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.
Nick looked up from his work as he saw Will come into the squad room. He looked a little lost – almost like he hadn't been there before. But Nick really didn't think he'd been there for some time. He couldn't think of the last time he'd seen him. It certainly had been since before they moved around some of the desks and before Liv had moved into Cragen's office – and Munch's desk had been left vacant. He figured Will hadn't likely been in there since in the days following Liv's assault. He actually wasn't too sure how much Will was around at all anymore, in any way.
He and Liv seemed to have an unstated agreement that they wouldn't talk about their family lives. Olivia had always been tight lipped about it. It took nearly pliers to get out of her that she had a kid and was married at the beginning. Nick actually suspected that if Noah hadn't gotten so sick again, neither him nor Rollins would've ever gotten too much of a glimpse at her family life. Of course, if she hadn't been abducted by Lewis they also likely wouldn't have either. But that certainly had brought the McTeague aspect of it into the limelight. For better and for worse.
It used to be Nick who'd talk a bit about his family. Enough. Enough for the others to know he had a wife and kid at least. That he loved and cared about them. But, he supposed, he'd become just as tight lipped about some of it since his separation from Maria as Liv had always been about her family life.
He'd tried to give her an opportunity to talk about how she was doing. Whether that was about her family or about herself. He'd attempted to broach it a few times since Lewis but she always shut him down. Told him that what she liked was that he'd just been treating her normally and she wanted to keep it that way. He'd respected that. But, if anything, it was a message to him that things were far from OK.
Just how not OK things were was brought into a starker light the previous month when Liv had let him spend a few days on their couch after his house had been shot at and he was going through the court process. He'd been hesitant. Even in the best circumstance it would've been awkward but he also knew that Will McTeague didn't like him very much. Nick wasn't sure he liked McTeague too much either. Or it was just that he didn't know how to relate to the guy a lot of the times. Sometimes he struggled to understand exactly how it would've been that Benson ended up with a guy like that but the most she'd ever said to him with a shrug was, "He was a friend who became something more." Nick supposed he could appreciate that. Seems to be how a lot of things start. But, he, personally, couldn't figure out how to hold a conversation with McTeague in the limited interactions he'd had with him. But he'd also gotten glimpse of how much Will cared about his partner and her son – or he supposed, their son. He'd seen it when the boy was sick and he'd seen it again when his partner was in Lewis' clutches. Actually, Will had been barely holding it together while Liv had been gone. Though, he wasn't sure what he expected him to do? Nick supposed he likely wouldn't have held it together either. But his way of showing that probably would've been to go out on a rampage and looking for Maria himself if something like that had ever happened to his family. He supposed too, though, that Will eventually reached that point. He had showed up at the crime scene where they'd retrieved Liv after all.
Nick, though, got the sense as much as he wasn't sure what to make of McTeague the man felt about the same way towards him. He actually got the sense that McTeague didn't think he was good enough for his wife – not to serve as her partner. He suspected too that the fact his family had fallen victim to Lewis only served to prove that point. As much as Nick sometimes wondered how Will could've let that man touch his son and his wife, he knew that McTeague wondered how her partner, her squad and the whole of the NYPD and judiciary system let it get so far that that had actually been allowed to happen to his family. Nick gotten the sense that that hadn't been forgiven yet – and it doubted that it could ever be something that could be forgotten. Nick knew he'd never forget. Whenever he looked at Olivia and could still see the hurt there – and not just that, the change in the woman that he'd come to know – it made him think about it. It made him think about how broken Will had seemed in that interrogation room. It made him think about how empty Noah had seemed in the lounge. It made him think about Olivia half naked and tied to the bed while Lewis bled out slumped on top of her. And it made him wish so much that they hadn't gotten EMS in there to deal with it. That they'd let him die. He thought about how confused and dazed Olivia seemed when they guided her out of that beach house and to the bus. How already she was sputtering about how Lewis was still alive. It made him think about the next day at the precinct when she had to come in for her debriefing and with her sling and baggy clothes and bruised and battered face, she looked even smaller and more broken and embarrassed than she had in that beach house. And then he thought about how it seemed like they weren't supposed to talk about any of it.
It was really only Rollins who ever seemed to broach the subject. To say that Liv was off, that her judgment was impaired, that how she interacted with victims and suspects and perps and cases now was different and how they had to be careful about that. The rest of them – all the men at the office – they seemed to just defender her, to give her space, to not discuss it. Nick wasn't sure that was right. It was just burying it in a different way and making it like she wasn't allowed to talk about it either. The stigma of it ran so deep. It wasn't exactly that he wanted to talk about any of it either. Dealing with emotions wasn't entirely his strong point. But she clearly needed someone to talk to about it.
