The next morning he goes to work, same as always, coffee cup in hand, sun rising behind him. His conversation with Olivia is still echoing in his mind as he walks along; he's wondering whether she slept last night, whether her Elliot called, whether she answered. He's thinking about the day ahead, as well; he's got about two hours before his receptionist and his first appointment of the day turn up, two hours he intends to spend sipping his tea and reading over patient notes. Of course he could just as easily have done that at home, but he is a creature of habit, tied to his routines, and he will start this day same as he starts every day. It's just what he does. As he's walking up to his building he sees something unexpected, however; a tall, powerfully built man is leaning back against the door, watching the street, hands in his pockets. There's a nasty-looking but healing cut above his brow and his dark hair is shorn close. His face is weathered, and hard. His coat is expensive, european tailoring. His shoes identify him as a cop.
"Can I help you?" Peter asks as he approaches.
The man straightens up. He looks like a gangster, but the classy kind. Don Corleone in Midtown.
"You Lindstrom?" The man says. His voice is all New York and all police, deep and authoritative. It makes Peter uneasy. For the last fifteen years he's worked closely with the NYPD, and he's had his fair share of run-ins with police officers; some are patients, and some have come looking to him for dirt on patients - one even robbed him - and he has learned that when a cop turns up without warning, nothing good can come of it.
"Yes. And you are?" He stops at the bottom of the three short steps leading up to his front door, craning his head to look up at this stranger. To enter the building he would have to mount those stairs, and squeeze onto a narrow stoop beside this hulking man, and he has no interest in doing that just now. Likely the man knows that; likely he's done this on purpose, blocked Peter's way in an attempt to waylay him, and force a conversation. The man is heavy with muscle and Peter has never been particularly athletic; he doesn't like his chances in a scuffle with this man. He's also fairly certain he couldn't outrun him, either. It's a troubling thought on a beautiful morning. Maybe he should start going to the gym.
"Detective Elliot Stabler, NYPD," the stranger says, lifting one of his hands from his pocket long enough to flash a badge at him.
Oh shit.
From the moment Olivia first mentioned him, Peter has been trying to get a picture of Elliot in his mind. What this man would look like, how he'd sound, how he'd carry himself, what about him would draw her in so completely. He doesn't have a lot to go on; she hadn't told him much about Elliot's personality, and she certainly didn't describe the man's physicality. Peter never met Brian or Ed, either; Olivia showed him a picture of Ed once, a picture of them in Paris, and between that picture and everything she told him about both of those men he has gathered she has a tendency to pick men who are a little...dangerous. Strong, rough around the edges. Prone to anger, willing to back it up with their fists. Maybe they make her feel safe. This guy definitely fits the bill.
But what on God's green earth is he doing standing on Peter's front doorstep? Has he discovered that Peter is Olivia's therapist? Is he seeking him out in hopes of mending his relationship with her? If he is, he's going about it completely ass-backwards, Peter thinks. Then again, Stabler may not know he's her therapist at all, may believe that he is as much a stranger to Peter as Peter is to him, and Peter's profession is governed by a code of ethics that will not permit him to reveal the identity of any of his patients. However he responds to Stabler now, he cannot reveal that he treats Olivia, and he certainly cannot reveal anything he's learned during their sessions together.
"What can I do for you, Detective Stabler?" he asks, very carefully.
"Mind if we go inside? I've been living in Rome the last few years, and I don't like the cold so much anymore."
"Of course."
He really doesn't want to climb up those steps, but Stabler has given him no other choice. Slowly, carefully, he moves, key in hand; Stabler squeezes himself off to the side to allow Peter room to maneuver, and in a moment they're stepping into the foyer of the building. Inside Peter unlocks the door to his suite, and then they're moving into his waiting room together, Peter reaching for the lightswitch reflexively, the way he does every morning.
"Thank you," Stabler says. He does look tan, like he's been spending his days in the sun, and he does look grateful to be in the warmth.
