Author's Note: Okay, so I wrote this based on the BTS picture of a football field that had a hashtag of "holdmeclosertinycaptain," some spoilers/spec for the 500th episode, the lyrics to "Tiny Dancer" - hold me closer, tiny dancer - and a healthy bit of theorizing and maybe a little wishful thinking about having Elliot in the 500th episode. I doubt the episode will go anywhere close to what I've done, but I wanted to write what was going through my head.

Title comes from "Tiny Dancer" by Elton John, parenthesis come from "True" by Spandau Ballet. Quotes from two Shakespeare plays are also used, Romeo & Juliet and Twelfth Night.

TRIGGER WARNING: Mentions of grooming/underage relationship/statutory rape and alcoholism. Please read with caution and care. It is rated M for this reason.

Olivia Benson has had a terrible, no good, horrible, very bad day. Series of days, even. A week? Longer? That sounded more accurate.

But today had been particularly brutal, watching the man she used to think of as her soulmate – and what a load of crock of shit that was – be arraigned for multiple counts of statutory rape. As she'd sat in the courtroom, listening to the charges against him, she felt bile rise through her throat, and she'd had to run out of there before she projectile vomited all over the courtroom floor.

That was her.

They aren't charging him with her case, in particular, but she knows that there should be at least one more count tacked onto the end. More, likely, considering the number of women who would never be able to come forward for one reason or another.

He'd taken advantage of her insecurities, seduced a broken young girl – her – with thoughts of a brighter future and promises he never meant to fulfill. At the time, she'd looked at him as a savior, but now, she was repulsed to remember how he used to make her feel.

He'd seen someone who would have walked to the ends of the Earth barefoot over broken glass and hot coals for anyone to show her some love, and he'd made her feel like the most special girl in the world. For a time. And when Serena found out about their engagement and threatened to forcibly castrate him with the edge of a broken bottle of Jack if he touched her daughter again, he'd gone back on his promise to never let her be alone.

Should have let you do it, Mom. Sorry I doubted you. On that, anyway.

Even once she turned 18, even once she was up at Siena and far removed from Serena's random bouts of alcoholic anger, he'd never return her phone calls, and he'd moved away from the apartment he'd been living in.

And she'd grown up.

No one would put up with her for very long – except Elliot, but he'd left too, for a time – and she'd seen what had happened the last time she'd bared her soul to anyone. The last time she let anyone in and see the vulnerable side of her, the one that read Danielle Steel novels alongside the classics, the one who believed in such things as soulmates and one true love and true love's kiss.

She's occasionally slipped around Elliot, letting a tiny crack of her soft heart show, but he's the longest relationship she'd had with a man. If she didn't count the years he'd spent gallivanting around God-knows-where doing God-knows-what against him, she's known him for over 23 years. That's longer than anyone else in her life besides Serena, man or woman, though Fin isn't too far behind.

In the midst of all the confusion and chaos earlier in the day, she'd almost forgotten – until she received a reminder text with the exact address – that she'd promised Kathleen she'd swing by Eli's soccer game that night. "It's his first game as a starter, and he could really use some moral support, even if you don't pull out your pom-poms and stand on the sideline yelling his name," Kathleen said. "With Dad being undercover and all, he feels abandoned, and there's only so much the rest of us can do."

You'd do the same for any of your friends' kids. If Jesse ends up joining t-ball like Amanda said she wanted to, you'd go to her games too. It's not because it's Elliot's kid.

Except, in a way, maybe it kind of is. Anyone else's kid, and she likely would have texted with an apology and gone home to drown her weary sorrows in ice cream and a bottle of whatever wine struck her fancy. Elliot's kid, and she's going straight from the courthouse to the soccer field, not even swinging by home first to freshen up or change into something more casual.

Right now, she isn't sure if she wanted to be alone.

She sits on the bleachers and watches as Eli's team takes on their main rivals, at least according to the woman sitting next to her. "Far Bestwick High beats us almost every year," she says. "I think they put something in the Powerade there."

Olivia's eyes narrow slightly, but relax as she sees Eli jog out onto the field. She has to admit, she doesn't know much about soccer; Peter had tried to interest Noah in baseball a long time ago, and that took for a time, before he left and Noah's passion for dance blossomed instead.

