disclaimer: still not clear about whether or not I have to do a disclaimer that these babies don't belong to me

a/n: thank you for all of the reviews and kindness :) this story is kind of my way of coping with my own failing health + someone I love who I recently lost to cancer. I've had my own cancer scares before I even turned twenty, and am currently in the middle of one at the moment so this is my way of helping to handle it, and god forbid any of you ever go through it too, I hope this makes you feel a little less alone. much love xo


Chapter Three - Casey

"Liv? It's me, Casey. Are you home?" the persistent sound of knocking pulled Olivia out of her reverie. She was staring hazily at the television, which wasn't even on. Her phone was on the coffee table, receiving unread texts and unanswered calls for two days straight as it buzzed against the glass top. Her discussion with Cragen must've gotten around.

That must've set off alarm bells with everyone.

"Liv, I know you're in there." she sighed, her head thumping against the wooden doorway from the outside of the apartment. "Please let me in, I'm really worried." Casey tried again. Maybe if she didn't move, Casey would go away. Maybe the whole world would go away too.

If only she were that lucky.

With what little energy she had left, she pushed herself off of the couch and trudged to the door. As soon as the barrier was gone, she saw the nervous expression on her friend's face. "Hey," she whispered as she let Casey follow her into her apartment. "Sorry I wasn't answering my calls." She didn't bother to give any other explanation. She was too tired to come up with some complicated lie about her phone being in a dead zone when it was still ringing right there in front of them.

"I'm just glad you let me in," Casey said with a breath with relief as she set down her briefcase. "You uh... you're doing okay, right? Did something happen? Elliot says he tried stopping by but you took the key out of the hiding spot so he couldn't get in." the A.D.A's eyes dropped to the floor, her stature like a dog with its tail tucked between its legs. "He's really worried, Liv."

Oh yeah, she had forgotten about that. She'd heard him knocking but she had swiped the spare key from under the plant as soon as she had called in sick. Two days of staring at the walls in silence... well, in an attempt of silence. The walls didn't ask her any questions or kindly pester her about how she was feeling or what was wrong. Why couldn't her friends be like the walls? Why couldn't they just sit and let her wallow in a cesspool of self-pity?

"I'm fine, really." Hell, that couldn't have convinced even the dumbest person on Earth. She could hear how effortless her own tone was. The exhaustion had been to blame for that, once again. What was the point of putting in the effort to get everybody to leave her the hell alone if it wasn't going to work? She didn't even bother with eye-contact to try to seal her words with a little more reliability. If Casey didn't want to believe her, that wasn't Olivia's fault.

They could all believe whatever they wanted to, she had stopped caring.

"Oh, well, if you insist," Casey deadpanned, sarcastically rolling her eyes as she crashed down onto the couch next to Olivia. Just like that, the room felt a million times smaller. From the corner of her eye, Olivia could see Casey shrinking into her shoulders uncomfortably. "You uh — you know you can talk to me, right?" she asked, sounding heartbreakingly sincere. The crackle in her raspy voice sent lightning bolts to Olivia's tear ducts.

"Yeah," Olivia forced the word out, her own voice becoming increasingly unsteady as tears threatened to fall.

"I mean... I know all of us don't always get along, the stress of work, y'know? But uh—" she stopped, shaking her head as she scuffed under her breath. "Liv, you—you're kinda my best friend."

For once, Olivia was moved enough to make eye contact. She lifted her head, turning towards her friend with the lines of stress and fatigue prominent on her face. "Really?" she asked, her voice merely a ghost of a whisper. The way she arched her brows as she questioned made Casey realize that she truly didn't know that before it had been said.

"Yeah," she said as if it were the most obvious statement in the world. "I mean, I always want you to feel like you can talk to me. I know you usually talk to Elliot but I'm here for you, Liv. Seriously. No judgment, whatever it is, you can talk to me."

Olivia hung her head in shame. She knew Casey well enough to know that it took her effort to say something so vulnerable on her end... and she still couldn't even say what she needed to say. She certainly didn't want to say it, but she needed to at some point. Hearing Casey testify to the fact that she saw them as close friends only burned the wound.

"I don't... I don't think I can talk to anyone about this," Olivia muttered, her voice totally and utterly defeated.

Instead of overstepping a boundary or pushing her further, Casey carefully curated her next question. From what she deducted, whatever problem Olivia was facing had clearly not been spoken to Elliot about. That meant that it had to be bad. Unimaginably bad if she couldn't talk to her best friend and partner about it. "Well, is there maybe a counselor you can talk to? Someone who doesn't have any attachments? Or maybe you could talk to Huang? I get it if it's something you don't want floating around the office."

Olivia's eyes reverting back to their blank state, staring endlessly in front of her into the nothingness. "I have the numbers for some counselors, yeah," she mumbled, suddenly caring a lot less about how much she said on the topic. "Maybe Huang, I don't know."

