Chapter Seven – Ad Oculos (To the Eyes)
Disclaimer: I own nothing but the love of words and the ability to play with characters.
A/N: This is going to be a chapter featuring Kathleen Stabler, because she's my favorite Stabler child, with all of her complexities and shady past and her understanding of her father and of Olivia's sway over him.
When Kathleen Louise Stabler was younger, her parents had separated and she had given her father an ultimatum upon his comings and goings in the house.
She told him that he needed to either leave and stay gone, or stay home and be a family. She told him she didn't like what it was doing to Lizzie and Richard. Then, he'd stayed because her mother got pregnant with Eli – she told her parents people would think Eli was hers because she was 16 and who the hell had children when their other children were all in their teens?
She'd been a nightmare before she was diagnosed with Bipolar disorder. She'd been arrested multiple times for DUI, sentenced to community service (which was a total drag, by the way) and her father had burnt her driver's license. She'd stolen a credit card, she'd stolen jewelry, and she'd done drugs and nearly died as a result of it. The overdose was where she'd finally gotten diagnosed with bipolar disorder.
Now, she works with sexual assault victims as an Advocate and believes in the power of therapy, medications, and telling the truth about things she's been through and encourages survivors to do the same. She tells whoever will listen that she was the wayward daughter of a cop who had a partner that arrested her because she believed in her, because she knew it was the only way to get her help.
When her father had decided to retire from the NYPD, she hadn't thought of the repercussions that were involved with him walking away from the only job she'd ever known him to have. Namely the woman who she'd come to think of as an aunt in their family, Olivia. She'd asked about her in the first few months, and her father had just turned away without saying anything.
She was fond of Olivia, and when she'd seen her on the news being led out of a house on Long Island after being kidnapped…well, she'd thought about calling her father and telling him…but then she remembered that her father had asked them all to refrain from talking about or even to Olivia. That someday he would reach out, and then he would let her know that she could talk to her.
She really had wanted to reach out to Olivia after seeing the news reports. But, she had made a promise.
When she saw Olivia on the news a short while after, admitting that she had lied on the witness stand, something just didn't sit right with Kathleen. Olivia would NEVER lie on the witness stand. Her moral compass wouldn't allow for it, she was always honest and refused to bend the truth or lie to save face.
Olivia should've been nominated for sainthood – so she didn't believe one single word of the news conference. She almost called her that night, but remembered her father's warnings not to talk to her. It didn't stop her from telling whoever listened that the woman on the news was the most honest, bravest, and kindest person she'd ever met and that she had saved her life when it was spiraling out of control.
She'd hoped that her job would allow her to cross paths with Olivia, because then she could say it happened by accident, but it never had.
The only detective who'd actually seen her was Fin. He'd asked her how she was doing, and asked about her father – she'd just told him that her parents had moved to Italy and left it at that. The bare minimum. It didn't stop her from keeping the business card Olivia had handed her with her cell phone number on the back in her wallet for all these years. Fin had said she should reach out to Olivia, that he could tell she missed the kids. She'd asked Fin not to say anything to Olivia and when the time was right, she'd reach out.
Her mother had questioned her about her loyalty to Olivia Benson multiple times.
She'd even asked her if she'd spoken to her. She asked Kathleen if she thought her father had spoken to her. Each time, Kathleen would ask her mother what it was she had against Olivia. Olivia Margaret Benson had never kissed her father nor had she ever slept with him, all she had done was be there to support their family and she had looked out for their family. She knew this, because her father had been so adamant about it. If there was one thing Kathleen knew, it was when her father was lying.
It's how she knew her father loved Olivia Benson. Love came in all shapes and forms, and she wasn't sure what way her father loved Olivia, but she was sure that there was something there – something ancient and deep, something beautiful about it. She never doubted her father loved her mother, but that had been fading for years. It'd almost broken twice. She knew he loved Olivia Benson because she loved Olivia Benson.
She knew this for a fact, and yet she also knew that he'd never acted on his love for his partner, and Olivia was nothing but respectful of their family.
It was a conversation she'd had with her mother a few weeks before they came back to New York for the first time in ten years that had made her question if her father had actually wanted to leave, or if her mother had given her father an ultimatum. Her mother, while she loved her, and admired her tenacity to keep the family together, had manipulated her father into thinking that Italy was good for them. She had felt so scared of the presence of Olivia Benson in their lives that she felt like she had to put an ocean between them.
True, her parents had seemed happy, but the few times her father would question her about her work, she could tell he missed his job at SVU and his partner. He never said her name, but she could sense it in his voice. They were almost the same, she and her father. He had tried to shield his children from his job, but he had wound up with a daughter who advocated for the victims of the crimes he used to investigate, thrown right into the thick of the world he'd tried to hide from them.
When she'd picked them up at the airport, her father's eyes suddenly looked a little more alive than they had in any of the photos she'd been sent. Her mother, however, looked tired, and exhausted. When her father went to a few Department Meetings, her mother had asked her to come to lunch with her. It was at this lunch that her mother had told Kathleen something that she would never forget.
