Chapter Sixteen: Watching You
Olivia
"Cassidy was a drunk, late-night mistake that turned into an awkward, gossip-inducing office mistake. I know Elliot still thinks it was my fault that he left special victim's. He's probably right. I wasn't exactly kind afterwards. It sort of went downhill from there." I lift my chin from the cradle of my knees, looking at you to see how you're handling all of this. I can't help but wonder if you think you've bitten off more than you can chew. Are you asking yourself what you've gotten yourself into? I take my time meeting your eyes, not quite ready to meet their crystal blue. I'm afraid to see your disappointment there, your judgments, your disapproval. I'm afraid to see your disgust.
As I finally find your eyes with mine you straighten from your lean. You reach out with your hand and cover mine as it lies over the top of my knees where my chin rested only moments ago. I feel your fingers curl under my palm, between my hand and my kneecaps, giving me a squeeze. I grip you in return, giving you the quick flash of my hand curling around yours before I let go, shifting my arms so that they hug each other across my calves, as I curl and uncurl my toes, nervous despite this encouragement. I hug my knees to my chest, tucking myself into a tight square of muscle, making myself as small as possible on the seat cushion, my spine not even touching the back of the chair, my arms not brushing the armrests. I know you don't like hearing this. But I can't stop now… can't ignore the forward momentum. And deep inside the petty, childish, obnoxious, self-protective part of me reminds me that you asked for it. I fight to cast away this observation, and instead get myself in deeper. Now we're moving from things I didn't tell you, to things I couldn't tell you. It's important to me to explain about Jeff. I don't know why, but it is. It's nothing that you'd ever find out about otherwise, and our relationship happened long before you were ever around. But for some reason his murder last year made me realize some things that even your leaving couldn't uncover.
"There was someone else though. Something else." Thinking about Jeff still hurts me, and maybe that's why I feel like I have to explain, because I want you to know how I can be who I am and still be so upset by that case-- so upset by Jeff, by his secrets. Or maybe it's because I'm hoping that if I can tell you about it it'll make sense to me.
Alex
I can see you get more nervous, if that's possible. You're still looking at me though and I'm taking that as a good sign. I can see you fighting back tears again, which surprises me since a minute ago you'd didn't seem to mind that your cheeks were dripping with their salt.
"A year before you joined the DA's office we had a case that crossed over the path of the Bronx DA. Jeff York got sent to us to 'help' with the investigation." You give a mirthless laugh, "More like he got sent to make sure we didn't fuck it up. At first his presence annoyed me, I didn't like the idea of having some fancy Bronx district attorney looking over my shoulder. But he was charming, and after the fiasco with Cassidy I was looking for someone a little more temporary. Which is funny since Jeff's the only guy I really ever saw more than once. I guess I started out figuring that since I only ever hung out in the Bronx during a crime scene, I'd be safe. I figured an ADA would be busy enough to keep from bugging me about a 'relationship.' Even after the case was over, Jeff found time to call me. He was nice, intelligent. And once the tension of being watched while I work was over, we had some decent conversations. For a minute I started thinking maybe I could do the straight thing."
Your eyes flicker and I know you're worried about hurting my feelings. Your difficulty accepting being gay had always been a subtle, but ever-present bone of contention in our relationship.
"Problem was, Jeff and I had no chemistry. We still managed sex, but there was something missing. York had undeniably better character and personality than any of the other guys I'd been with, but as hard as I tried I just couldn't feel a spark. We broke it off after a month, both of us realizing we needed more than just convenient sex and decent conversation.
"Last year, after you were…. after you left, we got called to a Ho-row near the bridge. Black Mercedes found with single white male, strangled by red Lycra leggings. His pants were unzipped and they found a kissed condom on his… on him."
In another setting, I'd pause at how cute you are, blushing as you avoid using the proper words for where they found that condom. For now I'm just lost in your story, afraid of where it's going.
"We started at the beginning of the evidence chain. There were men's fingerprints on the passenger door handle of his car. By the time we'd worked through half of the trail we realized that Jeff had secrets to rival anything I'd kept from the squad. His tests came back positive for HIV, and it became impossible to deny that he'd been a homosexual."
Olivia
I'm still fighting my tears as I talk about finding out that Jeff was gay. I can't figure out why it upset me so much. It didn't bother me to think that my own … preferences accounted for our lack of chemistry, but for some reason the idea that Jeff was gay, hadbeen gay threw me. I remember Huang's face when he stopped me in the halls, asking if I was all right.
"Sexuality is very complicated. Just because he was gay, doesn't mean he wasn't attracted to you." His words left me speechless, I wanted to tell him then, to explain why I just didn't understand, why it was so hard for me to accept…but I couldn't explain something I didn't understand. The sudden appearance of the suspect's wife spared me, temporarily from my confusion.
I pause to look at you before I continue, wanting to make sure you haven't given up on my completely yet. "At first I worried primarily about the test results. Worried that I might have caught something… not even that, worried that maybe I--" I can't finish the sentence. I can't find the words to say that the first thing I thought about was you. I can't stop my tears anymore, and just as I thought my cheeks were starting to dry I feel a fresh cascade of water escape me. I struggle to stop my sobs, needing to tell you this… needing to tell you that you were always in my mind.
"I worried that maybe I could have given it to you."
Alex
I can't respond to you with words. I can't respond to the tears that fall unchallenged from your eyes, except to allow mine to fall with them. As soon as you say the word HIV I understand. I know you too well to think you'd stop to ponder the actual statistics. I know you didn't bother to remember how low the chance of a female-to-female transfer is. I know you didn't bother to remember that we got tested before that first night. I know you didn't bother to think of those things. I know you responded to those words emotionally first, because that's what you do. You've got everyone convinced of your ability to stay essentially detached. They know you get involved in cases, but I'm the only one that's seen the way you torture yourself over them. Of course it's not because you tell me about it. I'm the one that rocks you back to sleep at night, when you're crying in your dreams, groaning at the thought of your vics' pain, unable to calm the dreams that batter you when you leave the day behind. I was the one wakened by your nightmares.
The force of your sobs stops you and I reach out for you again. This time I take your wrists and pull you away from yourself. I don't try to speak through my own tears as I unfold you from the chair and pull you over till you're lying on the couch, your head on my lap. I run my hand over your forehead, stroking the wrinkles above your eyes, using my thumb to catch some of your tears. One of your hands is tucked under my thigh, the other grips my free hand, and I don't bother trying to keep the feeling in my fingers as you cling to me. I've never seen you this way. Never seen you give in like this before. I knew you'd changed, knew something had sparked an alteration in you. I never assumed it was my leaving, and in some part of myself I'm sort of hurt that it wasn't my disappearance that created this, but soon all I can think about is holding you as your sobs continue. I'm watching your shoulders shuddering. feeling my jeans become wet with your tears.
Every secret you've kept falls out as you cry. Every secret you've hidden from the squad, from Elliot, from me, every secret you've tucked away even from yourself is slipping out with your tears, falling into my lap as you turn so that your curling into me, your back to the room, and I lean over you, cradling you the way I imagine you've never been held before, not even by your own mother. My tears are coming harder now too and I watch them fall on your ear, into your hair, powerless to stop them because my hands are full of you as you shake from your sadness.