C

by kasey11124

O

A/N: Well. It was bound to happen. We traded fic notes so many times over IM, phone, in person, that we slipped and fell and traded a whole story. It's kind of like what happened to Elliot. He didn't mean to create The Child, but it happened. Maybe one of us wore K-Mart lingerie and drew the other in, who knows. Whatever it is, this is a back and forth between the two of us. There's no consistency to when one started and the other stopped. But we had fun, are having fun, will continue to have fun as we continue, and really, it's all about us and our fun, right?

-Jess and Maddy

Proximity

The silence is so loud she can't sleep.

She can hear every little nuance of the stillness. The hum of the refrigerator, the ticking of the clock, the faint buzzing of the light she always leaves on these days in the kitchen. She can hear herself breathe too, and it's the one part of the symphony that's keeping her awake. It's erratic - the gasping, hissing, grasping at air she's now acknowledged is her attempt to drag in oxygen.

If she thinks about it, she'll collapse again, and it's only two a.m. She's promised herself she won't roll up in a ball and crack again until at least four. It's pacing herself, because the survival is in the pacing. Not too much all at once anymore.

When he touched her, it was too much at once.

She's different now than she was this morning, this afternoon, this evening. She's different since he held her and the thought makes her so nauseous that she's out of her bed before she can feel him on her skin again. She's kneeling over the toilet when it hits her, and when she's done heaving again she remembers what he smells like.

She's heard this keening sound before and she knows it's the sound of her giving up. Control was lost sometime tonight, and she's forgiven herself for falling apart. She's decided that it's okay if someone finds her in a few days, shivering on the floor of her bathroom and dehydrated, as long as she's learned to stop choking on the things in her head by then.

He grabbed her, she thinks again as she empties her stomach.

The horror of it was that for one brief moment, she had known what it was to finally rest.

When she stops shuddering, there is just the silence again. Her eyes have become swollen and her lips are numb, and when she tries to stand by pushing herself up against the sink, she's wobbling. She thinks there are limits to what one person should see, and watching his wife bleed out, his baby nearly die, she's gone careening past her quota for this lifetime.

She hears his wife beg her not to leave her, hears his voice echo I love you again and again. She hears the sirens and the sound of a flat line and as she tries to stand up she feels the naked, slippery, new skin of his son nestled snugly against her neck.

Olivia grips the sides of her sink and reminds herself there is no one here. There is no one here so she can finally scream, cry, and claw her eyes out because that's the only way to get the memories out of her head.

And when the day gets to be too much in her head, it always comes back to one thing. His neck was against her cheek, because the day didn't know limits when it came to teaching her the last of the things she'd never have.

Four a.m. seemed ambitious. The roaring in her head was becoming louder.

There was no reason to hang on, and nothing left to prove.

She'd give in now, instead.

He sits on the bar stool and stares at the liquid in the glass that is only two inches tall. It's filled with a clear liquid. Not amber, like the lightest parts of her.

He's a father again.

Fifth time must be the charm.

He can't stop thinking about his son. His tiny fists, the generic blanket, the blood on her shirt when he walked by, walked past, walked on.

These things are tied together and he can't separate them, but he's thinking surely the vodka can.

He thinks he's a liar because he's said things today he didn't mean and he's kept silent about the things he did. He thinks about holding things, and does the shot when the first person that comes to mind isn't his son.

His son stared back at him, and his eyes were clear, open, unwritten. When she looked back at him he was drowning in the history, suffocating in the silence, and thinking God, he needed to sew her on.

He is sitting in a bar off Broadway, because his kids are at the neighbors and his wife and son are done with him. No more visitors. He's got nowhere to go right now, on a day he nearly lost it all, so when the bartender asks if he wants another, he gives the most effort he's had in hours to the emphasis in his nod.

He wants another, he thinks. Another shot, another chance, another fucking minute in that hall. He wants another, he decides, and before the shot slides across the mahogany, he's dropped a twenty and he's gone.

Her teeth hurt.

She's brushed them so many times tonight that they ache and she's focusing on that. She's curled up against the wall of the bathroom and she's so cold. Shivering. Her head is knocking against the wall.

She's drawn her knees up to her chest and wonders about the reasons she didn't die. She's wondering about sides – his side, her side, the side of the car that collapsed in on them. She's thinking about her insides pressed against his front side and the way he's always at her side when he walks.

She's shuddering every now and then, and she can feel his wife's blood against her shirt. She remembers her phone being thrust into her palm and knowing that it was inconceivable that she'd be asked to talk.

Everywhere around her is the glass, and the cold, and the grating of a saw and the idea that someone was bleeding out. Her lips are cracking and her breath is shallow and the faint light in the hallway is fading away. She thinks about being warm and it makes her think of him and she's keening again before she can stop.

There is one thing that makes the room stop spinning, that makes her forget the haze of the day and the baby and the way her toes are curling up.

He was warm, she thinks. He was warm and even now, as the temperature of her skin is surely dropping, she squeezes her eyes shut and burrows into the one moment that she's got.

For one moment he took it out of her head. The day, the year, her past. For one moment she wasn't responsible for herself and she thinks, one moment would be all she'd ever get.

He doesn't care why he is there.

His knuckles are sore from the pounding he's been inflicting on her door, but he knows she's there, of course she's there, because really, where else would she be?

So he pounds again and he's thinking about how in the movies it seems so easy to just shoot off the locks.

"Open this door, Olivia," he cracks. "Please open it," he thinks. He says. He says. He yells.

Then he thinks about mistakes when she is standing there, and she's gripping the doorframe and her lips are blue, just like the blanket wrapped around his son.

A lack of perfusion, or not enough fusion, or its confusion from being on the brink.

"You can't be here," she mumbles, but the monotone invites him in.

He thinks about grabbing her again because it worked the last time, but before he can tug at her, she sinks. She crumbles like he imagines the car must have; the metal bending and breaking and he scolds himself mentally the moment he imagines Olivia in that car instead of his pregnant wife. Kathy had told him what happened. It had become fragments in his mind as he stared at his son, at the blue blanket, at the child's eyes. He heard his wife speak: words, phrases, catastrophe after catastrophe like he was watching some pathetic daytime television show with her instead of living his own life. He looked at eyes that might not belong to him, but to someone else who would always remain nameless.

He reaches for her now, but she jerks away, and for the life of him, he suddenly can't remember what her hands had felt like on his back, if her back had been warm, if she had been shaking, if she had been calm. The lights are off but in the shadows he sees the alcohol and he wonders if he kissed her right now, if it would be his own vodka he tasted or hers.

It comes as no surprise, that for as hard as he tries to be a good guy, he has the potential to be an inappropriate asshole at heart.

"What are you doing here?" Her voice is like broken glass; like the glass she had shattered to save his wife. "How's Kathy?"

"She's alive, thanks to you."

In the dark, he sees more than he ever has. Her breath changes, switches, becomes uneven, and he imagines she has closed her eyes. The tears must be evident like they were earlier and all the words he wishes he could stay sit on his tongue like ice on the hottest summer day. Melting, disappearing, gone.

"She's alive because the paramedics got there in time." Something in the air shifts, and maybe this is what it feels like to know you're alive, but on the brink of death. "Why aren't you there?"

"Elliot is asleep. They gave Kathy a sedative. Can I sit down?"

She shakes her head. Once, Twice. Too many times. "Elliot," she rasps. She shuts the door and that's good, he thinks. But she's still clutching the handle of it, and she could open it too easily. At any moment she could tell him goodbye.

He hates the way she breathes. It's unsteady and it makes her rock and every time she's done with another breath she looks surprised.

"At the hospital-" he starts. Then he stops. He doesn't know what he has in him to say. "I should have said-" but again he doesn't know. He doesn't.

No.

He has things to say. He's had them in his head since the air was rushing around him and the ground was too far beneath him. He's made promises he should tell her about, because three thousand feet in the air and flying towards the hospital he had stopped believing in comic book heroes. No one had ever flown in to save the day.

He'd talked to God during those minutes. The most he'd talked to him in years. He'd apologized and prayed and shut his eyes to see if he would feel it in the moment his wife died. He already knew Olivia was alive, she was, she was. Because he hadn't felt the need to start raging for no reason at all.

So. Because. Now he's got things to say.

"Tell me," he says, licking his lips and staring beyond her at the wall.

She knows what he's asking and she closes her eyes. It's as if she can keep the horrific details inside. "You shouldn't know."

But that's just it. He's spent too much time not knowing. He steps towards her, and she flinches, straightening her back against the front door. "They told me," he goads. "Kathy did. The docs. They all told me, Olivia."

He's got this picture in his head, and it's getting worse as time goes on. He's picturing her there, in the car, her voice, her panic, her eyes. He's imagining her face and how many times she told herself she's pathetic if she cries.

Olivia fades behind the curtain of her eyes. "They can't tell you what they don't know," she whispers.

She looks tired. So tired and that's in his favor, he thinks. She's so tired; she'll be easier to fight. His words have sunk in pitch and tone. They are full of conviction and loud. So loud. It was funny how the truth had a volume of its own. "But I know."

She lifts her head and he sees her. He sees all of it. The things that will live in her. The flatline is in the press of her lips. The blood is in the whites of her eyes. The glass, and the cutting, and the sound reverberates in the trembling of her chin.

The fear is in her fingers. It's in their fumble to get the door handle behind her unlocked once again.

"There wasn't an order," he finally admits, his voice hoarse. "To who I bargained with God for first."

And then he sees it. The faith he thinks might have once been embedded in her by the first cries of his baby, dies.

She thinks she knew limits.

She doesn't know hers. Because she's still standing and he's taking - he's taking from her what she didn't have.

"Don't-" Olivia pleads. "You've got no right." But he does. Of course he does. She gave him the right when she held him, grasped at him, imagined a life.

"I have every right," because of course he can read her mind.

She turns from him and the world spins, like the car had, like her vision had when she had blinked in the expanse of the car as she tried to adjust to her surroundings. For a millisecond, as her eyes opened, she thought he was in the car with her like he usually was. She stared out the broken window, her mouth dry, and all she wanted was to yell his name. Make sure he was okay. She had blinked, tried to remember, tried to breathe when it hadn't been all that easy to begin with lately. She had wondered where they were, what had happened, and if he had lived because surely if he hadn't her mouth would have opened. She would have screamed.

But then she saw her. His wife. Her head had been tilted; her neck had looked snapped. And all that came to mind was if he would have to raise five children alone. Four if the child had died inside of her.

The sob escapes her lips before she can stop it, before she knows that she has broken in front of him. He reaches for her again, and she turns another fraction of an inch. A dance, much like theirs in the hospital hallway. A dance so elegant, so fragile, so lost.

She makes it to the couch, although she doesn't remember lifting her feet to move. She doesn't know what has kept her walking all these years, but tonight, as the faith died as he uttered words she never wanted to hear, she knows what has caused her to stop.

"You know what's important, Elliot. Your wife and child are alive. It should be enough for you."

As much as she doesn't know her limits, he's never known his as well.

"I need to hear it from you, Liv." His voice is soft, almost like it had been in the hospital. You're okay. He had uttered them in a whisper, in a breath, in a moment she wonders if he regrets. It had been said into her hair, and if she hadn't been trying so hard not to hear the cries of the children in the hospital, her breathing, his heart against hers, she never would have heard it at all.

You're okay.

No, Elliot. It was never okay.

He's down beside her now, in this endless world of darkness and lost hope.

"Does he have a middle name?"

"Kathy wants it to be after you."

Her eyes close but all she can see is his face right before his body touched hers. "You shouldn't do that. It was nothing, Elliot. It was nothing that anyone else wouldn't have done."

"What happened in that car, Olivia?"

"Your wife went into labor-"

"No." His hand is tight on her arm and the air from her lungs has escaped. "I mean what happened to you in there."

He sometimes wonders if God wants to punish him.

He had been on that chopper for one minute and nineteen seconds before Jesus became his savior. He had lied. There was an order to his prayers.

His child. Olivia. His wife.

It wasn't intentional. It wasn't a choice. It was a frame of mind. It was one name and then another and it wasn't until the prayers were done and the cross was touched upon his chest that he realized his mistakes.

He looks at her now and she's leaning back against the cushions of the couch. Her body is limp and her head is tilted to the side, and her eyes are open but not blinking, left wide. Christ, he knows now what she would have looked like if she had died.

She lifts her heavy eyelids to look at him. "There was one moment," she starts.

He's frozen by the thready, disconnected waver in her voice. He's afraid if he speaks, moves, inhales it will destroy any chance he might have that she'll tell him this time.

"They made me cover her face," she whispers. She's haunted now, and he doesn't think these demons even God himself could exorcise. Olivia's eyes are welling, and her chest is contracting and he's losing her, he knows. "As if she had died." Her head rolls against the couch. She squints at him, and she's crying there's just no sound on the outside.

He's never seen anything so locked up. He's seen kids with their secrets, seen women with their scars. He's seen abuse and horror and lifetimes lived in cages, but he hasn't seen this. Her hair is limp from the tears, and the sweat, and the more she keeps her mouth closed, the more he hears her screaming inside. He wonders what this has done to her. If she's gone. If she's ever coming back.

He's got to find her.

That's what makes him touch her again. He shifts on the couch, just a tad closer to her, and its close enough that the outside of her leg touches his thigh.

Olivia gasps and closes her eyes.

She shakes her head. "I'm tired, El," she murmurs. But she's not moving. "So tired. You should go."

He wants her to sleep. He wants it with force and ferocity. It's a sudden thing, this need to watch her rest. She hasn't. Not ever. Not really. He wonders what it is that propels her to fight. "If I go, will you sleep?" he says, and it's guttural and raw and waiting for denial.

It's what finally makes her smile. She lifts her head from the couch and stares straight ahead into the blackness. Her smile holds no humor and when she blinks it holds no strength. "I can't sleep," she admits.

He nods. This he understands. He can't sleep either. He's got a son, and he's got secrets. He thinks about holding her again and his hands grip his thighs.

"You want a beer, Elliot?" she finally offers into the ticking silence.

This place smells like her. Like mandarin and air, like things scrubbed cleaned one too many times.

"Yeah," he says.

And when she moves off the couch, he wonders if he would have ever seen his son if Olivia had died.

Warm beer tastes like piss.

She thinks that as it slides down her throat. She had forgotten to put them in the fridge. She had been called into work, onto a scene, into her car to take Kathy to the doctor. If she had the clarity to believe in a God, maybe it was the one who told her to buy beer that morning when she was shopping for groceries.

It's still dark and she thinks that it might be better to live life in total blackness. When she had been with Simon that first night, he had asked her questions like they had been siblings their entire lives.

Strawberry or chocolate ice cream? Captain Crunch or Coco Puffs?

It was an hour into it when he had asked: Would you rather be blind or deaf?

She had thought about it, the glass of whiskey in her hand, her fingers shaking with the slightest bit of trepidation and she had answered without thoughts, without pretenses. Deaf. He had asked why, and she had shrugged. She had her reasons, her answers. If she was deaf, she could still see the victims, the harmed, the ones who reminded her so much of her mother. She didn't need to hear pain in order to listen to everything they wanted to say. She had gotten good at reading people through eyes, movements, instead of their words.

Now, she wishes she could change that answer. She would choose blind, because there's something about total darkness that is settling. There's something about not being able to watch the world as it shatters like glass, as it breaks like heavy metal.

He breathes beside her and she realizes she's not sure she can do it on her own. There must be a piece of that car crushed against her, or maybe it's his heart. Maybe the moment he had crushed his body to hers, he had taken the thing that caused her to breathe.

"Did the kids see Elliot?" It feels weird calling another human being Elliot. It feels weird that she cradled this one in her arms, and the one beside her has only ever touched her once.

"I don't know what I would have done if you had died in that accident."

She presses her teeth together and grinds. Her fists clench around the bottle. The jaws of life that never broke open her car capture her heart. "You would have had your family."

He's staring straight ahead, but she can feel his eyes on her anyway. "Why do you do that?" he asks, and he's not angry, but curious, and almost sad.

"Why do I do what?"

In the darkness, silence follows. Deaf, blind, maybe that was the way to go. Life must somehow be easier without seeing and hearing death and despair and all in the pain in the words never said.

"When was the last time you slept?"

She thinks she loves him more for changing the subject, for not making her answer. "I don't know." She takes a sip and the piss beer dries out her mouth. "When was the last time you slept?"

In his voice, she can hear his smile. "Twenty-two years ago."

His joke falls on deaf ears.

It's not comfortable, but it never has been. And tonight his discomfort here doesn't compare to his discomfort there. In Queens. He thinks it's odd that he's got another kid but there's no one sleeping in the house tonight. He doesn't want to think that his fifth is like the last card, the one that makes the house of cards fall down.

She's up, again. Off the couch. He watches her movements for any signs of pain. She wouldn't tell him, she never has, but he's watched her over the years. She flinched at close contact for seven months after the cut on her neck. The one across her arm left a scar, but it has only been two months, and he's still hoping when that fades it'll take with it the accusations in her eyes.

Tonight she's barely favoring her right foot, and he's seen the spattering of cuts across her palms. He's watching the bruise on her temple and the way she's rolling her neck. Most of all he's watching the way her eyes are glossing over because she's ruthlessly disallowing sleep.

She's in the kitchen at the counter, and her bangs fall over her eyes. Olivia flinches as she grips the top of the beer bottle, trying to twist off the tops of another two. She doing it with cut up palms, ripped up a bit, and he wonders if she felt the jagged cuts at all as she hauled herself back into the car. To his wife.

He's off the couch and behind her before she can try the second one.

"Lemme," he says softly.

But that was it, the magic word, because she lets the bottle clatter onto the counter. The agonizing sound she makes sounds like one she's practiced and he wonders how much things can change in one day.

Her back curves over and she hunches forward, her wrists pressing against her eyes. "El-" she chokes.

Elliot steps forward, his hand reaching for her back. He's touched her before, after all. And that's when he knows just how many changes one day could bring. "It's too much," he says, and it's meant to soothe. "One day was never meant to hold so much, Liv."

She nods into her palms and leans back against his hand. And because he knows how to turn her now, where she'll step and how she'll sink, he reaches for her and she's spun and for the second time, he thinks things shouldn't be left to chance.

Olivia is against him, and he knows now what to pay attention to. He knows what he missed when he stepped away last time, so he knows now what to go back for. He missed her hair against his neck and her fingers branded into his back. He missed the way she didn't breathe and the way she didn't move and what he got wrong last time was the fit.

He forgot last time to slide his hand along her spine. He forgot last time to push her head against his neck. He forgot last time to tell her, tell her, but she must have forgotten things too and because of that he can't.

But he's holding her, and she's staying in him and he sees that the beer bottle nearly rolled off the counter's edge.

She twists her head and she's breathing this time, and her lips are nearly on his neck. "I'm tired," she repeats and it's a tiny sound. Broken and biting and pleading. All his.

So he stands there and stands there until her breath evens out. It's been so many minutes and he didn't rock his baby to sleep, but he did, he did.

He's back to making deals with God because someone listened.

He thinks he's been standing there twenty minutes before he's finally sure that she's standing up and yet asleep.

One sliver of light shines across the ceiling like shards of glass waiting to slice.

She considers turning, but she remains, staring outside the window. She watches as the headlights from the car down below blink across her walls. She doesn't look at the time. She doesn't need to see the green lights flash and flash every sixty seconds. She doesn't need to see the minutes turn, the seconds tick, the sky sooner or later lightening and sending him back to his wife. To his child.

He's beside her on her bed, but he doesn't say a word. He breathes and the part of her that forever remains broken wishes she could put her hand to his heart and count the beats. If she counts the beats, if she can feel his heart, maybe one day, she can feel her own.

"What's it like?" Her voice doesn't sound right; she's not sure it ever will again.

"What's what like?"

Even with his soft words, his rasped breaths, she jumps the slightest bit. He's always been beside her, guiding her, following her, protecting her, but tonight is different. Tonight he is beside her, closer than he ever was before the clock stroke midnight the night before, and she has never felt more alone. "Holding your child."

The palm of his hand brushes across her hair, and she closes her eyes because this is what it must be like to fall, to fall and look for the ground, to fall and know there is no escape. "It feels like…" He stops, because there are no words. If she were to have a child of her own, she knows there would be none. "Like everything has fallen into place."

It's ironic that his child has done that for him, and he has done that for her.

"You should get going soon. You should be there when Kathy wakes up."

"She won't be up for another few hours."

She doesn't know why he bothers to pray, when he's here instead of with his wife. She doesn't know what God is going to listen to a man who has left his wife to find his partner. But then again, God did listen to him, and she's no more fixed than she was before.

"This changed us, didn't it?"

Her breath gets caught in her throat, and she can no longer survive. She can feel the tears on her cheek, the taste of salt that lingers on the tip of her tongue. "A lot of things changed us. One more thing wasn't going to matter."

He's so close and if his body touches hers, she wonders if she could melt. If he could somehow bring her to a peace she didn't know existed until earlier that evening. "I need to tell you something, Liv. There's something you need to know."

"No," she manages, and she turns over to face him. The headlights are gone; the darkness has returned. In his silhouette, his eyes shine, and she knows what he's going to say. For the third time today, he's going to crush her heart to him without intention or realization. "I can't hear it, not ever and certainly not tonight."

She closes her eyes and wishes his hands were on her spine; she wishes he had told her what he wanted to now ten months ago, before their lives had changed.

"Okay," he answers, but all she can hear is You're okay, and she wishes to hell she were. "He shouldn't be named after me. He shouldn't be named Elliot."

Another shard of light shines on the ceiling, and this time it slices across the room, as if dividing them in half could somehow change this all.

He rolls over because he can't sleep.

He's suddenly afraid to miss things. It's strange to count minutes when he can't remember years. She's fallen asleep again, not too long ago, and in intervals of ten minutes. The night seems never to end.

Daylight will come soon.

The beer has made him thirsty, but he's not willing to leave this bed. He's still got his slacks on, and his dress shirt but he's lost his tie, and it's probably hanging off the bed. She really had fallen asleep standing up when he had held her and he thinks that's it, that's what it all meant.

He had tried to move without waking her after he had absorbed of her what he could, but when he had shifted she had said his name. It had been sleepy, content, and when he moved her just enough to wake her gently she hadn't stumbled back.

But she had been unsteady, and he had followed her, urging her to climb into her bed.

She had. She'd climbed in. And then scooted over to the other end.

She's sleeping in pajama pants and a t-shirt and he's fully dressed. He holds onto that thought as she inhales and rolls over, facing him. God never said thou shalt not lie in proximity, he thinks and he holds onto that for awhile.

He hears a shifting and in sleep her hand is sliding up the bed, It's a queen mattress and he's on the edge, but he shifts so that her hand lies comfortably in the space between them. Her palm is open, her fingers slightly curled. He sees the roughened, torn skin on her lifeline and on her wrist.

Her lashes fan her cheeks.

He watches her, until he is breathing with her. Maybe for her. After all she's done today she deserves the extra breaths.

She still won't admit to saving his wife. She won't even consider it about his son. She's spent years saving him, too, but he's a coward and he's never said.

The shadows of dawn are edging the darkness away, and on her outstretched arm he sees her scar.

He knows then that she doesn't believe in saviors because she's never been given one.

He turns on his side and watches her, and he thinks about rewards and sacrifice and his son. If he was at the hospital now, he'd hover and he'd slip a finger into his baby's palm.

It's fading, and he's tired and his arm is reaching out. He feels his thumb slip into her palm, and her fingers close.

The exhaustion wins, and he succumbs.

Life is never the same once the new morning has come.

She hasn't been asleep for the past hour. Even when she was, it was restless and cold and filled with the blood on his wife's face, hands, clothes. Sometime in the middle of the night, she had rolled over, her fingers pressed against his hand, and then the soft cotton sheets, but it was the jacket she felt sliding through her fingers. The jacket that she had placed over Kathy Stabler's face, like she had died, like Elliot had been left alone in a life that he never felt he fit inside of. So, she had opted to remain awake.

Desperation was the same awake as it was in dreams. At least when she was staring at the ceiling, not sleeping, she could stop the screams that so desperately tried to come.

She doesn't have the heart to wake him. The minutes pass, the seconds tick, the numbers tinted with a green glow flash and flash and flash. She turns over to face him, watches him sleep, like he's the child she helped deliver earlier. She had seen the similarities as she held the newborn in her arms; the way his eyes opened and they were so blue and alarming that she could see the purity that resided inside. Little Elliot Stabler clenched his fists before he understood what it meant, just like his father did to hide the rage and despair.

His body twitches. His eyelids flutter. And without thought, she touches his shoulder, shaking it gently. She feels the guilt settling inside of her and while she's not Catholic, while she's not anything, she thinks it's possible that after all these years he has given his guilt to her on a silver platter, along with the words that she has never allowed him to speak.

"El…" Her voice is hoarse, and might be for the next decade it takes to forget him. "It's almost six. You need to go to the hospital."

He shifts and in a bed not big enough for both of them, his arm brushes hers. He opens his eyes and she doesn't dare look at him, at least not long enough to know, to know all the things she doesn't need to hear. "I didn't realize I had fallen asleep."

"We were both tired, I guess."

The darkness has lost its fight and the morning has never seemed so empty. "Olivia, thank you for-"

"You've already thanked me, El."

"I was going to say thank you for letting me spend the night."

Those who break the rules might have fun, might live on the edge, but in the end, there is always a crash, a burn. And yesterday was merely the beginning.

He touches her arm, squeezes her bicep. Once. Twice. Too many times. He tosses the covers onto her side to keep her warm, and one leg lingers over the edge of the bed. "We'll talk soon. Right?"

She knows limits, except her own.

"Yeah. We'll talk soon, El. Send Kathy my best."

And in minutes, he is gone, like he had never been there at all.

Life will never be the same. Morning or not.

A/N: Thank you so much for all your lovely reviews. It's been a lot of fun for us to do this and we hope you continue to enjoy!

Proximity – Chapter 2

She's never been interested in the life of Jesus Christ, the savior.

She had learned about him as a child from the girl next door, and even then, she knew it was a bunch of shit. She had never understood, not fully, but there are too many stories, too many beliefs in life that contradict, that lie, that have facts that always seem a bit too perfect to be real. Catholics and Christians believe that he provides salvation, that he is the incarnate of God; Muslims believe that the crucifixion of a God is nothing but a divine illusion, that he ascended bodily to heaven, that Jesus is considered one of the most beloved prophets; a worker of miracles.

She wonders what he believes. She wonders if he believes his life is molded in salvation, or if it's a divine illusion, or maybe miracles that he has just started to see. She wonders what he thinks of God these days, if he prays all the time now, or if one moment was all that it was.

It's dark again. She thinks she's been locked in the black abyss for the past week. Personal time; her captain had called it that. She calls it avoidance, but she doesn't let anyone else know that. There had been messages on her machine over the course of the week. Messages from him. Messages from his wife. Kathy had called and her voice on the tape had been like sharp glass, like a jagged edge slicing and weaving underneath her skin.

The baby had cried in the background. Her eyes had closed and she had felt him against her chest, the warm, writhing body of a child. His child. The message ran long and the tape ran out and in the darkness she had cried, not because of her, or him, or a child, but because she hadn't known when she had gotten so pathetic.

Whiskey burns her throat as she takes a sip. Maybe she'll call Simon. Maybe God gave her a brother because He knew she'd be alone the moment Elliot reconciled with his wife, the moment their child was born. She hasn't seen her brother in almost six months, hasn't spoken to him in almost three.

The phone sits beside her. Number after number. All these numbers to combine into one to hear someone's voice. She learned Simon's number after six weeks. She learned Elliot's after one.

Her head hits the wall. She bends it back and looks outside the window, watches as headlights dance. Dance like choreographed steps. She had never learned tap, ballet, modern. She had never learned how to move, except beside him with a gun in her hand. It was the one thing that didn't make her pathetic, although maybe it did. Maybe it was pathetic that she lived for a woman who was no longer alive, that she holds a gun because it's the one thing that has protected her since the moment she took those steps into the academy.

Outside, thunder rumbles to life, breathes in a world that is cold. The lightning strikes and splits open and divides the night.

She wonders if this is what it looked like when Jesus parted the heavens.

His mother in law looks at him like he has committed the ultimate sin.

He's not sure which one she is thinking of these days, if it has to do with work, or the fact that he had sex with his former wife without using a condom and had another child, or just the fact that he was a Catholic who wasn't all that good at being noble. He tried, but it never came out right, he was never the man she had expected for her daughter.

He had left tonight, not forever but for a walk, for awhile. She wanted time with her grandson and Kathy wanted time with them. Alone. There's a part of him that thinks she blames him for not driving her that day, for not being there when their fifth child was born, for not being there to save her when it looked like it was all going to end. He had heard her call Olivia over the past few days, and he thinks that one day he'll open his front door to realize that Olivia is Kathy's best friend and not his own.

He hadn't meant to come here tonight. Then again, he hadn't meant to come here last week and yet it was where he had ended up. He had given forty-one Hail Mary's on his way back to the hospital that morning. The clock in his car flashed and flashed, because the damn keys broke and he didn't know how to fix it; he didn't know how to make time move. It flashed and flashed with every new plead for forgiveness, for every wish that someone would tell him proximity wasn't a sin but a necessity.

He hasn't seen her since then, since he came back to work and heard she was taking personal time. She didn't need personal time. She never had, except when it came to him.

"Olivia," he calls, and his fist hits the door. She's home, like last week. She's home because she has no where else to be. "You home?"

He almost walks away. Tonight, he is in no dire need to talk to her, to ask for answers that she had never given, at least not with words. He almost walks away, but he hears her feet against the floor, gentle and pounding and fierce and desperate all at once.

She opens the door and her eyes look dead, like someone has hollowed her out and left her stumbling. "Hi." She doesn't fight and that's when he knows that something is wrong. The apartment is dark, but he looks around anyway as if blindness can help him locate her plane ticket to Oregon or Washington or hell, China. "What are you doing here?"

He wants to say he doesn't know. He thinks there is a reason he's spent all the years intimate with his lies. But she's drawing him into the darkness of her apartment and suddenly she's the only one he can tell without being damned. God keeps whispering all is forgiven, but he's done with God's bullshit too, God lies.

"She can't keep calling him that," he finally chokes. "She calls him me, and Christ Olivia, I don't think he's mine."

It's in the darkness, she thinks.

In all her years of living alone, she's never been afraid of it. She'd learned it, accepted it, listened to it. She'd never left lights on, or felt her heart pound. She'd seen shadows, of course, but she'd always been able to reach for her gun.

She had started leaving a light on after comic boy had attacked her. Something about lighting the bulb in the hallway that night, in the seconds before he found her. It made her think she'd given whomever Elliot believed in a lighted glance. Given herself a fighting chance.

But since he slept here, she's been shutting all the lights off again. Something about folding a losing hand.

So he's sitting next to her now, fourteen inches to her right on a couch that's a little too small. His feet are on the carpet and her toes are locked beneath the table and they're both holding beers they won't drink, because this week the things they are holding are a little too cold.

She hasn't said anything since his confession. He hasn't elaborated, either. But he's breathing, she thinks, and if he's breathing then that's good.

She peels the label and the wind picks up, his head drops back onto the couch and his bottle is still full. She realizes then that he's not going to say anything else, because it's like a game of Bullshit and they just have to keep dropping cards until someone calls bull.

"I usually look," she says, and clears her throat. Her words are scratchy because the air is too smooth. "Even on green, you know. I usually look."

"It's not your fault," he rumbles softly.

Her head falls back onto the couch, and they're just sitting there. Sitting there. She's thinking about how she's blamed him for so long, but really he's a husband. It's who he is, who he's been, even when he's only been left with her. "And it's not yours."

He rolls his head along the back of the couch and she can see him now, because he's clearer in the dark. "No," he says softly, staring at her. He's so quiet, so still, and she thinks of things like absorption and free will. "But I wish it were."

She's silent because he got it wrong. That's not what she meant. It's not. If there's one thing he's taught her it's that biology means shit, and she should tell him that, she should.

But the more he looks at her, the deeper the night gets, she thinks she's the one who got it wrong, because he's not talking about the baby.

She's half asleep next to him before it occurs that he's talking about her.

It's the thunder that wakes him.

It had taken a moment to remember where he was, but before eyes opened, he could smell her. That mandarin scent that seemed to follow him on the streets, that followed him everywhere he went. She's beside him and he doesn't look because with the lights out, he knows he'll never see, at least not what he wants. She likes the darkness; he's noticed that about her. He wonders if she always has, or if suddenly she began seeing things that made her wish she was blinded to the world, things that weren't about the world but about accidents and blood and things that appear to be yours but never are.

The cushions shift, but she doesn't speak. He never knows what to say anymore. Not to his wife, not to Olivia. He loves his wife, and she loves him, but in that pathetic way that happens when things change and you're too much of a coward to let them go. Kathy doesn't love him. She can utter the words, and in some part of her heart, they're true. But she loves her family more, more than she has ever loved him.

"You can't spend the night," she whispers, and she plants her feet on the ground like she's ready to run. The ticket to China must be lingering in the crevice of her bookshelf, or hell, even in the freezer where she keeps the hard alcohol. Where she keeps the objects used in case of an emergency.

"I know."

"Where does she think you are?" She breathes and with the wind in the background it's like a melodic symphony that he doesn't think he could ever tire of.

"I don't know."

He thinks about that chopper a week ago, about the lights and noises, and prayers that were uttered. He thinks about the seven deadly sins, about how he embodies all of them, and yet sometimes, somehow God still listens. Then again, he always thinks of those sins, always waiting for the moment someone above strikes him down.

Lust. Gluttony. Greed. Sloth. Wrath. Envy. Pride.

Olivia. His life. Betrayal. Desperation. Perpetrators. Freedom. His kids.

If God has an order to life, to promises, to regrets, to guilt, to seven sins that bleed through his veins, he wonders if the next bolt of lightning will be the one that strikes him down, that makes him pay.

In two hours, the rain has started, stopped, started again, and yet they remain. Unmoving, unspoken.

She's tired, but then again, she always is these days. Her bed hasn't felt right since he left and sometimes she finds herself falling asleep on the floor of the bathroom, up against the wall in the kitchen. It's in there that she feels his hand on her spine. It's in there that she awakens and knows that all the personal time in the world could never make this go away.

"I used to play baseball in high school. Short stop." His voice startles her, like the first blast of thunder earlier that evening.

The darkness wraps around her, and while she should find his outburst insane, maybe it's proof that it all doesn't change, that things can be normal, that hearts can mend. "I was on soccer until senior year. I hated it."

And so silence it is as it once again takes hold. She doesn't think he'll be leaving anytime soon and she has no drive to stop him. The guilt eats away at her anyway, it eats away at him. Maybe if it eats away at both of them, it'll stop the pain.

She can hear his breathing change, his hands move, his body shift, and she waits for his words in the stale night. "The worst part about it is that even if he's not mine, I still love him. I still want him."

Sometimes, late at night, she thinks she's still in that car. She waits for the metal to crush her, but it never does. It lodges inside of her heart, it causes her to bleed, but death never comes. "You wouldn't be you if you didn't."

He looks out the window to his right. "What's that say about me? That I want someone who isn't mine?"

When she tilts her head, it's towards him. And maybe it's inevitable that as the moments pass, she slides.

She told him he couldn't stay and he listened. He heard her, at least, but he didn't go.

He's lying next to her again, and he's staring at the ceiling, and for some reason of all the ceilings he now knows, he prefers hers.

She had fallen asleep on the couch and he had debated. He should stay. Fuck, he should go. Instead, he had let himself out into the hallway beyond her front door, and he had picked up his phone.

He was a prick of course, because he had let his baby decide. He'd figured if the baby was crying in the background, he would go home.

But the baby was sleeping, and the world was quiet and when his wife had answered she had been accepting, drowsy, naïve despite knowing what she probably knows.

"Caught a case," he'd said brusquely, as if the severity of a lie was rated by the number of words it required to be told.

Of course that meant Olivia was finally getting his truth, because when he had walked back in and she'd been standing there, she'd just walked to her room before he could use too many words.

The early sun is beginning to break up the thick fog on her ceiling when he finally hears her stir. He reaches towards her until the palm of his hand settles on her back, and he thinks she needs pajamas because she's probably been sleeping far too often in her clothes.

She shifts, and he presses his palm harder until he can feel her spine beneath it, but he doesn't move it around because last night she told him to go. Olivia settles farther into the bed, and he's going to hell, he's going straight down, because there's such satisfaction that he's bought her fifteen more minutes of sleep. She's conjuring whispers from him and he's deliberately locking up his belligerent throat.

He's needed her, he thinks. He's needed her and he wonders if she knows.

It's only after the creaking, groaning, shredding sound of the garbage truck outside has Olivia jerking straight up and screaming his wife's name that he finally realizes what Olivia had meant when she had told him to go.

There are reasons she doesn't sleep.

It had been like this since the accident, all the nightmares that haunt her in the few hours, sometimes minutes that she rests. In the hours preceding the nightmares, she stares up at the ceiling. The light of her smoke detector shines red, although a red not the color of blood. It's brighter, less offensive, and the more she would stare, the more she would realize that sight is forever fleeting. The light fades, becomes brighter, and sometimes she's not sure if it's her tears that have made it blurred or that if you look at something long enough, hard enough, your perception of it will change.

She's not sure if the nightmares are because of the accident or because on the night his wife almost died, he had stayed with her as the night ended and turned into a new morning.

Her back is to him and he doesn't come closer, doesn't move. She had felt his hand on her earlier and she wanted to scream because once was enough. Twice had hurt and third had burned and if he keeps it up, she's not sure she'll know how to say goodbye. His breath hits her skin in small puffs and she shivers because the heat of him is almost cooler than New York on the coldest blizzard of the year.

"You lied to her about where you were."

"You lied to me about being okay."

She didn't lie. Sometimes he doesn't realize that all the truths she speaks are in the words she never says. "What happened with her? Why do you keep coming here when you should be there?"

She thought she wanted to know, but as the words tumble out of his mouth, she knows she was wrong. She blocks out his answer because she'll never need to know in the long run, she'll never need to know because this isn't where he belongs. She can hear the pattern in his voice, the accent in his words. She listens as his pitch fades and his breaths cover the sounds. It takes him seconds to finish and when he's done and she's as naïve as she was moments before, she shifts.

The clock on her nightstand catches her eyes. The green numbers flash and flash, but this time it's with time and not uncertainty and she sees that morning is here. Light filters into the room, filters across the tattoo on his arm. The tattoo, the meaning, him, maybe it's all some divine illusion.

"What's your belief on Jesus?"

She stares at him, waiting for him to answer, waiting for him to ask why the hell she cares about something she never has before. He reaches his hand across the space between them, and she stares at his fingers splayed across her faded blue sheets, blue like the blanket his son had been wrapped up in at the hospital when she had held him for the second time before his father had even arrived. She stares and on the wall, the shadows of the clock flash and flash and she places her hand beside his.

There is no sin when no wrongs have been committed. Or so she tells herself, just as he tells himself the same.

And when he doesn't answer, she rolls onto her back, staring up at the red light. His hand remains beside hers and this time, when the redness fades and blurs, it's from the lingering of tears. "Do you think he provides salvation?"

"I sure as hell hope so," he mutters, and his voice sounds like it's filled with gravel.

She doesn't mention the moment it crosses her mind that they provide salvation daily. She doesn't mention it because saving all the souls in the world doesn't compare to the broken promises they have both made.

Salvation, they both know, is only reserved for those willing to accept and repent for their sins.

Proximity-Chapter 3

She's been back at work for nine days.

He had brought his son in on the fourth day, and when she had heard the cries coming from down the corridor, she found her salvation in the heavy bag upstairs. His wife had found her up there, intentionally seeking her out, and she had wondered why in all the years of knowing each other, Kathy Stabler chose now to want a friendship. Her scars were healed, but her eyes still looked empty, like maybe the moment the jacket had covered her face, she really had let herself go. Almost as if her eyes had closed and while her body remained, her spirit was gone.

She had indulged Kathy in small talk, told her she looked well, gushed about the child that she was the first to hold. She was a fraud and she wondered how long she had been that way. She had smiled, she had touched the other woman's arm, she had done gestures a friend would do. But she was no friend, not when she had been spending time with this woman's husband, not when there were so many secrets between them. The jaws of life, the machines, all the things that had taken the car apart and pulled them together also pulled them into a vulnerability no one else would ever know, into a vulnerability that wasn't as daunting as these secrets, as these omissions of truth.

He doesn't talk to her much at work aside from the cases and she thinks she's okay with that. At least when there is routine, things are normal. He doesn't look at her often, but it's been a long time since he has and so things feel sane, like pretend and magic and all those things that children believe in, that his son will one day believe in.

She sits at home now, on the ninth night since returning to work, and it's dark. She lets music play although it's soft, all these whispered words telling secrets in the night. She closes her eyes and thinks that if you listen to something so low, maybe it has more meaning. Maybe there is more to be heard when nothing is being said. She lifts her feet onto the couch and when her knees brush against her breasts, her heart beats a touch faster. She doesn't feel as dead anymore and that's good except for the fact that she's not all that sure she feels alive either.

He hasn't come by since that night over two weeks ago and she wishes he would and then curses herself because of course he can't. He has a wife again and another child and a life she knows he needs. But she misses someone else who is lost because even if she's alone and wandering, it's nice to run into someone else who is equally displaced.

There's a knock on the door and she scolds herself because she knows it's him, because she's hopeful to see him, because she misses her friend. She stands up and pulls open the door and there he is, with that smirk on his face, with that look in his eyes as if nothing has changed, as if it's all remained the same.

"Snyder case," he says, holding up a blue folder. Darker than the hospital blanket. Darker than his eyes. "Cragen told me to give it to you."

She reaches for it and their fingers brush and she turns before he can look at her, before she loses her heartbeat. "Thanks."

The song changes but whispered words sound the same no matter who speaks them.

Tonight, she will not let him in. Tonight, he will go back to his wife and his children and be the man he was supposed to be. Tonight, she will send him to where he belongs and maybe try asking God to help her through. She doesn't believe, but if half of the world, more than that, can get by with faith, she can too.

"Do you mind if I use your bathroom?"

Tonight, she lets him in because he has asked and the bathroom seems like a logical enough reason to invite someone inside.

He wasn't going to stay.

In the bathroom, he had looked at himself in the mirror and swore he would go home. He had moments with his son when his wife was asleep, moments where the child would stare up at him with all the wonders in the world written in his eyes like he was asking what to believe in, what the world was, what life would be. There were parts of him that wanted to tell his namesake that everything out there, everything that existed was tainted and bruised, and that trust was sacred because in the end everyone lies. But instead he watched, touched his fingers across the soft skin of his little boy, memorized everything about him.

On some nights he is a father. On most nights he is a fraud.

He walks out of the bathroom into the darkness he has become accustomed to. Even without light, he sees her outline on the couch, and he should go home and talk to his son, and be the man who he so badly wants to be. She doesn't talk, but he hears the music, the soft sounds that lead him to sitting down. It's not silent and maybe that means she's okay, that he'll be okay, that they'll be okay.

He shifts on the couch and he thinks he's closer to her than he was the last time he sat down here. He thinks that because when she tilts her beer bottle at him, he can hear the alcohol swish against the sides. He takes it from her and their hands brush and he can remember how her shirt had felt against his hand when he had hugged her in the hospital, how it had lifted, how she had nearly gasped in surprise.

"Simon got engaged," she finally says, and he doesn't know why the image of her in a wedding dress comes to mind. Not to him, not to anyone in particular, but standing there happy because he knows she hasn't been in so long.

"Are you going to the wedding?"

He hands the bottle back to her, but this time their hands don't brush, their fingers don't reach.

"Sure." Her voice is deadpan, not because she doesn't care but because she's resigned to it. To her past, her present, her future. "He's my brother."

It comes out of nowhere.

He laughs softly, just half a sound. She's always been blunt, and the more indefinable things were, the simpler the things she said. He can't tell her he still doesn't trust Simon, but that he's grown to miss the days when the most difficult of their complicated was a sibling she didn't know she had.

It's been days, weeks, a year or two. But the corners of her lips finally lift and she's still looking straight ahead. "You don't like him," she observes.

"It's not that-" he begins.

"Yes, it is," she counters.

And because he's been dying to agree with her lately, he gives in. "It is," he says.

She laughs softly too then, and the night truly begins.

Because it's more wrong than it was a week ago, when they lie next to each other this time, they've added barriers. She's got her socks on, and he's wearing his tie, and no one bothered to pull back the covers this time.

She lies next to him, with her hands folded on her stomach and he's doing the same. But their elbows don't touch, they're too careful, they're cautious. She starts thinking of a kid's book at the station about two children sharing a small bedroom, and how they decided to split the space using masking tape.

"Who was it really, Olivia?" he asks quietly. "When you went after Thatcher?"

She tilts her head, and she can see him, he's chewing on his lower lip, drawing it in, and she thinks about how in that book, the kids forgot to split up the doorway, and one was always trapped inside. "Wasn't you."

He's looking at the ceiling, and he blinks as if he's startled. He does that when he's trying to buy into the lies.

"I just kept thinking Simon had done it. He'd done it and…"

Elliot expels a thick breath. "And what?"

She knows what she wants to say, and he knows it, too. Words to explain, history in simplicity. He's my brother, she thinks silently. As if it was enough, more than enough.

But Elliot sighs quietly because he already knows. She's been explaining and blaming on simple definitions for years.

He's my partner, she remembers. And he's lying besides her.

He's my partner, she remembers.

And the lies are beside her.

"When I was nine, I walked out of the house into the backyard one day. And there was a baby rabbit burrowed into the grass," he murmurs. "It had been abandoned, left alone. And for four days I did everything I could to keep that rabbit alive."

She's been sleeping, rolled away from him, but at the start of his tale she blinks a few times, drawing herself out of the darkness. She doesn't roll over, but she assumes he knows she's now awake.

"I fed him. I changed the grass in his cage. I cut up vegetables and celery and…" he trails off. "I always used gloves when I held him, in case one day when he was better, his mother wanted him back."

Her back is to him, but when she closes her eyes she can see him, his hands still folded and his eyes peeled above. She's afraid to breathe, to move, to speak. She's afraid he'll stop, run, walk, think.

But he's remembering, and he's not yelling, and just talking like this seems like it must be good.

"One day, I thought he was ready. He was better. I'd done what I could. So I set him out in the yard and waited for him to go." He's telling a story. A picture book. One set inside of his head.

She knows what happens. She does. She's been let go, left alone. She's already written the end.

"Thought if I left him, he'd be strong enough to..." his voice trails off, as if the mystery of that day is with him, between them, once again alive.

"What did you do when he died, Elliot?" she whispers.

There's no answer. She hears him breathing, but there's no pattern in it. It's a rudder in his chest, and it's rattling her, the mattress, the bed.

He's quiet for so long that she thinks he fell asleep. She's lying there thinking about children and boundaries and things left for dead. When it's been quiet long enough, she finally thinks there are things that need desperately to be said.

"You're his father," she whispers.

He shakes and she rolls over. His eyes are closed and his fists are holding parts of the bed. It's like he's heard that, and he's crumbling. Really the only thing she can do is touch him, because the game of mercy is a game of affliction versus strength and when one has been lost, the other wins by default instead.

Her fingers curve around his bicep and she lets his heat sink between her fingers. The cotton of his shirt is scalding against her palm. He flinches and then settles before exhaling a bottled up breath.

She thinks she should let go, but as his breathing slows, she doesn't. His wife's hands had been in hers only weeks ago, squeezing, pushing, bringing a life into the world. Kathy's fingers had clenched her palms, small moon sphere indentations left as a reminder. She wonders if when he goes home tomorrow, the outline of her palm will have remained, will have branded him. It wasn't scars that stayed on our skin for years to come. It was their legacy.

"I had a bunny when I was a kid." She stares up at the ceiling and tries to find the red light. It takes seconds before she locates it, before she has a focal point.

"What happened?"

"My mother gave it vodka instead of water. Ran around the cage drunk for two minutes before it dropped dead."

If you stay in the darkness long enough, everything becomes an illusion, a myth, a remembrance.

"How pathetic is it that we both have dead rabbits?"

She smiles and her fingers tighten around his bicep because she can't let go, because if she does, he'll be gone. "Pretty pathetic."

He tilts his head towards her and when he speaks, she feels his breath on her face like fire, like hell, because that's what this is. There are steps taken before falling into a fiery pit, and these are hers.

"What did it look like? The drunk bunny?"

"I was sitting in the living room with a friend and I heard all this rattling from his cage. He was running around in laps, hopping across, and then all of a sudden, he stopped. He waited a few seconds, and as we watched him, I wanted to be him. I wanted to know what it would have been like to be completely and totally free." Her fingers loosen over his muscle, as the jaws of life loosen upon her heart. Remaining, lingering, but fighting for peace. "He looked like he was having fun so my friend and I decided to run around in circles. When we stopped, so did he. He just never got up."

It's a delayed reaction, but soon his laughter is uncontrollable. He shakes beside her and it's no longer from regret, fear, the unknown. It sounds like the freedom she had searched for years ago, and if she had known this is what would have caused it, she would have told him the story of her dead rabbit the moment she met him. As her fingers release their grip on his arm, and her laughter begins, she can suddenly breathe.

She suddenly remembers what it feels like to be alive.

He hadn't called his wife tonight.

He thinks it's okay, because for the most part he's been home. Olivia covers for him and tells him to go and he obliges, maybe to ease his own guilt, or hell maybe to ease hers. He goes home and spends time with his wife once his newborn has fallen asleep and he laughs with her, but it's never the same. She looks at him like she's waiting for him to run, and he looks at her because he wonders if she's lying and if she is, if she knows. So, when he doesn't come home, he knows she assumes where he is, because things can change, but something always remains the same.

The shadows of her clock flash onto the wall and in hours, morning is soon to come. He feels at peace here in her bed, but peace always has a flip side and anxiety and despair soon follow. She doesn't touch him now. In fact, she has placed pillows between them and he almost wants to laugh because it's been a long time since he's been treated like he has cooties.

He wonders if she's sleeping because her breathing is even and he's come to learn the pattern of her sleep. It's only in small intervals, sometimes ten minutes, sometimes fifteen, but she hasn't screamed his wife's name tonight and that's something.

"When I thought she had died, I didn't know how I was going to tell you." Her voice is webbed in a state of exhaustion and he realizes that maybe all the screaming is inside of her head these days. Maybe she yells and yells and no one hears her, not even him. "How was I supposed to tell you that she was gone?"

He tries to find the words, but as the clock flashes and flashes, and minutes pass, he knows there are none. He loves his wife, but it's different now. He loves his wife, but he finds himself here with his partner because complications feel far easier than lies.

He wants to tell her that he can't talk to God anymore these days.

"I have nightmares," he gurgles into the dark, his throat bubbling with the need to tell her. He doesn't enunciate. He doesn't stop whispering. She hears him; she knows. "I lose him. Lose them."

Next to him, she nearly wheezes as she takes in air. Olivia rolls over, her back towards him. He hears the comforter beneath them rustle as she pulls at it, tugging at the corner and pulling it close to her face, cradling what little he's left her to grab.

He watches as she shifts through the shadows.

Her breathing is short, shallow, hollow. He knows this because her back is jerking as she inhales, but it's the only sound she allows beyond the faint strands of melody still drifting in from the living room.

"I'm sorry," she chokes.

He flinches. "For what?"

Her back slows. Stills. Stops. "I kept thinking, if only it had hit my side, Elliot, at least then-"

He's got the pillows between them sent to the floor before she can finish what she's going to say. His hand is on the curve of her hip and his forehead is pressed against the back of hers.

"No," he grates out forcefully. And then because once with her will never be enough, he says it again. "No."

She shudders and he blinks, and he realizes what he's done. The edge of her shirt has lifted and his finger has slipped beneath it, and because Jesus already died for his sins, he's recklessly wracking up more.

He doesn't move his hand.

His fingertip is pressing into her hot, shivering skin. Her waist dips beneath his touch. He's squeezing his eyes shut, as if that will blind him to the feel of her. Her hip is smooth, taut, impossibly soft. He pulls his head back and swallows. Even though he can't see her face, he knows her mouth is moving but mute, as if searching for words but being given no sound.

He's touching her. He exhales, and too many things are crashing around inside of him. They're hitting and bashing and he knows all too well about the devastating damage left behind by things that collide without warning. He's feeling like he's smacking into her, only it's just his fingertip, just resting, just touching.

Just sinking.

"Elliot," she pleads on a strangled, agonizing breath.

His eyes flash wide open in the dark. The sudden, cracking impact spins him around, his back left to face hers.

He knows now what she would sound like, he thinks. She'd sound like that if he was…if he were to…Christ, he's been wondering for far too long.

He should tell her, he thinks. He should tell her that in the nightmares, he doesn't lose his family to the accident. He loses them because he walks away. He's got no choice but to leave them.

He's a monster of a man in the dreams.

Because in the nightmares, the car always hits her.

He doesn't wake until five a.m, and she tells herself that if he hadn't awakened on his own within the next fifteen more minutes, she would have done it. She would have walked into a bedroom where she doesn't sleep anymore, and she would have told him to go home.

But he's standing in her living room now and watching her, as she sits at the dining table with her hands wrapped around her mug. Her legs are drawn up beneath her, and her hair is probably a mess, but she doesn't care. The faster he wants to leave, the better.

She should tell him to get his shit and go.

"There's coffee," slips out of her mouth.

"You didn't sleep?" he rumbles. His shirt is crinkled and his shoes are in his hand, and he's a bastard, really, because after what he's done he's a stupid fuck to think she'd be able to settle down.

She lay awake after he fell asleep, and she remembered the moment Dana Lewis asked her to go to Oregon. She thought about punching him, too, but dismissed it when she realized if he didn't know it was coming, the satisfaction of landing a good one would be lost. So instead she had let the minutes pass, willing the brand on her hip to fade, to erase, to stop burning her like a flame searing into skin that had been soaked with fuel.

She's been awake long enough that she's had time to convince herself. When she said his name, it was in protest.

"No," she answers simply. She can't look at him, so she searches for the clock on the microwave.

He shifts, but he's unsteady, and he's looking at her like he doesn't know how to tell her he's had a good time, but not to expect a call.

"Just go," she says softly.

He stares at the door. Her elbow lands heavily on the table, and she drops her head into her palm.

She never heard the door open, but the sound it makes as it closes is loud.

Four hours later, she's late for work, but she breathes a sigh of relief when he's not there, his desk is empty, she wonders if he's out.

But he's been there, she knows, because in the middle of her desk is a small, clear plastic container. It's the kind won for a dollar in the candy machines at Coney Island.

She opens the container, letting the blue, furry fake rabbit's foot fall into her hand.

She hates him, she does, she does. But she finds herself smiling as she sits down.

Chapter 4

A/N: We are emo-superfreaks. Add a little bit of LA rain, some gray days and y'all are lucky this isn't a death fic. Sorry Jess, that wasn't eloquent. Betcha wish you had time to the write the author's notes this time, don't ya?

He's home tonight and he finds the darkness unsettling.

His wife has been asleep for an hour now, his children for three. Even the baby sleeps and he doesn't know if he's grateful or lonesome for the quiet desperation in the house in Queens. He rests in his bed now, but the ceiling is too bumpy and the lights of the clock don't flash, they tick. He thinks about praying, but how do you ask God for things you don't understand, how to make you understand, how to give you peace when you're no longer sure it exists. So he stares and stares and he looks for the red light on the ceiling until he realizes that it's not here, that it's with her.

She hasn't spoken to him much, and he hasn't tried because in the confines of work, their complications are elephants and space wasters and barriers that once again remind him of cooties and all the things that should never be touched. She tosses him the rabbit foot sometimes and he rubs his finger over the soft fur wishing that all those years ago, he had found the good luck charm in the grass, that her mother would have dipped something fake, something inhuman into the toxic liquid. But life is what it is and so he doesn't pray because none of it gets better, none of it has hope.

He glances at his cell phone beside the bed, but there are no missed calls, no text messages, no signs of life. Work won't call, it never does anymore late into the night, so he stares at the ceiling again, the phone clenched tightly in his hands, willing it to vibrate, willing himself to breathe.

And when minutes pass and the clock ticks and ticks, he quietly gets out of bed with the protection of his phone, almost as if it was his gun. He walks down the stairs quietly and opens the door and when the night air assaults him, he finally breathes. The step is cold, but no colder than anything else, and he hits number five on his speed dial, as if ranking her is somehow of importance, as if that could ever explain away their lives.

"What?" she answers, and it's not angry or emotional, but deadpan, like long ago she forced her need to stop caring.

"I stopped praying the day after Elliot was born." It comes from nowhere; it always does these days.

He listens to her breathe and if he closes his eyes, he can see the pattern of her ceiling, the green numbers of her clock flashing and flashing. "I started to pray a couple of weeks after."

"Does it work?"

"Don't know." Something rustles on the other end of the line and he wishes he was there, wishes the silence, the darkness, the world was comforting. "I'm not sure what I'm praying for."

In Catholic school, he had learned that God was the creation of divine simplicity, that He was the source of all moral obligations. Sometimes, when he has no idea what to pray for and why, he wonders if people believe because there's nothing else. If God was the result of divine simplicity, why was life, why was the world so complicated? If people prayed to God, if people believed, then why was most of the world immoral? It doesn't make sense, or maybe he forces that upon himself. If there's nothing to believe in, then it makes sense.

But it doesn't.

And he still believes in something, even if the prayers have stopped. Maybe not in divine simplicity, maybe not even in moral obligations, but in her, in his children, in his wife, in something.

"What position were you in soccer?"

Her voice is soft, exhausted, resigned. "Sweeper."

"Were you good?"

"I was on varsity. Still hated every minute of it though."

He looks down at the ground, at the wet patterns that have formed from the rain. It remains in streaks, spots, some areas tainted, some not. He sweeps his foot across the concrete and as his leg moves to the left, he almost expects to hit her, to knock knees with her like they had once long ago. "What are you doing?"

It takes her minutes to answer and he listens to her breathing to see if she has fallen asleep. But soon she answers and he wonders how many nightmares she's had tonight, how many times she's wished she had been on the other side of the car. "Stay at home tonight, Elliot."

"The baby...he sleeps through the night. The other four never did."

Her throat clears and her covers shift and if there's divine simplicity in life, is it allowed to be convoluted at the same time? "There's a key in the light fixture next to my door."

And the line goes dead.

She's half asleep when he walks into the room.

His footsteps are light, cautious, and when he slips into bed beside her, she fully awakens, her lids blinking, her body moving a little further to the right, a little further away from him. She had promised herself that she wouldn't invite him over tonight. He was home and that was good and when he slept in his own bed, beside his wife, it never made her feel the guilt that had become so much a part of her. But when he had brought up the child, the infant that was his in all the ways that truly mattered (except maybe one), she gave in. She gave in because she always does these days. Because the fighter who once lived inside of her, who once pushed her, guided her, fed her, has left.

And she is alone.

Even when he's here, she figures she'll always be alone.

His body settles into her mattress, and the sheets rustle, the blankets move. She continues to stare out the window, into the darkness, into the abyss of life that she has never come to understand. She stares out this window when she prays. She stares out the window and prays for things that she doesn't remember the moment it's done, just a stream of consciousness that flows without thoughts, without pretenses, without lies. She prays, and yet she's still not sure she believes.

"Knock, knock."

She buries her head in her pillow and smiles. Without looking, she knows he's staring up at the ceiling, he always does when he spends the night. "Who's there?" she asks quietly.

They're like children, learning to share their space, learning to get along, learning to thrive. But it's sadness that overwhelms her. The sadness from knowing he got these jokes from his kids, that he'll always need to be the father, the husband in life.

"Rufus."

"Rufus, who?"

"Your roof is on fire."

And finally, she laughs, and it's real, and painful, and light all at the same time. "That was horrible."

"Knock, knock."

She doesn't know why she plays along. Life isn't fun, isn't amusing, doesn't survive off of Knock Knock jokes. She doesn't remember much of what she prayed for, she doesn't even know if she prayed right, but in there somewhere, she had asked to be able to laugh again. Actually, she thinks she might have asked to be less pathetic, but if she laughs, she figures it means she's capable of being a little less of a freak. "Who's there?"

"Fanny."

"Fanny, who?"

"Those jokes aren't very fanny."

She can hear the laughter in his voice, and she thinks that maybe this is his redemption. If he can make her laugh, make her forget that this is wrong, then he has done his job. And when his laughter starts, it's powerful and unrelenting, and hers soon follows. There is no rhyme, no reason, no purpose, but it's theirs and the sorrow doesn't seem so overwhelming anymore.

The silence has been dominated; the world hasn't ended.

It's easier tonight.

The guilt isn't so bad when he's making her smile, when he has her talking like they never have before. She faces him now, and in the darkness, he listens to her laugh. It's not like it once was, but it's there, and after all this time, after all these complications, that's something. He listens, listens as her laughter fades when she turns her head into her pillows, listens as the cars pass outside, their headlights offering him a glimpse of her every few minutes. The clock flashes and flashes, but he doesn't look at the time, he doesn't want to know how soon this is all going to end.

And then the guilt returns because she isn't his wife, because she isn't, shouldn't be anything more than his partner, his friend.

His hand slides towards her, but it doesn't touch, doesn't graze her skin.

"Where did you hear those jokes?" she asks, and her eyes open to gaze at him. She notices his hand, but doesn't mention it, doesn't move further away. She slides hers out of the covers, moving slowly towards his, but it never touches. It remains like them, close, but never close enough.

"They're at the precinct. Munch brought them in last year." When you were gone. "We spent a good couple of hours reading all of them. None of them got better."

"I think any smart child would think we were morons for reading those to them."

"I bet we could come up with better ones."

He watches her smile again, her lips curving on the soft cotton material of her pillow. His at home don't feel right anymore and he figures the guilt can't get any worse when it's already taken over most of his soul.

"Do you have any in mind?"

He thinks about it, but the mandarin is too strong, the night is too dark. "Do you?"

"Knock, knock."

"Who's there?"

He can tell when her eyes widen and soften, narrow and close, that she has no idea. "Simon."

"Your brother?"

"Would you just ask Simon who?"