"Now, what's this about?" Peter asks him. As casually as he can Peter crosses the room, and leans back against the reception desk, in reaching distance of the telephone. He had hoped to be unobtrusive, but there's an amused look in Stabler's eyes like the man has clocked his movements and sussed out his intentions already, and finds the whole thing terribly funny. So far there has been very little about Elliot Stabler that strikes Peter as particularly likeable. There's a cocky cast to his mouth, and an easy arrogance to his movements, and he wears intimidation like Peter wears his scarf, casually and without thought. It's hard for Peter to reconcile Olivia Benson - who is warm, and endlessly compassionate, and deeply feminist - with the men she chooses to align herself with. Does she like smug sons of bitches? Why? A question for another time, perhaps.
"To tell you the truth, Doc, I need your help," Stabler tells him. There is nothing particularly beseeching about the request; he sounds like he expects compliance. Maybe he does; maybe he's used to getting his own way. It would be difficult for anyone to tell a man like him no. Maybe that's why Olivia doesn't want to answer his calls.
"I've been reassigned to Organized Crime." Though Peter knows that's code for mafia he doesn't understand the significance of it, but Stabler explains in a moment. "My new Sergeant seems to think I need a therapist. She gave me your name, and she told me I had two weeks to schedule a sit down with you, or I'm benched."
If Peter were to treat this man - which he has no intention of doing - that would be one of the first questions he'd ask. How Stabler likes working for a female Sergeant, how he liked working with a female partner for a long time. Then again Stabler can't know that he's spoken to Olivia about him, so he couldn't reveal his knowledge of their partnership - it is a can of worms he simply cannot open.
"My two weeks are up today," Stabler adds with a wolfish grin.
"Cutting it a bit fine, aren't you?" Peter asks him before he can think better of it. It might be unwise to taunt this man, but he is feeling a bit frustrated; why didn't Stabler just call him? Why wait until the day of the assignment, as it were, and just turn up out of the blue and hope for the best? Perhaps, Peter thinks, because he knows the chances of him getting a spur of the moment appointment this way are slim, but he can go back to his Sergeant and say I'm working on it, Doc just doesn't have time for me, and avoid the whole process for as long as possible. It's a particularly artful piece of procrastination.
"Work's been busy, and I've got a teenager to take care of."
A teenager who Peter knows is no longer living at home. Stabler is already lying to him - or at least, glossing over the truth - but Peter can't reveal it. The frustration makes an ethics violation tempting.
"I'm sorry, Detective Stabler, but I can't treat you."
"I know it's last minute. Maybe you can just put me on the list. Book me for a month out, shit, I don't care."
No, Peter thinks, you probably don't. He thinks about what Olivia has told him about this man; it is a study in contraindications. He was the one person I trusted most; his kids are afraid of him. He's a good man; he's totally out of control. He cares so much; it isn't safe for his son to be alone with him. It is Peter's opinion that Stabler probably needs therapy, and that Stabler probably thinks therapy is horseshit. Working with him would probably be like pulling teeth, but those are Peter's favorite patients; the ones who need his help most are always the ones who don't want it, and when - if - the breakthroughs finally come, they are deeply satisfying. They make the rest of his job worthwhile. But there are rules, and in this instance he doesn't feel comfortable taking Stabler on. It would be like counseling a married couple separately, and that is generally considered unethical. Already his conversation with Olivia has colored his perception of this man, and he knows it. From the moment Stabler revealed his name Peter became defensive, because he knows this man has caused Olivia grief, and Peter cares for her. It is too difficult, when a relationship has already been established with one half of such a close pair, to be completely objective when treating the other.
"No, I mean I can't treat you, Detective. I can give you a referral, though."
Stabler's brow furrows. "Bell said you work with plenty of cops. Is it just me you're turning away?"
So he works for Sergeant Bell; that is good to know. Peter knows Bell, and she's as steady as they come, and as strong as Olivia. With a woman like that holding his leash, maybe Stabler will stay in the road.
"I'm sure you understand I can't be specific. It would be a breach of patient confidentiality. But I can't work with you."
"So you're treating someone I know," Stabler says shrewdly. That's something else Olivia has told him, that Stabler is a good cop. Likely he can see through any excuse Peter chooses to throw at him, so Peter just frowns, and does not speak.
Stabler gets the hint.
"All right, so you can't treat me. The thing is, Doc, I need to show my Sergeant I've been to see you. Can you give me the referral-" Peter is certain if he does Stabler will just throw it out - "and just write a note, or something, saying I came in?"
