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Each day that passed with Oliver gone, John Diggle thought of something new that he’d forgotten to say. Of course, neither had ever been particularly loquacious with each other, and Felicity had always supplied the majority of the chatter down in the Arrow cave, but there was so much that was more familial than friendly to his and Oliver’s silences that there was never any uncertainty to what was going unsaid. Still, with Oliver so definitively absent from Starling City, Digg found himself thinking of things that he should have said before the farewell.
On the first day, as he and Felicity maneuvered their way through the darkened Verdant and talked about everything that didn’t matter just to avoid talking about the one thing that mattered most of all, Digg regaled her with a fairly convoluted story about the domestic squabbling that came with the planning of a wedding at which most of the attendees on both sides would have secret identities and/or code names while an infant teethed in the background. Felicity’s smile had reached her eyes for the first time since Oliver had left, and John was so relieved that he allowed his mind to wander.
"Come back soon," he might have said to Oliver. "I gotta have a best man at the wedding, and you’re the only brother I have left."
Oliver might have argued, maybe even gotten that playful tone that so few ever heard in earnest. “Oh, I don’t know,” Oliver might have countered. “Roy could probably do the job.”
"For ring bearer, maybe," Digg would have answered. They would have laughed and avoided eye contact and nodded at the floor, but that would have been okay, because Oliver would have smiled that smile that still looked somewhat out of place and called him "John" and stood with him as he married Lyla for the second time.
The thought brought an expression that was half a grin and half a grimace to Digg’s face, and he knew that Felicity knew that he was lying when he said that nothing was wrong.
On the second day, as the three members of Team Arrow still in Starling sat in silence and tried not to look at their phones, Digg made a discovery that had him wishing that Oliver was there just to hear him try to explain. Ridiculous and immovable as he had been about baby Sara coming down into the lair, Oliver had still gone out of his way to babyproof the case of trick arrows that stood between the Arrow and Arsenal suits. The thick arrows with serrated edges and barbed tips were still arranged pointing upward near the training mats, and the tray of flechettes was as exposed as ever, but he’d made sure to cover up those impact-triggered trick arrows that even Roy had a hard time properly deploying. Roy had been surprised into a smile and Felicity laughed until she cried when he pointed it out, so Digg allowed his mind to wander again.
"Come back soon," he might have said to Oliver. "Lyla and I are debating godparents. You got knocked out of the running early—sorry, man, but you can’t ever live in a cave if you want to inherit any infants—but Felicity made the shortlist, and I think godparent-in-law is a thing that you could really take advantage of."
Oliver would have rolled his eyes and changed the subject, but he would have been so amused by John’s unabashed domesticity and increasingly obvious attempts at matchmaking that he wouldn’t have had the heart to argue. He wouldn’t have commented on the Felicity tease, but Digg knew that Oliver would have heard and would have remembered and would have filed it away as part of the imaginary life that he would take a moment to look at whenever he got so lonely that he’d dare to dream.
On the third day, Digg let gravity do most of the work as he and Roy descended the stairs into the foundry after too many hours of too much patrolling. He was just shaking his head at Roy’s disbelief that Oliver had managed to do so much by himself when Digg saw Felicity. She had on earrings that looked uncomfortable to wear, a dress that looked confusing to put on, shoes that looked impossible to walk in, and an expression so deathly pale and desolate that he did not need to see the bloody sword in front of her to understand what had happened.
It wasn’t until much later, after Lyla had brought baby Sara to take Felicity home with them and Roy was pretending to sleep on the cot that had been Oliver’s that Digg’s mind had the chance to wander again. Leaning back against the medical table, he rolled up his sleeves and had a staring contest with the faceless silver dummy that wore the Arrow hood and leathers.
"I wish you’d come back," said Digg after a time. "But say hi to Andy for me."
He didn’t know what Oliver would have said to that.