Complications lie with them.

Lies complicate them.

"Simon who?"

"Simon says this is a bunch of fucking bullshit."

And it starts again, that feeling of overwhelming laughter that he cannot control. It comes out and invades the room and if God is listening, he wonders if this is a punishment. If feeling comfortable, feeling alive, is merely a fantasy and when reality comes, the truth follows. His hand slides further towards her, sliding underneath her, and he holds on because tonight, in this darkened room, he doesn't feel so alone.

He doesn't feel so dead.

He comes over three nights in a row and she lets him. She wonders what atrocity he's told his wife is keeping him from being home, to cover up for the one they are committing. She spends the days thinking of ways to tell him not to come over, and spends the evenings wondering how deep into the night it'll be before she'll hear the key turn in the lock.

Tonight, he is early. She is already in bed. She's been expecting him.

He is standing in the doorway to her room, but she doesn't roll over to look at him. Lately, she finds herself pretending that if she doesn't watch him walk in, she won't know when he walks out.

"What the fuck was that?" he growls softly. His voice is hollow, his fists gripping the doorframe so tightly she can hear his palms squeak on the wood.

She ignores him. She knows why he is angry. Their suspect was a janitor at an elementary school on Baxter Street. Elliot and she had split up early in the evening, combing the shadowed halls of the school. She'd heard footsteps clanging on the metal stairs that descended to the boiler room and had followed. She hadn't called for Elliot, hadn't waited, hadn't wanted him there with her in the mesmerizing darkness.

Their suspect had landed a blow to her back before she'd managed to spin around and take the fucker down.

"I'm fine," she says quietly, with as much resolution as she can offer. It's so cold tonight that when the light rain hits her window it clatters, freezing just before impact. She wonders about that sometimes, if she had known the car would hit, if somewhere in her head she had realized, if her reflexes had been decimated by the last words she'd heard before the crash.

She wonders if she had frozen.

He's so angry tonight that his breathing is sharper than the rain. "Damn you," he curses. She hears movement behind her and his heavy footsteps, slamming on the wood floors as he retreats, heads back for the front door.

The door opens. She thinks of the clock flashing beside her. Wonders how many beats of the light it will take until she hears the door close.

Eleven.

The door hits hard and he's back, but he's rustling too much behind her. She knows what he's doing and her heart slams, crashes, hits.

She rolls over to face him, and the rain is tap-dancing on her window. Erratic. Uneven. She can't breathe as she meets his eyes, illuminated by the streetlights because she never closes the drapes anymore.

His fingers are on the buttons of his shirt, and he's got three quickly undone. He's glaring at her and his tie is hanging loose and he's stopping midway down his chest to tug the shirttails angrily out of his pants.

"Elliot," she protests as the falling ice picks up speed outside. "Don't."

But he ignores her, like she ignored him in that school five hours ago. He's tugging his arms out of his shirt and she's drawn to him, to his hypnotically bare chest, to the thick, corded column of his neck. He's got his dress pants on, but the light blue cotton has just hit the floor and he's glittering, she thinks. He's all lit up.

The ache crawls up her body, until her blood is pounding against the confines of her skin. She's got a tank top on, and it's suddenly too much, not enough, the sheets are grating and bruising on her thighs.

She can't tear her eyes off of him as he pulls back the covers on his side and climbs into the bed. He's in front of her then, turned on his side to face her.

He's inches from her and he's all heat. He's suspended movement, momentum confined. He's on the verge of cracking, of launching, of exploding and she's not sure if she should seek shelter or latch on.

The storm suddenly passes then, and he blinks as the clouds evaporate in the hollow shadows of his eyes.

"Tell me you're sorry, Liv," he finally pleads, and she's never seen him back down. But maybe that's just it. He's too close to her to rage. Maybe if he'd been this close to her all these years, the proximity would have eliminated the room to fight.

He shakes his head just a little, his rough cheek scratching against the pillowcase. His eyes press closed. "Tell me you won't do that again."

He's got so much locked up in him, she thinks. Too much to be contained by one set of eyes, one set of fists, one heart, one face. Her fingers are moving before she knows it, her thumb tracing his cheekbone, the sandpaper of his jaw line, the place where his stubborn chin gives way to his lips.

She doesn't want to fight him tonight. He's too close to her to let the anger win. "I'm sorry," she says, as his eyes flutter open.

He's peaceful, accepting, his lips tilt up in the faintest hint of a smile. "Wasn't expecting that," he rumbles contentedly. "You giving in."

She braces herself as she lifts her fingers off of his skin. "I'm not giving in," she teases into the darkness. "I'm just letting you win."

He laughs and she shivers, straining to hear the rain. It's softened against the window now, and she absently thinks he's even managed to heat the rain.

"Roll over," he instructs, and she knows why. They don't do this for long, lie face to face. Temptation, they've learned, was not a beast to be fed.

She rolls over, her back to him and in seconds, the pads of his fingers scrape reverently across the bare back of her neck. It's sore a bit from earlier, but of all the punches she's absorbed, this one wasn't so bad.

She feels him breathing on her skin and nearly arches back into his lips. He kisses her like this, without touching, without contact, with just his breath pressing rhythmically hard against her skin. When the wanting gets to be too much, when the urge to arch her hips back towards him, to be filled, becomes too strong, she stifles the pathetic sounds curdling in her chest.

She wants him yet she has to grasp that she'll never know what it is like to have him inside of her. She has him in her bed and in her heart, and that has to be enough. Her body will just have to live.

She just has to live.

But something is building inside of her, with every cut of a knife, every gun drawn, every blow that lands on either one of them, it grows. She's afraid of becoming desperate, wonders if she already is. She's afraid of losing him, of never knowing the shape of all of him. She's begun to rank the things she will one day regret. She thinks of things like adultery, her morals, his body, the sound of her name on his lips.

She wonders where she will fall one day on his list of regrets.

"Knock, knock," she whispers, shoving her hands beneath her pillow.

"Who's there," he murmurs back, not missing a beat.

"Police," she responds, exhaling and closing her eyes.

His voice is closer to the back of her head. He's shifted. "Police who?"

The rain stops, and the night is heavy, sedate. Everything fades away until it's just them and the hushed breeze of their limbs moving against the sheets. "Police stay tonight," she croaks.

He laughs softly at a joke that isn't.

And with the gentle slip of his hand around her waist, he accepts.

She's been sleeping for over an hour.

He thinks it might be the first time she has since he's started to spend the night, since the accident, since she walked into their unit on that first day long ago. She's facing him now, because in her sleep she has turned, tumbled, fallen into a dream, into a world that isn't her reality. She moans sometimes, not a name, but soft, unidentifiable. She moans and he finds himself closing his eyes, wishing things were different, knowing they never can be. His hand had touched her hair, pulling a thin strand behind her ear, and she had breathed, like it was comfort, like it was right.

The rain has started to fall again; the clock still flashes and he refuses to look. Tears of water litter the ceiling with their shadows and he watches as they appear, as they fall. He watches and watches until it's blurred, until the red light, until the shadows fade into nothing. Darkness has become his route of evil, of peace. Tonight, it's right, comfortable, perfect.

He tears his eyes from the ceiling and onto her, onto the way her body moves as she sleeps. She looks peaceful and he thinks she is, if only for the moment. His hand reaches out to her, to her face, her hair, and he's suffocated because it's right and it's wrong and is it possible that guilt could cause both?

He gently touches her shoulder, his fingers skimming the bare surface of her skin. She doesn't move; he wonders if she stops breathing for only a moment. He shouldn't touch her, he shouldn't, he shouldn't, but his fingers skim across her skin, tickle her. She doesn't move though and he thinks maybe she figures she's dreaming, that this life, this moment isn't real.

"If something would have happened in that car, Liv, if I had lost you-"

"Stop," she whispers, but her eyes remain closed, almost as if she's answering in sleep. She shifts and his hand slides down her side, causes her to shiver. Her breath catches in her throat and he wishes this was easier, that there weren't so many damn complications. "Why aren't you sleeping?" Her eyes open, and they're so dark, so lonesome.

"Don't know."

"Oh."

She shivers, although her bedroom is warm. She shivers, and he finds himself moving closer to her, he finds himself wanting her to remain where she is. Their rules, their temptations, it's there and whether or not she faces the window or him, it always will be. His hand is on her skin, his nails tickle, hold on. He doesn't think, he doesn't remember the guilt, his life, his children, his wife. He leans in towards her until her breaths are on his face, until his lips are nearly even with hers. The air stills and the night is silent, and he doesn't know what he's done, what he's almost done, until her hand lands on his bare chest, pushing him back, pushing him away.

"Knock, knock," she whispers, and there's something caught in her throat, like her entire life force, or maybe his, or maybe theirs combined.

"Olivia-"

"Knock, knock," she repeats, and he has nothing else to do but oblige.

"Who's there?"

"Alfalfa."

"Alfalfa, who?"

She stares at him for a moment, and in the darkness, he sees the glistening of tears. She doesn't break eye contact, she doesn't move, he's not even sure she's forcing herself to breathe. But when she speaks, it's strong and broken and soft and screaming and if contradictory was a person, was human, she would be their prototype.

"Alfalfa you if you kiss me."

Her eyes close again, but his hand remains, like one more night, one more moment is all they get. He replays her joke in his mind, listens to her voice as she says it again and again. He can hear the tears in the hitch of her voice, in the sobs that stay in.

He hears it and hears it until his hand drops. Until he counts her breaths to know she is asleep.

He hears it the moment he closes her front door before the sun has risen.

He hears it long after it's been said.

I'll fall for you if you kiss me. His feet hit the pavement outside and he exhales.

He's fallen for her and their lips have never met.

Chapter 5

A/N: It's me again! Mousie is the nice one, I'm evil one. I'm the one that is like "Let them eat only EMO!" So really, I'm sure Mousie would like to make this better for everyone. She has suggested that they have a nice chapter. But it's like, well, maybe that time of the month or something, because I'm like in Emo-la-la land, and all the music I'm listening to is like the Elliot and Olivia Soundtrack From Hell. So...um...enjoy? (yes, y'all are just as weird as us, because you're here, aren't you? Think about that. We might write it, but you read it, so really, judging us not so smart anymore, huh?)

It changes.

One night, with her lips near his and her eyes wide, the scattered questions that normally permeate her irises finally gather, and it all shatters beneath them. Beneath him. He's spent weeks denying the word covet any residence in his head, but that's all changed. He thinks about that word, now. He looks it up. Searches for it. Notices it in the people all around.

He sees it in the mirror.

He almost kissed her that night she told him she could fall for him. And since then, he's kissed her a dozen times in the fucked up sanctity of his head. He's started saying things to himself, to his marriage, to God. He likes to think he's making himself promises, but he knows he's just building up his fog of lies.

He tells his wife things when she lies asleep next to him. She breathes and he makes silent lists. I'm staying here tonight, he tells himself. In this bed, in your bed. It's the place in which God expects me to lie.

He's lying alright.

So he goes to her apartment and he stops at the door. He's come up with punishments and hurdles for this, but no matter how uncomfortable his personal edicts, he's leaping past just to get to her. He tells himself he has to sit there, outside her apartment, for an hour at least before he goes in. Just to make sure this is really what he needs.

He's sat there far longer; it still doesn't make him go home.

So tonight he stands by the edge of her bed, and he sees her too clearly because the city is illuminated by the magnitude of the full moon. The blanket is hooked around her waist, and the strap of her nightgown has slipped down her shoulder. She's facing away from him, as she always is. Of course lately, after he lies down, she's been turning around.

He stands in her doorway, his tie loosened and hanging from his neck and his shirt cuffs unbuttoned. He wants to say something to her, but he's been feeling like lately he's been lying to her, too.

"When you sit there," she says in a melodic, haunting whisper. "Outside of my door. What makes you decide to come in?"

He didn't know she had known.

"I finally realize you know me," he says hollowly. "You know I can't be the one to walk away so you can have more," he builds up rhythm in the drumbeat of his voice. "I realize you're stronger than me, and when you're ready, one day, to get rid of me..." His breath is harsh. "The key won't work. So I always stand up, Olivia, thinking that this will be the night that it doesn't fit, that the handle won't turn."

Her breath is shaky, it starts high and collapses into pieces, her shoulders shaking. "Then you don't know me."

He feels like he's been hit square in the chest, the impact of her words smashing around between his ribs. "Don't say that, Liv," he pleads. "You're the only thing I think I do know, and if you say-"

She rolls over and he can't speak. He thinks he's seen things that were beautiful, but they were just practice for this. He's never seen eyes so big, so dark. Her bangs fall across her forehead, and her slender shoulders slope and meld into the long, satin sheath he imagines has become tangled around her thighs beneath the covers. She's stopped sleeping in her clothes, and he's grateful.

"Olivia-" he croaks, and he sounds like he needs help. She said he didn't know her, and he feels like his knees are done, they've given up.

But the thing is, she's never really let him falter for long. Her eyes widen, if it's possible, and her hand skims across the bed in the space where he knows he will sleep. "I think about it, Elliot. Changing the locks."

He doesn't know why it's relief, but it is. It's perverse that he's once again reassured he knows her because she's told him she thinks about locking him out. But the corner of his mouth tips up slightly.

She smiles a little too, as if they are conspiratorial cohorts in this game of fucked up.

When his shirt is off, he slips into the bed and she doesn't move backwards. He rolls over to face her, and his forehead tips towards her, until his head brushes her bangs. They're in the same air, the same breath.

His palm is aching to touch the satin on her hip and he groans. Maybe God isn't testing him by forcing him to stay in his marital bed, but by placing him here and allowing him nothing. Bleeding temptation all around him and giving him nowhere to stand.

He's made deals with the devil before.

Elliot's hands skim over her bare shoulder and Olivia shudders as his fingers trace slowly down her goose bumped skin. Her breath comes faster, and he lets his thumb drag along the inside of her arm, to the hollow of her elbow, and she arches towards him, her eyes pressing closed. Her legs slide a little along the bed. He wants to stop when she shifts, when the thin strap falls a little more off of her, when the satin begins to fall forward, dipping slightly beneath her full breast.

"Elliot," she says, and he freezes because it's the smallest thing he's ever heard. He's never heard her really beg, he thinks, but the begging filled the sound.

He can't stop. He wants to. He wants draw his hand back and find his shirt and he wants to stop tossing and turning when he is laying next to his wife. But he's never really been privy to the things he's wanted. Until now.

Now.

He's cutting things out of his life as he touches her. As his hand slides upward again, over her biceps and her shoulder and down onto her neck, he gives up his religion. As his fingers slip upwards, his thumb tracing her chin as he pushes his fingertips into her hair, he gives up being a husband. And as he draws her face closer to his, his lips millimeters from hers, he gives up being her partner.

Her lips part, and she moans, and he simply gives up.

He gives up.

He needs to taste her, to slide into her, to press his hips against her satin before bunching it up into his fists.

But he's always given up on himself far more easily than she has. So in the moment before his lips finally land on hers, she turns, ducking her head. His mouth is hot, pressed against her forehead.

She lets out a small, painful cry and he tangles his fingers into her hair because she's saved him once again.

They're standing at the edge of the nightclub, scanning the crowd. She's exhausted. She didn't sleep last night, again, but she's worn out because he's standing next to her and lately that's been a little too much.

He came over last night. She knew he would. She had stiffened beneath the covers as she heard the key turn in the lock. When he had walked into the bedroom, she had remained turned away as she lay in bed, her back facing the door and her palms shoved under her pillow. He'd stood there, his breathing erratic, and she had assumed he was waiting for her to roll over, to turn around.

But she hadn't. She'd simply forced her breathing to even out.

He'd blown out a breath, or two. Maybe more. And she knew he had wanted to ask, to know, to demand. The changes would be hard to miss.

She'd bought a king-sized bed.

"Olivia," he had whispered. "The bed..."

"You can't touch me anymore, Elliot," she had said quietly, without facing him. "Not even by accident. We needed more room if you were going to keep coming around." She had waited, and he'd been silent. "The boxspring," she explained, filling the thick air. "It's two twins. Two beds."

The sound he made wasn't a laugh, it was too harsh. But he had sat on the edge of the new bed for nearly a half hour before he had finally decided to lie down.

And now, nearly twenty-four hours later, they still hadn't slept. They'd still barely spoken.

Proximity, she thought, didn't guarantee sound.

"They're not coming," she finally mumbles. Their suspects were a couple known for swinging, and on a night gone horribly wrong had potentially committed rape. Not for the first time, Olivia questioned the perversion that permeated her job.

"They'll be here," he grinds out, stabbing at the ice in his club soda with his straw, before thinking better of it and tossing back a few cubes, crunching at them hard.

She leans against the wall, watching the couples gyrating on the dance floor. The red and yellow lights swirl along the walls and the music is a slow, languid beat that makes her think of summers and South America and flowers with names she can't pronounce.

They had come from the precinct, but she'd taken off the black vest she'd been wearing, unbuttoned a few buttons on her purple blouse and his tie now sat on the back seat of the car. It was as close as they could get to this - to the club, to the atmosphere, to pretending they were someone else for an hour.

"What makes you think they'll be here?" she says, sighing and straightening once again.

"Olivia, Christ, get a soda or something," he growls impatiently, ignoring her. "You look like a cop."

She turns her head to the right, glaring at him. "I am a cop."

The muscle in his cheek jumps. He is gritting his teeth, grinding his jaw. He's going to say something, she knows this, but he thinks better of it and attacks his ice once again instead.

She folds her arms across her chest and slouches down against the wall, eyeing the crowd.

"Liv, I swear to God," he hisses. "We agreed-"

"We did not agree!" she fires back, straightening and stepping closer to him. "This was your goddamned idea!"

Elliot whips to face her, sending his empty glass skittering across the cocktail table to his right. It circles and circles as if spinning on its axis before finally settling down. "Well, you know all about that, don't you? Making decisions on your own?" And he's glaring at her, and he's not talking about the case at all.

She flinches. She hates that the first thing she thinks about is that she knew he'd be angry when he first saw the bed.

"We've got a hunch about these two," he continues, filling up the awkward space. "Not enough for a warrant, yet you seem to think this club is still going to risk telling all if we just ask?" He tilts his head, swiping his tongue across his lower lip and drawing it into his mouth. "This club's revenue depends on its discretion, so either buy into this approach or I'll do it alone!"

The air punches out of her chest as he narrows his eyes in anger, staring her down. They are a foot apart, but even the air has eliminated itself from the canyon of heat that now cracks and splits between them.

She's been buying into his approach for far too long.

"Fuck you," she curses, just loud enough for him to hear.

He smirks, and his eyes flash with something far more dangerous than anything that lurks in the crowd. She knows by the way his lip quirks that whatever he is about to say is going to slice, cut, decimate her before she has a chance to respond.

"You both new here?" comes the low chuckle from behind her.

Olivia twists around. She swallows thickly, her skin prickling as she assesses the source of the sound.

The man is leering at her, his eyes lingering too long at the bare skin of her neck, her throat, the places where the chiffon blouse dipped down.

Behind her, Elliot steps closer to her body. "Who're you?" he demands roughly.

The man settles himself against the wall, crossing his ankles and looking pointedly again at her chest. "You two look like cops," he says absently. "Making a lot of people unnecessarily nervous if you're not."

Behind her, Elliot laughs disgustedly, his big hand wrapping around her and flattening on her stomach as he pulls her back towards him. "She's my wife," he spits immediately, possessively. "She look like a cop?" he challenges.

She learns this from him. She will use it later. The best defense is a good offense.

His hand is open, pressing into her abdomen. His thumb is close to her belly button and the chiffon is too thin to keep out the fire. Her shoulder blades are knocking into his chest and his jaw is at her temple. The music blares in her ears as she braces herself, forcing herself to remain steady. She wonders if the reason his hand is pushing into her so hard is because he knows, he knows.

He's holding her up.

She tries to get back in the game. She needs seduction, a smirk, something to draw this bastard's attention away from the things she wears in her posture - her badge, her job, her past. She drags her eyes up his body and twists her lips arrogantly, but she's dizzy, she's spinning. Elliot's drawing her in.

The guy stares at her, daring her, locking eyes to see if she flinches. But he's no match for the games Elliot has played, the ways Elliot has looked, the things he has taught her. The heat in this fucker's gaze is just embers, whereas Elliot has always scorched her like a wildfire blaze.

The smarmy shithead laughs, shaking his head. "No man, she ain't no cop. But fuck, you've got your hands full. Won't catch me marrying her type. Too much piss and vinegar in bitches like her." He winks at her. "But of course, they're always fun to break."

With that he's gone, absorbed by the crowd.

Elliot's hand remains, and she's willing herself not to shake. She was his wife for a moment, for a moment.

It's true, what they say, that sometimes a moment is all it takes.

He doesn't know why he still comes here.

There seems to be no purpose anymore, no reason when even their conversations have diminished. The silence bleeds into the night, enough silence to cover the entire room in blood. The blood from the wreck, the blood from the nightmares, the blood from all the secrets, all the lies, all the betrayals. There's too much space in her bed now and he shifts and shifts and never finds his solid ground.

His wife still thinks he's working. She doesn't know that he was married to another woman tonight, that his hand had grazed her skin possessively, that he had finally prayed again tonight for salvation, redemption, forgiveness. He wonders if she still prays; he wonders what she prays for.

There's an ocean between them and he thinks about that river in Egypt. Denial. His middle daughter had walked around for days, years ago, muttering words from some television show he'll never remember the name of. Denial isn't just a river in Egypt. It's a freaking ocean. He had thought it was ridiculous then. Denial was denial and there were no levels, no determinations to whether it was big or small. But maybe that damn television show was right. It was a fucking ocean between them of denial, and pathetic tales, and darkness that never seemed to cease.

"Can I ask you something?"

Her voice startles him and she's far from him, across the river, across the ocean, across the Goddamn world. "What?"

"Do you love her?"

The clock flashes and flashes and he inhales her breaths, her questions, her lies, her truths. "I don't know, Olivia. Maybe not in the way I should." He steeples his fingers over his stomach. "When did you develop feelings for me?"

She's quiet for a moment and when air escapes her, it's like the hiss of a snake waiting to strike its prey. "Screw you."

A headlight sweeps over the room, but he doesn't look at her, he doesn't, he can't. His teeth grind and his hands clench and he hates this fucking bed how it is now. He hates the space; he hates how much has changed. It's been months since the accident, since his son was born, since doubt and questions and lost hope and faith intermixed and caused him to stumble, to fall. "There was nothing wrong with the old bed."

"This isn't your bedroom, Elliot. Why the hell do you care what kind of bed I have?"

He rolls over, moves closer, lets his hand reach across and touch her back. But he doesn't touch. Instead, he lets it linger, lets it hover. "You should have asked me."

She spins over and his hand swipes across her back like a flame, so many flames, so much fire. "And you should have asked me to go talk to Jake Keegan while you took your wife to the doctor!"

Bless me Father, for I have sinned.

"You offered to take her," he seethes.

"Because you didn't give a damn!" She takes in a breath, and then another, and then another. She rolls away from him again and the room is left cold, left silent, left dark. And when she speaks, he knows. He knows the amount of time, the moment it changed, the moment difficult turned into complicated. "It's been two years, Elliot. And it's made me into a person I don't like."

My last confession was far too long ago.

"You could have..." His eyes close and the darkness is no longer comforting. "When I was single-"

"You were never single. She was always with you. We both know that."

These are my sins.

"When Fin told me you were both in the car..." Ocean, river, denial. Ocean, river, denial. But he has lived in denial long enough. He has sank and drowned and there is nothing left but an open, cavernous pit. "You never asked why I stopped praying."

"I don't want to know, Elliot. I can't be that person anymore."

I am choosing to be wrong and failing to do good.

"What would you have said if I had-"

"I have a date tomorrow night." The silence and darkness isn't peaceful. It's painful, morose, pathetic. His chest clenches and he thinks of his wife, his child, her, the car that was smashed, ruined, broken. "I can't wait for you anymore, Elliot. I can't."

I fully intend to make up for my sins and love as I should. Amen.

Her knees are drawn up, pressed against her breasts. She can't make herself any smaller in this bed, and she hates it. Hates that she's coiled up in all the space she's given herself. She stays on her side now. Even when he's not there, she sleeps on the right, and in the morning, the sheets on the left hand side remain undisturbed, waiting only for him.

She won't lie on her back tonight. She can't look at the ceiling; she doesn't want to wish that the hulk of his body was slumbering next to her. She doesn't want to hold her own breath just to wait to hear his; she doesn't want to lie awake for hours and wonder what side his wife sleeps on. If it's hers, if it's his.

She has tucked herself under the covers, but she's still wearing her dress. She managed to take her shoes off, but just barely. There are small beads at the hem that are now embedding themselves into her thighs and the mascara is seeping into her eyes and making them burn. She'd screwed up even this, something as simple as a date.

She had managed to sit still through dinner; she'd learned the art of the smile. She'd ordered halibut and never touched it, drank three glasses of the merlot. She'd listened as David Jacoby told her about mutual funds, and stock options, and critiqued the mayor's involvement on the pier development project. When he'd asked her about her job, she'd simply replied "it's fine."

She'd gotten through, she had thought. She'd gotten through fine.

But then they had stepped outside to hail a cab, and his hand had fallen to her lower back. She'd flinched as if he'd bit her, and he had looked at her in surprise. She'd covered - talked too fast, smiled too bright, asked him to stop someplace for another drink.

That had been the mistake.

He had leaned in to kiss her, and she had frozen, waiting, waiting, and when his lips landed on hers, she'd rebelled so fast and so completely that she had nearly screamed as if burned. She had wanted to kick, to yell, to claw at him until he stopped. Until he pulled away, until she could leave. Until she could wash him, scrub him, scour him off.

She had left. Didn't remember the cab ride, only remembered needing the dark and the bed.

She's drowsy beneath the ache of it, trembling beneath the realization. She can't stop shivering and she's got two comforters piled high. Her makeup has smudged her pillow, and she wants to wash the hairspray out of her hair, but she's dizzy, and the room is spinning, and the darkness has never been fair.

Her room smells of him now. She comes home night after night and never even turns the living room lights on. She slides right into bed these days, she wonders if he knows that she switches her pillow out for his on the nights he stays where he belongs.

She hears the key turn in the lock, and sounds rumble up from within her chest. She hates him, she thinks. She hates him. Hates. And when he's standing in the door to the room, she rolls over to face him, wondering if in the dark, without seeing her, he will still know how she feels.

"You arrogant sonofabitch," she grates.

He's silent. He is just standing there. He doesn't flinch. Waits.

She narrows her eyes, and she'll destroy him. Piece by little piece. "I had a date," she hisses accusingly. "What if he was here?"

He shakes his head, and stares out the window. "He wouldn't be," he says quietly. It's matter of fact. Resigned.

Confident. She tells herself he's arrogant.

She wants to fight him. Wants to tear him up. Him and his stoic, stalwart stare. She wants to rip him up and scratch him, and she wants to stop the choking sound that's growing in between breasts. She sits up and hunches over, and she's pathetic because she's in her dress. The beads at her bare thighs are catching the moonlight and she's garish. She's cheap. A late night thrill.

"I fucking hate you, Elliot," she says venomously, and her breath hitches hard at the lie. She should have fucked her date, she thinks. Should have at least tried. Elliot would have walked in on that, and he deserves that. He should have seen that, her fingertips white from pressing into another's back, grasping at another life.

She wants another man to make her come.

"Olivia," he whispers.

She's falling now, forward, her head caught only by her clammy palms. "Get out," she instructs, praying for seconds before the collapse.

He doesn't move.

"Get out," she says a little louder, lifting her chin and staring straight ahead. She blinks. The beads must be on her cheeks now, because there is something shiny beneath her eyes catching the outside lights.

He doesn't breathe.

"Get out!" she snaps, yells, throwing the covers off and whipping to face him. Her voice is shrill because she's finally screaming, disintegrating. "Go home to your fucking wife!"

But he doesn't move and she loses her mind, because he's always goddamned there. Her head is weightless, her eyes are unfocused and she's gonna destroy him tonight, just to get back her life.

She crawls across the bed, racing for her cell phone. "Call her, you bastard," she threatens disjointedly. Her fingers close around the phone. "Call her or I will!"

But he's faster, and he's bigger, and as she flips open the phone to dial his wife he launches at her, his fingers closing around her hand, her phone, shutting down the line. He's grasping at her, pulling her towards him as he falls onto the bed. He's a bastard because he's not yelling, he's holding her and it's over. She's done. There's no more fight.

"He try to kiss you?" Elliot murmurs into her hair, and it's not angry, its somber, understanding, frayed.

She's turns into him when it happens. She seeks him, craves him, her face needs the heat of his neck. One harsh, wracking sound rips from her and it lasts forever, forever, it just slams around recklessly in the dark. She remembers now why she doesn't do this, why she doesn't cry. It strangles her, and it sounds horrible and she's never learned how to even the crying out. "How did you know?" she rasps though the asphyxiation. He's holding her and it's giving up, giving in.

There is silence. And then.

"She's tried too," he quietly admits.

"You have five kids together. Don't tell me she's never tried to kiss you," she responds, and it's bitter this time, angry. She pushes him away and turns back to the window, and it's so dark, so lonesome. She can feel him breathe on her skin and her eyes close. She thinks that maybe this is all some nightmare. Maybe, like the visions of his wife dying, this is nothing more than imagery, fears, fantasy.

"I never meant to hurt you." It's a whisper, a plea, an act searching for forgiveness.

"Yeah, well." She pulls the blanket over her. "Some things in life are unintentional."

He hears it. It's like the soft sound of raindrops that used to fall onto the roof of his house in Queens. Gentle, rhythmic, steady. He hears it when she breathes, the soft hitch, the loss of air. He hears it and his eyes close because long ago he learned that life wasn't fair. There was good, but bad dominated. There was good, but in order for God to prove his points, those who want to play the game, those who want to survive have to be willing to suffer.

He's close to her, so close, so close. He reaches his hand out to her back and he stares, mesmerized at her movement. Her back shakes and he doesn't know why it took him so long to notice that she's still in her dress. It's black, and he almost wants to smile. She doomed it from the start, and the sad thing is, he knew she would. She didn't want to date, maybe not even him, not when she lived for the victims, for the forgiveness of her mother, for the hate of her father, for the acceptance of her brother.

He touches her, and his nails skim across her bare back. And this time, the tears are no longer like the soft drumming of rain. This time, it's a storm that brews, that breaks, that floods. The silence is broken and her cries are heard and he wonders if this is what she sounded like when she got home from the hospital, when his wife's blood had been over her, everywhere, existing even without proof.

He moves and he looks up to the ceiling, not because it's become familiar, but because he's searching for God. Because even when he doesn't want to believe, he finds himself turning to his savior in his times of need. And before his prayers are finished, before he can ask for forgiveness, his arms are around her stomach, and he's holding her to him, holding her so tight that even he cannot breathe. In the center of her king sized bed, he holds her, and he lets her cry because without him, there would be no tears. Without him, she'd be tortured deep within, but not because of this. Because of him.

"Olivia-"

"No." She shakes her head, but she doesn't move, she doesn't attempt to stop her tears. She leans her head back against his chest, and her hair spills across his shirt, across a ratty old sweatshirt he had grabbed out of his closet. She leans her head back and he knows she doesn't realize what she's doing, that even if she did, she might not care, at least not anymore. "I hate that I have become this."

His lips touch her hair but he doesn't move, doesn't pucker. "The night before Christmas when I was seven, I asked God to let me go to this cool monster truck show with my friend." He moves a strand of her hair, tucks it behind her ear, tucks it away from the tears. "I didn't believe in Santa by then. It was ruined for me the year before by my brother and so I figured if I wanted anything at all, I'd have to pray for it. I knew my parents would never let me go. It was dangerous and it was Christmas. But I prayed anyway, begged God. And in the morning, when I asked, the answer was no. I stormed into my room and swore never to pray again because this was all I wanted and no one was giving it to me."

She smells like mandarin, and if sadness and confusion and a glimmer of hope had a smell, it would be this.

"I stayed in my room the entire night. That night we got a call and on the way to the show, my friend and his mother got hit by a car." Car accidents. Death. Blood. Life. "They died en route to the hospital."

Her body writhes and he finds her head on the pillow, her hair tickling his hand. His lips feel dry without her touch, without what doesn't belong to him. "Why are you telling me that?" she whispers, and the tears haven't abated, she's just learned to speak, to live with the pain.

"Because sometimes, Olivia, the things we want isn't what is best for us. They're not given to us because it's better not to have it than to have it end in shit."

He convinces himself because he has to, because he has to believe that things happen for a reason, even if he never has. He has to believe, has to believe.

He rests his forehead on the back of hers and he knows, even if he had never gotten Kathy pregnant that last time, even if he had never gone home, Olivia still wouldn't be his. "I can't cheat on her. She loves me in the same way I think I love her, but I-"

"This isn't about you, at least not directly, and if you think I would ever want you to cheat on her, then you don't know me at all."

"Talk to me," he whispers, and he can feel her shiver, shake in his arms. Silence. So much silence that he has now come to hate. "Olivia. Talk to me."

"I don't want you to cheat on her, Elliot." She sniffles and her head burrows deeper into the pillows, her words are muffled, stained with lies. "It was never what I wanted."

Want is never a necessity. It's a desire, a temptation, a sin.

"Why do you keep coming here?"

He thinks he's told her the answer the other night, but maybe it was all in his head. Maybe reality and fantasy has crashed so many times that there is no going back, there is nothing but the merging of the two. He thinks and realizes there aren't always answers to life, to prayers, to God. Maybe there never have been. Maybe God was guidance, but not the one with answers. Maybe life is filled with all the maybes in the world and he'll never understand any of them.

He lets the silence burn through them like wildfire, scorching them, forcing them together. He holds onto her to keep her safe from the flames he has ignited, he holds onto her tonight because he thinks he can smother her burns, never learning how to smother his own.

Bless me Father, for I have sinned.

She's been gone for ten days this time before it happens.

He sits up straight in the bed, gasping at air. He's got the covers thrown off and his eyes won't adjust to the dark. His skin is coated in a sheen of sweat and his fists are filled with the down comforter.

His wife's hand settles on his lower back. "Nightmare?" she whispers, trying to soothe.

He squeezes his eyes shut so that they match his lungs. He can't let himself panic. She told him this time, she did, she did. She told him she'd be back. They only needed her for a few weeks. But she also told him not to go to her apartment, not to use the key, to try and sleep at home while she was gone.

She always tries to teach him lessons when she leaves.

"Elliot? You want some water?" Kathy asks.

He can hear his wife's voice and he's doing his best to focus on it. He wants his shoulders to relax because she's speaking, wants his eyes to close because she touches him. He wants to not sit on surveillance with Fin and feel his partner's apartment key pressing into his palm for so long that the ridges of it leaves marks branded into his skin.

"I'll get it," he manages as he throws back the blankets. "Just need some air."

She lets him go.

The tile floor is freezing against the soles of his feet as he leans over the sink in the kitchen, letting the water run before filling a glass. There is a window over the sink and he can see across the backyard. It had snowed two nights ago and the grass was missing, everything now coated in a foot of undisturbed white flakes. He wonders if she's warm where she is, or if she's just as chilled as he is.

He's scared to death that she is cold.

He hears the baby wake upstairs because for the past week, he hasn't stayed settled through the night either. It's three a.m. and that makes sense, it's about that time for all of them to wake up.

He thinks about going upstairs, maybe lying awake with his son on his chest, but before he can make a move, the floorboards in the upstairs hallway creak and his wife is already there.

Olivia should have taken away his key, he thinks, if she didn't want him to sleep there. He misses her; his fingers hurt. He texted her a knock-knock joke four days ago and it came back undeliverable. He has replayed every time she has laughed for him, because of him. This afternoon, he picked up the coat he had tossed on the back seat of their sedan and it came away with two strands of dark brown hair stuck to the chest. He thinks of her pillow, the smell of mandarin in winter, misses the green illumination of her clock measuring his time. He thinks he's going crazy, he thinks he's not breaking her rules if he gets his pillow from her apartment and takes it to the crib. He thinks if she was here he'd grab her by the lapels of her jacket and inhale, and he'd tell her. She was his and so he would.

He's downed two glasses of water before he's in the laundry room, searching for a clean sweatshirt, jeans and some shoes. He puts on what he sees and turns to pull his keys off the hook before he realizes they aren't there.

He is so stunned that for a moment he wonders if Olivia was here. If she knew he would collapse, if she knew he couldn't be trusted. If she knew he'd need her too much. If she knew all the things he didn't say.

"You having sex with her?" comes the tired, locked up voice from behind him.

He stares at the wall in front of him. The one covered with frayed artwork from the kids, most of which is years old. There is a painting in the middle of all of it, a new one, two tiny brown handprints on the white paper. His son's. On each baby finger, there is a brightly colored glued feather, and Lizzie had added a head and some feet until the little handprints became turkeys. In the corner, his daughter's handwriting proclaimed it Baby El's Gobble Gobble. Elliot had stared at it for hours, wondering if his son's fingerprints were at all misshapen like his.

"Elliot," his wife says, exhaustion and defeat permeating the sound of his name. "Just tell me if you are because-"

"I can't have this conversat-" He stops mid-sentence and turns around, unable to look at her. He's thirsty again, and he needs water. Now.

But his wife isn't done. He's got the tap on full force when she pushes him again. "Goddamn you, Elliot. I've got a right to know if you're fucking-"

He whirls on her. "A right to know?" he says hoarsely. "You've got a lot of nerve bringing up the right to know. Because that baby, that baby-" the glass is shaking in his hands and he turns again, too fast, dumping the contents into the sink as the glass falls from his hand and clatters around in the metal basin. The shelf above the sink is lined with bottles, with containers, with Infant Motrin and pacifiers. He doesn't want to know. It's his fault, not hers. He never really wanted to know. Still doesn't. "My baby," he says, shaking his head, ending that conversation even though the questions will always linger.

His hands grip the edge of the sink and he pushes his body back, hunching over until his back is bowed. There have been far too many lies, he decides as he stares at his toes pressed against the frigid tiles. His wife deserves the truth. "No, I'm not," he answers quietly. "I'm not fu-" he stops. He can't say it. Can't talk about her. Not in crude terms and not with his wife.

"You should."

He stills at the quiet, boxed up tone of his wife's voice. There is no threat. No anger. No screaming or ranting or taunt. She's never been one to fight loud or with extra words.

But he's angry. He's furious. He hates that his wife is throwing out there the one thing he knew he could never do. She's said it too quickly, cheapened the thing he fights, the thing he wants, the thing that looms over his family, his job, his religion. His soul. Hers.

He's trying to calm down and his knuckles are white from where he grips the counter. The edge of it is biting into his palm where the key earlier burned.

"I'm not stupid, Elliot. You're never home. So if that's what you want, go do it. Get it out of your system once and for all because I can't live with it hanging-"

He's bubbling inside and he's scared. She's not here to calm him, to soothe him, to talk him down. He's thinking she's left him and he'll break, he'll come apart, he's no longer safe. "I told you, I'm not-"

"The extra key on your ring. You didn't even try to hide it," she continues behind him. Her voice is far too calm as if she's accepted the things he cannot. "So if you want me to believe you haven't yet, fine. But don't insult my intelligence by-"

He picks up the glass in the sink and slams it back down, shattering it into the sink. The noise jars him, the impact absorbs his rage. He stares at the broken shards and envies them.

What a simple thing, to be allowed to break.

"I went there," he crumbles as he turns to his wife. "I went there but I never slept with her." He's crying, like a fool. He's crying and his wife isn't and he's a fucking creep for doing this. To her. To Olivia. To all of them.

His baby is crying again upstairs. He wonders how long it will be before Lizzie tiptoes into the living room to listen as she used to do. He turns again, searching across the backyard and he hates the snow and its pristine bullshit, he wants to take a tractor across the lawn and destroy the perfect view. His chest burns and he's crying and he's got two sons upstairs, a daughter, and he's crying because he doesn't know how to love their mother. And he's crying. "I never slept with her," he mumbles again, the words burning on his tongue.

"Maybe that's worse," his wife finally says, her voice fragile.

He thinks about the nights he would have died to simply lie next to Olivia. The nights he's stayed up to listen to her breathing. The nights he replayed her dreaming murmurs again and again, trying to discern, to learn, to know. He thinks about the way her fist curves loosely when she sleeps. On the first night he thought she was cradling her gun, and now he knows it's because asleep is the only time she's ever been a child. He thinks about the heat of her body seeping into the sheets next to him, he thinks about the way her huge eyes blink at him across the dark. He thinks about the dip at the center of his chest, just beneath his neck, and how her skin would feel if she slept there, her lips parted, her body cocooned by his, safe for the night.

He looks at his wife then, uses the back of his hand to swipe away his tears. She deserves better than him, and he wonders if she had it. If the night he came home and slept with her, he took away the life she was building. Would have built. He wonders if she misses it, being made love to. Because he is an arrogant bastard, he wonders if in the years to come she will think of him as the best she ever had, or not. He wonders what she looks like when she is all dressed up and flushed with anticipation for a night out; wonders if she almost said his name by accident when she slept with whoever it was.

He wonders if he will be okay. If she will. He still doesn't know if he's staying or not.

She's perfectly still as she stares at him. Her blonde hair is long and loose, and her painted toenails peek out from the bottom of her nightgown. Her cheeks are wet, but the nights of the loud arguments are long gone. They are living with resignation and defeat as their badges of honor.

Their baby's cries abate one floor up.

"I want to hate her," Kathy muses, blinking away the moisture pooling in her eyes. She lifts a bottle from the counter and twists it in her hand, watching her fingers fold around the top. "She handed me my baby and took away my husband."

He wants to protect her, but he hasn't in so long. He's been protecting Olivia and so he does, because it is what he knows how to do. "She didn't take me, Kathy. She didn't, she doesn't..." he can't say the words, the conversation can't be real. "She doesn't want me," he manages through the wall of fire lodged in his throat.

Kathy lifts her chin and she's the strongest one of all of them. She's the only one who has been willing to do what needs to be done all along. "Does she know she has you?" she whispers, old haunts creeping back into her eyes.

He stares unflinchingly at his wife. And because of her, he realizes where he went wrong.

Proximity – 6

She's half asleep when the knock sounds on her door, once, twice, three times.

The clock flashes and flashes beside her and when she looks at it, she sighs. She had been gone for six weeks. It was different out in Oregon this time, no pretending to be someone else, no living a life that wasn't her own. She had spent nights talking with her former case agent, and in the darkness of the state where she had changed, she had told Dean Porter the truth. Not in the right words, but in everything she wouldn't say, wouldn't answer. He had listened without looking at her, listened while nothing got solved, listened because he had come to know her well enough to know she wouldn't take advice, not on anything, and certainly not on this.

And when she had been on that plane back to New York, her head against the window as a storm crashed and split open the night, she had prayed that he would stay home, that he would remain devoted to his wife, that he would let her go. She had prayed but knew that for as hard as she tried, she would always be doing it wrong. There were no Bless me Father's. There were no crosses touched upon her chest. Instead, it was pleading words, it was begging, it was all the things that she figured God never answered. She was selfish, she was devoted only to herself as she spoke through the clouds, the storms, the strikes of lightning that seemed to hit her heart.

Now she knows God hadn't listened. Because the knocking persists, and she hates him for coming back, for not using his key like a child who is angry. She hates, and sometimes she can never quite figure out who the hell she hates, or if hate and anger and guilt and loss of control can manifest itself as one.

"Elliot," she yells, because she's sick of the knocking, of the fight raging inside. "Just use your key and open the damn door!"

It doesn't end. Once. Twice. Three times.

"Asshole," she mutters, throwing the covers off of the bed.

She weaves around the furniture, around the darkness that has become her home, her solace, her life. "Why don't you just…" And she stops when she sees who is on the other side, when she sees his wife standing there, her blue eyes dark, her hands enclosed in her pockets like she's a child, like she's hiding. "Kathy…" She fights for the words, but there is no fight left, no lies she is willing to tell. There's nothing but the overwhelming lingering of death, of demise, of finality.

"Can I come in?" His wife sounds shattered, cold but without the chill. She's bitter, but the anger isn't there and she can't help but wonder how many times Kathy had prayed, how many times she had begged the Lord for her husband not to fall for someone else, fall for her.

"Of course."

The door widens and light floods the room from the outside. Her luggage remains in the living room, pieces of her life scattered across the counters, the floors. She wonders what Kathy thinks of her, if she believes Olivia to be a pathetic woman, a mess, just some woman her husband feels sorry for.

Her heart hammers, and she wishes to hell her flight had been delayed. She wishes she had stayed in Oregon, that she had spent one more night in a hotel room taking notes, going over testimony. She wishes she had one more night with Dean Porter to ask the questions she never did, like how the hell would she be able to become Persephone James again, become someone who wasn't here. But there is nothing for salvation now except for God, except for the man she isn't sure she believes in.

I don't do Hail Mary's. I don't do this right, but please. Figure this out for me because I cannot do it myself.

The door closes and the two of them stand in the darkness, in the expanse of all the secrets that live between them. It's in the darkness, she can see Kathy's neck, the way it had looked broken, cracked. She had moved it that afternoon without thought, without warning, because maybe if she tried hard enough, she could be a savior instead of the cause. She can see the look on his wife's face when the jacket had covered her, when life wasn't a privilege but a fight. She can see the look on Kathy's face when that child was born, when it was placed on top of her, when her eyes closed and she nearly lost the fight. And she can see Elliot, with his smile and his honor of being a father for the fifth time in his life.

It's in the darkness that she sees the missed opportunity of hope, of love, of one man she's never had and always will.

"Can I get you anything?" she asks, and her voice sounds strangled. Kathy reaches for the light switch, and before she can stop it, it's out of her mouth. "Don't. I…" She sits on the arm of the couch and shakes her head. "I'm sorry. Of course you can turn on the light."

"He likes them out too," Kathy mutters. "I didn't realize…"

She reaches for the small lamp on the coffee table, but the dim bulb barely lights the room. She can see Kathy now though, the woman she thinks she'll always be inexorably tied to. She looks determined, yet resigned. Maybe that's what all people look like these days. Maybe all life comes down to is those who can fight and those who will break, but being resigned always remains.

"A beer if you have it."

I know I don't believe. Or maybe I don't believe in organized religion but I believe in You. I don't know.

She walks into the kitchen and takes out two beers from the fridge. She wonders if he knows his wife is here, if he has sent her to do his dirty work for him. She thinks an overnight ticket to Oregon would cost less than five hundred at this time of year.

I don't know when it happened, and I can think about it for a long time and never have any idea. Maybe you just spend so much time with one person that you automatically find yourself attracted to them…or maybe I've looked for this punishment my entire life as some kind of redemption for my mother. She never could date after I was born. Maybe this is someone's guarantee that I can't either.

She hands his wife a beer and as their fingers touch, she remembers the car, the accident, the blood. Kathy's hands had been tight in hers as she pushed, as she gave birth. The silence is painful, like a heart attack, or a gunshot wound, or a love that was never yours.

I know I made a mistake falling for him, and I'm sorry.

"How's Elliot?" she asks, and then winces. "The baby. How is he?"

The bottle hangs from Kathy's hands and she notices that he does the same thing. He lets it dangle, lets the neck of the bottle slide through his fingers and into his hand. She's his wife, and that gives her the right to use his traits, to pass them off like they were her own. Or maybe they were hers first and he had followed.

Maybe. Maybe.

"He's good. Getting big."

Sometimes I don't know if I can believe You exist. I have watched him believe in You for so long, but...when is enough enough?

There's so much silence. So much silence that she knows is going to explode.

"Kathy, what are you doing here?"

But she knows. She should have known all along it was going to end like this.

"I don't know how to do this with you," she mumbles. She's like her husband; she makes no eye contact. She stares and stares until it becomes a blur. Until nightmares merge with reality. Until life is far too confusing to comprehend. "There is a part of me, Olivia, that wants to hate you."

I know I have made a lot of mistakes in my life, hurt a lot of people, and the truth is, I'm not sure if it counts simply because I didn't mean to hurt them. I never meant to screw up a marriage, especially not one of two people I respect. But I seem to do that a lot. I screw up without intention. With Elliot, with my mother, with my brother, hell, oh, I probably can't say that...I…Even with my father, I've probably messed up somehow.

"And you want to know what the shitty thing is?" Kathy tilts her head, but she doesn't make eye contact, she doesn't look at how the one woman who has given her so much has taken away more. "For as hard as I try, I can't."

"Kathy—"

"I told him a couple of weeks ago that he should have sex with you."

But for all the times I have messed up, I'm asking you, pleading with you to stop this. I can deal with a lot of things in life, and I can deal with other people's pain. But I cannot deal with this anymore. It wasn't my intention to fall for him. I didn't want to hurt Kathy or their family. I'm sorry for all the nights I wanted him to spend the night. I can't do this anymore. I can't keep being this person who I never was and who I hate.

Kathy rubs her hands down her face, and in her sigh, there is evidence of tears. "But the truth is, if he did, it wouldn't be one night, one time. I want my husband back, Olivia. And maybe the only way he can do that is by being with you."

If silence is a demon, it has just stolen her soul.

"Kathy…" She clears her throat and she aches for the clock lights, for her bed, for simplicity where maybe none has ever existed. "Elliot and I…We never…"

"He came here night after night. Whether or not you slept together, it was an affair!" It's not her tone that is loud, that is angry, but her words, her posture, her presence.

Came. As in no longer. She wonders if he has chosen or if his wife has assumed. She thinks that maybe in her six weeks away, they had reconciled, they had fallen back in love, he had forgotten her when she was no longer there to remind him. He wasn't hers and she wasn't his. It was better this way. It had to be better that he was with his family, that she was where she belonged.

Came. As in no longer.

I used to be a fighter. I used to remember how it felt to get angry, instead of whatever this is.

"I never asked him to come here, Kathy." Let the fight return. "I…" But maybe I shouldn't fight this. Maybe I know I deserve it. To learn some kind of lesson, right? "I've always respected you." His wife looks at her now, and even in the dim bulbs, the shock is evident. But she turns away from the gaze, and out the window, out the window they used to stare at in the beginning. "He's hard to work with a lot. And there were so many times I saw him fucking up his home life and thought he was such an asshole for that." She thinks a smile forms on Kathy's lips. Broken, saddened, but real. "But you stayed with him for a long time in spite of it. You let your husband go off half cocked and trusted him to come home." She shakes her head, but the thoughts are still there, the board hasn't been wiped clean. "I never wanted to be the reason he didn't come home."

If we're put on earth to learn about the struggle of life, does the struggle ever stop? Elliot used to tell me that God never gave us more than we could handle. But if we keep handling things, is it Your job to push us until we break? Until the struggle can no longer be fought?

Kathy takes a sip of her beer, and the neck of the bottle slides until it's reached the crevice of her knuckles. "He doesn't think Elliot is his. I know he doesn't."

Her eyes close for the briefest of seconds. "You shouldn't be telling me this."

"No," Kathy clears her throat. "But I know he already has."

And if we're meant to struggle, then how many people have to come along for the ride with us? How many people have to prove their faith or their resilience? Because I don't get that. If my mother had to suffer, is that why I did? If Elliot suffers over the idea that this child isn't his, is he using me to make Kathy suffer? The point is, how much suffering does everyone have to endure before the entire world is locked into each other's messes?

She knots her hands, the beer on the floor. There's so much she wants to say, but if there's any fighter in her, she needs to allow it to breathe, to survive on its own will. "You came to me and asked me to help you get a divorce." There's a crack in her voice, and she wonders if while the heart breaks, it slowly divides your entire body. "Out of everyone, you came to me, you asked me to end your marriage. You were desperate. What changed?"

"I can't discuss this with you, Olivia. I don't…I can't."

"You came here! You accused me of having an affair with him. You told me you told him that he should sleep with me. I should be able to ask you that!"

Kathy nods, and it's almost eerie how civil this is, how the world can end, lives can shatter, and no one would know. "Because I wanted to move on with my life. I never stopped loving him, I just…He came back to me. In our entire marriage, he never put effort in. He tried, but there was always something else. Work, one of the kids, you…" It's quiet, pained. "For once, he put us first. It wasn't going to work out. Even after we got back together, I knew that. But then I got pregnant and…and I couldn't do it alone."

I don't know what I'm asking you. I don't even know if I am asking you anything. But if the entire world, or at least half of it, can believe in Your presence, in Your strength, then why can't I? But if I do believe, it's asking me to accept things I don't know how to. How do I accept what happens to people every day, how they're victimized and tortured? How do I accept this when the woman next to me is telling me things that I don't want to hear and she sure as heck doesn't want to tell me?

"I want my husband back, Olivia."

She leans back against the couch, resting her head back against the cushions. "But what do you want from me?" The crack widens, and her chest fills with water, drowning her, causing her to lose oxygen.

If sacrifices are given to make up for the mistakes, do you offer yourself as sacrifice if you're the one who has sinned?

And before Kathy speaks, she knows. She knows there are no answers to solve this, no quick fixes, no way out of life. "I don't know. I'm not going to ask him to leave the job. I know how much it means to him. How much it means to him to work with you."

"Why do you want him, Kathy? Why do you want him if—"

"I know he's falling in love with you?"

Here is my prayer, or my begging, or whatever it is. Let me go. Stop using me as a pawn in everyone else's life. Let me live my own.

She startles, and she's tempted to turn on all the lights, to flood the rooms, to wipe the slate clean. "He's not in love with me," she croaks. "We both needed someone to talk to and maybe it was wrong, but that's all it was."

I guess the real question is, am I forcing myself into these decisions or do You exist and You're forcing them on me?

"He's my husband," Kathy repeats. "I guess…" She looks down at the ground, at the newspapers shoved underneath the table. "The way he talks about you, Liv…he used to regard me like that." She laughs then, but the tears break the humor, the jokes have long ago been told. "It's pathetic, but I miss him. And if there's a chance he can love me again, then I need to make that work."

I just know that I'm done. I'm done being a pathetic mess, I'm done being the scapegoat. I'm done being the one who gets nothing in return.

"You should." She tilts her head towards Kathy, their eyes meeting in the shadows, in the abysmal light. "You should make it work."

I'm not a martyr. Or a sinner for that matter. I'm just trying to do what is right.

His wife nods, and she's not sure if it's grateful or accepting. "I should be going." Kathy stands, the bottle sliding onto the table. "Goodnight, Olivia."

Maybe I'm not asking anything at all. Or maybe I'm asking too much.

And when Kathy is nearly at the door, she stops her, because she's always been a glutton for punishment. The bulb has nearly burnt out; the shadows dance like omens, ghosts, prayers across the wall. She places her head in her hands; she moves her foot where she imagines her heart must have fallen. "What was my nickname?"

The door is open now, and the hall light washes over Kathy. "What?"

"You called Dani The Stunner that day in the park. What have you been calling me all these years?"

Kathy leans against the doorframe, and for a moment she does nothing but stare. The reason silence exists is because there aren't enough words, or there are too many words, or there aren't the right words. "His partner."

Just make this go away.

Amen.

He knows now what it feels like to be the one left behind.

He's been laying in his wife's bed for over three hours, wide awake, staring at a ceiling with no lights, no illumination. He heard her leave tonight and he thinks it's ironic that on a night he fought his skin, his blood, his soul to try and stay put, his wife couldn't.

He's a coward because he should have followed her. He wonders what his wife has done, what Olivia has. It's his mess, and he's let them do with him what they will. He's got no opinion anymore; because opinions were reserved for those with a future, a past, a basis for rational thought.

He has none.

His breathing has shortened as the hours went on. He thinks about yelling into the darkness for no reason, about screaming, about sliding in behind the wheel of his Jeep and never looking back.

But he's got reasons for staying, for being, for waiting. Kids sleeping down the hall, a wife that he knows, years too late, will now always come back.

He hears her footsteps as he stares into the darkness, the ceiling, the lack of lights, the lack of anything. The lack.

He waits for her to flip on the lights, but she doesn't. She just stands in the doorway and he knows her tonight. He knows this. Staring at a place you once were, but might never be again. He knows Olivia too, now, so he rolls over, his back to his wife, blocking out the things he can't face. The truth is more easily accepted when it feels like no one else is there.

"What'd you say?" he finally manages to splinter from his throat.

He hears the hitch of her breath, the slipping of his wife's coat as she shrugs it off and lets it fall to the floor where she stands. "I told her I wanted my husband back," Kathy whispers.

He shudders, her need too much for the both of them. He wonders when that shifted from him to her. Why he didn't see it, why on dozens of nights it wasn't enough to make him stay. He wonders about Olivia's face when his wife showed up, if she was angry, afraid. If when there was a shuffling at the door if she was disappointed, if her need sometimes left her frayed.

If she was relieved. If it finally taught her to hate him.

He is silent.

"Ask me, you bastard," Kathy struggles in the dark. "You want to know. So ask me what she said."

His throat is dry, his chest inverted. "I know what she said."

Kathy lets out a torn sound before she stifles it, bites it back, absorbs it away. "She'd let you go, Elliot. And it's almost worse, knowing she'd let you go but you still won't stay."

He shakes his head against the pillow and thinks he should face her at least. He needs to do that. To let his wife damn him with her eyes. "I'm here," he says, but it's mangled. They're all a bit mangled.

For all of it, it's been too many years.

"Don't," she says forcefully. And he thinks she's right, because it's like he always says to the suspects. They'll go easier on you if you just confess.

But he's suddenly too stifled to lie down; the comforter is too old, too worn. He's suffocating beneath the history of these covers just as he shivers beneath the fragility of the ones that shroud him when he is with Olivia. He sits up and faces away from her, his legs sliding off the edge of the bed, and his toes chafing against the berber carpet. That's all he can offer her, some movement, but no words.

"She called out for you," Kathy pushes. "When I was at the door, she assumed it was you," her voice falters, and on the last word, it breaks.

He wants to comfort her, he does. He wants to fill her ears with denials, and explain the lines he hasn't crossed and he thinks of the late nights they used to spend in this bed with her glasses on as she read. The days that the drone of laugh tracks from Letterman or Leno would lull him to sleep. He thinks of mornings filled with the twins' giggles as they hovered near the door, trying to determine if their parents were awake. He thinks he hasn't slept in far too long, and that some things finally needed to be put to rest.

He thinks of Olivia, always awake.

He thinks of her coming home to a dark apartment, to the moment she heard the door, to where she was right now. He wonders if she smells like tequila, if she's sitting on the floor of her kitchen, if she'd pour him a glass if he went over. If she has ever known how to rest.

He hates that he is in this bed, his chest caving because she had called out for him, and instead had been given his wife. He can hear her saying his name.

"Kathy," he finally begs, his back hunching over as his elbows rest on his thighs. "Please just lie down."

"It's not that simple," she says, and she's finally doing it. Crying.

And the words that could destroy the remnants of his marriage are on the tip of his tongue. It is that simple. It's that simple with her. Just lie down.

"Just tell me what it is, Elliot," his wife asks quietly. She's cautious, as if she's not sure she wants the answer. He thinks he can hear her gripping the doorframe, and he knows what that feels like. To be holding on to something that's slipping away. "She's beautiful, but I know you, it's not that."

He thinks of the moonlight on Olivia's skin, and the way she blinks so damned slowly when she looks at him. He thinks of her stride when she's running next to him, how she never hesitates. He thinks of her head cocked as she assesses a suspect, of the way her apartment smells in the minutes after she showers. He thinks of the moments she sat in a sedan next to him, and probably for the first time admitted she was alone. The snagging of her voice. He thinks of her as she sat next to her brother all those months ago, accusing Elliot with the silence in her eyes of reducing her to needing a stranger.

He thinks of the way her back straightens in the moments she's the most scared. He thinks of her hand holding a gun steady, unwilling to let him give up, unwilling to do the one thing that would let her save herself. He thinks of her cutting her hair to get rid of things, thinks of when it was so short he could see delicate column of her neck. He thinks of watching her let go, for once, just for once, until she attacked Thatcher, gloriously, brilliantly wild with it.

He thinks of the four times he has heard her truly laugh.

He thinks his wife is wrong. It is the beauty.

"Say something, Elliot, after all of it. At least say something!" Kathy's voice picks up speed and anger, as if she were barreling down a hill with no brakes. "Don't just let me stand here talking to myself, as if I've lost my mind! You can shut me out of your job, you can shut me out of your heart. But you can't shut me out of my own damned marriage!"

"You did that to me!"

It comes out of everywhere that it's been for all these years. He's stood up, and he's spun on her. He's just yelled, and it's like he's thrown fists of gravel at her. His hands are clenched and he knows this isn't good, it's not good having all of this raging through him. He's yelled. Oh Christ.

She stands there, perfectly still. She's not breathing and her coat is in a heap around her feet. She's breathing so hard but she's staring and he knows as she looks at him there is no going back.

He keeps looking at her and his heart breaks. He sees her long blonde hair, far straighter than it has ever been before. She's too thin, all of her. Even after the baby, she's wasted away.

He's wasted her. She's let him for all these years.

"That's what this is, isn't it?" Kathy says softly. "We didn't really ever have a chance this time around." Her face is wet and the moon is too bright and he sees her but it's always a little too late.

He hates himself that this is the first time he has wanted to hold her in far too long. But he's got so much to say. Things like I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Let me go, and I'll be better. You'll be better. Do this for us. For you. For me. He thinks it's ironic that two years ago, his wife taught him all that he now wants to say. "Why'd you ask me to leave back then, Kath?" He shakes his head and uses the side of his hand to wipe his fucked up face. "I was doing the best I could and I didn't…I didn't understand." He swallows, willing his lungs to stay down, to stay intact. "I let go, I guess. I didn't think I had." Each word is a stone that pushes past his throat, that falls between them. That builds again.

"I didn't let go. I thought I did," she says, and she turns to press her forehead into the doorframe. But the wood has been sealed, and it won't absorb her tears.

He has to give her something. He has to give her what she hadn't allowed him when she had once asked him to leave. "If you want to be with me, Kath. I can try again. I can." He thinks he knew nothing of giving up before now. Because he's offering Kathy his life, his happiness, for her he's willing to be cracked, to break. "I can stay here, and I won't go to -" He stops, his chest heaves. He's losing too much, too fast. It's his turn on the crash cart and there's no one who will know how to save him. This is it. "I won't go to-"

He can't say it. He wants to. He wants to say he'll stay here. But he thinks of buildings falling, shattering upon themselves and disintegrating into faintly recognizable pieces that emerge from the dust.

