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Any way you want to do it, I’ll support you.
The words have been rolling around in his head for days. Every time he thinks about it, he gets a sinking feeling in his stomach, kind of like when you’ve had too much to drink at a work party and say something dumb to your co-worker, then stew on it for way too long.
He’s done that before, too.
Probably with the same person.
Liv has always been the one he overshares with, and for good reason. They spend so much time together that sometimes it’s difficult to see where one of them begins and the other ends, and in many ways, he feels more enmeshed with her than with his own wife. Not only does he know how she takes her coffee, but he knows how Liv prefers quarter socks to crew because they don’t squeeze her calves as much, and that she keeps a special bar of soap and a razor in her locker for when she wants to shave her legs at the precinct. “That soap they leave in the locker rooms might as well be scrubbing salts,” she told him the first month on the job.
He remembers that.
He can’t remember the last time Kathy shaved anything. But he really doesn’t give a shit if she does or doesn’t, because he’s so thankful for any kind of sexual attention that she could braid her pubic hair and he’d still get down on his knees and thank her for showing him a little affection.
These thoughts are meant for no one aside from God and maybe his priest.
But, even his priest is a stretch. He hasn’t confessed anything regarding Olivia in years.
He just hopes that God is understanding, and that he agrees some things are better left unsaid.
But this most recent time, when he opened his mouth and let the words spill, he wasn’t drunk. He was in the middle of a case with Liv, and stone-cold sober.
Any way you want to do it, I’ll support you.
He isn’t exactly sure what he meant when he said it. Just that, he would do anything for her - he would.
Except for that. He can’t do that.
Well, technically he could. Physically, he really, really could - he’s wanted to as long as he’s known her - but it would surely land him a one way ticket to Hell, if he isn’t doomed already, that is.
Though compared to what Liv would do to him once his life began to implode after that, Hell might be a cakewalk.
She would never tolerate him wrecking his life and hurting his family for a few minutes of bliss, and anyway, he doesn’t want to. Even if he’s known since the first time Liv’s life was threatened and he was faced with the prospect of her not existing in his world, that Kathy was the mother of his children but not the love of his life, he’s still determined to be a good father and husband.
At least he tries his damnedest to be.
But sometimes he thinks that Liv is more of a champion for his personal life than he is. She shows up for him, his kids, his wife. She was there to save Kathy’s life and deliver Eli when he wasn’t.
They go through so much together at work that time has taken on an amorphous, meaningless presence in his life. The only way he can really judge the passing of time, is by the age of his children.
Aside from that, time doesn’t mean much to him anymore.
He knows that the twins are turning fifteen, because when they met Olivia, they were six. He knows that Kathleen is old enough to drive but not buy alcohol, though the other night she came home reeking of it. Liv asked if he remembered what it was like to be that age and all he could think about was that he was already cruising towards fatherhood at a breakneck pace. He knows that Eli was born in the front seat of a NYPD sedan three months ago, and then Elliot cornered Liv in front of an elevator and told her she’d make a good mom.
There was a lot of time in between those things, but at the moment he can’t remember any of it.
Sometimes his body reminds him about time. His knees have begun to ache when he spends all day on his feet. “You should get better shoes. Or put orthotics in the ones you wear,” Kathy told him the other night. He wanted to tell her that better shoes are an expense he doesn’t want to incur when he has to worry about college tuition. Plus, new shoes would just get splattered with blood and other bodily fluids soon enough anyway.
He kept that information to himself and just hummed his agreement, flicking off the light and asking Kathy in the darkness of their bedroom if she wanted to have sex.
She didn’t, so he went to bed thinking about Olivia, half-hard and uncomfortable until the morning when he jerked off in the shower.
“What are you thinking about?”
Olivia’s cautiously prying voice cuts through the haze of his reverie, and he glances up from the file that’s been sitting in front of him for the last hour. He’s supposed to be looking for something - what was it again?
Any way you want to do it, I’ll support you.
God, he’s such an idiot.
Liv, clicking the pen in her hand and leans in, steady gaze snaring him like a lasso. “You’ve been looking at that page for ten minutes, anything useful?”
He’s probably reread the same five lines enough that he could recite them, if he’d been paying attention.
“No, nothing useful. Just the same old crap.” He closes the file and leans back, digging the heels of his hands into his eye sockets. He thinks it’s probably late enough that he could go home, but he also wants to stay and sit with Liv a bit longer - the conflict that will undoubtedly be the death of him one day.
It doesn’t help that Kathy has been vacillating between annoyed and livid with him for going on six weeks straight. Raising kids is hard, and starting all over with a baby - at their age - is harder. He was worried about postpartum depression for a little while, but then he overheard Kathy talking to her friend from mom’s group, and she was laughing and joking and carefree, and he realized that, maybe it’s just him.
“Coffee?” Liv asks, the wheels of her desk chair scraping on the floor as she pushes back and stands.
“Yeah, coffee.” He follows her to the pot of coffee that is most certainly burnt at this point, and watches as she pours a mug for him, handing it back with a small intake of breath.
“Um, I wanted to talk to you about something,” she says, so quietly that he knows instantly it’s probably a conversation they shouldn’t be having in the squad room. But he isn’t going to stop her.
“Okay. Shoot.” He says encouragingly, hoping it sounds more casual than it feels.
“So, remember that conversation we had last week? The one - you know - about me wanting to have a baby?”
He stops breathing as he watches her hand steadily pour another mug of coffee. She doesn’t shake at all, and he has to admit, he’s impressed. His insides are quivering like a bowl of jello.
“Of course,” he tells her, watching intently as she sets the carafe down and dumps powdered creamer into the shitty coffee, like that’ll make it taste better.
She looks over his shoulder at the near-empty precinct, with an alertness that tells him she doesn’t want to be overheard. Luckily it’s late, and they are the only detectives left here.
“Well,” she starts, taking a deep breath. “I went to a fertility clinic and talked to them about… my options. How I could…” She clears her throat nervously. “Have a baby on my own.”
His heart is hammering fast, both with joy for her, and terror at where this is headed, because they never talk about personal stuff. Except for those few times that they did.
