[And then there's that one woman who doesn't stare at his back as he trains on the salmon ladder like she wants to lick the sweat off him. (Because, ew.) And who isn't family, obviously, let's not talk as if Thea would -- anyway, that's not the point. She knows she's the newbie part of the team, only on it because Laurel sort of vouched for her first, and then Barry, and then officer Gordon sort of maybe sent captain Lance a message about the vigillante trying to take on the vicious criminals of Gotham on her own, and then Oliver Queen showed up and boom: team.
But she knows, alright, that she's new and she's got a history of exceptionally evil parents, and therefore has no place getting in Ollie's business but... he unfortunately makes it fun for her.]
You know the good part of this? [She pauses, and rips part of a licorice with her teeth, chewing quietly.] Is if you ever decided to get yourself out there a la Bruce Wayne, you could pull the tragic romance card.
Edited (sorry 'uncle' i forgot your gf's name) 2014-10-19 17:52 (UTC)
[Not all of the scars on Oliver's body are from deceased lovers. He's been shot, cut, burned, stabbed enough times that it creates a cover for the marks that really hurt. There's one for Sara, and another for Shado. Then there's the marks that haven't scarred over, because McKenna, Helena, Felicity and Laurel aren't dead (not yet, not if he has anything to do with it) and he loves them all in different ways, each mark has different shades of black and red and even if he knew which ones belonged to who, which mark has been black for most of his adult life and has varied, twisted, changed so many times, he's not going to say.
(it's laurel, it's always been laurel even when they fight and he says he's done believing her, he's not. he's carried the mark so long it's more a part of him than any of his other scars. even when there's a nearly matching mark for felicity that's slowly but surely turning back to red)
Oliver rolls his eyes at his new protege, and does a few more reps before he drops to the ground and bothers to respond to that.]
[Spoiler alert: he doesn't need to say. Way before coming to Starling city, back when she was sneaking out on dear old dad to clean the city (see, even then she sounded like her current mentor) she got by based on good detective work. Reading people. Laurel and Ollie in the same room is like a mute movie. You see it all, and get it all, without the text in between.
She throws him a bottle of water because she's so helpful, and with the licorice still in her teeth she goes back to sharpening each arrow tip one by one.]
You could always look for a sugar momma. Or plural. Or learn to live like the 99%.
[Yeah, just going to drink a third of that water bottle before he answers this time too. He's getting more than a little tired of people telling him that he should go out and date more because seriously? Look at his track record.]
I already work for free and live in an abandoned club. But I'm not looking for anything right now. I've got enough going on.
I'm multitasking! [Shnickt, goes the stone on the sharp edge of the arrow, sharpening more. She's multitasking, Ollie. You're doing it all the time, don't pretend like you don't think when you're doing pull ups.
She sets down another arrow in the quill -- his; Roy's quill is full and done, and only Artemis' is left after this -- and glances up at him.] Hey, answer me something. It's better to have the scars, or not to have the marks at all? [Because Artemis, she's clear of any of them.]
You do know. [She's quiet, and listen help her out Oliver. It's her...yeah, it's her way of saying that she wants to know what it's like. To get a mark. Of saying she regrets not getting one at all.]
[Oliver Queen is maybe the last person she wants to go to for romantic advice, honestly. Is it better to have loved or have never gotten a mark? For him or for them because that's vastly different. If you asked him, Sara and Shado would've been better off without ever having met him.]
I sometimes wonder if they still would be alive if it hadn't been for me. Actually, probably would be. So yeah, I regret that part. I regret playing a part in Shado and Sara's deaths.
[She's been wearing her own sleeves longer since last year, and when she's not wearing long sleeves she's been wearing watches and other things that cover her wrists because hey, it's getting colder now. It's a totally legitimate excuse.
Right now she's monitoring the system and trying not to glare at him from over the tops of the monitors. Pro tip, it's not working. In the end her eyes fall to his wrist and her brows crease in confusion.]
[He's so caught in his thoughts that it takes him a moment to realize that she's a) speaking to him and b) actually asking a question and c) what she's referring to. Oliver's eyes follow hers to his wrist and quickly, much too quickly to be smooth, he pulls his sweatshirt's sleeve down over the mark.]
[The comment "I didn't know gigolo was in your job description" is on the tip of her tongue, but that's mean, too mean and very untrue. She knows he actually cares for everyone more deeply then he'll ever let on. She's just mad and biting remarks aren't going to make her feel any better.
From behind monitors she reaches for her own covered wrist and frowns. Part of the job, no it's not. It's not part of the job to get red marks on you - even if apparently all of them do have at least one. That's completely beside the point.]
