Chapter Text
The one-six is buzzing with noise today. It’s certainly a busy morning, he and Nick along with Fin have taken care of all the witnesses and paperwork.
Olivia still hasn’t shown up.
She told him on the phone that she would make a stop first and she’ll try to be here as soon as possible. There’s traffic today, a lot of it and it may take an hour tops to get to the 1-6.
He knows that she’s feeling pressured with all the responsibility that comes with the position of a Sergeant and he constantly tries to help, to take the weight off of her shoulders and just let her breathe for a few minutes.
There’s also the added baggage of Cassidy and their relationship. He can admit that seeing them living together and still going strong after Lewis especially, is like someone is poking him with a hot iron on the chest.
He would never intervene with her life and mess up the progress of her recovery especially after he had been part of it, front and center, but watching Olivia with other men has always been a torture, always made him go off the rails and act a little feral because he thought he had a claim on her.
He wishes he had, especially since he is divorced.
After Lewis, Kathy figured out his scheme and what’s been hiding inside his heart. She had seen the level of desperation, hurt and pain he had concerning Olivia. It didn’t take long for a heartbreaking conversation to take place in which she decided she deserved better than a man who is in love with another woman in a way he never was with her.
Taking a deep breath and holding his cup of coffee as he passes by to head to his desk, he sees as Olivia walks quickly inside the squadroom and sits down.
Her short hair shines in the lights of the precinct and he wants nothing more than to tag a stray tendril and pull it behind her ear.
Nick comes and offers her a cup of coffee while she puts a white bag quickly inside the drawer. He watches as the other man walks, standing beside him, his black orbs still focused on Olivia.
“You okay?” he asks.
“I’m fine.” The answer comes quick as a lighting from her mouth.
Elliot winces. Yes, she’s definitely not fine.
She’s hiding something.
When she gets up and heads towards the bathroom, Nick steps closer, whispering quietly in his ear.
“You felt it too right?”
“Yup.”
“There’s something going on with her.”
He knows Nick as her ex-partner cares about her and he’s coming to him because they share this common denominator much more intimately than other members of the squad.
He senses that’s why Olivia partnered them together after she got promoted.
He nods, silently.
“I know. Give her time. She’s going to talk about it.”
“You speak Benson fluently, Stabler, that’s why I’m mentioning it.”
“And that’s how I know that if you push her or keep asking she’s going to clamp down like an oyster or get irritated and I won’t ever learn anything because you pissed her off. So leave it alone, Nick.”
He can tell that Nick still feels guilty about Lewis. He was her partner back then, Cragen having separated Olivia and him after Jenna and assigning him to Munch.
He too blames himself for that night. For not checking out her place and not being the partner that Elliot was in the past.
That night he had to go home because Eli was seriously sick and Kathy was up all hours of the day, taking care of him. He left in a hurry but if he’d have taken Liv home first and then departed for Queens, he believes that Lewis wouldn’t have happened. She wouldn’t have suffered at the hands of that monster.
Quietly, his eyes carefully follow as Olivia comes back and sits down at the desk.
He hopes whatever it is, she’ll tell him or at least she’ll tell her therapist.
~oOo~
Turns out she did go to her therapist.
After she returns from the appointment her mood is foul.
She looks sad at times and others like she’s thousands miles away.
When Nicky’s case comes into their hands and they discuss it, all members of the squad huddled together, he watches as her brown eyes stay absorbed looking at the wall.
There’s a certain emptiness in there and he walks beside her, standing on the left of her, letting her know in his own way that he’s here.
Support in their wordless way is always better than actual words when it comes to them.
She turns her eyes to his piercing blue ones.
After a sigh escapes from her mouth she gives words that calm the panic that’s raging inside of him.
“Not right now, El. Nicky needs us.”
His departing steps are the only answer she receives back.
~oOo~
When the case comes to an end, he finds her in their usual place.
The rooftop.
It’s a space that is filled with sadness, joy and confessions. It’s a piece of their own personal heaven. Up here they can just pretend they are Benson and Stabler, Elliot and Olivia, two young detectives that were just partnered up, filled with passion and justice that’s burning bright inside of them.
Up here they can just turn back the clock and be how they were. Partners, best friends, confidants, two people without the weight of family, responsibility, trauma and positions of authority dragging them down.
