A/N: This fic assumes that the relationship between Olivia and Serena is never good - something which the show feels like it leans into more as it goes on. So basically ignoring the S1 Serena appearance and what that relationship looked like.


8

Olivia Benson was 8 years old when she realized her mother didn't love her.

It was not that her mother beat her, or called her names. It was not that Olivia was ever starving or dirty or unclothed. It's just that her mother didn't care. Couldn't be bothered to play with her, to comfort her, to love her.

It took Olivia years to understand this.

In her first memory, when she was maybe 3, Olivia can only recall tears and loneliness.

She'd sit on the swing set and watch her kindergarten classmates sharing excited reunions with their mothers after hours apart. But when her own mother arrived she could never seem to muster even a smile for Olivia.

She'd hear friends share stories of ice cream treats or toys given for birthdays and good grades. But it seemed no matter how many straight A report cards Olivia brought home, no matter how well-behaved she was, her mother never looked at her with affection or pride.

All these incidents compiled and compounded. But it wasn't until she was 8, as Olivia ate dinner alone in the kitchen, that the pieces finally came together.

She'd walked herself home from school. Had finished her homework. Watched tv. Her mother was working, which Olivia had been told many times was very important. Was the only way that Olivia had food in her stomach, a roof over her head. Her mother was late, which wasn't unusual. So Olivia had poured herself a bowl of cereal, sat quietly in the kitchen as she'd eaten it dry, no milk in the fridge.

And then her mother came home. Stumbled through the door. Her bag thudded to the ground and Olivia had watched her wobble her way towards the freezer and pull out a large glass bottle. She twisted it open, taking a large gulp directly from the mouth. And then she'd tried to close the freezer door. But the movement was all wrong and she dropped the bottle and it shattered on the kitchen floor with a loud crash. The liquid's pungent smell had filled the small kitchen immediately, puckering Olivia's nose. Olivia must have made a noise then, because her mother turned her head and seemed to notice her for the first time.

But her mother hadn't asked if Olivia was ok. She hadn't tried to warn her about the broken bottle, as Olivia had seen her teachers do when something broke at school. Instead her mother had taken in Olivia's fright and then dismissed it. As if she wasn't worth the trouble. She'd made a face that Olivia would later identify as disgust and she'd left the room.

As Olivia's heart rate had slowed, as the ache in her tummy passed, she had known then that her mother didn't love her.

She didn't cry.

Eight year old Olivia Benson quietly gathered the pieces of broken glass and mopped the floor.


12

Olivia Benson was 12 years old when she learned about her origins.

She had asked for years about her father. Everyone she knew seemed to know theirs. Most were even lucky to have them at home. But somehow Olivia had never met hers. Didn't know what he looked like, or even his name.

She'd brought it up over the years, more times than she could remember. But her mother never seemed willing to talk about it. But the year she turned 12, Olivia decided she had a right to know.

She'd launched a campaign. Made it a birthday wish. Had watched her mother grow more exasperated and irritated each time the topic had come up. But Olivia was tired of her mother not telling her, and didn't care if she made her mother angry.

After all, what could be so bad? So what if her mother had her out of wedlock? Olivia had read Ms. Magazine and she already believed in feminism.

Olivia had plotted with a friend about how she could get her mother to tell her and her friend had suggested that her own mother was much more pliable after she'd had a cocktail or two.

Well, wasn't that a good idea? After all, her mother drank non-stop, falling over drunk at least twice a week. Olivia didn't particularly like to see her that way and tried to hide out in her room when she was like that. But maybe this once she could use it to her advantage.

So Olivia had waited until her mother came home tipsy and giggling, laying in wait in their dark living room.

As predicted, her mother had gone first to the minibar, turned on the light and looked in startled surprise at Olivia. But then Olivia had asked the question and watched her mother's eyes narrow, a mean countenance slipping over her face. Your father was a rapist.

She had sat staring at her mother as the words bounced around her young mind. She understood what rape was. She understood that sex was what you did to have babies. She understood that she was the outcome of her father raping her mother.

Olivia didn't want to believe it. For weeks she pushed the thought away. Told her friend that the trick hadn't worked. Convinced herself it was some cruel lie her mother had told her to shut her up.

