Disclaimer – I do not own Arrow.

Full disclosure – I really don't know what happened here. I usually (truthfully always) don't like Laurel. I usually will never justify cheating. I am a die-hard Olicity fan through and through. But this happened and I like it for some very strange reasons that will be disclosed at the end. Enjoy?

The world around him rumbled as he heard the thunder roar outside of his concrete and metal asylum. He welcomed the chaos that roared outside, hoped that it would banish the thoughts that were consuming him.

The foundry was cold and empty. It was missing the warmth provided by his friend and IT genius Felicity Smoak. It was missing the wise words and comfort that were embodied in John Diggle. And he couldn't be more grateful at this point. He didn't need their pity or their judgment, their understanding eyes or the curious and probing gazes that he knew would be sent his way.

Because twenty-four hours ago he never would have thought he would be here, feeling the cold seep into his very bones as he sat on the dirty concrete floor of the Arrow Cave.

He welcomed the cold. Welcomed the feeling in the hopes of it numbing his thoughts, his emotions, until he was a mass of nothing.

Wishful thinking.

There was no cure to walking into your bedroom only to see your wife of six years in the throes of passion with your best friend.

Laurel and Tommy. Unthinkable right?

But the more he thought on it the more he realized he should have noticed the signs a long time ago, making him wonder exactly how many years ago the affair had started. Because the more he thought about it, the more he realized that this was in no way a one night stand. All the lingering glances that he brushed off to the back of his mind, all the times that Laurel would work late nights when he knew she didn't have any pressing cases, the way Tommy had withdrawn him self from their friendship over the past several months. It was like putting all the puzzle pieces together and the big picture finally made sense before his eyes.

So now he sat in the icy floor trying to catalogue his emotions to get them under control, just like he had learned to on the island. Betrayal. Hurt. Anger. Jealousy. Denial. Confusion. Every single emotion was coursing through him like a knife that was digging its way across his skin.

He buried his face in his hands, willing his brain to shut down.

But images of their faces and the moments that they had had throughout his life flashed before his eyes in full force every single time he allowed his eyes to close.

Laurel walking down the isle to him, her white gown hugging all the right curves as she looked up at him through her veil.

Tommy finding him sitting in a gutter outside a nightclub after a particularly wild night only to sit right down beside him without a care in the world to his Armani suit that would have cost more than what the average person made in a month.

Laurel in the early days of their marriage staying up every night until he got home from the office, refusing point blank to go to sleep without him next to her.

Tommy helping him choose the perfect engagement ring as he stood practically shaking with nerves in the jewelry shop.

There was countless moments, a never ending kaleidoscope of snapshots that had haunted him since seeing them together, in his house, in his bed, on the sheets that he had slept on with that same woman by his side every night.

The sound of heels coming down the stairs made him groan silently, almost wishing that she didn't see him sitting in the corner.

Obvious the fates hated him today.

"Oliver! What's wrong? I came here to check on the computer updates and I thought you took the afternoon off from the office to go see Laurel and surprise her? Please tell me you didn't go and do Arrowy things by yourself and something went wrong? Or did you go with back up? Oh my God! Did something happen? Where's Digg? Roy? Oliver! Say something! For the love of…"

"Everybody is fine Felicity". Even he was surprised at how calm his voice sounded when he felt like a volcano was ready to explode inside of him. "Everybody is just brilliant."

She looked at him then, her blue eyes taking stock of his appearance until her penetrating gaze drifted back up to his eyes. She moved closer to him then, her steps slow as if she was moving towards a particularly vicious animal that she didn't want to frighten but needed to comfort all the same. He thought that the vicious animal simile was pretty close to the truth at the moment.

She bent her legs, coming down onto her knees until her face was close to his, one of her hands drifting to his shoulders and he knew from the look on her face that it was an unconscious gesture. An action she didn't even know she was making.

"Oliver what happened between now and the office?"

But he couldn't face it, couldn't stand to see the look of pity in her azure eyes, which is exactly what he knew he would get. So he stood up roughly, missing her form by mere millimeters in his haste to get away from her.

"Nothing Felicity, I'm fine. I'm heading out to get some air, feel free to have the night off from the Arrow, you can pass the message onto Digg and Roy too". And with that he was done, striding towards the stairs and his escape with all the determination that he had left in his body.

He should have known never to underestimate Felicity Smoak. He should have known that she was the most unpredictable variable in his life.

Her voice and words stopped him with the tone alone.

