Chapter Text
Utterly Fabulous and Flawless Story Graphic made my the lovely (and talented... uber-patient) fallingmeleth (THANK YOU!)
*Disclaimer: part of the words on the banner belong to Emily Palermo’s poem, PICTURE OF ATLAS AS A TWELVE YEAR OLD GIRL, COWERING
0. Prologue
“reasons to not to kiss her:
1. you weren’t raised to love tender.
2. when she’s around all you do is tremble. when she’s around you want to get on your knees. look how much power she has over you. it’s dangerous.
3. she’s too good at forgiving and you’re too good at violence.
4. you know what they say about monsters. you know what happens to those who love them. are you going to do that to her?
5. your hands don’t know how to be gentle. think about the last beautiful thing that shattered in your palms. the fresh rosebuds crumbling between your fingers like a bruise. you wolf-boy, you war machine. you wouldn’t know how to hold something magic and not destroy it.
6. if you hurt her it might kill you
7. if you hurt her you might kill yourself.
8. you are very bad at rehabilitation. this is one addiction you’d fail to give up. she’s going to ruin you for all other kisses and you’ll spend the rest of your life trying to forget her name.“reasons to kiss her:
1. because she’s beautiful.
2. because she asked.
3. because she preceded please with, I’m not afraid of you.”
— yes & no // natalie wee
She’s watching. He can feel it. The awareness of her eyes on him is a near-physical feeling, more like a touch than a look.
He’s up on the salmon ladder, on the highest bar doing chin-ups, concentrating on his breathing, his form, the burn of his muscles. Knowing that she’s down there, alternating between staring at his back and his ass makes Oliver's diaphragm feel unsteady, which makes chin-ups that much more a challenge after the first 100.
Felicity has never kept her appreciation for him all hot and sweaty a secret. She’s made a hobby of it actually. A kind of recreational distraction - like watching TV (‘-but better’. She’d say something like that and depending on how intentional the slip was, she’d either give him an unflinching smile, or follow with babble that would probably just make it worse and make him smile). It used to be a private joke between them, harmless because it was never meant to be more than skin deep appreciation.
What Felicity didn’t know (at least he hoped she didn’t) was that the smarmy-asshole part of him that no island, no place or experience could scorch out, had always liked knowing that she had a crush on him. He’d indulged in it more often than not, like picking at a scabbed wound, despite the fact that he had very deliberately (and resolutely) planted her in the ‘people you will never touch, ever’ compartment of his brain. But there had always been something vaguely reassuring about it. A fragile sort of warmth that Oliver had refused to examine too closely… and that had made something gross and vicious inside him snarl when her attention threatened to shift to someone else.
He’s been afraid of depending on people for the longest time, but all the same, Felicity and Digg had become lifelines and Oliver doesn’t take well to the idea of losing either of them.
He’s never been too good at sharing, has he?
Oliver huffs as he pulls his chin over the metal bar. He is ridiculous, and this time he knows it. Like a kid with a toy, right? Doesn’t really want to hold on to it, but doesn’t want anyone to have it either.
The surge of resentment tears at the inside of his ribs, a trapped, directionless anger surging up, making him grit his teeth and push himself harder than before with a grunt. The muscles in his arms are screaming. Oliver likes them that way. Maybe he’ll just slip and fall. (He knows he won’t)
Back when he had no fucking clue what was going on, Oliver had done a pretty good impression of a five year old with a tantrum, but it wasn’t like that anymore. Hadn’t been for a while.
He remembers her smile at the shores of Lian Yu, the way she’d so obviously been feeling him out. (Because when she’s not sure of things, Felicity asks. She makes sure. Unlike him, she faces her fears head on.) And, surprisingly enough, after so much running from himself Oliver hadn't wanted to take that out she’d given him. What would have been the point? He’d been running for so long and still came back to the same place, right in front of her.
Yes, things have changed. But at the same time they really haven't. This thing between them… it hadn’t always been this kind of something. But at the same time, there has never been nothing there either.