He wants to make promises but his heart breaks. He thinks he knew about giving up, but he didn't, he didn't. He knew nothing of losing until he's losing Olivia, trying to walk away.

"I won't go to-" he tries again, and he fails. He chokes, he's coughing or crying, his fist slams into the bed to hold him up. "I'm not going there, Kathy, I won't." He shakes his head just a little too fast and he's going to be sick. His insides are going to come out. "God, I'm sorry, I won't."

But he's done. He can't give her more, that's all there is. All that's left to take. He closes his eyes and wills himself not to shake.

She shifts by the door and as she moves towards the bed, to her side, she grabs her pillow and pulls it to her chest. "Did you ever cry for me that way?" she whispers, and there is no accusation, no bitterness, nothing but a heart that needs to be told it will be okay.

"For two years," he says into the darkness.

And then it is over. She flips on the bedroom light, flooding it will illumination, and takes her pillow and walks away.

He hasn't come to her in nearly a month and a half. He hasn't come to her after she had returned home, after his wife had left her apartment that night, and she knows now where she was on his list of regrets. She figures she was number two. Number one was letting his wife go in the first place.

The bed is too big, and she remains balled up on her side. Even without him there, his presence still lingers. If she closes her eyes for a moment, and it's never longer than that, she can hear him breathing beside her. She can hear him breathing as he looks up at her ceiling, at the red light. She hears him whisper jokes into the darkness, but the jokes fall flat when his voice fades from her mind, and silence is just that.

He's the same at work, the same as he was before the night of the accident, the same as he was after she had returned home from Oregon. There were days he was nice to her, and days they argued, but he was no longer the man who used a key to enter inside of her apartment. He was the man he was when he was married - when their relationship was nothing more than friends, than a bond that had been a lie, that was easy to break. He's the same and she guesses she is too, because the pain is still there and no pleas with God have made that fade.

She doesn't do it anymore. Pray. She talks to the ceiling sometimes in whispered breaths that sound like pleas, but it has no direction, no aim. She talks because she misses someone being there, because if she talks then the silence can't destroy her.

But it does. It does, it does, and she figures she'll always be this person now. She'll always be waiting for something to never come; she'll always find her battles harder and harder to be fought. She is now a coward, and she hates herself and is resigned to it all at once.

She stares up at the ceiling and her mouth opens to speak, but she doesn't. She has nothing to say tonight, nothing as the tears blur the insides of her eyes, as the salted water slips down her cheek and into her mouth. She licks it, and the bitter taste causes more to fall. Shadows dance across the ceiling, the flashing lights of her clock. It flashes and flashes and times moves and nothing is solved and one day bleeds into another, into another, into another.

She reaches over and unplugs the clock because it's Saturday, because time doesn't matter, because life is routine and a clock isn't needed when her body knows it all. The shades are drawn tonight and in the complete darkness, with nothing but the dim red light to guide her way, she listens to the silence, to her future, to her life. Dead air permeates into the room, like the sounds she heard right before she woke up in that car. Dead air that lingered, that spoke its truths, that knew all but never said a word. Dead air that made her heart beat faster, that made her vision blur, that made her heart break.

She cries out into the room because she has to, because she can't listen to the silence. She cries, because the need and want have rolled into one and there's nothing left for her to do. She cries, because she misses the woman she once was, even when she never thought she would. Being hollow, being stone, was so much better than having a beating heart, than melting.

"Fine, I'm giving in," she manages, and she stares at the ceiling, at the moldings, at a shadow that she wishes were God. "You want me to ask it aloud? You want me to fucking beg? Give me my life back."

Now instead of silence there are her moronic prayers that are selfish, without structure.

Some nights she cries. Some nights she stares. Some nights, some nights she forgets she's awake until she realizes she can't breathe, until she remembers to do so. Tonight she does it all because sooner or later, something has to work. Sooner or later, she can piece herself back together. But broken vases, broken knick-knacks, broken glass, is still broken even when pieced back together. It's still more susceptible to cracking again; it's still got its war wounds evident the moment anyone looks.

She turns onto her side and thinks she should ask more. But there are children out there being hurt, women being brutalized. And a broken heart is far easier to mend than souls. She thinks about praying for them, but there are no words to fix things like that, to make it better. Her mother had prayed for years before finally giving up, before realizing that nothing made it better, not even the Lord.

The drapes blur beneath her tears, and she knows she should turn on the lights, wipe it all away. But she can't, she can't yet. So she watches as the timid shadows dance, as the tears gather and fall and abate until she can see the dark blue of the curtains, until she can see the ground.

She can be strong, she can, she can.

She sits up in bed and the covers pool around her. She breathes and breathes and breathes until it's steady, until it's stable. She closes her eyes and inhales. One second, two, three…longer than she has lately. And when something inside of her settles, she reaches for the light on the bedside table.

She can do that. She can use the light, let it heal her like darkness no longer does.

She doesn't turn it on though. Not when she hears the noises outside of her door. She thinks she might be imagining it. Like some symbolic bullshit the moment she is about to turn on the lights. But the noise persists; the key turns in the lock.

So much for breathing.

She slides down in bed, and closes her eyes. It's been so long that maybe he thinks that she sleeps now, that he'll leave her alone, leave. But she wants to know what has brought him here, why after all this time he's willing to leave his wife's bed and come to hers.

The front door opens, fifteen seconds before it closes, like he had to debate whether or not to stay. And the tighter her eyes shut, the closer his steps become. She tries to breathe even; she tries to breathe at all.

"I know you're awake," he mutters, and she can feel the moment he sits down, the moment the weight on the bed shifts.

She doesn't answer him; she doesn't do anything but hope that he'll leave.

"Knock, knock."

Her eyes squeeze shut and she allows the tears to slip. She rolls over in bed and faces him, opening them, staring at him. She knows the tears are there, she knows he sees, and she's not all that sure she cares. "Go home, Elliot."

This time, when she sits up in bed, she floods the room with light.

But he's still there, still waiting, and she should have known not even the savior of light could wipe this slate clean.

She's turned into his wife. He thinks that as he blinks, adjusts to the light.

He had spent six hours debating on whether or not to come here. He had sat at home, sat on the old leather couch that he hated, that squeaked every time he moved, and debated, ran through scenarios. She wouldn't be happy to see him, he knew that. Not when he's barely spoken to her, not when she's barely spoken to him. It's like they've been coexisting in a time warp, in a vortex that only they can see, only they can understand. He had expected her to be mad. He had expected her to throw things, curse at him, something. But he hadn't expected the lights. For some reason, he never expected the lights.

The clock doesn't flash and flash and he nods his head towards it. She doesn't look at him, but he knows she sees, feels his every movement. "Why's the clock unplugged?"

She pulls her knees up to her chest, rests her elbows on her knees. Her face falls into her palm, and she sighs, she breathes. "Elliot, just go."

He wonders why Kathy believes he has fallen in love with her, when sometimes he hates her so much more. "Can you turn out the damn lights, Olivia?" he asks wearily.

"No." She still doesn't look, doesn't move. He wonders what the hell is so interesting on the wall, on the ground, on the dresser.

He gets up, and the calm that had been with him outside of her apartment dissipates into the night. He stalks across the room, across the expanse of her bed, and when he reaches for the light switch, her hand stops him. She's finally looking at him, and while the tears linger behind her dark eyes, he sees the anger, the fight returning after all of this time. He's brought the old Olivia Benson back, and he knows he's about to lose his battle.

"You're not shutting the fucking lights," she grinds out, swatting his hand away. She rests her head back against the pillows, against the sheets he doesn't recognize. "It doesn't work."

The light does and he knows it's something else, because it's too bright, there's too much to see. He sits down on the edge of the bed, and lets his hands fall onto the comforter. "What doesn't?" he asks quietly.

"Nothing. I'm asking you to leave."

"It does," he answers, because he thinks he knows what she means. "It does when it matters." She closes her eyes, and he wants to tell her, wants to tell her so much. He reaches for her, but he doesn't touch because she has boundaries, because he's broken her boundaries far too many times. "Liv, we need to talk."

"Stop." Her eyes slip open and she stares at him, stares at him for so long that he feels like he's going to snap in half, break, never find the ground he thought had been recovered. It's her voice that causes his heart to stop, to speed up, to tear just the slightest bit. She's fragile, so fragile, and even when she tries to be strong now, he's not all that sure he is. He's like flames and fire and knives and guns. He's a weapon that was there for warmth, for protection, but it got out of control, so out of control. "Let me go, Elliot. Please. Just let me go."

He wonders if she prayed about this, if she asked God these same things. He wonders if the only person who can save her now is him. "This isn't you. You don't…you're okay."

She laughs, but it's hollow, and sad, and so lonesome that the tear in his heart widens. "You've told me that twice now and no, I'm not. When you said that to me after the accident…I wasn't fucking okay, Elliot." She rubs her hands over her eyes. "I'm thinking about leaving. I think it's for good this time."

He hates her, he does. He does. "Because that's what you do when things get hard, Olivia? You walk out?"

"Don't. You don't get a right to lecture me on this. Your Goddamn wife came to my apartment and you never mentioned it to me after the fact! You haven't spoken to me in a month and a half when it wasn't about work. And you know what? I am so sick and tired of being a miserable human being! Elliot." She reaches for the light; she loses her fight and the darkness returns. "Let me go."

He should tell her, he should. He should tell her and in the darkness, he opens his mouth, but nothing comes out, not when she slides underneath the covers, not when she gives up her fight. He thinks that maybe the true act of forgiveness, of redemption, of heartache, of fears, of prayer, all come down to the same thing. If you let someone go in order to honor their wishes, does it make you honorable? Or a coward?

He stands up, and he thinks this might be the end, this might be the last time. He knows she'll go if he doesn't ask her to stay. He knows she'll stay if he asks her not to go. But for tonight, he walks to the bedroom door, stares at her for moments, counting the seconds in his head because the clock no longer flashes. He watches as she shakes, and he hates himself, or maybe he just hates situations where there are no answers.

He raps his knuckle on the door, glances out at the open living room, at the door that will honor him forgiveness, redemption, heartache, fear, prayer. "If I made you the person you don't like, Liv, I'm sorry." He can hear the hitch of her breath, the start of her tears. "I…" He doesn't know how to let her go, he doesn't, he can't. He breathes deep, and it's hard to inhale, to stand without falling. "Call me, okay? When you find out where it is you need to go, call me."

And when he reaches the door that was supposed to honor him with all of these things, all he gets in return is her heartache, her pain, her cries. It closes behind him, and as he listens to her in the apartment he has come to love, he slides down the wall in the hallway when he can no longer stand.

He didn't just let her go tonight; he let himself go as well.

She thinks she should tell him she can't be trusted with her gun.

She realizes this as they are taking down a suspect at 3 a.m. in an alley off of Houston. She's wavering a little bit; nearly dizzy with the way he fills her line of sight. She watches him, his dark jacket pulling over his shoulders as he trusts her to keep her Sig on their target while he cuffs the guy. But she's teetering a little bit, and she readjusts her grip on her gun, trying to find some clarity in the rain that is coming down. Elliot's head is covered by a dark wool cap and his hands are bare, and she's watching them, chapped and cold and dry as he snaps the cuffs on. She blinks.

She has to keep her gun on the guy.

She's still here, with him, for five more weeks. She's got five more weeks until the FBI can process all of the paperwork she's been staying up late at night filling out. They told her that if she applied for a position through the New York office, that she wouldn't be eligible to return to this area for two years. That was how it worked. She had to pay her dues elsewhere first.

She hadn't told them she'd already paid her dues. That was why she was leaving in the first place.

"Liv," he calls out behind him, over the pounding of the rain. "You want to go and grab the car?"

She thinks of leaving him here in the alley with the guy, of the things that can happen, of how she used to think he was invincible. About how she worries too much now.

"No," she shakes her head. She'll have to leave him behind in thirty-five days. "We can take him together," she says, her chest burning in the freezing cold as she lowers her gun. She finds herself staring at him these days, as if her memory will be stronger if she gets more face time in.

He hauls the guy up and looks up at her, and despite the shadows he can see her so clearly. And because he hasn't said a word about her leaving in the two weeks since she has told him, he just shrugs. "Fine," he says casually, his eyes falling away. "Suit yourself."

She wonders what she would do if he made her stay. If when she told him she was leaving, he had yelled at her, accused her, told her she was just as much to blame. She wonders what it is like to not be needy. She wonders if she will learn when she leaves.

She wonders how many more arrests they will make together before she's gone.

She's been counting down things like that so that when the end comes, she will have all of the details.

Something to take with her, when she finally goes far enough away that there will be nothing left for him to take.

He sits across from her. He watches her too much, he thinks. He watches her because later he will need to know what it looked like when his life slipped away.

He will never blame her. There are nights he wants to help her pack, because she deserves it, a life that is different than this. A life away.

He's created her destination in his head, and although she hasn't as yet been told where, he's sure it will be down south, maybe out west. Some place that it never rains.

He's imagined where she is going, because it's too much not to know. He thinks her apartment will have hardwood floors and oversized windows, and an open kitchen with barstools. She'll have a wine rack and there will be a patio, maybe even a few plants. She'll have a neighbor or two, he thinks, and someone in her home office will ask her on a date.

His skin stopped hurting after she told him she was leaving. This time it didn't chafe. He was surprised by it for the first few days, then he realized. His blood had stopped flowing, so there was no pounding, no pressure, no pain.

He'd never been able to be the one left behind. But he can do this for her. Let her go. She didn't deserve this place, this life, this ache.

He can't ask her to stay for him. He can't make her give up whatever is left of possibility for whatever is left of him.

Before he can stop himself, he rasps her name. "Olivia."

She looks up, and her eyes are incessant in their attempt to speak, to say the things that she cannot convey. "Yeah?" she answers softly, tilting her head.

He doesn't have anything to say to her. Maybe he just wants to know if when he says her name she will still listen, still answer.

He wants to know if when he calls out, she will still hear him.

Her eyes soften, deepen. She is leaving him, he thinks again stupidly, the certainty never really settling in. He doesn't see anything past the next twenty-seven days.

Don't leave, he says. Please don't leave me. I don't turn on the lights anymore, and there is no one here who can see me.

Her gaze falls away when faced with his silence.

She can only hear him when he speaks.

Chapter 7

A/N: So now that all your happy holiday festivities are over, let's get back to business, shall we? There will be no more smiling, none of this laughing crap, no joy and ringing bells and fa-la-la-la bullshit. We're glad y'all had fun, but we're throwing you back into the pit of despair. Why? We don't really know. Maybe because they are El and Liv, and really, clearly, they are the most dramatic, emo people (they are not characters, they are real, so shush) ever. Maybe its just because we are too happy in real life and this makes us feel like we are not shallow, we have depth. Who knows. We are beyond thankful, impressed and humbled by this vid: watch?v=YTiGvirGQMY Thank you SO much ITPROF, it's stunning. I have listened to this song 900 times now, writing my parts in this, and really, honestly, all of it was so inspiring to both of us, so thank you. Yes, we will make it better. At some point. Don't rush us, we're angsty.

It's a different kind of darkness this time.

In the hours before midnight, Central Park is nearly silent. She walks beside him, but her hands don't touch his, not tonight, not ever again. There's light that filters in through the trees, lights from the cars, from the streetlamps, from the moon. It's a darkness that exists with hope, but she learned weeks ago, months ago, maybe even years ago, that hope was a prayer, a wish, but not a guarantee. His footsteps are seconds behind her, and she wonders when it was that they stopped walking in sync, if she'll ever be that connected to another partner again like she once was with him. There's a slight breeze tonight and the wind whistles, the trees rustle, her heart murmurs, her feet shuffle.

She thinks that she'll miss this place, that she'll miss the serenity inside the wild nature of the city; she thinks that no matter where she ends up, there will be no place like this, no place filled with the beauty of the world, and the horrors of it all at once. Late at night, she wonders where she'll end up when sleep still doesn't come and his whispered jokes linger in the air like ghosts of the past. Oregon again, maybe. Or some place where it never rains, where it never snows. San Diego, or Los Angeles, or hell, even Florida. She can become one of those women who finds companionship in older people who play canasta or gin and live life waiting for the moment it's all bound to end.

He breathes beside her, and even with the noises of the city, silence dominates. She hadn't wanted to come with him tonight, hadn't wanted to spend time alone when she knew it would merely further her cracking heart. She's been doing so well, she has, and things like this make her want to leave and stay, an all inclusive war in her heart.

It had been a departmental dinner, something done yearly, but it was different tonight. Her captain had tried to make a speech to honor her goodbye, but she had stopped him, she had made it stop. She didn't want goodbyes; she didn't want the speeches. She wanted her life, and her partner, and all the things that should have been simple and hadn't been for a long time.

And when the night had ended, he had asked her to walk. She knew to say no, she knew to let him go home. But if tonight is the end, if in the next couple of weeks it is work and nothing more, she wants it. She won't touch him, she won't. She won't invite him home with her, she can't. The frame of the bed is gone anyway. It's just the mattresses now; it's just a place to sleep until she moves. But she thinks she'll get rid of it sooner instead of later.

She doesn't sleep. She doesn't rest.

"Do you know where you're going yet?"

She shivers, and she doesn't know if it's his voice or the chill in the night. "No." She shoves her hands in her pockets, because she wants to touch, she does, she does. "I never meant to fall in love with you," she whispers.

She closes her eyes; she stops. And the air, the oxygen, slowly drains from her body with words she never meant to say. His hand reaches for her, but she shakes her head, she stops him before she breaks down, before she gives in.

She continues to walk, and behind her the footsteps follow. She waits for him to speak, to respond, but he never does. Instead he moves to the side, sits on a bench and expects her to follow. She inhales the night, but it's too tight, there's not enough there for the both of them. She wonders where his wife believes he is right now, if she thinks the dinner lasted longer or if she knows. She wonders what it would have been like to have sex with him, to listen to his wife's request so his marriage could get back on track, so she could either live or die at the feeling of his touch on her bare skin.

But she isn't a pawn; she promises herself that she never will be again.

"Will you call me when you get there?"

Her head falls back, and she stares up into the sky. There is no God tonight. There is nothing tonight but him. "No." Her eyes close and she tries to breathe. She tries to live. "I can't."

Minutes pass before he speaks, and his voice is broken, so broken. "I never meant to hurt you." And she can swear he uttered something like that to her days before.

"It's my life, Elliot. There was nothing you could have done differently." Her eyes open, and she continues to stare into the sky, into the obscured view of branches and trees, and the city skyline. "It wasn't just Kathy's blood that night." She hears his intake of breath, the moment he lets it go. "It was the baby's also. I didn't realize it…I didn't know until days later, until I washed it. He was so warm when I held him; he was so perfect." Central Park confessions. Life confessions before it's the end. "Is Kathy okay?"

"Are you?"

"This isn't about me."

But it is. It is.

"She's okay," he says. He taps one foot on the ground, and it reminds her of the flashing of the clock that has come back to life in her bedroom. He taps and taps and minutes pass, time changes, and yet everything remains the same. "Don't leave, Olivia."

A plane flies across the sky, and she wonders where her destination will be, how long the flight will take, how many miles it will take to get away from him. She closes her eyes again, and she long ago forgot how to hide her emotions, she long ago forgot what it was like to care. "Please don't ask me to stay." Because if he does, she will, she will.

"Promise me something, okay?"

"What?" she murmurs.

"Be happy, Liv." He turns to look at her, but she remains staring at the sky, at the moon, at the clouds that move and drift, yet always follow one another. "Find someone who makes you happy."

She suppresses a sob, and places a finger over her lips. She doesn't feel the wind anymore, the rustling that passes like lingering ghosts of the past. She's numb, and she figures that even if she leaves, even if she goes to the ends of the earth, her feelings for him will never change, her life with him will always remain.

"Elliot," she whispers, and it's broken, and strained, and soon enough she allows a tear to fall.

Her eyes close again, and she feels the pad of his thumb on her face, rubbing, washing, clearing her slate of all the things that have brought her here. She thinks that maybe it's her imagination because another tear falls and then another and his thumb, his movements seem to be doing nothing to take them away.

"Knock, knock." He says it so quietly that she thinks it might be the voice she hears in her bedroom at night, the voice that will haunt her dark, silent home for years to come.

She doesn't fight it this time. She can't, she won't. "Who's there?"

His thumb falls from her cheek; the wind freezes her tears; the loss of his touch freezes her heart. He speaks and it's mangled, like the metal of her car had been on that day so long ago. "I want to be able to let you go, Olivia."

"Then let me go," she manages. "Go home to Kathy, El. Go home to your kids." She turns her head to look at him, but he's staring up at the sky now, staring up at everything and nothing. They don't make eye contact anymore. They barely make contact at all. "You should be happy with her. I want you to be happy with her."

"Liv—"

"I did what I needed to in the job. I can never get redemption for my mother, Elliot. I can never make what happened to her better. But if I helped even one person like her, maybe it's enough. You do this for so many years and it kills you. Maybe that's what's making me miserable."

But it's not. It's not.

"Maybe." He crosses his ankles, leans back against the bench. "He's getting so big. The baby." He rubs his finger on the plastic seat, rubs it like he rubbed her tears. "He looks just like Dickie did when he was younger. He laughs just like Maureen did."

Another plane passes; she wonders how many people on board are running away from someone they can never have.

"He's mine. In all the ways that matter, he's mine."

"That's good, Elliot. That's how it should be."

It's hard to breathe out here. So hard. She thinks that she's become numb though, because it doesn't hurt anymore. Her body aches, but it doesn't bruise, it doesn't break. She wonders what it will be like to live life pretending he doesn't exist, pretending that the past nine years were nothing more than time filled with amnesia. Maybe that's what she should have been praying for all those times she begged to someone who inevitably hadn't listened.

Amnesia. The moment of forgetting all else and beginning again.

A leaf brushes past them, and she pulls her jacket around her a bit tighter. There's so much she wants to tell him, so much she wishes she could say. She thinks about writing him a letter, but she doesn't do the sentimental things in life when there never seems to be a point. She thinks about telling him, but words were never their forte, their driving force. So she knows, like always, she will leave those memories, those moments, those words to herself.

He shuffles beside her and if she had to make a scrapbook of all she's leaving behind, she thinks his movements would take up the entire thing. The way he would lean back in his chair, comfortable, cocky, like he owned the world and all its problems. She'd fill it with his stances while holding a gun, how one foot would move carefully in front of the other but he would always keep his pace, his aim. She'd fill it with his moments with children, how he'd handle the aching kids, how his hands would soothe their backs, his whispers would soothe their hearts. And she'd fill it with the moments he stood still, the moment his movements stopped and his eyes told it all, like stories she was expected to know by heart. It was like brail to her, never reading, just knowing how it felt, knowing what to expect because she had been doing it for so long.

"Look, Liv, if I never said it in the past, if I never let you know…" His foot brushes across the ground, and he tilts his head to look at her. She can see him from the corner of her eye; she can see him staring, wanting her to look. But she doesn't. Not tonight. "You were my be—"

"Mine too," she answers quickly, because she doesn't want to hear the rest. "Do me a favor, okay?"

He laughs, but it's sad, gruff, almost lifeless. "What?"

"Be good to your next partner, Elliot. Don't…" She finally turns to look at him, and even in the darkness, she can see the irises of his eyes, the sadness that resides behind the blue. "Don't give them a hard time. In the beginning, you used to bring me coffee. Do that for them. It doesn't make the job better, but the gesture is nice." She misses him from those days; she misses him when he was teaching her how to be a better cop, a better person. "You get angry sometimes. Don't take it out on them and don't show it too early on. You don't want to scare them off." She turns away and the sky is so dark, so abiding that she thinks maybe it'll all be okay because if there's that much out there, if the abyss never ends and continues on forever, there has to be good out there somewhere, there has to be a life better than this. "Let them take on more work than you. Go home to your family. Let Elliot see more of you than the other kids did."

"You're not dying, Liv. Stop treating this like you are."

She's never wanted to stay and leave more than she does right now. "Promise me that."

"Are you going to find someone out there? Are you going to be happy?"

She closes her eyes, because she's found him, because he can never be hers, because she knows now that it was never the job that kept her pushing other men away, it was never a factor of time; it was him. "I hope so."

He pushes his hands into his pockets, and when her eyes open, she notices he's staring up at the sky. She wonders if he has continued his prayers, if the safety of his family has caused him to believe again. "Knock, knock," he mutters.

"Who's there?"

"Olive."

She doesn't want to know the punch line. She doesn't, she doesn't. "Olive who?"

"Olive you."

She laughs, and this time it's real, fleeting. "That doesn't make sense."

He stands, and she'll miss how he leans, how he moves. "Yeah, it does. Think about it." He nods his head towards the exit of the park, towards the darkness and volatile moments that await outside the haven of grass and lakes and serenity. There's peace here, and even if she's numb, even if she's scarred, it's better than out there; it's better than the real world. "We should get going."

His hand reaches out to her, but she doesn't take it. She stands up and beside him she remembers what it feels like to be partners, to stand next to him, to have him be hers. Even if tonight isn't the end, even if she has weeks left, she knows that everything that needed to be said was.

He starts to walk towards their cars and she follows now steps behind him.

Olive you.

She rolls it around in her mind; she rolls it around until she hears it, until she gets it. Until she knows why he had chosen that word.

I'll leave you.

I love you.

She catches up to him, and her hand touches his elbow, his coat. He looks down at her, and for the first time, she smiles, and it's genuine, and sad, and nine years of emotions compressed into one. "Thank you," she whispers, and she doesn't know which one she is thanking him for, which one he meant.

His smile is weak, but it's there, it's never the end because he still knows her, because even minutes later, he understands what she means. Her hand slides from his elbow, and for the slightest moment their hands touch. "You're welcome," he answers quietly.

And when they walk, now side by side, the numbness abates, and the tear in her heart begins to realign.

I'll leave you.

I love you.

He is watching her leave.

She doesn't actually leave for another six days, but he's watching her leave already. She stopped refilling his coffee mug four days ago. Today she handed him a stack of files she had never started, that there wouldn't be time for. He saw her quietly sort through the junk in her top drawer, leaving only a few pens and an unopened pack of gum.

He watches her and he wonders if she knows he is looking at her. She probably does. She knows everything else.

She haunts this place already, though she is still here. He can't see his surroundings in color anymore. It's all black and white and gray. Memories of a place she fills; will always fill.

The sound of the bottom stair creaking reminds him of their argument on those same steps in their third year. Olivia had been racing upstairs when he'd said something suitably irritating from the bottom, and she had come barreling down, her hand skimming the railing until she made it down to that first step. Her chin had jutted out defiantly as the stair creaked, and she had never made it all the way to the floor. She'd maintained the six inches she gained by staying on that step, simply so she could glare at him from just above eye level as she chewed him out.

He thinks about her lounging at her desk in the fourth year, a cup of coffee in her hand as he descended those stairs with their Captain. He'd been undercover and he'd been decked in the chin a few times by their suspect. When Fin had asked him how he was doing, Olivia had just smirked, teasing Elliot that it was just a few scratches. Her eyes had sparkled with something resembling both pride and mischief as she'd cracked dismissively that he'd live.

He wonders if she still thinks that. If she thinks he'll live.

He tries to think about things that don't involve her and can't.

She is all of his memories.

He wants to tell her to stay. He says it all the time. Don't leave, Olivia. Don't leave. He just doesn't give it a voice anymore. Not since that night in the park. He amends his thought. He doesn't give the words sound intentionally, because last night, standing under the steam of the shower with his eyes pressed tightly closed, he'd begged her not to leave. He'd asked her again and again to stay. He'd made promises he couldn't keep. And when he heard his own voice pleading in reverent whispers, his head bowed beneath the spray, he put himself back together, praying the sound of the water beating down would drown out the things he shouldn't say.

He'd asked her not to leave when they had been in the park, and he knows it was unfair. He wouldn't say those words to her again. He can't make her stay. He shouldn't.

He should help her go.

He's got nothing to offer her. He's a cop, he's got five kids. He's got rage issues and a jacket filled with warnings. He sleeps like shit; the rims of his eyes are always red. He's gone through a whole bottle of whiskey this week and it's only Wednesday, and that alone would piss her off if he keeps it up.

Even as a single man, he wouldn't have much to give her. He is just leftovers from another life, and she's got a new one to live.

So he can give her this. Another chance at another life. He can give her a clean break, a fresh start. He can give her everything if he says nothing. She's found the strength to leave; he has to have the strength to let her go.

He's living in the gray. She's always been his grasp on color.

"You want to have lunch?" he finds himself saying. He clears his throat so that the grainy scratch that has permeated his voice as of late will go away. It never does.

Olivia looks up and the rest of the squad room fades away. The noises blend, and the room is underwater and the only thing he can see is this; her. He sees the past. He hears her laughing as they leave for a beer one night; he sees her stalking after Alex, her voice raised because she is convinced the ADA is tactically wrong. He sees Olivia by the lockers, ready to quit until their captain intervenes; he remembers the afternoon three days after she finds out Kathy has left him. That afternoon Olivia puts a lunch on his desk. It is one she has made him, brown bag and all, to match the one she has made herself. As if responsibility for him has passed to her, no questions asked.

He is living in yesterday. He sees nothing ahead.

Please, don't leave me, Olivia. I'll sleep outside your apartment door if that makes it easier. I won't come inside anymore. You won't even hear me. Just let me stay there.

I'm afraid I will still go there after you leave.

I can't figure out where else to be.

"El," she says softly. Olivia clears her throat, too, because her voice hasn't quite decided on a single decibel lately. Her eyes are so dark that they reflect everything behind him. She's about to say something and he hears her, two years ago, chasing him down the hallway, screaming at him that if he has something to say, to just say it. He hears her again and again.

If you have something to say, Elliot, just say it!

He's decided she must be going to California. She knows where she is headed now, they've told her. But she won't tell him and he thinks that's good. If he doesn't know, he won't be able to go. So he picks California to imagine, because it's good to see her there. He thinks of her with sunglasses perched on the top of her head; pretends she will buy flip flops and develop an affinity for surfing.

He imagines she will laugh there. Something about all the sun and serotonin.

But he's watching the memories of this place play out in his head. He's living with ghosts; they've come early to haunt him. They couldn't even wait until she was gone. He tries to imagine her desk empty, everything gone. He can't get his head around all of the blank spaces, the implications, the finality. He thinks it's like one of those tricks where someone whips the tablecloth out from beneath a fully set table, and the china is supposed to just settle back into place provided the cloth is ripped away fast enough.

He wants to swipe his arm across her desk and send everything clattering to the floor now, once and for all, just so that what's done is finally done.

He wants to grab her, to tell her he will be enough. He wants to tell her that he'll figure out how to be something that vaguely resembles all that she deserves. He wants to tell her that the Pacific Ocean never gets warm and that those fucking earthquakes will wake her in the middle of the night by shaking her bed and there will be no one there to hold her like he could.

He wants to tell her that just as she hasn't told him where she will be living, he has kept secrets from her for her own good, too.

"No," she says.

He is silent.

He doesn't get what she's saying until long moments later, when she's already back to her files. He'd asked her to lunch, she'd said no.

That's right, he thinks. They stopped eating together three days ago.

He's watching her leaving, and he thinks that in the midst of the ghosts he's watching, he sees himself. Who he used to be; that man is roaming these halls. He's leaning up against the lockers, teasing her about a date, that man is grabbing his coat and following her sure footsteps as they raced out of here to track down a lead. That man is now gray and transparent, no longer solid, and he's still with her, he'll be with her when she's gone.

She won't eat with him anymore.

He's watching her leaving, and he thinks he'll watch himself go, too.

She hears him outside her door on the last night.

She has a flight the next morning, six a.m., and it's nearly midnight already. But she hears him, hears the movement outside the door. She wonders if she should let him in, if this will be too much for him; for her. The boxes are stacked along the wall, shadows dancing in between them. She's got a blanket out and the bare mattresses, but nothing else.

It was just supposed to be enough to get through the night.

Maybe that's why he is here. Just enough to get through the night.

When she opens the door, her fingers are numb to the sensation of the doorknob. Her body's been shutting down so she can't feel anything. Her heart was the first to go, her sense of the touch the latest. She wonders when her lungs will give up.

He's standing there, and he's holding a six-pack of beer. His tie is loose, his jacket rumpled, and she can tell he's had a few already. His eyes are red, swollen, and his lips look like he's been chewing on them. He's just staring at her, and he's lost, and so she's going to let him in.

She always has.

He steps past her, into her space.

He always has.

"Liv," he says brokenly, sliding the beer heavily onto the breakfast bar as if he'd been holding it for hours. He's bent over, his broad back illuminated by the moonlight. His big hands are gripping the edge of the counter. "I don't want to say it," he cracks raggedly. "I don't." He shakes his head back and forth. "God help me, I want to let you go. I want to..." He chokes a little and stops. His fingertips are bright white against the Corian countertops.

He's the biggest thing she's ever known, and he's breaking in front of her and she's going to be done, too, if he keeps going. She thinks of the horrible things she's seen. She's seen a body plunge off the side of a building when the Towers fell that morning, and she remembers knowing in that instant that she'd finally seen desperation.

Elliot's crumbling and he'll take her with.

Olivia steps forward and lets the palm of her hand rest on his back. He flinches, but he lets her touch him. She slides her hand upwards until her whole forearm is against the heat of his jacket. Her forehead falls forward, resting on him, too. One last time in the heat of him. She thinks of dying one day, and wonders if this moment will be what she will remember of him in the instant before she stops breathing. She thinks it's obscene that she will never know more of him. That in this lifetime, she won't know his touch, not anymore, not any more.

"Chicago," she whispers into the dark. "They're sending to me to Chicago."

He turns then, the counter at his back. His eyes scare her. They're emptying as she watches. "It's too fucking cold in Chicago," he grates painfully. "They should have sent you somewhere…somewhere…" He stops mid-sentence, as if that's the moment he realizes that she's really leaving for good.

It's all there, trapped into one single moment of dawning recognition, and she thinks it's what it must be to watch someone get hit by a car. He's perfectly still, but in the shadows of his eyes he's spinning, tumbling, horror is filling his crevices. She wonders what he would have looked like had he seen the accident with her and his wife; if the moment the car stopped, spun, crushed, crashed, he would have as well. It was in that one single moment, when the car nearly broke and her eyes closed, that she thought of nothing but him. Of how he had looked in the car on the night he had asked her to flick her lights, so protective and caring. She thought of him outside of his house in Queens, that smug look on his face, when she had yelled about the protective detail. She thinks she imagined him on that night outside of his apartment, their knees touching, their friendship sliding back into place like that one missing piece of the puzzle.

He's all she's ever known.

She shakes her head, her lips pressing together to keep it all in. But the pressure is too much in her head, so her eyes fill and spill instead. She tells him. "What if," her breaths are harsh, infused with air. "What if I can't do it out there, El?"

It seems ridiculous to think of Manhattan as a cocoon. As being shelter. But it is. He made it seem smaller by being in it. The rest of the world seems harder. The rest of the world, the rest of her life, is daunting. Impossible. She wants to lay with him, to listen to his voice forever. She wants to hear him laugh, to lie on him in the middle of a storm and do crossword puzzles while the rain beats down. She doesn't want to leave. She doesn't want to start over.

She likes her skin the way it is. Intact.

But her insecurity has always been his catalyst for strength. Elliot's eyes dry, his pain fading as his irises pick up a furious glint in the shadows. "Don't think like that, Liv. You've got this." His voice is gruff. "You'll do great." He drops his head, rubbing his hand over his face. She thinks that for some reason, he might actually be smiling all of a sudden. When he looks back at her, she sees a precious, sad, shy grin on his face. "It's the rest of the world I'm worried about," he teases softly. Gently.

She can't hold anything in. Not anymore. Olivia shatters against the sweetness in his smile. Against the rarity of the moment. Against him she collapses, her chest splintering as she finally cries for him, in front of him. It's a horrible sound, the one she is making. It's filled with pain and nothing, it's got no future. She loves him, she thinks as he hauls her up against him. She loves him and she's never loved anything like this. He is crushing her and she is finally warm against the rough wool of his jacket. He's murmuring things into her hair about what she's got ahead of her. He's painting pictures in her head of a life that she knows she will never manage to lead.

He's holding her up.

Against the harsh, damp fabric of him, she finally pulls her lips above his shoulder. She leaves her fingers scraping and grabbing him, but she frees her face, so she can turn it against the heated skin of his neck.

"It's good, you know," she rasps.

He's silent for a long time. His hand is rubbing her back, and his heartbeat rages against her body. "What is?" he finally whispers in return.

"Being loved. It's so much. It's so much and I never knew…" She wants to say more, but he's holding her so tight she can't breathe. She thinks Manhattan has even silenced itself for them tonight, because there is no more rain, no sirens, no traffic. It's just the silence and the shadows, a few packed boxes and some mattresses that would never allow her any boundaries no matter how big it was.

"I'm glad you know," Elliot says into her hair. His voice has been sifted. It's powdery and fragile, as if it could float away. "I'm glad you know that I…." His fingers dig into her back. "That I love you."

She is silent as he holds her, one last time. She doesn't tell him that she meant more than even that. She doesn't tell him that even though she can have nothing more of him, she's had more than she had ever expected of anything or anyone because of him. She doesn't tell him that she had expected to never know. That as a child, she'd decided she could live without. She doesn't tell him that he's broken past every barrier she has ever placed, that her fortresses meant nothing when faced with just his eyes.

She doesn't tell him that he's taught her all she's ever known of love, that he's been the only one to give it to her.

She doesn't tell him that he is her home, but that she will leave it so that he can keep his intact.

She doesn't tell him that he has shown her the depth of his love when he took on a child that wasn't his.

She doesn't tell him that love means sacrifice.

She doesn't, because as he holds her, she is sure that he already knows.

Chapter 8

A/N: Please excuse the unfunniness of this author's note. We just wanted to wish everyone a happy new year and we promise sooner or later, the emo-want to gauge your eyes out-want to stab someone or yourself angst will end. Unfortunately, this is not that chapter. But it's coming. It really is. We promise. We really, really promise.

Spring seems to come earlier in Chicago.

It's crisper, brighter, the winds seemingly soften overnight. She's been in the city for nearly six weeks, and she's beginning to get a feel for it. She likes her apartment, it's got history and she doesn't, so she thinks it's a good fit. She was lucky to find the walkup in a residential neighborhood in Old Town, and Lincoln Park is calmer than even the deepest recesses of Central Park.

She goes to the church down the street sometimes. St. Michael's, it's called. She started sitting in the back pews at night when she discovered the building was one of the few to survive the Great Fire of Chicago. There was something to it, being in a place that was protected amidst the destruction that raged around it. The candles burn late into the night, and she usually sits on the edge of the pew, her fingers trailing the smooth mahogany carvings. She doesn't talk to God; she just sits quietly, wondering if God will talk to her instead.

She only hears Elliot's voice on those nights. She hears him laughing, she hears his whispers into her hair late at night, and she pulls her coat tighter around her body, unwilling to learn the restaurants, the museums, the shops of a place she can't call home. She stares at the paintings, the rich fabrics and the stained glass windows of the church and she loses herself.

The cross fascinates her. The way two planes intersect, the way they are permanently, divinely bound together, the way they form the basis for sacrifice.

Some nights, her memories are scattered - a phrase here, a movement there. Other nights she remembers him in order. The way a case had played out, the way it had changed them in the weeks after.

She hasn't unpacked much. Just some blouses, some dress pants, a few things for the kitchen. She keeps telling herself this is the week she'll settle in, and instead she finds herself in a ball on her bed, the covers pulled around her.

She swears that she can still smell him on her sheets. On the nights that his scent lingers, she finds sleep. It's in her slumber that she hears the rain, sees the red light on her ceiling in New York, feels his hand reach for hers in the dark.

She'd give up everything for just that again. His skin on hers. His hand flat against her palm. It was oddly innocent, the ways in which she craved him. Despite all of the shit they both lived in, they had found something clean, child-like, pure.

The changes came quickly, without warning.

The first time she heard a suspect curse out the fucking feds, she had nearly smiled, until she realized she was one of them now. She'd flinched, wanting to throw her badge on the ground and head to New York, desperate to ask Cragen for her badge back, the one that fit. She hates her new gun, it is too heavy. The hallways of the federal building are too sterile, the carpet seems to be permanently new. There are too many framed pictures on the wall and once in awhile, she startles, thinking that amongst the hundreds of ties that she passes every day, one of them matches one of Elliot's.

She wonders what he is doing. She watches the clock, wondering if he is at lunch. She imagines that his new partner is someone young, someone who has just made Detective. She likes to think that Elliot is teaching them, is sympathetic if they puke, that he doesn't eat alone at his desk late at night.

She hasn't spoken to him in six weeks. The third time his name showed up on her cell, she finally relented and walked into one of the stores on Michigan, and bought herself a new phone, with a local number. She didn't call to give it to him. She wonders if he thinks he got the number wrong the first time he heard the disconnected tone. She wonders how long it will be before he calls the field office.

She wants to go home. She shakes with it, the need to go home.

She didn't really know she had one, until she couldn't allow herself to be there.

It's four-thirty on her seventh Friday away when she sees a shadow cross her desk. She looks up, and she's met with soft, pale green eyes that are barely crinkling at the corners.

"Olivia, we're heading to Danny's for a beer in about a half hour. You want to join us?"

Special Agent Mike Kelly. She's been teamed up with him since she arrived, and she has to give him credit. He's barely thirty, but he's dedicated. He's easy-going, plays by the rules. He never yells, he fills out all of his paperwork before it's due. He doesn't pry into her silence, he's only asked her a few questions about Special Victims. He's from somewhere in Minnesota, and he's got a twang in his voice that she likes, that she listens for. It's unfamiliar, it makes her feel like she's on vacation. Just visiting.

She doesn't do this. Socialize. She doesn't want to make friends, she can't invest. She invested once and she's been raw ever since. She's surviving, because she won't allow herself less. But she's not living because she won't allow herself more.

She's about to say no. She's got the decline hovering on her lips.

You'll do great.

She hears Elliot on that last night she spent in his arms. He's too strong, too completely trapped within her to simply be a ghost. He's talking to her and she's afraid she's already disintegrating, becoming less than the person he knows.

She blinks.

Kelly smiles, rubbing his hand over his light brown hair. "You should come. You can leave whenever you want, you know."

Her fingers freeze on the pen she is holding. "Okay," she whispers. She nods, because she is hoping the assent will be enough. He'll leave her alone until they are ready to go.

You can leave whenever you want.

This is what she fantasizes about. Late at night, this is what fills her head, until it's so clear in her vision that she has no choice to believe that it is real. She pretends that she goes home; she imagines that Elliot is waiting for her. In the darkest part of the night, behind the bliss of her eyelids, she has packed her things again; she has turned in the badge that is always too big, too much.

And when she goes home, he is always standing there, smiling. She always steps into him; he always holds her.

She always tells him she loves him; he always says it easily in return. Because in her fantasies, God has finally forgiven the both of them for all of the victims, for all of the mistakes, and for all of the love.

In her fantasies, He's forgiven them for all that they simply couldn't help.

He's quiet these days.

He thinks it is strange that he used to be so loud. He remembers yelling at his kids, at his wife. At Olivia. But it seems incongruous that so much noise had ever come from within the same chest he now used.

He doesn't rage. He's not angry. He hates the pedophiles and the child molesters and the rapists. He hates them, but he does what he can, he locks them up. He's got a partner, and he's civil to that kid. He's taken the kid out for a beer a few times; he's gone to the firing range with him. The kid seems to like him well enough, hasn't complained or stared at Elliot in fear or disgust. The kid's pretty good with the victims, he's got four sisters and he's intuitive. The kid hangs out with Lake at night, and that suits Elliot just fine. He figures Lake's been filling him in on the past, and maybe that's why the kid never pries. Of course, it might just be that the kid doesn't care.

Two weeks after Olivia left, Kathy finally gave voice to the truth and lies that hovered between them. He'd brought the baby home from errands an hour past his bedtime and she'd been angry. She'd taken the baby from his arms, and settled him immediately to bed, and Elliot had known that the truth was coming as he heard Kathy's footsteps descend the stairs.

She'd finally been filled with all of the anger from all of the years. "At least call, Elliot!"

It was a stupid argument, really. He'd been hungry, he'd wanted a burger, so he'd taken the baby with. He'd shifted on his feet, his hands still stuffed into his coat pockets. He'd looked around the kitchen, trying to escape what he knew was coming.

"It's irresponsible!" she had hissed. "I was worried to death that something had happened, that-"

"He was with me, Kathy," Elliot had started quietly. He didn't have it in him to argue. If she wanted to yell at him, to hate him for the last few weeks, for the last few years, for their marriage falling apart, then she should just say it. He wasn't in the mood to hide the truth behind the trivial.

"It doesn't matter, Elliot. You said you'd bring him home by seven, it's half past eight and you weren't answering your cell. How do you think that makes me feel? I'm his mother for God's sake, it-"

He didn't know then why he had done it. Later he would think about it, he'd realize he was just tired. He was worn out from hiding, from trying to survive. He'd been tired of Kathy's inane arguments that had begun over the last few months. He'd been tired of trying.

He'd just wanted one thing, and he'd lost her. He didn't have a hell of a lot of fight left.

"And I'm his father," he'd murmured, locking his burning eyes on Kathy's. It was a dare really, and he knew that despite whatever words they both kept repeating, that her eyes wouldn't lie.

They didn't.

The air was thick between them, but her eyes were filled with all of it. The apologies, the pain, the need to survive. He didn't blame her, not really. She'd been fighting for their family, just like he had, and there was no reason to destroy the kids one more time, over one more mistake.

She shook her head that night. "God, Elliot-" she'd squeezed her eyes shut, her fists pressing against her eyelids. "God."

He'd been okay with it. It was easier like that, out in the open. They'd never speak of it again. There was no need to. The baby was his, was only his, despite blood and history and genetics. And now, at least the suspicion wouldn't eat at him, the guilt wouldn't eat at her. They stood in the kitchen that night, and in the silence, they made a decision.

A pact. A vow.

It reminded him of the night he told Olivia that he loved her. It was easier to simply lay the truth out in the open. Love meant sacrifice and he loved his baby beyond all thought, all reason.

He had tried to call Olivia a few times after that. He didn't want her to come home, not to him, he still wasn't much. But he wanted her to know. Wanted to hear her breathe after he told her.

Her phone had been disconnected. He thought about calling her office, and as his fingers hovered over the numbers on the dial, he gave in.

He put the phone back down that day, and tried to let her go.

She's found a bench on the south side of Lake Shore Drive, and it's never taken.

She sits there now at night, because after a few months, the church seemed to close in on her. The air isn't as humid at night in Chicago as it is in the summers in New York. There is a constant breeze that blows in off of Lake Michigan, one that keeps the air moving, that keeps reminding her to breathe.

She likes this one spot in the city. The dusk settles around her, and the streaks of orange linger in the sky. Sometimes she closes her eyes, leans her head back against the wooden slats of the bench and lets herself go. She never played make-believe as a child, but she plays it now, all the time. She hears a child laugh nearby, their footsteps rapid against the walking path and there is the sound of a mother's gentle cold as she chases after. There is the rumble of a father's amused laughter.

She plays make-believe.

She talks to him here. She has whole conversations with him. She never says anything out loud, but she asks him things. She listens to what he would say. The breeze lifts the strands of her hair, far longer now, and she squints against the vibrancy of the settling sky.

I miss you, Elliot.

In her head, he laughs. I miss you, too, Liv. It's quiet here, I'm not in trouble as much.

I didn't get you into trouble, El. I was the one who always saved your ass.

Are you sure it wasn't me who saved you?

Her heart cracks, because he's always been able to see through her. She smiles a little as the mother scoops the child up, against protests and giggles and innocence. She inhales, staring out at the endless lake. It's rougher sometimes than a lake should be. There have been nights that the waves were white-tipped from the wind. But tonight it's calm, it's just rocking. Swaying. It's calm, but she's seen what the storms can do, what they will do when they come again. And they do. The storms always return.

Tell me the best things about the baby, El.

He's silent for a few moments, and he sighs. It's a deep sound, filled with love. You should see him crawl, Liv. He's so fast that you practically have to run after him. His favorite thing to play with is my badge. His small fingers trace the etchings in it. It always calms him down.

Does he sleep through the night?

Elliot is silent. He does, Liv. He does, but I don't. Do you?

She swipes her wet face, drinking in the sight of the child. His small legs are pumping, and he has taken off once again, in the same moment he was set down. She gets this. She knows about running just to feel the wind in her lungs.

I don't sleep, Elliot. I flipped the mattresses around. I've dug out the old sheets. But I can't smell you on them anymore. And it scares me, how tired I am. If you could just hold me, just for one more night, I think that might be enough. I could survive on that.

Come home, Liv.

She stands up, using the backs of her hands to dry her face. The sun is setting on a city she doesn't know. But she can't go home, especially not now. Because the wants have deepened, her needs for him have grown. She's spent the darkest parts of the nights in his arms, his mouth on hers. She's thought about his fingers on her cheek, sliding into her hair. She's imagined his big body slipping on top of hers; she's imagined the groans breaking from his throat. From hers.

She's imagined all of his bare skin on hers. She's imagined the way he would taste if he opened her mouth, kissed her hard until she could only breathe from within him.

Whiskey and honey.

Her memories hurt like hell. But she lives in them, she lives for them.

They are like him.

Harsh and gentle.

Relentless.

He's given up wearing ties again. The summer is too damned hot, and they make his shirt stick to him. They suffocate him, and he hates the way that the fabric will cling to his skin.

He's gone back to the henleys, the t-shirts, the things he hopes will let him breathe.

He sits in the booth at the deli on Forty-Third and waits for his daughter. It was Maureen's birthday yesterday, and he missed it. He's been living in the crib, chasing leads on a case for the last three days. He lost track of time and there was no one to tell him to go home.

So Maureen will come to him. She's asked him to lunch and didn't mention that he forgot to call. All he has to do is sit here and wait for her.

After twenty-three years, she's learned not to expect too much from him. She's probably learned that what she wants from him, she will have to teach him, take from him.

He stares at the menu. It's four pages long and he's not hungry. He can't find anything he wants to eat.

He knows by the bell on the door that Maureen has just walked in. The bell clatters, hitting the door more than once, and that has to be her because she always makes an entrance. She's always out of breath, she's always moving. Her cheeks are always flushed, her eyes are always lit.

He wonders where she gets that. Maybe from her mother, the way she had been years ago.

She's wearing yellow, and she's so bright. He's grateful for it, for the color.

"Hey, Dad," she grins, tossing her oversized bag into the booth, sliding in across from him. "Were you waiting long?"

She's waited twenty-three years for him to stop screwing up. He missed her birthday, so the best she can hope for is that he'll learn by next year.

He shakes his head, and she's smiling so earnestly that he can't help it. From somewhere deep within he feels himself smile. "I'm sorry I missed your birthday," he says, clearing the sand from where it clogs his throat.

Maureen shrugs, leaning forward on the table. She's been applying to grad schools. She's thinking about becoming a criminal psychologist and he hates it. Hates the idea, but he hasn't told her. He will. Soon. Just not on the day after he's forgotten her birthday. "No big deal." She flashes that smile at him again, and he blinks against it. "But you're on the hook to buy lunch."

It's that easy with her. She flirts with their waiter, she answers two calls on her cell. She laughs easily and her fingers are always moving. Fidgeting. As if she's filled with too much energy and not enough outlets. She tucks her hair behind her ear and it doesn't stay put for more than two seconds. She orders him a club sandwich when the menu swims in front of him. She replaces his coffee with a cup of green tea and he stares at the cup, at the teabag, and wonders if Olivia still drinks the stuff.

She's got a small Yankees hat tucked into her big bag, and she's laughing, because she's convinced her mother to let her and a friend take the baby to a game. She rolls her eyes when she tells him about Dickie's girlfriend. He listens to her, desperate for more. He doesn't know how she is his.

They haven't received the check yet when she leans forward, across the table. Her soft fingers reach for his hand. For the fist he's been making for the last five minutes, without knowing he was all tensed up like that.

"Dad," she says, her voice dropping and her head tilting. Her eyes dim a little bit in concern. "You heard from her at all?"

He flinches. His heart stills because no one dares to talk about her. No one. Not Cragen, not Fin, not Munch. Not even Lake, who has never known when to shut up. Kathy has never again uttered her name, not since the night she came home from Olivia's apartment.

But his daughter sits in front of him, her fingers tracing a pattern on the back of his hand. She's not backing down, she's just masking the brutal questions with her empathy.

He shakes his head. "No," he tries to look at his daughter. To maintain eye contact as he feels everything he avoids come crashing down.

Maureen looks down, at her own hands. At the table. When she lifts her gaze again, she isn't his daughter. She might be his only friend. "You think about calling her." It's a statement. There is no question, and there shouldn't be. There is no uncertainty in the obvious. Maureen lifts her chin, daring him to defy her.

He just stares at her. He wants to break. He wants to finally shatter. It's been too many months of holding it together. It's been too many months of just moving, of avoiding his own head. He's been numb, but he's been hollow for so long, he had forgotten there was anything different.

He wants to scream, here in the deli on Forty-Third. He wonders if his daughter will help him get home.

"Dad, you should call her," Maureen says gently. Her eyes are filling. "You're gonna get yourself hurt if you keep this up."

He knows she is right. His reflexes are slower these days, his head isn't in the game. He has to clear his head when he holds his gun. Has to remember that she isn't with him, that the kid won't instinctively know what he is going to do when they are chasing after a suspect. He has to consciously remember to speak to people.

Her cell phone rings again and she has to answer it. He sits there in silence as she starts packing up her bag, putting the hat away. She finishes her call and he's still waiting for the check.

"I have to go," she says quietly. There is apology in her voice. She slides out of the booth, dragging her bag with her and straightening the skirt on her yellow sundress. She looks at the door, and then looks back at him. Her hand settles on his cheek and she bends over to kiss him on the forehead. "Check on her at least, Dad. It will make you feel better." Maureen straightens and reaches into her tote. She pulls out an envelope, and by the pale purple of it, he knows it is a birthday card his daughter has received.

Maureen sets it on the table in front of him. "She was always the one who reminded you, wasn't she?"

There is no accusation. His eyes fall to the scrawl on the outside of the envelope. His skin aches as he reads it. He can't take his eyes off the return address. Her first initial. Her last name. A street address. His daughters name scrawled beneath it, in the same messy loop.

"Keep it," Maureen says with a smile.

His fingers trace Olivia's handwriting as his daughter leaves, rattling the bell again. He sits there for another hour, his thumb rubbing the envelope as he reads the card she touched only days ago again and again.

Happy Birthday, Maureen. It's hard to believe how old you've become. I hope your wishes come true and your dreams only become bigger. Love, Olivia.

He rubs her name on the envelope so many times that her initial fades before he remembers to pay the check.

He thinks about what she's said in the card to his daughter.

And he wonders if she sleeps soundly enough that dreams find her.

She has these dreams in the moments she allows herself sleep.

The wind always ripples through the dark night, the trees swaying like raging fires that were once desperate to tear down Chicago and its havens of peace. It must be past midnight, because it's dark, so dark, and the entire world seems to be at peace, at rest. She wanders down the streets of Old Town, but the blocks alternate and she finds herself in New York, outside the precinct where she had once lived, once thrived. She looks, looks for something to save her, something to guide her way, but it never comes. The streets continue to change, an interwoven series of places that honor her life. She walks and walks and it's on Mott Street where she sees herself leaning over a dead body with him beside her. He whispers in her ear, but she doesn't hear it now, doesn't know what he's saying, what he's asking. She's desperate, so desperate to know, and when she moves closer, it's no longer him beside her, but the new man she works with. On Everett Road, miles outside of the city of Chicago, she interviews a victim. But something's not right, it's not, because when she looks for him, he's not there, and she thinks that someone made a mistake. It's then that she yells for him, yells and yells, but no one listens, no one turns, like she's invisible, or maybe just a ghost of the woman she used to be.

But tonight, as the snow falls down in the city that has yet to feel like home, there's a new dream that comes to her, that startles her, that causes her to awaken. The wind remains, so loud, so forceful she feels as if she'll die, as if she'll blow away on the next gust and land in a place where her life can truly begin. But there are no interwoven streets tonight. Tonight, she is solely in New York. The metal is crushed against her, and she can't breathe, she can't. Her eyes flutter, and when she awakens, she is alone. There's no one beside her, no car that has crashed into her. There's just metal, and debris and things that make her think she's going to die, that make her think it would be easier to just stop breathing. The world is silent; no ambulances, no cars, no people. It's only her, like it's always been, learning to live, to thrive, to do it all alone.

The houses, the streetlights, New York fades away, and when she turns, she sees him outside her window. He stands there, gazing around the streets, looking for something, for anything. It takes minutes for him to turn to the window, to find her, because this time when she calls his name, nothing comes out but flooding water; nothing comes out because when you're drowning, there's nothing but rippling waves and a loss of air and the desperation to let go, to let it all go. She places her hand on the window, and she grasps for him, but he doesn't know, he doesn't. And when he turns to the car, his eyes lifeless, he places his hand against hers. She watches how his fingers flex, how his ring finger shines with the gold of his wedding band.

It's when he's staring right through her, with his hand still pressed against hers, that she realizes he doesn't see no matter how long he looks. He opens his mouth, and he utters her name, but there's something in his tone, in his eyes, that causes her to know. She's nothing to him now but a memory, a ghost, a reminder of a life no longer. The water rises tonight, and when he utters her name, she feels herself drowning. She can swim, she can, but instead, she lets go.

Even in her reality, she's always been the one to let go.

She's awake now, and she can't catch her breath, can't settle down. Her phone rests on her night stand, her medium for time. She no longer has the clock that flashes and flashes; she no longer wants to remember that he isn't there, that the red light from the smoke alarm no longer guides her way in the darkness. She reaches for the phone, the time illuminating in an electric green.

It's ten where he is, and she wonders what he's doing, who he is with. She wonders who stands beside him during crime scenes now, if he has sex with his wife when he's home after a long day at work. The phone is tight in her hand, crushing like that mental had been on that day so long ago. She doesn't know why she thinks of it so much tonight, why her dreams had changed after all this time. She doesn't know why after eight months of being here, after it all, she wants to call him, needs to call him even though boundaries tell her she shouldn't. But boundaries have never been her friend, her forte, and she finds herself dialing when her heart accepts and her brain screams.

"Stabler," he mumbles and she realizes he doesn't know this number, this area code.

She doesn't talk, not for seconds, for minutes, for what seems like hours. She doesn't talk when she has the option to listen to him breathe, to know that as long as he's still alive, she is as well. "Hi," she finally answers, and she wonders if he'll still know her despite how weak her voice has become.

Seconds, minutes, maybe even hours pass until he answers as well. He's stunned, and she wonders if he ever called to find out her number, if he ever asked Cragen, or Fin, or Munch. She wonders if when a voice is lost, if it could ever return, if it could ever be the same again. "What's wrong?" There's no anger, and she thinks she loves him for his concern, for his dedication long after she's not his partner, not his anything.

She misses her flashing clock and the red light of her smoke alarm. She misses sky scrapers, and pizza and the smell of flowers that bloom in Central Park. She misses it all, but she's never missed him more. "You told me you loved me."

But that wasn't wrong, it wasn't.

"I know." He sounds different and she can't place her finger on it, can't remember his moods, his emotions, his stances she once wanted to fill a scrapbook with. "How's Chicago?"

"Cold." She turns over in bed and outside, the snow blankets her window. She thinks of him beside her, of the rain, the snow, the crossword puzzles that she never gets to dream about. The tears gather in her eyes, and she breathes, but even on dry land, she feels as if she's drowning, suffocating. "I'm sorry to bother you." She wishes she knew what to say; she always wishes she knew. "I probably shouldn't have called. I know it's been a while, I don't know why—"

"The accident," he says quietly. "It was a year ago tomorrow."

She rests her head back against the pillows, and in the web of her tears, shadows dance across the ceiling. She hadn't remembered, she hadn't. Her chest burns, and she wants to scream, to live, to die, because she suddenly understands why she had called, why she had let herself go. She thinks of that broken metal, of his wife, of the jacket that had covered Kathy's face. She thinks of the blood, of all the blood, of the machines, of it all. "We were okay," she whispers, and she thinks of him on that night, of his hands on her back, of his muttered words against her skin. "We walked away from it…we…it shouldn't be this hard. We walked away."

But she never did. She never could.

"Liv," he murmurs, and the air is gone. He fights to say something, to comfort her, but she knows he cannot. He fights, when all that comes out of his mouth is, "I miss you."

"I…I shouldn't have called." She squeezes her eyes shut and she wishes she still prayed, still went to church, even if she never believed. It's too cold for the bench now and she thinks of going back to St. Michael's; she thinks of going back and finding solace in stained glass windows, in people who sit in pews and believe, in anything to find peace from the conversations with him in her mind. "I thought leaving you would be the best thing." She talks, but it's not to him, it's not to anyone. "I thought…I don't know what I thought." Her lips feel chapped, her heart feels incomplete. "I never wanted to be thought of as an affair."

She thinks he stops breathing, that when he starts again, it's slower, sadder, a bit more desperate. "No matter what happened, Olivia, no matter what didn't happen, no matter what Kathy said to you back then, you weren't an affair. You…" He pauses, and she wonders if he has to find words, if he has to leave the room so his wife doesn't hear. She should hang up, she should, she should. "I…I fell in love with you," he whispers, and it's so low, so faint, she knows she must have imagined it.

The tears continue to slip down her cheek, and she misses her old bed, the queen, the king, the one with him in it. "What are you doing for Elliot's birthday?"

"Olivia—"

"Tell me," and it comes out like a plea.

And he obliges, like he has so many times before. "Kathy's throwing him a birthday party. I never understood why a one year old needed a party." She hears something rustle on the other end of the line and her breathing slows, then quickens, then slows again. "You were supposed to be his Godmother. Kathy wanted to ask you, but I knew, I knew it would hurt you."