If Stabler married his wife at seventeen, and they were together nearly forty years, then he must be in his mid-fifties, at least. His face is worn from time and strain, and he has lost most of his hair. For all that he is a grown man, he looks very much like a teenager trying to wheedle his way out of gym class.
"I can't say that I've treated you when we haven't had a session."
The grin is back, sly and smug and all teeth.
"Let's have a session, then," he says. "One can't hurt."
For a moment Peter mulls it over. The rule about not treating people who are involved with one another is not set in stone; exceptions can be made, and his license won't be in jeopardy. He can monitor his questions over the course of a single session to avoid revealing anything he's discussed with Olivia. One session will not be sufficient to get to the root of any of Stabler's problems but perhaps it could be enough to make him set up regular appointments with someone else. It would help him keep his job - which, Peter thinks, would probably make things easier on Olivia, too - and it would give Peter the opportunity to learn a little bit more about this man who holds such sway over a woman Peter respects. It would answer some of his questions, and provide some insight into a sticky situation he has only just begun to unpack. And he has two hours until his first appointment of the day.
"All right," he says.
Slowly he heaves himself off the desk, and leads Stabler into his office, turning on the lights in there, as well. There's tea in the thermos he carefully tucked into his briefcase, and so he retrieves it before settling into his usual chair.
"Please," he says, gesturing towards the sofa, but Stabler shakes his head, and leans back against one of the bookshelves instead.
The patients who don't want to sit are the ones who most want to run out the door.
There's a legal pad and a pen within reaching distance on his desk, so Peter takes a sip of his tea and then trades his thermos for the paper. He's had no time at all to prepare for this, which he doesn't care for, but the best place to start is always at the beginning.
"So tell me why your Sergeant has sent you for counseling," he says.
"You'd have to ask her."
For a man who needs to complete this work in order to keep his job, Stabler apparently has no interest in cooperating. It is frustrating, but not insurmountable.
"Why don't you tell me why you think she recommended it, then."
There isn't an immediate response; Stabler sighs, runs his hand over his head, slips out of his coat. Beneath it he is wearing a black suit, with a grey vest beneath his jacket. The suit is expensive, and well-tailored like his coat, and far more tasteful than the usual blue jeans and white button downs Peter sees on most detectives. Maybe it wasn't just the warm weather Stabler got used to in Rome.
"My wife was killed two months ago," he says. Peter knows this already, but he writes it down like it's new information. "I believe it's tied to my work. My squad is currently investigating the man we believe to be responsible."
That is news to Peter.
"Is that wise? I thought detectives were generally discouraged from pursuing cases that involve family members."
"We are," Stabler says grimly. "This son of a bitch killed my wife. I'm gonna bring him down."
There is a righteousness to vengeance that cannot be found in any church; it is holy, and sacrosanct, and its adherents will not abandon it, not for anything. Peter thinks of Olivia, ducking her security detail and putting herself directly in the path of the monster who had kidnapped and tortured her once already, convinced that she and she alone could stop him. Perhaps it is something they understand about one another, that need for justice, at whatever cost.
"Can you tell me about her? Your wife?"
The question appears to catch Stabler off guard; perhaps he thought that Peter would ask him more about his investigation, but it isn't the investigation that interests him. Whatever has made Stabler so out of control that his Sergeant has sent him for counselling and Olivia has sought Peter's services for the first time in more than a year, it has less to do with the man he's tracking and so much more to do with the loss that hangs over his head. It is not vengeance that has made him a danger to himself, to his family; it is grief.
"She was my wife," Stabler says in a heavy voice. Like that explains everything. Maybe to him it does, but Peter needs more to go on.
"What was her name?"
Stabler's jaw works angrily, and his right hand clenches into a fist. Has anyone asked about her? Peter wonders. Has anyone asked, not about the man who killed her, but the woman herself? What she meant to him?
"Kathy."
"What did she look like?"
"Blonde hair, blue eyes. Like our daughters."
So, Peter thinks, not at all like Olivia.
"How many children do you have?"
"Five. Three girls, two boys."
The youngest is a boy, Peter knows. A boy Olivia held in her arms when he was only minutes old while his mother nearly died. He wonders if the boys favor their father as the girls do their mother. It's always a topic of curiosity, among families, how much children resemble their parents. Every parent, every time, seems surprised, and pleased, to see their own reflection in the faces of their children. Even Noah, who is not Olivia's by blood, seems to take after his mother.