"Oliver Queen. You will not walk away from me. We are partners but more importantly we are friends. I've known you for five years now and God knows we've been through hell and back so you will NOT walk away from me right now until you tell me what is going on in that head of yours. We can fix it, whatever it is we can fix it together. And I can almost guarantee that whatever it is, we've faced problems of a much bigger scale. And we've come out on the other side still kicking." She would have continued with her speech had his humorless chuckle not interrupted her.

"Even you can't fix what was broken a long time ago. This is not something you can hack into and repair. Yes I went home early to surprise Laurel. But turns out, she's so much better at surprises than I am. And so is Tommy for that matter".

He looked up at her then, seeing the confusion swimming in her eyes as he continued. Once he had started it was hard to stop.

"I came home and found them, together, in my bed wrapped up in each other until you couldn't distinguish where one ended and the other began. And they didn't even hear me".

Her whole face changed with this new peace of information, her mind working a million miles per hour as she digested the facts that he had just spilled.

The only thing that he had gotten right tonight was the fact that she was unpredictable. Because he didn't get pity. He didn't get comfort. He got the cold hard truth and a reality wake up call that had been long overdue.

"So that's what this pity party was about then?" she gestured towards his general direction and he staggered back a step at her reaction, his own mind not comprehending the woman before him.

"What?"

"This pity party, the whole I'm a brooding billionaire vigilante, I save the city at night but no one appreciates me and my wife just cheated on me with my best friend poor me thing you have going on?"

"Pity party? For fucks sake Felicity I just told you that my wife is cheating on me with my best friend and you think I'm having a pity party? What is wrong with you?" Now he was just angry. And confused. Because her words weren't making any sense.

Until once again she shocked him to his core. As only she had the knack to rattle his world until he no longer knew which way was up and which way was down.

"Laurel cheated on you? That's nice Oliver. Because exactly how many times have you cheated on her? Isabel? Sara? McKenna? And your last three secretaries? That girl in Tokyo? The stripper at Verdant last year? How many times Oliver? You didn't think I knew about all of them? Lets face facts and say that even you don't know how many times you've cheated on her. I'm not saying what she did was right, far from it. Especially with your best friend. But as for the cheating part and you feeling sorry for yourself? You have absolutely no right. Because this perfect marriage sham that you have going for the press and everyone around you should have ended years ago Oliver. She may have cheated on you with Tommy, and that really is unfair to you. But you shouldn't have cheated on her for years. I've known you for five years now, you've been married for six Oliver and as far as I know you've been cheating on her for at least four of them. Four years. So yes you can stop with your man pain and pity party and smell the roses." She caught her breath, not in the least bit sorry for once for all the word vomit that had spilled from her lips.

She met his eyes then, his almost feral gaze piercing hers and she matched his intensity with her until she watched as he visibly deflated in front of her. His shoulders sagging as they moved out of the defensive stance that he usually held. He looked like a lost boy whose innocence got taken away before his time. While she never had any illusions about Oliver Queen she knew that life had thrown him one too many curveballs, had pushed too much weight on his shoulders for any one man to bear.

He in turn looked at the woman before him and thought that no matter what she said, life hadn't been fair to him. Because if it was fair he would have met her seven years ago. Her office should have been his first step in his crusade to make his father proud and become the Arrow with some flimsy excuse about a laptop that needed to be fixed or something. If he had met her straight after he had been rescued off Lian Yu seven years ago she would have become his beacon in his fight against those that wronged Starling City. He would have never married Laurel a year after his return. He never wouldn't have turned into this man that cheated on his wife because he couldn't have the one woman he wanted. The woman he had met a year after his disaster of a marriage.

No, life wasn't fair and he had learned to expect that, that and all the jokes that fate played on him. The Gambit. His father dying in his arms. Lian Yu. A.R.G.U.S. Amana Waller. The League of Assassins. Laurel Lance. His mother being murdered before his eyes at the hand of Slade Wilson.

He knew that he had royally fucked up. With his life, Laurel and Felicity. With all the numerous girls he had used in the hopes of getting some relief from his own thoughts.

He knew he had to fix this. Knew that he now had to fix his own wrongs as much as his father's. He just didn't know where to begin.

Yes Laurel had cheated on him, but Felicity was right, he had been cheating on her both mentally and physically on her for years.

The gentle hand on his shoulder startled him out of his thoughts and he was surprised how much his guard was down around her that he didn't even hear her approach.

"It's okay Oliver. You're okay, or at the very least you will be. I'll help you. Digg will help you. And I wasn't joking before when I said we'll get through this together".

MMMM – I just wanted to do something where Oliver only met Felicity a couple of years after coming back to Starling City. Because I imagine this is exactly where the Lauriver Ship would sink to if Felicity wasn't in the picture in the first season of the show/first year of him being back. But please do let me know your thoughts!

Love to all – Stace - XX