She wonders if someone has ever drowned without water being present. "It's better this way."

"I forgot Maureen's birthday this year." She can hear the disappointment in his voice; she should have called, reminded him. She was always the one to remind him. "On Kathleen's birthday, I bought her a card for a twenty year old." She had bought a card for a twenty-one year old; she had written a message about drinking and prayed that he wouldn't see it. "You remembered both. You sent Maureen a card and she got it on her birthday. You knew Kathleen was turning twenty-one."

"I'm good with dates," but she's not and he knows it too. She's good when it matters; she's always been good with things when it matters. "They love you. It doesn't matter if you forgot, if you were a year off. But maybe next year you can get a calendar."

She listens to him laugh; she wonders if when the heart breaks, the cracking is as defiant as the ground splitting from an earthquake. "Do you like it there? Are you happy?"

"Yeah," but it's unconvincing, raw, broken. "Talk to me."

"About what?"

"Anything." She closes her eyes, because it burns, it all burns. "Just talk to me."

In the darkness, she sees him beside her, like he used to be. He's laying across her bed, staring up at the ceiling, watching the shadows, the lights. His breath hits her when he laughs, and she wants to tell him she'll come home, that she'll respect his marriage as long as she can see him, know he's there.

"I went out with Lake and Fin the other night," he says, and she misses that world. "We were on a case for almost a week straight, and I think we all needed a drink. We go to this dive bar downtown, and Lake spends the entire night hitting on this woman. She wasn't interested at first, but he didn't give up, and at the end of the night, she agreed to go home with him." She can hear the laughter in his voice and she waits for the punch line, for something to make her smile, to make her come back to life. "It was getting late, Fin and I decided to head home too, but when I went to the bathroom, Lake's date was in there."

And it comes, like a blessing, like an answered prayer. She laughs and it sounds strange coming out of her throat, scratchy, and pained, yet so real. "Oh God, he almost took home a transvestite?" She laughs harder and the tears abate, the water fades. "What happened when you told him?"

There's a smile in his voice, and she can picture it, she can. "He kindly told her that he wasn't interested in those services, but if she wanted someone to talk to, she could give him a call."

"Did you guys give him shit about it?"

"Lake requested to work with Munch for the week."

Her laughter dies down, and her chest clenches, begins to ache again. "I had this dream tonight that I was alone in the car." She shouldn't tell him; she shouldn't make him see things she wishes she could forget. "You were there, but you didn't see me. You didn't know I was there. Sometimes…" She stops, because she needs to, and begins again because she has to. "You were all I had, and I needed more, I need more, but…don't let me go."

"You know if you ever need anything, I'm here," but he's not hers first and foremost. He's not, he's not. "Have you been seeing anyone out there?"

She thinks of Mike Kelly, of how he had asked her out and she had accepted because she was looking for Elliot, because she wanted someone who was like him. But he wasn't. No one ever could be. "I'm okay without being with someone," but she's not because she wants to be his first and foremost. "I should let you go. You have a big day tomorrow." She takes a deep breath, turning towards the window. "If the accident hadn't happened, would I still be there?"

Flakes of snow fall onto the window, create a path, a picture. "Would you have fallen in love with me either way?"

Her eyes close, and even if he's not there, she nods. "I guess I would have."

"You can always come home, Liv. You can always come back."

She wants to tell him that her home is crowded, that her home is filled with a family, with a wife, with kids, that there would be no room for her, that there's never been room for her anywhere. But instead, she clears her throat, she wipes away her tears. "Goodnight, El."

"For the record, I would have too. I would have loved you either way." She listens to him breathe for one second, two, three. "Night, Liv."

She holds the phone in her hand long after he's hung up.

She holds the phone in her hand long after his voice has stopped screaming its confession, its guilt, its truth.

She holds the phone in her hand long after she's fallen back to sleep, long after he's beside her, and she's finally at rest.

He wonders what she's doing tonight.

He thinks about what Christmas looks like in Chicago, if the buildings blink with silver lights, if there's a tree somewhere in the middle of the city, if there's one in the apartment she rents. He wonders what it looks like sometimes, if she's decorated, if she's put the dishes into the cabinets. He wonders what size bed she has, and if she still sleeps to the left or has learned to adjust to center again.

It's almost one, and he thinks he should call her and wish her a Merry Christmas, but it's only eleven there, and he hasn't spoken to her since the moment he told her he loved her again. He's wanted to call, but there was Elizabeth's class play, and Elliot's first word. There was a part of him that wished he would say Dada before anything else, something that would let him know that his son loved him despite biology, despite the truths and lies. But it had been Ickie, because his son had fed the baby words, names, although the moment it was spoken, it hadn't come out right.

Then again, he learned that most words never did.

He scrolls through his phonebook on his cell and stares at her number. 312. He should have known the moment she called it was her; he should have known because he had tried to look her up, but wouldn't get past the first number of the area code, wouldn't violate the privacy he knew she needed.

It's windy tonight, and the snow falls, and Kathleen had squealed when she realized it would be a white Christmas. The windows in his car rattle against the force, and he turns the heat up higher. He sits outside the house in Queens, but it's dark, all the kids, Kathy, asleep. He should go in, finish wrapping the presents, leave out cookies and milk not because his kids believe but because it's tradition. Because the world can change, people can fight, lives can become altered, yet some things always remain the same, some things have to remain the same or else the world would crumble and fall.

He dials, and hits send, listens to it ring, wonders if she's out with friends or if she's alone, if she'll always be alone.

She answers on the fourth ring, and she's out of breath, and panting, and he thinks that maybe she answered in the middle of sex because he let her leave, because he didn't know how to make her stay. He thinks that maybe she's celebrating Christmas, and that maybe she didn't need the sun and the surf, but someone who could give her everything that he hadn't. "Hello?" She doesn't answer with her name, and he realizes she knew, that she knew it was him.

"You sound busy."

"There's a gym next door to my building. I just got in."

He hadn't known that he had stopped breathing, until he does, until he inhales, and exhales, and lives. "I wanted to wish you a Merry Christmas."

He thinks there's a smile in her voice; he thinks she sounds happy and he's glad but if she's let go, he doesn't want to be forced to do so as well. "You too." He can hear her fridge door open and close; he listens as she takes a sip of her water, as her breathing slows. He thinks that if he closes his eyes, he can see her sitting down, he can see her relaxed.

"Doing anything?"

The bottle squeezes in her hand, and he wonders if water has spurted out of the top. "One of my co-workers invited me to her house to spend it with her family. We'll see."

He leans his head back against the padded rest, tilts his head to face the snow, the purity that has never been pure. "You should go, Liv." He places his hand on the steering wheel and for a split second, he wonders how long it would take to drive to Chicago. He wonders how many cups of coffee it would take to get him there in a straight shot; he wonders if she'd be happy to see him or if she'd force him away. "I didn't think you would be gone this long," he mutters, and when it comes out of his mouth, he didn't even know he'd been thinking it.

He shouldn't have called her; he shouldn't keep ruining her life, ruining her chances at a life. He doesn't intend to. When he thinks about her, he hopes she has found peace, that she has found happiness. There are times he hopes she has found someone to openly love her, and there are times he thinks he'd kick the guy's ass if given a chance. But he calls because he has to, because he has to know she's still there, still okay.

"I like it here," she says, but she's lying because the pitch in her voice is lower instead of higher and after working with her for nine years, after being in love with her, it is one of the many things he's learned.

She doesn't ask about the kids anymore, about Kathy. He knows she loves him, but sometimes, late at night when it's not dark enough, when there's no red light, when there's no flashing, he wonders if she hates him more. "He's not mine, Liv." He doesn't know why it's come out of his mouth, he doesn't know when it's never mattered, when it never will.

Her sigh comes through the line and it's agitated and sad and he thinks her hand is over her face now, wishing she hadn't answered, wishing she hadn't called with her new number last month. "Elliot, you have to stop questioning his paternity, you have to—"

"No," he interrupts. "I…" He's going to burn in hell for partaking in this conversation; he's going to burn in hell because he makes it seem like it matters when it doesn't, when it never has. "I love him more than anything in this world. But I know…Kathy went out on a couple of dates with a friend of a friend." He closes his eyes, wishes he was beside her in her queen sized bed, even her king sized bed, as long as he was next to her. "It wasn't serious and she stopped seeing him a couple of weeks before I came back." His voice is strained and she shouldn't know this, she shouldn't have to know she helped deliver another man's child. "Is it wrong that I want someone else's child?"

He thinks of the case that caused them to be in a car together because he wasn't there. Of the man destroyed by the news that this child, his little boy wasn't his. He thinks that God must have stock in irony and foreshadowing and sin because in that case, if his life proved anything, it was that. He thinks of all one man went through because he loved his son, and he knows he'd do the same.

"He's your baby, El," and in her words, he believes, he believes. "She knew you'd love him, that you'd want him. Biology isn't everything."

He knows that, but it still causes him to question. "You've always thought it was."

"Because I had nothing else." He looks to his right, to the passenger seat, to the side of the car she usually resided on. She hated to drive; she hated to drive unless she wanted to prove a point of some kind. "How was the Christmas party this year?"

"Munch almost lit Fin's hair on fire when he was lighting the Chanukah candles. And I think Lake and Casey might be dating."

He doesn't know if she still speaks to Casey. He hadn't ever asked.

"Does Casey know about the transvestite?"

He smiles, and he misses her, he does, he does. "Fin told her. I don't think she was bothered by it." He thinks of her in past years during those parties, of how he would hear her laughter from across the room, how she'd nurse one drink for the entire night because she didn't want to go home with someone she'd later regret. He thinks of the Christmas after her mother had died, how he had found her on the roof, staring out into the city skyline. She was shivering, and he had taken off his coat, handing it to her. It was in silence that they stood, the wind brutal, the night dark and filled with pain. She had spoken minutes later, a passing comment about her mother, about Christmas, and because neither of them had been in love then, she hid her tears behind the cold winter's night. He thinks of her last year, how she had kept her space, her distance, and he wonders if she knew then, if she knew what was happening before he ever did. "Do you have a tree?"

She rarely did when she lived in New York; he hopes she does now.

"A small one."

"What's Simon doing for Christmas?"

"You hate Simon," she muses. "Why are you asking?"

"I don't hate him."

"Yes, you do."

He smiles, and he should go inside soon, but he can't, not yet. "I know I do." He thinks of the wedding, of her in the white dress. He wonders if she's come home for it and never told him; she wonders if despite biology, she declined her attendance.

"He didn't get married yet," she murmurs, because she used to know how he thought, because she always will. "Lucy wanted to wait until she was done with night school. The wedding is in May."

He doesn't want to wait until then to see her; he doesn't think he can last longer than a year, and even in June, he's not sure she'll come by, he's not sure they'll be speaking then, if he'll survive all of this by then. "Are you coming home for it?"

"I can't, El," she whispers. "I can't come see you when I do."

He shouldn't have called tonight; he shouldn't have. "I think about it sometimes." He closes his eyes, and he's back in her bed, he's back in the darkness with the red light and flashing clock. "I think about when it happened, when it changed, and it never makes sense."

"It's not supposed to make sense." She's holding them up, and he thinks that the roles have reversed, that she has become stronger, that she has to protect him now. "You can't think about it. Don't make me…It happened and we both have to move on with our lives. You can't change it, and you can't figure out when it happened, because I've tried for a long time and I've never figured it out." Her words hitch on a pause, and he knows he has broken her for the night; he never should have called. "You have a good life. Don't throw it away. Okay? Promise me that."

He learned long ago that he could never make promises when he was eventually going to break them all.

"Will you go to your co-workers for dinner tomorrow?"

He thinks she's smiling now; he hopes she is.

"I'll think about it."

"Olivia—"

"I said I'd think about it, Elliot." He misses her, but she'll never let him say it, not tonight. "You should go. It's late over there."

He sees her on their nights together, their bodies close, and he closes his eyes because he wants her again, because he needs her. "Knock, knock."

"Who's there?"

"Mary."

Before she answers, he knows she's aware of the joke. "Mary, who?"

"Mary Christmas."

It's quiet, so quiet, and his chest burns, his heart aches. He wishes he knew the answers: to life, to the world, to her, to them. He wishes he didn't love her and yet wishes he could love her more. He wishes for a lot of things that never come true, that never work out.

"El?" Her voice is soft, and he opens his eyes, he focuses on the mobile's shadows in his youngest son's bedroom that dance across the shaded windows. "I'm okay now, you know. It's okay for you to let me go."

His eyes are moist and he forces himself to believe that it's the cold, that he has to go, that he'll be fine once he's inside. "You've always been okay, Liv, whether you believed it or not." He turns off the car; the heat and the air and the warmth evaporate into the night. "But what if I'm not ready for you to let go?"

"Goodnight, Elliot." He hears the tears in her voice, the sadness in her words. "Merry Christmas."

"Merry Christmas," he mutters, but she's already gone.

He doesn't feel the cold as he walks to the house, as he waits for the phone in his hand to vibrate, as he waits for her to call back.

He doesn't feel the cold, because after thirty minutes, and one present wrapped, he realizes that she already had.

She had let go the moment he had touched her in that hospital; she had let go in that moment and never returned.

A/N: So this one is a little better…I mean, let's face it, even when they're fun, they're always a little emo. But we tried…we did. We gave them some laughter. We gave them semi lives. We gave them what we could, even if they're still sort of depressing. On the bright side, we're getting there. On the down side? Well, you can probably figure it out by now. We also just wanted to thank JAGgedIverson376 for her beautiful playlist of this story. It's absolutely perfect and inspiring. Thank you!

Chapter 9

"Elliot."

His eyes pop open at the desperation in her voice. He had reached onto the nightstand the second his cell rang, without looking at the caller ID. The sound of his name tearing from her lips has him bolting upright.

"Christ, El -"

He grips his cell too tightly, his heart freezing. He reaches for the landline, expecting that she's in trouble. That she needs help. "Olivia, what's wrong?" he fires off, sitting up in the bed. He's dialing the squad room already, ready to have them connect to his Captain. Fuck those goddamned feds that can't keep her safe.

"I'm okay," she says brokenly and he sets the other phone down. His throat is immediately dry, so he flips back the covers, heading for the kitchen. She's okay. She's okay.

She sounds like shit.

He runs the tap in the kitchen, letting the water run icy cold. "Liv, talk to me."

Her voice is hoarse, like she's been crying for awhile, and he wonders what JFK has available to Chicago in the next two hours. It's barely dawn; he could be in Chicago to take her to a late breakfast. He shoves a glass beneath the faucet, filling it. He has to clear his larynx. He can't panic. He has to process that he can't hold her, he can only talk to her. His voice is all he has left.

She is breathing hard on the other end, and he thinks she might be close to hyperventilating. "Liv," he says, lowering his voice. Her name on his lips scars, it's too easily brought back, too quickly ingrained on his chest. It's too much relief, just to be able to say her name out loud after all this time. After all the months he's only been able to think it in silence.

"We've been tracking this little girl, Elliot," she breathes. "She went missing two days ago, and we had her. The sonofabitch who took her held her in his apartment, wouldn't let us near her. But I got him on the phone with me. I was just downstairs, El-" she breaks off, and he hears the clinking of a glass against another. He knows where this story is going. He prays to God she's got a full bottle of tequila with her.

"Olivia," he starts gently. He dumps the water, searches for the bottle of tequila he knows he has. He'll drink with her tonight. He finds it, and unscrews the top. He pours a healthy shot into the empty water glass. He wants to tell her it will be alright. That it isn't her fault. But he's been there too many times to fill her ears with bullshit that a thousand others could give her. "Tell me what happened."

He pours a little more into the glass and brings the bottle too as he heads for the couch. All of the lights are off, and it's just them and the tequila and the nightmares she is having while still awake.

"He put her on the phone with me, Elliot. He put her on and told her to beg. She was eight, El, she was eight," and she's breaking down. She's coughing to try and stop the tears, but it ends up sounding like she's choking. He wonders where the rest of her team is. Why she isn't out drinking until oblivion with them. Why she has come home to him, instead. Why she still seeks him; trusts him. Why in the dark, she still turns to him when he doesn't deserve it. Has never deserved it.

"He told her to beg," she whispers. "He told her if she begged hard enough, long enough, that he wouldn't kill her."

He doesn't sit on the couch. He sits on the floor. The bottle of tequila sits next to him and he'll stay up with her tonight. He'll stay with her until he can get her to sleep, or until the sun breaks and she's not alone in the dark. Until he hears her breathing even, until he can get her to just lay down.

He waits in silence for her to finish. For her to let the demons loose, for her to give them to him. He wants them out of her, because he can handle a few more if she'll only give them up.

Her breathing is erratic. He lowers his voice. "Liv, take a sip of it, whatever it is. Just take a sip of it and then breathe, okay?" He uses this tone with the baby, when he's teaching him what is off-limits. When he is teaching him boundaries. He has a cadence that he only hears coming from him when he is talking to his son.

He is using that with her now.

"I'm right here," he says softly.

She is crying. There are muffled sounds against the phone, but he can hear her crying. "She did it, Elliot. She begged. She was so afraid. I heard her. Every word. She tried to use words but she was crying-"

His eyes can't withstand her agony. They are on fire, the air searing his irises. He wonders if she has room inside of her for this latest horror, or if she has finally filled up. If this will be the one that decimates her, that makes her lose control. He thinks she's too alone. Out there, she's too alone. It made sense that they could save the world together, but alone they are just people. They are breakable. Ordinary.

Alone he is weak.

"We didn't get up those stairs fast enough, El," she whispers and it's all empty. She sounds hollow, as if she's all caverns and tunnels and echoes. "And I heard her scream over the phone line, I heard it get louder and louder and then nothing. There was nothing."

He presses his eyes closed. "He was never going to let her live then, Olivia," he whispers. "You know that. He knew how long it would take you, and he only gave her exactly that much time to live."

She crashes on the other end. She explodes into her agony, and as he hears her cry without limits, he hears the faintest sounds of her struggling to pour another shot. He knows she will regret the liquor later on. That she will, for the briefest of moments, wonder if she is her mother for needing the crutch against the pain. But for now he is grateful for it. He prays that she will lie down and let him talk to her.

"Liv, where are you?" he asks softly.

She is ragged. "I'm in my apartment."

"Where in your apartment?" It's important for some reason that he know. That he is able to pretend he can see her.

"On the floor," she manages. "By the…bed."

Their bed. The one that was too big and too small all at once.

He closes his eyes and leans his head back against the seat of the couch. "Okay, Liv. I'm staying with you."

Her breath hitches, catches. He thinks she might have hiccupped and his lips lift in the slightest smile despite himself. He wants to taste her. He imagines the way her lips would feel against his, swollen and sweet with the tequila. He wants to use his body to quiet her, to settle her. He'd take forever to soothe her if given this night with her beneath him. He'd go slow. He would, he would. And in the end, he'd draw her face against his chest until she slept.

Instead, tonight he has only his voice and their history.

"Okay," she acquiesces, because miles are just negotiable space.

"Okay," he says, and he wonders why he has been given a reprieve when God didn't grant one to an eight-year-old little girl that deserved it far more than he did.

She doesn't hate the city as much these days.

She doesn't want to admit it is because she has him with her late at night, she can't acknowledge that they are heading down a path that will lead to pain again.

She never asks where Kathy is on the nights that he talks to her. She doesn't want to know, she can't process that another woman is lying next to him, even if that woman is his wife. Some nights he calls, some nights she does. Most nights they don't talk at all.

It took until last night for him to make her truly laugh. He told her he had bought Elliot a Backyardigans dinner plate and cut up his food into tiny bits on it before setting the plate in front of his son. Within seconds, Elliot's chubby arm had purposefully swiped all the food off and onto the floor, as he proudly raised the plate for his father, showing him all the characters his father had obviously mistakenly covered up with bits of mashed potato.

It was the look that she imagined would have played across Elliot's face that made her laugh. She imagined her partner, the one that could easily intimidate a suspect into confessing by just rolling up his sleeves, standing there dumbfounded by the highly logical thought processes of his son.

"Glad you find it funny," Elliot had grumbled, laughter hinting in the recesses of the sound.

"Well, it makes sense," she had said. "He thought you were suffocating his buddies by burying them beneath potatoes and green beans. Sadist."

There had been a moment of silence before Elliot had laughed, too, and when they hung up she had slept so soundly she had missed the screaming of her alarm clock this morning. In the shower, she had closed her eyes, and she didn't see him on the night she had left. Instead, this morning she saw her desk in the squad room in New York, sitting empty even though she knows it isn't.

It's making her tired, trying so hard to forget what it was like to be home.

She blinks against the rising sun, and pushes open the door to the coffee shop, scanning the room for Mike. He's a coffee fanatic, and the crap he eats for breakfast almost makes Elliot look like a health food nut. He's standing in line, three croissants in his hand and some chocolate covered graham crackers in the other. He's bouncing from foot to foot, obviously desperate for his first caffeine fix of the day.

He looks pained as he sees her. "Been waiting twelve minutes," Mike complains. "I'd take it black at this point."

That was another thing that she found amusing. He liked what she called girl-coffees. Things with whipped cream, caramel, the seasonal flavors.

Olivia arches her eyebrows. "Wow. So it's true what they say, desperate times call for desperate measures?"

Mike laughs, because he does it easily. He does it a lot. He stopped for a few weeks after they lost the little girl, but slowly his laughter crept back. She's got ten years on him, and she wonders if she was ever that resilient, or if she had always been waiting for the other shoe to drop. When he looks at her again, he ducks his head, peering at her face with open curiosity.

"You look rested," he says with disbelief.

She blinks against his easy assessment, and wonders if she has failed all these years at covering things up. "I slept," she says, and she's staring at him, wondering if he is going to push, to pry, to make her face that without Elliot she never really rests.

Mike grins. "Good for you," he smirks playfully, implications infiltrating his expression.

She feels the color drain from her face. That's another thing she'd added to her haunts. She hasn't told Elliot, but she tried to bring someone home with her a few weeks ago. He was just a someone, but at least he was someone other than him. She had sat in the bar, with the intention that she would drink too much. But she had never been good at it, drinking to pure oblivion and recklessness. Something about history and lessons learned. With twenty minutes left until closing she had become oddly angry. Angry at Elliot, angry at herself. She'd struck up a conversation with the guy across from her, and two hours and a late night snack later, she had allowed him into her apartment. He hadn't gotten far before she had pulled back, called it a night.

She knows why she stopped so suddenly. She'd panicked when he kissed her, she'd nearly cried when his hands wrapped around her waist. She'd taken a hot shower when he finally left and she had found herself sitting on the floor of her bathtub, letting the water rain down until the only hands she remembered on her skin were Elliot's.

There is a part of her that wishes she could be guilty of Mike's teasing implications. But she can't be. She can't stand anyone on her. Not even near her.

She's tried.

When they are sitting at a small table, her hands wrapped around her tea, Mike finally looks at her with a mixture of interest and concern in his eyes. For all of his playfulness, he is always uncannily aware of his surroundings. Most of the time, his surroundings include her.

"When you left New York, were you running from a person, place or thing?" he asks without preamble.

That's the other thing about him, there is no bullshit. There are no double meanings, she never has to wonder what he meant.

She looks out the sheet glass of the front door. The sun is startlingly bright and she doesn't know why the bright red sun spots in her line of vision make her answer. "Person," she says quietly, not making eye contact.

Mike doesn't flinch, doesn't take a sip of his coffee. "Love, or hate?"

Olivia's lips move of their own accord, as the coffee shop fades and she's in her bedroom in New York too many, not enough, months ago. "Love."

He pauses, and then as if this were just another one of his games, he throws out another multiple choice casually. "He knows, or he doesn't know?"

She thinks of Elliot's voice rumbling across the miles, how he's stayed up with her a few times until she has fallen asleep. She thinks of waking to the sound of his even breathing on the other end of the line, and knowing that he, too, has fallen asleep with the phone by his ear. She wonders if he has moved to the guest room those nights, or if he is sleeping on the couch. She wonders how he explains the phone on his pillow in the morning.

She thinks about how she never closes her phone, even when she knows he is fast asleep. She thinks of all the minutes she has let tick by as she counted his breaths, and wonders if he has done the same.

"He knows," she murmurs.

The sun spots shift and she knows why it is now that she has been able to tell Mike the truth.

The spots remind her of her ceiling on the darkest of the nights last winter, in the days when she still was still able to sleep against the heat of Elliot.

She aches. She's so tired it's seeping into her bones.

Mike stirs another packet of sugar into his latte. "You think about going back?"

Olivia lifts her head and she thinks the truth never hides for long. "All the time," she whispers, her cheeks pounding with the memories. "All the time."

On the nights he doesn't talk to her, he drifts.

He lays awake, the comforter carefully placed over his legs, his hips. His hands lay at his side, except for the occasional moment when he feels the need to rub his palm hard over his forehead, his cheeks, over all of the places on his face where the blood has stopped flowing.

He rubs at his chest, too. Over the cavity where his body shelters his slowing heart.

The air is still tonight, and the curtains are open. Outside, there is a quiet, steady snowfall. The flakes are mute, silent and soothing as they slowly rock downwards. They are in no rush. For them, time has never been quantified.

He knows about time and quantity. He is aware of every minute, every second, every breath. He knows the number of days it has been since she left. He knows the number of cases he has worked without her. He knows the number of times he has talked to her, but he doesn't know for what number of minutes.

He stops counting time when he is with her.

He can't sleep, and he's beginning to think that she won't call tonight. It will be one of the nights he paces the floor in the kitchen; it will be one of the nights that he wonders who she is with, if they are touching her. It will be one of the nights when he imagines what it would have been like to have touched her until she turned her face into his neck, maybe whispered his name in the lowest tones of her voice. He wonders what his name would sound like if she said it in pleasure, without the haunting pleas in her eyes. He's debated if she would use his whole name, or just a portion of it. He wonders if when he finally got inside of her, it would be the first time they both prayed together, begging for things from a God who seems to have forgotten them.

The ceiling is empty. Dark. He looks at his cell phone on the end table, and wonders if it will vibrate tonight. When it lights up on the nights she calls, it doesn't flash her name. It is just her number, because he believes that by never attaching her to a number he doesn't recognize, he can keep her from belonging there.

He hears movement down the hall, a rustling against sheets. He knows this sound and he's grateful for it. She won't call tonight, and his son will save him. He hears his child's small movements in his crib, and he knows that Elliot's small fists are probably pushing his tiny body upright, and his wide eyes are likely assessing the shadows as he sits up.

Elliot is out of bed before his child can even begin to express his displeasure at being alone in the dark in the middle of the night. He doesn't question that he has brought his cell phone with him as he opens the room door slowly, peeking in. His eyes scan the small table and twin bed in the corner, finally coming to rest on the crib on the opposite side.

"Oh!" comes the surprised, tiny voice. Then the sweetest of laughs. He's been found before he even had to cry, and he's delighted by the turn of events. He says something in a language only he understands, but it's important, serious, denoted as such simply by the tone of the punctuated jibberish.

Elliot leans against the doorframe, scratching his bare chest before crossing his arms. "Bud, you're becoming a night owl, just like your old man," he says softly.

His baby responds in his secret language, and his chubby finger points out the window to where the moon is reflecting the snowflakes. "Da."

Elliot feels it, the brief respite from the ache. The momentary loosening of his lungs. "Those are snowflakes," he whispers as he moves towards the crib. "Snow. Remember when Maur took you out in your inner tube?"

In the deep blue glow that filters in through the window, he sees his son's chin tip upwards, his dark blue eyes opening even wider as he listens to his father. His small hands reach upwards, asking to be held.

They both need to be held. They can be. They've got each other.

Elliot sets his phone down on the end table and reaches for his child, settling him against his body, and bringing the soft fleece blanket with him. His baby's cheek is pressed against his shoulder while his fragile fingertips absently play affectionately with the stubble on his father's neck.

"Da da," his son says, the musical cadence of his innocent voice filling the room.

"Yeah baby?" he responds, inhaling the scent of powder as he burrows his nose into the silky strands of his son's hair.

His child tells him a story. It's all unrecognizable consonants and syllables. It's contented. There is a purpose behind every word of the foreign language, there is an earnestness Elliot has not heard in any voice in years. When his son quiets for a moment, Elliot settles the two of them onto the twin bed in the room, and his baby lays flat on his father's chest, his head tucked beneath Elliot's chin.

His son's skin is warm, and he's been teething. He's probably running a slight fever. Elliot debates getting the Motrin, but his child is content. He's not fussing, he's just lying in the dark, weaving tales in spurts of conversation. Elliot strokes down his child's back, encouraging the sound of his voice. He wants his son to talk endlessly, to say what he means, to live without a fear of his own voice.

It's a humbling thing, to just hear talk flowing freely, even when one person knows another doesn't understand. Maybe that's the point, to just keep talking until something makes sense.

A half hour passes before his baby stops talking, before the stories have been told, before a child has offered up enough air that his father can breathe again for a few hours. Elliot turns his head towards the window and wonders if it is snowing in Chicago. He wonders, when he allows himself to be free of boundaries, what it would be like to have her lying with him, with them, tonight. She would have to be rolled fully against him, on him, because this mattress is only half of the space that she had once created for them.

"Ho, ho, ho," his son whispers sleepily.

Laughter rumbles out of him, and his blood begins to push into his fingers and toes again. It's nearly painful, his limbs nearly cramp as he begins to feel them live again. "That's what Santa says, right bud?" Elliot whispers. And then, because he wants to hear it again, "What's Santa say?" His fingers sift through the short strands at the back of his baby's neck.

"Ho, ho, ho," his child murmurs, drawing his hand up to play with his father's earlobe.

Elliot lets his eyes drift shut, absorbing the sounds.

When the world quiets again, he peers down to see if his son is sleeping. His baby's eyes are still wide open, and he's perfectly still as he stares out the window. He's still warm, but he's not fussing. Elliot reaches for the small CD player on the end table, the one that Lizzie has decorated with Backyardigans stickers. He hits play and lets the slow, faint sounds of a piano fill the room. It's a haunting melody, the one that Lizzie has stuck in the player on repeat, but she insists her baby brother falls asleep faster to the strains of light Christian rock.

Dickie had rolled his eyes at her proclamation and promptly told her that his brother wasn't going to be a nerd or a fag. He'd been grounded for using the term, and Lizzie's CD remained.

So now the song plays, the slow beats and breathy, rasping lyrics mixing with the heavier breaths of his son against his chest. It's a song about forgiveness, about needing just the simple presence and security of another.

He can't believe she's been gone so long.

He misses her, and as he shifts, tucking his baby's diapered bottom more securely against him, he wonders what she has found to fill her hands with, now that she now longer holds him.

"Da da."

The sound is faint, thickened with impending slumber. Elliot kisses the top of his child's head. "You save me, buddy," he whispers. There is silence and all is still. There is no one listening. His voice cracks. "I wonder what saves her."

His baby says something so faintly, it could have just been him breathing. He is falling asleep on his father, and for tonight, Elliot will stay awake just to hold him. The night will go faster if it is filled with the smell of talcum.

"You'd like her, bud," he rumbles, watching the air outside the window whiten as the snow picks up. "She's pretty fierce in the beginning, but she's got her reasons." His head tilts to the side on the pillow and he blinks against the moonlight. "She loves like that too, you know. Fiercely."

He could swear that his son has finally fallen asleep. But he doesn't check. He'd like to think his baby was listening to him. That someone was.

"I think she loves you too, buddy. I do. I don't think she expected she would," his throat catches, pauses. "I know she's not here, but it doesn't mean that she doesn't…that she…" He stops, closing his eyes. He sees her on the last night before she left. He feels her fingertips slide reverently down his face one more time before she climbs out of bed. Before he hears the zipper of her bag despite the roaring protest of his heart. "She needed to go. It's better for her there, you know. I wasn't…" He thinks of all the times she has left him. How she walked away to become stronger, how her instincts even then had been to leave to live. His lips move, and only he knows what he is saying within these garbled sounds. "I wasn't good for her," he mumbles into the dark. "Not good enough."

His lips are numb once more, his eyes are pounding with the restraint. His blood is slowing again, but at least now his chest is beating because it is where his baby mercifully warms him.

A man shouldn't be required to live like this. As only pieces. Less than half. He knows it is fundamentally wrong for a man to live with his body hollow because it craves a woman, just one. One woman that bled and filled and illuminated his whole world.

"I miss her like hell," he says into the dark. "I'm trying to let her go, bud, I am. I want her to have more than just me. She needs this, moments like this of her own. I don't know how to be enough for you, for her. I haven't been enough for anyone yet. I don't…." His whispers disintegrate as his accent deepens. "There ain't much of me these days, bud. There's not. And without her, I got even less. So ya gotta just….as we go on here, you and I…just…just please…forgive me…cause I'm just gonna do my best to be somethin' for you."

His child sleeps. His son lays trusting on his chest, his small fists outstretching and opening, leaving him without defense. As if where he lays, he doesn't need it.

Olivia had done that once. Given herself to him in sleep.

He shatters. His chest cracks, and he can't help it, he shakes with it, with the sound and force of his need exploding out of him. "Christ," he mutters, trying to dry his face without disturbing the one that sleeps on him, that trusts him, just like she had once done.

"I miss her," he scrapes out again, his hands flattening on his child's back to hold him even more securely. Between the bare skin of his chest and his son's fleece sleeper, there is finally a heat that thaws him, that undoes what the months of her absence have frozen in him. There are pleas and denials that are coming undone within him.

"She held you first, buddy," he finally grates, and his throat is on fire. "And that night, I think…she gave you a part of her."

He is crying. Alone in this room in the dark, with only his baby, he cries for himself. For what he's lost, for time passing, for being given only one life. He cries because he's seen too much, and without her here, he remembers all of the brutal, vivid details.

"I pray for that, you know. That she did. That she left something here for me, cause baby boy, I gotta tell you…" The song is replaying again, stuck on repeat because he hasn't bothered to change it. It's stuck, like he is, and it's lyrically rationalizing away being abandoned. He's finally found his confessional in a room that holds his baby's crib. "I need something of her, just something to hold onto. She was always stronger. God knows how, or why. But she was. Despite everything. She was always stronger."

On his chest, his child stirs out of slumber. The snow has slowed again, winding down for the night.

His son lifts his head and looks his father in the eyes. "Da da."

Elliot nods, using a broad fingertip to trace his baby's cheek. "Yeah, bud. That's right. I'm your dada."

There is the slightest grin on his child's face because he got it right. He makes a sound of pleasure, and then before Elliot can say anything, his baby drops his head back onto Elliot's chest, sprawling out, ready for sleep once again.

He blows out a deep breath. "Yeah, she did," he tells himself as the night slips into the hours in which she has never called. In which she won't. "She left a part of herself with you the night she held you." The moon is vibrant against the newly blanketed snow. "She left a part of herself with me." He wonders what she has kept intact of herself.

He rolls his head towards the window, and he can see her. He thinks about the night he sat next to her in the back of a patrol car in New Jersey as she searched for her brother. Those days, he'd had purpose. He remembers how for just a few days, he'd felt some semblance of control, of an ability to protect her. He remembers how for just a few days, she'd let him be her guardian. He'd gratefully stood between her and the job, her brother, her fear.

He wonders what stands between her and the world now.

She calls him on the nights she needs him. She must not need him tonight.

The snow outside stops completely, and the night is suddenly thrown into its stillness. Without warning, the dark is now frozen, there is no movement.

"Night, Liv," he whispers hoarsely.

He closes his eyes, and holds onto his baby, thinking the twin wasn't that small. She'd have fit on it with them.

If she had been here, there would have still been room to move.

On her one year anniversary of working in Chicago, her co-workers take her out.

She's been to Danny's numerous times before; she's been there on the nights that she misses him; on the nights that she pretends that she has formed another life for herself, that she's happy. She has spent hours talking with the people she works with, but none of them know her well, none of them know her like he once had, like he still does. She was the detective from special victims, but no one knew why, no one asked, except one. No one ever questioned her reasons for leaving, because unlike New Yorkers, the people in Chicago didn't want to know, didn't care. They minded their own business; they lived in their own world.

Danny's is crowded and she's ready to go home, ready to climb into bed and enjoy the weekend that she's thrilled to have off. She has her blue sheets on, the ones she used to keep matted to the bed when he would spend the night, the ones that smell of detergent and her perfume, but never his smell. In the corner of the room, Special Agent Mike Kelly raises his beer to her, smiles. She smiles back because she likes him, because she thinks that if she wasn't in love with another man, if she had no inhibitions, then she would be with someone like him. He's the one person who has asked, the one person she would ever be willing to tell. He walks over to her, and when he speaks, she finds that twang in his voice that she has found she loves, that makes her feel comfortable, that makes her feel safe because this place is no longer her visiting city.

"Didn't think you'd make it a year," he goads, leaning against the table. He's teasing but it reminds her of Elliot, reminds her that she hasn't seen him in twelve months, that she's still breathing, that she hasn't forgotten how to smile every once in a while.

She still thinks of that eight year old girl that she wasn't able to save weeks ago; she still thinks of her late at night when she slinks down onto the floor by her bed, when she misses him and wants to talk, but never lifts the phone to call. "Well, how could I leave you, Kelly? Who else would fill me in on the stats of the Minnesota Twins?" She misses Elliot; she misses their conversations about the Yankees, the Knicks.

In his smile, she wonders what a life would have been like if she wasn't socially fucked. "I have a feeling you wouldn't miss that at all." She looks around the room, at Samantha Close and Jack Martin who have started a relationship, at the others they work with, at the life she has started to build. But she's learned that foundations are merely that, that even foundations don't always make homes, safe havens. "I think you're safe to head out of here. Everyone has enough liquor in them that they're no longer celebrating your year here. You're clear to make the exit." Before she can respond, he kisses her, and it's soft, just at the corner of her lips. Her heart aches, her chest burns, because it's not him, it's never been him. "Congratulations."

She thinks about Mike on the ride home, she thinks that if given the chance, Elliot would like him. He'd never admit it, but he would, he would. It's half past eleven when she walks in the door. She's learned her apartment in the dark by now and she weaves past the couches, the discarded items of clothes that had fallen from her laundry basket two days ago. The light shines through her window and she considers closing the blinds, but she likes it tonight, likes the shadows, the pictures that tell a story on her wall. She sits down on the floor in front of her bed, the blanket brushing her back. He's awake, she figures this because he always calls at this time if he dials her number, because she knows now what he watches on television when the nights are too long and the thoughts are too much.

Her purse is beside her and she remembers a time when she would joke that he carried it for her. They joked a lot in the beginning; they joked a lot before it got complicated, before they fell in love.

She fishes it out of her bag and holds it in her palm for a moment, because she shouldn't call, even if they've done it more lately. She shouldn't call, and she's not going to, she's not. But it vibrates in her hand and she smiles because he's done it first, because even if boundaries should never be broken, even if she knows she should let him go, she can't. It's not for him, not really. It's for her, for them, for nine years of partnership, for love that never got to thrive.

She has the guilt, the desperation, the despair on some nights. She has everything else on others.

"Hi," she says, leaning her head back onto the bed. She stares up at the ceiling, at the lights, and for a split second, she swears she sees the red.

"You home?"

She wants to tell him no, because even after a year, she still doesn't consider this her home. Last week, when sleep wouldn't come and his calls hadn't either, she hung a photo on the wall. It was a black and white of the Brooklyn Bridge, one Lake had given her before she left, and after five minutes, she had taken it down. She didn't want reminders of where she was from; she didn't want to resign herself to a life here, even if it was hers for the time being. "I just got in."

"How was the party?" He sounds tired and she wonders if the baby has started to wake up in the middle of the night.

"Fine." She pulls the blanket off of the bed, wraps herself in it, wraps herself in what she wishes was him. She closes her eyes and listens to him breathe, wonders where he is, what cases he's working on, how his kids are. She misses him more and more, but she finds comfort in him now instead of sadness. She finds comfort in his stories, in his jokes, in the random nature of their conversations. "I finished Harry Potter last night. I don't understand the phenomenon."

He laughs, and she wonders how often he does it these days. "You are so closed minded when it comes to the imagination."

"Yes, because you're always so open to things that have no logic."

"Read the second one, okay?" She was going to; she was going to because he loves it, because she knew he'd ask. "Even if you don't understand it."

He's quiet, so quiet, and she sends a silent prayer up to God. She's back at church now, and she thinks she's starting to believe that there's something more up there, that there's something keeping her alive. She prays for a lot of things now, for her, for him, for the victims, for all the other people in the world who are lost. She prays without expecting answers now, resolutions, and she thinks she likes it better like that.

If there are no expectations, there is no disappointment.

She tells herself that, but she knows it's just lies.

"I watched The Lake House, by the way. Didn't make sense."

She smiles against the cotton blanket; she smiles and she imagines it's against his neck, against his rugged skin. "I never should have told you I liked that movie."

"No, you shouldn't have. It's shit." She hears his TV in the background, but she doesn't want hers tonight. She doesn't want the sound to interfere with his voice, his words. "Elliot's walking a lot now. He chases Liz around the house. He's completely in love with her."

He hasn't sent her pictures. She hasn't asked. "Is he talking a lot?"

"He's learned how to say freeze," he says, and then laughs. "He says feeze. Every time he does, Kathy looks like she wants to kill me." She hates the sound of his wife's name, because for as much as she has always liked Kathy, she doesn't need to hear about his family, about his life. "He loves the badge too. He always steals it from me and plays with it."

She smiles, because in all those conversations that she spoke in her mind, she knew. The child was a part of her now; she thinks of him sometimes, of how he had felt against her shirt, of the blood she had stared at for hours before slipping it into the wash. She thinks of him inside church, wonders if he'll grow up to be like his father.

And then she curses herself because she shouldn't think of this child, she shouldn't. She should know that being held doesn't mean she belongs to someone, that someone belongs to her.

She has nothing to say, so she doesn't. She listens to their silence, imagines their conversations in her head, conversations they don't dare to speak of anymore. He hasn't said I love you, he hasn't said I miss you. But she's told herself so many times that they will no longer and somehow they always do. They always cross their picket lines, their boundaries, their fenced in areas.

"Did you know that the posterior root, which is a prolongation of the upper border of the brain, is strongly marked, and that it runs backwards above the external acoustic meatus, and is also continuous with the temporal line?"

If she wasn't so baffled, she thinks she would laugh. "What the hell are you watching?"

"I'm reading. Kathleen went out and bought Gray's Anatomy because she wants to be pre-med all of a sudden." She can hear the pages of the textbook rustle and she wonders how long he's been reading it, how much of it he understands. "She spent almost ninety-five dollars on a textbook and spends ten minutes reading it before she hands it over to Maureen. I think she expected the book to be like the show. As in, there were no people sleeping with each other, so she stopped caring."

"So now you're studying up to be a doctor?"

"I'm brushing up on neurosurgery."

God, she misses him. She does, she does.

"Should I have walked away, Liv?" His voice changes, and it's soft, and sad, and she hates him for doing this, for ruining the fun, for taking them back. "Should I have let you walk away?"

She squeezes her eyes shut, and a tear slips down her cheek. "You let me walk away, Elliot. I came back." She breathes deep enough to get her oxygen back, to get her heart rate steady. "Do you actually understand anything in that book of yours?"

"Not really. I'm done with neurology and onto cardiology. The endocardium is a thin, smooth membrane which lines and gives the glistening appearance to the inner surface of the heart."

"I've always wondered what gives the heart the smooth glistening appearance." She shivers, and she wonders if where he is, it's cold. "What else have you learned?"

She wants to know about the heart; she wants to know if Henry Gray knew everything about the cardio region, if he knew how to mend a broken one with stitches, and scalpels, and ten blades, and if he could somehow come back to life and help her through.

The pages rustle, and she knows he's looking, looking for the right thing, the wrong thing, anything to give them conversation. "The fibers of the heart differ very remarkably from those of other striped muscles. They are smaller by one-third, and their transverse striæ are by no means so well-marked. They show faint longitudinal striation."

She thinks this is true; she thinks that the heart is barely marked, because if it had been people wouldn't be so careless with it. There would be names attached, there would be places to belong. One heart would belong to another and there would be no mistresses, no affairs, no falling in love with those who already belonged to someone else. But barely doesn't mean never, and the scratches are scarred into the muscle, into the person no matter how faint. The names of who belongs to who fades, and people fall in love, until they realize that someone else has branded their heart to the someone other than them.

When she in high school, she had looked up that word during biology. Striation. They were alternating light and dark crossbands that were visible in certain muscles, and at the time, she hadn't cared. It went in one ear and out the other, but she remembers it now.

She wonders if her heart was always light in the remaining years of their partnership; she wonders how dark it's become.

She breathes differently than he remembers.

He thinks that she's fallen asleep, because she hasn't spoken in almost fifteen minutes. He can hear her television on, but he doesn't know what it is, he doesn't want to ask. There's a laugh track, although he hears no dialogue; there's five minutes left and he wonders if she always sleeps to the television now or if she's turned it on to drown out his breathing, to drown out him because in the long run it will hurt less.

They've been on the phone for three hours. He's spoken to her about the anatomy of the human body, about television, and movies and books. She's asked him questions about his children; he hasn't asked about Chicago. He doesn't want to know of that life there. He doesn't want to know all the places she goes, all the people she meets. He's happy for her, he is. He is. But it's things he doesn't need to know; it's things he doesn't want to think about when he realizes her life is moving on. That she is moving on.

They've let the call linger in silence: no words, no stories, no anecdotes. There is breathing, and a couple of tears, and secrets so deeply hidden in the depths of the line that there are no phrases to make it all okay.

"You've been on the phone a long time," she mumbles, and he knows that her eyes are still closed. He wonders if she still thinks of him at night; he wonders why he can't just let her go. "You shouldn't spend so long on the phone with me." He wishes he could let her go, he does, he does. "Where are you?"

"I'm sleeping at Maureen's." His voice sounds raw when he answers, almost as if he's never spoken a word before. "She went to Connecticut to meet her boyfriend's parents a couple of days ago. I'm taking care of her dog."

"Where in Connecticut?"

He thinks that for as long as she's known him, she doesn't need to ask if it bothers him that his oldest daughter has a boyfriend, that he's forced to take care of her yippy dog that reminds him of a life he never gave his children when they were younger. "Greenwich."

She laughs, and it's exhausted and pure and the air closes in on him in the tiny one bedroom apartment. "Maureen's dating someone from Greenwich? Good for her," she mumbles, and he wonders how many people she's dated since being there, if she wishes there were more.

The couch is bare and scratchy and when he looks up at the ceiling, he sees the red light of his daughter's smoke alarm. He's been here for three days already and he hadn't noticed. He closes his eyes, and even if it was a little over a year ago, he remembers that last night with her. He remembers that he had stared at the red light for so long, at the flashing of her clock, at the shadows, and wondered if he would spend the rest of his life thinking of those things instead of her. But he thinks of both, of how much she loved that red light, not because it was special, not because it had meaning, but because it cased the room with just a tinge of light. It was never enough to be noticeable, but it was there, and somehow, it was power.

He thinks he must be some kind of asshole that he's thinking of her, of the damn red light, inside his oldest child's apartment.

The little Yorkshire terrier moves towards him from the bathroom, jumps up on the couch because it needs a companion, because it needs love. He understands that. He understands needing body heat, needing someone to touch, needing someone to know that he's not alone. He pets the warm fur of the dog, and he hates himself for wishing it was her, wishing that he could slide his fingers through her hair, lay with her when the night is cold and over and warm and just beginning.

She shouldn't have to be in love with someone like him. She shouldn't, she shouldn't. She deserves someone who doesn't have baggage and a life filled with too much, with too many complications.

"Do you have someone there?" He thinks it's funny that sometimes he talks and never knows what has come out of his mouth until it's gone and buried. "Do you have someone to talk to?"

He wonders where she is in her bedroom now, if she had gotten up off the floor, if she's now encased beneath blankets and sheets that smell of her, of mandarin.

"I talk to you." Her voice is whispered and frayed and he wonders how much he can learn in that anatomy book about the human form, about the way people work.

"You should find someone there, Olivia." The dog exhales gently and he's reminded of his youngest son, of the soft breath of a life that holds no complications. "I want you to have someone there."

"I don't want to talk about this tonight, Elliot." She sighs, and he should end this now, because he has to stop hurting her, he has to stop taking her life away.

But he can't stop. He can't.

"The dog's name is Keppel. She calls him Kep," he says, as the dog settles on his chest at the sound of his name. "She named him that because Robert Keppel was the detective who tracked down Ted Bundy. How did she get to be so old that she names her dog after a detective? After someone who tracked a serial killer?" He closes his eyes because it's too much, it's suddenly all too much. "She's going to make an incredible criminal psychiatrist and I still hate the fact that she's doing it."

"You have to let her live, El. She's smart enough to know how to live her life the right way."

He wonders how many times she's going to have to reassure him that he's not a failure, how many times she'll have to do it before he starts to believe. The dog shifts, lifts himself so he's closer to the phone. He thinks that maybe Olivia comforts him too.

He tries to think of amusing things to say; he tries to think of something so she won't hang up. He doesn't know why she hasn't yet; he doesn't want to ask because then he knows she will.

Kep rubs his nose on his t-shirt, grunting, settling. He wishes he were settled. He wishes a lot of things. "What about you? Do I let you live?"

"Elliot." He hates that strain in her voice. He does. "For the last time, I make my own decisions." The pitch in her tone rises; he waits for the apocalypse. He waits for the screams. "I pick up when you call. I spend hours on the phone with you when I shouldn't. I make my own fucking decisions. So can you stop blaming yourself and just leave it alone?"

She's asked, and like always, he obliges. "If you had to like a movie with Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock, why couldn't it be Speed?"

"Thank you," she whispers, before the laughter in her words sink in. "Speed is a good movie, but I still like Lake House more. I shouldn't have to defend my choices to you."

He's silent. She doesn't have to defend herself, her choices, but he wishes she would. He wishes he could know all her reasons for leaving the first time, the second time, the last time. He wishes he could know, but he never asks, he can't.

And when the dog breathes on him again, he remembers to do it himself, he remembers that life and choices are always there, that there's no escape because the choices are never good, not anymore.

"No, I guess you don't have to."

"Did you ever have pets when you were a kid?"

"No. Too many of us. There wasn't any room. Did you?"

"The bunny." Shit. He doesn't know how he forgot, how he could block that from his mind like he's blocked so many other things before that. He doesn't know if he can count his own as a pet, when it had just been another life lesson for him to learn. "I named him Gustavo."

He doesn't know why, but he finds himself smiling. "Where did you come up with Gustavo?"

"I don't remember. I think it just came to me." She yawns, and he wants her to sleep, but he can't tell her, not yet. "What else have you learned from the book?"

It rests on the floor beside the couch and he reaches down. The dog shifts, but doesn't move, doesn't let go of his security. He moves the book onto the couch, flips pages, skims lines that he doesn't understand. He thinks he likes that though. He likes that there are things out there beyond the job, beyond love, that are still waiting for answers, that he still has to learn.

"The rhythmical action of the heart is muscular in origin. That is to say, the heart muscle itself possesses the inherent property of contraction apart from any nervous stimulation. The more embryonic the muscle the better is it able to initiate and propagate the contraction wave. This explains why the normal systole of the heart starts at the entrance of the veins, for there the muscle is most embryonic in nature." Kep snores on his chest, and he can feel his heart moving, he can hear her breathing even though Chicago is thousands of miles away. "I don't think I'll ever understand what any of this means."

It's minutes before she answers, the static filling the line, the white noise that whispers secrets, that tells their truths, their lies. "I think it means that the heart operates on its own. That the weaker your heart is, the more susceptible you are to pain."

Her voice is softer, more exhausted, lighter, heavier, free, alone. He wonders if the entire world, if all humans are contradictions, or if it's just her.

He stares up at the red light; he has to.

"It does what it wants," she murmurs, and he knows that she's falling asleep. "And nothing else in the body can stop it."

There are times as of late, deep into the night when the baby doesn't awaken, when it's so dark that even the shadows give off no light, that he thinks about what it would be like if he hadn't met her. He thinks of all the times he's needed to talk and has done so without a word because she knew; he thinks about her in the moments she yelled, in the moments she challenged, in the moments she stood her ground. He knows his marriage might never have faltered, and then knows that it would have failed much sooner had she not pushed him to go home on those nights where he didn't think he could.

He tries to think about life if he hadn't met her, and never can, never knows how.

Her breathing slows and he knows she's fallen asleep; she's given up her fight for the night.

His eyes close but he doesn't hang up. He listens to her soft breaths, listens for the slightest change.

He wonders if there's a sound for when the heart finally stops doing what it wants, and lets the rest of the body thrive.

A/N: We apologize for the delay. That pesky work thing came in and bit us both on the ass. Now if only something would come bite Olivia and Elliot on the ass (like each other)…anyway, we're getting there. Soon. Sort of. One day.

Chapter 10

Later, he would spend a lot of time wondering about fate and destiny.

He'd wonder about things set on predetermined paths versus things that were left up to serendipitous chance. He'd wonder if he was only moments away, a single reaction, a solitary innocuous decision away from having been directed towards another ending.

Later he'd wonder about the things he didn't do, how they had meant everything.

He's standing in the kitchen of a house that holds his history, that has sheltered his children, that has pushed and pulled at him for years. He's holding his son, and he's got his coat on, and he's shifting from foot to foot, waiting. Kathy had realized at the last second that the diaper bag didn't have any Motrin in it, so she ran upstairs to grab some before he takes the baby to Gymboree.

He hears footsteps behind him, and they are too slow to be Kathy's. In moments he's facing his newly awakened daughter. Her blonde hair is tousled and her eyes are still puffy with sleep.

"Hey, Dad," Kathleen mumbles sleepily, immediately reaching for a coffee mug.

"Hey baby," he grins back. "It's almost noon. You're up early."

Kathleen smirks at him and fills her mug, wrapping her hands around the warm ceramic before turning around and leaning back against the counter, letting the steam from the hot coffee wash over her cheeks.

"Titi!" his son gurgles, his chubby hands pointing happily at his sister.

Kathleen rolls her eyes playfully. "E, you really do need a new name for me."

Elliot smiles at his daughter, his shoulders relaxing as he shifts his son to his hip. "Well, in his defense, E isn't all that creative either. So I'd say you're even."

She leans over, kissing the baby on the cheek before setting down her coffee mug and heading for the fridge. "You two named me Kathleen and him, Elliot. Apparently being unoriginal is hopelessly genetic," she teases softly.

"Hey, naming your brother after me was your mother's idea," Elliot protests. His son tries to put his hand into his father's mouth, and Elliot playfully nips at the tiny fingers, eliciting a giggle from his baby.

Kathleen grabs a bag of bagels and lets the refrigerator door slam shut. "Right. Like you didn't love it."

He is silent as his daughter puts a bagel into the toaster. He is thankful the baby is named after him. It's another link, another bond, another reminder that this child is wholly his. He inhales, letting his mouth fall to his son's silky hair. There are moments when he is holding his baby, when he is standing in this kitchen, when he hears the conversation flowing between his other children that the rage settles.

He shuts down in between these kinds of moments, and it allows him to survive.

Of course, when she calls he closes his eyes. Really lives.

He clears his throat as he watches his daughter move around the kitchen, soaking up her easy movements. She's settled in the last year. She's calmer; she spends hours with the baby. She doesn't look at her father with animosity. Sometimes she looks at him warily, but for the most part, she isn't twisting in spiraling circles anymore.

"So what are you up to today?" he asks, filling the descending silence.

Kathleen shrugs, opening the fridge once again for cream cheese. Her back is to him. "I have to find an airline ticket that isn't a fortune and I've got to call the school and get my name in for one of the tours. Other than that, I was gonna take Liz over to the flea market."

His immediate reaction is confusion. Then panic. Then absolute refusal. "Where are you going that you need a plane ticket?" he says slowly, willing himself to stay calm.

Her hands still, the butter knife she was using is now suspended in mid-air. He sees her shoulders rise and fall as she breathes. One count. Then two. He knows this movement because it is his own. The desperate attempt to calm down. She is like him, always has been.

Kathleen turns, all playfulness gone. "Mom said she was gonna tell you earlier this week," she accuses, as if his ignorance is his fault.

His son is kicking against him, bouncing on his hip. He can't yell, he'll scare everyone. "Tell me what?" he practically growls instead.

Behind him, footsteps stop. His daughter's eyes swing to her mother's. "You said you told him!" she says, her voice rising dangerously.

"Calm down," Kathy says, as she steps into the kitchen. "I didn't have a chance to talk to him yet."

That sets him off. "I'm standing right here," he thrums. "So why don't you tell me now?"

Their eyes match, his daughter's and Kathy's. They are both staring at him. One set of eyes is panicked, the other set neutral.

"She is applying to grad schools this summer, and she is trying to make a decision where she wants to go," Kathy explains, reaching for the diaper bag and sliding in the small bottle of Motrin.

His spine crawls with the implications. She's leaving. His daughter is leaving and she's old enough. He can't stop her. Not really. She's leaving, she's leaving. He tries to swallow and his throat is too tight. He wants to say something, but his tongue is too thick in his mouth, so instead, his fingers clutch at his son. Holding him. Keeping his small body against him. "Where are you looking?" he manages.

He can see it in them, both Kathy and Kathleen. They are gaining confidence in light of his lack of anger. They expected him to rage, to yell, to deny. But he's used to letting people go now. He's got this down; he knows that he can't make anyone stay just for him. That it's not fair to try, that he isn't their whole life.

Kathleen lifts her chin, and for the first time this morning, her eyes soften in sympathy. "Chicago," she whispers, tilting her head. "The Art Institute there has a great MFA program in film."

He stares at her and he's dizzy. He hates that city now, wonders what it has that he doesn't. He hates that it's in the middle of the country, never picking a side. He hates that it is compelling in a way that he isn't. He hates that it takes everything from him. He can fight people, but he can't fight places. If people want to leave, they will. He has never figured out how to make them stay.

He lets his lips fall to his son's head. He knows that they know she is there. He knows Kathy is watching him, his daughter is afraid of what he will say or do. "When are you going?" he asks instead, inhaling the smell of his son's shampoo. Inhaling. Breathe.

His daughter's breath is audible. "I was going to look for a cheap last minute ticket for next weekend," she says in a rush. "I wanted to take a campus tour and meet with the admissions and financial aid offices before the semester lets out and everyone is gone."

He knows she didn't expect it to be this easy, that he'd just let go. He looks up at her, at her clear blue eyes, at the hope on her face, at the potential she wears on her like infallible armor. She's got her whole life ahead of her, and she can't stick around just to make his fucked up world a little brighter. He's terrified of her being out there, away from him, where he can't protect her.

Then, for a moment, he relaxes. He can't help it. She's picked Chicago at least. And while he can't protect her, Olivia can. His daughter and Olivia weren't friends, but in an emergency, he'd have someone there he trusted to take care of his child.

She's leaving him.

He wants to yell, to make her stay, to guilt her into sticking around because he needs her.

He lets her go, because it's best for her. He nods, picking up the diaper bag and slinging it over his shoulder. He walks by his daughter, kisses her on the forehead. "Tell me what you need," he says, the tenuous words ripping violently into his gut. "Let me know how I can help."

He is not anyone's everything.

He thinks they are both still standing there in silence as he walks out the front door with his son.

She is exhausted.

Olivia rubs the heel of her palm into her eye, staring at the computer screen. It's unseasonably warm out for late March, but she hasn't been able to get the chill out of her bones for the last few days. She pulls her sweater tighter around her body and crosses her arms, letting the names she has pulled up in the NCIC database swim in front of her.

She tries to focus, and can't. The words blur and she blows out a breath, as if she could clear the apparent fog off of the flat screen.

She hasn't spoken to him in over a week. She called him mid-week and it went to voicemail. She didn't leave a message, but she knows her number would have shown up. It's now Friday.

He never called her back.

The air she draws into her lungs seems sharp.

Around her, the office hums. She can hear the cumulative buzzing of hundreds of computers, and it all blends together. The clacking on the keyboards, the chatter, the rushed steps. In a far corner, there is a television on the wall, tuned to CNN, and the anchor's voice is a faded, muted flat line of noise. A suicide bomber has blown himself up in Riyadh, and the world is waiting for one terrorist group or another to lay claim to the carnage.

She spends a lot of time thinking about futility these days.

She thinks about how he once told her she could always walk away, and she wonders if he was hoping that she could, that he could. She wonders if he knew at the time that he was lying. They're both bound to it. To all of it.

Then again, he hasn't called her back. Maybe he is finally letting go.

Her phone rings and it startles her, the digital display on the hard line indicating it is the duty agent. "Benson," she answers, buttoning up her sweater.

"Special Agent Benson, I've got a call for you. Name is Kathleen Stabler."

Her blood freezes and her eyes fill despite her shock. She is vaguely aware that she hates Kelly because he made her eat a bagel for breakfast and it's coming back up. She searches for her wastebasket, wondering if she will do this here, now. If she's going to throw up in front of hundreds of colleagues. She can't breathe, but she somehow manages to tell them to patch Kathleen through.

She hasn't heard from him in a week. Surely, if…if…Kathleen wouldn't be the one to call her. Cragen would. Fin. Munch. Even Kathy. They wouldn't let Kathleen call her. They wouldn't. If he was hurt, if he was…she'd have felt it. She would. She'd know, her body would contract, her heart would explode. She'd know. It wouldn't be like this. This ordinary.

In a moment, in the silence as she waits, she regrets everything. She wants to scream, to go home, to rewind. She pushes her chair back, hunches over, her elbow resting on her knee and her fingers threaded roughly through her bangs as she clutches the phone in her other hand. It can't be…it can't…

"Liv?"

Olivia exhales. His daughter's voice isn't thick with tears. "Kathleen?" Her throat aches. It's scratchy, painful. "Is your dad, is he…."

"He's fine. Fuck. I didn't even think! Of course you would…" Her discomfort and apology is evident over the phone line. "He's fine. I should have known that if I called, you'd think…"

She pulls herself back up towards her desk on her rolling chair, lets her face fall to her palm in relief. Her heart rate gradually slows. "No, it's fine. I just got worried. It's fine." But it's not. She realizes that if his daughter is calling her, something is up. She's never called before. "Are you okay?"

