I thank you again for reading and I enjoy your enthusiam with they story. Just letting you know that this chapter took on a mind of its own and got longer than expected so I'm breaking it up into two chapters. The good news is that since I wrote it all together, I will be posting the chapters back to back. So expect part 2 to be posted tomorrow night.

Christmas Party Part I:

It was Monday, a day after my mother's surgery. I spent the day with her just happy she was alive and safe. Oliver had come by to visit, but his cell phone kept ringing off the hook and I finally told him he should go back to work and put out the dozens of fires that came up while he was busy rescuing me and my mother. It didn't help that I wasn't going to be there to help him, but he insisted I take a few more days off so I could be there with her, which I greatly appreciated and happily took him up on.

The next couple of days flew by like the wind. On Thursday my mother was discharged from the hospital, and I took her home and spent the day with her. The surgery went as well as Dr. Echolls had said it would. She would need some physical therapy in the upcoming weeks for her injured shoulder but she was, in fact, expected to recover fully with time and the proper treatment.

My mother and I talked a lot those few days we were together, but we didn't talk much about what happened in Munich. Incidentally, most of it turned out to be a blur to her because she had been drugged during her kidnapping and heavily medicated for her pain on the way home. She did have flashes, however, of being snatched in broad daylight, knocked out, and then waking up in a strange place surrounded by strange men with machine guns. She vaguely remembered getting shot, and she remembered less about seeing my father. I didn't know if she was just sparing me of the ordeal of what he had said to her or she really didn't remember. Either way, I didn't want to bring it up unless she did because I thought it best we didn't waste a minute of our time talking about 'him,' the man that left this life as abruptly as he left us.

The most vivid memories she did have, however, kept circulating spontaneously in her head. She recalls the strange and distinct sound of a canary cry and then seeing flashes of a masked man. As much as I wanted to tell her that Sara and my very own Oliver saved her life and brought her home, I knew it wasn't possible. She could never know what really happened.

The temperatures had dropped even more rapidly the last few days. Since my mom was home safe and sound, I decided to go back to work on Friday. It was 8:15 a.m. , the 5th day of December, and after everything that had gone on, I hadn't realized it was so close to Christmas. I wasn't really in the Christmas spirit but I was about to have to get into it incredibly faster than I thought I would despite my objections.

As I made my way into my office, I sat down at my desk, picturing all of the work that was ahead of me. The stacks of files were so high, they blocked my view across the room. I casually looked down at my desk and spotted a very familiar envelope with a Queen Consolidated Logo on it that I had forgot all about. I had left that very envelope on my desk before I was kidnapped. It had spent a couple of weeks just sitting there right where I had left it just waiting to be opened. I opened it up and almost spit out my coffee.

Dear valued employee,

You and a guest are cordially invited to attend the 12th annual Queen Consolidated Christmas Party being held on Friday, December 5th, at 8:00 p.m. in the Penthouse Suite.

Dress: Cocktail attire

Cordially, Moira Queen

Oh, God, that's tonight. Invited, really? It's more like required.

God only knew why, but the company felt it kept the morale up and the employee turnover down to get all of the employees together for a night of socializing and holiday cheer. Just what I had needed on my first day back. Then again, I was not in the I.T. Department anymore and I was close to the CEO, so maybe no one would notice if I skipped the party.

As the day lingered on, I kept looking at that envelope. I really didn't want to go to that party. I didn't want to waste another evening when I hadn't even had the chance to sit down with Oliver and discuss what had gone on with us before he had gone and rescued my mother, because I had been preoccupied with her the whole week.

Now my anxiety had set in and I was in limbo again. I needed to know that everything that was said and everything that almost happened with us before he left was more than just reacting to what had gone on around us. I mean, my kidnapping and my mother's kidnapping had been very emotional things for me and Oliver had been there every step of the way to hold my hand. I couldn't have made it through any of that without him. But now that things were back to normal, as normal as they get with how we lived our lives that is, did that mean things between Oliver and I would go right back to the status quo too?

