So… this totally did its own thing again. Hope you enjoy.

Not my toys! Just my toybox.

THE MORNING AFTER THE NIGHT BEFORE

By Katsume

NC-17

When she awoke the second time, she felt better. It was still dark out and she just took a moment to absorb the warmth and comfort of the man behind her. She should be more embarrassed, but she really couldn't be. The comfort that was simply El, was something that she missed like a limb or breath. It had been one of the hardest things she had ever had to deal with while he was gone. She had missed him beyond his mere presence. He had been her friend, companion, confidant, buddy, and partner. She had loved him beyond anything else and the hole he had left behind had been impossible to fill. David had been charm and confidence, Brian had been impetuousness and temper, and Ed had been stability and understanding companionship. All pieces of what she had tried to replace when she had lost him. But none of the pieces could replace the real thing because they weren't the real thing, just bits of the whole she had lost. Shifting uncomfortably, she tried to push those thoughts away. The past was the past, and he was back now, and they were here, together, even if it was a glitch of sorts. As she moved again, he began to stroke her arm in slow, soothing movements.

"Are you okay, Liv?"

She nodded against his chest, humming out a low affirmation.

"Not feeling sick again, are you?"

"No, I really do feel okay. Just thinking. Sorry I woke you."

He rubbed her arm again. "You didn't. I was just lying here, watching you sleep."

"Oh…" She blinked. "I…" She started to move, to get up, but he pulled her tighter against him, resuming the soothing motions.

"Shhh… It's good. This might sound a little weird, but I've missed just being with you. The quiet companionship, sharing a space, no one talking. Just knowing that it is okay to be in the same room and be near and just be."

Her fingers curled over his. "I was just thinking the same thing."

He nuzzled his face in her hair. "Liv…?"

"Hmmm?"

"I don't want to get too serious, but I want you to know. I truly am sorry for leaving, and I'm not leaving again." She started to roll to face him, but he stopped her. "Please, don't… Just listen." He resumed his stroking. "I know I screwed up. And I know we've touched on this… but I need you to understand that you are one of the most important things in my life, and even if I can only ever have your friendship again, than I really just want your friendship." The soothing movements stopped, and he gently squeezed her arm. "But Liv… I really, really want to be more than just your friend. I tried to make the right choices, I tried to let you go, to focus on my family, but I never, ever forgot you." His fingers tangled in hers. "Every night, I would look up at the moon and stars, and wonder if you were doing the same. And every… single… day… I would turn to speak to you, to show or share something with you."

The war between her heart and her mind de-evolved into simply pain. Time had patched over the weeping wounds with something akin to spit and toilet paper. Every time something good or bad happened in her life those wounds would break free of their careful patching and bleed anew, making her wish she had another way of cauterizing them. Therapy had helped, but in the short months he had been back, and all the careful words and deeds between them, something had shifted, and those weeping wounds were seeping pus instead of blood, and the anger was ebbing away, leaving only hurt and a bit of regret. "And yet, you never did…"

He stilled. "No…"

She took a slow, deep breath. "At first I understood… You were hurting, upset… tired. I got it, but I couldn't understand why you wouldn't talk to me." As he started to speak, she waved her hand. "Then Cragen told me you put in your papers and I… was hurt, but I still understood… Then I had to clean up your desk and locker… and even though it hurt, I still understood. I trained people to take your place. It was like you were dead, and yet I didn't have even that closure. You were just gone as if you had never existed, and it felt as though I was the only one who truly comprehended what was lost. El… not only did I lose you, I lost my friend, my partner, your family… granted it was never mine to begin with, but it was as if it had all been erased and not only were you gone, but I was too. I didn't know myself anymore. I had to redefine myself without you." Her words had gotten faster as she spoke, and she had to take another couple of breaths to settle herself. "I literally had no one. Absolutely nothing but work. I wanted to quit because you were everywhere. But I couldn't because it was all I had. It was the only way I could connect. I threw myself in, took the extra calls, booked extra lectures. I was rude and ugly to the new people… my anger leaked out everywhere."

