FF#17: Deputy Mommy – Part Six
Flash Fic Prompt #17: Impulses
Felicity's eyes ricocheted back and forth. "Creamy peanut butter or crunchy," she asked herself, holding up the respective jars as she contemplated them. "That is the question." A question that she had no answer to – damn Roy!, so she ended up tossing both options into her already heaping cart. Before she could walk away, the Simply version caught her eye, so she grabbed that as well for good measure. While she was allergic to nuts, peanut butter was one of the four staple childhood food groups. Unfortunately, she just didn't know what kind of peanut butter Mowgli liked.
"Having an Elvis moment," a familiar voice asked from beside her. Felicity glanced up from the grocery list she had pretty much thrown out the window after she started walking up and down the aisles, picking up everything and anything a kid might like to eat. She started to smile warmly at Captain Lance, but then she remembered that she was irked with him – depending upon his help with David Copperfield but still irked. So, instead, she scowled, the facial expression just becoming deeper set when she saw what was in his basket: potato chips, pop, cookies, and jerky. No wonder the man had a heart condition.
"You know, green things won't kill you."
"I've heard. For about a year now," Lance added, smirking. "Apparently, he's trying something new." She frowned, not amused; he scratched his stubbled face, rocking back nervously on the heels of his boots. "So, where's the kid?"
"At home. My home," Felicity clarified quickly, though she realized afterwards that such clarification really wasn't necessary. If someone had come forward to claim Heidi, Captain Lance would have been the first person to know. His eyebrows quirked, and she rushed to explain... well, anything he might have been questioning with that little gesture. "He's not alone, don't worry. I know better than to leave a child of an undetermined age (but let's put him around eight) alone. Raisa's watching him."
"Queen's Raisa?"
"Yeah. He, uh, he asked for her help on my behalf."
"Well, that was... nice... of him." It looked like it was painful for Lance to give Oliver even that much praise.
Felicity, however, still wasn't convinced that she had satisfied his eyebrows' judgement. "And it's not like I'm being an absentee foster parent applicant," she rushed to add, holding out her hands as if they could ward away his suspicions and conclusions. "I was going to bring Pip with me, but then Roy started throwing a fit. You know, he's been acting really strangely ever since Heathcliff showed up on my front porch. But anyway," she got them back on track, refusing to contemplate just what Roy's apparent attitude meant. "He started complaining that, if the kid came, then he was coming, too, because it wouldn't be fair if Sookie Stackhouse got to pick out all of the food." Grumbling one last thing under her breath, Felicity added, "and it figures that, of all the pop culture orphans Roy could reference, he uses one that spent the majority of her time on-screen naked."
"Yeah, I've been meaning to ask you about that." For a moment, Felicity thought Captain Lance was going to ask her about True Blood, but he washed that fear away by, instead, inquiring about something equally as terrifying. "How'd that happen, you and that Harper punk?"
Felicity was offended, insulted, and horrified by the implications of cop's question. "How did what happen?"
"Well, you're friends, right?"
She sighed in relief. It was one thing for Captain Lance to think that she was dating Oliver, because, well, he was Oliver, and they had gone on one, explosion interrupted dinner together, but Roy?! Even the thought of someone drawing such a conclusion made her start scratching her arms like she was breaking out in hives. Roy was... Roy. He was... a pest. If anything, he was the little brother she never wanted and should probably just take care of by drowning in the bathtub. "We're...? He's...? He's just always around." Which was the truth. Now that Roy was an official member of the team and the Diggle to her Oliver (as soon as she was officially elected Deputy Mayor, the city would be hiring him on as her personal driver), he was always around, but that explanation wouldn't work for Captain Lance. "With Thea... traveling, I think Oliver likes having Roy around, because it's what Thea would want. We're helping him out, keeping an eye on him."
"More like keeping him out of trouble," Lance interpreted. "But that's good. I guess." His face being screwed up in confusion didn't say the same thing, but Felicity wanted to move past their current conversation. Plus, they physically needed to move, because they were starting to create a pile up in aisle seven. Pushing her cart forward, she nodded her head in the direction she was heading, insinuating that the off duty police officer should follow her. He did. "And, by the way, you're no longer a foster parent applicant... or, well, you never were. I pushed through an emergency guardianship for you over the minor John Doe. Once we see where this goes, we can pursue a more formal custody arrangement... if that's what is necessary. In the meantime, are you sure this is what you want?"
Felicity paused. "What do you mean?"
Lance rolled his eyes, shrugging his shoulders. "Given what you do...?"
Interrupting him, Felicity spoke rapidly while tossing even more food into her cart. Cereals, oatmeal, and granola bars were piled on like it was the 80's and carbs were thought to be the base of any well balanced diet. "What I do," she repeated, raising her voice in emphasis. "I'm running for deputy mayor. Granted, that's a high pressure, big commitment job, but, if you're implying that I can't help govern this city and take care of a child, Captain Lance..." His gaze was wide, for he didn't know how to respond, so she just kept talking, steamrolling over him, filling the uncomfortable silence with the first things that popped into her mind, and hoping that she was doing a good enough job of distracting both him and anyone else who might have heard his less than tech-support-to-a-secret-hero-worthy-stealth query. "As for my job in the interim, I work at Queen Consolidated... like so many other people in Starling. Sure, it's for a pompous ass who doesn't realize just how uncouth and inappropriate belt buckle tech is given the ramifications that come with a man... fondling his belt buckle, but, if I can survive Isabel..."
"Wait," this time it was Lance who cut her off. "What does a man's belt buckle have to do with anything?"
Quirking a pointed brow, grinning impishly, and dropping her gaze down to where the cop himself was standing with his hands spread on his waist along his belt, she answered cheekily, "every time a guy touches his belt buckle, he's thinking about sex, Captain Lance."
Oh, how the tables had turned... Gleefully, Felicity watched as Lance first blanched and then flushed a dangerously telling red, clearing his throat and shuffling his feet several times before he was the one moving them forward and then around to the next aisle. "So, uh, Palmer. I haven't met him yet. You...? You're not a fan?"
"Let's just say that I'm looking forward to taking office."
"I'm sure Oliver feels the same way."
Hands dropping from her cart and down to her hips, Felicity demanded, "what's that supposed to mean?"
Captain Lance refused to look at her as he spoke. Instead, he pretended to be busy studying the various salad dressing options in front of them. And for what – his jerky? "It's just that no guy wants his girlfriend working for someone who... has a fascination with his belt buckle around her."
Through gritted teeth, she said, "for the last time, Oliver and I are not dating." While she knew such conclusions bothered her so much because of the fact that they weren't true when they should have been, Lance didn't need to know that.
"He got his nanny to take care of your kid."
"Anne Shirley is not my kid; he's my ward. Raisa was not Oliver's nanny; she was the Queen's head housekeeper. And your argument holds absolutely no validity."
"Me thinks the lady doth protest too much."
"That's not the quote," she snapped, only realizing after her comment how inane it was.
"And you just brought a child into Oliver Queens' life, and he didn't run screaming for the hills," Captain Lance challenged, ignoring her petty argument. "In fact, he's helping you with the boy. Maybe you're not dating, but you sure as hell act like it. I see it. The newspapers see it. And so will the kid, too." Before she could protest, he continued, "by the way, the blood tests you took came back. The boy's not related to you." With a tip of a non-existent hat, grin, and a slight bow, Lance said, "have a lovely evening, Miss Smoak," before disappearing around the corner and leaving Felicity with more on her mind than what was in her cart... and that was a lot.