Work Text:
Heavenly Realm
“Once you have repaid this debt in the mortal realm I will reveal all that is to know about your past life,” the Monitor as he was known watches Felicity carefully for a reaction.
Her face exhibits no recognition as she merely nods at him in agreement. She didn’t have much experience navigating this existence yet but there was one fundamental thing she knew about herself. She hated mysteries. Her past life was done and over. Maybe it didn’t and shouldn’t matter anymore but she still wanted to find out before choosing what her next state of existence would be.
The thought of roaming the Heavenly Realm for an eternity aimlessly did not appeal to her. At least in the mortal realm she could do some good by repaying the debt that the Heavenly Realm owed Oliver Queen.
“Once the debt is repaid to Oliver Queen I will appear before you again Felicity.”
Felicity bounces on her feet a little. She wasn’t quite sure what to expect but she was eager to get on with it. She needed to find out about her past in order to really know who she was and find a place for herself somewhere in the three realms.
Mortal Realm
“You might wanna circle around the block a few times, because your sister just showed up,” Oliver whispers frantically to Sara on the phone before hanging up quickly to greet his girlfriend, the other Lance sister.
As he turns towards an approaching Laurel, he’s confronted by a blinding flash of light that causes him to momentarily shut his eyes. It was as if someone had aimed a high beam right into his eyes. When he opens his eyes again his attention is not on Laurel but rather the beautiful young blond standing in front of her. The girl looked about eighteen or nineteen at most but it wasn’t her wavy blond ponytail or big blue eyes that drew Oliver’s gaze to her. Nor was it her sudden appearance from seemingly out of nowhere. No it was the way her bright pink lips formed a surprised “Oh” and how her face lit up in a huge mischievous smile that threw him for a loop.
“Whoops. I’m still new at this teleporting business. Hmm need to stop potentially blinding people.” She smiles apologetically at Oliver and continues to explain, “I am here to stop you from getting on that boat Oliver.”
She beams at him sunnily before sidling up to him and whispering in a conspiratorial tone.
“I’ve been told all about you and nothing good will come from getting on that boat. Five years of absolute misery and hell. Or failing that just plain old death. So come with me. I have been sent to repay a debt owed to you and my first course of action is to stop you from getting on that boat.”
“Ollie! Ollie who is she?” Laurel demands as she marches up to them, not quite making up her mind whether she should glare at him or this cheerful interloper who had seemed to appear out of nowhere.
“Is she one of your…”
Laurel fails to finish her sentence as a car pulls up and Sara scrambles out, dragging her luggage with her.
Oliver’s jaw drops wide open. Why was Sara here right now when he’d clearly told her to circle the block?
“Oh goodie your sister is here. I have something unpleasant to tell you ladies. Oliver Queen here has been having relations with both of you. And none of you should get on that boat. It is my task to stop Oliver from getting on that boat but I strongly advise that no one get on that boat.”
She turns and beams at Oliver. “Sorry for blowing up your relationships but it really is for the better after everything I have been told about you. This life varies from your past life but everything is like a stream. The water wants to flow a certain way. So even if you are not destined to become the Green Arrow in this life, you are sure to perish on this trip somehow. If you listen to me I can help you find your true love as part of the debt that our realm owes you.”
“What the…Ollie did you sleep with her and not remember who she is or which one she is?” Laurel grinds out angrily. “How old is she? I know you’ve cheated on me but don’t tell me you hooked up with an underage girl?”
“I have not had relations with this man,” Felicity turns around and addresses Laurel serenely. “As for my age I can’t really tell you what it is since I was born from a lotus flower and looked exactly like this when I emerged.”
“Well this is certainly unique even for you Ollie,” Sara finally steps forward to give Oliver an incredulous look.
“Sorry ladies I have to go. Please don’t get on this boat. Actually I don’t know what happens if you two get on a boat together but I would advise against it just to be safe. Oliver and I need to have a chat.”
Before anyone could get a word in edgewise, Felicity takes a firm grip of Oliver’s arm and with another burst of light Sara and Laurel are left standing at the pier with only each other for company.
***
“You are crazy! Absolutely crazy! Either you’re crazy or that batch of Vertigo I took last night was really bad.” Oliver rubs his face with his hands and proceeds to keep his face buried in his hands.
One minute he was on the pier avoiding a confrontation with Laurel, the next minute all hell had broken loose and suddenly he was sitting in this diner with a very beautiful, touchy feel (and down right crazy) blonde by the name of Felicity. He couldn’t help but wonder if this was some great joke. Did Tommy pay this girl to drug him?
