Oliver flopped down on Joe's living room couch, letting the banked exhaustion and weariness sweep over him. He'd finally loosened his tie and discarded his suit jacket the way he'd been itching to do all day, safe in the knowledge that he was temporarily out of the public eye and no one here was judging him.
For dinner, Joe had made a hearty chilli, which was actually one of Oliver's favorite foods. In addition to Barry, Joe's other children, Iris and Wally, had shown up.
Iris, a very pretty lady a handful of years Oliver's junior with skin the color of brown sugar, had been a consummate host, attempting throughout dinner to engage William in conversation, asking about school and his interests. William answered in one or two word responses, but it was more than he'd said to Oliver since they'd left the island. It didn't escape Oliver's notice that William didn't even finish his bowl.
After everyone had finished eating, all of the West-Allen children had gravitated upstairs, cajoling William to Barry's childhood bedroom with the promise of board games. From the living room, Oliver could hear slight strains of laughter and he imagined that maybe one of those peals was William.
Tossing a dish towel onto the counter, Joe rounded the sofa back and dropped into the recliner perpendicular to where Oliver sat.
"Long day, huh?" Joe asked.
"The longest."
Both men sat in silence letting the sounds from upstairs filter through the floor. Oliver dropped his head back against the cushion behind him and tilted his head to look at Joe.
"I have no idea what I'm doing. What if I'm doing it all wrong? What if I'm just making him worse?"
Joe looked down, seeming to gather his thoughts, and then rubbed a hand across his face. Letting his hands drop to rest on his stomach, Joe looked at Oliver.
"Well… He's still alive, so you're getting it at least a little right. The rest… you just kind of have to feel your way through. There's not really a magical guide on how not to further mess up an already traumatized kid. Lord knows I could have used it. Three times over." Joe glanced over to the pictures of his kids that decorated the wall. "Iris after her mom took off. Wally when he found out who I really was. And Barry… For Barry, I would have needed a whole 'nother book just for him. Did he ever tell you how he came to live with us?"
Oliver nodded. "Reverse Flash killed his mom, but his dad was blamed and sent to prison. He didn't have any other family, so you took him in."
"Right," Joe said. "But back then all Barry could say was that a man in a yellow suit that moved faster than lightning had killed his mother and that his dad was innocent. He would tell anybody that would listen. Hell, he'd tell people who wouldn't listen."
"Which was pretty much everybody, I'm guessing."
Joe sighed. "Right. This was years before the particle accelerator explosion. No one had ever heard of a meta-human or time travel. We all just assumed he was a traumatized little boy who was trying to make sense of what had happened in the only way that would let him be with the only parent he had left."
Joe paused, his gaze clearly focused on his memory of the past. His gaze sharpened, his mind returning to the present, and he let out a derisive laugh.
"He told me over and over again. 'Joe, it wasn't my dad. It was a man in a yellow suit.' And every time I would try to set him straight. 'I know you want to be with your dad, Bar. But there's no evidence that anybody else was there.' He told me over and over again. And then, without me really realizing it, he just… stopped."
"Just stopped?" Oliver repeated. It didn't really fit the Barry Allen he knew. As jovial and even perhaps naïve as Barry could be, he was like a dog with a bone when it came to things and people he really cared about.
"Just stopped. Never brought it up again," Joe said. "But that's when the nightmares began. Night terrors really. He'd waking up screaming, drenched in sweat, but when I asked him about it, he wouldn't tell me what he'd dreamed about. But I knew."
Oliver let out a low hum. Even now Barry still liked to talk things out. Every time they worked together, Barry peppered him with dozens of questions. It had likely hurt Barry deeply to continually be talking, desperately telling the truth, but never feel like he was being heard.
"So what did you do?"
Joe gave a frustrated flap of his hands. "What could I do? Part of me, the part that always want to give Barry whatever he needs, wanted to put him therapy. But the other part, the part that swore to protect Barry, knew that if Barry kept insisting that a man with magic powers had killed his mother, we wouldn't be able to keep him safe and with us."