“That’s amazing, Liv. What did they say?”
She smiles tightly and nods, brushing her chin-length hair back with a finger.
“They said I’m a good candidate for a donor. That…my eggs are still good, but I need to act quickly if I want to carry it myself. My window is closing,” her eyes dart around the room, looking anywhere but at him. “But, they think I can have my own baby.”
The smile that follows this news is damn near infectious. Her face lights up, eyes shimmering, cheeks pink, tiny crinkles forming at the corners of her mouth. That smile melts his insides and turns his knees to putty.
“Wow,” he smiles along with her, because how could he not? “That’s - that’s so great, Liv. Really. I’m - I’m so happy for you.”
He is so, so, happy for her. This is something she’s wanted as long as he’s known her. Something she didn’t think she could have. It’s also something she’s been incredibly reluctant to discuss with him, and the fact that she’s broaching it now feels a little like tiptoeing along the edge of a cliff.
“So, a donor?” he asks casually, still wondering where she’s headed with the conversation. She isn’t going to ask him—
“I was hoping you could take a look at the two candidates I narrowed it down to. From the sperm bank.”
He’s embarrassed to admit that for a split second, he thought she was going to ask him something else, and his stomach drops with disappointment. She just needs his opinion, not his—
“Of course,” he takes a too-big sip of his coffee and it burns as much as it tastes like shit. “Of course, Liv. I told you. Any way I can help.”
Any way you want to do it, I’ll support you.
Why the fuck does his mind keep going there? God, he just can’t turn it off; that need to help her, take care of her, even though she isn’t his to take care of.
“Okay. Okay, that’s - good. Thanks. I was kind of nervous to ask you.” She smiles again and takes a sip of her own coffee, grimacing at the taste.
“What? Why?” he asks.
She shrugs, “Well, you know. It’s such a personal thing. We never really talk about stuff like that.”
Yeah, no shit, he thinks.
Do me a favor? Shut up and drive.
Her words, not his.
But now?…
She bites her lip and looks back at her desk like there’s something incredibly important waiting for her; like she’s about to break the case they’ve been working on, but he has a feeling whatever is waiting for them on her desk has nothing to do with sex crimes.
What has changed since the last time he tried to talk to her about motherhood?, he wonders.
“You know, when I told Eva Sintzel that the cryotank didn’t make it back to the lab in time, and the eggs weren’t viable…” her voice trails off, and he can practically see the conversation playing out in front of him. Two women, roughly the same age, same marital status; Olivia informing the other that her only hope for having a child just evaporated along with the liquid nitrogen that was keeping the eggs alive.
“I uh - I just, I don’t want to completely give up on the chance of being a mom. You know? Just, not yet anyway.” She swallows hard and glances back towards her desk. “I have the profiles with me. Can you just - take a look real quick?”
What she’s really asking is: can we do this before I lose my nerve? Before this conversation becomes a little bit too real, and I shut down?
Elliot thinks for a moment the walls might be closing in on them, like that trash compactor in Star Wars. The pressure is going to squeeze them until all the air is forced from their lungs and their eyes are bulging. “Sure. Yeah.”
He walks to Olivia’s desk with her right on his heels. She’s so close he can feel the energy radiating from her chest. If she was a perp, he’d expect to feel her trying to tackle him to the ground next. It’s like she’s worried he might try and ditch her before they get there. Her hand darts out to a light blue folder - he’s surprised he didn’t notice it earlier. It’s a different color from their standard case files, and there’s a logo on the front he’s never seen before.
She slides it off the desk and shoves it into his hands. “The first one is what I’m leaning towards, but the second seems like a good option, too. Fuck. I don’t know.” She slumps into her chair and sets the mug of shitty coffee down in front of her. He didn’t even bother to bring his over with them.
He glances at her once more, noting how her anxiety is visible in the downturned corners of her mouth and in the way she won’t look up at him. She wipes her palms on the tops of her thighs and he catches sight of her pulse fluttering wildly at her neck.
He flips the folder open, skimming over the first page.
“There’s no photo?” He’s looked at these donor profiles in the context of casework, but he swears the last time he looked at one, there was a photo.
“Not if it’s anonymous.”
He doesn’t like it already. “Hm.” He nods, returning his attention to the page.
The information there - black and white text, dates, credentials, information - it all looks fine. But how do you go through with something like this, creating a whole new life, without seeing the person’s face? The eyes are the window to the soul. Don’t you need to see the eyes?
He doesn’t understand, but he knows if he tells her that, she will say something about him being lucky he could have kids the old fashioned way, and then she will be too annoyed to continue the conversation.
“I mean - yeah. This guy… he went to Penn. He’s an oncologist, so he’s smart. Um - yeah. He looks - good. On paper. He looks good.” He glances up at her in time to see her furrowed brow correct itself, smoothing out like she doesn’t want him to know she’s worried.
“And see the last paragraph? No history of family genetic disorders. That’s good, right?”
He supposes that yes, that is good. On paper, that is good.
“Yeah,” he agrees.
“What about the other one?”
He flips to the second packet and quickly reads through the profile; journalist, Columbia graduate, marathon runner—
“He seems good, too.” Elliot hates him, actually. He hates both of them.
It doesn’t matter how smart they are, how much they spent on a college education - or if they got financial aid - how athletic they are, how healthy they are. None of it matters, because they can’t father Olivia Benson’s unborn child.
“Fuck,” the strangled word slips out of her. “So what, I just pick one?” She swivels in the chair so she’s facing him, knees practically pushing against his own joints, which at this moment feel like they’re about to buckle.
He doesn’t want her to pick either of them.
“I guess so. Doesn’t seem like you could go wrong with either of them?” The thought leaves his mouth like a question, and immediately he knows his mistake.
“Ugh.” She groans and covers her face with both hands. “‘Go wrong?’ Elliot. This is… this is a huge decision. It’s half the genetic material that could make up my baby, and I don’t know anything about these people aside from what’s there on that paper. I mean - what if - what if…”
She doesn’t finish, and she doesn’t need to.
With the job they both do, he can finish the thought for her.
