sixthiterationlogs | /closed to Oliver

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/closed to Oliver

WHO: Felicity Smoak & Oliver Queen
WHERE: Outside their house in 7I
WHEN: Last week of December
OPEN TO: Oliver
WARNINGS: Plot!

Felicity knows Oliver is outside as soon as she opens her eyes. The bed is cold, which means he's been up for a while, and she inhales deeply before deciding that, braving the cold with him is better than lazing around in bed without him. With a little effort, she might be able to get him to join her. They've been spending a lot of time preparing for winter, something she'd thought she'd only read about in history books, not something she'd ever actually apply to herself as a survival tactic.

Actually, she never thought she'd be grateful for Oliver's time on Lian Yu.

Pulling on her scrubs, she steps into their kitchen, catching a glimpse of him outside as she reaches for a glass. The red on the counter surprises her and she wonders, only for a moment, if he's gotten her a gift. Only a moment, though, because the letters, the wax seal... it's all too precise and her heart starts to pound.

Instinctively, she looks out the window again, eyes searching for Oliver, just to be sure that he's there, then she opens the envelop. Reading its contents, her pounding heart goes into overdrive and, for a hot second, she's afraid she's going to pass out. Again, her eyes go to Oliver, who seems oblivious to what's happening inside the house, and she calmly folds the letter, puts it into the envelope, and rips it into eighths.

She sets the pieces down on the table in the center of the room with a firm slap, then turns to get the glass of water she'd wanted, only to drop the glass when the letter shows itself to be in one piece. She goes through the motions again - opening, reading, and shredding - only for it to reappear once more.

Sitting down at the table, aware of the broken glass but uncaring, Felicity stares outside without seeing.

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Oliver had actually been gifted some real clothes the day before in one of the boxes and luckily they'd included a sweater and scarf because snow has come and it's still falling now. It's not unmanageable yet but it will be if he doesn't try to keep a handle on keeping it clear.

For the moment, he's using boughs to sweep it off the stoop in lieu of a shovel. There's not many of those around, from what he understands, so they come at a premium. He'll have to borrow one later. Having done a good enough job on the stairs for the moment, he comes back inside and sees Felicity staring at a red envelope and broken glass.

"Felicity? Everything all right?"

She's so caught up in what's happening in her mind, the different possibilities, that she doesn't keep track of where Oliver is in relation to the front door, which means she's not paying attention enough to think to hide the envelope when he comes in the door. Secrecy, then, is out, which actually relieves her. Secrets have never been their strong suit.

"No, I--" She stops, confused at the question. It doesn't say anything bad will happen if she doesn't complete the task, just that something good will happen if she does. Frowning up at Oliver, she holds the envelope in her right hand as she asks him, "I'm fine. I mean, I broke a glass, I need to clean it up."

She stands, still holding onto the paper in her hand.

"I was talking about the envelope but I can handle the glass instead," Oliver says mildly. He'd gotten an envelope on top of his box from the Observers earlier in the week but it'd only listed out what was inside the box. Somehow he doesn't think Felicity's envelope is the same thing.

He bends down to pick up the larger pieces with his hands, making a soft noise when one of the edges barely nicks his skin. He deposits the glass in the trash and sucks on his finger for a moment, trying to get the bleeding to stop.

"We're going to have to sweep up the rest of it."

For a moment, Felicity is struck by the fact that he cut his finger and she watches with wide eyes as he sucks on his bleeding finger, both worried for him and curious if that settles the debt in the envelope; she broke the glass, it cut him...

She suspects that it's not that simple and finally takes another breath, nodding.

"Right. I'll--" She's so distracted by the letter, and now his small cut, that she can't think. "We don't have a broom."

"We can get some branches or something and do it," Oliver says. "It's not that difficult to make a broom. I know I'm not the builder out of the two of us but I think I can get us that far." Felicity seems worried and distracted and he comes close enough so he can squeeze her shoulder. He doesn't want her to have to worry, not if there's something he can do about it. He has never had any doubt that he's the brawn in this operation; Felicity's the brains.

"Don't worry about it, Felicity. It's not going to take long to get it cleared up. No big deal."

It dawns on her that he's being way too patient and kind for her overly space cadet self. Worse, she's letting him, even as she contemplates the best way to cause him pain. Should she tell him first? Would it negate the terms of the letter? She wants to look at it again, even though her stomach is so tight, she's a little afraid that she's going to throw up before he has a chance to leave the room.

