Olivia panics, pulling frantically at her arms and wrists, but when they flail too easily in the air, she gasps, not in pain, but in relief.
It was so freeing, literally, to be able to move her hands and arms, for them not to be locked and constrained above her, behind or bound together. As much as she is relieved by the ability to move, the thought of it is exhausting because she doesn't have the energy.
She forces herself to at least change positions because where she's laying in now is causing a dull numbness to spread over her left side, and as she attempts to rock her body to relocate herself onto her back, she releases a painful hiss. Every part of her body feels sore and tender, even parts she hadn't realize had been injured. As she faintly opens her eyes, she recognizes the pristine ceiling above her, the smell in the air bursting with disinfectant, and the sound of creaking doors and the rolling wheels of heavy machinery passing by are telling her everything she needs to know about where she is. She is in hospital, safe.
At a slight ease, she closes her eyes again.
She can barely remember what happened to her. The details are patchy, blotted and most probably a little skewed, but she can remember feelings; the heaviness from the anxiety in her chest, the trembling, shaking, and freezing cold that travelled through her body each time she felt fearful, the temperature that would instantly rise when she had a flash of temporary anger or burst of emotion, the way the switch between fight or flight, hot and cold only intensified the physical responses she was experiencing, and even now, laying in this bed, she can still feel the chills.
"Olivia," a soft, calming female voice gently calls out, and she knows it will be a nurse. It is the same type of voice she woke up to last time she was in hospital and the time before that and the time before that.
In her experience, it's always been the nurse who oozes of care and kindness to be the first person to attend to the patient, the one they deem capable enough to handle such a delicate, sensitive case, because that is what she is now, again, a case.
She doesn't want to be rude or ignore the youngish-sounding nurse, but she wants to buy herself a few extra minutes, an additional bit of quietude where she doesn't have to deal with it all, go over what happened, dissect every little detail.
From Daryl, to the reason she left the coffee shop, to Lewis to David.
David
She harshly squeezes her eyes together, hoping the tightness of the closure will dispel the desperate thoughts that are attempting to make sense of it all, but it's too late, her mind has woken up; it's consciously aware now and she knows, from past experience, that everything's going to come flooding back.
She needs to breathe because the thought of remembering, re-living it, telling it, is overwhelming, and it's burning inside of her again. She's struggling for air, clutching her heart because it's beating so fast she's certain it's just going to burst out of her chest. Then there's her head. It's not just hurting, it's spinning, swirling, flashing around painful images in front of her eyes, and even though she is lying down, she is dizzy. She's so dizzy, and she tries to recall how she got to hospital, but it's all a blur, a mismatch of random, disconnecting incidents, so she attaches to her last memory.
David.
David, running away.
She throws her eyes open and scrambles her hands into the mattress, and the agonizing pain from the skin splitting again over her healing wounds forces her to cry out. She had almost forgotten about the raw damage, the desperate bids to free herself have caused to her wrists.
She needs to fight through it and catch the attention of whoever's voice it was that previously spoke to her, because David left, and if he left, he would have Noah. She can't lose Noah. She can't go through all of that and not have her boy, her beautiful, giggling, reason for everything, sweet boy.
"Noah," her voice cracks. It's low and husky, and she attempts to swallow to relieve the dryness, but it's not sounding any louder.
"Noah," she whispers again as she ushers herself higher up the bed, but the nurse is leaving. Olivia knows there is no way she could have heard because she was already on her way out of the door when she first called, and she could kick herself for wanting those few extra minutes, because now, she needs her back in the room, she needs someone, anyone who can get a message about David.
Anyone who can get her boy.
She is desperate, between the pains ripping through her head and her eyes still attempting to focus, she searches around the bed, then the room, looking for anything to help.
From her seated position she slowly swings her right leg off the hospital bed and lingers it over the edge. The gown they must have placed her in rolls up because suddenly, she is breathless, struck by the sight of the latest addition to Lewis' work.
It's lined out in front of her, not as deep as it's predecessors, but looking at the long, thin, reddened mark stretching from her hip down to her inner thigh reminds her of the blade.
