Disclaimer: I don't own Law and Order SVU or its characters.
A/N: Reviews welcome, flames too, suggestions appreciated. That is all.
Aftermath
Why can't men, in general, be more sensitive? Why can't they understand that our bodies are always at risk? Why do we have to instruct them?
I sit here alone, clutching my sanity, my hands on my hips, pinching the skin there, pinching so hard to make an excuse for the tears welling up in my eyes. The love that lasts the longest is the love that's never returned. Is that why his cologne is still wrapped in my sheets or why I see him when I imagine? I only cry a little, small tears cling to my cheeks like the diamonds in my ears. The diamond he promised to buy me, but never did. The diamonds I bought myself to replace what he'd stolen. When I see my tears, the wet diamonds, I think of another piece of my heart that he broke. I vowed that no man would break my heart, make me cry, make me talk to the walls and wail out to God. Yet here I sit, thinking of him. When I hold my newborn daughter to my breast, when I run my fingers through her hair, when men whisper, when I sigh, sneeze, breathe.I think about him.
Look at us and know us and you will know yourselves, for we are you, looking back at you from the dark mirror of our lives."
I wonder if he'll know her when he sees her. Her dark eyes, dark hair, not my own. There is a void…an absence…a silence. I feel I have to be schizophrenic around her. I cast a prideful veil over my loss, my sadness, my agony, when her eyes meet mine. But I'm jealous of her peaceful slumber and her willingness to love. When her eyes close I'm allowed to crumble, I'm allowed to die. I am the survivor of a crime that doesn't exist. Mothers are immortal; mothers never leave children they love. I'm split in two. So I clutch my sanity, blink back my tears, and pour my first drink.