"Right." Oliver agreed. "Same thing with me and William. If he goes around telling people that his dad, the mayor, is secretly Green Arrow and the former DA, who was also the Star Throwing Killer, committed suicide in front of him in order to blow up an island and killed everyone on it…" Oliver tossed a flat, disgusted laugh and ran a hand over the bristles of his short-cropped hair. The words sounded insane even to his own ears and he'd witnessed himself and knew it to be the unadulterated truth. "One of us would end up locked up, either in Iron Heights or some looney bin."
Joe tilted his head in agreement. "The truth is stranger than fiction in our world."
Oliver stood and walked over to the wall of photos. He took a moment to look at the pictures of the young kids who Joe had nurtured from traumatized children to functional adults. They looked normal. Happy. A small picture of Iris, Joe, and a lady Oliver didn't know. A slightly larger picture of a young Barry and Iris playing at a public pool. A teenaged Wally grinning while working under the hood of car. All three of them at STAR labs.
No indication of their rough beginnings. Nothing to indicate that two of the three would literally become super heroes.
"So what do I do, Joe? What did you do? Barry's basically normal. Or, as well-adjusted as someone in our line of work can be." Oliver turned back to Joe, who watched him from his seat on the recliner. "How can I be sure that I haven't accidentally kick started another Prometheus in my own son? I can't let that happen to William. I can't let Adrian win."
Joe stood and joined Oliver in front of the family photos. He put a hand high on Oliver's back, a fatherly gesture Oliver hadn't felt in nearly a decade, making Oliver realize how much he missed his own dad. Robert Queen may not have been the paragon he pretended to be, but Oliver felt his absence every day with an almost physical ache.
"Well, for starters, you can't think about it terms of whether Adrian or Prometheus, or whatever the hell he called himself, won or loss. Your whole focus has to be on your son." Joe reached out and ran a finger over the framed photo of Barry and Iris. "With Barry, even though I did know enough to believe his story, I let him know that I was there for him unconditionally. No matter what the truth was, he is always welcome in this house and I will always be here for him."
Joe turned and picked up another picture frame from the bookshelf catty corner to where they stood. He passed it to Oliver. It was a photo of a smiling teenaged Barry holding a certificate standing in front of a poster board. A science fair of some sort.
"When Barry started to get older and developed an interest in science, in forensics, I supported it. I knew what he was doing, that he still wanted to exonerate his dad, but it also made him happy. He felt useful. Less helpless. It gave him some of his power back."
Oliver passed the frame back and Joe placed it back with care. Oliver looked over the shelved display. There were just as many pictures of Barry as there were of Iris, Joe's biological daughter. There were more of Barry than Wally who'd Joe had met after Wally had reached adulthood.
"Most importantly, I let him know that I was taking care of him and I considered him family, but I wasn't trying to replace his dad." Joe circled back to the recliner and retook his seat. "I respected that relationship. Never really talked about Henry's conviction beyond whatever Barry wanted to discuss. I didn't want him to think I was trying to tarnish or take away the memories he had."
Oliver rubbed a tired hand over his eyes. Barry had been lucky to find Joe. Although Joe would probably say it was really the other way around. Joe was stern but warm and served as a bedrock of stability for Barry. Anything Oliver had to offer would be even less than a pale imitation.
"I don't know, Joe. I'm just… I'm not touchy feely like you guys."
"Look. No one expects you to change overnight. But kids need to know you care. I'm a cop," Joe said with a smirk. "I'm all about force and logic. But I'm also a dad. To kids who lost their mothers when they needed 'touchy feely' the most. I'm not saying you have to cuddle the kid. Shoot, he'd probably freak out if you tried."
Joe laughed as though the thought truly tickled him, pulling a small smile from Oliver as well.
"All I'm saying is you'll be fine. You just gotta figure it out in a way that he can understand. He's probably feeling really alone right now. You gotta let him know you're there for him and figure out a way to connect that works for both of you. And if you get stuck, don't forget, Barry's not the only person in Central City you can call for help."
Later, after Iris and Barry left and Joe had helped William settle into Barry's old bedroom across from Wally for the night—Oliver laughed to himself thinking how surprised William would be if he knew he was literally sleeping in The Flash's old room—Oliver lay on the pullout sofa bed. His conversation with Joe kept playing through his head. A way to connect with William. Oliver had spent a lot of time avoiding making connections in a bid to keep everyone safe. Clearly that hadn't worked.
A way to let William know that Oliver cared.
Oliver had the perfect idea.
