Rating: still K+...
Disclaimer: Characters are property of Dick Wolf, NBC et al.
Spoilers: Pretty much everything's up for grabs
Pairing(s): Elliot/Olivia, incidental Olivia/Brian and Elliot/Kathy
Summary: All that matters is the love.
A/N: This section includes a post-ep for the season 3 episode "Wrath".
2014
Olivia's ears prick and eyes turn at the slightest stirring sound from Noah. For a moment, both of them freeze, their face-off momentarily halted. Each holds their breath, waiting to see whether the faint whimper will transform into a full-blown wail. It does. Noah's sobs escalate, simultaneously echoing down the hallway and though the baby monitor at her hip. Olivia instantly re-abandons her partner, heading out of the kitchen and down the hall. This time, Elliot follows.
When he enters the tiny room, newly decked out in ducks and boats and the letters of the alphabet, Olivia is reaching over the rails of a white cot, lifting a ruddy-faced and bawling Noah from his pale blue blankets. She leans back, cooing softly as she settles him against her body, her breast, her heart. She pulls a white, muslin cloth from the cot and throws it over her shoulder, giving him something to nuzzle into. Noah is inconsolable though, hiccupping and blubbering in her ear, one tiny hand grasping a chunk of her hair. Olivia's hand goes to his back, patting gently and rhythmically as her body begins to bob in place.
Back to the doorframe, Elliot watches the small, unfamiliar tableau, something inside his chest snapping then expanding. His eyes are glued, watching her pace and circle and bob and pat, all while whispering under her breath to the distressed little boy in her capable arms. It's not like he never knew this aspect of his partner existed. It always has – he saw it in her compassion and concern for victims, both young and old. But seeing it directed at a child in her care, a child of her own in this everyday kind of way is something of a revelation for his eyes, for his brain, for the heart that's been so long without her. His eyes shadow her in the dim light, studying how the slowly rotating stars from a bedlight glide over her well-known form, insisting that he see the woman he's known for over fifteen years in a whole new light.
He watches her wander to the window and draw back a sheer, white curtain, peering out and murmuring about it being so very, very late and time for all little children to be fast asleep. Then she turns, her eyes falling on him and immediately cooling, hardening. Elliot averts his fixed gaze, adjusting his spine against the doorframe and quietly clearing his throat.
"Not sure…" he says, returning to their conversation, "I'm not sure Cassidy's the devoted daddy type, anyway." He waves a hand at her, the edge of his mouth tugging upwards, "And you've always been a natural at this."
Changing direction, Olivia bobs on a different trajectory, shakes her head. "Not tonight apparently…"
Elliot smiles, folding his arms over his chest. "Babies are like suspects. They can sense the tension in a room."
"You would know…" she mutters, turning on her heel and continuing her pace-bob-pat cycle.
Elliot hesitates before pushing away from the door. "Here— give him to me."
Olivia stops and stares at him over Noah's brown-haired babyhead, her arms wrapped protectively around his tense little body.
"Trust me," he says with a small nod of assurance. "I have the touch."
She eyes him another moment, then drops her guarded gaze and acquiesces, handing over the tired, squealing child. Elliot takes the muslin cloth as well and Noah grabs onto it, pressing it to his wet, open mouth. One of Olivia's hands goes with him, lying flat on his back as Elliot lifts him into his larger arms. Then, withdrawing her hand, she watches her partner's more experienced touch. He doesn't know to bob as Noah seems to like, although sometimes she suspects her new-mommy bobbing becomes more anxious than soothing. Instead, Elliot is like a rock beneath the little boy. Solid. Safe. Huge. Warm. A world of boundless protection. His voice when it murmurs in the baby's ear is deeper, an underlying command to his tender sleep now, little man, sleep…
Noah squirms, squawks once then settles, his high-pitched cries gradually dwindling to mere gurgles and snuffles. One little fist beats aimlessly against Elliot's chest then scores his hairy chin, his aged lips. Elliot gives the tiny fingers a kiss then glances over at Olivia to find her eyes aren't full of relief or thanks or love. Instead, they brim with pain, with panic, with supplication and sorrow.
"Please…" she murmurs, her voice choked and tears gripping her eyelashes. The stars continue to rotate round the room, drifting slowly across her face. There's enough light that he can see her tortured expression yet it's also low enough that she feels safe in whispering in a desperately unstable voice:
"Please don't do this to me. I'm trying to build something new here. I'm…trying to have a life, one in which I can finally…thrive. This is my family, Elliot. It may not look like much compared to yours but it's mine. Please…— please don't come in here and ruin that."
Elliot takes a step forward, a deep, sad frown on his face and her child quiet in his arms. "I don't want to ruin anything for you. Nobody deserves this more than you do."
-x-
2000
Elliot cradled the nameless ICU baby whose case had fallen onto their desks early that morning. His little face was still blue from birth and his body barely bigger than Elliot's palm. He had been swaddled and re-swaddled though, molding him into a sturdy, warm, living lump. Only a tuft of dark hair and a brand new pair of glutinous eyes peeked out at them. Elliot glanced at his partner, noting her soft, conflicted expression. Then he rocked the baby her way, asking quietly:
"You want…?"
