The World On End II
I couldn't believe I'd been called into work on a Sunday. "Meet me at the hospital," Fin had said, and he wouldn't say a word more. And now I was here, outside an examination room, just glad to see that we had a living vic on this one. Fin didn't really seem to want to so much as look at me, which of course meant he was hiding something. Olivia and Elliott came around the corner, and she got the strangest look on her face when she saw me. "What've we got?" I asked her, since Fin clearly wasn't speaking up.
"John," she said, with that stalling tone that made Elliott turn away from us and Fin avert his eyes. "It's Cara."
For once in my life, I was utterly without comment. My eyebrows raised in shock, I looked at her, hoping this was some kind of sick joke. The pain of breaking it off with her, of knowing that I had hurt her like that, was nothing compared to knowing that someone else had hurt her and I hadn't been able to do a thing. "Are you sure?" I asked, stupidly.
"I recognized her the moment I walked in," she said.
"How is she?"
Olivia shook her head. "She's pretty much just in shock." Fin came over and smiled a little sorrowfully at me as Olivia walked away to check on her.
"I'm sorry to hear about this, man. It's a awful thing to have happen."
"I know it's an awful thing," I snapped back. His phone rang: Cragen. I could hear the captain on the other side, asking about 'the girl' and what kind of state she was in.
"She's a friend of John's," Fin said, in response to one of his questions. "He wants to talk to you." He handed me the phone.
"I don't want you working on your girlfriend's case," he said, before I could even identify myself.
"We broke up," I said, as simply as possible, knowing that the rest of them had suddenly perked up their ears. "I'm fine with this."
"You and Fin are off the case."
This was incredible: I hadn't been there to help her, and now I was being kept from finding the guy who did this. "I'm fine, Don." I have no idea when the last time was I'd ever called him by his first name. "If anyone else on this case has a problem with my work, you can take me off then."
In the end, Cragen let me stay, but I knew he wasn't happy about it. There is nothing he hates more than blending work and personal life. But how could I not investigate this? I wanted to find this guy myself, and I was honestly willing to do whatever it took, even if it meant a suspension.
"I'll talk to her," I said to Olivia.
"She's getting a rape kit right now," she replied. "Afterwards."
"What makes you think she wants to talk to him?" Elliott said, quickly: he didn't seem to want to talk to me, which didn't surprise me.
"Elliott, he's a friend. She might feel more comfortable talking to him than to a total stranger." Though Olivia is all too often a little reactionary, she's certainly more levelheaded than Elliott. When it comes to rape victims, she is all passion, but Elliott Stabler will be damned before he lets harm come to anyone he considers a child. This was no time, we could all see, for his ideology to get in the way.
"Fine. But call when you're done," he said, addressing me for the first time all morning. When the two of them were gone, Fin sidled up to me.
"Stabler hates getting called in when he's supposed to be home with his family," he said, trying to sound apologetic. It was hard to have sympathy when I had no idea what that felt like.
I leaned against the doorjamb and pretended to ignore him, closing my eyes behind my dark glasses. This is hell, I told myself. I realized then that I could hear the doctor talking to her.
"These bruises," she said. "Some of them are old. Where did you get them?"
"Which ones? Oh, they're . they were willingly endured."
"You'll have to tell me exactly which ones were from before." There was a pause, during which I remembered very clearly which ones they were talking about: I had put them there myself, on her collarbone and chest. "When was the last time you had sex, Miss Jones?"
"You mean real sex?" she asked. "Last Saturday night." I damn near blushed.
"There's a lot of semen here." Hadn't this perp even bothered to use a condom?
"I know!" she said, plaintively. "He did it twice."
"Is there anybody I can call for her?" Fin asked, breaking my reverie. I had forgotten he was there.
"All her family is back in Detroit." I handed him my phone, which, pathetically, still contained her home number. "Call her roommate and have her pick her up."
A longer pause this time: she must have been finishing up. "I'll bandage up these lacerations on your wrists and then I'll have the detectives come in, okay?"
The doctor came out a few minutes later, holding a chart and balancing a variety of vials and sealed test tubes. She looked down at it and rattled off a grocery list of classic injuries. "Rope burns and lacerations on her wrists from where he tied her down, minor dislocation of the left shoulder, and plenty of bruising consistent with a rape, right down to thumb prints on the insides of her knees."
"Where he pried her legs apart," Fin filled in, entirely unnecessarily. This was too much.
"Can we go in?" I asked. She nodded and left.