She wasn't sure why she said that. Her plan was total radio silence, and just like that, she found herself debating on talking to the company shrink? Maybe she wanted people to know. Maybe self-sabotaging her own silence was all she could do to truly break the news without breaking herself and others in the process. Yet, despite his title being someone who helps others deal with their issues, she couldn't imagine unloading this onto Huang. It wasn't a problem with her job, it was a problem that they would see her deal with as a friend, not a colleague. That meant expecting him to carry that burden of her secret on his back in any sense other than professionally.

She wouldn't lie to herself, she knew that George cared about her as a friend, not just a colleague. He'd been there to help her through the grief she faced over her father. She had confided in him about her brother, a fraternization that wasn't entirely work-related.

Could she really go to him with this?

"Liv," Casey's voice dropped to cautious levels with a sharp intake of her breath. "You weren't... y'know... attacked, were you?" she asked, genuine concern dripping from her hushed voice. The word dropped as it usually did with people who weren't used to seeing abuse everywhere they went. They did. The only change was that it was her.

"No," Olivia cut in quickly, laying those fears to rest. In their line of work, that was the biggest fear — and a valid fear that some of them had faced. That was as bad as it could be in Casey's mind. Rape. They had all seen such heinous things, the crimes of their job had replaced all thoughts of evil in their heads. It didn't get worse than that anymore... until it did. "No, nothing like that."

No, she wasn't attacked. She wasn't used or abused, not in the way that all SVU members feared. But if that was as bad as it could be in Casey's mind, she wondered how her friend would react when the truth came out. When they all came to realize that their fears were on a totally different radar.

She wasn't raped, attacked, beaten, stalked, kidnapped, abused, or broken.

She was malignant.

Something none of them would ever see coming. A whole new enemy on a whole new battlefield. It wasn't a perp who could be thrown behind bars. It wasn't a criminal who dodged justice.

Malignant.

God, that word had a way of making her shudder in disgust.

Still, somehow she felt violated. In a whole new playing field, she felt so damn violated at the thought of an intrusion on her body. It wasn't another human's touch that made her feel as if her skin was covered in unwashable dirt. She had felt that before, she knew what that was like. Lowell Harris had given her that awful experience.

She felt dirty in a different way now. A part of her body was no longer her own. Something within her that would either kill her or deform her. Another enemy in a whole new dimension of her world. She wasn't looking into the eyes of a human being who found pleasure in destroying people. She was face to face with disease, with sickness. A face that could not see its host with its own eyes. It was a soulless killer.

How could she bring that about to the people she cared about most? How could she expose them to yet another demon?

They'd know, eventually. She lived with that for now. The least she could do was spare them a little bit more time before they had to know... right? In her mind, it was the noble thing to do. For as long as she could handle it on her own, she would.

Which likely wouldn't be that long. But she could try.

She wanted to.

"Liv," Casey whispered, her voice in a downward slope. "You're crying,"

Fuck, damnit!

That was happening every so often. Just a few lone tears leaking down her cheeks. It wasn't a proper cry, she still felt next to nothing. Two days and the tears fell at their own volition while she stood by and succumbed to the numbness.

"Sorry," she replied, wiping away the tears with the back of her hand. She was more annoyed with the fact that she was crying in the first place. She sniffled, hoping it would cover all traces of her façade breaking. The truth was, her façade had been cracking for quite some time; the diagnosis only seemed to speed up the process.

She was strong. She was oh so strong. But how strong could the strongest woman alive be?

"I uh — I don't know what to say," Casey started rambling, her voice going a mile a minute. "I mean, is this a personal problem? Some sort of relationship that didn't go well? Or did something happen at work? I—I mean, I don't wanna pry, really. I just wish I knew what to say or do because I don't think I've ever seen you like this and it's scaring me. Maybe there's something I can do to help, maybe—"

"Cancer," Olivia breathed out, instantly cutting her friend's incoherent babbling. She turned to look at her face to face, seeing a shocked and heartbroken pair of hazel eyes staring at her in return. Her own tears started to fall once again with no signs of stopping "I have cancer, Casey."

The word rolled off her tongue like poison.

Would the floorboards accept her if she could melt away into them?

She had wondered out of everybody who she would tell first. She certainly didn't expect it to be Casey. Except, the words just fell out. Words that she hadn't even had time to tell herself, she was telling Casey instead.

Casey stared at her longer, a vow of silence falling over her previously scrambled hysteria. Her lips fell apart, her jaw hanging ever so softly as the words ran through her mind. Rarely did she ever see Casey so speechless. Heaviness took over her eyes as they welled up with her own tears. Her brows arched as she stared at Olivia, somehow trying to decipher what the hell she had just heard.

Yet, no words came. The woman who always got the last word couldn't even get a word out edgewise. She just stared at Olivia, her own heart beginning to break with each moment that the news took to set in. Maybe it would be days until it set in for everyone, weeks even. Olivia had thought it a million times but she still couldn't shake the voice in her own head telling her that if it were up to her, she'd do it alone. She'd suffer in silence. She'd suffer treatment and sickness in the darkness. But the world didn't stop turning for her. It never did. It never would.

That was the cruelty of the planet. Time never stopped for more than a moment. Between one heartbeat and the next.

"But it's— it's fixable..." Casey's weakened voice cracked. "Right?"

Ah yes, the timeless question.

Is this the end?