Smallville

I've Loved Her from the First

Couple: Tess and Oliver

Rating: PG-13

Summary: Oliver tries to cope with the death of Tess Mercer.

Disclaimer: I own nothing

When he had first heard the news it really did not register. Clark and Lois had been the ones to deliver it and they had made sure that Chloe was there, too. Clark had wanted her there in case he had broken down.

But he had forgotten that the first stage of grief is denial and so he had made the trip for nothing because Oliver did not break down into tears or sobs. He had taken the news calmly and even when preparing the funeral he was not upset.

He arranged the flowers. Tess had always liked purple roses so he bought out all of the flower shops in the state.

He picked out the tombstone. Tess was big and bold but simple and tasteful so he had no idea which way to go. In the end, he chose a simple, smooth granite tombstone with an angel on it.

After all, she had been his angel even if he never would have admitted it to her.

He had chosen the song. That was the easiest choice.

It had to be you...

It was the first song they had ever danced to and whenever he hears it he can almost feel her head on his shoulder and her breath hitting his neck.

The funeral had been small but grand and it was the most beautiful tribute to this extraordinary woman that he was sure was meant to find him on that island. She had saved him in so many ways.

And he broke her in return in so many ways.

They left him alone with her after the service and he kneeled down on the muddy ground and cried until he could not cry any longer.

Then he went to the nearest bar and got so drunk that he blacked out for a day and a half or so he was told by Clark and Lois.

It became his routine. He would drink and drink and drink until he was either dreaming of her or too inebriated to remember that she was dead while he still lived.

Chloe tried her hardest. At first she tried to get him to come back to Star City but he had looked at her, shook his head, and said, "Do you really think I am going to leave her? She'll be in Metropolis forever and so will I."

The look on her face had been one of shock, understanding, and anger. She had nodded her head and walked away from the conversation.

So Chloe had moved back from Star City to Metropolis. She had even resumed her duties as Watchtower. And for a while everything was going smoothly as everyone would do their best to ignore the ghost in the room.

Then one day he walked into the room and noticed immediately that some of Tess' things had been taken off the desk.

It had been one of the ugliest fights he had ever been in. Chloe had had enough.

So had he and he had accused her of always being jealous of the only woman he had ever been himself with. He had told her that she had no right to touch anything in Watchtower. It was then that she brought up something he had never heard her ever talk about.

"Don't forget that your precious shrine to Tess was actually a wedding present from Jimmy for me. So if anyone has the right to touch anything here it's me."

It was the final nail in their coffin. Watchtower represented different things to both of them and none of it had to do with their relationship.

So it was ended. Chloe continued to be Watchtower. Oliver continued to hate it.

But they dealt.

Oliver sighed into his drink.

He was sitting in her chair.

He was sitting in her chair at her desk at the Luthor Mansion.

It was the former Luthor Mansion. Now, it was the Queen Estate. He had refused to let it go back to Lex after everything he and Tess had been through together underneath this roof. The closest was still full of her clothes, her scent still clung to his sheets, and her daily planner lay open on the desk in front of him.

She was still there with him. He wasn't alone.

Figuratively or literally as Clark had just silently walked through the double doors and now stood in front of the fireplace.

He could feel Clark's eyes on him as he continued to stare into the drink in his hand.

"You can't keep doing this to yourself, Oliver." Clark said quietly. "It's been a year. Oliver, it's time to move on."

Oliver snorted and swirled his drink still not looking at Clark. "That's rich. Move on, you say? Tell me something, Clark, the first moment you laid eyes on Lois did you love her?"

He turned his eyes up at Clark and he could see the man's locked jaw and hard eyes. Clark knew where he was going with this and hated that Oliver was about to make a point that he could not dispute.

This was not the first time they had had this conversation.

He cocked his head to one side briefly before he said, "No, I did not love her the first moment I laid eyes on her. I should have but I didn't."

Oliver nodded. "I did love Tess from the first moment I saw her. She died thinking my heart belonged to someone else."

He brought the drink up to his lips and downed what was left.

"I am only thirty years old. I have loved and lost the only woman that ever truly understood me and accepted me. I cannot explain the depths of what I feel for her but I know that you will understand when I say this, if Lois died today and one year from now I told you it was time to move on you would know it was impossible to do so."

He turned his eyes down at her planner. Her neat scrawl littering the pages with meetings, deadlines, and secrets only she would understand.

"I won't move on just like you wouldn't move on from Lois. So please, respect that, and leave me alone."

And Oliver was grateful that after a moment of silence Clark walked back out the double doors and left him alone with his thoughts of her.

He closed his eyes, laid his head back on the chair, and willed himself to another time when she was in his arms, and he knew not that she would ever leave him.

Tess was still in his heart and on his mind.

And until his final day, that would have to be enough to get him through to the end.

That and the thought that after it was all done and he was finished with this life of agony that he would see her again.

He sighed as her face flashed in front of his mind and maybe it was his imagination but he took it as a sign from her that she was waiting for him somewhere and that someday they would get what they had always truly wanted.

Forever. Together.

End.

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