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Oliver sighs when Thea all but crashes through the front door. At least she managed to not ruin the displays he’d just finished reorganizing. His little sister giggles a, “Whoops,” before hopping to sit on the counter next to him. Good thing her shadow didn’t follow her in today or he’d have a hard time not stabbing the punk with the gold shears Thea had gifted him with last week.
“Don’t you have class?” he asks when she reaches out to touch a near perfect hydrangea. Sharply, he raps her across the knuckles with a stem.
Thea gives an exaggerated complaint before shrugging, “Canceled.” Off his disbelieving look, she holds her hands up in innocence. “I swear! Here’s the email. Apparently, Professor Michaels had her baby this morning.”
He considers for a moment before conceding. It’s too delicate a situation for Thea to lie about. In the past, her reasons for skipping class were hastily constructed excuses that fell apart with the slightest prodding. Her professor having a kid is too easily confirmed for her to even bother lying about. Still, not too long ago, it was the exact kind of thing she would try so at least Thea isn’t offended by his skepticism.
“I was thinking of taking her flowers?” she shyly suggests, fiddling with the aforementioned gold shears. Suddenly, the reason for her appearance at the shop is a lot clearer. They hadn’t been raised to lack manners, but it’s been a long time since Thea’s wanted to reach out and do something nice without any external prompting.
Oliver gives her an encouraging smile. “That’s a nice gesture. She’s the professor you’re TA’ing for, right?”
“Yeah, Comparative Grand Strategy and Military Doctrine,” Thea elaborates, as if that’s a perfectly normal class for an almost college dropout to be taking. “I really like it. She’s made a lot of changes from last semester so it’s still interesting for me to go to class. Lyla’s a good teacher like that.”
Must be, Oliver muses to himself, if she can get someone like Thea Queen to do so well in a class she’s offered a job to help grade it the next semester. For a moment, he lets himself consider a life where he managed to check into reality sooner than he did. If he’d gotten it together enough to engage in school, found something he was passionate about, not been a complete waste of potential. Maybe then he wouldn’t be manning a flower shop that fell into his lap because his old nanny’s sister wanted to retire and remembered he’d always been a good sport about helping Raisa arrange the flowers.
“Hey, broody,” Thea prods him with the closed scissors causing him to jump, “You going to help me with those flowers or what?”
“Or what,” he grumbles, quickly disarming her before she can do more damage. “How about this? Let me finish this one then we’ll put together an arrangement, drop it off, and grab dinner.”
Thea beams at him, and suddenly he’s glad he turned it around at all. Or else, he would have missed this, the simple pleasure of making his sister smile. He gives her a one-armed hug before she slides off the counter to collect flowers.
Thea isn’t the only one Professor Lyla Michaels has left a lasting impression on, judging by the number of gifts flooding her small hospital room. He’s proud to say, though, Thea’s arrangement is hands-down the best one. By her smug smile, Thea knows it, too.
In the room among the forest of flowers are a woman dozing in a hospital bed, who he assumes is Professor Michaels, a blonde woman holding a bundle of blankets which probably contains the newborn, and a tank of a man hovering anxiously over the entire scene. He watches in confusion as Thea shrieks before tackling the man into a bear hug.
“Dig, she’s gorgeous!”
The man—Dig apparently—chuckles heartily before calmly reminding Thea, “You haven’t even seen her yet.” Everyone freezes when the woman in bed stirs slightly at the commotion. There’s a collective sigh of relief after she settles without waking.
Chastised, Thea very quietly says, “Yes, I have. Felicity sent me a picture. Because you apparently don’t know how to do that on your phone.” The man ducks his head in embarrassment, but Thea’s ribbing is quickly forgotten as she goes to hang on the blonde woman’s shoulder.
“Oh, she’s beautiful. Almost makes me want one,” Thea declares, and if Oliver’s right about her tone of voice, she’s tearing up.
“Don’t tell Roy that,” the blonde quips, “He’ll go running for the hills.”
Thea snickers quietly before tentatively reaching out a finger to caress the baby’s cheek. “Roy’s got a shift tonight,” she offers to the room, “but he said he’ll come by in the morning. Ollie came with me.”
Suddenly, all eyes are on him, and Oliver shifts uneasily. Momentarily, he feels guilty, wondering exactly how much he’s been neglecting Thea to make sure he doesn’t fuck up the business. All these people—okay, all two of them—seem perfectly comfortable with Thea, and her with them, and he has no idea who they are.
The guilty feeling lessens when Thea—proudly—cuts in to introduce him, “Sorry, guys. This is my brother, Oliver. Ollie, this is John Diggle, or Dig, Professor Michaels’ husband, and Felicity, a friend.”
John offers him a handshake, but his attention is fully on his newborn daughter and rightfully so. Felicity performs a careful hand-off to Thea when his sister asks to hold the baby. His attention is grabbed by the other woman for a moment, now that she’s no longer holding the person of interest. Ponytail, glasses, a bright purple dress that shows off her curvy figure. He wonders why Thea’s never mentioned her before.
Feeling like he’s intruding, Oliver excuses himself to the hallway. Thea starts to protest, but he’s already gone. He drops into a convenient chair in the hallway and startles slightly when someone appears in front of him.
“Sorry. I just— Felicity Smoak.” She sticks out her hand, and Oliver hesitantly shakes it. Based on her flushing cheeks, he’s not the only one who felt that slight jolt.
“Oliver Queen,” he says, but she’s already nodding as she takes a seat in the adjacent chair.
“I know,” Felicity says with a knowing smile. He grimaces because nothing good’s ever come from his reputation preceding him but he’s not expecting her to continue with, “Thea talks a lot about you. And I work next door to your shop.”
That causes him to double take at the slight woman in her bright dress. His flower shop is located on a corner, all the more windows to showcase those riotous displays of color. To one side is the start of a residential street, and on the other side is a tattoo shop.
