Title: Home Is In Your Arms
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Summary: Oliver interrupts Felicity and Barry, and sounds like a whining six-year-old in the process.
Author's Note: Hello again, it's me! Hope everyone's doing wonderful and having a marvelous mid-March.
Just a little something that came to me because all the filming pictures of "The Flash" had me missing Barry Allen. Sorry about the cheesy title - the muse picked it and wouldn't let me change it Comments would be most welcome, please & thank you!
She hears him come in mid-conversation and pauses to listen to him lock the door faithfully behind him. There's the clattering sound of his keys falling into place next to hers in that ceramic bowl she keeps on the hall table; she had bought the bowl at an art fair when she first moved to town, and had no idea it'd be the perfect fit for both her keys and his.
Life's funny like that.
She senses his presence crossing her tiny entrance hall across her tiny living room to the doorway of her tiny bedroom. Senses, because of course she can't hear his footsteps. Even in dress shoes, he'd never make the mistake of stepping too loudly, his body trained to never make a sound, never leave a signature of where he's been unless he's leaving a clear path of destruction.
But there's no mistaking the smile on his face as he sees her curled up in bed, tablet on her lap, hair falling out of her ponytail. It's a tired smile, and his shoulders are weary, sagging under the pressure of another investment dinner where the dollar signs get bigger in proportion to how charming he's being.
"Hey," Felicity says from across the room. "Long night?"
Oliver just shakes his head, shrugging out of his blazer and undoing his tie, draping the clothes over the back of a chair in the corner of the room. It's where she throws her work clothes at the end of a long day too, unzipping the dresses and sighing with relief as she steps out of her heels. He knows her routines by now, and he does the same.
"Aw, poor little billionaire. Come here," she teases, beckoning for him to join her on the bed.
He does as she asks, crawling in next to her, resting his head against her side, burrowing in closer as she wraps her arm around him and runs her fingers through his hair. It's soothing, her scratching lightly at his scalp. Back and forth, back and forth, the rhythmic pattern already loosening his tense muscles as he relaxes in her hold. He can imagine the pink cotton candy color of her fingernails that she'd painted last week with Iron Man playing in the living room, her looking up every so often with interest when Pepper Potts was onscreen.
"Is that Oliver?"
Barry's voice echoes in the quiet of her bedroom. Oliver snaps his head up to look at her tablet, and finds the young CSI staring at him with interest from the screen.
"No, it's some other blond guy I like to cuddle with," Felicity retorts with a chuckle. "Yes, of course it's Oliver. Oliver, say hi to Barry."
Oliver merely stares back, narrowing his eyes as Barry waves at him enthusiastically. He turns to Felicity, shaking his head in mock disappointment as he says, "So this is why you couldn't come to dinner? You had a Skype date with your pen pal?"
"Okay, he's not my pen pal," Felicity echoes back with an eyeroll. "We're not six."
"Yeah, we're not six," Barry repeats, shaking his head as if offended.
"I thought you said you had work to do. Actual IT work," Oliver says petulantly, his voice coming out more like a six-year-old whining than he'd like to admit. She's been by his side at all sorts of QC events year after year, but tonight she'd told him she had work to finish. She fixed his tie and gave him a goodbye kiss and ushered him out the door to, what, talk to Barry?
"I did have work!"
"And it took you all night?" He raises an eyebrow as he questions her further, and when she hesitates and bites her lower lip in a sign of obvious guilt, he knows he was right that it hadn't kept her occupied all night. "I see how it is."
"I'm sorry!" Felicity turns to him completely, tablet forgotten, arms wrapping around his neck and pulling him further up the bed onto her. "I just... Jared did really need help with this project so I told him I would help him after work, and I've been running ragged all week with finding an algorithm for stupid Fasconi's gambling trail, and, and, I just," she takes a deep breath, "okay, the truth is, I just really didn't want to shave my legs tonight, okay?"
Oliver tries to contain the chuckle that wants to burst free at her confession - and fails. He's been failing the battle to hold back his laughter a lot more now that he and Felicity are together. It's a strange sort of war, one he doesn't mind giving in to despite it taking him by surprise; the sound bursts from his lips like a foreign noise to his ears, the rumble of his chest a sensation he doesn't feel too often.