The squeeze to her shoulder makes her jump and she tosses him the most generic smile she can manage. "Thank you."

It's quiet and she clears her throat, waiting for him to vacate the room so she can glance at the letter again without his noticing.

"Felicity, what's going on?" Oliver knows that sometimes he can get wrapped up in his own mind, sometimes truly to his detriment, but he senses there's something wrong with Felicity and it goes way beyond shattering a glass in the kitchen.

"You know you can talk to me, right? You don't have to keep secrets from me."

Keeping secrets has been the bane of their relationship, every time they've tried to have one. She knows this. And yet, even as she eyes the red envelope, she thinks about holding back. Just for a moment.

Hand pressed against the paper, she looks up at him.

"Someone wants me to hurt you," she starts, then slides the envelope to him. "They don't say why, but they say what I'll get out of it." Well. "Kind of. Some kind of reward. I don't know what it is, but. If I hurt someone, then--" She trails off. It doesn't say she can't discuss the opportunity, so she doesn't feel like she's breaking the spirit of the law it's laying down. "Read it."

Oliver takes the envelope and opens it, reads the letter inside. It's pretty clear that she has to commit harm against something other than a plant or hunted animal. It's clear that the stakes of this mean she'll get some sort of hefty reward for showing a bend in her morality.

He's bent his morality before. He doesn't do it any longer but before, back when he was the Hood, he regularly pushed things to the point of murder if it was necessary. He hasn't always had issues with hurting others for the right reasons. Does he have an issue with this now? He can't say.

"So. Do you want to do it? Do you want to hurt me and see what you get?"

Biting at her thumb, Felicity watches as he takes it, stares at him as he reads it, and feels her stomach tighten as he understands what it says. Does she want to? See what she gets? Yes. Hurt him? Never. Vocalizing that is one of the hardest things she's ever had to do, despite how simple it sounds.

"I don't want to hurt you, Oliver. That's--" She shakes her head and snatches the envelope back. It crumples in her hand, but doesn't rip, so she's not worried about it replicating itself once again. "I'm a little curious to see just how well we're being controlled. I want to know what these people have on us. I don't know how far I'm willing to go do to do it." She looks up at him again. "It didn't say I couldn't tell you about it, so I thought we'd talk about it first. What do you think?"

"I think it's worth it to see what they're going to give you," Oliver says. "It doesn't say you couldn't tell me about it, like you said, and I can handle pain."

He has the evidence of pain writ all over his body, honestly, and adding one more scar to that isn't going to change the canvas he's working with. It could, though, change their current situation.

"You can slice me open with that broken glass," he suggests. "If it's deep enough for stitches, we'll go get them."

"I don't want to cause you pain, just because you can 'handle' it," she replies an obvious frustration, not standing and pacing as she normally would because of the tiny pieces of glass still on the floor. The scars that he carries are evidence of how much he's endured and she doesn't want to be the one who adds to it. Not on purpose. Is it worth it, just to see? Even if he says it is?

When he makes his suggestion, she looks over at the glass and the obvious pain it causes her to think about it appears on her face again. Clearly, that's the point of the exercise and she takes a deep breath before standing carefully and leaning over to grab one of the bigger pieces, laying it out in her palm before looking him over. "Stitches? Here? What if you get infected?"

"Well, we can try to see if we can do it as cleanly as possible," Oliver says. "Look, I know you don't want to cause me pain. If you did, we'd have other problems."

He looks at her, meets her eyes with his own. "We can go to the clinic and do it. If one of the doctors is there, they can stitch it up right then."

He got a huffed laugh that wasn't a laugh when he mentioned causing him pain and it was immediately followed by a frustrated look.

Taking a deep breath. "Does it say how much pain I have to cause? Or how hurt you have to be?" She slides carefully off the chair and looks for a piece of glass she can hold. "If it's a little cut, maybe you won't need stitches."

"It doesn't seem to indicate how much pain, just that it has to be an actual injury." It's something that doesn't bother Oliver particularly but the implication of it is a little grimmer than he'd like to admit.

"So I think it's not going to be a papercut that does it. I think we'll need to cause a decent injury."

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/closed to Oliver

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