Title: Hold On (To All She Had Left Of Him)
Words: 3145
Genre: Tragedy/Comfort
Pairing: Laurel/Oliver
Status: Done-ish.

Summary: Laurel and Oliver got married before the boat trip. Laurel goes to his funeral and curses his name and moves on with her life. Five years after, he comes back, and sees her and she has to deal with the fallout.

"We're gonna have a life together," He said as he kissed her.

She smiled. "I just wish we didn't have to wait till after the boat trip to tell everyone."

"Dad has had this planned for weeks. And I thought it'd be a good opportunity." He told her as he looked in her eyes. "It's the last time I want to leave you."

She nodded. She had finals. She couldn't go with him. Law School came soon and he was going to be back and show her the world. "Well, don't get into too much trouble."

"I promise," He told her, "I won't"

She looked down at the big ring on her finger and smiled. She didn't get to wear it very often, because people would ask and they didn't want people to know yet. "I'm gonna miss you so much," She frowned

"Hey," He cajoled. "It's only gonna be a little while longer and then we can tell the whole world about it. But for now, I just want to enjoy being married to you. And we'd be barraged with questions if we came out now."

She weakly smiled. He was right. Her father didn't approve. Her mother thought he was nice, if a little out of his own headspace. His father loved her and his mother seemed to like her, but they were going out for a year or two and got married young. People would ask questions. "You're right. I love you."

"I should go," He said and pouted. "Early day tomorrow."

She slinked out of bed and stood up. He gave her a hug and she cried a little. "God, this better be the last trip you take for a while, Mister."

"Stop thinking about tomorrow," He chuckled as he gave her one last kiss. "And it is. Last trip. And I'll be back before you know it." He said as he opened the door and closed it quietly. When he did, Laurel got the marriage certificate out of her drawer and looked at that. They were legally married.

Sara opened her door and nodded to him and he nodded back. This was it. He was having his last fun with her on the boat and then it was over. This time, really over. He'd done a lot of things to Laurel in the past that she didn't deserve, but this was the end of his rope. He was going to be a good man for her after he came home. He was gonna be a proper husband.

A week later, Quentin made dinner in their kitchen while he watched the game on the little TV they kept in the kitchen. "Come on," Quentin yelled at the TV, "Gotta buy a ticket if you're gonna play like that."

Laurel came over and leaned on the counter, a glum look on her face as she faced the TV.

"Hey, kiddo, how's the apartment hunt going?" He asked. He didn't want her to move out an they both knew it, but he at least took an interest in the situation.

"Terribly," Laurel said as she turned down the TV, so he could hear her talk as he took a pan to sink and started cleaning it there. "I really wanted to find the perfect place to show Ollie when he came back from his boat trip." She said with a pleading in her voice, not to him, but to the universe for the both of them. "Everything good was already taken by the time I walked in the door." She said as she fiddled with the rag in her hands.

"Maybe it's a sign you're not supposed to move in with the frat boy you call a boyfriend," He remarked.

Laurel bit her tongue because Oliver wasn't back and she wanted to tell her father with him, but damn if she hadn't thought about just shoving it in his face he's my husband. Still, she smiled to him and dried the pan he just washed. "You and mom were my age when you moved into that place on Spring Street. You weren't even engaged yet."

"Well, that's because your mother kept turning down all my proposals," Quentin told her and gave her a plate to dry.

This came as a shock to Laurel. Her mother hadn't wanted to get married? "She did?" Laurel said with the biggest smile she could muster as she walked into the kitchen and looked at her father. He was a romantic, deep down, and maybe that would play in their favor.

"You know your mother, free spirit and all. Why do we need rings when we have love?" He chuckled to himself. "You know, I spent a year with that ring, burnt a whole in my pocket.."

Laurel's smile at the story of her mother and father's engagement quickly turned to a look of shock and Quentin knew. She dropped the plate and rag she was working with and the plate shattered on the ground.

"...There was a mayday transmission late last night and it has not been heard from since. Among those missing are locals Robert and Oliver Queen"

Her husband was dead. Oliver Jonas Queen who had told her, his wife, that he would come back to her, he was dead. She didn't move for several minutes. "Laurel, sweetie, it's gonna be alright, I'm sure there was just an accident. I'm sure they're fine."

"No, no, no." Laurel shook her head. She couldn't. "Oh god," She cried.

Quentin held her in his arms. He had no love for the boy, but he couldn't exactly let his daughter's pain go to waste. "It's gonna be alright, sweetie." He told her as he took her to the couch and waited. It would be only a matter of time before Moira came and talked to them about how sad she was that Oliver and Robert were gone.

A couple of weeks later, Dinah looked to Quentin who looked after Laurel. "How is she?"

"She's taking it pretty hard." Quentin said. "She won't get out of bed. She's just, you know, I didn't think she loved him that much."