Kathleen sits down next to her, and hands her a crisp, cold bottle of water. "Hey," she says, giving Olivia a hug. "Glad you could make it."

"Glad I could too. Really." She sits back and watches as the two teams began to chase the ball around the field, guided by their sure feet.

She doesn't ask about Elliot, and Kathleen doesn't volunteer. "Rich is pulling a night shift at the firehouse," she says. "Maureen got her booster yesterday and doesn't feel well, and Liz said she'd be running late if she could make it at all."

"So it really is you and I cheering him on," Olivia says, whooping as Eli stole the ball away from the other team's player and began running downfield with it, before a different player from the other team swipes it away from him.

"Yeah, Grandma was having an episode before I left. Dad decided to stay with her, but told me to come cheer on Eli."

So that's where Elliot is. Taking care of his mother.

It's almost too much to take, because watching him with her – knowing those two haven't always had the strongest relationship – does something to her heart. She's heard him call her mama, and it was a passing glimpse of the scared little boy who loved his mother and feared his father, and didn't know what to do with either emotion, so he'd bottled them up inside along with everything else.

"He said if she went to bed early, he might swing by toward the end."

"Does he know I'm here?" Olivia asks, and she didn't know which answer she'd prefer. He's still undercover, as far as she's aware, still playing with fire against people made to combust at the slightest spark. And she wants Elliot, the man she knows as her partner, the one who protects her – and yes, could be a possessive son of a bitch sometimes. She wants the one, the only person who'd looked at her since she was sixteen and scared and saw something to – well, he'd say love.

He's said it to her once in front of his kids, all but said it a second time in her apartment while high on whatever truth serum the Albanians were dishing out these days, and then started to say something about it on the voicemail he'd left, before he got cut off and didn't leave a follow-up message. So, she suspects it's likely true.

If he knows she's here, she thinks there's no way he wouldn't try to make an appearance, but she also doesn't want him to risk his cover.

Far Bestwick is good, and at halftime, they're up 3-1. When Eli comes back to the sideline, he catches Kathleen's eye and grins, and then looks confused as he looks over and sees Olivia next to her.

Kathleen leans over. "Don't worry about him, he's still a little grouchy. But he secretly appreciates it," she whispers, patting Olivia on the shoulder. "He's still learning why you're so important to the rest of us, besides from the obvious connection with Dad."

"Thanks," Olivia murmurs, as she takes another sip of the water and stares into the distance.

It was a night not too unlike this, a crisp early autumn evening over 35 years before, with the leaves beginning to fall. Another one of Serena's insensitive drunken remarks had hit a raw nerve for Olivia, and she'd fled from the apartment. Before she knew it, she'd ended up on the football field outside her school, a place where she'd never spent a lot of time.

"Olivia."

Her name in his voice will never fail to thrill her.

"How'd you know I was going to be here?" she asked.

"I was in my office," he gestured to a window above them, one she knew was his office – the site of many of their previous meetings alone – "and I thought I saw you. Have you been practicing your lines?"

They were reading Romeo & Juliet in class, and for some reason, he saw her as a perfect Juliet. "I have," she says.

"Let's start from Tybalt's exit from the party at the Capulet house in Act 1, Scene 5. I'll be your Romeo, of course." He shifted from his casual stance to his more authoritative one. "If I profane with my unworthiest hand, this holy shrine, the gentle fine is this: my lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand to smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss."

She cleared her throat, and looked at him with the wide-eyed innocence of young Juliet. "Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, which mannerly devotion shows in this; for saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch, and palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss."

He looked at her, his gaze flitting between her eyes and her lips, and smirked. "Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?"

"Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer." She felt herself moving closer to him, drawn to him as if by a magnet.

"O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do; they pray, grant thou, lest faith turn to despair."

She snaps out of her reverie as the referee blows his whistle to start the second half of the game. Her own faith had turned to despair not long after, and she's never managed to truly find it since.

There's a part of her that's always going to be the scared teenage girl who wants someone to love her.

She knows, by now, of course, having worked in SVU for decades, that love can be manipulated to look like all sorts of things, and that all sorts of things can be manipulated to look like love in return, but she also knows that somewhere out there, there's love in its unaltered form.

