A/N: I really haven't forgotten these stories. Life is just kicking my butt. This is why I'm a oneshot kinda writer people! Hope you enjoy. Elliot fans: Don't come after me with the pitchforks until you get all the way to the end!
It wasn't like Ed Tucker to show up at your run-of-the-mill crime scene if it wasn't some kind of IAB-related incident. And yet, he found himself barreling up to the curb outside an alleyway between two apartment buildings on the Upper West Side and barely tossing the car in park before jumping out, crossing the perimeter, and running down the dead end to where two officers huddled in the corner.
Tutuola turned first, hearing his footsteps.
"Hey," he said. "Thanks for coming man. I mean I woulda called Stabler but since he's not on the job anymore…"
"It's not a problem," Ed said, holding up his hand to stop any more speeches.
"She, uh…" Tutuola started again. "Dude had a little mini blowtorch like the one Lewis was using. He fired it up behind her back and she heard it hissing. Then she freaked. We don't think he's actually connected to the case, just a homeless guy who lives nearby. But she turned around real quick and pointed her gun at him. I talked her down, but… well."
Ed understood. She had PTSD now. He had it himself from working search and rescue on 9/11 and from various other close encounters on the job. They'd talked about it when he called her last night.
"Ready for your first day back?" Ed asked when he called after dinner.
She was still staying at Stabler's place even three months later. Ed could hear him loading the dishwasher in the background.
"Yeah," she said. "Lindstrom and the department Doc think I'm ready. This job is in my blood."
"You'll be fine," Ed said. "Your instincts are still there, remember that."
"I will," she'd said.
He could almost hear her smiling through the phone (and Stabler no doubt scowling behind her) before they hung up.
But when Tutuola stepped aside he saw Olivia for the first time. Her back was to him, the left side of her body flush against the brick wall. She had her hands braced on her thighs and she was breathing heavily.
"Olivia," he said, as calm as he could.
Her head shot up when she heard his voice.
"What are you doing here?" she asked, her voice full of venom and accusation. "Coming to write me a rip?"
"No," Ed said. "Wanted to see if we could talk."
"You can't take my badge," she whispered. And if a tone of voice could kill, Ed would be a dead man. "I just got it back."
"Olivia, I'm not here to take your badge," Ed said. "I'm just here to talk."
"I know 'talk' is IAB code for a frame job," Olivia said, clearly still in the throes of her panic.
"Why don't we go sit in my car?" Ed asked, trying to stay calm. They couldn't both be snarky right now, even if he wanted to snap at her for talking to him that way when he was just trying to help. "Maybe go down the street, get a coffee?"
"I have a job to do, you know," Olivia said. "And last I checked, so do you. So if you're not here to give me a rip then leave us alone to handle the crime scene."
Ed let out a sigh. She was testing his patience, just like old times. At least she didn't have her trusty guard dog at her side these days.
"10 minutes in the cruiser," Ed said. "It's a scorcher today. Just sit in the air conditioning for 10 minutes and then you can go back to work, alright?"
"Is Fin going to get his turn in the AC, too? Or do I get special treatment because I'm damaged?" Olivia hissed.
"Would you please just get in the damn car?" Ed asked.
She rolled her eyes at him but stalked out of the alley to the passenger side of his car, so he followed, Tutuola giving him a nod on the way out.
Olivia was already inside when he got back to the driver's door. She'd turned the keys he'd left in the ignition, cranked the AC, and was sitting with folded arms and a scowl on her face staring out the windshield, refusing to look at him.
Ed got in and said nothing, other than telling her to buckle her seatbelt, which she did. He eased away from the curb and drove a few blocks away and parked in front of a coffee shop that one of the girls in the office always raves about.
"I can do my job, you know," Olivia said. "I can still do my job."
"Who said you couldn't?" Ed asked.