And then she'd realized that there was a piece of paper that should tell her exactly who her father was. She knew it was in her mother's study, a place she wasn't allowed to go. But she was done caring. Coming home from school and opening up her mother's desk, searching through stacks of papers until she found her birth certificate. But there was no name. There was no proof of who her father was and where she had come from.

That's where her mother found her, hours later, staring still at the piece of paper. She'd glanced up at her mother and it took her a long moment to figure out the look on her mother's face. Loathing was where she finally landed as her mother began to speak, telling her the story of the night of her conception. Olivia listened until the very end, not moving, not speaking.

Twelve year old Olivia Benson ran to the bathroom, emptied the meager contents of her stomach into the toilet, then cried herself to sleep on the bathroom floor, alone.


14

Olivia Benson was 14 years old when she decided she was done needing her mother's love.

Olivia had spent years trying to win her mother's approval. She had decided that if she was the best, if she was just absolute perfection, her mother would have no choice but to love her. One day, she'd find a way to win her over, despite the way that Olivia had come into her life.

So Olivia had worked hard. Top grades, sports, popularity. Whatever it took to gain her mother's attention. Her affection.

The day she'd come home to tell her mother she had won a national essay contest and her mother had looked at her, unimpressed, Olivia decided she was done.

Her teachers told her she could be someone special, someone great. That was never really her concern. She just wanted to be loved. She just wanted her own mother to notice her.

But Olivia was realizing that maybe that would never happen. Maybe her mother would never give her any approval.

She decided she hated her mother for this. It was not Olivia's fault that her father raped her mother. Yet here she was, getting all the blame. She spat the words at her mother because she was tired of holding them in, tired of thinking them again and again and having no response. Maybe even sort of thought they were true, that things would be better for everyone. You should have had an abortion.

Her mother's eyes dropped away from hers and Olivia wondered if she realized where the words came from. That they weren't Olivia's thoughts, but something she'd overheard. An idea that had come from her mother's lips. That Olivia knew exactly how much her mother regretted her very existence.

If Olivia was hoping it would spur something in her mother, she was sadly mistaken. She watched as her mother drained her wine glass, standing to refill it from the bottle near the sink.

Olivia's accusation lingered, and she knew her mother would never provide her an iota of comfort, an ounce of compassion.

Fourteen year old Olivia Benson accepted for the first time that she was truly on her own.


16

Olivia Benson was 16 years old when she fell in love for the first time.

And finally someone loved her in return. Loved her in a way that she'd longed for. He would save her from a life that had been dark and lonely for too long. He would save her from her mother. He would give her a future where she could be happy.

These things alone were enough for her to love him.

Her mother hated him, and it was all the incentive she needed.

When Olivia told her she was running off, getting married, it was purely for the pleasure of watching Serena's face drain of color. When the fight started, it was exactly what she expected, screaming and cursing. Things her mother had not usually dared speak to her face were being hurled around. And it was exactly what Olivia wanted. Until there was a broken bottle, a jagged edge of glass shoved towards her.

And suddenly she realized none of it was in her control. She kicked, she ran, terrified. Back to her lover, the safety of his arms.

It lasted a week, this great love of hers. A whole week and then he told her he couldn't do it. She was too young, still a child. She should go home, finish school, find someone her own age.

She felt used. Chewed up, spit out, like a wad of gum on the heel of a shoe. She hated him, stronger than she ever loved him. He wasn't her first, but he was the first one she'd actually thought she could count on.

He was the first man to leave her, if she didn't count the man that raped her mother.

So she returned to her home, tail tucked between her legs. Her mother lorded it over her with a cruel laugh and Olivia thought about taking her conveniently packed bag and walking right back out. Finding somewhere else, another way to get by, because she wasn't sure she could survive another two years under that roof. But she was savvy enough to know her limited options made her vulnerable. And no matter how unsafe her home environment, there were worse places to be. So she unpacked the bag.

Sixteen year old Olivia Benson was alone once more, sure that love would never save her.


21

Olivia Benson was 21 years old when she decided to become a cop.

