Title: the more that you say (the less I know)
Author: SneetchesToo
Pairing: Olivia + Elliot
Rating: Teen (language)
Summary: Ten years is a long time, too long in fact, and yet, maybe not quite long enough.
Author's Note: I've never actually written Elliot/Olivia on paper before, so, here we have it.
I'm like the water when your ship rolled in that night; rough on the surface but you cut through like a knife. And if it was an open-shut case, I never would've known from that look on your face.
Chapter 1
(the one in which Olivia sees a ghost)
The gnawing feeling in her gut should have been enough of a warning.
It should have been enough for her to realize that this was the one time in her life where she didn't need to go where duty was calling her.
And yet, she had heard the 10-13 call over the radio and she hadn't been able to stop herself.
Despite the way her heart had started to race in her chest, despite the voice in her head that was telling her to turn around.
The way her hands had tightened around the steering wheel should have served as a clue, and yet, they hadn't, not once.
She hadn't even slowed down until she made it to the scene, not even when Fin had called her and reminded her that she was due for her award ceremony any minute now.
Her ceremony, just for her, and yet, here she was, practically throwing herself out of her barely stopped vehicle as her eyes took in the scene before her.
She didn't know why she was here, they hadn't asked for her to come.
But her body had gone on autopilot, as if she was being controlled by something greater, something bigger than herself.
She had never been one to believe in such a thing, but today, well today that was honestly the only way she could describe it.
Her legs had carried her across the scene, her eyes locking on the body that was being loaded into the back of the ambulance.
And her heart skipped a beat.
"Kathy?" There was no mistaking that face, not after she stared at it in a picture frame on her partner's desk for thirteen years.
Some things never change.
Apparently Kathy Stabler was one of them.
The paramedics had shoved her off, stating that they had to get going, and Olivia had held her breath as she felt the air around her change.
He was here.
There was denying it.
"Liv?" She held her breath as she turned because let's face it, it had been ten years and nothing could have prepared her for this.
Just like nothing could have prepared her for the way her heart literally stopped beating when she locked eyes with him again for the first time in a decade.
This couldn't be happening.
"Elliot?" She barely registered herself saying his name as her legs betrayed her.
Moving toward him was the exact opposite of what she wanted to be doing right now.
No, instead, she wanted to be running in the other direction, away from him, as far away from him as she could possibly get.
"They tried to kill her." He breathed out, his eyes unforgiving and his breathing shallow. "They tried to kill Kathy."
How was she supposed to respond to that?
How in the hell was she supposed to make any sense of this?
He had left, gone away, vanished for all she knew.
And now, just shy of ten years later, he was standing before her on a street corner with pain and anguish and horror in his eyes.
He didn't even look heartbroken, no, rather, he looked like he was full of regret.
If his wife wasn't currently being ushered to Mercy she would've slapped him.
Because frankly, that was the only kind of welcome she thought he deserved.