Title: Therapy

Author: ZombieJazz

Fandom: Law & Order: SVU

Disclaimer: I don't own them. Law and Order SVU and its characters belong to Dick Wolf. The characters of Will (and his family) and Noah have been created and developed for the sake of this AU series.

Summary: Olivia talks to her therapist about her husband's reaction to her pregnancy test results and the implications it has for their relationship. A O/S of the therapist office scene in Wednesday's child.

Author's Notes: This AU series is for SVU fans and readers who want Olivia to have something that resembles a more normal life outside of work and a family of her own - hopefully somewhat realistically within the canon of SVU. My stories are not EO and never will be. You may want to read some of my other ones for context on the characters in this AU first - though, it's likely fairly self-explanatory on its own too.

Noah slammed down his pencil and glared at her. "I AM NOT DOING THIS NO MORE!" he yelled at her.

Olivia drilled into his eyes. "You don't raise your voice to me, Noah," she said sternly. "I'm your mother. You don't talk to me like that."

He sulked and flopped his forehead against his hand and glared at his homework in front of him. "I hate math," he said. "It's stupid."

She looked at the top of his downcast head. "Those are two words we don't use in this house either, sweets," she said a bit more gently and pulled the assignment a bit closer to her to take a look at. She flipped through the pages and let out her own small sigh. "Com'on," she said, though. "There's only two more pages."

"Two and a half," Noah muttered at her.

She shrugged. "OK, well, two and a half. Let's get it done."

"I don't want to," Noah pouted.

"I know you don't want to," she conceded. "But you have to."

The reality was that she didn't really want to either. She didn't mind helping her son with most of his homework. She could sit there and help him with his reading and his writing. She could apply that to his sciences and social studies work. She didn't mind coaching him through some of his projects and or helping him come up with ideas or decorations. She was good at all of that. She knew how to manage all of that and motivate him and even how to teach and guide him. But when it came to fourth grade math? Well, she got just as frustrated as him.

She knew it shouldn't be this hard for her. It was math questions designed for nine and ten-year-old kids. But math had either gotten a lot more sophisticated since she was a kid or she'd gotten a whole lot dumber about it. What she did know was that if Noah couldn't figure out how to answer the question on his own she sat there with a pencil and paper – erasing madly – for about as long as him (sometimes longer) trying to come up with an answer. And, even when she did manage to come up with an answer she rarely could figure out how to explain to him how she'd reached it. Sometimes she didn't even really know how she managed to get it. What she did know was that most of the time she wanted to reach for a calculator just as much as him.

It was made all the more frustrating because she knew that Will could barely glance at the questions and know the answer. Not to mention his ability to explain this stuff to Noah was pristine. He could explain it in ways that even she could understand it. He knew how to teach there son to do it so he could actually apply it and do it himself later. Or at least that he could eventually get to being able to do it himself. But Will wasn't there that night – and he hadn't really been there much for math help since January. So Olivia had been trying to fill in. Noah was apparently just as frustrated with that situation as she was.

"I'll do it when Dad gets home," Noah said. "You don't know what you're doing."

He'd said it so flatly and it wasn't even looking at her. But it still struck her. He wasn't exactly calling her stupid but it still hurt. She wasn't sure it was his observation that she was failing – the fact that he knew that she was struggling. Or it was that he so clearly wanted his father more than her in that moment and she couldn't provide that. But it hurt.

She sat back in her chair a bit looked at him. He was rubbing his eraser over yet another answer that they'd tried to work out and hadn't been able to. They'd been sitting there for an hour and they'd barely made it through half a page. She wasn't sure they were realistically going to be able to make it through the remaining two-and-a-half pages. Not if she wanted him to have anything that resembled a childhood and a break before she was starting to hustle him to bed. That hurt too. She hated spending so much time with him doing homework at night. She valued education. She knew her son was smart. She had so many high hopes for him. But so much of that had been dashed and now so many of her priorities had shifted. Spending endless hours doing homework in a week just seemed like such a waste of precious time no matter how much she wanted her son to be educated.