His hand trails down the length of her leg, slipping under the fabric of her sweatpants to slide up the skin of her bare calf. "Your legs feel fine."
"Oliver!" She squirms in his hold, but he only holds her tighter, his hand moving up and down, his fingers warm over her skin. She marvels at how he lights her whole skin on fire with just one touch. "Stop, they're all stubbly."
"No, they're not. They're soft," he murmurs. He leans in closer, appreciating the fact that she hasn't taken out her contacts yet though he does miss the familiar feel of her glasses as he moves for the kiss. She sighs against him at the contact, her entire body sinking into the mattress as his body relaxes against her own. The tension eases from his shoulders as she runs her fingers through his hair, and it finally feels like he's come home after a very, very long day.
He moves his hand from her leg to her shoulder, a much more pleasurable area for her because she shivers at the contact when he traces the ridge of her collarbone. He grins into the kiss, smiling further as she tries to move in his hold. He doesn't break the kiss, even as she arches her back; his hands slides down to her chest, fingers brushing just under the collar of her t-shirt. Her hands trail down his chest, unbuttoning the buttons on his dress shirt one by one.
"Um, guys? Okay, I'm gonna go now."
Oliver breaks the kiss with a low growl and ignores the way Felicity giggles in amusement when she sees a tiny piece of Barry's face on the tablet screen that's been pushed aside by their impromptu makeout session.
"Sorry, Barry. Good night! Say hi to Iris."
"I will. Thanks for your help with the coding for the hard drive I found, Felicity, I could not for the life of me-"
Oliver's not in the mood for further conversation. He reaches for the tablet, his thumb hovering right above the "end" button. "Bye, Barry."
"Right, sorry, of course. Bye, Oliver."
Oliver moves to end the conversation, but pauses for a second. "How's it going out there in Central City? Everything okay with your... jobs?" He doesn't know how secure the line is so he doesn't refer to his night life of fighting crime. But he knows Barry knows exactly what he means.
Barry lights up at the question, nodding enthusiastically as he answers, "Yes, yeah, it's going fine, thanks."
Oliver nods. "Right. Good. Well... stay safe."
"Thanks, I will, Oliver. Bye, Felicity!"
"Bye!" Felicity calls just as Oliver closes out of the app and reaches to place her tablet on the bedside table. She smiles at him brightly as he returns to her side, his body stretched out over hers in all the right places.
"What?" Oliver questions just before he drops a sloppy kiss on the side of her neck.
"That was sweet. You talking to Barry." Felicity sighs in approval as he trails another kiss up her neck, humming at her comment but not paying it enough mind to say anything back. "He really looks up to you. It's cute." Again, Oliver says nothing, too busy paying attention to the skin of her shoulder, the line of her neck, then making his way back up to her lips.
Before he can silence her using his most favorite method, she stops him to blurt out another apology. "Sorry I didn't come with you to dinner though. I just needed a night off. Which is horrible of me considering you never get a night off, and, yeah, I'm sorry, that's not an excuse. Forgive me?" She pouts adorably, eyes twinkling at what she already knows his answer will be.
He always forgives her.
Sure enough, Oliver simply shakes his head at the unnecessary apology. "It's okay. I don't blame you. Thea missed you. She said hi."
"Did she now?" Felicity slides off his dress shirt, tossing it behind him, pulling him more firmly on top of her as she slides her hands familiarly down his chest. She sighs as his hands quickly dispose of her tank top, the touch of his body warming her even as she shivers. "That was nice of her."
"And Roy. Roy said hi."
Felicity grins to herself, humming appreciatively as she nods along, but saying nothing more. Then, finally-
"I missed you too."
The words are quiet as they're murmured in the silence of her bedroom, but she hears them clearly as they're muttered from mere inches away. Their eyes lock and she smiles at him sweetly, gaze darting to his lips but not closing the distance just yet.
"Me and my stubbly legs?"
"You and your everything."
the end ~