Just a one shot of my take of the post-EO in bed together moment that we'll *hopefully* get eventually. I don't know when/how it's all going to unfold but this is what I envision in the moments after. Let me know your thoughts/predictions in the reviews!

Complete bliss was all Olivia felt. Peace. Contentment. She didn't want to be dramatic in saying that she felt whole again because in those 10 years of his absence she learned how to stand on her own. But after today, she could admit to herself that she might not want to do it alone and that was okay. She wasn't running back the clock to those years when they were so co-dependent she felt like she couldn't breathe when he wasn't around. She finally felt like they were both on equal ground now and it had made all the difference.

It wasn't to say that everything in her life was now perfectly set up. They still had a lot of work ahead of them. But right now, the outside world was on pause and it felt like the only thing that existed was them two, lying in this bed.

Olivia's head was nestled into his chest with her hand absentmindedly moving up and down his torso. It was liberating to have this freedom to touch what had been off limits to her for so long. What she'd only been allowed glimpses of over the years. Their limited physical interactions since he'd returned had increased the tensions between them.

His full weight crashing into her in the interrogation room as she tried to hold him back. Their shoulders brushing on the rooftop. Their hug in the hospital, with him nuzzling into her neck. The way his hand reached out to hers in the stairwell, anchoring them both to each other. How he'd stumbled into her at her apartment door and desperately clung to her like a drowning man at sea. His hand brushing her lip as she tried to steady them. It was like a gravitational pull between them, constantly bringing them together, briefly having their paths cross again and again as the pressure built up. Until it finally exploded.

Now here they were in the aftermath, the post-coital glow. Her hands were exploring, learning, mapping out the peaks and valleys of his body. The rough edges of his muscles poking out. The soft, smooth bumps of the occasional scar. Their texture all too familiar to her.

She would never admit it aloud but she still felt self-conscious of her own. They'd always just looked so ugly to her, the way their raised edges marred her skin. She'd hid them from Brian in various ways, keeping her shirt on, facing away from him, or insisting the lights be completely off. He'd been all too eager to oblige. With Ed, he had seen them already in her file, in intimate, graphic detail. When they were blistered and bloody and fresh. He was a gentleman and had acted non-chalant, but stayed clear of the area which Olivia had been fine with. But she always felt like he'd seen them as an intrusion. His active avoidance of them made her feel like they were marks of Lewis's depravity instead of a testament to her strength and survival. Elliot on the other hand had dutifully acknowledged their presence. Ever so gently pressing his lips to each one as his eyes reverently held Olivia's. She'd never felt so vulnerable but also so seen. Like all the fragmented parts of her: a victim, a survivor, a captain, a protector, a mother, were all meshed together into the whole person she actually was. And here were her and Elliot, who not too long ago had also been physically enmeshed. Their scars aligning together like constellations along with their bodies. Matching each other in perfect imperfections.

"That one was courtesy of Dana Lewis," Elliot muttered breaking Olivia out of her trance.

"Oh I remember vividly," Olivia chuckled.

"What's going on up there?" Elliot asked inquisitively as he lightly tapped her forehead.

"Hmmm, just thinking," Olivia murmured.

"Not having second thoughts are you?" Elliot questioned, the hesitation and nervousness evident in his voice.

"No, none at all."

"Me neither. I have a lot of regrets about how I handled everything over the years. But I don't regret this. And I hope I can prove to you that I won't make you regret it either."

"I know," Olivia whispered as she pressed her lips to his neck, trying to convey her faith in him.

"El?"

"Yeah, Liv?"

"I'm really glad we never…..crossed the line physically….back then. Because it would've ruined this."

"Me too. I'm glad we never. And I'm so glad we did now."

"Mhhmmm yeah, it was perfection."

"So I'm that good?"

"Don't let it go to your head, Stabler."