She's not sure if she's capable of giving that love, and she's certainly not worthy of receiving it, but she knows it has to exist. Somewhere.

Kathleen nudges her in the shoulder about halfway through the second half. "Dad's coming. Said he's parking the car now. I guess Liz decided with the traffic, it'd be shorter for her to go to his apartment and make sure Grandma was okay, especially with her being a nurse. Also, so Dad could at least see the end of the game."

"Oh, good," Olivia says.

"He doesn't know you're here, by the way," Kathleen replies. "He's going to be surprised to see you."

Olivia blows out a short breath and watches as Eli deftly steals the ball from the opposing team's player, with some very fancy-looking footwork, before making a run down the field with it. "Go Eli!" they both yell and cheer, as Eli sails the ball over the goalie's outstretched hands and into the goal.

"Great job, Eli!" they hear a gruff, but proud, voice shout, and Olivia would recognize that voice anywhere. She can see him, far down in the other section of the bleachers where no one else is around him. He can make a fast exit, if he needs to. He's wearing a black knit beanie and a black overcoat, and if she didn't know better, she'd think he's trying to be a shadow of himself.

And maybe he is, but under the light of the full moon and the lights of this stadium, and under her watchful gaze, she's always going to see him for who he is.

The person who, despite everything, doesn't see her as a broken shell of herself. The person who looks at her and sees a whole being, worthy of love.

Elliot doesn't feel things by inches; he's a man of passion, a man who believes in holy things like abiding faith and that sex should be the best part of life. He's a man who intimidates everyone he comes across, but she has never once stood in fear when she's standing beside him.

The game's over, eventually, and even with Eli's amazing goal, his team still loses 3-2. "Good game," Kathleen says, high-fiving her brother as he comes into the stands. "Dad's here, but –" she looks over at where he'd been sitting in the bleachers. "I guess he had to leave, or something. He was here, though, cheering you on."

"Sure he was." Eli blows out an annoyed puff of air and rolls his eyes a little. "I – you know, the guys on the team want to take me to get pizza, celebrate my big goal. Coach says I have real potential."

Kathleen smiles at her brother. "Go. We'll tell Dad you said hi."

"Yeah, you go ahead and do that." Eli takes off toward the crowd of cheering boys, who whoop and holler and clap their hands on his back, and Olivia grins. She remembers saving the little boy when he was barely more than minutes old, and to see him be a full-grown teenager – attitude and all – means she's succeeded along the way, somewhere, at least once.

"I probably should go back and check on how Liz and Grandma are doing," Kathleen says. "Until Dad gets home permanently, he's put me in charge of that whole situation. Says I understand it the best, and that Grandma reacts the best to me."

"I'm sure she loves all of you equally," Olivia says, "but she's always been so worried about you."

"I worry about her now too, so the feeling is mutual. 'Night, Olivia," she says, quickly hugging her before beginning the walk to the parking lot. "You'll be okay, right?"

"'Night, Kathleen." She stares out into the inky blackness, as the crowd disperses for home or for dinner: celebration for the winners, commiserating for those who lost, and she swears she sees a shadow on the field. "I'll be okay. You go take care of Bernie."

She eases herself off the hard metallic sting of the bleachers and walks across the field, and they meet at about the 40 yard line, her and her shadow; it isn't a shadow at all, but Elliot, blending into the night sky as best as he ever could. She shivers, pulls her coat around her tighter.

"You're still so beautiful, my Livvie."

In the background of his hotel room, he was playing the song that was always "their" song – True by Spandau Ballet – and he swayed against her with the stench of stale vodka on his breath. For a moment, if she closed her eyes, and imagined her physical scars had disappeared and she was a teenager again, she could almost believe this was then and not now.

His touch had a dull edge to it; it was the same touch that used to electrify her insides and make her feel wholly alive, but now, as he ran his hand along her shoulder blades, it didn't do anything.

"Do you remember when you were my Juliet, and I was your Romeo?" The question was rhetorical, she could tell, for he launched into a mini-monologue. "Ah, Olivia, if the measure of thy joy be heap'd like mine and that thy skill be more to blazon it, then sweeten with thy breath this neighbour air, and let rich music's tongue unfold the imagined happiness that both receive in either by this dear encounter."