He pulled her tighter to him as if he could help hold her together, as if holding her could refill and seal those cracked parts. "Jesus, Liv…"

She curled into herself and him. "And then I met someone… he was handsome and charming. At first, it was casual, and I was onboard with that one hundred percent. Even though I laid out the excuses and tried to play it off, he pursued me. It felt so good to be wanted, to be treated like a woman… I stepped through that door, and it was good, until it wasn't. Once again, something else was more important than me and he walked away." She took another moment to focus on her breath, broke free of his embrace, and sat up on the edge of the bed. She carefully adjusted the sheet around her and stood, pacing, as if that would help expend all that pent up frustration. She turned and studied him. Watching as he sat up, the muscles rippling across his chest. For a moment, the briefest flash, she wondered why she even cared to explain. Why not just jump him, have wild crazy monkey sex, and walk out of his life as he had hers? It occurred to her in that flash of questioning, that the anger wasn't gone at all. The abscess might be weeping, but its pockets were deep and filled with so much more than she thought. Thoughts of sex drifted away to be replaced by an almost overwhelming urge to hit him, to keep hitting him, until there was nothing left but blood and spatter and exhaustion. She wanted to hurt him as deeply as he had hurt her. The pain and psychological damage were every bit as traumatic as what Lewis had done to her, and her reaction just as visceral, just as violent. Her hands came up to cover her mouth as the realization of that thought truly hit home. The difference, in her mind, was that she had loved, still loved, Elliot Stabler and he had destroyed her every bit as much as William Lewis had. She took a step back, and then another and another until her back flattened against the wall.

He stood slowly, approaching her cautiously. "Liv? … Olivia?"

She shook her head, hands still clutched to her mouth in horror. "Don't… just don't…"

He held up his hands in the age-old gesture of surrender and just stood still and calm. He wanted so much to approach her, to take her back in his arms, but he had felt the shift, and he did not know this creature before him. "If we are going to work through this, we have to talk. We need to clear the air between us."

She gave an almost hysterical laugh. Tears pooled in the corners of her eyes, trailing down her cheeks. Now you want to talk! The words screamed through her brain, but she didn't let them out. Instead, she said, "there were two other relationships while you were gone. Cassidy… wild, impetuous Brian… We found each other and I moved on him. It was a taste of the familiar and the forbidden and a piece of the past. We had fun, but I couldn't open up to him… I couldn't share with him the deepest parts of myself. We grew to want different things, Brian and I, so we pushed each other away. Then… then there was Tucker…" She studied him then, with a deep satisfaction, watching as the recognition of the name slapped viciously at him. "Tucker was steady, and sturdy and dependable as the day. And he loved Noah, wanted Noah, and me. He catered to both of us, encouraged both of us… and I pushed him away because I could not give him what I did not have!" The words were yelled, strong and fierce and angry, the pus vomiting up in a deluge of sound. "You took my heart and left me with a damn hole that nothing could fill…" She quieted again, trembling… "Nothing but Noah… and if he didn't fit quite the same it was okay, because his little roots spread and grew and I was finally, finally able to find joy and peace and something to connect with again." And just like that, the empty places seemed to fill back up with love, and hope and the dark and hidden ones suddenly felt purged and… better. Her hands dropped to brace against the wall, and the look she gave him was no longer filled with venom. "I went through some of the most horrible things while you were gone, and I HATED you for not being there, for not caring, for not RESCUING ME!"

Elliot couldn't stand it any longer. He moved forward, snatching her into his arms wrapping as much of himself around her as he could. "I'm so sorry…"

She leaned against him, allowed him to hold her, but made no effort to return his embrace. She continued as if he had not spoken. "But mostly… mostly I hated me. I hated myself for loving you, for wanting you, for needing you… But you know what, El?" He shook his head, tears dripping onto her shoulder. "If you hadn't gone… I wouldn't have grown. There would be no Captain Benson, no Noah… because there was no room for it. I couldn't let go of you so I couldn't BE. I had to clear out everything and redefine ME. And while I missed you, and God help me… I AM glad you are back; I like who I've become." Her arms made a loose link around his waist, and she turned her face into his chest, nuzzling her nose in the hollow at the base of his throat. "But I am afraid too. If I let you back in, I am afraid I will drown in you like before. I can't lose myself again, I can't define myself by you anymore. I am Olivia Benson. I am Noah's mother. I am a Captain of the NYPD… then I am Elliot Stabler's friend… or whatever that is meant to be. I will not become a ghost again." She quieted then, exhausted and strangely at peace. All those years, and the bits of time they have dance around each other since he came back, and she finally felt substantial again.