“Not crazy,” she shakes her head at him with what is an adorable pout on her face. Oliver closes his eyes again for a second. He really needed to get a grip. He was finding Cuckoo Barbie here attractive. She was right about one thing. He was a hot mess. He had no idea what was going on and yet still found time to lust over this peculiar girl’s good looks.
“You’re not crazy and I am not crazy. Look I’ll show you everything I’ve tried to tell you is true.”
Before Oliver could protest there’s another flash of light and they are sitting on a wooden bench in a secluded park, opposite a lake.
“I can teleport. It’s one of the powers the Monitor let me have in this Mortal Realm. Please don’t be so agitated. I really am here to repay a debt that’s owed to you.”
She’s gazing at him so earnestly that Oliver is now certain she certainly believes what she’s saying. Whether she was full blown crazy was another matter. Still he couldn’t deny that he was on a pier, then a diner and now on a park bench.
“I am here to help you navigate through this difficult phase of your life. You’re destined to have a wonderful life with my help. In your past life you were married to this girl. The love of your life. A woman you declared would always be the love of your life. My task is to help you so that you’ll be ready when you meet her. It is to repay the debt that is owed to you because of what you did for everyone in your past life.”
Finally losing patience with her repeated heavenly airy-fairy nonsense Oliver decides to take matters into his own hands. He winds an arm around her waist and pulls this Felicity close so that his nose is only millimeters from hers.
“So if you really do owe me a debt, how about we find a place to go for you to repay it?” he asks in a low voice, dipping his head a little so that the tip of his nose nuzzles hers while his arm is still gripping firmly onto her waist.
Her cheeks turn pink right away and she averts her gaze momentarily, however in the next second she bounces back and bops his nose cheerfully with hers, “Having relations with you is not part of the debt repayment Oliver. If you want to have satisfying relations you will listen to me so we can send you on the path to find your true love sooner.”
She’s smushing her forehead against his as she speaks and is smiling at him happily, completely unperturbed by his aggressive advances.
“The Monitor has said that once you find your true love the debt will be paid and I will be able to unlock the truth about my past. So I swear everything I have told you is the truth. Please believe me?”
She removes her forehead from his and tilts her head a little as she gazes at him beseechingly. He keeps his arm around her waist however his grip is gentler. He simply does not know what to do with this girl. She was either out of her mind or he was out of his if he actually started to believe her.
“Ok so let me get this straight. According to you in my past life I was this guy, the Green Arrow. I spent my life being a hero but I lost my children and spent twenty years being separated from the love of my life. You keep harping on about this woman, this great love but you NEVER mention her name. What’s her name? Who is this amazing woman? Let’s just find her now and you can report back to the boss or whatever it is you call him.”
“The Monitor,” Felicity corrects him earnestly.
“Who is this woman of my dreams Felicity? Let’s go find her,” Oliver demands. He wasn’t even sure why he was going along with this but she did appear to be able to teleport and there was a part of him that was profoundly intrigued to find out who this woman was, this oh so great love that he must find not one but two lifetimes.
Felicity gazes at him suddenly looking flustered and confused.
“I…I don’t know the name of the love of your life…The Monitor he never told me. Actually now that I think about it, it’s very strange. He’s told me everything about you but I draw a complete blank when it comes to your great love.”
“Oh you have got to be kidding me. So after spouting all this crap you have no idea who this alleged miracle, magical woman is.”
Oliver throws his hands up in the air in frustration. He didn’t even know why he was so worked up. He’d cheated on Laurel how many times through the course of their relationship and now suddenly he was letting himself be sold on the idea of this great love by an overly perky blonde.
“I am really very sorry,” she looks at him beseechingly. “The heavenly realm works in mysterious ways. Rest assured though their intent is for you to have a wonderful life in this lifetime to make up for your last.”
She gives his arm a comforting squeeze and rests her head on his should, “You will find her one day I promise you will. I won’t rest until you do.”
“That’s really supposed to make me feel better,” Oliver grumbles at her. He places an arm around her shoulder, just to see what her reaction is. To his surprise she snuggles closer and doesn’t protest.
“How old are you exactly?” he asks as he watches her innocent little face. He didn’t even know why he was asking. Surely even he couldn’t stoop low enough to hit on (at worst) a poor unhinged girl and (at best) a mythical being here to help him find his great love. He decides he must know the answer because whoever, whatever this girl was, she was turning his world and everything he thought he knew upside down. He needed to find a way to manage his emotions when it came to her and to do that he needed to work out who she was.
“Like I told Laurel before, I was hatched from a lotus flower.”
“Oh don’t give me that bullsh*t. Surely you can’t expect me to believe that.”
Felicity scrambles up and looks at him with wide, innocent blue eyes. “I was born from a lotus flower. That’s all I remember. I had no childhood, I was never a baby. I remember waking up and emerging from the flower. That’s why I need to know about my past.”