How he bitterly ripped through her pants material, the expression of sadistic happiness on his face as he snarled threats at her, the way he….
She needs to stop.
Stop thinking, stop remembering, and stop the phantom feelings of him tugging at her, of the sharpness from the blade piercing into her skin.
She exhales, focusing on her words, repeating them in her head, swapping the painful images for her three perfect scenarios:
Noah
The Slide
Giggling
"Noah," she calls out again and although her voice is dry, the syllables form perfectly this time. Swinging her left leg to be alongside the right, she braces herself, ready to lift her body weight to stand on her feet, to take the ache on her wrists again because this is the longest she has ever been without Noah. If she needs a little extra time to heal, to make sure he is ok, then she will do it.
She bites her bottom lip in preparation as the door creaks open behind her. Loosening the tension, she turns her head around to look towards the open door in the hopes that the nurse has come back.
"Liv?" he exclaims, the apprehension and alarm rife in his tone.
"Elliot," she murmurs as she snaps her head back. It was not a statement of his name or a question. She had remembered he was there, that he came for her, and even if she didn't mentally revisit it yet, she knew everything he went through to save her. She was still having a hard time of connecting the specific dots; everything had been so hazy since she opened her eyes that it was difficult to fully piece that part of the experience, the trauma, together.
"Elliot, you, you were hurt badly," she stammers as she attempts to rake her eyes over his battered and bruised appearance.
He smiles as he answers her, rubbing the palm of his hand across the back of his neck. "Nah, I'm all good."
His tone is pleasant, filled with ease, but she can see it's all a front, all in the aim of continuing to protect her more than he already has. But even after all these years, she can see straight through him, recognize the downcast and heavy look in his eyes.
It's not all in vain; she does take some comfort. The way his mouth curls at the sides as he says the words, the way the smile forces the reveal of his laughter lines at the corner of his mouth, the way his whole face lifts with the tiniest of a movement is soothing to her. She finds herself smiling back, and it isn't a false, disingenuous smile; it's a natural reflex, the easiest smile she's returned in such a long time.
He slowly nods his head in acknowledgement before continuing. "Just so you know, there's uh ah, a -" He squints his eyes as he apparently attempts to remember the name. "Detective Rollins?"
When she nods her head, he quickly wraps up his sentence. "Yeah so, Detective Rollins is on her way in with Noah."
Relief washes over her as she drops her head towards her knees and clasps her hands together. "Thank you" she sighs, taking a few seconds of reprieve to regulate her whole entire nervous system.
"Is he ok? Does he know? Has – " she pauses, staggering over her words once more, but this time it has nothing to do with physical restrictions. Its distain and betrayal for the name she needs to say. " David been taking care of him?" She abruptly ends her sentence and looks away from Elliot.
"No, he's been with his sitter. He's totally oblivious Liv," he reassures her. "Fin said it was best that way. They told him you'd been in accident, but no-one wanted to elaborate more. That's for you. David hasn't been heard from since he called it in, and I briefly told your guys what I saw, but they're gonna need to know more from you." Elliot moves over and cautiously lowers himself into the seat opposite her bed.
"I know, I just don't think I can today," she shares.
"Don't worry about that. That's for tomorrow." His voice is understanding, supportive, and she needed that. She has some vague memories of talking to Fin and Amanda last night, but the exhaustion was tainting what she could actually remember saying. Whatever it was though, it must have been enough for them to convince IAB and anyone else that needed to talk to her that she'd given enough information for now.
"Do you need some water or coffee or -" He looks around the room, specifically observing over any charts or notices around her. "Are you allowed to drink coffee?"
"Of course I'm allowed to drink coffee," she mocks, "I have not had surgery. I'm just resting." She half laughs and amongst all of the trauma, pain, and everything they are going to need to unpack, she enjoys taking respite in this moment.
"Fin says Amanda is bringing the coffee. I did offer but apparently…" He twists his face to the side and outstretches his arm. "You take it different than ten years ago."