[Oliver sighs more to himself than to her and raises his eyebrows just a little bit, just enough to qualify as a look. Like really, does she want to get into this? Or does she want to pass it off as a scar from his job and leave it at that? Because that's what he would like to do. And Oliver Queen is very good at lying to himself when he wants to.]
I get bumped and bruised and cut all the time, Felicity. That's all it is.
[She will meet his look with a look of her own that is an attempt to say Really. You really are an idiot and you're really not fooling anyone and can I poke it? If I poke it like, five times will you stop being a jerk and suddenly acting like I can't handle being on a date where an explosion almost killed us? I've been through way worse.
She's pretty sure her look didn't actually manage to convey all that. Which is also probably a good thing.]
Right.
[She presses her lips together tightly, turning back to the monitors.]
Just another scar.
[The staccato way she says the words makes it seem like she's not finished. She's not, but she's not going to say it out loud. In her head she's screaming at him, for being a jerk. She's been doing a lot of that recently. In her head at least.]
[Laurel has never thought it necessary to hide away her own scars, or her marks, because these are just as much a part of who she is and what makes her Laurel Lance as the suit and the briefcase and the fantastic hair and the spirit.
But more recently than not, she can be found rubbing idle fingers over the scar what reminds her of Tommy, or the mark that can't decide anymore between red or black. Like tonight, for instance; doing this is safer than looking towards the minibar, safer than running down the streets to another AA meeting. There's no AA meeting for being addicted to heartbreak, she thinks; she also thinks she's starting to sound as melodramatic as Ollie about it.]
[He resents that, he's not melodramatic. He's... being cautious when no one else seems to want to be, doesn't see the danger the way he does, trusts people in ways that he is trying so hard to remember how to do but he's finding that he can't because that part of him is broken.
Oliver hides his scars under green leather, and pretends like he doesn't notice a thing. Doesn't notice when one of them starts to shift from an ugly bright red to black again because acknowledging it, even to himself means that it would be real and if it's real, there's no going back this time.
He keeps a close eye on Laurel when he can, he's worried about her more so than he usually is because she's been off kilter since Sara's death. He doesn't blame her for it, she loved her sister no matter what she said and they did just reunite and it was his fault really that they ever broke apart in the first place. He just-- he sees that fire in Laurel, the same one he knows he has, the one Sara had, and the last thing he wants is for Laurel to be burned by it. She doesn't deserve the scars, the heartbreak, the pain, she deserves to stay unblemished and he thinks he'd do anything to keep her that way.
Later, he'll realize that the best thing for her would've been to teach her himself, because he should've known that Laurel would go from person to person until she found one willing to train her. But for now he doesn't see that, thinks he's protecting her even if properly protecting her would mean staying away from her, but he's never been any good at that. Tonight he's not any better at it, landing on her fire escape with a soft thud before he knocks on her window.
Just your friendly neighborhood vigilante checking in to see how you're doing Laurel, no big deal.]
[Truth be told, if he'd been the one to train him, she wouldn't have progressed. She would've been another one in a line of women Oliver taught, she'd be in the same category as Helena, and Laurel wants that less than she wants her sister's killer brought to justice. (Killed. She wants him killed. The rage inside her hasn't shifted, not yet, but they're getting there.)
As it is, she's getting ahead just fine on her own, even if her knuckles itch from the inside of the gloves. She's distracted rubbing lotion on them, wondering if she needs to start investing in better concealer to cover them up at work, when the knock on her window makes her jump.
She gets off the couch and is at the window instantly, no attention paid to her arms being bare this time around, scar and black mark in full sight.]
[Oliver brushes past her into her apartment instead of lingering out in the open, since her fire escape is very well lit, good for security but not so much for a vigilante to be sneaking around.]
Uh, no. [Now that he's here, without a reason to be here really, in his leather and hood, he's suddenly a little awkward.]
[She closes the window, her brow furrowed at how him brushing past her brought up a shiver. This is not the time and place to shiver, Laurel, she thinks. But inevitably she ends up thinking about the last time he'd been in her apartment in the middle of the night...
And feels guilt-ridden for it. Because her sister's killer is still out there, and that had been the time she and Tommy could've been together, and she has better things to do than linger on Oliver.]
Why? There's nothing out to get me, surely you've got about a dozen neighbourhoods you should be checking on that are better than this.
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oliver queen | arrow
H A
But she knows, alright, that she's new and she's got a history of exceptionally evil parents, and therefore has no place getting in Ollie's business but... he unfortunately makes it fun for her.]