There is something so honest and pure in her eyes as she tell him what she believes to be her truth, Oliver decides in that moment that no matter who she was, he had to see to it that she was protected.
“Oh you don’t need to protect me,” Felicity beams at him as if reading his thoughts.
“I studied human emotions before I came down here,” she explains. “I can see it in your face that you want to protect me. I am fine. I will be fine. I was sent down here with two skills. Teleportation and hacking.”
“Hacking?” He was looking like a stunned mullet again for what must be the 100th time today.
“Yup. It was the closest skill to a human super power so I chose it. I really enjoy it actually.” She’s grinning at him without a care in the world and Oliver finds himself feeling an odd combination of charmed and…frustrated.
“Felicity, let me this this straight, you think you are a fairy who can teleport and hack?”
“Oliver I AM a fairy who can teleport and hack.”
***
“For an alleged fairy you sure can eat a lot,” Oliver states as he watches Felicity dig into the prawn pad thai with gusto. He was slowly coming around to the idea that she was a mythical creature of some sort. Well it was hard to keep denying it when she repeatedly teleported them to places and could appear instantly in front of him as soon as he called her, even when she was nowhere near him and out of sight. It also helped that she looked like how he would imagine a fairy to look. Felicity was all blonde curls and big blue eyes. If he were to get lyrical about it he would say she was sunshine personified with hair like spun silk. That and the teleporting was enough to convince him she wasn’t crazy or a con artist.
“I don’t need all this food for sustenance. I just…exist. But it sure tastes delicious,” Felicity grins at him and takes a bite out of a spring roll.
“I’m still not entirely convinced about that. You keep claiming you are hungry and you eat three meals a day plus snacks. In any case I don’t think I should keep feeding you take out. I think it’s time to find a place for you to live.”
Oliver looks at Felicity with a serious expression and gears himself up to argue against another round of nonsense from her. The first time they broached the subject of where she was to live, Felicity had waved him off merrily and informed him that she would be more than comfortable to live in a tree. To his complete horror she then proceeded to teleport herself up a tree and lay lengthways on a branch while trying to convince him with utmost sincerity that this was how she slept and she would never fall off. He’d yelled in horror until she finally agreed to teleport down.
Oliver checked her into a hotel that very day but it had been a fortnight now and they really needed to find somewhere to live. He didn’t know why they were suddenly a “they” or why he was embroiled in this crazy situation but the one thing he knew was that he could not leave Felicity (who believed she sprouted from a lotus for crying out loud) to fend for herself.
“Ha you’re scared I’ll tell you I want to live in a tree again aren’t you?” Felicity chuckles and slaps his arm.
Oliver looks relieved despite making disgruntled tsk tsk noises at her.
“Thank you for that laptop and tablet you bought me. With them I have been able to study more about human life. I was going to surprise you later today but might as well tell you now. I have a job.” She makes a gesture as if to present herself to him, beaming at him proudly.
“A job? What? How? Felicity you don’t even exist in the system!”
Somehow he wasn’t quite ready for this. He’d expected to waltz in and “save” her. Be the knight in shining amour to the lost fairy and here she was proudly telling him she’d found herself a job.
On the flip side if he was to be completely honest with himself, he did feel a hint of relief that Felicity was so…efficient and was not another person who wanted, demanded, and needed something from him.
Oliver smiles fondly at her. She was just so…Felicity. Behind the convoluted story about true love and debts she was just this joyous presence that kept him on his toes and made him smile. Maybe the reason why she never wanted anything from him was like she had previously stated. She was here to repay a debt allegedly owed to him. She didn’t want anything from him, even if he was more than willing to give her anything she needed.
“Remember when I told you my human super power was to hack? Well it’s a bit more than that. I am good with all things science. It was the closest thing I could find to magic so in lieu of the limited magic I was allowed here I asked the Monitor to grant me with this particular set of skills instead.”
Felicity rubs her hands together enthusiastically, her face lighting up as she continues. “I created an identity for myself. I am Felicity Megan Queen, an orphan who hails from Las Vegas and graduated from MIT at the age of 19.”
Oliver raises an eyebrow at her and smirks a little when he hears the surname she has chosen for herself. Felicity however is unperturbed.
“Kord Industries have hired me as a Senior Developer. They did ask if I was any relation to you Queens but I waved them off and said we just happen to share an ordinary, common surname.”
Felicity scrunches her forehead a bit at this, looking thoughtful before stating apologetically, “Your surname was the first thing that popped into my head when I was hacking into the government database so I didn’t think and just entered it.”
“But then I ran a search and did you know there are 78 Queens living in Star City, all of whom are unrelated to you. I am just one of those anonymous Queens.” She makes a casual flick of her hand, apparently now feeling quite satisfied with her decision.