Kathleen laughs nervously. "Yeah. Yeah I'm fine. Mom gave me your number. For your office. You know, in case I needed anything or anything happened while I was here. She thought…"

She pieces together the tidbits of information. "You're in Chicago?"

There is silence on the other end. "Yeah, I'm looking at a few grad schools. And I wasn't going to call. But I thought…"

Olivia presses her lips together, blinking at her computer screen. Across the room, she sees Mike pause mid-sentence and look at her, and she drops her head, unwilling to let anyone see the moisture in her eyes. She wants to say something to his daughter, but she doesn't know what to say. The girl is floundering in the awkwardness, but she's got nothing to give her, no way to help her when she doesn't know why Kathleen is calling.

"After the accident, I wanted to talk to you," Kathleen finally rushes. "I just…I can't imagine how I'd feel. I'd have been scared shitless. And I just…"

Her heart aches. His daughter's concern penetrates the walls she has created around that one, single afternoon. She has blocked out the horror, tried to ignore the trajectory the accident instigated.

Elliot always said Kathleen was the most like him, and her stilted conversation wrought with concern is him. She is his daughter.

"You saved her, you know," Kathleen says quietly, the sounds of traffic growing louder behind her. "My mom, she's usually really calm. But when it comes to us, she panics. She would have panicked because of E, and…"

She's rambling.

Olivia finally cuts in. "Kathleen, I was just doing my job." As soon as she has said the words, she realizes they are inappropriate. They sound one-dimensional and stupid.

Kathleen chuckles softly, finally in control. "Maybe. And maybe she wouldn't have died. But you were there and…" Her heavy breath fills the line. "You want to have lunch with me? I have this afternoon, and I'm here, on Michigan. I could…take you to lunch."

Olivia's eyes dart aimlessly around the room. She sees people, and she knows a lot of them by name. She's worked with a few, she reports to some. Some report to her. She's had drinks with a couple, but she doesn't know any of them. Not really. They don't know her. She's spent over a year in a room with strangers, and she's lonely as hell.

On the other end of the line, his daughter waits. And while they have never been close, Kathleen is familiar. She is his child, and Olivia craves her. She is desperate for the past. She thinks of Elliot's grumblings over the years, that this one was like him. Hot-headed. Sometimes surly. Too passionate. She misses the twist of Kathleen's lips that is entirely Elliot, misses the way she speaks because her rhythm is her father's. She thinks of the tense set of his shoulders for weeks after Kathleen's DUI. She thinks of him reading Kathleen's books over the phone in the darkness.

She misses her history. Theirs.

"Yeah, I'd like that, but I'm buying," she hears herself saying. "Just tell me where to be."

Come home, Olivia, be here.

She silences his voice in her head because he hasn't asked her. Not really. Not in a way that permits her to believe.

In the forty minutes between when she hangs up with Kathleen and when she pushes open the door to Norma's Grill, she doesn't think about what she is doing. She just moves forward, unwilling to think about seeing her. A familiar face. His child. Her chest aches with the inexplicable and sudden need to see his daughter and she thinks it's insane to love someone she hardly knows. She doesn't know Kathleen's favorite color, or her favorite food. She doesn't know the name of her first boyfriend or how old she was when she lost her first tooth. But she knows things about her, bits Elliot has given her over the years. And now, faced with the chance to see her, she is grateful.

His daughter sits in a booth in the trendy café. Her long, light blonde hair falls straight down her back and she is wearing a brown newsboy hat, white shirt and jeans. She has a thin, striped scarf wound loosely around her neck and her face is devoid of makeup. She looks older, calmer. Composed. She is stabbing at her coffee with a thin red straw and she looks up as Olivia approaches her booth.

Kathleen smiles, anxiety infiltrating her expression. "Hey, Olivia," she says, in a demeanor that is deceptively casual. There is nothing casual about this. They are both tense, smiles plastered on their faces.

Olivia finds herself smiling before she has decided on an approach. "Hey Kathleen," she says quietly, sliding in across from her.

Kathleen pretends to read the menu for a moment, before her eyes shyly look up again. "Well, no one expected this, did they?" she says wryly, her lips tipping upwards.

For a moment, Olivia thinks Elliot is wrong. Kathleen is like her mother. She says things outright, calls the bullshit and doesn't silence herself because of something as simple as awkwardness.

Olivia shakes her head. "No one did," she agrees.

And just like that, the tension eases enough that she thinks she might actually be able to eat something for lunch.

They are saved by their waiter, and they both order drinks before Kathleen tosses her head thoughtfully to the side and searches Olivia's eyes. "He didn't tell you I was coming, huh?"

She flinches. She didn't know if anyone knew they talked, didn't know if Kathleen was going to tell her to stay the hell away from her family. But his daughter's eyes are merely curious. Nearly sympathetic. "No," Olivia shakes her head.

"So you talk to him?" Kathleen prods.

Olivia's head snaps up and she almost laughs. Never mind medicine or the arts, his daughter should be a lawyer. She has a tenacity that reminds Olivia of Casey, years ago, when Casey had first been assigned to Special Victims and didn't know anything about conceding or boundaries.

Olivia figures the only way to answer is with the straight truth. Not all of it, but enough so that she's not technically lying to his child. "Sometimes."

Kathleen nods. "That's good."

There isn't any animosity on her face, and Olivia questions the reasons why. She wonders if things are going so well at home that Kathleen has finally relaxed, has finally stopped blaming her father, has finally been able to count on her family for some level of stability. She pushes away the niggling notion that it is because she left that Elliot is finally happy at home, that his kids can count on him again. That he isn't pulled between two places at once anymore.

She wonders if everyone is thriving now that she is gone.

Olivia clears her throat, knowing that tonight she will lie in the dark again. She will stare at her ceiling and he won't call. She'll be awake when the sun comes up, she'll stand exhausted under the hot spray of her shower tomorrow morning.

"How are you doing?" Olivia asks, treading gently on the space between them.

Kathleen looks up, and her eyes are wide, honest. "I'm good, Olivia. Things are finally okay." She shrugs. "Mom and Dad figured it out, you know? It worked out for the best. For all of us." She smiles sheepishly. "I wouldn't have thought that I would ever admit that this would work, but…" she shrugs.

She thinks it's ironic that for all the years she wondered if she would die in front of him, she is dying in front of his daughter instead. She suddenly wants to be alone, and as her iced tea is slid in front of her, she blinks, praying to God she will shut down. Her lips burn beneath the pressure of being slammed shut, her eyes ache from being kept open.

She hates herself. It's wrong to hurt because he is happy. It's wrong to feel pain when a marriage is surviving. She is a shitty person, and a shittier friend to him. This was what he wanted, all along. A chance to keep his family together. Her head pounds.

She's never been this tired before. She thinks of all the fighting she has done in this lifetime. Against her mother, against the scumbags on the street. Against her history and genetics. Against the system and for the victims.

The fighting she has done to stay away from him. To let him go.

She's lost every single battle.

Even from hundreds of miles away, she still wants him. She still finds herself huddled in bed sometimes, reliving the nights his big, warm body was next to her. She'd been aching for more in those days, but now, if given the chance she'd take anything.

She remembers the agony she lived in then, lying next to him, and thinks those were the best days of her life.

"I'm glad," she manages, despite her dry mouth.

Kathleen nods, dropping her head in thought. "How are you?"

Olivia shrugs, her fingers picking at the menu. "I'm good." She tries to smile for the younger girl's benefit. "It's nice here. Where are you thinking of going for school?"

It changes the subject, and Olivia is innately grateful that his daughter allows it. Kathleen becomes animated, her eyes sparkling as she touches on one subject or another. Film. Documentaries. Places to live and the things she wants to see. The minutes pass, one after the other, and she thinks this was how it was supposed to be when someone left to go somewhere new. There should have been excitement and possibility, adventure and a future in it. She tells Kathleen about the summers in the Midwest, and all the boaters out on Lake Michigan. She tells her about the winter and how the winds pick up, how they never pick one single direction in which to blow. She tells her about the jazz clubs and the walking tour of the city she took last fall.

She doesn't tell her that it will never be New York.

She doesn't blurt out that she is in love with her father.

Their plates come and Olivia picks at hers, unable to comprehend that she is expected to swallow pieces of it. Her throat is locked up, her stomach too tight.

"Liv?"

It's the first time Kathleen has been truly tentative in the last half hour. The way her eyebrows furrow in concern is so like her father that it knocks Olivia's breath away. "Yeah?" she responds, dragging a french fry across her plate.

"Why did you leave my dad?"

She stills, searching Kathleen's face for a hint of what his daughter needs to know. There is nothing readable in her expression. "I didn't leave him, Kathleen, I just…needed a change."

"From him."

Olivia lets her eyes drift shut and lets the fry drop out from between her fingers. She swallows, and seconds pass. She has to think of something to say, something that doesn't let out all of the secrets, the emotion, her heart. It isn't fair for his child to wonder about her father this way. If he had, if they had, if there was something there with a woman that wasn't her mother.

Too much time passes, and Kathleen fills the silence. "The accident. Did he blame you or something?" She's brash in her assumptions, and through the ache Olivia realizes she likes that about her. That she jumps in with both feet again and again, trying to get to the truth.

She can finally deny something unequivocally. "Absolutely not. He didn't, Kathleen. Not at all."

Kathleen's fork clatters against the plate. Her frustration is growing. It's Elliot, again. His prodding, his need to investigate, his impatience. "Are you happy here?"

Her blue eyes are clear, as yet unwritten. For his daughter, the world is still black and white, it's either or. Choices are simple.

Olivia licks her bottom lip, drawing it into her mouth as she scans the small restaurant. "Yeah."

Kathleen shakes her head and picks up her fork. "You're just like him." She stabs at a cherry tomato on her plate. "I can take it, you know. The truth. I'm not a little kid anymore."

It actually draws the smallest of smiles from Olivia. Kathleen's belligerence is familiar. She may have grown up, but her impulses are the same. She is the same girl that came stomping into the office years ago, hurling accusations at her father without reserve. She is unhindered by boundaries, and it draws Olivia to her.

"What truth do you want?" Olivia asks quietly.

His daughter pops the tomato into her mouth and chews, giving Olivia an assessing look. Her gaze is so open, it is as if she is outright daring her father's old partner to lie to her. "You didn't leave because of my dad. You left because of my mom, right? She said something to you?"

Of all the things she expected to hear, that wasn't one of them. Her stomach twists, and for the first time, she thinks she shouldn't have accepted Kathleen's invitation. This wasn't a good idea. This was only making things worse.

"No, of course-"

Kathleen interrupts her by rolling her eyes. "I heard my mother telling a friend she had been to see you. She was grateful for everything after the accident. I know that much. But you also scared the shit out of her. I think she assumed that after they separated that you and Dad-"

"I can't do this," she interrupts, rubbing her fingertips over her forehead. "Kathleen, please. This isn't a conversation-"

His daughter blows out a loud breath and sighs in defeat. "I'm sorry. That's not why I wanted to see you. I wanted to say thanks, I guess. For everything you did for us. The accident and all. I just…I don't know if anyone said that to you."

Olivia is silent. The waiter comes, and she lets him clear her uneaten plate. The silence at the table is thick, and she knows she has to clear the air. She can't leave it hanging. Can't leave it open for interpretation. Not with his child. "Kathleen, nothing ever happened between your father and me."

Kathleen's eyes cloud slightly. Olivia doesn't know if his daughter believes her or not, but she can't say or do more to convince her otherwise.

"How come…" Kathleen clears her throat, leaning back in the booth. "How come after…" She stops, playing with the ends of her scarf. She ducks her head for a moment, as if building her courage, and then lifts her chin. "How come you haven't come back? Now that mom and dad-" Again, she stops. She takes a deep breath, and lets all of it out. "I heard my mother say she thought you loved him. That maybe…he had fallen in love with you."

This isn't her conversation to have with his child. This isn't hers to deal with. This is a conversation Kathleen should have with her mother, with her father. She doesn't know what Elliot would do. Would he lie to her? Would he deny this? Would he talk to her about love and right and wrong and how some things would never, should never happen?

She wants to leave. She's got new wounds that need to be closed. New images and words that she needs to process. She can't explain to Kathleen that yes, she loves her father. That he was everything, the only thing of love she had ever known. That the sound of his voice makes her skin stop hurting, that she thinks the days he sat across from her, working alongside of her, were just a fantasy she conjured up.

Kathleen leans across the table. "Do you, Olivia?" she asks, her voice wavering. It is the first sign of trepidation that she has displayed. She seems vulnerable, unsure. "Is that it? Did you leave because you loved him?"

"Your mom and dad love each other," Olivia says quietly, thinking this time it is done. She is done. The fight is ebbing out of her and she wonders what will be left in its wake. She thinks it is some sort of sick joke that she is the one that has to convince his child of his love for his wife. "There's a lot of history between them, and sometimes things get strained, but he needs her. He fell apart without her, Kathleen. Without your mom." Olivia thinks about him cracking and breaking all the time in those first months after Kathy left him. Of how she couldn't help him, how she had wondered if at night he cried for his wife.

She's hollow, all carved out.

"I'm glad he's with your mom," Olivia offers, forcing her lips into a tight smile. "It's the best thing for him. For everyone. Their marriage…" Her hands are shaking, so she folds them into her lap, her fingernails biting into her palms. "I don't know your mom that well, Kathleen, but I know your dad. Their marriage means everything to him and he can't…he wouldn't survive without it."

Kathleen stares at her, her eyes wide. She looks like she is in shock, and Olivia realizes she never expected to hear that much. That, in essence, by not denying anything, she has just admitted she loves her father.

Kathleen's mouth opens, then closes. Her face is suddenly pale, and her chest is rising and falling faster and faster as the moments stack up. "Liv-" she murmurs, about to say something. She stops and her chin falls. She stares at her lap, blinking.

The check is placed on the table, and Olivia grabs it, searching through her purse for some cash. She has to get out of here, because although Kathleen isn't looking at her, she can tell his daughter is formulating some new line of inquiry. That she's processing right now, and when she is done, there will be a new, unrelenting barrage of questions.

She places the money on the table, and his daughter still hasn't looked up. "Kathleen, I have to go. Will you be alright? Are you in town for awhile?"

Kathleen shakes her head, rubbing her face with her hand. She won't look up. "I'm flying out tonight." She finally lifts her head, and her eyes are bright with moisture. "Thanks for lunch," she says softly, her voice oddly small.

Olivia nods and slides out of the booth, and her gut protests leaving his child here. Leaving the closest thing to him she's had in months and months. She's homesick all of a sudden and the pain slams into her without warning, nearly knocking her back. She wants to get on that flight tonight, the one that will take her home. Back to him. She wants his hands around her waist, his shoulder beneath her lips. She wants his mouth against her hair as she wakes up and she wants to be held. Just held, even.

She wants to hear him say her name, to smell him on her sheets. To sleep.

Kathleen's eyelids are heavy. "You gonna ask me about him?" she asks gently, her lips barely moving.

Olivia shakes her head. "No." She tugs on the edges of her sweater, cold again. "No, Kathleen. I'm not."

His daughter nods. "Take care of yourself, Olivia." Her voice sounds faraway, her eyes not making contact.

"You too," she gives back to his child. "You too."

She doesn't look back because she already knows too well what she has left behind.

He's been lying on the couch for an hour, his back stiff and his eyes trained on the empty ceiling when he hears his cell phone ring. For a moment, he wonders if it is her. She called earlier this week and that night he watched his phone light up, her number insistent on his screen. He clenched his fists that night, slammed his eyes shut and fought the urge to send the phone flying across the room.

He's been trying to let go of her. To give her what he has to give his daughter. Her freedom. Some hope. A life away from him. A chance.

But tonight, as he reaches for the phone that is whirring against the coffee table, he knows if she calls he will not be strong enough to let her go. Not tonight. Not two times in a row.

It is his daughter. Her name is on his lips before his phone is fully open. "Hey Kathleen," he says quietly, his eyes sliding across the plaster above him.

"Why didn't you…" She is crying. "God, Dad."

"Baby, what's wrong?" Behind her, he hears the sounds of the airport. The loudspeaker, the calls for the flights, for late passengers. He closes his eyes, knowing she must be at O'Hare again, on her way home. He tells himself she is okay. She is in the airport, she has to be okay.

"Is that why you just…you didn't fight me on leaving?" She isn't making sense, and she is sniffling into the phone.

He sits up, thinking he should turn on a light or two. "Kathleen, sweetheart, what's wrong?"

"I saw her, Dad. I saw Olivia."

His blood freezes where it is, his heart stops. There is a rushing in his ears that nearly drowns out the sound of his daughter, and the white noise threatens his ability to speak. He needs words. He needs to find some goddamned words. "Kath, baby," He has to stay calm. He can't panic. He can't wonder if his world is about to come apart. "How'd you see her? You call her?" Christ, this is what it feels like to implode. His chest is disintegrating into a million pieces, exploding again and again until he is breathing in dust.

There is silence on the other end of the phone. Then a heavy, shaky breath. "Mom gave me her number in case of an emergency."

His head immediately pounds as he tries to stay rational. To stay focused. Christ, he had reasons he didn't give Olivia's number to his child. There were reasons and history and fuck, Kathy had no right… "Katie," he says gutturally, reverting back to his nickname for her when she had just been a little girl. "Katie, please tell me that you didn't-"

"No. I didn't. I didn't, Dad, and I don't get why. I don't!"

He drops his head to his hands, his knees hitting the coffee table. He has nothing to say.

"You didn't tell her," she accuses, her voice becoming smaller. "You talk to her, and you didn't tell her. So you're lying to her, right? Is that it? You're a liar now?"

His anger is immediate. He has always responded to her goading. "Kathleen, you don't have a clue why-"

"Yes I do!" she yells into the phone. Her voice falls into pieces, her crying killing him, even through the phone. "You're just letting go of everyone, right Dad? So that's why you didn't say anything when I told you I wanted to move? Because you don't care anymore? You don't feel anything anymore?"

His daughter is nearly a thousand miles away from him and hysterical. He squeezes his eyes shut, and pinches the bridge of his nose, trying to figure out what the hell he has done now. He can't figure out why Kathleen cares about what he has and has not told Olivia.

"Baby, of course I care. I just-"

She sniffles into the phone. Once. Twice. There is silence, then the sound of them calling her flight to La Guardia. "You didn't even get upset when I told you I wanted to move to Chicago," she says brokenly.

He finally smiles, just a little bit. She sounds like a little girl. Irrational and impulsive, and he can almost picture her pigtails flying fifteen years ago as she fought with Maureen in the backyard. She had always used her fists, never her words. She is like him, her words have never worked for her.

"Katie, all those years you said I got upset about everything. Now I don't and I'm still a shithead?" he teases gently, trying to calm her. He needs to know about Olivia, he's desperate to know, but he has to calm his daughter first.

"Dad," she protests.

"Why did seeing Olivia make you think I didn't care that you wanted to move?" He opens his eyes and stares at the mantel. At the pictures of his kids, the ones of his son. He thinks of how he doesn't need pictures of Olivia, because he sees her everyday when he sits at his desk. She is always there across from him, their history remains, and sometimes her presence is so strong that he says her name a few times. The kid always looks away in embarrassment when he catches Elliot talking to the ghosts.

His daughter doesn't answer. For long moments there is nothing, and if it weren't for the sounds of her gate agent calling the rows, he would think she had hung up.

"Baby," he says as evenly as he can. "I can't keep you here. I can't." He thinks he might be sick. He thinks of his fingertips burning off as he tries to hold onto things that are slipping out of his control. "I want to and God knows, I want to tell you no, not to go. But you can't, I can't…" He stops. Changes direction. "You've got all these things in your life that you have to do, that I…want you to do. And you can't, if you're stuck here…with me. I can't keep you here, just because I don't know how to…let go."

The only breathing is his. It is ragged. Timed. He will stop breathing soon.

She sucks in air and tries to speak. She makes a few attempts before the words come. "I'm scared if I go, I'll be the one of us that left. That you'll…give up on me and…" her voice infused with a heartbreaking melancholy. "When I leave, I don't want you to let go," she finally cries softly. "But you will, won't you?"

"Kathleen," he starts, needing to speak now more than ever. His voice is rough. Sawed over.

"You loved her, didn't you?" she asks softly. It's the most fragile she's ever been. "But you don't care if she comes back. So what does that mean? When people leave you learn to love them less?" There is accusation and petulance and insecurity in the sound of it. She is challenging him on it, trying to prove he won't want her back one day, too.

He doesn't think he's ever felt so silent. The inability to speak permeates his head, his heart, his throat. He's quiet in his fingertips, his heart has lowered in decibel. He wants to reassure his daughter but he can't. Not now. Not in one phone call. He will have to show her in the coming months, in the days after she leaves. He'll have to prove to her he isn't who she thinks he is. He'll have to show her that absence is an ache that doesn't dull.

"How is she?" he finally says, avoiding everything his daughter is asking.

There is no response for long seconds. Then, "She doesn't eat. She's too thin. You'd yell at her." Silence again. "It didn't do her any good," she says. "To leave, it didn't do her any good."

He wants to scream. He wants to haul Olivia home.

"Why didn't you tell her, Dad? What if she needs to know?" his daughter whispers.

He knows this isn't about Olivia. Not for Kathleen, not in this moment. "I love you, baby. No matter where you go that won't change. And it won't get easier to let you go. Everyday will be harder than the last. This I…" his lips won't cooperate. He's mumbling, but he can't stop. He tries to raise his voice to something that can be heard, understood. His eyes burn. "I know this, and you gotta trust me baby, that just cause you need to go, you do, I won't stop loving you."

Because it's his child, it's easy. The words come, they are easily given. They are meant, he will repeat them for her until she knows. There are no boundaries, no rights and wrongs.

She sighs into the phone, and he hears her get up, the rustling of the phone against her ears. "They're calling my row, Dad," she says. "And…" she shifts on the other end of the line. He can hear her breathing. "I love you, too."

After she hangs up he sits there, and he wonders if that was all it took. A call. Some words. The truth. He wonders if it's enough, and as his daughter boards a plane and heads home, he wishes he had the right to bring Olivia home, too.

She should have asked.

If she had asked, she would have gotten the answers she needed to move on. His daughter would have told her that he was happy with his wife, their children. She would have heard the words, pasted a smile on her face, and nodded as if it was the best news she had ever heard.

If pretending was an art form, she surely mastered it years ago; if she was an actress, she would have won an Emmy, an Oscar for her performance for being the understanding ex partner who merely needed a change.

But long ago, she learned that life was never a film, television, the nightmares that caused children to awaken in the middle of the night. It was real, piercing, soul shattering, and it held answers that even the strongest person couldn't bear.

She hadn't asked though; instead, she had gone back to work and Special Agent Mike Kelly had her outside and in the coffee shop around the corner within fifteen minutes. She had protested. She had threatened to kill him, but he had laughed. He had forced a coffee in front of her, while he got up to get extra whipped cream topped onto his.

The rain, that has washed away the lovely afternoon, trickles down the window, and she turns. She turns to the corner of the room where she had sat with Kathleen. A different restaurant, a different location, but when it came down to it, it was all the same. Because now her life, her existence here was tainted with the memories of his daughter, of all the things left unsaid, of all the things spoken. She should just leave Mike here, go to the church and pray to find the solace that would heal her.

How is it that this hurts more than being beside him and never having him? God, she wants to go back to then, she does, she does. She thinks she'd give up the freedom from him here; she thinks she'd give up the chance to ever see him again as long as she knew he was near, as long there was a chance she could run into him.

She laughs at herself, and it isn't until Mike sits down with an eyebrow raised that she realizes she did it out loud.

"What's so funny?"

"Nothing." She leans back in her chair, snaking her hands along the warm cup. "No offense, Mike, but I'd really rather be anywhere else right now."

"He knows you love him." Shit. She cannot do this for the second time today. "What happened that you're here and he's not?"

The gentle twang in his voice almost makes her give in, but she's smarter than that, she is. She pushes her chair out, reaching for her bag as she stands. "I'm leaving."

"Sit down, Olivia."

And she does, because at some point today, she lost her will to fight.

"The girl who called earlier. What was her name, Kathy, Katherine?"

She thinks of those pages Elliot read to her about the heart, about how every once in a while, it's quite possible to die of a broken one. "Kathleen," she whispers.

"Was it case related?"

"You'd know if it was."

"No," Mike shakes his head, "I mean an old case. Someone from New York?"

She thinks now might be her time as the pounding in her heart continues; she thinks about all the things she'd say if she got to the gates of heaven, all the questions that were supposed to be asked. She thinks what would be on her list of regrets and so many come to mind that the world spins and her heart begins its decent into oblivion.

Walking into SVU on that first day; laughing with him because if it was always serious maybe there wouldn't have been the chance to see the side of him that made her fall in love; choosing not to get another partner all those times she threatened it; going to talk to him when he had a wife and children who needed his ear more.

Leaving; coming back; leaving; coming back; leaving.

There are no other regrets that enter her mind that don't involve him.

"It was my old partner's daughter," she finally answers. "She was in town checking out grad schools and wanted to have lunch."

She watches as realization dawns across his face like the sun escaping the rain, the clouds and finding peace. "It's always the partner," Mike adds, and his voice changes into something different, more familiar.

She finds it interesting that a lonely heart sounds the same, accent or not. Desperation for someone lost will always sound similar to the shattering of broken glass.

He looks down at the table, stirs his coffee until the white cream dissolves into the brown liquid. "I was in homicide for two years before Anna became my partner. The job was so different with her. It always sucked, you know?" He looks up at her and she finds his vulnerability. She finds her reflection in the depth of his eyes. "We had no living victims, but there were still families we had to talk to. There was still that knowledge that the world sucked. I fell in love with her. I don't know when, I don't know how, but one day she asked me a question and it was just different. It was a stupid question, unrelated to the job, but I wanted her with me. After a while, she knew. She figured it out. We talked about it sometimes, about what would happen if we got together. We considered screwing our partnership if it meant…"

A smile crosses his lips, and she feels hers part as well. "If it meant you could screw each other."

"I never thought I'd hear those words come out of your mouth." Mike laughs, nods. "We thought about it, but before we could do anything…We were tracking a serial killer and she got into our squad car and it blew up. She was dead before I had even realized what happened."

The moisture pools in her eyes and he's just one more tortured soul she wishes she could help. She holds the coffee in her hands, glaring at the small scratches etched into the table. Nothing ever remains as it once was; not even inanimate things. "Right before I moved to Chicago, I was in a car accident with his pregnant wife. She went into labor and after she delivered, she went into cardiac arrest. She was fine. The baby was fine, but…" She looks up at him, and she finds the compassion she needs. She finds the look that Elliot used to give her, that saved her. "I fell in love with him and he belonged to someone else."

"Philly."

"What?"

He looks down at his coffee, then at her, trying to save her. "When I was in homicide, I lived in Philly. When Anna died, I moved here."

"Why are you telling me this, Kelly?"

"We all have our war wounds. Most of us, we're just outrunning all the shit we left behind. You're not as alone as you think you are."

But she is, she is. War wounds were branded onto the skin of every person who walked the earth. She knows better than most that it's all visible, that nothing is worn inside the heart. She's watched rape victims walk down the street, watched them jerk away from anyone who gets close. She's watched children's faces go as pale as a ghost at the first sign of their molester. She watched the way Elliot held his child on that night over a year ago, the relief washing across his face because the life he once knew still remained.

And she watches herself in the mirror as she gets ready for bed, the dimness in her eyes, the pallor of her skin.

Scars might not be visible, but reactions always are.

Reactions are the one thing that never lies; the one thing she can never outrun.

He misses God.

It's a weird thought to have, he's aware of this. But on nights when it's so dark, when the rain pours because the air is too thick to remain still, too warm to let the snow kiss the ground, he thinks about what it was once like to believe with no questions asked, no thoughts given. He's always believed because it was in him, because on his brother's twenty-first birthday, they'd both gotten a tattoo of their Lord. It was to piss off their father more than anything else, but as he watched the ink permeate into his skin like a disease that now belonged to him for an eternity, he thought that maybe the tattoo meant something. It was sacrilegious, yet comforting. It was wrong, yet somehow felt right.

But over time, when the innocent children continued to be harmed, when women were brutally attacked, when his marriage fell apart, he felt himself losing the grasp of his faith, of his knowledge in God. Yet, it wasn't until he fell in love with two women that he stopped believing, that he stopped thinking that maybe there were answers out there. There were no answers, not ones that made sense, not ones that would ever fully make him understand.

He prays, but now it lacks the meaning it once had. Then again, most things do these days.

In his son's bedroom, the lights from his mobile glide across the walls, a picture book of animals and shapes weaving between the shadows of rain. The baby rests on his chest, and Elliot shifts in the plush chair, feeling the small breath that exhales onto his t-shirt. He runs his hand through the child's hair, inhales the smell of Johnson & Johnson, of the innocence that comes from knowing nothing of the world. His son can walk, fall down, cry, but within minutes, he's up, laughing, carefree.

There are no consequences; there are no bruises that didn't heal within days.

The rain hits the gutters that he hadn't cleaned before the storm season, listens as it pounds, as it fires off its fury. He wonders if it's raining in Chicago. If it was four hours ago, he could have called his daughter and asked.

He thinks about her in the rain sometimes, about the length of her hair, if she pushes it aside and waits for it to turn into waves. He'd seen her in the rain for nine years, but he no longer thinks about standing beside her so she doesn't slip, so she doesn't fall. He doesn't think of handing her an umbrella before they head out of the precinct. Now, he thinks about walking through the park with her, listening to her laugh as she remains beside him with her hands rooted deeply into her pockets, the rain striking her skin like the tears he hopes she doesn't still cry. He thinks about what she would look like tucked into bed, getting warm after being caught in the storm. He thinks that he never thought of Kathy like this, not even when she was his everything.

In moments like these, he thinks he's stopping his belief in God because He won't grant wishes to the sinners of the world.

"Did you talk to Kathleen?"

He startles at the sound of her voice, and his child grunts, shifts, sleeps. He hadn't heard her footsteps. He hadn't heard her step into the room. He blinks, adjusting to the light she must have turned on in the hall, adjusting to the steady sound of her voice; a metronome for their lives. He could have sworn she was asleep when he had come in from work. Then again, he doesn't know much of her these days, not like he once had.

He turns back to the window, to the shadows and shapes and images that belong to his son. He tries to remember Kathleen as a child, as a baby who didn't have the power to sting with words, as a little girl who didn't yet have knowledge of how fucked up the world could turn out. He thinks of her in terms of who she is now, the young woman who went from pre-med wannabe to documentary filmmaker hopeful in seconds. Of the girl who knew things she shouldn't, who saw things because she learned from her father that what is seen by the eye is never what is.

"You gave her the number, didn't you?" His voice is hollow inside the bedroom, so hollow. If his son wasn't in his arms, if he didn't have life breathing against his heart, he thinks he'd just disappear.

If there was one description that could define silence followed by words that should never be mentioned, it would be shattering glass.

The glass is beneath him as he shifts; it's under her toes as she leans against the frame of the door.

"I gave her the number of the FBI offices in Chicago. If she needed anything, I wanted her to know she had someone there." In the darkness, he watches her. He watches and he wonders if Olivia was never in his life, if he would still love his wife so completely. "When…" She clears her throat, sliding into the room. Her back touches the wall, and he thinks that she might crumble, break, dissolve, the third in their trio to waste away to nothing. "When did you fall in love with her? Was it before you came back?"

He closes his eyes, because he can't discuss this with her, he can't. He thinks there should be guidelines and rules and directions on how to deal when life never turns out the way you expect it to. There should be potions on how to stop yourself from falling in love. There should be prayers on what to do when the world splits open and fights to swallow you whole.

But because he once loved her, because he still loves her, he finds himself shaking his head. There are no potions. There are no prayers. There's just honesty; salvation. "I don't know when it was," he mutters, and his eyes open.

Even in the dark, he can see her stare, the shine of her eyes that hasn't diminished in over a year. "You have to let her go, Elliot. If you love her, you have to let her go."

His heart joins the glass that has shattered the ground.

"Kathy—"

"I hate that you love her. I hate that this has become a part of our lives." Conversations that have been spoken before can never be resolved. Sometimes, there are no words; sometimes, there are no solutions, no resolutions. "But before she became this person to you, she was Olivia." Her name burns his skin coming off of Kathy's lips and as if Elliot knows, he presses his lips against this father's heart. "I spoke to Kathleen too. She told me Olivia was miserable. Why didn't you—"

"You have no right, Kathy," he whispers, and he wishes that people didn't grow up, become wiser, leave what is theirs.

She laughs and he'd think it was almost cold if he didn't already know that once you're dead inside, emotions no longer matter. "I have no right? I have every right, Elliot. You think it's easy for me to know you love her? You think I like that our daughter went to lunch with her, that Olivia's miserable because of you I'm assuming?" She takes in a breath, and it must be his because he's suffocating, because even with the baby's touch against him he can't breathe. "She's in Chicago for a reason. It's been over a year. Either go or let her go."

If it was that easy he would have done it long ago, but he can't let her go, he can't.

He looks up at her, mesmerized by twenty-four years of their life together in her stance. The way she'd lean against the fridge as she watched him stare at the news after coming from his own crime scene; the way she'd place his hand on her stomach all those times she was pregnant, how together they had felt their children move. God he loves her, he does. He never meant for it to happen, to fall for someone else. He never meant to cross the line that remained invisible. He never meant to love two women, need two women in completely different ways.

"Are you sleeping at Maureen's tonight?"

He rubs his thumb along Elliot's soft hairs, and he falls in love in a completely different realm. "Yeah. I don't know why she bothered to get a dog when she's never there to begin with."

Kathy smiles, pushing herself off the wall. She holds her hands out for her son, but he can't hand him off, not now, not yet. He can't give his life support away when he still cannot breathe on his own. "Because she knows you'll always be there to watch him." She brushes her lips across her son's head. "He hates it when you leave him," she says softly. "You changed with him, you know."

He nods, but it's not solely the child who has changed him. It's not. "Maureen still has the crib at her place. Can I take him with me tonight?"

"He's your son, Elliot." The smile appears again, aged lines from fighting in circles, around her mouth. "My mother was planning to come by in the morning. Can you have him back by ten so she can spend time with him?"

"Of course."

She stands frozen, staring, and when he looks up, she glances out the window, out into rain soaked night. "He's everything to you," Kathy mutters. She turns back to face him, one strand of blonde hair obstructing her view. "Why are you so different with him?"

He's always loved his children. For all the nights he failed to come home, all the birthday parties he missed, all the dates he wasn't there to see his kids leave for, he was always thinking of them. When Olivia would drive, when there was too much in the air to speak, he'd think about them, wish he was the one to tuck them into bed. They've always been everything. They're all always be everything.

He comes home now though. Ever since his son was born, he's there with his kids for dinner at least four times a week. He's the only one who can put their son to sleep. He's the only one who can read to Elliot in a voice that calms him from his tears. Maybe he'll forever be proving to himself, to Kathy that he is that child's father.

"I have enough regrets in my life, Kathy. I can't make it up to them, to you, but I can make sure I don't do the same to him."

There are tears in her eyes and she nods, walking towards the door. In the threshold, her body bathed in silhouette, she places her hand on the frame, holding her steady, holding her up. "I wanted to know if she was okay. That's why I gave Kathleen the number." Her voice slices through his heart, as smooth as a skilled surgeon. "I wanted to know if any of us were really okay." She clears her throat, one foot out of the room. "Make sure you bring E's blanket with you when you go. He'll fuss in the middle of the night without it."

And then she's gone, with nothing but his child and the rain providing music in the night. Even without voices, without the sounds of anything but life and Mother Nature, he hears Kathy's words like a broken record in his mind.

Let her go. If you love her, let her go.

It's a nice sentiment, it is.

He lifts his son into his arms, grabbing the blue blanket out of his crib. The blue blanket with miniature yellow ducks Olivia had given him when he was two days old. The one his child can't sleep without.

In the end, maybe being a baby isn't easier. Maybe, despite age, there's always an issue of letting go.

On the anniversary of his sixteenth year in SVU, she had her landlord install a smoke detector on her bedroom ceiling.

She had stared up at it for hours that night, at the red light that blinked every few seconds. Her eyes had closed, but the light remained against the black background of her mind, and if she moved a little bit to the left, she could have sworn she felt him beside her. She tried to remember what it had felt like with him there, all the conversations, the touches that seemed like a lifetime ago.

He hadn't called her that night. There was a party for him downtown and when she had closed her eyes again, she had pretended she was there. She would have given him shit for being there for so long, yet even without words, he'd know how much she respected him. She'd give some speech like partners were supposed to do. She'd stand around with a glass of wine, a bottle of beer, and talk about old times, about happy memories interwoven with all the bad.

There were no speeches that night, though. There were no memories spoken with others. She was alone, with nothing but the red light to guide her way like so many nights before when he was beside her. It was that night that she realized how truly alone she was, how the light that was supposed to comfort her did nothing but remind her of a failed life no longer hers.

She stares up at it now, counts the five seconds in her head until the red blinks, disappears, returns. She can't stop thinking about Mike, about Kathleen, about it all. She had gotten home hours ago, the rain soaked through her clothes, but she hadn't changed. She'd climbed into bed, let the tears mesh with the water from outside.

On her bedside table, her phone rings and even without looking she knows it's him. His daughter must be home by now and she debates picking it up, ignoring him like he had her for the past week. She used to be strong. She's nothing but weak now.

"Hi," she answers wearily.

"I heard you had lunch with my daughter today."

She shouldn't have answered the phone. She makes note of this the second her first tear falls. Her eyes slip closed and it's not him she sees tonight, but his daughter. Sitting across from her, the innocence, the maturity, the passion in her movements, her words. It was Elliot she had been sitting with today, a version of him, a child that was part of him. "She looks good, El."

"I hear you don't though." His voice is smooth, but filled with so much concern, with a tinge of anger, with a measure of desperation. "Why aren't you eating?"

"I'm eating," she mumbles, rolling over in bed. "I didn't realize I'd be getting a progress report."

"Olivia." Her name is like an exhale on his lips and for a small second, she allows herself to wonder what it would be like if he breathed it into her mouth as she kissed him. "You're not okay out there, are you?"

She presses her lips together, hopes to hell it'll keep out the gasp that is threatening to cross her lips. She thinks about the breathing exercises Kathy did when she was giving birth, the exercises she tried to calm his wife with. She could breathe through this pain, she could, she could. She'd breathe and it would be okay. She would be okay.

"Where are you?"

"E and I are watching Kep again. Maureen's out of town with one of her classes."

On her way home from work last week, she had almost bought Gray's Anatomy. She kept thinking about the heart. It was nothing more than an organ. Blood and valves and pumps that kept a person alive. She wishes she knew who had made the heart something sacred, something that related to love, to emotions. She wishes she knew so she could fight them because while she's not a doctor, she won't let herself believe it's anything more than what Henry Gray described. Blood and valves and pumps that kept a person alive.

Love wasn't a part of the heart. It was the mind weaving tales, telling lies.

She turns on her television, the sound filtering into her room. She had put her TV in there when she moved. Sometimes sound was far easier than silence. There won't be much talking tonight. He seems distant, upset, and for the first time she doesn't have the strength to help him through it. She can't listen to him about his wife tonight, about his children, about anything. But the drama on TV can't block out the sounds of breathing, of her memories of him on those nights another lifetime ago.

Her eyes blur as she stares at the people on screen, the tears obstructing her vision, making her see things she wants to, making her believe that the world and its problems can be solved after an hour.

She misses him. God, she misses him and she hates herself for that. She was fine the first time she left. She came back because it was where she belonged, because staring at a computer for ten hours a day didn't suit her. She missed him the second time she was gone, but it wasn't this painful, it couldn't have been. What she hates about herself the most though is that she's stopped caring. She's stopped looking for backup when she walks into an abandoned building. She's stopped caring if God forbid something happened in the job.

She's stopped, as if the world finally learned how to remain still.

"You're not a detective anymore."

The tears crowd her eyes and she blinks, once, twice. She's almost forgotten he's on the phone. She's almost forgotten that he's not a figment of her imagination. "What?"

"You're in the FBI. Special Agent."

That sounds like someone sophisticated, suave, confident. Things she never was. Things she'll never be again. "I'm still a detective. The other title isn't me."

His son makes a noise against the phone and she closes her eyes, picturing the baby on top of his father. She wonders what he looks like now; if he has Kathy's eyes, mouth, Elliot's personality.

"Can I ask you something?"

"What?" he asks quietly.

"Do you look at Elliot?" She stares up at the red light, watches it blink, disappear, return.

"What do you mean do I look at him? Of course I look at him."

She's always found it funny that the naïve think you're the one who is stupid when they're the ones not understanding. "Do you look at him and…When you look at him, are you looking for someone else?"

His voice cracks, breaks, shatters like glass. "He's my son, Olivia. He flexes his fingers how I flex mine. He doesn't know he's doing it, he doesn't understand what he's doing but he does. He stares up at the ceiling sometimes when I do and I see myself in him. I stopped looking for someone else the minute Kathy told me the truth."

She slides her face across the pillow, the moisture warm and wet against her skin. She doesn't know what she wanted to hear from him. She doesn't even know why she has asked. When she was younger, she would catch her mother looking at her. Serena would watch her movements, listen to her laughter. She would stare, looking for something that didn't belong to her, drinking because she found what she always wished she wouldn't.

However, she knows her mother wasn't the same as he is now. Serena was alone. Elliot isn't. In the long run, he never has been.

The red light catches her eye and she blinks back the tears. She can hear his child stir on the other end of the line, gurgle noises, cry, thrive in a world she has nearly given up on. She listens, takes in the garbled noises, the yells of the little boy she helped protect minutes after he was born.

She sometimes thinks she's given up her whole life, her wants, her needs for someone who can never reciprocate, for someone who can never fix her, change her.

And at the same time, she knows that her life began the moment she walked into that precinct in Manhattan.

He whispers and it's so delicate, so unlike the seasoned detective that he is, that she mutes her TV so she can listen. She's learned how to pay attention to all the things unsaid, the way a voice sounds when it speaks, the emotion and pain that lives inside each person. He talks to his son, and she hears everything she wishes she would when he speaks to her.

The love, the devotion, the never-ending dedication.

Shhh. Go back to sleep. You're okay. It was just a nightmare. You're okay. I love you.

His son's cries abate; her cries escalate.

She hadn't meant to let them through. She hadn't, she hadn't.

Shivers run down her spine, and she shakes, willing them to stop. This isn't her heart. This is her mind going insane, looping like a Ferris wheel, over and over and over until she can't think, until she can't breathe.

She hadn't understood before this moment what it was like to break down with no barriers held. She's cried. She's relived moments until she's forced herself to sleep. But she always held her control no matter how small.

Control isn't an option tonight though. It's a distant memory that lives inside of her like the pieces of him do, like the touch of his hands upon her skin, the mark of his smile against her pillow.

The cries echo in her eardrums and she no longer knows if it's only her. His son could have started again; the television could be on too loud. But her chest aches and her eyes burn and she can't breathe, she can't, so it has to be her.

"Olivia." His voice is firm, axes trying to knock down her walls, trying to get her to salvation. "Olivia, talk to me. What happened?"

I fell in love with you, I fell in love.

She works to catch her breath, but the tears clog her throat, the sobs echo in her abysmal room like thunder in the night. "I'm fine," she whispers. "I'm…I'm fine."

"Olivia." The firmness becomes a demand. The demand hurts like no other. "What. The. Hell. Happened?"

If the heart were to tear, would it still be possible to live?

"I don't…" She gasps on her words; she grasps onto the pillow beside her. "I can't…" The salt of her tears burn the tip of her tongue. She's out of control and she can't stop. She can't remember what it was like to be the person she was before love. Before him. "I want…"

Her chest heaves, her heart slowly dies. She's going to be sick. She's been sick for so long. She throws the covers off of her, runs to the bathroom, kneels on the floor. Oh God. Oh God. She can hear him talking, yelling, alarming his child. She hears, but it's a fog, it's so foggy.

The phone is on the floor seconds before she empties herself into the toilet. She fights the nausea, closes her eyes as she hears him through the line, panicking. Panicking like she had, like she has been for a year now. She holds her hair back, retching into the toilet again, but it's nothing but her soul now. He's right. She doesn't eat. She's forgotten how.

She hates herself. She hates him.

"Olivia, answer me!"

She flushes the toilet, grabs her phone, does her best to breathe. "Shut up," she mumbles, resting her head on the now closed toilet lid. Simple breaths. One right after the other. "You're going to scare Elliot."

"Are you going to tell me what the fuck just happened?"

She needs to brush her teeth, wipe him clean. "I'm fine, Elliot."

"Bullshit."

It is bullshit. All of it. Love being the happiest thing in the world.

Without love, without him, she thinks she'd finally understand that it was possible to be free and chained for an eternity at the exact same time.

He was taught to believe in hell.

When he was nine, he became best friends with David Ginsberg. On the eve of Elliot's tenth birthday, the two of them went to the video store and snuck into the porn section. There had been a man in there with them, a man too oblivious, too interested in Charlie's Anals and A Midsummer Night's Cream to notice the two underage boys rummaging through the titles. They had been there for two minutes when David tapped him on the shoulder, sliding the case for Guess Who Came At Dinner under his shirt. He had snuck out of there, Elliot hot on his heels, and when they were safe on the streets, he knew it was wrong. He demanded David go back. After all, they had stolen, stolen porn no less and he knew he was going to go to hell. God didn't forgive sinners. He branded them as damaged and sent them to a place where they were to repent.

David had laughed. As a Jew, he didn't believe in hell. It simply didn't exist like Santa, and the Tooth Fairy, and white noise and for days after that, he wondered how he could convince his parents to let him convert to Judaism. It seemed like there were so many options. There would be no guilt. There would be mistakes, lectures on all he had done wrong, but that would be it. There would be no fires, no makers to meet when he already had his father.

He thought to ask so many times, but he never did. He never knew how to let go of his beliefs and his faith and all that had been handed to him, all that he was petrified would be taken away.

Even now, he still believes in hell. David Ginsberg was wrong, yet in his naïve nine year old mind, he was desperate to believe.

There was a hell. It didn't exist when you died, but when you walked the earth, when you lived your life. There was hell each time he had to inform a parent that their child had been raped, murdered. There was hell when his wife left him alone, without his children, without salvation. There was hell in the split second he thought that he had lost Olivia to a knife wound, that his youngest son wasn't his. And there was hell when she had broken down on the phone an hour earlier, her cries echoing across the line; an egg shell cracking against the side of a bowl.

Hell wasn't something that existed in the afterlife. It was around him always, blazing, waiting for the moment it was bound to erupt and explode.

He had heard her throwing up, the sputtering cough that filled the line. He had called for her, and as his son looked at him with such care and concern, he wondered if that's what he had sounded like the moment Victor Gitano had struck her down.

It was like icicles breaking, volcanoes erupting, waves crashing. It was forceful, ripping from his throat like a fire willing to burn down the world.

She had calmed. It had taken minutes, maybe it was even hours, but her cries had been suppressed. In between the silences, between their doubts, she told him she finished the second Harry Potter, as if nothing had happened at all. And when he had folded out the couch so he could lay down, the hinges creaking, she talked about the weather, about the rain. He had laid down with his daughter's dog on one side, his son on the other, and closed his eyes, unsure of how much more he could handle.

His stomach still aches from when she had gotten sick, tight knots that might never unravel. He had considered running to the bathroom himself, getting sick for her, taking her pain like he knows he never can.

He doesn't need to hear her cries to know that she isn't okay. He doesn't need to listen to her cry in order to know what he has to do. In the suspended silence, with the baby pressed against him asleep, the blanket clutched in his tiny fingers, he looks out the window of Maureen's apartment. The rain drizzles like tears across the glass pane and this time, he no longer sees her there with him. He closes his eyes and in the rain, he sees her shadow walking with another man. He doesn't see her, but he can hear her laughter, he can see the outline of the gun that is attached to her hip. She tilts her head, the tainted moonlight now spilled across her skin and she looks happy, peaceful. Her hand reaches for the man, the man who isn't him, who can never be him, and he takes it, dragging her across the rain soaked grass. She screams, but it's not from the horrors of the job, from the pain Elliot has bestowed upon her. No, she screams in exhilaration, because maybe all along all he ever had to do was let her go.

He opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. The baby's fist opens and in sleep, he slings the blanket over his father. The fleece is soft against his skin and he slides it from his son's hand. He places it next to his pillow, rolls his face so the material touches his cheek. When Olivia had given it to Elliot, it had smelled of her for days. The mandarin had washed off. Her scent left behind what she never could: herself.

The blanket touches his skin and he breathes in, wondering if Elliot had smelled of her the days after his birth. He can't remember and maybe it's better he doesn't.

"Are you miserable there?"

It takes her a few minutes to answer, and he thinks it's because he's asked her this too many times. He's asked her and was never willing to hear the truth in the lies of her answers. "Sometimes," she answers, and he's surprised that for once she has been honest. "I wish…" She's quiet, so quiet. The red light of his daughter's fire alarm burns a hole through his heart; a cigarette ash making its everlasting mark. "I wish…" She cries, and his eyes close as if that could stop his as well, as if sheer force could end this pain. "I never should have…You deserved a partner so much better than me."

He wonders how long it would take for someone to hyperventilate; he wonders how long it will take her. He wonders if letting her go is what will finally set her free.

"Olivia—"

"Ask me to come home," she whispers. His toes bunch the sheets, his eyes open and the light that reminds him of her remains hidden behind tears. "I don't…You don't have to come see me, but I can't stay here anymore, Elliot. Ask me to come home. I can't go back unless you ask me."

If God existed, He wouldn't put her through this, He wouldn't.

He thinks of her, of who she was in the beginning. Of how she had no fear, how she survived to take down perps, to save victims. He thinks of how much she would laugh, how she hadn't yet lost the weight due to too many nights and lack of appetite. He thinks of who she has become since becoming close with him, since falling in love with him.

She was wrong. She was.

She deserved a partner so much better than him.

He lifts Elliot onto his chest, needing something to hold onto, needing his salvation when he's about to watch his world crumble.

When someone died, someone else was supposed to live: the continuous cycle of life. She had helped bring his child into the world, gave him warmth when his mother could not. And he had never realized that the moment she had taken his youngest child, even if it was only for a moment, she had given herself up so he could live.

He braces himself, feels the knots inside him tighten, cutting off his circulation. "You can't be this person anymore, Liv." He's surprised when it comes out of his mouth, when he finds the courage he didn't believe he had. "It's not who you are." There are shadows on the ceiling, but all he can see is her, all he can see are her lost opportunities, her lost moments. "I have to let you go, Olivia. I have to…You have to move on with your life."

He squeezes the baby against him, loosens his grip when he writhes to break free. He doesn't know how to keep his voice steady, how to force her into the life that she needs, deserves. He thinks this is what it must have been like in her dreams. The drowning. His lungs fill, and he fights past the water, past the pain because this has to be it, it has to be.

"I can't make you happy. I can't…I can't give you what you need. I can't ask you to come back to New York."

He waits for her to speak, to yell, but it's not who she is anymore. He's watched her lose her fight; he's let her lose her fight.

Her cries filter through the phone, sifts through a colander from gentle gasps to uncontrollable sobs.

"I shouldn't have…" He bites his lip, knows this is his hell. "In the bus station that day, I shouldn't have…I should have saved Ryan Clifford. I shouldn't have, in the hospital after the accident, I…"

"When did you fall out of love with me?" Her voice holds no remembrance of the Olivia Benson he once knew. This one has no passion, no drive, no life force to keep her alive.

I don't know when I fell in love with you, but shit, Olivia…I never fell out of it.

"I don't know when it was," he mutters, squeezing his eyes shut.

He can feel the moisture on the tip of his tongue as he licks his lips, the salt of his tears. He thinks of her in the rain, of how happy she used to be, how happy she could be again. He's a selfish man. He knows this. He's always known this. He's done things for the sake of him. He's said no to his children because it worried him, because he was scared. It had never ruined lives though. His selfish choices never ruined lives. Until now.

If he loves her, and he does, he does, he has to be selfless. He has to let her go for the sake of love.

"You deserve someone who will love you and that's not me, Olivia. I'm sorry, but it's not."

And then the tears stop. The sobs abate; her breathing remains fast, then slows, steadies. He can hear her sheets rustle. He knows her light has turned on. She's no longer willing to play the victim when she has nothing left to lose. "Screw you."

That's my girl, Liv. He'd almost smile if he wasn't too busy trying to save her from his pain.

"You would have ended up hating me, Olivia. I—"

"Don't," she says, and he can hear the chill in her words. "Don't make yourself feel better for this. I asked you to let me go, Elliot. I asked you to let me go and you kept calling. You kept calling and making me fall in love with you and Jesus Christ!" The rage is breathing life into her, breathing fire into him as he desecrates, as he lets her slip away. "I asked you to let me go months ago!"

His son moves on his chest, reaches his hand up for the phone. "Liva," he mutters, his lips touching the receiver.

The world stills, except for his son who rolls over on his father's chest. The anger has faded, or maybe it's there, waiting, taking a break to let the sorrow in. His son had never known her except from the late night desperation talks that Elliot listened to without knowledge. His son had never known and yet, and yet he knew it all.

"You're right," and for a moment he has no idea what she's talking about. The web of tears clears from her words, makes her strong. "You should have saved Ryan Clifford that day. You should have let me go back then."

"For what it's worth Olivia, I did…I lo—"

"No, you didn't, Elliot. We…That car accident, that night we let it get out of control."

He loves her for being strong; he hates her for the same exact reason.

"It was more than that." He finds himself fighting because she has to know, she has to know that he still cares, that it was never a mistake. "You deserve happiness and I can't give that to you. I can't…I'm not what you want, Olivia."

"You don't get to tell me what I want. You…" Her voice softens and he knows he won't sleep tonight, maybe not ever again. "You don't get to be the martyr here. This was my life, Elliot. You…I hate who you've made me become."

He wants to tell her that he didn't make her become anyone, but her anger is better than her tears. But he doesn't listen to her words right now, he can't. Instead, he listens to the sound of her voice, to the change in octaves, to the way her New York accent slips in every once in a while. He wonders if he'll remember what she sounds like weeks from now, months, years. He wonders if he'll ever spot her on the streets of Manhattan again, if she'll get married, what her first child will look like, what its name would be.

It isn't until he tastes the tears that he's even aware that he's started to cry again. He's such a piece of shit; he's such a wuss and even his gun and badge can't change the asshole that he is at the moment.

She's talking, and yelling, and it's too much now, it's too much. He places his son on the bed beside him, holds him against him like a shield. "Olivia…I…" But there's nothing to say, nothing to do.

The ice in her voice freezes his soul, freezes his mind. "You don't get to be the martyr here," she repeats. "Goodbye, Elliot."

It's only after the operator has come onto the line telling him to hang up that he realizes he wasn't the one to let her go after all. He had taken the steps, broken her down, broken her heart. And when it was said and done, when he felt her pulling away, he kept her on the line, needing her, wanting her, afraid to live without her.

He had spent his entire life watching people go, watching them walk out, but in the end, he had always done it first. He knew his father would leave him one day, either from the job or his hatred of his son, so he distanced himself. He distanced himself and when his father died, he didn't care, he couldn't care. It was weeks before Kathy left him that he never came home, expecting the worst when the fights continued long into the night, when he had already been pulling away for years. He spent evenings in the crib, worked until the morning, and when Kathy was gone, as much as it hurt, he stayed away. He wouldn't call; he wouldn't go visit.

It's always the one who is about to leave first that is petrified of being left behind.

Chapter 11

The sun is too bright again.

She wonders if she is the only one that equates the coming summer to bruising, to fire, to pain. She can't believe it has been over a year, that this time last year she was just learning this city, that this time last year she still woke up at two a.m. from the crawling, twisting unease of not belonging anywhere. In a way, she misses who she was a year ago, two, three. She misses the person she was when she cared, when she didn't feel as if her skin was made of unyielding, impenetrable steel. She misses the person who still dreamed of scenarios that would take her home, the person who still fantasized. The person who still held onto the fraying, unraveling strands of belief.

She's changed.

She doesn't cry much anymore. Not even late at night, when the darkness is at its worst. She doesn't cry because she's let the desperation go. Maybe that's what she had needed all along, one night to let him know at last that she was failing out here, one night to let him know that she felt herself fading. Maybe she just had to admit it to him before she could let it happen. He hadn't fought her admissions, hadn't needed her to come home like she needed to go. It left her with nowhere to go. Nowhere she was supposed to be.

She apologizes to herself sometimes. There was someone inside of her that had fought for so long. Someone that, even as a child, had held onto hope when given nothing, who had believed in good and evil and triumph and justice. There had been a person inside of her once that had believed perseverance could mean everything.

She let that person down, and she knows now that perseverance isn't noble. It's just repetition borne of habit; it's just doing the same thing again and again until time passes by. She doesn't expect much anymore, she doesn't honor the hope she held onto for far too long. She's quieted that person inside, she's said her sorry's, she's said her goodbyes.

The sun slides over her skin. It's too warm for early May, and she's wearing a short sleeved blouse with her slacks, but the Kevlar vest is making the cotton of her shirt stick to her skin. She feels the sunlight on her cheeks, on the tip of her nose and she wishes she had put her hair up today.

Those are the kind of things she wishes for these days.

"He's got to be here," Mike mutters, checking the magazine of his Glock 22. "Sonofabitch must think we've got our heads up our asses to think he's got a chance in hell of getting away this time."

She hears him, but her eyes are already trained on the uneven, cluttered terrain of the junkyard ahead. It smells like shit in this place, and she wonders what's rotting in between the hollowed out cars, the shredded metal, the discarded and stained appliances. They've got a suspect they just tailed into this fenced in junkyard, and he's got no way out unless he scales a fourteen-foot fence that is wrapped around the perimeter. Which would put him directly in their line of sight anyhow. So they had him, so long as they found him before he found them.

She wonders what the bastard is armed with today. A classic Smith & Wesson, she decides. He's killed three girls in three states and he's meticulous. He'd appreciate the history of a piece like the Smith & Wesson. He probably polishes it, hates to use it. Must me why he cuts up his victims. Easier to swipe a blade clean of blood than to reach the crevices of a weapon saturated with gunpowder residue.

"Olivia," Mike prods.

She squints as she looks at him, flexing her fingers while she settles her Sig in her hand. "What?" she says, trying to focus on Kelly. The rotting decay of this place is drawing her in.

"Are you listening to me?" he asks, cocking his head to the side. His green eyes are too startling out here in the vivid, obnoxious sunlight. They look clean, earnest, and she shudders at their unnerving depth.

She nods, letting her eyes slip from his face and back towards the heat and reflection that is simmering on all of the twisted metal. She's almost dizzy with the need to start running towards it, into it. It's a mess of shit that has been left behind. Abandoned. Forgotten.

"Yeah," she answers absently, trying to figure out where their suspect is. Where would he head for? The tangle of broken, abandoned cars? The shaky pile of worn tires? She wants to go after him, but she wants to without the confines of the job, her restricting vest, her partner. She wants just her gun and twenty minutes alone with the guy. She doesn't care if she comes out of this hellhole or not, just so long as the bastard doesn't either.

She is invincible these days. She's realized that no one can kill those that aren't living.

She doesn't fear repercussions anymore. That's what Elliot gave her. Fearlessness. He proved to her she didn't have any ties, any responsibilities. There was no one to answer to. No one for whom she had to try so damned hard to survive.

She knows now that consequence and fate are the same thing, they are both just explanations for how the end plays out. Only consequence implied there was some control given along the way, it implied that there were other choices that would have meant other results. Which is bullshit, of course.

The end has always been predetermined, and it was easier on those that just accepted it. Waited for it. Didn't fight.

Kelly's jaw tightens in anger. "We'll wait for backup," he says harshly.

Her eyes snap back towards his, fury seeping into her bones. "Why? They're on their way, and we've got him. I've got you and you've got me. That's backup. Regs say we can go."

He glares at her in silence.

Her chin lifts. "You don't trust me to have your back, Kelly?" she goads.

He doesn't rise to her bait. Instead he leans in closer to her. "You're not hearing me, Benson," he says quietly, using her last name to get her attention. "And if you're not hearing me out here, I don't believe you'll hear me once we get into that pile of shit over there. He's in there, and he's armed. And you think you can't bleed like the rest of us. So no, we stay."

She suddenly hates him. She hates his ideals and his accent and the fact that his hair lightens into streaks of blonde beneath the sun. She hates that he cares about the rules, that his trust isn't blind. She hates that he cares, that he doesn't just let her go.

She hates that he is wrong. She knows she can bleed. She's been doing it for months.

She wants to just go into the ragged edges of the ripped and torn metal, the cracks and crevices of all that has been thrown away.

She wants to just go.

"I'm going," she says, staring at the playing field in front of her. She's got goals, and they're all living in the garbage in front of her. She focuses on the remains of a red Honda, the door twisted and hanging off at an odd angle. The dull finish reflects the sun. "I'm gonna get him," she murmurs, unable to drag her eyes away from the pieces of lives left behind.

The colors blend together in front of her and her ears roar with sound. It's a muted replay of his voice, Elliot's, always his. She hears him scream her name when she had been cut across her neck, she hears him whisper as he held her the first time, beneath the fluorescent lights of a hospital corridor. She hears him tell her that despite her history, she turned out great and she hears him confess he was scared to lose their partnership as she rocked against him one blissful, perfect night on his porch.

And loudest of all, she hears him tell her he fell out of love.

She clamps her lips shut so she doesn't roar with the protest that threatens to rip from within her. It was what she had, the one thing she had, even if she didn't have him. She had the knowledge, the belonging, the powerful secret locked deep inside of her that he loved her. That he did, he did!

He doesn't anymore.

She wants to claw, to fight, to die. Her eyelids lower into a squint. She's got nothing. Kelly shouldn't be here – he's got family, he's got ties – and she can do this on her own.

In a situation like this, expendability is everything.

"Liv," Mike breathes in warning. "What's going on with you? Talk to me."

She's magnetically drawn into the maze and the chase. She feels the faintest inkling of adrenaline seep into her veins. She's waiting for something. She wants something. Out here. It will happen out here, in the rot and decay and startling sunlight.