She knew her next line, knew what Juliet said in response to Romeo. What Olivia said in response to him.

Instead, it's another line from the same scene, said by Friar Laurence, that came to mind. "These violent delights have violent ends and in their triumph die, like fire and powder."

Maybe they'll combust together.

He sees her approach, and a grin forms on his face, and she covers the last several yards with a sprint unlike any she's managed to do since her ankle injury. "I'm surprised to see you here," she says, and she feels a tear threaten to course its way down her cheek at seeing Elliot standing there.

"You? I'm surprised to see you here," Elliot says. "I didn't think you and Eli were on the best terms these days."

"Kathleen invited me, and I wanted to show him support." She smiles. "You saw his goal, right? His coach says he has real potential."

She can see his eyebrows shoot up under the tight-knit material of the beanie at the coach's words of praise. "Does he now? That's good. Maybe getting involved in this will help get him back on a good path." He turns to look at Olivia, and he sees that tear that has now streaked its way down her cheek; he reaches out with the pad of his thumb and brushes it away.

His touch is soft, reverential. It's how she's always wanted to be touched, but never truly has. The simple gesture of him wiping away her tear threatens to make more fall.

"Olivia?" he asks.

She knows what he's asking, without him saying it. They've always been good at this, reading each other's minds, knowing what to say without always having to find the words. And she says, "I'm fine, really," while shaking her head no, I'm not at the same time.

And he pulls her into an impossibly tight embrace, and nuzzles his face in the crook of her neck. "Like hell, you are," he whispers against her skin, his words a warm breath in the chilly night air.

Like hell, I am. That's about right.

"Want to talk about it?"

She looks at him, and from this close, they've only ever been a handful of times. She can see the spark in his blue eyes as he looks at her tenderly; even his own kids don't get that look from him, but she does.

She shakes her head. "No. Just – just hold me, okay?"

"I can do that." He wraps his arms so tightly around her that she's safely cocooned inside them, and they sway a little as they hold onto each other. He whispers soft things against the chill of her skin; they're so soft she has to strain to hear them. Things like I got you and you're okay and you're strong and beautiful and you're the best person I've ever known and Noah loves you andthen his voice cracks with emotion and whatever words he's trying to say are muffled against her skin.

His words warm her; his touch soothes her.

She isn't sure if they've been standing there for two minutes or for twenty – time seems to slow to a maddening degree when they're together. She knows he's still under, the outfit and the secrecy and the untrimmed beard all speak to that.

"Let's go home," he says, "I'll drive you."

She wants to protest; she wants to ask about his car, and how he's going to get home if his car is down here in Brooklyn and she lives up in Manhattan, but the thought of someone taking care of her, even if it's just driving her home after a long day – and he doesn't even know how long it's been – makes her smile, even if only slightly.

So instead, she digs in her purse and pulls out her car keys. "Here you go," she says, and she expects him to walk on ahead to get the car ready for them. Instead, he shifts to holding her hand, clasping her hand in his, weaving his fingers through hers.

"Let's go home, Olivia."

The traffic is a little heavier than she would have expected for this time of night, but the stop-and-go stutter of the traffic doesn't phase her like it normally would. Elliot is navigating her sedan surely, and his hand is still clasped in hers, except for the times when he needs both hands on the wheel; when he doesn't, his hand seeks hers out.

"Amaro was in town," she says, breaking the peaceable silence in the car. "He had a client who said he was falsely accused of statutory rape, that he would never hurt anyone, let alone a teenager." She squeezes her eyes shut, and then opens them again, so that she can see Elliot when she says the next part out loud. When she begins to give herself the voice that she's denied herself for so long. "I knew him."

"What do you mean, you knew him?"

"He'd come to the precinct the day before, asking to see me. He'd looked me up and heard I was Captain of the Special Victims Unit, so he wanted to stop by and congratulate me, and invite me out for dinner."

"Who is he?"

"He was my English professor for a special college literature class I was taking while I was in high school. I was 16. I thought it was love." She winces. "You know my mom never showed me much love." Elliot is silent, soaking in what she's saying, but his fingers continue to stroke her hand. "He told me – he told me – that he'd take me away from here, take me away from anyone who ever wanted to hurt me. That he'd take me to a little summer cabin his family owns outside Halifax, and we could live there together, surviving on love and literature."

