Chapter Text
A sober realization would dawn on him, from time to time, that his life wasn’t as ordinary as it once was; as he once thought of it to be. And in deeper thought, he knew that he didn’t exactly lead a conventional life prior to his in partenza ; his departure from New York City and the life, not so mundane, that he once knew.
Detective Elliot Stabler left many things behind. There were Kathy’s parents, who were sad mostly to see their grandchildren move away. A necktie he remembered caring a great deal about because it belonged to his father, Joseph. It only occurred to him on the plane as he sat beside his sleeping wife that he laid it on the dresser at home, well, his old home. The dresser wouldn’t be coming with them so, he imagined it still lying there collecting dust until a new family moved in.
It’s probably in a landfill now. Or maybe whoever moved in after claimed it for themselves.
Elliot wondered for a long time if that was the case. He pictured a man, faceless, because he couldn’t conjure a profile, tying that old, deep crimson tie he wore quite often to work.
There was only one person who knew who the tie belonged to and why he wore it.
When he thought of those reasons, in retrospect, he almost wanted to laugh at himself. It was silly. Wearing the tie of his father did not make him a kinder man; in fact, he would argue now that the tie carried juju along with it which made his life a living hell up until that grand departure he eventually took from New York. From the United States.
From her.
The only person who knew why he wore the tie so often.
Elliot zoned out every morning over breakfast, for as long as he could remember, thinking about all of the secrets she knew about him. She had once said to him that he knew her best. What he never told her was that the scope that they saw each other through was just as magnified as the other. He contemplated these things over the course of the years in fragments.
Every morning, over breakfast, like clockwork. He started by focusing on the orange juice that Kathy placed down beside his plate. Half full. She never filled it to the top and it wasn’t until much later in their marriage that he realized why. She only filled their children’s glasses half full because she was afraid they would spill their drinks down their clothes.
That morning in particular was especially interesting for him. He wasn’t sure why he woke up feeling the way he did, but he honed in on that glass of orange juice like it was the red-headed stepchild. Like it was gum on the bottom of his shoe. With one hand resting on the table, he used his long, thick index finger to push it back. Part of him hoped it spilled just so he could fill it up to the top because he was a grown-ass man who deserved full glasses of orange juice.
Olivia would tell him to get over it and drink the damned orange juice. He could hear the lecture in his mind, with as much clarity as he could ten years ago.
“ She’s the mother of your children. She’s used to taking care of them not you.” She would say. Elliot lifted the glass from the table and took a sip, then placed it back down. He reached for his fork and poked his eggs until the sound of the ceramic underneath could be heard mingling with the sizzle of extra bacon that Kathy was cooking on the stove.
A faint smirk appeared on his lips. He was no longer thinking of how full an orange juice glass was. He was thinking of other things. Familiar flavors have lingered with him even after all this time. There were few things that he and Olivia did not share and food nor drinks were exempted from it. He recalled sandwiches, salads, soups, drinks from plastic bottles (washback be damned), and yes, orange juice.
Elliot no longer cared about how full his glass was. He was too busy remembering what citrus and Olivia Benson’s lipstick fused together tasted like. He smacked his lips together, basking in the cold liquid before setting it back down.
“Want more?” Kathy asked from the kitchen. Elliot shook his head, taking a bite of eggs off his fork.
“Wait what?” He asked. It only really dawned on him then what she said to him.
“Bacon. Do you want more bacon?” Kathy repeated her question, a slight annoyance present in her voice.
“ Nah. ” Elliot shook his head. He stuck another bite of eggs in his mouth and then dropped his fork onto the plate. “Where’s Eli?”
“He stayed at Gabriele’s last night. Remember? He asked you.”
Elliot, picking up on her tone, stood to his feet and picked up the glass of orange juice. “Oh, right.” He replied nonchalantly and moved into the kitchen. “What are you going to do today?” He added.
“Mm … probably get some laundry done. I don’t know. I thought maybe later we could go see a movie … there’s a couple playing that I think are going to be good.” Kathy suggested.
Elliot nodded, thinking about whether he should agree. “Yeah. We’ll see. Maybe I can get out early.”
“Out early?”
“I’m going in for a few hours. I told Marchetti I would.” Elliot explained, chugging what was left of his orange juice, then placing it in the empty sink basin.
“I thought you talked to them about weekends.” Kathy’s tone was bland, while somehow mildly annoyed.
“ I did. But sometimes I have to go in. That’s just the way it is. They need me.” Elliot replied, heading back into the adjoining dining area. He realized as he passed the kitchen table that he forgot to pick up his plate. So, Elliot grabbed it, headed back into the kitchen, dumped what was left on the white ceramic plate, then put it into the sink next to his orange juice glass.
“Thank you.” Kathy said quietly.
“Mhm. Thanks for breakfast.” Was all that he met her with before leaving the kitchen. Elliot headed into the entryway of their home, where coats and hats laid hung upon the old-fashioned rack. It came with the house when they purchased it. Elliot slipped his coat on and just as he put his arm through the last sleeve, he looked up to see that Kathy followed him. She stood by the entryway and leaned against the frame of it with her arms crossed, a subtle look of dismay written on her face.
“What if I need you?” Kathy asked, revisiting their conversation.
“What?” Elliot asked, making a funny face. He was already lost, but reached for his cap because there wasn’t much that was going to stop him from leaving the house that morning.
“You said they need you. What about me, Elliot? What if I need you?” Kathy asked.
Elliot shimmied his hand into the material of his leather glove. At first, he didn’t answer. What was he supposed to say to that? With his brows furrowed and his bright blue eyes squinted, creased on the outer corners, he gave a shrug. Which would’ve pissed Kathy off twenty years ago but she grew to bear him more over the years and those mannerisms that once made her feel slighted.
“ Uh, ” Elliot began. “I don’t know what you want me to say. I gotta work. That’s the whole reason we came here, wasn’t it? For me to work? It ain’t a vacation …”
“I never said it was.” Kathy’s voice shifted into a steady hostility.
“We have time. Time to do what we want. I’m getting older, Kath.” Elliot put his other glove on. “I know I’m not going to be able to do this much longer.” Elliot reached for the doorknob, where he pulled the front door open to allow in the blistering cold, and beyond that, a plethora of flurried cotton balls which danced in pirouettes. “But I’m gonna do it for as long as I can.” He said, and with that, he gave his wife his usual love you, see you later, before exiting the house.
As he drove to work that morning, he thought of a variety of different things. His wife, who was ultimately unhappy with him and possibly always had been.
And ties, which only Olivia knew the reason he wore the particular one which was either around another man’s neck or in a landfill.
Orange juice. Lipstick.
These are all things that crossed his mind, in no particular order.
But it never mattered what he started with every morning. It would vary, but usually end with the same thought. The same outcome. Like a maze with different routes and ways go to, but with one exit. He would think of her; of Olivia, last.
Elliot would cement himself with one good and final thought of her every day before he distracted himself with his work.
After work, he would come home to the box, an old Nike shoebox to be exact, the one that no one knew about, and would disappear into it for a while. Disappear into one particular photo that laid at the bottom of the stack of photos in said box. Something he found years ago when they first moved to Rome and were unpacking.
How he managed to forget his father’s tie and not the box with the photograph in it, he’ll never know. But there was a part of him that was glad for whatever trade-off to the universe that was. He would much rather have the memory of her face than the recurring thought hanging around his neck of the man that he always fought so hard not to be, but ultimately, could never fully shake the grasp of.
He preferred to linger on her instead.
The woman he left behind.
Olivia.