Chapter Thirteen – Cor Unum (One Heart)

A/N: Part two of the previous chapter...loaded with tons of feelings.

SONG: All Again – Ella Henderson

Disclaimer: Not my characters, just my playtime.

Previously: "I feel like I should be grieving the loss of my wife," he supplied, "But we've not been really happy in years – and I was disillusioned to believe we were." He nodded. His eyes meeting Olivia's eyes and he saw the storm brewing in the depths. "I just want to get back all the time I lost and give it - back to her. I want to be better to tell her that I'm not going anywhere, and I want her to believe it when I tell her these things. I want to grab her and kiss the hell out of her and never let go of her ever again. I want to be the person she deserves." Elliot looked down at his feet, exhaling.

Olivia's eyes had tears in them as she looked like she was about to be sick – where the fuck had that come from?

Dr. Lindstrom looked at Olivia who had now sat up and her breathing patterns seemed to be slightly labored. Her eyes were darting left to right, and she closed her lids tightly as he noticed her jaw seemed set in a position that meant she was clenching her back teeth together, as she sucked in her bottom lip and bit down slightly. Finally opening her mouth slightly, she inhaled and then exhaled. Elliot had looked over at her as she had shifted. With her shaking hands, she reached out and took her water bottle, taking a sip.

Was this behavior normal, their sharing things? Even in a pandemic? Lindstrom shrugged it off, the first responders were the first people to have gotten vaccines, so he could only assume that they weren't worried about it. He had been able to get his because of his proximity of working with the NYPD as one of the official psychiatrists that would be called in. It's a different level of intimacy, though, sharing a drink.

Elliot darted his tongue out and lightly wet his lips, as Olivia just stared at him for a moment, trying to compose herself, swallowing another drink of water.

"Elliot." Olivia finally found her voice, and it was slightly shaky, a tone that neither man had ever heard before in their recollection. "We can't go back in time and re-collect lost moments. What's passed…has passed, and it should remain there." she closed her brown eyes trying to hold back the tears that were threatening to fall. "What we can do, is focus on establishing solid footing beneath us at the moment. What we can do is work on forgiveness. We can focus on taking care of ourselves, dealing with the fallout of everything that happened in the lost years. We have to fix ourselves before we can just jump into the deep end of things. When you –" she took a deep breath, and looked over at Lindstrom, meeting his eyes and seeing the encouragement behind them.

It was hard, admitting the truth out loud. Yes, she had admitted things on paper, but that was different than throwing the words out into the known universe and allowing people to actually hear them come out. Once words were spoken out loud, they had the propensity to leave what could only be described as scars just as deeply in the ears, on the hearts and minds of the people that heard them. It was a fundamental truth, one that she'd had to accept in the wake of the words Lewis had spoken to her years ago, and no matter how much she had denied that his words hadn't scarred her more than the physical scarring he had inflicted upon her – they had, and it was this truth she had kept to herself.

It was her secret, the one she kept from everyone about her assault – how the words Lewis had spoken to her had somehow mixed along with all the drunken tirades that she'd been subjected to in her youth.

A single tear escaped from beneath her lids and she cursed it, because her body had decided to betray her.

Swallowing the saliva that seemed to be thickening in her mouth by the second, she told herself she had to push forward, to say what she wanted to say; what she had to say, to shatter the last brick wall completely. "When you left me, I fell down. I fell so far down. Then, when you crash landed like a fucking meteor in the middle of that street on the night of my awards ceremony, it was like someone had tethered me to the largest cruise ship anchor and just left me in the middle of the Arctic ocean. All the while I was standing there…it felt like someone had doused me in cold water and at the same exact time, I felt my heart leap into my throat. I thought I had given up. I had been working on fixing myself and moving on for ten very long years." She brought her hands up and ran them both through her hair.

"I broke again." She whispered, looking between her former partner and her therapist. "I shattered into a million tiny pieces right there in the middle of the street. I'd been running for so long from all those emotions that I thought I'd buried – I had thought I was strong. I thought I'd forgiven you for leaving me –" she closed her eyes once more, willing the tears behind her lids to stay where they were. "I'd laughed, loved, and lived in the ten years you left me. But it didn't matter. None of that mattered the moment I saw you again. Because the carefully constructed mirror-mask that I had been wearing shattered."

"My heart and brain had a tug of war standing there – and my heart yelled at me." She shook her head. "I lost it. But I knew that I had to swallow all those things for just a little while longer. I tried to stop you, to not address it, when you wanted to talk that night in the hospital, with your wife just a few doors down, dying. Elliot, we had both been police officers for so god damn long, we both knew the prognosis of Kathy's injuries weren't looking positive." she closed her eyes again, for a split second, as she steered herself with the strength deep inside of her chest and when she opened them, both the therapist and the love of her life were staring at her.

"I didn't want to think about that. She didn't want to believe that we hadn't been in contact in ten years, she really didn't believe it at all – and when she expressed her disbelief at the fact that we hadn't spoken in ten years, I wanted to express the disbelief that we really hadn't. Standing there, looking at her, I didn't want to address the fact that the moment she was gone, you'd no longer be married. I didn't want to address the fact that my heart was breaking for you or your children. She was your wife for thirty-eight years. It doesn't matter who you are – but to remain married for that many years, there has to be some level of love for one another – you might not have been in love any longer, but you had a comfortable life, a somewhat happy life."

