himself a thousand times over for saying it in those circumstances, but it was the God's honest truth. And if he was being entirely honest, he'd say that he could have strode across that room and kissed Olivia the way she'd always deserved to be kissed, and the fact that his kids would've been his audience wouldn't have been a factor at all. None of their old boundaries existed anymore – he wasn't with SVU, they weren't partners anymore, and his marriage had tragically ended in a dying gasp of smoke and ash.

"I always want to talk to you, Liv. It's hearing what you have to say after that scares me."

She laughed, a clear, tinkling sound across the phone network that offered a healing balm to his bruised and battered soul. "Look, I'll call you tomorrow, okay? And then you can talk my ear off, if you want."

"Sounds good. Night, Liv."

"G'night."

Another endless night of being alone.

The memory of her smiling face was the last thing he saw before he mercifully dozed off.

x. all you gotta do is smile that smile, and there go all my defenses

Even with her and Elliot seemingly trading in honesty these days, she'd still find it hard to admit to him that some part of her felt like a giddy schoolgirl when she called him back the next afternoon. "Told ya I'd call," she said, as soon as he'd picked up the call.

"I never doubted you would, and besides, I know where you work, Captain," he said.

She bit back a smile. At one time, he'd known it as well as she did – now, the balance was in her favor, but she knew he could still command and overwhelm the room with his mere presence if he wanted to. He had a way of doing that when she was around. "I really don't want to have this conversation by phone," she said. "It seems so impersonal when we can just – see – each other, you know?" Her breath hitched when she remembered they could see each other. They'd had ten years of distance, but that was over now.

"You want to meet at that deli down the street? I saw it was still there."

There was that famous shorthand of theirs, back in action. She knew exactly what he meant.

"Be there in an hour?"

"Less, if traffic is good."

"You know the city. It won't be."

Later, as they finished the final bites of their sandwiches and dusted scattered crumbs from their shirts, Olivia cast her gaze over to Elliot. Time had been kind to him, physically, although she knew something of the emotional toll it had wrecked by the same hand. Once upon a time, she'd known him better than anyone else in her life and the reverse was likely true – but that time wasn't now.

"What are you thinking about?" he asked. One of his easy, lopsided grins flashed across his face. It was a familiar sight, almost as if it was a smile reserved exclusively for her.

Damn him. Once, he may have had that right, but he'd forfeited it; it was always rightfully his, though, and maybe she could be brave enough to give it back.

"You. Me. Us." Each word was punctuated by a small breath, as she screwed up the courage that had laid dormant in some form for as long as they'd known each other.

"Oh, so there's an us now?" His eyebrow arched up, and she would pay anything in the moment to be able to read his mind.

Cocky son of a – "of course there's an us, there's always been our partnership, and the friendship," she said. "But you're back, and I've always been here, and what's stopping us from being us?"

Silence, and she heard the table behind them scrape their chairs across the floor to leave. "I'm not going anywhere, not anymore," he finally said, running his tongue along the course of his lower lip. "So, tell me, Liv, what do you want from me?"

"El, all I've ever wanted is you."

The words hung suspended in the air.

xi. now there's two less lonely people in the world tonight

Her admission cut through every layer of armor he'd ever managed to cloak himself in, and he sagged against the chair. She'd somehow managed to lift an emotional weight the size of Detroit from his shoulders with eight short words. He could get drunk off those words and never be sober again for the rest of his life, that was how intoxicating it was to his ears.

"You okay?" Her voice had taken on a tone of concern, and he recognized it as one she sometimes used with their victims. "I get it, I mean – "

Before she could finish her sentence, he'd reached across the table and grasped her delicate wrists in his hands and nudged her to stand up. "I'm more than okay," he said, his voice barely above a low growl of a whisper as he moved closer to her.

It was basic instinct sprung free. It was the start of everything he'd wanted to do for so long that he couldn't believe he was finally doing it. Her lips were full and impossibly soft, and he planted a tentative kiss to the corner – a silent question, him seeking her willing consent.

"Goddamnit, Elliot Stabler, I swear to God," she muttered, but her eyes were clear and sparkling and he'd never seen her look at anyone the way she was looking at him right now. And then she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him again, with passionate force and pent-up desire fueling every second of it. "That's how you kiss a woman."

