Author's Note: This is the sequel to a fic called "If You Ask Me To Stay". Reading that fic is kind of important.
After Oliver kills the Dark Archer, they go to Felicity's apartment. Ostensibly, this is because it's closer than the foundry, but Felicity suspects the real reason is because Oliver is wounded.
Felicity walks through the front door; Oliver takes the fire escape.
Once she opens the window to let him in, Felicity grabs a couple of bath towels from the hall closet and tosses a few at Oliver. She attacks her hair with the last towel, patting it dry. It fluffs out into a ball of fuzz, but she doesn't have the energy to mess with it any more.
Apparently the hood is pretty waterproof, because Oliver is considerably drier than she is. The black shirt he wears beneath the green jacket isn't even damp. Black and green trail down his cheeks, and Felicity isn't sure if it's from tears or the rain. She guesses the rain.
Felicity hands Oliver a washcloth so he can take his paint off. "Bathroom's that way."
Oliver nods a thank you, and a second later she hears the door shut.
In search of some dry clothes, Felicity heads back to her bedroom and grabs her MIT shirt from the stack of clothes on her dresser. Peeling off her waterlogged jeans, she balls them up and tosses them into a laundry hamper before easily changing into a pair of grey sweatpants. Her hands are shaking so badly she can't get the buttons on her blouse undone.
"Hey."
Felicity glances up at the sound of Oliver's voice. He stands in the doorway, still in those green leather pants, suspenders and long-sleeved black shirt, but with the remnants of his mask now washed away. The blood is gone from his hands as well.
Cautiously, he approaches her. He looks at her like he's asking permission, and she nods her consent. With steady fingers, he starts undoing the row of white buttons. His eyes stay on his work, but when he finishes, he pushes the blouse back over her shoulders and slides it off of her arms.
When he pulls his right hand away, his fingers are sticky with blood. Again.
"Did he hurt you?" Oliver takes her arm between his fingers and gently turns her toward him. Felicity tips her head down to examine the cut. It's a bit long, but it's not very deep.
"I...I didn't notice; one of the arrows must have grazed me."
The look on his face scares her. It's murderous, and while she's seen it before - Laurel, anytime anything threatened Laurel - she's never seen it brought on by something that's happened to her.
Suddenly overwhelmingly tired, Felicity sits down on her bed. Oliver moves next to her and gestures to the cut on her arm. "We should clean that."
And he does, with gentle, kind hands. Even so, the absolute anger on his face doesn't subside. She doesn't need stitches, but it still stings a bit as he cleans it. Felicity tries not to wince; Oliver has faced much, much worse. The scratch on her arm doesn't even compare.
When he finishes dressing the wound, Oliver grabs the dry shirt from her hands and pulls it gently over her head. Felicity maneuvers her wet bra straps off of her shoulders as she works her arms through the sleeves. She tosses her wet shirt and bra into the laundry hamper.
"You don't have to stay with me," she says. "I'm fine."
"I want to stay."
Recognizing his concern for what it is, Felicity smiles. "I warn you, my couch is not the most comfortable thing in the world."
"I've slept in worse places."
And her heart hurts because he has. She worries her lower lip; Oliver sets a hand on her shoulder. "It's fine, Felicity."
"I kissed you." Which was not at all what she was intending to say, but Felicity doesn't think the conversation can get more awkward.
He smiles. It's a nice smile, one of amusement. His eyes light up, and she thinks it's really attractive. "I kissed you back," he says.
"Do we have to talk about that?"
"Not if you don't want to."
"I'd honestly rather kiss you again." She flinches as soon as the words are out of her mouth. Oops.
Except he dips his head down and complies with the request. His hand moves from her shoulder to cup her cheek, and he uses the touch to tip her head up.
If their kiss on the rooftop was all passion and adrenaline, this is warm and gentle. Over hers, his mouth is feather-light and barely there, but even the slightest contact burns.
He's pulling away when Felicity stops him by placing her hand on his chest, her fingers making a fist around the material of his shirt. It takes a second, but she feels him give in, and she sighs against his mouth.
Felicity coaxes his lips apart with the flick of her tongue, and he deepens the kiss immediately. Lifting her up from the bed, he drags her to her feet, and his arms surround her as she goes up on her tiptoes. His hands slide up underneath her shirt and in some distant part of her mind Felicity registers that she's no longer wearing her bra.
Thunder booms above their heads. Oliver breaks the kiss, and for a second they just breathe, lips separated by a tiny sliver of air. Dropping back onto her heels, Felicity closes her eyes as Oliver presses a kiss to her forehead and tucks one of her stray curls behind her ear.
"C'mon," he says, "You need to sleep. We'll talk about it in the morning."
After Oliver falls into a fitful sleep on Felicity's couch, he dreams of blonde hair and blood and sharp knives slicing through Felicity's pale skin. The Dark Archer's words echo in his ears.
I will slit her throat.
Like the traitor that it is, his mind conjures up images of her death. A silver blade slashes across her neck, and blood gushes through her pale fingers as she places them against her throat in a futile attempt to stem the flow. She starts to fall and he dives for her, falling to his knees as he catches her.
He sees vivid snapshots of her lips stained with blood instead of lipstick, dark red drops that bubble from her mouth and slide down her chin. Her mouth works, trying to say something, and in the blurred reality that is his dream he tells her not to talk, begs her not to leave him. Pleads with her to stay.
