(no subject)
Title: Requiem.
Summary: Life is like a delicate tower of cards. Take out one piece and the entire deck will come crumbling down.
Pairing: Alex and Olivia.
Rating: PG, I would like to assume. M just to be safe.
Disclaimer: I disclaim everything. Even my brother. Seriously, if you want to buy him, I’m willing to sell. No, I’m kidding. I disclaim for the purpose of disclaiming. If that makes sense.
The hole in the wall always stares back at her on waits like this. It’s not overly visible - no one would ever notice it was there on a passing glance, but in the cold wait that always accompanied a visit to the local Mercy General Hospital, Alex always noticed the hole sitting across her, slightly bigger then a pin, but visible to her, if her alone, none the less. She supposed it could be part of a pattern. Maybe when they were designing the building, they began something but had to stop. The hole is a mystery, much like her lover’s illness in the way that it is perfectly rounded, circular, with not one rough edge that would accompany the run of accidental misfortunes that could possibly result in a damaged wall.
Alex Cabot stared at her fingers. Where would she be without Olivia? When they had left the doctors for the fifth time, and the last one for that man was a pig, he had told the detective she had a form of Bone Cancer that was untreatable. Olivia had been numb and Alex distraught, they had arrived home and after a frantic session of love-making brought on by their grief, Olivia brushed Alex’s hair as she cried.
“Shouldn’t I be the one comforting you?” Alex had said in a shaky voice, trying to bring herself to some semblance of calm. Olivia had looked at her with a small smile and eyes - Alex remembered her eyes most of all during that night. Dead. Resigned. Olivia Benson had already calmly met the realization of her fate and it had killed her inside.
“You stand the most to lose Alex.” She had whispered into blonde hair, “I may be dying, but you my love, will have to live without me.”
Alex giggled slightly, an odd reaction born from the prospect of living without Olivia.
“You make it sound,” she said amidst hiccupping, “Like I won’t be able to handle it if you go.”
Olivia smiled sadly, wrapping her arms around Alex’s shoulders and pulling her into an embrace.
“I have no doubt you will. But I love you. And you love me. And I know it takes a long while for the living to realize love never really dies.”
Alex looked up into the chocolate brown eyes hovering above her.
“You’re scaring me Olivia.” She whispered, unable to imagine life with Olivia Benson gone. Who would save the children? Who would save the world from the evils that peril it?
“I’m sorry.” Olivia whispered equally in tone, “I’m sorry.”
Later, when they had finally arrived back at a new hospital for a new diagnosis, to their happiness and dismay, the medical professionals revealed they had no idea what was wrong with Olivia, but it definitely wasn’t cancer. They decided to umbrella it under “Locomotor Ataxia”, a term used to broadly cover anyone considered to be losing the ability of function in limbs. Olivia didn’t believe them when they had first told her of the disease, surely, she thought, there must be some cure, some way of determining what she really had. ‘Loss of mobility in legs’ the doctors had said. That explained, Alex had realized, the pains and cramps her lover had lately began to experience at night.
Olivia had just gone in for the newest checkup. The pains had been getting worse for her and it was reaching the time where she would have to retire from the force. Alex was staring at the hole in the dry wall and wishing they would come out smiling, the doctor telling her it wasn’t a disease after all, simple a misunderstood minor abbreviation, easily cured.
Easily cured. They would tell her soon it was easily cured. Thank to Olivia they would have found the disease to be a malignant tumor, barely the size of a dollar coin. Thanks to “Olivia’s Sacrifice” Others would live.
What about the people that wouldn’t live? What about the children who relied on Olivia Benson to save them? Where would they be?
They would have no one. Just like Alex has no one now.
They buried her on a cold winters morning. It was a funeral she never would have liked. Mahogany coffin, an NYPD sendoff, white roses and cold bitter wind. Alex didn’t cry. She sat numbly, staring at the ground, wishing the world would just fall away and she too would fall into oblivion.
It didn’t. She didn’t.
Once she stumbled in the apartment, the apartment they shared, she burst into tears. Her coat, scarf and jacket were dumped unceremoniously on the ground as she collapsed onto the bed that smelt of Olivia Benson. She cried as darkness encircled her like arms giving her their warmth. She wanted to believe it was all a dream. She so desperately clung to the idea she would wake up and it would all be over. But she didn’t. She drifted into sleep with the sound of her lover’s boots hitting the floor behind her and she knew she would never see Olivia again.
Wait. Boots? Wrenching open her eyes, Alex looked back, her eyes full of tears. The sun had set, casting an odd glow on the carpet around their bed.
“I’m sorry.” A voice said from behind her as the person climbed into bed. Alex froze, turning around slowly. Arms encircled her waist. “Work was a bitch.”
Alex stiffened.
“Who are you?” She snarled, “Where is Olivia Benson?”
The man looked at her.
“Alex. It’s me Elliot. Olivia died remember? She was shot by a perp years ago? And what do you mean who am I? We’ve been living together for the past fifteen months.”
Alex stared in eye wide open shock.
-.-
Voices drifted in and out of her consciousness.
“How is it going?”
“…Fine.”
“How is she?”
“Still unconscious. The doctor says it could be hours yet.”
“It was a close one.”
“I know.”
A strange noise could be heard and she realized it had originated from the back of her throat. Eyelids pried open slightly before shutting immediately after the blinding light.
“Alex?” A voice whispered in her ear, “Alex, baby, wake up.”
Alex recognized that voice. She really did.
“O-Olivia?” She stumbled, prying her eyes open again to find her lover’s desirable brown eyes looking down on her own.
“I’m here.” The detective, now in concerned lover mode, whispered as she grasped Alex’s hand. Alex felt her eyes fill with tears at the feeling of real contact.
“What happened?” She whispered, throat dry. Olivia grabbed a water bottle from beside the bed and Alex sipped lightly from the straw, the liquid easing her throat in cool goodness as she refused to take her eyes off the woman in front of her.
“Honey…do you remember leaving the courthouse this afternoon?”
Alex nodded. Of course, she was going to meet Olivia for lunch when…she noticed a boy standing by the edge of the road. He was three, four at the most and looking longingly for gaps between cars to reach the small red ball that had rolled into the main road outside of the courthouse. She had screamed as he stepped out, his young mind not registering the truck screeching to a slow halt but still barreling toward him. She did the only thing that came naturally to her without having to think, she raced forward, picked him from the road by the scrum of his neck and threw him as hard as she could before blasting pain, light and she miraculously blacked out.
“I was hit…” Alex said in wonderment, looking up at her lover. Olivia smiled sadly. “The boy..?”
She didn’t need to finish her sentence for Olivia to understand.
“Is fine. Honey, you saved him. He wants to meet you when you’re out of hospital.”
Alex smiled.
“Did he get his red ball?”
Olivia smiled fondly.
“He did. Although it didn’t seem that important anymore for some reason.”
“Kids will be kids.” Alex said with her smile, blackness creeping in on the edges of her vision.
“Get some sleep.” Olivia whispered lightly into her hair. Such a pleasant reality compared to her others.
“Will you be here when I wake up?” Alex managed to get out around a yawn. Olivia nodded with a smile and kissed her on the forehead.
“I promise. I’ll never leave you.”
End.