I opened the door and strode inside, willing myself to be professional. She was in a hospital gown, the stirrups still up on either side of the bed from her examination. Her hair was a mess - she hated that - and she wasn't wearing a lick of makeup. Her eyes were red, like she'd been crying for hours. I hadn't seen her since she fled the bar Monday night, and I have to say that she looked a lot better then than now. She started in surprise when she saw me. "John?" she said, disbelievingly. "Are you on this case?"
"Yeah," I said, rolling the examination stool over to her bedside. "Are you okay with that?"
"I guess so." Then she noticed Fin. "You're his partner. Fin." He nodded.
"I'm so sorry this happened," I said, not quite able to come up with the right words. I just sounded like an idiot.
"It's not your fault," she said, quickly, as if that was what she'd been telling herself all morning. "I'm surprised to see you here, after ."
She didn't need to finish that thought. Embarrassment flooded her features: I had never, in all our time together, seen that look, save when she had apologized for the pot incident. Oh my God, I thought, suddenly. Is that what she thinks that was about? I didn't care that she'd been getting high - God knows I've done that myself - it was the way that it made me feel, like I had to take care of her. I had felt so responsible for her, so much like her father, and it had made me question my own intentions. I'd dated younger women before, sure, but it had never been like this.
But there's a case to solve here, I reminded myself. "What can you tell me about what happened?"
She sighed, as if finding the strength within herself to recite the story. "I went to bed last night around one. Maybe an hour later, I thought I heard my roommate coming in, kind of fumbling around in the kitchen, like she was drunk. But then the door to my room opened, and it wasn't her, it was . some guy."
"No one you recognized?" Fin asked from behind me.
She shook her head, holding back tears. "And he came in, and he jumped on me. I screamed, but who was going to hear me? Then he sat on me and tied my hands to the headboard. He grabbed my hips and yanked me down, so I couldn't do a damn thing. He pulled down my . my pajama bottoms, and he ."
She stopped. I took her hand: half of me was working on auto-pilot, comforting a faceless victim of a horrible crime, and half of me was suddenly so passionately concerned with helping her through this. That second half wanted to stop the interview, but the first knew I couldn't.
"That bastard raped me," she spat suddenly, rage in her eyes. "I tried to relax, you know, because there was nothing I could do. I tried to look at his face, like you always said, John, so I could remember for later, but he was wearing a ski mask. And then, when he was done, he just laid there next to me, playing with my hair, like he was my goddamn lover!" I could feel her rage as she tightened her grip on my hand. "And then, he put one hand on my . chest, and the other on . himself, and when he was hard again ."
It was almost too much for me. I could feel my face, stiff and detective- like, denying how I felt inside. Damn me, I still loved her.
"What happened then?" Fin coaxed.
"He left, after a while. He was there for maybe forty-five minutes." I suppose I had trained her pretty well over the months. "When I could get my hands free, it was almost morning, so I got dressed and I came down here. I didn't take a shower. When can I go home? I just want to get clean." Tears were rolling down her cheeks now, tears of shame and humiliation. This was a classic case.
"Do you have any idea who might have done this to you?" I asked, softening my voice to a murmur as I had a thousand times with her. I couldn't imagine why anyone would do something like this to her: how could anyone want to hurt my beautiful Cara? She was so full of life and love.
You hurt her pretty badly yourself, John, I reminded myself. And she's not yours anymore.
She shook her head, as I knew she would. "What did you do earlier that evening?" Fin continued where I could not.
"I," she said, pausing and looking away from me and up at him for the first time. "I was on a date." Insult to injury, Cara, I thought, as if I were the one suffering. "He seemed pretty upset when I wouldn't kiss him goodnight. You don't think he ."
"We need to investigate all possible leads," I heard myself say.
"Shawn can give you his contact information."
"Shawn?" Fin repeated, scribbling into his notebook.
"My roommate. Could you call her for me?"
"Already did," I said, affectionately sweeping a fallen tendril out of her eyes. "Anything you need, or if you remember anything more, give us a call. You still have my number?" She nodded. I was a little surprised, to be honest. "Thank you, Cara."
She nodded. The doctor came in a moment later. "I have the results of some of your tests, Miss Jones."
Fin and I took that as our cue to leave. I couldn't seem to find the right words to say to her, so I just left. Either way, I would have felt horrible. No sooner were we in the car than I pulled out my cell phone.
"Who're you calling?" he asked me.
"An anonymous donor is about to send our vic some flowers," I said with finality, and left it at that.