Dinah looked away, feeling some guilt over what she had done. "Should we tell her about the service? Or do you think it might upset her more?"

Quentin sighed, "Probably should," He went in and sat on her bed, "Laurel sweetie, I have something to tell you."

"Yes?" She asked in a distant tone. It was like she wasn't even there.

Quentin hated seeing her like this. "You know, Oliver's memorial is gonna be in a couple of days. Do you wanna go?"

She sat up and looked angry at him. "Of course, I want to go. Why would I not want to go?" She asked him with malice in her voice.

"Well, baby, you've seemed a little broken up about this."

Laurel laughed in anger. "Of course, I'm angry. I learned that my sister went with my freaking husband on his boat trip."

"Husband?" He asked, an eyebrow quirked up.

Laurel sighed as she got out the marriage certificate out of her bedside table drawer. "We were waiting until he came back from his boat trip, but I guess that really doesn't matter now." She told him as she gave it to him. "Here,"

He looked at the certificate. They were married. "Why didn't you tell us?"

"We were gonna have the big ceremony when he came back. That was when we were gonna tell people we were married." She said. "Now, I have to go to that church by myself and say goodbye."

On the day of Oliver's memorial service, Laurel got up, put on a black dress and heels and put a black hat with a netted veil on her head. Everyone deserved to know now that he had a wife and the he left her alone.

She drove the church and got out of the car and there were plenty of cameras on her. They would have been on her regardless, because she was his girlfriend but now that people had heard whispers of her being his wife, well, they just got more intense.

Tommy took her hand and ushered her in and pushed the cameras away. Since there was no body, there was no casket, but she put her roses by the picture of him and cried.

People tried to come up to her and talk about it, but Tommy sent them away. The only people who were allowed to come up and talk to her were her family and his.

Thea came over and hugged her. "Is it true? What they're saying? That you guys were married?" She asked.

Laurel nodded. "He was my husband." She told Thea.

"He still could be," Thea told her, trying to be supportive. She looked down at the Harry Winston ring on her finger. "He had good taste,"

Laurel sighed as she looked at the ring. She'd been so happy to down to that jeweler and look at rings. He told her, anything she wanted. That it was hers. "Yeah, he did." She told Thea.

People trickled out of the church and into their cars to go to the Wake that was being held for both Robert and Oliver at the Queen Mansion and left was only Tommy and herself. "We should go," He told her.

"Can you give me a minute alone?" She asked him as she stared straight ahead. He gave her a kiss on the head and left. She got up from the pew and went over to his picture. "This isn't how it was supposed happen, Ollie. I was supposed to come in here because we were getting married. I was supposed to be wearing white, not black, and you took that all away from me with your stupid boat trip and sleeping with my sister. We were fucking married, god damn you. Damn you to hell. We were married. We were supposed to look out for each other and all you thought about was yourself. I was counting on forever with you and now I don't even get a right now with you. And the worst thing is I want you to come back. I want this to be a stupid dream. But it's not. You're not coming back. You've made a fool out of me. But not anymore Ollie, I can't do it anymore. I have to let you go. I have to live my life." She told him and touched his photograph once more.

Laurel tucked the ring away and tried to forget about Oliver. "You okay?" Tommy asked.

"I'm gonna try," She told him with a smile.

He gave her a little push. "You know you seemed pretty upset in there with him."

"I am, Tommy. He broke his vows the moment he got on that boat. He went with Sara. He told me he wanted to give me the world. Obviously not."

Tommy shrugged. "He didn't get married to you for nothing. He wanted to be binded to you forever."

She laughed at that. "Well, now he's dead and I'm bound to him."

She went to the wake and smiled, but that was the last time that she talked about Oliver to anyone except Tommy or the Queen.

She had a gag order on Oliver's name and took care of Thea and Moira as best she could. But it was hard. The whole world fell apart when Sara, Robert, and Oliver were declared dead.

Five years went by and things got better and worse. She became a lawyer, but her parents got divorced and her father started hitting the bottle. She got dad to quit drink. Mom moved to a new city. She got a job at a nonprofit and dad got his detective shield. Tommy hounded her about moving on.

Life seemed to be going in the right direction fast forward five years later, after she had forgotten about her little stint as Mrs. Queen. Of course, it never could stay like that.

"Oliver Queen is alive. The Starling City Resident was found by fishermen in the North China Sea five days ago, five years after he presumed dead following the accident at sea which claimed the Queen's Gambit. Queen was a regular tabloid presence and a fixture of the Starling City club scene. Shortly before his disappearance, he was acquitted of assault charges of a highly publicized drunken altercation with the papparazzi. Queen is the son of the Starling City billionaire Robert Queen who was also on board, but now officially confirmed as deceased. Oliver was survived by his mother, Moira Queen, sister, Thea Queen, and his wife, Dinah Laurel Lance, who could not be reached for comment." Laurel was mostly asleep when the story came on and when she woke up in the morning convinced herself that it was a dream and went to work.

