AN: this chapter is my nemesis and if I rewrite it one more time I'm gonna gouge my eyes out with a rusty nail. Seriously though, I think I wrote six different versions of this and I'm so exasperated I could scream. I hope you guys like it more than I do. Also, I updated the story synopsis, because the old one didn't really fit once I decided to make this more than a one-shot. Thank you for your continued support, and happy reading!
"How can you not like it?" Thea queries, staring openly at her. "It's a classic romance."
"It's horrifying," she replies easily.
"How can it be horrifying? It's a love story!"
"What's a love story?"
Felicity is turned away from the door, facing the television and Thea where she's standing at the DVD rack, but she doesn't need to turn around to know that Laurel and Oliver have apparently decided to join them. Laurel is the one asking the question, and it makes her feel like she doesn't want to answer it.
An uncharitable sentiment, she knows, but she doesn't care. They are not competing, but Felicity knows that she is being sized up, taken stock of, and it doesn't make her feel inclined to share more than is necessary. It's a self- preservation thing, really, and logical, because she can't afford to be friends with Laurel if the other woman should decide that she likes her.
"Romeo and Juliet," Thea answers. "Which Felicity apparently hates." Thea's tone is not condescending or hurtful, but truly intrigued.
Oliver steps into her line of sight first, and she avoids making eye contact but makes herself take a moment to stare at the feminine hand that is wrapped in his. She doesn't want to be around Oliver and Laurel and their couple-ness, but she knows that she needs to be, for exactly that reason. Seeing them together will hurt, but she needs to be reminded that she and Oliver will never be a thing, no matter how close they seem to be becoming.
Oliver and Laurel take a seat on the opposite couch, and she is thankful for that small mercy. Being in the same room with them is one thing – being next to them on a couch is another.
"How can you hate Romeo and Juliet?" Laurel asks, fixing dark eyes on her.
She shrugs and tries not to, but her eyes shift to Oliver anyway: he smiles, just the tiniest pull of his mouth and then it's gone, and she wonders if he remembers her threat to stab him with his own arrow.
"I just think it's a terrible story."
She doesn't elaborate, and for just a second she thinks that the conversation is over, that she will not be asked to reveal more, but that's not to be the case. Laurel is giving her a veiled sort of stare, not outright threatening or disapproving, but Felicity gets the feeling that Laurel might not be her biggest fan – and she doesn't care, really.
Thea is the one to pick up the thread of conversation. "Terrible because …?"
"Don't you want to watch a movie?" Felicity evades, trying to change the subject.
"Yes, and we will – right after you explain."
Thea is interested, and the way her eyes are alight makes Felicity wonder if she isn't a fan of Shakespeare; she seems very curious as to why Felicity is averse to Romeo and Juliet and very excited to talk about it. She abandons her post near the DVD's to take up the seat next to Felicity, sitting sideways on the couch so she can look directly at Felicity and still see her brother and Laurel.
Felicity sighs softly and pulls her legs up onto the couch. "Well, for starters, it's a three day romance between a thirteen year old and a seventeen year old that results in several deaths, which is just … disturbing."
"To us," Laurel interjects. "But things were different in Shakespeare's time – their youth would have been more acceptable then. And that's the argument everyone makes against it."
"True," Felicity concedes. "But the premise of the story is still tragic at best, and macabre at worst. The characters, the entire story would have us believe that love is the be all, end all of a life; that it is worth committing suicide over."
"And you don't think so?" Thea prods, leaning forward and propping her elbow on the back of the couch so she can prop her hand against her cheek.
"Not at all. I find it a little insulting, actually."
"Insulting," Laurel repeats, and there's an edge to her tone that Felicity doesn't like. "How is it insulting, exactly?"
Felicity had been looking at Thea, because Oliver's sister is the one who seems the most interested in the conversation - and also the one who started it - but Laurel's question has drawn her gaze to the woman sitting next to Oliver.