"Fin, clearly," Olivia said. "Since he had to call in my handler. And you, since you showed up. Everyone else in the squad looked at me with puppy dog eyes when I walked in this morning. Elliot, who asked me about 15 times this morning if I was sure I was ready to go back."
Ed sighed again.
"Olivia, that's not any of us thinking you can't do your job," he said. "We just care about you."
"Why?" Olivia snarled. "Why can't you all just leave me alone and let me do my damn job and live my own damn life?"
"Hey," Ed said. "I don't think this is about us at all. What's really going on?"
Olivia crossed her arms across her midsection even tighter and stared out the passenger window at the sidewalk.
"He had a blowtorch," she whispered. "I didn't know that until I heard it and… I pointed my gun at him."
Ed already knew that, but he wasn't going to let on. He just wanted her to continue.
"The sound and the smell, it just… took me back," she said. "And I… if Fin hadn't been there I don't know if I would have… accidentally… out of instinct…"
"But he was there, and nothing happened, right?" Ed asked.
"No," Olivia said. "Fin took the blowtorch from him, sent him away. Turned it off. Talked me through it. But that shouldn't be his job. I can't do that in the field. I can't put him at risk because I'm too screwed up to do my job."
"Olivia, it's your first day back," Ed said.
"So?" she said, whipping her head around. He could see the unshed tears in the corner of her eye.
"So there's going to be an adjustment period," Ed said. "You're not screwed up, you're not a danger to your partner. You're just a little rusty."
"I shouldn't be," she said.
"Why?" Ed said. "You're not Wonder Woman, Olivia. No matter how much you want to be."
"You sound like Elliot," Olivia muttered. "Always making me blink my lights and whatever. And the one time he's not there to do it, bam. I get tortured by a psychopath. You're all right. I can't take care of myself."
"I don't think that's it," Ed said. "It's really hard for you to believe we could care about you, huh?"
"Why should you," she said. "When I screw everything up."
Ed reached across the center console and took her wrist in his hand.
"You do not screw everything up," Ed said. "And whoever told you that is a dumbass. You got your pride hurt today because it was your first day back and you wanted to act like nothing happened. But you had a setback. Nothing happened to the homeless man. You were safe. Tutuola is safe. And truthfully, if someone snuck up behind me with a blowtorch, PTSD or not, I probably would have reacted the same way."
"Fin can't keep pulling you out of your office every time I have a meltdown," Olivia said, sliding his hand from her wrist into her palm.
"He won't have to," Ed said. "Because as you get used to being back on the job, if you keep going to your appointments and talk about coping tactics, you won't have them in the field."
"You know from experience?" Olivia asked.
"Yeah, I do," Ed said. "We talked about what happened after 9/11. Sirens, jackhammers, certain smells. It brought everything back. It took time, but I learned how to handle it. Today is just day one. Once you get through it, everything else will be a lot smoother sailing."
"I didn't want to react that way, you know," Olivia said.
"I know," Ed said.
"And I didn't want to interrupt your day," she said.
"You didn't," Ed said with a smirk. "Tutuola did. But really, I didn't have to come down. I wanted to."
"Can I buy you a coffee?" Olivia asked. "As a thank you?"
"Make it iced tea," Ed said. "We'll even get one for Tutuola and I'll take you back to your crime scene."
She squeezed his hand before letting go and pulling open the door to head into the cafe. As he watched her hold the door for a woman with a stroller before entering the cafe, he couldn't help thinking about how complicated and infuriating she could be while also being kind and gentle. It was attractive. It was a turn-on. And Ed hated himself just a little for thinking about what could have been if Stabler wasn't still in the picture. Because with him around, Ed didn't stand a chance and he knew it. It would always be Benson and Stabler.
Elliot had finished up his work about 15 minutes before Olivia walked through the front door of the apartment. He thought he'd hate the administrative desk job, but he actually kind of liked calling the shots for once. Plus, working from home gave him more time with Olivia. It allowed him to be home tonight after her first day back.