And now here I was at work having to deal with a company Christmas party getting in the way. Not to mention the "you and a guest" in particular on that card had been burning a hole in my invitation since the moment I read it. I had no idea what my options were. I knew I didn't want to go to this thing. Last year I was conveniently out of town, but I wasn't so lucky this year.

Why hadn't he mentioned anything to me? He'd been back to work all week so he knew it was coming up. God, what if he was bringing someone else? For all I knew, he could have invited anyone, even Laurel, weeks ago before all hell broke loose in my life. She was an important part of his life, after all, and apparently still was. I mean, there was still that burning issue I had never brought up to him of me overhearing him mumbling, "Laurel, you have to stay" in his sleep that night in my apartment.

I was kicking myself now, wishing I had just asked him about it. I hated not knowing. I hated guessing. But we had been up to our eyeballs in craziness for weeks now and now I'm gonna be making up for all the days I'd missed and all the work piled on my desk. And to top it all off, now I had to throw in this damn party to the mix. I had no dress, no date, and I had no idea if Oliver would bring it up or if I should. More chaos ahead.

I needed to just face it, the party was tonight. If Oliver wanted me to go with him, he would have said something to me by now, right? But then again, maybe he didn't think it was an appropriate time to bring it up given the circumstances as of late. This is such a mess. The party was less than 12 hours away. All I knew was if he showed up with someone and I didn't have a date, this evening was gonna go downhill pretty rapidly.

I sat at my desk talking to myself and watching the clock, daring it to be lunchtime. It was now 10:30 and I knew I had to go shopping to find me something presentable to wear tonight. Date or no date, I needed a new dress.

Suddenly Oliver's voice through my intercom caused me to jump in my chair.

"Felicity, can you come into my office, please?"

"I'll be right there, sir."

Did I just call him, sir? I'm getting far too comfortable in this assistant role.

"Hello, Mr. Queen, what can I do for you?"

"Mr. Queen? You haven't called me Mr. Queen since – well, you've never called me Mr. Queen when there's been no one around."

"Sorry, I'm just having a very, very, Very hectic day."

"You wanna sit down?"

"Why, do you want me to sit down?"

"You're not getting written up, Felicity. What's up with you today?"

"It's nothing, I'm just a little out of it and behind on some stuff. My 'boss' gave me a pile of files to go through and only two days to go through them."

"Well, maybe you need a new boss."

"Tell me about it. Mine's a real slave driver."

Oliver grinned over at me as he leaned back in his chair. Per usual, I felt the extreme effect that one of his grins had on me and I quickly forgot what we were discussing.

"First, welcome back," he said with a smile.

"It's great to be back," I smiled back.

"Second, I wanted to talk to you about the thing tonight," he said catching me off guard.

"The thing?" I played dumb.

"The party, Felicity. Didn't you get your invitation?"

"Oh, that thing."

"Yes, that thing," he repeated.

"What about it?"

"You're going, right?"

"Uh, yeah, sure. I just have to go pick up my dress."

I'm just so unprepared for this conversation.

"Are you bringing anyone?" He was being overly blunt today.

Am I bringing anyone? Oh, God, what should I say? Yes or no? Yes or no? I don't want to lie, but if I say yes and he was going to ask me, I'll hate myself and if I say no and he's already got a date, I'll feel like a total idiot. So self-loathing or stupidity, which shall I choose?

"Uh, I'm keeping my options open at the moment," was the best honest answer I could come up with.

"Well, I know it's last minute but we haven't had a lot of time to talk, but I just figured if you were going and I was going –"

"Oliver, we need to talk," suddenly and rudely Isabel, the ice queen, barged into Oliver's office and interrupted us.

"Can this wait? I'm in the middle of something, Isabel?"

"Not if you want it to cost you ten million dollars."

"Oliver, I'll just bring you that, uh, report later, okay?" I made up something to excuse myself.

"Fel – Ms. Smoak, we weren't finished here."

"Oliver, your secretary –"

"Administrative assistant!" I blurted out to the wench standing before me.