Her answer is quick, her tone maybe a little more biting than she intends for it to be, because she doesn't like the way Laurel is looking at her or the wordless challenge she sees in her eyes when she looks at her.
"Because it undermines everything else. Love is important, of course, but what about hope? Ideals? Beliefs? Love would be nothing but a sad shadow without them, because it owes its existence to them. You don't start out loving someone, you start with hope: the hope that there is someone out there who knows how to love you without being told, and that you will recognize them when you meet them; so on and so forth. You can't reduce a heart – a person – down to one single emotion; that's not how we work."
Felicity is hearing another voice in her head, a much beloved voice, and it is replaying old discussions of this subject and many others that took place years ago; it's drawing her back to a place where her mother is still alive, and they are sitting together on the couch and talking about these exact things while her mother brushes her hair.
"And love isn't worth dying over?" Laurel questions, pulling Felicity from her memories.
"Dying over? No. Dying for? Maybe."
"But you don't think that what Romeo does is romantic, at least a little?" Thea pipes up then. "I mean, the thought of living a life without the woman he loved was so terrible that he would rather die than be without her."
"That's not romantic, that's cowardice. We all live without the people we love at some point, for some reason: they die, or they don't love you in return, or they do and you can't be together for whatever reason. Death is easy; learning to live your life without them, that's the hard part."
She knows that Oliver's eyes are on her, because the weight of his gaze is familiar and she feels like the heat of it is burning holes through her. She wants to look at him, to catch his eye and see what secrets lurk there, but she's afraid of getting caught in that dizzying vortex of … whatever it is that seems to be building between them, and she can't risk that with Thea and Laurel present.
"Have you ever been in love, Felicity?" Laurel's voice is edgy, and it's the first indication she has that maybe her words have made the other woman think of Tommy.
"No."
"I can tell."
"Laurel," Oliver says then, his tone soothing and warning simultaneously.
Felicity bristles at the words that are clearly meant to be an insult and tucks her tongue into the side of her jaw, clamping down on it just firmly enough to keep her from spitting out a retort. Her words have obviously struck a sour note with the other woman, and although she can't know exactly why, she does know that Tommy died trying to save this woman; she tells herself that's why Laurel seems so hostile now, because she thinks Felicity has insulted his memory, and tells herself that exchanging barbs will not do any of them any good.
"Don't 'Laurel' me, Ollie, she gets to express her opinion and so do I; mine just happens to be that she doesn't know what the hell she's talking about!"
Felicity isn't really sure what's happened, but when Laurel's attention turns back to her she looks like she's about ready to break: there are tears standing in her eyes and she looks ready to fight, but Felicity doesn't know what she's done or what there is to fight over.
"Why don't we have this discussion later, Felicity, when you've had a chance to stand in my shoes: your sister dies after running away with your boyfriend, and the man you love dies saving you. Then we'll see what you have to say about love."
"Yes, because you must be the only woman in all of creation to have suffered losses," Felicity snaps, unable to keep her tongue any longer. She slides to her feet, no longer in the mood for socializing, but can't resist speaking again. "I am sorry about what you've been through, Laurel, but you need to find a way to accept it."
She turns and heads for the door, and she can hear Oliver and Thea both speaking although she can't hear their words. She clears the room and makes it to the foyer before she realizes that there are footsteps behind her.
"You never accept something like that, Felicity."
Laurel has followed her, and for some reason it makes her irrationally angry. She spins back to face the other woman, doing her best to keep a lid on her anger, and barely registers that Oliver is right behind Laurel, with Thea hot on his heels.
"No, Laurel, you don't. But you know what you do accept? That Tommy's death wasn't your fault, because he was a grown man who made his choice."
That doesn't seem to be the answer any of them were expecting, because it hits Laurel like an invisible slap to the face. She not only stops her pursuit, but also draws back and away from her.
