Disclaimer: No copyright infringement intended. Nor do I own anything in relation to Arrow or it's characters.
Chapter Two: Every story has two sides
Light...
Light had been his enemy for longer than he cared to recall. Light meant that had another day had dawned, light meant that another night had passed, and light meant that once again she was gone. Every night since his parents died there she'd been. At first he'd thought she was nothing more than a distant mirage or a trick his grief stricken mind had played to distract him from his own pain. The first year was simple she'd been there to talk to to and he'd been there just sitting there beneath that lone lamp. She'd been this bright, kind, sweet, simple soul that was willing to listen when he'd even bothered to speak.
His nightmares were growing progressively worse with each passing day. Every night as his eyes began to slide shut he knew that in moments he'd either be in her arms or trapped in a world where she didn't exist. Tonight he'd found her arms...
Tonight he'd found his home; but when his eyes opened and his arms reached for her his heart once again broke.
Knowing that sleep would once again prove to be just as illusive as the multitude of nights before he sighed as he forced his weary body forward. The light was not yet cresting over the still darkened skies so he knew the house would still be silent as the dead. Relishing the solitude that these hours often brought he opened the door and began to pad carefully along the hardwood floors. The floor was cold but soothing against the bare skin of his feet as he walked slowly down the long darkened hallway. Each door he passed served as a cold and empty reminder of how much he'd lost in just this past year.
His heart always clenched as he rounded the corner and glanced upon the lightly painted red door. That door was supposed to serve as a beacon of hope in his often darkened world. That door was supposed to be open as she slept soundly within. That door was the only reminder he'd dare to keep, everything else had been destroyed. His sister's life was often a mystery to him but her death sadly was not. Thea had remained in Starling after their parents had died. She lived her life with kind glances and a peaceful setting. Thea had what he often felt he was beginning to have even if it was only in his not long enough dreams.
After his trainer and often tormentor had been disposed of he'd made arrangements for his sister to travel to Russia. He'd only seen her a handful of times since that awful day. His training and rapid ascent to his predecessors throne had made finding time to spend with his completely unaware sister rather difficult. He often was covered in cuts with the purple yellowish skin to match. The last thing Oliver had wanted for her was to see her once strong big brother now being nothing more than a punching bag for his legal guardian. No Thea was safe in the care of two very loving people, she was happy and well cared for while he suffered at a murderer's hand.
The tables had finally turned and now he was in a position to finally make their small family once again whole. Oliver had arranged for everything she was going to leave Starling on a private jet and she'd arrive at what was now his own private airfield. Hours that's all that had separated them from each other...
Apparently those hours had been still one hour too long. He'd been pacing back and forth in what was to be her bedroom as Magdalia finished preparing the bed. His nerves were raw but excited as the hands on the antique clock in her room slowly ticked away.
"Mr. Queen if you don't stop pacing you'll wear a hole in the floor." Magdalia's voice was thick with her accent as she moved her hands rapidly over the flawless silk sheets.
Oliver stopped in mid-stride signaling that he'd heard her words as his eyes shifted from nervous to amused in a few very short seconds. "Mags what if she hates it here? What if she doesn't want to be a family anymore? What if I've changed far more than she can handle? Mags what if I can't care for her?"
The questions had been running wildly through his troubled mind as he'd made the final arrangements for her flight here today.
Magdalia was a kind middle aged woman with light grey streaks amongst her once very bright blonde hair. She'd been a semi permanent fixture in his life since he'd been brought here at the tender young age of 12. His parents death had been fairly fresh in his mind and in his heart when he'd stepped trough the silent echoing halls. His feet had scraped and sloshed against the floors as he'd be pulled toward the black solid oak doors. Mags had been standing before them with her short thick arms braced in front of her slightly puffed middle. Her green eyes had shown him kindness and warmth when everyone else around him had shown him nothing but pain. She' been an angel in white who he suspected often checked him as he wailed and screamed through all hours of the seemingly endless nights.
"Oliver it will be fine your sister will see the kind man behind that steely blue stare." He smiled as she lightly patted his shoulder and left the perfectly decorated room.
Oliver was about to leave for the airstrip when he felt his phone vibrate in his right pants pocket. He'd reached down and when he saw the number his heart had immediately froze...
With another heavy sigh his head lowered as he moved rather quickly past the room's sealed door. Thea had died from a drug overdose just mere hours before 7am that very same day. According to the various medical officials that he'd spent hours speaking to his sister had been in this type of trouble for quite some time so to them her death came as no surprise.
Oliver however had felt the world fall from beneath his feet. That night as he locked the room he'd felt broken and destroyed...he'd wanted someone to erase the pain of that day...he'd wanted to feel something for someone who despite who he was felt something for him as well...Oliver's eyes had closed and moments later his skin was tightly pressed against her own.
His smile was soft but visible as he rounded the corner and found to his utter surprise that the kitchen light was casting a shadow of bright neon on the tables below.
"Oliver?" He glanced up to see his friend and now almost constant companion John Diggle sitting at the lower kitchen counter staring at him with wide eyed amusement.