“No, Liv. You can’t think like that. These guys are healthy, and you know, the rest is up to you. It’s nurture. You’re a living, breathing example of that.”
She blinks furiously and snatches the folder from his hands, shoving it deep into the dark pocket of her bag. “I’ll just flip a coin,” she mutters acerbically.
“No, no. Hey - c’mon - I’m sure either of them would be great.”
Lie.
“There’s a reason they call it a donor. It’s just the genetic material you need to get things going, and you’ll be able to take it from there. You know, it’s a kickstart.”
Fuck, what is he saying right now?
“Liv, seriously, you are overthinking it-”
Lie.
She’s not.
“What about you?” She blurts it out on the tails of a stifled sob, all choked words and watery eyes, and he isn’t sure which is more painful, what she said, or her expression. Her mouth drops open in horror and her cheeks turn the most intense shade of crimson he’s ever seen on a human being. Her chest begins to rise and fall quickly - too quickly - as she kicks away from the desk and reaches for her bag. Even with her eyes downturned, he can see them shimmering with unshed tears.
“Never mind, sorry. I’m just - I’m just having a really hard time with this whole thing. I didn’t mean - forget it.”
She pulls her jacket from the back of the desk chair and the whole thing flips over with a loud clatter that would draw the attention of everyone in the precinct, if there were other people there to hear it.
They both flinch, and his ears are still ringing as they both reach for the overturned heap of metal and vinyl. He gets to it first as she starts to step backward with a look on her face that reminds him of a caged animal.
“Slow down, Liv. Just - hang on a minute.” He rights the chair and pushes it out of the way, taking a step towards her. She shakes her head and smiles, but it’s not an amused expression. It’s the smile of someone who’s in the middle of laughing at a joke and is told their dog just died.
“I don’t know why I said that. I’m sorry. I should just sleep on it and take a look at the profiles in the morning.”
He understands her fear. He feels it, too. And he also feels something else; something even more sinister, but potentially beautiful.
“Wait,” he reaches out, toe catching on the wheel of the goddamn chair and he lurches forward. His hand instinctively closes over her forearm to steady himself - or maybe to keep her rooted to the spot for just a few seconds longer.
Her eyes are wide as his fingers continue to dig into the meat of her arm, just below her elbow. He fixes the awkward stance of his feet and lets go, dropping his hand back to his side.
“Wait,” he says again. “Just… wait.” He’s breathing raggedly, from both the chaos of the chair and their floundering limbs and his own self made panic at what he’s about to tell her. “I didn’t say no.”
Somehow her eyes get even bigger, the whites visible around the deep brown of her irises. Her lashes flutter over them, once, twice, three times, and her lips part like she’s going to speak, but nothing comes out.
“I mean, we both know my swimmers are pretty efficient.” He says it quickly, desperate to bring a little levity to the conversation. “It would give you a better chance of… conceiving, right?”
Conception.
That is not a word he never imagined saying to Liv, at least not in this context.
She just stares back at him, jaw and shoulders set in a rigid way that reminds him of how she approaches perps in an interrogation that’s lasted too long.
“Kathy would never allow it,” she whispers.
She’s correct about that. Kathy would sooner file the divorce paperwork again than know there’s another little Stabler running around in Manhattan, especially one that was pushed out of Liv’s uterus. But it wouldn’t be a Stabler, it would be a Benson.
A tiny brown-haired baby that would be all hers. Maybe a girl, with Liv’s amber complexion and perfect little fingernails. A round pink mouth that would know one word: mama.
He can give that to her. He knows he can do it, and it would be the greatest gift ever: unconditional love. Family. Two things she’s never really known.
“You’re right,” he murmurs, chest tightening as he says it and her face begins to crumble with the certainty that she’s reached another dead end. “But, I don’t have to tell her. This could… just be between us.”
It’s the most unnatural thing for him to say, and they both know it. Like a spider wrecking its own web. There’s no one else he’d bend the rules for in such an enormous way.
She lets out a strangled huff and drags a hand over her face. “Won’t you go to Hell for that?”
He laughs loudly before he can smother it and waves a hand in the air.
“I don’t know. It certainly gives me something to discuss with my priest.”
Olivia frowns and adjusts the strap of her bag. “I can’t do that to you, or to your family. I couldn’t live with it-”
“With what? It wouldn’t be mine. It would be yours. All yours. It’ll be in the paperwork - I’d just be the donor.”
“Are you even capable of that?”
For you?, he thinks.
“Yes.” Maybe he’s delusional, but he’s never been so certain. Even when Kathy told him about her last pregnancy, he had doubts about the longevity of their marriage, about starting all over with another baby. He forced himself back into Kathy’s life because that’s what he does - he shows up. And now he’s gonna show up for Liv.
“I want to do this for you,” his chest inflates with pride - with purpose. “I’ll never overstep. I won’t give my opinion or unsolicited advice. I won’t even buy a birthday gift - unless you say it’s okay. It’ll be your baby.”
Her eyes are glassy as he finishes, resting his case with a gravitas that even Casey would find impressive.
“I- I don’t… I don’t even know what to say.” She murmurs, wiping a knuckle underneath one eye to catch a tear before it escapes.
“Don’t say anything. Just text me where and when. I’ll be there.”
____
One week later, as he’s stopping to grab a coffee from a street cart outside the courthouse, his phone buzzes in his pocket.
He’s been trying not to think about their conversation, and spending the last three days in court instead of sitting at a desk across from her has made that easier. Part of him wonders if she’s ever going to mention it again, or if she’ll just pretend like it was a dream and carry on as usual. But as he takes his phone out of his pocket and flips it open, he sees her text message.
Benson 11:00am
New Life Fertility on Madison Ave. Thursday, 8:00am.
Benson 11:01am
Unless you’ve changed your mind. I will understand if you did.
Benson 11:01am
I wouldn’t hold it against you.
Stabler 11:02am
I didn’t change my mind. I’ll be there.
He slips his phone back into his pocket and pops the plastic tab on the lid of his cup, breathing in the comforting smell of watery street coffee. He never once thought about his offer and regretted that he made it - he hasn’t changed his mind. He’s a man of his word.
