Black ice.
Effortless spinning.
Spinning in complete, perfect, sickening circles. Spinning so fast maybe they're not really moving at all. Past the guardrails. Past the edge of the road. Past the edge of the world. Tires spraying up gravel, grass, dirt.
A blur of brown and grey and ghostly white and brown again.
Thinking shit when's it gonna stop?
Thinking who knew black ice really was so fucking black?
Funny, the thoughts that wander into your head when you think you're gonna die.
Funny ha ha.
And, funny strange.
Family. This is a given. What's funny is that even relatives I dislike intensely are strolling casually through my consciousness right now.
Hi, Richard.
Friends. Funny, because I don't have many, but the ones I have suddenly seem worth hanging onto.
Food. Hey, if you've never been in my position, don't knock it. A cold beer and a hot steak sound pretty damn appetizing right now.
I mean, I've thought about death many times in my career. Believe me, you can't do the work I do - we do – and not contemplate biting the big one at least a couple times a week. One of the many, uh, benefits of being a cop is getting your last will and testament squared away before you're actually six feet under. I know so many people who keep saying, Yeah, I gotta get that will written up one of these days. Wish I was more organized, like you. And I always tell them, hey, it's not organization that drives me. It's plain, unadulterated terror. It's the fear gnawing the pit of my stomach at 3 a.m. when I think about my kids going to college, getting married, with no Dad and no money.
But, I'm getting off track here. I was talking about my death, which, it appears, is imminent.
I am so fucking cold I feel almost warm, if that makes sense. And it makes sense to me, which scares the shit outta me because if I feel warm, it can't be a good sign.
Not when November river water is seeping into the bottom of your car.
Not when you're pinned in your vehicle and you're pretty sure your arm is broken and maybe your leg, too, and it's pitch-fucking-black and no one knows where the hell you are.
Anyway, I was thinking about my kids. Maureen, in particular. I was thinking about a time, God, so long ago. She was just a little thing, couldn't have been more than five or six. I was putting her to bed and she was saying the things she used to say. The stuff that used to come out of her mouth would blow me away. So fucking smart, that one. We'd finished reading her story and she had her head on my chest. It was very quiet and peaceful.
"I can hear your heart beating, Daddy," she said.
"That's good," I said.
"Why?"
"Means I'm alive."
"What happens if it stops?"
"Oh, it won't…" I said vaguely, hoping she'd drop it.
"But if it does," she persisted.
"Uh huh…"
"You die. Right?"
"Uh…"
"Right?"
"I suppose," I said.
She'd hugged me then, very tightly, tears in her voice. "I don't want you to die, Daddy. Ever. Okay?"
I'd hugged her back and whispered those nonsensical but reassuring words that parents can whisper to small children and make everything better.
God, I miss those days.
Because then those kids grow up and murmuring, Don't worry everything will be all right I love you, just isn't enough anymore.
But, old habits die hard.
Pun intended.
I turn my head infinitesimally to my right, my eyes seeking out the dark figure slumped motionless in the passenger seat.
"Don't worry everything will be all right I love you," I whisper through numb lips.
Then, to myself, because I can't bear to say these words aloud:
I I don't want you to die, Olivia. Ever.
Okay?
He walked into the one-six that morning and there she was, like she'd never left. Just sitting there at her desk, drinking coffee, leafing through papers.
Like she'd never fucking gone anywhere at all.
For a moment he was too stunned to move. He stood immobile in the doorway, watching her all-too familiar and yet somehow foreign movements; the way she crooked her wrist when she picked up her cup, the way she flicked her hair away from her eyes, the way she breathed.
He knew she'd be there, sitting across from him this morning. Cragen had told him about it a week ago. Just to prepare him, he'd said. Well, short of tossing back six Tequila shooters and stumbling into the office shit-faced, nothing could have helped prepare him for the kick in the gut feeling he got just laying eyes on her again.
She looked up then and saw him standing there, watching her. She smiled, but her eyes were guarded. She moved to stand, but stopped halfway when she realized he still hadn't taken a step towards her.
"Hey," she said in her own voice. Olivia's voice. For some reason he'd expected something different, a sound that didn't belong to her, horns honking, tires screeching; but then she spoke and it was just Olivia's voice and, of course, it couldn't be any other way.
"Hey," he replied, jolted from his reverie. "Long time no see." Three quick strides forward and he was at his desk. Safe, familiar, wooden. He dropped his bag, draped his coat over the chair. He gripped the edge of the desk, solid, unmoving, gripped it tightly because he suddenly felt very light-headed.
"You all right?" She was leaning forward, her face a perfect blend of concern and detachment. Elliot closed his eyes and opened them again. She was still there.
"Couldn't be better," he said. "You all caught up?"
She leaned back in her chair, crossed her arms, nodded tersely. "Think so." She tossed a sheet of paper down on her desk. "Seems Dani got things pretty messed up."
"How d'ya mean?" Defensive.
"The vic. This girl, Alicia. She stopped talking after Dani had a go at her. Hasn't said a word since. To anyone."
