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"So," the ophthalmologist said with a grave face, "your retinal nerve scan came back with 95% function on the right side, and 99% function on the left. That's after the surgery we performed while you were unconscious, mind you. Tell me what you see with your right eye, Olivia."

She sighed and said, "Everything is there, it's just out of focus."

"Is that why you're squinting so much?" Rafael asked, his voice not unkind as his grip on her fingers tightened. She was glad of the hand-hold, tethering her, grounding her, because it gave her something to hold onto and focus on.

"Yeah, I guess so," she murmured. "And my head hurts."

"Well, the way you're having to squint to focus, I'm not at all surprised," the doctor said in a gentle tone. "We'll have to ascertain the strength of lens you'll need for that eye to correct your vision – it should be an easy fix. Glasses or contacts will do the trick."

She paused, then said, "I have to be able to shoot a weapon with precision or the NYPD won't keep me."

"The NYPD won't fire you," Rafael said, his tone firm. "Don't start worrying about work now – baby steps. We have to get you from the hospital to rehab first."

"Are you lecturing me?" Liv snapped.

"No, I'm reminding you that you're only human," he muttered. "Not goddamn Superwoman."

The doctor chuckled and finished setting up her portable equipment to test Liv's sight range. "Your husband loves you very much, Mrs. Benson, if he's willing to fight with you about what's best."

"We aren't married," they both said at the same time; Rafael with regret in his tone, Liv's voice sharper than maybe it should have been.

"Oh," the doctor said, suitable chastened. She did the tests and wrote out a prescription for Liv's lenses, and advised that they shop online for a pair of glasses frames that they liked to have shipped to the rehab facility quickly; the contacts would process in a few days and arrive before the glasses.

Once she was gone, Liv was waiting for the neurologist with results from the latest scans of her brain, and another doctor with the x-rays of her upper spine and neck. She hated feeling like everything hinged on whether or not she could do things – she had already demonstrated that she could get up and shuffle around using a walker, albeit slowly and with what felt like superhuman effort, and she was lifting half pound wrist weights already. She didn't have the ability to touch her finger to her nose, however – she always missed and either hit her forehead, eye, cheek, or chin. Maybe that had to do with her vision?

"Hungry?" Rafael asked, disturbing her out of her worry.

"Yeah, I guess," she said.

"What fine specimen of lunch does mi querida amor require?" he inquired, looking over the menu. "If you say a salad, I will glare at you until you change your mind. You need actual food."

"I don't care: you pick something for me," she said. "And you should get something for you, too, Rafael."

"Sí, señora, lo hare," he teased. He called in lunch for them both and sat back, watching her. "What are you thinking, Olivia?"

"How much I hate hearing you call me Olivia," she quipped.

"What would you rather I call you?" he asked.

She sighed and murmured, "Fin calls me Liv sometimes – when we're not around a lot of people. It's just a smaller, more intimate –"

"Liv." Rafael tested the name on his tongue; it dripped like a golden drop of honey, a rich caress of warm tones caressed in sensual joy. "What are you really thinking, Liv?"

Liv sighed and mumbled, "I wish everything wasn't up in the air. I wish it wasn't so difficult. I'm already tired of struggling and I've been awake for three days."

"You've been struggling for longer than three days," he said. "And that's my fault."

"It's no one's fault, Barba," she said. The declaration was firmer than the tone she spoke it in. "And the past is the past: we can't change it now. We can only go forward. I'm going to need all the help I can get, especially if… if I can't go back to work."

"That's a pretty big if," he said, his tone slow and even. "You're catastrophizing the situation –"

"I can't help it," she murmured. "You saw how long it took me to get to the bathroom earlier."

"You've only been mobile under your own power for 24 hours," he reminded her. "I think you're expecting way too much of yourself, Liv."

"Rafael –"

"It's going to take time," he said. "I'll help you with everything I can, but you have to be patient and understanding with yourself, mi amor."

"Yeah," she said, doubtful that she could ever be that.