They have always had a connection, an undercurrent that just kept pushing them closer together. Colleagues, friends, partners… something else. Its gravitational force is perceptible now, because it makes the space between them feel hot, turning Oliver into a creature so self-aware around her that even the dust molecules in the air grate against his skin.
Giving in to it, even just thinking about it, makes his stomach drop, as if he’s standing at the edge of some great height, one foot already out, about to take that leap.
Oliver lets go of the bar and falls on his feet with a dull thump, bending his knees to absorb the impact. He takes deep controlled breaths to normalize his heartbeat, awareness of his surroundings not letting him forget that, if he’d turned around at the right time, he would have seen the swish of her long ponytail over her shoulder for how fast she’d turned her head back to the screens of her computers.
Felicity doesn’t get caught staring anymore, for some reason.
(he knows the reason: there’s nothing harmless about it now.)
Oliver walks around to her workstation, asks about the case details. She answers him without a pause in her typing. At some point she does look up and when she meets his eyes, her speech slows just a little bit. She teases. He teases back, without looking away. Oliver doesn’t think of himself as a particularly funny guy anymore (was he ever?), but he can make Felicity laugh every once in awhile.
She looks at him with bright eyes and even her nose smiles at him, with that adorable little crinkle… And there it is: Vertigo. Heart-swooping dizziness.
He’s such a liar, really. There’s no teetering at the edge going on here: he’s already falling, eyes wide open.
He’s been falling with every small touch, fingers brushing when she hands him the coms or a bottle of water. With every look that lingers a little too long to be easily blinked away. Every night that they stay behind in the lair, just being around each other without even talking, Oliver has been getting a little bit closer to the reality of this thing between them that is so huge he can see hardly anything past it. And so frail, it’s like holding a tiny newborn bird in his hands and feeling the softness of its fluttering wings against his rough palms.
It’s overwhelming.
It’s fucking terrifying.
Because he is already in so deep, has been for so long, that feeling like this – allowing himself to - is like waking up. Because there are secrets he hides between his ribs, but they are making space for new ones now. Little truths that don’t hurt the way he’s used to and that flutter to life every time Felicity is close. Every time she speaks to him on the coms when it’s quiet, just to say ‘Hey’ and hear him say it back. Every time she tells him to come home.
(In the privacy of his head, the meaning of home is starting to change and shift, looking more like a person and a purpose now, than simply a place).
There is so much there. Fine layers of complexities, of intimacy and closeness of working for so long with someone that he had immediately liked, as a person, ever since the first time they met. It's the genuine affection Oliver had surprised himself into feeling, tender as a bruise, slipping through the cracks if his defenses without him ever even noticing. A feeling so intricate and subtle that, when the words had escaped his mouth that night at the mansion, for a panicked moment he’d thought ‘oh god what have I said’ …and then he'd known it was the truth[4].
It had stopped his heart really, knowing that, right then. It still does every once in awhile, if he thinks about it too long.
He looks at her profile when she’s busy coding and wonders what goes on in that brilliant brain of hers.
He knows that he’s not alone in this. That she feels it too, even if a little bit. He also knows she’s not so far gone as he is. It’s not as serious for her as it most definitely feels like for him. He doesn’t think that’s possible, or even realistic. A big part of him that hopes she’s not, actually.
(the other part of him is vicious in hoping she is right there on even ground with him, because no, he’s not above that)
He could still just let it happen, though. He could let himself go and just breathe; be around her and it would happen. He knows it. And in those moments, when Oliver lets himself think about it, he imagines her hands wrapped around his beating heart, and it makes a shivers crawl up his spine and count his every vertebrae.
He knows himself well enough to face that truth openly: it scares him.
Felicity would never mean to hurt, but he’d still feel her every twitch like an exposed nerve, wouldn’t he? It’s a scary thought really, more so than any naked blade he’s ever faced.