Really? He hopes he hasn’t voiced the question out loud, but her amused smirk tells him that even if he didn’t, it’s written all over his face.
“Mmm, I don’t like it.”
“You don’t like any of them,” Oliver retorts with an exasperated eye roll. His lips twitch on an almost smile, though, as she delicately strokes down the rose’s petals. He knows what she’s going to say next. Something along the lines of it being too pretty or too perfect.
Over the last couple weeks, Felicity’s made a habit of coming over to his shop between appointments to browse his assortment of rejects as she calls them. She’s looking for inspiration for her next tattoo and decided the florist next door is the perfect place, especially since he puts up with her remarkable pickiness. He’s not going to complain as long as it means she keeps coming over.
After meeting in the hospital, they didn’t become friends.
Not until Thea sent over Felicity one day to help with pictures for the new website because, in his sister’s words, he was “hopeless at that shit.” After a somewhat awkward beginning posing him for photos that Oliver could admit were worlds better than he could do, Felicity asked to look at the new website he was paying some Starling University undergrad to create. She immediately scoffed and deleted the entire thing. Turns out, Felicity’s artistry wasn’t limited to tattoos or photography, and she whipped up a new, improved site in no time at all. A website even he could update without her help.
To thank her, Oliver left an extravagant bouquet—Thea’s still teasing him about it—at her shop. The next afternoon, Felicity stopped by to thank him. A client saw the arrangement and promptly asked for a few flowers to be included in her design. He’s kept it up in the weeks since, with the occasional smaller, more understated arrangement to “provide inspiration”. And she’s been visiting in the weeks since, somehow brightening his already bright workspace even more.
“If I’m going to tattoo one of your flowers onto my body, I think I’m allowed to be choosy.”
Oliver nearly chokes on his tongue. He hasn’t let himself think about it like that, but apparently Felicity has. A delicate flower—one of his—etched somewhere on her skin? Hidden under the colorful armor she calls clothing? The flush is already building to his face, and he ducks to the back of the shop to hide it.
Unlike most other tattoo artists he knows, meaning the three others who work next door, Felicity has a girly wardrobe. She’s a sharp contrast to her co-owners Sara and Dinah, who’ve never met a leather jacket they don’t love. Her collection of sleeveless dresses with short skirts perpetually exposes her unmarked skin to the point that he once asked if she had any tattoos herself. Felicity’s answer was a charmingly bad wink that sent his imagination swirling down the drain. And so he hasn’t let himself think of where she might put his tattoo.
“Any more back there, Petunia?” Felicity calls when he fails to reappear. Shaking his head, Oliver smothers the smile at the name of the day. She’s sometimes been calling him by flower names—none of the complicated ones because that’s just ridiculous—and he always finds it amusing despite himself.
Blindly, Oliver grabs a handful from last night’s cleanup pile and ventures back to the front. He dumps them on the counter for her perusal, but she barely glances at them before focusing on him. “Your turn,” Felicity says, only for him to murmur in confusion.
When she raises an expectant eyebrow at him, he remembers. Today they’re playing twenty questions, sort of, to get to know each other better. So far he’s learned that she grew up in Vegas, went to MIT, might be an actual certified genius, and doesn’t have any siblings. She’s learned that he was born and raised in Starling City, was expelled from Stanford and Yale, dropped out of Harvard and Vanderbilt, might be an actual certified waste of air, and only has Thea.
“Oh. Uh, how do you know Lyla and Diggle?”
Ever since he moped about it, “like a sad, little toddler” in Thea’s words, she’s been better about including him in her new life, which mainly involves babysitting for her professor and low-key dates with Roy. As a result, he no longer wants to stab her boyfriend—Roy’s a decent enough guy actually trying to make something of himself—and has found a new workout partner in John Diggle. Felicity is a conundrum, though, a mess of contradictions whose presence in that rag-tag group he can’t even begin to explain.
“I used to work for Lyla,” Felicity shrugs casually, “When she moved here to be with John, we reconnected.”
Oliver’s brow furrows. Somehow, he doesn’t think the college professor he strongly suspects is a semi-retired, high-ranking military officer would have much need for a tattoo artist, especially one as young as Felicity. But she doesn’t offer more details so he prompts, “Worked for Lyla how?”
“Nope, my turn,” she retorts with an infuriating grin. “Hmm. Why a florist?”
It’s Oliver’s turn to shrug, but he does it self-consciously, a little embarrassed about the whole turn of events. “Basically dropped into my lap. After my parents died and we lost the company, I didn’t have a lot of options or, you know, skills.”
“You mean you can’t build a resume on the strength of your keg stands? Lies,” she teases lightly, and he rolls his eyes.
“This place was my nanny’s sister’s. She wanted to retire so I took over. Pretty unqualified for it unless you count helping Raisa with the flower arrangements when I was a kid,” he finishes with a self-deprecating grin.
Felicity doesn’t let him dwell but smiles widely. “Well, you’re good at it.” She gestures at the sparse remains of the day’s offerings. Business has picked up ever since Felicity revamped the website and also set up some social media accounts that Thea’s taken and ran with. But he’s pretty sure the uptick in business is just because people are morbidly curious now that it’s public knowledge the male heir of the fallen Queen family is working as a florist of all things.
“So. You worked for Lyla?” he repeats to change the subject.
Felicity nods, a little tightly. “Government contracting, IT stuff. I did some freelancing right out of college before I got into tattooing, still do on the side. Lyla was one of my points of contact.”
If anything, they’re both equally good at avoiding what seem to be painful subjects. Oliver lets it drop since he’s certain it’s one of those “if I tell you, I have to kill you” types of things. Not to mention, it’s clearly a sore point for someone who’s proven to be naturally bright. Her sudden caginess is unsettling.
“Shoot, is that the time?” Felicity’s eyes are fixed on the clock that’s nearly hidden by a stack of metal buckets piled on a tall refrigerator. “I got to go. See you Monday?”
