Dirt in the Carpet
Chapter 2
A/N: Thank you so much for your comments and follows! I really appreciate all of you! Please feel free to drop a comment and let me know what you like about this story or any other thoughts you may have. If you would like to connect via social media, my Instagram/twitter is faceinbud.
Here is chapter 2! Hope you like it! I will say that this chapter is quite a bit darker than the first one, so just a heads up there.
I need to add both a disclaimer that I do not own SVU or its characters and a trigger warning for non-detailed discussion of kidnapping and rape.
"Mama?"
Both cops turned to the sound of a soft pitter-pattering against the linoleum flooring. Jesse was standing outside the bedroom door, tears running down her face. Amanda shot up off the couch and knelt in front of her daughter, wiping the streaks from her face. "Jesse. What happened, baby?"
The child looked up at her mother with the same piercing blue eyes she had, her lip quivering fearfully. "I had a bad dream."
"Oh, sweetie. Come here." Amanda lifted her up and began walking towards the couch. "Come sit with me and Olivia, and let's talk about it." Benson scooted over on the couch so that Jesse could sit between the two adults. The blonde eyed Olivia for a moment. Jesse didn't very often have bad dreams, or at least, Amanda realized, a lump forming in her throat, she hadn't known about them. "Can you tell us what happened in your nightmare?"
Jesse nodded dutifully, abandoning her position between the two cops in favor of climbing onto her mother's lap, straddling her and lying her head against her. "You went to work, and you didn't come home."
Amanda's heart throbbed in her chest. Jesse had always been a resilient child, but the detective worried her early struggles would affect her later down the line. Apparently, that time had come. This was the worst possible outcome, according to Amanda. All she had wanted was to spare her girls the turbulent childhood she'd endured, and it felt like the more she fought against it, the worse it became. A barely there father. Revolving door boyfriends. A drug addict grandfather. A mother who's never home. A new brother/cousin—how confusing must that have been for the four-year-old? Rollins felt like an absolute mess, like she was ruining her daughter's life before it even began. At least Billie was still young, and as she slept soundly in her carrier, being diligently guarded by Frannie, Amanda let herself be grateful for small mercies. "Jess, have you had that dream before?"
She nodded against her mother's chest, squeezing her tighter, a new set of tears taking the journey down her flushed cheeks. "When you didn't come home. You didn't come home 'til the morning."
She took a shuddering breath, pulling away from the other blonde for a moment, two sets of blue eyes meeting, both of them waiting for the other to do something. It was Jesse who spoke first. "I'm okay, Mama. I just wanted to see you," she whispered, mesmerized by her mother's features, the fingers of a tiny hand reaching up to wipe away the lone tear that had escaped the prison of her tear ducts. Moments later, the little girl went back to hugging her mother, holding her as tight as her little arms and legs could. She never wanted to let go.
Amanda returned the tight embrace, rubbing circles into Jesse's back. "Oh, baby, I'm right here. I'm right here, Jesse." She opened her mouth to say something else, to promise her something, but she didn't know what to tell the trembling child. Realistically, she couldn't assure the little girl she wasn't going anywhere because she knew she could be taken out by a perp at any moment. She knew there were more Frank Buccis in the world, more Charles Pattons, and Amanda's safety was never guaranteed. The detective hated empty promises, loathed them with the fire of a million suns, because she had been placated by more than her share when she was young—
I'm gonna leave your father.
We're gonna get outta here, Mandy Jo.
We're a team, the three of us. You, me, and Kimmy.
Empty promises were the same as lies. And they were just as poisonous to the soul. Jesse deserved better. But Amanda didn't know what she could offer her.
Olivia noticed the falter in her detective's voice, the way she'd interrupted herself before she began speaking, and the tears that were now falling from her own crystal blues. The SVU captain was struck by the similarities between the mother and daughter. The way they both struggled to hold back tears. The way they comforted each other before they asked for comfort themselves. Until Billie had come along, it was just the two of them, but Jesse reveled in the role of big sister, of protector, of leader. She got these qualities from her resilient mother, but Amanda didn't want her to feel like she needed to take on those jobs. She was barely in preschool, for goodness sakes!
Amanda opened her mouth once more, platitudes forming on her lips the same way they had formed on her mother's, but she couldn't bring herself to utter them aloud. She felt Olivia's hand rest on her shoulder, and then a soft voice penetrated the silence. "May I?"