"Did he –"

She cuts him off before he has to say the words she's still grappling with herself. "Yes." His heartbeat is fast, she can feel it under her fingertips, and she squeezes. "He – he has Polaroids of me too, that he took in his office. Me, lounging on his couch, fully exposed. Me, sitting in his desk chair, touching myself." She chokes up. "He still has them; he showed them to me when we were at dinner, like it was a sick inside joke between us."

"What happened, Olivia?" He's using his soft voice, the one he uses when he talks to traumatized victims of rape. "Please tell me –"

"I thought it was sweet, that he still wanted to remember me." She bites her lip and stares at the taillights of the car in front of them, willing it to go faster. "But as we were in his hotel room – he had our song playing in the background – he – he saw my scars, and he turned away, as if I repulsed him, all of a sudden. And all I could think was – you wouldn't – you would love me, scars and all, and it wouldn't matter, and I wanted you there and not him."

"Your scars?"

And then she remembers, she hasn't had this conversation with Elliot either, the one about the consequences of when the abyss they stare into every day as police officers decides to fight back. She still has the faint scar of a knife wielded by a family-slaughtering psychopath dancing across her throat, and some other assorted line-of-duty scars. He has those too. It's the ones he doesn't know about.

But somehow, she doesn't think he'd turn away or be repulsed by her, no matter how many scars she had.

She takes his hand and lets it run up under her shirt, until – "you can touch it," she says, feeling his finger hit the edge of one of the scars on her back, one that no brassiere of hers will ever fully cover. "I trust you."

He traces the outline of what he can reach, the hard ridge of skin protruding slightly from the whisper-soft smoothness of everything around it. "Olivia," he says, her name a whisper lodged in his throat.

"I'm alive. I saved myself when no one else would or could. But he saw me as someone who had been ruined, and each scar was another reason why I wasn't the same girl he'd once known."

"Because you're a strong, beautiful woman who saves everyone, including herself. You're not a teenage girl anymore."

"I sometimes feel like I am. Like I'm going to wake up and it's 1984 and I'm back in my childhood bedroom with my Duran Duran, Journey and Queen posters next to my bed and my little portable boombox and princess telephone on the desk."

"I'd have figured you'd have a Princess Leia poster. You know, badass women doing it for themselves."

She laughs for the first time all evening, tucks a loose lock of hair behind her ear. "No, but I did have a Leia action figure on my vanity. She watched over my jewelry box. The little boy next door gave her to me as a present for me babysitting him a few times when his mom had to work late."

"You're not her. You used to be, a long time ago, but you aren't anymore."

They've reached her parking garage, and she holds him still for a moment. "When – when Amaro brought him back in and I found out what he was accused of – I realized why I saw my face in so many of the faces of the young women we've helped over the years. I am them, whether I acknowledged it or not. Seeing all the pictures he had – all of them, his sordid little collection, and he was proud of it, Elliot – I didn't know I wasn't the first girl he'd done it to, either. He – he always made me feel – feel like I was special, and perfect, and the only –"

And the cascade of tears that has been threatening to pour out of her all evening finally comes to her in a torrent, and Elliot holds her against him; his strong arms are looped around her back, and she's sure that if he could manage it, he'd pull her over the center console and have her come out the driver's side door with him. "Let it out," he says, stroking her back, stroking her hair, stroking any part of her that he can reach, "shhh, Olivia, let it out, you're safe here."

"He's going to be behind bars for a long time," she says, hiccupping slightly. She stares at him with watery brown eyes. "You can go now, if you want, call your Uber or whatever."

He shakes his head, takes the keys out of the ignition. "Tonight is about making sure you're safe and secure." He gets out of the car, and she misses his hand touching hers until he comes around and pops her door open. "You've always been taking care of everyone else. Let someone take care of you."

As they walk through the entryway of her building, she nods to the night doorman, who seems to have a flash of recognition when he sees Elliot. "Evening, Captain Benson," he says. "And Captain Benson's friend."

"Evening, Ronnie," Olivia says. "Detective Stabler is helping me after a long day at work."

