A/N: This chapter is a big deal, it's short but it's important. If you've been paying attention to the timeline you might have guessed FAULT was coming. This chapter is a post-episode to 'Fault' (7x19).
Song: I Found by Amber Run and It's Alright by Fractures.
Chapter 13- Olivia
"What about me?"
"What about me?"
"What about me?"
Her own words played on a loop in her mind. She sat up in bed and pulled her legs to her chest, resting her chin on her kneecaps.
"I want a new partner."
"I want a new partner."
"I want a new partner."
And then there were his words,
"I can't do this anymore. I can't be looking over my shoulder making sure you're okay!"
"I need to know you can do your job and not wait for me to come to the rescue!"
"You and this job are about the only things I've got anymore. I don't want to wreck that."
Her body ached all over, and her neck itched under her butterfly stitch. She wanted to rip it off and pour alcohol into the wound, the wound that had started this mess. She rocked her chest into her folded legs as she felt the cries consume her body.
She didn't know why she was crying. She'd lived. He'd lived. But they almost hadn't. She'd held that gun in his direction as his eyes bored holes into her. She knew she would never recover from the wounds he'd given her. The thought of losing him had filleted her into pieces she didn't recognize.
"It's alright"
"It's alright"
"It's alright, Liv,"
She clutched her hands against her ears as she tried to get his voice out of her head. It was not alright. Nothing about any of this was alright. They'd both been at fault; they'd both chosen each other over the job. They couldn't be partners. She cried into her knees and hated herself for being so broken over this. She knew it was coming. They'd been dancing around each other for half a year, keeping up the facade that nothing of an unprofessional nature had ever happened between them.
"I think that when I enter you for the first time, I want the ink dried on my divorce papers, and I want my hands free to touch you wherever I want."
He'd said that while she sat on top of his aroused body, and then neither of them did a damn thing about it for six whole months. And then they almost died, she almost had to laugh. He'd wanted her to take his life, like it wouldn't have taken hers too, in one single shot. He had no idea what he'd asked of her. Didn't he know it would kill her just the same?
"What about me?"
That was why she marched into Cragen's office and requested the change, because he had no idea how deeply he'd ruined her.
Maureen's words followed her the whole way to Cragen's door. "Promise me you won't ever leave him too; he couldn't handle it."
She couldn't handle it.
She couldn't handle it anymore- the waiting, the months of waiting, to hear he had signed the papers. If she was being honest with herself, she laid in bed at night waiting to hear the knock on her door, waiting for him to come take what was already his.
She didn't want him to have that hold over her, but no matter how many times she told herself he didn't, no matter how many men she let have her in his place, his hold- that force that tethered her to him, was still the strongest.
And she'd just cut it, cut that tie and let him go.
"I want a new partner."
She didn't want a new partner. She wanted Elliot to suffer for how bad he'd hurt her. He thought he could expect her to not pick him when he'd picked her. She was sick of him expecting her to be the stronger of the two of them. It wasn't her job to prove to everyone around them that they were just partners, especially not when he'd never held up his end of the bargain. She wasn't going to ease his guilt over their dependency by putting a bullet through a man who had a gun to his head. How dare he expect that of her? She'd pick him every time, and they both knew it.
She was sick of waiting around for him to sort through whatever it was he felt for her. She felt for him; she felt so much that it hurt. She wasn't going to deny it, and she surely wasn't going to kill him to keep their secret.
Everybody already knew- Elliot and Olivia are such damned fools that they couldn't do their jobs, they'd cost civilian life, they screamed at each other in hallways, and neither of them would have taken that shot. She wouldn't have taken that shot, and who would have expected her to? She'd spent eight years beside him, of course he mattered to her, it was hardly a secret. The only one who seemed angry over these facts was Elliot.
What would he have wanted her to say at his funeral? Would he have been angry with her if she shed tears over his grave? Would he have thought it wasn't her place to grieve him? Would he have grieved her if the tables had been turned?
Of course he would have. He would've assaulted the florist and kicked down the empty chairs at her ceremony. The chairs that should have been filed with her mourning family, but she didn't have any, she only had him. He would have torn patches of grass from her grave site, he would have driven there after work, he would have sat with her late into the night while his family wondered where he'd gone, and maybe Kathy would even take him back because he had nowhere else to turn. Everyone would walk on glass around him, and the whispers would sound like: he lost his partner, he's hurting, he loved her.
He loved her.
It was no secret.
And what would they say if the tables were turned? She'd have sat beside his wife and maybe his mother. His daughters would have hugged her, and his son would have wondered why she was there, she wasn't his mother, just a strange woman his father worked with. She would have held back any emotion because she would have had to be strong for his family. They all would have secretly resented her because he'd died on her watch. She would have approached his casket, and maybe she would have touched the metal, the most she would ever get of him. She'd go home alone, and maybe she'd open a bottle, if anything could drive her to be like her mother it would be losing him. And what would they say: she has no one now that he's gone, it's not fair to his family that she wasn't able to save him, she might have been in love with her married partner, she hasn't let another man touch her since, poor thing, how sad, how pathetic. Now she really has no one.
She hated him, she hated that he'd done this to her. She hated how much she cared. As she clung to herself and sobbed, she thought about how she wanted him there. She wanted to curl her body into him and have him hold her. Did he have any idea how much she needed him right now?
Her phone sat silent on her nightstand. She wanted it to ring.
Then she heard a pound at her door, the pound she'd been waiting to hear for months.
It was him, it had to be him. She sucked in a breath as she tried to compose herself. She unfolded her legs and reached for the short silk robe she had lying beside her bed. All she had on was a tank top and panties. She swiped the moisture from her eyes as she headed towards her door. It would be obvious that she had been crying, but she didn't care. He could see what he'd caused.
She looked through her peep hole to see him standing in his jeans and leather jacket. He had one hand in his pocket and the other resting against the door with his forehead resting against his fist. She was reminded of the time five or so years ago when he'd banged at her door and she'd left him standing outside while she cried. All because he had been worried for her life. Their problems weren't new problems.
She decided she was done repeating their history, so she opened the door. His eyes lifted as he removed his hand from the opening door.
"Olivia," he exhaled as his eyes canvased her. She felt the weight of his gaze linger on her swollen eyes. She looked up at him and could see that he'd been crying too. They were pathetic.
"I didn't mean it," he said as he stepped inside. We can't be partners anymore.
"Yes, you did," she said as she stood in front of him. She felt so exposed under his hooded stare. Without her clothes, her badge, and her boots, she felt small in his presence. He stood inches higher than her, his broad shoulders and muscled arms startlingly apparent. Her only barrier between herself and his intensity was a thin piece of silk. He had meant it, and she'd done something about it. Now, as he stood before her, she didn't know if she should tell him what she'd done or let the betrayal have its intended impact come tomorrow morning.
"Did you want me to come here tonight," he whispered as his eyes dipped to her barely covered body. He knew, he knew she'd been waiting for that knock for months.
"Yes," she sighed.