"Oh, really? I have an empty apartment that's willing to test any and all theories regarding that." He was taking a chance – he knew this had been an extended lunch break, he knew there had to be things she had to get back to at the precinct, he knew she'd have to contact the sitter regarding Noah – but they say you can't hit a home run if you're afraid to swing the bat.

She took her hand and ran it along the planes of his chest, sending trails of goosebumps following in its wake. If she could make him feel like this when they were in a deli on a Wednesday afternoon wearing all their clothes in public, he knew he was in danger once they got behind closed doors. "Let me make a few phone calls, see if I can get away for the rest of the day. If not, I'm all yours after I get off."

He snorted at her unintentional innuendo. "I don't think that's the only time you'll be getting off tonight."

"Patience."

Oh, he's been the poster boy for patience, and honor, decency and all the other good, solid adjectives that should describe a good Catholic boy who sided with the law – what's a few more hours between friends when they've waited literal decades to get to this point?

He heard her finish the last of her calls. "We're good. I'm all yours."

Music to his ears.

xii. don't anyone wake me if it's just a dream

The light of the streetlamps filtered in through the window later that evening, as Olivia laid in Elliot's bed. Her hair was splayed out across his chest in a casual wave, and her ear was pressed close enough to his heart that she could hear it beating out of control. "That was – "

"Yeah." He threaded his fingers through her hair, weaving it together as he caught his breath. "That was definitely – "

"Wow is a good word." She curled into him tighter. She wasn't usually one for much in the way of cuddling, but when it was her Elliot – finally – she could make exceptions for any rule in her book. Plus, she felt so deliciously weak that she couldn't barely move from where she was if she tried. Age hadn't dulled any of the feeling. "Any more of those theories of yours you'd like to test?"

"Oh, I have one about my mouth and your – " He gestured down her body and gave her a lewd wink. "That one might take some time though, if I'm to do the kind of proper exploration this would require."

"Funny," she said, planting a small kiss next to his pec, relishing the feel of his skin beneath her own. "I had a similar one, but with the roles reversed." She could get used to this far too easily, fall back head over heels over ass madly in love with this man. He could be the stability she'd craved, the love she'd desired – and she had a hunch that her job wouldn't be at all intimidating to him, even with the change in title. "Somehow, I think great minds think alike."

"Once we got out of our own heads and saw what was always in front of us, anyway." He drew in a breath and even though she couldn't see his face at her angle, she could just tell that he was looking at her. And if it was with half as much wonder and awe as she felt in this moment, she was the luckiest woman by far in the city tonight. "God, Liv."

"You rang?" She tilted her face up to look at him, and she nuzzled her nose against his.

"Yeah, I wanted to call the sexiest, most perfect woman in the world – somehow, I got connected to you." He captured her lips with his, and she couldn't help but moan at the sensation. He did know how to kiss a woman after all; it wasn't only bravado and swagger. "I'm not complaining. At all."

"Better not." She wiggled against him and gave him a small smirk. "Else, I – "

He cut her off with another kiss and cupped the back of her neck. "There's never going to be anyone or anything else. Not for me. This is it."

And she could only whole-heartedly agree with his affirmation as he dragged his lips down the curvature of her throat and began his much-promised theory of bodily exploration.

This is it.

coda. whichever way I go, I come back to the place you are

"When we first met, did you think we'd make it this far?"

"Honestly, not at first, but you eventually won me over."

"It better not have taken too long!"

"It really didn't. What about you?"

"Honestly, not at first." She laughed at herself, and her hand brushed along the meandering slope of his bicep. "But yeah, you won me over, once I realized you weren't one of the meatheads like I'd dealt with at the Academy."

"God, twenty-two years, Liv. A lot's changed."

"But we're still here."

"And that's all that matters."

Time would go on, and so would they.

-fini-

title. "Dice" – Finley Quaye
i. "Something About the Way You Look Tonight" – Elton John
ii. "Alone" – Heart
iii. "Love Me Like You Do" – Ellie Goulding
iv. "Your Type" – Carly Rae Jepsen
v. "Vienna" – Billy Joel
vi. "If You Leave Me Now" – Chicago
vii. "Someone Like You" – Adele
viii. "Love Will Lead You Back" – Taylor Dayne
ix. "Wicked Game" – Chris Isaak
x. "Here You Come Again" – Dolly Parton
xi. "Two Less Lonely People in the World" – Air Supply
xii. "Angel Eyes" – Jeff Healey Band
coda. "In Your Eyes" – Peter Gabriel