13. Doing Your Job

Because they caught the guy - whose name turns out to be Robert Garcia - we can go back home.

I sit at the island and finish some schoolwork. Mom comes to the kitchen after her shower. She loosely shakes her wet hair out from her towel.

"What'cha working on?"

"Science. Do you happen to know what makes aspartate, glycine, and glutamine different from or similar to each other?" I ask, in no way expecting her to know.

She stares at me for a second. "I'm sorry, I don't even understand what you just said," she replies.

"They're amino acids," I tell her.

"Which do what?"

"They're used in DNA production and help with diets and stuff."

"That's why I'm not a scientist," she says. "That's all way over my head."

I smile and give up on answering questions. I turn to Algebra.

"Oh, math. Something else I'm not good at."

"This is easy. Quadratic formula."

She gives me another stare.

"Opposite b plus or minus the square root of b squared minus 4ac all over 2a?"

"Ellie, I literally have no idea what you just said. Say it again in English."

"I did. Here, look."

I scribble down the formula and some random equation.

"You take the number in front of x-squared and put it anywhere a is. You take the number in front of x and put it wherever b is. You take the number without a variable and put it where c is."

"I'm going to bed. My brain is starting to hurt."

"It's really not hard, Mom."

"Ellie I nearly failed math a couple times," she tells me.

"Before or after trigonometry?"

"After...?"

"Exactly!" I flick my pencil in her face.

"Get some sleep tonight, okay?"

I nod, my mind going back to the case. Mom going out, pretending to be me. Going with Robert, him being able to do who knows what to her.

She leans onto the other side of the island, takes my pencil. I keep staring at my textbook.

"What's wrong, Love?"

Whatever question I thought I asked wasn't what comes out of my mouth. "W-Were you scared...when..." My voice trails off somewhere.

"You mean today?"

I nod. "How do you just go do that? It doesn't make sense."

"I've been trained not to back down from tasks like those. I went undercover in a jail before."

"Were you scared then?"

"Not at first. But I got alone with the guy we were trying to catch. He was much more...aggressive than this guy was. But I've learned. It's not so hard when its for you, either."

I nod again. "I just don't get it."

"Why?"

"I was so scared you wouldn't come back."

I look up at her now. Her face is unreadable. But I know what she's thinking when she puts my pencil down and says, "Come on. Let's go to bed. You can work on this tomorrow."

I get off my stool and let her lead me to her room. I guess it's not so bad I'm super clingy right now.

I lie on the empty side - which is now my side - and flip onto my left.

She plays with my hair a little, then reaches for my hand. I hold on.

"I'm not going anywhere for a very long time, My Love. I promise. You can't get rid of me."

I smile at her attempt for a joke, but I'm not in the mood for laughing. Nor am I in the mood to tell her what I'm thinking.

"El, you can tell me anything, you know. That rule isn't limited to Amanda." Does she always know what I'm thinking?

Then I realize: I'm tense, my breathing is off, and I won't shift even the slightest bit. It's the body language. If anyone is better at reading that than me, it's her.

"Remember ten seconds ago how I said I was scared you wouldn't come back today?"

"Mhm."

"I only ever see you at the precinct magically figuring out who did what to who and why. I don't know what goes on other than that unless you tell me. It scared me the guy would take you and still have Ashley too. Those times you wouldn't come home until 3 AM and have to wake up by 5 to leave. Those times you left me with Amanda because you went undercover or on a case out of New York. It-"

"Ellie. Your job is to go to school. Learn. Be my daughter. It's my job to worry about that. About you. Don't grow up this fast. I'm not ready for that. Be a kid, please."

I turn over now to face her. She runs her fingers along my cheek.

"Don't worry about me on any case for any reason. Go out clubbing and make me worry and yell at you. That's what I want."

All of a sudden, I feel heat in my eyes.

"I'll never do that ever again," I barely choke out. "Last time I did that my best friend disappeared and I nearly beat a girl to a pulp and I lost all independence I thought I had."

She pulls me towards her, keeping me tight in an embrace. "I know you don't wanna hear it, but when I heard what you said to Amanda about the girl, I nearly went to applaud you."

I smile a little. "My comeback for her saying 'you ruined my manicure' was better."

"What's an Ellie response? 'Now your face matches?'"

"Maybe."

She's quiet for a while. I start thinking our conversation is over for the night.

"Ellie, I know you may or may not think your life will ever get better from day to day, especially now. But it does. It will."