"That girl was raped by three men. Think maybe that had something to do with her unwillingness to talk?"
Olivia shrugged. "Still…"
"What?"
"Pretty rough bedside manner. No empathy for the vic's feelings." Patronizing.
"Dani was a damn hard worker." True. "Fit right in." Lie. "Played by the book." Bullshit.
He wasn't sure why he felt this sudden irrational need to defend Dani to Olivia, the desire to make Olivia understand that they, he and Dani, had been a good team, had survived. More than survived. Thrived.
"Not what I heard." Smug.
"You heard wrong." Grasping.
Standoff.
"Olivia, Elliot. Getting reacquainted, I see," Cragen with his impeccable timing stepped in, placed his hand on Olivia's tense shoulder. She smiled tightly up at him.
"Not much to get reaquainted with," she said.
"Well, you'll both have lots of time to catch up on your drive to Hillsboro."
"Where?"
"Hillsboro is a private asylum two hours upstate. It's where our vic's parents have placed their daughter for some serious rehab. If we don't get to her, if we don't get her to talk to us, and soon, our case is finished and three rapists walk."
Elliot and Olivia barely exchanged glances as they gathered their belongings, shrugged on warm coats and gloves.
"Olivia." Cragen nodded her way. "I need you to work your magic here. What I don't need to tell you is how much we need this girl's testimony."
Olivia nodded. She knew. She turned to follow Elliot, who was already walking out.
"Olivia," Cragen said again. She turned, suddenly tired. How was she going to get through the rest of the day?
"Yeah?"
"Welcome back."
Driving.
Stony silence.
Just maneuvering through the city traffic took a good 45 minutes.
They were both stubborn. They were both used to waiting it out, to letting the perp sweat and stammer and finally give in. But, this silence was different.
This silence was personal.
"You up for this?" he asked after an hour of staring at leaden grey skies and rolling hills and farmland.
"What are you talking about?" Her voice was quiet and cold.
"Are you up for talking to this girl."
"You better not be asking me if I'm capable of doing my job, Elliot."
He shrugged.
"This is my job."
"It hasn't exactly been your job for months."
She looked out the window. "Go to hell."
He shrugged again.
"Sure. Gotta be warmer than this."
Stony silence.
Driving.
The girl wouldn't talk, after all.
Not for any lack of effort on Olivia's part. If Elliot had been on civil terms with his partner, he would have told her, in no uncertain terms, what a great job she'd done, that if she hadn't been able to get her to open up no one could. All that stuff he would have said, before.
After almost three hours the girls' therapist and doctor and parents intervened. No more. Desist. Enough. She needs to rest. She needs to sleep. She needs peace.
So do we, thought Elliot. And we won't get it until those three fuckers are behind bars.
"We're so close," Olivia pleaded, on deaf ears, it appeared. But even she could see this girl was exhausted, damaged, perhaps beyond repair.
So, they got back in their car and they left. Elliot drove without asking because he could see the fatigue in Olivia's face, could see it in the way her shoulders sagged, the way she dragged her feet. She lay her head back against the seat and closed her eyes. Elliot didn't think she was sleeping but she was close enough.
Dark fell early on November evenings in New York state. By 6 p.m. it was full black with only the headlights to guide their way home.
They hadn't spoken since they left the asylum – "Ready to go?" "Yeah. Just let me grab my coat."
Elliot wondered what she was thinking about. He wondered if she hated his guts and if she was sorry she ever came back.
He glanced over at her.
He opened his mouth to ask her.
Black ice.
Effortless spinning.
Spinning in complete, perfect, sickening circles. Spinning so fast maybe they're not really moving at all. Past the guardrails. Past the edge of the road. Past the edge of the world. Tires spraying up gravel, grass, dirt.
A blur of brown and grey and ghostly white and brown again.
Thinking who knew black ice really was so black?
Thinking Jesus Liv I'm sorry.
Trees stripped bare of leaves standing straight at attention like sentinels by the roadside. Hurtling forward and gathering speed like some crazy carnival ride but realizing a second too late that this particular ride will not end happily with toothy smiles and giddy laughter and gasps of relief.
This ride will end at with a thud and a jolt at the bottom of a ravine where a river rages and roils, beckoning wayward travelers with icy fingers.
Maybe they grab for each other's hand, blindly, desperately, as the car lurches and nosedives and hurtles down the brown frozen bank.
Maybe they manage to look over at each other for a split second, making eye contact before the car slams into the water, the riverbed, lurching, settling, gathering bone-chilling November water.
Maybe.
But, most likely it is too dark to see anything except what is caught in the frantic sweep of the car's headlights.
Tree trunks.
Underbrush.
A torrent of dark water.
Most likely they are both too terrified to do anything except grip the dashboard, the seats, themselves, for dear life.
They are definitely aware of one another, as they always were and always are. They are thinking of each other, wondering if the other is all right.
Hoping.
Maybe praying.
Please be all right, they think.
Don't die, they think.
Ever.
Okay?
tbc