Her breathing is shallow and her chest is rising faster and faster beneath the constricting vest.

She wants to feel something. She prays to God he'll let her feel something.

She turns back to face Kelly. She's shaking, lightheaded, and the only weight she feels is the reliable metal in her hand. "You coming?" He's trying to read her. She knows he can't get a handle on her lucidity, so she helps him out. She forces a smile because it will get her what she wants. "You and me, we got this, Kelly. Plus, don't you have a quota? Can't go more than two months without being a hero?"

She wins, she knew she would. He finally grins half-heartedly and shakes his head. "You're a loose cannon, Benson."

She shrugs. "Well, someone has to have some balls around here," she says, turning her head before he can see that she can't maintain the smile. Before he knows that the teasing in her voice is a lie.

It's enough. He agrees to go in.

She finally breathes deeply as she enters the debris. She likes this, the adrenaline pushing through her. Her blood has failed to keep moving these last few months, but this she can rely on. Her feet crunch on the stone-riddled gravel, her toes sweating in her boots. Her shoulders are the most relaxed they have been in weeks.

He's out there, and he's armed. She knows she should be concerned that she doesn't instinctively crouch, that she only scours the perimeters in an effort to look out for Mike.

Ten feet to her left, she sees Mike moving, crouching, staying low as he palms his weapon. She walks upright, wondering if she should call the bastard out. She wonders if he'd meet her in the middle. Wonders if he likes a challenge, the risk, the uncertainty. She wonders if their suspect would stand right up too, recognizing that they both don't have much to lose.

She doesn't have much time to wonder. To her right she sees movement, and as she twists her body to face their approaching suspect she sees nothing but the sunlight glinting off the barrel of the Smith & Wesson she had expected. She doesn't scream, doesn't startle Kelly so that he freezes up.

She doesn't have time to raise her weapon, but in an instant she knows the truth. If she absorbs the first shot, Kelly will have time to take his own before their suspect can even pull the trigger again.

She doesn't crouch, doesn't duck. Kelly is safely behind her and she'll be the biggest target their suspect has ever seen. Everything slows, and she drags her eyes up from the barrel and into the hollow, flat eyes of a man that has managed to channel hell onto earth far too many times.

In the millisecond after she hears his gun go off, she sees it – the horrific realization in his eyes that he has just left himself open for Kelly's retaliatory shot. She sees his empty eyes fill with fear and she thinks he is stupid for being so afraid of death.

His shot slams her left side somewhere and it spins her around counterclockwise. She sees the dull red paint of the Honda slide across her vision as she falls backwards and somewhere in the distance she hears Mike's gun fire off once, twice.

She hears her name as she hits the ground hard and the last thing she processes is that her name doesn't sound like it did when had Elliot screamed for her all those years ago.

He takes his personal days these days.

He spends them walking the city, riding the subway, discovering new places he has never seen before. He's found a coffee place in SoHo called Dante's she would have liked because they make grilled ham and cheese sandwiches with the crusts cut off and they serve them on white plates that always seem a little too small. She would have said it was charming, she would have liked that the owner's grandfather always sits at the corner table and takes a nap at a quarter to one.

He thinks it's ironic that for all the years he didn't take a day off when Kathy had begged him to, he now takes them as soon as they accumulate. He wishes he could bring his son with him as he roamed the city sometimes, so they could maybe go to the park or play in the train section in the corner upstairs at FAO Schwartz, but that would mean Kathy would know he wasn't at work. He doesn't need the questions or the scrutiny, so when he takes the days now, he takes them quietly.

Alone.

He's been trying to find something, he thinks. He's been to Magnolia's and tried the cupcakes, he's been to the memorial site for the towers. He's watched the tourists line up for an art show in Bryant Park, he's watched the fish being brought into the small shops in Chinatown. He knows the problem is that he can't sit still, and he's waiting, just waiting, for something to give him a clue about just where the hell he is.

He doesn't know where he belongs these days, and the sick knowledge lives in him that she has probably never known. He knows her now, what she lived with, who she was. He knows her better now that she is gone.

He didn't feel like walking today. He doesn't drink as much as he probably should, so he gives that a try this morning instead. He's not alone in the bar at ten-thirty a.m., it is Manhattan after all. He wants to think he isn't like the rest of them in this place, but he is. He is.

He misses her so fucking much.

She haunts him. No matter how much he moves, sees, hears, it's always her that seeps into his skin at night. He thinks about her in the first years, how she had justice blazing in her eyes. How she had been infallible, how she had been everything that defying the odds should have looked like.

She'd believed, those days, and that's what kills him now. He knows he got it all wrong for too many years. He had always believed his job was to protect the victims, but it hadn't been. That had been her job; she'd always done it better than him.

His job had simply been to protect her ability to believe. She'd been the one strong enough to save the world; he'd only been entrusted with the job of saving her.

He'd failed spectacularly.

He takes a drink. The scotch is cheap and it burns and he wants it to burn him straight into hell. Of course, the more he drinks the closer to hell he gets. He knows what she feels like against him, knows the smell and texture of her hair, the pulse of her breath, the small sounds she makes as she murmurs in her sleep. He thinks of the way her hand curls slightly as it lays outstretched on the bed and he grips his glass tighter in his fist.

He thinks about kissing her. This is what he thinks about all the time. He wonders about her mouth beneath his, if she'd push her fingertips into the back of his neck, if he'd have to coax her to open her mouth, if she'd moan.

Christ.

If she'd moan into his mouth as she pushed her warm skin against his. He thinks about other things too, things he's got even less of a right to. He thinks about the thickest part of the night, of lying next to her. He thinks of the nights he watched her sleep, how her life was written across the shadows of her eyelashes, and how her eyelids never really settled, even in sleep. He thinks about the hours he clenched his fists as he watched her, desperate to wake her, to slide her body beneath his, to wait for her surprised breath to exhale onto his cheeks.

Sometimes, when he's feeling especially dangerous or reckless, he thinks about sinking deeply into her heated body, of drawing her long, slim thigh up over his hip and feeling her ass push against the mattress as she arches upwards, sheathing him slowly. He doesn't think it would have been as common as making love, or as simple as fucking.

He just wants to be in her, and the only way he knows how is by using his body.

He pushes his glass away and rubs his hand hard over his face. He's got shit to give her, he reminds himself. He's got nothing. He's got kids already and too much history and he's a washed up cop at best. His knuckles are scarred; he's drinking in the morning. He's got nothing.

He thinks about how he lied to her, told her didn't love her anymore. His elbows settle onto the bar and he rubs the heels of his hands into his eyes. He's falling apart without her, and the only thing that makes sense in all of it is that he's got nothing to offer her, not compared to all the things she deserves. He thinks about the smell of mandarin and the way her voice would rise and fall across the phone line. He thinks about all the years she strode next to him, how those memories were so sharp and painful he can't even recall them without needing to close his eyes. He thinks about how she used to laugh a little bit in the first years, how she wanted to seem tougher than the rest of them in the years after.

His glass is once again in his hand. He throws back the rest of the scotch and feels the sting as it slides down his throat.

He thinks about how when she first came back from Oregon, she looked radiant and he knew then that given enough time away from him, she thrived.

"Christ, Olivia," he mutters, praying to one or the other and pressing his eyes tightly closed. He bows his head, gives the gritty, grating words to the already damp, sticky floor.

He is saved by the ringing of his cell. He fishes it out of his jacket pocket and grimaces as he sees his Captain's name flash across the caller ID. He's in no mood. "It's my day off," he answers, grumbling, as if by the very nature of not being on duty, he no longer needs to adhere to rank or niceties.

There is a pause, an expelled breath. "Yeah. I'm clear on that," comes his Captain's succinct, strained voice. "There's something you'll probably want to know, although I should be committed for telling you."

He nods to the bartender for another scotch before squeezing his eyes shut. Maybe if he's drunk enough, he won't be called in. They'll let him be. "What?"

Cragen swallows audibly, and by very nature of his hesitation, he puts Elliot on edge. "She's alright, that's the first thing you need to know. She's fine."

He straightens on his barstool, the scotch threatening to come back up. There is no question as to whom his Captain is referring. His Captain doesn't know the details of Olivia's leaving, but he still looks at Elliot these days like he knows all of the in between.

"What the fuck happened?" he hisses into his cell. He's shaking, even as he reaches for his wallet, he's shaking.

Cragen sighs, and he's probably slumped over in his desk chair. "Huang just got a FLEOA email. There was an officer involved–" he pauses, apparently thinking better of it and offering one more warning. "Elliot, hear me out, alright?"

"Captain," he bites off angrily. "With all due respect, I need to know what the fu-"

"Olivia and another agent were involved in a shoot-out in a junkyard on the Southside of Chicago."

He's gonna lose it right here on the floor of the bar. The bartender slides another scotch in front of him and he repels, pushing himself away from the faux mahogany, letting his head fall. "She was hit," he whispers, barely hearing himself. He's sitting in a fucking bar in Midtown while she's taking a bullet. He's swaying on his bar stool, so he tries to stand up, thinking it is a better option.

It isn't.

Olivia was hit. She was his, and he let this happen. He let this happen. He's fucking failing again. Failing to do one single, fucking thing right by her. No one has ever really protected her, and all his stupid head could do was tell her to go figure out, once again, how to protect herself.

He told her he didn't love her.

Lies. Lies. Lies.

"She's okay, Elliot. From what Huang could get, she took a bullet across the arm, but it's not too serious. That and her concussion from falling will keep her out a good while, but she's okay."

It is blasphemy, he thinks. Absurd. Someone had managed to hit her with a bullet and his Captain is insisting she is okay? There is no possible, fucking way that it is bloody okay that some fucker had aimed at her! Had pulled the trigger. Had gotten close enough to hit her.

"Where the fuck was her partner?" he growls, without warning. He is loud, and he knows people are looking at him. The bartender is now watching him carefully, assessing if he will be a problem or not. He is met with silence. "Captain, what the hell-"

There is a pause. Then a sigh. "She stepped right into the line for him, Elliot. Huang mentioned there were rumblings of an investigation into her actions."

He throws a twenty onto the bar. His vision is blurring, becoming a haze of orange and red and yellow. As if the sunshine is blazing, when this day is the grayest day New York has seen since winter. He knows, he knows before his Captain even says the words.

"She didn't raise her weapon," Cragen said quietly. "Never raised her weapon."

Elliot's palm brutally slams open the door of the bar and he falls into the air outside.

He is desperate for light, and all he can see is the never-ending, oppressive gray.

"What the fuck was that!"

The door to her hospital room bangs open so violently that it hits the doorjamb behind it. The motion makes her head start to pound again as she gingerly tries to slip her arm into the button down she'd asked a uni to bring from her locker. "Christ, Kelly, keep it down," she murmurs, hoping he'll take a clue from her decibel.

But Mike Kelly isn't one to normally yell. Which also means that once he has started, he doesn't know how to tone himself down all that quickly. He storms over to where her legs are dangling off the edge of the exam table, ignoring the fact that she is half dressed. "You want to tell me what the hell you were doing out there?" His lip curls into a snarl as he leans towards her. He's about to say something else when he bites off a curse and shakes his head, spinning around and giving her his back instead. He's agitated, his palm rubbing over his scalp. "I knew it. I goddamned knew it," he mutters to himself.

"For God's sake," she says irritably. "It's just a scratch." She manages to get her arms into the shirt, but the prospect of buttoning her buttons seems daunting. Her arm is throbbing, every movement feeling as if lava is gurgling from where she had recently received twenty-three stitches. The bullet had grazed along her upper arm, but it still hurt like a bitch from all the skin it had torn off. She uses her right hand to grab both sides of the shirt and concentrates on pushing the buttons through with one hand.

Mike whirls on her, and his eyes, the ones that had been so clear this morning, are muddled, nearly gray. "You could have been killed."

She rolls her eyes. "I wasn't." The truth is, the pain in her arm is a welcome distraction. It's overwhelming, and she now has to compensate for it, and that's enough to take her mind off things.

"I saw you, Olivia," Mike fires off. "I saw you just stand there! You didn't pull your weapon, you didn't-" his voice breaks off and he shakes his head again, dragging in air.

For the first time, she pays attention. She feels the blood seep out of her in a way that is far more pronounced than when she had been lying on the gravel. "You sonofabitch," she whispers. "You reported that, didn't you? That's what you told OPR?"

His head whips up. "You bet your ass I told them."

Somewhere behind her, her cell phone rings. She ignores it. She's got a bigger mess to deal with right in front of her. Her fury is swirling around her, all of it directed at Kelly. "Some fucking partner. I save your ass and you-"

His eyes flatten, his agitation visibly gives way to arrogant righteousness. His voice is deeper by an octave when he speaks. "I'm saving yours. You want to get yourself killed, you do it somewhere else."

She slides off the table, determined not to wince at the jolt of pain that shoots through her arm as her feet make contact with the scuffed linoleum floor. She laughs in bitter disgust. "You think I'm suicidal, Kelly? Is that it? You think I need my head shrinked? Well fuck you. I didn't alert you out there because in the time it would have taken you to turn and find him in your line of sight, you would have been a sitting duck."

He narrows his eyes. "So you thought you'd be target practice instead? I knew we shouldn't have gone in there. I knew it, and I let you convince me-" his voice rises until it trails off. He shakes his head again, as if warding off the effects of shock. "You've got some sort of death wish, Benson."

She flinches, staggering back towards the exam table. It hits her lower back and steadies her. She hears her cell ring again and she can't move. She hates Kelly in this moment, she hates him. "I was doing my job," she says, and Christ, she had intended to say that with so much more force. With conviction. Instead, she sounds like a child. It comes out as an explanation, one she is plaintively pleading with him to believe.

He doesn't. The warm green is back in his eyes and he's looking at her too much. Seconds pass, and he's staring at her. There's compassion on his face, and pity. She wants to tell him to go to hell, but she can't. She's drinking in the concern in his expression, and somehow it's warming her skin. She's forgotten this, what it's like to be cared for.

"Go home, Olivia," Kelly finally says quietly. One finger reaches out and swipes her bangs to the side. "Go home, because…beacause you're dying out here." His lips lift in the smallest of smiles, one that doesn't reach his aching eyes. "One way or another, you're gonna let yourself die out here."

She can't move. Her body aches; she's shivering and she's thirsty. She is staring at her partner, the one who cares enough to tell her to go home. But she's trembling with the need for another partner, the one who proved to her that she didn't have a home to begin with. She wants Elliot, and she hates herself for it. She wants the warmth of his big body and his hands doing the buttons on her shirt and she wants her apartment in New York. She hasn't cried since the night he told her he didn't love her. But she wants him right now so much she's on the verge. Her body, her life, her job, it's all a mess. "I am home," she tries.

Mike grins, finally, his Midwest roots coming out in the sweet, dimpled smile he flashes her. "Nah, Benson. This was never home for you. And you've had a long enough visit here, don't you think?" He takes the liberty of reaching behind her for her purse, bringing it into closer reach for her on the bed. "Home's New York for you, Olivia. Always will be."

He's gone then, probably to wait for her outside, and she's left standing there, shivering in the sterile hospital air.

She hears her phone chime behind her, indicating a voicemail, and her eyes are so blurry she hastily reaches her good arm around to grab it without looking. She flips it open, instinctively pressing the voicemail button. She's trying to lock herself back up when she hears the message.

Hears him. On the other end of the line.

"Liv…Christ, Olivia…"

She sinks heavily into the chair by the bed. She wants to disconnect, but she can't, not yet. She needs the sound of his voice.

"I know you don't owe me anything, Christ, of course you don't…" His voice is cracking, rushed, whispered in rolling tumbles. He expels a harsh, ragged breath. "I just need to know…" he stops. She hears him just breathing. Again and again.

Her own breath hitches as she clutches her phone. She wants him, she wants him so badly. It's been months without the sound of him and he's breaking. She wants to give in, to make him come and get her.

Come get me, El. It's supposed to rain tonight, and…and…just one night, El.

"Huang told Cragen, told him about today and goddammit, Olivia," his voice hardens in the message. "Goddammit! What were you doing out there?"

Her nose is running, and she's rocking back and forth on the chair. Her bandaged arm is curled around her body and she's clutching the phone, and she's so damned tired. She doesn't know, and maybe that's it. Maybe that's why she's crumbling. She doesn't know why she didn't pull her weapon. Maybe she should have, maybe she should have.

"Tell me you're okay," he begs, and it's just his voice because he isn't really there. It's a recording, just electronics. "That's all I need, Liv, please. Just tell me you're okay."

He sounds like he is crying.

"I need to know you're okay. I…" then there's nothing, for long seconds. "God. You were supposed to be better there. That was the point. That was the point, Olivia, and then you don't pull your weapon! What, what –"

She hunches over at the waist and hears herself crying in the empty hospital room.

She can't do this. She can't let him destroy her again and again. She'd have died for him, she's scared she almost did when there was no point. He's not hers, he's not. He was the one who let go. She doesn't owe him this, a call, her tears. She owes herself.

"I need to know you're okay," he says one last time, his voice a torn, mangled whisper. He sounds desperate.

She drags in air, enough to straighten her body as she peels the phone away from her ear. Her eyes feel flat and raw as she looks at the glowing numbers on her phone. She hits seven and hears the faint confirmation.

Her message has been deleted.

It's only then that she finally answers him, gives him the confirmation he was looking for.

"I'll be okay, Elliot," she says to no one in particular. But she hears herself, and in the end, she decides she's the only one that really needed to hear it, anyway.

She never calls him back, so he lives with that too, now.

They all asked him how she was doing. Munch, Fin, Lake, even the kid, who now knows enough about her to realize that her well-being bodes well for all of them. Only Cragen doesn't ask. It's as if he knows she doesn't call Elliot, that she won't.

He's stopped sleeping with the baby over the last two weeks, since she was hit. He doesn't sleep soundly anymore, he thrashes and twists and the sheets get all tangled up. He sweats a lot at night, he changes the sheets every day. He hates his fucking bed because it taunts him, teases him that he should be able to lie there in peace. But he can't.

He's sitting at his desk at the 1-6 and he's been shoving papers around for at least an hour. He wants to say he needs a case but the thought is horrific, that he'd need someone else's pain to make him forget his own. The kid sits across from him, and he types maddeningly fast. There's a lot about the kid that is maddening – that he's of Maureen's generation is one of them. He also wears designer jeans and he uses his own laptop because he complains that the departmental computers are just pure shit.

Elliot wouldn't know the difference.

The kid catches him looking at him. "You okay?"

There's something about the kid that makes Elliot not hate him. Maybe it's that he's lasted this long, maybe it's that he has just enough chip on his shoulder that he doesn't back down. He should probably respond, give the kid an answer, but the truth is, he doesn't know what he could say that would qualify as the truth.

The kid doesn't flinch in the face of the silence. Somehow, the silence gives him courage. "You look like shit, Stabler," he says, without a hint of a smile. "Case was a bitch," he offers as a possible explanation to his own observation.

That was another thing about the kid, he doesn't mince words, doesn't think he is eloquent like Lake. He is basic. He likes steaks, he watches the Knicks, he spends two nights a week at the firing range.

Elliot doesn't say anything, and he knows the kid probably goes somewhere at night and has a beer and tells his drink mates that his partner is a crazy bastard. He stares off, over the kid's shoulders, down a hallway that used to be Olivia's backdrop.

"You should call her," the kid says out of nowhere.

He flinches, because she's never been mentioned, not like that. But the kid's observant as hell, which was why he'd been promoted so fast in the first place. "You should mind your own business," he says, with just a tinge of threat in his voice.

The kid laughs. "Stubborn sonofabitch," he says, shaking his head. "She must have been a saint."

He'd been angry the last time he heard that, years ago, a lifetime ago. When life had seemed complicated and yet been painfully simple. He'd been bitter, clouded, unable to see the one thing he had right in front of him.

Now that was all he saw, and she was gone.

His eyes narrow as he leans forward in his chair, his arms resting on his desk. "Why do you stick it out, kid?" He really wants to know. He's suddenly curious.

The kid's head jerks up from his computer, because it might be the first thing he's been asked about himself since he got to the 1-6. He doesn't say it's about the victims, the job, the justice. He sees through the question. "You don't scare me, Stabler," he says instead. "Which pisses you off. And that's probably why you treat me like shit." He shrugs. "Which means your crappy attitude is all about you and not about me."

Well. Fuck.

"I didn't scare her either," Elliot says, before he can stop himself.

"That piss you off, too?" the kid asks, his eyes narrowing. He's accepting this conversation as if it is something they do every day. He's rolling with the punches, never over-analyzing.

Elliot flinches, settling back into his seat. He thinks about how angry he'd been with her for so many years. When everyone else had left him, run from him, threatened to go away, she was in his face, day after day, daring him to throw her away. The more everyone else scattered, the more she was there, pushing him, making her presence known.

She never walked away, never gave up without a fight.

He'd tested her. He'd pushed her, hurt her, tried to prove to himself that she would leave, too. But she hadn't, not really. She'd always licked her wounds for awhile and then come home. To him.

Until now. Until he told her there was nothing to come home to.

He wants her home. He wants her in this squad room, wants to watch her stand up and go toe-to-toe with him as they disagree over a case. He wants to hear her curse him out, wants to stand at the edge of the room and listen to Munch tell her jokes, because Munch is the only one who really makes her laugh.

He wants her to hear his son call her Liva; he thinks his son might be able to make her laugh too.

Christ, he's messed it all up so bad. He wants to bring her home. He doesn't know if she will come home, not after all of the bullshit, not when he still doesn't have much to give her. But there is an inkling, a notion growing within him that like she did all those years before, she'll come home if she thinks there is anything left.

She always came home, and he's never been much.

Christ, those years, she came home again and again for him.

"Stabler, man you can sit there and wish for things, or you can get off your ass. But like my mama always said, only fairies can pull wishes out of their ass," the kid offers good-naturedly.

He doesn't know why, but the kid makes him smile. "Who you callin' a fairy?" Elliot taunts.

The kid shrugs. "If the fairy shoe fits-"

Elliot finds a grin finally make his way across his face. "Lake's probably wearing it."

The kid laughs, and two hours later he actually buys the kid a sandwich. He calls the kid Grant, makes an effort to use his name, and he thinks about her.

He thinks about her, and that night as he lies in the bed he hates, he says out loud all of his apologies and he pretends that they are enough.

He pretends, for one blissful night, that he has brought her home.

There were things she thought about when the night had fallen and the air was still.

It wasn't always about him, but about the other things she had left behind, the people, the places, the moments that lived in memory but would never be hers again.

Almost six months ago, on the night before the New Year began, she missed her former captain. She had been out at Danny's with members of her unit, the lights dimmed, the countdown screaming through the room like the wind in New York used to on the coldest day of the year, and from the corner of her eye, she thought she had seen Donald Cragen. Reflections from the television shone onto his bald head, and in the midst of conversations with co-workers, she yearned to go talk to him. The man had turned then, the nose, the eyes, the facial expressions so different from the man who had guided her for nine years, but in that moment, she missed the conversations, the dictations, the rules.

At the stroke of midnight, Special Agent Mike Kelly had kissed her, and she tried to relish in a world that she wished could be hers. He had tasted like champagne and as she licked her lips and pasted on a smile she knew he didn't believe, she excused herself and stepped out into the snow covered night. Her foot brushed across the ground, the snow fading, returning, as if things in life could be washed away and replaced that easily. She had lifted her head to the sky, the clouds covering the night in a blanket of cotton, and taken the cell phone from her jacket pocket. She knew her captain would be awake; he always was hours into the New Year, showing his dedication to the people who showed theirs three hundred and sixty five days a year.

His voice had been filled with laughter when she had called and she had fallen back against the brick building, wondering what life would have been like if she remained. The conversation had lasted minutes, filled with pleasantries and humor, and when she got off the phone, she had merely gone home. There was nothing left for her inside of the bar. There was nothing left when her life still lived inside of the 1-6, even if she did not.

On the night of Simon's fortieth birthday, she had sat in the corner of her apartment, clutching her phone in her hand. She had found it funny that most of her human interaction, aside from work, existed on a line that spanned across cities, counties, states. And the moment he picked up the phone, she had wondered how it was possible to feel so much for someone she barely knew. He had made her laugh that night with stories of his childhood, with plans for the wedding and the flowers that Lucy refused to let him get; he had made her feel alive, like she belonged to someone, that her life wasn't solely to serve her mother's past.

It made her feel as if she belonged to someone aside from Elliot, when the truth was she had never belonged to him at all.

Today, in the waning hours of the late afternoon, she slips out onto the balcony of the hotel unnoticed, the music fading as the door closes behind her. She's almost forgotten what New York feels like in May, and as she inhales the soft breezes that smell of lavender, she closes her eyes. She's been back here for two days now, watching each step she took, each person who passed her as if that could prevent her from running into Elliot.

She hadn't returned his call from weeks ago. Last night, her fingers had traced the numbers that would reach his cell phone, the digits repeating in her head like a record stuck on a single moment, but in the end, she had tossed it across the room, watching as it landed in her suitcase. She had laid there, the lights out in her hotel room, the shadows from the city shining off of the ceiling, and wondered where he was at the moment. She could still hear him on her voice mail, the desperate pleading, the quiet desperation. She had replayed it over and over until the sun began to rise, the crisp white clouds sinking into the infinite blue sky.

It had been six a.m. when she had left the hotel, wandering around the city. It was somewhere in Midtown that she found this little café, Dante's, and ordered a grilled ham and cheese sandwich with the crusts cut off despite the time of morning. She had sat there, watching the city awaken, and wondered if he would have liked it here. He would have complained about the small white plates, about the flow of people that came in and out for a hot cup of coffee. She had watched how the men played bridge in the corner, lifelines around their eyes that were filled with laughter, with good times, with the company of old friends. One of them had looked up at her, smiled and nodded his head in her direction. She had wondered if he had seen the bandage that still remained on her arm, the scars of all of her mistakes left for the world to see.

She had realized that she had lived in the city for so long without ever knowing that places like these existed. She didn't know how she could have missed this, how she never could have known that New York wasn't merely filled with pain, with hate, with fear. She had watched the men play for another fifteen minutes before she paid her check, bought a coffee for all six of them around the small table they'd been coming to for years.

And afterwards, she had gone back to the hotel, gotten dressed, sat through the wedding of a brother she didn't know existed until a couple of years ago. She had sat in that church with God and prayers that she still spoke into the night and wondered if he would have come with her despite his hatred for Simon. She had wondered if he would have danced with her, if he knew how to dance or if he'd step on her feet, bruising her toes.

It had become too much, it had, and now, as she stands outside, she rests her elbows on the balcony, overlooking the Hudson River; overlooking New York. Her eyes graze the spot where the Twin Towers had once been, where the smoke had taken over on that day nearly a decade ago. She inhales, breathes in the memories of her life, of things that she'll leave when she flies back to Chicago in a couple of hours. She had listened to Mike, considered what he had said, but this wasn't her home. It was where she had lived when she was someone else; it was where she had learned to breathe, to live, to thrive. It was where her heart had been left frozen, where the former Olivia Benson resided, someone she could never be again.

She glances inside of the ballroom, watches as her brother dances with his new wife. Even from here she can see his smile, see the person she always wished she could be. Carefree, happy, married. She thinks of Elliot again, of the tux she would have forced him to wear, of the comments he would have muttered. There's a part of her, the one who still allows the dreams of him to come at night, that wishes he would come here, surprise her. There's a part of her that wishes he was someone else, that she was someone else, that together they could be someone else.

She thinks of him, and as the wind rushes past her, skims across the river, she can hear him behind her, the conversations picking up in her mind, in her heart, in her soul.

I knew you would get yourself shot sooner or later.

She almost smiles, the air hitting the skin around her bandage. And you've never been hurt before? A bird lands on the crimped waves; looks up at the sky before letting itself free. It's part of the job.

In her mind, he comes up beside her, leaning his elbows on the railing of the balcony. She can smell the faint hint of cologne, the faint smell of knowing that hope exists, that it's as simple as sleeping beside someone, even if they're not yours. You were being careless.

I was doing my job. And I don't need the lecture from you. The music slips out through the balcony door that remains cracked the slightest bit. He moves closer to her, and her eyes slip closed, she becomes someone else. I'm doing okay without you, you know.

No, you're not.

One cotton ball of a cloud shields the sun, breaks darkness into the warm afternoon. I'm trying. I don't talk to you as much anymore. I sleep much more than I ever have. It's not as bad as I thought it would be.

What isn't?

Living without you. The darkness breaks at the sound of her lie; ironic that the sun reflects off of the water, like a promise of faith, of tomorrow. Do you remember that night when you waited out in the car until I turned my lights on in my apartment? He nods, her eyes becoming moist with tears. You sat outside for another twenty minutes after I flashed the lights. Why?

He's silent for a moment, and she wonders if the wind is merely ghosts desperately looking for a home. It was my job to protect you.

You stayed there, Elliot. I was fine, I was safe. Why did you stay out there when you knew I was okay?

I knew a lot of things, Olivia. But there were times when it came to you I didn't know what to do. You were so damn stubborn and you make things so damn impossible sometimes. I stayed there because I knew if I didn't, you would leave your apartment. You would go find White and lose your career over it.

It's there in her heart that the stabbing that had once ceased now begins to bleed again. You should have stopped protecting me so much. You just made it harder to let go.

He smiles, and it's warming, comfortable, home. Well clearly I should have been protecting you. You never got shot when I was watching your back.

You're an asshole. She rests her elbow onto the railing and lifts her head to him. The sun lowers, obstructing his face in the impending shadows of night. He's nothing but an image, a portrait. He's shapes and figures and it reminds her of those nights he spent beside her in the dark, nothing but the molding of his body, the lingering of their hearts. She moves a step closer to him, her shoulder touching his. She can feel his fingertips on her bandage, searching for her scars, wondering if he has created them. Her voice comes out in a whisper, and she thinks it went unheard in this complicated world. I miss you.

"You're missing the party."

Her heart stops; for a simple moment, she thinks that he's come, that he's saved her. But when she turns, it's only her brother, a cigarette in between his fingers. She watches the flame of the lighter hit the paper: crinkling, igniting, wasting away to nothing but ash, obscurity.

"Do you do that often?"

The smoke circles around her, filters into the air of the city. She watches it float through the late afternoon and disintegrate as if it is simply that easy.

"Do you know how on my ass Lucy has been with this wedding?"

She smiles, because he isn't as bad as Elliot wanted to believe. He isn't.

"You could have brought a date, you know. Whatever happened to that guy you worked with? Tall, mumbled a lot, didn't like me very much."

A car alarm blares from somewhere down below, a warning, a sign. She thinks of Elliot in that tux; she thinks of him beside her and it's not until her hand clamps closed that she realizes she's been shaking. She lowers it to her side, glancing at him. "Agent Porter?" she asks, because she can't say Elliot's name out loud, to Simon. She can't.

Simon inhales, the paper breaking the slightest bit and exhales. "The other one. Stabler, I think."

Her chest aches; a cigarette burn etched into her heart for eternity.

She wonders what it would have been like growing up with Simon, if despite being younger he'd always ask her about her dates, her men, her choices. She thinks that maybe she wants to tell him, that she wants to be the older sister who looks to her sibling for support. She lifts her head towards the sky, the pale moon hidden in the vast expanse of remaining sunlight. There's a part of her that misses the cloud filled sun of Chicago, the coffee dates with Mike, the knowledge that all of her demons remained thousands of miles away.

"I don't know," she finally answers, and she wonders if her voice cracks like the singed ends of his cigarette. "I haven't spoken to him in a few months." She thinks of the conversations in her head, of the ghosts that will haunt no matter where she goes, no matter where she ends up. "Thank you for having me here, Simon. It means a lot."

He throws the cigarette down three stories and she watches as it lands, rolls away underneath a bush. "You're my sister, Olivia."

She thinks about how some words are sacred without realization. She knew love was overused, handed out freely when it never should have been. She's read emails from strangers that barely knew each other who utter the words as if they're nothing; she's been around enough people to watch it be thrown about like a ball, like something resilient. But she had never realized that brother, sister, sibling were words like that, words that held meaning, that held the option of being spoken too much, used enough times that it became nothing more than consonants and vowels.

She thinks that most people wouldn't be grateful for something always in their life without being taught that things could easily disappear just as fast as they've arrived.

"Why a sister?" she asks, turning to look at him. She watches the confusion in his eyes, the shadows of the sun across his skin. "You said you always wanted a sister. Why not a brother?"

He takes a step closer to her and she can smell the champagne on his breath, wonders how many glasses it would take him to get drunk when it takes her six. "You have brothers if you want someone to play baseball with, someone to roughhouse with. Brothers will protect you from bullies and then give you a noogie and torture you the second you get home. A sister is always honest with you, no matter what. No bullshit." He looks out onto the water and she wonders if he sees the same lost hope that she does or if he sees things filled with contentment, with happiness. "I had enough bullshit in my life. I didn't need anymore."

She wants to ask him about his father, but she can't, she doesn't know how. "So is the brother supposed to be honest right back?"

"If he is, are you going to tell me who you were talking to when I walked out here?"

She stills, just as the wind picks up speed. The bottom of her dress brushes along her knee, tickles her skin. She hadn't realized she had spoken aloud, she hadn't. Simon touches her bare shoulder and she closes her eyes for the slightest of seconds.

"Simon, I—"

"What happened?" he asks, nodding towards her bandage.

She wonders if brothers also know the moment to change the subject, to let their blood receive a reprieve.

"Oh." Then again, changing the subject only meant another day, another mistake. Her hand touches the bandage. "Work accident."

He nods, shoving his hands in his pockets. She watches the sky blend into orange and red, a water canvas painted to perfection. She never does watch the sun set in Chicago; she never does subject herself to things that remind her of New York, of beauty, of him.

"I've thought a lot about it," Simon says, and the whisper of his voice can't nearly compete with the gentle winds. "About why my father kept that stuff on you, why he tracked you." She closes her eyes, lets the overwhelming feeling of pain in her chest take over. "You said ra…men don't keep track of the people they've..."

She doesn't make him finish. She doesn't make him live in the same pain that she does over their father. "No." Her voice is hoarse; she thinks maybe this is what it sounded like when Elliot told her goodbye, when there were no words, no thoughts that could ever make the world stand still. "They don't keep track."

"I wonder if I'm going to end up like him sometimes." She opens her eyes, looks to the man who shares the same fears, the same blood. "I lay awake at night and I wonder if even for a second Lucy believed all that about me, if she would have kept me away from her son because of it." The iridescent blue of his eyes looks green in the shadowy light. "Do you ever think like that?"

"Yeah," she whispers. She wonders what he would say if she told him that aside from Elliot, it's all she thinks about. She wonders if it's possible to have two children free of their parent's demons, free of their parent's mistakes. "I think like that."

"It's never who I was, Olivia. When all of that happened with Captain Millfield, it was—"

She places her hand on his arm, feels the heat of another human being. "Simon, I know that. I just…" She looks down at the water, at all the promises, all the wishes floating on the dark tide. "I forced myself to doubt you at times. I forced myself because I knew there had to be some bad in me, that neither of us could be okay."

Simon takes her hand and she thinks that it's been so long since someone has been this close. "Why did you believe me then? Why did you risk your job?"

She squeezes his hand, the tears forming an array of color as she blinks into the dusk. "There are things in my life that I've been so desperate to believe that I would have risked everything for them."

She wishes she could tell him all the meaning behind that, all the lies she forced herself to believe in, all the truths. She wishes she could tell her brother that she believed Elliot would never let her go, that she almost risked her life for him, for them. She wishes she could tell him that she needs him, but she thinks that maybe he hasn't been her brother long enough to admit such a truth.

She's found that all those who say they love her, learn how to leave her.

"You're not like him," Simon says. "Not in that sense. He…he wasn't always a bad guy, Olivia. I know it doesn't make up for anything he did to your mother, but he…I don't know. Lucy's father used to hit her when she was younger, but when you watch her with Jack, she's so good to him. Maybe most people never turn out like their parents because we learned from their mistakes."

She thinks of how Elliot's father used to hit him, how amazing he is with his own children. What if every person who had a bad parent ends up living their life in a completely opposite way?

"Either way, neither of us is like him. You just have to start to trust people more, to believe in them." She opens her mouth to protest, to tell him that it's not that easy, that even if she's not her father, what if she's her mother? But he speaks before she can, his hand slipping free from hers. "Football or baseball?"

She smiles, and almost wishes she could have one more day with him, one more morning, afternoon, evening of knowing she's not alone. "Baseball, although I love the Giants. Winter or summer?"

"Winter, definitely. Too Goddamn hot in New York during summer. Dark or milk chocolate?"

"Dark. Yankees or Mets?"

"Who the hell likes the Mets?"

She laughs, shaking her head. "No one I know."

"Eli Manning or Plaxico Burress?"

Eli. She wonders if maybe they call the baby that these days because Elliot would be too confusing, because the child deserved to be someone original, his own person, independent of his father. She's not sure all these questions matter in the end; she's not sure any of this actually causes her to know him, for him to know her.

But the name is out of her mouth before she can stop it, before she realizes that truth is as unpredictable as rain when there's not a cloud in the sky.

"Elliot," she murmurs.

The blush creeps up on her cheeks; maybe it's time to risk everything once again, risk being honest, risk believing that having a brother means no bullshit, nothing but truth. "I was…When you walked out here…I…"

She can't finish; she can't, she can't.

His hand touches her bare back, her thumb rubbing over skin that knows only the cold. "You should get out of here. I'm sure there's some people who would want to see you before you head back to Chicago." He stops, kissing her softly on the cheek. "And come home every once in a while. I'd like to get to know my sister better."

Sister. The sacred word, again. She wonders what other words would be considered sacred, what other words could mean so much, hold so much, and yet never find the right placement in the world.

Religion. God. Victim. Survivor. Family. Life. Love.

Partner.

"Simon…" She wraps her arms over her chest, braces herself for the cold. "I'm sorry that I ever doubted you."

He smiles, and she knows all along why she had believed in him when no one else did. "You don't have to apologize, Olivia. If you love someone, you forgive them. No matter what was said, what was done…" She wonders if he's thinking of their father, of the mistakes, the past, the lies. "People make mistakes. If you love them, you forgive it. It's as simple as that."

And as she takes one last look across the river, into the city, she thinks that some things can never be forgiven, some things can never be forgotten.

There are nights when he thinks of nothing but her.

He lies awake, the lights of the city reflecting off of the ceiling, and takes his phone off the night stand. There were those moments that seemed like a lifetime ago when she would text him, stop by, come to him when things hadn't been complicated, hadn't been the defining moment of their end. He stares at the numbers which would call her, which would let him know that she was alive, she was okay. And when the phone went down and sleep managed to come in waves of minutes, sometimes hours, he would see her fall to the ground, the blood pooling around her. It was always the perfect color, the dark red that was so abiding it almost looked black. She would look at him, her eyes closing, and he never saved her. He had said his goodbyes, abandoned her, and as he watched her die, he stood there with her blood on his hands, seeping through the crevice of his fingers like he had let her slip away from his life.

He never sleeps for days after that, too afraid of missing the call, too afraid of missing the moment the sun rises and his clock blinks like hers once did on nights no longer belonging to him. It's on those days that he takes the day off, wanders around the city looking for her, searching for those things that will bring her back home. He sits in places she would have loved, begs for forgiveness in the new Church he's found around the corner from the precinct. He asks for sanity, for peace, for her well being, for his own. He begs for things to become normal again, when long ago he lost the meaning of what normalcy meant.

It's been three days since he's slept. He's told Kathy when she's asked that it's been a long case, that the beds in the precinct are uncomfortable, but he knows her well enough to know she doesn't believe him. That now, as they sit at the kitchen table, she looks at him wanting to ask, not knowing how.

"What's Kathleen's social?" he asks, picking up his cup of coffee. It's lukewarm, sliding down his throat with an edge, like the truth or forbidden love. A drop of dark caffeine slips onto the papers that need to be filled out for the graduate school in Chicago; the papers that will bring his middle daughter to Olivia. He finds it ironic that when people leave him, they go to a place where it's easy to blend in, where there are too many people to simply miss one.

Kathy leans over him, wiping the coffee from the paper. "071-34-0867."

"She should be filling these out herself." The words on the page blend together and he blinks. "I don't even know my own social right now," he mumbles.

"You need to sleep more, Elliot. You can't keep running on nothing. 132-03-2146."

He wonders how it is that one person can know so much about him, understand so much about him, and not hate him. He wants to ask Kathy her secret, ask her why he's still allowed at that kitchen table every night, why she hasn't given up all hope on him. He wants to ask because maybe if there are answers, he can teach them to Olivia, teach her that no matter what he says, no matter what he does, he's just a moron who fell in love.

"Thanks." He shoves the paper to her, and when she looks up at him with a raised eyebrow, he smiles. "I was about to ask you for yours when I realized it would save us a lot of time if you did it yourself."

She rolls her eyes, shoving her cup at him. "Get me more coffee then."

It's wrong to think of Olivia when he's in this house, when he wants nothing more than to be pouring her coffee in the middle of the late afternoon. He's a pathetic mess, and he almost wants to tell her about it, ask if this is what it felt like when he broke her in half, when the took away her life only so she could get it back.

She hasn't called him back, she hasn't.

She hasn't called him back because she's moved on, because in the aftermath of saving her life, he learned how to desecrate his own.

He needs his son. He needs to know that some things in life won't leave, that even if they do it won't be for years, for decades. He pours the coffee, absentmindedly adds cream, three sugars.

"Would dorms be cheaper or getting her an apartment?"

He leans against the counter, needing a moment, needing to find the words that'll make it easier to let Chicago take another piece of his soul. "How much are the graduate school dorms?"

"Enough to guarantee that Liz and Dickie aren't going to graduate school and E might not even be going to college. Do you have any idea how much college will cost by the time he's ready to go?"

"Enough to know I don't want to know."

His phone rings on the table, vibrating across the wood tabletop. He holds his breath for a minute, his feet glued to the ground, his heart hammering at the thought that it could be her. He watches as Kathy glances at it right beside her, and he can swear he hears her breath catch; he can swear he hears her letting it all go.

"You might want to take it."

Without looking back at him, she pushes the phone towards his end of the table and with one look to the area code, he knows. She knows. 773. Chicago. It's not her number though; it's not her number and he wonders what else could have happened, if a minor shot had turned into proving herself, had turned into more. He swipes the phone off the table, moves his feet outside the threshold of the room, holds his breath until he utters his name.

"Stabler."

"Detective Stabler, this is Special Agent Mike Kelly. I'm with the FBI in Chicago..."

But he's stopped listening. He stopped listening the moment the Midwesterner uttered his name, the moment the twang she used to speak about registered in his brain. This was it. He had finally learned that words could kill, yet actions spoke louder. He learned that it was possible for the heart to stop, yet still be alive; that it was possible to walk when your shoes were filled with lead; that it was possible to scream without a single noise being uttered.

It was like wind and water rushing through his ears, and when his back connected with the wall outside of the kitchen, he gazed out the obscured view given by the front door. There was something to be said for watching the world outside survive while you slowly died.

"Like I said, she's okay…"

And just like that, the words hit him like an avalanche, like an overpowering ocean wave. She's okay. She's okay. She's okay.

"Detective Stabler?"

He takes in a breath, exhales what sounds like a mangled cry of someone almost gone. "Could you repeat that?"

The Twang repeats itself, and he wonders how she ever could have liked it when it was so different from home. "It's none of my business, I know that. And to be honest, when she finds out I did this, she'll quite possibly kill me."

He doesn't have time for this; he doesn't have time for mixed messages when it involves her. "Get to the point, Agent Kelly."

"Like I said, none of my business. But Olivia is my partner…" No, he wants to say, she's not. She's not. "She's in New York, Detective Stabler." Once again, his heart stops. The room spins. The world switches on its axis, tumbles into oblivion. "She's an incredible agent, but she doesn't belong here. She's…she's reckless, goes in without listening to anyone—"

"She has gut reactions," he finds himself arguing. "She knows what she's doing. She knows when there are no other options."

"There are always other options. She could have gotten herself killed a few weeks ago and I can't take that risk. Not with myself and not with her."

He wonders if The Twang would get along with Grant. Both of them young enough, naïve enough to believe that it's all that simple, that risk is something that can be prepared for, that options always exist.

"She's in New York for her brother's wedding. She called me twenty minutes ago from the airport and she's on her way back." The Twang takes a deep breath, prepares himself for what comes next. "She still loves you, at least she acts like she does." The breath is released in a rush of air, but he doesn't know if it belongs to The Twang or to him. He can't think, he can barely listen as the words run through his mind, funnel down to his heart. "I know that a couple of months ago she started to become careless and never mentioned you again. None of my business what happened between you two and I never bothered to ask her because she sure as hell wasn't going to tell me. But she doesn't belong here."

The truth fills his heart, clogs the funnel so nothing can come out, nothing can be released. "She doesn't belong here either," he whispers, and for the first time he realizes that Kathy is just inside. "I can't stop her from being reckless out there as much as I want to. And I can't stop her from leaving New York, either."

The Twang mumbles something under his breath. "She's leaving from JFK at 8:20. United. Gate 7. She's going to get herself killed sooner or later, Detective." He's about to hang up when he hears him again, no longer confident but someone who understands. "She thinks she's okay and she's not. I care about her a lot but there's nothing I can do for her. She doesn't listen to me. Rumor has it she used to listen to you."

He almost smiles. "Rumor is wrong." Most of them always are. "I appreciate the call, Agent Kelly, but like I said, I can't stop her from leaving."

He can't stop her when he already tried and she didn't listen. He can't her when he knows she deserves so much more.

"She was right about you." He doesn't have time to ask what that means, to sit down and listen to everything this man knows about Olivia, everything he is afraid to forget. "JFK, 8:20, Gate 7. Thanks for your time, Detective Stabler."

The line goes dead, a heart rate monitor flatlining with a life. He had never known the date of the wedding; she had never told him. She had never told him when there was too much at stake, too much to lose again and again.

He takes a deep breath, clutches the phone in his hands as he walks back to the kitchen, sits down next to Kathy as if nothing has changed, as if the world is still the same as it was minutes ago, as if her presence didn't now taint the city that he spent all morning in. If he had known, he would have found her. He would have tracked her down, made sure she was okay, told her that despite his lies he still loved her.

"She's here?" Kathy asks, never looking up from the college information sheet.

He takes the pamphlet of classes that his daughter might soon take, looks at the credentials when he should have realized that they mean nothing. All of the word asks for credentials: classes, work, relationships. Experience is never something that can be learned in a classroom, on the job, in love. Instead, it's in all the unexpected moments, all the realizations you never knew could be true.

He considers lying, but there would be no point anymore. She understands his war scars; she has her own to match. "Her brother got married this weekend. She's flying back to Chicago in an hour."

Kathy nods, penning in the answer to some question he probably doesn't know about his daughter. He thinks that maybe by the time his youngest son is set to leave him, he'll know more than he does about the others. "You're not going to see her?"

"Kath…" His voice is strained, and he rubs his hands down his face. He doesn't have the energy for this. He doesn't have the will to fight for the things that no longer belong to him, for the things that maybe never did. "Drop it."

She goes back to the information sheet while he stands up, grabbing a mug from the cabinet above the sink. He needs new coffee, something that is still hot, that hasn't yet become stale, bitter. He stands at the counter, his elbows on the edge, and he wonders where he can go tonight, if Dante's serves their sandwiches with the crusts cut off past midnight.

"Did you really think I wouldn't find out that you were taking days off, El?"

He turns around, and she's facing him, her eyes haunted, sad. "Kathy, I—"

"No." She shakes her head. "You walk around miserable when you're here. You take days off and do God knows what and don't even tell me. And you know what? It's not my business. But when I call about E or one of the other kids and I find out that you're not there…I thought we agreed to be honest."

He turns back around, glances outside the window into another house, into a home that still remains in tact, that hasn't yet been broken down. "I can't," he murmurs and he prays to God that she doesn't hear. "There are some things we can't talk about."

"Sit down, Elliot."

"I'm not—"

"Elliot." And her voice is firm. "Sit down."

He's like the child that he sometimes believes he is, the one who has to follow orders, who gets punished when he breaks them. He turns around and looks at her and in all of the years of knowing her, of being married to her, of raising kids with her, he has never seen her look so determined.

He walks, because there is no other choice. He walks, because the steps to death row have to be far worse than death itself.

"You know, there were so many nights that I used to stay up and wait for the call that would tell me you were gone." She rubs her thumb along the handle of her mug, the one he had picked out from his youngest son for Mother's Day. It's still new, the color bright, the cracks and washed out texture not yet evident. He wonders how long it will take until it's no longer special, until something new comes along. "There was one night, the twins were about seven I think, and you had to go undercover with Olivia."

At the sound of her name, his heart cracks and he wants to hate Kathy, he does, he does.

"It happened late, and you had to be under for days. Don called me so I wouldn't worry, to let me know why you wouldn't be able to make contact." She looks up at him, the glistening of tears evident behind the blue of her eyes. "But when I first heard his voice, I thought that was it. I thought I would have to raise the four of them by myself. I thought…I thought you were gone because I waited for that call so much that I forced myself to believe that one night it was going to happen."

He wants to say something, but he doesn't know what, he doesn't know how.

"I waited for that call through our entire marriage before I left. I couldn't do it anymore. I couldn't keep waiting. All along I convinced myself that I would get the call you were gone, but I never let myself believe that she would be the one who took you."

"She didn't take me," he lies, and Kathy merely gives him a smile filled with so many years of experiences, moments, love.

"We both know that's bullshit. Do you remember when I went to her so you would sign the papers? I did it because….because I knew she was the right person to tell you to let go." She bites her lip, stops her tears. "What are you still doing here, Elliot? She leaves here in an hour and if you let her go without seeing her, you're going to regret it."

How does he explain to the woman who loves him that he told another woman he didn't love her just to save her? How does he explain that watching her get on that plane, going back to her life, will force him to abandon his own?

"Why the hell do you want me to go?" he asks, and he finds comfort in his anger. "What are you trying to prove, Kathy?"

She pushes her chair out, grabbing her mug off of the table. "Why didn't you…" He knows what she's going to ask. He knows what she's going to ask and the moment she stops, he breathes a sigh of relief. He can't answer these questions. Not tonight. "There are things I have been very forgiving of, things that most women wouldn't be. You know how I feel about this situation. You know I would give anything not to bring this all up again. But if she goes back to Chicago and you don't see her, then one of these days, I'm going to get that call that you've gotten yourself killed."

Kathy walks out of the kitchen, her words resonating in a room that houses so many memories of his family. He can see the faint line of purple Sharpie on the table from when Dickie tried to prove that it wouldn't stain, at least not forever. On the floor, scuff marks remain from the first time a boy ever called Elizabeth and she ran out of the room to save the boy from her brother. There are photos on the fridge, pictures drawn by all of his children. There's a life in this one room that holds pain but a promise that there's always tomorrow.

He looks out the window again, the seconds, the minute ticking like a bomb that will soon determine his fate. He thinks of the idea of an hourglass, all this sand funneling through until it's the end. There shouldn't be sand in there though. There should be memories, an entire hourglass filled with all the things that can run out if you wait long enough: smoke alarms with a flashing red light, alarm clocks that blink and blink, a gun indented with your mark, the knowledge of having a partner who knows you, understands you, guides you. There should be pictures of Central Park, drops of rain that provided the sounds of the night. There should be her and him and a Queen sized bed. There should be love that never found a home between them.

There's so much to funnel through; so much that can easily be lost.

7:35.

He looks at the clock.

And waits for the hourglass to bottom out.

She sits at the terminal, and she shivers.

The air conditioning blasts throughout the airport, and the bland surroundings seem especially harsh tonight. She had to leave the wedding to catch her flight, and she hasn't changed clothes, so she is sitting here in her dress and heels, her weekend belongings packed away in the carry-on that nudges at her feet.

She draws her thin sweater around her even more tightly and listens to the faint stirrings of rain as it gently hits the huge windows in front of her. The rain had held off for the wedding, and now it is rolling in, lightly coating the tarmac that glistens in its expanse in front of her. The planes roll by, huge configurations of metal and engines and power that deceptively glide into their gates in front of her. The sun has settled, and the sky is fading, and the lights on the planes blare in sharp contrast to the evening shadows.

Her plane isn't here yet. She watches the luggage vehicles speed by and tries not to shake.

She closes her eyes and thinks of the moment she saw Simon standing at the altar, the way his tense shoulders had fallen in relaxation as he had turned, seen his bride for the first time. He'd seemed bigger as he stood there, more willing and able to take on the world. His eyes had lightened, his lips had tipped upwards and for a moment, Olivia had forgotten about all of the things that marriage had withheld from her, and instead had been thankful for all the things she hoped it would give to Simon.

She is leaving New York. Again.

She rubs her hand over her face and opens her eyes, but with the terminal lights behind her, all she now sees in the dark glass in front of her is her reflection. Her hair is longer again, brushing past her shoulders in loose waves and she looks thinner than she remembered being the last time she really saw herself. She sees her eyes, and they are bigger, softer than she wants them to be. In her pale dress and silk cardigan she doesn't look tough.

She doesn't look very strong.

The rain comes down and she looks away, unable to see who she is anymore.

The memory of the sound of traffic on Manhattan's streets echoes. She had missed the horns, the chatter, the screeching tires and the faint beat of thousands of footsteps. She had missed the way she could find food from around the world at any corner, had missed the bright red signs of the Duane Reade's. She had missed knowing where she was, how to get around, had missed her old apartment. Now that it is gone, she thinks it might have been home.

She had missed her routine. She had craved the squad room, the sound of her friend's voices. She had missed racing around this city on a case, catching bits of sleep in the crib, seeing the NYPD cars on every street corner and feeling just a little bit connected for the briefest of moments. She missed the park, missed her shoe repair shop in the Village, missed it, all of it. Everything.

She thinks she was young those days, when she had been his partner. She'd been young and full of things, and justice had felt good and he had too, he had felt good. She wonders if she will always look back, if she will always think the days with him were the good old ones. She thinks that Gitano had held a gun to his head and she'd still been naïve. Even after that, she'd been so naïve.

She had looked for Elliot these last few days. God help her, it was why she had chosen a seat in the airport that left her back facing the rest of the terminal. Because otherwise she sought him. Every set of shoulders, every voice, every footstep behind her and she would let herself believe for one, single, painful moment that it would be him.

She didn't cry. Not once in three days. She didn't, she didn't…she didn't.

But now.

She doesn't want to get on the plane.

In front of her, her plane finally comes in and the red lights on its wings flash slowly, steadily. She feels the goose bumps rise on her arms and she feels herself rocking just a little bit in her seat, trying to calm down. She was okay. For three days, she made it through. For three days she didn't break down.

She doesn't want to leave to New York.

She wants to stay here, to stay home. She's tired of wandering. So tired.

Next to her, a little boy is playing with a blue, rubber ball. He's barely three and he's laughing as the ball hits the wall and sends him on a chase to recover it. The child is giggling; endlessly amused by the unpredictable trajectory of the ball each time he throws it. He doesn't fear that he will lose it.

She may lose it.

The sound of the child's laughter sends new shivers dancing across her skin. Her chest is so tight she can't breathe. The rain picks up strength, and the droplets hit the nose of the plane as it heads towards her, and then the water slides down. Down the window, down the plane, down, down, down.

Her phone rings, and she absently clutches it. She turns it over in her palm until she can see the name on the display.

God. Oh God.

Not now.

She hits ignore, and prays to God she doesn't cry out loud. She blinks, and focuses on the plane as the lights are turned off and the jetway is brought out to let the passengers off. He is calling her, as if somehow he knows that this is her weakest moment since the one in which he told her he didn't love her.

She reminds herself of all the things he would say if she answers, how he would tell her she didn't belong in New York anymore. How he doesn't love her, he doesn't love her. She wonders if he would tell her he loves his wife.

Fuck you, she wants to say. Fuck you! I belonged here, Elliot. I did. It was the only place I've ever belonged! How could you tell me not to come home?

I miss you. I miss you.

I was given one person and it was you.

She folds her hands tightly in her lap instead, letting the phone rest haphazardly on her thigh. She's going back to Chicago. She focuses on the minutes. The minutes it will take to get the passengers off the plane, to get her on it. She just needs to lift off, to get away again and she will be alright.

Her still healing arm begins to throb and she realizes she's tensed up every muscle in her body. She forces herself to breathe, to just try and relax.

I need to know you can do your job without waiting for me to come to the rescue!

Her breath hitches as his voice, the past, echoes in her ear. Haunting her across all of the years. She itches the bandage that covers where the bullet cut her skin and swallows thickly.

You can always walk away.

In her head, he won't stop talking to her. Next to her, people are filing off the plane and she focuses ruthlessly on her reflection in the glass, trying to get herself under control. She doesn't need him, she never did. She doesn't. She didn't. She can't.

Her phone rings again and she makes a sound, jumping a little as she looks down at it, without touching it. The display is clear. Nearly throbbing in its effect.

Elliot.

Again.

She almost laughs. Her hysteria is so close to manifesting itself into tears that she finds herself shaking her head, staring at his name lit up on the phone. It rings, and rings and rings.

And rings.

She finally snaps, sending it to voicemail again. The phone quiets and there is no message left.

Her knee starts bouncing, keeping time with the rain outside. It's starting to come down now, and she thinks that all of the rumbling isn't that of the jets, but of thunder. She tries to think of things in Chicago that she misses. There is Kelly's shit-eating grin, but even that is fading these days. Ever since the day she was shot, the more he looks at her, the more serious his eyes become. She tries to focus on her apartment in Chicago, the morning runs along the lake.

Nothing compares to the noise and chaos of Manhattan. To him.

She's so close to him. Miles. Minutes. He's only miles and minutes from her. Her head falls forward, and she presses her fingertips into her forehead. She can't cry, not here. She doesn't cry anymore, she's made it a rule.

You're gonna work this case with me?

It stills her, this last recollection of his voice. It was from the moment she saw him, after she came back from Oregon. The moment she walked into the room that day, his eyes had lit just slightly. It was weak hope fanned on a lot of faith. His expression had been nearly child-like. Guarded, sure, but too relieved to hide all of it. He hadn't looked strong that day, not for long days after.

She wonders what he looks like now. If he looks strong, if she would want to crawl into his space and just be held.

Her phone rings again and they are pre-boarding her flight. The red lights on the plane flash and flash and flash.

Miles and minutes.

She closes her eyes and picks up her phone, needing something. She doesn't say anything.

But he knows. He knows the second she has answered.

"Olivia, Christ Olivia, don't go," he rasps, out of breath. "I'm on my way, just please, don't go."

She stares at the passengers, lining up to board. Her bag sits at her feet, and she could slide into the seat on that plane, go back to where the make-believe has never truly become real. She is silent, wishing herself away.

"God, say something," he demands harshly, because he's always been an asshole when he is afraid.

"Fuck you," she whispers into her phone, unable to take her eyes off the line of people disappearing into the jetway. She should just do it, just get up, hand over her ticket and let the plane take her. Again. Again. Always running from him, again and again and again.

Never getting anywhere.

His response is a short crack of mirthless, hollow laughter. It's self-deprecating. Painful. "Olivia, please. Just please don't get on that plane."

They are calling her row now. She could board, and in minutes they would tell her to turn off her cellular device. "You've got no right-" she says, gripping her phone.

"You're right," he cuts her off. "I don't. God knows I don't. And I've never done a goddamned thing right, but this-" his voice trails off and there are horns in the background of wherever he is. "You were here," he finally says, incredulously. "You were here and you didn't call-"

She slams the phone shut and squeezes her eyes closed again. Accusations. Always him with the accusations, the blame, the righteousness. She hates him, she thinks. She hates him. He told her he didn't love her and yet he doesn't know why she didn't call?

He fell out of love with her.

She hates that she picked up her phone. His voice is louder again now in her head. She's given him that by answering; she's given the bastard control over the volume.

Her row is boarding and she stands up, her phone embedded into the palm of her hand. She uses her left hand to pull out the handle on her small suitcase, to start to pull it behind her when her phone rings again. She ignores it, wonders why she doesn't turn it off. But she doesn't. Even after it stops ringing; even after she starts walking down the tunnel to the plane.

She doesn't turn her phone off.

She waits behind the line of people, trapped in the small enclosed space, and she thinks of him across from her. At his desk. She thinks of the way he'd hold his phone when someone called and he'd stare off into space, how in the later years, she'd always catch him staring at her. She thinks of his fists, how they still bore scars. She thinks of how she once was too late coming around a corner and how that afternoon, he'd been accused of taking a life.

She's heard him laugh before, too. This is what she thinks of as she waits to get on her plane. She thinks of his eyes crinkling and his lips lifting and the way that when someone made him laugh, he'd always look for her, to make sure she had found the laughter too.

Her phone rings again.

She opens it, holds it to her ear. She wonders what would happen if she asked him not to say anything, but just to laugh. To laugh for her, to fill her up again.

"Please," he begs, his voice cracking, wearing the effects of the rings on which she didn't answer. "Please Liv, don't leave."

Maybe it is the quiet desperation in his voice, the lack of hysteria, the broken things. She doesn't know what of it makes her hold on, but she doesn't hang up. "I'm boarding," she says quietly, but it's not an answer, it's just all she knows, all she has to say.

He lets out a harsh breath. "I'm on my way, Liv. I can be there in ten minutes. Just ten. Please. Just hang on."

"You told me to let go," she whispers. She hates it, that she says it, that she still thinks it. She hates that she is pathetic, that he has been able to do this to her.

Later she will think about the sound he makes. Later she will think he sounded like he was crying.

"Did you? Did you let go, Olivia?" he's nearly coughing, choking. He sounds strangled.

Her lungs search for air.

She reaches the plane and the seats are laid out in front of her. There are dozens of people sitting already, settling in. She could make her way towards the back, sit down, and the flight attendants would tell her soon to turn off her phone.

Panic slides up her spine at the thought of hanging up on him.

"Liv, I have to show you," he tries. "Let me just…there's something you should know, and if you want, if you want to leave after, I'll take you back to the airport. I-" he stops after his burst of words. "I will, Olivia. If that's what you want, I'll take you back to the airport." He stops, and then she hears it. Then she is sure. He is crying. "I can't let you go," he says, cracking. "I told you to let go, I wanted you to, but I can't. I don't have shit to give you, Liv. I'm a fucking mess and you-" he trails off. "Fuck," he curses gruffly. "Fuck."

