Elliot continued to glance in the rearview mirror through the duration of the drive, nervously checking Noah for any discomfort.
At first Noah engaged in a lively conversation with Eli about college and all of Eli's new friends, but he grew quieter as the drive wore on. At this point, he had been silent for almost a half hour with his eyes fixed out the window.
Elliot spent the better part of the week reassuring Liv that everything would be fine. He'd taken his boys to the lake for years. He even googled the location so Olivia could see that the campsite wasn't frequented by bears, and there weren't any serial killers or mysteriously missing people in the area.
Elliot hadn't worried about any of those things, but as the scenery became more rural, he finally acknowledged his own nerves over taking his kids out to the lake. It wasn't like he thought anything bad would happen, but painful memories from the previous summer continued to rear up, causing his heart to clench in his chest. It had been a school trip. It shouldn't have been safe, but the darkness that often stalked his life was able to find them in the quiet stillness of the woods. What once provided a consistent source of calm now filled him with apprehension.
Service became spotty as they wound through the mountain roads, eventually making Eli give up on texting his girlfriend. Five minutes later, he fell asleep with his head resting against the window.
Elliot glanced over at Dickie in the passenger seat, scrolling on his phone and listening to music with his earbuds. He appeared mentally checked out, so Elliot thought it would be safe to start a semi-private conversation with the anxious child in the backseat.
"Doin' okay, Noh?" He glanced at the rearview mirror, but Noah's eyes remained fixed out the window.
"Yeah, I'm okay. Just… nervous a little." He finally turned his head so Elliot could make brief eye contact in the mirror. "I know it's going to be fine, but my stomach still feels," he sighed, "nervous."
Elliot nodded, bringing his eyes back to the road curving in front of them. "Would it help if I told you I feel the same way?"
That caught Noah's attention. "You do?"
Elliot nodded. "Yeah. The last time we did this..." His grip tightened on the steering wheel. "Last time was hard on all of us, but you know what?" Elliot glanced up at the rearview mirror so he could see Noah's eyes.
"What?"
"I'm pretty damn proud of you for coming on this trip. It's really brave." Elliot continued to reassure him. "I'm glad you are giving this another shot."
Noah shrugged and turned back towards the window. For a moment he just watched the trees blur past, but eventually he spoke. "I don't," he started, but he struggled to find the words. "I really liked being outside with all the plants and animals and stuff. I liked that part a lot, and I think," he bit his lip, "I don't think Clem would want me to be afraid of something that I really enjoyed."
Elliot felt his throat tighten as a lump of emotion formed in his throat. "I think you're right." Elliot felt tears sting the corners of his eyes, but he blinked them back quickly. "You're a pretty great kid, you know that, right?"
Noah grinned and rolled his eyes. "You and Mom tell me all the time."
"Well, it's true," Elliot defended himself with a smile.
A mischievous smile snuck across his face. "You're lucky I don't have an ego like Dickie. Otherwise, you and mom would be raising me to be a total..."
Elliot cut him off. "Please tell me they," he glanced at his boys, "haven't 'expanded your vocabulary'."
Noah laughed. "Uh. No, not at all." He shook his head. "You realize I'm in seventh grade, right? Like, I hear worse words every day."
"Yeah. Not sure I love that," Elliot grumbled.
Noah shrugged before his eyes shifted back to the window. "How much longer?
Elliot glanced at the clock on the dash and the GPS screen. "Twenty minutes, I think."
"Cool."
Elliot's eyes returned to the road. Deciduous trees with their large, brightly colored leaves began to become more sparse, giving way to the more cold-hardy pine. The temperature began to drop as they continued their ascent up the mountain.
Silence once again blanketed the truck, and Elliot resisted the urge to continually check on Noah. He would be fine. They would be fine. He just prayed to God that the trip would go smoothly and they could all enjoy some time unplugged and away from it all.
-000-
"You freaking out," Amanda said over the ambient sounds of the bar.
"I'm not freaking out," Olivia insisted as she eyed Amanda over her drink. "They're fine. They called just before they made it to the lake. Everything's fine."
Amanda rolled her eyes and took a swig of her drink. "Yeah, okay. I'll try to get on board for the fake it till you make it mentality."
"I'm not," Olivia waved her off. "It's fine. They are going to catch fish, pee in the woods, and do all that man-bonding shit." She sipped on her drink. "It's going to be fine."
"Fine." Amanda agreed. Olivia knew she was itching to point out the number of times she said the word fine in the past two minutes, but thankfully she held her tongue. Instead, she shifted the conversation to another uncomfortable topic. "So… you picked out rings yet?"
Olivia choked on her drink. Sometimes she swore Amanda did all she could to provoke a reaction. "Uh," she reached for some nearby napkins. "Yeah. We're not." She took a deep swallow from her glass. "We aren't there yet."
Amanda's eyes danced with mischief. "You mean you aren't there yet."