"I hear you're moving to rehab in a couple of days," Cragen said as he sat down at her bedside.

"Yes," Liv agreed quietly. "They went over the results of all of my tests today. Apparently, I have some cervical nerve damage that needs treating – which accounts for why I can't hold anything tightly in my right hand, like a pen or a pencil – but that's secondary to getting my strength built back up so I can run around the streets, chasing perps."

He frowned. "You know you wouldn't be doing that for a long while yet, anyway," he said. "Barba and Langan are bullying the hell out of Internal Affairs to make sure you get more than a fair shake in this mess. All of you and Fin's medical expenses are being paid for by the City – not by the Fund."

"What?" she asked, eyes wide.

"You aren't paying a cent for this: it's not going through your insurance," he said. "And if there's any issue with that, McCoy says he's personally going to sue the NYPD on your behalf. Personally, I think Barba has something on him, but –"

"Oh god," Liv said, covering her eyes with her hands, "he disclosed. He disclosed everything to McCoy while I was unconscious and you want confirmation –"

"I don't know what he told McCoy," Cragen said. "I just find it suspicious –"

"We slept together," she said quickly. "He's… he's Serenity's father. But we didn't have a relationship, Don. Not then, anyway. Now… everything has changed."

His brows furrowed with surprise and concern. "You understand what this means."

"One or both of us has to leave SVU," she said. "It's a conflict of interest at best, a breach of the law at the worst – but I can't stop loving him. And he's Ree's dad."

"You didn't even blink," Cragen said. "You just told me you love Rafael Barba and you didn't even blink."

"He's a good man, Don," Liv murmured. "He's taken care of Ree and tried to take care of me –"

"I know," he agreed. "And I wondered why. Why put up such a fight for someone you barely knew? But now I know." He nodded and exhaled a little roughly. "Olivia… I hope, for your sake, that this works out well for you and Serenity."

"Me, too," she murmured. "I'm not going to fool myself thinking it's going to be easy. It's not. We're both damaged in different ways – I can't speak for his pathological fears of settling down, but god knows you know about my struggle with everything."

"Of course," he acknowledged.

"I just… I just need Ree to know she has a family that loves her very much," Liv said firmly. "I didn't have that. Rafael struggled with that. The only thing in this world that I want for my little girl is for her to have better than I did."

"You've already done that," Cragen promised.

Liv woke up in the middle of the night – not really dreaming, but not really awake. She expected to see Rafael at her bedside, but was surprised instead to see Kathy Stabler sitting there with a Kindle and a tired expression of concern. "Hey," Kathy said, "you okay? Need some water or some painkillers – Barba said you've been having headaches."

"No, I – water," Liv mumbled, fumbling with the bed buttons in her sleepy state. "Rafael home with Ree?"

"Just where he was a few hours ago," Kathy reminded her gently, coming over to help with the cup of water. "There we go. Anything else, Olivia? I've got some snacks if you're hungry."

"Are you pissed at me?" Liv mumbled.

"Nah," Kathy said, waving her hand. "You're hurt: why would I be mad? I already ripped Fin a new asshole. So did IAB. Then, apparently, Barba and Langan went after IAB."

"I heard," Liv said, slowly becoming more alert. "Captain Cragen told me."

"Elliot couldn't believe that Barba was sticking his nose in like that, just being SVU's ADA," Kathy said, "but here we are."

"Rafael is more than an ADA," Liv whispered.

"Is he?" Kathy asked. "I always thought that you were after Elliot."

Olivia frowned. "No, never," she said. "What gave you that –"

"You two always had a connection," Kathy said with a shrug. "It wasn't so much of a leap to think that you'd tumbled into bed together."

"We were friends," Liv said. "I was never romantically attracted to him – he's always been yours, even when you were having issues. That was never a door that was open for me."

"I thought he was Serenity's father," Kathy admitted, "with as quickly as you named him godfather –"

"But I made you godmother," Liv countered. "Why would I do that if –"

"Guilt?"

Liv shook her head and sighed. "He isn't."

