La Posados Mexican Restaurant – 6:30pm
The whole family went out to celebrate the announcement of the new baby girl. Olivia picked out the place and, of course, it was a Mexican restaurant. Plus, the fact that she told Elliot that she was craving the fajita quesadillas.
"You know, Liv," said Elliot. "Our daughter's going to be born speaking Spanish if you keep eating this kind of food."
"Well, I would like for her to become bilingual when she goes to school," said Olivia, giving him a look. "And I want her to like Mexican food too."
"Can I have one of your fajitas?" Lizzie asked Olivia.
"Sure, sweetheart." She handed the girl a flour tortilla with a piece of chicken fajita meat.
"I want a piece too," said Dickie.
"Here, goofball," Lizzie told her twin brother. "You can half of mine." She tore off a piece of the chicken and tortilla and gave it to Dickie.
"Thanks, Elizabeth," replied Dickie, who bit into the tortilla.
"So, how are things going with the baby?" Maureen asked Olivia.
"Well, Dr. Morris said that everything is fine and Baby Girl has a very strong heartbeat."
"This is so awesome!" exclaimed Kathleen. "I'm so glad that we're having another girl in this family. Maybe I can recruit her to be on the drill team when she goes to high school. What do you guys think?"
"She needs to be on the drill team rather than becoming a cop like her parents," said Elliot, smiling.
"Dad!" exclaimed Kathleen, laughing.
Stabler Residence – 8:30pm
About a couple hours later, they had all gotten home in chaos. The girls and Olivia were laughing and giggling over girl talk while Dickie was being nosy and rolling his eyes. After everyone settled down, Elliot announced that it was time for the twins to get ready for bed. They said good night to their father and new step-mom and the twins retreated off to their bedrooms with Maureen and Kathleen following them after deciding to give Elliot and Olivia some alone time.
Meanwhile, Olivia went in the living room and stretched out on the couch with her feet propped up on the coffee table. Elliot came in there and stretched out and rested his head on her lap, his cheek pressed against the bulge of her belly as Olivia began to run her fingers through his hair.
"It's been a day," said Elliot.
"Yeah, it has been," replied Olivia.
They lay there on the couch for a little while as Elliot shifted in her lap and placed his hand on the bulge of her tummy. About that time, Olivia felt a thump against it and began to gasp.
"I guess you felt that too?" she said, looking at Elliot and smiling.
He looked back up at her with a wide grin, "Yeah that was amazing." He rose up and linked his fingers into hers, placing his hand on her cheek and kissing her lightly on the lips.
"I love you, Olivia."
"I love you too." Just then, the baby kicked again and Elliot pressed his cheek on her belly and said, "That's my girl. She's letting us know that she's definitely a Stabler."
Olivia looked at him and laughed, "Yes, she sure is."
SVU Squad Room – Thursday – 10:00am
"You guys are having a girl," said Casey. "Congratulations!" She came over and hugged Olivia and Elliot.
"Thanks," said Olivia. "We're very excited."
"She's going to be beautiful and will look just like her mother," said Cragen. He turned to Elliot and said, "And I'm not for sure if she will look like you," giving him a pat on the back as Elliot laughed.
"Not to mention free baby-sitting from a comedian and by her honorary uncle," stated Munch with a wink.
"And she'll be surrounded with lots of love from great parents," said Fin. "Also, she will learn lessons on how to be a gangster from Uncle Fin."
"Odafin Tutuola, you are not going to turn my baby into a gangster rapper!" said Olivia, laughing at him.
"I'm just kidding," he said.
"I've got a couple of pictures," said Olivia, showing the group the ultrasound.
"This is her foot and arm," said Elliot, pointing at the parts in the picture.
Munch looked up from his glasses, "Wow, that's interesting."
"That's so sweet," said Casey.
"What's this blur in the picture?" asked Fin, pointing at an arrow.
"That," said Olivia, slightly embarrassed, "is when she decided to show us that she's a girl."
"Well, I have to get back to the office, but I wanted to congratulate you guys on the baby," said Casey.
"Thank you, Casey," replied Elliot.
After Casey left the squad room, everyone got back to work as usual. Olivia started on some paperwork from one of the past cases while the men decided to go check on some leads on their Central Park case.
About an hour later, Cragen came over to Olivia's desk to see how she was coming with the load of paperwork.
"Hey Cap," called out Olivia. "I've got this stack completed and they're ready for you to sign."
"Great," replied Cragen, taking the stack of papers. "I hope I'm not stressing you out over all of this desk duty work. If you want to, I could give half of it to one of the other detectives."
"No, it's fine. I'd rather be on the job here on the desk than at home." As much as Olivia loved Elliot's kids as if they were her own, she also loved being on the job and she would enjoy spending time with them during her maternity leave after the baby is born.
Stabler Residence – 7:00pm
Olivia was sitting in the recliner with her legs propped up in the chair. She had came home an hour ago, greeted with dinner that was prepared by Maureen, consisting of baked chicken, broccoli rice casserole, and mixed vegetables. Now she just wanted to relax and tend to the kids with their homework if they needed any help.
She and Maureen were watching TV when a commercial came on that was very sentimental about a father and daughter. She thought about Elliot with the new baby and her eyes began to water.
"Are you OK, Liv?" asked Maureen, handing her a Kleenex.
"Yeah, I'm fine. It's only hormones," said Olivia, taking the tissue and wiping her eyes.
About that time, Kathleen came from the stairway and called out, "Are we going shopping with you on Saturday, Olivia?"
"Absolutely," said Olivia, trying not to sound as if she had been crying, "we're going to go to Motherhood, because I need to get some maternity clothes. Then, we can go to a few other places to look at some things for the baby."
"We can make it a girls' day out," said Elizabeth.
"I can go with Dad to Home Depot if you girls are going out," said Dickie.
"We'll let you go," said Kathleen.
"That's OK." Dickie replied.
"He probably needs a man to go with him," Olivia told him with a smile. "You can make it a guys' day out."
About an hour and a half later, Olivia was tired so she decided to go to bed early. This pregnancy was really starting to wear down on her and she needed her rest. Elliot had just called and told her that it would be late when he came home. She went upstairs and told the kids good night and retreated to her bedroom to change clothes, wash her face, and brush her teeth. She pulled the covers up and got in the bed, drifting off to sleep when her daughter had other ideas and started kicking so Olivia lay in the bed to feel her bouncing in her tummy.
"Hey little baby, your mommy needs her rest," she said, patting her hand lightly on the bulge of her belly.
The baby stopped kicking and Olivia turned on her side and drifted to sleep. Sometime later on that night, Elliot must have came home, because she felt his strong, protective arms wrapped around her as if she were an anchor. She shifted in the bed to get a little closer to him as he slung his arm over her shoulder. Elliot was like a safe haven to her and everything felt perfect.