"I'm…not used to…" she said but still held her hands out to receive him.
"Support the head," he murmured, shifting one of her hands beneath the baby's soft, furry skull.
"'Kay…" she juggled him against her, her shoulders hunched and an uncertain smile on her face. "God," she glanced up at her partner, her smile increasing, "so tiny..."
"Mother's milk will fatten him up," he mused, eyes on the baby.
Olivia looked down again, poking a finger into the bundle and stroking his cheek. "When we find her for him."
He sighed but nodded. "We will."
She began to sway in place, lulling the baby to back sleep. "Did you always know," she asked a moment later, voice hushed, "that you wanted kids?"
Elliot tipped his head, gave a low chuckle. "Happened a little earlier than planned but yeah…always wanted 'em." He paused, gaze lifting to her face. "How about you? You gonna do it? One day? Have one of your own?"
Olivia kept her eyes on the unknown baby's face. "I dunno," she answered with a slight stammer, "With my history, it's…"
"None of that matters, Olivia." He smiled softly, watching the baby boy open his toothless mouth and release a wide yawn. "All that matters is the love."
She nodded vaguely, bobbing a few times as the baby squirmed in his swaddling. "Shh-shh-shh…"
"And look…" he added, leaning closer to watch the baby settle, the beginnings of a wail subsiding, "You've definitely got the touch."
She looked up, brows raised. "The touch?"
"Can't be taught," he told her with an authoritative dip of his chin. "You've either got it or you don't."
"I see…" Olivia gave a throaty chuckle that was cut short as the nurse entered to reclaim Baby Doe. She handed him over, watched as his swaddled, fragile form was placed in the sterile hospital cot. Then, reassuming the stanch demeanor of her profession, Olivia faced her partner and asked with her eyes if he was ready to track down the mother of their young victim.
-x-
2014
Elliot finds her in the adjacent bedroom. Her jacket is thrown across the foot of the bed, her badge and gun both gone, presumably secured. She's sitting on the bed, scrunching up one leg of her pants to unzip her boot then tug it off. His gaze quickly flits around the room, finding no sign of a second inhabitant. There are no happy couple photos, no mangy man-slippers, none of those crappy spy novels Cassidy used to love. Olivia straightens, throwing away her first boot and flicking her hair out of her face.
"He's asleep," Elliot says, stranded on yet another of her thresholds without knowing if he's welcome to enter.
Olivia just nods and bends to take off her other boot, scrunching up her pant leg, tugging at the boot then shoving her pants down again.
"You look exhausted," he says when she straightens a second time.
"Didn't I always?" she mutters without meeting his eyes.
Elliot steps over the threshold, heads for the bed. "You know the best thing about prison?"
"The charming company?"
He sits beside her, turns to look her. "Ten pm? Lights out."
There's a miniscule moment in which she isn't moving away from him, in which she almost allows the heated pull that still exists when they're in a room together, on a bed together, within reach of each other. Elliot is immensely relieved that it's still there, that it hasn't expired in his absence. It means something – though he's not sure what. If nothing else, it gives him hope – though he's not any surer of what it is he hopes for. Olivia looks at him with a creased brow, her mind making some sort of deeply private calculation. After several long seconds, she gives a slow nod and says:
"You should go."
She leaves the bed and heads for the door. But Elliot stays put.
"Where?" he demands, something of a challenge to the query.
Olivia doesn't turn around. "Home. To bed. To Kathy."
"Why? So you and I can both lie awake thinking about all the things we want to say to each other?"
She stops on the threshold, turns. Placing one hand on the doorframe, Olivia considers him for a long moment. "I have nothing to say to you," she says eventually before walking out of the frame and away from him.
-x-
2001
He'd knocked and called repeatedly. He could hear the phone ring through her resolutely closed door. He could hear her answering machine pick up, her brisk outgoing message followed by a beep then his own incoming message recording as she presumably ignored him. He knew she was in there, though she hadn't let him drive her home. She'd kept her distance at the crime scene, avoiding his concerned gaze while the E.M.T. checked her out. And she'd kept her distance at the stationhouse, disallowing his defensive interjections as she gave her initial statement. She'd told him to leave her alone and apparently she'd meant it, though the vehemence with which she'd addressed him had shocked him. He'd had to chase her, catch her elbow in order to offer her a lift home. Olivia had just stared at him with blank, cold eyes and told him she had nothing to say to him. She'd yanked her elbow free and walked away, abandoning him in the grim aftermath of Eric Plummer's shooting.