"Say no more, ma'am, you keep the streets safe so the worst thing I have to deal with is GrubHub and DoorDash drivers who can't find the right building, or the occasional drunk or high idiot." He smirks at Elliot, and Olivia has to stifle a laugh. "Present company excluded, of course."

"I deserved that."

They get in the elevator to go to her floor. "Noah should be asleep by now, but I'll check in on him when we get to the apartment," she says. "If he is asleep, Lucy's probably on her tablet on my couch making her way through another season of Great British Baking Show."

"Lucy really helps you out, doesn't she?" he asks.

She smiles, as she turns her key in the lock. "Now that Noah's growing up a bit, he has some friends that want to have him over or do things with him, but she's invaluable. She's practically a member of the family by now." Sure enough, a young woman is bundled in a knit afghan, laying back on the couch and watching someone put together an exceptional-looking tray of brownies. "Lucy, we're home."

"Oh, hi, Olivia!" She stands up, startled, allowing the afghan to fall from her. "Noah was out like a light tonight, his dance teacher worked him hard at rehearsal." Her gaze goes from Olivia to Elliot. "And you must be her friend, Emmett?"

"Elliot," he says, smiling at her as he reaches out to shake her hand. "I've heard a lot of good things about what you do for Olivia and Noah."

"They're fantastic." Lucy grins, shaking his hand with a little too much vigor but plenty of enthusiasm. "I'll go, you can Venmo me tonight's payment when you get a chance."

Olivia mouths to Elliot I'm checking on Noah, and Lucy leaves the apartment with an extra spring in her step, and he goes into the kitchen to see if there's anything to drink. There's a fresh-looking pitcher of lemonade in the refrigerator, with a note attached: my mom wanted to use up all her lemons before the cold set in – L.

He takes out the pitcher and pours them each a tall, cool glass and sets them down on the table in the living room.

A few moments later, Olivia comes out, wearing a simple light blue button-down pajama shirt and matching pants, and a soft smile. "Oh, Lucy's mom make us lemonade again?"

"I guess so? It looked more appealing than that green smoothie stuff you like to drink."

"I'll have you know –"

"Yeah, antioxidants, vitamins, healthy skin, I know," he grins. "Ever get Noah to drink it?"

"I tell him it's superhero slime, and then I have to restrain him from drinking it by the gallon." She sits back on the couch next to him and takes a sip from her lemonade. "I'm surprised you didn't try to run."

"I'm done running," he says, and she thinks about how he's run so far – and so has she, before that – but somehow, they've ended up back here. "Olivia."

"El." She has no idea what he's about to say – he's found new ways to surprise her in almost every serious conversation they've had since his return, so why would he stop now? "When I saw those girls – all those girls –"

He reaches out for his glass, and accidentally grazes his hand against her knee. "I'm sorry, Liv, I didn't –"

"No, you're okay." She leans against him and looks up, her fingers playing against her hand. "You're okay. I trust you." She trusts him, despite Amanda having her well-intentioned and well-vocalized doubts, because she knows the kind of man he is. He's the man who would hold her on a soccer field, the one who would drive her home and listen to her, the one who would pour her lemonade and listen to her talk about her day. "I don't open up easily. But you're different. You've always been different."

He leans his head against hers and takes her hand in his again. "Olivia," he says quietly. "No matter what you do or is done to you, it doesn't change how I feel about you. I will always love you." He massages small circles on the back of her palm with his thumb and presses a small kiss to the crown of her head.

Maybe this is what true love is. It's not the reckless, impulsive decisions made out of desperation by teenagers who don't know any better, that change their lives and everyone else's around them forever. It's two souls who find themselves entwined in each other's lives over the course of many years, and realize they're far better together than they ever have been apart.

A line from one of Shakespeare's other plays creeps to her lips, and she smiles, as she whispers it against Elliot's chest as she feels herself begin to drift to sleep, securely tucked against the one person who would be able to let her bring down her defenses and show her delicate softness to. "Love sought is good, but given unsought better."

-fini-

Author's Note: If you or anyone you know has experienced anything like in this story or in the episode, please DO NOT hesitate to contact someone. You are not alone, and you are loved.

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