Patterns in Traffic
Title: Patterns in Traffic
Rating: PG
Fandom: Law and Order SVU
Pairing: Alex Cabot/Casey Novak
Summary: A chance meeting leads to a surprising end.
Warnings: None
Spoilers: None
Word Count: 1,649
Disclaimer: SVU belongs to Dick Wolf and NBC.
A/N: A special thanks goes to twtd for betaing. Written for femme_fic for calleigh_j

Just outside of the restaurant, Alex stopped for a breath. She could just make out Casey Novak sitting alone, the warm lights of the bar reflecting in her hair. For a moment, Alex was tempted to take a step back, to hail a cab. She was already late—too late, she had both feared and hoped the entire way there.

But she had never walked away from anything before. Alexandra Cabot did not walk away...unless she had no choice. Sometimes she wondered if that had even been the case or if that was what she told herself. Things seemed to be back to the sort of normal that Alex had longed for, but she felt a distance, a tension with them. She was happy in the courtroom, but she was not at ease with bringing her past and her present together.

For all of its noises all around her, even though it pressed in on her, the city seemed more distant than the woman sitting in the quiet bar. Alex pursed her lips and took a deep breath. She opened the door knowing this was something she wanted.

“Alex.” Casey smiled brightly. Alex had not remembered that from Zapata’s trial. But why would she? Then, Alex had been more worried about Casey as a prosecutor than as a person.

“I’m sorry, I’m late.” She put her bag on the floor as she slid onto one of the high backed barstools. “SVU needed a warrant...”

Casey waved her off in an instant, smiling slightly. “I know how it goes.”

“Yeah.” Alex caught the bartender’s eye. She wondered if it was really that easy for Casey to dismiss it or if she didn’t want to hear about SVU at all. “I’ll have a glass of the rioja,” she said. “Thanks.”

She watched Casey finger her glass. “Planning this has been pretty ridiculous, hasn’t it?”

*****

“Shit...” Someone left the top half unscrewed on the carafe of nonfat, so of course, it splashed everywhere, including the front of the person who picked that moment to step up to the coffee bar beside her. Casey instinctively grabbed for napkins at the same time as the other woman, one of them spilling her lidless cup in the process. “Shit. Oh, God, I’m so sorry.”

She grabbed the cup before even more of the coffee could get everywhere, and she put a wad of napkins over the biggest part of the puddle.

“No, it was my fault, I...Casey? Casey Novak?”

Casey looked up. The voice was had a distant familiarity, but the face, she knew immediately. She blinked. “Alex Cabot. I...” It had been three years, and she hadn’t paid much attention to Cabot’s return to the city because it didn’t really affect her. “Sorry about your suit.” Her suit—the one that looked like it had most certainly been worn for a day in court.

Alex just shook her head, and both women stepped back when a barista came out with a mop.

“It’s fine. I was headed home. It’s...good to see you.”

Casey smiled tightly, looking down as she rummaged in her purse for her wallet. But Alex was not looking at her the way she expected, the way everyone in the legal circle still did, even after a year. It was surprising not to find the usual polite pity when she looked up, but it was good, refreshing.

“I heard you’re at SVU again.” She didn’t know why she kept up with it, why she did it to herself.

“Yeah. We should have...coffee sometime, compare notes.” Alex pushed her glasses up, suddenly seeming just a little uncomfortable.

Casey pushed her hair behind her ears. She could smell stale coffee on her skin. “I’m pretty sure the last thing your office wants is for any of its prosecutors to compare notes with me.” She laughed lightly, but the sound of it fell heavier than she would have liked.

Alex pursed her lips. “I tried my share of...questionable justice,” she said quietly. “You just ran out of luck.”

“Right.” Alex Cabot always knew how to cut to the quick—that much hadn’t changed. “Well, good luck with SVU,” she said matter of factly, adjusting her purse on her shoulder.

Casey was turning towards the door when she felt Alex’s hand on her arm. She couldn’t imagine that the situation could get any better, but something made her turn around. Whatever Alex Cabot’s opinion of her really was, whatever bitterness she still had about the censure and disbarment, Casey knew that Cabot had been through losing it all. So, she stopped, turned around, and once her eyes met Alex’s, she knew she hadn’t made a mistake.