She blinks, frozen, unable to move. She's supposed to do something, to put her luggage in a bin or something and she can't. Her fingertips are white against her phone and she's wobbling.

"Do you remember when you came back from Oregon, Liv? You looked so good, you did. You looked stronger, and you were full of fire, and you did so good. Away from me, you were so good. I wanted that for you, I wanted you to find that again." His voice is a low, thick panicked rush, words tumbling end over end to fill the silence she is offering. "But I'm a bastard cause I can't let you go. I can't. Not until you know everything. Just give me an hour. Please. Even an hour." He bites off another ragged, mumbled curse. "Christ, I'm shit, I know that. I do. I'm a prick. I want to let you go and I…I… can't."

People are staring at her because she isn't moving. She was supposed to do something else when she got on the plane, hand over the LEO forms she had filled out to carry her weapon. She was supposed to find a flight attendant, let them know where she was sitting because she would be armed. The pilot is supposed to know, someone is supposed to know where she is.

He's on his way to her. He always finds her.

He's talking because she has nothing to say. For all of her silence, his desperation is coming out in stilted, accented words. "You got shot. A bullet hit you, and I…I can't… I couldn't…Christ, a bullet hit you! I just kept thinking this is stupid, she should know, I have to tell her, I do, she has to at least know…"

"Know what?" she pushes past her numb, uncooperative lips. She's not moving. She's just trying to breathe.

She wonders if he will talk to her again. If he is still there, on the other end of the line.

"Olivia," he finally expels. He's got no more words.

"Elliot," she says, his name ripping out of her. It hurts to say his name, to have him hear it.

"Ma'am, if you could take your seat, we've got a line of people waiting behin-"

The voice in front of her fades. She only hears the one she is clutching against her ear.

"Don't leave, Olivia," he says again. "Just…" he stops, nothing left to beg her with.

"Why are you doing this?" she pleads.

"Ma'am," the attendant insists.

"I can't let you go, Liv. I can't. Just meet me outside at arrivals. I'm pulling up, okay?" His voice drops, softens. It's coaxing, soothing, as if he is talking to a victim. "Can you do that? Can you meet me there? Let me just…there is something I need to tell you, and if you want to go after, fuck, if you want to, we'll get you another flight out. Okay?"

Around her, the rain pounds the outside of the plane.

"I bet you looked beautiful," he hitches, his thoughts scattered in panic and his voice plummeting with each word. "At the wedding, you would have been…" His voice shudders. "God, I don't know what I've done."

"El-" she tries. She wants him to come get her. To help her get off this plane. She's frozen in place, unable to clear her head, and all she knows is she wants to see him. Even though she will leave later tonight. She just needs to see him. Even though he is married, even though he isn't hers, she needs one more moment with him, just one more. Even if it is to say goodbye. She thinks it is wrong that in the moment she had been forced to say goodbye, he hadn't been holding her.

She misses his eyes, the color of them, the world inside of them. She misses his broken hands, the way his words always originate in the back of his throat.

Come get me, El.

"Ma'am can you please take your seat? I can help you, if you'd just let me know where-"

"I'm here," he says softly, the panic ebbing from his voice. She knows it is deliberate, that he's forcing himself into control, into some semblance of calm. "I'm here, Olivia. I'm here with you. I'm outside of the United terminal."

She doesn't question that he knows where she is. "El-" she says again, the faces of the passengers blending together. She should just sit down, close the phone, end this confusion.

"I'm right here," he says roughly, his voice cracking in his determination to stay calm.

But he's not. He's not there in the faces in front of her, and suddenly he's the only thing she can possibly see. She's exhausted, and she needs him. Even for a few moments. She'll leave again, she tells herself. Later tonight, she'll get another flight. There is still time to run away.

The rain gets stronger outside.

He's asking her to stay. Maybe not forever, but for a little while at least. For tonight. She wants to hold out for more, but every minute with him already means everything. A minute more of him would be enough.

"I'm here, Liv," he says softly. "I'm here. Waiting."

Her face is wet, although the rain is outside.

"I'm on my way," she whispers, and she turns around with her bag, shoving her way past the people behind her, desperate to simply get off of the plane.

A/N: We left you hanging, I know. Olivia got stopped by security, Elliot got towed by the mean airport traffic men, and it's raining pretty badly out there. She can't run or else she'd slip and break her leg, and well, there would be hospital scenes and other such nonsense. Anyway, this chapter is not the end. We have a little more coming.

We also were going to put subliminal messages in here and then decided against it, but we do need to promote. One of our friends is a semi finalist to be on HGTV's "Design Star". She's an amazing interior designer and we're both busting our butts to get her on the show because she's so deserving. So if you can take a minute out to vote for Stephanie over at designstar that would be incredible.

Thank you and thank you everyone for your incredible support on this story. It blows us away (and we're shocked how much emo people can survive!)

P.S. "Everytime It Rains" by Charlotte Martin and then "Your Armor" also by her. *wink*

Chapter 12

He wants to go in and get her.

He wants to throw the NYPD placard up on the dashboard of his truck and haul ass through the terminal. He wants to tell her he's fucked up in every way possible, but that he needs to be forgiven. He wants to tell her that Chicago can go to hell, that he doesn't feel righteous about justice without her, that she's so beautiful it haunts him sometimes and leaves him without an ability to sleep.

He wants history to be rewritten; he wants to dictate how it should have been and how it will go.

But he's not eloquent, and he's definitely not a believer. She said she was on her way, but he doesn't indulge in the hope or the expectation. He's got no rights here, in this. He's got no right.

Over the edge of the terminal roof he sees the planes taking off, and he wonders if she is on one of them. He wonders if she has thought better of it, of all of it, and has decided that he doesn't deserve another minute, another hour, another chance to use his voice.

It is goddamned pouring outside and the rain slashes across his windshield. His throat is burning and his knuckles are aching from the grip he has maintained on the wheel as he stares at the automatic doors. His breath hitches every time they open, and his heart stops every time it isn't her.

He wants to call her again, but she said she was on her way. He doesn't call her because he is afraid to know for sure that she is gone. He's afraid to get only her voicemail, he's afraid to give up on this fragile, tearing hope.

The minutes pass and it's never her. There is an older man hoisting a little girl, her head tucked against his wet coat as he dashes towards a waiting minivan. There is a young kid, maybe fourteen, with his iPod in his ears and the hood of his Hurley sweatshirt pulled over his head. There is a middle-aged man in a dark overcoat who steps into the rain, only to check his watch and promptly turn around to head back into the shelter of baggage claim.

There is no Olivia.

There is no Olivia.

Until he blinks, giving in just once to taking his eyes off of the door, and she is there.

She just stands there, outside of the automatic doors. Unlike everyone around her, she is oblivious to the rain. Her pale dress is immediately plastered against her body. She is dragging a single carry-on and a light, useless sweater and she just stops, scanning the cars in front of her slowly. For the tiniest of moments he is frozen, until she tilts her head sideways slightly. It is a movement so gentle, so fragile, that he's propelled by it, spurred by the realization that if nothing else, he has to get her out of the rain.

He is out of the truck then, and he knows why she has been standing there. She doesn't recognize this truck, the one bought just after she left, the one he knew was safer for his son than the unreliable Jeep, the one he now needs to get her into if simply to provide her with some shelter from the relentless rain. He can't take his eyes off of her, even as she sees him approach, even as she lifts her chin and presses her lips together and lets the rain have her - he can't stop staring at her. He is learning her again, trying to reconcile that he would never, ever have been able to forget.

She's far too fucking thin. She's shaking. She's looking at him like she hates him, like she is angry, like she is afraid. As he gets closer, he sees the rain slip down the bridge of her nose.

Her eyes are full of trepidation and defensiveness, like she is bracing for a fight. He thinks she might be rocking just a little, or maybe he is.

"What the hell are we doing?' she asks hoarsely, her gaze sliding painfully away and to her right.

He wants to touch her. His hands are opening and closing, flexing with the need to grasp her, to feel her skin beneath his palms, to thrust his fingertips into the wet strands of hair and tug them off of her cheeks and the delicate, perfect column of her neck. He sees the rain catch on her lower lip and he's mesmerized by the way the water clings to her. He wants to cling to her.

"Please get in the car," he hears himself whisper against the sound of the rain. It seems like hundreds of hoof steps are beating down, racing, thundering, moving around them. He's afraid that if he makes one wrong move she'll hurtle through those doors again, and for some reason in the nightmare he imagines, he can't catch up to her.

She finally drags her eyes back to his and she nods, just once. She seems strong until she tries to take a step and falters. He reaches for her and she recoils, not much, but enough for him to be painfully clear that she doesn't want him to touch her. At all.

He reaches for her bag instead, and she lets the handle fall into his hand.

She's a movie in his head. Just seeing her, the memories come back, each one tossed into his consciousness without regard to the fallout. He thinks of every time she ever came back to him. How she had seemed stronger those times, her head tilted to the side as she assessed him, her stride purposeful, her eyes no longer holding the endless, vulnerable depth she had left with.

He can hear his prophetic words. Years in the past, they are now echoing in the present. You can leave. You can leave.

She's been gone for so long, and yet here she stands.

No, I can't.

As he watches her reach for the door handle, letting him toss her bag into back, he realizes this isn't the same as all the other times she came home. She can't really look at him, she won't make eye contact. Her head isn't tilted, it's ducking low instead, avoiding him. Every movement is hesitant, gauging the consequences.

And her eyes. Her eyes.

He slides into the truck next to her, trying to focus on the tasks at hand. He can't process that she is next to him. He can't comprehend that hours ago he would have never expected to see her this month, this year, or this lifetime, let alone tonight. He reaches into the backseat and pulls a blanket off the seat, the one always left there next to the empty car seat for Eli.

He hands her the blanket and as he cranks the heat despite the humid May night. He sees her fingers clutch the blue and gray striped chenille.

He realizes he's done something wrong as she shifts the blanket once, twice, into her lap, shaking her head and tipping her head to the right so she can stare out the window at the airport she has just left. Her lips are pursed, her eyes filling. She doesn't use the blanket despite the fact that she is soaking.

"How is he?" she asks quietly, against the hum of the warm air shooting through the vents.

"You don't look good," he says instead, without being able to stop himself.

She whips her head around to face him and there is heat and fire in her eyes. He can't explain the relief that slides over his skin at her fury, but it is reassuring that she's still in there. That she is still Olivia.

"There is a flight at ten-forty. I want to be on it," she says bluntly. But her voice breaks.

That's always been who she was. Strength and armor painted with delicate cracks.

She's looking at him now, her eyes locked on his. He hasn't realized how weak he's been until she is in the car with him again. Until she is riding shotgun with him, until she is glaring at him. But now he knows. He knows that he has been so weak for all these months, because in this one moment he's got strength. He's got purpose and definition and control. He's got the ability to fight for things, and maybe, just maybe, he's a little bit invincible.

She's sitting next to him. Olivia.

He starts the truck. He's got minutes to undo years. He's got hours to undo a lifetime. He's saved lives before when facing a ticking clock.

Tonight, he finally knows, he will have to save theirs.

She thinks there are memories that should never be remembered.

There are moments, passages of time that should remain locked in some part of her mind; the places where she had kept her mother, her father, her childhood. There are corners, so far back, that begin to break down their walls, inundate her with a flood of memories she's forced herself to forget over time.

She stares out the window of his truck, the chenille blanket warm against her chilled skin, as the rain pounds onto the windshield, the glass, their reflections. It had been like this the night of her first hardest case, the one that had caused her to get sick in front of him. She can remember how hard the water had been against her skin, how when she had gotten into the car he had handed her a blanket, the one he had accidentally taken from one of the twins. He had smiled at her, offered to buy her a coffee.

She has forgotten his smile; she has forgotten so much.

"Were you trying to get yourself shot out there?"

His voice is like the bullet that had pierced her weeks ago. It hits her skin with shock, pain, the brutality of a force she cannot yet comprehend.

She turns away from the window, her fists balling at her sides. She can't do this with him, she can't. She should have gotten on that plane. She should have left him the way he had left her. With no hope, no pride, no sense to make it all right. "Stop the car," she whispers. But he doesn't, and her fingers unclench.

She thinks of all he's ruined. Of all he's taken away.

"Elliot." Her voice rises. She finds her anger, her strength, her faith. "Stop the car," and now it's through clenched teeth and tears that she thought she'd be able to hide. "Or I swear to God, I will get out while it's moving."

His foot slams down on the brake and she finds herself in the middle of residential Manhattan. She thinks about her apartment that she had left behind. She wonders who lives there now, if they're happy. She wonders how it is that life can seem mundane and desperate and alone yet looking back on it it was anything but.

She wonders a lot of things these days. She wonders about him.

The fight leaves her as she turns back to the window. She watches two teenagers run through the streets, laughing and wonders what it would be like to be free when maybe she has never known.

"I..." Her voice cracks and she knows she should have gotten on that plane. "I was doing my job, Elliot. And I don't need to answer to you."

He reaches across the console, touches her bandage as the air escapes her. His fingers are rough against her skin, cautious, warm. Her eyes close and she thinks that maybe she died out there that day with Kelly, that none of this is real. She thinks that hope is a lie and desperation is sin.

She thinks that as much as she hates him, she needs him, loves him more.

"I miss you," and for a moment she thinks that it was her words instead of his.

She turns to him, to the sound of his confession, and he's staring at her and there's so much in his eyes that she has to look away. She looks at his fingers on her arm, the goosebumps that form against her skin. She closes her eyes and listens to him talk, listens to his voice, to the pitch, to the tone.

"If I had lost you that day-"

"You already lost me." She lifts her head, promises herself to be strong. "You let me go, Elliot. And I can't, I won't do this with you again." She rubs her hand over her forehead, sighs into the dark early evening. "I made a mistake getting into the car with you. I have to be back in Chicago, I have to..." But there's nothing she has to do. There's nothing. Nothing. "Please." In her voice, she begs, she pleads. "Just drive me back."

But the car doesn't rumble to life. His hand doesn't leave her arm.

"There are things I haven't told you, Olivia, and I-"

"And there are things I haven't told you."

She shouldn't tell him the truth, she shouldn't let him win. But next to him, beside him, she slowly feels her heart die. The sword has been thrown down; the battle is over, and she admits defeat.

"I'm in love with you," she whispers, and through the web of tears, the rain looks almost haunting.

There should be something more to say because he knows that, he does. She opens her mouth, but the words don't come out. The words don't work. They're broken or she's broken but she can't tell him anything he doesn't already know because maybe he's always known it all.

His hand slides from her arm, and he looks out the windshield. He looks and she wonders what he sees, she wonders if he sees her, if he's ever seen her how she wishes he would.

"He knows your name." She can feel his eyes on her and she looks at him, sees his pain. "He's not even two and..." She hears the crack in his voice, wonders if two broken people can become whole as one. "I shouldn't have let you go, Liv."

The nickname breaks her harder than a bullet ever could.

"You have a wife. You have...You have people who you should be with and I'm not one of them."

"Would you stop being so fucking noble?"

Anger tears through him, and she finds herself smiling.

"If I was noble, I wouldn't have gotten into the car, Elliot."

She looks at him, takes in all the things she's afraid she'll forget. The scars on his knuckles from hours of fighting the heavy bag, the lockers, a perp. The piece of hair on the side of his face that doesn't quite connect to the others. The blue of his eyes that seem almost lighter in the shadows of rain.

These are things she won't lock up in the corners of her mind, that she'll keep against her heart when it's all gone, when he's all gone.

"There's something I need to show you," he says, and takes the keys out of the ignition.

She looks at him with an eyebrow raised, with a quick glance outside. There's nothing here he could be showing her; there's nothing here but residences, Starbucks, a local dry cleaning. There's nothing here but lost dreams, tall buildings and an overwhelming need to come home.

"Elliot, I..."

His fingers touch her bandage again, tickling skin that is yearning for his touch. "You were never shot when I had your back."

Her eyes close because she had imagined this, she had.

And when his car door opens, she finds herself following because she always has. Because he knew she always would.

She follows because he's spoken words she has only imagined.

The rain pours down on her, cleanses her and she lifts her head towards the dark skies. The cold water touches her lips, brushes against her tongue.

And in the darkness and shadows of his footsteps, she finally lets herself breathe.

It's nothing special, this building.

It's a brick walk-up, four floors. It's older, and this means the hallway is covered in creaking, wooden floorboards. They are wet right now, and he wants to grip her elbow and make sure she doesn't slip in those ridiculously high heels, but he knows the only thing that will truly make her falter is his hand on her elbow, so he walks ahead, praying she will follow.

She does.

He isn't steady as he climbs the stairs. He hears her heels click on the floor behind him, and she's slower than she should be too.

"Elliot," she starts.

Ahead of her, he lets his eyelids shut and keeps climbing, unwilling to answer. His name always sounds like a protest when she says it.

"Elliot," she tries again, her voice rising in frustration.

He shoves his foot onto another stair and keeps walking. He can't answer her before the third floor. He can't, not until he has her where he needs her. He needs her to be far away enough from the front door that she can't run right away, he needs her close enough to him that when she tells him to go to hell he can hear her this time.

He thinks he knew what hell was, but he didn't. Not really. He thinks he's about to find out. When he shows her, when he shows her, she's gonna run and she isn't going to look back.

He gets to the third floor and heads down the hall. She stops at the top of the stairs. He hears no movement after that, so he finally turns to face her, fifteen feet left between them.

"What the hell is this?" she demands, her face paling. Her eyes seem stark against her skin and dress.

He should have brought up her suitcase; she could have at least changed inside, gotten into something dry before she walks away, again. He can't focus on the magnitude of this or he's gonna crumble. He's afraid he'll beg again, he's afraid that one day his desperation won't be enough for her.

"Keep walking, Liv," he says, because asking her again, pleading with her, it'll leave him with nothing.

Her face contorts into pain and anger and she spins on the floor, her fingers gripping the railing and she starts to descend the stairs once again. He's on her before she has gone down three steps, the sound of his racing footsteps filling the empty hall.

"Christ, Olivia! Just wait, can you do that? Just fuckin'wait!"

He grasps the arm without the bandage as he lands on the same stair she is on. She whips her chin upwards to face him. "Wait? Are you kidding me, Elliot? Wait?" Her voice is perilously high as she wrenches violently away from him. "I waited, you sonofabitch! I waited for over two goddamned years for you to get through Kathy leaving you. I waited for you to sign the papers. And then you went back, because you should have. You should have, Elliot. It was the right thing to do, and God knows, that's you. You ultimately do the right thing. And then you find out you're gonna have a kid, so I do it. I try to let go. I think, goddammit Olivia, you have to let this stupid idea go! Let the bastard go. But no, you're there then. That's when you are there, at my door, in my bed. When you have a baby at home!"

He's frozen in the face of her fury. Her eyes are bright with tears and the fight, the fight is all laid out in every nuance of her expression. Her skin is now flushed, one hand brutally gripping the railing. Her lips are pressed tightly together now as she shakes, as she makes a sound she never intended. He knows what that sound is, it's the one she makes when she is swallowing a sob. When she has decided she won't cry, and she fights herself, suffocating on her need to let go.

"Olivia," he says, his voice rumbling. He's got a thousand apologies that he's said every night, and none of them reach his voice.

She doesn't want his apologies anyway. Her eyebrows draw together as her eyes fill. She's quieter now. Solemn. Her voice is deeper, nearly monotone."That's when you were there, Elliot. When there was no possibility for me. And I can't...I can't figure that part out." She shakes her head too quickly, swallowing again as she denies herself tears. "Even now, that's what I don't understand. How come you came to me when I didn't stand a chance? Because I forgot that part when you were next to me, I'd forget for moments too long those nights that I didn't stand a chance."

He needs to hold her. It's all he can think about. His fingers are throbbing to reach for her. He's never needed her more than he needs her in this minute. He's been waiting a lifetime for this one, single moment. He's got to get this right. Of all the words he's ever said, these are the ones that count.

"My marriage," he finally says, clearing his raspy, constricted throat. "Liv, it's my marriage that never stood a chance."

He's so quiet that he's not sure that she hears him. She's staring at the corner of the stairwell, as if lost in thought. "You said you didn't love me," she whispers, never looking at him. "I had finally decided that just knowing you did would always be enough, but then..."

"I took it away," he finishes gutturally.

She nods, shrugging nearly imperceptibly. Her eyelids seem heavy and her movements slow down. The burst of fight is over, as if her anger had been a firecracker that sparkled and cracked before fading into the nothingness of the night sky again. She is back to being withdrawn, the way she had been in the car. She rubs her fingers over her face and sighs, turning to head down the stairs, back to Chicago. "I didn't try to get shot, Elliot," she says resignedly as she descends onto the landing four steps below him.

"You just didn't try not to, either," he murmurs.

She stops. Her back is still to him. He knows she wants to issue denials but unlike him, she's never been a liar.

"Where are we, Elliot?" she finally asks quietly.

He doesn't know if she is asking about them, or about their physical location. He gives her the answer he knows. "Come upstairs and I'll show you."

She expels a breath and stands there for long moments before she turns around, walking up the stairs again without looking at him. He leads the way, the faint smell of mandarin permeating the air around her. Her shampoo, he thinks. Her hair is wet and it smells like her shampoo.

The mandarin, the mandarin always brings him back. That first night. Hours after the accident. That was the first time he recognized the sweet, citrus smell of it.

It was the night his confessions stopped being told to God and started being told to her.

There wasn't an order to who I bargained with God for first.

He stops in front of the door again, his nerves shot to hell. She is behind him this time and her breathing is erratic. He is trying to find the key on his ring for this place and get it into the lock when she lets out a shaky burst of air.

He had lied to her even on that first night of all of this. There had been an order to his prayers after the accident, because there had always, always seemed to be an order to his prayers.

For his children. For Olivia. For his wife.

"Don't hurt me again, Elliot," she whispers.

I never meant to hurt you, he had told her one night over a year ago, as he cradled her in her bed after she had tried to end it with him, had tried to save herself by simply going on a date.

Some things in life are unintentional, she had said hollowly.

He's sorry. Tonight, again, forever, he's so very sorry for what he has done and what he still has to do.

His hand stops on the doorknob. He knows if he had said he won't hurt her, he would have been lying to her. He's about to hurt her. He's about to decimate her. He's about to rip away everything she thought she knew.

He stops, presses his palm against the door and regroups. He's got to do this. He has to do this because unless she knows, she can't forgive him. Unless she knows, they don't have a shot. Unless she knows, unless she knows, she doesn't know everything about him.

He turns the key in the lock and as the door opens, he flicks on the light.

Behind him, he hears it, the agonized gasp, the involuntary movement that makes her follow him into the apartment just far enough so that he can close the door and lock it.

He turns to watch her, to crowd her, as her frantic, disbelieving eyes sweep the small place laid out in front of her. He needs her within grabbing distance so that he can reach for her if she runs.

"Let me explain, Liv-" he starts.

But she doesn't hear him. She turns and spins and immediately her shaking fingers reach for the chain lock he has just closed, tugging on it to open. "Sonofabitch, sonofabitch..." she mumbles again and again. "Christ, you sonofabitch!"

He's behind her before she can unlock the bottom lock as well. He tries to still her by placing his hands on her waist.

She whirls on him. "Are you kidding? Let go of me!" she bats his hands away. "Why is all your shit here, Elliot?" she finally yells. "This is your stuff! This is...why is it here?"

He grits his jaw and gets his hand on the door, holding it closed. It doesn't matter, she isn't going anywhere. She is so startled, so shaken by the room around her that she has already abandoned the idea of immediately running.

He wants to be able to say something different than what he is about to say. He wants to give her more than the truth she won't understand. She won't stick around long enough for him to explain that he couldn't give her less than knowing for sure that he had something to offer her. That he couldn't make her stay while he sorted out his life once again. That he couldn't watch her run unless he could be the one to tell her to go.

"Kathy and I-"

She looks at him with horrified eyes. Ones that scream betrayal and liar and how could you, how could you? She backs up in anticipation of his words, inadvertently walking deeper into the room.

"Kathy and I are done, Liv," he says, grating the words out and never taking his eyes off of her.

She flinches as if slapped and then recovers, striding towards the door his back is against. "I don't believe a word you say," she says, wholly dismissive and reaching for the door handle. "You're always done and then you go back. It's just another go round for you. You'll go back."

His hand shoots out and wraps around her wrist, stopping her. His lips are nearly on the top of her head. "It's done, Liv. It's been done for awhile."

She stills. He can feel the tension rolling off her body, can feel her bones shake in her wrist from the way she is clinging to her disbelief. "Liar," she whispers venomously.

"Olivia," he says, his lips sliding down, towards her temple without touching her skin. "I'm not..." he pauses, terrified that his next words will tell her everything she needs to know. Will tell her just how deep the lies were. How long they had been building and how little she had really known.

"Olivia, I'm not married anymore."

One day was never meant to hold so much.

She thinks that maybe this is some sick joke, the aftermath of her life in death. She thinks that the gun must have killed her because it would have hurt so much less than this. She lifts her head, and she knows all those times that she believed her heart had stopped it was nothing more than a lie.

This couldn't be happening; it couldn't be.

I'm not married anymore.

She hears the words the way she did the night he left her, the night he confessed that he didn't love her. Repetitive. Over and over again. Never stopping. Never ending. Words that twist inside of her soul, burn their imprint into her heart, into places that she'll never forget.

Her back presses against the door, the wood cold against her bare shoulders. "How long?" she whispers, and she's surprised that she still has a voice, that she still has the will to speak. She twists her wrists in his hands, fights to break free. "How long have you been divorced?"

She watches his eyes as he looks down at the ground, watches as his hands clench at his side.

In the corner of the room, she sees pictures of his children, a crib set up for his youngest son. She sees things like she did on that night what seems like decades ago. She had gone upstairs with him after confessions and his promise to buy her breakfast. Her knees had felt weak from knocking against his, her bones had been cold from the chill of the world, of their jobs. She had never been up there before; she had never seen him as a bachelor. The apartment was cold, but it was his.

It was his.

Just like it is now.

He looks at her and she can see it in his eyes, see the lies, the truths, the denials, and as his lips move, her body stills. Her heart stops its beating for a second filled with complications it has never known.

"Almost a year."

She doesn't mean to do it, but her eyes slip closed. She can't breathe, she can't. It spins around her, all of it, like an amusement park ride, like the aftermath of falling in love.

"You've been divorced for a year?"

The words are biting, and she wonders if it's possible to hate the person she loves most in this world. She wonders if it's possible to love the person she hates the most.

Her eyes open. Her fists ball. And the rage, the passion that once lived inside of her finds its home once again.

"You sonofabitch," she seethes, and her fists find solace on his chest.

She hopes his heart will stop beating the harder she hits. She wonders if she can kill him in all the ways that he has killed her.

She hits, and hits and it doesn't help, it doesn't. Because her heart is still breaking, the tears are still coming and she is broken. She is. She is.

"I hate you, I hate you," she mumbles, and she doesn't know what she's doing.

She's never used her rage like this, at least never with him. But her fist connects to his hard chest, and she misses him against her at night, she misses his chest upon her back when the sun had yet to rise. She hits for the moments she has lost, for the lies he has told, for the lies she's forced herself to tell. She hits because control is lost, because she no longer knows who she is.

His hands grab her wrists after seconds, or minutes or maybe even a lifetime, pulling her off of him, pulling her back to the clarity lost long ago, so long ago.

She writhes against his touch, but she doesn't have the energy anymore. She can't keep fighting when she has already admitted defeat, when the punches do nothing but bruise only her. "How could you..."

She slinks against the door, slides down to the ground. She wonders where the strong willed detective is. She wonders if there's a point to any of this, to life, to love, to God, to anything when her dignity has been taken, her pride stolen.

"If you didn't love me, Elliot, then why..." She shakes her head, but the words don't come.

"You have every right to hate me right now, Liv, but-"

"But what?" she yells, and her voice rises. She pushes one foot onto the ground, tries to stand but there's nothing there to hold her up. So, she remains. Crumbled. A torn ragged doll that has lost the will to be someone's companion. "But you decided to keep it from me because...because..." She doesn't get it. She's not sure she'll ever get it. "Fuck you, Elliot."

There's dirt on the floor beside her, small traces left over from tiny shoes. His son is walking. His son is walking at this apartment because he's not with his wife, because he no longer lives at home.

She can hear him sit down beside her, his shoulder touching hers, and she lets the sob escape. She's this fucked up mirage of emotions, or maybe she's just fucked up.

"I didn't tell you because..." He pauses, and she should run, she should. But his hand touches hers that lies facedown on the floor, and she can't move, can't function. "You deserved so much better than me, Olivia. I...I tried to make my marriage work and I couldn't. You deserve someone who..." He stops, and tilts his head to her and it's then she sees the tears in his eyes. It's then she realizes that they're not so different after all. "You needed your life back before I told you. I thought that letting you go was the right thing," he whispers, and she wonders if he knows that he hasn't explained anything at all.

She thinks of that car accident, the one that had started it all. She thinks it's funny that staying on solid ground, standing still can be the same thing as crashing. The glass had shattered that afternoon, onto the concrete, into the car. It had sliced her skin, bled the same dark red that later remained on her shirt. There is no glass now, but admissions of truth that slice just as fierce. There's always some kind of accident, something to throw the ground off, something that makes unsteadiness the common demoninator.

Trust has always been a thin blue line, the thing that held them together, the thing that had torn them apart. Maybe if she didn't need him so much, it wouldn't have happened. Maybe if she hadn't sat outside that hospital room after Gitano asking about herself, about what she would do without him, then this wouldn't have happened. It wouldn't have happened if she had trusted him more, or less, but now it doesn't matter because she's not sure she trusts him at all.

"What did you expect me to do, Elliot? Did you expect me to be happy about this when you lied to me?"

His shoulder brushes against hers and she remembers how their knees had touched, such an innocent, childlike gesture filled with adult implications.

"No, I knew you would hate me for it." The web of pain etched into his words stings her soul. "You kept telling me that you hated the person you had become, that I had made you into someone you didn't like. I couldn't...I couldn't tell you until I knew you were okay." He scrubs his hands down his face, and he's just as exhausted as she is. "You're not okay, Olivia. And I'm not..." There's too much honesty, and it's itching at her, pulling at her like something that doesn't fit, like something that isn't right. "I'm not okay without you."

She doesn't understand herself anymore, because she wants to run, she wants to remain. The crack in her heart widens; the blood pools, clots in one spot so it's hard for her to breathe again. She rubs her foot over the specs of dirt, watches them disperse into nothing.

Her mind spins with all the things she should say, all the things that sound too formal, too comfortable, too angry, too sad. Her mind spins and for a second she thinks that maybe this isn't death from the gunshot wound, but death from the accident. All of this was just pieces of her afterlife, proof of her pathetic existence. Maybe he really hadn't loved her at all.

Maybe.

"Say something, Liv."

She tries, but she can't. There's too much between them now. There's too much of something stealing the air from the room, stealing her words, her heart, her voice.

She should go. She should, she should.

There's a plane waiting for her at the airport, and uncomfortable waiting room seats that are better than his floor and a life she has become almost used to. There's so much there that can save her when his words haven't, that can help her heal when he has effortlessly learned how to shatter her, but all she can see is him. Him with his damn smirk when he had gotten her a coffee before she had gotten his. Him with his Knock, Knock jokes that were never all that funny. Him with his late night conversations, and pearls of medical wisdom and declarations of love that might have all been a lie.

Him.

And when her feet refuse to move, and her leg slides down beside his, all she can do is stay.

They've been sitting here, side-by-side on the floor with their backs against the front door for over twenty minutes. They've been sitting in silence and the rain outside doesn't let up. Instead the thunder has rumbled in with a voraciousness only reserved for the storms of early summer.

The apartment is only half lit, just the front lamp is illuminated and he's a bastard, because even though they aren't talking, he's thanking God for every minute that passes, every minute that makes it less and less likely that she will have time to make that plane. And even if she decides to try to make it, he's gonna drive as damned slow as possible.

In the shadows, he finally recognizes that she is still wet, that she is still shivering. He has been sitting here like an asshole without paying attention to the fact that she will get sick if she sits her in wet dress for much longer. She's so still that if it weren't for the ragged, uneven drawing of her breath he would have thought she had fallen asleep. Her head is tilted away from him, and her bare leg is only inches from his. There are faint scars on her knees and he wonders if she earned them when the bullet hit her, when she fell and he wasn't there to catch her.

"Olivia," he finally says quietly. He feels the rocks in his chest tumble as he tries to speak. "You're still soaking. At least take a hot shower or something and then we can talk."

He's grateful he's been a father for so long. He's long ago learned how to keep his voice low enough, even and calm enough to seem in control if push came to shove. This is every push and every shove he's ever faced, all wrapped up into this one night, these terrifying rolling minutes.

Her head tips towards him, her hair catching on the wooden door as she lifts her heavy, pain-ridden eyes to meet his. "You're not married," she mumbles accusingly, the words filled with air and disbelief.

He has nothing to say. He can feel her breath against his face and he's missed her so fucking much.

"What if...what if I never came to New York, Elliot? Were you ever going to tell me?"

She looks like a little kid, waiting for him to give her back her faith, her sense of right and wrong. Something inside of her is hinging upon his answer, and she's searching his eyes for a hint of what he might say. If he ever says anything again.

He can't be silent. He's gotten into all of this for the silence. He's been so damned silent for so many years and he's got things to say.

"When you first left, Liv, I let you go because I wanted to get all of this all straight here," he says, licking his lower lip and drawing it into his mouth as he searches for something that will make sense to her. She is here, in his apartment, and he has to keep talking so she doesn't leave.

He has to make sure his talking doesn't make her leave.

He clears his throat, his jaw grinding despite his best effort to quell his nerves. "I didn't want you to watch and wait and...wonder what the hell I was doing again. I couldn't drag you through that. I wanted to resolve all of it, make the divorce final, and then...bring you home."

Her eyelashes close enough so that she is squinting. Her anger is visible, palpable. "What makes you think I'd come home?" Her chest fills and expels and her fists clench. She finally shoves herself upwards and stands, her back resting against the door as she catches her breath.

He gets up, as fast as he can, terrified she will run. He wonders if this is what he has earned, the never ending unease that she will always be on the brink of fleeing. "I didn't know, Liv. I didn't. I think I just prayed that you'd be happy there, and if you weren't, then at least I'd have something to offer you. And then..." he flinches. "And then you told me you didn't like who you were and I thought, Christ, I have to fully let her go, she can't come home."

Her face crumples because every mistake he has made has ripped her apart too. She launches at him again. "You sonofabitch! Who died and gave you the right to play God with my life? What the fuck happened to the truth, Elliot?" She shoves him again, and he wonders if he should step back when she connects with him, should give her the satisfaction of making him stumble. He stands his ground because he can't let her push him away."You tell me what the hell happened to telling me the truth!"

She goes to shove him again and he grabs her forearms, holding her still. God, all he can smell is the mandarin. Her skin is cold and damp, small bumps gracing the soft flesh of her arms. She tries to yank out of his grip and he doesn't want to let go. He hauls her closer to him instead, until the damp strands of her hair are under his nose, brushing against his chin. It's only when he realizes that she seems smaller, that she fits against him differently, her cheek against his neck that he notices that at some point while they had been sitting she had kicked off her heels.

His arm slides around her waist, his hand slipping up her back. But this time, he's learned his lesson. He isn't half-assed this time, he isn't afraid of holding her. He has to hold her, he has to tell her more than he did the first time he held her like this.

The afternoon his son was born.

He uses his other hand to grasp her this time. His hand tangles behind the damp strands of her hair, cupping her neck and pulling her closer. The first time he had ever grabbed her, her hands had remained on his back, beneath his arms, and she had remained that way because even the slightest shifting would have meant they would have broken apart.

This time she reaches up, her instincts having been honed.

And mercifully, she curves her arm around his neck. She steps forward, despite her protests, despite her anger. Despite the thousand ways in which he knows she will question him, accuse him, curse him. They'd had a million questions dangling between them the first time he held her, and they have a million more between them now.

But she presses herself against him and he's never known this, what it is to hold her without restraint hammering at him. Without boundaries, without rules. He's never before held her and been able to make promises. He's never before held her, felt her heart beating against his chest, and been free of secrets and responsibility and obligation.

He's never before held her and been right with God at the same time.

His arms are around her and the ache that has lived along his forearms since the night he first held her is finally easing. His skin needs hers.

So tonight, as he draws her up against him, lets his eyes drift shut, whispers - it isn't about reassuring either one of them that they will be okay without the other. Tonight he's gonna start with the truth.

"I wasn't okay," he whispers under his breath, into her hair. "Without you, I wasn't okay."

Tonight she doesn't pull back, he doesn't either. Tonight, instead, for one moment they both let themselves go.

The water sluices down her body, hot, steaming, filling the bathroom with its heat.

She has been standing under the spray in the bathtub for almost fifteen minutes and she is just now feeling the shivering begin to subside. She wants to think the shaking is from the cold, but she knows what it is.

He held her.

He held her for minutes and minutes. He held her so long that against his muscular, warm neck she felt herself on the verge of sleeping, despite her clinging wet dress, despite the icy surface of her skin. He held her so long that her fists unraveled, her anger became disorganized. He held her as she found herself crying, he held her as she felt herself get so angry that she cursed at him in a frantic whisper. She called him angry name after name after name. But she didn't unravel her arms from around him, she didn't draw her arm off of his shoulder or pull her hand away from where she had clung to his neck.

She lifts her face and lets the water directly hit her swollen eyes, her burning cheeks.

He held her.

She doesn't know if it is pain or anger or relief or fear, but something fills her chest, makes her ache so badly that she wants to call for him, even now. She wants to be against him again, just as badly as she wants to take her fists and make him hurt, to make him feel the blow of every night she slept alone, of every night he let her think she was on her own.

Her eyes drift shut and she wobbles slightly as the water hits her shoulders.

He isn't married anymore.

You deserve someone who will love you and that's not me, Olivia.

She wonders if those words will ever leave her ears. If there will ever be a moment she doesn't hear them. If there will ever be a moment when she fully believes that they were not true.

Recognition slams into her.

Her face jerks upwards as her eyes open, the water making her blink back the onslaught. She plants her foot backwards to keep herself from falling. Her hand shoots out onto the wet ceramic tile of the wall to steady herself.

He's asked her to stay, he's asked her to stay. But that was all. He's asked her to stay and she's been a fucking fool for standing here, for missing her flight, for only nodding silently as he finally urged her towards the bathroom and started the shower.

He's only asked her to stay while she's laid herself on the line. She's been pathetic and she's been crying and she's told him again tonight that she is in love with him.

He only asked her to stay.

Her palm slams the knobs back against the tile, abruptly shutting off the water. She pulls the towel off the top of the curtain rod where he had slung it, and she wraps herself in the navy blue cotton, determined not to inhale near anything that might smell remotely of him. She whips the dark curtain back and sees her crumpled, wrinkled and damp dress on the floor. She can't breathe, her panic is overwhelming.

She will fall for him every time.

Every time.

This was why she had run. Not to get herself back, but to stop herself from giving herself to him. She hadn't run to be someone else, she had run so she would stop giving herself away. Yet here she is, ready to hand herself back to him just because he looked at her, because he is divorced, because he has pleaded with her to stay.

You deserve someone who will love you and that's not me, Olivia.

Her throat constricts in her desperation to flee. She will have to go farther this time. Phoenix. California. Goddamned Canada. She's got to get away from this sonofabitch because he's the only thing she sees, he is the only thing that can make her believe. He makes her believe. He'll always make her believe.

He only asked her to stay. There was nothing more, and he had once said he didn't love her. He didn't. He wants her to stay but he doesn't love her.

You deserve someone who will love you and that's not me, Olivia.

She feels like she could choke on all of the nothing he has given her. She's dizzy with her need to get away from him, from here. She should have never seen this place, never been forced to realize that even without his wife, he still doesn't love her. She should never have known what it was to love a man that was free to love her too, but didn't. Wouldn't. Couldn't.

She wonders what made her do it, what made her walk off that plane hours ago. She was okay then. She wasn't great, but she wasn't this. She wasn't frantic and sick, so sick she thinks she may throw up. Her eyes slide across the bathroom, the beige walls, the closed toilet, the steamed mirror.

She sees it then, the pile of clothing he has left on the edge of the sink. He must have retrieved her suitcase because he has left her a pair of black yoga pants and...his sweatshirt. A big gray zippered sweatshirt he has worn a thousand times. It doesn't matter. She will wear it, find a hotel, book a flight.

You deserve someone who will love you and that's not me, Olivia.

She steps out of the tub and drops the towel, trembling as she runs her fingers through her wet hair, as she pulls on the pants and slides his sweatshirt hurriedly over her skin. She grasps the edge of the sink as she can't help but smell him on the fabric. It warms her and envelops her body and it's a lie too because he can't warm her up anymore, he can't. She doesn't look in the mirror, she doesn't want to see this person who is so desperate that she would so easily believe, who would be so weak as to be swayed by just his eyes, the smell of him, the grainy, rumbling of his ragged voice.

Her hair is dripping down her neck as she whips open the door, ready to find shoes in her suitcase, ready to claw his eyes out if he so much as says one word about how he wants her to stay. She's ready to fight him, to ignore him, to hate him and his lies and this fucked up life.

But he's standing there, his hands braced high on the doorframe and his head is hung low. He is drowning in apologies and he's been crying while she was in the shower. He's been crying and it has been bad. His eyes are on her, swirling and wet and relentless. His eyelashes are dark and the moisture still clings to them.

"I love you," he says simply.

And she stays.

Chapter 13

A/N - Maddy: So it's me. Madness. Jess will probably leave her own A/N too, because really, mine are useless. They are just a way for me to talk, and read myself and really, that's what it's all about, right? I just wanted to say you all make me feel mentally healthier, because I've been using the pooper scooper here to hurl angst at you, and you just stand there and take it. So it's like, if a crazy person falls down drunk in a room full of crazy people, is she really crazy or just a drunk? Think about it. It's deep, really it is. And no, I've locked my door so the people lurking outside in white coats can't have me. I just wanted to say thank you for trusting us with this story of emo-ness. I mean, you stuck with us, and we didn't even really mention Elliot's penis-of-mythical-magical-proportions until this chapter. Songs, *sigh*...you want songs. "My Skin" by Natalie Merchant. And Caffe Dante's? For you NY'ers, it is on Macdougal. It's tiny, with character - and the best italian coffee in the city. And now would be a good time to thank you so damned much for all the support on this. Hope this gives them the story you had hoped for.

A/N - Jess: Like I can ever top your insane author's notes, Mad. Because really, the whole pooper scooper, drunk, not drunk, crazy rambling...it's just too much for muddled brain to take. Songs...I'm different than Maddy. I go for melody more than lyrics most of the time (unless I'm listening to the emo mix she made for me) because listening to words distracts me so I follow tone and go with songs I'm so used to that I don't need to pay attention. "When the Children Cry"-White Lion which has inspired like half of the things I've written. "So Are You To Me" by Eastmountainsouth. "Never is A Promise"-Fiona Apple. And "Do What You Have" by Sarah McLachlan because it explains this story so damn well. The response on this story is so much more than we expected. Thank you doesn't quite suffice, but I don't think anything would.

There's one more after this. Our baby is being put to rest.

She doesn't smell like mandarin anymore.

He thinks about change, about the good and the bad. He thinks that people fear it their entire lives, that he has feared it his entire life. He had felt the earth crumble, the world decimate at his feet the moment his wife had left that first time, the moment she was gone. He had felt the undoing of his career when Olivia had left him for a unit she didn't belong in, when his fists and his rage had made an impact on Lucius Blane. He had felt the rejection again when she had left for Oregon without a word, come back as if she had done something noble, right, instead of running away once again. There was regret and desperation when he had pushed Dani Beck up against his car, kissed her because there was something to prove: to himself, to Olivia, to the entire Goddamn world.

It was always change upon change, the world stealing his breath, his air and with Dani he decided to take the power back. Change couldn't own you when you forced it upon yourself, when you welcomed it, when you told yourself it was right. But even then it did. It did when Dani left, when Olivia came back, when change came and came and came and the world spun and he couldn't stop it, he couldn't, he couldn't.

But maybe there always were two sides to all stories in life. If his first partner hadn't left him ten years ago, Olivia never would have walked into his life. She would be somewhere else, maybe someplace better, but she wouldn't be his. If his wife hadn't left years ago, he wouldn't have discovered that life continued to revolve, that Olivia was something more than a partner, a friend. He thinks that maybe there wouldn't be his youngest son, just a marriage that was dead and doomed and would remain that way because no one had the energy to let it go.

There was change in the aftermath of Victor Gitano, and in all the words that were spoken, in all the ones that weren't, something had turned, something had faltered. She had left and became someone softer, broke herself, became who she was all those years ago again.

And if he hadn't changed his plans that day, he would have been in the car the afternoon his son was born, or in a hospital somewhere holding the child that had stolen his heart. He wouldn't have touched her for the first time, felt her hands against his back, the worn material of her shirt, felt the slightest intake of breath as if she could still be surprised by the good things in life.

There would have been no accident; there would have been no truths.

She doesn't smell of mandarin anymore.

He thinks that maybe it's okay. When she smelled of oranges and the slightest hint of mango, she didn't belong to him. She would lie beside him in bed, watch the blinking red light, the flashing clock and know it would all remain the same. Maybe, with the smell of his shampoo coming off in her waves, the change is okay. It's okay.

She's beside him in bed now, her back to him, and she stares out the window. She hasn't spoken to him in hours. She hasn't done anything but watch the rain that slides relentlessly down and every time he opens his mouth to speak, he stops.

The lights are out; the night is still.

He listens to her breath, to the patterns and the changes and the things he has missed. He's missed the way her hair moves the slightest bit with her inhale. He's missed the curve of her spine, the rise of her shoulders. He's missed so much, and he wonders if change is always constant, or if it finally stops when something is right.

He reaches his hand out across the mattress, the queen size that never felt right without her, but he doesn't touch her, he can't. His hand lingers inches from her spine, and through the shadows of the night, he watches her stiffen, listens as her breath hitches, as she suppresses her cries.

He has failed.

She has missed her plane, and he wonders where she'll spend tonight when it will no longer be with him. He wonders if she'll sleep at the precinct, live in her former life for one more night until she goes back to the forced life she has created for herself, the memories that aren't as real as the ones here.
He hasn't undone anything tonight. He's added decades onto the years. Infinity onto a lifetime.

He rolls onto his back, stares up at the ceiling that doesn't have the red light. "I..." His voice cracks when he speaks, breaks and shatters into pieces at her feet.

He has nothing anymore but his words. They've never saved him before, but then again, he's not sure anything ever has, aside from her. "I take the days off now," he whispers.

Through the reflection in the window, he watches her eyes close, listens as her breath hitches. She's shivering and he can't touch her, he can't make it all right.

"I walk around the city and I look for places that I think you would like. I...There's this little café called Dante's and they have these fucking small plates that I hate and their sandwiches have no crusts and I sit there for hours because I think that maybe one of these days, you'll come home and find me there."

She whimpers and chokes on a sob, and he's an asshole, he is, because he doesn't know how to make this better. He doesn't know and God, he wishes he did, he wishes he could fix it, change it, change him, change them.

There are lights on the ceiling from the posts outside. There's rain and memories and a life he wants back, needs back. "Did you know..."

He finds himself losing the words, losing it all. He thinks of all the things he wants to tell her, all the I love yous that can never negate taking it back. He thinks of their phone calls, of her breath against his, of late night talks. He thinks that loving her is the only thing he has anymore, that loving her is all that makes sense, maybe all that's ever made sense.

"There's this place in the heart where something is placed between the two venae cavae." He tries to remember what it is, but the name doesn't matter, it doesn't. "The walls are so thin and it's connected to these parts, but that's it. The rest of it, the rest of the heart, it's just there. It's free from everything else except that thing holding it together."

Her body shifts, and he watches her turn. Slowly, painfully. Her eyes burn with the tears that he has caused, and maybe this is it, this is their moment that she breaks him apart, this is their end.

"That's what she was trying to tell me, wasn't it?" She turns onto her back, stares at the same spot he was just watching, and he wonders if she misses the red light or finds peace in knowing that none of this is the same, that he can't leave her this time when she's quite possibly already left him. He wants to touch her, to drape his arm over her stomach, but there are rules. Even now, there are rules. "When Kathleen was in Chicago, that's what she was asking."

"I guess so," and it sounds like an apology on his lips.

"I feel like..." She's talking, and it's something, it is, it is. "What else is there, Elliot? What else haven't you told me? All those nights that I told you to get off the phone because Kathy was going to hear, all those nights...I...You made me feel like..." She shakes her head, her head sinking into the pillow.

It doesn't smell like mandarin anymore.

"How did you know?"

A strand of hair falls in front of her face, and he wants to remove it, wants to tell her again and again how sorry he is. He thinks that there's so much between them now, so much air, so much space, so much diminishing time. He fights for his words, like he had once failed to fight for her.

"How did I know what?"

"What airport I was at, that I was here at all, what time I was leaving."

If she leaves him, goes back to Chicago, he can't risk the only friendship she has, the only person keeping her as safe as she allows herself to be. "Cap told me."

And then he sees it, the smile that washes across her face. The rain reflects in her eyes, and he thinks that beautiful isn't a grand enough word to describe something filled with so much of nothing, and so much of everything all at the same time that it's overwhelming with a poetic sadness. But she is, she is.

"Cap didn't know I was here. And before you bring Munch or Fin or even Lake into this, none of them knew either." He opens his mouth, but her hair rustles, her head shakes. "Casey didn't either." She glances up at the ceiling again, and he thinks that he likes her hair like this because it slides into the crook of her neck, leaves her a pillow when the rest of the world is bare. "Kelly called you, didn't he?"

"He was worried about you," he defends, and he wonders why he's willing to help someone who has taken over his role in her life.

"I went to Dante's," and this surprises him. She licks her lips, inhales before she can tear up again. "I was there this morning, before Simon's wedding, and I...I kept thinking how much you would hate those plates." She tilts her head towards him, and he can see her anger, her fear, her love in expressions he used to know so well. "You've made me miserable this entire year, Elliot. You made me fall in love with you, you made me...you made me not care about anything and I can't...I don't know if I can forgive you for that."

His chest constricts and he feels the walls of his heart disconnect. "You can blame me all you want, Olivia," he says softly, "but you weren't the only one who fell in love. You weren't the only one miserable this past year. I did what I had to do because I needed you to be okay without me. I needed you to...I needed to know if there was better out there for you because I couldn't give you what you deserved."

He doesn't want to argue, he doesn't want to give her reasons to leave, but he wouldn't be him if he didn't fight. She wouldn't be her if she didn't let him.

"But don't say I made you fall in love with me." He turns on his side, watches as the rain dances in her eyes, as the shadows lighten and fade, as forgiveness ebbs and mistrust begins. "Don't...You can't blame me for that."

His fingers ache without her touch, and he clenches his fists, as her eyes widen, soften. He doesn't want to be angry, he doesn't want to fight.

"I miss you," he says instead.

"Elliot-"

"I miss the woman who would fight me because she knew she could. I miss the woman who would...who would stand up for herself no matter what." He watches her, watches her blink, watches her stare. "You can hate me, blame me if you have to, but I couldn't be the one who destroyed the person I know you are. I couldn't..." He looks down at the worn sheets, at the patterns, at the drop of juice that his child had dripped onto the cotton. "I couldn't watch you destroy yourself when I loved you that much."

She nods, and it's so quick, so gentle that he thinks he's imagined it. But when she turns to face him, he can swear the resentment is gone. He finally gets there's a common ground, an understanding to change, to honesty.

Maybe all she needed was the truth; maybe the lies had complicated from the beginning.

"Tell me about Elliot," she whispers, and she lifts her head, moving it slightly towards him.

She's forgiven him, and there's a miracle in that alone.

"Eli," he corrects, watching a smile flit across her lips. "Kathleen, she still calls him E. Liz wanted something different. She came up with it when she was watching football and it seemed to have caught on."

There's a laugh that bubbles in her throat, that spills out of her lips like the first drop of rain, the first flake of snow. Pure, beautiful, unexpected. "You hate Manning."

"I know I do. Eli suits him though, I don't know why but it does. He's...God, Liv, he's amazing. Maureen just bought him those shoes that light up so he runs around the house, the apartment just to see the red lights. He claps when the audience does when the girls are watching American Idol. And he sings."

Her eyes light up and he thinks this is what it's like to fall in love all over again. "What does he sing?"

"That song about the umbrellas." He rolls his eyes, sliding his leg closer to her. There's a heat there, and he listens as the sheets rustle, as she moves closer. "Kathleen loves that damn song. Eli walks around the house screaming ella, ella, ey, ey, ey and he dances to it too. He's going to be a little hoodlum. I'm dreading the day."

And then she does it; she laughs and aside from his children's voices, his children's happiness, it's the most beautiful sound he's ever heard. It's loud and it reminds him of those nights in their first year together when he would take her out for dinner, when she would take him for coffee.

There's a past to it all, to them.

The laughter slowly fades and she sobers, looking away from him. Her fingers thrum along the comforter, and he wishes he could hold her in the moment of her happiness forever.

"How's Kathy?" she asks, and he can hear the fear, the desperation creep into her voice.

"She's good. She's happy."

"I didn't...I never meant to..."

He lifts her chin with his finger, because his hands had unclenched, because he knew where they belonged all along. "I know."

She doesn't move, even her eyes are unwavering in the moment. There's so much he has failed to see over time, so many moments dimmed and lit in the wake of her moods. He sees his reflection, and for a second he wonders if this is how she sees him. Pained, scared, desperate to believe.

"I can't get on that plane again, Elliot." His heart stops, starts, and life begins again. "I can't leave you."

He rests his forehead against hers, and she breathes life into him, she does, she does. "And I can't let you go."

His fingers slide through the soft strands of her hair, and he tilts his head, rubbing his lips against hers. There's a sob that escapes her, and he can taste the salt of her tears, the acceptance of hope that has come alive within her.

There's a softness to her skin, to her hair, to her lips, and he can feel his heart break and piece itself back together all at the same time.

He slips his leg between hers, sliding his spare hand down the curve of her body. She inhales against his mouth and he steals all the secrets she's never told, all the mistakes he's ever made.

He captures her bottom lip between his, and finally, he's okay, he's okay.

There's gentle pressure on the back of his neck, and she's holding on because he's promised not to let her go. He wants to taste her, God he does. The salty tears slide into his mouth and he rests his head against her cheek, nuzzling her skin, wiping away all the pain he's caused her.

There's so much he wants to do; he wants to feel as her hair slips down her shoulders as their mouths move in sync; he wants to watch the red light that had guided their way and know that they're finally home.

He wants to know.

His head rises to hers again, and he tastes her, slowly running his tongue across her lips. She gasps, and it's small, so small. She licks her lips, the corner of her tongue touching his.

When the night stands still around them, the seconds holding their time, he pulls her closer. And when he finally knows what it's like to be against her, what her kiss is like on all those nights that sleep failed to come, he knows this is the end of all that came before.

There is no more running. There is no more when this is it, when this is what he had been asking for so long.

There was an order to his prayers on that night long ago.

There was an order when she held that gun to him, too afraid to shoot.

There was an order when she came back, when she let go, when she found her ground again.

There was order when he had lied, because she deserved her chance to find someone better.

There was always an order.

There was always one more change that could be for the best.

Her mouth moves together with his, long, languid strokes in perfect sync. It's been seconds, minutes, what feels like hours, and he reluctantly lets her go, learns how to breathe without her air.

He rests his head back against the pillow, the night filling the space between them. His hand lies between them and in the calm silence, she slides her fingers into his.

The rain settles, and he knows now that God should have believed that Thou shall lie in proximity, because it was always right with her beside him.

"Knock, knock," he mutters, closing his eyes.

There's no space between them and he thinks that every change, every wrong step has led him to this moment.

"Who's there?"

"Olive."

Her fingers tighten in his grasp. "Olive,who?"

In the darkness, he turns his head. His lips find hers, and his words slip into her mouth like a prayer that is no longer his.

"I love you."

There were nights she imagined this. Nights that the sounds of Chicago echoed in her bedroom, nights when she would wonder if the faint rustle of whistling was because of the wind or because Chicago didn't bury its trains beneath ground. In the darkest parts of those nights she would sometimes imagine being permitted his hands on her body. She would imagine his mouth dragging against her lips, she'd pretend his voice wouldn't sound differently when mumbled against her skin.

In the imagination she indulged those nights, he loved her fast, quickly, desperately. Or maybe it was just that she was so frantic that she couldn't discern her panic from his. She imagined he would pull her beneath him, draw her leg up and there would exist only seconds between the moment his mouth claimed hers and he became forever embedded within her.

In all of those nights, she had never imagined this.

She lies perfectly still in the crux of him, her eyelids pressed against his neck, her lips pushed against his throat. Her thigh has slid between his now and his big, hot hand has slid beneath the back of the tank top she finally dug out of her suitcase.

I love you.

She shudders again, the words rolling inside of her ear. He knows it will pass, because this isn't the first time tonight she has shuddered without explanation. He does what he has been doing for the last hour, what he has been doing since the moment he first kissed her.

He tells her again. And every time he tells her, he's drawing the deities into it. Christ. God.

"Jesus," he chooses this time, his voice almost hoarse. "I love you."

Every time he tells her she thinks she's ready for more of him on her. They've been holding back, learning each other's skin slowly. And her hesitation isn't because she doesn't want him, it's because he is overwhelming - too much at once. The smell of him, the taste of him, the steady, strengthening beat of his heart. She's afraid of what it will be like to have him inside of her. She's afraid of combusting, of screaming, of clawing at him so violently that they can't finish and he can only hold her, rock her, wait until her throat unclogs.

Instead, she learns his details slowly. Between them, she finally slides her palm up the bare expanse of his muscled chest. She feels the way his breath grabs at him, the way his stomach expands and contracts, dragged along by his chest as it moves. His skin is warm, nearly hot, and it is rough across his pectorals and smooth as her palm slides over the side of his torso. She is making a sound, and she buries it against his neck as she squeezes her eyes shut. Her hand stills. This is all she can know of him right now.

Her fingers flex into his skin.

His thumb slips over the scar on her upper arm and she flinches. He has started shuddering and she's afraid of this too, of him losing it.

"He reminds me of you, you know," he says. His deep voice is melodic and she feels herself arching into it. The heat of him - the heat of being held by him - she's nearly dizzy with it. She doesn't shift too much in the bed, she barely moves because she's afraid that too much movement will wake her from this, and she'll be in her bed in Chicago and nothing will have changed. Nothing. She's afraid she will be in Chicago and she will be left to spend the rest of the night pacing the generic apartment and alternating between sweating and shivering.

She thinks of his son, of the moment she cradled him against her chest, of the moment the child's bare skin was pressed against her neck. She can't remember who was holding onto whom that afternoon so long ago, and but she thinks it is ironic that she feels the same way now, with the child's father. "How come?" she says, and she is so close to him that her lips brush his neck as she speaks.

There is movement above her, and she thinks he might be smiling. "Kathy has him in this daycare two mornings a week, so that she can go back to school and he gets time with other kids. And he plays so hard there, Liv. Sometimes, if I can, I'll pick him up. And I can watch him playing before he sees me. He's so animated, and he laughs so hard sometimes that he falls back onto his diaper from it. But when he cries..." he stops. Inhales. "When he cries he looks around with this look on his face, and it's everything I can do not to make it better, at all costs, right and wrong be damned."

She finds, surprisingly, that her lips are lifting. She doesn't know if it is from the way he talks about his son, openly, freely, where in everything else he can never find the words, or if it is because of the picture he paints. It was his child's birth that sent her reeling, and yet she craves every image of him. "A crying baby reminds you of me? That can't be good, Elliot," she teases softly, testing the waters on the banter that used to define them, heal them.

His hand flattens on her back, his thumb sliding up and down her spine. Someone's breath hitches as his hand dips, all the way down to her lower back, his fingers sliding against the waistband of the bikini briefs she had put on instead of her yoga pants. "No, what reminds me of you is when he comes home. He never wants to take a nap. He fights it, he arches his back if I try to set him in his crib. He holds onto me and won't lie down. So I put him in his booster seat at the kitchen table instead, and give him something to eat." His laughter is impossibly gentle. Nearly reverent. "And within minutes, sometimes with a banana clutched in his hand, Eli's head falls forward until his chin hits his chest, and he's out."

She pushes her bare leg in between his thighs, all the way, rolling half on top of him. She is just listening. She's never been told stories at night, not like this. She understands the phenomenon. She finally recognizes that stories uttered in the dark are magical, perfect.

Her hand slides down his torso, all the way to his hips, to where his boxers meet his skin. Sprawled onto him, she can feel his arousal pushing against her belly and she nearly cries out with the sharp, searing ache that spears into her.

She wants him, wants, wants, wants. Wants.

Needs.

God, how she needs.

His voice is gravelly now, and she can feel the tautness of his muscles as he holds himself still, letting her hands roam him. "You used to do that, Liv. You'd fight me on sleeping. You'd never go up to the crib. And then you'd inevitably be there, sleeping at your desk."

His finger traces the narrow elastic band of her underwear and she moans, and the sound gives him permission. He is barely beneath the fabric, but it's so intimate that her heart races. He stills, again letting her get used to it, or maybe he is getting used to this too.

They are going slow, and she knows the reasons for this are timeless. Across history, when man was given freedom too soon, he always approached it with trepidation. As if a life without boundaries was too much responsibility all at once, too fragile, as if the promise of possibility could be taken away too easily.

The mention of her desk, her old desk, the one that was once placed stubbornly against his, silences them. She isn't a detective anymore. Some of the changes they've made can't be undone. Some of the damage is permanent, as it always is.

"What did he do?" Elliot finally asks quietly. Gruffly. "When you got shot. What did Kelly do?"

She laughs softly because it is all she can do. His possessiveness has always flared over the most unpredictable of things. "You'd like him, El."