Of course, that should also apply to his marriage vows, and there is an obvious lapse where those are concerned.
Being a sperm donor isn’t cheating. He isn’t going to fuck Olivia. He isn’t going to raise the baby with her. He isn’t even going to give his opinion on what kind of baby monitor she should get. After he makes his donation, he’s going to keep his mouth shut and never mention it again.
He’ll watch her body change from across the desk, but not from the driver’s seat of the sedan, because he’ll get a new temporary partner. But that’s alright. He’ll still get to watch her come into the sixteenth precinct - everyday, a little bit fuller, a little bit glossier. Pregnancy hormones will do unreal things to her. He’ll watch her change and become softer. He’ll watch her belly grow round and listen to her complain about her swollen feet, all with a knowing smile on his lips.
He’ll watch it all, and he’ll know that he did that to her.
He will know it, and she will know it - and no one else.
He’s a miserable sonofabitch for how that excites him.
It’s shameful.
It’s downright sinful.
And yet—
Making the donation is actually the part he’s been thinking about more. Even though they’re sex crime detectives, and they practically breathe sex terminology, going into a room and actually doing that with Olivia waiting outside is a whole other thing. It shouldn’t embarrass him, not with how many times they’ve both said the word masturbation to each other, and with how many times they’ve had to watch someone masturbate on grainy VHS footage, or listened to someone else talk about masturbating. But… he’s embarrassed.
Elliot doesn’t want her thinking about him doing that. They’ve managed to keep a professional wall up between them, and doing that is definitely going to put a chip in that wall.
Any way you want to do it, I’ll support you.
It’s his fault, really. He started this thing by saying that.
But he doesn’t regret it.
He just would like if there was a way for her to conveniently forget about what’s involved in the donation process, or maybe he could forget. Like post donation amnesia.
Fuck it, he thinks. She’s a grown woman, and he’s a grown man with five children of his own. They both know what’s involved in the act.
He’s going to do this for her one way or another.
_____
He sees her twice before the donation day. Once, at the precinct as they spend an entire nine hours just writing reports and filing paperwork. He catches her peering over their desks at him, studying him with a kind of intensity that makes his stomach flip.
“You good?” He asks.
She nods, “Yep.”
“Want to talk?”
She shakes her head. “Nope.”
The next day they take the NYPD sedan out into the field to question a witness in an ongoing case, and the silence in the car is stifling.
He finally decides to break it. “Things won’t be like this… after. Will they?”
Olivia squirms in her seat and glances over at him. “Like what?”
“You know what I mean. Awkward. Like you’d rather be anywhere, and with anyone but me.”
She lets out a long breath. “I’m sorry, El. No, it won’t be like this after. I’ve just been really… in my own head lately.”
He studies her profile for a moment; her jawline which looks like it was cut from steel, her elegant nose, her full pouty lips. He quickly looks away.
“Okay, I get it. There’s a lot to think about.” He doesn’t exactly want to share what he’s been thinking about either.
He could press her more to talk, but he can tell by the way she turns her head and looks out the window, that she still doesn’t want to share what she’s thinking.
They continue their drive in silence, and eventually Elliot begins punching the buttons on the radio to see what is pre-programmed from the last driver. He finds only static. Apparently the previous partners didn’t feel the need to fill the silence. Maybe they are better at talking than he and Liv are.
_____
It’s Thursday at 7:42AM and Elliot has already been sitting outside the New Life Fertility Clinic for half an hour. He was afraid of being late, or maybe just nervous about the thing he came here to do, and he’d fidgeted and fussed around the kitchen, trying to help with breakfast, until Kathy told him he was just getting in the way. He promptly left.
He uses his NYPD parking placard to snag a spot, and waits until he sees Olivia walking towards the entrance to get out of the car and stroll casually towards her.
Just another normal day, he thinks to himself. Nothing unusual. No reason to be anxious.
His palms begin to sweat. It’s already unseasonably warm, and he realizes he could’ve left his suit jacket in the car.
“Hey.” His voice cracks at the end.
“Hi.” She smiles, but he can see the apprehension underneath. She was smart and left her outer layer behind, so all she has on top is a thin sweater. It dips down just enough in the front that a sliver of her cleavage is peeking out. He averts his gaze to the doorway of the building.
“You can still back out, if you’re having second thoughts.” She says suddenly, probably sensing his own nerves. “This is a big decision, and I don’t want-”
“Just a little performance anxiety,” he blurts out. “You’re the one who is walking away with a potential baby. Are you having second thoughts?”
She doesn’t answer right away and he leans in closer. “Liv?”
“I’m just - I’m worried about you, actually. And your family. And you deciding this was a mistake later on. I was up all night thinking about all the ways this could complicate our partnership.” She swallows hard and folds her arms protectively across her chest.
“There is no ‘this,’” he says. “I’m doing you a favor, as your partner and as your friend, and that’s it. After the appointment, it’s all you.” He needs that to be the truth, because he needs to do this for Liv. He needs to be the man that shows up for her.
Any way you want to do it, I’ll support you.
“I want to do this for you, Liv. So you aren’t just selecting from a binder. We’re always going to be close, right? I’m always going to have your six, and this is just another way of having your back.” Even he knows the smile that stretches across his face is goofy and slightly unstable.
”I don’t think this is what the Police Academy had in mind for the Partner Relations section,” she scoffs.
He chuckles. “No, definitely not. This goes way against those guidelines. No one can know we did this.”
“So if it comes out looking exactly like you…?” She raises her eyebrows. It’s a question he’s thought about as well.
“Well, you’ve seen my kids. I might have good swimmers, but my genes aren’t particularly strong.” He grins as he pictures his five blonde kids. His hair, or what’s left, sure as shit isn’t blonde. “I don’t think anyone would think twice about it if you have a baby with brown hair, Liv.”
“What about blue eyes?” she murmurs.
He can feel his throat closing up. The vision of a baby that looks like her, but has his eyes, is almost too much to bear.
“That would be a beautiful kid.” He adds quickly, “You just tell everyone you picked a tall Nordic man from the sperm bank. Björn, Six foot four, blue eyes, Olympic swimmer.”