"I know. He told me. He told me that it's Barba." Kathy quirked a small smile. "He ranted about it for like fifteen minutes and couldn't come up with a single flattering thing to say about the man except that he's clearly a good father." The women shared a conspiratorial chuckle. Kathy then said, "Meanwhile, I'm internally screaming because that man has a nice ass and even though he's a little on the short side, I wouldn't throw him out of bed. So, hey – good on you, Olivia."

"We aren't really… seeing each other," Liv hedged, unsure how to define their relationship. Was it even a relationship? It was more like an uncomfortable pair of slippers where all the cushioning was gone and you hadn't quite got the heart to upgrade it just yet.

She wanted the upgrade, she was just scared to get rid of the familiar.

"But you care about him."

"Yeah," Liv said quietly.

"Don't let anyone else take that from you two: if you want him, go for it," Kathy insisted. "You've waited long enough."

Liv hesitated a moment, then smiled. Suddenly, she said, "You really thought I'd slept with El?"

"I did. And when you first introduced us to Trevor, I was thinking that there was no way you were going to date that perfectly nice lawyer just to cover up the fact that you fucked my husband and got knocked up –"

"Trevor was a mistake," Liv said with a heavy sigh. "We'd be divorced by now if we'd actually made it to the altar. I don't know what I was thinking."

"You were lonely and hormonal and didn't want to admit that you wanted someone."

"I wanted Rafael," Liv muttered. "But that wasn't going to happen."

Kathy chuckled. "What about now?"

"Now… I'm not pregnant and we're trying to figure out how this all works." Liv shrugged. "We have to make it work for Ree, if not for us."

"Well, for what it's worth – and that's not much, coming from me – I think it's good for you two to have him," Kathy said. "Elliot worried, and that made me angry and kind of… confirmed it in my eyes, you see? And it made things worse. But now… now I know I don't really have to worry, right?"

"No, you can fuck off back to Rome – but you'd better expect phone calls on a regular basis," Liv said firmly. "And we're coming to see you sometime. Even if I have to drag Rafael there."

Kathy smiled. "Maybe on your honeymoon."

Liv frowned. "I don't see us getting married. It's just not something we have to do, Kathy."

"You should. It's better for a lot of things – the certainty, I mean."

Liv stifled a yawn and Kathy backed off, letting her go back to sleep. Truthfully, she didn't want to talk anymore; she was talked out. She just wanted to rest and try to get ready for the next day.

Rafael was helping her unpack her bag of things into the dresser in some semblance of an order she would have an easy time with when there was a knock on the door of the room. "Hello, sorry to interrupt –"

"Come in," he muttered.

"Yes, I just came to check up on Detective Benson and her progress –"

Olivia stared at the unfamiliar man, squinting as if that would make his features resolve into someone she recognized: still no dice. "Who are you?" she inquired.

"Oh, sorry – I'm William Dodds, the new Chief of Police," Dodds said with a wide smile that seemed almost predatory. "I went by the hospital first and they said you were discharged to the rehab facility today, so… I see Mr. Barba is keeping you company."

"He's my power of attorney," Liv said.

"Yes," Dodds said, his casually kind demeanor slipping for a moment, "I am aware. He's been giving IAB a run for their money as of late – and kicking puppies over at 1PP when he doesn't get his way."

Rafael glared at him. "Would you not discuss this in front of Olivia?" he hissed.

"I think she would like to know what her lap dog is doing while she's not holding his leash," Dodds shot back.

"Stop it," Olivia said, her voice ringing out in the room like a bell. "Stop it – don't you dare come for Rafael, Dodds. We are partners in every sense of the word. Did you want a disclosure? You have it."

Rafael was staring at her, wild-eyed. "Liv –"

"I don't care anymore," she said quietly, holding up her right hand. "I don't know if I'm ever going to be able to fire a weapon again. I don't know if you're ever going to let me go back to work. Fuck it. Let me have this."

Both men were staring at her, and she shook her head. It was too much and not enough.

TBC...