Stay with me.
And in the terrible world of his subconscious, Oliver Queen watches the life drain out of Felicity Smoak's eyes as her blood drenches his hands and spills onto the Hood.
Oliver wakes up to the harsh rumbling of thunder and the sharp taps of rain pelting against the windows in Felicity's apartment. He falls off of her couch, landing on his palms and his knees as his chest heaves with the sudden, desperate need to regain all the breath the nightmare stole.
"Are you okay?"
He looks up, and she's there. She's standing in the doorway, wearing flannel pajamas and sleep-mussed hair.
"I'll be fine, Felicity," he says, turning away. His heart is racing in his chest, and he just needs a minute to come back, for his head and heart to return to the reality his body has already recognized.
"You were calling my name," she says softly. "Why?"
It shouldn't really surprise him, but it does. The dream has faded into little more than the sensation of terror pulsing through his veins, but somehow he knows it was about her. About losing her.
"Hey." She kneels beside him, placing a hand lightly on his shoulder. "I'm okay, Oliver. Really. I'm right here."
And she is. She's solid and real and very much alive. He wraps an arm around her and pulls her against him, buries his face in her curls and breathes in the scent of her.
"You should go back to sleep," he whispers.
"Not if you're going to stay awake," is her reply.
"This isn't a big deal, Felicity."
"Maybe to you it's not," she says, "but it is to me."
"I'll be okay," he says. One of her hands brushes against his chest and the gesture is so intimate he's nearly undone by it. Oliver swallows past the thick emotion in his throat. "This is hardly the first time my nightmares have been about losing you."
At 4:58 AM, Felicity's laptop sounds out a tone just loud enough to pull her from her slumber. It takes her a moment to realize that she's on her couch, snuggled against Oliver's side, his arm draped around her shoulders. He's sleeping sitting up, but he stirs as she slips off of the couch and grabs her tablet from the end table.
She winces as the screen flickers to life. The words on the alert send her heart careening into overdrive. Felicity reaches for Oliver's shoulder, then hesitates. She's suddenly very reluctant to touch him. Waking Oliver seems similar to waking a sleeping bear. She settles for saying his name instead.
"Oliver."
He wakes with a start and grabs her wrist. The look of terror in his eyes frightens her, but only a second passes before she sees recognition dawning. "Felicity?"
"Yeah. It's me. You're okay. I'm okay. Everybody's okay."
Even in the dark, his expression says he's sorry for scaring her. "What's going on?"
"Oliver, the cops found the Dark Archer's body." She swallows and holds out the tablet so he can see the news report. "It was Mr. Merlyn."
Over the next two days, Oliver sorts his reality into three things he knows to be true.
One. Felicity is alive. It's impossible for Oliver to be anything but thankful for that.
Two. The Archer is dead. It's impossible for Oliver to feel anything but relieved about that.
Three. Tommy's father is dead, and the guilt wrapping around Oliver's chest is crippling.
He doesn't stop moving. While he can't quite bring himself to cross any more names off of the list, he still takes the time to train. When he's not doing that, he's working at the club, trying to keep things afloat now that Tommy's understandably MIA. Somewhere deep inside he knows that he can't slow down, because if he does everything will catch up to him and swallow him up in a tidal wave of grief that will leave him unable to stand.
He loses count of how many times he calls Tommy only to get no answer. Keeping track of how many times he picks up his phone to call Felicity is equally futile. He does see her in the foundry, but their relationship has fallen into a strange sort of holding pattern. He doesn't exactly mean for it to happen, it just sort of does. She's there, but she's not there. Like a bad habit, they slip effortlessly back into the same routine as before. She doesn't push him - though he half expects her to - and he doesn't seek her out.
Oliver finds that he can hold on to comfortably numb so long as Felicity isn't in the vicinity. Around her, every wound on his soul just bleeds.
Oliver comes back from Malcolm's funeral sporting a wrinkled shirt, a loose tie and a black eye.
"You look terrible," Felicity says. Oliver doesn't answer.
When he reaches the bottom of the staircase, Felicity wraps her arms around him, but he stands stiff and unresponsive in her embrace. She tries not to let it bother her. Oliver's walls are thick and high, but Felicity's waited this long and if she has to she can wait even longer.
"This isn't your fault, Oliver," she says.
Breaking away from her hold, Oliver walks over to the table shelving his bow and quiver. "I killed my best friend's father." Slowly, he draws his hand across the arch of the bow, but he doesn't pick it up.
Felicity steps next to him and places her hand over his. "Your best friend's father was not a good person."
"Have you looked at me lately? Neither am I."
"You saved me," she says.
"I put you in danger."
"The Archer put me in danger; I put myself in danger. You don't get to carry all the blame for this, Oliver." Felicity caresses his shoulder with her opposite hand. He still doesn't respond to her touch. "I won't let you."
"I don't know if I can keep doing this," he says softly. "I knew when I got into this that people might get hurt but...this is the first time I've seen the damage."
"People can always get hurt, Oliver," Felicity says. "But you protect people. You protected me."
She tries to shun the sharp hurt in her chest when he pushes away from her. She only settles back down by her monitors when Oliver peels off his shirt and changes into the cargo pants he usually wears when he's about to hang from the ceiling for a few hours or do something else equally implausible and impressive.