She laughs and it eases the tension just a tad. “Right. Björn.”
“Mhm.” He nods, waiting for her to make the next move.
“Let’s go inside before we miss the appointment,” she says, turning and walking through the double doors ahead of him.
He follows, consciously thinking about how his feet suddenly feel like they’re made of lead.
_____
Elliot spent an hour earlier in the week filling out paperwork in the privacy of an interview room at the 1-6. They agreed he would donate anonymously in case anyone ever looked into the paper work, and he signed a donor agreement giving up any parental rights in the future. There’ll be no thread tying him to this. Doing that was not easy, it felt a little like swimming against a strong current, but he kept reminding himself who he’s doing this for. He pictured Liv pregnant, smoothing her hand over a big round belly, breasts fuller than they’ve ever been before. Then he saw her sitting in a glider holding a newborn baby swaddled in a soft blanket, looking down fondly at the tiny bundle with nothing but love in her eyes.
His ball point pen skidded across the signature line with ease.
The only thing he has to sign upon arrival is a final consent form, and then he finds himself alone in a small warm room.
Too warm.
The walls are a light pink, and there’s a large vinyl - for easy clean up he muses - armchair in the corner. Next to it is a low side table that has three plastic specimen cups, a sample-size bottle of lube, and a stack of magazines fanned out. Hustler, Playboy, Juggs, Barely Legal - he cringes at the last one. Clearly they didn’t know an SVU detective with five kids was going to be here. There are a few other more niche magazines that he’s never heard of, including MILFs. His hand hovers over that one for a moment before he reaches up to shed his suit jacket and loosen his tie.
God, this is fucking weird, he thinks, undoing a couple of the top buttons too. He can’t jerk off with a tight collar constricting his airflow. He spins in a small circle, examining the cramped room he’s supposed to do this in.
There’s a full length mirror on one wall as well, a couple coat hooks, and a fake plant in the corner.
He clears his throat and the sound fills the space like a grenade going off. He wonders if Liv can hear him from out in the hallway. It would have been better if she wasn’t here for this part - if he could’ve come alone to the office he’d be done already. But knowing that she’s out there waiting for him…
He drags a hand down his face and feels a drop of perspiration get pulled down with it.
Olivia said she had to meet with the fertility counselor one more time to finish some of the paperwork. And after this they have to drive downtown to the courthouse together, so there are reasons for her to accompany him. But he still really wishes that she didn’t.
He circles the small room once before settling into the chair with a squeak of shifting vinyl, and reaches for the April issue of MILFs.
Maybe his sexual proclivities are a little vanilla - a little boring. Maybe he lacks creativity in that department, but he likes what he likes. He’s always been more attracted to confident, strong women, of an appropriate age. He likes women who are assertive and who know what they want. Granted, he’s only actually had sex with two women in his adult life - Kathy and another one when he was separated from Kathy - but if he’s picking a magazine based on what he’s drawn to overall, it’s a woman. Not a girl.
He wants there to be hair in all the right places, and maybe some meat on the hips to grab onto - or to imagine grabbing onto.
As he flips through the pages, he finds one that appears suitable; leggy, shiny brown hair, bronze skin, dark eyes. The irony of this choice is not lost on him, but he pushes the thought away and gets to work.
Any way you want to do it, I’ll support you.
As he curls his hand around his flaccid shaft, his own words echo in his head for the millionth time that week. He practically wrote this outcome himself.
The face in the magazine is pretty enough. She’s probably in her early forties, with soft looking skin and even softer red lips. They are parted slightly, just enough to see her tongue poking out. The lips covering her teeth aren’t the only ones parted.
His eyes zero in on the apex where her legs meet, and the thatch of neatly trimmed brown hair surrounding her vagina. It’s a nice looking vagina, he thinks. At least, as far as he knows from photographs and videos. It looks surprisingly proportional actually, the folds all extending in a perfect teardrop shape to meet her clitoris where her manicured fingers are resting.
Elliot clears his throat again and reaches for the lube.
One squirt. Two squirts.
He returns his hand to his dick and starts working the slick goo over it, stroking up and down exactly how he likes, trying to make quick work of this.
They have to be in court in ninety minutes, but as long as traffic isn’t bad, that’s plenty of time.
Even so, Olivia is probably tapping her foot right now.
He blinks and focuses on the photo in front of him. The woman’s slick cunt is wide open, like it’s ready to take something inside. He tugs harder on himself, waiting for the tell-tale rush of warmth that he should be feeling any moment now. He reaches for his free hand to turn the page. Maybe this first one isn’t the right one.
The next photo features a woman who is a few years older than the first, skin a few shades darker, hair shorter, on her hands and knees looking back at the camera with a come hither expression.
Kathy never liked having sex doggy-style. She said it felt degrading. He didn’t quite understand that, because it’s just a sexual position, and he doesn’t ever degrade her, but whatever she says in the bedroom goes. They usually just have sex missionary style, in the dark.
The woman in the photo is spreading her ass cheeks apart to give a good, clear view of her asshole. Elliot ponders this - also something Kathy has never shown any interest in. His understanding from working in sex crimes and learning about every single goddamn aspect of the physical act, is that some women enjoy having their anus and rectum stimulated during sex.
He would do that, if Kathy asked.
He wonders if Olivia likes that.
Fuck, he sighs exasperatedly and gets another dollop of lube from the bottle.
This is taking too long.
Another drip of perspiration works its way down his temple, and he looks around, hoping a fan will magically appear in the corner.
Why is it so fucking hot in here? Don’t other men get warm, too? Wouldn’t setting the thermostat at sixty-five degrees be more appropriate for this type of work?
He rolls his lips and drags his teeth over the bottom one, sucking hard so that the air makes a hissing sound as it rushes through his teeth.
Focus, he tells himself, returning to the photo.
The woman has a very pink asshole and he remembers a porn actress saying once that they make her bleach it for on-camera. He thinks that’s bizarre. Even so, Elliot tries to imagine what it would feel like to put his dick inside something that tight.