She spent years trying to avoid the thoughts of her mother's rape, of her bloodline and what it meant. She feared for the longest time that she was destined for nothing good. That with half her blood from a drunk and half her blood from a rapist, she couldn't possibly turn out ok.

And then one day she saw a flyer on campus and she found herself looking up the address, making her way across town. She asked if maybe she could help and they started her out with the easy things, the filing and paperwork. They told her she should take the counseling training. And then a few weeks later she sat down with a survivor for the first time and it finally clicked.

Maybe she couldn't save her drunk mother. Maybe she couldn't undo the pain of her childhood. Maybe she would never really be a good person. But she could try to do a little right for someone else. She could be there for the next rape victim. Help them catch the one who hurt them. Help them find a better way forward.

She could try to be someone they could lean on because she knew what it felt like to have nowhere to turn.

Twenty one year old Olivia Benson decided that maybe she couldn't undo her past, but she could fix someone else's future.


30

Olivia Benson was 30 years old when she met Elliot Stabler.

Elliot was the first person to really see her. Unlike the friends and boyfriends and colleagues that she's kept at arm's length, Elliot wouldn't allow the distance.

She'd spent years learning to protect herself from her mother. Years knowing she was the product of something heinous. A secret she hid from others, never letting them get too close. She had known with such certainty that she was beyond acceptance, beyond real love. So she had built walls and neglected a door. She'd decided that it was safer behind these walls, alone, than to let anyone in, to let them see all of her.

But Elliot bulldozed down the walls and barricades like they were made of straw. He drew her out of the places she sheltered in. He saw all of her and still told her he was there, still showed up day after day. Somehow it never felt like an intrusion. It was more like acceptance and safety.

Before she knew it, he'd wormed his way in, displaced the conviction that she could never be fully accepted by anyone.

Thirty year old Olivia Benson realized she'd never had a best friend before.


38

Olivia Benson was 38 years old when she realized she was in love with Elliot Stabler.

Once she knew, she wasn't sure how she ever didn't know. It was so damn obvious. So clear that she couldn't figure out if she was in denial or just stupid. She tried to trace it back to its origins, but she couldn't find the root. She wondered if it was there from day one.

She was long used to the rumors that would come back to her about the two of them. Dismissed them as gendered nonsense - the antiquated idea that a man and woman couldn't have a platonic relationship. But she had to wonder if everyone knew. If they saw something that she just couldn't see herself. If it was less judgement and innuendo and more assessment and analysis.

It frightened her. Not just the fact that he was still married, even if he was separated. Not just the fact that he was her partner. It had more to do with being unworthy. She was never enough for her mother, never enough for the men she dated. She was already living in fear of not being enough for her best friend. There was absolutely no way she would be enough for anything more.

She was certain, with these truths undeniable, that she had to leave before he did. She had to run because the end was inevitable and at least it provided her a little control. If she left, she could bear the pain. She wouldn't survive if he left her.

Thirty eight year old Olivia Benson ran, because she had never learned that she deserved love.


43

Olivia Benson was 43 years old when Elliot left her.

She was sure she did something wrong. She was sure it was because of her. Because no one had ever been able to love her. Not any of the men she'd had in her life. Not even her own mother.

But the reasons didn't actually matter all that much. The fact was he was gone. Without an explanation, without a goodbye. And maybe it was for the best.

Olivia had learned to do without a lot of things. And she would learn to do without Elliot. It didn't matter that Elliot was her rock, the cornerstone of her life, her only true friend, she'd find a way on her own. She had always been good at being alone.

Olivia never expected happiness to last. So when Elliot left, she couldn't muster any true surprise. Just disappointment and anger and certainty that if she'd allowed herself to depend on him then it was just her own damn fault.

Forty three year old Olivia Benson decided she wouldn't make the same mistake twice.


45

Olivia Benson was 45 years old when she learned nobody would save her.

She'd lost track of time. She didn't know anymore, if it was day or night, how long he'd held her. She'd spent hours tied up and drunk and blindfolded. She'd seen him enact damage beyond her most frightening nightmares, rape and torture and murder. And she knew she'd die, very soon, if not that moment.

She was exhausted.