With a careful eye, she watches him. He goes through his paces like it's a normal day, even though they both know it isn't. She has the timing of his working regime figured out almost down to the second, and today Oliver follows all of his normal habits almost to the letter.
For the next hour or so - Felicity doesn't really keep track - the only sounds in the lair are the taps of her fingers on her keyboard, and the softthwack of Oliver's arrows plucking tennis balls out of the air and pinning them to the walls.
Glancing over at him, Felicity frowns. Everything's going to catch up with him at some point, that tidal wave is inevitably going to hit, and Felicity plans on helping him stand up again in the aftermath.
After she finishes her research on the next name on the list, Felicity moves to sit on the edge of the training mat. It takes a while, but eventually Oliver puts down the bow and sits beside her. Neither of them says a word. Oliver hurts and Felicity hurts with him.
Tentatively, she curls an arm around his body and slowly leans against him. Oliver releases a deep, heavy sigh. She runs her hand along the width of his shoulder, tracing the ridges of his scars and the planes of smooth skin, letting her fingers linger on his neck. Unlike earlier, he leans into her touch; he allows himself to be comforted. Felicity blames this lapse in control on the fact that Oliver is emotionally and physically exhausted. He doesn't kiss her and she doesn't kiss him, but Felicity finds that she's alright with that. They don't need that, not right now.
Her hand strokes down his back, fingers tracing his spine. As she tries to soothe some of his pain, Felicity blinks away tears that she sheds because he can't and tries to lift the crushing weight of the guilt she knows he can't carry alone.
It takes some time for things to settle down into anything remotely resembling normal, and even then 'normal' still doesn't feel like the right word.
Tommy quits working at the club in order to take over Merlyn Global, and Oliver goes back to his list of names, albeit a bit half-heartedly. Felicity starts looking into other shady dealings is StarlingCity and the next few targets Oliver eliminates aren't even on the list. If Merlyn's death did one thing, it opened Oliver's eyes to the bigger picture. He's also suddenly and understandably more concerned about vetting everybody on the list before he takes them down, so Felicity spends a lot more time researching things for him in order to make sure that everyone Oliver's threatening is actually involved in illegal activity.
It's a new normal, one with almost all the same pieces of the old, but everything shifted and out of place. Nothing fits together right anymore, not even Oliver and Felicity's relationship. Neither one of them really knows what to do about recent developments. The one main change in their relationship is this: They start touching each other more.
Oliver's almost forgotten what physical contact is like. He's lost how wonderful it feels to touch another person with affection, how comforting it is to hold and be held.
The first few times she reaches out for him, he shies away. Her fingers jump up to touch his chin and he instinctively turns his head. She moves to lay a hand on his arm, and he stays just outside her reach.
And it's not that he hasn't had any physical contact since the island, because he's hugged his mother and Thea, Laurel, and Tommy, but there's a level of intimacy here, with Felicity, that seems glaringly absent everywhere else. She knows him so well, in so many ways, knows him despite all the shattered and scattered pieces of his soul.
He's certainly forgotten the ease of physical affection, the simplicity of it. Their fingers brush when he hands her something, and he wants to let them linger. He finds his hand landing casually on her arm or her shoulder when he stands behind her while she's working, and he wants to draw it across the nape of her neck, beneath that blonde ponytail and against her soft, pale skin.
Oliver's been noticing Felicity Smoak for the better part of a year, but suddenly he's noticing absolutely everything about her now. It's like he's seeing her for the first time. He notices the way her eyes linger on him, he notices the way her body responds every-so-subtly whenever he touches her.
He just doesn't know what to do about it.
Oh, he knows what Oliver Queen the playboy would do. Oliver Queen the playboy would wine her and dine her, get in her pants, and then be gone when she woke up in the morning.
The Oliver Queen reborn on Lian Yu didn't have the time to think about such things.
And Oliver Queen now? Oliver Queen now feels stuck.
There's this ache in his chest for more, but it's compounded by the knowledge of who he is and what he's doing. He still has a list of names to cross off, still has a mission to complete, and is it fair to her to make her wait for him?
He makes the unforgivable mistake of voicing that last concern to Dig.
"Talk to her," Diggle says. Felicity is mercifully not at the foundry at the moment, much to Oliver's relief. "You're never going to know how she's feeling if you don't talk to her."
Oliver levels an exasperated look at him. "I talk to her."
"Not about what you need to talk to her about.
"And what do I need to talk to her about?"
"Oliver, your conversations with Felicity tend to revolve around one of two things: the next name on that list, or how she's feeling about the next name on that list."
"So?"
"So, the playing field isn't even. You know a lot about her, but she doesn't know nearly as much about you. If you want to be with her, you have to let her in. You might want to consider letting your guard down. That's all I'm saying."
It's a twinge ironic, then, that two seconds later Diggle lands a blow that knocks Oliver to the floor.
Oliver doesn't recognize the trap until it's too late. He's in full Hood mode, breaking into the office of a name on the list - Lee Heuton - in order to find more information about the people behind Walter's death. Two of Heuton's hired thugs have already had their heads smashed into the concrete flooring, and four more have arrows in their chests.
The door to the target's office is at the end of the hall, and Oliver moves to it slowly, cautiously.
"I'm still getting an active signal from Heuton's cell phone," Felicity says through Oliver's earpiece. "He's in there."
