Chapter Text
He recognized the sound on the window immediately, shifted from his clumsy attempt to fall asleep to wide awake in a matter of moments. It’s been a long while since she’d come here like this, unannounced without even an attempt at a phone call. He knew because he kept the cordless phone in his room at night now, buried in his laundry pile to stifle the ring if a call came through.
His dad would beat his ass if he ever found it there. It had been a splurge to buy one, a bone of contention between his father and his mother, who spent a small fortune on the damn thing, per his father. And that wasn’t the only thing she bought that day, he overheard as his father screamed at his mother late one evening half a year ago.
He told her they were going to lose the house because of her, asked if she wanted him to never come home based on the amount of overtime it would take to fix her mistakes. He pretended not to hear the thud that night, not to suspect what it meant, and if that made him a coward, well… He could only do so much, and a part of him, tiny, hidden, echoed his father’s frustration and wanted to punch the wall in response to some of his mother’s actions as well. Holes could be plastered, fixed, he’d learned, but the mortgage had to be paid, and his father was the only one who did it.
He was glad they had the cordless, though, and he took the risk of keeping it by his bed at night in case she should call. She only had once, but the terror in her voice that time made him sure to never forget to take it from the cradle at night and sneak it back into the kitchen before anyone noticed in the morning. The only one to ever catch him was Randy, who razzed him about making kisses through the phone to Kathy at night, but it wasn’t Kathy on his mind when he took the risk to keep the phone near his bed. No, it was Olivia, his friend, the only other person who really understood what it meant to survive your family of origin rather than loving them.
It was pouring that night. It had been all day, which made his choice to lower the fire safety ladder down for her rather than trying to sneak out the front door of his house himself easier. There was no place safe, dry for them to go that night, and if she was soaked through, which he suspected she would be, she could get sick. They’d just need to keep it down.
“Come up,” he loudly whispered through his open window, looking down at her dark form. She did, slowly, and he noticed her limbs shaking more than they typically would. She must be freezing.
When she pushed her way in, her hair long, dark, and dripping in her face, it took him a moment to notice the bruise, but it was big, jarring, worse than anything he’d ever seen her sporting after a round with her mother. It was beside her right eye, and he gasped looking at it.
“Jesus Chirst, Liv,” he breathed, reaching out to touch it. She flinched back. “What happened?”
“I didn’t think she’d make it back tonight,” she whispered. “She left late. That usually means I won’t see her until the next afternoon, but I guess… She lost some cash somehow, got kicked out of the place she went when she couldn’t pay. She accused me of - of taking it. I didn’t, Elliot! I swear I didn’t!”
“I know. Hey, it’s ok. I know,” Elliot told her, leading her shaking form to take a seat on the bed. “We gotta keep it down, though. Ok? My old man only went to bed about an hour ago.”
Olivia nodded abruptly, but no longer met his eyes. He saw her swallow, breath hitching as she held back tears. Her mom had been physical before, violent, but it had never been as abrupt as this, he didn’t think. It had never been this violent. She hadn’t come bruised, so obviously beaten before. It’d mostly been slaps, shoves, things that didn’t leave a mark anywhere other than her soul. The escalation alarmed him, and for a moment, he wondered whether he should tell his father. He was a cop, after all. He was supposed to protect people.
He was supposed to, but he didn't. That’s what stopped him, that and memories of how hard he hit with his belt, with his fists himself sometimes. There was no reason to think he’d protect Olivia from abuse from her mother when he dished it out himself enough in his own home, though he didn’t call it that. Discipline was different, he would say, but the marks were often the same.
“I should get you some ice,” Elliot told Olivia, but she quickly objected.
“No, it’s not worth the risk,” she told him. “If your mom or dad wakes up, we’re toast. I shouldn’t have come. I just - I wanted to feel safe, for a minute. She’ll be asleep soon. She’ll pass out. She had a bottle open when I left. It won’t take long.”
“I’m glad you came,” Elliot said. “I’ve been worried, wondering how you’ve been.”
Olivia smiled at him, somehow shy after all the time he’d known her. If she wasn’t so young, and he wasn’t committed to Kathy, he might think that she was his person, that they were fated in some way, but he was nearly eighteen, she still had months until she turned sixteen, and Kathy was nice, kind and loving. He wouldn’t do that to her. He’d given her a promise ring, Kathy, and he intended to keep that promise.
Still, he loved Olivia like a sister he could actually talk to. He existed in a state of stoney silence with his own sisters most of the time, never quite able to bridge the gap their parent’s problems caused for them. They all kept quiet about the reality of their life, the Stabler kids. They focused on school, sports, friends, and pretended their home wasn’t the most frightening place they went each day.
Olivia understood that. It was the way she lived as well, though she often played the role of adult for her mother. Her care for Serena was real. Elliot knew that. In that way, even the thought of telling his father, or any other authority figure, about what happened in their home was a betrayal itself.
“You’re soaked, freezing,” Elliot told her. “Take some of my sweats and change.”
“In, uh, in here?” Olivia asked.
“I’ll turn away,” he told her, and he did. She wasn't shaking as much when he turned back around. She looked more relaxed, finally, a calm after a storm.
“Do you want to lay down?” He asked her, but she shook her head even as she yawned.
“I shouldn't,” she told him. “I can't risk falling asleep, and -” She yawned again, and he decided that he’d insist.
“I'll stay up,” he told her. “It's not going to stop raining for a bit, I don't think, and I don't want you walking home and catching your death.”
“Catching your death? What are you, fifty?” She teased him with a smile, but she found herself laying down, her eyes drifting shut. The effects of feeling safe for the first time in weeks overwhelmed her, and she fell asleep before she could fully think better of it.
Elliot covered her with his blanket and pushed loose hair out of her face. She was sleeping with the bruise facing up, and it looked worse than he initially thought, dark purple in the center, lighter shades and pink on the outside. Her mother hit her really fucking hard, it seemed, and he wondered where it's going to end, if they'd both make it through. The time left on his sentence was less, so he worried more about her than he did about himself.