Disclaimer: All hail Dick. Dick Wolf, NBC, yadda yadda. They own them.
Summary: An attempt at a non-cliche story of, well, The First Time. O/E of course!
Author's Note: Oh gosh, I am so not an author. Have NO idea where this came from. Watching too many SVU DVDs instead of finishing summer reading, maybe. I would love comments yes, but I won't beg. Not much at least. As you will soon learn (if my a/n hasn't already bored you from reading on) that I got kind of hyper with the italics. And incomplete sentences. And questionable possessives. And more incomplete sentences. And just stuff. I repeat, I think? Basically anything under the sun that any of my boring-too obsessed with grammar-than looking at the amazing stuff –his/her students are actually doing(discluding muah)-English teacher would just cringe at. (ended with a preoposition...) MWA-HA-HA. Finished. Enjoy and I am really just happy if someone besides dear old Ella May reads this. PS-You will learn not only am I terrible at writing conversation, but I just don't do it. Sorry.
Setting/Time Reference: I have NO idea. I mean, I do, But :cough:FAULT:cough, some things just make it difficult. Well, after Elliot's separation/divorce (duh!) and you can put it with Fault, afterwards at least when Olivia has returned (and pre the gut-wrenching for O/E ers spoilers I SO should not have read!) or just don't. Who cares. No spoilers, except for in the mile long author's note part. Oops.
The First Time
"I swear I never watched you sleeping..." - 'Lonely People' Augustana
The first time wasn't after hour long professions of their incurable love for each other. They didn't fall into each other's arms after hours of riding that merry-go-round of what will they be giving up and is it worth it? They didn't look into each other's eyes, one sapphire, the other smoky copper, and simultaneously screech their rushed 'I love you's' and laugh and giggle and embrace. They just didn't do that. They also didn't giggle. A sweet little nothing movie wasn't watched that enchanted them into a macking mooching fest, that hardly constituted as normal mature behavior for even his youngest daughter. They didn't bolt from their desk chairs to go to the roof and get lost in it's open skyness and find comfort in each other's arms and later mouths. Remember: smog. There was no stroll in the park that made them feel gushy, and there was no doing 'it' on a park bench just because they got 'lost in the moment.' They didn't have a case that sent them to Rockaway where they got their heads lost in the sea air and its saltiness and have passionate Harlequin romance sex. He hated sand. She liked to go to the beach alone.
The first time wasn't after that case. You know, the one where all the similarities and parallels are just too unbelievable that surely the only solution would be for them to do it on her couch. His bed. The crib's bunks. He didn't see his kids in the eyes in one of those so innocent violated ones and miraculously decide the solution would be to spend the night in her arms. She didn't meet a young woman that was exactly like her mother down to the sound of her name and figure that jumping his bones would make her forget that. There were no stalkers that scared them into each other's embrace. No psychopaths pushed them into bed together. No drug-lord and his appreciation for offing cops caused them to just see what it would be like. Neither Huang nor Hendricks told them it would just help to give into their impulses.
He didn't get plastered and jeckyl her into allowing him to just use her the first time. He only got plastered alone and she only allowed strangers to use her (whilst telling herself she was in fact using them ). She didn't get drunk and invite him over to talk. They didn't go out after a case to celebrate or drown themselves and end up walking out hand in hand, mouth on mouth. They didn't just wake up unclothed one morning and only assume what it was they exactly did the previous night and decide it was completely attributable to alcohol. She learned that didn't work long ago. Fin would have approved, at least in one area, for there were no narcotics or alcohol involved.
She didn't play puppets with father's after getting knocked up by a one-nighter and decide on her love for her partner afterwards. Kathy didn't call and beg for him back causing him to just-then decide his love for his partner and later ensue in their first time. Maureen didn't set them up, Kathleen didn't beg for them to get hitched, and Elizabeth and Dickie never more-than-subtly hinted that they had a prime candidate for a step-mom. She played it safe and Kathy never called unless it was to set up another meeting with another lawyer. Or to talk about arrangements for the previously mentioned young ones.