"Yeah," she flat answers, unable to figure out how to respond. She knows he was testing the water, bringing up his nonexistence of the last ten years lightly because of what they'd just been through, but she couldn't laugh that off, not yet.
"That's another thing we need to discuss," she finally announces before flitting her eyes up to his. On contact, she suddenly looks away, staring into anything else other than his eyes. She is second-guessing herself, him, his reason for being here. "That's if you're staying, that is?"
His eyes search to meet her despondent gaze, and he locks with them this time, urging her to maintain it. Losing the light tone to his voice, he is now slow, low, gravelly. "I'm not going anywhere Liv. I'm here for as long as you'll have me."
There is silence, an awkward, almost painful silence that's made up of so many emotions and feelings. Too many, because it's tough to understand where to even begin.
"What about Kathy and the kids?" she blurts out, a surprise to both of them. She darts her attention away from him again. She knows he can't stay forever; he has a family to get back to, a life to get back to, and it already means so much that he came for her that she knows she can't ask anything else of him.
"Liv. Will you please stop looking away from me," he pleads.
She doesn't speak, but she purses her lips and slowly turns her head back to look at him.
"Kathy and I," he begins, "we divorced. It was a little over a year ago. It's a long story." He stretches his arms above his head and expels whatever air is in his lungs.
"Well, it's not that long, but it is complicated."
She feels her heart sinking. She has no idea why it's sinking, but it is. "I'm so sorry. I didn't know," she replies, in a genuine apologetic tone. She is genuinely sorry; she fought for them to be together for so long, not because she necessarily thought they were good together, but because she knew how important marriage was to him, how important it was for him to be the foundation of his family, be what his father hadn't been.
"Don't be. It's good, we're good," he implores. He seems genuinely pleased, content even with his answer.
"Hmmm," she hums, bowing her head to look over the dressings that are wrapped around each wrist. She goes to speak but hesitates and strokes her finger over the injured area.
"Why did you come back?" she finally plucks up the courage to ask, but she still can't look at him. She doesn't know if she wants to hear his response.
"Let's not get into all of that now Liv," he replies as he nods his head towards the door. "I think there's someone here to see you."
"Mom!" the little voice shouts from behind her, bursting through the door and crashing it against the wall.
"Aunt Manda says you got hurt! You ok?" he climbs onto the bed, not wasting any time wrapping his arms around his mother's neck.
The tightness of his hug is the most amazing feeling in the world, even if it does mean she is grinning through the physical pain the tightness is causing.
"You ok?" Noah checks again as he pulls himself back and looks at his mom.
"I am more than ok, now that you're here." She beams toward him, and as she reaches out to caress his shoulder, Noah catches sight of her wrists.
"Mom!" he frantically exclaims, looking between both of her wrists, her bruised skin, and cut face. "What happened?"
She can see the worry in his little eyes, and she finds herself stuck in the most difficult of places. If she doesn't tell him the truth, he will more than likely find out anyway. If an escaped prisoner breaking out to enact revenge against the cop he took hostage all those years ago is not already in the media, it soon will be.
She can only shield him from so much and, especially when added in the mix, everything she needs to address with David. That is, even if she can fathom how to handle the whole situation.
She can't lie to him.
She will loosely tell him the truth, she decides. She will disguise what she can and wear her kid gloves. She needs her little one to be happy; she needs him to continue spending his days smiling. She wants to be able to see him grinning about something, anything, every day.
"Ok." She pats the bed in front of her. "Let's chat."
Elliot has to draw his eyes away from the interaction happening ahead of him. He admits, since that boy ran through the hospital room, he has been sat in silence, amazed. All of those years he had spent imagining Olivia with her kid could never weigh up to the level of fulfillment he has now.
Olivia Benson and her son.
It's all he'd ever wished for her, to have a child of her own, and now she has her own son, a son that loves his mom so much that he erupted into a room and dove on top of her. Elliot had noticed Olivia's flinches of pain at the impact, but he knows she didn't care. She was savoring that moment with him; her tightly sealed eyes, the way she drew in the smell from his hair, the gentle caress of her head against his, all show him how close this bond is.