I couldn't believe I'd been called into work on a Sunday. "Meet me at the hospital," Fin had said, and he wouldn't say a word more. And now I was here, outside an examination room, just glad to see that we had a living vic on this one. Fin didn't really seem to want to so much as look at me, which of course meant he was hiding something. Olivia and Elliott came around the corner, and she got the strangest look on her face when she saw me. "What've we got?" I asked her, since Fin clearly wasn't speaking up.
"John," she said, with that stalling tone that made Elliott turn away from us and Fin avert his eyes. "It's Cara."
For once in my life, I was utterly without comment. My eyebrows raised in shock, I looked at her, hoping this was some kind of sick joke. The pain of breaking it off with her, of knowing that I had hurt her like that, was nothing compared to knowing that someone else had hurt her and I hadn't been able to do a thing. "Are you sure?" I asked, stupidly.
"I recognized her the moment I walked in," she said.
"How is she?"
Olivia shook her head. "She's pretty much just in shock." Fin came over and smiled a little sorrowfully at me as Olivia walked away to check on her.
"I'm sorry to hear about this, man. It's a awful thing to have happen."
"I know it's an awful thing," I snapped back. His phone rang: Cragen. I could hear the captain on the other side, asking about 'the girl' and what kind of state she was in.
"She's a friend of John's," Fin said, in response to one of his questions. "He wants to talk to you." He handed me the phone.
"I don't want you working on your girlfriend's case," he said, before I could even identify myself.
"We broke up," I said, as simply as possible, knowing that the rest of them had suddenly perked up their ears. "I'm fine with this."
"You and Fin are off the case."
This was incredible: I hadn't been there to help her, and now I was being kept from finding the guy who did this. "I'm fine, Don." I have no idea when the last time was I'd ever called him by his first name. "If anyone else on this case has a problem with my work, you can take me off then."
In the end, Cragen let me stay, but I knew he wasn't happy about it. There is nothing he hates more than blending work and personal life. But how could I not investigate this? I wanted to find this guy myself, and I was honestly willing to do whatever it took, even if it meant a suspension.
"I'll talk to her," I said to Olivia.
"She's getting a rape kit right now," she replied. "Afterwards."
"What makes you think she wants to talk to him?" Elliott said, quickly: he didn't seem to want to talk to me, which didn't surprise me.
"Elliott, he's a friend. She might feel more comfortable talking to him than to a total stranger." Though Olivia is all too often a little reactionary, she's certainly more levelheaded than Elliott. When it comes to rape victims, she is all passion, but Elliott Stabler will be damned before he lets harm come to anyone he considers a child. This was no time, we could all see, for his ideology to get in the way.
"Fine. But call when you're done," he said, addressing me for the first time all morning. When the two of them were gone, Fin sidled up to me.
"Stabler hates getting called in when he's supposed to be home with his family," he said, trying to sound apologetic. It was hard to have sympathy when I had no idea what that felt like.
I leaned against the doorjamb and pretended to ignore him, closing my eyes behind my dark glasses. This is hell, I told myself. I realized then that I could hear the doctor talking to her.
"These bruises," she said. "Some of them are old. Where did you get them?"
"Which ones? Oh, they're . they were willingly endured."
"You'll have to tell me exactly which ones were from before." There was a pause, during which I remembered very clearly which ones they were talking about: I had put them there myself, on her collarbone and chest. "When was the last time you had sex, Miss Jones?"
"You mean real sex?" she asked. "Last Saturday night." I damn near blushed.
"There's a lot of semen here." Hadn't this perp even bothered to use a condom?
"I know!" she said, plaintively. "He did it twice."
"Is there anybody I can call for her?" Fin asked, breaking my reverie. I had forgotten he was there.
"All her family is back in Detroit." I handed him my phone, which, pathetically, still contained her home number. "Call her roommate and have her pick her up."
A longer pause this time: she must have been finishing up. "I'll bandage up these lacerations on your wrists and then I'll have the detectives come in, okay?"
The doctor came out a few minutes later, holding a chart and balancing a variety of vials and sealed test tubes. She looked down at it and rattled off a grocery list of classic injuries. "Rope burns and lacerations on her wrists from where he tied her down, minor dislocation of the left shoulder, and plenty of bruising consistent with a rape, right down to thumb prints on the insides of her knees."
"Where he pried her legs apart," Fin filled in, entirely unnecessarily. This was too much.
"Can we go in?" I asked. She nodded and left.