She’s out the door before he can reply, and it’s the first time Oliver wishes he hadn’t kept the help for the weekends.
“Ollie, you do know flowers have meanings, right?” Thea asks as she skeptically eyes the bouquet he’s about to walk over to the tattoo shop.
Well, yeah. He’s got the basics down. Red roses for love, white lilies for funerals, forget-me-nots being self-explanatory. Everything else is kind of a jumble of love and death.
“What’s wrong?” he sighs impatiently. The rest of his day is supposed to be spent creating centerpieces for a wedding tomorrow, and he’s never going to finish in time if Thea keeps holding him up. Oliver never thought he’d have this particular reason to hate wedding season, but here he is.
“Maybe not gardenias,” she hints, pulling a face.
With another sigh, Oliver looks it up on his phone and kind of gets Thea’s point. Only kind of because he’s given Felicity flowers that mean all sorts of things before and she’s never read into them. They have a silent understanding that his bouquets are created purely for aesthetic reasons, and aren’t some mating ritual decipherable through ancient flower meanings.
“It’s fine, Thea. Felicity knows gardenias don’t really mean I’m secretly in love with her.”
Thea rolls her eyes before waving him off with a, “Sure.”
“Gardenias, huh?” Felicity tries to ignore Dinah’s suggestive tone. “Wasn’t last week’s white carnations? So he thinks you’re innocent and is secretly in love with you.”
“You’re the worst,” she scowls because somehow Dinah’s become an encyclopedia of flower meanings ever since Oliver started delivering bouquets. She can’t complain though because they’re a nice contrast to the otherwise sleek industrial and exposed brick look of the place and have been useful in setting the more traditionally feminine clients at ease. Unfortunately, just about every flower in existence has some sort of meaning connected to love, requited or not.
“If a flower’s meaning is literally secret love, doesn’t that mean it’s... not a secret?” Felicity asks.
Dinah frowns in a way that means she’s won the point before going off to help Alena. Felicity gloats for a second, but her shoulders drop once Dinah’s back is turned. Lightly, she touches the perfectly formed flowers. If only.
“Seriously though, do you have any tattoos? I’m not trying to be creepy. I’m just curious. I thought tattoo artists are supposed to be proud of theirs.”
Behind him, he can hear Thea stifle a laugh where she’s supposedly working on an essay but really eavesdropping on him and Felicity. Hmm. If he can’t get the answer out of Felicity, maybe Thea knows.
Felicity’s cheeks are reddening before she answers with a jerky nod. “Well-hidden though.”
Oliver can’t stop his eyebrows from raising. He also can’t stop himself from skimming his eyes down Felicity’s body—short-sleeved bright pink dress today with a flippier than usual skirt—and wondering where exactly those tattoos are hidden now that she’s confirmed his suspicions.
“I’m Jewish!” she blurts, and he snaps his eyes back up to her face in concern. She’s bright red now, her eyes shut tight in... embarrassment? Clearly, the declaration was meant to distract him from his blatant perusal of her body.
“I mean,” she continues after a long moment, “They’re especially well-hidden because I’m Jewish. Tattoos are pretty forbidden in Judaism. My mom cried when she saw my first one and made me promise I’d get them where only God and my lovers would see. Lovers, what a creepy word. So, yeah, not anywhere that might be accidentally seen. Very well-hidden.”
That’s not helping at all as he imagines peeling Felicity’s dress off, discovering the tattoos few have seen and probably hadn’t appreciated for the revelation they are. He’s assuming there are multiple but what if it’s only one? A line of code, a pair of dice, a Star of David, something else he’s yet to learn she holds dear? What is she hiding under her pretty sundresses?
“Really, Felicity?” Thea’s raised voice breaks into his thoughts as she forfeits the pretense of doing her homework. “What tattoos are you hiding?”
It’s not until Thea echoes his question does he realize maybe her rambling’s contagious and he voiced that diatribe out loud. Felicity doesn’t look spooked by him or his lustful thoughts, though, so he breathes a quick sigh of relief. She’s also thankfully distracted by his nosy little sister.
“None of your business, Thea.” Felicity childishly sticks her tongue at her, but Thea just laughs (at him). “And none of yours, Oliver.”
“He’d like to make it his,” Thea pipes up again with an amused snicker they both ignore.
Felicity must slip in when he’s in the back because she’s waiting for him at the counter when he emerges. There’s a sheaf of paper in her hands and a bright smile on her lips. Immediately, his lips quirk up in return.
“What’s all that?”
“Sketches for your tattoo,” she replies with a hint of “duh”. When his eyes widen in surprise but don’t register recognition, Felicity frowns. “Thea said you wanted one, but you didn’t know how to ask me about it. That’s why you’ve been asking about mine.”
When did his sister become a world class meddler? Oh, right. At birth.
“Actually, I think Thea’s taking her creative writing class too seriously. I don’t want a tattoo,” her expression is disappointed so he’s quick to tack on, “I’m very particular about what it is I put in—and on—my body.”
“I’ve noticed,” Felicity automatically retorts then flushes. “I said not noticed right?” He purses his lips together to tamp down the smile as she shakes it off and resets. “Is pain a factor, too? You know, I’m scared of needles so I try to be conscientious of that with my clients.”
“Felicity’s got the lightest touch, Ollie. She’d break you in, nice and easy. I’d bet you’d get addicted and want to do it with her over and over again.”
Oliver doesn’t need to look up to see that Sara Lance has wandered into his shop, somehow bypassing the small set of bells attached to the door handle. The only reason he looks over is to shoot her a dirty look for the suggestive tone. Her shit-eating grin grows wider.
Felicity barely suppresses the groan at the purposefully worded innuendo, so dissimilar from her slips of the tongue. “Shut up, Sara,” she hisses with embarrassed venom, “Did you need something?”
“Walk-in is asking for you. Since you’re not technically busy...” Sara trails off, arching a judgmental eyebrow. He can’t tell if it’s because Felicity’s spending time with him when she should be at their shop or if it’s because they aren’t hooking up all over his counter.