“I start work on Monday. I can slowly pay you back for the hotel and if I live in a tree for a few months I can rent an apartment and you can stop worrying about me.”
“You will not live in a tree,” Oliver all by growls at her, causing Felicity to pout into her crab fried rice.
Not meaning to sound so harsh he reaches over and takes her hand, intertwining their fingers. “I didn’t mean to snap. But you really shouldn’t keep talking about living in trees. It stresses me out.”
Felicity opens her mouth to respond but he interrupts her right away. “I know you are a fairy and all that, I’ve heard it a dozen times but you cannot live in a tree.”
He smiles at her, careful to use his best coaxing smile but to ensure that it wasn’t the usual insincere Ollie smile he reserved for others. That wouldn’t fly with Felicity.
“I’ve been thinking of moving out of home anyway. Time to be a grown up and take responsibility for myself. How about we share an apartment? You’re here to repay some debt owed to me right? How about we live together and you help me on this journey of gaining independence?”
That was a pretty good sell Oliver thinks to himself. Anything to get her stop with the tree business. If Felicity had it her way she’d be perched in a giant tree in the middle of dark Star City Park at night with nothing but her tablet.
“Of course I am here to help you but I cannot accumulate more debt even if it is monetary,” she informs him soberly, her little face looking ever so serious. “You must let me pay you off slowly for all the food, the hotel and my share of rent if we find a new place to live together.”
“Anything you want Felicity,” Oliver agrees eagerly, grabbing her small hands and caressing them in his.
***
Eight months. They’d been living together for eight months. Eight months and not a single sign of Oliver’s true love. Felicity began to feel uneasy despite knowing that mission wise she was well on track to repay the debt the Heavenly Realm owed Oliver.
Felicity had mastered practically all aspects of human life. She ‘d even successfully managed to navigate Oliver’s family without any declarations about being a magical creature or sprouting from a lotus much to Oliver’s relief. In fact Oliver’s mother who first appeared rather frosty and intimidating had taken a shine to her tremendously. They brunched with Oliver’s family ever second Sunday.
As for Oliver himself, based on Felicity’s limited observations of humans, she could comfortably conclude that he was content. Happy even. She still didn’t quite understand why she’d been sent down to help save Oliver from himself. She couldn’t see anything wrong with him that needed saving.
She knew about his past of course. About all those unfortunate incidents where he’d had relations with many ladies, including the Lance sisters but the Oliver she knew wasn’t like that. Her Oliver was kind, caring and had a heart of gold. He joined his family’s company not long after they found their apartment and every day he waited for Felicity at 5.30pm on the dot outside her office. Felicity didn’t think he had time to have relations with other ladies. Her Oliver was with her almost every moment they weren’t at work.
Felicity liked to tell herself that Oliver was like this because of his great love he was due to meet. It was a safe and comfortable reason to default to. He was being his best self so as to be ready when he met that girl again in this lifetime. Felicity desperately wished she could tell him who the girl was but that gap in her memory would not fill no matter how hard she tried.
There she goes again. Her Oliver. He wasn’t hers. He was someone else’s. As for the way he felt about her. Well Felicity didn’t want to think about that at all. She was here to help him and repay a debt. Not to tempt or entice. Somewhere along their journey the friendship she’d so eagerly extended to him had progressed to a point where it was dangerously close to crossing a line.
“What are you looking so thoughtful about?” Oliver asks, pulling her out of her reverie. “You’re not cold are you? You say that you can’t get cold but I see you cuddling up to fluffy blankets all the time Felicity.”
“I can’t get cold but I do like the warm and snuggly feeling,” Felicity confesses with a smile. They were outside, sharing a bottle of wine and looking at the stars. It had become somewhat of a weekly ritual for them to unwind after a long week at work and just sit outside on the outdoor sun lounges Oliver had set up on their modest balcony.
Sometimes they chatted, about everything and nothing in particular. They were never short of conversation. Sometimes they sat in silence and watched the stars. It was in those moments that Felicity realized how little she cared to find out about her past anymore. This current existence, it wasn’t hers to keep but it felt so real.
This life is not yours. It belongs to someone else. He belongs to someone else. The pragmatic voice in her head warns her again, as a reminder that she was getting carried away and perhaps losing sight of what she was sent here to do. She lets out an involuntary shiver. She’d come to realize and accept now that she was not impervious to human feelings and emotions. In fact the longer she spent with Oliver, the more human she’d become. It was going to be painful to say goodbye to all this. To his friendship. Felicity was glad for it but it was all so very fleeting. He was destined for someone else and she was…well she was nobody.