That was made even more clear in those few nights at her apartment. His worries about his interactions with Will faded to be replaced with the realization that his partner wasn't having much interaction with her husband either. The man had hardly been there – and when he was, he and Olivia were rarely in the same room. The guy was always coming home while into the evening, usually after Liv already had her kid to bed. If Olivia was working at the table or sitting on the couch, Will usually disappeared to their bedroom in the back of the apartment. If Olivia had already gone in there (likely to be away from Nick), Will would come and sit on the couch and stare at the TV with him silently for a while. Sometimes a long while to the point that Nick measured how rude it would be to tell the guy that he sort of wanted to lie down and try to get some sleep. Though, he suspected with all the things going on in Will's head, he was likely sleeping about as much as he was with the shooting and the court case and IAB. So not much. But all of that just concerned him too. It made him worry more that Olivia really wasn't coping. That it wasn't just her that wasn't coping – clearly her whole family wasn't.
Though, maybe this appearance was a sign of hope. Will was holding a bouquet of flowers. Though with the way he was holding it, it looked like he didn't really know how to be gentle with flowers or he was deeply embarrassed about having them in his possession.
"Hi Will," Nick offered.
It took Will a minute to find his eyes. He was still looking around the bullpen like it had changed immensely since the last time he was there and he was just hoping that Liv would materialize in front of him.
"Oh … hey …" Will said absently but kept glancing about.
"She's not here," Nick offered.
The man's eyes fell on him more at that point and he seemed to consider that. "Oh …" he said and looked at the bouquet.
"Brought her flowers?" Nick tried because as usual the man didn't seem to even want to attempt to make conversation with him.
"Ah … yeah …" Will said and then gestured at them again like he was still embarrassed to have them. Nick was guessing that Liv hadn't gotten a lot of flowers from the guy over the course of their relationship if this was how he seemed to feel with them. Though, he supposed that a lot of times flowers were an indication of a peace offering after having done something wrong. "I was late last night," Will offered. That didn't surprise Nick. It seemed like he was most nights. "Noah was giving her a hard time. I just thought …" He dropped his hand and let out a little sigh.
Nick just allowed a nod. "Well, she's out at a meeting with Barba right now and then I think she's got one of her appointments after that."
"Oh …" Will said and shook his head. "Yeah. OK. I forgot that it was Wednesday." Will looked around again. "Ah … well … which desk is hers now? Or the … ?" he pointed at Cragen's door.
Nick shrugged. "She's not spending a lot of time in there yet," he said. "Not sure she's quite comfortable in the boss' chair."
Will gazed at him more with that. "Oh …" he said but he'd gone back to examining the desks, likely trying to find some picture or belonging that marked it as his wife's. But Liv didn't leave many personal effects on display anymore. Not that she ever had. But they'd really disappeared since Lewis.
"That's hers," Nick said and nodded across from him. "But … you might want to take them home? She might like coming home to that," he suggested.
Will looked down at the flowers and seemed to think about that and then just shook his head again and set them on the desk. "I'll just leave them," he said.
Nick sort of wanted to press him. To tell him to take the bouquet home to his wife. Hell. Pick up something to make her a nice dinner while he was at it. But he wasn't exactly the best person to be giving martial advice. He sort of thought, though, that maybe Will and Liv needed some. He definitely got the sense they were struggling. And, Nick at least knew what martial problems looked like. He knew how much that hurt and how stressful it was. He wouldn't wish it on anyone – especially his partner, with everything else her and her family were already dealing with. It was enough as it was. But he was also sure it was contributing to whatever they were going through now.
"Hey Will …" Nick called, trying again as it looked like the man was just turning to leave about as silently as he'd come in. "I've been meaning to thank you for letting me crash on your couch for that bit. You just weren't around when I was leaving to say."
Will just gave a small nod of acknowledgement that he'd said it. "Yeah, it's OK," he allowed. "… It's what partners do, I guess."
Nick allowed his head to bob a bit at that. He wasn't sure it was what partners did. Maybe in an ideal world it would be. But it was what Olivia did. He wasn't sure if she'd had done it in other circumstances. He got the sense that part of the reason the space had been offered up was simply because she didn't want to be alone in the evenings and could use some distraction. Nick supposed he could use the same. But it made it more awkward and even more concerning.
"Well … I appreciated it," he said.
That small nod from the man again. "Your daughter doing OK?" he asked.
Nick made a small gesture. "Yeah, she's staying with her mom for now. … In DC."
"That's hard," Will said quietly.
Nick looked down at his desk. It was hard. He hated it. As much as he hated what was going on between him and Maria, he hated the rift it was causing in his relationship with his daughter more. He missed Zara so much. He missed all the things that he was missing because of this separation.
"How's Noah?" he asked, though.
Will shrugged. "Yeah … you know …"
"Giving his mom trouble …" Nick put back to him. It was almost a question. He sort of wanted to know. He'd seen some of the extreme emotions that were going on in the boy when he'd been there. That he was scared and sad and angry. He was clingy and teary and a fit of tantrums. He was a handful. But he had a lot going on for a little kid.
But Will just shrugged.
"You OK?" Nick tried instead.
"Yeah … you know …" Will offered again and then just gestured at the elevators. "I've gotta get back to work. But let her know I stopped by."
Nick pointed at the flowers. "I think she'll figure it out."
Will looked at them and seemed to have to think about it. "Yeah … maybe …"