With an exasperated eye roll, Felicity departs, leaving him facing down Sara until she mutters about “lost causes” and pushes out the door.
“It’s my turn, isn’t it?” Oliver prompts the next time they hit a lull in their standard conversation topics.
It takes a second but then Felicity shrugs, “Fine. Shoot. Not like literally.” To his amusement, she’s warily eying the spray bottle in his hand. “Because, you know, white top, water, not a good combination. Ugh, fine, maybe an amusing combo for you. Not so much for me. I have an appointment in fifteen and I’d rather not look like a wet t-shirt contest contestant. Stop smirking at me like that. Ask your question.”
Oliver gives himself a moment to process her ramble and mentally fast forward past the image of her in a wet t-shirt. It’s mostly successful so he gets back on track. “If you’re a computer genius, why are you a tattoo artist?”
“You know, reasons.” He shoots her an unimpressed look, and she sighs dramatically. “Computers and I hit a rough patch at the end of college. Long story short, I needed a break from them before I spiraled down a not-great, most likely illegal path. So in the spirit of going outside my comfort zone and whatnot, I decided to get a tattoo. Face my fears and all that jazz. I kinda fell in love with it, the combination of artistry and technology and changing someone’s life. Don’t get me wrong. I still love computers. It’s just that, well, I’m kind of so good with them, I only need about twenty hours a week to earn a decent living off contract work, and I wanted something else to do so I figured tattoos. Why not?”
Oliver’s mostly impressed but also crestfallen. It’s a weird feeling he doesn’t really want to analyze, but he was hoping, on some hidden level apparently, that Felicity wasn’t as perfect as she seemed. People who become tattoo artists don’t really desire, or qualify for, normal jobs in society, or so he assumes. He figured there was some hiccup in her past so she, like he, didn’t pursue a more traditional career path. That Felicity genuinely enjoys her off-the-beaten-path job and has a socially acceptable job she’s still pursuing reinforces his gut feeling that she is not for him.
Felicity can and should do better than him and all his barely adjusted glory.
He must take too long brooding, as Thea would say, because she’s staring at him in concern. To wipe that expression off her face and to distract her from follow-up questions, Oliver casually aims the spray bottle with deadly accuracy. In response to her offended shriek, he tosses out an insincere “Whoops” for the light misting he gives her. It’s not nearly enough to soak her shirt (unfortunately), but she swipes a paper towel and pats herself dry, muttering at him all the while.
Felicity tried to not like Oliver. She really did. When they first met in Lyla’s hospital room, she felt bad for him. Clearly, he was uncomfortable, and probably guilty, about not knowing the close friends of his sister so she went out in the hallway to make conversation. It felt like the decent thing to do.
She didn’t expect him to fumble over not knowing she worked next door. And, yes, next door meaning the tattoo shop. She was used to surprising people with that and couldn’t suppress her amusement at his shock. Thea emerged soon after, and they left for dinner, and she thought that was the end of it.
Then Thea, incomparable meddler she is, begged her to help with the shop’s new website, and she couldn’t say “no” to those puppy dog eyes. She didn’t expect Oliver to be so endearingly timid in the “candid” shots of him working. It was certainly a departure from the brash, drunk college student peeing on cop cars and punching paparazzi. And she figured that was the end of it.
Then Oliver, old-fashioned charmer he is, left her the most extravagant bouquet she’d ever seen as a thank you gift. Sara, Dinah, and Alena didn’t stop teasing her for days. Of course, she had to personally thank the first man to have ever given her flowers, sad as that was to say. That would have been the end of it, because she wasn’t going to pathetically and creepily stalk the gorgeous man next door—she’d exhibited enough self-restraint so far—except he sent another bouquet. Much less extravagant, but no less effective at triggering waggling eyebrows and suggestive comments. She would ask him to stop if she weren’t so flattered, if they didn’t brighten up the place, if they weren’t such a good excuse to go next door and talk to him.
The one week she self-consciously didn’t go over, he came looking for her in his roundabout way, asking for help on the website when she knew for a fact he’d updated it just fine the week prior. Yeah, okay, maybe she set up a Google alert for Verdant Blooms, but it was for quality control. Thea said Oliver is hopeless with technology, and she’s making sure he doesn’t royally screw things up, no pun intended.
Her point is they’ve both been goading this train along. She’d have much less of a problem with his avoiding her if he’d given any indication before now that her presence is unwanted and unwelcome. Why he’s suddenly shut down and barely interacted with her the past few days is as annoying as it is mysterious.
Because, god damn it, she likes him. Against her better judgment, against his past reputation, against every insecurity she’s ever had. If her mother could see her now... After all those years of vocally judging Donna’s taste in men, Felicity’s stuck with a crush on a man who’s so far out of her league it’s not even funny.
Not only is Oliver inhumanly attractive—and she suspects he’s hiding some major muscles under those t-shirts and work aprons—but that’s not all she likes about him. That he stepped up to provide stability for Thea after their parents’ untimely death and the loss of the financial excess which allowed him to be such a shithead as a teenager is nothing short of impressive. That he’s genuinely interested in her life but is never too pushy and lets her reveal details in her own time is a level of consideration she’s never experienced before.
What she thought was a strong friendship, with just the slightest, minutest, tiniest hint of the possibility for more, has now gone kaput without warning, reason, or explanation. Damn it. She should have tried harder to not like the jerk in the first place.
The bells chime loudly—too loudly—and Felicity grimaces. It wouldn’t have mattered because Oliver is standing behind the counter, instead of hiding in the back like normal, and frowning at a bouquet of red roses. He looks up at the twinkling chimes and freezes when he registers it’s her.
“Long time no see,” he finally offers after they both just stare for a second.
Well, you clammed up and ignored me for over a week so I took the hint. Felicity doesn’t voice that out loud but shrugs in a way she hopes is nonchalant. “Yeah, been busy. You?”