He twists the knob and steps through the doorway. The room is empty, the aforementioned cell phone blinking innocently on the desk, and he picks it up. As he does, he hears beeping coming from the phone, high pitched and whiney.
Realization dawns too late. The phone explodes in his face, and Oliver feels an intense, searing pain in his eyes. The world turns white and then black.
The last thing Oliver hears is Felicity screaming his name over the comms.
Upon returning to the foundry, Oliver practically falls down the stairs, grabbing onto the railing for dear life and crying out her name. Felicity doesn't think she's ever seen him look so helpless. Rushing to his side, she ducks under his arm and starts guiding him the rest of the way down the stairs.
"I got you," she says, wincing because Oliver is still really heavy, even when he's mostly upright and somewhat lucid.
"Dig," she says into her Bluetooth, "He's here. I don't know how but...he made it back here."
"I'll be there in five," Diggle says over the comm. "Get him undressed."
Felicity almost trips. "What?"
"Can't take me to the hospital dressed like a vigilante, 'licity." Oliver's words slur together. Together, they stumble towards one of the tables. With a grunt of pain, Oliver leans back against it.
Felicity has already started to unzip the infamous hood. "We're going to the hospital?"
Fear grips her. She's seen Oliver injured in quite a few different ways now, and this is the first time he's ever mentioned needing to go to the hospital. He's practically ripping off his gloves off of his hands, and she stills his movements by taking both hands in her own and patiently pulling the gloves form his fingers.
"I don't know what they put in my eyes," Oliver says, and Felicity can hear the pain in his voice. She tosses aside the hood, then reaches to unsnap the clasps of his suspenders.
Oliver's hands fall to her waist as he continues, "If I don't know what they did to me, I don't know how to fix it."
He lifts his arms to help her tug the shirt over his head, a move which requires her to slide her hands in his pants to un-tuck the shirt. The material is soft against her skin; her knuckles brush lightly against his stomach. Felicity tries not to think about that, especially when Oliver ducks his head down to rest it in the space between her neck and her shoulder. It's a intimate gesture that makes her knees week, if only because it's so very, very unlike Oliver Queen.
He's never sought this amount of comfort from her before, and as lovely as it is, it's unnerving too.
His eyes are squeezed shut tightly. His makeup is smeared all over his face. "The story is I was working late at the bar when they attacked. Diggle found me and brought me to the hospital."
"Where's your suit?"
Oliver points in the general direction, and Felicity grabs the shirt and pants. "You think we need the jacket and tie?" she asks.
He shakes his head, carefully. "Working late, remember?"
Carefully, Felicity helps him slide his arms through the sleeves. The buttons seem especially small and hard to fasten, and she fumbles with them a bit, but eventually they're all done, all but the top two.
In order to undo the long laces of his boots, Felicity has to kneel in front of him. Her fingers catch on the ties as she tries to get them off as quickly as possible. Taking them off of him is awkward to say the least, but her palms are already sweating and her pulse is already racing.
Biting her lower lip, Felicity unzips Oliver's leather pants and fights the urge to close her eyes as she tugs them down his legs. If things were different, this would be even more awkward, but she can hear the harshness of Oliver's breathing and it scares her more than the Archer's knife to her throat. She tosses the pants off to the side and bends down as she helps him step into his dress slacks. Oliver's grip on her shoulders is firm as he holds onto her for balance.
After he's dressed, Felicity grabs a makeup wipe so she can take the paint off. His eyes look terrible, and the closer she gets the cloth to them the more scared she is that she's going to hurt him.
She just barely touches his eyes, and he screams.
Felicity jerks her hands back. "Oh, god, Oliver."
His jaw is clenched and his voice is strangled. "You have to get it off, Felicity."
"But what if I make it worse?"
"Take it off. No one can know."
She hesitates, and he gently grabs hold of her wrist. "Hey. You can do this."
Swallowing anxiously, Felicity grits her teeth and does as he says. To keep her mind off of things, she starts talking. This is undoubtedly a mistake.
"So I've been thinking...about us. Not that there is an us, just...there is a you and a me." He cries out again, but catches himself this time. She watches as he sets his jaw. His hold on her tightens slightly, and she worries her lower lip.
"And you and me - well, you and I - haven't really talked about if we want you and me to become an 'us'. And I know I said that I didn't want to talk about it, and I still sort of don't because everything might just get all kinds of complicated."
She's got about half of the paint off, and he's quiet, so she keeps on talking. Felicity really hopes that the relationship talk is distracting him from the pain she's absolutely certain she's causing, because this was not how she wanted to have this conversation.
"Still, I'd sort of like you and I to become an us. I know you have a list of bad guys to shoot, and I don't know if you think a relationship will get in the way of that or if you're just trying to keep me out of harm's way, but I want you to know that I think a relationship with you is worth all the sleepless nights and the bomb collars and the face-offs with your crazy crossbow-wielding ex girlfriend."
Oliver doesn't say anything, but he grabs her free hand and holds on tight. Diggle arrives back at the foundry just as she finishes cleaning off the last of Oliver's make-up. There are tears streaming down her face that she's immensely grateful that Oliver can't see.
The waiting is torture. The world doesn't recognize Felicity Smoak as a friend of Oliver Queen, so she can't go to the hospital with him. Instead, Felicity goes home and tries to sleep, but periodic updates from Dig via text message and a gnawing ache in her stomach keep her from slumber.