I opened the door and strode inside, willing myself to be professional. She was in a hospital gown, the stirrups still up on either side of the bed from her examination. Her hair was a mess - she hated that - and she wasn't wearing a lick of makeup. Her eyes were red, like she'd been crying for hours. I hadn't seen her since she fled the bar Monday night, and I have to say that she looked a lot better then than now. She started in surprise when she saw me. "John?" she said, disbelievingly. "Are you on this case?"
"Yeah," I said, rolling the examination stool over to her bedside. "Are you okay with that?"
"I guess so." Then she noticed Fin. "You're his partner. Fin." He nodded.
"I'm so sorry this happened," I said, not quite able to come up with the right words. I just sounded like an idiot.
"It's not your fault," she said, quickly, as if that was what she'd been telling herself all morning. "I'm surprised to see you here, after ."
She didn't need to finish that thought. Embarrassment flooded her features: I had never, in all our time together, seen that look, save when she had apologized for the pot incident. Oh my God, I thought, suddenly. Is that what she thinks that was about? I didn't care that she'd been getting high - God knows I've done that myself - it was the way that it made me feel, like I had to take care of her. I had felt so responsible for her, so much like her father, and it had made me question my own intentions. I'd dated younger women before, sure, but it had never been like this.
But there's a case to solve here, I reminded myself. "What can you tell me about what happened?"
She sighed, as if finding the strength within herself to recite the story. "I went to bed last night around one. Maybe an hour later, I thought I heard my roommate coming in, kind of fumbling around in the kitchen, like she was drunk. But then the door to my room opened, and it wasn't her, it was . some guy."
"No one you recognized?" Fin asked from behind me.
She shook her head, holding back tears. "And he came in, and he jumped on me. I screamed, but who was going to hear me? Then he sat on me and tied my hands to the headboard. He grabbed my hips and yanked me down, so I couldn't do a damn thing. He pulled down my . my pajama bottoms, and he ."
She stopped. I took her hand: half of me was working on auto-pilot, comforting a faceless victim of a horrible crime, and half of me was suddenly so passionately concerned with helping her through this. That second half wanted to stop the interview, but the first knew I couldn't.
"That bastard raped me," she spat suddenly, rage in her eyes. "I tried to relax, you know, because there was nothing I could do. I tried to look at his face, like you always said, John, so I could remember for later, but he was wearing a ski mask. And then, when he was done, he just laid there next to me, playing with my hair, like he was my goddamn lover!" I could feel her rage as she tightened her grip on my hand. "And then, he put one hand on my . chest, and the other on . himself, and when he was hard again ."
It was almost too much for me. I could feel my face, stiff and detective- like, denying how I felt inside. Damn me, I still loved her.
"What happened then?" Fin coaxed.
"He left, after a while. He was there for maybe forty-five minutes." I suppose I had trained her pretty well over the months. "When I could get my hands free, it was almost morning, so I got dressed and I came down here. I didn't take a shower. When can I go home? I just want to get clean." Tears were rolling down her cheeks now, tears of shame and humiliation. This was a classic case.
"Do you have any idea who might have done this to you?" I asked, softening my voice to a murmur as I had a thousand times with her. I couldn't imagine why anyone would do something like this to her: how could anyone want to hurt my beautiful Cara? She was so full of life and love.
You hurt her pretty badly yourself, John, I reminded myself. And she's not yours anymore.
She shook her head, as I knew she would. "What did you do earlier that evening?" Fin continued where I could not.
"I," she said, pausing and looking away from me and up at him for the first time. "I was on a date." Insult to injury, Cara, I thought, as if I were the one suffering. "He seemed pretty upset when I wouldn't kiss him goodnight. You don't think he ."
"We need to investigate all possible leads," I heard myself say.
"Shawn can give you his contact information."
"Shawn?" Fin repeated, scribbling into his notebook.
"My roommate. Could you call her for me?"
"Already did," I said, affectionately sweeping a fallen tendril out of her eyes. "Anything you need, or if you remember anything more, give us a call. You still have my number?" She nodded. I was a little surprised, to be honest. "Thank you, Cara."
She nodded. The doctor came in a moment later. "I have the results of some of your tests, Miss Jones."
Fin and I took that as our cue to leave. I couldn't seem to find the right words to say to her, so I just left. Either way, I would have felt horrible. No sooner were we in the car than I pulled out my cell phone.
"Who're you calling?" he asked me.
"An anonymous donor is about to send our vic some flowers," I said with finality, and left it at that.