"You're going to do it now, Noah," she finally managed to say and to do it as emotionlessly as possible. "Daddy's not going to be home until late."

"He's always home late," Noah mumbled.

Olivia sighed and rubbed her eyebrow. "He's been trying to come home on time lately. But he has a class tonight. He's teaching."

"No he's not," Noah spat and glared at her. "There's no school at night."

She met his eyes again. He could be so mouthy lately and she knew she was struggling with managing it. Before she never would've let him talk to her – or anyone else – that way. Now she often couldn't bring herself to discipline him. Not in the way she used to. She knew how much he was hurting. She knew how much anger and rage was in him. She so didn't want any of it directed at her yet so much of it did end up being sent her way. What she really wanted was just to have her little boy back and for him to be happy and smiley and stable again. Some days that seemed so far out of reach – especially when he grew frustrated with something. And there was so much to be frustrated about anymore.

"Watch your tone, Noah," she said firmly again. "And, yes, there is school at night when you get into college and university."

Noah huffed at her and looked at the homework again. "I'm never taking school at night," he said.

She allowed a small smile at that. "You might feel differently about that by the time you're in college."

"No I won't," he said and scribbled an answer on to the sheet.

She pulled it back over to her and looked at it. He'd just randomly written down 438. She looked at him.

"Do you think that's the right answer?" she asked.

"I don't know," he said in a voice she knew he was near tears. He was so tired and so frustrated at that point. "I don't know how to do it."

She nodded. "OK. Well, let's read it again and look at the examples again – and then we'll try to figure out the answers again," she said and took her own eraser to work on his dark, heavy-handed numbering.

"Dad's better," Noah put back to her again. "He's a professor."

She looked at him again. "Dad is not here right now. So I am helping you, Noah. That's enough for that. I don't want to hear anymore of it. You're hurting my feelings."

Noah examined her at that and seemed to really consider it. Consider it really with too much depth for a nine-year-old. Watching him process her statement actually almost hurt more than him telling her how much she sucked at math and how much he just wanted his Daddy. Some things Daddy just made better faster and easier than her. But Daddy just wasn't that available right now. He was hurting too much too.

Olivia really didn't want either of her boys to hurt. She just wanted her family to be whole again. And for all the little steps they took towards that some days it just felt like they were so far away from that ever being a reality again.

"Sorry Mom," Noah said softly and gave her his deep puppy dog eyes. He really was sorry. She could tell. He didn't want to hurt her. He hadn't meant to. It wasn't his intention. There was just so much stirring inside him anymore too. Even with all the help they were getting him, he was still learning how to manage any of it. And just like so many other things, it seemed like he was so far away from being able to and that all the therapy hadn't come close to doing enough to help her baby. That William Lewis had scarred her child for life in a way that struck her to the very core and for which she wasn't sure she'd ever be able to forgive herself.

"I know, Noah," she said. She sighed and kept her eyes with him. "Sweets, I know things haven't been that nice around here lately and you miss Daddy. But Daddy and I are working really hard right now to make them better. Things are going to get better. I promise you."

Her little boy gazed at her silently for what felt like an eternity. "You guys are hugging. That's good right?" he finally asked.

She gave him a small smile and a little nod. "It is good," she agreed. "It's very good." But, in reality, it pained her to know that her and Will's division had become so apparent that even their child had noticed they hadn't been hugging. It was that stark to him.

Noah just looked at her again. Took her in again. "Is Dad mad at us?" he asked finally.

Olivia felt tears sting the back of her eyes at that and quickly shook her head and reached out to find her son's hand. "No, Noah. Daddy is not mad at us." She sighed. This was going to take her conversations with Will to a different level. Their son couldn't be thinking there was any sort of anger going on between them. But it was even worse for him to fear that Will was mad at him in some way. "Daddy loves you very much," she said. "He loves both of us very much."