Before he can lose himself any further in the moment, he staggers to his feet, silently excusing himself. He enters into the hallway, and as he closes the door behind him, he is greeted by the blonde-haired person who had brought Noah in.
"So you're Stabler, huh?" she says to him, turning away from watching the mother and son interaction through the glass. "I'm Amanda Rollins," she offers as she holds out one of the three coffees resting on the ledge towards him.
He winces in pain as he stretches his arms out. Taking the cup with one hand, he places the opposite hand over the back of his shoulder, kneading his fingers into the aching muscle. "Yeah," he nods towards her, "and thanks."
"You took quite a beating I hear," she follows up with, turning her stance away from him to look through the window into the room.
Elliot steps back and turns away, taking the lid of the disposable cup that holds the coffee he gently blows into it. "Not as much as she did," he says, looking over to Amanda and nodding his head towards Olivia's room.
"That's what I need talk to her about. When you were there, did he... did Lewis…did you see if he…" Amanda swallows thickly.
He can see she's re-thinking what it is she wants to ask, and he considers finding a way to unburden this woman from having to ask the question, but in all honesty, he doesn't know how to answer it.
"How was she?" she seems to settle on asking after a brief spell.
"I dunno yet." He loudly sniffs, stiffening his body. He knows what he heard happening when he got there, but he hasn't processed it himself yet. He hadn't wanted to. Elliot already knows they were holding off any questioning until tomorrow, giving Olivia the time she needed to process. He had been expected and urged to go in earlier, but due to his own injuries, he had been granted the day too.
"Ok," Amanda nods, not saying anything else.
He looks back through the window, watching over Olivia and her son again. He can see Noah's concerned face, his bright eyes are surrounded by that red flush of worry. He looks pained, and Elliot struggles to watch. The boy looks just like Olivia, and he acts like her too, has certain mannerisms he can already see visible in his young traits.
He is warm with his mother, appears to be caring but also strong. All his years he had at SVU, he had observed many interactions like this, when mother and son are finally reunited. Usually the child runs into the arms of the mother with floods of tears rushing down their faces as they seek their own comfort, but not Olivia's child; he appears different. He is holding himself together, fighting back the tears, showing his concern, and thinking of his mother.
He certainly has Olivia's heart.
He takes it all in, this mother son dynamic, and it's killing him that this is the first interaction he has ever observed of her being a mother.
3 3 3
It had taken hours for the hospital to discharge Olivia. Noah had stayed, with Amanda and Fin dropping off numerous methods of entertainment for him. She would not let him out her sight.
Over the years there had never been a single part of her that ever had concerns over David's parenting. He loves that boy beyond all else, and she knows he'll be safe, but that was no ease to her today. At one point in their marriage, she had believed he loved her like that, and even if what David had done was some huge misconstrued mistake, in the end he had left her there. He had called it in, but still, he left her, shackled in a freezing cold warehouse with two dead bodies and a barely conscious ex- partner.
He wasn't behaving as the David she had married, adopted Noah with, and been through so much with. She couldn't recognize who he was at the moment, and that in itself meant she couldn't trust him to be anywhere near Noah, and she couldn't allow herself to not have Noah by her side.
Fin and Amanda both offered to take Noah over night. They also both offered to stay over at hers, but she turned them down and sent them home to be with their own families. They, after all, had also gone through this whole thing with her, just in their own way.
Elliot had insisted on taking them both home; he more so told her that he was taking them home. Usually she would fight it, be loyal to her own stubborn insistence that she would be fine, that she was better being alone, but tonight she didn't want to fight it. Maybe it was the overflows of nostalgia re-surfacing, maybe it was reminding her of their partnership, the times she shut him out of her life, the times she kept to herself and never confided in him, and then, before she knew it, he was no longer there to confide in.
"El," she whispers as they travel in the elevator up to her apartment. "You don't need to carry him. He can walk." She strokes the back of her sleeping son's back and he lays over Elliot's shoulder.
"Let him sleep. He's not heavy," he replies, hunching him up more securely.