At her temple, she feels his jaw flex.

"He decided that I wasn't going to die, and then called for a bus," she says softly. "And then he told me if I pulled that bullshit one more time, he'd kill me himself."

Elliot's jaw unclenches. The air around them moves and his hand slides lower, over the curve of her ass. He cups her, drawing her more tightly to him. His groan pierces the silence and she has to turn her mouth away from his neck just to breathe in the growing heat. She can't help it. Her hips rock against his, her thighs clenching in anticipation.

"Christ, Olivia, stay still," he orders. Begs.

She struggles against the need to move on him. She wonders about the moment when he pushes into her body - she wonders if that moment will be the weakest one or the strongest one she has ever known. It will, without a doubt, be one or the other.

The silence wins again.

She thinks about the moments when life veers. When one course and another splinter and fragment in a second. She wonders if there are two paths that lead to two different endings, or if there is only one ending, and a million paths by which to get there.

She is here tonight, and she thinks that there is only one ending that is meant to be, and a million ways to miss finding it. She thinks about sitting in the airport, about standing on the plane and staring at the faces and intending to leave. She thinks about the million ways she could have ended up in Chicago tonight, the million ways she might have woken up tomorrow still believing he was married.

She thinks about the million ways he might have stayed married.

"What happened?" she finally whispers. Her hand instinctively curls at his side, as if ready to hit him if the answers hurt her. As if she can thrash away the pain because all the months of stillness haven't worked. "What made you...you..." She can't say the word right now. It has always been one filled with agony. For him, it was a word that sliced him from his past. For her, it is now a word that reminds her that all of the omissions that lay bordered forever on lies.

He sighs heavily, slipping his hand out of her underwear and instead sliding it along her side, up beneath her tank top and across the edges of her breast. "You mean why did we go through with the divorce?"

It is also a word of hope. For her, for him. It could be a word of new beginnings, of being given a chance.

Her silence is his answer. It always has been. She wants to encourage him - his voice, his hands - so she slides her hand down his waist, past the edge of his boxers and over the bare, carved curve of his hips. He's all muscle. He's all hard angles and feral hisses that break from his lips. She can feel the indentation of muscle between his hip and his groin and she shakes, because he's more than she imagined.

"The night she came home from your place, Liv, she just..." Elliot groans as her hand stills against his words. He continues anyway, because some things have to be said. "She asked me to stop going to your place. And I...couldn't say okay. I couldn't say the words. I couldn't say to her that...that I wouldn't go see you."

She starts to pull away from him, to prop herself up. She can't do this. She can't be his reason, even if it is the truth. She doesn't want to know that she made things worse for one more person; she can't hear that she has cost him anything.

"Lie down, Olivia," he rumbles, using his free hand to cup the back of her head and pull her back down to him again.. "After all of it, just hear me out."

She braces herself, waiting for the gauntlet to be thrown, for the moment when she knows she has to run. She's shaking, thinking that this time she won't even have the strength to set her feet on the ground, yet somehow last time she was able to run thousands of miles.

His lips have changed her. She knows the taste of him now and she knows what it is like to close her eyes and feel him on her, moving, breathing, enveloping.

His eyes find hers in the shadows. "The reason we were done wasn't because of you, Liv. Our marriage was truly broken when I walked out of that house the first time. It was dying when I stopped listening to her years ago, and it was done the moment that she first told me it was time for me to consider living elsewhere." His eyes are steady, unwavering and his finger traces her ear. "But she came home from your place that night, and she slept in the other room. And in the morning, she said what I'd been thinking. It was really over."

Her chest is constricting. She had still been in New York for weeks after that night. For weeks he hadn't come to her, and if he had told her, if he had, she wouldn't have gone to Chicago.

No gunshot, no crying, no words rescinding love.

No Kelly, no churches, no kids being happily chased down the bike paths of Lake Shore Drive.

No semblance of breathing.

Chicago had nearly destroyed her, but maybe staying, maybe watching his marriage disintegrate around him again without any guarantees, maybe that would have killed her.

"Then why didn't you tell me?" she asks again, despising the quiver in her voice, the extra air.

He presses his eyes close and lets his head roll back on his pillow. She can see the moonlight slide over the skin on his neck, the stubble, the twitching muscle of his throat. "I couldn't. Not until it was done, Olivia. Not until it was over, not until I was okay and I wasn't dragging you back into the aftermath." He opens his eyes but doesn't look at her. He is silent for so long, it seems like the moonlight moves across the ceiling before he speaks again. "She said that when she and I first met, she tried for weeks to get me to see her, to fall in love with her. But she said that I'd always seen you, without you even knowing I did."

Her eyelids feel heavy. "You just said it wasn't about me," she mumbles quietly as she tenses, once again pulling off of him.

He lets out a defeated breath, as if he knows his words won't be what she wants to hear."It wasn't anything you did, Olivia. I couldn't talk to her anymore, or even be around her for too long, because she didn't understand anything that lived in my head. But you did. And I think in the end that was too much for her to live with."

She sits up suddenly, dragging the covers with her. Her skin is immediately cold again. She turns in the bed and stares out the window as the small flicker of hope that had been building in her begins to dissipate. "Having the same filth in our heads isn't anything for her to be envious of," she whispers. "And Jesus, Elliot if that's what this is to you," she shakes her head, focusing on the faint light beyond the sheers. "If you need me just because I've seen the same shit you have, if you need me because our nightmares are the same..."

There hasn't been enough crying for one night, because she is still capable of it. Maybe she's been building it up over a lifetime, and now, her heart won't stop bleeding. Her fingertips rub her cheeks, as if that will make the aching stop.

The sheets rustle behind her as he sits up too. "Liv..."

"No," she stops him. She doesn't want his explanations. And she doesn't want his love if it is simply given to her by default because no one else could understand the hell they have seen. "Why aren't we those people out there, Elliot? You know, those people who grocery shop on Sundays with their kids in the cart and who take walks, who take long lunches and push strollers in the park? I always see them, and I don't get it, you know? I don't get who they are. I don't know how they got that life. And I want to know. I do!" Her voice is picking up speed and she can't stop herself. "I want to know what that life feels like sometimes. Even for a day."

This must be what it is like to claw at life. This must be last few minutes before conceding to the suffocation. This is the last ditch effort. This is the moment when pride is finally revealed to be useless; this is the moment when the perpetual silence is unveiled as having been the enemy.

He's sitting up behind her, and he is quiet and that gives her permission to keep flooding the room with everything, with all of it. "That's what I want to know," she says, her voice cracking as her face dampens again. "And you're telling me, you're telling me that I'm here, with you, because I don't know! Because I probably won't ever know. You're telling me that because I get it when you can't sleep for days, I get it when you distrust every single person out there, I get it when you want to rage and beat and blow some fuckers head clear off, that you need me because of that?" She throws off the sheet, no longer fighting the goose bumps on her skin. Her feet hit the ground and she can't think, can't comprehend what he is telling her. Her head is shaking in disbelief, and she can't see the dark floor beneath her toes.

She needs to find her things. All of them. She needs to close her overnight bag, to gather the things she has spilled here, on the floor of his bedroom, and shove them back into the bag she will take with her. She needs to pack herself up again.

"Liv..." He tries again, his voice so low she wonders if he has spoken at all.

She lifts her chin, and she's determined not to cry anymore. She's done crying. Enough. Enough. "I hate this, Elliot! I hate it. There is a reason people transfer out after a few years. We just didn't. We didn't. We thought we were tougher than everyone else. We thought that we could handle it because we could do it together, but we can't." She's failing at containing herself. "Your marriage was killed over what this job has done to us. And I...something in me was..."

The pain in her gut is so sharp that she backs up unexpectedly until she hits the wall. She's seen children cry like this, wholly, fully, without restraint. She's seen them do it when realization hits, when everything they had believed is stripped away, when they are thrust into a reality they don't want to live in.

"You can't love me because of this." She's searching for him in the room. Her eyes lock on the blue that is him. "I don't...want you to. I want...I want to have something else in me that's worth something, Elliot. I don't want you to love me just because I've stopped throwing up over the cases. Or because I'm as shut down as you are...that can't...that can't be why..."

He out of the bed then, and he's moving so damned fast that it startles her. He's swift, animalistic in his stealth. He's on her before she can move. He's so close to her that the heat of his body radiates, and then one hand is on the exposed skin at her waist, one is cupping her neck. She is against him before she fully realizes he is holding her up. "You think that's why I love you?" he growls in his frustration.

It occurs to her now, in this moment, that after all the months of believing wholeheartedly that he didn't love her, she can't discern the reasons why he might. All she can see is what his wife had, that there was a shared space in the darkness that only the two of them understood. And rather than be alone, he will be with her.

"Yeah, Liv," he murmurs against her hair. "Yeah, you get me. Yeah, you've been there with me. But Jesus, if sheer comprehension was all of it, I'd be in love with a shrink."

She hears him, and he does what he always does. He surprises her. His words are so even, so steady, that she is listening to him again. He has always had a way of cutting through the white noise and reaching inside of her. Years have existed in which the only voice she really heard was his.

He is pressing her everywhere. His lips are pressing into her hair, his hard body is pressing against her. "I don't love you because we're haunted by the same things. I love you because you're the strongest damned person I know. You make me feel stronger. Even in the midst of it, you're enough to make me have hope, Olivia, even when God knows, there shouldn't be any..."

That's all she's wanted. Just to not be his darkness. That's been all of it. The running, the leaving, the nights she let him lie with her. She's wanted to not be someone's darkness. She's wanted to live somewhere outside of the shadows in his head. She's wanted to be something good for someone for so long. For him. She's wanted to be good for him.

Because he's always been what was good for her.

"Elliot," she finally says, her voice strengthening as his lips slide down her temple. "Even when I want to run, don't let me go."

He is silent, yet his arms tighten around her. Holding her. Containing her when she can't do it herself.

"I mean it, Elliot. You have to know that's what I do. And..and I do it even when I don't want to. So please, don't let me...just..."

"Just try to get past me, Benson. I'm faster with my cuffs than you are," he says softly, his voice laced with so much conviction that he erases all the years in which he seemed uncertain. With his newfound surety, he's taking her back. He's taking her to the beginning. Theirs.

She closes her eyes, and lets her face fall to his naked shoulder. She clutches him because he will clutch her. The way he holds her is more than the here, the now. The way he holds her, the way he holds her.

She has been stilled, finally, but not by purpose, not by vengeance and not by penance. She's only being held in place this time by her love for him.

His contented laughter is quiet. It echoes and rattles in his chest. It is bittersweet because it is intermittent, not full. Not yet. It is laughter permeated with fear, with a thread of belief, with a thread of hope. It's the laughter made by confined men who are suddenly given their freedom, the laughter made when the effects of time decide to stop fighting a life and the life begins to win.

It is his laugher, and the sound of it, she thinks, is what home sounds like.

There's a quiet solitude that slips between them long after midnight has passed, and the shadows no longer undulate against the night.

She's against him, nearly on top of him and in the rare moments that he lets it all settle he closes his eyes and listens to the whisper of breaths that tickle his skin while she rests. It's like the sound of his son when he's fallen asleep on top of him, when there's nothing to cry about and the world has found the contentment it never actually holds.

His fingers slide through her hair and there are things he wants to ask her, things that hold no meaning, that hold no logic. The name of the shampoo she uses, the number of times she's cut it since she was gone, the number of times she tried to call him after he had let her go. He wants to know what she uses to make her skin so soft, what it was that was in her eyes on the evening Victor Gitano had changed their lives, all the reasons she made him promise not to let her run when he wasn't fully sure why she wanted to stay.

But instead, he slides his leg between hers, their bodies tangled in a web that had once seemed complicated. She shifts into his embrace, but she remains asleep and as he stares up at the ceiling, the red light no longer needed for survival when he has her, he allows himself to breathe. There are deities that have slipped from his mouth in her presence, but she's better than that, she's so much better. Because she isn't God, she isn't Jesus.

She's more than that because no one else prays to her like he does, because she is his, because all vigils, desperate pleas and begging had led him to the only God that listened to him without ultimate sacrifice. She chose what she wanted to hear; she didn't listen when there were things she refused to believe in, but she was the only one who could give him what he needed, the only one who knew him, who loved him with faults and mistakes and an array of regrets he could never change.

He thinks that there are moments that live in infamy for them, bibles verses that would be considered a sin if no one knew the real stories behind them. Of the lies, the betrayals, the moments where truth fought to survive and fables spun their web. But no where were the motives behind the lies that were told, lies told with the intention to save lives. There were no reasons hidden in the scribbles of consonants, vowels, sentences on the betrayal that had taken place, just the memories and aftermath of things that could never be forgotten.

There were reasons people bowed to love when God was no longer powerful enough, when even prayers couldn't manage the uncontrollable.

Her hand slides up his chest, and in her sedated sleep, she settles it upon his heart. The wind outside picks up, rattles against the windows as the rain dies, starts and dies again.

His movements are gentle as he gathers her hair in his hand, brushes it to the side. He's almost forgotten the scar just below her hairline, the one that had been hidden by the length, the bangs. He's forgotten history, and so as not to forget it again, he finds the second scar marring her skin, the one left behind from a knife and faith lost. He rubs his finger over it, watches as it disappears under the pad of his thumb as if the past could easily be erased.

"I love you," he whispers, and there's no need for the deities this time.

It's simple, effortless, and he thinks this is how it always should have been.

Her body moves, as if his proclamation is a trigger to bring her closer, and she settles herself between his right leg. He wants her, God he wants her. He wants her hair bunched in his hands as he moves inside of her, to see her writhe and escape at the feel of his touch.

He wants, he wants so goddamned much.

He drops a whisper of a kiss across her forehead, and he aches for the mandarin, he does, he does. He aches, and he thinks this is what waiting for something worthwhile is, a constant twinge that doesn't abate, that doesn't let up because it's all too much, it's all too right.

"When we were in the hospital," her voice comes out in a whisper, and he startles. He hadn't known she was awake, but she is and she's here, against him, on him. "After Eli was born and you..." She pauses, and he can hear her tears, the slight hitch in her breath. "You held me and whispered that I was okay."

There's so much from that night that he remembers, so much he has tried to forget.

"That afternoon when Saul Picard threw you into that window, I...I couldn't believe we were going through this again. I couldn't, I didn't know how to lose you to this job after Gitano." She looks up at him, and in the darkness, in the familiar closeness, he wipes the tears that glisten in the night. "I held you. I held you against me and I just...I kept repeating that you would be okay, but I...I wasn't..."

"You were making yourself believe it for yourself," he finishes because he knows, he knows. "After Eli was born, I did the same thing."

She raises herself up, her smooth skin washing across his sculpted body. There's something in her eyes, in the shadows that weave between her dark pupils. There were so many emotions inside of her that he never allowed himself to read, to indulge in, to figure out the meaning when it would cost them too much.

But he sees it now; the fears, the courage, the will, need to stay.

He knows all the things he's supposed to say now, all the things that should stop her tears, cause her to find her solid ground when he's taken it away so many times before.

"I lied to you because I had to," he starts and he watches as she begins to shake her head. He takes her chin in his hand, causes her to stop, to look while fully seeing all of him. "And if I had to do it again, I would do the same thing, I would tell you the same lies because I was doing what I had to do to take care of you."

If her position would allow, she'd hit him for his attempt of protection, for his need to be the savior, the father, the husband.

"But you need to know, Olivia, that I haven't lied about anything else, that I won't lie about anything else. I ruined my marriage because of that. I won't make the same mistakes twice. And I know there's a part of you that is still pissed off about it all, I know there's a part of you that worries you can't trust me. But I'm telling you now, that was it. There's nothing else."

He can see the smile that tips the corner of her lips, the flit of her eyes as she looks down at the bedspread. "I almost forgot how well you know me."

The laugh escapes him, gruff, full of energy, full of defeat. She drives her hands over the planes of his chest, and his breath changes with hers, slow, full of air that might soon evaporate. There's so much darkness in here, but he can see her, see the way her chest rises, falls, like inhaling is the hardest thing she's ever done, the easiest thing she's ever done. She's a mix of contradictions that define her, that cause him to fall in love as if it were for the first time.

He thinks he should answer her, but there's nothing to say that she doesn't already know. She knows his deepest secrets; she knows that she is loved.

Her nails tickle his skin as she absentmindedly runs her hand along his body, down his chest, across his stomach. She lowers the waistband of his boxers slightly, slides her fingers across his hip bone.

"Olivia," he mumbles, and it comes out with so much restraint, so much need.

"I love you," and when she says it, he rolls her off of him, presses her against the mattress because that was all that needed to be said after all of this time.

Her legs spread apart, the perfect amount of space for him to fit inside of her. The ache spreads across his body as he lies on his side, his elbow beside her head. He just wants to touch her, to feel the body that had held a gun that threatened, that saved his life. He wants to know how his mouth would feel across every slope of her skin, how his lips would fit around her beaded nipple, how she'd taste right before she's about to come.

She's watching him, and he brushes his fingers through her hair, allows her scars to breathe life into a world that has changed. There's an innocence to her, a trust that she seems to be giving him freely when there's nothing left to lose, when it had once all been taken.

He's waited to touch her; he's been content to do nothing but hold her.

The wind finds solace in the night, and it reminds him of that night in Central Park before she had left, it reminds him of all that he's come so close to losing.

He needs her now. He needs her, needs her, needs.

He kneels between her legs, can hear her breath hitch as he slides his hands underneath her tank top. His palms brush across the taunt skin of her stomach, and she lets out a soft moan, closing her eyes. He can feel her body shudder beneath his hands, shake despite the heat of their touching skin. He rubs his thumb over the skin outlining her naval, slides his hands up as her tank top gathers just below her breasts.

She's breathing hard, and her eyes open. Her pupils are dilated, begging for more. His fingers skim across her breastbone, and he tries to familiarize himself with it all, with the way her heart feels against his palm, the way her breaths become even when he doesn't move. There's a small birthmark on the side of her breast, and it's amazing to him that there's parts of her he doesn't know, that he still has new ground to cover after all of this time.

He slips a finger underneath the cotton, and he's surprised at the way his breath catches, at the way her breast fits perfectly in his hand. He brushes a finger across her nipple and it hardens between his fingers, and need is no longer the appropriate word for him.

There's too much between them, too many clothes, too much skin. He slowly glides her tank top up, and she raises her arms so he can slide it off, so he can touch her, God so he can touch her.

And when it's discarded onto the floor, he stares at her, mesmerized. She's breathing hard, so hard, but he can't be inside of her, not yet. Not when there's skin still unmarked by his touch. He's throbbing for her, to be inside of her, but there are things he has to do first, there are places his hands need to know.

"El..."

But she bites off his name with a gasp as he rubs his finger along her collarbone, as his finger trails down her neck, rubs against the second birthmark, a mirror image of her first. There are curves he had never known existed, a scar beside her belly button in a perfect crescent moon.

"How did you get this one?" he murmurs.

She doesn't have to look to know, but she smiles, her hair pooled around her. "I was seventeen and I had gotten my first hair straightner." She laughs, and it's so low, so sensual that his dick tightens. "I was sitting in my room, naked, and I don't know how it happened but it hit my stomach and burned me." She lifts her arm, and he doesn't know how he missed it, but the faintest hint of a scar graces her elbow. "I'm usually in a rush and I grab it. Got this one too." There's a tone of laughter in her words, a tone of freedom. "There's one on the lobe of my ear too."

If possible, he thinks he loves her more.

"And I've let you protect me with your gun all these years?" he murmurs, kissing the scar on her stomach.

He continues his journey, finding new ground, new things he had never known. His hands find new ways to touch her, to stroke her.

She's shivering and he braces his hands on her hips, holds her steady when the rest of the world refuses to stand still.

"I need you," she begs, and he's never truly been able to deny her.

He hooks two fingers in the waistband of her bikini briefs, and he thinks this moment might kill him. He thinks that he's never wanted something, someone more than he does right now, and as he slowly pulls them off, she lifts her hips off of the bed. She lies before him naked, waiting, and he can't remember a single moment before this, before she was his.

He knees her legs apart, settling in the crux of her. His boxers are tight against his erection, and he buries his face in the skin of her neck. She lifts her hips again, and he grabs them, the force of his erection tight against her clit. The friction of the cotton, the sound of her pleading moans, of the movement of her hips nearly pushes him over the edge.

"Christ," he grunts, and he needs to be inside of her, now, now, now.

She's never before ached with this much want, this much need.

There's not enough air in this room, in the world at the moment, and as she slides his boxers down his thighs, his legs, she knows there's not enough in her lungs to keep her alive.

In all of the times that she thought about this, about her hands on him, about the feel of his erection against her, she had never known it would be this freeing, this consuming. She had never known that someone who walked beside her for nine years, who had seen her sick, who had watched her fall asleep at her desk like a one year old, could make her feel like this, could make her lose the control that she always held so sacred.

His long, hard body rises above her and in the forceful brutality of the winds outside, she shakes, convulses in the fear that this is it. That tonight has been just another dream, another desire conjured in her mind. More real, less painful, but nonetheless her imagination.

But as he bends his head, his lips brushing her cheek, she thinks that maybe, maybe, she had gotten off that plane tonight. She thinks that maybe he drove her to this place, that he was no longer married, that this between them, the love was right.

"Liv..." He breathes her name into her neck, and it's a prayer that only he can utter in the right tone, the right way.

She hurts for him, and with shaking fingers that betray the need for control, she grabs his chin in her hand. His lips are parted and she kisses him gently because she needs a minute, she needs time before she loses the last ounce of restraint that she has. Her mouth moves over his, and even this, this is too much.

"Olivia."

He keeps saying her name and God, it's everything.

He brushes her hair to the side, lowers himself so he's hovering, waiting. Her skin is crawling with desire and desperation, and she shakes her head because she doesn't know, she doesn't know what she's supposed to know anymore.

"Elliot," and that's all he needs, that one little affirmation, because he's lowering himself, lowering, lowering.

And she thinks this is it, the moment her heart will stop beating, and she closes her eyes because it's all between them, it's all there.

"Open your eyes, Olivia," he whispers, and when she does, she sees nothing but him.

She sees him over the years, the late night dinners at the local diner, how he'd lean back in his chair and for one minute relax under the florescent lights. She sees him in the passenger side of the car while she drove, the exhaustion evident in the lines of his face, in the words that seemed too tight against his lips. She sees the anger, the hurt, the lack of control that existed in the aftermath of Gitano, in the aftermath of her leaving that first time as if she ever could have escaped him. She sees him on those nights beside her after his son had been born, when his body was rigid beside her, when his hands would reach across the bed but never touch her, never hold her.

She sees him now, and as his body lowers, when he pushes past her, inside of her, she lets out a sob, because it wasn't only her weakest moment, it wasn't only her strongest moment, it was both. It is both as he nestles inside of her, and remains still, and God, he feels so good, he feels so right and she knows now this is what she had been waiting for, this is what she had been praying for on all those nights the church guided her through.

The salt of her tears runs down her lips, and before she can wipe it away, his tongue does it for her, salvages her just like he was always there to do.

There's so much inside of her right now, and she captures his mouth, because she needs to breathe, she needs him, his air to breathe.

"I love you," and in the moment it's said, she's not sure who has spoken the words, if they've spoken them together, if they've spoken them at all.

The sound he makes is strangled, and his hand fists in the pillow next to her head. The sheets beneath them rustle and she arches into the softness beneath her, arches up towards the hard, solid planes of him. She's rising off the bed for him, to grasp at him, to hold him. Her hips tip upwards, an offering, and he sinks impossibly farther into her body.

Her fingertips bite into the smooth, flexing skin of his back. He's pushing deeper and she thinks that's right. Of course there is more of him; more than she thinks will fit inside of her, more than she thinks she can take. Of course he's stretching her, filling her, taking parts of her that haven't ever been reached before.

He finally rests the weight of his hips against hers and she cries out, her eyes drifting shut. "Elliot."

Against her forehead, his lips move. "Am I hurting you?" he rumbles softly.

She thinks of the nights in Chicago, of the nights she lay in her bed freezing cold, her skin aching. She thinks of the way she always felt bruised, as if her blood was sharp inside of her. Now, he's inside of her. His body, it's found a place in hers. She wraps one of her bare legs around his waist and finds the crook of his neck with her cheek.

"No." Not anymore. "You're in me," she whispers reverently into his shaking shoulder, her body constricting desperately around him. "Jesus, Elliot, you're-" but the knowledge is too much. The stark reality, the sensation, the history, it's more than she can withstand. He's filling her, and she realizes it wasn't her skin that had been cold all along.

She reaches the shattering point. He drives farther, opening her more to him, sliding into her belly until he's everything she feels. The only thing. She's so full she can't breathe; she's so full that her throat is closing and her chest is collapsing.

"Liv," he says, full of scratchy, wondrous, possessive air. "Christ, I'm inside of you."

And then, as if he needs to prove it to her, he digs deeper into her, and she clutches at him, grabs for him, wraps around him and forgives herself for finally breaking.

He is holding.

He's holding her, he's holding his breath, he's holding perfectly still. But he isn't holding on. He is increasingly sure that he doesn't have the willpower to do that, to just hold on.

She's everywhere around him. Her leg is wrapped around his hip, and one of her arms has snaked around his neck, clasping him to her. The fingers of her other hand are digging into his lower back, and his body is embedded deep into the hot, tight, slick wet heat of her. Around him, her body is convulsing, the hard tips of her nipples stabbing into his chest as she shakes, her body coming off the bed. Arching upwards. Towards him.

Into him.

He braces himself on one arm and uses the other to keep her leg drawn up around him. He can't open his eyes, even though he can hear her crying. He's scared of the crying, he's scared of her tears. He hears his name in the midst of her choking, hears the fear in her voice as she calls out to him. She had come, is still coming. Just by the slide of him into her she has shattered.

Is still shattering.

Her orgasm is ragged, fierce, incredible. It is uneven, as if she is exorcising the past. Maybe she is colliding with the future. She reaches for him desperately as the waves lick through her, and he can only hold her. He might be crooning to her because he hears his voice, telling her again and again that she is okay, she is. Or maybe he means he is. He's okay. It doesn't matter. It's intertwined - her well-being and his.

He has to hold on. That's all. He just has to hold on until she stills. Until he can make this what she deserves. But her body is clawing at him, closing in around him and he's never needed anything like he needs to release deep, deep into her. She keeps saying his name, and he prays that she is okay. The way she's crying out for him, it doesn't sound good. As much as he wants to, he can't help her. He can't even breathe because the shift will cause him to explode inside of her. He can't open his eyes, because seeing her hair sprawled out on his pillow, seeing her swollen lips parting for air as she cries, it'll all be too much. It's been too many years for him to be able to open his eyes just yet. It's been too many years of needing, of just needing.

Her body is finally slowing down. His cheek is pressed against the side of her face and his forehead is pushed into the pillow next to her. His face is wet because of her. Always because of her.

He hears her breath hitch, as if she is nearly hiccupping. Her fingers loosen just a little bit on his back but she doesn't unhook her leg from around him. Instead she hikes it higher, her heel digging into his ass.

Even though she has stopped making that heart-wrenching sound, he can still hear the shaky, uneven way she is breathing. He's terrified he's hurt her. He's terrified, even while buried between her legs, even while holding her damp, naked body against his. He's terrified that she regrets this; that she will always blame him for lying, that even now, after this, she's going to leave him.

He has to know if she is okay. His body is rigid, his control tenuous at best, but he can't even redistribute his weight without knowing first. "Please tell me you're okay," he whispers hoarsely.

She takes one breath beneath him. Two. Her stomach pushes into his abdomen as she breathes. He can't believe there is nothing between their skin; nothing between them. Not air, not space, not time, not even the demons. For tonight, there is nothing in this darkness but them.

He's thought all along that he knew what it would be to fit inside of her. To be able to sink into her and just lie still. But he hadn't known. This moment is the first one that singlehandedly redefines how much he thought he knew. He doesn't know what this is. It's not fucking, and it's not sex. He thinks that it's not even making love, because he doesn't even want to move. He's not making anything. He's just staying in her, staying still. Even release isn't paramount. He just wants to get used to this, to absorb the magnitude of what he's done, what they have. It's been ten years of her body near his. It took him ten years to learn that this - this had been right there at his side all along.

"Olivia," he says again.

She hasn't spoken.

He has to get his eyes open. He's going to have to move. He just wants to lie like this all night, paralyzed by it, by her. But she's starting to shift just a little bit beneath him again.

He lifts his head, prying his eyes open.

He's hit with the abyss. The free fall of dark that is staring up at him, inches from him. Her lashes are wet, and she looks like she's terrified. She's silent, just blinking at him, and her lips are parted, as if in a soft, startled surprise.

She blinks again, staring at him and moisture slides down the side of her cheek and into her hair. That's what prompts him to move. The need to brush the trail away.

"You okay?" he asks again, his voice so gruff his words don't seem to make sense.

Her eyes are wide and beneath him, under him, around him, she is trembling. But he sees it now. He's wrong; the look on her face isn't terror. There is fear there, but there is more. There is wonder, and...trust.

Christ, she's looking at him with trust.

He doesn't know what to do with it. She's opened her body to him, her heart, her head, all of it. She's in his bed, and she's never been this vulnerable and even with all his reasons, he knows he's just spent more than a year filling them up with his lies. But she's let herself come for him, she's called his name, she's...

She's looking at him as if she trusts.

The darkness in her eyes recedes. "You're still in me," she murmurs. Her eyebrows furrow and then smooth. She is rasping, as if her throat is sore. The longer she looks right into him, the harder her chest pushes against his with each intake of air.

He's seen this look on her face before. He's seen this look but it's been years and years. She looked at him like this in the beginning. Not in the first year, but in the second, in the third. It startles him, because after everything she's still her, he's still him. She's still the only partner he is desperate to die for; she's still the only one that makes him believe that what they do can rectify the wrongs. She's still looking at him, and he's humbled by it. By just how many years she's been giving him her faith, and just how many times she has ultimately forgiven him for being careless with it.

"You used to look at me like this," he says quietly.

Her body constricts around him and he groans. He's not going to last, not if she does that even one more time.

She lifts her back off of the bed and slips her fingers along his temple. Her gaze doesn't waver from his. A small sound slips past her throat and he nearly flinches from the need that permeates the air around them. "I want you to come inside of me," she encourages quietly.

Her words knock his breath away. Maybe he should worry about protecting her. Maybe he should. He can't. He doesn't want her protected from him. Not anymore.

He doesn't realize he's closed his eyes again until he feels her lips slide over his eyelids. Her mouth is gentle, sweet against him. He shifts his hips and he's hit again by the unimaginably tight grip of her body on his. He thrusts a little bit into her and she cries out again, only this time the sound comes from her throat. It doesn't echo like it did the last time. It doesn't sound broken.

She sounds stronger - stronger than he is.

She is. She always has been and even after what he's done to her, she still is. She's still formidable, even sprawled out beneath him, even completely naked in his bed. She's a force of a nature, and he's never known this kind of need. He's loved his wife, he's loved his kids, but he's never been at their mercy.

He is at hers.

He opens his eyes and her focus doesn't waver. Her eyes are a little swollen from the way she cried when she came, and he's never seen anything more beautiful. He's got her in his bed, and she isn't on a plane tonight. She isn't escaping; he isn't pretending that he knows what is right for her.

It's been years, he thinks. It's been years that he's loved her. And the way she is looking at him now, he's seen that look on her for years too.

He's so hard inside of her that he's afraid he's going to break if he doesn't move soon. He grinds his hips into her and her fingers push into his back again. It's like the first time he held her, really held her. That day, beneath the fluorescent lights of a hospital corridor, he'd felt this. She'd grasped and he'd grasped, holding on to something that always seemed like it was poised to slip away. They'd held on because they were desperate, because they hadn't been permitted to need anything for far too long. They'd been the only two things left standing far too many times and that day, he'd clutched her as if pleading just once for a reprieve.

He'd clutched her as if he could get in her, and she could get in him.

He's in her now, and she's all heat and safety. He thrusts deeply into her and she sounds strangled, frantic, as she envelops him.

"Welcome home, Liv," he whispers into her hair. She doesn't protest. By saying nothing, she says everything. He widens her legs a little more as he takes her, takes what she is offering. It doesn't take movement to make him come. Instead he opens his eyes, sees her.

He sees her. Olivia. After all the years. She's home, and he's home.

He finally comes deep inside of her, in a place where he has been, where he has lived.

He comes into a place where he has belonged all along.

A/N:

We think of this story as the start. Maybe of Olivia and Elliot. Maybe of a beautiful friendship. Maybe of the very things that we want in life. Sometimes you have to get ripped down to get put back up, and the second time around you are stronger, braver, more willing to fight.

This story lived in our hearts, but it was your response to this story that made it special. Thank you for braving the angst, for trusting us and for letting us take you on this ride. We hope that this is the resolution that you wanted, the life that you see and the closure they deserve. We often wish they were ours, and for this story, they were.

It's one of the few stories we have ever written that we truly look back on with pride. We hope you enjoy.

Happy Birthday, Pooks.

Epilogue

When he walks in the apartment, the lights are off in the family room and kitchen. There is a faint glow coming from his bedroom and an even lesser glow coming from Eli's. His neck is so tense from the day that he has been fighting a headache since noon, and the wind tonight is the first sign that it is about to snow again. The moon is bright in the sky though, and it filters into the midnight blue haze of the apartment.

The apartment is warm and there is a pizza box sitting on the counter. Toys are strewn about the floor, and Eli's booster seat is covered in bits of crackers. He grins, feeling the knots in his neck slowly unfurl as he shrugs out of his sport coat and unhooks his belt, sliding his Glock from his belt. He doesn't redo his buckle and he doesn't move quickly, because he's finally learned there is no rush. His badge now sits on the counter next to his gun, and he grabs both and places them within the locked kitchen cabinet. In seconds, he opens the refrigerator, letting his eyes adjust to the bright light that emanates from within. He finds what he is looking for, a longneck bottle of cold beer, and he sets it on the counter. He opens it and rolls up his sleeves before taking a long sip of it, letting the hushed noises work their magic.

He gets dizzy sometimes in moments like this. The beer helps. It makes him settle, it calms him. It makes him forget that everything can be taken in an instant. Years on the job have made him wary of indulgence, but these days, he's trying. He's trying not to assume the worst, trying not to sit in wait for the fall. He's trying to believe that he's done something to deserve this, when everyone else seems to struggle so much harder.

Her voice drifts through the open doorway. It's just a hum from here, a low, melodic rise and fall that beckons him. He makes his way to Eli's doorway, beer in hand.

He's spent a lot of years on this job praying for miracles. He'd just never expected to be granted any.

But Olivia is lying on Eli's bed with his little boy. Eli should be falling asleep on his own by now, but no one is in a hurry to force him to grow up too soon. Elliot leans against the doorframe and watches her, watches his son.

Eli is curled up in the crook of her arm, half asleep and listening to her as she tells him a story. She must know he's in the apartment, but she doesn't look over her shoulder at him. She doesn't even stop the story. He guesses she doesn't know he is watching her.

From here, he can only see the delicate line of her back, clad in a fitted white tank top. Her head is bent over Eli, and her hair has grown to where it shifts and falls seductively over her shoulder. Eli's small hand rests on her bare arm and his little fingers scrape at her skin gently, as if rubbing her.

"And then when the tiger came roaring up-" her voice gets deeper in its whisper, conveying the seriousness of a tiger encroaching. "Your daddy told everyone to be very, very quiet and to stay hidden, because he was going to be very brave and go out of the cave to talk to the hungry tiger."

He takes a long sip of his beer and shifts, leaning against the doorframe. He undoes his tie with one hand and lets it dangle, content to just stand here and let her voice do what half a dozen Motrin hasn't been able to do for him all day.

Eli notices the movement, and his head lifts slightly from against her.

"Daddy," he says sleepily, his eyes heavy and his lips breaking into a gentle smile. He acts as if his father's appearance is not a rare occurrence at all. And it isn't. Not these days. He's surprisingly involved with this child. "You talkin' to da tiger?" He furrows his little eyebrows in concern as he considers something. "You scared of da tiger?"

Elliot grins and shakes his head, taking another sip of his beer. "Nah, buddy. If he comes to get me, Olivia will save me."

She shifts in the bed, so that her back is flat against the mattress and she can better see the doorway. Her eyes are soft, her smile knowing. She's saved him. He's saved her. And none of the saving involved guns or suspects or nights spent running the streets.

This saves him. Nights like this, they save him a little more at a time.

"Hey," she murmurs quietly, her expression not far from matching Eli's.

He doesn't have anything to say. Not in moments like this. Not in moments when his whole world narrows so fiercely that he can't breathe. For too many years he has believed that love was a depleting thing when it came to anyone other than his children.

She has shown him otherwise.

"Hey," he replies and he doesn't move. He can't. He wants to watch her, watch them. The snow has just started in the window beyond, and a song is playing on repeat on Eli's plastic CD player. Eli isn't a child that craves animated children's songs. He likes the soulful songs - drawn out melodies that require the slow strum of a guitar or a single voice riding the chords of a piano. She has such a song playing now, and he doesn't think he is ever going to let the sun come up.

"Long day?" she asks easily, her hand coming up to stroke Eli's hair as she visibly struggles to keep her eyes open.

He nods, his throat constricts. Yes, it had been a long day. The days they don't work together seem longer than those they are able to move in proximity to each other. She is still with the FBI, but she started a task force eight months ago, after months of pleading and paperwork. It's a joint task force for juvenile sex crimes and she has managed to somehow unite the NYPD and Feds because she has an unbreakable will like no other. Her swagger is stronger these days, her strides longer. But when they work together when their cases overlap, she still moves with him. She slows down and he speeds up and every now and then it is like it has always been.

Some nights she is home before him. Some nights he knows she hurries through her paperwork so that she can pick up Eli. So that she can have time alone with the little boy she is forever linked to not by him, but by fate and God and circumstance. And a growing, breathtaking love.

But today she has been home all day. Eli is sick, and Kathy had been scheduled at work. Olivia takes the days off. She is running up against her vacation days faster than she can accumulate them.

"You find Rochelle?" she whispers, and her voice roughens over the name of a little girl she knows he has been looking for.

He shakes his head, and this will be all they will discuss of it in front of Eli. But her eyes darken, fill just a little before she blinks. He has needed that, to see her, to tell her that no, he hasn't been able to save anyone else today. He has needed the look in her eyes that tells him she knows not just the horror of it, but the way injustice will weigh on him tonight just a little bit more than it did yesterday.

"Want to lay down with us?" she asks, never taking her eyes off of him.

"Daddy you seep wit me?" Eli says grinning, using his clutch on Olivia's arm to pull upwards just a little bit. His eyes have a slight sheen to them, his fever finally breaking.

"You're feeling better, huh buddy?" he says, stepping towards them. His hand skims Eli's silky hair, tracing his tiny, perfect ear. And then he looks down at her, at where she lays nearly level with his thighs. The blanket is twisted around her waist, her lips parted as she meets his gaze.

He loves her.

He is humbled by it. He aches to lie against her, to hold her, to hold his son. Rochelle is still missing tonight, and he's trying to remember he can only do what he can. He's trying to remember he can't save everyone, but he can save himself.

He sets his beer bottle down and pulls out his dress shirt from his slacks. He unbuttons it and shrugs out of it, pulling his belt out of his pants and letting it fall. His shoes and socks kicked off, he climbs into the space she has just shifted to make.

It's a full-sized bed, and they have to lie facing each other to fit. Eli burrows in between them and Elliot leans across his youngest child and presses his lips against Olivia's head. "Missed you," he mumbles, his lips against her warm skin. She feels a little warm.

"G'dbessyou, Daddy," Eli says, snuggling into Olivia.

He laughs softly, and the day fades. "I didn't sneeze, bud. I was telling Olivia how I missed you two."

It's over Eli's head, but Olivia's eyes become heavy as she looks at him and smiles sleepily again. She looks worn out, and he knows that time with Eli usually leaves her energized instead.

"You getting sick, too?"

Her eyes lift to his, melted and exhausted. She nods. "I think so. You shouldn't get too close to me," she says, her head pushing into her pillow.

"Like hell," he laughs softly. In that moment, he knows what is coming next. He's going to owe Olivia another dollar because he's promised he'd watch his language.

"Yike hell, Ibya," comes the tiny, sleep thickened voice between them.

He can tell by the way the moonlight dances in her endless eyes that she is planning to collect.

She never looks back nowadays.

There are moments she misses Chicago: the pews in the church where she had spent so much time, the calmness of Lincoln Park when the slightest breeze rustled against the night, the lunches with Mike Kelly even when she feigned annoyance, but she doesn't think of it much anymore. She doesn't like to recall the lies that had once been told, the pain that gnawed through her veins until she was nothing but a pale portrait of who she once was.

She still thinks of that accident sometimes though, the accident that had changed all their lives. There are flashes of the wreckage, explosions of one car hitting another, of the grunts and exhaustion as Kathy gave birth. It's like a movie sometimes, a scene looping in her memory. She can recite lines, movements and all she ever wants is to forget. To watch another movie, this one about love, about family, about a job that saves her but doesn't define her.

But it's always there, even when she doesn't think of it. She can see it in Kathy's eyes when Eli changes hands, that deep glimmer of regret that exists without fault. There's guilt there, she thinks. From her, from Kathy, from both of them, maybe. She wonders what was spoken about on those nights when she was gone, when Elliot still went home to Kathy. He doesn't discuss it with her, and she never asks. But she still dreams of it on occasion, the impact of the car, the tightness of Kathy's grasp when it very well could have been the end. She guesses it was, though.

For all of them, it was the end of life as they knew it.

He loves her, and she thinks that's all that matters these days. That and his son, the child who has become her own in all the ways that matter. She takes her days now, the desperate ache of needing, wanting to spend time with the baby she had held against her beating heart years ago. She watches Eli sleep a lot, his soft breathing fluttering across her skin, his tiny fingers brushing her arm, and she thinks that all those years of work never mattered in the way this child does.

Their bedroom is dark tonight, only the light of the moon shining through as Eli's muttered words slip through the baby monitor beside her. She likes the darkness now. She likes watching the shadows, the red light and knowing that sometimes change is good. She doesn't use her mandarin shampoo anymore, not since he told her it reminded him of before. She uses something floral, something different because she's different. She doesn't think about running anymore. Not when she thinks about Elliot, about this family he has given her.

"You're on my side of the bed," Elliot says, leaning against the bathroom door, as he watches her. He looks confident, happy, and a smile flutters across his lips.

"The dog is on my side," she mutters, her eyes closing. "When did we gain custody of him?"

"When my daughter decided to move in with her boyfriend and couldn't take the dog with her." She listens as he walks to the bed, his footsteps exactly how she once remembered them. There are times she still walks beside him when it comes to work, when he'll smile down on her in the middle of a conversation, always marked at the same pace. He tosses his shirt into the laundry basket in the corner of the room, pulling back the covers. "Kep, move."

The Yorkshire terrier grunts and scurries across the bed, and she flexes her feet underneath the covers. The dog settles on her toes, and she remembers how he had run to her that first time, like he was welcoming her home.

Elliot slides into bed beside her, and she recalls those nights he had rested next to her, unable to touch her. He does all the time now, touches her. She can feel his nails skimming across her skin when she's half awake in the morning, his lips on her neck before she goes to sleep. He's gentle, and loving, and so unlike the man she imagined he could be with her, so unlike the man she believed she deserved. His hand slides against the small of her back, and she inhales. There are still nights she finds herself wanting to cry, the memories of that year she had spent alone, thinking he was gone. It's like a dream to her now, a haze that clouds her mind in the strongest part of sleep. But he's there when she wakes up, he's there, he's there.

He's here.

"You're hot," he mumbles, placing a kiss on the back of her neck.

She loves him; God, she loves him. "No sex tonight, El."

Laughter spills onto her neck, and she settles into his arms. She thinks of all those nights she yearned for his comfort, and being close to him is never close enough. "I meant you have a fever." His fingers gently brush her hair away from her neck. "Your hair is getting long again."

She nods, and if she didn't love his son so much, she'd complain about the headache that is slowly spreading throughout the rest of her body, the slow ache that is breaking her down. "I need to cut it."

"Don't. I like it like this. Besides, what is Eli going to pull?"

"Well, we all know he can't pull your hair," she teases.

"Sick and still hilarious," he says sarcastically. She shivers beneath the blankets, beneath the cool touch of his palm. "You're not going to work tomorrow."

"I'm running out of sick days, I have to go in. I've worked through worse. At least this way, I can take the days when Kathy and you can't take Eli."

"I have four other grown kids, baby. They can watch their brother."

She turns over in his arms, and there are things she finds herself wanting to say, never having the words to do so. I love you has become too simplistic, maybe it always had been. He had said it to her often in those first few weeks, molding them, making them his own as it slid off his tongue and into her mouth, her hair, her ear. They had sounded like prayers, and in those moments she misses God. He still says it all the time, he does.

"I know they can watch Eli, but I love taking him." She sighs, wrapping her leg around his. "Stop arguing with me. Unless I'm dying by morning, I'm going into work."

There's a light in his eyes, a flicker of red from the shadows above. "When are you going to marry me, Olivia?"

She thinks she had dreamed of this when she was in Chicago, not so much the words, but the image, the tone. She had dreamed of those nights before she had left-their conversation in Central Park, the Knock Knock jokes that had stayed with her long after she was gone. There had been so much desperation then, so much pain that she never wants to relive.

"We're already married," and her eyes close, because he's with her, because he's there.

He kisses her nose, his lips lingering. "How worried do I need to be about you right now?"

She's not the same person she was before she fell in love with him, before she left. She's not the same woman who ran to Oregon, to Chicago because loving him was far too hurtful, far too much. She opens one eye, and the blue of his irises causes her to fall in love all over again. "There's no ring on my finger. It doesn't mean we're not married."

He doesn't understand; she knows that by the look in his eyes. For a man who was married, who believes that is God's answer to love, he has never looked at it from another angle.

"I don't need the white dress, El. I just..." She coughs, and he rubs his hand over her forehead, sweeps the bangs from her eyes. "For the last few years, I've convinced myself that I needed to get married. I fell in love with you, and I...I'm not saying we'll never get married, but right now, I love what we have."

"I'm not going to let you run, Olivia." There's hurt in his voice, in the web of his vocal cords that he tries to erase by clearing his throat.

It's her turn to laugh. For a year, she had forgotten what that sounded like, what it felt like as it bubbled along her throat, tumbled out of her lips and into the air. "Does it look like I'm running anywhere?"

"Then why won't you marry me?"

She lifts her head, just barely. She never in her life believed she could love someone, love him as much as she does. "You think that marriage is confirmed in front of a God, and I understand that's what you believe in and I respect that. But it's about so much more than that, Elliot. There is a dog at the end of our bed that is sleeping on my feet like he does every night. There is a bed in your son's room that we both lie on with him because most of the time it's the only way he'll fall asleep. I have spent every day of the last year falling in love with you even more than I already was."

She presses her lips against his heart, the warmth of his body sending goose bumps over her skin. "We'll make it official someday. But right now, we're not any less married than we would be if you put a ring on my finger."

"I love you," he whispers, and this time it touches her heart. "How was Eli today?"

"Fussy. He finished off the antibiotics though, and his fever broke. He should be fine in the morning."

"And you?"

She smiles as his hands weave through her hair. "It's the flu, Elliot. I'll be fine."

"Did you get all your paperwork done?"

"Most of it," she confirms. "Maureen called earlier. She's coming by over the weekend to see Kep. I told her we'd order in and do dinner." She stretches her legs, her muscles screaming in protest. She winces, his hand now a comforting caress over her chilled skin.

"Did you take anything?"

"Stop babying me, Elliot. It's not a big deal." Her eyes close, and she's against him, nearly on top of him. She moves against the rise and fall of his chest, her chest constricting, contracting nearly at once. "We'll get married, but right now, I'm happy."

Her voice fades, and the dreams slip and weave through her mind, pulling her into a place where he hadn't existed, bringing her out into the world where he does. "I'm happy."

He wakes to the sound of his life, as it is. As he wants it. As he had never imagined it.

She is shushing Eli and laughing at the same time, the sound of a pan settling on the counter intermixed with the sounds of their joint amusement. He can hear the unusual huskiness of her laugh and he knows she is sicker than she lets on. He hates that she let him sleep, that she probably tiptoed out of their bedroom to get Eli from the first moment that the little boy had stirred.

"Eli, no!" she admonishes, no discipline in her voice. But whatever catastrophe she was trying to avoid occurs anyway, and a pot clatters to the floor, seemingly breaking. It is followed by Eli's delighted claps and his devious giggle.

"It bwoken, Ibya! It went bwoken!" His child's laughter stops and his small voice takes a serious, dramatic turn. "You keen it up, Ibya?" There is silence. And then, "I made messy, Ibya?"

He waits for it, thinking today will be the day. Today will be the day Olivia manages some discipline. She won't laugh today at Eli's antics, instead she will haul Eli's mischievous little rear end into his time-out chair. He has no doubt that the mess has less to do with Olivia's questionable cooking skills and more to do with his son's fascination with anything that slightly resembles destruction.

He lies in bed and waits for it. For the scolding. For the frustration that any exhausted parent would have at seven in the morning.

But this is Olivia, and with this child, she is never over it. She is never worn out. She is never unavailable. For this child, she is wholly devoted and infinitely patient, and she gives Eli the love of a thousand parents and the forgiveness of a saint.

"Eli," she sighs.

"It a sanbox, Ibya? See? It a sanbox!"

She chuckles in resignation, and he watches as Kep scurries off the bed and out the bedroom door. His footprints scurry into the kitchen and the barking chases Eli's laughter all the way through the halls and back to Elliot. He listens over the amusing din of it, Olivia's voice wavering with sickness.

"All that Bisquick looks like sand to you, baby? That's what you wanted? A sandbox in the kitchen? Okay. You want a spoon and you can scoop all that sand back into a bowl for me so we can throw it away? Or maybe you can make me a castle first, hmmm?"

He hears a few drawers open and close and he exhales. Only she would make this a game for Eli. The child is going to forever be trying to dump out mixing bowls to make their kitchen floor Rockaway Beach. She indulges Eli's imagination to the point of inconvenience for everything around them. If it causes a mess, causes them to be late, causes them to spend more than they had planned, she does it, so long as Eli's games of pretend are encouraged.

Eli taps whatever utensils she has just given him on the kitchen floor. "I make you castle, Ibya. You a pwincess?"

Her laughter is throaty, raspy from her cold. "Not since I was your age, monkey."

He groans in his bed. She sounds more amused than annoyed, more indulgent than irritated. Eli plays away contentedly, probably sitting in the mess at the feet of his greatest defender.

"Okay, Eli. That was the last of the pancake mix. Now what are we gonna eat?"

Her voice is soft and reassuring, and he knows that she has just let Eli get away with whatever he had done to cause the mess. He closes his eyes, wondering if he should intervene. At some point she is going to have to discipline Eli. At some point his two-and-a-half year -old toddler of terror is going to have to learn about boundaries, what he can't do and the things he can't have. The things that aren't real.

He throws back the covers, and swings his legs over the edge of the bed. He rubs a hand over his face and debates grabbing a shirt to throw over his boxers, and then decides against it. She's got the heat turned up in here and he knows it's because she has chills that she won't otherwise admit to having.

He pads out into the kitchen, and just as he suspected, Eli is on the kitchen floor making sandcastles out of the fallen dunes of Bisquick, while Kep laps up the mix, covering his salt and pepper body in white coating. The refrigerator door is open as she searches for something else to eat. At her socked feet is the pile of dry pancake mix that Eli has spread all over himself, as well as a steel bowl, several wooden spoons and some plastic cups that Eli is now streaking through the mess as he tries ineffectually to scoop up the powder.

"Look Daddy! I at da beach!" Eli says proudly, raising a wooden spoon in victory. It's a beach or a disaster, one of the two.

Olivia looks up at him, and he forces himself not to frown at the way she is obviously cuddled up in one too many layers of his NYPD sweats. Her skin looks flushed and she seems nearly weak.

"G'morning. We're out of pancakes," she explains, her eyes a little bit glassy from fever. She smiles, clearly united with Eli behind the idea that this is a plausible beach. "We made a mess."

He can see the way she is fighting the illness. The way she is denying it, determined to cover it up. She will go to work today over his dead body. "Eli made the mess," he clarifies, a little harsher than he intends. He looks at his son. "Hey buddy. You need to clean that up, you got that?"

Eli frowns at him, his face starting to fall simply by the tone of his father's voice. "But I payin'. I payin' at da beach." He widens his blue eyes, as if waiting to decide if he should get mad or just start crying. Eli has a streak of defiance and a lack of fear that would be almost admirable, had existed in anyone but his toddler.

He shakes his head. "This is our home, Eli. Not the beach. You can't just make a mess whenever you feel like it. Olivia is sick, and you're just making more wor-"

"I'm fine, El," she interrupts, placing a hand on his arm. "He's just having fun. It's no big-"

She stops when he glares at her.

She is gripping the fridge and he realizes just how sick she really is. She wobbles a little bit and blinks and he's suddenly pissed that she won't take care of herself. On a morning like this she needs to be in bed and resting, not allowing their kitchen floor to become the gateway to the Atlantic Ocean simply because she doesn't want to say no to his son.

He stares at her, and it's too early for this. "Olivia, get back into bed. There's no way I'm letting you go into-"

Her eyes widen, and she must need every ounce of strength she has in her to muster the stiffened spine and glare that she gives him. "Letting me?"

"Yeah," he says softly, thinking this is just going to cause shit. "Letting you. I'm not letting you risk your health just to try and save a sick day."

She closes the fridge door and rubs her hand over her face. "El, I'd rather tough it out today and get a day at home with Eli in the next few weeks. Kathy's got him today and that means I'll be stuck here by myself today. You know it will make me stir crazy to waste a day like that."

"Daddy! I eatin' da sand!" Eli proclaims in the midst of the standoff happening above his head. The Bisquick is all over his lap and his pajamas and he takes a mouthful of the mix he has lifted up with a spoon. He promptly scrunches up his face and spits it out. "Ew. Dat yucky." His small hands bat at his mouth as he continues to spit it out onto the floor. "Ew!"

Kep has no such qualms. He happily licks at the mix, his saliva making it stick to the tile floor.

Olivia isn't listening and Elliot has had it. He bends down and scoops up his son, ignoring the powdery cloud that falls from Eli's legs. "Eli. Enough. It's not a beach, okay? Olivia is sick and you just made a mess instead of just eating breakfast like a good boy. Say you're sorry to Olivia."

But Eli is staring at the beach he's being pulled from on the floor. "I want to pay," he protests, wriggling his feet against Elliot's waist. "Pease, Daddy? I pay it, pease? I at da beach!" Eli tries to squirm out of his father's arms.

But he's only got a few minutes here to get Olivia back into bed and set this day the way it is going to go. He'll get Eli ready and he is going to work, and she is simply going to catch up on some much-needed sleep. He doesn't want her at her desk today, let alone out on the streets. When she isn't up to par, she is at risk, and it isn't his fault that he can't imagine one damned second of his life without her.

"Eli-" he starts.

"El, it's fine. It's already all over the floor. What difference will it make if he plays in it now?"

He's holding his protesting son away from the disaster on the floor, but his concern right now is the increasing sheen on her skin. "How warm are you? Did you call the doctor?"

"I'm not that sick, El. Seriously. I just need a cup of tea and-"

"That's crap. And I'm not arguing with you." Elliot holds onto his son, staring at Olivia. She can barely handle an argument with him, let alone handle her Sig. Eli arches downwards, reaching for the enticing mess on the floor yet secure in the knowledge that his father won't let him fall. "Need down, Daddy!" Elliot holds fast to him. Eli finally straightens and sighs dramatically, lifting his chin bravely as he looks at his father. This child proves that genetics don't matter, and he channels the Stabler stare, glaring challengingly at his father. "Dis is cwap!"

For one moment, both adults freeze. Olivia's eyes widen and Elliot's narrow.

And then all hell breaks loose.

"You're in timeout!" Elliot immediately growls, stalking towards the small chair in the corner of the room, Eli in tow. The blue painted mini-rocker faces the wall, and it's only used in moments when Eli has to sit there for two minutes to calm down or face punishment.

Her skin is damp with the fever and she should have ignored Eli's pleas for one minute this morning and run to the bathroom and taken some Tylenol before she started her day. Her bones ache and she's freezing, but right now she has bigger problems ahead.

"El, it's because he just heard you-" she manages. Shit. Her throat is sore now too, and her chest feels heavy. It doesn't matter. Eli needs her defense here. He needs someone to remind Elliot that he is just a baby, even now.

But he sets Eli in the time-out chair, ignoring her. "Two minutes buddy," he says forcefully, pointing his finger at his son. "That's a mommy and daddy word only, you got that? And when you're done, you're gonna clean up that beach."

She has to intervene. "El, he's two. He's just learning-"

Elliot spins on her and his frustration with the morning is now directed at her. "Yeah, that's just it. He's learning he can do whatever the hell he wants. He's almost three and he's got just as much a say around here as you and I do. You have to set some boundaries with him, Olivia!"

She flinches, and for a moment, she is out of place. For a moment she is rocked by him, by his words. She takes them and lets them have her, emptying her out. She isn't Eli's mother. She isn't doing this right. She's failing at this and of course she is, because she doesn't know how the hell to raise a child. He's telling her that she is going to screw up this child, just like she has always suspected.

She swallows and her throat is closing on her. Insecurity is like riding a bike, and knowing how to ride it is something she will never forget.

For a moment, her eyes burn. She scrapes her teeth over her lower lip and wonders if this is it, if this will be the moment that every day of what has almost been two years with him will come crumbling down.

If this is the moment when she will not fit. Eli isn't hers, and she will never be his mother.

But behind Elliot, she sees movement. And as his angry gaze follows hers, they both see Eli's back, as he sits there, opening a small Diego backpack that they had missed as it sat near the chair. As they watch, Eli purposefully pulls out a book and a small pack of crackers, settling in to his punishment without protest and now very well-equipped to handle the two long minutes.

"What's he doing?" Elliot breathes, his back now to her.

She can't help it. In a moment, the doubt fades. It exists less and less these days, and in moments like this, when Elliot is reverently asking her about his child, she realizes she isn't out of place at all. She is no different than Elliot here. Genetics, she now knows, do not determine if one is a parent or not. "Guess he decided to pack a survival bag for the next time he had a timeout."

Elliot is silent for a moment, and then it comes. The laughter. "Are you fucking kidding me?" he whispers. "Where'd he get that idea?"

He doesn't know, but she does. She watches Eli's small head as it is contentedly bowed over the cardboard book that sits in his lap. His small, pudgy fingers tear at the small pack of cookies that usually sit low on the pantry shelves and she knows. She knows where Eli has gotten this idea, where his plan had come from. She knows something about Elliot's son that he doesn't, and it's reassuring.

She knows.

"We went to the pediatrician's yesterday," she says, her voice rough with sickness and thick with emotion. With rights to this child. These are the stories a mother would know. Of which a father might ask. "When we packed a bag of snacks and books before we left, Eli asked what I was doing. I said that we always had to be prepared in case we had to sit there with nothing to do."

"Smart kid." Elliot half turns to face her and he smiles just a little bit. "Must get that from you."

His eyes are calm, his back no longer ramrod straight. Their fight isn't the end of them, or even the end of the morning. It is the kind of disagreement that is had all over the city every morning. It is two people raising a child and wanting the best for him or her. Their words are not life-altering and they are not about character or strength or honor or duty. Fights like this are just the details. The daily grind. One that she never thought would belong to a woman like her.

She can rightfully argue with this man about raising this child. He is hers, she thinks, and she doesn't know which male in the room she is referring to.

The corner of Elliot's mouth tips up in a self-deprecating smile. "He's not crying. The other kids? As soon as I yelled, they'd cry. This one," he tips his head towards a quietly reading Eli. "He's not afraid of me."

She can see the apology in his eyes. They will never be perfect when it comes to communication, and they will never be easily able to say what they mean. But she knows him and he knows her and that's enough. It's more than enough. It's what she has and it's everything.

"I'm not afraid of you either," she says softly, her socks stepping through the mess of Bisquick as she walks towards him.

Elliot's eyes darken and he waits for her. She steps into him, waiting for their morning to be erased, for their morning to start again. "That's why," he says into her hair, his arms slipping around her waist.

His mouth moves through her hair, and as she leans against him, against the hard, chiseled curves of his chest, she feels the aches and pains of the flu win. His hand slips over her neck, his fingers sift through her hair. She leans against him, in their home, their life. Her body hurts, but her heart, her heart doesn't feel the once searing, blistering pain.

This moment alone proves that time heals all wounds.

"That's why?" she questions as she closes her eyes against his neck and lets him hold her.

"That's why Eli isn't afraid of me," he rasps into the top of her head. "Because you aren't. I'm not a monster to you. I'm not out of place with you. I'm not a visitor here and I'm not...I'm not failing. That's what he sees. What he knows."

She lifts her head, and he looks at her. She's rooted to this life; she's been rooted to him all along. She has proven this: that leaving him is impossible, that life without him is unlivable. She is tethered to him and she will sink or swim with him because anything else is just treading a water that has always been far too cold.

"It's what I know," she manages. "And it's the truth, Elliot. You're not failing. Not with any of it. Not with us." She speaks for Eli. She's earned that right.

His hand skims down her back, his breath hits her ear. Their legs are so close they are almost tangled, and in the quiet of the morning, they just hang on to each other.

They fit these days. They don't have to clutch and grab like they did that very first time he held her. She isn't unsure of her place; she isn't already expecting it to end. She doesn't feel pain when he holds her, instead his touch alleviates it. She doesn't have to figure out why he is holding her, because these days she knows. He grasps her for the same reasons that she grasps him.

And that is what has not changed. Even that first time, when he pulled her against him in the hospital years ago, he was reaching for what was his.

He still does that.

As does she.

"I love you, Liv," he rumbles against her.

The words are half-formed, but as people, they are not. They are whole, and with the child that now loudly proclaims he's all done with his time-out, she has something far more precious than just proximity.

She has a family. She has a child.

And one day she will have him as her husband, because the next time he asks, she thinks she is going to surprise him and say yes.

finis