"Then how come he doesn't come home and play and help with homework anymore?"

Olivia let out a slow breath and rubbed her thumb across the top of her son's hand. "Daddy really is trying to be home more lately, sweets. He really is – and he really does have a class to teach tonight. But …" she paused and tried to collect her thoughts. Sometimes – all the time – talking to her son about any of this had been really hard. She knew they hadn't been managing it as well as they should. Sometimes she could just erase it all for him – like he was doing on that paper. That she could just make what happened disappear. "The trial," she finally said softly but looking directly at her son and he seemed to sense it was hard for her to say and his little hand gripped at hers more. "That was hard, right?"

Noah nodded. "Because the bad man was there," he agreed. "And they asked lots of questions about what he did."

Olivia nodded. "Yes, and that was really hard. It made me very sad and it made me very angry too," she said.

Noah nodded harder. "And it made everyone cry. Even Popa cried."

Olivia sucked in the lump in her throat and nodded in agreement. She didn't want to think about the trial. She didn't want to think about what her family had been put through and what her family had to hear. She didn't want to think about her son on the stand. She didn't want to think about Lewis screaming in his face or the feeling of his salvia hitting her – spraying against her – again.

"He did," she managed to agree. "And, all of that made Daddy really sad. Just like all of us. It made him remember things and feel differently than before. It made me feel all kinds of things too. Just like you, right?"

Noah nodded. "I didn't like the trial, Mommy," he said.

She shook her head. "Neither did I, sweetheart. But it meant that the bad man went to jail."

"Popa says he didn't go to jail for long enough."

She gave him a thin smile. "But he went to jail. So we're safe now – and everyone else that he might've hurt is safe now too. And us talking to the judge about what happened let us help make sure other people were safe. So that's good, right?"

"Yeah," Noah said quietly but she could feel his uncertainness. She understood it. Sometimes she felt the same uncertainness. She wasn't sure any of it was worth it. Especially when he hadn't gone away for everything. Especially when she'd never forget – and neither would her husband or son. They'd be carrying that with them for the rest of their lives.

"Yeah," she nodded. "But sometimes thinking about it all is hard, isn't it?" She saw the way he was looking at her. The look told her more than she needed to know. They hadn't been talking about any of this very well with him lately. They hadn't been giving him enough opportunity to talk or to feel. They'd been struggling so much in their own emotions – their own mess – that they hadn't been giving their son the outlets he needed to cope. They'd just been sending him to therapy and hoping that would be enough. That's all they'd been doing since January because her and Will were barely coping on their own.

She held his hand a little tighter and gave him a small smile. "Sometimes when thinking about something is hard and we don't like the things it makes it us remember or the way it feels – we think it's easier if we just bottle it all up and not talk about it. But that's not a very good way to deal with things, Noah. It's a really bad way to deal with feelings and hurt. But Daddy and I … we forgot that for a little while too. So we're working on talking about our feelings again now and dealing with them. And, you're allowed to be talking about your feelings too, sweets. You're still allowed to be angry and scared and sad. And you're allowed to tell people that's how you feel."

He gazed at her. "I don't like feeling angry and scared and sad, Mommy," he said.

She nodded. "I know, sweetheart. I don't like feeling that way either. That's why we need to all do better at talking. It will help us not feel those things quite as much. We'll learn how to deal with those feelings."

Noah looked down at his homework again and fingered at the corner of the one page. "Sometimes doing school stuff is hard when I feel stuff, Mom," he said. "Sometimes I don't like the other kids too."

Him saying it broke her heart a little bit more. Her son used to be so good at school. He may not have had the most friends. His cancer might've left him on the outskirts. But academically – he'd always been strong. He'd always been bright. But now? She knew even from the amount of homework he was brining home – from the endless comments from his teacher and from the phone calls home – he just wasn't doing his work in class. He wasn't concentrating.