"You're injured and he's 8. He doesn't need to be carried," she insists, rolling her eyes.
"Exactly Liv. He's only 8, he has his whole life to walk everywhere, let him have this." He smiles, and as the elevator dings, Noah makes a little grunt as he shuffles into Elliot's shoulder.
As she opens the door to her apartment and holds it for them, she realizes that this is the first time Elliot has ever set foot in her apartment. He is carrying her son to his bedroom and gently placing him on his bed, and she struggles to find the reality in all of this.
"Kitchen this way?" he asks, as he points back down the hallway.
"Yeah," she answers, surprised by how easily he's settling in.
"You get him tucked in and I'll get your pills together. Doc said you needed to take them…" he checks his watch, "20 minutes ago."
She doesn't respond as he passes her by. The thought of taking any form of medication still makes her recoil, but as she pulls Noah's shoes and socks off and lifts his comforter over him, she feels the surge of pain through her body again. She'll take the pills; it's ok to take them. She'll manage, she reassures herself.
Leaning over Noah, she brushes the fallen curls from his face, softly kisses his head, and mouths, "Love you sweet boy," before quietly shutting the door to his room and following Elliot into the kitchen.
As she enters, she can hear Elliot pouring the water into the glasses. He's really made himself at home, cupboard doors left open, his jacket over the stool at the breakfast bar.
"Hey," she says as she approaches him. Laid out on the bench beside him are two groups of pills and one extra-large chocolate bar.
"What's this?" she inquisitively asks, gesturing to the chocolate.
"Oh, erm," he rubs his hand over his face. "I'm sorry Liv, I just- Fin told me earlier how sometimes it's a struggle for you to take pills and I -"
She stares at him blankly and he pauses, gripping his hands onto the bench behind him and blowing out a breath. "Liv, I just thought it might be good to try and change that. Take a pill then have some chocolate. I dunno, I'm sorry, it's stupid. I just-"
"No," she interrupts him. "I like it, it's a good idea. Thank you," she states, because she did like it, as much as she could, as much as her PTSD and recent trauma would allow her to like it. Ultimately, it was more that he cared; he cared enough to want to help her take her pills but also to help her be able to do it more in future.
"Here," he says, scooping the pills off the bench and placing them into her hand. He picks up the chocolate and peels back the packaging, snapping a piece off. "Ok, you ready?"
Olivia looks confused as he places a piece of chocolate in his mouth and starts eating it.
"I thought that was for me?" she snaps with humor as he takes yet another bite.
"It is. I'm just going to describe it to you as you take your pills. You know, take your mind off it." He smirks, and she can't help but laugh because for the first time in years, stood here ready to take pills, she's actually thinking of something else other than taking the damn pills. She is actually calm and smiling, and as she watches him take yet another bite, she sharply puts all the pills in her mouth and downs the water in her glass.
Slamming the glass off on the bench, she wipes the remnants of water from around her mouth. "Ok, give me that," she insists, pointing to what's left of the chocolate in his hand.
"Wow, ok. Well, that went a lot better than I expected," he laughs as he hands her the bar, clearly stuck between confusion as to whether she actually did have issues taking pills or if she really did just love chocolate.
"You didn't give me much choice," she jokes, taking her own large bite. "The size of your mouth, there'd be nothing of that chocolate left."
"Ahh," he laughs, clutching onto his ribs, his face briefly changing to a sharp grimace.
"I'm ok, I'm ok," he tells her as she rushes by his side. She knows he's laughing the pain off but it doesn't help her anguish; he's only hurt because of her.
"El. I'm sorry." She furrows her brow and looks over his visible bruises; she catches his gaze watching her and looks away, turning her body with her. "I'm so sorry," she says again, her voice barely over a whisper.
She can feel his eyes burning into the back of her head, but she doesn't want to turn around. Looking into his eyes has become one the most difficult things she's had to face after all of this. They hold so much depth, so many stories, and too much pain.
"Liv," he reaches his arm out to touch her shoulder but she jerks away.