"Whatever," she threw me a disinterested glare. "This company can't afford to lose this deal, especially since you've been MIA for almost two weeks. We have a conference call set up in 15 minutes to go over the details. I suggest you get yourself together and meet me in there. I also invited Mr. Klein, the Chief Financial Officer to the party tonight so we can convince him over drinks how lucrative this deal could be to the both of us."

"Felicity, I'm sorry, can you excuse us for a second?" he said with an annoyed look at her and an apologetic look for me.

"Yes, sir, Mr. Queen."

I expeditiously turned around to leave Oliver's office. I couldn't stand to be in the same room as that tart. I opened the door and stepped out and just before the door closed, I heard the dragon lady say, "Pick me up at 7:00 tonight. We can mix business with pleasure, same as last time."

Slut!

On that note, I returned to my desk. I was so tired of being dismissed by women as vile as her in front of Oliver. I mean, he wouldn't take her up on her offer, would he?

This unspoken thing between Oliver and I needs to be verbalized ASAP or I may just think it never even existed.

"Hello, Felicity, I've got some financials I needed to drop off for Mr. Queen," a soft sweet voice said.

"Oh, thank you, Stefan. I'll make sure he gets them."

"By the way, you look really nice today," he said as he started to walk off.

"Thank you for noticing," I smiled at him as he scurried on about his business.

Suddenly Oliver's office door flew open and the tramp made a beeline straight for me. She grabbed a post-it off my desk and began writing.

"Be a dear and go pick up this exact brand of Cognac for me on your lunch hour. Just charge it to Queen Consolidated's business account."

"I don't work for you. I work for Oliver."

"Well, he's paying for it. We're going to give it to our client tonight when Oliver and I go to the party together."

I snatched the post-it from her claws. "I'll see what I can do."

"Oh, and have it gift wrapped, will you?"

"How long do you think my lunch hour is?"

"I'm sure you'll manage, Ms. Smoak."

The hussy turned to walk off and then turned back around. "Oh, Oliver's on the phone right now with another client. When he hangs up, will you hold all of his calls? We'll be in this conference call ALL (emphasis on the all) afternoon." Her sarcastic smirk at me was more like an ugly snarl as she scampered off in her low-cut-skin-tight mini-dress.

If it walks like a skank and talks like a skank, it's a skank.

Well, I can't say I saw that one coming. I just had to realize that I was never going to get Oliver's full attention when loose women like Isabel were around throwing themselves at him at every turn and Oliver wasn't doing much to turn them away. It's not like he led me on or anything. He hadn't made me any promises. But Isabel? Isabel? I can't even stand to say her name. If that's what Oliver wanted, than he wasn't the one for me anyway. One thing was for sure, I needed to stop romanticizing every moment I spent with him. I just really had thought something was happening between us, but it was time to stop waiting around and hoping for it to come. It was time to stop pining. It was time that someone started pining for me, damn it. I deserved a good pining in my life. I was going to go to that party and I was going to have the time of my life. No more second guessing everything.

And it was 10:45 and I am leaving for lunch early. What's he gonna do, fire me?

I hurriedly straightened my desk to make a clean getaway.

"Going somewhere?" a deep sultry voice rang in my ears.

"Oh, hi." The hot guy from Risk Management was making the rounds again.

"How are you today, Damon?"

"Not as fine as you, believe me."

He doesn't take long with that flirty eye thing he does now, does he?

"What can I do you for?"

"Well, we can discuss that later, but right now I'm dropping something off for Mr. Queen."

"Okay. Well, I'm going to lunch and he's about to go into a meeting so I'll take it from you and make sure that he gets it."

"Well, Mr. Queen needed that ASAP. I wouldn't want to keep him waiting."

"I understand. Anything else I can do for you…professionally speaking?"

He tilted his head ever so slowly to the side, his mind blurting out what his mouth wasn't.

He gave me the head nod, then turned to leave, but thought better of it and with an oh so sexy smirk said, "Professionally speaking, you should wear that color more often. It brings out the color in your eyes."

