Breathe

Falling apart

Laurel got up to check what was going on after she heard Thea’s worried voice. She was taken aback by the scene that she found in her foyer. Oliver looked like hell, pale and sweating and shaking, breathing shallowly and erratically. She couldn’t remember a time she had seen him like this, and she had known him since first grade.

She was scared about what might have happened to give Oliver ‘I’m in complete control of my emotions at all times’ Queen a freaking panic attack. Something horrible must have happened. Maybe with Felicity? Or Dig?

“Oliver what’s wrong?” She walked towards him, trying to calm him down and find out what happened at the same time. He looked at her bewildered for a moment as if he didn’t recognize her and her presence confused him but then seemed to try to answer her question.

“I…” Just to stop before starting and his focus shifted to something behind her. She turned around just in time to hear her sister’s quiet, steady voice ask:

“Ollie what is it?” while she slowly and carefully approached the tall man. Laurel could see the barely hidden worry in Sara’s crystal blue eyes and the inner struggle she seemed to have while she kept her movement slow, deliberate and smooth. Making sure that her actions were obvious to anyone watching, but Laurel was sure that those were only meant for Ollie. Sara slowly lifted her hands and moved them towards Oliver’s face.

The way her baby sister seemed to know exactly what to do in this unfamiliar situation and how to handle the usually very composed man in his agitated state impressed her. The brunette watched fascinated how Oliver’s eyes fell closed the moment Sara’s hands touched his cheeks and how the small woman moved them down his throat as if to emphasize her words:

“Ollie breathe, you need to breathe.” Oliver followed her calmly whispered command without a moment’s hesitation, breathing in and out in the same pattern that her hands were stroking his throat. Just to suddenly pull her into his arms.

“God, Sara...” He seemed to hold on to her for dear life while he buried his face in the blonde’s hair. Sara appeared to return the hug just as fiercely.

Laurel’s position made it obvious to her that Oliver was crying while repeating her sister's name like a mantra, clutching her even tighter, giving the impression that he was trying to pull her inside his chest so he never had to let her go again.

He loved her.

This realization hit her like a sledgehammer.

Oliver loved Sara.

She had wondered about them for years, and why they did what they had done. If it had just been about sex or the thrill to screw behind her back and getting away with it. Or maybe Sara getting back at her for one thing or other and Oliver trying to sabotage himself, as he was known to do.

Not knowing the reason why, they had had an affair behind her back had driven her just as crazy as the question how long it had been going on before the Gambit. Both questions remained unanswered to this day. She wasn’t even sure anymore if she wanted to know. If it still mattered.

She had been furious when she had found out about their renewed romance after Sara first returned. Still not knowing what it was about her own sister (goddamnit) that made a relationship with the blonde possible even after everything while a relationship with her was “too much”. She had assumed that it was about comfort and both of them knowing what it was like to be gone for so long and probably sex. She was talking about Oliver and Sara here after all. Plus, both of them being vigilantes. She knew they cared about each other. There was never a question about that they had been friends for years. 

But seeing them together now, really for the first time ever with none of their usual walls up, it was clear as day. They loved each other. They didn’t feel the need to pretend, hide their emotions and be strong. They trusted the other enough to be vulnerable. 

She motioned to a shaken Thea that they should leave them alone while grabbing her keys and walking out the door. She turned around to grab the door handle but stopped before she closed the door, when she saw Oliver’s legs give out from under him, just as a broken "Ollie..." was choked out by the woman in his arms, and he was slowly sinking to the floor, still holding on to Sara and pulling her into his lap while he pushed his knees up to cradle her between his legs and chest while her sister wrapped her legs around his hips, now being completely wrapped around the muscular man, crying hysterically while clutching desperately at his shoulders. Oliver’s hands were moving over her back and hair in a soothing pattern, trying to calm her but still crying himself.

God, she did this to Sara. She did this to her sister because she hadn’t wanted to listen. Not to Nyssa who loved Sara desperately nor Malcom whose fault her death was in the first place. And essentially not to Oliver either. That’s why she hadn’t told him. She had known that he would’ve done everything in his power to stop her. 

“She deserves a proper burial, she’s earned it… She’s home…” Laurel could hear the ghost of Ollie’s voice in her head, closing the door with one last glance back at two of the most important people in her life falling apart in each other’s arms, knowing that there was nothing she could to for them except to give them the privacy, time and space they needed to try and mend at least part of what was broken by Sara’s death and her resurrection.

Because Laurel had finally realized that Oliver had never grieved her sister, a woman that he loved. He had been so focused on finding her killer, avenging her death and everything that followed after with the league.

He had put his emotions aside to take care of everyone else so they all got to mourn Sara. And once all of this had been taken care of, he had left with Felicity. Never taking the time to grieve and say goodbye.

“C’mon Thea let’s go grab a cup of coffee.”