"Maybe this isn't a good idea," she spits back over her shoulder.
As she bows her head into her chest, she struggles to swallow. This is all becoming too painful, too quickly, again. Her throat is tight and raw, and she feels like she is breaking. Why can't she have a moment of laughter without it followed by pain, emotions, questions, and trauma?
"I can't do this, Elliot," she rasps.
He takes a step back, giving her space, room to breathe. "I'll go if you want me to Liv?"
His voice sounds frail, and she cannot figure out if he is exhausted with her or if it's physical.
She silent, unable to speak; even if she could, she doesn't know what she'd say.
Please stay?
Don't leave me, again?
How could she ask him to do that? How could she say what she wants to say without him feeling obligated? How could she tell him ' I need you' when she has already had so much?
"Liv, look at me," he pleads.
She shakes her head from side to side because she can't look at him. The tears are burning her eyes, and she's desperately trying not to sob, but she's breaking her own heart. She's tearing herself to tiny little pieces with her own thoughts, and she can't let him see her like this.
"Olivia, please," he tries again. His voice is insistent but not strong, and as he carefully places his hand against her shoulder, she grabs at the cuff of her sleeve and abruptly draws it across her eyes, wiping away the moisture. The sharp movement causes the pain to sear through her wrist, and she immediately withdraws in pain, cradling one of them.
The soft tears fall from her face, and she gives up. She cannot fight it anymore; there's no fight left. Closing her eyes, she allows the tears to fall.
Elliot carefully takes a slight hold on her arm and tenderly places it by her side. It's unknown to her what he's doing, but he's soft and delicate and she trusts him, she needs him, and when he draws her in closer, she allows it, falling into his movement.
It's quiet around them, and as Elliot's hand lifts her chin, she's speechless at his slow sensitivity, at the subtlety of his thumb drifting up to her cheek and catching the remaining drops of tears.
"I'm not going anywhere tonight Liv," he whispers.
I don't want you to.
She nods, still unable to speak. His arm drapes around her waist and as he draws her closer, again, she willingly looks up through her tear-soaked lashes to catch his warm smile.
"Can I hold you?" he quietly asks as he looks over the cuts and bruises on her face.
It is such a small gesture, asking to hold her, asking for permission for something so simple. It means so much after everything she's been through; it means so much that it comes from him, that he wants to.
"Yes," she sobs as the dam of tears nears capacity. He pulls her against his chest, and as she rests into his safety, she breaks. The overwhelming, consuming feelings can't be held any longer, and when she's encased with him, it's the first time she willingly allows herself be vulnerable.
As she cries into his chest, she can feel his feet slowly shuffling them backwards until his back is pressing against the wall.
"Sit with me Liv," he whispers, and he doesn't need to wait for her response. He knows it already so he twists out his arm to the couch, straining to reach the fluffy overthrow. As he grasps it, he lets the length of it trail around them before concentrating on wrapping it around her, tucking the material over both of her shoulders, and then the end piece across his.
"Thank you," she soothes as she runs her fingers through the soft fleece, letting the material brush up against her cheek. She holds it there, and between its softness and Elliot's chest, she breathes out a sigh.
Noticing his head tilt down to check on her, she looks up again, timidly smiling from underneath her new blanket protection. As she closes her eyes, he smoothly lowers them both to the ground and once seated, he helps her straighten her legs to rest over his lap.
The soft touch of his hands guide up through the back of her hair, and as he massages her lower scalp, she nestles herself further into his chest.
"I could stay here forever," he tells her, unsure if she's asleep or even still listening. "There's so much I want to tell you Liv, so much I want to know about you, about Noah, about everything."
"Tomorrow," she sleepily murmurs. "We can talk tomorrow. Let's just have this one moment of peace before it all starts again."
He bows down and kisses the top of her head. She is right; it's only going to get worse before it gets better. Dealing with IAB, figuring out how the exact connection between the whole screwed up scenario even occurred, then finding, and dealing with David; it can all wait until tomorrow.
He wraps his arms around her tighter and closes his own eyes.
"I think that's a great plan."