He'd already placed an order from their favorite Chinese place and popped a cork on a bottle of red he knew she liked.
"Hey, how'd the day go?" Elliot asked as he watched her toe off her shoes by the front door and hang her blazer on the coat hook, revealing the tank top underneath.
She'd been shy about him seeing her in anything scoop neck or sleeveless in the first few weeks after the incident because of the scars on her shoulders and upper chest. But once the July city heat kicked in, avoiding death by heat stroke beat out her shyness over the burn scars.
Olivia walked to the couch and flopped down, but she didn't say anything. He could see the war happening behind her eyes. Something happened today, and she was trying to decide whether she wanted to tell him or not.
"Talk to me," Elliot said, sitting down on the coffee table across from her. "You have that look."
"What look?" she asked.
"The 'I'm going to tell him everything is fine when it isn't' look," he said.
"You know, it really sucks living with someone who knows all your tells," she muttered.
"Oh, like you don't know mine and call me out on them daily," he said with a chuckle.
Olivia rolled her eyes, but she also smiled.
"Fin and I went to a crime scene today and ran into a homeless guy in the alley," she said. "He, uh, fired up a blowtorch behind my back and I flipped my gun on him."
"But you're okay?" Elliot asked.
"I wasn't the one with a gun pointed at my head, El," she said.
"Fine, he's okay? And you too?" Elliot asked.
"Yeah. Fin confiscated the blowtorch, told the guy to get out, and talked me down," she said. "Then he called Ed to come to handle me."
Elliot felt the squirming pit of jealousy in his stomach anytime Tucker's name came out of her mouth.
It wasn't that he wasn't grateful for what Tucker did, saving her, killing Lewis. And he shouldn't be jealous of their friendship. After all, Olivia was living with Elliot. They slept in the same bed now. He was the one who held her and talked her through nightmares which were, thankfully, becoming a less frequent occurrence. They had meals together, watched TV together, and talked about their lives. But Tucker was going to always have something with her that he didn't because he'd been the one to save Olivia and take care of her in the immediate aftermath.
And that burned Elliot up from the inside out.
"How'd that go?" he asked.
"I may have asked him if he was going to write me a rip and then told him to get lost," Olivia said, running a hand through her hair. "He didn't listen. Took me for iced tea instead before he brought me back to the scene."
"Did he help? Showing up?" Elliot asked.
"Sort of," Olivia said. "I just wanted to have this day go off without a hitch. And instead, Fin had to call Ed in to talk me off the ledge."
"But you made it through the worst part," Elliot said. "Tomorrow is day two. It's not new anymore."
"It shouldn't have been new in the first place," Olivia grumbled.
"No, it shouldn't have," Elliot said, moving to sit next to her on the couch. "But the first hurdle is always the hardest."
"I thought the saying went 'the first cut is the deepest,'" she said with a smirk.
"I'm not exactly in the habit of quoting Sheryl Crow," Elliot said.
"Cat Stevens wrote that, actually," Olivia said.
"And this is why I refuse to watch those music trivia shows with you," Elliot said. "Because you kick my ass every time."
"There's just so many 'firsts' I have to conquer now because of Lewis," Olivia said.
"But look at how many you've already done," Elliot said. "First night without a nightmare, done. First day back at work, done. The first day of therapy, done. You're running out of 'em Liv."
Suddenly she got quiet and turned her entire body to face him. She was giving him another look, a pensive one. It wasn't one he had cataloged in his Olivia index. She was biting her lip, and there was a cross between fear and fire in her eyes. Something that almost looked a little bit like… lust?
Before Elliot could read too much into it, Olivia was leaning forward and her lips were on his. Somewhere within the shock, his body reacted on instinct, curling behind the back of her head. And when she poked her tongue between his lips, he let her enter.
He wasn't completely sure how long they stayed that way. It could have been seconds, hours, or days. But when she pulled back, Olivia looked satisfied and he, no doubt, looked dumbstruck.