“Come here,” he beckons her with one finger and an adoring smile on his face. The smile sends a flutter of butterflies in her stomach. Her heart always went crazy whenever he looks at her like that, which was often. She was playing a dangerous game here but didn’t quite know how to extract herself out of it.
“I’m fine,” she shakes her head at him. They were friends; she was here to repay a debt. There was absolutely no reason why she should be sharing a sun lounge with him.
“You’re shivering. Come here,” he beckons once again, this time a look of concern starting to cloud his features.
Felicity doesn’t protest anymore and slowly slides over onto Oliver’s lounge. He has no qualms whatsoever, pulling her onto his lap and wrapping his blankets around both of them, winding his arms around her waist snugly under the blankets.
“That better? I am convinced you feel the cold no matter what you say.” His voice is soft and his lips are right next to her ear. They brush briefly across her cheek when he moves to settle his chin on her shoulder.
“We shouldn’t be doing this,” Felicity whispers.
“Why not?” Oliver challenges her, his nose brushing her cheek.
“Because...”
“Because of this woman I was married to in the past life,” Oliver finishes for her in a resigned but frustrated tone.
He pulls away from her for a bit and gently turns her face so that their eyes meet.
“Felicity I tried. I really did. I tried so hard. At first I told myself that you’re just a fairy. You don’t understand human nature, human emotions. You don’t understand flirtation, attraction or love. But it’s been eight months. Eight months which have showed me that you are very well versed in human emotions. You just don’t want to address yours.”
“Oliver…I…I’m not supposed to…” tears well up in her eyes and she can see the pained look in Oliver’s eyes when he spots them.
“You were not supposed to fall in love with me. But you have. And I’m not supposed to fall in love with you. But I have.”
Slowly so as to not startle her, Oliver wipes the tears from her eyes and kisses Felicity on the forehead. Pressing their foreheads together so that their noses are practically touching he continues.
“Maybe I am a bastard in every life. I know I’m supposed to wait for this girl, this epic love but honestly I don’t care Felicity. I don’t want it. I don’t want to be bound by something that happened a lifetime ago. Maybe I loved her once and I am sorry I made all those promises but that wasn’t me. That was me in another life. The me now, the me in this life. Well he loves you.”
“I love you. I shouldn’t and I wish I didn’t because you’re not mine but I love you with every ounce of my being,” Felicity whispers back through a flurry of tears that were now streaming down her face. Human emotions were so messy and she had no idea what was going to happen next, what kind of Pandora’s box she’d opened. She’d probably angered the entire Heavenly Realm and disrupted the balance of the universe but in that moment Felicity didn’t care. Oliver said he loved her and she needed him to know that she felt the same way no matter the consequences.
That was all he needed, all he wanted to hear. Eight months of joy, friendship, laughter and bliss had culminated in this moment. Slowly he tilts his head so that their lips meet. The kiss was more than anything his imagination could furnish during his eight glorious months with Felicity. She tasted of springtime, summer, warm orchards and everything that was glorious in this world.
Felicity simply melts into his arms, into his kiss and in that moment Oliver knows that no matter what he’s been told, no matter what Felicity believes; she is the one for him. She is everything he wants, everything that he needs.
The moment their lips meet Felicity stops thinking. She simply lets herself feel. Feel his kiss, his touch, his embrace. So when he gently carries her to his bedroom, Felicity twines her arms around his neck and deepens their kiss. She didn’t have a past and she was sure there was no future with Oliver. All she could allow herself was the glorious present.
***
“Don’t go. Promise me you won’t go,” Oliver whispers as he clings onto Felicity tightly. “I’m not going to let you go.”
“You forget that I can teleport?” Felicity teases, lifting her head to flash him a small impish smile.
“I’m so tired but I’m afraid to fall asleep because I’m scared if I sleep you’ll vanish in the morning,” he confesses. It was the truth. He was a jumble of conflicting emotions to say the least.
Lying there with Felicity in his arms, Oliver felt a sense of calm and peace that he’d never experienced before. He wanted this; he wanted it to always be like this. He didn’t need or want anything else. Yet within the peace there was a constant gnawing fear. The fear that everything they’d built together could be ripped from him in an instant.
“You mean like one of those tropes where we’ve made love so in the morning I teleport away and leave you a note with something scribbled along the lines of Oliver I have done everything I can for you but we are simply not meant to be. Try to forget me for I am not supposed to be yours.”
“Well if you know it’s a trope don’t do it,” Oliver whispers looking at her with pained eyes that simply crush Felicity’s soul.
“I wouldn’t. Not to you. I’m not like that. If I were to walk out I would have done it months ago. Not after one of the best nights of my life.” She reaches out and grabs both of his cheeks, squeezing them affectionately.