Felicity feels as if something is breaking apart inside her; the walls that have kept her standing through the last week and everything that's happened are shuddering beneath their own weight, crumbling, and it's all bubbling to the surface. She is filled with the overwhelming need to lash out, to overturn everything she can see because the force of whatever is beating in her breast feels so destructive that she thinks it might rip her apart.
She flees in the face of Laurel's silence, rocketing up the stairs and straight into the guest room she's using; she locks herself in and then stands in the middle of the room for a long moment, battling to keep hold of herself.
The tears are cool against her flushed cheeks, and the battle is lost.
Felicity likes big windows; she likes to stare out them and wonder what sort of lives people are living out there, and when she sees someone she likes to create stories for them. She'll give them lives, and full back stories, and then wonder, if she ever got the chance to ask them, if any of it would be close to the truth.
She really loves big windows at night, though, because she likes to sit under them and stare up at the stars and see how many constellations she can remember; and when the day has been a little too long, the light a little too harsh, she likes to talk to her mother and pretend that she can hear her.
It's nearly two o'clock in the morning and it's almost a full moon; the long silver fingers of light are stretching across the kitchen floor and they almost reach her where she's sitting on the edge of the counter. She thinks she could probably extend her leg and her foot would be aglow with moonlight.
Her mom used to hate it when she sat on the countertops, and she knows that it's probably impolite of her to be sitting on the countertops of the Queen mansion, but it is late and she doesn't think she'll be caught. This is also the reasoning behind her theft, which she really does feel bad about: a pint of ice cream. Although, the argument could be made that Oliver actually owes her ice cream, since he'd made her toss hers that night in the foundry; she never has found that spoon.
"Great," she says softly. "Now I'm rationalizing theft."
The mansion is quieter than she expected, really, but it is a big house so she doubts that she would hear anything even if someone else were awake - which also means no one can hear her.
"I bet tag was a nightmare to play in this house."
Her voice is barely above a whisper, but she likes the way it seems to fall through the shadows and disappear. She didn't bother to turn on the lights, because there is something soothing about the darkness and the pale moonlight. This place is infinitely larger than her apartment, but she feels strangely safe here; maybe because no one would think to look for her here, and maybe because she knows there are several security guards on the grounds.
Felicity sighs and stabs her spoon into the ice cream, then pops it into her mouth upside down. She lets the ice cream melt against her tongue for a minute, savoring the flavor, before withdrawing the spoon and swallowing.
"What the hell am I doing?" she asks then, as if someone were there to answer. As if there were an answer. "How has this become my life?"
She sets the tub of ice cream down next to her on the counter and then leans back on one arm, holding the other one up in front of her face. She uses the spoon to trace formless patterns in the air, then draw imaginary lines between a cluster of stars before finally holding it in front of the moon and then closing one eye, so that it disappears.
"Well, everything isn't a total bust. You'd be scandalized to know, mom, that I have become a polygamist and am now in a relationship with two very fine men: Mr. Ben, and Mr. Jerry. Both are tall, dark and handsome, of course, and crazy about me – even when I ramble. I guess you could say I make them melt."
She chuckles quietly, breathlessly, and then shakes her head. "And now I'm the crazy lady sitting in the moonlight and telling puns to the stars. I lied, my life is a total bust."
"I don't know, I thought it was kinda cute."
Felicity groans and drops her head back, closing her eyes in embarrassment.
"How long have you been standing there, Oliver?"
"Long enough to know that you've taken up a career in petty theft."
When she opens her eyes again and raises her head he's standing next to her, one hand braced on the counter not four inches from her right hip.
"I'm sorry," she says, motioning at the ice cream. "I'll replace it."
"No, you won't," he answers. "You'll share."
He steps around her and opens the silver ware drawer to retrieve a spoon and then comes back, and she is surprised when he hefts himself up onto the counter beside her.
"Hand it over."
She passes him the ice cream, and can't help smiling a little as she does; the corner of his mouth turns up in answer, and then he's plunging his spoon into the tub and pulling out twice the amount she usually takes.
"You're gonna give yourself a brain freeze."
