Disclaimer: Dick Wolf owns Law and Order SVU and the characters. I only own the idea for the story and the new characters.

Chapter 111: Change the world

'PROSTITUTION!'

'I wasn't actually...'

'You got picked up for PROSTITUTION!' Elliot repeated, practically foaming at the mouth.

Hannah carefully tried again, 'I had to say something...'

'You're FIFTEEN years old and you decided to pretend to be a HOOKER.'

'It made sense! If they thought I was with the cops...'

'You'd be dead,' Elliot finished, 'So apart from the fact that you had no business being there and we're lucky we didn't get a call to come get you at the morgue, we have to be grateful you got arrested?!'

'They decided not to charge me though...'

Elliot had started shouting once again, but then changed his mind, 'You know what? I'll let Liv deal with this one.' And he walked away, seriously questioning his own sanity at this point.

Olivia, however, hadn't spoken a word yet, which somehow scared Hannah even more. So, she looked at her mom from underneath her eyelashes with unspoken questions. Finally, Olivia spoke one syllable, 'Home.'

The ride home in the back of the cab wasn't much better. Hannah still got the silent treatment and in her mind, she was thinking up every way possible to appease Olivia.

'It wasn't right,' Hannah finally said, not finding the words to explain why she did what she did in order to help Devon. She wished she could explain, but she failed.

Olivia sucked in a deep breath, 'You know what isn't right, Hannah? You not telling me about anything you're involved in and then me having to hear through Alex what you've been up to, not because she wanted to tell me, but because she had to tell me. Because my fifteen-year-old kid got picked up for prostitution. Now that REALLY isn't right.'

She was mad, like really mad, and Hannah had no idea how to fix it. In a small voice, she asked, 'Do you hate me now?'

'No. That'd be too easy.'

Hannah tried to understand what she meant by that but couldn't. So, she said, 'You can, if you want to. I mean, I'd understand.'

'I don't,' Olivia bit, 'And I don't fucking understand anything about this.'

This startled Hannah, because Olivia never swore. Sure, she'd get angry at times and would shout out things she might later regret, but never like this.

Carefully, Hannah looked at Olivia and noticed she seemed genuinely hurt and upset. Whenever they fought, the main problem always seemed to be they both were stubborn as hell. So, Hannah decided now wasn't the time and she dropped her head down into her mom's lap before she could object, whispering, 'I'm sorry. I didn't mean for it to be like this. And I'm sorry for saying sorry all the time. I keep fucking up... and I'm sorry about that too.'

Olivia looked down at Hannah and tried to remember what she'd been like at fifteen. She remembered feeling lost, the sense of urgency when it came to getting out of the life she felt trapped in, but also the loyalty she felt towards her mom...

Olivia was thirteen when her mom told her for the first time: 'I wish I'd never had you.' That's how she'd learned, that's how she'd heard about her mother's rape. And it had created the biggest identity crisis in her you could imagine: the curiosity she had when it came to her father didn't disappear, but she had a newfound sense of protectiveness towards her mom and, on top of that, a white-hot burning anger inside of her.

At fifteen, she'd just started high school. For a project, they had to write an essay on a future career they wanted to pursue.

'What would you say if I want to be a detective?' She'd asked her mother.

'Why?' Her mom had scoffed, slurring her words slightly, 'Why in the hell would you want to do that?'

'I want to catch him and if not him, people like him.'

Her mother had looked at her intently, 'Darling, you've got your head in the clouds. The world is a rotten place and there is nothing you and I or anyone can do about that.'

But young Olivia was still full of idealism, 'But what if I can?'

'You can't.'

Olivia thought about that conversation and looked at Hannah. again. Without a doubt in her mind, she knew this little girl could change the world. She'd already changed hers. So, she proposed, 'How about we go to that new cafe, the one I wanted to go to before, and maybe then you can explain.'

The new place was nice. Olivia and Hannah sat at a small table near the window, which afforded them a nice view onto the streets. Still, the atmosphere between them was still a little tense.

