A/N: This took a little bit of thinking. It was a challenge to figure out how to go forward from where I'd left them off in part 9, especially with certain canon events. But I think I've got it worked out. Hope you like where this goes and that you enjoy this first chapter back. Set after 3x12 when Oliver returns to Starling. I love to hear from readers, so leave me a note and let me know what you think!
The weeks where Oliver had been gone had changed her.
They'd changed him too.
But not in the way she had hoped.
Felicity had almost shut down when she'd seen him in the streets. She expected him to come to the van, to come to her. But as she had sat mute while Digg drove them back to the foundry she'd felt a coldness enter her bones.
She watched the news reports, hungrily drinking him in, not fully believing he had returned. There had been a part of her that had grasped to the hope that he'd somehow survive, but it had been so so small. Now that he was back she didn't know if she could trust it.
For a few brief, wonderful seconds she had been warm again. His arms around her, his hands on her skin, the scent of him so familiar it caused a physical ache in her chest. She clung to him as hard as she could as the blood pounded relentlessly in her ears blocking out everything but his voice telling her it was okay.
And then it wasn't.
He was aligning himself with Malcolm Merlyn.
Her world crumbled again and as the air grew tight in her chest she walked away even though she couldn't feel her feet. The dream she'd held on to, that had kept her going, that had sustained her night after night without him by her side had been shattered.
She thought it fitting that they ended it in an alley.
His eyes had been filled with pain as she'd ground out her parting words. She hadn't been lying. She didn't want to be a woman he loved if that was how he loved. She'd given him everything and what they'd cultivated in the shadows since Sara's death had somehow worked.
But it was gone again.
And she felt more lost than she had when everyone was telling her he was dead.
Hours later after she'd managed to get home she found herself watching the news video of Oliver addressing the citizens of the Glades. The sound was turned down because hearing his voice just then was too difficult. Instead she studied his movements, how he held himself, the way his right arm hung a little too limp at his side, the realization that he hadn't really fought, how his jaw had tightened as he'd fired the grappling arrow.
She remembered what he'd said in the lair about how he'd almost died and the way he'd grunted when she'd slammed into him.
How badly had he been hurt? How had he survived? Was he still injured?
The questions rolled through her head as her gut tightened at the thought of him in pain. No matter what she'd said to him that night she still loved him. She still couldn't stand the idea of him being hurt.
He'd retreated. Shut down. Put his walls back up.
Intellectually she knew why, but it didn't make it any easier to see. She'd done the same.
If she was hurt would he still help her? Would he still want to make sure she was taken care of?
As she slid her feet into shoes and grabbed her bag she knew her answer. Even with her heart pounding so loud in her chest she was sure it would break through her ribs at any moment she couldn't go without knowing he was okay.
Something she didn't understand pointed her back towards the foundry. She'd known he'd already seen Thea, but she knew he hadn't returned to the loft. He'd been too raw, too wronged to seek the comfort of family. Instead he'd go back to his underground lair with the damp air and the concrete floors and the bed he'd reluctantly let her buy.
The main lights were off when she entered through the alley door, the same door she'd stormed through only hours before. The irony wasn't lost on her.
This time she was careful to hold the door as it shut, letting it ease into place, making only the softest of sounds as it locked.
Her monitors were in sleep mode, the low emergency lights the only assistance she had to see by, making her walk slowly as her eyes adjusted.
The sight of him on the bed made her heart flip painfully, a flock of birds seemingly caught in the trap of her ribcage as her stomach dropped out. That bed was the first place they'd made love. They'd had sex numerous times, but the fleeting last minutes before he'd left to fight the Demon had been the first time they'd made love.
He hadn't managed to pull the blankets down, as if it had been too much trouble, or maybe he thought he didn't deserve the comfort. His shirt and boots lay against the foot of the bed and for the first time she saw the bandages and the bruises.
She swayed for a second, the air in her lungs tightening so quick it made her wince. Unwillingly she was dragged back to when Malcolm had told her Oliver was dead, to when Digg of all people had told her to face reality.
Maybe he had died, because she'd never felt so alone.
Her feet had other plans, moving her closer and closer until she stood so close to the edge of the bed she could recall exactly how she'd laid when they'd come together.
Except now the man who had been full of power and purpose looked pale, his cheeks hollower than they had been when he'd left. Two white bandages stood out against his lightly tanned skin.
The one that she knew in her soul to have been the death blow, the one that had collected the blood she'd tested on the sword returned to her, spread wide across his chest, wider than the sword looked. It seemed to encompass him end to end but as her vision cleared she realized it was just how the blood had seeped into the gauze.
Red on white. That's what drew her even closer. She was sitting on the edge of the bed, carefully pulling back the bandages before she even knew she'd moved, the surprising contrast of her bright nails against the starkness is what shocked her into stillness.
And then the tips of her fingers touched his skin. Dry, hot, unnaturally warm. Any concerns she had about being too close evaporated as she slid her palm along his neck, feeling for his pulse.
The heat of his skin was like a brand, a low fire that burned through him, taking away his edge, his awareness. The reason why even with her hip pressed against his leg and her hand flat along his throat he still hadn't moved.
He was sick.
The wound on the right side of his chest still had stitches. Small, tight, precise. But the skin around each black knot was an angry red, and she knew an infection raged through him, a few had even torn loose, the source of the blood.
Cursing his stubborn, hardheadedness she sprang to her feet, rushing to the medical supplies. She didn't know who had stitched him up. He'd had treatment obviously, but she knew he couldn't have done that to himself. Knowing Oliver he'd left wherever he had been before he should have.
The thought of him struggling to return to Starling when he was still injured, still hurting made tears prick her eyes.
With new bandages and a syringe full of high dose antibiotic she let her wobbly knees lower her back to the bed.
She focused on cutting off the old gauze, spreading cream over his wound before she wrapped it again, unable to move him to his side to see the back, her stomach turning because she knew the blade had gone all the way through.
She couldn't bring herself to see the exit wound. It was too much.
By the time she'd injected the medicine into his arm she was shaking.
He'd moaned once when she'd pressed too hard over his ribs, but other than that he hadn't moved a muscle, until suddenly his face contorted in pain, hands clenching at his sides as tension ran through him.
For the next two hours she didn't move. Her fingers stroked through his hair, wiping the damp strands away from his clammy forehead.
He muttered unintelligible words until his fever broke somewhere near dawn. That's when he began to say her name.
With her heart in her throat she stayed until she knew it was safe to leave him alone.
The whispered 'I love you' drove her to her feet.
She draped the blanket over his now quieting form, granting herself one final stroke of his brow before she drew back.
The further she moved from the bed the more she remembered why she had to put distance between them.
He loved her. Of that she had no doubt.
And she loved him.
And the only chance they had of being together was by being apart.