A/N- I repeat from chapter 1, I'm relatively new to the SVU Universe, so please forgive any plot/timeline errors
Disclaimer: Don't own the show, don't own the characters, don't own the songs
Chapter 2
Elliot trudged into his apartment after yet another grueling day at work. It wasn't necessarily the cases that made it grueling, it was the lack of his partner that made the days endless. It had been nine days since Olivia Benson disappeared off the face of the Earth, and out of his life, and every day seemed longer than the last. True, he had another partner, but Dani Beck was no Olivia Benson. Sure, she was nice enough, but she just didn't know how to handle the victims. That's what they were to her, they were victims. To Olivia, they were people, people she had the misfortune to meet on the worst day of their lives, but people nonetheless. She knew that they needed to be treated with sympathy and respect, that all they wanted was to maintain their dignity. Dani's inept fumbling around them was far from what they needed. She was improving, but Elliot was glad that her assignment was a temporary one.
It was temporary, Elliot insisted to himself. Olivia would come back from wherever she was, as soon as she could. There were no words to describe the sheer terror that went through him when he heard those damning words, "we're sorry, the number you have dialed has been disconnected…". She was gone, again. Only this time, he couldn't even call her, he couldn't just call to hear her voice, just to make sure she was OK at the end of the day.
First came the anger. Of course anger came first, he was Elliot Stabler after all, anger was what he did best. How dare she run again? Didn't she realize how badly she hurt him the first time? Apparently not, since she just did it again. He was tired of her pulling his strings like this. First she was his best friend, slowly inching towards something more. The instant he challenged her, made one tiny push towards finally admitting what the hell was going on between the two of them, she bolted. When she came back, he was cautiously optimistic, yet held her at arms length. He wanted to trust her again, like he had before, but she had to prove to him that she was willing to work for it. She had, and while things still weren't the same as they used to be, they were close. And now she was gone again, and he felt like they were back to square one.
Two days later, rationality began to seep in. She wouldn't do this, she knew they wouldn't recover if she ran again. So why? Why ruin everything that they worked so hard to find again. She wouldn't, he realized. She wouldn't skip town, cancel her phone, and not tell him what was going on, not voluntarily. She wasn't kidnapped, because the Captain wasn't panicking, and no perp would go through the hassle of getting a victims cell phone disconnected. He stopped by her apartment after work one day, using the key she gave him in case of emergency, figuring that her disappearing into thin air was enough of an emergency to warrant its use. Nothing was out of place, no hastily thrown together clothes, no sense of "what to take, what to leave behind" like one gets when packing in a hurry. So she wasn't running from something, and she wasn't taken, so what was left?
The next day it hit him, Dana Lewis. The last time he had seen Olivia, she had been preparing to infiltrate an eco terrorist group with the obnoxious FBI agent. It was only supposed to be a brief undercover stint. Get in, get the guy, and get out. Obviously something went wrong, and in order to preserve her cover, she had to get out of town, and fast. That worried him. The two chances he had to work with Dana Lewis, she had gotten him shot and blown up. What the hell kind of condition was his partner going to come back in?
The rest of his days were spent worrying. She was obviously undercover with a potentially dangerous terrorist group, and she was alone. There was no one there to watch her back. HE wasn't there to watch her back. For the last nine years, they had been Benson and Stabler, where one was, the other was right behind. When one was hurt, the other was hurting. This was who they were. Now she was Benson, or whatever the hell her name was, and he was part of Stabler and Beck. The combination didn't sit right in his head. Who was out there to watch her back? Who was checking in with her at the end of the day to make sure she was OK, that she wasn't trapped in the mental abyss that could sometimes overwhelm her when she got too involved in a case. She needed him to keep her grounded, like he needed her to do the same. Would the same Olivia Benson who left him, be the same one who came back to him?
While he was agonizing over these things for the millionth time in his head, he absently flipped through his mail. Bill, bill, crap, credit card offer, bill, and… one with no return address? He looked at his address, noticing that it was handwritten. More importantly, whose handwriting it was. Olivia! He would know that writing anywhere, could recognize it among hundreds of others. The only other person whose handwriting he would know better was his own. Hands shaking, he gently tore open the letter, unwilling to chance destroying anything the precious envelope contained Opening up the paper folded within, his eyes gazed on the one link that he had that she was OK, taking in their meaning:
El-
We'll do it all, everything, on our own
We don't need anything or anyone
I don't quite know how to say how I feel
Those three words are said too much
They're not enough
Let's waste time
Chasing cars
Around our heads
I need your grace
to remind me
to find my own
If I lay here
If I just lay here
Would you lie with me
And just forget the world
Forget what we're told
Before we get too old
Show me a garden that's bursting into life
All that I am
All that I ever was
Is here in your perfect eyes
They're all I can see
I don't know where
Confused about how as well
I just know that these things
Will never change for us at all
I'll come back, I promise. Will you still be there, when I do?
There was no signature, but she knew there was no need for one. Brows furrowed in concentration, he tried to gauge the meaning behind her words. Pausing briefly to re-inspect the envelope, he took notice of the postage marking. It was processed somewhere in Oregon. What was she doing in Oregon? Realizing that he wasn't getting anymore answers from the envelope itself, he returned to the letter, hoping to find what he was looking for there. The words seemed familiar, though he couldn't place from where. They were beautiful though. The first bit, he understood, and he realized his assumptions were correct, she was undercover and she was alone. That thought made his heart clench, because she clearly didn't enjoy working by herself.
As he read the next verse, the tears that had been gathering in his eyes finally spilled over. Those three lines, God, they were everything he has been feeling for a while now. Was she really telling him what he'd almost giving up hope of ever hearing her say? The next two verses, of what is obviously a song (which song, he didn't know, but he damn well was going to find out, because it was his new favorite song), pretty much told him that she was thinking of him, missing him, and holding onto him as much as possible. It was liberating to realize that she was feeling the exact same thing, at the same moment that he was. Looking to the next part, he felt tears in his eyes, she was telling him she wanted him there. The part about laying with him, he didn't want to interpret too literally, but he hoped like hell that that was what she was implying. The thought of holding her in his arms, trying to drive the horrors of the world from her mind, even just for a little bit, was something he had dreamed of many times. The thought that she wanted the same, was amazing.
Smiling through his tears, he considered the last line, obviously the only personal touch that she could afford to put in a letter. I'll come back, I promise. Will you still be there, when I do? The woman was crazy if she thought he would be anywhere other than waiting with open arms for her when she returned. Not after that beautiful letter that she sent, reaching out to him, possibly at her own risk, reassuring that she was alright and thinking of him. He felt that last spark of rage and resentment flicker out, replaced by the warmth her words spread through him.
He went to bed that night, smiling for the first time in nine days. Yes, he thought, he would be here whenever she got back, and if he had any say in the matter, he would make those words come true. He wanted nothing more than to sleep with her in his arms forever, and if that was truly what she wanted, there was no force on Earth that would stop him.
There's chapter 2! Drop a review and let me know how I'm doing :)
Song for this chapter: Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol