A/N: One-shot, just something that came to me after listening to this song. It's sent in the current time frame, minus the season finale.
No sexy times, sorry. Next one, promise.
I don't believe the things I say
About us when I'm drunk
And distance leaves a bitter taste
When you're gone, when you're gone
(New York – The Boxer Rebellion)
"I wasn't in love with him"
It's 3 am and she's almost through a bottle of cabernet when she decides it, lying on the couch, staring at that fucking picture of them. She can't remember when it was taken, the alcohol making everything hazy, the twelve years of memories mixing together like a tornado in a bottle.
"Fuck him"
She pushes the frame off the end table with her foot, shutting her eyes to ignore the moisture that pools, the sound of shattering glass ripping at her insides. He's gone, and she can't be in love with him, not when there's another man in her bed…not when he fucking walked away without even saying goodbye.
No, she can't be in love with him.
Even if she still is.
I walk the line of great unknowns
But I never questioned us
(New York – The Boxer Rebellion)
His key slides into the door of the new place. The house in Queens has been sold, Kathy's across state lines in Jersey, and he's in a one bedroom in Brooklyn. He figures it doesn't matter where he lays his head at night because he never sleeps anymore and he hasn't been home in years.
Because long ago he realized that home was never the dwelling with the wooden fence, no, home was a feeling, a person, and the one place he ever felt home he can never go again.
When he lies in bed at night, he tries to conjure up her eyes, stares at the flecks of shiny plaster in the popcorn texture of the ceiling and remembers the way they shimmered when she'd smile, and sometimes, he can finally manage to sleep.
OoO
It's not the late nights in the precinct she misses him most. Although she once thought that would be the place. The way he'd place a cup of coffee over her shoulder and onto her desk, knowing she needed another, or look at her from across the pile of paperwork with raised brows and the same look in his eyes that she reflected.
No, it was the mornings she missed him the most. The getting out of bed and knowing that they'd be back together, Benson and Stabler, unstoppable.
Until they weren't anymore.
He had been her safety net, the soft place to land, and now it was like she'd been free falling from the Empire State Building and never really hitting the ground…just in limbo, permanently flailing.
The man next to her moves and turns to her side, she should be happy now…but she's not, and she's not quite sure she even knows what that is anymore.
OoO
"I had to talk to your old Cap"
Nodding, he looks down at his shoes and back up at the man, "Yeah, I figured" he says.
"He gave you a stellar review, I'm glad to have you here"
When he sits at the desk that's now his, he feels like he's coming out of his skin, because the ink splat on the left corner isn't there, and he can't look up and look at those eyes that beckoned him home. Lowering his head, he grabs the first pile of files, he can't keep missing her like this.
OoO
"Stabler's working in Brooklyn"
It captures the breath from her lungs and for a moment she can't fucking breathe but she nods, gives a terse smile, "That's great"
"He and Kathy split up"
The words strike her in places that haven't been touched in the years he's been gone because her first thought is, "What happened, is he okay?"
But it's not her place anymore…he doesn't need her.
That's the part that rips her apart, because he's completely moved on and she's still stuck running in place.
OoO
He's off his game. He knows it but he's trudging through the swamp that's become his life without his life raft and he's just trying to tread water. If he was with her, there would have been no doubt he wouldn't have ignored the feeling creeping up his spine as he knocked on the apartment door.
What actually happened is a blur but he's sitting at a kitchen table with a gun pointed at his head, a bloody wound on his leg and the man's non-shaking hand is barking orders into the walkie-talkie to his frantic partner, "I will fucking shoot him, are you fucking listening to me, I will paint the walls with his fucking brain" he yells into the receiver.
Swallowing hard he licks his dry lips and he thinks of his kids…and he thinks of her because if he dies tonight, there's no doubt who's face is going to be the last that he sees.
OoO
She's finishing up the last of the paperwork on her desk. Brian's talking to Munch at the door, waiting, and he shoots her a cocky smile and she forces one back, ignoring the dread that twists her gut.
"Cap" Rollins says, "The Captain from Brooklyn is on the phone, says there's a cop involved hostage situation, wants to know if we can send anyone"
Brooklyn, Brooklyn, Brooklyn, Brooklyn, Brooklyn.
And she can't fucking breathe as she watches him pick up the phone, before slumping in his chair, and she knows, because she feels it. It's been there, all day, this feeling of being off, the frequency they run always in a similar rhythm…even now, even though he left her.
She loves him, she fucking loves him, and he has to be okay, because if he's not…she can't be either.
OoO
"I don't want to kill you" the younger man admits, "I don't want to kill you man"
His hand shakes, the barrel of the gun scraping his forehead and he looks up at him, meeting his brown eyes, "You don't have to, you're not past the point of no return, okay, just give me the gun, let me out of here. You can still fix your life"
Slowly he raises his hand to the kid's wrist and he nods, tears falling down his cheeks as he lets him take the gun out of his hand and he hopes he still has time to fix his own life.
OoO
"Olivia, you can't"
"Fuck you Brian, get out of my way"
No one could have stopped her, not when he's up there by himself, and she's waiting in between yellow lines, praying for a miracle. Cragen's there, she can feel him standing in back of her, like he's going to catch her if she crumples. Her knees shake and she's surprised she's still upright because it feels as if the earth is dissolving beneath.
Something happens, a flurry of activity, and she sees officer's running up the buildings stairs and his hands are on her arms, "Olivia, he's going to be okay"
They pull a man out, a kid really, tears on his cheeks, his head down and she's holding her breath, moisture pooled in her eyes and the deep sigh doesn't release until the moment he walks out and then two years of emotion rips from her throat and her legs shake as she almost falls to her knees.
Their eyes meet and she rips away from Cragen, and her legs are moving with provocation because all she knows is that anything between them doesn't matter right now because he's okay…he's okay.
OoO
He almost loses it when he meets those cappuccino colored eyes, and he can't help the tears that spill down his cheeks, because she came…and he's finally home again.
His arms open, limping to meet her, and she's in them, her body melding to his, it's been too long and there was never enough of her touch to truly sate the need that coursed through his veins since the day she walked into the one six. He inhales her, his chest heaving against hers, their tears mixing on skin like the cooling waters of baptism, their rebirth, and she lets out a sigh, her fingers digging into his jacket.
"I fucking hate you, don't ever do that to me again" she whispers against his skin, "I fucking hate you"
It rips him apart, the tenderness in her voice, the way it tears from her throat, "I love you Liv…I love you"