And besides, he already imposes enough on her as it is. She’s been the Hood’s IT girl, accessory to murder and all kinds of violence. Jumped out of a plane for him, practically given up her career for his mission by playing at being Oliver-fucking-Queen’s assistant. And it’s too much. Even Felicity has limits. And she deserves so much better really, than someone who is so in pieces that he doesn’t even know if he can be whole enough to love her like she deserves.
Felicity deserves better.
… she deserves someone like Barry Allen, Oliver thinks with a wince, as he steps in the shower, the scalding water digging its hot fingers into his muscles, trying to loosen them a bit.
She deserves someone whole and open and uncomplicated. Someone smart the way she is and who doesn’t carry around more baggage than an international airport. Someone who is not held together by sheer force of will most days, and that would rattle loose and fall around her like a rain of glass shards.
(He knows he would. He knows all the ways he can hurt those he loves. He’s done it so many times before, after all – without ever meaning to. That’s the worst part.)
And this is it, really: all Oliver can see, ten miles down the road, is every single negative thing and he can’t find even a single reason why it would be worth it for her.
His fingers curl into tight fists against the warming tile of the shower and Oliver hangs his head. He expels a long shaky breath, water rolling off him in rivulets.
He can’t shake off the things he knows to be true, the things impressed with fire against the inside of his skin. He has never once been able to touch someone and not hurt them in some way. Never. Every single person he’s ever loved has slipped between his bloody fingers. He still has nightmares that wake him drenched in cold sweat, heart pounding like it’s about to crack his breastbone. About his mother’s sightless eyes, Thea’s screams and Tommy’s listless face. About Shado in the woods, Sara swallowed by the ocean… Felicity unmoving on the concrete floor, bone-pale, her blood violent red and wet against his skin.
A shiver rattles his spine and it’s only then that Oliver realizes that the water has gone cold. He honestly has no idea how long he stood under the spray.
The first thing he hears once he gets into the main area of the lair is Felicity's laugh. She’s sitting close to Roy on one of the wider chairs, her tablet between them.
"What's going on?" Oliver asks Digg, carefully keeping his voice low. Some survival tactics do lend themselves to the most unexpected scenarios. Digg just shrugs and keeps cleaning the insides of his disassembled gun, the smaller pieces arranged in a precise order around the table. Oliver turns his attention back to the duo as he fastens the cuffs of his button-up.
"No, no the other one! The other one!" Felicity says around a smile, wiggling in her seat. Roy's fingers move even faster on the screen. Felicity squeals and claps a moment later, high-fives Roy without even looking away from the screen.
It's an laid-back familiarity that she and Roy have grown into. Easy affection. They have their jokes Oliver doesn't get and sit together sometimes and talk in low voices about things Oliver doesn't know. (But then again everyone seems to slide into place easily around Felicity Smoak.)
He's never had an easy time like that around her, not really. It's different between them. Not difficult, just different. He doesn't really know if he has a word for what it’s like between them, actually.
Felicity looks up, meets his eyes as surely as if she’d been aware he was staring. Neither looks away and it’s like that that awareness of anything but her and the contemplative look on her face strips away in layers. Her eyebrows twitch in a small momentary frown.
'Something wrong?'
Oliver feels one side of his mouth curve upwards into half a smile as he shrugs and shakes his head minutely. She pleads the case of her curiosity with a small tilt of her head, but smiles back nonetheless. The urge to look down to his feet gets stronger with every lick of heat at the back of his neck.
A sad-trombone ringtone and Roy's groan breaks the moment. Felicity snaps her eyes back to the tablet.
"No! Where did your brain go, Scarecrow?" she laments as she smacks Roy's chest.
"Hey! That's offensive, Barbie." Roy protests, stuck between laughter and disbelief. Felicity rolls her eyes.
"Don't worry Roy, I think you've probably met your Wizard of Oz by now." She says with an indulgent little smile.
Roy looks from Felicity to Oliver, whose smile widens. Digg huffs from his seat, without ever looking up.