The detective shifted her focus from her daughter's quiet crying to her boss's gentle expression. "Sure."
"You know, Jesse," the brunette began slowly as the little girl's head lifted in response to her Aunt Olivia's words, "when I have a nightmare, the first thing I like to do is remind myself that it wasn't real, and I do that by telling myself what is real. You did a very good job, coming to find your Mama after your dream because now you know that she is home."
Of course Olivia had nightmares. Sometimes Amanda forgot that even though Liv didn't often speak of her own dirt, it didn't mean it wasn't there. Everyone in SVU suffered through bad dreams. But not everyone in SVU had nightmares that became realities. Amanda and Olivia shared this experience.
Amanda hadn't processed any of it. She'd hardly worked through previous traumas before Bucci decided to barge into Dr. Hanover's office, and now they were just piling on—like dust, like dirt. If Amanda had never processed adverse experiences in a healthy way, how would Jesse be able to do so? The child was stuck—without a decent role model, Amanda told herself—with a pile of dirt accumulating in the carpet of her own life. God, the detective needed to deal with her shit.
Most recently, the ordeal with Frank Bucci had brought up so much for the blonde. Like Amanda, he was a single parent, raising two girls practically on his own. And as a cop, he already had a painful understanding of the evil that existed in the world, waiting patiently for the right time to strike. He did what he thought he had to do to save his girls. Every time she found herself empathizing with the man, Amanda forced herself to rid her mind of those thoughts. Olivia was also a single parent, but she didn't routinely resort to violence to solve her problems. Amanda had two girls too, and Bucci had intended on keeping her from them for as long as it took to charge Getz. There was no excuse for what he did, Rollins told herself, knowing they were the same words any therapist worth their salt would say to her. The only person to blame for what Bucci did was Bucci.
Right?
And when the topic of blame was brought up—oh, boy. Speaking of blame, who was to blame for what happened to her in Atlanta? Looking at Olivia's compassionate eyes as she continued to soothe Jesse, Amanda could almost hear the words that her captain—then sergeant—had so gingerly spoken to her in the brunette's office: "Can you go back to that detective you were five years ago and feel compassion for her?"
Now it had been nine years.
Nine years.
Why did it feel like yesterday? Why could she still feel the blood trickling down her face? Why could she still hear his voice, see his smirk? Why could she still feel his hands, his—
Stop! This wasn't productive. Jesse needed her.
"Why do you have bad dreams, Olivia?"
The innocence in the child's voice brought Amanda back to the present, but only for a moment. The tone, the cadence, the wet and wide eyes that accompanied the question brought the detective back to something she'd asked her mother on more than one occasion.
"Why do you let Daddy hit you, Mama?"
If only she'd known.
If only she'd known…
"We all have bad dreams sometimes, Jesse." Amanda found herself thanking her lucky stars that her vacuum cleaner of a friend and captain was there to talk to the little girl. She hadn't known just how fresh these wounds were. If she'd known, she never would have accepted this invitation. "We dream about things that make us happy and things that make us sad. Sometimes we dream about things that make us feel scared."
"But why?"
Olivia sighed. "I don't really know, Jess. But what I do know is your Mama is with you, and I am with you, and you are safe."
"Okay," the little girl replied sleepily. The older cop tucked a strand of Jesse's hair behind her ear, and the child yawned after a moment.
"Thank you," Amanda whispered to the other woman, rocking Jesse from side to side as she began to relax.
Benson offered her an earnest nod. "Of course."
When she'd fallen asleep, Amanda stood up, cradling Jesse's head against her chest. "I'll be right back," she whispered. She returned a few minutes later, kneeling in front of Billie's carrier and brushing a few strands of wispy hair away from her eyes. Frannie gave a quick lick to the back of her hand, and then the blonde sat back down. "Noah and Mason are still asleep."
"Good," the captain said. She watched her friend rake her fingers through her hair, staring intently at Billie's gentle breathing, and after almost five minutes of silence, she couldn't let Amanda stew in her own thoughts any longer. "Alright, vroom, vroom. I need you to talk to me, Amanda."
Amanda feigned ignorance. "Talk to you about what?"
The brunette gestured to the other woman's head. "Whatever is going on in there."
She held on to her stoic façade for several more seconds, but it was no match for Olivia's stubborn yet kind gaze. Amanda fell apart all at once, her hands coming up to conceal her watery eyes. After the elevator with Carisi, she had pledged not to do this again. But there was something about Olivia that—well, she said it herself. Vroom, vroom.
