Unravel Me | Arrow [ COMPLETED ]

chapter fourteen

[ NOTE: Potentially triggering themes. Read carefully]

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"So I try to laugh about it, cover it all up with lies
I try to laugh about it, hiding the tears in my eyes."
THE CURE - 'Boys Don't Cry'

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Good old Starling City, Cali thought wryly to herself, flipping off the news and yawning hard enough to make her jaw click. Apparently, there'd been an attack at Iron Heights last night. Someone gunning for Peter Declan and Laurel Lance. Somehow, Cali wasn't surprised in the slightest. This whole situation has been trouble from the start.

Instead of panicking, Cali very calmly got dressed, grabbed her bag, and walked out the front door. She had work today, and as much as she wanted to lay under the covers and hide from the terrible world, she was an adult and really couldn't do that.

She drove to work slowly, the radio blaring as loud as she could stand it in an attempt to mask the thoughts that were beating around her head. Oliver's name made her feel sick, and everytime she tried to think about Tommy, she thought about the USB drive and Malcolm, and thinking about Malcolm just made her remember syrupy lemonade and disappearing bruises.

She still hadn't looked at whatever was on the USB.

She knew it was important, knew that it explained why Malcolm was drugging her, why he was so insistent on having her around, but she was so terrified of the answer she'd get. She knew her father wasn't a good man, but to have the evidence... She didn't want this. She didn't want to know, and she didn't want Tommy to know, and she'd really just like her life to go back to the way it was.

Back before Oliver had miraculously returned, the most she had to worry about was work. For that last year after she'd finally found the strength to live on her own again, her life had been an easy cycle of Tommy and Laurel and Starling Public Library. She'd once had a crisis over which flavour of ice cream was the best.

Now, she had attacks over her father's secrets and a not-dead best friend. Ex-best friend? Well, whatever Oliver was to her now. His very existence went against everything, because what was dead should stay dead and what was trouble should stay far away from Calissa Merlyn. Of course, neither of those would happen, but they should, and that was the whole problem.

Oliver was the whole problem.

No, no he wasn't and Cali knew it, but it was so much easier to blame him. Oliver could be cut off, shoved away, locked out. He could be called a liar, a fake, a playboy. His mask could easily be mistaken for the truth if one didn't care to look deeper. It was infinitely easier to blame someone like Oliver Queen than Malcolm Merlyn. It didn't mean that Oliver deserved it, but it meant that Cali didn't have to try anymore.

Her grip tightened on the wheel as she slowly backed into a park outside the library. She really was her father's daughter if she was thinking about using Oliver as her emotional scapegoat. It was a cruel thing to do, and no matter what secrets Oliver found himself hiding, he didn't deserve her animosity.

The walk inside felt impossibly long, and by the time Cali made it to the office after clocking in, she really just wanted to be at home in bed again. She was still tired, and her body seemed to be more sluggish than usual.

Naomi had commandeered Martha's desk again, and looked up as Cali trudged in, her fine eyebrows drawing together into a small frown. "I didn't think you were coming in today, boss."