"Where did that come from?"

She sounds ready to talk about something really important, but I can hear her heartbeat. And it quickens. When I look up at her, she shakes her head. "Just thinking about your grandma. She couldn't find light for herself. Not even with me. Don't do that. Ever."

I take her hand and squeeze it. I know she's thinking about something else. "Is it my dad?" I ask before deciding if its a good idea.

"A little. Mostly mine. They never found who raped her. I'll never know who he is."

I nod, knowing I've asked enough questions tonight. "I love you," I say.

"Love you more," she replies.

With that I snuggle up more against her and fall asleep.

~*~*~*~*~*~

"I gotta go. If you feel like coming to the precinct later, call me and tell me. And please take a bus," Mom informs me.

"Okay. I'll probably be down there around 1-ish," I predict.

"Okay. Bye." She hugs me. "Love you."

"Love you too."

It's 6:30 AM. I lie in bed until I doze off, but I don't sleep much now that I'm awake.

At around 8:40, I take my school stuff to the living room. I turn on the TV and throw a blanket over my legs and work until everything for today and some of tomorrow is done. Its 10:50 when I'm finished.

I shower and look for something to eat, but there's never anything good in this house. I didn't expect anything either, because Mom and I both haven't been home or had time for grocery shopping.

I text Jordyn and see how she's doing, even though she's in school. She says it's fine but she wishes she could skip like me. Another text comes through when I don't reply to hers within 5 minutes: "people think you're missing too, though."

"What did you say?" I reply back.

"That your mom is awesome and lets you stay home."

"Can't argue with that. But I sort of just told her I wouldn't be in school."

It's nearly noon and I'm bored as hell. With the 20 bucks Mom gave me, I get a bus pass and head to McDonald's. I sit on my phone for a while, watching the little kids in the playplace.

While I'm finishing off the fries, Mom calls me.

"Hello?"

"Why haven't you gotten down here, yet?"

I make sure there's food in my mouth when I reply. "I'm eating."

"Where?"

"McDonald's. And I told you I wouldn't be down until around 1 anyways."

"I figured you would be here earlier though."

"I had homework. I can head over there now," I tell her, knowing she's probably way more worried than I am.

"Please do. And bring me an order of fries."

"We'll see if there's any left when I get there."

I get up and throw my trash away, buy a large order of fries, and get on the bus to SVU.

I walk in, handing Mom her fries.

"Thank god, I'm starving," is her opening statement.

"No need to say hello," I reply.

Amanda walks past us, snagging a fry.

"Hey, my fries!"

I smirk when Fin walks by just to get a fry to bug her.

I sit next to her as she eats with one hand and scrolls through a computer with the other.

Fin and Amaro are in charge of interrogating Robert, but he doesn't give it up. I'm almost scared they'll make me talk to him, but Mom gets up and goes into the interrogation room without a second's thought. I'm in charge of guarding her fries.

After twenty minutes, she's back, obviously pissed, and snatches her fries to eat them.

"What?" Amanda asks.

"He called for a lawyer," Mom replies.

When said lawyer shows up, he goes to argue with Cragen in his office.

The day is rather uneventful after that. Robert is still under arrest, but if Ashley doesn't show up before his 24 hours are up, they have to release him.

By 5 o'clock, and another search around the warehouse, I've lost hope. And the peace of mind I had.

Fin and Munch went out, so when the door opens to the squadroom, I don't look up. I look up when I hear a very, very weak voice.

"O-Oliv-via B-Bens-son pl-lea-ease."

We all look over to the doors. A girl, hair ratted, clothes ripped and falling off, arms wrapped around her, legs bent awkwardly as she walks. I stand up but don't move. It's Ashley.

"Ashley," my mom says for me.

She gets up and walks with Cragen over to her. I don't have to be a detective like them to know she's probably hypothermic.

Ashley reaches for my mom, and just before they touch hands, I watch Ashely's eyes roll to the back of her head and she collapses.

"Someone call a bus!" Cragen yells.

Amanda runs to do that. The only person - the closest person to me - left is Nick, who I turn to to cry.

He holds me until Amanda can. She holds me until Mom can. Mom can't work the case so we make our way with Nick to the hospital. We have to sit and wait while Amanda goes with Ashley.

Fin and Munch show up and choose to sit with us in the waiting room.

"She'll be okay, Bud."

I nod, obviously not believing them. I heard the words "severe" and "ICU".