"You were together a long time?"
"We got married when we were kids. Kathy was pregnant with our oldest. Nearly forty years, we were together."
And some asshole just took her away, that's what the anger in Stabler's eyes says.
"That's a long time. Didn't I read somewhere most cops end up divorced?"
Peter has the stats memorized, actually, but that's not the point. He's trying to lead Stabler down this path, and he has to do it carefully.
"We did get divorced, once," Stabler tells him wryly. "Signed the papers and everything. I had my own place, kept the twins every other weekend."
And it must have been hell on him, Peter thinks. It's warm in the office and Stabler sheds his jacket, lays it over the back of the couch. Rolls up his shirtsleeves as if on instinct, and as he does Peter catches sight of the heavy black ink of a tattoo on his thick forearm, but he can't quite make it out from this distance. It interests him, though; none of the cops he treats have visible tattoos. But Stabler does; there was something that was important enough for him to brand it on his skin, and he wears it proudly beneath an expensive suit. This, Peter thinks, is an unusual man.
"But you got back together?"
"Kathy got pregnant with our youngest."
Though he still doesn't know much about the woman herself, this information is helpful; it means that even when they were divorced Elliot couldn't keep his distance from her. It means that even when he was divorced, and staying up late at night talking to Olivia, he still chose to sleep with Kathy, and went back to her when she got pregnant. Which is exactly how they ended up together in the first place - they were kids, and Kathy was pregnant, and Elliot stood by her. Which means he may be smug and aggressive and ill-tempered, but he takes his responsibilities seriously, and family matters to him. Probably, Peter thinks, more than anything else. And now that family is shattered. He makes a few notes on his legal pad, about family, and about duty, and he adjusts his previous assumptions about Stabler, just a bit. Maybe there is something to like about him after all.
"She must have meant a great deal to you."
"She was my wife," he says again. Stabler says the word wife like it's something holy. "She...she kept me together, when everything was falling apart. She was my life. And she deserved better than me. If I'd just let her go…"
He stops himself, but it is too late. The self-loathing in his voice has made itself plain. That he loved this woman, that he feels responsible for her death, that the guilt is eating him alive; Peter can see it all on his face, now.
"But you didn't," he says, very quietly. "And she chose you, same as you chose her."
"She didn't choose this," Stabler spits out at him.
Neither did you, Peter thinks, but he doesn't want to push too hard, not just yet.
"How did it happen? You said she was killed."
"Some asshole planted a bomb in our car and waited until she got inside to detonate it."
Jesus, the car was just this horrible, burnt-out shell and they were already loading her into the ambulance and they wouldn't let me talk to her. That's how Olivia had described the scene. And Stabler there, just behind her, looking to her for aid. The visual Peter conjures in his mind of that moment is horrific, and he wasn't even there. He can't imagine how the two of them, Elliot and Olivia, have managed to live with the memory of it for the last two months.
"Where were you?"
"I had a call. I was on the sidewalk, a few yards away."
"So you saw it happen."
Stabler nods, tightly, and Peter makes a note on his pad. Olivia described Elliot as being like she was, after Lewis took her, and Peter took that to mean that she thought he might have PTSD. If the man saw his own wife blow up right in front of his eyes, she's probably right.
"You think I have PTSD," Stabler says shrewdly, like he's read his thoughts.
"Do you?"
That earns him a short, sharp laugh, and he watches as Stabler runs his hand over his head. It appears to be a nervous tick with him, and that, Peter thinks, is not a good sign.
"Liv thinks so."
It's said quietly, a mutter that Stabler is probably mostly directing at himself, but Peter hears it just the same, and his stomach drops, because they are venturing into dangerous territory now. Or at least, he thinks they might be. Olivia has always been Olivia to him, but he has heard members of her squad call her Liv, before. A nickname, a spoken fondness, a familiarity that Peter cannot allow himself to enjoy, with her, one that comes easily to this man who has known her for so long.
"Liv?" he asks.
Stabler's head shakes again, like he's angry with himself for letting his mouth run away with him.