“Wedding season still,” he agrees with a terse nod. Right. It’s the near the end of summer, and no one’s missed the constant caravan of white delivery vans pulling up to the florist every Friday, weekend, and even the occasional weekday.
Once again, he doesn’t elaborate or continue the conversation to set her at ease. So Felicity remains decidedly ill at ease. Instead of prolonging the torture and before she can kick off an epic, awkward babbling session, she gets to the reason behind her visit. “A client is asking for asters. I wanted to see if you had any I could look at. I like to—”
“Handle the merchandise?” Oliver fills in with the barest hint of smirk, using the unfortunate turn of phrase she’d blurted out when describing her process to him weeks ago.
Closing her eyes, she blows out a steadying breath. “It helps with my rendering,” Felicity muttered self-consciously, knowing he didn’t need the explanation. “So do you have—”
She’s interrupted again when he points over her shoulder to a metal bucket containing deep red flowers. With the way they’re backlit by the large window, it almost hurts to look at them. While she’s still squinting, Oliver mutters, “Take what you need.”
When Felicity turns back to the counter, he’s gone. Okay then. She allows herself to feel the disappointment for three seconds before redirecting it to annoyance, snagging a few flowers, and leaving in a huff.
“Have you ever gone out with a client?” Thea asks, presumably innocently, as she stares into the void that is her physics textbook.
“A client?” he repeats in confusion, “Like Mrs. Davis?” The funeral director is old enough to be their grandmother, and acts like it, too. She likes to offer him cookies whenever he makes a delivery, and he always makes sure to bring her a sunflower to brighten her morbid profession.
Thea drops her pencil to shoot him an incredulous look. “No, obviously not. I mean someone age appropriate, like, I don’t know, a pretty bride or someone.”
Oliver scoffs instinctively. Yeah, right. Only if they want to starve. Sure, he’d been tempted a time or two with a bride who obviously was in it for all the wrong reasons or got a bad case of cold feet, but he knew one misstep like that would tank his working relationship with every wedding planner in town. The momentary pleasure wouldn’t be worth it. Besides, once he met the couple, the groom would usually volunteer for flower duty and redirect his fiancée to other tasks. It was an endless source of entertainment for the wedding planners.
“Of course not,” he finally settles on answering, leaving the “I’m not that guy anymore” go unspoken. “Why do you ask?”
With a furrowed brow, Thea nods at the wall. “It’s all they’re taking about over there.” Clearly, she means the tattoo shop on the other side of the wall. Ever since Felicity stopped coming over here, Thea’s been splitting her time and hanging out over there more often. “Ethical issues and whatever of dating a client. I was curious about your take on it since they haven’t run into it before.”
That’s odd. The women of Goddess Inks are all beautiful and confident (obviously, based on their business name) in vastly different but appealing ways. Surely, someone they’ve tattooed has made a move on one of them. Then again, Sara has her girlfriend Nyssa, Dinah’s perpetually on or off with a police officer, and Alena—well, no one knows what Alena’s deal is. Maybe it hasn’t been an issue before because the answer was always a solid “no.” That must mean—
“Was this a hypothetical situation, or is someone dating a client?”
Thea cocks an eyebrow at him, and Oliver squirms. He’s not going to like her answer one bit. “Felicity. Maybe. Some guy with a weird old-fashioned name came in for a lightning bolt tattoo. She thought it was a Harry Potter reference so they got to talking, and they’re getting dinner tonight.”
Instead of taking the bait, he redirects the conversation to something that’s been on his mind. “Hey, Speedy?”
“Hey, Ollie?” she mimics his tone, clearly disgruntled her trap didn’t work.
“Why didn’t you tell me about Felicity when you first became friends?”
Thea’s first response is a confused frown. “I don’t tell you about all my friends.” No, she doesn’t, which was a real problem when she was dabbling in recreational, and almost non-recreational, drugs, but not so much these days. He’s not really asking about her study groups and he’s pretty sure she knows that.
“No, but when you’ve made friends with the crew of the tattoo shop next door to me, I think it warrants a mention.” His point is well-taken, and Thea drops the innocent act.
“Right away, I liked—like—Felicity. As a friend, obviously, but also for you. For each other, I mean. It’s, just, you’re so hard on yourself these days. I didn’t think you’d see her the same way. I thought you would think that you weren’t good enough for her or she deserved someone better or some other nonsense. I was waiting to introduce you guys until you were, I don’t know, in a better place about yourself.”
“What do you think I think now?” Oliver can’t help but ask. He didn’t realize Thea paid so much attention to him, not when he worked so much and she was a young college student with a boyfriend and her own life. Like usual, he’s been underestimating his sister.
“I think you know when a damn good thing is about to slip through your fingers and you have the power to do something about it.”
Oliver doesn’t appreciate the calculating look in her eye. Thankfully, he’s not incorrect when he grumbles, “Don’t you have class to get to?” With a mumbled curse, Thea crams her stuff into her backpack and hightails it out the door.
The gangly young man who enters the shop close to closing isn’t an unfamiliar sight even if he is a stranger.
Oliver’s seen plenty of guys like him: twenty-something, nice jeans and a tailored blazer, hair fixed to an inch of its life. If he had to guess, the guy’s got a first date and really wants to make a good first impression. Which explains why he’s in a florist in the first place.
When he reaches out to open the fridge and instead knocks into a container of azaleas, Oliver decides to interrupt, “Can I help you?”
The guy startles more, jumping in place and jostling the sandwich board of bouquet prices. “Sorry!” he flushes as he straightens the board then collects himself and approaches the counter. “Sorry about that. I was, uh, looking for something.”
Oliver’s more amused than he should be. The kid—on closer inspection he looks younger than his outfit would suggest—is clearly nervous, and Oliver’s been kind of bored all day aside from Thea’s ridiculousness. Crossing his arms over his chest, he does his best to look intimidating, which, based on the kid’s still red face, is pretty successful.