The tingle of blood moving south surges for a second, and his dick twitches, but then it dissipates just as quickly.
Fuck.
He turns the page again, and again, and again, until he’s reached the end of the magazine and he’s no closer to ejaculating than he was when he first walked into the room.
His watch tells him that it’s been fifteen - no seventeen - minutes since he walked in. That’s too long. It’s taking too long.
What if he can’t do this for her? The realization of that is crushing. Performance anxiety, the one time he could actually do something for her that could change her life for the better. This has never been an issue for him before, so why now? Will Olivia believe him when he tells her that this never happens? It’s such a cliché.
I swear, Liv. I’ve never had an issue getting hard before, I’m just nervous. It’s not you. It’s me.
He should tell her sooner rather than later so that she can hate him for the rest of her life and pick some random dude from the catalogue.
Any way you want to do it, I’ll support you.
He’s failing her. That realization spurs him on, and he begins to pump more vigorously on his dick, determined to at least get it to half-mast. He can do that. If he just gets it—
There’s a knock at the door and he audibly gasps.
“What?!” he yelps out, maybe a little too loudly.
“Sorry, I’m sorry. I just - are you okay?” Liv’s voice fills the room and his cock responds immediately, moving in his hand like a shark sensing blood in the water.
“I - I don’t - fuck. I don’t know.” He lets go of himself and drops his chin to his chest, the shame of letting her down rolls through him, a suffocating weight.
“El?” she calls out.
He isn’t even sure if she was able to hear him when he answered her.
He’s been embarrassed the whole time about having to masturbate to give her the donation, but this is far worse. He might die from this embarrassment.
“I’m sorry,” he says a little more loudly. “I don’t - I can’t-”
The doorknob jiggles and he realizes she’s trying to open it. He quickly shoves himself back in his pants and zips them up, pulling a tissue from the box to try and wipe away some of the excess lube from his fingers.
He readies himself and opens the door, pulling it inward to reveal her concerned face on the other side.
Her features quickly shift as she takes in the scene before her: the empty donation containers, his own terrified expression. Her disappointment hits him like a wall, because now she knows that he’s a loser with a limp dick.
“I know, this is weird. It’s alright,” she says, too quickly.
“No, no. I said I could do this. I can. I just - yeah, it’s weird. But, I can do it, I just need - more time maybe.” Even as he says it, he can see the skepticism on her face. How her eyes betray her thoughts and he knows she doesn’t believe him.
“I hate these fucking magazines,” he blurts out, seeking some kind of defense to explain his failure. “I’ve just never been a big porn-mag-guy. And yeah - I know the jokes that Fin and Munch make - good Catholic Elliot. The altar boy. The prude. But I don’t know what to say, they just don't do it for me. I’m trying though, I really am.”
She blinks back at him for a few seconds, studying his face as if she’s trying to solve an impossible math equation, and something passes through her - quiet and calm like a sunrise.
“Can I come in for a minute?” she asks.
He just stares dumbly back at her. “What?”
“Can I come in?” she says again, with a little more urgency.
He steps aside, waving her in like he’s welcoming her to a dinner party.
Here’s the bar. Here’s the hors d’oeuvres. Here’s the lube.
She glances around the room. “Yeah I see what you mean, this isn’t really… conducive to arousal.” Heat rushes to between his legs at the way she says arousal, and he automatically palms himself to check if he’s getting hard. It’s instinctual, especially considering what he was doing before she knocked. His hand just goes there, like it remembers the job it was doing a minute ago.
But Liv, so observant, snaps her head towards him at the exact same time and hones in. He raises his hand and scratches his chin instead; the spitting image of casual.
“What we’re doing is already wildly inappropriate. So, would it-” she stops.
“Would ‘it’ what?” he asks.
Just say it, the voice in his head screams.
She clears her throat, eyes sliding to the magazines on the side table.
“Olivia,” he exhales her full name. “What?”
She turns to face him, hips and shoulders and tits all squared off with a confidence that makes him think they’re about to duel. “Would it help if I stayed?” She whispers and blushes at the same time as his dick twitches in his pants again.
“Stayed?” He repeats, like he doesn’t understand what the word means.
“Yes, Elliot. Now that we’ve come this far, do you just - want me to… stay?”
He does. Yes, he really, really does.
“I - I - would - how -” he shuts his mouth as the thoughts rush through his mind faster than his tongue can manage.
“I don’t mind,” she bites her lip. “If you want me to.” She takes a step closer, and the room is so small that now she’s right in front of him. His heart is beating so fast he’s certain she can hear it.
Ten years of being partners, and all ten of them he’s managed to convince himself that he isn’t wildly, desperately, in love with his partner. He’s done an expert job of existing in that denial, of assuring himself that he could even donate his sperm to her, and it wouldn’t mean anything.
But now, as she’s standing in front of him, offering to stay so he can make that donation successful, he realizes how wrong he was.
His cock jumps, like it’s reaching for the sound of her voice. For the heat of her body.
Any way you want to do it, I’ll support you.
“Fuck,” he adjusts himself again, and discovers he’s half-hard now. All it took was one minute of her looking at him, coupled with the mere suggestion of her participating, and he’s practically there. They could be done with this and out of here in no time.
“I - I mean, we could never speak of this again. I most certainly will go to Hell. And I don’t even know how I could look at you again without-”
Her eyes go wide and her neck and chest turn even redder. “You’re right. It was insane of me to even - yeah, I’m gonna go.” She spins away, reaching for the doorknob as he leaps forward, hand flattening on the door to hold it in place.
“Wait,” he mutters. “If you think that’s a good idea. I’m not totally against it. What did you have in mind?” He knows he’s talking too fast, the words tumbling out like a kid who's been caught cheating on a test.
He’s never been so nervous. Elliot doesn’t get nervous. He gets mad. He gets distraught. With Gitano he was terrified - but he wasn’t nervous. Whatever this is between them, the way her body is humming a mere few inches from his, it’s like someone just pinned him to the bench with a barbell, then added extra weight to it.