"Captain Olivia Benson," he says. He leaves out half the letters in Captain when he says it. Peter feels certain it means something that Stabler chooses to refer to her professionally, rather than personally. He just doesn't know what. It's a mark of respect, but it's distancing, too.
"We were partners for a long time."
That's what Olivia told him. A long time.
"So she's a friend? And she's expressed concern about your mental health?"
Across the room, Stabler sighs.
"Liv is Liv," he says. "She's been working SVU more than twenty years. She sees victims everywhere."
It is not an entirely inaccurate statement, Peter thinks. Olivia can smell pain like a hunting dog can scent a rabbit. She doesn't get out much, she is fiercely protective of her child - with good reason, given that Noah was kidnapped when he was small - and she recommends therapy and counselling to her squad and to the civilians who cross her path with a near constant devotion. But she does these things because she knows, intimately, the benefits of confronting trauma rather than ignoring it. More than twenty years in SVU and she has seen it all, in the victims who cross her path and in her own life, and experience has taught her well.
It's Olivia that Peter wants to discuss, because their relationship interests him, but Olivia is not the reason why Elliot has sought him out, and he must deal with the patient in front of him. Whatever's going on with Elliot, Olivia is certainly a part of it, but she is not all of it, and he can't allow his personal curiosity to distract him.
"So your Sergeant has directed you to seek counselling, and your friend thinks you have PTSD. What do you think led them to those conclusions?"
There's that cut on Stabler's face he wants to ask about, too, if he gets the chance.
"I'm having trouble sleeping," Stabler confesses. "And a few weeks ago I was distracted, and I crashed my car."
"Was anyone hurt?"
"No. My son was a little shaken up, though."
So the boy was in the car with him. No wonder the rest of his family - and Olivia - have decided that Elliot isn't safe for him, at the moment. Peter doesn't know the details, and he's certain he won't get them from Stabler, but he can read between the lines.
"My kids were upset about it," Stabler continues after a moment. It is the first time he has volunteered anything without prompting, and Peter just watches him, holding his breath. "They decided to stage an intervention."
The word is dripping with disdain when it leaves his mouth, and Peter knows the answer to his next question before he asks.
"How did that go?"
There goes Stabler's hand, running over his head again. The expressions that cross his face, rapid-fire, are a study of a man in crisis. There is so much going on inside Stabler's head, Peter feels certain he must be on the brink of exploding from keeping it all inside.
"Not great."
It is a dramatic understatement, and Peter knows this, because Olivia told him. Because Olivia told him that Elliot said I love you to her, in front of his children, and then left, and in his absence his children decided to move Eli out of his home. Peter knows this, but Elliot does not know he knows this, and so Peter must keep quiet. It's frustrating, because what he wants to do is call the man out, press him, back him into a corner where he cannot lie, but he can't, not without violating Olivia's trust.
So he waits, hoping that silence will weigh heavily enough on Stabler to break him. The seconds pass, uncomfortably; Stabler knows what he's doing. The man has been a cop for a long, long time, and he knows how interrogations work.
"Look, Doc, they're my kids," he says, after a moment. "It's my job to take care of them. I have to protect them from this investigation, and from the asshole who killed their mother, and I have to be strong for them. I can't have them thinking I'm too weak to look after them. And Liv, Christ..."
"What does she have to do with any of this?"
"Everything," Stabler fires off heatedly, and then he shakes his head. "Nothing. I don't know."
He presses his palms against his eyes, hard, and rubs.
He was me and I was him and he was everything and then he just walked away. Peter can hear Olivia's voice in his head, full of rage, full of hurt. It's clear that whatever they were - are, whatever - to one another, Olivia has come to recognize his importance to her, but Stabler still seems to be struggling with it. With a wife and five children he sees as his sole responsibility, it's easy to understand why; his family is supposed to matter to him more than anything else, but Olivia matters to him a great deal, and he can't reconcile those two facts. The man exists in a black-and-white world, and he's not supposed to love anyone as much as he loves his family. It's Peter's belief that one love does not cancel out another, but for a man with old-fashioned convictions like Stabler, that nuance is difficult to grasp.
"Was she there? At the intervention?"
"Yeah. Yeah."
"So she wants to help you. That's a good thing, Detective. You have a friend in your corner."