Oliver can’t help but let out a chuckle as he pulls her even closer into his chest. “Best night of your life huh Felicity,” he whispers into her ear before running a trail of kisses down her neck.
“Well to be fair I am a fairy hatched from a lotus so it’s safe to say I haven’t had any nights like this and I don’t know any better. By default you are the best.” Felicity responds with mock sincerity.
This earns her a growl from Oliver who rolls of top of her, causing Felicity to squeal in delight.
***
"When I came back to Star City to start my mission, I didn't think that I was capable or deserving of love. But you opened up my heart in ways that I never th- thought were possible. My only regret is not telling you I loved you sooner."
"No regrets."
"Would you tell Mia that I love her every day? And I know that she will grow up to be as smart and as beautiful as her mom.”
"I will find you... again. I promise."
"I love you."
"I love you so much."
Oliver wakes up with a start, his heart racing as he scrambles to look for Felicity. The tightening in his chest slowly eases as soon as he spies her still fast asleep next to him.
The dreams, they were haunting him more frequently now. That life with the woman he allegedly loved and had children with. Those dreams kept plaguing him and yet it was always Felicity’s face he saw in those dreams. She always assumed the identity of his mysterious great love.
Ever since that night neither of them had looked back. They never spoke about the future but there was an understanding between them that they were to forge ahead together, damn the consequences.
Oliver slides over to Felicity’s side of the bed and scoops a fast asleep Felicity into his arms. They might be on borrowed time but she was still here with him so all was not lost yet.
***
“We need to talk,” Oliver says in a resolute voice.
It was just another night where Oliver cooked dinner and Felicity did the dishes. After dinner Felicity curled into bed with her laptop, coding away at some new found vision she had for a work project while Oliver did his usual nightly exercise regime, partly to keep himself in shape and partly just to preen in front of Felicity because she enjoyed it and often showed him how much she appreciated watching him.
Felicity types a few more lines of code and proceeds to stop, putting her laptop on stand by and giving him her full attention.
“What’s up?” she smiles gently at Oliver.
“I…I want to move forward. I don’t want to do this anymore. It feels like we’re not moving forward because we’re afraid.”
He scoots onto the bed beside her and takes her hands in his. “We never talked about the future after the night we got together Felicity. It feels like we’ve got one foot in the door and one foot out. I don’t want that. I want us to forge ahead and if one day the consequences come I will happily burn in hell to pay for them.”
“Don’t. Don’t say that,” Felicity stops him quickly with a look of fear in her eyes.
“Ahh the Demon Realm. Sorry. You know there are moments where I genuinely forget you that you’re a fairy.” He tries to keep his tone light to coax that look away from her face.
“You were suppose to have a wonderful life this time around Oliver. It was one tragedy after the next in your past life and when you did find happiness you were ripped away from it for twenty years. It was my job to stop that but it feels like I am pushing you into the same vicious cycle again. I…I don’t know when the Monitor will show up for me. It could be tomorrow; it could be five years from now. It was never very clear what I was supposed to do for you in paying this debt.”
Oliver tugs at her gently so that her head is now resting on his shoulder.
“Hey I partied for more than two decades and then I met you. I didn’t spend five years in hell or have to save this city or any city. I think I’ve led a pretty charmed life so far. I made a conscious choice to be with you and I will gladly pay for it. When that Monitor comes I will tell him to do whatever he wants with me because it was worth it.”
“You’re not sacrificing yourself for me! That’s what you did in the last life for everyone!” Felicity protests sharply.
“Fine we’ll just latch onto each other and let the Monitor vaporize us,” Oliver says stubbornly clinging onto her. It was strange to think that only about a year ago he was fumbling around, living his best debauched life. Now he was facing the prospect of getting vaporized by a mythical being and feeling quite at peace about it. He briefly wondered if that Green Arrow fellow in his last life had the same mentality.
“But we still need to move forward.” Oliver hadn’t entirely forgotten the point of initiating this conversation.
“Well I’m not crying every night about the prospect of us being torn apart if that’s what you’re worried about. It is what it is. I love you and I will always love you. I’ve made peace with anything that’s to come.”
Felicity is gazing at him with a serene look of acceptance that puts him at ease for what he’s about to ask next.
“Felicity Queen, will you marry me?” he appeals to her with adoring heart eyes.
The ring, which he’s been keeping and transferring around in his various tracksuit pockets, finally makes its debut. He tries to patiently wait for an answer but he can’t help gently tugging on her hand so he can access her ring finger.
“Yes. Always yes,” Felicity nods with a huge smile on her face. For the first time there is no caveat in the back of her mind. They were really going to do this and there was no looking back.