He tries to swallow and coughs instead, dropping his hand from the door, because he doesn’t want to keep her there if she wants to leave. Her head turns towards him, dark brown eyes getting darker by the second as she imagines - what?
What is she imagining?, he wonders.
She has one hand still on the doorknob and she flicks the lock, as his heart begins to beat even faster.
What if he has a heart attack? How would they explain that to Cragen - to his wife?
To everyone?
But she already said it, and he wants it, and it’s too late to stop whatever this is. It’s too late because whatever this is was started long before she asked him to be a sperm donor. He’s known that for years. Things between them were going to end up here eventually, some way, somehow.
Any way.
Any way you want to do it, I’ll support you.
There’s a lump in his throat so thick he isn’t sure if he can breathe. He swallows, forcing it down into his chest.
“I could… take my shirt off?” She asks, as if there is even a question. He just nods tightly, once, and then her shirt is gone and he’s staring at her bra. It’s her bra, but it’s also her breasts; full and round, rising up and out of the satin cups like the garment was painted onto her skin.
He’s seen her in a bra before, but he always tries not to look. He doesn’t want her to feel like he’s leering, so in the locker room he does his best to avert his gaze quickly and pointedly.
But now? Now, she’s just standing there, a foot away from him, in her bra. She’s not moving, save for the rise and fall of her breasts - her magnificent breasts. They are heaving along with her expanding lungs as she does her best to regulate her breathing. Up, down, up, down, up, down…
He realizes he’s holding his breath.
He inhales loudly and his dick strains against the zipper of his pants - it’s throbbing, desperate to be free. Her eyes are drawn to the movement. He’s an unlucky mantis and she’s the female about to use him for his seed and then devour him.
It twitches again.
“Well?” she asks, not needing to finish the question because he knows the answer.
“Okay,” he says with a nod.
His hand falls back to the zipper and he slides it down, slowly, still giving her every opportunity to stop him - or maybe he should stop her?
They are both guilty in this, and yet, he doesn’t feel guilty. At least, not yet. He’s sure he will later. As he experiences immediate relief by the space provided to his filling cock, he knows guilt will follow. But something about the way Liv is looking at him, it feels right. It feels good. It feels like the answer to a question that’s been plaguing him every minute, of every day, for the last nine years.
She licks her lips - actually licks them, like her mouth has run dry - as he frees himself from his briefs. He curls a hand around his shaft and gives it a few test pumps, exhaling a ragged grunt as her eyes stay fixed on him.
He loves how she’s watching him.
More blood rushes to his core and the hard column of his cock expands in his grip.
“Jesus,” he mutters.
Her lashes flutter, but she doesn’t say anything as her gaze drifts down to where the tip of his dick is leaking pre-cum.
Finally, he thinks.
He tries not to think about anything else, like how insane it is that they’re doing this. How insane, and how absolutely, totally, fucked up it is.
Instead, he drags the pad of his thumb over the wet tip of his cock and shudders at the pleasurable sensation.
“Your bra?…” He lets out a strangled puff of air as his focus returns to her breasts. Now that he can see most of them, it seems like a pity to not see the rest. At this point, he’s already completely fucked and there’s no coming back from this. But he doesn’t care. All he’s thinking about are the smooth curves of her tits and how the bra is holding them up high, but he wonders what they’d look like with the pull of gravity working. He wonders if her nipples are contracted underneath the smooth cups. He wonders if she has any freckles or moles on the skin surrounding her areolas.
She doesn’t say anything, but she slides one strap off her shoulder, then the other. His hand drags over his shaft but it’s tacky and dry and he reaches back for another squirt of the lube. When he turns back, he finds that she’s flipped the bra down over her stomach. It’s still clasped in the back, but it’s upside down, framing her waist and her rib cage almost like a bustier.
“Pffff,” he whimpers. It’s a sound that he can’t recall ever making before, but he isn’t embarrassed because he’s too distracted by the dusky brown of her nipples, and the freckle on the side of her right breast. The room is warm, and they aren’t contracted yet, but when he mutters her name, “Liv,” they instantly respond. The skin around them tightens as goosebumps spring up, and he watches with rapt fascination as they shrink to sharp points.
“No names,” she grits out, as if not saying each other's names will somehow make this less abhorrent. Like maybe he can forget who she is for the next couple minutes. Or maybe she wants to forget who he is.
“Pfff-fuck. M’kay,” he chokes out, cock jumping in his hand. His throat is dry, and he suddenly realizes he needs to sit down. He stumbles back into the vinyl chair, sinking into it with a raspy exhale.
She walks closer, until their knees are almost touching, and meets his gaze. Her eyes are darker than he’s ever seen, entirely black - pupils blown so wide that she looks high as a fucking kite. He realizes then: she’s aroused.
He didn’t exactly have doubts, but it’s still reassuring to know he’s not the only one.
“What else?” She asks, lifting a hand tentatively to her breast. “Want me to… touch myself?”
“Y-yes.” He can barely get the word out.
Her fingers land on her nipple first, plucking gently with a small sigh, before letting go to cup and lift the breast. It fills her palm entirely, spilling out over the top like a cresting wave.
His mouth drops open in awe.
He’s never seen anything so stunning and he wants to know if his hand would be big enough to cradle the whole of her breast, or would there be excess?
“What else?” she says again, and his eyes dart over her body, over the soft lines of her hips and waist, landing on the button of her jeans. But he can’t say it - he can’t ask for it. He won’t ask for it.
Turns out, he doesn’t need to.
She flicks the button, jerking the zipper down in one determined motion, and slips a hand between her legs. As her wrist begins to turn, her tits rise and fall heavily, the pebbled peaks at their center dancing in front of him.
“Jesus fucking-” he groans as his erection pulses in his hand, so achingly hard it feels like it might split in half. “Are you - are you actually…”
She hums low, one knee bumping into the arm of the chair. “Shut up, Elliot.”
He takes that as a yes, she’s pleasuring herself in front of him, and he also declines to point out that she already broke the no names rule.
Her breathing changes and becomes shallower, the red flush in her chest spreading higher to her neck and cheeks. Her stomach is relaxed, pushing against her forearm as she leans into it, but her thighs are flexed. He can tell by the dip at her hip bones that her quads are working overtime to keep her upright. Her legs answer the observation with a gentle quiver that makes his balls draw tight.