Stabler barks out a laugh. It is not a happy sound.
"God only knows why," he says.
It's interesting to Peter that when pressed about his wife Stabler said she deserved better than me, and now he has expressed incredulity at the thought that Olivia might still care for him. Is that how he sees himself? Peter wonders, making a note on his legal pad. Does Stabler believe there's something wrong with him, something dangerous to the people he cares about? Is he right? If this session reveals to him that Stabler is unstable - the irony of the man's name is not lost on him, but it's a cheap joke - then Peter has a duty to report that to the brass, and if he does Stabler will be taken off the investigation into his wife's murder, and that may be enough to push him over the edge. Olivia told him that she feared one more devastating piece of news might make the man kill himself, but Peter doesn't know if that's a professional assessment, or the overstatement of a woman who is terrified of losing one man she loves the same way she lost another. This, he thinks, is why it was a bad idea for him to treat Elliot.
"Look, me and Liv, we were solid," Stabler tells him then. "We worked together for a lot of years. We understood each other. We were good together. But before Kathy…" he trails off, can't say the word died, "I hadn't seen or spoken to Liv in ten years."
"That's a long time to go without speaking to a friend. Did something happen between you two?"
This time, Stabler literally turns his back on Peter. He hides his face, runs his hand over the back of his head, fiddles with the cuffs of his shirtsleeves. Part of this story Peter knows already, but it is only the part Olivia saw. Whatever made Stabler choose to ignore his partner, that is something Peter doesn't know. Maybe it will help him bring the conversation back to Elliot's recent bereavement - which is, after all, the entire point of the session - or maybe it will be the final straw, the one question that finally sends Stabler running from the room.
"No," he says shortly. "I wanna be very clear about that. I never touched her."
There's a note of something in his voice, something like self-loathing, something like anger, though Peter doesn't know if that's because what he says is true and he regrets it, or if it's because he resents having to explain himself.
"Did you have an argument?"
"Listen, Doc, I don't wanna talk about this any more. You wanna talk about my wife? You wanna talk about my job? Fine. But leave her out of this."
"That's fair," Peter says, because they really shouldn't be talking about Olivia anyway. "Let me ask you this. Do you blame yourself for what happened to them? To your wife, and to Liv? These two women were both important to you, and they both got hurt."
It isn't until the words leave his mouth that Peter realizes his mistake. Stabler turns on his heel, his face a picture of anger and confusion. Olivia told him that Stabler didn't know about Lewis but Lewis, and what he did, is the foundation of Peter's connection to Olivia, and he's forgotten what it's like to talk to someone in her life who doesn't know about that horror. And the root of Stabler's problems, he thinks, are that grief and guilt are tied together, and he wants to make Stabler confront that, but damn it he's just committed a gross violation of confidentiality.
"What happened to Liv?" Stabler asks sharply.
"I misspoke," Peter says quickly. "I can't-"
"You can't discuss your patients. Christ, that's why you can't treat me. You're treating Liv. Jesus."
In a sudden, shocking burst of speed Stabler is moving; he doesn't get in Peter's face, but he comes close. Peter is sitting, and Stabler is towering over him, tall and broad and terrible to behold. The very idea of Olivia in pain has left him looking unhinged.
"You can't tell me details, fine," he says, although it sounds like there's a part of him that would be all too willing to beat the truth out of Peter, given the chance, a part of him that needs those details. "Just...tell me she wasn't raped, Doc. Tell me that didn't happen."
His eyes are tortured. They're blue, and sharp, and in this moment Peter can see everything Stabler feels for her in them.
"Would that be the worst thing that could happen?" It didn't happen - Lewis got close, but he never finished the job - but what did happen is horrific enough all on its own.
"To Liv? Christ, yeah. Come on, Doc, you know about her mother." That's interesting, to Peter; in the split second before Stabler spoke those words, it had occurred to Peter that perhaps it is Stabler's love of her - his possessive feelings towards a woman who was his partner, the other half of him on the job - that makes him hate the thought of another man forcing himself on her. But it is not pride or sexual possession that makes the thought of Olivia being assaulted so haunting to Stabler; it is the thought of what such a thing would do to her, given her history. A history Stabler knows. It is not selfishness on his part; he is consumed with worry for her. But then.