"You had a head start."
Felicity reaches over and takes a smaller scoop for herself, and then turns her gaze out the window again. She starts swinging her feet back and forth slowly, careful not to let her heels bang against the counter.
"Couldn't sleep?" he asks.
She shakes her head. "I'm sorry about earlier."
"So am I. For what it's worth, I don't think Laurel was actually mad at you; we were fighting when you came downstairs."
"I know. That she wasn't mad at me, I mean, not about the fighting. I think we were both just a little tense, and things got out of hand. No harm, no foul. Sorry about the fighting."
"Not your fault."
"I know, but …"
She trails off, because she isn't exactly sure how to put her thoughts into words, and it's probably better that way because she doesn't think it's her place to say them anyway.
"But what?" Oliver prods.
"Nothing."
He seems to know that she has more to say, but he doesn't press her; instead he holds out the ice cream so she can take some.
"So," he says finally. "A polygamist, huh?"
He's teasing her, and she tries to purse her lips against the smile that tries to form but only succeeds in keeping it to a smirk.
"What can I say," she shrugs. "I'm irresistible."
A beat passes. Then, "Why are you down here, Felicity?"
"Couldn't sleep, so I wandered for awhile – your house is beautiful. Ended up down here, where I proceeded to high jack your ice cream and set up camp on your counter. It took me like ten minutes to find the spoons, by the way. You?"
He doesn't answer. He puts the ice cream down on the counter, sticking his spoon into it like a stake, and then leans back on his arms in a mimic of her earlier position. His eyes are on her though, and he tips his head just a little in her direction; she can feel him regarding her, and she draws one leg up onto the counter and turns sideways to look at him.
"What?"
"Your mom – what was she like?"
Felicity exhales quietly. "She was … dynamic. Impatient sometimes, but compassionate, and she loved reading. A little fanciful."
"What did she do?"
"She was a teacher, actually; seventh grade English."
"What did she think of Shakespeare?"
Felicity chuckles and looks away for a minute, and when her eyes turn back to Oliver his gaze is soft on her face.
"She loved him, actually. We use to have long discussions about him, and his plays. She encouraged me to form my own opinions, but she was quick to make me defend them. 'Know what you're standing for,' she'd say."
"She sounds wonderful, Felicity."
"She was."
The silence stretches around them; Oliver's gaze is still on her face and his expression is serious, the way it normally is, but there's something in his eyes that feels thoughtful – and maybe a little hesitant.
"Laurel and I aren't together anymore."
Her heart trips over itself, and his admonition is so sudden that she can't immediately think of what to say. She also can't help wondering why he's felt the need to share the information with her.
"I'm sorry," she says after a breathless moment.
"Don't be. We both have some things we need to … figure out."
She nods wordlessly, because she can't think of anything else to say. He seems a little sad, yes, but there is something else in him that looks … well, she isn't sure, really. She can read his moods better than he realizes, so she knows that it's there, she just isn't sure what exactly 'it' is.
She can't help but wonder what it is that he needs to figure out.
"I like it," he says suddenly, and his voice is quieter than before.
"Like what?"
"You're rambling; it's honest. People rarely ever say what they mean; they're hardly ever who they say they are. Not you."
"It's embarrassing," she hems, because the way he's looking at her is giving her butterflies.
"And sweet."
Sweet? Did Oliver just call her sweet? She's so surprised by his words that she doesn't realize that he's sat up and is now dangerously close to her; her mind is stuck on the multiple meanings of the word sweet, and her heart is busy repositioning itself in her throat.
Oliver Queen simply does not call her sweet.
"Sometimes you feel like the only thing that's real, Felicity."
He is close, closer than he should be, and her eyes feel as if they are locked with his; her lips part, because she is going to make some sort of reply – regardless of the fact that she's not sure the speech center of her brain is even working anymore – but then his fingers are tucking themselves under her chin, tipping it up with the barest hint of pressure, and all the world is falling away.