Oh, he's smooth, I'll give him that.

As Damon walked off, I glanced over through the glass into Oliver's office and saw he was finishing up his call. It was now or never to get the hell out of there to avoid the awkward moment I was anticipating having when he told me he was going with that twit to the party. I was apparently going alone unless I could find a date in the next few hours.

As I got on the elevator, I saw Oliver walking out of his office to head to the meeting. He looked toward my desk as if he was looking for me. I prayed to the Elevator Gods to please close these doors before he spotted me. Please, Please.

Thank God.

Oliver was in his meeting most of the day so thankfully there was no way for any awkwardness to occur. After lunch I finished up on most of the work that had been sitting at my desk. It was finally 5:00. I had picked up a dress on my lunch hour and an unexpected date an hour after that. Now I just needed to make my 6:00 hair appointment and grab a quick bite to eat before I met my date back here at 7:45. I made a dash for the elevator. I might not have been going with Oliver but I sure as hell was gonna make him wish he had asked me. Wait till he sees my dress…

"Felicity?" Oliver called out from outside the elevator.

On instinct, I quickly put my hand in the door to stop it and then held onto the open door button inside the elevator with my thumb.

"Hey, what's up?" I asked.

"I looked for you earlier before I went into my meeting but you were gone."

"Sorry about that. I left a little early for lunch. I had some extra errands to do that came up rather suddenly." And inconveniently, I should say but I won't.

"No, I'm sorry we were interrupted and then I got stuck in that meeting all afternoon. We never got to finish that conversation about the party."

"Oh, it's all good now."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, I found a dress and a date."

"A date?"

"Yes, Stefan Salvatore from Accounting asked me to go with him."

"Wait, the over-eager-over-achiever who broods when the copier is out of paper, that Stefan?"

"He's not that much of a brooder."

Oliver gave me the are-you-serious look.

"Okay, he is a bit of a brooder, but he's always gone out of his way to be nice to me."

"I've noticed."

"And he came all the way up here from the first floor to ask me. You know, the invitation did say bring a guest and he was the only one to ask me."

"Who was your other option?"

"Huh?" I said surprised.

"You said you were keeping your options open earlier in my office."

You were my only option, Oliver, before Isabel offered you her services for the evening.

"Oh, my other option…"

"Let me guess. Was it his self-centered charismatic brother from Risk Management, the one always giving you the eye when he drops off files at your desk?"

"Who, Damon? Well, he is very charming and not hard on the eyes, but he's a bit of a bad boy and I don't think I need that kind of trouble right now, do you?"

"Probably not."

Hmm, Oliver sure does notice a lot of stuff I had no idea he noticed.

"What are you smiling about, Felicity?"

"I just didn't notice that you noticed those kinds of things."

"Well, it's kind of impossible...not to notice you."

His honest and pained expression he had on his face affected me. I wanted to hop off that elevator right into his arms.

"Well, I hope you two have a good time, Felicity."

"Oh, no, it's not like that. I strictly just needed a plus one." Why I still felt like I had to explain this to him, I had no idea.

"I'm sure Stefan won't feel that way, not when he's got someone like you on his arm."

"Someone like me?"

"A guy would be a fool not to want to spend the evening with you."

Why does he look like he's regretting something right now?

"So are, um, you going with anyone?" I nosily asked already knowing the dreaded answer.

"No. I'm going alone."

You've got to be shitting me.

"Really?"

"Yeah. I don't like office parties much anyway so I didn't want to make a big deal of it."

"I thought you were going with Isabel?"

"Whatever gave you that idea?"

That lying bitch.

Felicity, come on. One mistake with her was one mistake too much."

"Well, then what about Laurel?"

"What about her?"

"I thought maybe you two still had –"

"No, that's been over for a long time. I thought you knew that."

"Well, that was the impression I had, but –"

"She's not here in town right now anyways."

"Oh, she's not?"

"Excuse me, are you going to use this elevator or not?" a squeaky male voice hollered behind Oliver.

Oliver turned around to look at who was doing the complaining.