Oliver slips the ring (a bring peachy pink stone adorned by an intricate array of diamonds) onto her finger and it fits perfectly.
“It’s a padparadscha sapphire. It’s the colour of the lotus flower to represent you who allegedly sprouted from a lotus.”
Felicity lets out a laugh as she kisses him playfully on the lips. “You still don’t believe I was born from a lotus.”
“Felicity I know every single aspect of you, intimately, and while I believe that you’re a mythical creature from somewhere I find it hard to swallow that all this” he waggles his eyebrows suggestively while running his hands down her body, “came from a lotus flower. You will never convince me entirely.”
Giggling with amusement at Oliver’s somewhat offended disbelief, Felicity pulls him in for another kiss.
***
5 years later
“It is amazing how well that baby of ours sleeps. It’s a miracle. Every night at 7pm she’s out like a light.” Felicity lets out a sigh of relief as Oliver tops up her glass of wine or “Mom juice” as they liked to call it.
“I’ve always been intrigued by that. Is she a really good baby or is it because she’s part fairy?”
After Felicity’s very easy magical unicorn of a pregnancy Oliver had taken a keen interest in how the fairy aspect of her heritage would affect their daughter.
There was another thing they were both acutely aware of, however they had a quiet understanding and never voiced it out loud in so many words. They had vowed to move forward come hell or high water and that extended to starting a family of their own. It seemed that every moment they spent together, they wanted more, craved more from each other and Mia was the result of that immeasurable love.
There was no running from the Heavenly Realm, they were both well aware of that fact, however it didn’t stop them from packing up and moving away from Star City to Bloomfield where they took turns juggling their careers and raising Mia.
Felicity commuted to Star City a few days a week to tend to her yet unnamed start up business, as did Oliver who was flourishing in his role at Queen Consolidate much to his parents delight. On the days when neither parent was available to take care of her, Mia was handed to Grandma Moira early in the morning. It was everything Oliver ever wanted and if the Heavenly Realm were serious about repaying him, this was what they should have planned.
In Bloomfield they could shut themselves away from the world and pretend that they were untouchable in their little pocket of paradise.
“You didn’t brag about her sleeping when you took her to rhyme time last week did you?” Felicity asks her husband with a suspicious look on her face.
His expression confirmed it all.
“Oliver!!!” she screeches angrily (albeit in whispered tones at him) “It is VERY poor form to brag about these things. Keep acting smug and it’ll come back to bite you. The next baby will be the hardest baby ever.”
“The next baby will be half fairy too.” Oliver informs her serenely, with a smug look on his face.
“Hey if you sprouted from a lotus how come you had to squeeze our baby out the normal way? Shouldn’t we have found her in a pond somewhere?”
“Ha ha I am glad you still think the lotus jokes are funny after all these years,” Felicity rolls her eyes at her husband.
Their lighthearted banter is interrupted when they hear a loud noise in their living room. The glass in Felicity’s hand drops to the floor and shatters. Oliver pushes forward and moves in front of her protectively.
There is a familiarity in the fear they both feel, a certain déjà vu. Like they have both been here in this setting and faced this feeling of dread before.
“You have completed your task Felicity.”
The Monitor’s tone is neutral, neither pleased nor displeased with what she’s done.
“No,” Felicity whispers in a pleading tone. “No. Please don’t take me away. I will repay the Heavenly Realm for everything I have done wrong but please let me raise her. At least until she’s an adult.”
“We’ll both do whatever you want just let us raise our daughter until she grows up.”
Unlike Felicity Oliver doesn’t plead. There’s a part of him that is angry. Furious. This was all a load of crock. They screwed him over in the past life and now they were here to screw him over again despite all the rhetoric about owing him a debt.
“You have mistaken my intentions. It is true that last time I was here you were separated for twenty years. This time it shall not be so. I am here to tell you, you have completed your task Felicity Smoak. You were the debt that was owed to Oliver Queen in this life. His great love, the woman neither of you can remember. That person is you Felicity Smoak for that was your name in your past life with him.”
“I can stay?”
“You’re not going to take her away?”
They both cry out in unison.
The mumbo jumbo he was spouting flew right over their heads as all they could focus on was the fact that the Monitor’s words seemed to indicate that Felicity was in no danger of being taken away.
“Indeed you shall stay. You will lose your heavenly powers but you may retain your human ones. I wish you a long, prosperous life together and I greatly apologize for the 20 year separation in your last life.”
The Monitor bows his head at them solemnly.
“Did I really sprout from a lotus in this life?” Felicity asks suddenly to break the silence. Oliver bites back a smile and refrains from making a snarky comment at his wife.
“Goodbye,” the Monitor bids them farewell without answering Felicity’s question and vanishes into thin air just as he appeared.