"Kathleen, I can't keep him forever. I don't even think he was mine to keep." Her mother admitted, "I love your father, but I realize now that moving away didn't fix anything."
"What are you talking about, mom?" Kathleen had asked her mother; her blue eyes had searched the identical ones across the table. "I thought you guys were happy?"
"Katie," her mom had grabbed her hand, "I've never been happier, but when I look at your father at night when he's standing on the patio looking over the plaza, there's a forlorn look in his eyes and he's lost. I've kept him for myself these past ten years and I regret that I've killed a part of his soul."
"Mom."
"Katie, listen. I know you know your father. Does he seem happy? Do you HONESTLY think they HAVEN'T spoken in the last ten years?"
"Mom. Seriously. When are you going to let this go? None of us have had any contact with her in ten years. It's been excruciating." Kathleen shook her head. "My job should've brought me in her vicinity, and it hasn't. He forbade us from talking about her or even mentioning her, and none of us have."
"She's getting an award. I saw the bulletin announcement when your father left his e-mail up a couple weeks ago. They sent out invitations to all the officers that were once a part of SVU. I accepted the invitation. It's time."
"Does he know?"
"I told him before we got on the plane, I told him that he needed to call Fin. I told him they wanted him to write a speech."
"Wow. That's…quite a step, mom." Katie was surprised at this olive branch that her mother seemed to want to extend. "Are you going?" She asked, curious.
"Yes. I plan on going. There's something I have to give her."
"Mom, you're being really cryptic here. What do you have to give her?"
"I'm going to file the paperwork while we're here. I've had it tucked away all these years, and I just can't compete with a ghost anymore."
"Mom?"
"Listen to me, Katie. You know it as much as I do, Eli is happy in Rome, and I don't want to take that away from him, from me. But your father – he's every bit like you. New York is in your bloodstream, and so is Olivia. She's always had the two of you."
Kathleen was confused. Her mother was giving her father to Olivia? What twisted world was this?
When her father had called her to tell her that a bomb had gone off on the night of the awards ceremony, her blood had run cold.
When she arrived at the hospital, after picking up Richard, she was shocked to see Olivia standing there at the entrance. Her first instinct was to hug her, but this was her mother that had been attacked. Was it meant for her father? Or was this something else entirely?
Her father had left the hospital due to the COVID restrictions, and she'd been left alone with her mother. She'd woken up, and Richard had gone to go get their father from the 1-6. Of course he would run home.
While her mother was laying there in the hospital bed, she'd asked something of Kathleen that she would never forget.
"Make sure that your father holds onto Olivia, Katie. It's important. Do you understand? He'll be so lost."
She told her mother to stop talking nonsense that she could pull through this…but even those words coming out of her mouth had felt foreign because she knew the truth, her mother had planned on delivering her father to Olivia just not broken.
When she'd gotten the call that her mother had passed away, all the air had gone out of her lungs. They'd found their father in the chapel, broken. She'd heard the door open and knew. She could always feel the woman's presence whenever she was near. Olivia was standing in the door and as her father and Richard had embraced, she had extricated herself and flown into the older woman's arms.
She'd called Olivia later that night and had a long conversation with her. She'd told her about how much she had wanted to reach out over the years but they were told they couldn't. She'd told her that she knew about the kidnapping ordeal, she'd followed it, and she had wanted to reach out but she couldn't. She told Olivia that she had missed her in her life so much and that she wanted to catch up with her once things had calmed down from the loss of their mother.
She'd started to fix her own relationship with the person who had seen the good in her when she was at the bottom of the abyss. But, she couldn't bring herself to tell her what Kathy had spoken to her on her deathbed. Or what she'd told her before the night she got blown up.
Kathleen was glad Olivia had come to the funeral, she'd caught the look her father had given Olivia and knew that her mother was telling the truth. They were two ships that had been listlessly cast into a hurricane and needed each other to find shore.
Then, her father got attacked, told Eli it was over a parking spot – what the hell, dad, that is the lamest excuse ever. And then he had his accident with Eli. She knew PTSD when she saw it – so she reached out to Olivia.
The intervention had been a disaster. But, it did confirm something she'd always known. Her father loved Olivia. He loved all of them.
She told Olivia that only she could talk him into therapy. But they would both probably have to go to make it work. She told her she'd threaten to kick him out of their family if he didn't go. She told Olivia that maybe she should try to talk to her father alone. She told her how she'd told him to get help.
She knew Olivia was his stability. She knew Olivia wouldn't let him bullshit her. She knew Olivia could push back just as much as her father pushed. They were the same person.
She loved Olivia Benson, and she was grateful that she now could call her anytime she wanted. She just hadn't had the heart to tell her the real reason Kathy had suggested they go to the Awards Ceremony. Maybe she would, sometime soon – when the moment was right. Maybe she'd hand her the manila envelope that she'd found in the bag her mother had left with her that afternoon when she told her the real reason they'd come back.
It didn't matter, in the grand scheme of things – because Kathleen knew deep down that no matter what happened, she wasn't letting the brunette out of their lives again. And she hoped that the brunette wasn't going to let them out either.
Because honestly, Olivia Benson gave the best hugs on earth.