"Oh, shit," he says, understanding washing over his face. "Her son. Tell me he's not-"
Tell me he's not like her, that's what Stabler is asking. Stabler is begging, desperate to know that Olivia did not suffer the same trauma and the same consequences as her mother. He's right to ask, and right to be afraid; that scenario is one that would have devastated her, but it never happened.
"He's not."
Really, Peter shouldn't tell him even that much, but he gets the feeling that if he doesn't throw Stabler a bone the man is going to run straight out the door and into SVU to confront Olivia and that would be the worst thing for all three of them. There has to be some way to salvage this, he thinks. It's his job to run this session, to keep his patients from tearing themselves to pieces over the course of an hour, to send them off into the world stable enough to make it through another week, and the direction of this conversation needs to shift, now.
"If you want to know what happened to her, you should ask her," he says.
At long last, Stabler relents, and sits on the couch, where he promptly buries his face in his hands.
"It's my fault." The words are muffled, but Peter hears them just the same. He's right; Stabler does blame himself for this, but he wouldn't even know about it if not for Peter's carelessness. This session is unraveling around his ears. In all his years of practice, he's never made a mistake like this one.
"If I hadn't left, none of this would have happened."
Olivia blames Elliot for Lewis, too. They both believe, firmly and unreservedly, that if only Elliot had still been her partner none of it ever would have happened. It's a delusion, Peter thinks; when Lewis took her Olivia had been given two days off work, and her boyfriend had been forced to pull a double shift and cancel their date, and so there was no one around to notice when she didn't turn up the next morning. How would Elliot's presence in the squadroom have changed those circumstances? It wouldn't, he thinks, but they both believe it. They believe in their connection to one another, their devotion to one another. They both believe that Elliot is her protector, and that he alone could have saved her. Not for the first time Peter wonders just how much they endured together as partners, how many times they saved each other - and from what - and how that has shaped their understanding of one another, and their relationship.
"You don't know that."
Stabler lifts his head from his hands, his expression that of a man spoiling for a fight.
"Doc, if I'd stayed at SVU, my wife would have left me. She told me so, after. She tried to leave once when Eli was little, and Liv talked her out of it. By the time I left we were right back in that same place, me spending too much time at work, her feeling like she wasn't getting the help she needed. If Kathy had left me, there would be no reason for anyone to hurt her to get at me, and she would still be alive. And if I was still with Liv, I never would have let this son of a bitch get close to her."
While Stabler speaks, Peter writes Liv talked her out of it on his legal pad. It is a fascinating detail. These two people love each other - Elliot has told Olivia that, straight out, and Olivia has confessed it to Peter - but when Kathy tried to leave him it was Olivia who stepped in and mended things between them. It is a friendship, a care, a devotion to one another that goes far beyond the usual camaraderie of partners. It is Olivia fighting to save what must have been, to her mind, the ideal family, for to watch it break would be to watch her own dreams of what family means shatter, too. And it is Kathy, heeding her words, perhaps because Elliot and Olivia are so much the same that they speak with one voice. That relationship - Kathy and Olivia's - is one he wants to discuss with Olivia the next time he sees her. If he ever does.
"You couldn't have known," he says. "You can't change what's been done, and at the time you had absolutely no idea what lay ahead. You have to make the best choice with the information that's in front of you. At the time, did you think you were doing what was right for you and your family?"
"I thought it was the only way to save all of us."
All of us, he says, like he's including Olivia in the same category as his wife. Maybe he is. It has become clear to Peter that Stabler sees himself as solely responsible for the people he cares about. It is his duty to protect his children from his grief, it was his duty to support and protect his wife, it is his duty to keep Olivia safe, and it is, all of it, a tremendous burden for one man to bear. As he watches Stabler shifts on the couch, rests his elbows loosely on his knees, and as he does Peter is finally able to see the man's tattoo clearly. It is the Marine Corps symbol, with USMC written under it. Of course, Peter thinks. Of course the man was a Marine. The few, the proud. Always faithful. Stabler's entire pathology is inked on his forearm.
"Do you know what else happened to Olivia while you were gone?" Peter asks. What he is about to say is wildly inappropriate and if it ever gets back to Olivia it will cost him his job, but she is not answering Stabler's phone calls, and someone has to save this man before he drowns. I've had a good run, Peter thinks. He's helped a lot of people over the years. If this is the last time, so be it.