Olivia shook her head. "No, I mean, I know him, and I'm sure he's thought about it, but not seriously. I mean, we don't even officially live together."
Amanda laughed. "Seriously, Liv? That's just a formality at this point. You both might still have your own places, but I'm willing to bet he's at yours nearly every night."
Olivia's cheeks flushed a little. "Not every night."
"Yeah? I guarantee the only reason he keeps his apartment is because he doesn't want to spook you, and he wants a place for his kids to gather without overwhelming you. Have you even talked about it?"
She wasn't wrong. There wasn't a solid reason why they hadn't taken the plunge and officially moved in together. Elliot took over half her closet, had two drawers, his own toothbrush, and DVR settings on the TV. Likewise, she and Noah had nearly full closets at his place. She even had several pairs of earrings and other jewelry items tucked into a jewelry box he specifically bought to keep at his place. Living together was just a formality neither of them had pushed for. They were comfortable, and maybe that's why Olivia resisted any sort of change.
"I, no, not really. And it wouldn't overwhelm me," she said. "Things are just good, I guess. Why change something that's working?"
She was happy. She and Elliot were good together. Sure, they bickered, and they sometimes had full-on verbal sparring matches, but in a matter of hours the storm would blow over, and they would find safety and strength in each other's arms. Things were good, and rings changed things. Plus, she didn't need a ring to feel certain of Elliot's commitment. He showed up for her every day, in every way that mattered, and that was more than she could ever ask for.
Amanda watched her for a moment, and Olivia realized she hated that all of her friends were overly perceptive, intuitive cops. Olivia liked to believe that she had a good poker face, but her friends were trained to pick apart the slightest incongruities.
Amanda reached for her straw and stirred her drink aimlessly. Her eyes remained focused on the small whirlpool forming in the liquid. "But what if things could be better?" Amanda's bright eyes lifted, and she posed a question that would haunt Olivia for the foreseeable future. "What if you could be more?"
-000-
Dickie had decided to run a little interference for Noah the moment Olivia said yes. Dickie only had a cop for one of his parents, and that was bad enough. Nearly every adult in Noah's life worked for some form of law enforcement, and Dickie couldn't imagine what that might be like.
He was also well aware of his father's tendency to be overprotective, especially when it came to Olivia and, by extension, Noah. The kid was growing up, and both his "parents" treated him like he was made of glass.
It wasn't their fault. He was quite cognizant of the outright horrors his dad and Liv encountered on a daily basis. Between their jobs and what happened the previous year, Dickie worried the kid was at risk of full parental smothering.
His dad was right on schedule for doling out the unnecessary long list of camping rules as they pulled up to the campsite next to the lake. Dickie looked over his shoulder, slightly satisfied that Noah wasn't listening to one word coming out of his dad's mouth. He had his window down, his hands gripping the door as he stuck his head out. His blue eyes widened with wonder and appreciation for the wild beauty surrounding them.
He knew Noah had an artist's soul, and the landscape ahead of them was truly breathtaking. Elliot had barely dropped the truck into park before Noah's door swung wide open. Boots hit the dirt, and Dickie exited the truck just as swiftly, making his way to the other side of the truck before his father opened the door. He knew the minute his dad exited the vehicle he would start listing things that needed to be done, and while Dickie understood the importance of getting camp set up before dark, he wanted Noah to have time to explore a little before the sunset.
"Dad, how 'bout you and Eli unpack the truck and start working on the tent so I can show Noah around a bit?"
His father pursed his lips, and Dickie knew challenging his dad's sense of order was a little risky. The military and a law enforcement career didn't exactly make Elliot Stabler a flexible man.
"Come on, Dad." He knew he had a track record for being an ass who happily provoked his dad, but this wasn't one of those times.
"Yeah, why don't you walk him to the pier and show him the boardwalk? Eli and I can handle camp for a bit." He glanced over his shoulder and frowned when he caught Eli holding his cell phone up in a futile attempt to get any service. Dickie mentally facepalmed. Eli was in for an earful, and from the looks of it, he might need a little grounding. "Eli," his dad snapped.
Before anything could get more intense, he turned back to Noah, who was already pulling a sketchbook from his backpack. Dickie tilted his head towards the water. "Wanna check out the pier?"
Noah nodded eagerly, slinging his pack over his shoulder before following Dickie down the short path towards the lake. A few trees blocked their view of the truck, but Dickie could already hear his dad throwing down a familiar lecture. One Dickie had become intimately familiar with in his youth. He shook his head. They would work it out.
Dickie looked up to see that Noah had gotten ahead of him a little ways, making it to the edge of the shore before he did. Dickie jogged a little to catch up. "Whatcha think, Noh?"
Noah's eyes swept over the lake's glistening surface. "It's beautiful." A smile crept across his face. "I wanna see the boardwalk so we can get back before Elliot kills Eli."
Dickie let out a full-bodied laugh. The kid didn't miss a thing. "Alright then, let's go."