“Something like what?”
“Flowers. Obviously, I mean. This is a florist. That’s pretty much all you sell,” he continues, almost mumbling to himself. “Are you— You work here? Of course you do. You wouldn’t be wearing that apron for no reason.”
“We sell balloons, too,” Oliver deadpans, jerking a thumb in the direction of the helium tank. This kid gets any more nervous and he’s going to start sounding like he inhaled some. Oliver hasn’t met a ramble that random since the last time he had a conversation with Felicity. Shaking his head, he finally takes pity on him, “What kind of flowers?”
“First date flowers. Not like creepy or overbearing or “I’ll stalk you if you don’t agree to a second date.” Just, you know, you seem awesome, and I’m making a real effort. That type of flowers.” He finally putters out lamely, “Do you know what I mean?”
“Single red rose,” Oliver suggests, rounding the counter to retrieve one himself. He doesn’t trust him to not turn the entire store upside down. “Perfect bloom, trimmed thorns, straight stem. You’ll do great.”
“Thanks,” is the answering sigh of relief as the kid trails him to the refrigerator then back to the counter. “I’m Barry.”
“Oliver,” he offers, focusing on clipping off the more stubborn thorns. Somehow, he doesn’t think Barry will win over his date by causing her to bleed. “Barry,” suddenly, it hits him, “Is that short for something?”
“Uh, Bartholomew. But I never use it,” Barry replies with a cringe. “Weird. You’re the second person today to ask me about it.”
Clenching his jaw hard, Oliver remains silent as he finishes with the rose and exchanges it for the cash in Barry’s hand. Barry beams at him and retreats backwards out of the shop, miraculously not knocking anything over. Oliver only winces a little when he calls out, “Wish me luck!” and turns left towards the tattoo shop.
One minute there was nothing there. The next, the bouquet he’d left with Alena because Felicity wasn’t scheduled for the morning is back on his counter. Oliver assumes the culprit is Sara since no one else bypasses his simple but effective alarm system of bells on doors.
“Actually, you know what?”
Startled, he looks up to find the blonde he was just thinking about, though not the blonde he normally thinks about. Sara is standing there, petite but infuriated, and pointing an accusatory finger in his face. He does his best to not let his terror show.
“Fuck you, Oliver Queen. You don’t get to pull this bullshit. You’re perfectly happy to be buddies with Felicity for months, making all of us choke on the unresolved sexual tension, then, for whatever twisted reason in your broody mind, you shut her out cold. The minute she goes on a date with someone, who, okay, is basically the male version of her and never going to last but at least she’s having fun, you decide it’s the perfect time to come strolling back into her life. So, no, it’s not happening. You can take your “declaration of love” flowers and shove them up your ass, or I’ll go find some striped carnations and shove those up there.”
By the time Sara finishes, his eyes are wide and unblinking. For some reason, the only thought in his head is: why does someone like Sara Lance know that striped carnations mean rejection? He’s shaken out of his confusion when the bells ring angrily from the door slamming shut behind her.
Well, shit.
Three days later, he’s loading a delivery van when a throat clears behind him.
It’s Felicity, wearing a blue dress and a smile, and he doesn’t think he’s seen anything so bright in his life. Which is saying a lot, considering his profession. Oliver doesn’t expect her to be smiling though so he’s more at a loss for words than he hoped.
“Uh.”
“I hear Sara ripped you a new one.” She ignores his gawking and hands him the second coffee cup he didn’t notice she’s holding. “I’m sorry about that. She’s a little like a mama bear once she decides you’re a friend. Or a cub, I guess, would be carrying the analogy through.”
“How’d you find out?” Oliver’s genuinely curious because it sounded like Sara really didn’t want Felicity to know about the bouquet she cockblocked. Maybe Alena told her, since the younger woman had been too happy to accept the flowers from him that morning.
“Sara would get this growly face whenever Thea said your name. It’s a lot like the face you used to make whenever Thea mentioned Roy. Wasn’t too hard after to get the story out of her. She might be a bear but she’s a cuddly one. Figuratively, I mean, because she’s all muscly like you. Kind of hard to cuddle. I imagine. Lack of personal experience, there. Obviously, Sara and I don’t cuddle because Nyssa’s kind of terrifying. And, obviously, you and I don’t cuddle because—obviously.”
The corners of his lips are twitching as Felicity runs out of steam, hiding a red cheek behind her coffee. “I hate my brain,” she mutters, more to herself than anything. “Anyway, I wanted to say sorry about her. I’m sure whatever she actually said was out of line. And if you were trying to make a gesture and be friends again, then, um, gesture accepted. If not, then never mind, I guess.”
“I was. Making a gesture, I mean. I’ve been a jerk,” he confesses with a tight smile.
Felicity rolls her eyes at him. “I notice there wasn’t actually an apology in there but I’ll take what I can get. Are you going to tell me why you were being a jerk?”
Oliver feels his own face flush. “Uh, maybe some other time.” No, he’s not going to admit he was ignoring her because of his feelings of inadequacy and was only prodded into “making a move” because his sister conspired to inform him about her date.
“Okay, then,” Felicity accepts easily. Because of course she does. She doesn’t judge him or badger him, just lets him be and quietly encourages him to excel in the circumstances life’s handed him. “So. Friends?”
He almost cringes at the word but twists it into a small smile. “Sure, yeah.”
“So whatever happened to Barry?”
The question causes both women to freeze then look over at him suspiciously. He’s dropping off the weekly bouquet and noticed a new photo added to the wall next to Felicity’s work station. The picture is of a bicep covered with a painstakingly realistic, black and white illustration of a lightning bolt striking the ground. Immediately, his brain remembered the details of what Thea had told him about Barry and Felicity bonding over his lightning bolt tattoo.
“How do you know about Barry?” Dinah asks, clearly on the verge of labelling him a stalker and kicking him out.