But she knew she was on her own. That no one was coming to her rescue. Not her squad, with Lewis staying two steps ahead. Not Cassidy, who was probably being kept out of the loop. And certainly not her former partner who she hadn't heard from in years.

A part of her wanted to give up. Wanted to let go of the fight she'd been in her entire life. She was so fucking tired of her loneliness, her heroics. She was tired of being tough and strong. She was tired of being stoic in the face of rejection. A part of her saw this as a way out. A chance to let go. Because her life had been too hard and it often felt unfair.

But that was not who Olivia was. The struggle might be hard, it might be exhausting. But she was a fighter. That's who she had always been. That's what she told every survivor to be. And she would be a survivor of this, just as she'd survived so many other things. Because she sure as fuck wasn't going to let William Lewis be the one to end her life, handcuffed and mutilated. She was going to go out on her own terms.

Forty five year old Olivia Benson gripped the steel bar of the bedpost, gathered her strength and pulled.


47

Olivia Benson was 47 years old when she built her own family.

When Olivia looked at the family she assembled, she could acknowledge that it didn't look the way she had imagined. There were pieces missing she assumed she'd have. It had happened when she was well past the point of giving up. She had to work so very hard to make it happen at all.

But she considered her squad, her very own little boy, and she didn't care about the imperfections, the years it took. Didn't mind at all that it was not the way she imagined. She doesn't even care that she was still a little scared, still trying to figure this out. Still worried about the lasting imprint of her parents, of her own childhood. Still frightened that she wouldn't be enough for this child.

Maybe there were things missing, fears and doubts lingering. But she had known so many disappointments in life and she didn't want to focus on what was not there. She wanted to live in that moment, accept the gifts her life had granted.

Forty seven year old Olivia Benson was proud of the life and the family she built.


53

Olivia Benson was 53 years old when Elliot burst back into her life.

He'd returned with a literal explosion, a death, a trauma. And wasn't it just like them. Nothing could ever be easy, not his departure, not their reunion. Certainly not the years of denial, before, during and after.

She'd long learned to make peace with the things she would never have. For a long time, a family of her own had been at the top of the list. She was damn lucky to have even that. Why expect more?

A true love, something real and deep and not just passing the time, that was a close second. Elliot back in her life, a distant and unrealistic third.

So for months she refused to believe he was back to stay. Wouldn't allow herself the thought that she could have him in any form. That just wasn't what her life was. That just wasn't the thing she got to have.

When he told her he loved her, she had to remind herself.

When he found an apartment, she had to remind herself.

When he learned about all that he missed and he apologized, she had to remind herself.

And so it took a long time for her to imagine something different. To imagine that the list of things she wanted, she not only deserved, but may actually get.

He told her this himself. That she deserved happiness, that she deserved better than him, but he was hers if she'd have him.

She didn't really believe him. It was too good to be true. It was too much.

She had to work her way from denial, to disbelief. From disbelief to uncertainty.

And then one day, as he said all these things again, she felt tears on her face. They weren't accompanied by pain or sadness or anger.

She'd cried so few happy tears in her life that she didn't even recognize the relief, the fulfillment. There was an ache in her chest and she was sobbing and he was holding her. When she started to laugh she thought her brain was broken. But he was laughing too and his mouth was pressing against hers.

Fifty three year old Olivia Benson thought for the first time that maybe she got to have so much more than she ever expected.


55

Olivia Benson is 55 years old when she feels truly at peace for the first time.

It takes ages to recognize and understand the feeling. It's so foreign that she can't name it for the longest time.

But it's there in the morning when she wakes to Elliot's arm slung across her body. It's there in Noah's smile. It's there at the Sunday night family dinner.

She's spent her whole life in a fight. Spent years just trying to survive. Putting everyone's needs before her own because she couldn't fathom how to help herself. But it somehow comes together, in spite of everything.

Olivia still doesn't assume it'll last. She stopped believing in happily ever afters when most kids stop believing in Santa Claus. But she has learned to embrace happiness when it shows itself. She has learned to not take a single second of it for granted. And she still knows she's luckier than so many.

So it doesn't matter if she gets 3 months of it or 30 years, she'll take whatever is offered with gratitude.

Fifty five year old Olivia Benson has finally learned how to be loved.