I am not entirely convinced that I did a good job writing Sara. I like to think of her as the type that will listen to a friend's full story before making a judgement call, which is my explanation for her behavior here. Either way, I'm actually really happy with the way this chapter turned out. :)

Part Seven: They're Admiration Flowers, Felicity

"Whoa," Sara commented as she made her way into Felicity's kitchen. Her eyes had caught on the huge bouquet of tiger lilies sitting on the counter. "That's some admirer you've got, Felicity."

The tech guru went from sweet and happy to a nervous wreck all at once. "Oh," she stammered, wide eyes traveling from Sara to the lilies and then to the bottle of wine she'd pulled out. She threw herself into opening it as though her life depended on it. "They're not from an admirer. I never have admirers. Not, you know, that I'm one of those pathetic people that lays on their couch every night sobbing into ice cream over not having admirers-I've only done that once, I swear, and with mint chocolate chip I fully believe that no one should be able to blame me-and people that do that aren't pathetic. I didn't mean that. Just that I'm not like that and the flowers were just here and-" Felicity cut herself off as the cork popped free. "Wine's open! Big glass for you? I'm going to have a big glass."

Sara's eyebrows crept toward her hairline as Felicity fumbled two large wine glasses out of her cupboard, filling them nearly to the brim. She was positive that the other blonde was hiding something now, but given that stream of babble she decided not to press until there was at least one glass of wine in her. It was probably a good thing that Oliver had sent a box of twelve bottles along with her 'just in case.' At least there was no danger of them running out.

Felicity turned toward her, flashing and unsure smile and holding out one of the glasses. "This is a 'bad day and Firefly got cancelled' size glass. I hope you don't mind, but I really do need to chill out and lots of wine is usually the best way to start that."

Accepting the glass, Sara shook her head with a smile. "That's entirely what tonight is supposed to be about." She rolled her shoulders and slid onto one of the brightly upholstered bar stools at the counter. "We're going to pretend that vigilante activities are normal life things, eat pizza, drink lots of wine, and talk like normal girls do." She made sure to catch the other woman's eye. "And none of the boys will ever be told a single word of what we talk about from either of us."

The look Felicity gave her was exactly what Sara imagined a very bad person who'd been given forgiveness at confession would give the priest. She bit her lip, briefly looking everywhere in the kitchen but at her guest. Finally, she turned her glass up and downed every drop of wine she'd poured in it. Felicity refilled the glass, turned back to Sara, and blurted the exact last thing the Arrow's girlfriend had expected to hear.

"I think I went on a date with Slade Wilson."

Sara blinked once, twice, thrice, and downed her own glass. Sliding it across the counter, she pushed herself up from the stool and reached for her phone. "Top me off and open another bottle while I order the pizza. This sounds like a story for many bottles, and we should make sure food's on the way while we're still coherent."

"Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. He cried? Are you sure you weren't still dreaming?"

Red wine sloshed over the rim of Felicity's glass as she gestured violently, several droplets falling on the cardboard pizza box between them. "That's what I thought!" she exclaimed, taking a bite from the slice of pepperoni she held in her other hand. "But it was real!" Shoving one hand in her pocket, she produced the note she'd found next to her flowers. "I know it was real because he left this with the lilies!"

Snatching the note unsteadily, Sara read it over three separate times before she actually absorbed the words. Finally, she passed it back, narrowing her eyes as the took another large mouthful from her own glass. "I thought you said the flowers weren't from an admirer?"

Her face growing steadily more red, Felicity began to sputter. "Flowers for lending a friendly ear do not mean admiration!" she insisted, indignant. "Oliver, Diggle, and Roy could learn a thing or two and get me flowers for all the times I listen to their shit!" She clapped a hand over her mouth, eyes wide as she caught herself swearing, but a fit of giggles escaped and distracted her.

"Tomato, to-mah-to," Sara muttered. "What happened next?"