"Oh, Mr. Queen, I'm sorry. Are you using this elevator? I'll go get another one. Have a nice day." He scampered off with his tail between his legs.

"You sure do have an effect on people, Oliver."

"I didn't say anything," he smirked.

We had a moment where we just laughed and then it hit us that we were in the middle of a very strange and awkward conversation that I don't think either of us knew where it was headed.

"About Laurel… You know how hard Tommy's death was on her, and she's been going through some pretty heavy stuff. Matter of fact, that day you got kidnapped I had went to see her. I tried to help her and realized I wasn't the help she needed, so I talked to her father and we both thought it best she got help from people who specialized in what she's going through. He checked her into a facility not exactly with Laurel's full consent; nevertheless, she reluctantly agreed to give it a try. She's actually been on my mind a lot recently, because for the longest I took all of the responsibility for Tommy's death and I'm just now letting that go. Before she left, I told her it was for the best and I urged her to stay there to get the help she needed."

Wait, what? Rewind. And there it is, the reasonable explanation I never stopped to think of.

Suddenly it all just hit me. All this time I thought Oliver may have still had romantic feelings towards Laurel and it was all a misunderstanding. Oliver's talking in his sleep made sense now. When he said, "Laurel, you have to stay," he was referring to her staying at the substance abuse facility so she could get the help she needed.

"I guess I'll see you later at the party, Felicity."

"Wait, Oliver. What were you going to tell me earlier in your office?"

"Oh, it doesn't matter now. I've held you up long enough. I know you have things to do before the party. I'll see you there, okay?"

He let go of the elevator doors and they shut, leaving me standing there alone feeling like I had read the signs all wrong and had been missed the entire point of something for some time now because I had assumed something without knowing the facts.

Why didn't I just talk to Oliver that night in my apartment when he wanted to? Because I was busy making assumptions that clouded my judgment, that's why. Why didn't I just ask him about it? And now I'll be never know what he wanted to tell me. God, he was going alone to the party and I was apparently going with Stefan from Accounting when there was only one man I wanted to dance with tonight.

I feel like such a jerk. Standing outside of these elevator doors letting the woman I'm crazy for go to this stupid Christmas party with Stefan from Accounting. What the hell is wrong with me? Why does this girl make it so hard for me to think rationally? I should have asked her to the party when I had the chance. Hell, I should have thrown Isabel out of my office. Maybe if I'm lucky, I can steal one dance.

(7:30 p.m. Outside Queen Consolidated Building)

The sound of nervous whistling filled the cold, dark night. As Stefan stood in front of the building, he paced back and forth, repeatedly looking at his watch. He didn't know it yet, but I was on my way.

"Hello, bro."

"Damon, what are you doing here?" Stefan said angrily.

"I work here, too, remember."

"But you never come to these things."

"I made an exception."

"Well, unmake it."

"Whoa, what the hell are you wearing, Stefan?"

"A white tux. Why?"

"This is a Christmas party for the employees, not the Oscars."

"What, you think this is too much?"

"Uh, yeah, that's three, four and five much."

Stefan stood there looking down at his attire with a strained look on his face.

"Don't brood Stefan, just go to your house and change."

"I can't. I'm meeting Felicity from the office here in a few minutes."

"So I heard…"

"I can't just leave."

"Look, the kind gentleman I am, I'll stay here and wait for Felicity. You can go home and change and come back."

"Oh, no, you've already stolen enough of my girlfriends from me. I don't trust you alone with her."

"Come on, Stefan, don't be so paranoid. It's not my fault you pick girls that fall for me. I'm just here to help you. And Felicity isn't actually your girlfriend and she sure as hell won't be if she sees you in that."

"But my car is parked all the way on the other side of the building."

"What the hell for? There's a whole parking lot right in front of you."

"I didn't want anyone to dent it. It's brand new."

"Tell you what, see that cab over there, I'll pay the cab driver to take you to your house."

"Why are you being so helpful, Damon?"

"I don't want you to make a fool of yourself, that's all."

"Fine, but keep your hands off of my date."