"John what are you doing up at this hour? Our plane won't be leaving the tarmac for another four hours." John's eyes lowered to the steaming cup of coffee before him as Oliver walked towards the still half full coffee pot his nose wrinkling when he smelled the rather distinctive blend. "John really what is it with you and the hazelnut garbage that Raisa keeps making me purchase at least once a month?"
His own nose wrinkled as his lips came to gently rest over the rim of the dark blue ceramic cup. "She threw out our usual blend so it's either this or nothing."
Oliver sighed heavily once more as he poured the putrid blend into his own dark blue cup. Raisa was punishing them for this little jaunt to Starling City and this was part of her silent revenge.
"She's upset over our travel plans Digg you do know that right?" His lips curved as he choked down another awful sip his eyes giving away his answer before his mouth had a chance to form a reply.
"Am I doing the right thing? I mean what if she still fights this? What if she still doesn't believe in me? What if she's not willing to take the risk?" Those questions had Oliver questioning everything over the past few days. The plan was simple she'd just been appointed to the head of the IT Department for his father's and now his company back in the States. She'd be there...she'd be flesh and blood as they each finally came face to face.
All he'd have to do was take her perfectly shaped hand as she reached forward to shake his own. He knew that once that spark ignited as it always did whenever their bodies touched she'd feel for the perhaps the first time that it was all real.
His beautiful, bright, beacon of hope would finally see what he'd known for quite some time.
His Felicity would finally know that what they had was real.
"Oliver she'll resist you already know this." Digg's form was hunched over the edge of the black and white marble as his next phrase aimed for home. "Just be smart she'll be timid and afraid so remember what I told you. Let her come to you Oliver let her make the tentative first move and then you can you know do whatever it is that you two do in those shared dreams of yours."
Oliver's face paled as Digg finished his final phrase. "John what if it's not enough? What if I'm not enough?" His voice was tight and hard as he leaned back the cold of the marble hit gently against his lower back.
"Felicity loves you Oliver even though the entire world has told her not too. she won't abandon you just give her the time and the space if she asks for it." His words banged about in Oliver's head for a few more moments before he leaned forward and dumped out the rest of his undrinkable coffee. Then with a slight nod he thanked the man for his as usual fairly good advice.
"I know she loves me Digg...I just have to get her to realize that perhaps we've loved each other all along..." His eyes were appraising as his lips slid into yet another easy smile.
"Oliver you're a sap you know that right?"
Oliver's eyes crinkled as he moved forward his hand reaching up to pat his friends shoulder as he walked by. "Only when it comes to her...Only when it comes to Felicity does that statement apply."
With that Oliver left his friend alone in the now sunlit room. Oliver didn't see it but the moment he left the kitchen Digg's mouth moved.
"Don't give up her Oliver...don't stop fighting for what's right." Had he heard the sentiment his answer would have been a simple but clear...
Never.
Oliver would never give up on Felicity.
They traveled in relative silence towards the private airstrip each of them was lost in their own personal thoughts. Oliver's mind once again went back to her...
His mind always came back to his shared time with Felicity...
"Felicity why do you keep fighting what's between us?" His fingers were trailing up and down her slim naked form as she curled her fingers in this close cropped hair.
Her sigh was small but the puff of air she'd released still chilled Oliver's dampened skin. "Oliver you're some rich tycoon with a horrible story in the real world while I'm just the daughter of a cocktail waitress and a once influential cop." She tilted her head so her nose rested at the crook of his neck while his lips came down to press gently against her forehead. "Oliver I know that you don't understand this but I remember you when we leave this place..."
He was about to interrupt but her fingers had fallen down to his parted lips. "I know what I feel for you is real Oliver and frankly it scares me...when I'm with you all I want is you...when I'm awake all I want to do is sleep so that once again I'll be with you. So yes it scares me that maybe I'm the only one who can recall this place during my waking hours...it scares me that maybe you can't remember me when your mind is once again in control..."
Oliver knew she was scared because he was too. He'd felt the same way she did each and every time they'd both been forced to leave the other. His heart would slowly break into a thousand pieces as his mind tore him away from her now very loving embrace. Felicity had become his heart, and soul. Felicity had become his gravity and he'd be damned if he was going to lose another person he loved.
"Felicity just tell me how you feel...tell me that you love me baby...tell me that what we have is real." It was the same plea each time they'd come together. His voice would start off soft and calm as she began her usual I can't you're not real speech. As her reluctance grew his voice would grow stronger...he'd become more desperate as he felt her beginning to pull away. Each time it was the same routine and each time as the words were about to fall from her parted flushed lips the dream would end.
The dreams always ended before Oliver had heard her truth.
His attention was brought back to the present as the felt the plane shift beneath him. John was by his side with his eyes partially closed... each of them was secretly dreading the trip home. John was going to face the consequences of his choices now over two years ago. He was going to face the girl he'd once known in the woman who would come to stand before him. John was going to face Felicity's unfiltered response once Oliver had given her the full story.
Oliver was going to give her the full story and this time they'd be face to face.
This time they'd be in the same room, at the same time, with their eyes for once wide open.