"Oh come on! The movie, Roy: Wizard of Oz!" Felicity adds, impatient. It's quickly followed by a huff as she gets up and snatches back her tablet from Roy’s hands. "Of course you haven't seen it. No appreciation for the classics. Kids these days."
Roy raises one eloquent eyebrow at her. "And you're what? Three seconds older than I am?"
Felicity turns quickly. "I resent that. And you need some movie education, STAT."
And that’s when she gets that look in her eyes –the one that crawls there whenever she gets an unexpected idea. It's a look that instinctively makes Oliver tense and Digg look up, which really is a testimony to the lives they lead, since usually - not always, but usually - Felicity's unexpected ideas involve blowing something up.
"We could make a night of it. My place. Oliver can bring the wine. Digg, you're in charge of the food, cause we all know how that would end if I do it. Tell Lyla too, obviously. Ok? Ok! Great!" She turns directly to Oliver then. "We have to go. Walter's waiting for us."
Oliver gives her a nod as he straightens.
He could have laughed at how quickly that went from contemplation, to possibility, to an action plan within the space of a sentence and a half. He could have, if it wasn't exactly how they operated every night out there. Maybe that was why nobody thought of objecting.
Felicity grabs her purse and a couple of files, raising her eyebrows at him. Oliver is right by her side in three strides. From this close he can tell she's wearing the fruity perfume today. Which makes sense - her nails are painted soft pink. She's already talking a mile a minute as they go up the stairs and Oliver is only half listening. He should pay more attention, he really should. The triangle cutout high on her shoulder blades has never been more distracting, though.
…No word to describe this has come to mind yet. Oliver hadn't really thought he'd find one anyway.
Felicity turns to him quite suddenly and he's not even registered her ponytail swishing around when he feels her hand on the crook of his elbow, through the layers of his light jacket and shirt.
"You don't mind, do you?” She asks him earnestly. “I mean, I thought it would be nice. We don't really see each other that much out of the lair and you're starting to spend way too much time in there for it to be healthy."
For a fluttering moment Oliver can't answer.
"We're not calling it that." he enunciates slowly. He's just buying time, really. "And no, I don't mind. You're right, it would be nice. And we haven't seen Lyla in a while."
The smile she gives him is radiant.
"Great!"
It makes him want to reach over and touch her face.
Oliver curls his fingers in a fist, nails biting at his palm.
The company car is bigger than her tiny Mini, but Oliver can still catch a whiff of her perfume even from across the seat. He takes a breath and closes his eyes, leaning his head back against the seat.
He knows he isn't the best of men. Of all the risks dancing around them like shadows, the most dangerous one seems to be his own self. Because he might just want Felicity more than she might need him to. Because he is learning to want… to hope, and it is like coming alive again. Like that gasping deep breath after a too long dive: one long lungful of air that stops the burn in your chest and teaches you that even air has a taste - you just never noticed before.
It hurts a little, this feeling, the way shedding calluses does. But it’s also why he's been detouring his usual morning jog so that he can run by that small coffee-shop that Felicity likes so much. She usually reads, either a book or from her tablet, sitting in the corner, back to the wall and the exits and windows within her line of sight, just like he and Digg taught her.
In moments like that, when all that is standing between possibility and reality is just a threshold, Oliver's world usually narrows down to the fast-beating heart in his chest and anxiety snapping at his heels. He wants to walk in there and join her. Wants to see the surprised smile she'll give him. Wants to ask her what she's reading.
And one day he does.
It happens two weeks after they have their first movie night and he makes her laugh to breathlessness when he tells her about the first time he tried to zipline through a window and smacked against the glass instead. He sees her in that small coffee shop on a day no different than any other day, and just walks in.
It feels like an impulsive decision. The more honest truth is that it has been coming for almost a year.
He walks to her table and says ‘Hey’ softly, trying not to startle her. He fails.
The smiles that comes after, bright and alive, the surprised (delighted) way she says his name, shocks happiness into him, like a jolt of adrenaline. It makes his hands shake.
He smiles back anyway.