“Casey, I’m sorry. I just...what I was trying to say is that...I know how it is...to get a tough break.”

Casey had heard those words before, but she smiled, a bit sheepishly. “You’d think it would stop stinging after a while.”

“You’d think, but...” Alex shrugged. Casey noticed then that Alex was still touching her arm. “I meant it about getting together.”

All of a sudden, she wasn’t sure if it was notes that Alex wanted to compare. There was something in the way Alex withdrew her hand, letting her fingertips linger that took Casey by surprise. While she had never really known her, aside from what she had been told about Alex’s “death” when she took the job, Casey had always heard Alex Cabot was something of a political bisexual. She wondered if politics was in the equation anymore.

She instinctively went to reach for her cards, only to rummage around in her bag until she found something that she could write on. Casey penned her cell number on the back of an old receipt, and she was successful in her determination not to blush when she handed it to Alex.

*****

She folded and unfolded the number a few times for a few days before putting it into her phone. But Alex did not call Casey right away. She wanted, needed to evaluate what had possessed her to indirectly ask for it in the first place. In the three years since her return, she had managed to keep SVU out of her life. It hurt, but the pain was dull compared to what she had felt when going into witness protection.

But the fiasco that resulted in Novak being disbarred had been everywhere, for a moment at least, and Alex hadn’t been able to avoid that. It had been nearly a year, but she still thought about it, still felt something like compassion...no, she felt something of a kinship with Casey. They both pushed, and pushing too hard gotten them both lost.

There was something about Casey, some sort of promise behind her tight smile. And it had been so long since Alex felt anything beyond a hint of interest for anyone.

She looked at the number on more time before calling. The sound of her heartbeat syncopated with the rings until Casey’s voicemail picked up.

This is Casey—leave a message.
Alex thought about hanging up, but the recording was starting. “Hi, Casey. It’s Alex. I was...thinking we could have drinks, maybe Thursday at eight? Let me know.” She sighed after hanging up. A date for drinks and a date for coffee were two different things, and that probably wouldn’t escape Casey’s notice.

*****

“Drinks,” Casey said aloud as she listened to the message again. When she finished saving Alex’s number, she tapped her phone against her chin. She wondered if she really hadn’t imagined the lingering touch. “Right,” she said, dialing the number with a touch.

As the tin ring sounded in her ears, Casey wondered where this came from, how this had just fallen into her lap. She hadn’t been on a date in over a year; SVU did a good job of killing one’s personal life, and afterwards, she had been in a little more than a funk.

“Hey, Alex...” She had completely missed the intro message. “Thursday sounds fine. Just let me know when and where.”

*****

Alex swirled her wine thoughtfully. “Ridiculous is a word I would use, yes. I’m really sorry about that...I mean, having to cancel—“

“Twice,” Casey cut in. “I was beginning to think...” She looked down, a self-deprecating smile on her face. “I’m not sure what I was thinking, actually. Things come up...the office before personal life, right?”

“Yeah.” Alex breathed the scent of the wine before sipping, letting the taste fill and relax her. Those were words she had lived by once, but it wasn’t the same. No matter how much she wanted it to be, being back at SVU wasn’t the same. “Theoretically, at least.”

Casey chuckled. “Until it destroys whatever you’ve got left,” she said bitterly. Alex blinked. It was not that she wasn’t thinking it, but she realized that Casey had come as close to living it as she had.

“Bitterness and resentment is a great way to start something,” Alex said, slightly amused.

“What are we starting here, Alex?”

“I...” Alex ran her hand through her hair. “I don’t know, Casey.”

Once, all she had wanted was power, political clout. That was what had driven Alex, and it was what haunted her when everything had been taken away. Now, though, she found herself craving nothing more than a human connection—something simple, something real.

It came as a surprise to her when Casey leaned forward, kissing her gently. Alex licked her lips, forcing herself not to tense, while Casey smiled into her glass.

“Maybe...” Casey said, “we need to stop trying so hard. It’s obvious that we both need something, and it’s really okay if that’s just sex.”

Alex broke into a slight smile. It was something she would have said, something she might still say. And most importantly, she could not argue with Casey’s reasoning. It was something—something she wanted, no matter how unexpected her companion.