as usual this did have a plan and that plan went to hell so this rambled concoction of words that wasn't even intended to be part of this 'words' series now is and isn't exactly about the word I was given but oh well, it's kinda in there/.

read and review please.
leave me a word in the comments section if you have a word you'd like me to base a fic on
thanks.

word: moon
suggested by: I can't remember, sorry. I have the words but not the people.

I find shelter in this way
Under cover, hide away
Can you hear when I say
I have never felt this way

/

"I'm okay…"

"Liv…"

"I'm fine" Olivia shrugged his comforting arm away from her shoulder and ran her fingers through the ends of her slightly damp hair. Yanking the sheets from her body she made a quick exit from the now nearly empty bedroom making sure to avoid tripping over the packed cardboard boxes that littered his apartment.

Brian sighed and sat up against the headboard. Her third nightmare this week and she once again refused to give him any details. Since going back to work just over three weeks ago she had turned back into her stubborn self, the brick wall that housed her heart and her feelings had shot back up and it felt damn near impossible to get back in.

The days and weeks after her attack Olivia had changed, she turned to him when she was scared, she let him hold her and whisper quiet words in her ear after a nightmare but now she was back to her old I'm-not-saying-how-I-feel-because-it-means-I'm-weak self, just with a few constant reminders of the worst four days of her life added on.

She began to shut him out again, as if letting him see her falter was going to change the way he felt about her or make him see her as weak.

Brian slowly made his way out of the bedroom, he stood at the door and watched her standing by the kitchen sink, her back was turned but he could see her shaking. The black shirt that she wore was once his; it hung low to her thighs, looking more like a dress than a shirt. He watched her for a moment, her hands trembling as she tried to fill a glass with water.

"Here…let me." He said quietly, quickly making his way over to her.

"Brian, I'm fine" She insisted as he gently took the glass from her hand and held it under the running tap.

"Go sit down" He nodded towards the couch that was currently surrounded by boxes marked 'books' and 'kitchen' and 'fragile'

He gave her a minute to get situated, watching as she brought her legs up under her, almost as if she was trying to curl herself as small as she could. Quietly, he made his way the short distance from the open kitchen area to the living room and stood in front of her, holding the cool glass of water in front of him.

"Thank you" She mumbled, brushing some stray hairs from her face before gulping down a large mouthful of water.

He shifted a box to the floor and created a space beside her for himself. He kept his arms to himself, clasped in his lap as they sat in the dark silence of the room, the dull moonlight barely peeking through the thundery clouds in the night sky.

"You can talk to me you know?" He said, not making eye contact. "I know you don't want to. I know you think talking to me makes you seem weak or you just don't want me to know what happened to you and that's fine, I get it but damn Liv…" He turned to face her, trying to hide the hurt he was feeling at this moment.

"I just want you to trust me," He said quietly into the room.

The heavy silence lingered for a moment; the earth seemed still, his weighty confession like an elephant in the room. He knew both he and Olivia weren't the best at conveying their emotions, when they first got together just over a year ago neither of them expected to be where they are now, two days away from moving in together and still going strong…or almost going strong.

Her timid voice broke the silence "I do" She whispered, "I do trust you, Bri. I…I don't know how I would've coped without you" He heard her voice crack and his heart cracked with it.

Here was the strongest person he had ever known, a warrior, endlessly fighting for others, standing up for thousands of victims, now broken down to the core, her wounds exposed at the hands of William Lewis.

"I'm trying to trust myself again," Olivia admitted, releasing a deep breath she didn't even realise she was holding.

"I'm trying to find myself. It's like I know who I am but now there is this thing that happens in my brain…" She sighed and gestured with her hand "Like a switch, whenever I have a good day or things seem to be looking up, I'm reminded of him, of what he did to me, of how…he broke me, Bri…" She let a few tears fall and shook her head, hating herself for crying in front of him.

Brian sat back and reached for her free hand, pulling it between his, his thumb gently tracing the palm of her hand, avoiding the small scars that littered her wrists thanks to the persistent pull of the tight metal cuffs Lewis had kept her in for days.

"I had nightmares a lot when I was a kid" She began, her voice still quiet as she rolled off on a slight tangent. "About my mom, the girls who used to bully me at school, normal stuff really but I had learned to deal with it because I never had anyone to turn to"

Olivia turned her gaze from the wall in front of her to the man by her side that was staring intently at their joined hands. "I've never had anyone Bri, I've never had someone to hold me when I woke myself out of that clutch of a nightmare and tell me everything was okay and that it was all in my head. I've always had to deal with things on my own…everything on my own."

He sat in silence and nodded, never facing her; he lifted their hands and pressed a few kisses to her skin.

"I'm not used to having someone in these sorts of situations. I've never had to, I dunno; tell someone else what's going on inside my own head. I knew who I was before this and now he's broken me and I don't know how to fix it…"

Brian let his head fall back against the couch, turning to make eye contact in the dark "You have me." He squeezed her hand lightly. "I'm not going anywhere."

He saw her tears shining in the dim moonlight and kissed her hand again "You can tell me everything, or you can tell me nothing but I'm not going anywhere. I might annoy you, hell, chances are I will annoy you but this is a new thing for both of us. I've never…" He took a deep breath and turned his gaze back to their still joined hands "I've never felt about anyone, the way I feel about you. No matter what happened with Lewis, it doesn't change how I feel about you and it never will"

Olivia nodded through the tears that gently stroked her cheeks; Brian reached up and brushed them away before kissing her shoulder.

"You're not broken" He whispered against her shoulder "Just…bruised, badly bruised but that's okay. You'll heal and I'll help you as best I can, you say you don't know how to do fix it and honestly neither do I but I'll do my best to help you figure it out."

Olivia smiled and leaned forward, her forehead pressed against his "Thank you" She mumbled against his mouth as she placed a sleepy kiss on his lips.

They sat in silence for a few minutes in the wake of their deepest confessions; Olivia let her eyes wander around the near empty living room.

"You sure you wanna live with me?" She whispered with a slight chuckle as she glanced around at the boxes stacked up throughout his apartment.

"Might as well, I mean, my stuffs all packed up so…" He shrugged and smirked, letting out a laugh as she smacked his chest.

"Ass" She muttered, shifting her body so her legs lay over his.

"You okay?" He asked seriously, his fingers reaching to brush her dark hair back from her tired face.

"I will be. I've got you taking care of me" She smiled and wrapped her arms around his shirtless middle, her head resting on his shoulder. "You're cold…"

"No wonder" He rolled his eyes jokingly "It's freezing out here and you stole my shirt…" Brian pulled at the black cotton that was wrapped around her slender frame.

"You have too many t-shirts"

"No, I don't…"

"Bri, I helped you pack, you have far too many" Olivia laughed, unknowingly making Brian's heart leap.

It had been too long since she laughed, it had been too long since she had seemed like herself but in the last two minutes she had been more Olivia Benson than she had been in the last four months. Two minutes of normality in an ocean of anxiety was worth it considering the hell she had been through.

They both knew it would be a long road for the both of them and nothing about this road was about to be smooth sailing but for now, in the dead of night, sitting together in a packed up apartment in the moonlight, life seemed pretty okay.

.

lyrics: Shelter - Birdy (originally by the xx)

twitter: ahoycinderella