But she made herself nod. "I know, sweets," she allowed. "But school is really important too. To me and to Daddy. And you're so smart. So it's important that you try your best and that you listen in class and you do your homework."

The look he gave her was more sad than a pout but the message was the same. He was done for the night. He wanted to get to go and play with his Lego and watch some television and then go to bed. She suspected that night he was going to want to crawl into her bed – and that he'd end up sprawled all over Will, seeking the attention he'd so clearly been missing and craving.

She allowed a little sigh but tapped on the page. "I want us to finish this page tonight, Noah," she said. "But we're going to have to get you caught up on the weekend. You can't get behind."

He looked at the page and let out a sad sound. "I don't know how," he whined in that near tears voice again. "I really don't Mom. I don't know how."

She nodded. "I know. So we're going to read the examples again and we're going to try again. We only have five more questions on this page Noah."

She saw the tear trickle down his face and it dropped and splattered onto the page. He reached and wiped it away and she again found his hand and rubbed her thumb across the top of it and then reached and brushed his awkward bangs back from his face and gave him a small smile.

"Don't cry, sweets," she said softly. "We can figure it out together."

"We aren't smart like Daddy," he said quietly.

She nodded. "Noah. We are just as smart as Daddy. The two of us together are even smarter than Daddy."

He shook his head. "Daddy knows lots about math."

"He does," she said. "But you and I know lots about all kinds of other things – and I know if we put our heads together we can figure out these lousy math problems. So com'on, let's finish up."

Noah just sniffled and swiped at his eyes and she sat watching him. Waiting for some sign that he was ready to continue. That if she read the examples out loud with him again that he'd actually be listening and following along and not just sitting there in tears waiting for her to figure out how to do it all for him.

She let out a little sigh and looked at him. She was going to break another one of her parenting rules that had been bent so much since Lewis. Bent even more than she'd ever been willing to bend them while her son had had cancer. But things were different now. Motivations and distractions and things to look forward to had become a standard staple in their lives but none of them ever really seemed to be enough to provide the kind of relief that any of them needed.

"OK, sweets, how about this – if we get through this page tonight and we have you all caught up on your math homework before Friday – on the weekend, you can get a new Lego set?"

He looked up at her and eyed her. He was clearly weighing that statement. He undoubtedly knew it was a bribe. It wasn't even a very good one. It was too vague. Her son would want more details.

"Do I have to use my allowance?" he asked cautiously.

She shook her head. "No. Mommy and Daddy will buy it for you. But there will be a price limit."

He squinted a bit at that. "How much?" he asked.

She gave him a small smile and "Hmm…" she thought about it. "Twenty-five dollars."

"So does that mean I can get two or three if I get cheap ones?"

She smiled more at that and shook her head. "No, Noah. One Lego set. The most expensive it can be is $25. Or it can be anything less than $25."

He looked like he was considering that.

"Sounds like a good deal to me," Olivia pressed him. "How many weeks allowance is $25?"

Noah thought about that. "Twenty five divided by nine," he said.

"So how many weeks is that?"

He looked at the ceiling and counted on his fingers. "Almost three. Two and some days," he said.

She nodded. "Only me and Daddy don't give you by days. So you'd have to wait three weeks to be able to afford a $25 Lego set. That's almost a month."

"Yeah. But I have $25 in my bank," he said.

She shrugged. "Well, if you do this deal that $25 will still be in your bank and you'll have a new Lego set. Considering it sounds like you know how to do math pretty good, this might be a deal to get on-board with, Noah."

He looked at her and thought about it some more. "What happens if I don't finish?" he asked.

"I'm going to be upset with you tonight and your teacher won't likely be very happy with you at school tomorrow either," she said and gave him a look.

Noah sighed. "What if I don't get the rest done by the weekend?"

"You will," she said. "Daddy can't help you tonight but he will help you tomorrow night."

He still needed to think about it. Her son was a bit of a negotiator. Sometimes she sort of liked it. Though, in that moment she'd prefer they just got back to the homework because she'd really like to be done and cuddling on the touch with him watching old 1960s Batman episodes too.