They stumble into each other’s arms as soon as they are alone, neither quite knowing what to feel. Joy, elation and sheer relief that the cloud, which had always hovered over their heads no matter how hard they tried to deny it, had finally dissipated. They had made a conscious choice to move forward many years ago but now they could finally be completely at peace with the knowledge that they were no longer star-crossed.
***
“Whose moronic idea was it to set us up as star crossed lovers in this life and let both of us believe that you were destined for someone else when it was me all along?” Felicity grumbles as she takes a bite of her chocolate molten cake. The little visit from the Monitor had left them with much to discuss and Oliver knew the only thing to calm a jittery Felicity down was chocolate. Warm gooey chocolate cake.
“They could have made us childhood best friends or something? Which idiot decided it was a good idea to send a fairy down complete with the cryptic back story?”
“Well maybe you hatched out from the lotus flower and they couldn’t set us up as childhood best friends since you were, you know, mythical and not mortal. So the only way to set us up was to send you down here.”
Oliver was feeling very mellow. Whatever it was the Heavenly Realm had done he was completely at peace with it. Their daughter was safely asleep, Felicity was his forever. He was too grateful to quibble over anything.
“You’re finally buying the lotus story now? After he refused to confirm it?”
Felicity however did not share the same sentiment. She extremely indignant about the information that had been withheld from her.
“Wait, you don’t think you sprouted from a lotus anymore?” Oliver looks at her quizzically with an amused expression on his face.
“It was very poor form on their part to make us defy the odds and forge ahead whilst thinking we were star crossed and not meant to be.”
Felicity takes a vicious bite out of the vanilla ice cream accompanying the molten cake. “All that angst. All those dreams you had with me in them and us both thinking it wasn’t supposed to be me. Incompetent hacks.”
“Scoot over.” Oliver lifts Felicity off from her chair, sits on it himself and deposits her cozily on his lap hoping that cake and ice cream on his lap would sooth her faster.
“Maybe they wanted to give us to chance to really fall in love? I have never bought into the concept of destiny and meant to be in the movies. Why should you get together with someone because destiny says so? Why does destiny know who is the best match for a person? It’s ridiculous if you think about it. What if you have nothing in common?”
“What if you have nothing to talk about?” Felicity echoes in agreement. “Or you’re on completely different wavelengths.”
“Yep,” Oliver says. “So maybe they wanted to give us a chance to make sure we really did love each other instead of just pushing us together because it’s our fate. That we truly wanted this life no matter what and would fight for it.”
“I’m glad we fought for it Oliver. We did it in our last life and we did it again in this life.” Felicity places a chocolaty kiss on her husband’s lips, feeling much appeased about things now.
***
6 years later
“Mommy Mia punched me,” four-year-old Lucas Queen tattles on his sister, looking pleased with himself.
“He asked me to,” six-year-old Mia Queen replies indignantly. “He told me he has a hard belly from karate and told me to punch him.”
“Lucas did you ask your sister to punch you?” Oliver asks, not taking his eyes off the road. They were on their way to Bloomfield Gardens where the annual flower show was in full swing. The attraction this year was a specially created lotus pond that was purported to have hundreds of lotuses in bloom. It was an opportunity Oliver could not pass up and he was determined that the entire family was going to see those lotuses come hell or high water.
“Yes I did,” comes his son’s honest response.
“Then you shouldn’t tattle in your sister if you asked her to punch you buddy,” Oliver reminds his son gently.
“No one is to punch anyone whether they have been asked to or not,” Felicity announces in an authoritative voice to the whole car.
“If there is one thing I do miss it’s my teleport powers,” Felicity says as she shuffles in her seat, shaking off a case of pins and needles in her leg.
“They travel pretty well for kids,” Oliver leaps to his children’s defence at once. In his eyes the kids could do no wrong even when they were absolute terrors. Impeccable genetics with one half-fairy genes as he often put it.
Felicity turns her head and smiles when she sees and hears Mia animatedly acting out some sort of story to entertain her little brother who was giggling merrily, all his attention focused on his big sister.
“I hope those lotus flowers are in bloom when we get there.”
“Oh they will be in bloom. They have to be open to greet their Queen,” Oliver teases her.
“Seriously? Eleven years and you still have it in you to crack lotus jokes?” Felicity rolls her eyes at her husband.
“I’m sorry honey. I can’t resist. The excitement of seeing real lotuses, your ancestors, is getting to my head.” He takes one hand off the steering wheel and holds onto hers. “I do love you even if I tease.”
“I love you too,” Felicity says grudgingly. “But you have got to stop with the lotus dad jokes.
“Queen of the flowers, Mommy is Queen of the flowers,” happy little voices can be heard chanting from the back seat.