At work the next day, Felicity is just about to take a break for lunch when Diggle walks through the door with a laptop tucked under one arm. She doesn't say a word as he sets it on her desk.
"Mr. Queen was wondering if you might have time to fix this," he says, and she raises her eyebrows. "He says to tell you he spilled a latte on it."
That almost gets her to smile.
Diggle continues, "Mr. Queen requested that you drop it off at his residence, if you managed to have it fixed by the end of the day." Not a difficult feat, Felicity thinks, considering that there's likely nothing wrong with it - " I've been instructed to be here to pick you up at the end of your shift, if you need transportation."
Felicity shakes her head. Diggle is holding back a smirk.
"Tell Oliver that I'm not going to his house. I don't care how much he doesn't pay me."
The Queen's housekeeper smiles kindly at Felicity as she leads the way to Oliver's room, Felicity can't help the nervousness that winds in her stomach. Over the past few days, she has been unrealistically anxious, constantly checking her phone for a call or a text, or picking it up and letting her thumb hover over the image of Oliver's name on her favorites list.
When she finally sees Oliver, he's sitting upright in bed, wearing a pair of dark sunglasses. The drapes are closed and the lights in the room are dim.
"The Doctor says bright light can cause even more damage to his eyes," Raisa says softly.
"I heard that," Oliver says. "Who's with you, Raisa?
"But there is nothing wrong with Mister Oliver's hearing," Raisa tells Felicity with a smile. To Oliver she says, "Miss Felicity is here to see you."
It could be her imagination, but Felicity thinks she sees some of the sorrow drain out of Oliver's expression at those words. He reaches out to her. "Hey, c'mere."
Timidly, she approaches, and as she nears Oliver, his smile soothes her nerves. She takes his outstretched hand.
"I wasn't sure you'd come," he says.
"I wasn't sure I would come." Felicity takes the 'fixed' laptop out of her bag and sets it on the mattress.
Oliver tries to get up, but Raisa clicks her tongue at him. "The doctor said to stay in bed, Mister Oliver." She hurries to his side and helps fluff the pillows behind his back. "Can I get you anything?"
The smile he gives the housekeeper is more of a grimace. "No, thank you." A few seconds later, Felicity hears the sound of the door shutting as the woman leaves.
Perching on the edge of the bed, Felicity nervously wrings her hands. "How are your eyes?"
"They hurt," he says, pulling down the sunglasses with his free hand. The skin around his eyes is red and puffy. Felicity frowns at the sight.
"Hey." Oliver's sets the glasses aside; his fingers ghost against her cheek. "I'm okay, Felicity."
"Forgive me if I'm not quite willing to believe you." She leans against him, rests her head against his shoulder.
"Then believe the team of doctors who've all said I'm going to heal up just fine. You don't have to worry about me." Their fingers are still linked together, and he gives her hand a squeeze.
"Oliver, you almost went blind. This isn't worry so much as it is expressing an appropriate level of concern for a...friend."
His smile holds a touch of that smooth, playboy persona. "A friend? Is that all we are to each other, Ms. Smoak?"
"You're my boss."
"And you're the IT girl I've made out with three times."
At his words, Felicity feels her cheeks growing hot. "We're not having a 'Define The Relationship' talk right now. I mean, not that we have a relationship - except for a friendship, I mean, which..." She stops talking when he chuckles.
"Can you suggest a better time?" he asks.
She sighs. "What do you want from me, Oliver?"
The problem is that Oliver doesn't know exactly what he wants from her, and he's well aware that it's extremely unfair of him. He knows what he wants to be for her, which is exactly the person he isn't. He wants to be the guy that's steady and consistent, not the vigilante that unwittingly kills his best friend's father because he's already inadvertently thrown his other close friend into danger.
He wants to be the person she calls when she's sad or she's happy or she just wants to talk about her day. He wants to be the reason she smiles; he wants to be the cause of her laughter. He wants to be in the pictures on her fridge and the first spot on her speed dial.
He especially doesn't want to hurt her, even though his history's proven that he's uniquely gifted when it comes to hurting the people he loves.
It's an emptiness in his soul that Oliver realizes he's been trying to fill since he came back from Lian Yu. This desire for connection, for belonging with someone. First there was Helena, then there McKenna.
Helena was a spiral into darkness that damn near consumed him. His relationship with Helena was like playing with fire. They burned each other badly.
McKenna was a return to the safe and secure and the Oliver-of-before, except that is a person he is no longer and even she held too many memories of who he was to fully realize who he had become.
Felicity is different.
It's a difficult thing for him to admit, even just to himself, but she is. He doesn't have to explain himself. He doesn't have to lie about where he's going or what he's doing. (Even if he did, she would see right through him.) She's patient with him.
Sitting on the edge of his bed, she's a bit of a blur because the world is a bit of a blur right now, but Oliver thinks that Felicity Smoak might be the prettiest blur the world has ever seen.
Lightly, she gives his hand a squeeze.
Oliver likes Felicity's hands. Her hands are soft, capable. He likes how bold they are, likes the smoothness of them, how they glide over her keyboard. He likes the colors of her rings and the bright paint on her nails.