You know the good part of this? [She pauses, and rips part of a licorice with her teeth, chewing quietly.] Is if you ever decided to get yourself out there a la Bruce Wayne, you could pull the tragic romance card.
no subject
(it's laurel, it's always been laurel even when they fight and he says he's done believing her, he's not. he's carried the mark so long it's more a part of him than any of his other scars. even when there's a nearly matching mark for felicity that's slowly but surely turning back to red)
Oliver rolls his eyes at his new protege, and does a few more reps before he drops to the ground and bothers to respond to that.]
It'll go well with my tragically broke card.
no subject
She throws him a bottle of water because she's so helpful, and with the licorice still in her teeth she goes back to sharpening each arrow tip one by one.]
You could always look for a sugar momma. Or plural. Or learn to live like the 99%.
no subject
I already work for free and live in an abandoned club. But I'm not looking for anything right now. I've got enough going on.
no subject
no subject
Don't you have something you could be doing?
no subject
She sets down another arrow in the quill -- his; Roy's quill is full and done, and only Artemis' is left after this -- and glances up at him.] Hey, answer me something. It's better to have the scars, or not to have the marks at all? [Because Artemis, she's clear of any of them.]
no subject
I don't know.
no subject
You can compare.
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I sometimes wonder if they still would be alive if it hadn't been for me. Actually, probably would be. So yeah, I regret that part. I regret playing a part in Shado and Sara's deaths.
Couldn't resist
Right now she's monitoring the system and trying not to glare at him from over the tops of the monitors. Pro tip, it's not working. In the end her eyes fall to his wrist and her brows crease in confusion.]
Is that new?
:3
It's just part of the job.
Re: :3
From behind monitors she reaches for her own covered wrist and frowns. Part of the job, no it's not. It's not part of the job to get red marks on you - even if apparently all of them do have at least one. That's completely beside the point.]
Seriously? Because that's a really crappy cover.
[She lets out a puff of indigent air.]
Like my dog ate my homework crappy.
no subject
I get bumped and bruised and cut all the time, Felicity. That's all it is.
no subject
She's pretty sure her look didn't actually manage to convey all that. Which is also probably a good thing.]
Right.
[She presses her lips together tightly, turning back to the monitors.]
Just another scar.
[The staccato way she says the words makes it seem like she's not finished. She's not, but she's not going to say it out loud. In her head she's screaming at him, for being a jerk. She's been doing a lot of that recently. In her head at least.]
...H A again
But more recently than not, she can be found rubbing idle fingers over the scar what reminds her of Tommy, or the mark that can't decide anymore between red or black. Like tonight, for instance; doing this is safer than looking towards the minibar, safer than running down the streets to another AA meeting. There's no AA meeting for being addicted to heartbreak, she thinks; she also thinks she's starting to sound as melodramatic as Ollie about it.]
no subject
Oliver hides his scars under green leather, and pretends like he doesn't notice a thing. Doesn't notice when one of them starts to shift from an ugly bright red to black again because acknowledging it, even to himself means that it would be real and if it's real, there's no going back this time.
He keeps a close eye on Laurel when he can, he's worried about her more so than he usually is because she's been off kilter since Sara's death. He doesn't blame her for it, she loved her sister no matter what she said and they did just reunite and it was his fault really that they ever broke apart in the first place. He just-- he sees that fire in Laurel, the same one he knows he has, the one Sara had, and the last thing he wants is for Laurel to be burned by it. She doesn't deserve the scars, the heartbreak, the pain, she deserves to stay unblemished and he thinks he'd do anything to keep her that way.
Later, he'll realize that the best thing for her would've been to teach her himself, because he should've known that Laurel would go from person to person until she found one willing to train her. But for now he doesn't see that, thinks he's protecting her even if properly protecting her would mean staying away from her, but he's never been any good at that. Tonight he's not any better at it, landing on her fire escape with a soft thud before he knocks on her window.
Just your friendly neighborhood vigilante checking in to see how you're doing Laurel, no big deal.]
no subject
As it is, she's getting ahead just fine on her own, even if her knuckles itch from the inside of the gloves. She's distracted rubbing lotion on them, wondering if she needs to start investing in better concealer to cover them up at work, when the knock on her window makes her jump.
She gets off the couch and is at the window instantly, no attention paid to her arms being bare this time around, scar and black mark in full sight.]
What's wrong? Did you find any new lead?
no subject
Uh, no. [Now that he's here, without a reason to be here really, in his leather and hood, he's suddenly a little awkward.]
I just wanted to check on you.
no subject
And feels guilt-ridden for it. Because her sister's killer is still out there, and that had been the time she and Tommy could've been together, and she has better things to do than linger on Oliver.]
Why? There's nothing out to get me, surely you've got about a dozen neighbourhoods you should be checking on that are better than this.