He quietly walks beside her standing in the fresh air.
"I took a pregnancy test."
When she utters those words his heart stops.
Instant sadness and happiness at the same time fill him. Olivia always wanted this, he'll feel so happy for her if she’s about to have a baby with Cassidy. She’s going to be an amazing mother, he knows that, yet a selfish part of him can’t help but also feel sadness. Not for her but for him.
There’s other feelings too — like raging jealousy and deep longing. Emotions that accompany the sorrow inside his chest.
He aches, desperately wanting to be in Cassidy’s shoes.
"And?” he asks, a slight tremble and apprehension coating his voice.
“The test was negative. When I told Cassidy the result, he was relieved.”
Her voice sounds so melancholi, he wants to find Cassidy wherever that prick is and deck him in the jaw.
There’s a burn that spreads across his entire body. Seeing her in pain kills him. She’s his weakness. She always will be.
He watches slowly as a small tear trails from the corner of her eye. His own eyes are barely holding the water that’s about to escape.
His own pain and selfish emotions don’t matter at this moment, only hers.
“He was relieved, El, and I wasn’t. Part of me, for just a moment you know, imagined this whole other life I could have had if that test turned out to be positive. As I was waiting in the bathroom, I saw me with a baby in my arms and a nursery. In my mind I flash forward a few years too and I was holding a child’s hand and taking them to school.”
Her voice is wavering and he can see how much it tears her apart. The fact that this dream is now nothing but smoke and ashes in the passage of time.
“Then I looked down and I saw the negative result and the whole image disappeared. I crushed hard back to reality. I mean my life has a lot of responsibility lately and I’m still recovering. I should be relieved right?”
Her hands land on top of the concrete in front of them and his eyes linger there. He wants to hold one. To feel her warm palm on his skin, to grasp onto her hand and never let go.
“I’m not relieved, El. Instead there’s this emptiness inside of me, like I lost something I never had to begin with. I wanted it. I still do. I want to become a parent but Cassidy doesn’t, the adoption agencies already rejected me and it’s probably too late now to have one. Funny thing, I always thought there was time.”
He can’t take this any longer. He can’t keep hearing Olivia talk like that, with such despair and resignation.
She deserves to become a mom, to hold a baby in her arms, to nurture it, raise it and love it with the motherly instinct that he’s sure resides deeply inside of her. Elliot is certain that she’s made for this.
He vaguely remembers the baby boy that she held in her hands when they infiltrated the Pearson house when searching for Nicky. How she held that baby with eyes full of possibilities, an unspoken wish on her features.
Grasping her hand tightly, he observes as her eyes land on him.
He’s rubbing circles on her palm and with a strong voice that never shakes once he makes the suggestion that he made initially years ago.
Back then he was a new father for the fifth time and he told her that he would have helped her in any way possible to make her dream a reality.
He meant it.
Any way possible.
This time he won’t leave room for doubt.
He will mention exactly what that entails and give her the chance to decide. He’s divorced now, Kathy is not a factor only him and what she wants.
“Fuck Cassidy, fuck what the adoption agency said, Liv. Do what you want. You were made for this and you deserve to have it in your life.”
She looks at him with red eyes trying to barely keep contained the tremble of her upper lip.
“It’s too late,” she whispers with a broken voice.
“No it’s not. There are other ways. You can try IVF or a surrogate. Science has evolved, Liv and you won’t be doing it alone. I told you back then, when the case with the embryos happened, that I would support you any way you wanted to and I meant it. Any way, Olivia. That means helping you pick out a sperm donor or me being the sperm donor, building a nursery with you, going baby shopping, all the doctor’s appointments. Every little thing that you want.”
Heavy tears land on her cheeks, her no longer able to keep a hold on her emotions.
“You—you would do that for me?”
He grasps her cheek no longer being able to keep his affection at bay for the woman he’s so desperately in love with.
“I’ll do anything for you. Just give the ok and I’m all in.”
She doesn’t answer back, instead she lays her head on his shoulder as they both watch the moon and the stars shining above them.
~oOo~
A few days after their talk he learns that she and Cassidy have called it quits.
Two weeks after that, she starts the hormones and he makes his donation.