He wonders if she knows that her mere presence is intoxicating, dizzying. She shakes the very earth beneath his feet, makes him question everyone and everything. And yet, at the same time, she's this anchor holding him steady, keeping his feet grounded.
After a silence that lasts far too long, he says, "I want to be with you."
"And you don't think it's too complicated?"
"I'm a bow and arrow wielding vigilante and you're my highly intelligent tech guru. How can our relationship be anything but complicated?"
"Oliver..." Felicity bites her lip, and he sees her slowly giving in. "You are not allowed to break my heart. Okay?"
Reluctantly letting go of her hand, Oliver reaches up and very carefully takes her glasses off, folding them and setting them on his bedside table. His fingers glide across her cheek, back behind her head as he draws her close.
She whispers his name, and her breath fans across his mouth.
"Wouldn't dream of it," he promises, right before he kisses her.
"So you really have to sleep sitting up?"
"That's what the doctors say."
"Is it hard?"
"Not really. I've slept in a lot of worse places."
"...right."
"It's okay, Felicity."
No, she thinks, it's really not.
She falls asleep beside him, her body pressed up against the length of his. One of her arms stretches out across his stomach, and one leg is hooked over both of his. At the mere sight of her, Oliver can't help but smile.
His eyesight isn't all that great at the moment, but he can make out the mess of her blonde hair spread across his sheets. Oliver touches one of the loose curls, twisting it around his finger.
The loss of his vision shook him. For a long moment he has to stop and look at what his life would be like if he couldn't be the Hood anymore.
It's not as scary a prospect as he once thought it would be. Something about the idea is actually a little tempting. Hang up the hood, live a normal life.
A normal life. A life with Felicity. It seems a little less impossible today. He's not even sure why.
In her sleep, Felicity releases a deep sigh. Reaching down, Oliver tugs the covers around her shoulders more.
The doctor says his eyes are going to fully heal. Soon he'll be putting the green hood back on. The strangest part of that is, Oliver thinks Felicity wants him to keep that mantle. As concerned as she is for his safety, she understands why he does what he does. She even loves it about him. That's something he thought he would never find.
He thinks about Diggle telling him to open up to her, and he self-consciously drags his thumb across the arch of a scar on his ribs. There's so much to tell. He hasn't wanted to open those doors to his past for fear that they would make Felicity leave. But is that true? Would she run from him? Become scared of him? She watched him kill the Archer without even flinching. How much of his darkness can she take before it becomes too much?
Felicity wakes with a start, clutching at the blankets around her and sucking air into her lungs with a terrible desperation. For one frightening minute, she doesn't know where she is. Eventually, her eyes adjust to the dim light and she recognizes Oliver's room in the Queen's mansion.
She has a vague recollection of Oliver telling her to just close her eyes for a second and rest. Scanning the room, Felicity finds him sitting on the floor in front of the window seat, no pillow, no blanket, nothing. He's not even wearing a shirt.
Grabbing a blanket and pillow, Felicity climbs quietly off of the bed and kneels down on the floor next to him. Oliver opens his arms. She hesitates for a second, but eventually she slips into his embrace. He's warm and solid and real, and Felicity sighs as she settles against his chest.
He isn't wearing a shirt (surprise, surprise), and after summoning up more courage than she thought she possessed, Felicity brushes her thumb across the curve of one of his scars. She doesn't ask the question on her lips, but Oliver answers it anyway.
"They wanted information," he says. "I didn't know the answers to their questions. They had to make sure."
She doesn't press him, doesn't ask who 'they' are or what it was they wanted to know. The rest of the stories come in bits and pieces, some short and some long. For one of the marks, his only explanation is, "Got stabbed."
She lets him be as vague as he wants, carefully making mental notes about the few specifics he does give. He once promised to tell her about his scars, and she vowed to herself to let him make good on that promise when he was ready.
When the last tale has been told, she sees the distance in his gaze, knows that his thoughts have carried him far, far away.
So she comforts him with a kiss, slanting her lips over his. She's not trying to start something neither of them are currently prepared to follow through on, but she needs to connect with him right now and her words alone won't do that. His fingers grip her hips firmly as he drags her onto his lap. The desire to let him take what he wants, to give him every part of her without thought of receiving a single thing back in return is oh-so-tempting.
It takes all her willpower to slow down, but she does, breaking the kiss and ducking her head in order to escape his gaze.
"Oliver," she murmurs as she arranges her body against his. "You can't go back to the island now. I need you here. I need you to stay here with me."
"Felicity," he says, broken. "I don't think I want to be alone anymore."
"Sleep," she whispers, her voice quiet, reassuring. "I'll be here in the morning."
For the next week, Felicity stops by the QueenMansion after work to see Oliver while his eyes heal. It doesn't take long for him to be up and about, and on the second day Felicity walks in on him doing one-armed push-ups. He's shirtless. Of course he's shirtless.
To Felicity's credit, she merely quirks her eyebrows and lets out a quiet sigh as she sits down on Oliver's bed. "What would you have done if I was Thea? Or Raisa?"
"Told them I was getting stir crazy." Down. Up. Inhale. Exhale. "Which I am."
"Uh-huh."
Finishing his set, Oliver jumps to his feet and walks towards her. Quickly, he leans over to press a kiss against her temple. "Let me take you out somewhere."
"What?"
"Let me take you out, Felicity. Somewhere nice." He takes her hands in his. "I need to get out of here."