'Go on,' Olivia demanded, 'Explain.'

Hannah let her head rest on one of her hands and swirled the straw in her coke around, 'Where do you want me to start?'

'The beginning.' And even though it felt like Olivia was interrogating her like some suspect, Hannah started telling her about everything that had happened with Devon. She went back to how she'd first met him and ended with every move she and Alex had made to try and give him a chance. In the end, Hannah was full of fire and indignation as she talked about Devon's situation.

Olivia listened to the whole story, while leaning back in her chair and with her slightly cold police officer face on. Internally, she cursed Hannah urge to fight for justice, mainly because she'd gotten herself in way over her head. Still, she knew this was just Hannah and she most likely wasn't going to change that.

After Hannah was done, Olivia nodded slowly, her face still betraying no emotion, 'Tell what's been going on at school.'

And here we go, Hannah thought, part two of the interrogation. But she truly was glad she and Olivia were talking again, sort of, so she tried to tell her as much as she could about school, about the subjects she took and the ones she was failing.

'I remember the first year of high school,' Olivia mused, sounding a little less cold already, 'but I went to a public school, so we didn't have that much choice when it came to the classes.'

'Neither do we,' she shrugged, 'most subjects are just compulsory, and I guess the same as in public school? I don't know. I guess Latin isn't that standard...'

Olivia sighed and finally asked the question she really wanted to ask, 'Are you gonna pass this grade?'

'I could...' Hannah didn't sound too certain, 'if I wanted to...'

'Right, so here's the thing,' Olivia sounded strict again, which made Hannah's eyes shoot up, 'You're fifteen, which means you have options now regarding your future and you can choose more in how you want to spend your life. However, you are not yet grown, and I am your parent, so you don't get to decide whether or not you want to TRY and maybe pass this year. You're smart, you're just lazy, so from now on, I will keep an eye on your homework and make sure you do it.'

'Fine,' Hannah sighed theatrically, slumping down in her seat.

Olivia leaned in closer, 'It's not a punishment, sweetheart, it's what parents do or are supposed to do. I'm responsible for setting you up for life and this is all a part of it.'

Hannah was still new to all of this parenting stuff and she did try to understand, 'You think I could work for ACS or something? Or, I don't know if the NYPD has like a child abuse squad or whatever?'

Olivia thought of the conversation with her mother and said, 'I think you can do anything.'

'It's just, working at the shelter and just seeing Devon... I get the system's trying but it's failing so hard. Like what they told me, 'some kids just fall through the cracks'? There are way too many fucking cracks, you know?'

'I know. I almost lost you due to one Manhattan-sized crack in the system.'

'I don't really know what exactly I want to do though,' she thought out loud, 'Do I need to know yet?'

'No, you don't. Just, try some things out and get your head around school first. It'll come to you.'

'I talked to Alex too... They're offering law classes next year at school as electives, maybe I could take that, if you're okay with that?'

Olivia barked a laugh, 'Sweetheart, I'll be the last person to protest if you wanna get more acquainted with the law.'

They looked at each other for a few moments, finally feeling closer to each other again. Their comfortable silence was interrupted though by the waitress. Olivia ordered a burger and asked Hannah, 'Do you want to eat?'

'I'm not that hungry,' Hannah shrugged, 'I'll just have a double cheeseburger, fries on the side and the chicken wings and maybe like a milkshake?'

Olivia blinked and looked at the waitress, who smiled and mumbled, 'Teenagers. Wish I could still eat like that...'

As they ate, or devoured in one case, Hannah suddenly asked, 'Mom, you know what you said about parents having to worry about their kids' future and stuff?'

'Yeah?'

'Panic's parents aren't even at home most of the time. They don't fucking know what she wants to do and they don't care either. They just give her money when she asks for it and that's it.'

Olivia frowned, 'Well, what do you think about that? Should someone get involved?'

'No, nothing like that... It just sucks for her.'

'What does she want to do?'