They'd gotten up that morning. She at her apartment and he at his house. Her drive to work quick and effortless and his long and far too thought provoking. No coffee from Starbucks, or that cute coffee place that's smell just makes non-coffee drinkers yearn to live on it. When she arrived earlier than him, as usual, she got the second cup of Munch's muck and he would later get the fourth because Fin even got there before him that day. Fin and Munch were catching all day, or appeared to be or along the similar lines because Cragen only handed outside the precinct tasks to the all male twosome. He'd said hello when he'd walked in, of course. She replied with another hello and an unforced smile. He'd even given her a smile back. Her heart had skipped a beat not because her womanly hormonal side got visions of romping, but because his smiles had become just so rare. Sure, their hands lingered on the other's a little extra longer, not because they just wanted to feel the opposite sex's skin, but because the veteran sex crimes detectives had learned to appreciate another human being's helping hand and the rareness of it. They might have even looked in each other's eyes, possibly even gazed, but it had been so long since they'd done that, and they were both believers that for you to learn or re-learn something new, you must dive in head first. He even got her a refill of muck. He was a gentleman after all.
The one thing I will give you is that they both felt a change that day. The walls weren't a different color and her hair wasn't short. Again. The change was not only in their attitude towards each other, but in the attitude that they looked at their futures. Together. They both knew things were going to change so drastically but also plummet back into a region of comfort. They would no longer delicately flirt then return home to their wives and demons. They would return to their area of expertise as being best friends. The other half. Allies. They were once again partners. Although neither would admit it or cop to it, it was simply known that being partners would soon have a double meaning. It wasn't because of a tragic outside influence or an unavoidable outburst that would lead to regrets. It was simply a digression and growth in their characters. An advancement of who they were in life. Not because of fate or free will but because of living.
Neither left their desks that day and opted for delivered lunch. So the first time her eyes smiled at him and his hand on instinct went for the small of her back was in the evening when they had oddly called it a day at a normal hour and were walking outside. Walking outside to just be walking, not walking towards a bar or romantic dinner, but to be walking and enjoying the fact that they were no longer running from something that might not be that scary after all. She didn't ask him, but instead told him to come over and help clean out the refrigerator of left over's. He didn't protest or ponder as to why he didn't try to protest either. He, in his car, she in her's, slowly made their way back to her building.
Silently they took the stairs. He didn't tell her he had to have her just then and they must run, and run fast, to her apartment. She didn't choose the elevator so she could have a quickie right then and there. She never trusted her building's ancient elevator anyways.
She easily and fumbling-less-ly opened her apartment door and he wasn't standing directly behind her sending shivers down her back. They walked in, still silent except for their completely normal and even-paced breathing. She didn't offer a beer or wine, he knew he was welcome to anything. Still no words. She set her scarce work belongings down and he quitely took his coat off. They didn't find themselves peculiarly close when the concurring gentle look of love glazed over their eyes that had seen too much. He didn't have to seek her brown ones out, because she was already looking into his blue ones. Both of their lips curved into what some would constitute as a smile and others would consider as an understated grin.
There was no running over to each other and clashing and thrashing. He walked over as she tiptoed to meet him halfway. A wordless conversation continued to ensue. The words being that of exactly what the other wanted to hear and equally deserved to be told. Her soft still slightly pink glazed lips moved equidistantly as his and they met in the middle. Always straight to the core. It was soft and affectionate. So unlike who they were externally in the world that was equally as rough.
Sure, lights were dimmed and sheets were tangled. Gazing ensued, as well as other things...Of course it was mind-blowing for both of them, and they felt a little bit more complete afterwards. She did fall asleep in his arms and he did finally fall asleep shortly afterwards to the sound of her gentle breathing. But what promised that this would probably happen again and other similar activities that were surely reason enough for them to be transferred to different states from one another, was their real way of looking at it and their joint appreciation of the reality. She knew this wouldn't change where she came from and he also knew this wouldn't change the less than heroic turns he had taken in his past. This wouldn't make the job easier. This wouldn't even make all of their friends content. They jointly considered Cragen a friend, after all. These realizations were going to be beneficial and okay though, because they realized them together. Collectively they were caught up in the seriousness of their situation. Agreeably they knew this wasn't just a simple undertaking. But as partners, they were willing to go through thisand just revel in the afterglow of their first time.