"What the…?" Elliot said, not sure if he could even form a coherent sentence after that.
It wasn't until the words were out of his mouth and her face fell that he realized they sounded not like an elated exasperation, but an attacked accusation.
"I'm sorry," Olivia said, quickly drawing back into herself. "I just… I thought."
Elliot quickly reached for her hand.
"Never ever apologize for kissing me, Liv," Elliot said. "Especially not like that. I'm just… surprised. I didn't know you were ready for that. I wasn't sure you wanted that… with me."
To Elliot's surprise, Olivia laughed.
"El, I've wanted to kiss you for seven years," she said. "Maybe longer. But that's as long as I've allowed myself to admit it. Since Gitano. When he had the gun to your head all I could think was, 'we're both going to die in here and I never got to kiss him.'"
"Would you hate me if I told you I had a similar thought?" Elliot asked.
He'd wanted to kiss her, yes. But his potential end-of-life regret was that he'd never gotten to touch her, taste her, make love to her. Not that he'd bring that up now. Not when she was trying to overcome her own demons and having her tongue in his mouth was more than he ever expected to happen when he woke up this morning.
"After getting back to work, there were two more big firsts I wanted to get out of the way," Olivia said. "That was one of them."
"Well thanks for sharing it with me," Elliot said.
"Who else was I going to share that with, El?" she asked. "The super? The food delivery guy?"
"Tucker," Elliot said. "Maybe."
"You're not seriously going to go all jealous over Eddie right now, are you?" she asked.
"Eddie?" Elliot said, feeling his voice catch in his throat. "Since when do you call him Eddie?"
"Since just now, when I knew it would make your ears turn six or seven shades of red," she said. "Ed is my friend now, yeah. But he's not my partner. He's not you. So stop being a jealous asshole, okay."
"You know if I promised that I'd just be telling you a lie," he said.
"I know," she said. "But could you try?"
"I think you secretly kinda like it," Elliot said.
"I plead the fifth," she said.
"Alright, so that was one of the big milestones you wanted to get out of the way. Really glad to be of assistance on that, by the way," Elliot said. "What was the other?"
Elliot watched Olivia bite her lip again and stand from the couch. He thought she was going to walk away, maybe go to the kitchen, pick something up. But instead, she came to stand in front of him, and then she straddled his legs and sat down on his lap.
Slowly, she leaned forward and whispered words he never thought he'd hear come out of Olivia Benson's mouth–not directed at him anyway–flow into his ears.
"Are you sure?" he asked, watching her pull her head back so they could look in each other's eyes.
He searched them for any kind of fear or regret. While he did see a little hesitation, a few nerves, it was nothing that made him feel like he had to put the brakes on to keep them from them moving too fast.
"I told you months ago I wanted to trust you," Olivia said. "I do trust you, El. I wouldn't trust anyone else to do this with me right now."
"You know, the food is going to be here in like 15 minutes," Elliot said, shifting uncomfortably because he knew she knew he was already losing this battle.
"Guess we better move quick then," she said, bringing a hand up to cradle his chin and cheek.
"Oh no, baby," Elliot said. "I've waited 15 years for this. We're going to go nice and slow and take our time."
"Baby?" Olivia asked with amusement and Elliot just shrugged his shoulders. "But you just said the food was almost here."
"I paid with my card over the phone," Elliot said. "Let the kid leave it at the door. We'll heat it up later. I'm hungry for a much different meal now."
And just his luck, Olivia tilted her head and smiled before reaching for the hem of her tank top and yanking it over her head.
Elliot couldn't be certain, but he was pretty sure he saw stars, just like the first time she sauntered out of that cheap, dingy bathroom wearing nothing but her bra to save his undercover ass. There were scars that littered her skin now that weren't there before, but he didn't care. She was still beautiful as hell.
One thing he was certain about was that Olivia Benson was about to make him the luckiest damn man on the planet, and he wasn't going to take one second of it for granted.