Stabler just stares at him.
"She got to travel. She got to see Paris, like she always wanted." And she went with Ed Tucker, but he knows, instinctively, not to mention her romances to Stabler. "She was promoted not once but three times. She gives lectures on assault and victims' rights, and she has the respect of the entire NYPD. She made new friendships. She has a son, and two goddaughters she adores."
She found happiness, that's what he wants to say. It looks like Stabler understands that already, though, so he just carries on.
"And what about you? Ten years is a long time. Were you happy, in Rome? Was Kathy?"
It takes a minute for Stabler to answer, but when he does, Peter breathes a sigh of relief.
"Yeah," he says. "Those ten years...I think those were the best years of our marriage."
It's exactly what he wanted to hear.
"Life is the good and the bad, both," he says. "And we can't erase any of it. Our experiences make us who we are, and we learn from them. You have suffered a tremendous loss. But you were not the one who detonated that bomb. You didn't even know it was there. Someone else did that." And someone else hurt Olivia, too. "You can't hold yourself responsible for other people's actions."
There are actual tears in Stabler's eyes now, but when he laughs his voice is hard.
"Do you know how many times I've said that to victims?"
If he spent a long time in SVU, the answer is probably hundreds. Maybe thousands.
"Does it make it any less true when someone says it to you?"
This will not be enough, Peter knows, to undo a lifetime of self-belief. In Stabler's heart, he is a protector, and he will not shed his feelings of responsibility over the course of one conversation. He will not give up his quest for vengeance. The trouble he's had sleeping - nightmares, Peter assumes - will not immediately resolve itself. But then it didn't for Olivia, either. She still has them, sometimes, dreams about Lewis and the scent of her own burned skin, dreams about Sheila Porter stealing her son away. But they are less frequent, now. The trauma Olivia suffered has found its place in her life, and she has found a way to live with it. Forgetting is not the answer; acceptance is. Is this a first step towards acceptance, for Stabler? It's hard to say.
"So what do I do, Doc?" Stabler asks. He isn't answering Peter's question. "How do I fix this?"
Quit your job, that's what Peter wants to tell him. Spending all day, every day, steeped in the memories of what happened to his wife is a surefire way to drive the man to disaster. But he knows, already, that there's no point even suggesting such a thing. He remembers how Olivia reacted when he asked her why she had to be the one to do her job, why she couldn't hand it over to someone else and enjoy a quiet retirement after so many years of horror. Her response, then, had been one of incredulity, of passionate defense. Stabler would be the same, he thinks. They are the same. They believe they are the only ones capable of handling the work they have taken on. And maybe they're right. He's never really believed that, before, but these two...they are crusaders. They are righteous, devoted to the care of others, in a way he has never really seen in anyone else. No one will fight harder than they will.
"Start by being honest," he says. "If you're struggling, tell your family. Tell your Sergeant. Tell your friends." By friends he means Olivia, and they both know it. "Accept the help that is offered to you. There are people who care about you, Detective. Let them."
It's what Olivia did, after Lewis. Her first instinct was to run away from Brian, but she leaned on him instead, and they made a home together, and when she pulled a gun on him he talked her down, and held her after, and she was stronger for it. She saw Peter weekly for years, after. She went to group therapy, too, and when she went back to work her friends supported her. It was a battle, overcoming her instinct to withdraw into herself, but it was one she fought, and won, and she was better, after. If Stabler can do the same, maybe he will be, too.
"Thanks, Doc," he says, running his hand over his face.
It is time to draw this session to an end, and so Peter does. He asks Stabler about his work, asks him if he's had thoughts of hurting himself because he has to ask - and Stabler laughs, tells him I wanna see my grandchildren grow up, and Peter breathes a sigh of relief for Olivia's sake. By the time Stabler leaves - with the name of another therapist in his pocket, though Peter doubts he'll ever call the man - Peter is feeling marginally more hopeful about the whole situation. The night before he asked Olivia to answer the next time Stabler calls her, and as he watches Stabler go he knows in his heart that the man will call. Maybe that's what they need. Just one more chance to grab onto each other, to grab hold of someone who understands, and never let go.