For a little while, she just cried, allowing the emotions of the past several months to catch up with her. Getz. Bucci. Ivy and Milly. Kim. Mason. Patton. Always Patton. She hadn't consciously felt any of it, burying each instinctive attempt on her brain's part to process with a casual dismissal.
"I'm just tired."
"It's been a long case."
"I need some coffee."
Excuses. Amanda had an "Excuse-Maker 5000" ever on alert, ready to spit out a response to any situation. Did she have a nightmare? "Well, you had ice cream for dinner, Mandy Jo. What did you expect?" the condescending figure in her head that sounded suspiciously like her mother would reply. She hadn't slept in three days? "Girlie, you gotta stop drinkin' that coffee." Did she feel hopelessly and completely alone? "We're a team, Mandy Jo."
A team.
Jesse.
"God, I think I do need to go back to therapy," she wept softly, realizing the enormity of the burden she had been bearing. "I just don't know where to start."
"Well, then, let me help you. I've been referring surviv—" She cut herself off, deciding a more broad term would make Amanda feel less self-conscious. "—people to therapists in the area for more than two decades. I can come up with a few providers I think you'll mesh well with, and then we can do some more research together. I'll even come with you to your first appointment."
"Liv, I can't ask you to do that."
"You're not asking. I insist." At Amanda's skeptical eyes, she amended her statement. "As long as you're okay with me doing it."
The blonde relented, nodding her head. There was something so incredibly inviting about being cared for in this way. Olivia was holding her accountable, and not with screaming and hitting and threats, but with patience and compassion and the most gentle tough love she'd ever known. Amanda had never really had a friend before. She'd been a friend—that was easy. But having a friend, feeling safe going to someone with the icky stuff—the dirt—was unknown territory. "Thank you. My girls and Mason deserve a fully functioning parent."
"I know you want to do this for your kids, and I think that's very noble of you, Amanda, but can you please take a second to think about also doing this for yourself? You deserve healthy coping mechanisms. You deserve to work through your trauma, your dirt," she added, remembering the woman's earlier metaphor. "I'm not saying it will be easy, but it will be possible. And it will definitely be worth it. For you and for your children."
"I just feel like I suck at everything," she eventually lamented, as usual, finding an excuse to hold back. "Don't wake up the children, Mandy Jo," her mother scolded.
"Amanda, no. I will not allow you to say that." Olivia was being uncharacteristically forceful, but that's exactly what the younger woman needed in this moment. A counterpart to her mother's contrived maternal care. Liv's fiercely compassionate demand sent Ol' Beth Ann Rollins packing, at least for the time being, which was more than the blonde believed she deserved. "You're a great mom," Amanda's captain continued, shaking her head when the detective scoffed in disbelief. "You are. Jesse is smart, inquisitive, kind, and she's strong, just like her Mama. Billie and Mason are going to be just as amazing."
"How do you know that?" Amanda looked up at her boss, sniffing quietly as she made sure the baby and the dog hadn't been disturbed by her outburst.
"Because I see how much you love all three of them, how much you've sacrificed for them, how much they love you. I know you're afraid of becoming your mother. But you're not her. And your babies will not suffer like you did. Look." Olivia pulled out her phone and pulled up her most recent photo, showing it to Amanda. "I thought you might want to have this candid." A fresh wave of tears came cascading over her cheeks as she looked at the photo of her daughter tenderly looking up at her as they wiped each other's tears. The little sneak had captured the picture while Jesse and Amanda had been absorbed in each other. "Did you ever look at your mother like that?"
All she could do was shake her head in the negative. "Well, at least I have that," she sighed tearfully. God, she was acting so pathetic, practically fishing for compliments at this point.
She still wasn't expecting the next phrase to come out of Olivia's mouth. "Amanda, you're an amazing detective."
No one had ever overtly complimented her police work before, not without an ulterior motive. Her drooping shoulders lifted instantly, and she looked Liv in the eye for the first time since she returned from Noah's bedroom. "You think so?"
She nodded vigorously. "I know so." The captain leaned forward, searching for eye contact in turbulent crystal waters. "Who do you think put in for your promotion?"
A/N: Let me know what you think about this one, guys! Thanks for reading! The last chapter of "In the First Degree" is almost done, and it should be up in a few days.