Lindstrom found himself having a hard time breathing now, it was curious, to examine the two people across from him. They'd known one another for twenty-two years. And out of those twenty-two years, he'd been married all of them…and Olivia had been in love with a married man for all of those. His heart broke for her. But, looking at the two of them, he now knew without a doubt that her former partner had been in love with her too. He'd said as much. But they had never done anything about it.

"You raised five beautiful children. They are beautiful, El." She tilted her head slightly, shaking her head. "And the thing that really irks me the most is that I keep replaying all the conversations we ever had – and I keep tapping the breaks at the conversation we had in the car one day while we were working the case with the frozen embryos. You had fucking told me I'd make a great mom. Do you remember that?" She paused, as Elliot nodded, he knew where she was going with this.

"You said to me that I should start thinking about having kids and any way I wanted to do it that you would support me. What the actual fuck were you offering? Elliot? Were you offering to sleep with me at the time? Because you said a lot of fucked up shit during that case." She shook her head, "But I cannot. I refuse to dwell on that conversation because with everything you've said to me in the past few weeks. But, would you have?" She shook her head. "No. Don't. Just don't answer it. I don't want to actually know."

Lindstrom watched Olivia carefully. "I shared the worst four-plus days of my life in the letter to you – and I bared the part of my soul that I was never honest with Ed nor Brian about." She placed her hands over her nose and mouth, trying to breathe. "I do want you. I've always wanted you. And I would take every single moment I've been through over these last ten years and do it all again if I knew that you would come back and say all the things you've said to me over the last few weeks. I'd relive every trauma, every single triumph – if it meant that I could grow as much as I have in spite of the fact that you weren't present."

She shook her head, "I'm so fucking weak, Elliot. I know everyone looks at me and they see the strength and survival, but you left a mess when you left me. When you told me in the intervention that you were drowning and I told you to grab onto us – I meant every single word. But, even though you were drowning, you were still on the shallow end of the sandbar."

She now allowed the tears to fall, "I've been running so long from the pain of losing you that having you near me, I don't want to let you go. I don't want to be away from you for any extended amount of time. I remember all the smiles, laughs, looks, everything. I've had your voice in the back of my mind for ten years. I've been running. I've fallen, I've picked myself up. I grew. I fucking rose like a phoenix from the ashes all around me. I poured my heart into my squad, and I'm ready to find the parts of me that I've been missing all these years. I'm tired of the what-could-have-beens, and the what-ifs. I want to find out the possibilities and the inevitabilities of it all."

Lindstrom sat up straighter in his chair, where had this honesty been when she was sorting through her trauma? Was Elliot the key that fit all her locks?

"Liv." Elliot tilted his head at her, and then in a single motion, he moved and wrapped the woman in his arms, enveloping her in a hug that could only be described as the type of hug that was the equivalent of a life preserver being thrown to a drowning crewman in the middle of the ocean after a shipwreck.

"I'd do it all again." She whispered between sobs.

Lindstrom looked at the clock. Their time had expired ten minutes ago, but he hadn't the heart to interrupt them. "Olivia." He spoke softly, "Thank you, for your honesty with Elliot. Do you have Noah waiting on you at home?" Lindstrom asked, he wanted to make sure she would be alright tonight, because her emotions were raw.

"No. Staying with Rollins." She whispered, her fingers were digging into the back of Elliot's suit as she held on for dear life.

"Did you drive here?" Lindstrom asks, and Elliot answered for her.

"She drove, but we came together." He answered, "I can drive her home." Elliot supplied. "I don't think she's in any state to drive herself home."

"I'm fine." Olivia whispered. Elliot laughed a light laugh and just held her tighter.

"The hell you are." Elliot answered. "Thank you, for this session, Doc. We'll be in touch." He held Olivia as they stood together, and Elliot picked up Olivia's bag, and reached in her pocket to take the keys out. "C'mon, Liv. Let's get you home."

Together, they walked out, Elliot holding her against him as they made their way out of the office and to the elevator to go down to the parking garage. Olivia had moved her arms from around him and was holding onto the lapel of his coat. "I'm sorry." She managed to stand up straighter, and wiped her palm against her cheek, swallowing her emotions. Elliot looked down at her, his brows slightly furrowed. "I'll be alright to drive."

"Liv, just…let me drive you home. I'll drive myself home after – if you don't want me to stay and I'll come back in the morning to give you your vehicle and you can take me to get mine."

"El, you don't have to go home. You can stay. We'll sleep on the couch again." She looked up at him, "If you want."

"You know, we could just sleep in your bed, I promise I will behave."

"Elliot." She whispered, looking up at him, and when the elevator stopped they walked out and over to her SUV. Elliot unlocked the doors and opened the door for her, and closed it once he had handed her the purse he'd carried for her. Once Elliot had slid into the driver's seat, he put the keys in the ignition and looked over at Olivia who had tilted her head back on the headrest, exposing her neck. His eyes still found the scar and she had reclined the passenger seat.

"Comfortable?" He asked, a small smile on his lips. She turned her head to look at him.

"Yes. Now, drive, Stabler. I'm starving." she paused, and then threw her arm over her head, "It's not you I don't trust in my bed."