I go and visit Casey in the hospital and bring with me a softball.
She looks at me for a long moment and then laughs.
"You're an idiot, Stabler," she says, and I know she feels better.
Liv told me she could use a visit, because she's stuck here until the doctors say
That it's ok for her to leave, and we're all out searching
For the guy who attacked her, because
No one hurts our ADA and gets away with it.
The softball has the squad's signatures on it, mine included.
Casey notices this, and shakes her head at me.
She asks how things are going, and I know she means at work, but
I can't help but tell her that they could be better, talking about home.
The answer fits both, though.
And I know she knows it because she says nothing else about it.
It's things like this that makes me sure that this is where I belong.
The unit, that is, not the hospital.
Can't stand the places. I've been in too many over the years.
Seen too many people hurt.
Most of the time, it's people I don't know,
But it feels like I know them, so it hurts.
And this time, I know my victim, and I have to remind myself that we don't get to pick.
But Casey isn't the sort to let anything get her down.
And sure enough, as soon as she's able, she's walking around with a cane.
Talking about how she's going to go about this case with this complication.
And Branch takes her off because he worries.
It bothers her because she wants to put away our doer, but…she knows when to let it go.
Used to be that she watched us to find out how the unit worked and
What we'd do when the ADA balked at giving us what we needed, because
She didn't think we had enough.
But now I watch her.
And I can't help but think of her as some kind of a hero because
She took this beating, and yet she's here,
Working. Being an ADA. Doing what she does best.
And I've taken nothing of the sort, and I'm falling apart, because I don't know how to handle it.
It's almost amusing, but at the same time it's not, and she's…
So much stronger than I am, because she's bounced back, and I still haven'