Oliver obviously didn’t think the question through and he’s already regretting how it slipped out. “Thea asked if I ever dated a client since you, uh, had a date with one. Then he came in later that day to pick up flowers for you.” He directs the answer to Felicity because she’s all who matters in his estimation.
Slowly, Felicity nods, accepting his explanation. More importantly, accepting the implied reassurance he wasn’t keeping tabs on her while they were “broken up”, for lack of a better term. At least Sara isn’t here to call him out on the bouquet she reamed him out over the next day.
“Barry lives in Central City, so we’re just friends,” she offered simply.
“Oh, too bad.” Oliver tried not to smile at the news, but based on Dinah’s eye roll, some of his relief must have shown through.
Oliver’s genuinely excited about this. Thursday is the day he usually brings by a bouquet for the girls, but that’s not what he’s holding today. No, his delivery today is much smaller and delicately wrapped in tissue paper.
Last week, he received a shipment of purple bougainvilleas, specifically for a bride from Brazil. Felicity, in her never-ending quest to glean a new tattoo from his inventory, immediately fell in love with the flowers. Yet she decided they were, again, too bright and too pretty. She wants something with a little more character.
Just to see what would happen, Oliver snipped off a few from the vine. For the last week, he’s been carefully drying the bunch. Now, the petals have faded to a softer purple, almost pink and brown, and gone a little more transparent in places. He thinks Felicity will love it.
“Morning,” Felicity grins at him then frowns at his relatively empty hands, “No flowers today?”
“I’ve got something you’ll like better.” Leading her to the receptionist area, he places the bundle on the counter. “Remember those bougainvilleas you liked that were too pretty?”
Felicity nods, peering closely over his shoulder as he unwraps it. “Oh!” Her exclamation sounds pleased, and Oliver grins to himself. “They’re perfect! Oliver, how did you—”
“I might have saved a few from the centerpieces. I’ve been drying them ever since. You never notice how cloudy Starling is until you’re trying to sundry flowers,” he tacks on wryly before noticing the tension. Felicity looks like she might jump him in gratitude, and he’s more than willing.
“You two sharing secrets over there?” Sara sarcastically tosses out, effectively killing the mood. He didn’t even notice she was in the shop. “Or is the rest of the class invited?”
Felicity slides out from where he suddenly realizes she’s been wedged between him and the counter then beckons over the other artist. “Come look. You’re going to love these.”
“Oh, yeah. I can definitely work with these.” Sara straightens from her assessment to eye Felicity contemplatively. “You want to—” She’s cut off by an eager nod. “Okay, on your—” Another nod.
Oliver wants to ask what they’ve just planned with barely any words but he’s thrown off course.
“You’re not doing anything tonight, right? Why don’t you come by after we’re closed? Like around nine? Okay, see you then.”
Felicity doesn’t wait for his agreement but gathers up the flowers and follows Sara’s tracks to the back. He’s not offended by their abrupt departure. Not when he’s too busy patting himself on the back for a job well done as evidenced by Felicity’s uncontained excitement.
“Hello?” he calls out into what looks like the empty shop.
Only the row of lights on the left side are on, but his view is blocked by what looks like a changing screen that’s not normally there.
“We’re over here. Lock the door please, Oliver.” Felicity’s voice calls out, and he does so before walking around the screen. She’s seated on a padded table while Sara arranges inks and other materials on a tray. Despite Sara’s easy chatter, Felicity’s smile is tight, her feet are kicking, and her shoulders are hunched. All in all, she’s very poorly hiding her nerves.
“What’s going on here?”
“I’m getting another tattoo. Thought you might want to observe,” Felicity answers, picking up the flower he gave her from the tray and waving it at him. “If you’re not doing anything else tonight, that is,” she adds on, challenging him with a head tilt.
“Yeah, sounds cool,” Oliver’s quick to agree before he realizes he might sound overeager. “But I thought the only people allowed to see your tattoos are God and your—” He cuts himself off before he can finish the thought because Felicity was right. “Lovers” is a creepy word, but it’s also a really evocative one.
There’s a small splash of pink on her cheeks as she stands in front of Sara. Conveniently, the sweater she’s wearing fastens in the back so Sara only has to undo a few buttons before she can disinfect the area and transfer the stencil onto Felicity’s spine. Compartmentalizing Felicity’s bra strap into a box marked later, Oliver watches curiously and ignores Sara’s knowing smirk.
“I figured we can make an exception since this is your flower,” Felicity finally responds. She’s incredibly still, more than he’s ever known her to be, and relaxes after Sara directs her to the full length mirror against the wall. Arm holding her sweater in place across her chest, she twists a little to get a glimpse until she’s handed a small mirror to angle for a better view. “Looks good, Sar.”
It does, even as just a stencil. Barely three inches high, it sits low on the middle of her back. The stemmed flowers aren’t low enough to be considered a tramp stamp but should be out of sight for those cutout or low back dresses she favors. Belatedly, it occurs to him that the rest of her back is spotless so now he’s really curious about where the other(s) are.
“If you can’t see it, what’s the point?” he questions as Felicity hops back onto the table.
The look she responds with is heavy, and he feels his temperature rising. “I know it’s there,” is her enigmatic reply before she adjusts to lie face down.
A secret. A precious, little secret between him and her. Well, and Sara, but his tightening pants don’t care about that.
The dull scrape of metal over concrete interrupts his train of thought, and he finds both women staring at him expectantly. Felicity’s hand is hanging off the edge of the table, and a chair’s been dragged next to that side. He raises his eyebrows in question.
“You’re mainly here to hold her hand,” Sara prompts drily, tapping on the chair’s backrest. “In case you’re forgetting, Felicity’s scared of needles.”
Hesitantly, Oliver pushes away from the wall and drops into the chair. He carefully slides his hand into Felicity’s, briefly taken aback by how small it is. When the gun starts up, she squeezes his hand, surprisingly tightly.