"Are you sure?" he asked.

She nodded. "I am sure."

He thought another beat. "Do I get to go to the Lego store or the toy store to pick?"

She rubbed her eyebrow and weighed how to answer that. She probably should've waited until Will was there to talk about this with him too. But she did want to give him time to acclimatize to the idea – and they were running out of days for that. She thought that Will would get over it. She hoped.

"Daddy and I were actually talking about taking you to the Lego Discovery Center this weekend," she said. "So you'd get to pick there."

Noah squinted in some thought at that. "What's that? The Lego store?"

She nodded. "It's sort of like the Lego store but it's got some rides and games and a movie theater. Some fun things to do," she said. "You'll get to build things and see some pretty neat sets already built."

"You get to build things?" Noah asked excitedly. "Like what?"

"Hmm," she considered that and wracked her brain trying to remember what all the website had said. "I think race cars and towers. Maybe other things."

Noah's eyes lit up a bit at that. The most she'd seen them light up in a while. But then they darkened. "Wait …" he said, "Will Dad come?"

She nodded. "Yes, sweets. Dad is going to come. It's Daddy who suggested we go."

There was some clear disbelief in his eyes at that. It told her too much about how poorly her and Will had been managing things. Olivia knew she'd been trying to convince herself that their son hadn't really noticed how much tension there had been between her and Will. She'd even more thoroughly been trying to convince herself that Noah was oblivious to Will's absence. That she was enough for him. That it didn't really matter who was home as long as someone was there with him. But his comments that evening showed her just how much she'd been fooling herself.

"He said he'd come?" Noah clarified.

She nodded again. "Yes, Noah. Daddy said he's going to come."

He thought for another moment – seeming to weigh whether or not he was going to accept that. Deciding if he was remotely excited about this idea at all. Olivia really wanted him to be excited. She wanted him to have something to look forward to to get him through this week. She wanted them to be able to do something as a family together outside of the apartment. She just wanted something normal. Something that remotely resembled the times they'd spent together before. Though, this was a little more sophisticated than what most of their previous Saturday afternoons might've looked like. But at least it was a start. A step forward for them to build on.

"I don't want to go the movie," Noah said finally. "It will be dark."

She couldn't even remember the last time they'd been to a movie. But it was definitely before Lewis.

"We don't have to see the movie there if you don't want to, sweets," she assured him.

He thought about it some more. "Are the rides in the dark?"

She shrugged. "I don't know, sweetheart. We'll have to ask when we're there."

"Do they tie you up?"

Her heart broke again and her eyes stung. She despised that the dark was something that scared him now. But it hurt even more to know that what would be little more than a seatbelt in all likelihood now constituted being tied up by her son. And, she knew he'd never agree to that.

"The rides will likely have some sort of safety harness," she allowed. "A bar or a seatbelt."

"Then I don't want to go on the rides," Noah told her firmly.

She nodded. "We don't have to do anything you don't want to do, Noah."

He looked at her some more and then looked back at his homework. "But I still can build things and pick a Lego set?" he clarified.

She nodded again and again reached for his hands. "You can. And there will be other things to do there besides the rides and the movie, Noah. We'll do whatever you feel comfortable with."

He tapped his eraser against the worksheet some more and then looked back up to her. "Maybe we should tell Popa to come," he suggested.

She examined him at that suggestion. Noah had become very dependent on his grandfather since the assault. They'd had a bond before but what had developed in the past months was different.

"Would you like Popa to come?" she asked.

"Well, he tells Dad to stop being grouchy when he's grouchy," Noah said.

Olivia allowed a small smile at that. "He does. Sometimes Daddy even listens."

"And he's our bodyguard, Mom. He says so. So that way you won't have to be scared when we're there."

"I won't be scared when we're there," she assured him but then looked at him more closely. "Will you be?"

Noah shook his head. "Not if we bring Popa."