Off of her frown, he asks, "Why are you looking at me like that?"
"Cause this is the Oliver Queen I rarely get to see."
"Which one is that?"
She shrugs. "The suave womanizing billionaire. Is that what you say to all the girls: Let me take you out somewhere nice?" She deepens her voice as she says the last part.
"I don't sound like that."
Her smile is contagious. "You actually kinda do."
"Somewhere nice" ends up being Big Belly Burger. Felicity sits across from him and swirls a French fry in her chocolate milkshake. They talk about everything they always talk about. It's easy and simple.
It's completely upside-down, but Oliver finds that everything that's easy with other girls is difficult with Felicity, and everything difficult with the other girls is easy with Felicity.
Actually, when Oliver stops and thinks about it, being with Felicity's never been complicated. She's the one who is open and trusting. She's the one who exudes authenticity, while he's damaged layer upon layer upon layer - scars on scars.
"What are you thinking?" she asks.
"I think we should do this more often." It's a habitual response, brought on by dozens of inconsequential dates and flings. Still, Felicity smiles and blushes, and Oliver's not sure whether that's because he's said the right thing or the wrong thing.
"No, Oliver," she says, "What are you really thinking?"
He sighs, reaching across the table and taking her hands in his. "I'm thinking that I want to make this work, if you do."
Pursing her lips, Felicity studies him for a second. "I do."
Oliver tries not to think about how nice those two little words sound.
"You know I can't concentrate when you do that."
Felicity leans back in her chair and crosses her arms across her chest. She doesn't take her eyes off of Oliver's shirtless form dangling from the rafters. "Do what?"
"Stare at me." Carefully, he drops to the ground. "I'm trying to concentrate; you're distracting."
Trying not to smile, Felicity says, "So are you. Do you ever wear a shirt?"
Without answering, Oliver walks over to her, and she takes a second to appreciate his drool worthy everything before he places both hands on either side of the chair at her back. He dips his head down and kisses her lips.
With a happy little squirm, Felicity sits up and loops her arms around Oliver's neck. His hands grip her waist and suddenly she's up out of her chair and fully in his arms. As she locks her legs around him, her shoes fall to the floor, but she ignores them, wrapped up in Oliver and the way he's tilting his head in order to kiss her deeper, longer. She mewls in pleasure and approval.
Felicity's not sure if she should be grateful or frustrated by the fact that she's wearing a skirt. On the one hand, it's bunched rather uncomfortably around her hips. On the other hand, those hips are pretty nicely aligned with Oliver's right now, and the skirt's not really getting in the way of that.
Twisting around, Oliver falls back into Felicity's chair, pulling her onto his lap. His hands wander for a bit, then finally settle on her thighs; his thumbs rubbing circles along the exposed skin there.
"Where's Diggle?" she whispers when Oliver abandons her mouth and starts kissing her neck. His stubble scratches the underside of her jaw, but Felicity finds she kind of likes the sensation. She tips her head back in order to give him better access.
"Out," Oliver says. One of his hands finds the collar of her sweater, and his nimble fingers quickly start undoing the row of buttons. She has to take her hands off of his shoulders to help him slip the garment off, but it's worth it when his mouth connects with hers again.
Oliver kisses like he's drowning, dying, sinking. Everything about him is overwhelming, overpowering. He is the force that weakens her knees and quickens her heartbeat. He kisses with want and desperate need, winding her up. Skilled, practiced hands that know just how to touch, just where to touch. His calluses are rough against her skin, but she likes it. Likes how the two of them contrast - hard and soft.
In his hands she is as well held as his bow, as cared for and as loved and as secure beneath his fingers.
Leaning back, Felicity reaches behind her for her keyboard and with one hand, types in the code to lock the doors. Just in case Diggle comes back early.
They manage to be slightly normal until Felicity's apartment explodes. In hindsight, it makes complete and total sense that this development would push their relationship forwards, because thus far, only extreme circumstances have made their relationship move forward.
When Oliver arrives, she's covered in soot, wrapped up in a blanket, and probably in shock. Felicity would just as soon go to a hotel, but Oliver goes all overprotective vigilante on her, insisting that she stay at the QueenMansion until more permanent arrangements can be made.
"What if they were really after you, Felicity?" he asks as he helps her into his car and climbs in after her.
"You think moving in together is the best way to protect me?" she says, then flinches. "...not that this is us moving in together because I really don't think we're ready for that step. Unless you want to take that step. In which case, I probably still wouldn't be ready for it, but you would be and that would probably be...good for me to...y'know, know."
Felicity fumbles for her seatbelt; Oliver sighs. "I'll call Raisa and let her know you'll be staying the night."
"In a guest room," Felicity says. For a second he looks just a twinge hurt, but only a second and no more. Felicity wouldn't have even caught it had she not been intimately in tune with Oliver's facial expressions.
"What would your mother think?" she asks.
"She wouldn't care, Felicity." His smile tells her way more than she needs to know.
A second, even more horrible thought strikes her. "What would my mother think?"
He raises his eyebrows, and she can tell he's holding back a chuckle.
When the car slows to a stop, Oliver climbs out and runs around to open Felicity's door for her. She draws the line at him carrying her inside, preferring to walk under her own power.
True to form, Raisa has a guest room all set up. There's even a mint on the pillow.