"Fine, no hands." He didn't say anything about lips.

Damon walked over to the driver's side door of the cab and leaned in holding cash. "There's five hundred bucks in it for you if you get lost on your way back here."

"Sure thing, Mister."

Damon popped his head above the cab and yelled, "Stefan, you're all set."

I pulled into the parking lot of Queen Consolidated at 7:45 with so much on my mind. On the one hand, I wanted to be here with Oliver and on the other hand I wanted to be here with Oliver. But I got myself into this mess and was going to have to get myself out. I made assumptions that were all wrong and now I was meeting Stefan here instead of the man I really wanted to be here with.

This evening can't possibly turn out the way I want it to, can it?

I got out of my car and walked toward the building. The chill in the air and the heavy breeze swept my newly styled flowing hair to the side. I had my contacts in and fire red lipstick that matched my red strapless cocktail dress with sweetheart neckline, ruched bodice and A-line skirt that sat a couple inches above my knees. My long-sleeve white buttoned down cardigan sweater I had grabbed on my way out the door wasn't enough to keep me warm, unfortunately. It had to be 30 degrees outside and dropping. I wished I had grabbed my coat.

As I walked speedily through the cold parking lot, I spotted someone standing up near the entrance with their backed turned to me, who I assumed was Stefan. He was always an early bird and always ready to go, but as I got closer, I realized it wasn't Stefan at all.

"Hello, Felicity."

"Damon, hi."

"Wow, you look…incredible."

"Thank you. Have you seen your brother around? I'm supposed to be meeting him here."

"Unfortunately, he can't make it tonight."

"Oh, really? What happened? Is he okay?"

"Oh, yeah, he's fine. He just had last minute deadlines for work and couldn't get away. He sends his apologies."

"Oh, I'm sorry to hear that."

Oh, thank God. I'm off the hook.

"And I wasn't about to leave a pretty girl stranded so I'm filling in, if that's okay with you."

Fuck.

"Well, um, that's not necessary."

"Of course it is, I'm not gonna leave you minus one." He unexpectedly pulled out a long stem red rose from under his jacket.

"A red rose to match your dress, Beautiful."

"That's very sweet, but you didn't—"

"By the way, this red rose has nothing on that red dress. Nothing at all."

"Thank you, I'm flattered."

By all accounts, Damon was sexy and gorgeous in a 'not many exist as hot as that' kind of way. By all accounts, his blue eyes would win every state contest for the most smoldering. By all accounts, women would fall at his feet with the bad boy/romantic vibe he's got going on. But there was only one problem, none of those things mattered to be because being in love with Oliver meant I only had eyes for him. Damon was just another guy to me while Oliver was The Guy For Me.

"Damon, it's very nice of you to do this, but I can't accept –"

"Ms. Smoak," the whiny voice of Isabitch suddenly distracted me and I turned around. "How are you this evening?"

There she was, the ogress, dressed in all black, with her $5,000 coat and $500 shoes, and on her arm there stood Oliver looking at Damon like he was none to pleased.

"I never received that bottle of Cognac you were supposed to pick up for me."

"They were all out of it," I said as abrupt as I possibly could.

"I bet," the old biddy said under her breath.

"What Cognac?" Oliver said sounding confused.

"It's nothing. Never mind," the hag said in a hurry dismissing Oliver's question.

"So who's your hot date, Felicity?" The nosy witch just wouldn't go away.

I'd almost forgotten Damon was standing beside me.

"Oh, this is Damon, Damon Salvatore, from Risk Management."

The hussy gave Damon the once over and leaned into me and whispered, "You did good."

You did better, bitch.

"Well, come on, Oliver, we've got some schmoozing to do," the hobag pulled on Oliver's arm and Oliver didn't say a word as they entered the building.

"So Felicity, are we doing this or what?" Damon said with a smile, another feature that would melt any other girl's heart.

"Sure, why not? We're here, we're dressed up –"

"—and there's an open bar," he finished my sentence.

"Just show me the way," I said under my breath.

To be continued...