His own pleasure is demanding and impossible to ignore, but he isn’t sure what her end goal is. He slows down the motion of his fist for a few seconds, eyes flicking over her pretty pink lips, then down to her contracted nipples, then further down to her where she’s stroking her own sex like a master musician putting on the symphony of their life.
Is this more than just a peep show to get him off? Is she trying to come, too?
The idea of that twists with a blinding heat low in his belly.
“Show me.” He doesn’t realize he even says it out loud; some kind of final plea to prove this is really happening. And then she’s pushing her jeans and underwear down lower on her hips, low enough that the close-cropped hair covering her sex appears, and not just a sliver of it - but all of it. The perfect triangle of dark-chocolate-brown hair is staring back at him as she slides her fingers through it. He expects her to return to touching herself, but she interprets show me in a different way. She uses the pointer fingers from both hands to spread herself open to him, baring her luscious pink folds, which are far more beautiful than any of the photos in the magazines.
She shows him, and she waits.
She waits, blinking down at him as he stares unapologetically at the perfect apex of her sex.
She waits as his rough palm continues to work.
The sight of her standing before him like that, swollen and open, totally exposed and more vulnerable than her personality usually allows for - it might kill him.
She’s so beautiful, it physically hurts to look at her. He feels like a crudely drawn cartoon who’s stumbled into a renaissance painting where he doesn’t belong. She’s serene, partially disrobed, backlit and luminous.
“Oh, Li-” he cuts himself off before he says her name, groaning as fresh blood rushes to his cock and it reaches for her heat. Everything seems to move in slow motion then.
Her slender bronze fingers return to her clit as she leans forward, the other hand drifts to the wall.
His face is hot. His chest is on fire. His eyes are stinging with the effort to not explode and come all over her legs, one of which is now pressed into the arm of the chair.
On every turn of her wrist he gets a glimpse of slick pink, and he’s never wanted to taste anything so badly in his life.
He thinks he hears the click of moist skin coming from underneath her fingers, and he feels his climax dangerously close to seizing control.
“Shit - close. I’m close,” he grunts, and watches as she lunges for a plastic specimen cup.
Of course, that’s why they’re here.
Jesus. He almost forgot.
As she hands him the cup, their fingers brush and she quickly lets go, slamming her hand down on the arm of the chair to brace her weight as she curls towards him.
“No touching. No - no touching,” she gasps as his hand instinctively reaches for her arm, curling it around thin air instead.
Fuck.
He just nods, dropping his head back against the chair, allowing himself the vision of her perfect breasts swaying in his eyeline. She’s more taut than a tightrope, the tendons in her neck sharp and long, shaking with exertion as she hurries to finish herself off in the hope that he’ll follow quickly after her.
He will.
He’s barely holding on - reality stretched so thin, for all he knows he’s in the middle of a wet dream. Maybe that’s what this is.
Maybe none of this is real and he’s going to wake up in a sticky puddle of his own ecstasy.
God, he’s so, so, close. Right there. He can practically taste the euphoria on his tongue and the pride of accomplishment that’s dangling right in front of him.
Her brows draw together and her eyes flutter shut. “Shit,” she keens softly as her body tenses even more, and she looks like she might fall on top of him. He wouldn’t mind that. But she doesn’t, and he brings the specimen container to the head of his cock as he feels himself beginning to shatter.
Any way you want to do it, I’ll support you.
He comes hard. Harder than he’s ever come before, as the release tears through him like hot lava spewing from a volcano and Olivia’s upper body continues to shudder above him, suspended close enough that he can smell her perfume and feel the warmth radiating from her skin. His orgasm is quick and fierce, but thankfully not messy, as he glances down to make sure he caught the sample in the cup.
Liv is still braced on the chair, leaning over him, flushed chest and erect nipples only a few inches from his face.
What the fuck? He bites his cheek to keep from smiling because he isn’t sure what else to do; so overwhelmed by the absurdity of their situation that he could laugh or cry. Or both.
He reaches carefully to the side table and places the container down with a trembling hand. He handles it like he would a weapon that has the safety flicked off - reverently, with great respect and a little fear.
There’s three red lids set to the side and he picks up one of them, screwing it on slowly as he sees Olivia moving over him. She begins fumbling with her bra, turning away as she flips the cups back up to cover herself, and he shoves his softening dick back into his pants.
He tries not to look at her as she finishes getting dressed and he zips and buttons his pants, but she turns and catches his eyes. He must have an agape, oh-my-god-what-the-fuck-just-happened kind of expression, because she just shakes her head.
“Don’t look at me like that. It’s done.” She points at the specimen container. “There’s a barcode on there, you don’t need to label it.”
He glances at the plastic cup, then back to her. “Oh, okay.”
“You just leave it in here, and they come and collect it.” She tells him.
He nods, “Okay. I think I remember them saying that earlier.”
“Okay, so I’m going to go out. I’ll be out there.” She jabs a thumb towards the waiting room.
“Okay,” he says.
“Okay.” She backs up a few steps to the door and brushes a few strands of hair behind her ear.
Before she can pull the door open, he feels himself returning to his body for a moment of clarity. “Liv, are you alright?”
She straightens her spine and slings her bag over her shoulder, snapping her head to meet his gaze. “Yeah, fine. Why?”
Why?
Did he miss the part where she got a concussion?
“You’re fine,” he repeats.
“Yeah. Why are you asking?”
Now he’s fairly certain that he’s slipped into an alternate reality.
“Liv, what? We just-”
She spins to face him, eyes blazing and cheeks instantly turning crimson. “No, Elliot. No, we didn’t. We. Did. Not.”
The realization hits him almost as hard as his orgasm. She’s going to act like this never happened, and he’s going to have to do the same.
“Right,” he swallows and watches as she jerks the door open and is gone. “Right.” He says again to the empty room. While before it felt too small, now it feels cavernous.
Any way you want to do it, I’ll support you.
He can do that.
For her.
He can do anything for her.