They'd been partners nearly three years and, while the beginning may have been bumpy, he now considered them a tight, well-functioning unit. More than just partners, Elliot considered them friends. This was definitely not the first case to knock Olivia sideways but it was the first to impact their partnership, to shake its core stability. And to expose to him that – beneath the intoxicating loyalty and friendship she undoubtedly extended to him – Olivia retained a tenaciously protected singularity. Unlike his life, in which he was never alone, even when he wanted to be, loneliness was her norm. Isolation, her home base. And if pushed to her limit as this case had done, she'd always revert to her default state of aloneness. She'd discount those years of trust and allegiance and interdependence. She'd reject his efforts to protect her or console her or support her. And instead, she'd tackle her demons alone. She would rather risk her life, career and freedom than rely on any one person in her sparsely populated life.
Elliot didn't know how to break through that sort of intensely ingrained independence. Not when it was so integral to who she was and all she'd survived. So he'd quit knocking and quit calling. He'd turned away from her door and headed out into the pouring rain, intending to go home. His inherent stubbornness had intervened though, the only response he could conceive of to her instinctive self-sufficiency. Instead of heading for his car, he'd headed across the street to a cluttered bodega. He'd bought a six-pack of beer and a massive packet of pretzels then headed back to his partner's building. She still wouldn't answer his knock but he didn't expect her to. So Elliot parked himself outside her door in anticipation of the moment she decided she was ready to let him in.
Two beers later, the door swung open. Leaning against it, Elliot nearly fell backwards, landing on his back at her feet. But he caught himself, one hand grasping the molding while the other focused on not spilling his beer on her carpet.
His partner glared down at him. "I thought you left."
"I came back," he replied, showing her the six-pack. "With beer."
She braced one hand on the doorframe and one on the door. "What part of me not answering the door or phone do you not get, you stubborn—"
"Yeah, yeah—" Elliot cut off the familiar accusation, scrambling to his feet and ducking under her arm. "Mind if I use the bathroom? I downed two already."
He didn't wait for permission and Olivia didn't give it. In fact, she was still waiting by the open door when he returned from emptying his bladder. She held the door for him, clearly communicating her desire for his departure, for her continued solitude. But Elliot faced her on the threshold, running an eye over her white singlet, her thin sweater, her lycra leggings and worn sneakers.
"So now you're going running in the rain? What's that supposed to be? Your penance?"
She crossed her arms over her chest. "Don't you think I deserve some?"
He shuffled closer, lowered his voice. "You can't let Plummer do this to you. It's exactly what he wants."
Her eyes met his, giving him that same cold, hard look she'd directed at him at the crime scene. "He doesn't want anything, Elliot, he's dead. I shot him. An innocent man—"
"A killer," he interjected insistently. "Who goaded you into taking that shot. It was suicide by cop."
She shook her head, disconnected eye contact and tried to close the door on him. "Leave me alone. I've got nothing to—"
"Look—" he stopped the door with one hand, bent his head towards hers, "you did your job—"
"No," she insisted, eyes back on his and brows deeply furrowed, "I messed up."
"You're human," he told her quietly, shoulders giving a sad shrug. "Even the best of us are."
She turned away, hiding her eyes, her face from his view. One hand lifted to her lips, fingers pressing against them to stem her tears. Elliot quickly bent to retrieve what was left of his six-pack plus the giant bag of pretzels. Salt, to replace what she'd cried out.
He held out a bottle to her. "Beer?"
She laughed wetly, weakly.
He offered her the pretzel bag. "Pretzel?"
"…Fine." She grabbed the bag and waved him in. "But I don't wanna talk about it."
"Good," he muttered, swinging the door shut and trailing her to the couch, "cos I'm not a counsellor."
She threw the pretzels onto the coffee table and dropped down into the cushions. Elliot took a sip of his beer then sat, easing back into the cushions and turning his head toward her. Olivia squirmed under his gaze then muttered, her voice betraying the aftereffects of her tears:
"Well, don't say nothing either. Just…talk about something else. Anything…" she closed her eyes, ran a hand through her cropped hair, making it stand on end, "I don't wanna think about it anymore…"
Elliot bobbed his head a few times, turning his attention away from her and around the room. Leaning forward, he tabled his drink and located an old newspaper amidst the coffee table chaos. He snapped it open, leafed through it then shot her a sidelong look. "Let's see what the Mets are up to…"
Olivia gave a dim smile then lent forward to claim his beer. She took a sip, then another and another as he began reading aloud, inserting his own mumbled commentary, lamenting over the state of New York's resident teams. As he went on, his partner drew closer, peering over his arm at the paper's headlines and pictures. Toeing off her shoes, she propped her socked feet on the coffee table. Elliot licked his finger, turned the page and moved on to the Knicks. From the corner of his eye he could see her body slacken, one hand cradling his beer against her chest and her head falling back against the cushions. She didn't say anything to contribute, she just listened, the sound of her breath even and deep under the constant hiss of the rain.
Elliot didn't pause in his sport report, not even when her head shifted, dropping onto his shoulder. He stayed right where he was, did exactly what he was doing. His breath may have picked up a little and his heart may have cracked when a single, silent tear rolled out of one eye and landed on his jacket. But Olivia kept her eyes on the paper so Elliot followed her lead and did the same, never ceasing until he had reviewed the entire weekend sports section from two months before.
End of Part Two.