For a few seconds, Felicity just stands and stares, trying to figure out what to do. Coming up behind her, Oliver rests his hands on her shoulders, thumbs stroking the nape of her neck.
His hands rub down her arms and she leans back against his chest. He's solid and warm. Sliding his arms around her, he slips a hand beneath her shirt and lets his fingers splay across her stomach.
She shudders when he presses a kiss to the back of her neck.
"You should get cleaned up," he whispers against her skin. His voice is soft, and there's an underlining tone to it that she hasn't heard before.
"I'll be right down the hall," he says. It almost sounds like an invitation.
"I know where your room is." Felicity instantly winces when the words leave her mouth. Oliver just smiles and winks at her.
Oliver wakes up a few hours later to find her asleep beside him, legs twined with his, blonde hair fanning out across his chest. Felicity's legs and arms are wrapped around him, he's not sure he ever wants to move.
Ever since the island, Oliver sleeps in fits and spurts. He grabs a few hours here and a few hours there. The softest sounds wake him.
Twisting his head, Oliver glances at the clock on the nightstand. It's barely four in the morning. The sun hasn't even begun to rise.
Usually when this happens, Oliver tries to wear himself out. Sometimes he goes for a run until his legs ache and his shirt is damp with sweat.
For just a moment, he contemplates doing just that, slipping out from beneath her and letting her continue to sleep. But then she shifts against him and lets out a long, slow breath, and he changes his mind.
Felicity turns her head, but it's only when she presses a kiss to his breastbone that Oliver realizes she's waking up. Her fingers soothe a path up the length of his arm, from his wrist to his shoulders. Oliver closes his eyes.
"G'morning," she says, voice gravely and lips feather-light against his chest.
He draws his arms up around her, as she slides a leg over his hips. Gripping her thighs, Oliver maneuvers her into a more comfortable position. Bracing herself with a hand on each of his shoulders, she grins down at him sleepily, golden waves of hair making a curtain around his face.
Mornings on the island were spent waking up to dull grey skies. Waking up with Felicity is like waking up with the sun.
Damn it. He wants this. Every morning. Every day. For the rest of his life. The surge of emotion is a physical thing, an intense ache in his chest. He closes his eyes against it even as Felicity drops her forehead against his.
Lifting up his face, Oliver kisses her, holding onto her as tightly as he can.
It's good to see sunlight again.
Oliver counts Felicity's scars. With his thumb, he traces a crescent shaped scar no larger than his thumbnail that's nestled in the curve of her waist.
"What happened?"
She smiles when his whiskers scratch her skin as he kisses it. "Running with scissors."
Oliver jerks his head up and gives her a quizzical look, resting his chin on her stomach. "Are you serious?"
Playfully, she ruffles his hair. "You'll never know."
She has a rounded, almost heart-shaped beauty mark on her hipbone. That's where his fingers travel next, tracing the outside of the shape carefully. When he presses his lips to her skin he hears Felicity bite back a giggle. Oliver loves how ticklish she is.
Running his hand down the length of her leg, he stops when he reaches just below her knee. She's got a thin, three inch long mark there. Oliver rocks back onto his knees and dips his head to kiss it. "And here?"
"Nail sticking out of a park bench," she says. "I was eleven."
Oliver continues his way down her body, kissing the side of her thigh until he reaches the black, script lettering that swirls along the side of her foot. He rubs the tattoo there with his fingers..
"Dream Big," he says.
She smiles at him. "I went through a bit of a rebellious phase after I turned eighteen."
Oliver kisses it, and she giggles.
He finds another faint white line across her opposite thigh and presses his lips to it. "Here?"
"Ran into a table."
Felicity wiggles pleasantly beneath him as he crawls back up her body, dropping kisses everywhere as he goes. He stops abruptly when he sees the mark the Dark Archer left her, a slash across her upper left arm. The scar is light pink now, mostly healed, but the new skin looks a bit tender.
Taking his face in her hands, Felicity whispers, "Not your fault."
Gently, Oliver kisses the scar on her arm, then he moves to her lips. It's slow and unhurried. She hums softly against his mouth, fingernails lightly scraping against his shoulder blades. One of her legs wraps around his waist, the heel of her foot digging into his back as her body arches up into his.
Oliver sighs against her lips. Keeping her wrapped in his arms, he rolls them over and he pulls a blanket over them. Felicity's asleep in seconds.
Felicity wakes up to find that the storm has passed. The sun is streaming through the windows. Her body still aches enjoyably from earlier, but it's a lovely ache. Oliver's arm lays heavy around her waist and the scruff of his beard presses against the back of her neck. His breath tickles her skin. She's wearing a grey shirt that must be his, although she doesn't really remember putting it on.
She doesn't register that he's awake until his arms tighten around her waist. Oliver pulls her back to him, bringing her body flush against his. Desire tightens low in her belly. It's supremely unfair that he can have this effect on her. She squeezes her eyes shut; he buries his face in her hair.
Alternating between Russian and Mandarin, Oliver murmurs things she cannot understand into her curls. She thinks his voice is one of the best sounds in the world.
The palms of his hands flatten against her stomach; he starts to pull her shirt up. His touch is light and playful along her ribcage.
"Stay," he says in English. "Stay here with me. Stay forever."
Felicity covers his hands with hers and stays.
end.