“Sorry, babe, didn’t mean to startle you,” Sara soothes as she eases onto the stool on the other side and drags the tray closer. But her response to his hard glare for the false start is an eye roll Felicity can’t see. “Do you want me to count down, or...”
“No,” Felicity breathes after a deliberating pause. “Just start. I trust you.”
“Alright, I’ll get a good grip on you, but if you’re going to flinch, squeeze the shit out of Ollie’s hand instead.” Sara gives him a teasing grin, but he feels Felicity do exactly that when Sara lays a hand on her back next to the stencil. Instinctively, he rubs his thumb across her knuckles, and she relaxes a little but squeezes hard again as the gun starts and actually touches her skin.
The time passes quickly. He’s less focused on Sara, leaning over Felicity’s back and occasionally twisting away to change colors, and more focused on the canvas herself. Her glasses are askew from how she’s resting her head on her arm, and her eyes are shut tightly behind the frames. Every so often, she’ll sharply inhale or quietly whimper, and he makes sure his thumb never stops rubbing over her knuckles. At a particular distressed sound, Oliver raises her hand to his lips, murmuring assurances against the back of her hand.
“We’re done, Ollie. You can let go now.”
Sara’s voice is amused and so are Felicity’s eyes when he looks up. Now that he’s aware it’s over, the lack of sound from the tattoo gun is deafening. Sara’s still doing something, probably cleaning and bandaging, so he checks on Felicity, quietly asking if she’s okay. The verdict is good, and she gives him a tremulous smile he guesses means it was all worth it.
“Shit. I need to grab some more wrap. Go take a look. Ollie, hands off the merchandise.”
Felicity carefully levers her feet onto the floor while keeping her sweater against her chest. She wanders over to the mirror, grabbing the small one on her way, to admire the new watercolor. After a moment, Oliver joins her, an easy smile on his lips at her obvious excitement.
“Can I take a closer look?”
When she nods eagerly, he kneels next to her, bracing a hand on her hip. This must be the quietest he’s ever heard her, and Oliver’s not sure he likes it. Goosebumps rise under his fingertips, and he’s quick to try to retreat except Felicity lays her hand over his.
“It’s okay,” she reassures him gently. “This type of work is kind of Sara’s specialty. Thea’s been asking about getting one, but you didn’t hear it from me.”
Oliver scoffs. Of course, Thea wants a tattoo and, of course, she isn’t planning on telling him about it. Ungrateful brat.
He leans in closer to inspect the work. The pinks and purple are at once distinct and blended but still camouflaged by the redness of the new wound. He’s sure that once it heals, the colors will be as bright as the woman they’ve marked.
When he looks up to tell her it’s—she’s—beautiful, Oliver finds Felicity gazing down at him. Her expression is one of wonderment, trust, and anticipation. Without conscious thought and without breaking their stare, Oliver shifts even closer and presses his lips to the flawless skin just below the tattoo.
Felicity sucks in a sharp breath, her grip tightening on his hand once again. “Yes, Oliver.” It’s almost a moan, and he’s so, so tempted to kiss her again, but Sara makes an ungodly amount of noise coming back from wherever she went.
“Last time we let Dinah do inventory. Couldn’t find a damn thing,” she complains without mentioning how Oliver bolted upright as she walked over. By the gleeful look in her eye, though, she’s damn well aware of what happened.
Sara nudges him out of the way so she can apply the covering to Felicity’s back. Oliver takes the opportunity to flee, muttering a lame excuse and a “See you tomorrow.” If he’s not wrong, Felicity looks disappointed by his cowardice.
Loud pounding startles Oliver out of the sleep he didn’t realize he’d fallen into. He heaves himself up off the couch, rubbing at his eyes tiredly. “I’m coming!” he yells out grumpily when the noise persists.
Thankfully, Thea isn’t home tonight. She opted to sleep at Roy’s since she has an early exam and his place is closer to campus. That’s the reason she gave, and he’s sticking to it.
When he flings open the door without bothering to look through the peephole, the last person he expects on the other side is Felicity. But there she is, still in the clothes from earlier but with glassier than usual eyes. Before he can speak, she holds up a finger and takes a deep breath.
“Here’s the thing. Sara gave me some liquid courage and some really bad advice before she dropped me off. The liquid courage was a vodka shot, and the really bad advice was to be myself and say whatever comes to mind. So. This is the question that’s been on my mind for an embarrassingly long time: Do you want to see my other tattoos? The implication being you’ll see them in the course of becoming my—oh god, I still can’t say that word seriously. Sex. We’ll be having sex with the intention of more, hopefully a relationship, after all the sex. What do you say?”
If this is a dream, Oliver’s going to be so damn pissed when he wakes up.
“Yes,” he blurts out before the dream has a chance to end, “I’ve been fantasizing about your other tattoos for an embarrassingly long time.”
“Great!” Felicity enthuses, placing both hands on his chest to push him further into the apartment. Any doubts he has about this being real are dispelled because there’s no way his imagination could make up something that feels so damn electrifying. “There’s not a non-dirty way of saying this, but I need to be on top because I can’t irritate the new tattoo and I get the feeling I’m going to be writhing around like we’re in a romance novel if you get me on my back.”
“Here’s hoping,” Oliver mutters as he spins her around to attack the buttons on the back of her sweater. After a brief struggle, Felicity whips the garment over her head instead, and god, he’s never needed to kiss her more than right now. For the first time, he can give into that feeling.
Felicity senses the enormity of the moment, too, and she stops trying to tug his shirt off. Carefully, she steps forward and eases into his embrace. All the times he’s imagined kissing her must translate into instinct because, despite their height difference and the unrestrained urgency of a moment ago, he tilts his head at just the right angle and she leans up at just the right speed.
Their first kiss is a sigh of relief of finally.
Lines of code wrapping around her right hip, Hebrew scripture high across her left thigh, the playing card suit symbols arranged in a diamond on the left side of her ribs, and now, most gloriously of all, one of his flowers on her back.