She listened raptly as Felicity explained the whole of her morning and afternoon with Slade, starting at mugs of cocoa shared at the kitchen table. The very thought of that man sipping cocoa and talking about his feelings caused Sara's eyes to gloss over, and she nearly missed the shocking revelation that he'd not only eaten the eggs and turkey bacon Felicity made for breakfast but had insisted on paying for take out to be delivered when her stomach rumbled around lunchtime. "-and then I told him that maybe we should watch a movie to take his mind off of everything and we threw in The Avengers and I was telling him all about how he kinda reminded me of The Hulk and then I looked over and he was asleep. Just sitting upright right over there, leaning against the couch, and sound asleep." Felicity bit her lip, frowning into her wine. "Villains aren't supposed to be adorable when they sleep."

"Neither are angst-ridden vigilantes, but Oliver makes little spit bubbles like a cute baby sometimes," Sara admitted with a snort. "So, what then? You went to the foundry, came home, and he left you flowers?"

"Not just the flowers, Sara." Felicity leaned forward, her gaze conspiratorial. Her voice dropped to a whisper. "He cleaned the frickin' kitchen." She downed her glass again, reaching out to refill it with the bottle resting on the far end of the pizza box. Nothing emerged when she moved to pour. "We need more wine."

Gathering their feet unsteadily beneath them, both women wobbled toward the kitchen. Sara regained her perch at the counter while Felicity moved into the kitchen for a fresh bottle and a corkscrew. Idly, she reached out and stroked a finger along the petals of one of the lilies. "Felicity, these are Admiration Flowers," she insisted. "Flowers of liking you-ness and wanting to take all of your clothes off and do dirty things like Oliver and I do in the lair."

"First, eww, I work in that lair and please don't ever give me details and if I find out the two of you have done the nasty on my desk I will end the both of you in ways that only a technical genius like myself c-can." Felicity hiccupped the last word, her nose scrunching up as she tilted their fourth bottle of wine over each of their glasses in turn. "Second, they are not!"

Sara took another long drink of wine and pointed at her friend. "They so are. He even said in that note that they reminded him of you."

"Lots of things remind people of me. I've got one of those personalities. Besides, if he meant them as liking me flowers he would have said something when we were texting after I got home." Felicity realized what she'd said a fraction of a second too late, eyes darting to where her phone rested on the floor beside the pizza boxes.

She'd never make it before the ex-assassin, but she had to try.

Slade was sitting on his bed, still trying to process the events of the previous day, when one of his phones began to buzz on the nightstand. He didn't bother to suppress the faint smile that crossed his lips when he saw Felicity's name on the screen. He thumbed open the message, read it, read it again, and frowned.

need help. my place. asap

It wasn't a question of whether or not he was going to answer her plea. No, he was already lacing on his boots. What worried him was how unlike Felicity the message seemed. In the texts they'd exchanged over the last day-slightly comical, blissfully normal texts-she had always been very proper in her grammar and capitalization. This message, however urgent, didn't read like it was written by her, and that worried him. Without bothering to respond he slipped the phone into his pocket, grabbed his keys, and jogged to his car out in the lot.

Of all the dire situations he'd imagined on the entirely too long drive, nothing could have prepared him for what he found at Felicity's townhome. A loud giggle and a muffled 'it's open' answered his knock on the door. Turning into the living room, his eye widened in shock at the sight before him. Several empty bottles of wine lay strewn across the floor. An empty pizza box lay in the middle of it like a shrine. Turning to his left, he finally spotted Felicity, sprawled on her stomach on the couch with another bottle of wine dangling from her fingers. Sara Lance had made herself a wobbly seat on Felicity's backside, clutching a bottle of her own in one hand and Felicity's phone in the other.

"Slade!" Sara called throwing her arms up and listing dangerously to one side. Felicity wriggled beneath her to take a swig from her bottle before twisting her head to grant Sara a glare.

"I will utterly decimate your already questionable finances," she slurred.

Sara snorted. "Oh hush," she huffed before turning her attention back to him. "Now, Slade, tell my friend here-" and there she patted Felicity's thigh as though he might not know who she meant, "-that those beautiful flowers you left her and the drink and the lunch and, what was I saying?" She frowned at her bottle before suddenly seeming to grasp her fuzzy thoughts. "Yeah! Tell her that all that means you like her. She won't listen to me."

If Lian Yu had been Purgatory, this might actually be hell.