"Come on, Laurel, we're lawyers," Johanna pleaded to her. "Not miracle workers. We can't win this."

Laurel flipped through CNRI mail. "If we can't win a class action suit against a man who swindled hundreds of people out of their homes and life savings then we're not fit to call ourselves a legal aid office,"

"And if we go bankrupt in the process, we won't BE a legal aid office. Hunt has an army of lawyers and they are ready to bury us."

Laurel turned to Joanna who crossed her arms, "You and me against an army, I love those odds."

"Why do you hate me?"

Laurel sat at her desk and looked at her corkboard of all things mr. Adam Hunt. They wanted something that could give them just the ounce of leverage to make this guy pay back his debts.

The news was on. "Details of the castaway story you've all heard about, the son of a very wealthy billionaire will soon become a legendary story. Jessica has more details of the complete castaway story,"

"The Queen's Gambit was last heard from more than five years ago," Jessica said on the news and Laurel knew something was up. She went and watched with the rest of everyone and stunned by the news. This was not happening. Oliver was alive. "Mr. Queen has reportedly confirmed that he was the only survivor of the accident that took the lives of seven people, including local resident Sara Lance, survived by her sister, wife of Oliver Queen, Laurel-" She turned the TV off. She didn't need those questions, because they would all ask and she didn't want to talk about it.

They all turned to her anyway. "Come on, people, we have work to do." And everyone busied themselves with papers and shuffled awkwardly while Joanna came to her side.

"Why don't you take the day off?" She asked.

Laurel shook her head, "What about Hunt? You, me, against an Army, remember?" She asked.

"You're gonna have other things on your mind. You should go." Joanna said.

"Seriously," Laurel told her, "I'm fine. I just need to get back to work. Let's get back to work. Please. Oliver won't come bother me until at least tomorrow, and at that point, I'm just gonna tell him where he can shove it."

"You aren't at all excited that he's back?" Joanna asked, not believing Laurel's thorny exterior for a second.

To her credit, Laurel put up a good front. "No," She said, flatly. "Now let's get back to work."

"Okay," Joanna surrendered, but it was plainly obvious to her that there was something else going on with Laurel. She covered it well, though, and she understood why people genuinely thought Laurel didn't want to see Oliver Queen.

The next day came and they were back at CNRI and discussed the Adam Hunt case some more when she went to walk to her desk and saw Oliver in her way. "Hello, Laurel. Can we talk?"

She looked to Joanna who nodded to her and she nodded to him. "I know a place around the corner that sells coffee. I need some. Walk with me." She said as she walked out of the office.

"So you went to law school. You said you would." He said as they got out.

She looked down at her hand. "Yeah. Everyone's proud." She said.

"Adam Hunt's a heavy hitter. You sure you want to get in the ring with him?" He made small talk well.

She didn't. "Five years. And you want to talk about Adam Hunt?" She asked him as she looked him in the eye for the first time since stepping out of the office. "There are a lot of things we have to talk about. But you want to talk about Adam Hunt?"

"No, not really," He admitted.

She looked him straight in the eye. "Why are you here, Ollie?"

"To apologize."

That was incredible. He never apologized for anything and here he was, giving her words. "It was my fault. I wanted to ask you not to blame her."

"For what? Oliver, you married me and you still chose her and sleeping around over me. You really have no ground asking me to do anything for you. I married you because I thought you were a good man. She fell under your spell just like I did. She did the same stupid things I did,"

"I didn't..."

"She was my sister, Ollie. You cheated on me, your wife, with my sister, who was one of the only people to witness our actual marriage. And I wanted you back everyday for the past five years. But now that you're back, I want nothing to do with you."

She looked down at her hand and looked at the ring. She wore it today, because the world knew her as mrs. Laurel Queen, she might as well relish in it for a little while.

Oliver looked at her pained. She saw the good moments in that ring. "I know it's too late to say this, but I'm sorry."

"Yeah, I'm sorry too." She said as she took the ring off and grabbed his wrist and put the ring in his hand. "I'd hoped you'd rot in hell a whole hell of a lot longer than five years."

He put it back in her hand. "That's yours."

"You can expect the divorce papers soon," She told him.

He couldn't believe that she let him go. They were gonna be married. Of course, that was five years ago and a lot had changed since then. "Will you give me one more conversation, when you don't have work?"

She looked at him and looked to the coffee. "One more conversation to clarify everything. And then I'm setting up the divorce papers, Ollie. I'm not the person I was five years ago who you thought was a stop along the way. I'm the destination."