'She wants to become a tattoo artist and a piercer,' Hannah got really excited, 'Like her drawings are amazing, she's so much better than me and she can pretty much turn any idea into some form of art. And her piercing's gotten...' Hannah suddenly stopped.

'Continue...'

Hannah looked down at her food, 'She'll be really good at it, I think.'

'Is Panic piercing people?' Olivia demanded.

'No...' she moved a few fries around the plate, 'Just herself mainly.'

The detective raised her eyebrows, 'Can't imagine her posh parents being happy with that.'

'They don't care. Or they don't pay enough attention anyways. She pierced her own septum months ago and they haven't noticed it yet.'

And when Olivia stared at her full of disbelief, Hannah smirked her arrogant smirk and added, 'And neither did you. Maybe you're like one of those posh parents as well.'

'Didn't notice what... wait. What?' Olivia pulled Hannah in by the cuff of her shirt and studied her face. This made her laugh and she reached into her nose and exposed her own septum piercing she'd kept tucked away.

'When did you do this!'

'A few weeks ago? It looks cool, right?'

It did suit her, Olivia thought to her annoyance, but she was more concerned with hygiene, 'Did Panic do this? With some rusty needle and my towels? Do you have any idea...'

'Mom, calm down, it didn't get infected or nothing.'

She looked at the piercing again and finally said, 'Next time, you tell me, and we'll go to a proper piercer.'

'What?' Hannah called out, grinning broadly, 'You mean you're okay with me getting more?'

'It's your body... but you need to check that school's dress code. This one you can hide but most you won't be able to. Remember that kid that died her hair blue? They expelled her until she died it back to her natural color.'

'I know, that was Panic,' Hannah laughed. Obviously, that was Panic.

They talked some more and Hannah started telling Olivia about all the other kids in her class. Most of them didn't like her and she was a bit of an outsider, but it didn't seem to bother Hannah too much.

'What happened to that boy that was bothering you?' Olivia asked, thinking of the kid Dickie had mentioned, 'Is he still bothering you?'

'Nah, I told him I wasn't interested.'

'Sweetheart,' she started carefully, 'If you do like someone, you can tell me, right? I won't get mad or forbid you to have a boyfriend or anything like that.'

'Elliot would,' Hannah mumbled.

'Elliot's... different. He thinks little girls stay little girls until they turn eighteen.'

Hannah smiled a little, 'So, did you have a boyfriend at my age?'

Olivia sighed and decided to be truthful, 'I did actually. But he was a lot older than me. Actually, he was one of my mother's students.'

The teenager's eyes grew big, 'Are you serious? Do you have any idea how dangerous that is, let alone ILLEGAL!'

Olivia laughed out loud, 'Look who's the cop now!'

'Whatever. Anyways, I'd never do that, I'm not an idiot. No offence, but God, that's dumb.'

'Alright, well you may think so now...' her mom replied, 'But you're gonna fall in love and your brain's out the window.'

'Not with some college guy I won't.' Hannah scoffed, 'At least I have standards.'

'If you do get a boyfriend, just know you can talk to me,' Olivia repeated.

'Really very highly unlikely...' Hannah sighed, 'Can we drop this interrogation now?'

'Sure. We need to get home anyway; you still have homework to do!' Olivia feigned enthusiasm.

'Joy,' Hannah replied stony-faced

After they'd paid and went back to their apartment, Hannah rode alongside Olivia on her skateboard. She did a couple of tricks, until one patrol officer called out to her that skateboarding wasn't allowed there.

'Oh, piss off, officer! I'm just passing by, don't even...' Hannah started shouting back at him.

'Hannah!' Olivia shushed her, and to the officer, 'Detective Benson. Don't worry, she's with me.'

'Such an ass...' Hannah sulked, skateboard in hand now.

'Keep that mouth in check,' she warned, 'Or you won't be able to change the world.'

'Like some street-kid from New York with a record can change the world...' Hannah laughed sarcastically.

'Oh, you will,' Olivia was certain of it, 'As soon as you finish your homework.'

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